CHAPTER III.

THE DAY OF PREPARATION FOR THE PASSOVER.

Their reception in the house of Iddo surpassed all Helon’s expectations. At the seasons of the festivals, no inhabitant of Jerusalem considered his house as his own. Their city was the city of the whole people, not of the inhabitants alone; and when Israel came up to appear before Jehovah, every citizen regarded his dwelling as belonging to his brethren as much as to himself. Jerusalem lies on the confines of Judah and Benjamin. Its names, the Holy City, the City of the Congregation of Israel, the Gate of the People, point out its destination. No other city was ever in the same sense the capital and centre of a country.

“You are at home,” said their host, as he led them into his house; “and at this time, I am not more so than you. The citizen of Jerusalem considers himself, equally with his brethren, as a pilgrim at the festival.”

In fact the whole house was filled with strangers. Elisama found among them many old acquaintances—but great was his joy when he discovered, in the number, Selumiel of Jericho, the brother of Iddo. His emotion overpowered his utterance, and he could only press him silently, and with tears in his eyes, to his breast. Selumiel had been the dearest friend of his youth; he had lived long in Alexandria, and they had spent the earliest days of manhood there together; they had imparted each to the other all their youthful plans. At a later period they had been separated, and had not met for more than thirty years: but their hearts had remained united, and their joy at meeting was mutual. Elisama seemed to be changed by the sight of him, as if youth itself had returned with the friend of his youth.

While the feet of the guests were washing, which is the first duty of hospitality in the East, and indeed properly their welcome, Elisama and Selumiel were engaged in uninterrupted discourse, as if they had been sitting alone in the court, and rapidly ran over earlier and later times, Alexandria and Jericho. In the mean time Iddo and some of the guests had joined Helon, and were congratulating him upon his first pilgrimage. Selumiel and Iddo had in common a hearty and straight forward character, by which they might have been known as brothers. But, besides that they were attached to different parties in religion, Iddo had more liveliness and cheerfulness. “My son out of Egypt,” he addressed Helon, “to-morrow at this time, when the Passover begins, thou wilt see what thou hast never seen before. Already, on the tenth of the month, I chose a lamb without blemish for the occasion. Before sunset this evening, I fetched the water into the house, with which the unleavened bread is to be made. If you please you shall go with me after supper and seek the leaven in the house. A young Israelite, who has come for the first time to the Passover, should leave nothing unseen, but learn all the practices of Israel in the most complete manner possible. But I forgot, you are come from Hebron to-day, and must be weary.”

Helon seemed almost offended to be suspected of weariness, after a march made under such circumstances. With glowing cheek he repelled the imputation, and begged that Iddo would not spare him.

“Just like his father,” exclaimed his host, “jealous of nothing so much as of being thought a genuine Aramæan Jew. To-morrow, I will conduct thee to his grave in the valley of Jehoshaphat. In truth he was a noble-minded man, an Israelite without guile. He died in this house, and it was of thee, Helon, that he spoke to me in his last moments.” He then related the circumstances of his death, and many anecdotes of his intercourse with him. Their connection had been much the same as that of Selumiel with Elisama. Helon listened to him, as if his father’s spirit spoke from his lips, so intimate had been their friendship, so similar their characters.

In such discourse the time passed rapidly, and a servant came to call the guests from the cooling fountain of the inner court to the roof, where they were to sup. Here Iddo was accustomed to entertain his guests at the festival, when there was any one among them, on whom the spectacle, beheld for the first time, was likely to make an indelible impression. It was a fine, clear, cloudless night. The moon shone sweetly upon Jerusalem and changed the night to a softer and cooler day than that which had been twelve hours before. A breeze from the Mount of Olives cooled the heated air. The neighbours had in like manner brought their guests to sup on the roofs of their houses, and as far as the eye could reach on every side, feasting and illumination were seen. A busy hum ascended from the streets beneath, and the white tents glistened in the valley of Kedron.

