It is our second Easter during the pandemic. My nephew Chad and his wife Jackie’s son Hatcher in the photo on the left was born during the pandemic. I told them I didn’t know how they got him to look so surprised. It’s as if he has just come out of the egg and is taking a look around. According to theholidayspot.com, at Easter, eggs and chicks symbolize new life. Eggs have been a symbol of spring since ancient times. An egg also is a symbol of the rock tomb out of which Christ emerged when he rose again. The chick, hatching out of the egg, symbolizes new life or rebirth. I have always enjoyed the American traditions for children at Easter — hunting for Easter eggs filled with candy, dying hard-boiled eggs in beautiful pastel colors and getting dressed up in a brand-new dress to attend church. Easter dinners are always special too. As a child it was a family dinner at home or at a restaurant because we didn’t have any relatives that lived nearby, and as an adult, they are often potluck dinners where family members combine their culinary talents. This year I gathered with nine friends who had all been vaccinated. It was wonderful to have a dinner without masks. Whether we are in the middle of a pandemic or not, Easter is a special time of year. Let’s find out more about it.
According to Wikipedia, Easter — also called Pascha in Aramaic, Greek and Latin or Resurrection Sunday — is a Christian festival and cultural holiday commemorating the resurrection of Jesus from the dead, described in the New Testament as having occurred on the third day after his burial following his cruxifixion by the Romans at Calvary c. 30 AD. It is the culmination of the Passion of Jesus, preceded by Lent, a 40-day period of fasting, prayer and penance.
The photo on the right is an icon of the resurrection depicting Christ having destroyed the gates of Hades and removing Adam and Eve from the grave. Christ is flanked by saints, and Satan is depicted as an old man bound and chained.
Most Christians refer to the week before Easter as "Holy Week", which contains the days of the Easter Triduum, including Maundy Thursday, commemorating the Maundy or washing of the feet and Last Supper or final meal Jesus shared with his apostles, as well as Good Friday, commemorating the crucifixion and death of Jesus. In Western Christianity, Eastertide or the Easter Season, begins on Easter Sunday and lasts seven weeks, ending with the coming of the 50th day, Pentecost Sunday. In Eastern Christianity, the Paschal season begins on Pascha and ends with the coming of the 40th day, the Feast of the Ascension.
Easter and its related holidays are moveable feasts, not falling on a fixed date in the Gregorian or Julian calendars which follow only the cycle of the sun; its date is computed based on a lunisolar calendar similar to the Hebrew calendar. The First Council of Nicaea established two rules, independence from the Hebrew calendar and worldwide uniformity, which were the only rules for Easter explicitly laid down by the council. No details for the computation were specified; these were worked out in practice, a process that took centuries and generated a number of controversies. It has come to be the first Sunday after the ecclesiastical full moon that occurs on or soonest after March 21. Even if calculated on the basis of the more accurate Gregorian calendar, the date of that full moon sometimes differs from that of the astronomical first full moon after the March equinox.
Easter is linked to the Jewish Passover by its origin — according to the synoptic gospels, both the crucifixion and the resurrection took place during the Passover — and by much of its symbolism, as well as by its position in the calendar. In most European languages the feast is called by the words for passover in those languages; and in the older English versions of the Bible, the term Easter was the term used to translate passover. Easter customs vary across the Christian world, and include sunrise services, exclaiming the Paschal greeting, clipping the church — the church congregation or local children holding hands in an outward-facing ring around the church — and decorating Easter eggs. The Easter lily, a symbol of the resurrection, traditionally decorates the chancel area of churches on this day and for the rest of Eastertide. Additional customs that have become associated with Easter and are observed by both Christians and some non-Christians include Easter parades, Easter bunny and egg hunting. There are also various traditional Easter foods that vary regionally.
Etymology
The modern English term Easter, cognate with modern Dutch ooster and German Ostern, developed from an Old English word that usually appears in the form Ēastrun, -on, or -an; but also as Ēastru, -o; and Ēastre or Ēostre. Bede provides the only documentary source for the etymology of the word, in his eigth-century “The Reckoning of Time.” He wrote that Ēosturmōnaþ — Old English 'Month of Ēostre', translated in Bede's time as "Paschal month" — was an English month, corresponding to April, which he says "was once called after a goddess of theirs named Ēostre, in whose honor feasts were celebrated in that month."
