“When the LORD your God cuts off before you the nations which you
are going in to dispossess, and you dispossess them and dwell in
their land, beware that you are not ensnared to follow them, after
they are destroyed before you, and that you do not inquire after
their gods, saying, 'How do these nations serve their gods, that I
also may do likewise?' You shall not behave thus toward the LORD
your God, for every abominable act which the LORD hates they have
done for their gods; for they even burn their sons and daughters in
the fire to their gods. Whatever I command you, you shall be
careful to do; you shall not add to nor take away from it”
(Deuteronomy 12:29-32).
God warned us - Israel then, Christians now - not to adopt pagan
customs. However, we have chosen not to heed God’s warning. Many
traditional Christian doctrines and celebrations - such as going to
heaven or hell when we die, the immortality of the soul, and
Christmas - are rooted in paganism. So is Easter.
“Easter, a Christian festival, embodies many pre-Christian
traditions. The origin of its name is unknown. Scholars, however,
accepting the derivation proposed by the 8th-century English scholar
St. Bede, believe it probably comes from Ēastre, the
Anglo-Saxon name of a Teutonic goddess of spring and fertility, to
whom was dedicated a month corresponding to April. Her festival was
celebrated on the day of the vernal equinox; traditions associated
with the festival survive in the Easter rabbit, a symbol of
fertility, and in colored Easter eggs, originally painted with
bright colors to represent the sunlight of spring, and used in
Easter-egg rolling contests or given as gifts” (MSN Encarta, article
on Easter).
Easter eggs, the Easter bunny, the Easter fire, and the word Easter
itself: what do they have in common? They originated in paganism,
as the Catholic encyclopedia admits:
a)Easter eggs: “Because the use of eggs was forbidden during
Lent, they were brought to the table on Easter Day, colored red to
symbolize the Easter joy. This custom is found not only in the Latin
but also in the Oriental Churches. The symbolic meaning of a new
creation of mankind by Jesus risen from the dead was probably an
invention of later times. The custom may have its origin in
paganism, for a great many pagan customs, celebrating the return of
spring, gravitated to Easter. The egg is the emblem of the
germinating life of early spring.”
b)Easter bunny: “The Easter Rabbit lays the eggs, for which
reason they are hidden in a nest or in the garden. The rabbit is
a pagan symbol and has always been an emblem of fertility.”
c)Easter fire: “The Easter Fire is lit on the top of mountains
(Easter mountain, Osterberg) and must be kindled from new
fire, drawn from wood by friction (nodfyr); this is a
custom of pagan origin in vogue all over Europe, signifying the
victory of spring over winter.”
The word Easter is derived from “Eostre, a Saxon goddess celebrated
at the spring equinox” (The Oxford Companion to the Bible, pg.
173). Eostre is also known as Ostara. “In ancient Anglo-Saxon
myth, Ostara is the personification of the rising sun. In that
capacity she is associated with the spring and is considered to be a
fertility goddess. She is the friend of all children and to amuse
them she changed her pet bird into a rabbit. This rabbit brought
forth brightly colored eggs, which the goddess gave to the children
as gifts. From her name and rites the festival of Easter is derived”
(Encyclopedia Mythica).
The
Easter egg, bunny and fire, and the word Easter, are pagan. Is it
too farfetched to assume that the Easter celebration is also pagan?
The Bible does not contain the word “Easter.” Moreover, the Easter
celebration remembers Jesus’ resurrection (on the wrong day, by the
way). But Jesus commanded His disciples, then and now, to
observeHis death until He returns. God commands us to
remember Jesus’ death, and hence the reason for His sacrifice (our
sins), during the Passover season. “For Christ our Passover also has
been sacrificed” (I Corinthians 5:7). Why, then, do we celebrate
Easter? Why not Passover?
More on the pagan origins of Easter
“What means
the term Easter itself? It is not a Christian name….Easter is
nothing else than Astarte, one of the titles of Beltis, the queen of
heaven” (Alexander Hislop, The Two Babylons, pg. 103).
