I prepare our family dinners on average 3 times a ..

Roast vs Boil

2 w

I prepare our family dinners on average 3 times a week and often have to use a recipe. I have come to understand that to get the recipe the exact same way as the publisher of the recipe planned it, I have to follow the instructions rather closely as it does matter in which order the ingredients are added and how much a specific item is siered, fried, boiled, etc. as it produces a different texture and even flavour.

So my question comes from the instruction on how to prepare the Passover lamb. In Exodus 12 we are told that it has to be roasted (tsalah), but in Deuteronomy 16 we are instructed to boil (bashal) it.

These are big differences in the instructions when looking at it from a sacrificial perspective; even if it was just for a dinner preparation it would be significant.

If we take the Scripture-only perspective, then how do we explain this?

I'm not talking from a man-mande tradition perspective, but purely from Scripture.

What is your understanding on this?

#passover #sacrifice

Comment

the exodus recounting was of the actual Passover itself.
death passed over once and the israelites got out of egypt straight away.
and they all ate of it in their own house. roasted.

the deuteronomy recounting is the Passover observance, commands for when the israelites get jerusalem's temple designated as the place YHWH Elohim chooses, the animals must get sacrificed there, and the israelites eat it in their tents, as they've all come together for the feast. boiled.

just noting that in egypt, each ate in his own house, in jerusalem all eat in the House of YHWH Elohim.
also noting your cookbook observation, and sticking to a scripture-only perspective, i wonder if looking at which sacrifices were roasted for consumption and which were boiled would show some differentiation.
and a last note, is deut 16:6 saying what i think it is?
no temple, no passover sacrifice? post-temple-like.

· Reply · 1754823932

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Deut 16:7 in the bsb says "roast". I remember reading somewhere that it is not to be boiled at all, but roasted with fire.

· Reply · 1754853911

The hebrew interlinear also says "roast".

· Reply · 1754853980

2 Replies

I had a comment that got ridiculously long and I can’t shorten it, so I was going to make it a post in and of itself sharing your post attatched only to realize that posts aren’t shareable here. 🤔 Any chance that’s something that could be amended at some point after Sabbath. I’d love to tag this post and make my comment its own post just for shear volume of dialogue

(I’ll share the comment here anyway but it’s stupid lengthy.)

Shabbat Shalom

· Reply · 1755349361

You always ask good questions, Rhy! No exception here…and I must admit I haven’t considered this one fully till now…I used to believe that the writers of both exodus and deuteronomy are the same person - Moses …but internal details don’t support this. It seems to be the written record of what Moses wrote rather than what Moses wrote himself. (I think it’s fair to still say “Moses wrote” though the same way we say that “Josephus wrote” even though we only have copies of his work translated into Greek and Latin from the 9th to 11th centuries.)

If two different people wrote Exodus and Deuteronomy, it’s possible that the author of the second did not have access at the time to a physical copy of the first, but that is unlikely again due to internal evidence. There’s way too much in common for the author of one to not have been working off of the other. ( similar to the gospels Gospels of Matthew and Mark).

The question needs to be asked, not simply why Exodus says to tsali the lamb and Deuteronomy says to bashal the lamb but in a more complicated linguistic twist right after saying in exodus that they are to tsali they are told NOT to basheil the lamb. Bashal and basheil being different words but related. Bashal can mean boil or roast, bake or cook. While basheil can only mean boil.

So if it is the same author, it is strange that he would tell the first generation to tsali not bashal. And the second generation to basheil. It’s strange that the second generation should be given such terminology when the book is being written to clarify for the new generation, the instructions that came before. And it is interesting, noting how easily each generation misunderstands, whether by Accident or on purpose, that this should be the word choice.

There’s a couple options that explain it as far as I am seeing: either the first generation was supposed to tsali not bashal because that first passover was unique…(they were allowed to offer the Passover sacrifice in a place that was not the temple and it was outside of the land of Israel. Though that was never allowed after they entered the land and this became reserved for the priesthood. They were also supposed to eat it with their sandals on their belts on and their staff in their hand. They were supposed to eat it in haste.. but thereafter they were not required to eat in haste or girded up for travel and holding their staff. They were also never required afterward to put the blood on the door post, even though it was done in the first passover. Furthermore, the original explanation for eating on love bread is because they were to leave in such haste that the dough did not have time to rise got the later explanation is that leaven represents sin.

It seems in the Text it had some things changed between the first passover and subsequent passovers in the wilderness and even those later in the land of Israel.

So is the command to not basheil in exodus and to bashal in Deuteronomy such a change? Or should we take the directive of exodus to interpret bashal as roast not as boil. Keeping in mind that again basheil and basheil can both mean boil but bashal. A mean boil or bake or roast or cook in general or even ripen in other context.

I’m inclined to believe believe that bashal should be taken to mean roast as tsali did in the first telling but it is a good question since other things were one offs in the first Passover.

