Editing Passover (section)

==Passover sacrifice==
{{main|Passover sacrifice}}
The main entity in Passover according to Judaism is the sacrificial lamb.<ref name="Bokser"/> During the existence of the [[Tabernacle (Judaism)|Tabernacle]] and later the [[Temple in Jerusalem]], the focus of the Passover festival was the Passover sacrifice, also known as the Paschal lamb, eaten during the Passover Seder on the 15th of Nisan. Every family large enough to completely consume a young lamb or wild goat was required to offer one for sacrifice at the Jewish Temple on the afternoon of the 14th day of Nisan,<ref>{{bibleverse||Numbers|9:11|HE}}</ref> and eat it that night, which was the 15th of Nisan.<ref>{{bibleverse||Exodus|12:6|NIV}}</ref> If the family was too small to finish eating the entire offering in one sitting, an offering was made for a group of families. The sacrifice could not be offered with anything leavened,<ref>{{bibleverse||Exodus|23:18|HE}}</ref> and had to be roasted, without its head, feet, or inner organs being removed<ref>{{bibleverse||Exodus|12:9|HE}}</ref> and eaten together with unleavened bread and bitter herbs (''[[maror]]''). One had to be careful not to break any bones from the offering,<ref>{{bibleverse||Exodus|12:46|HE}}</ref> and none of the meat could be left over by morning.<ref>{{bibleverse||Exodus|12:10|HE}} {{bibleverse||Exodus|23:18|HE}}</ref>

Because of the Passover sacrifice's status as a sacred offering, the only people allowed to eat it were those who had the obligation to bring the offering. Among those who could not offer or eat the Passover lamb were an [[Apostasy in Judaism|apostate]],<ref>{{bibleverse||Exodus|12:43|HE}}</ref> a servant,<ref>{{bibleverse||Exodus|12:45|HE}}</ref> an [[brit milah|uncircumcised man]],<ref>{{bibleverse||Exodus|12:48|HE}}</ref> a person in a state of [[tumah and taharah|ritual impurity]] except when a majority of Jews are in such a state,<ref>''[[Pesahim]]'' 66b</ref> and a [[Gentile]]. The offering had to be made before a [[quorum]] of 30.<ref>''Pesahim'' 64b</ref> In the Temple, the [[Levites]] sang [[Hallel]] while the [[Kohen|priests]] performed the sacrificial service. Men and women were equally obligated regarding the offering (''Pesahim'' 91b).

Today, in the absence of the Temple, when no sacrifices are offered or eaten, the [[mitzvah]] of the sacrifice is memorialized in the ''Seder Korban Pesach'', a set of scriptural and Rabbinic passages dealing with the Passover sacrifice, customarily recited after the ''[[Mincha]]'' (afternoon prayer) service on the 14th of Nisan,<ref name=Kitov>{{cite book|first=Eliyahu|last=Kitov|title=The Book of Our Heritage: The Jewish Year and Its Days of Significance|publisher=Feldheim|year=1997|page=562}}</ref> and in the form of the ''[[zeroa]]'', a symbolic food placed on the [[Passover Seder Plate]] (but not eaten), which is usually a roasted [[humerus|shankbone]] (or a chicken wing or neck). The eating of the [[afikoman]] substitutes for the eating of the sacrifice at the end of the Seder meal ([[Pesachim|Mishnah Pesachim]] 119a). Many [[Sephardic Jews]] have the custom of eating lamb or goat meat during the Seder in memory of the sacrifice.