Hislop also demonstrates that many Easter customs, including hot
cross buns, are pagan.
Lent is a forty-day period of fasting, prayer and penitence
before Easter. Lent, too, is pagan: “The forty days' abstinence of
Lent was directly borrowed from the worshippers of the Babylonian
goddess. Such a Lent of forty days, `in the spring of the year,' is
still observed by the Yezidis or pagan devil-worshippers of
Koordistan, who have inherited it from their early masters, the
Babylonians. Such a Lent of forty days was held in the spring by the
pagan Mexicans, for thus we read in Humboldt [Mexican Researches,
v. i. P. 404] where he gives account of Mexican observances:
`Three days after the vernal equinox…began a solemn fast of forty
days in honor of the sun.' Such a Lent of forty days was
observed in Egypt, as may be seen on consulting Wilkinson's
Egyptians. This Egyptian Lent of forty days, we are informed by
Landseer, in his Sabean Researches, was held expressly in
commemoration of Adonis or Osiris, the great mediatorial god" (The
Two Babylons, pg. 105).
There’s no doubt about it: the roots of Easter are pagan. God
commands us to not keep pagan customs. Why, then, do we keep
Easter?
The Early Church
“The divine
authority of Moses and the prophets was admitted, and even
established, as the firmest basis of Christianity” (Edward Gibbon,
The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire, Volume 1, pg.
451). In his magisterial history of the decline of the Roman Empire
until the fall of Constantinople in 1452, Gibbon includes a succinct
and insightful history of the early centuries of Christianity. He
affirms what most scholars believe, and indeed, what the Bible
states: early Christians were considered a sect of Judaism.
The earliest Christians kept the law of God as found in the first
five books of Moses. They observed the holy days and festivals of
God. They did not observe Easter and Christmas; those celebrations,
which are rooted in paganism, arrived centuries later. Jesus
Himself validated the law and holy days of God: “Do not think that
I came to abolish the Law or the Prophets; I did not come to abolish
but to fulfill. For truly I say to you, until heaven and earth
pass away, not the smallest letter or stroke shall pass from the
Law until all is accomplished. Whoever then annuls one of the least
of these commandments, and teaches others to do the same, shall be
called least in the kingdom of heaven; but whoever keeps and teaches
them, he shall be called great in the kingdom of heaven” (Matthew
5:17-19).
Heaven and earth have not passed away. According to Jesus, neither
have God’s laws and holy days (including the seventh-day Sabbath).
Man, however, has ignored Jesus’ teachings and replaced them with
worldly traditions. “See to it that no one takes you captive
through philosophy and empty deception, according to the
tradition of men, according to the elementary principles of the
world, rather than according to Christ” (Colossians 2:8).
What happened?
The divergence of
early Christianity from God’s laws and holy days took a long time.
“The first fifteen bishops of Jerusalem were all circumcised Jews;
and the congregation over which they presided united the law of
Moses with the doctrine of Christ (emphasis mine)….But when
numerous and opulent societies were established in the great cities
of the empire, in Antioch, Alexandria, Ephesus, Corinth, and Rome,
the reverence which Jerusalem had inspired to all the Christian
colonies insensibly diminished. The Jewish converts, or as they
were afterward called, the Nazarenes, who had laid the
foundations of the church soon found themselves overwhelmed by the
increasing multitudes, that from all the various religions of
polytheism inlisted (sic) under the banner of Christ” (Decline and
Fall of the Roman Empire, vol. 1, pg. 453).
Luke
records that Roman and Jewish authorities labeled the apostle Paul
as a leader of this sect of the Nazarenes: “For we have found this
man a real pest and a fellow who stirs up dissension among all the
Jews throughout the world, and a ringleader of the sect of the
Nazarenes” (Acts 24:5). These Nazarenes (or earliest Christians)
believed not in the destruction of God’s laws, holy days, and
festivals. Instead, they clung to the belief in the validity and
permanence of God’s laws, holy days and festivals (Matthew
5:17-19).
