The Roots of Easter

easter-bunnyMonica Cheru-Mpambawashe Lifestyle Editor
“Easter is the real Christian holiday because it is not as commercialised as Christmas and Christians really take the time to go to church. Also, the build up towards Easter is long and highly effective, which puts one in the right frame for introspection and a chance to get into personal contact with God.”

These are the words of a pastor who leads one of the numerous new Christian churches that seem to be sprouting up every day. He was preaching to a group of people seeking spiritual uplifting in a CBD building during a lunch break.

The pastor went on to revile those who would use the long weekend to roast and consume copious amounts of animal flesh, get drunk, fornicate and heaven forbid, return to their rural origins to communicate in heathen ceremonies of ancestor worship.

He called down curses on every person who chooses not to spend the Easter weekend steeped in church-driven religious fervor. He accused such people of using God’s time to further depravities of the flesh.

Such views are shared by the majority of the Christians who will be taking part in the special Easter customs of their churches. For the Catholics and Anglicans among others, Easter is not a four day event but the culmination of a series of observances including Lent, Ash Wednesday and Palm Sunday.

Almost every church has special services lined up with the “Judgment Night 2” of the United Families Interdenominational Church slotted for today perhaps being the most advertised one this year.

But there are some Christian denominations that do not celebrate Easter. In this country these tend to be those who classify themselves as apostolic, who commemorate Passover instead.

But almost all of them are united in their denouncement of traditional Zimbabwean religion which becomes ironic when the origins of Easter and related customs go under the microscope.

It is now a largely accepted fact that Christians cannot run away from the fact that their religion sprung from Jewish roots. Scholars have cited specific statements attributed to Jesus as appearing earlier in Jewish scriptures.

One good example is the saying, “The sabbath was made for man and not man for the sabbath” which appears in the Talmud which predates the bible.

But it appears that many Christians and Jews are not prepared to acknowledge the influence of earlier religions which have been branded heathen or pagan.

But when it comes to holy days, the facts are just too blatant to be wished away. The name Easter is not to be found anywhere in the Bible, although there are several books which talk about the time after Jesus’ death.

Unlike Passover which is fixed, the date of Easter varies each year and between churches. In the Western churches it is linked to the lunar cycles, which in itself is a mannerism directly associated with ancient religions that predated Christianity.

Religious scholars have also pointed out that many traits of the holiday have direct parallels to those said religions.

“First of all, the list of resurrection gods is not limited to Christ — there is Osiris, Dionysus, Ba?al, Ishtar and Orpheus, amongst others. Osiris, an Egyptian god of the underworld, was killed by his brother Set and resurrected by his wife Isis. Dionysus was eviscerated by the Titans, but resurrected with his heart grown in Zeus’s thigh.

Ba?al, a god of fertility, descended to the underworld and was restored to life. Ishtar, a Babylonian fertility goddess, descended into the underworld and returned, while Orpheus travelled to the underworld to rescue his dead wife Eurydice.

Thus, it can be said that Good Friday, a holiday celebrating resurrection, is not particularly unique.” (deathandtaxesmag.com)

A site that prides itself on its unflinching interpretation of the Bible – christiananswers.net says: “The name ‘Easter’ has its roots in ancient polytheistic religions. On this, all scholars agree. This name is never used in the original Scriptures, nor is it ever associated biblically with the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ. For these reasons, we prefer to use the term ‘Resurrection Sunday’ rather than “Easter” when referring to the annual Christian remembrance of Christ’s resurrection .”

The site goes on to detail how the name Easter is said to have come directly from pagan goddesses Ishtar (pronounced Easter) or Eastre, the Teutonic goddess of Spring.

Another Christian website www.lasttrumpetministries.org goes on to link Ishtar to Nimrod (son of Cush who was the son of Ham), a rebel great-grandson of Noah (builder of the Ark) who rejected his great-grandfather’s religion and went on to found his own.

The tale of murder, gruesome dismemberment and the missing male organ, incest and alleged immaculate conceptions coincidentally echoes Egyptian mythology of the trinity of Osiris, Isis and Horus.

But not everyone subscribes to this idea:
“ . . . Nor was there any movement to choose an existing pagan celebration to match (Easter) dates with, as was done later with Christmas and Halloween, although the rough connection to Passover was allowed to stand.

“It took time, but over the next few centuries the vast majority of Christians accepted the new date for Easter. There were (and still are) exceptions, but the biggest difference was that the Eastern communities clung to their Julian calendar rather than using the new Gregorian method, and that wasn’t particularly important.

“So the creation and origin of Easter came about naturally. There was no effort to combine it with pagan ceremonies, religious or otherwise, and although it bore a tenuous connection to the Jewish passover that connection was more hindrance than anything and the Christians tried to sever it, not build on it.” (hubpages.com)

In modern day, Easter has become synonymous with the male oviparous male Easter Bunny who hides supposedly eggs his eggs for children to find.

It all appears to be a bit of harmless fun to bring much needed levity to a serious festival in which the central feature, the crucifixion of Jesus, is a rather gory and somber theme.

But tracking the roots of those traditions reveals a disturbingly dark link to matters that most Christians would not want to be associated with.

The Bunny is linked to German traditions and even earlier on to the successors of Nimrod. Both the hare and the eggs are symbols of fertility with overt sexual links which appear odd when juxtaposed with the central ideas of Easter.

Commercialisation has pushed the symbols to the prime spot as retailers tempt children and adults alike to splurge on chocolate confections.

Almost all the informed Christian world leaders acknowledge the pagan origins of most Christian holidays including Easter, which is deemed to be the most important religious festival on the calendar.

It is because of this acknowledgement that some churches do not observe Easter.

In some cases they do commemorate the death and resurrection but their members to abjure all forms of pagan originating customs like the Easter Bunny and Easter eggs.

But at the end of the day, the question is does it really matter where Easter came from? Or is the important thing really about what it means today to the multitudes of Christians for whom the holiday is synonymous with a deep spiritual experience?

Religion is about faith not about trappings as is best summarized in the words of a writer on hubpages.com “Every celebration means just what the celebrant wants it to mean, and it seems a little out of line to refuse to celebrate a very spiritual day simply because others have changed the meaning into something more in accordance to their own likes or dislikes. Give the day a meaning that you like and celebrate accordingly, just as everyone does for every celebration.”

You Might Also Like

Comments