-Passover: The name given to the chief of the three great historical annual festivals or feasts of ancient Judah and Israel. It was kept in remembrance of the Lord's passing over the houses of the Israelites.(Exodus 12:13).when the first born of all the Egyptians were destroyed and the Hebrew children were passed over by the death angel, all to convince Pharaoh to allow Israel.(Israel was all one nation at this time, Judah splitting later from Israel).to get out of Egypt and away from the bondage they were in.

Today Passover is a festival that begins in March or April and lasts for seven or eight days. Passover begins with a special meal that reminds people of how God helped their ancestors escape from Egypt.

Passover time is also called also the "feast of unleavened bread".(Exodus 23:15; Mark 14:1; Acts 12:3), because during its celebration no leavened bread was to be eaten or even kept in the household:.Exodus 12:15. The word afterwards came to denote the lamb that was slain at the feast:.Mark 14:12-14; 1Corinthians 5:7.

On the tenth of Nisan a lamb was set apart to be slaughtered and eaten as the passover lamb, symbolic of Emmanuel being set apart for His crucifixion to benefit all humanity. The passsover lamn was killed on the fourteenth of this month, towards sunset and eaten the same evening after the fifteenth day had begun. Days begin at sunset. The seven days from the fifteenth to the twenty first inclusive, were "the feast of unleavened bread" closing with a solemn.convocation:.Exodus 12:3-33.

A detailed account of the institution of this feast is given in Exodus 12th and 13th chapters. It was afterwards incorporated in the ceremonial Mosaic Law.(Leviticus 23:4-8).as one of the great festivals of the nation. In after times many changes seem to have taken place as to the mode of its celebration as compared with its first celebration.(compare Deuteronomy 16:2,5,6; 2Chronicles 30:16; Leviticus 23:10-14; Numbers 9:10,11; 28:16-24). Again, the use of wine.(Luke 22:17,20), of sauce with the bitter herbs.(John 13:26).and the service of praise were introduced. 

There is recorded only one celebration of this feast between the Exodus and the entrance into Canaan, namely, that mentioned in Numbers 9:5.(see Josiah in Easton's Bible Dictionary). It was primarily a commemorative ordinance, reminding the children of Israel of their deliverance out of Egypt, but it was, no doubt, also a type of the great deliverance wrought by the Messiah for all his people from the doom of death on account of sin and from the bondage of sin itself, a worse than Egyptian bondage: 1Corinthians. 5:7; John 1:29; 19:32-36; 1Peter 1:19; Galatians 4:4,5.

The appearance of Jerusalem on the occasion of the Passover in the time of our Lord is thus fittingly described:."The city itself and the neighbourhood became more and more crowded as the feast approached, the narrow streets and dark arched bazaars showing the same throng of men of all nations as when Emmanuel had first visited Jerusalem as a boy. Even the temple offered a strange sight at this season, for in parts of the outer courts a wide space was covered with pens for sheep, goats and cattle to be used for offerings. Sellers shouted the merits of their beasts, sheep bleated, oxen lowed.(made the characteristic sound of a cow). Sellers of doves also had a place set apart for them. Potters offered a choice from huge stacks of clay dishes and ovens for roasting and eating the Passover lamb. Booths for wine, oil, salt and all else needed for sacrifices invited customers. 

"Persons going to and from the city shortened their journey by crossing the temple grounds, often carrying burdens...Stalls to change foreign money into the shekel of the temple, which alone could be paid to the priests, were numerous, the whole confusion making the sanctuary like a noisy market."....Geikie's Life of Christ.

-patriarch: This name is generally applied to the progenitors.of families or "heads of the fathers".(Joshua 14:1).mentioned in Scripture and they are spoken of as antediluvian.(time from from Adam to Noah).and post diluvian.(after the flood from Noah to Jacob).patriarchs. 

But the expression "the patriarch," by way of eminence is applied to the twelve sons of Jacob and to Abraham, Isaac and Jacob..The Book of Genesis.places before us patriarchal longevity into the hundreds of years. 

-Pharisees/Sadducees: The Pharisees, Sadducees and their ilk, the lawyers, doctors and scribes,.were proof that knowledge without a motivation to use it to benefit others is worthless to advance humanity. They were the controllers, the corrupt masters over others they had subjugated by dishing out manipulated knowledge to work their own selfish advantage plans:.Luke 11:52 "Woe unto you, lawyers! for you have taken away the key of knowledge. You entered not in yourselves and them that were entering in you hindered." 1John 4:5 "They are of the world, therefore speak they of the world and the world hears them."

Ryle Gospels:."We must never so expound one part of Scripture as to make it contradict another."

All that really matters is love:.1Corinthians 13:1-8. The song!

