[continued from previous message]

abstaining from eating leaven products, and they are eating unleavened
bread, they are eating the Pascal sacrifice, and so on and so forth.

Just as an example, in the Gospels, we have a story about a famous Jew,
Jesus, and his disciples who had a last supper, which, at least
according to the Synoptic Gospels, was what we would call today the
Seder, eating the Pascal lamb with unleavened bread, and so on and so
forth. So we have this evidence from the first century of the Common Era.

We have some evidence from first century before the Common Era. Let’s
say prior to this time, we do not have evidence that Judeans were
keeping the Passover or the Festival of Unleavened Bread in any
wide-scale manner.


The Last Supper, Leonardo Da Vinci, 1494 (Public domain, via Wikipedia) Oftentimes scholars speak about a so-called Passover Papyrus from
Elephantine, which we had mentioned — the island in the Nile River. And
this papyrus supposedly speaks about Passover. It supposedly speaks
about refraining from eating leaven products on Passover, and so on and
so forth, hiding away leaven products in the house. It seems to be that
the Judeans living in Elephantine, according to this papyrus, were
keeping the laws of the Torah. And this papyrus is actually quite
well-dated to 419 BCE.

Why do you keep using the word “supposedly,” though?

Okay, so why do I say supposedly? I said that the papyrus is the
so-called Passover Papyrus. The problem is that more than half of the
papyrus is missing and the papyrus has been reconstructed on the basis
of what we find in the Torah. And it just so happens that all of the
parts that talk about Passover are in the reconstructed parts.

So it’s fair enough that scholars will reconstruct a papyrus that is not
well preserved on the basis of the Torah. Fair enough. We can try that exercise. The problem is we can’t then take that reconstruction and use
that as evidence that the Torah was well known. Right? That’s called
circular reasoning. We can’t do that.

So I say it’s the so-called Passover Papyrus, because once we remove all
of the reconstructed parts of it, it no longer is talking about Passover.

Really fascinating. Thank you so much for all of this. Much food for
thought, even kosher food for thought.

Thanks for having me.



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