What a scene! The whole environs of Jerusalem were turned into an encampment, all the hills and vallies, all the streets and open places were covered with tents. It was impossible that the houses should contain all the strangers, notwithstanding the unbounded hospitality which was practised on these occasions, and hence it was necessary that a large proportion of them should remain in tents during the festival. In the pleasant season of the year, at which the Passover was held, this had nothing inconvenient or disagreeable in it; it was the universal custom at the feast of tabernacles, and it reminded them of the patriarchal life, and the wandering in the desert. This gave to Jerusalem a singular but very interesting appearance. All was motion, life and animation, and the thought of the purpose for which these myriads of men had come up from near or distant regions, filled the mind with solemn and elevated feeling. A million of human beings have frequently been assembled here on such an occasion, all for the purpose of appearing with prayer and praise before Jehovah.

Carried away by the sight, Helon involuntarily exclaimed,

Behold how good and how pleasant it is For brethren to dwell together in unity! It is like the precious ointment upon the head of Aaron, That ran down upon his beard, That went down to the skirts of his garments. So the dew of Hermon descends Upon the hills of Zion: For there hath Jehovah commanded his blessing, Prosperity for ever more!—Ps. cxxxiii.

The guests gazed on him with surprise. “Why,” continued Helon, “do you not see before your eyes the application of the psalm? On such an evening as this, or at least in the view of such a spectacle as this, must it have been composed. Is it not the dew of Hermon,—are not these the sons of Israel from the Tyrian Climax and the plain of Jesreel, which fall here on the hills of Zion?”

“Listen!” said Iddo. Through the uproar of the streets they could discern a distant sound of cymbals, trumpets, and song, which came in the direction of the New City. “The Galileans are entering by the gate of Ephraim; they are late; and yet they cannot this time have been obstructed by the Samaritans; Hyrcanus has removed that obstacle from their way.” The distant sound of music and song, heard in this calm, soft night, seemed to Helon even more beautiful than the jubilation with which the march from Bethlehem had been attended. Penetrating through all the tumult of the city, which he heard not as he drank them in, the spiritual and ethereal tones seemed to him almost like the heavenly host, when they ascend from earth, to keep an eternal festival before the presence of Jehovah. On such an evening, what flight of imagination could be too bold for a youth of such enthusiastic temperament?

The guests had laid themselves down upon the carpets, when Iddo took Helon by the arm. Elisama had been compelled to occupy the place of honour, and Selumiel and he were inseparable. “You will stay by me,” said his host to Helon, “and we will occupy as is becoming, the lowest place. Look down below on the square; there it was that Ezra once stood, when the people returned from the captivity, and read the law to them.”

“I remember it,” said Helon; “it is written, Ezra read upon the open place before the Water-gate, from the morning until mid-day, and praised the Lord the great God; and the people answered Amen, Amen, with lifting up their hands, and bowed their heads and worshipped the Lord with their faces to the ground.”[105]

Footnote 105:

Neh. viii. 3.

“Often have I stood here,” said Iddo, “contemplating that spot, with this history in my mind, and have thought, with gratitude to Jehovah who has delivered his people, on that AMEN, sent up by the assembled multitude, lifting their hands to heaven. But let us eat and be merry.”

Their mirth was such as suited the age and the piety of the company, and their enjoyment was heightened by the expressions of joy which they heard all around them. The old men discoursed of the felicity of the times, and the glorious reign of Hyrcanus; above all, of the victory which his sons had obtained over the Samaritans, and the destruction of the abomination of Gerizim.

