I find all this fascinating as I have no experience at all with Jewish people. I love reading about the rituals associated with all the holidays. Especially the food related ones.
Amongst the Orthodox, there are no loopholes for Passover, and many outdo themselves with trying to come up with more and more restrictions over the 7 days (in Israel) or 8 days (outside of Israel). Many families will not eat anything outside their own homes, or will not eat some or any pre-prepared or cooked food made outside their own homes. Others will not eat any matza or matza products that have touched any liquid, so no matza balls for them!
Thanks for the explanation Broomstick, but my skepticism again rears its ugly head. I’m trying to envision a circumstance where Jewish villagers are going about their business, then they get the klaxon call to move out. As they pack, they urgently debate over what to take and what to leave behind, and somehow it’s determined universally that grain soaking in water that hasn’t fermented yet is easier to tote than bread. Thus, the birth of new eat-on-the-run type food that symbolizes their redemption.
Maybe they observed a certain time of the day for making bread that they strictly adhered to, and they had to flee during the initial stage. There were some commodities that were vitally important in that time that aren’t nearly as necessary these days.
No, no, no, no, no - I think you are still misunderstanding.
There was no sorting out of bread. What they did was take everything that was already made into dough and cooked it without waiting for it to rise, regardless of whether or not it had yeast, how long it had been moist, whatever. May have also converted all the flour in the house into crackers, too, or carried it and just did abbreviated cooking while on the run/wandering in the desert. That’s because cooked bread lasts longer than wet dough. So, if you have to leave on short notice you cook everything, some of which may have been risen already (which you eat first) and some of which is completely unrisen which you eat later because it will be more like a cracker (matzo) and therefore last longer).
You are making the mistaken assumption that the whole Passover rules and regulations came into being on the morning of the day the Jews fled Egypt and that’s just not so. If they had had not minutes or hours but a day or two then definitely they would have baked as much flour into matzo because that stuff is going to stay edible much longer than leavened bread, and unleaved baked goods, cracker-like stuff, and so forth not only was a basic travel food back then but it’s still used and available today.
The whole business about no leavening and water not touching the grain and so forth came later, much later, and was about re-creating the foods eaten on the flight out of Egypt. Indeed, the evolution of those customs are documented the writing left behind by the Jews, and even in different customs observed today, such as some Jews allowing the use of ground-up matzo to make thing like matzo ball soup and others saying no-no-no - you can’t have ground up matzo used in things like soup!
Most cultures that use a lot of bread usually start the baking process early in the morning. Pre-dawn is not unusual. So… you’re told midway through the initial dough-making process you have to leave ASAP. Instead of waiting for the bread dough to pick up yeast in the environment (the normal practice back then) and rise over the course of hours you roll the new dough flat as possible and chuck it on the stove. Do you know how long it takes to bake a matzo? FOUR MINUTES. (True of most crackers, actually). Take out your “journey bread” and while it’s cooling pack your essentials. Pick up the journey bread on your way out the door.
The entire process of from water touching flour to finished cooking for Passover matzo is 18 minutes. Total. Heck, while mom (and maybe oldest daughter, too) is baking up all the flour in the house dad and the kids can be packing. You’ll all be out the door in a half an hour if need be.
What is the origin/development of the unleavened bread stuff? Is it known? At what point did it become associated with the Exodus myth?
Um…Exodus.
Um… Have you read the rest of the thread?
The Hebrews in Eqypt were told to leave in the middle of the night. They didn’t have time to add yeast (actually, to wait for the yeast in the environment to find the dough). They baked what they had and left. Thus, while leaving Egypt they ate unleavened bread. Hence, the association with the Exodus and Passover (pass over referring to the angel of death killing all the first born but passing over the Hebrews who had marked their doorways with blood of sacrificial animals). So, pretty much the myth is the origin story for matzo.
So, to be clear, there was no independent old-school festival of unleavened bread which was later linked with Passover and Exodus? It originated with the Exodus story? (Cf.: “Hans-Joachim Kraus described the coalescence of the two festivals as an attempt by the Dtr to abolish the Canaanite influence upon the cultic familiae, which included the programs of reform initiated by Hezekiah and Josiah. The Dtr’s emphasis extended as far back as Josh 5:10-11 in an attempt to represent the Passover as an ancient festival at Gilgal. Thus, the Passover was combined with מצות into one ceremony that celebrated the great watershed from Egypt and the crossing of the Jordan river.” OK, but what is the story behind מצות? Does anyone have a copy of Kraus’s book?