In Latin and Greek, the Christian celebration was, and still is, called Pascha, a word derived from Aramaic, cognate to Hebrew Pesach. The word originally denoted the Jewish festival known in English as Passover, commemorating the Jewish Exodus from slavery in Egypt. As early as the 50s of the 1st century, Paul the Apostle, writing from Ephesus to the Christians in Corinth, applied the term to Christ, and it is unlikely that the Ephesian and Corinthian Christians were the first to hear Exodus 12 interpreted as speaking about the death of Jesus, not just about the Jewish Passover ritual. In most languages, Germanic languages such as English being exceptions, the feast is known by names derived from Greek and Latin Pascha. Pascha is also a name by which Jesus himself is remembered in the Orthodox Church, especially in connection with his resurrection and with the season of its celebration.
Theological significance
The resurrection of Jesus, which Easter celebrates, is one of the chief tenets of the Christian faith. The resurrection established Jesus as the Son of God and is cited as proof that God will righteously judge the world. For those who trust in Jesus's death and resurrection, "death is swallowed up in victory." Any person who chooses to follow Jesus receives "a new birth into a living hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead." Through faith in the working of God, those who follow Jesus are spiritually resurrected with him, so that they may walk in a new way of life and receive eternal salvation, being physically resurrected to dwell in the Kingdom of Heaven.
Easter is linked to Passover and the exodus from Egypt recorded in the Old Testament through the Last Supper, sufferings and crucifixion of Jesus that preceded the resurrection. According to the three Synoptic Gospels, Jesus gave the Passover meal a new meaning, as in the upper room during the Last Supper he prepared himself and his disciples for his death. He identified the bread and cup of wine as his body, soon to be sacrificed, and his blood, soon to be shed. Paul states, "Get rid of the old yeast that you may be a new batch without yeast — as you really are. For Christ, our Passover lamb, has been sacrificed;" this refers to the Passover requirement to have no yeast in the house and to the allegory of Jesus as the Paschal lamb.
Early Christianity
The first Christians, Jewish and Gentile, were certainly aware of the Hebrew calendar. Jewish Christians, the first to celebrate the resurrection of Jesus, timed the observance in relation to Passover. Direct evidence for a more fully formed Christian festival of Pascha or Easter begins to appear in the mid-2nd century. Perhaps the earliest extant primary source referring to Easter is a mid-2nd-century Paschal homily attributed to Bishop Melito of Sardis, which characterizes the celebration as a well-established one. Evidence for another kind of annually recurring Christian festival, those commemorating the martyrs, began to appear at about the same time as the above homily.
While martyrs' days — usually the individual dates of martyrdom — were celebrated on fixed dates in the local solar calendar, the date of Easter was fixed by means of the local Jewish lunisolar calendar. This is consistent with the celebration of Easter having entered Christianity during its earliest, Jewish period, but does not leave the question free of doubt.
The ecclesiastical historian Socrates Scholasticus attributes the observance of Easter by the church to the perpetuation of its custom, "just as many other customs have been established," stating that neither Jesus nor his apostles enjoined the keeping of this or any other festival. Although he describes the details of the Easter celebration as deriving from local custom, he insists the feast itself is universally observed.
Computations
In 725, Bede succinctly wrote, "The Sunday following the full Moon which falls on or after the equinox will give the lawful Easter." However, this does not precisely reflect the ecclesiastical rules. The full moon referred to — called the Paschal full moon — is not an astronomical full moon, but the 14th day of a lunar month. Another difference is that the astronomical equinox is a natural astronomical phenomenon, which can fall on March 19, 20 or 21, while the ecclesiastical date is fixed by convention on March 21.
In applying the ecclesiastical rules, Christian churches use March 21 as the starting point in determining the date of Easter, from which they find the next full moon, etc. The Eastern Orthodox and Oriental Orthodox Churches continue to use the Julian calendar. Their starting point in determining the date of Orthodox Easter is also March 21 but according to the Julian reckoning, which in the current century corresponds to April 3 in the Gregorian calendar.
Easter is the third Sunday in the paschal lunar month or, in other words, the Sunday after the paschal lunar month's 14th day. The 14th of the paschal lunar month is designated by convention as the Paschal full moon, although the 14th of the lunar month may differ from the date of the astronomical full moon by up to two days. Since the ecclesiastical new moon falls on a date from March 8 to April 5 inclusive, the paschal full moon must fall on a date from March 22 to April 18 inclusive.