In the mean time the master of the house called upon his younger guests to assist him in purifying his house from the leaven. This was the evening of the fourteenth day of the month Nisan, the preparation day for the Passover. Lest the command of Jehovah, to eat unleavened bread for seven days, and to allow no leaven to be seen any where, should chance to be violated, they performed the ceremony of putting away the leaven on this evening. The master of the family gave each of his guests a torch, and led them in a solemn procession through the house. He had himself a dish and a brush in his hand, and he said “Praised be thou, O Lord our God, king of the world, who hast sanctified us by thy precepts, and hast enjoined upon us to put away the leaven.” All present said Amen. They then proceeded to examine every corner of the house, opening every drawer, chest, and cupboard. Here and there lay a piece of leavened bread, purposely left in the way; the master took it up, laid it in his dish, and carefully swept the place. When the company had gone round the house, to the outer door, he said, “Whatsoever leavened thing there is in my house, which I have not seen nor put away, may it be scattered in pieces and accounted as the dust of the earth.” The search had lasted two hours; the dish was locked up, and the guests retired to sleep.

Unable, however, to obtain sleep, from the crowd of feelings which coursed each other through his mind, when he thought that he was at length in Jerusalem, in the Holy City, Helon was one of the first who arose. He went immediately to the roof of the house—the Alijah was open; he entered it and performed his morning devotions, with a fervour which he had never felt before, put the Tallith on his head, bound the Tephillim on his brow and his hand, and recited the Kri-schma. His whole body was in agitation; now he lifted his hand towards heaven, now threw himself on his face on the ground, now bent his head to the middle of his body. In the earnestness of his prayer he seemed to wrestle with God. Here in the Holy City, how much had he to ask from the God of his fathers!

When his prayer was ended, and he came out upon the roof, he looked down upon Jerusalem, which now lay before him in all the brightness of daylight. As yet all was still; even from the temple, which rose in elevated majesty above the towers and palaces of the city, no sound was to be heard. The loud tumult of the strangers on the preceding evening was hushed, and it seemed as if the repose which announced the vicinity of the sanctuary, had diffused itself around and reduced all to silence. All the lofty emotions of his heart returned with equal strength, but not the same impetuosity as on the preceding evening. His inward delight was even greater, but it was calm and holy. He felt that near the presence of Jehovah, in the solemn assembly of his people, on the spot where the noblest and wisest of his countrymen had met together for such high purposes, his joy ought to be tranquil and sober, and the emotion, thus driven back upon the heart, only became the deeper and more vivid.

Helon felt that this was his initiation into a new life. When the day dawns, on which all the visions of childhood and the dreams of youth are about to be fulfilled—to which the man awakes, in the firm belief that it will realize every thing for which his heart has longed, there is a stillness, an earnest expectation, a humble confidence which take possession of such a youthful bosom, from which it is easily anticipated, that a period decisive for the formation of the character has arrived, and that what is now felt and done will have a predominating influence over all the future life.

Sallu came to him, to ask his commands. When he had received them, he remained standing a little while and said, “Master, I am only a servant in Israel, but I too am of the seed of Abraham, and I feel that this is the land of our fathers and of their God. Let us not return into Egypt!”

When Elisama arose, his first occupation was to open the baggage and take out thence the presents destined for his host. It was his rule never to come empty-handed, and on this occasion he had indeed come with his hands full. To the mistress of the house he sent all that remained, and it was no trifling store, of the provisions for the journey, some skins of delicious Chian wine, which he had purchased in the caravan, and a quantity of the finest Egyptian linen. To Iddo he gave a turban curiously wrought, of a costly stuff, and an Alexandrian robe of ceremony, informing him that it had been his brother-in-law's, and that his sister had destined it for him.

To Selumiel he carried a book. It consisted of several pieces of papyrus, the stalk of which is divided with a needle into thin leaves, which are then laid together and fastened with the water of the Nile. Several of them were then laid upon each other and fitted together, and on these oblong leaves the book was written. It was an Egyptian invention and very highly prized. “I have brought you,” said he to Selumiel, “the Hebrew work of Jesus Sirach, the same which his grandson has translated into Greek. It is highly esteemed in Egypt both by Jews and heathens. I could easily have procured a transcript of the Greek version, from one of our literati in the Bruchion; but that would not have answered my purpose; it was with difficulty that I could obtain this copy of the Hebrew. I give it thee for the sake of the passage on friendship. Read here; ‘A faithful friend is the medicine of life, and they who fear the Lord shall find him. For he who feareth the Lord shall be happy in his friendship, and as he is, such shall his friend be also.’[106] And here too, ‘Forsake not an old friend.’” Selumiel smiled, a thing which he rarely did, and said, “I accept the present, on the condition that you come to Jericho with me, in order that I may be able to return it.” “We shall see,” said Elisama, “but in so doing I should be giving little, to receive much in return.” “Friendship,” said Selumiel, “has all things in common.”