I am quite familiar with the story of the Exodus, but reading only those words, without broader context, tells you little about the history of Israel, the Passover festival, or where the authors of Exodus got their material (the Wikipedia article paraphrases books saying that the story was kicked around for two hundred years before achieving final form).
Found it: it is not a book, but an article “Zur Geschichte des Passah-Massot-Festes
im Alten Testament” in Evangelische Theologie, Vol. 18, 1958. Anyhow, I am still not entirely clear on the origin of the Festival of Unleavened Bread, beyond it being a harvest celebration.
It’s not a harvest festival. It occurs in the Spring.
As far as I know the festival originated with the Exodus although, of course, Exodus is not a historical document in the sense normally meant by the word. However, when you’re talking about events that (probably) occurred 3500 years ago it’s pretty difficult to get any hard evidence or even reliable dates.
That the ancient Hebrews were influenced by the cultures around them is not news.
Exodus is a mythical legend, like Beowulf, King Arthur or Robin Hood, that most likely has some basis in historical events but, due to be handed down orally for a long time, has all sorts of fictional accretions.
The matzoh is a big ol’ metaphor - the Jews had to leave so quickly that they left their entire world behind and, by doing so, were able to create a blank slate for the Covenant. We go through all sorts of trouble to make sure matzoh doesn’t rise at all, but even if a fleeing people had to bake their bread way too quickly it would have risen at least a little - especially since ancient peoples used starter dough from the previous day’s batch when making bread.
We eat the matzoh to remember the story of Exodus. We eat lots of stuff at Passover to remember the story of Exodus but the OT makes the matzoh part explicit.
Prior to the first traditions of Exodus as a story? I have no idea. Fermentation was considered divine or semi-divine by a lot of ancient cultures, so I wouldn’t be surprised if there was an even older tradition about unleavened bread.
Try googling ‘festival of unleavened bread’ in quotes and look at the results. The folks making a distinction between that and Passover seem to be mainly Christian evangelicals. The only real interest they have in Passover generally (as opposed to the Last Supper specifically) is matzoh as communion, so it makes sense that they’d focus in on it.
OK, much clearer now. Maybe if the bible had context, I’d read it more. 
Sure it is. Remember, this is the Middle East. It’s not as if the snow has to melt before stuff starts to grow.
That makes sense- thanks (although we must be careful not to dismiss their critical commentary out of hand merely because of their theology).
I did find this newspaper column from 2014, which basically tells a story that
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Passover was a “pastoral apotropaic ritual” carried out by nomads.
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חג המצות was celebrated by farmers in the spring, because a harvest of barley was available, but for various reasons not easy to make into leavened bread.
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The holidays began merging, and also the Deuteronomists got involved.
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The Temple in Jerusalem was sacked, the book of Exodus was written, etc.
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The modern Passover seder was developed by Johanan ben Zakai and Rabban Gamaliel, way later, in particular after the Temple was trashed in 70 CE.
A big obstacle there would be the lack of gluten in barley - hard to make fluffy, leavened bread from something without gluten.
Although there are issues with determining exact dates that far back, most dates given for writing down the Torah (of which Exodus is a part) preceded the sacking of the First Temple by 4 or 5 centuries.
Which pretty much no one I’ve ever known denies, as significant changes would have had to have been made once the sole location for religious sacrifice in Judaism was destroyed. As I’ve mentioned, there are documented changes in the celebration and ritual both in time and space.
I really don’t know where you’re going with this. Not one person in this thread has suggested that the ritual is ancient and unchanging. The notion that the Hebrews were influenced by their neighbors is nothing news (indeed, there are multiple instances in the Torah itself lamenting such influences). None of that makes the modern seder less authentic or meaningful.
I was not trying to initiate a theological debate or suggest anything about the meaning of any ritual; just interested in the origins of eating unleavened bread by Jews and others (Canaanites, Babylonians, etc.) It seems pretty old-school.
It IS pretty old school.
As I noted, a cracker-like preparation of ground grain is nothing new, and probably predated leavened bread. It lasts just about forever, it’s good for trips and you can still get it today. The true origins of this food probably long predates writing.