Tonight is a full moon, and at sundown, Jews here in Taos and all over the world, gather around tables laden with ritual foods to observe and celebrate Passover. In some cases, those who want to feel connected to this time of the year will take part in holy land tours with companies such as immanuel-tours.com to get the authentic experience.
The events described in the Book of Exodus are believed to have transpired around 1,300 BCE.
Passover celebrates the story of Moses and the Exodus of the Israelites from Egypt. In the story, the pharaoh decrees that the first-born sons of all the Israelites (then slaves in Egypt), are to be killed. Pharaoh is scared that the boys will soon outnumber the native Egyptians and fight his rule.
In an effort to protect baby Moses from Pharaoh’s infanticide, his mother, Amram, sends him down the river Nile in a basket made from bullrushes. Somewhere down river he is retrieved by the pharaoh’s daughter, Bithiah, and raised as a member of the Egyptian royal family. After discovering his true identity, Moses (together with his brother, the Jewish version of Merlin, Aaron), fights for the freedom of the Israelites and brings ten plagues on the land of Egypt until the pharaoh agrees to set his people free.
The last of these plagues is where Passover draws its roots, where the Angel of Death mercilessly kills the firstborn of every Egyptian.
The origin story of the Jewish People may in fact have Pagan roots because of the transient nature of the early people who would become modern-day Jews, some scholars believe that they picked up the customs and religious traditions of the ancient people that they met and conquered. Others even surmise that Moses could in fact have been Akenaten, the Pharoah who ruled briefly as Amenhotep IV. He is known for abandoning the traditional religious rites of his people for the worship of one God, Aten.
In many ways this makes total sense. A deposed prince of Egypt (needing to flee for fear of assasination from one of his own) would certainly be able to muster an army of slaves; a motley crew of poor and downcast members of various pagan tribes from the nearby desert and beyond. Keeping them wandering in the desert for decades to let the old ones die out while training the youth to become warriors. This would also explain the reference to the Israelites taking “gold” out of Egypt. Certainly a prince had access to the Palace coffers.
He would also have been familiar with the territories he led them through and to, from campaigns with the Egyptian armies into Gaza and beyond, and in this light the story begins to make more sense.
Jewish holidays begin at sundown because, according to the Bible, days begin at sundown. This is based on the story of creation from Genesis, where at the end of each day it reads, “And there was evening, and there was morning” after every day. Because the Torah defines a day as beginning with the evening, so do the Jewish people.
The observation of a new day beginning with the moon is also reflected in the Hebrew calendar, which is a lunar calendar. This is also the reason why the dates of Jewish holidays change every year. The lunar calendar reflects the cycles of the moon, and when it is compared a 12-cycle solar calendar (which most of the Western world uses), there are slightly more than twelve lunations (or moon phases) in a solar year.
