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SHOULD CHRISTIANS
OBSERVE EASTER? To
millions of professing, churchgoing Christians, “Easter" is one of the
chief religious festivals. But what do eggs, rabbits, new clothing, sunrise
services, and hot cross buns have to do with If you're like the average person, the answer is probably
"never". Millions of sincere, churchgoing, professing Christians excitedly
arise in the pitch-black hours well before dawn on Easter Sunday morning,
hustle the kids out of bed, enjoy a quick breakfast, and bundle into the car
for a drive to a nearby mountaintop, outdoor bowl, huge cathedral, or small
countryside church. They are going to an "Easter sunrise service." At the precise moment of sunrise, the priest or minister may
likely turn toward the east, extending both hands in a supplicate gesture,
heralding the dawn of "Easter Sunday," and ask all of the audience
to pray as they face the rising sun in the east. While many of the less devout do not bother to arise early
enough to go to an actual sunrise service, it is a well-known celebration,
attended by millions in nations around the world. Why? These many professing Christians suppose they are gathering
together to commemorate the anniversary of the precise moment Have you ever researched the question for yourself? Have you
ever asked yourself why you do some of the things you do? Have you ever
looked up "Lent" in the history books or encyclopedias? Have you
ever wondered why fasts, drunken ribaldry, drug-induced chaos, vandalism, and
crime punctuate such pre-Easter celebrations as "Mardi Gras"? Have
you ever heard friends joke about their "Lenten fast," giving up
chewing gum or asparagus? Surely you remember the gaiety of Easter time; the projects
you were given in the first elementary years of school, fashioning little
gaily decorated baskets of paper and decorating them with paper "straw",
and jelly beans shaped like Easter eggs. Probably, as a child, you dyed
Easter eggs, engaged in Easter egg hunts, ate little chocolate bunnies, and
perhaps even gathered around a bonfire, singing and dancing in the streets.
Certainly you recall seeing old motion picture news reports or television
coverage of the famous "Easter Parade" in WHAT DOES EASTER MEAN? What is Easter"? Is it the opposite of "Wester"? Does it have something to do with one of
the points of the compass, or the Let's see what some of the historians tell us: Easter: The English term, according to the Van. "That the apostolic fathers do not mention it and that we
first hear of it principally through the controversy of the Quartodecimans
are purely accidental" (The Catholic Encyclopedia, article
"Easter," emphasis added). In a sense, we are dealing with a "hostile witness"
in this quotation, for the Catholic Church fully supports Easter. Therefore,
it is doubly important to note that The Catholic Encyclopedia admits the
"apostolic fathers" (including As we will see later, it is equally important that they admit
we first hear of it during a controversy of the "Quartodecimans." Now notice another important historical authority: "Easter: The annual festival observed throughout
Christendom in commemoration of the resurrection of "There is no indication of the observance of the Easter
festival in the New Testament, or in the writings of the apostolic fathers. "The first Christians continued to observe the Jewish
festivals, though in a new spirit, as commemorations of events which those
festivals had foreshadowed. Thus the Passover, with a new conception added to
it of Christ as the true paschal lamb and the first fruits from the dead,
continued to be observed, and became the 'Christian Easter'" (The
Encyclopedia Britannica, eleventh edition, emphasis added). Note well that this eminent history (the eleventh edition was
the last edition of the Britannica to include theological history) admits
that the celebration of Easter is not mentioned in the New Testament; that it
was not observed by the early apostles, and was clearly a later addition to
what has been called the "Christian church." This later addition is reflected in ACTS 12:4 of the King
James Version, where the term pascha is erroneously
translated "Easter." The term means Passover, not
"Easter," and is so rendered by all modern English translations. Just how Easter was adopted into the visible church, and how
it became called " Now, notice what an American high school level encyclopedia
has to say: "Easter is a Christian festival that celebrates the
resurrection of "In most countries, Easter comes in early spring, at a
time when green grass and warm sunshine begin to push aside the ice and snow
of winter. Its name may have come from Eostre, a
Teutonic goddess of spring, or from the Teutonic festival of spring, Eostar [pronounced "Easter"]. "Christians everywhere celebrate Easter with great
rejoicing. In many areas, children collect candy and chocolate bunnies, and