The Gregorian calculation of Easter was based on a method devised by the Calabrian doctor Aloysius Lilius for adjusting the epacts of the moon, and has been adopted by almost all Western Christians and by Western countries which celebrate national holidays at Easter. For the British Empire and colonies, a determination of the date of Easter Sunday using golden numbers and Sunday letters was defined by the Calendar (New Style) Act 1750 with its Annexe. This was designed to match exactly the Gregorian calculation.
First Council of Nicaea 325 AD
This controversy between those who advocated independent computations and those who wished to continue the custom of relying on the Jewish calendar was formally resolved by the First Council of Nicaea in 325 AD, which endorsed changing to an independent computation by the Christian community in order to celebrate in common. This effectively required the abandonment of the old custom of consulting the Jewish community in those places where it was still used. Epiphanius of Salamis wrote in the mid-4th century:
the emperor ... convened a council of 318 bishops ... in the city of Nicea ... They passed certain ecclesiastical canons at the council besides, and at the same time decreed in regard to the Passover that there must be one unanimous concord on the celebration of God's holy and supremely excellent day. For it was variously observed by people
That the older custom — called "protopaschite" by historians — did not at once die out, but persisted for a time, is indicated by the existence of canons and sermons against it.
Dionysius Exiguus, and others following him, maintained that the 318 bishops assembled at the Nicene Council had specified a particular method of determining the date of Easter; subsequent scholarship has refuted this tradition. In any case, in the years following the council, the computational system that was worked out by the church of Alexandria came to be normative. It took a while for the Alexandrian rules to be adopted throughout Christian Europe, however. The 8-year cycle originally employed was replaced by — or by the time of — Augustalis's treatise on the measurement of Easter, after which Rome used his 84-year lunisolar calendar cycle until 457. It then switched to an adaptation by Victorius of the Alexandrian rules.
Because this Victorian cycle differed from the Alexandrian cycle in the dates of some of the Paschal Full Moons, and because it tried to respect the Roman custom of fixing Easter to the Sunday in the week of the 16th to the 22nd of the lunar month — rather than the 15th to the 21st as at Alexandria — by providing alternative "Latin" and "Greek" dates in some years, occasional differences in the date of Easter as fixed by Alexandrian rules continued. The Alexandrian rules were adopted in the West following the tables of Dionysius Exiguus in 525.
Early Christians in Britain and Ireland also used an 84-year cycle. From the 5th century onward this cycle set its equinox to March 25 and fixed Easter to the Sunday falling in the 14th to the 20th of the lunar month inclusive. This 84-year cycle was replaced by the Alexandrian method in the course of the 7th and 8th centuries. Churches in western continental Europe used a late Roman method until the late 8th century during the reign of Charlemagne, when they finally adopted the Alexandrian method. Since 1582, when the Catholic Church adopted the Gregorian calendar while most of Europe used the Julian calendar, the date on which Easter is celebrated has again differed.
The Greek island of Syros, whose population is divided almost equally between Catholics and Orthodox, is one of the few places where the two churches share a common date for Easter, with the Catholics accepting the Orthodox date — a practice helping considerably in maintaining good relations between the two communities.
Western Christianity
In Western Christianity, Easter is preceded by Lent, a period of fasting and penitence in preparation for Easter, which begins on Ash Wednesday and lasts 40 days not counting Sundays. The week before Easter, known as Holy Week, is very special in the Christian tradition. The Sunday before Easter is Palm Sunday, with the Wednesday before Easter being known as Spy Wednesday. The last three days before Easter are Maundy Thursday, Good Friday and Holy Saturday, sometimes referred to as Silent Saturday.
Palm Sunday, Maundy Thursday and Good Friday respectively commemorate Jesus's entry into Jerusalem, the Last Supper and the Crucifixion. Maundy Thursday, Good Friday, and Holy Saturday are sometimes referred to as the Easter Triduum which is Latin for "Three Days." Many churches begin celebrating Easter late in the evening of Holy Saturday at a service called the Easter Vigil.
