Torah Portion: Bo
The entire congregation of the assembly of Israel shall slaughter it in the afternoon…. They shall eat the flesh on that night (Shemos 12:6,8).
It is a positive commandment to slaughter an unblemished, year-old, male sheep or kid-goat in the Temple on the fourteenth day of Nissan in the afternoon. This is called the Passover offering; as it is written: The entire congregation of the assembly of Israel shall slaughter it in the afternoon.
The general scheme of the mitzvah is as follows: Individual Israelites join to form groups and they buy from the market, or take from their homes, one of either a kid-goat or an unblemished year-old, male lamb, and they slaughter it in the courtyard of the Temple on the afternoon of the fourteenth of Nissan. Later, in the evening, they eat it together after completing their meal, for the commandment is to eat when already satisfied.
Among the roots of the commandment: It is so that the Jews remember forever the great miracles that Hashem performed for them during the Exodus from Egypt.
This commandment applies to both men and women, when the Temple existed. One who willfully fails to keep it and did not make the Passover offering is liable for kareis-excision.
And it is a positive commandment to eat the flesh of the Passover offering on the night of fifteenth of Nissan, as it says: They shall eat the flesh on that night.
The roots of this commandment are the same as the mitzvah of slaughtering the Passover offering: to remember the great miracles the God did for us when he brought us out of slavery to freedom.
This commandment applies to both men and women. One who fails to keep it violates a positive commandment.