It was the same in Jeremiah's day, so many years before. The religious controllers didn't want their control upset as it was of benefit to them:.Jeremiah 18:18 "Then said they, Come and let us devise devices against Jeremiah, for the law shall not perish from the priest, nor counsel from the wise, nor the word from the prophet. Come and let us smite him with the tongue and let us not give heed to any of his words.".And in Christ's time:.Galatians 1:7 "...there be some that trouble you and would pervert the gospel of Christ."

Why the same attitude today as has been seen throughout history in the evil of man taking advantage of others to others hurt? Because it's the same dark side beings behind it. And how have they harmed humanity today?

These Pharisees, Sadducees, Scribes and Lawyers back then were frequently severely.rebuked by Emmanuel:.Matthew 23:13-32; Luke 11:39-46.

They were so steeped in their selfish concerns most of them.(John 3:1-3).hadn't the least inkling of honesty and love in them and were corrupt having an attitude of condeming others by the standards of the religion they concocted for their own advantage.

The word 'Pharisee' in the original means 'separatists'.(why?). The first mention of these Pharisaical.sects who took the name of Jew is in a description by Josephus.(the great historian).of the three sects or schools into which this group was divided.(B.C.E. 145). The other two sects were the Essenes and the Sadducees, who were particularly.against the teaching of the resurrection. Many Pharisees were well educated lawyers, doctors and scribes who took pride in their self love:.Matthew 3:7,9. 

In the time of Emmanuel they were the popular party:.John 7:43-48. They thought that they were, because of their education, extremely accurate and yet minute in all matters appertaining to the Old Testament law, but were only accurate in punctilious matters.(Matthew 23:23-28).to do with the soon to be abolished ancient Mosaic Law.(the law the Infinite One gave Moses for ancient Israel until Christ would come on the scene). To this ancient law, they added their own fabricated ways. Saul whose name was later changed to Paul was part of parcel of this deceived controlling group. 

They knew absolutely nothing of the real living available to all through Christ. They woefully misunderstood why Christ came to Earth and by what they were producing showed themselves to be educated in methods of deceit and people control. This came in handy for them as they viewed Christ in the physical form of the one we call Emmanuel, as a competitor, a competitor to get rid of.

They were knowledgeable in the letter, but woefully ignorant when it came to the greater spiritual meaning of things:.Matthew 23:1-3; 2Corinthians 3:6. They knew nothing correct about a changed heart.(Romans 2:29; 7:6; 2Corinthians 3:6).necessary to have a relationship with the Creator. They knew nothing about the grace of the Creator and how that grace encompasses all. They figured that they held knowledge others would aspire to. They covered their greedy, hatefulness with an attitude of self love and deprecated any holding opposing views, thus remaining aloof from the feelings of others who needed help.

The Pharisees and their ilk.(even today), a corrupt religious sect, often tried to entangle Emmanuel in His talk:.Matthew 22:15,34,35. The Pharisees proved that there is no limit to  ignorance lying within the pompously educated. And it was even true of their forerunners way back further in Daniel's time, corrupt men who just looked for something together.(a conspiracy).to undermine another that they may have been jealous of:.Daniel 3:8-12; Daniel 6:11-15. And an example of 'you reap what you sow', of what happened to these conspirators:.Daniel 6:24. And another couple of examples of 'you reap what you sow', the two bitches Jezebel and.Delilah.

Instead of learning light and teaching others abetter way, they spent their time trying to put out the lights of others.

On the first notice of them in the New Testament.(Matthew 3:7), they are ranked by Emmanuel with the Sadducees as a."generation of vipers". They were noted for their self righteousness and their pride:.Matthew 9:11; Luke 7:39; 18:11,12.

From the very beginning of Emmanuel's ministry the Pharisees showed themselves bitter and persistent enemies. They could not bear his doctrines, as Emmanuel taught the Mosaic Law as it was intended and not as the Pharisees had learned it, with many traditions added having the effect of making them feel superior to others:.Romans 3:19. They sought by every means to destroy Emmanuel's influence among the people. 

The origin of the sect called Sadducees cannot definitely be traced. It was probably the outcome of the influence of Grecian customs and philosophy during the period of Greek domination.

The Sadducees acknowledged only the first five books of the Bible, which together were called the book of Moses, also called the book of the law:.2Chronicles 25:4. They believed this as being the only part of Scripture that God had inspired to be recorded.

Comprised with.Adam Clarke's Commentary:.Our Lord, by confuting them from those books, proved they were ignorant of the scriptures they professed to hold sacred:.Matthew 22:23-33.

The first time they are met with is in connection with John the Baptist's ministry:.Matthew 3:1-3.(see a Bible Dictionary, available in one of the free computer Bible programs, for more on him). They came out to him when on the banks of the Jordan and he said.......continues