hunt colorful Easter eggs. Many persons wear new spring clothes to church on
Easter" (World Book encyclopedia, article "Easter,"
emphasis added). The Encyclopedia Americana says: "Easter is a convergence
of three traditions, (1) Pagan. According to the Very early after being rescued from slavery and established as
a new nation under God's own laws, the Israelites turned to the idolatrous
customs and practices of neighboring nations. "And the children of Israel did evil in the
sight of the Eternal, and served Baalim
[which means "many gods"; the term baal
merely meant "lord"]: And they forsook the Lord God of their
fathers, which brought them out of the land of Egypt, and followed other
gods, of the gods of the people that were round about them, and bowed
themselves unto them, and provoked the Lord to anger. And they forsook the
Eternal and served Baal and Ashtaroth"
(JUDGES
The pagan Zidonians, the
Philistines, Moabites, Edomites, and other
surrounding tribes served the same gods and goddessessometimes
manifested in different ways. One of the prominent features (also adopted by sinning
Israelites) was the worship of the goddess " Notice: "The children of The worship of the upright pales, or phallic symbols, was
closely associated with the worship of other forms of the procreation of
life. The whole festival at springtime, in the minds of the ancient
pagans, was closely allied to the midwinter festivals when pagans implored
their sun god to begin his northern journey once again, bringing back the
warming rays of the sun and hastening spring, when new life would once again
spring forth. When this was an accomplished fact, the heathens used the
symbols of eggs, which they worshiped as a miraculous source of life;
rabbits, as the most rapidly procreating domestic animal; and lit fires in
order to bake cakes in sacrifice to the "queen of heaven" (Semiramis), the "Diana of the Ephesians," who
was viewed as the goddess of sex and fertility. Almighty God said He hated this imagery and idolatry, and
called all such ceremonies of the pagans great
abominations! Read EZEKIEL 8! In this shocking
chapter of the Bible, Ezekiel, in spirit, is shown the horrifying
abominations of the sinning Israelites who had made an "image of
jealousy" which "provoked to jealousy" the Eternal God (verses
3,4)! Showing Ezekiel, in spirit, even "greater
abominations" (verse 6), Ezekiel said he "went
in and saw; and behold every form of creeping things [the pagans
always used snakes, lizards, crabs, frogs, flies, and so on, in their
imagery], and abominable beasts, and all the idols of the house of Israel,
portrayed upon the wall round about. And there stood before them seventy men
of the ancients of the house of Israel, and in the midst of them stood Jaazaniah the son of Shaphan,
with every man his censer in his hand; and a thick cloud of incense went up.
Then said he unto me, son of man, hast thou seen what the ancients of the
house of And is that not precisely what millions of churchgoing
Christians believe today? A day-by-day, close awareness of the immediate presence of
God; the fact that He watches and clearly sees every human act and deed; that
He is immediately available through prayer; that He is not only our God, but
our Judge, and our Ruler this concept of a living, ruling, Creator God is
lost to the minds of millions! They do not know the living God! Rather, they think of God in vague, unreal terms. It is as if
He has truly "gone way off somewhere" into the blackness of the
"other side of the universe." Few really believe that Almighty God
does see through the rooftops, sees in the dark, and literally beholds the
deeds (good or evil) of humankind. Later Ezekiel was shown "women weeping for Tammuz"
(verse 14). Tammuz was their name for Nimrod, who made himself into "a
mighty hunter before [in place of] the Lord
" (GENESIS 10:9)! Next, read on in EZEKIEL 8 as he was shown even
greater abominations: "And he brought me into the inner court of
the Lord's house, and behold, at the door of the temple of the Lord between
the porch and the altar, were about five and twenty men, with their backs
toward the temple of the Lord, and their faces were toward the east: and they
worshiped the sun toward the east" (verses 15,16).
The sun is in the east at its rising! This is a sunrise service, a pagan, idolatrous worshiping of
the rising sun, in connection with pagan idols of "creeping things and
abominable beasts," with women wailing and weeping for Tammuz! "But, so what?" some will ask. "What's the big
deal?" some may complain. Are we to take away such innocent-appearing
things as cute little chicks, chocolate bunnies, jelly beans, and dyed eggs;
the excited, happy looks on the faces of our children as they search about
the lawn for hidden Easter eggs? "We're not doing it with all of these pagan things in
mind," some might reason. "We're doing it as a Christian ceremony
and it is only something to get the children to look forward to Easter!"
