Did Jesus Keep the Passover?

Did Jesus Keep the Passover? Theology teaches that Jesus’ Last Supper was also the annual Hebrew Passover meal. However, the Scriptures plainly teach that Jesus Christ died on the fourteenth of Nisan, the day before the Passover.* He could not, therefore, have eaten the Hebrew Passover meal as He was dead and buried before that time. To substantiate that the Last Supper was not the Passover, we will consider every reference to the Last Supper in its Biblical context. First though, let us set some basic information. 1. The preparation for the Passover is a preliminary part of the sacrifice, just as much as the preparation for a dinner occurs before eating the dinner. 2. The fifteenth day of Nisan was the Passover Day and the Feast of Unleavened Bread. During the days before the Passover, the people had to specifically prepare themselves, their homes and the sacrifice and thus make ready for the Passover. This activity is spoken of in John 19:42 as the Jew’s preparation. a. The Temple, if defiled, had to be cleansed. II Chronicles 29:4, 5. b. The homes of the people had to be cleansed. Exodus 12:15, 19. c. The priests and Levites had to be cleansed. II Chronicles 30. d. The individual person had to be cleansed. John 11:55; Hebrews 9:13, 14; Numbers 9:6. 3. Five days preceding the Passover, thus on the tenth of Nisan, according to Exodus 12:3-6, the sacrificial lamb was carefully selected and groomed properly until the fourteenth of Nisan. The five days beginning with the tenth of Nisan are an integral part of the preparation and sacrifice. Thus, logically the Passover began before it officially started in the sense that the preparations for it were begun. Technically, the preparation had started at the time the Passover lamb was selected on the tenth of Nisan. The lamb was then killed on the fourteenth; it was eaten after sunset and during the night following its killing which was, according to Jewish reckoning of time, the fifteenth of Nisan. 4. A human author may, f