Footnote 106:

Eccles. vi. 16.

As our travellers came from a heathen land, it was necessary they should be purified before they could go into the temple. This would have prevented Helon from attending at the morning sacrifice, and besides he wished first to discharge a duty of filial piety, and to visit the grave of his father, before he appeared in the presence of Jehovah, whom his father had taught him to honour.

When the ceremonies of bathing, cutting off the hair, and others in which purification consisted, were over, he went forth to the valley of Jehoshaphat, to his father’s tomb. It was by his own dying request that he had been interred there; for Iddo would fain have given him a place in the sepulchre of his own family. From the words of the prophet Joel, “I will gather all nations, and will bring them down to the valley of Jehoshaphat, and will plead with them there for my people,”[107] it had become a prevalent opinion, that this would be the scene of the general resurrection and of the judgment of Jehovah, and therefore many of the Jews wished to be buried there. It took its name from the king Jehoshaphat, who was said to have been interred in that place.

Footnote 107:

Joel iii. 2.

Iddo, Elisama, and Selumiel accompanied Helon. Leaving the city by the Water-gate, they turned to the south-east and kept along the brook Kedron. Willows and tall cedars threw their shadows upon the graves. They wandered silently along the Kedron, till they saw a large stone, such as the Jews are accustomed to place upon every grave, as a warning rather than a monument, to prevent the passers-by from defiling themselves unawares. To-day especially, it was necessary for them to keep at a distance of several paces from it, if they would not render themselves so far unclean, as to incapacitate them for taking any part in the religious rites of the day. Helon felt an irresistible impulse to throw himself upon the grave, but the others forcibly held him back. Tears streamed from his eyes as he incessantly exclaimed, “My father! my father!” With head and breast inclined forward he was supported by his companions, scarcely conscious what he did, to the Horse-gate, where they set him down. They spoke to him of the virtues of his father, of his surviving parent at Alexandria, of the happiness of being buried in the valley of Jehoshaphat. By degrees he became more calm; his tears continued to flow, but they were rather the effusion of tenderness than of sorrow, and he seemed to have found his father, rather than to have lost him. Iddo, whose manner was somewhat abrupt, reminded him of his obligations to them for having prevented him from making himself unclean by throwing himself on the grave, which would have compelled him to keep the feast, with the rest of those who were unclean, in the following month. “Bethink thee, too, that Jehovah himself has commanded that we should be cheerful on this day. Thou shalt rejoice before Jehovah thy God, at the place which the Lord thy God has chosen that his name should dwell there.”[108]

Footnote 108:

Deut. xii. 18.

They now made a circuit round the city, from the Horse-gate, which lies northward from the Water-gate, till they came to the Water-gate again. The whole circuit might be as much as five sabbath-days’ journies. Their object in making it was rather to give Helon a general view of the different quarters of the city, and divert his thoughts by variety of scene, than to examine any part minutely, which indeed would now have been impracticable, the whole ground being covered with tents.

Jerusalemforms something of an irregular oblong. In the middle of the eastern side, which was one of the longest, rose the temple on mount Moriah. Around the temple lay the city, divided into three parts, built on three hills. Directly behind the temple, in the middle, and due west from it, was the Lower City, on the hill Acra. On the other side south-west from the temple, the Upper City crowned the hill of Zion; north-west lay the New City, on the hill Bezetha; and a small hill, Ophel, lay southward from the temple. Thus it might be said that the city, though of an oblong shape, lay in a crescent round about the temple.