The week beginning with Easter Sunday is called Easter Week or the Octave of Easter, and each day is prefaced with "Easter" e.g., Easter Monday (a public holiday in many countries), Easter Tuesday (a much less widespread public holiday), etc. Easter Saturday is therefore the Saturday after Easter Sunday. The day before Easter is properly called Holy Saturday. Eastertide or Paschaltide, the season of Easter, begins on Easter Sunday and lasts until the day of Pentecost, seven weeks later.
Eastern Christianity
In Eastern Christianity, the spiritual preparation for Easter begins with Great Lent, which starts on Clean Monday and lasts for 40 continuous days including Sundays. The last week of Great Lent — following the fifth Sunday of Great Lent — is called Palm Week and ends with Lazarus Saturday. The vespers which begin Lazarus Saturday officially brings Great Lent to a close, although the fast continues through the following week. After Lazarus Saturday comes Palm Sunday, Holy Week and finally Easter itself, and the fast is broken immediately after the Paschal Divine Liturgy.
The Paschal Vigil begins with the Midnight Office, which is the last service of the Lenten Triodion and is timed so that it ends a little before midnight on Holy Saturday night. At the stroke of midnight, the Paschal celebration itself begins, consisting of Paschal Matins, Paschal Hours and Paschal Divine Liturgy. Placing the Paschal Divine Liturgy at midnight guarantees that no Divine Liturgy will come earlier in the morning, ensuring its place as the pre-eminent "Feast of Feasts" in the liturgical year.
The liturgical season from Easter to the Sunday of All Saints — the Sunday after Pentecost — is known as the Pentecostarion or the "50 days." The week which begins on Easter Sunday is called Bright Week, during which there is no fasting, even on Wednesday and Friday. The Afterfeast of Easter lasts 39 days, with its Apodosis or leave-taking on the day before the Feast of the Ascension. Pentecost Sunday is the 50th day from Easter counted inclusively.
Liturgical observance – Western Christianity
The Easter festival is kept in many different ways among Western Christians. The traditional, liturgical observation of Easter, as practiced among Roman Catholics, Lutherans and some Anglicans begins on the night of Holy Saturday with the Easter Vigil which follows an ancient liturgy involving symbols of light, candles and water and numerous readings form the Old and New Testament.
Services continue on Easter Sunday and in a number of countries on Easter Monday. In parishes of the Moravian Church, as well as some other denominations such as the Methodist Church, there is a tradition of Easter sunrise services, often starting in cemetaries in remembrance of the Biblical narrative in the Gospels or other places in the open where the sunrise is visible.
In some traditions, Easter services typically begin with the Paschal greeting: "Christ is risen!" The response is: "He is risen indeed. Alleluia!"
Liturgical observance – Eastern Christianity
Eastern Catholics and Byzantine Rite Lutherans have a similar emphasis on Easter in their calendars, and many of their liturgical customs are very similar.
Preparation for Easter begins with the season of Great Lent, which begins on Clean Monday which refers to the leaving behind of sinful attitudes and non-fasting food. While the end of Lent is Lazarus Saturday, fasting does not end until Easter Sunday. The Orthodox service begins late Saturday evening, observing the Jewish tradition that evening is the start of liturgical holy days.
The church is darkened, then the priest lights a candle at midnight, representing the resurrection of Jesus Christ. Altar servers light additional candles, with a procession which moves three times around the church to represent the three days in the tomb. The service continues early into Sunday morning, with a feast to end the fasting. An additional service is held later that day on Easter Sunday.
Puritans
Many Puritans saw traditional feasts of the established Anglican Church, such as All Saints' Day and Easter, as an abomination. The Puritans’ rejection of Easter traditions was — and is — based partly upon their interpretation of 2 Corinthians 6:14-16 and partly upon a more general belief that, if a religious practice or celebration is not actually written in the Christian Bible, then that practice/celebration must be a later development and cannot be considered an authentic part of Christian practice or belief. So, it is at best simply unnecessary, at worst actually sinful.
Quakers
Members of the Religious Society of Friends or Quakers — as part of their historic testimony against times and seasons — do not celebrate or observe Easter or any traditional feast days of the established Church, believing instead that "every day is the Lord's day," and that elevation of one day above others suggests that it is acceptable to do un-Christian acts on other days. During the 17th and 18th centuries, Quakers were persecuted for this non-observance of Holy Days.
Restored Church of God and Free Presbyterian Church of Scotland
Groups such as the Restored Church of God and the Free Presbyterian Church of Scotland reject the celebration of Easter, seeing it as originating in a pagan spring festival taken over by the "Roman" Catholic Church.
