Before the final plague, God told Moses and Aaron to make that month the first month of the year. On the tenth day, each household was to choose a year-old male sheep or goat without defect and keep it until the fourteenth day, when it would be killed at twilight. Small households could share with a neighbor. They were to roast the meat and eat it with bitter herbs and unleavened bread, made without yeast or other leaven. Any meat left in the morning was to be burned. They ate dressed for travel, with belts fastened, sandals on and staffs in hand.
They put the blood on the doorposts and the beam above the door of the houses where they ate. God said he would pass through Egypt and strike the firstborn of people and animals, but would pass over houses marked by blood. Passover was to commemorate how those homes had been spared. The people were also to eat unleavened bread for seven days. Anyone eating leaven during that feast would be cut off from Israel.
At midnight every firstborn in Egypt died. Pharaoh, his servants, and Egypt cried out loudly. Pharaoh summoned Moses and Aaron at night and told the people to leave with their flocks and herds, asking for a blessing as well. Egyptians pressed them to go quickly. The Israelites carried their unleavened dough in bowls wrapped on their shoulders.
They asked Egyptians for silver, gold, and clothing, and the Egyptians gave what they asked. The Israelites traveled from Rameses to Succoth: about six hundred thousand men besides children, with many other people and much livestock. On the very night that marked four hundred thirty years in Egypt, the Israelites came out of the land.