Why “unleavened” bread? (Jan 21, 2026)

Why “unleavened” bread? 

In reading this week’s Torah portion (Parashat Bo:  Exod 10:1-13:16), which deals with the first Passover, I found myself asking, Why unleavened bread (matzot)?

It can’t just be about making some “fast food” to take on the next morning’s trip. Yes, unleavened crackers are a lot more practical than fully-formed loaves of bread.  You can quickly prepare them, stuff them in a convenient pocket for a one-handed snack as you hoof your way into the wilderness.  Matzot is poor man’s bread (fast food). It is just flour and water quickly baked without yeast to puff it up.  As such, it is bread in its simplest and rawest form that is consumable.  On a journey you would only take the bare essentials that you could carry with you.  

Aside from the practicalities of crackers versus loaves, what meaning can we derive from matzot?  Could it be that unleavened bread reflects the “stripped-down/keep it simple” status of the children of Israel at the time they left Egypt?  

After hundreds of years in Egypt, they weren’t ready to dwell in Eretz Yisrael (the land of Israel), the place of promised fulfillment. They were raw and unformed as God’s people.  God would add the necessary ingredients to give “rise” to them as a nation during the 40 years of baking in the wilderness.  Fully-formed, they would enter the Promised Land.  [I see a similar theme in Ezekiel 37’s vision of the dry bones that came to life.]

Genesis tells the story of human response to the Creator resulting in the covenant God makes with Abraham and his descendants. Exodus shows us God forming a raw people into a purposeful nation. Leviticus details the recipe that will result in the “rising” documented in Numbers.  Deuteronomy displays that fully-formed loaf ready to inhabit The Land.  

The transformation from crackers to showbread is a process.  Start simple (wherever you are) and God will cause you to rise to your full potential.  Be patient.  The Master Baker knows what He is doing.  It takes time, but the end result is worth the wait.

-Jeff-