I will note though that in the first Passover, it is the explanations of these things that seems to change not the commandment itself, which is why I’m inclined to believe that both instances roast should be the proper translation of those two different words.

And the things that change, don’t really change in the sense of becoming the opposite. It’s more of an evolving explanation of meaning or an enhancement of the meaning. The first generation doesn’t need to remember things they lived through in the Hebrew sense of remembrance… And the things that differ from the first passover to others are the practical aspects which applied to the needs of the moment not a memorial.

After the first passover, no one was in a hurry to leave anywhere and the death Angel was not coming. Therefore, putting blood on the door after the first time does not have the same significance and dressing up to leave in a hurry is without purpose sense the exodus has already been achieved.

So the differences seem to be exclusive to meaning, which is enhanced rather than exclusionary. We were always to remember that the Sabbath is a memorial of creation but now that we have been given freedom, it is a memorial of our liberation as well. For practical reasons, the bread was without leaven leaving Egypt, but they are after for more practical reasons it represents sin, not in replacement of that original notion, but in the addition. The understanding gets expanded rather than the original understanding getting expunged.

You always ask good questions, Rhy! No exception here…and I must admit I haven’t considered this one fully till now…I used to believe that the writers of both exodus and deuteronomy are the same person - Moses …but internal details don’t support this. It seems to be the written record of what Moses wrote rather than what Moses wrote himself. (I think it’s fair to still say “Moses wrote” though the same way we say that “Josephus wrote” even though we only have copies of his work translated into Greek and Latin from the 9th to 11th centuries.) 
 
If two different people wrote Exodus and Deuteronomy, it’s possible that the author of the second did not have access at the time to a physical copy of the first, but that is unlikely again due to internal evidence. There’s way too much in common for the author of one to not have been working off of the other. ( similar to the gospels Gospels of Matthew and Mark).  
 
The question needs to be asked, not simply why Exodus says to tsali the lamb and Deuteronomy says to bashal the lamb but in a more complicated linguistic twist right after saying in exodus that they are to tsali they are told NOT to basheil the lamb. Bashal and basheil being different words but related. Bashal can mean boil or roast, bake or cook. While basheil can only mean boil.  
 
So if it is the same author, it is strange that he would tell the first generation to tsali not bashal. And the second generation to basheil. It’s strange that the second generation should be given such terminology when the book is being written to clarify for the new generation, the instructions that came before. And it is interesting, noting how easily each generation misunderstands, whether by Accident or on purpose, that this should be the word choice. 
 
There’s a couple options that explain it as far as I am seeing: either the first generation was supposed to tsali not bashal because that first passover was unique…(they were allowed to offer the Passover sacrifice in a place that was not the temple and it was outside of the land of Israel. Though that was never allowed after they entered the land and this became reserved for the priesthood. They were also supposed to eat it with their sandals on their belts on and their staff in their hand. They were supposed to eat it in haste.. but thereafter they were not required to eat in haste or  girded up for travel and holding their staff. They were also never required afterward to put the blood on the door post, even though it was done in the first passover. Furthermore, the original explanation for eating on love bread is because they were to leave in such haste that the dough did not have time to rise got the later explanation is that leaven represents sin.  
 
It seems in the Text it had some things changed between the first passover and subsequent passovers in the wilderness and even those later in the land of Israel. 
 
So is the command to not basheil in exodus and to bashal in Deuteronomy such a change? Or should we take the directive of exodus to interpret bashal as roast not as boil. Keeping in mind that again basheil and basheil can both mean boil but bashal. A mean boil or bake or roast or cook in general or even ripen in other context.  
 
I’m inclined to believe believe that bashal should be taken to mean roast as tsali did in the first telling but it is a good question since other things were one offs in the first Passover.  
 
I will note though that in the first Passover, it is the explanations of these things that seems to change not the commandment itself, which is why I’m inclined to believe that both instances roast should be the proper translation of those two different words.  
 
And the things that change, don’t really change in the sense of becoming the opposite. It’s more of an evolving explanation of meaning or an enhancement of the meaning. The first generation doesn’t need to remember things they lived through in the Hebrew sense of remembrance… And the things that differ from the first passover to others are the practical aspects which applied to the needs of the moment not a memorial. 
 
After the first passover, no one was in a hurry to leave anywhere and the death Angel was not coming. Therefore, putting blood on the door after the first time does not have the same significance and dressing up to leave in a hurry is without purpose sense the exodus has already been achieved.  
 
So the differences seem to be exclusive to meaning, which is enhanced rather than exclusionary. We were always to remember that the Sabbath is a memorial of creation but now that we have been given freedom, it is a memorial of our liberation as well. For practical reasons, the bread was without leaven leaving Egypt, but they are after for more practical reasons it represents sin, not in replacement of that original notion, but in the addition. The understanding gets expanded rather than the original understanding getting expunged.

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