The passover, in the first month, on the evening of
the 14th, here also indeed begins the feast, but does not, as in
Deuteronomy xvi. 4, 8, count as the first day of Easter week;
on the contrary, the latter does not begin until the 15th and
closes with the 21st (comp. Leviticus xxiii. 6; Numbers xxviii. 17;
Exodus xii. 18). The beginning of the festival week being
thus distinctly indicated, there arises in this way not merely
an ordinary but also an extra-ordinary feast day more, the day
after the passover, on which already, according to the injunctions
of Deuteronomy, the pilgrims were required to set out early in the
morning on the return journey to their homes. /1/
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1. It is impossible to explain away this discrepancy by the
circumstance that in the Priestly Code the day is reckoned from
the evening; for (1.) this fact has no practical bearing, as the
dating reckons at any rate from the morning, and the evening
preceding the 15th is always called the 14th of the month (Leviticus
xiii. 27, 32); (2.) the first day of the feast in Deuteronomy
is just the day on the evening of which the passover is held, and
upon it there follow not seven but six days more, whereas in the
Priestly Code the celebration extends from the 14th to the 21st of
the month (Exodus xii.
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