Jerusalem stood on a very elevated range of hills; the last eighteen sabbath-days’ journies in approaching it were almost a continued ascent. Only towards the north, joining the New City, there was some level ground, on the other three sides it was surrounded with vallies. On the eastern side, where the temple stood, was the valley, which, from the winter torrent which flowed through it, was called the valley of Kedron. The Upper City was skirted on the south side by the valley Ben-hinnom, where, under some of the last of the kings, children had been burnt to Moloch, at a place called Tophet. On the western side, the valley of Gihon bordered the Upper City, the Lower City, and the New City.

Two walls surrounded Jerusalem: one enclosed the Upper City and with it the southern part of the temple; the other began from this, and fortified the Lower City, joining the castle of Baris, which lay above, to the north, near the temple. The New City had at this time no wall. On the first wall were sixty towers, on the second fourteen, each twenty cubits high.

The city had twelve gates, the number which Ezekiel had prophesied on the banks of Chebar. But in regard to the position and names of the gates, the instructions of Jehovah by his prophet had been as little attended to as those which he had given in the same passage for the form of the city (which was to have been a regular square) or for the division of the country.[109] Every side was to have had three gates, and each gate the name of one of the twelve tribes, but in rebuilding the city they adopted the names and sites of those which the Chaldeans had destroyed.

Footnote 109:

Ezek. xlviii. 30.; xlv.

In the middle of the eastern side was the Sheep-gate, which led from the valley of Kedron to the temple. At the building of the walls under Nehemiah,[110] the superintendence of it was on this account given to the priests, and when it was ended, they consecrated it with thank-offerings and prayer. Higher up towards the north, but on the same side, was the Fish-gate, leading from the valley of Kedron into the New City, and not far from it the Old-gate, leading from and to the same places. It had its name from the circumstance of its not being destroyed, when the others were razed by the Chaldeans.

Footnote 110:

Nehem. iii. 1.

On the north side was the gate of Ephraim, and quite towards the west, the Corner-gate, both leading into the New City. On the west side the Valley-gate led from the valley of Gihon and Siloam, into the Lower City, and the Dung-gate and the Well-gate into the Upper City.

On the eastern side you entered from the vale of Kedron, by the Water-gate, close to which was the open square, on which Iddo’s house stood; and further up, by the Horse-gate and the Eastern-gate, into the Upper City. Lastly, the gate Miphkad, or the gate of Judgment, so called from justice having been long administered there, gave entrance into the precincts of the temple. It was near the Sheep-gate from which our survey began. In the space now described about 120,000 inhabitants commonly dwelt, but at the time of the Passover not fewer than a million have been assembled here.

The arrangement of the city bore some analogy to that of the camp in the wilderness. There the tabernacle was placed in the middle, and called the camp of the Majesty of Jehovah; around it were encamped the 22,000 priests and Levites, and round them, in a still wider circle, was the encampment of the twelve tribes, called the camp of Israel. So here at Jerusalem, the temple was called the camp of the Majesty of Jehovah, the exterior courts, the camp of the Levites, and the city, the camp of Israel. Thus the stranger, when he came from foreign parts, to celebrate the festival of Israel’s deliverance from Egypt, found here the names and divisions which had been in use among his ancestors in the desert, and the whole city became as it were a permanent encampment, a standing memorial of that wonderful event, which is incomprehensible to those who consider Israel as only under human guidance. By remarks of this kind Elisama endeavoured to divert Helon’s thoughts from himself, to what concerned his nation. The names of the different parts and public buildings of Jerusalem had recalled many historical events to his mind; its glory under David and Solomon; its forlorn and ruined state when Jeremiah poured forth his lamentations over its smoking ashes, its new splendour when, under Nehemiah, it arose from its ruins.

