Exodus13chapter 13

Two practices a Christian reader meets in the Gospels are commanded in this chapter. The first is the daily remembering of the exodus. Rashi reads the opening of verse 3 as a standing duty, teaching "that one must make mention of the Exodus from Egypt every day" (Rashi on Exodus 13:3:1). The second is tefillin, the small leather boxes bound on the arm and the head at weekday morning prayer, which the Gospels call phylacteries. Rashi takes the word in verse 16 to denote them, and explains the name from their four compartments, citing the tractate Sanhedrin. He carries a second reading from Menachem ben Seruk, that whoever sees them bound will remember the miracle and speak of it (Rashi on Exodus 13:16:1). This site's own Hebraic note on Deuteronomy 6 describes how tefillin and the mezuzah are kept today. At verse 8 Rashi reads the father's answer to his son as pointing at the food on the table. The answer is given for the sake of "this Passover offering, this unleavened bread and this bitter herb" (Rashi on Exodus 13:8:1).

Rashi reads the law of the firstborn as a purchase already made. The firstborn belongs to God, he says, because "I have acquired him for Myself through My having smitten the first born of the Egyptians" (Rashi on Exodus 13:2:2). At verse 4 he hears kindness in the naming of the month. Moses points out that God brought them out in a season fit for travelling, neither hot nor cold nor rainy (Rashi on Exodus 13:4:1). At verse 13 he gives two reasons why the donkey alone among unclean animals is redeemed, the second being that donkeys carried Egypt's silver and gold out for Israel (Rashi on Exodus 13:13:1). At verse 22 he reads the two pillars as a watch handed over, so that "before the one set the other rose" (Rashi on Exodus 13:22:1). At verse 19 he explains why Joseph made his brothers swear about their children rather than about themselves (Rashi on Exodus 13:19:1). The text is the Rosenbaum and Silbermann Rashi of 1929 to 1934, in the public domain.

The rabbis take up the hallowing of the firstborn at Bekhorot 3a:9 and 4b:22, and its redemption at Bekhorot 4b:13 and 5a:2. On the sign upon the hand they taught at Arakhin 19b:6. On the child's question of verse 14 they taught at Jerusalem Talmud Pesachim 10:4:2 and Mekhilta DeRabbi Shimon Ben Yochai 13:13. On the pillar of cloud they taught at Avodah Zarah 11a:3, and on the bones of Joseph in Bereshit Rabbah 100:11.