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NASB (UPDATED) TEXT: Mar_14:1-2
1Now the Passover and Unleavened Bread were two days away; and the chief priests and the scribes were seeking how to seize Him by stealth and kill Him; 2for they were saying, "Not during the festival, otherwise there might be a riot of the people."
Mar_14:1 "the Passover and Unleavened Bread" Originally these were two separate feasts commemorating the same event, the last plague that caused Pharaoh to allow the Hebrews to leave Egypt. The requirements for the Passover meal are found in Exo_12:1-14; Exo_12:21-28; Exo_12:43-51. The procedures for the seven day feast of Unleavened Bread are found in Exo_12:8; Exo_12:15-20 (cf. Num_28:16-25, Deu_16:1-8, and Josephus' Antiquities 3.10.5).
▣ "two days away" Because there were two feasts combined, the Jews sometimes referred to the whole period as "the Passover." Therefore, it is uncertain whether the "two days" means (1) two days before the eight-day feast or (2) two days before the Passover itself.
Joh_12:1-8 states this occurred on a different day; Mar_14:3 ff may be a flashback. The chronology of the last days of Jesus' life are recorded differently by the four Gospel writers. In my opinion the early church realized the discrepancies among the four Gospels, but did not try to reconcile them. The differences are caused by (1) the eyewitness nature of the writings and (2) the theological/evangelistic purposes of each individual writer. They each had the freedom (under inspiration) to select, adapt, and arrange Jesus' teachings and actions to fit their purposes and target groups (cf. Gordon Fee and Doug Stuart, How to Read the Bible for All Its Worth, pp. 126-129).
▣ "priests and the scribes" Matthew adds "elders," which is the full designation for the Sanhedrin. See Special Topic at Mar_12:13.
▣ "to seize Him by stealth and kill Him" This was nothing new (cf. Mar_3:6; Mar_11:18), but Jesus' actions in accepting the crowd's affirmations during the Triumphal Entry into Jerusalem and His cleansing of the merchants from the Court of the Gentiles sealed His fate with both the Pharisees and the Sadducees.
Mar_14:2 "there might be a riot of the people" Jesus was very popular in Galilee. During the Passover Jerusalem grew to three times her normal population with pilgrims from all over the Mediterranean area, many of whom were from Galilee. The possible "riot" is mentioned in Mat_26:5; Mat_27:24.