On the day of preparation it was customary in Jerusalem to take an early meal, in order to have time for the arrangements necessary before the evening. The time of this meal, however, had been long past, when they returned to the house; the unleavened bread had been already baked and lay on the tables in the women’s saloon, and the cakes designed for the festival had been taken from the oven in the adjacent room. That which was the portion of the priest, was of greater size than the rest; it was baked the first, and lay on a separate table, adorned with flowers. The father of the family was to carry it to the temple in the afternoon. “The first and best of every thing,” said he, “belongs to Jehovah; in honouring his servants we think we honour him, and we set apart the first portion for the priest who lives by the law.”

A short meal, at noon, was taken under the palm-trees in the inner court, beside the fountain. The greatest neatness reigned in the whole house—all the furniture and vessels, all the floors had been washed. Only the white unleavened bread was seen at table. The pilgrims had eaten it on their journey, but this was the day on which it began to be exclusively used. It consisted of thin flat crumbling cakes, made of water and meal, full of little holes, that not the smallest tendency to acidity might be occasioned. It was the food of haste and sorrow, and they had been commanded to eat it, as a memorial of their being thrust out of Egypt, without time for the preparation of their food.

Immediately after the removal of the dishes and carpets, a fire was made behind the women’s saloon, in a small garden belonging to the house. When it blazed up, the guests and members of the family came and placed themselves around it, and Iddo, bringing the dish which contained the leaven, threw it into the fire, saying at the same time, “May all the leaven which I have seen or not seen, which I have brought out or not brought out, be scattered and destroyed, and accounted as the dust of the earth!”

This ceremony had just been ended, and some other trifling preparations for the festival been made, when the trumpets from mount Moriah announced the commencement of the Passover, and a thousand horns, in the streets, from the houses and the tents, replied to the signal. The walls of the front court were hung with tapestry, which had before been suspended between the holy and most holy place. Our pilgrims went up to the temple to complete their purifications, and to show the impatient Helon at least its general arrangement. It was now about the eighth hour.

The ground-plan of the temple had been familiar to him from his youth. The mountain Moriah had an average length and breadth of five hundred cubits; its lowest part was towards the east. As it could not contain all the buildings of the temple, Solomon had carried up a wall of great height and strength from the valley of the Kedron, and filled the intermediate space with earth, thus extending the mountain into the valley. After the return from the captivity, the people are said to have erected huge masses of masonry, composed of squared stones, from the valley, on the eastern, southern, and northern sides, between three hundred and four hundred cubits high.

Iddo led his friend through the Water-gate into the valley of Kedron, that they might receive an impression of the magnificent exterior of this wonderful work, before they explored the interior. They ascended a flight of steps in the outer wall, and by the Beautiful-gate, called also the gate Susan, entered the court of the Gentiles. This court, a square of five hundred paces, had porticoes on all four sides, three on the south and two on the others. The double row of pillars on the eastern side was called the porch of Solomon. At its western end, but more to the north, stood the sanctuary or temple, properly so called, with its courts. Strangers from heathen countries and uncircumcised persons were admitted into the court of the Gentiles, but were warned by an inscription, in Hebrew and Greek, on the railing at the north-western end, not to proceed any further. Behind this railing you ascended fourteen steps and reached a level court, called _Chel_, ten cubits in breadth, in which was the house of the exposition of the law. It ended with five steps, leading to a second wall, which on the outside was forty and on the inside twenty-five cubits high. In it was the Lower-gate. Here began a court, called the court of the Women, or the Outer court, one hundred and thirty-five cubits long and of equal breadth. It was divided by a wall from the next court, the court of Israel, which had also one hundred and thirty-five cubits of length from north to south, and eleven of breadth from east to west. To go from the court of the Women to the court of Israel, you ascended fifteen steps, and passed through the gate of Nicanor. Next was the court of the Priests, of the same dimensions as the court of Israel. At its termination stood the altar of burnt-offering, fifteen cubits high and fifty in length and breadth. Beside it was the bath which supplied the place of the brazen sea in Solomon’s temple.[111] At the distance of twenty-two cubits the sanctuary with its triple division arose; being besides twenty-two cubits higher than the court of the Gentiles. Along the sides of these courts were porticoes, and a multitude of considerable buildings; the floor was throughout of marble.