The Roman and Jewish authorities considered the Nazarenes (or
earliest Christians) to be a sect because they believed that Jesus
had fulfilled the role of the prophesied Messiah. That was the main
difference between the earliest Christians and other Jews. (Other
differences involved the role of Mosaic Law in salvation and the
sacrificial system.)
During
the second half of the first century, the Jewish people in Judea
revolted against Roman rule. Josephus is our primary source for the
first Jewish revolt of 66-70 AD. He describes their unhappy ending
during the siege of Jerusalem by the Roman general Titus (son of
Roman Emperor Vespasian). “But when they went in numbers into the
lanes of the city, with their swords drawn, they slew those whom
they overtook, without mercy, and set fire to the houses wither the
Jews were fled, and burnt every soul in them, and laid waste a great
many of the rest; and when they were come to the houses to plunder
them, they found in them entire families of dead men, and the upper
rooms full of dead corpses, that is of such as died by the famine;
they then stood in a horror at this sight, and went out without
touching anything. But although they had this commiseration for such
as were destroyed in that manner, yet had they not the same for
those that were still alive, but they ran every one through whom
they met with, and obstructed the very lanes with their dead bodies,
and made the whole city run down with blood, to such a degree indeed
that the fire of many of the houses was quenched with these men's
blood. And truly so it happened, that though the slayers left off at
the evening, yet did the fire greatly prevail in the night, and as
all was burning, came that eighth day of the month Gorpieus [Elul]
upon Jerusalem; a city that had been liable to so many miseries
during the siege, that, had it always enjoyed as much happiness from
its first foundation, it would certainly have been the envy of the
world” (Josephus, War of the Jews, Book 6).
The
Romans sacked Jerusalem, killing many of its inhabitants and
destroying the Herodian temple in which Jews worshipped. “The ruin
of the temple, of the city, and of the public religion of the Jews,
was severely felt by the Nazarene” (Decline and Fall of the Roman
Empire, vol. 1, pg. 453). In the aftermath of this revolt, the
Roman Emperor renamed Jerusalem Aelia Capitolina, and ordered
a general persecution against the Jewish religion. In order to
escape persecution, the Nazarenes appointed a gentile bishop to lead
them. This bishop convinced many of them to renounce Mosaic Law and
the holy days and festivals found in Leviticus 23. However, some
Nazarenes did not comply with this order. “The name of Nazarenes
was deemed too honourable for those Christian Jews, and they soon
received from the supposed poverty of their understanding, as well
as of their condition, the contemptuous epithet of Ebionites.
In a few years after the return of the church of Jerusalem, it
became a matter of doubt and controversy, whether a man who
sincerely acknowledged Jesus as the Messiah, but who still
continued to observe the law of Moses, could possibly hope for
salvation” (ibid, pg. 455, emphasis mine).
The
Nazarenes (or Ebionites) melted into obscurity: “The unfortunate
Ebionites, rejected from one religion as apostates, and from the
other as heretics, found themselves compelled to assume a more
decided character; and although some traces of that obsolete sect
may be discovered as late as the fourth century, they insensibly
melted away either into the church or the synagogue” (ibid, pg.
455).
The
separation of church and the synagogue (or more aptly, Christians
from God’s laws, holy days and festivals) was almost complete by
the end of the first century. Then, in 135 AD, a false messiah
named Bar Kochba led a second revolt against Roman rule. “The one
thing that does happen in the second revolt, though, is [that] the
self-consciously apocalyptic and messianic identity of Bar Kochba
forces the issue for the Christian tradition. It appears that some
people in the second revolt tried to press other Jews, including
Christians, into the revolt, saying, ‘Come join us to fight against
the Romans. You believe God is going to restore the kingdom to
Israel, don't you? Join us.’ But the Christians by this time are
starting to say, "No, he can't be the messiah -- we already have
one." And at that point we really see the full-fledged separation of
Jewish tradition and Christian tradition becoming clear” (from
Jews and the Ancient World, companion text from the PBS
Frontline special, From Jesus to Christ, a portrait of Jesus’
world.
