🔢WEB · Numbers 28:17
What does Numbers 28:17 mean?
"On the fifteenth day of this month shall be a feast. Unleavened bread shall be eaten for seven days."
— Numbers 28:17 (World English Bible)
Surrounding context
Their drink offerings shall be half a hin of wine for a bull, and the third part of a hin for the ram, and the fourth part of a hin for a lamb. This is the burnt offering of every month throughout the months of the year.
One male goat for a sin offering to Yahweh; it shall be offered besides the continual burnt offering, and its drink offering.
“‘In the first month, on the fourteenth day of the month, is Yahweh’s Passover.
On the fifteenth day of this month shall be a feast. Unleavened bread shall be eaten for seven days.
In the first day shall be a holy convocation. You shall do no regular work;
but you shall offer an offering made by fire, a burnt offering to Yahweh: two young bulls, and one ram, and seven male lambs a year old; they shall be to you without defect;
and their meal offering, fine flour mixed with oil. You shall offer three tenths for a bull, and two tenths for the ram.
Explanation
Numbers 28:17 sets a specific date on Israel's sacred calendar: the fifteenth day of the first month, which begins a seven-day observance during which the people are to eat only unleavened bread — bread made without yeast. This verse marks the start of what Scripture calls the Feast of Unleavened Bread, a festival immediately following Passover, which was held the evening before, on the fourteenth day.
This verse comes from a larger section, Numbers 28-29, in which God gives Moses detailed instructions about the regular offerings Israel is to bring: daily burnt offerings, Sabbath offerings, monthly new moon offerings, and the offerings tied to the annual festivals. This chapter was likely given during Israel's time in the wilderness, as part of the broader covenant instructions meant to shape the nation's worship life once they entered the Promised Land. The unleavened bread festival itself, however, reaches back to the exodus from Egypt (Exodus 12-13), where
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