Consider what God told Ezekiel concerning ancient THE ANNUAL HOLY DAYS OF
GOD When God first called His nation Prior to the exodus, God began revealing to the Israelites the
Passover (see EXODUS 12). Directly connected with the Passover were the Days of
Unleavened Bread. Later, in the land of Sinai, before the giving of the Ten
Commandments, God revealed to them His weekly Sabbath, and enforced the
observance of God's holy Sabbath day by showing the Israelites that sin
required the death penalty (EXODUS 16:43). Later God revealed to them the remainder of His annual holy
days (LEVITICUS 23), consisting of the Feast of First fruits (Pentecost), the Feast of
Trumpets, the Day of Atonement, the Feast of Tabernacles, and the
Last Great Day, coming right at the end of the Feast of Tabernacles. God revealed to them the beginning of months, or the
"sacred year," which commenced in the spring with the month of
Nisan (also called Abib). The Israelites were commanded to take an unblemished lamb from
their flocks on the tenth of Nisan; to keep it unto the evening of the
fourteenth, and then to slay it as the "Lord's Passover." By striking the blood of the slain, unblemished lamb on the
doorposts and lintels of their houses in That ceremony was to be conducted "with their staff in
their hand," and by a meal of roast lamb and the "bread of
affliction" (unleavened bread), signifying the great haste with which
God was going to deliver them out of the land of Egypt, out of slavery. The spiritual types are set forth very clearly by The paschal lamb was symbolic of Jesus Christ; the blood on
the doorposts and lintels of the houses is symbolic of the blood of Jesus
Christ to atone for our sins; the escape from Egypt is symbolic of our escape
from the clutches of Satan the devil and sin; the passage through the Red Sea
was symbolic of baptism (1 CORINTHIANS 10:14); the land of
Sinai, and the forty-years wandering prior to entering the promised land, are
symbolic of the trials, testing, and tribulation which come upon every
Christian; and the entrance into the promised land, across the River Jordan,
is symbolic of finally leaving this human, physical life and entering the
very Kingdom of God. There are many other biblical types which come clear in one's
thorough study of the deep symbolism of the Passover
and the Days of Unleavened Bread. Pharaoh is a type of Satan the devil; his two magicians, Janes and Jambres, are symbolic
of the beast and false prophet; Moses and Aaron, who continually say,
"Let my people go," are symbolic of the prophesied "two
witnesses" (REVELATION 11), who will warn the beast and the false prophet
just prior to Christ's second coming. Leaven is used as a type of sin; the eating of
"unleavened bread" for seven days signifies taking Thus, in this first important holy day season of the sacred
year, God revealed to the ancient Israelites rich symbolism which has great
meaning to the very purpose of human life and which reveals, in large
measure, what is our final, glorious destiny! But, instead of remaining faithful to these deeply significant
annual holy days of God, the Israelites quickly descended back into idolatry.
Idolatry, condemned of God in the first two of the Ten
Commandments, is evil and a horrible abomination in God's sight for several
reasons. First, it puts inanimate, nonexistent, pagan "gods"
(which are nothing more than the figment of the imagination of demented,
ignorant, savage peoples) in place of God! Such imagery blots out from superstitious minds the truth of
God! It is a substitute, a counterfeit, which God calls the
"image of jealousy." As the Creator, as well as our Protector and Provider, like a
husband to the church (described as His bride), God is "very
jealous" over His people. The reason our English words idolatry and adultery are so
similar is because they stem from the same original word. God terms idolatry "spiritual adultery." In many
analogies in the Bible, imagery and worship are directly spoken of as
"adultery." Read REVELATION 17 AND 18, where the
great fallen woman (symbolizing a great, universal false church) is said to
be "committing fornication" with the kings and rulers of the world!
