This was,
1. Commemorative —
[The deliverance of Israel from the sword of the destroying angel, and from their bondage in Egypt, was great a, and unpa- ralleled from the foundation of the world b. And, in the com- memoration of it, God appointed that in all future ages one of the junior members of each family should ask the reason of the institution, and the head of the family should relate what God had done for their nation hi passing over the houses of the Israelites when he slew the Egyptians, and in bringing them out of their cruel bondage0. To this the Apostle refers, when he speaks of the Lord's Supper as an ordinance appointed for " the shelving forth of the Lord's death, till he come" again at the end of the world to judgment*1.]
2. Typical—
[Every the minutest particular in this ordinance seems to have been intended to typify the redemption of the world by the death of Christ. " The lamb," which was to be " under a year old,''' denotes Christ, " the Lamb of God," in a state of perfect purity6. It was to be "a male," as being the most perfect of its kind, and " without blemish," in order to repre- sent the perfect manhood of Christ, who was indeed " a lamb without blemish and without spot f." It was to be set apart four days before it ivas slain ; not only to mark God's eternal desig- nation of Christ to be a sacrifice, but to foreshew that Christ, during the four last days of his life, (from his entrance into Jerusalem to his death,) should be examined at different tri- bunals, to ascertain whether there were the smallest flaw in his character ; that so his bitterest enemies might all be constrained to attest his innocence, and thereby unwittingly to declare, that he ivasfit to be a sacrifice for the sins of the whole world. The precise hour of the day wherein Jesus was to die, is thought to have been predicted by the time appointed for the slaying of the paschal lamb, which was " between the two evenings," or soon after three o'clock in the afternoon : and it was ordered to be slain by all the congregation ; to shew that all ranks and orders of men, both of Jews and Gentiles, should concur in his death. Itsblood was to besprinkled on the door-posts and lintels, to shew that the blood of Christ must be sprinkled upon our hearts and consciences, if we would not fall a prey to the destroying angel : but it was not to be sprinkled on the threshold, because the blood of Christ is not to be trodden under foot, or counted by
a Deut. xxvi. 8. b Deut. iv. 34. c ver. 25—27. d 1 Cor. xi. 26. e This seems more suited to its tender age than the explanation generally given, of Christ being cut off in the midst, of his years. ' 1 Pet. i. 19.
77.1 THE passover. 379
any as an unholy thing s. Its flesh was to be roasted, (not to be eaten raw or boiled,) that the extremity of our Saviour's sufferings from the fire of God's wrath might be more fitly depicted. It was to be eaten by all; because none can ever be saved, unless they eat of Christ's flesh, and receive him into their hearts by faith. It was to be eaten whole, and not a bone of it to be broken^-, probably to intimate, that we must receive Christ in all his offices and in all his benefits ; and cer- tainly to foreshew, that he should be exempt from the common fate of all who died his death, and be marked out thereby with the most undoubted evidence, as the true Messiah. And none of it was to be left till the morning, lest it should be treated contemptuously by the profane, or become an occasion of idolatry or superstition to mistaken zealots ; and to guard us also against similar abuses in the supper of our Lord.]