Unless my eyes deceive me, the Text in Deuteronomy 16:3 is pretty clear that unleavened bread is to be eaten for seven days. Not eight, not six, but seven.
Is that what you read, too? Good. Just want to make sure we’re on the same page.
Why is it then that Matthew 26:17 has Jesus’ apostles asking Jesus, “on the first day of unleavened bread,” where they were supposed to prepare the Passover? If the Passover was on the 14th day of the month, and the Feast of Unleavened Bread starts on the fifteenth (Leviticus 23:5-6), why are they preparing it a day late?
Or is it a day early?
Apparently there is just as much confusion in the Biblical world, but this seems to fall more into a matter of colloquialisms and everyday speech than it is a hard and fast rule.
A more literal translation of Matthew 26:17 could read “on the first day of unleavened things,” which has more to do with a time period or season than it does the official celebration. That makes sense when you consider that a holiday on the scale of the Passover would naturally require some prep time.
Mark’s gospel seems to make this distinction. In Mark 14:12, the Text reads “on the first day of Unleavened Bread, when they sacrificed the Passover Lamb, which is clearly the day of the Passover (the 14th day of the month Nisan). Technically speaking, that couldn’t be the first day of the feast, since the feast starts immediately after Passover.
Josephus even states that the Feast of Unleavened Bread runs for eight days, which isn’t contrary to the Law in Deuteronomy if you consider the inclusion of a preparation day.
According to everything I’ve read, the order proceeds like this. The preparations begin on the fourteenth day of Nisan, with the Passover slaughtered at twilight on that same day, which then kicks off the seven days of Unleavened Bread.
There might be eight days in all, then, but the feast itself strictly runs for seven.
Any questions? I hope not, because that’s all I have on the matter.