How Easter replaced the Passover
The earliest
Christians kept the law of God, including the holy days and
festivals that begin with Passover and the Feast of Unleavened Bread
(Leviticus 23). We have seen how the forces of history led later
Christians to renounce Mosaic Law and God’s festivals and holy
days. These laws (such as the seventh-day Sabbath) and holy days
and festivals were considered too Jewish, and no one wanted
to be associated with the persecuted Jews in the last half and first
half of the first and second centuries. Therefore, they sought
replacements; hence the creation of Easter and Christmas as
replacements for Passover and the Feast of Tabernacles.
The
latent paganism of the gentile converts also contributed to the
gradual renunciation of God’s laws, holy days, and festivals, as
found in the Old Testament.
Still, in the fourth century, some plucky Christians celebrated
Passover and not Easter. “Churches celebrating Pascha (Passover) on
14 Nisan, known as Quartodecimans…were a minority” (Encyclopedia of
Catholicism, pg. 438). This reminds us of Jesus’ prediction that the
“gates of Hades,” of the grave, will never prevail over the Church.
To this day, a relative few Christians keep the Passover and other
holy days of God.
Why do most Christians refuse to observe God’s annual Holy Days?
Millions of
Christians, and specifically their pastors and leaders, refuse to
observe the holy days and festivals of God. Centuries of tradition
rooted in paganism have buried God’s truth. These sincere
Christians are unaware of what the holy days and festivals mean.
They are not Jewish holy days and festivals. “And the LORD
spoke to Moses, saying,"Speak to the children of Israel,
and say to them: The feasts of the LORD, which you shall proclaim to
be holy convocations, these are My feasts” (Leviticus
23:1-2). They are God’s holy days and feasts.
Sure, the holy days and festivals of God were first centered on
Israel. But the holy days and festivals represent many things. They
teach us about the past. They teach us about the future. They’re
symbolic. They are signs between God and His people: “You shall
surely observe My Sabbaths; for this is a sign between Me and
you throughout your generations, that you may know that I am the
LORD who sanctifies you” (Exodus 31:13). Not the Sabbath, but the
plural “Sabbaths,” which encompass the seventh-day Sabbath
and the Holy Days. (God says that we must refrain from working
on the holy days; they are thus considered Sabbaths, or days of
rest.)
These holy days and festivals point to Jesus Christ:
1Passover: Jesus is the Passover lamb which was slain for us;
2Festival of Unleavened Bread: Jesus was unleavened.
Biblically, leaven symbolizes sin. Jesus referred to Himself as the
“bread which came down from heaven.” Jesus was sinless, or
unleavened;
3Festival of the Firstfruits (alternately called Feast of Weeks,
later known as Pentecost): Jesus is the First of the
firstfruits of God, and Christians are also called firstfruits who
receive God’s Holy Spirit, which was first made available in a
transformative way on the first Day of Pentecost (Acts 2);
4The Memorial of Blowing of Trumpets heralds the return of
Jesus to the earth;
5The Day of Atonement depicts Jesus’ atoning sacrifice on our
behalf (and the binding of Satan for one thousand years following
the return of Jesus);
6The Feast of Tabernacles represents Jesus ‘tabernacling’ in
the flesh for 33.5 years, and He was probably born on the first day
of the Feast of Tabernacles; and
7The Last Great Day foreshadows Jesus as Judge in the judgment
period of the second resurrection.(When all those who have not known
Christ will have an opportunity for salvation.)
Since the holy days and festivals (collectively referred to as
Sabbaths in Exodus 31:13) are Christ-centered, and since they are
“signs” between God and His people, why have millions of mainstream
Christians unwittingly replaced these sacred days and festivals with
pagan Easter and Christmas?
The First Passover
The first Passover
was unique. Subsequent Passovers remembered the events that
occurred during that first Passover: the death of the Egyptian
firstborn; the saving blood of the sacrificial lamb that spared the
Israelite households from a similar fate; the exodus from Egypt.
