SPECIAL FEATURE: PESSAH AND EASTER
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The Shabbat HaGadol [The Great Shabbat]
This time of redemption becomes more significant in the days that precede the Feast of the Feasts or Pessah itself. The past Shabbat, which began on Friday April 11th, 2003 � 9 de Nisan 5763, was this year�s Shabbat HaGadol, the Great Shabbat. It is said that the very first sacrifice of Pessah offered by the Jews before they left Egypt was on a Wednesday. Therefore, it is considered that the Jews were commanded by God to set aside a lamb for the sacrifice, one per household. Thus this day is considered as the prefiguration of all the miracles that were shown during the time of Pessah. There is a kind of celebration in advance of the entire feast. And in the course of the development of the liturgical prayers, the psalms which were originally read throughout the year were not read anymore, but one started � as still nowadays � to read the Haggadah, i.e. the account of the Liberation from slavery.
It should be noted that the same appears in the Orthodox tradition : as we explained in the Readings of Lazarus Saturday, the Church readily sings the Resurrection of our Lord as it does throughout the Lenten period by the Halleluiah acclamation.
The Sacrifice of the Lamb is shown in advance by the Readings proposed by the Church on the Sunday before the Lazarus Palm Days. They do lead to the death of the Lord but stress His Resurrection from the Dead. The same is also expressed by the Shabbat HaGadol : the Jews �had the nerve� after 4 generations of slaves to answer to the Egyptian rulers : �Our God told us to offer the Lamb to Him, as a sacrifice of thankgiving and release�.
At the beginning of each Divine Liturgy, the deacon or the priest incense the altar and recalls what is sung in the Paschal Hours : � In the grave bodily; in Hades [Sheol, Hell, Gey Hinnom] with Your soul, though You were God�. Which continues as follows in the Hours : In Paradise with the Thief. And on the Throne with the Father and the Spirit were You Who fill all things, O Christ, the Uncircumscribable.
Lazarus� death and coming out of the grave shows also at the time of the Shabbat HaGadol in a specific way. Who were those who were lying in the huge Valley of the Dry Bones? Ezekiel is told to recount the Exodus of some members of the Children of Israel, before due time! It is said that the Sons of Ephraim and Manashe wanted to �accelerate the process� and perished, vanquish as bones in the wilderness.
Each day leading to both the Jewish Pessah and Christian Paskha [Easter] is a pedagogical way taking into account this challenge to be obedient to God�s Will and His Calls. On the one side : our own will even to be trustful to God�s Commandments, on the other side : our lack of obedience. And even more : we think that we are obedient and may then miss the �due time� of Redemption.
We enter this week into the Jewish time of Pessah and the Christian period of Paskha [Aramaic, Greek, most of Eastern languages, in English Easter to be distinguished from the Hebrew Feast of Passover.
Why is it so important to recall the connection which exists between the two Feasts? It appears to be as a twofold Time Table of the Greatest Event of Salvation which remains separate for this time of our history. On the other hand, it is not possible to make a total separation or distinction between these two Feasts.
All Churches have expressed these link through progressive rejection of the Jewish Feast of Pessah. But all of them consider, since the establishment of the date of the Feast at the Nicea Council [325], that the reference date for the computing of the Christian Easter Feast remains the Jewish day, in full accordance with the pending Jewish calendar which underwent various changes in the first Christian centuries. Therefore, it is still possible to consider that all the Churches, especially the Orthodox, Catholic and Protestant Congregations recognise the starting date as happening on the 14th day of the Spring Month of Nisan.
Thus, before the decision taken at the Nice Council in 325, most Christians admitted that the celebration of the Resurrection of Jesus Christ as true God and true Man had to be celebrated on the same day as Pessah, because on that very Day of Salvation, the Pessah Feast and order [seder] introduced to the Mystery of the fulfillment of all the Promises accomplished in our Lord.
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