THE PAGAN HOLIDAYS Today, millions upon millions of professing Christians gaily
go about the business of observing so-called Christian holidays, not
realizing they are nothing but modern versions of ancient, pagan idolatries! As the millions celebrate these days, they do so in abysmal
ignorance of their origin, their true symbolism, and ignorant of the fact
that such days obscure God's annual holy days. HOW WAS EASTER SUBSTITUTED
FOR THE PASSOVER? Believe it or not, it was many centuries before the apostate
church was finally able to stamp out the celebration of the Passover and the Days of Unleavened Bread! Actually, they never succeeded in stamping it out entirely,
and history proves there were scattered remnants of God's true church
observing the Passover, the Days of Unleavened Bread,
and the other annual days all down through the centuries just as there are
latter-day remnants of God's true church observing those days today! Do you remember our earlier quotation from The Catholic
Encyclopedia, in which they mentioned the "controversy of the
Quartodecimans"? The Quartodeciman controversy raged throughout the Mediterranean
world for literally centuries. "Quartodeciman" is merely another word for
"fourteenth"! The controversy stemmed from the insistence that the
early New Testament Church of God ought to follow the custom of Jesus Christ
of Nazareth in observing the Passover on the fourteenth of Nisan, the first
month of the year, according to God's sacred calendar. The "universal church" gradually began adopting
pagan customs and traditions, and began insisting upon standardizing the date
for the observance for the spring festival. The masses of pagans who were being "converted" into
this new religion brought with them their ancient customs of the celebration
of life, sexual reproduction, fertility and worship of the sun. Their gods
and goddesses were History absolutely proves that pagan customs and ceremonies
were allowed and merely given Christian names. Finally, those who insisted on continuing to observe God's
annual holy days were put out of the apostate church! Notice! "The first
council of Nicæa (325) decreed that the Interestingly, The Catholic Encyclopedia subtly inserts the word
Easter in its article under that term, even though the writer of the article
knew no one would keep "Easter with the Jews," for the Jews never
recognized this pagan custom. The Catholic Encyclopedia continually refers to
the Passover as "Easter." Note some
further quotes from the same source: "Easter eggs: The
symbolic meaning of a new creation of mankind by "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 (Simrock, Mythologie,
551). "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; this is a custom of pagan origin in vogue
all over What a shocking admission! Notice that even the Catholics
admit that the origins of Easter, and even the name itself, are totally
pagan! The rabbit is a pagan symbol! It is an emblem of fertility! Easter fires, lit on the top of mountains, are "customs
of pagan origin"! "The church adopted the observance into the Easter
ceremonies"! Could anything be plainer? Let's continue with the same
source: First phase [of the Easter Controversy]: The dioceses of all Asia,
as from an older tradition, held that the fourteenth day of the moon, on
which day the Jews were commanded to sacrifice the lamb, should always be
observed as the feast of the life-giving pasch
[Passover], contending that the fast ought to end on that day, whatever day
of the week it might happen to be. However, it was not the custom of the
churches in the rest of the world to end it at this point, as they observed
the practice, which from apostolic tradition has prevailed to the present
time, of terminating the fast on no other day than on that of the
resurrection of our Saviour. Synods and assemblies of bishops were held on
this account, and all with one consent through
mutual correspondence drew up an ecclesiastical decree that the mystery of
the resurrection of the Lord should be celebrated on no other day but the Sunday
and that we should observe the close of the paschal fast on that day only.
[No such fast is mentioned in the Bible.] "A letter of Again, it must be noted in this lengthy quotation from The
Catholic Encyclopedia that they have subtly substituted
"Easter" for the "Passover." What That they admit he kept a great event "on the fourteenth
day of the moon, whichever day of that week that might be, following the
tradition which he claimed to have derived from St. John the apostle”
absolutely proves that the festival Polycarp (who
was a student of John) kept was not "Easter," but the Passover!
In the final paragraph of the quotation, the distinction is
subtly drawn between "Christians" and "Jews." Another
obvious and flagrant misapplication of terms is the final quote: "Those
who kept Easter with the Jews were called Quartodecimans." Nonsense!