The Israelites were slaves in Egypt . Knowledge of God’s laws, the
seventh-day Sabbath, and the annual seasons, became lost during that
time. The Israelites accepted Egyptian gods and philosophy, and
were thus ignorant of God’s laws and holy calendar.
Enough was enough: God chose to deliver the Israelites from
bondage. At that time He began to reveal His annual holy days and
their importance: “Now the LORD spoke to Moses and Aaron in the land
of Egypt, saying, ‘This month shall be your beginning of
months; it shall be the first month of the year to you’” (Exodus
12:1-2). This month, called Abib (Exodus 13:4) and later Nisan
(Nehemiah 2:1), was the beginning of God’s holy calendar.
God instructed the Israelites to sacrifice a spotless lamb and put
its blood on their doorposts. This happened during the afternoon of
the fourteenth day of Abib. During the early portion of the
fifteenth day of Nisan, the death angel passed over these Israelite
houses on his way to kill the firstborn of the Egyptian households.
Later in the day the Israelites began to leave Egypt; destination:
the land promised to Abraham’s descendants.
God chose to save His people - the descendants of Abraham, Isaac,
and Jacob - and to establish them as His nation. They endured forty
subsequent years of trial and testing in the Sinai wilderness. The
older generation - everyone twenty years and older at the time of
the Exodus - failed that trial. They bickered constantly and on
several occasions expressed their desire to return to Egypt.
Eventually God enabled their children, the second generation, to
enter the promised land.
The Old Testament Passover reminded the Israelites that God passed
over their houses and struck the firstborn of Egypt, which provoked
the Pharaoh to release them from their bondage. The Feast of
Unleavened Bread reminded them about their exodus from Egypt.
The Old Testament Passover season (Passover day and the ensuing
seven festival days of Unleavened Bread) had great spiritual
significance, with respect to the plan of God. The land of Egypt
represents this evil world over which the Christian must overcome.
Just as the Israelites were actual slaves, we are slaves to our
passions and carnal natures, and to the institutions, religions, and
customs of this world.
The older generation perished in the wilderness. This typifies the
death of our “old man”(Ephesians 4:22), which dies in the baptismal
waters: “Or do you not know that as many of us as were baptized into
Christ Jesus were baptized into His death?Therefore we
were buried with Him through baptism into death, that just as Christ
was raised from the dead by the glory of the Father, even so we also
should walk in newness of life” (Romans 6:3-4). The blood of the
sacrificial and spotless lamb saved the ancient Israelites from
death. Likewise, “for even Christ ourPassover is
sacrificed for us: our Passover Lamb has been killed for us” (I
Corinthians 5:7).
The New Testament Passover
Jesus had always
kept the Passover. “His parents went to Jerusalem every year at the
Feast of the Passover.And when He was twelve years old,
they went up to Jerusalem according to the custom of the feast.When they had finished the days, as they returned, the Boy
Jesus lingered behind in Jerusalem. And Joseph and His mother did
not know it” (Luke 2:41-43). However, He missed the traditional
Passover celebration of the last year of His life. He was
the Passover sacrifice in that year.
His last meal, several hours before the traditional Passover lamb
was slain, is recorded in the four Gospels. Here is John’s account:
“Now before the Feast of the Passover, when Jesus knew that His hour
had come that He should depart from this world to the Father, having
loved His own who were in the world, He loved them to the end. And
supper being ended, the devil having already put it into the heart
of Judas Iscariot, Simon's son, to betray Him,Jesus,
knowing that the Father had given all things into His hands, and
that He had come from God and was going to God,rose from
supper and laid aside His garments, took a towel and girded
Himself. After that, He poured water into a basin and began to wash
the disciples' feet, and to wipe them with the towel with which He
was girded.Then He came to Simon Peter. And Peter said
to Him, ‘Lord, are You washing my feet?’ Jesus answered and said to
him, ‘What I am doing you do not understand now, but you will know
after this.’ Peter said to Him, ‘You shall never wash my feet!’
