For seven days you must eat unleavened bread. On the first day you are to remove the leaven from your houses. Whoever eats anything leavened from the first day through the seventh must be cut off from Israel.
Parallel translations
- WEB “‘Seven days you shall eat unleavened bread; even the first day you shall put away yeast out of your houses, for whoever eats leavened bread from the first day until the seventh day, that soul shall be cut off from Israel.
- KJV Seven days shall ye eat unleavened bread; even the first day ye shall put away leaven out of your houses: for whosoever eateth leavened bread from the first day until the seventh day, that soul shall be cut off from Israel.
- NKJV Seven days you shall eat unleavened bread. On the first day you shall remove leaven from your houses. For whoever eats leavened bread from the first day until the seventh day, that person shall be cut off from Israel.
- NASB For seven days you shall eat unleavened bread, but on the first day you shall remove dough with yeast from your houses; for whoever eats anything with yeast from the first day until the seventh day, that person shall be cut off from Israel.
- NLT For seven days the bread you eat must be made without yeast. On the first day of the festival, remove every trace of yeast from your homes. Anyone who eats bread made with yeast during the seven days of the festival will be cut off from the community of Israel.
Scripture taken from the New King James Version®. Copyright © 1982 by Thomas Nelson. Used by permission. All rights reserved.
Scripture quotations taken from the (NASB®) New American Standard Bible®, Copyright © 1960, 1971, 1977, 1995, 2020 by The Lockman Foundation. Used by permission. All rights reserved. lockman.org
Scripture quotations are taken from the Holy Bible, New Living Translation, copyright © 1996, 2004, 2015 by Tyndale House Foundation. Used by permission of Tyndale House Publishers, Carol Stream, Illinois 60188. All rights reserved.
Quick answer
For seven days Israel must eat unleavened bread and remove all yeast, or be cut off from the people.
Overview
The Feast of Unleavened Bread accompanies Passover, commemorating the haste of the exodus and dramatizing purity. Leaven frequently symbolizes the spreading influence of sin, so its removal teaches that the redeemed are to be holy. Paul draws on this directly: 'Purge out the old leaven... For our Passover also has been sacrificed, even Christ' (1 Corinthians 5:7), calling believers to lives cleansed from sin.
Cross-references & the web
Cross-references · 22
- Gen 17:14But if any male is not circumcised, he will be cut off from his people; he has broken My covenant.”
- Deut 16:3You must not eat leavened bread with it; for seven days you are to eat with it unleavened bread, the bread of affliction, because you left the land of Egypt in haste—so that you may remember for the rest of your life the day you left the land of Egypt.
- Exod 34:18You are to keep the Feast of Unleavened Bread. For seven days at the appointed time in the month of Abib, you are to eat unleavened bread as I commanded you. For in the month of Abib you came out of Egypt.
- Exod 23:15You are to keep the Feast of Unleavened Bread as I commanded you: At the appointed time in the month of Abib you are to eat unleavened bread for seven days, because that was the month you came out of Egypt. No one may appear before Me empty-handed.
- Num 28:17On the fifteenth day of this month, there shall be a feast; for seven days unleavened bread is to be eaten.
- Deut 16:8For six days you must eat unleavened bread, and on the seventh day you shall hold a solemn assembly to the LORD your God, and you must not do any work.
- Num 9:13But if a man who is ceremonially clean and is not on a journey still fails to observe the Passover, he must be cut off from his people, because he did not present the LORD’s offering at its appointed time. That man will bear the consequences of his sin.
- 1 Cor 5:7–8Get rid of the old leaven, that you may be a new unleavened batch, as you really are. For Christ, our Passover lamb, has been sacrificed.
- Exod 12:8They are to eat the meat that night, roasted over the fire, along with unleavened bread and bitter herbs.
- Exod 12:19–20For seven days there must be no leaven found in your houses. If anyone eats something leavened, that person, whether a foreigner or native of the land, must be cut off from the congregation of Israel.
- Exod 34:25Do not offer the blood of a sacrifice to Me along with anything leavened, and do not let any of the sacrifice from the Passover Feast remain until morning.
- Lev 23:5–8The Passover to the LORD begins at twilight on the fourteenth day of the first month.
- Mal 2:12As for the man who does this, may the LORD cut off from the tents of Jacob everyone who is awake and aware—even if he brings an offering to the LORD of Hosts.
- Exod 31:14Keep the Sabbath, for it is holy to you. Anyone who profanes it must surely be put to death. Whoever does any work on that day must be cut off from among his people.
- Deut 16:5You are not to sacrifice the Passover animal in any of the towns that the LORD your God is giving you.
- Gal 5:12As for those who are agitating you, I wish they would proceed to emasculate themselves!
- Exod 13:6–10For seven days you are to eat unleavened bread, and on the seventh day there shall be a feast to the LORD.
- Luke 12:1In the meantime, a crowd of many thousands had gathered, so that they were trampling one another. Jesus began to speak first to His disciples: “Beware of the leaven of the Pharisees, which is hypocrisy.
- Matt 16:12Then they understood that He was not telling them to beware of the leaven used in bread, but of the teaching of the Pharisees and Sadducees.
- Lev 17:14For the life of all flesh is its blood. Therefore I have told the Israelites, ‘You must not eat the blood of any living thing, because the life of all flesh is its blood; whoever eats it must be cut off.’
- Lev 17:10If anyone from the house of Israel or a foreigner living among them eats any blood, I will set My face against that person and cut him off from among his people.
- Acts 12:3And seeing that this pleased the Jews, Herod proceeded to seize Peter during the Feast of Unleavened Bread.
Themes, concepts, people & topics
Resources, by level
Commentaries & study tools
Free animated overview and word-study videos for this book.
Sermons and teaching on this passage from across YouTube.
Clear, readable, conservative exposition — the best free place to start on any passage.
Matthew Henry, Barnes, Gill, the Pulpit Commentary, Ellicott, Cambridge, and more — stacked on one page for this exact verse.
The beloved Puritan exposition of this whole book — warm, devotional, and verse by verse (free, CCEL).
Hebrew/Greek interlinear, word definitions, and cross-references for this verse.
Christ at the center
The Passover lamb whose blood turns away death, the exodus through the sea, the manna, the rock, and the tabernacle where God dwells with his people all foreshadow Jesus — our Passover, our redemption, the bread from heaven, and God-with-us in the flesh.
How Exodus 12:15 points to him is part of the one story that runs through all Scripture — meet Jesus at the heart of the web, or follow a trail that traces him from Genesis to Revelation.
Original language
Each word below is tagged with its Strong’s number — tap one to see the underlying Hebrew word, its meaning, and every verse that uses it.