Scriptural Leavening

Question: Most all groups who observe the Days of Unleavened Bread say leavening includes all modern leavening agents such as baking powders and baking soda, even egg whites. What is the Bible teaching on this subject?

Answer: The primary references are Ex.12:15, 18:

"Seven days shall you eat unleavened ("unfermented", NWT; SEC 4682) bread... even the first day you shall put away leaven ("yeast" GN; SEC 7603) out of your houses..." "...you shall eat unleavened (SEC 4682) bread, until the one and twentieth day of the month" (KJV).

The more authoritative Gesenius says of this word: "fermentation, leaven." In the Greek (SEC 2219), leaven is "yeast, leaven:" "a little yeast ferments the whole lump of dough..." (I Cor 5:6; A.G. p. 340). Unleavened (SEC 4682) means "what is sweet, i.e. unfermented bread" (Gesenius). The Biblical principle is fermentation. Websters says leaven is "a substance, such as yeast, used to produce fermentation, especially in dough."

Fermentation is "the breakdown of complex molecules in organic compounds by a ferment such as yeast or bacteria" (Websters). More specifically, this change is produced by the action of an enzyme. The yeast plant or bacteria produces the enzyme which ferments the starches and sugars producing ethanol, which is driven off during baking, and carbon dioxide which causes the dough to swell or rise.

These facts unmistakenly show fermentation must be the process by which bread is Scripturally leavened by yeast. Consequently, baking soda, baking powders, or eggs are not Biblical leavening. They do not produce the enzymatic fermentation process. -ICY