Jesus answered him, ‘If I do not wash you, you have no part with
Me.’ Simon Peter said to Him, ‘Lord, not my feet only, but also my
hands and my head!’ Jesus said to him, ‘He who is bathed needs only
to wash his feet, but is completely clean; and you are clean, but
not all of you.’ For He knew who would betray Him; therefore He
said, ‘You are not all clean.’ So when He had washed their feet,
taken His garments, and sat down again, He said to them, ‘Do you
know what I have done to you?You call Me Teacher and
Lord, and you say well, for so I am.If I then, your
Lord and Teacher, have washed your feet, you also ought to wash one
another's feet.For I have given you an example, that you
should do as I have done to you” (John 13:1-15)
In addition, during the meal Jesus introduced the symbols of the
bread and wine. “And as they were eating, Jesus took bread, blessed
and broke it, and gave it to the disciples and said, ‘Take, eat;
this is My body.’ Then He took the cup, and gave thanks, and gave it
to them, saying, ‘Drink from it, all of you.For this is
My blood of the new covenant, which is shed for many for the
remission of sins.But I say to you, I will not drink of
this fruit of the vine from now on until that day when I drink it
new with you in My Father's kingdom” (Matthew 26:26-29).
The unleavened bread became symbolic of Jesus’ broken body on the
stake, and the wine of His shed blood for the remission of sins.
As with the first Passover, this event was unique.
“For indeed Christ, our Passover, was sacrificed for us”
Jesus became our Passover. He is the Passover. When we eat the
unleavened bread and drink the wine, we’re celebrating not the Old
Covenant Passover, but the New Covenant Passover. “Therefore purge
out the old leaven, that you may be a new lump, since you truly are
unleavened. For indeed Christ, our Passover, was sacrificed for us.
Therefore let us keep the feast (of Unleavened Bread), not with old
leaven, nor with the leaven of malice and wickedness, but with the
unleavened bread of sincerity and truth” (I Corinthians 5: 7-8).
Paul urged the Corinthians, and is urging us, to observe the
Passover and Feast of Unleavened Bread not in commemoration of the
original Passover and Exodus, but in remembrance of Jesus’ sacrifice
for us. (Paul urged a gentile church - the Corinthians were located
in Corinth, Greece - to observe holy days and festivals first
mentioned in the Old Testament. This confirms that the laws, holy
days and festivals were not nailed to the stake, commonly referred
to as the “cross.”)
God
commanded Israel to eat unleavened bread for seven consecutive days
during the Feast of Unleavened Bread. Despite the original
injunction’s relation to the Exodus, there is unmistakable spiritual
significance in eating unleavened bread after commemorating Jesus’
death on Passover. “‘No one can come to Me unless the Father who
sent Me draws him; and I will raise him up at the last day.It is written in the prophets, And they shall all be taught by
God.' Therefore everyone who has heard and learned from the Father
comes to Me.Not that anyone has seen the Father, except
He who is from God; He has seen the Father.Most
assuredly, I say to you, he who believes in Me has everlasting life.I am the bread of life.Your fathers ate the
manna in the wilderness, and are dead.This is the
bread which comes down from heaven, that one may eat of it and
not die.I am the living bread which came down from
heaven. If anyone eats of this bread, he will live forever; and the
bread that I shall give is My flesh, which I shall give for the life
of the world.’ The Jews therefore quarreled among themselves,
saying, ‘How can this Man give us His flesh to eat?’ Then Jesus
said to them, ‘Most assuredly, I say to you, unless you eat the
flesh of the Son of Man and drink His blood, you have no life in
you.Whoever eats My flesh and drinks My blood has
eternal life, and I will raise him up at the last day.
For My flesh is food indeed, and My blood is drink indeed.He who eats My flesh and drinks My blood abides in Me, and I
in him.As the living Father sent Me, and I live because
of the Father, so he who feeds on Me will live because of Me.This is the bread which came down from heaven--not as your
fathers ate the manna, and are dead. He who eats this bread will
live forever” (John 6:44-58).
Leaven represents sin. Jesus was our Passover, and He commands us to
commemorate His death by eating unleavened bread and drinking wine.