They were called Quartodecimans because they kept the Passover and
absolutely shunned the pagan " Notice further: Second Phase: The second stage in the
Easter controversy centers round the council of Nicæa
(A.D. 325).The emperor himself [Constantine], writing to the churches after
the council of Nicæa, exhorts them to adopt its
conclusions and says among other things: 'At this meeting the question
concerning the most holy day of Easter was discussed, and it was resolved by
the united judgment of all present that this feast ought to be kept by all
and in every place on one and the same day And first of all it appeared an
unworthy thing that in the celebration of this most holy feast we should
follow the practice of the Jews, who have impiously defiled their hands with
enormous sin for we have received from our Saviour a different way and I
myself have undertaken that this decision should meet with the approval of
your sagacities in the hope that your wisdoms will
gladly admit that practice which is observed at once in the city of Rome and
in Africa, throughout Italy and Egypt.with entire
unity of judgment.' From this and other indications we learn that the dispute
now lay between the Christians of Syria and Remember, these lengthy quotations are from The Catholic
Encyclopedia! Notice, in the quotation above of Constantine's exhortation to
the churches after the Council of Nicæa, that he,
too, showed disdainful contempt for "the Jews" (who are accused of
having "impiously defiled their hands with enormous sin") and
repudiates the "practice of the Jews," meaning the observance of
the Passover (the Lord's Supper, as the apostle Paul began to refer to it) on
the fourteenth of Nisan, as it had been observed for centuries! At the end of the quotation concerning the development of
keeping Easter in the Catholic Church, the encyclopedia admits "the
important By no stretch of the imagination were the converted brethren
in Notice now the next quotation: "Third Phase: It was to
the divergent cycles which Rome had successively adopted and rejected in its
attempt to determine Easter more accurately that the third stage in the
paschal controversy was mainly due. The Roman missionaries coming to England
in the time of St. Gregory the Great found the British Christians, the
representatives of that Christianity which had been introduced into Britain
during the period of the Roman occupation, still adhering to an ancient
system of Easter-computation which Rome itself had laid aside" (ibid.,
emphasis added). What a fantastic admission! Here we read of "Roman missionaries" arriving in the
Few have stopped to speculate on where all the other apostles
mentioned in the Gospels went. Most disappear from sight, and the Bible
quickly begins concerning itself with the ministries of, first, the apostle Now, under the article "Councils" in The Catholic
Encyclopedia, notice one of the most important purposes for the Council
of Nicæa: "The First Ecumenical, or
Council of Nicæa (325) lasted two months and twelve
days. Three hundred and eighteen bishops were present. Hosius,
Bishop of Cordova, assisted as legate of HOT-CROSS BUNS --
HAVE YOU EVER EATEN A "HOT-CROSS" BUN? At Easter one may go to the local bakeries, or the bakery
counters of supermarkets, and see them by the dozen. They are served in
restaurants and cafeterias. The little rounded buns, with their quaint little sugar-coated
crosses, evoke memories of childhood; and to unsuspecting professing
Christians the tiny crosses are believed to represent the "cross of How shocking to discover that hot-cross buns find their
origins in paganism! Notice what history has to say about the origin of
"hot-cross buns": "It is quite probable that it [the word bun] has a far
older and more interesting origin, as is suggested by an inquiry into the
origin of hot cross buns. These cakes, which are now solely associated with
the Christian Good Friday, are traceable to the remotest period of pagan
history. Cakes were offered by ancient Egyptians to their moon goddess; and
these had imprinted on them a pair of horns, symbolic of the ox at the
sacrifice of which they were offered on the altar, or of the horned moon
goddess, the equivalent of Interesting reading, isn't it? But how many of your friends
and relatives have ever taken the time and trouble to simply go to a public
library and read such shocking admissions! Remember, this is not someone's "church doctrine"
you are reading; it is not the clever arguments of someone trying to confuse
your mind and "trap" you into observing some strange customs!
Instead, you are reading direct quotations from historians! That certain Easter customs have pagan roots is a matter of
authoritative, historical fact! Almighty God soundly condemns the entire practice in the
Bible! Of course, if there is no God the plaintive cries of "I
don't see what difference it makes," or "Why should we take away
such joyous occasions from the children?" seem to make sense. But, since there is a God, and since that Eternal Creator God
is righteously angry at instilling pagan customs in the minds of our children
it does make a difference! God says: "To him that knoweth
to do good, and doeth it not, it is a sin."
Once you know the truth, you become responsible for it. It is knowledge that, while readily available in any number of
historical sources, is not known by the vast majority of humankind! Millions of churchgoing professing Christians are blissfully ignorant of these startling facts! Copyright 1983, 1995,
1998 by The |
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Church of God
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