Footnote 111:

1 Kings vii. 23.

When Helon reached the Beautiful-gate, it was scarcely possible to pass, so great was the crowd of men and lambs. The children of Israel, out of all the tribes from Dan to Beersheba, from the extreme point of Galilee to the desert of Arabia, strangers from Egypt, Cyprus, Syria, Cappadocia, and Babylon, were here assembled in their festive attire. Every master of a house carried his lamb upon his shoulder, or had it driven before him by his servants. In the spacious court of the Gentiles stood vast flocks of lambs and kids, the dealers in which carried on a very extensive traffic at the time of the Passover. The bleatings of the sheep and the exclamations of their drivers resounded between the shouts of joy and the hymns of praise.

Helon passed through the court of the Gentiles, scarcely noticing what was going on there, to the enclosure behind the railing, keeping his eye fixed upon the altar of burnt-offerings. He looked up the fifteen steps, on which the Levites were already standing with their instruments, through the gate of Nicanor, and gained a view of the interior of the sanctuary. It was like a glimpse of heaven to him. He saw not the riches and splendour of the gold; he felt not the pressure of the crowds around him. A feeling of intense devotion wrapt his soul, and for a time suppressed every other emotion.

His companions roused him, by directing his attention to the court of the Priests. The evening sacrifice, which this evening was killed an hour earlier than usual, was already brought to the altar, the holy place was illuminated, and they were burning incense in it. Helon gazed around him, on the sanctuary, the altar, the courts, and the multitude which filled them, bewildered and overpowered, and incapable of fixing his attention upon any single object in the scene. He did not even notice the absence of the high-priest, whom in his imagination he had always pictured as ministering at the altar, or in the holy of holies; at this moment he was engaged in some of the adjacent buildings, making preparations for the festival.

The paschal lamb must be killed between the two evenings, the greater, which lasted from the middle of the seventh hour to the middle of the tenth, (half past twelve to half past four) and the lesser, which lasted till sunset, or about six o’clock. Iddo conducted Helon about this time into the court of the Gentiles, where the slaves with Sallu were waiting. The lamb must be without blemish, more than eight days and less than a year old. The people had divided themselves into three great bodies in the court of Israel. When the evening sacrifice was over, a priest opened all the folding-doors of the court of the Priests, and allowed one division to enter. The priests stood in a row, reaching from the place where the lambs were killed to the altar, each holding in his hand a basin, pointed at the bottom. Iddo was among the first. He presented his lamb and mentioned the number of the company who were to partake of it. They must not be fewer than ten, nor more than nineteen. He then drew his knife through its throat, the priest who was nearest to him received the blood in his basin, and handing it to his neighbour, it was passed from one to the other, till it reached the priest who was next to the altar, and who poured the blood upon it. Each as he handed the full basin to his neighbour received an empty one from him with the other hand; thus all was done with incredible despatch.

The father of each family killed the paschal lamb himself. In ordinary cases the priests were the sacrificers, but once in the year the master of the house was himself a priest, as a memorial that Israel was a nation of priests. The Levites in the mean time sung on the fifteen steps the great Hallelujah, and at each psalm the priests on the pillar which stands by the altar blew the trumpet three times. Iddo carried the lamb to the pillars, hung it to one of the hooks, and taking off the skin and the fat, gave the fat to the priest, who salted it and laid it upon the altar. He then carried the lamb home. So did every one of the body who had been first admitted; and when they had all finished, the folding-door opened again, and a second body was admitted. Without the greatest regularity, it would have been impossible in so short a time that such a multitude of lambs should have been killed. Helon descended the steps with Iddo, who had also offered a thank-offering; and as he paused at the gate and looked back, he mentally exclaimed, “Better is a day in thy courts than a thousand elsewhere!”