Your lamb must be an unblemished year-old male, and you may take it from the sheep or the goats.
5. Your lamb shall be without blemish. We shall see elsewhere, that in all their sacrifices prescribed by the Law they were diligently to beware, lest there should be any spot or fault in them; and by this the people were reminded, that the expiation was not legitimate, unless it possessed the utmost perfection, such as is never to be found in men.
Moses and Aaron here receive of the Lord what they were afterwards to deliver to the people concerning the ordinance of the passover, to which is prefixed an order for a new style to be observed in their months (Exo 12:1, Exo 12:2): This shall be to you the beginning of months.
Commenting on Exodus 12:1-20
Your lamb shall be without blemish,.... Without any spot or defect in it. Maimonides (h) reckons no less than fifty blemishes in a creature, anyone of which makes it unfit for sacrifice, see Lev 21:21. This lamb was a type of Christ, who is therefore said to be our passover sacrificed for us, Co1 5:7 comparable to a lamb for his innocence and harmlessness, for...