Jehovah’s Witnesses
Jehovah’s Witnesses maintain a similar view, observing a yearly commemorative service of the Last Supper and the subsequent execution of Christ on the evening of Nisan 14 as they calculate the dates derived from the lunar Hebrew calendar. It is commonly referred to by many Witnesses as simply "The Memorial." Jehovah's Witnesses believe that such verses as Luke 22:19-20 and 1 Corinthians 11:26 constitute a commandment to remember the death of Christ though not the resurrection, and they do so on a yearly basis just as Passover is celebrated annually by the Jews.
Easter celebrations around the world
In the Nordic countries Good Friday, Easter Sunday and Easter Monday are public holidays, and Good Friday and Easter Monday are bank holidays. In Denmark, Iceland and Norway, Maundy Thursday is also a public holiday. It is a holiday for most workers, except those operating some shopping malls which keep open for a half-day. Many businesses give their employees almost a week off, called Easter break. Schools are closed between Palm Sunday and Easter Monday. According to a 2014 poll, 6 of 10 Norwegians travel during Easter, often to a countryside cottage; 3 of 10 said their typical Easter included skiing.
In the Netherlands, both Easter Sunday and Easter Monday are national holidays. Like first and second Christmas Day, they are both considered Sundays, which results in a first and a second Easter Sunday, after which the week continues to a Tuesday.
In Commonwealth nations, Easter Day is rarely a public holiday, as is the case for celebrations which fall on a Sunday. In the United Kingdom, both Good Friday and Easter Monday are bank holidays, except for Scotland, where only Good Friday is a bank holiday. In Canada, Easter Monday is a statutory holiday for federal employees. In the Canadian province of Quebec, either Good Friday or Easter Monday are statutory holidays, although most companies give both.
In Australia, because of its location in the southern hemisphere, Easter takes place in autumn. Hence, Australian Easter is associated with harvest time, rather than with the coming of spring as in the northern hemisphere. The religious aspect of Easter remains the same. Good Friday and Easter Monday are public holidays across all states and territories. "Easter Saturday" or the Saturday before Easter Sunday is a public holiday in every state except Tasmania and Western Australia, while Easter Sunday itself is a public holiday only in New South Wales. Easter Tuesday is additionally a conditional public holiday in Tasmania, varying between rulings, and was also a public holiday in Victoria until 1994.
In the United States, because Easter falls on a Sunday, which is already a non-working day for federal and state employees, it has not been designated as a federal or state holiday. Easter parades are held in many American cities, involving festive strolling processions.
Easter eggs
The egg is an ancient symbol of new life and rebirth. In Christianity it became associated with Jesus's crucifixion and resurrection. The custom of the Easter egg originated in the early Christian community of Mesopotamia, which stained eggs red in memory of the blood of Christ, shed at his crucifixion. As such, for Christians, the Easter egg is a symbol of the empty tomb. The oldest tradition is to use dyed chicken eggs, but a modern custom is to substitute decorated chocolate or plastic eggs filled with candy such as jellybeans; as many people give up sweets as their Lenten sacrifice, individuals enjoy them at Easter after having abstained from them during the preceding forty days of Lent.
Easter eggs are a widely popular symbol of new life in Poland and other Slavic countries' folk traditions. A batik-like decorating process known as pisanka produces intricate, brilliantly-colored eggs. The celebrated House of Fabergé workshops created exquisite jeweled Easter eggs for the Russian Imperial family from 1885 to 1916.
Manufacturing their first Easter egg in 1875, British chocolate company Cadbury sponsors the annual Easter egg hunt which takes place in over 250 National Trust locations in the United Kingdom. On Easter Monday, the President of the United States holds an annual Easter egg roll on the White House lawn for young children.
Easter bunny
In some traditions the children put out their empty baskets for the Easter bunny to fill while they sleep. They wake to find their baskets filled with candy eggs and other treats.
A custom originating in Germany, the Easter bunny is a popular legendary anthropomorphic Easter gift-giving character analogous to Santa Claus in American culture. Many children around the world follow the tradition of coloring hard-boiled eggs and giving baskets of candy. Historically, foxes, cranes and storks were also sometimes named as the mystical creatures. Since the rabbit is a pest in Australia, the Easter bilby is available as an alternative.
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