By eating unleavened bread on that day, and during the ensuing Feast
of Unleavened Bread, we’re remembering Jesus as our unleavened, or
sinless, sacrificial lamb. And because leaven represents sin, we’re
also remembering to put sin out of our lives, just as we put
physical leaven (symbolic of sin) out of our households.
The necessity of observing Passover, or rather, the Lord’s Supper
Every year God’s people assemble on the fourteenth day of Nisan,
after sunset and the end of the thirteenth day. We assemble in
commemoration of Jesus’ last supper. Jesus was unable to have that
last traditional Passover meal because He became the sacrificial
Passover lamb several hours after His last supper. Technically, we
don’t keep the Passover because Jesus has become our Passover.
Instead, we observe the Lord's Supper.
This observance is the event of the year. It’s the annual festival
that points to the way of salvation: acceptance of the broken body
and shed blood of Jesus our Passover. Without such acceptance,
we’re without hope. Therefore, if you believe in the necessity for
salvation, you must keep the Lord’s Supper every year, on the
beginning of the fourteenth day of the first month in the Hebraic
calendar, which corresponds to our March or April. You must also
keep the ensuing Feast of Unleavened Bread, which lasts seven days.
There is no alternative.
Footnote:
Acts 12:4
"And when he had
apprehended him, he put him in prison, and delivered him to four
quaternions of soldiers to keep him; intending after Easter
to bring him forth to the people.
[Four quaternions
of soldiers] That is, sixteen, or four companies of four men each,
who had the care of the prison, each company taking in turn one of
the four watches of the night.
[Intending after
Easter to bring him forth] Meta (NT:3326) to (NT:3588) pascha
(NT:3957), After the Passover. Perhaps there never was a more
unhappy, not to say absurd, translation than that in our text..."
(Adam Clark Commentary)
The term Easter,
inserted here by OUR translators, (emphasis mine) they
borrowed from the ancient Anglo-Saxon service-books, or from the
version of the Gospels, which always translates the (NT:3588)
pascha (NT:3957) of the Greek by this term; e.g. Matt 26:2: Ye know
that after two days is the feast of the Passover. The
Anglo-Saxon has: "Wite ge that aefter twam dagum beoth Eastro."
Matt 26:19: And they made ready the Passover. The Anglo-Saxon
has: "And hig gegearwodon hym Easter thenunga" (i.e. the
paschal supper). Prefixed to Matt 28:1, are these words in
Anglo-Saxon: "This part to be read on Easter even(ing)." And,
before Acts 12:8, some similar words. Mark 14:12: "And the first day
of unleavened bread when they killed the Passover." The
Anglo-Saxon has: "And tham forman daege azimorum, tha hi Eastron
offrodon." Other examples occur in this version. Wycliff used the
word "paske", i.e. Passover; but Tyndale, Coverdale,
Becke, and Cardmarden, following the old Saxon mode of translation,
insert "Easter": the Geneva Bible very properly renders it
the "Passover". There are several Saxon spellings of the name
of the goddess Easter, whose festival was celebrated by our
pagan forefathers in the month of April; hence, that month, in the
Saxon calender, is called "Easter month". Every view we can
take of this subject shows the gross impropriety of retaining a name
every way exceptionable, and palpably absurd. (Adam Clark
Commentary).
Regarding this
same verse Jamieson, Fausset and Brown Commentary states, "Intending
after Easter, [meta (NT:3326) ta (NT:3588) pascha
(NT:3957)] - it should be, 'after the Passover:' that is,
after the conclusion of the festival. (The word employed in our King
James Version being an ecclesiastical term of later date, is
improperly used here.)
(from Jamieson,
Fausset, and Brown Commentary, Electronic Database. Copyright (c)
1997 by Biblesoft)
It is quite
evident that the term Easter is a mistranslation inserted by
translators. The Greek word used here in this verse is pascha
andshould be rendered Passover. Does it not make
you wonder why these two words were interchanged? A brief study of
the words Ishtar, Astarte, Ashtoreth or even Easter should
give you the answer.
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