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Aunt Nattie doesn't care. |
Posted on 04/08/2006 7:12:48 AM PDT by DouglasKC
1. Easter is known as "Pasqua" or "Pascha" or something similar throughout the Catholic and Orthodox worlds.
2. Easter's meaning is "that which comes from the East." Keep in mind that all churches used to point to the east, so that the miracle of transubstantiation had the whole congregation facing towards the resurrected lord. I don't know if Aesterte is in anyway connected with the East, but if it is, than "Easter" is only secondarily connected with Aesterte, and in such a manner as to preclude any significant ties.
3. Aesterte is the goddess of war, lust, and fertility. It is true that the rabbit is also (for obvious reasons) associated with fertility, but Aesterte was not ever associated directly with rabbits. Her symbols were the lion, the horse, the sphinx, the dove, and the planet Venus.
4. The worship of Aesterte was unknown in England at the time of the establishment of the date of Easter. Likewise, the practices of England were unknown to the Christians who established the date of Easter.
Churches who preach such filth, such as these, are engaged in a marketing practice called "product differentation." The goal is to come up with something unique about your product, and to convince the suckers -- I mean congregation -- that this unique aspect is somehow critical. Their co-conspirators in this are pagans, who want us to believe that paganism is somehow the true Christianity; anti-Christian secularists, who want to attack all the incidental trappings of Christianity; and of course, the god of Money.
No Christian should ever read this and say, "well, maybe he's got some good points." No! Satan's purpose is to weaken, and to divide and conquer! They should be treated the way you would treat someone who is trying to slander your wife with vague suggestions of adultery; the purpose is the same: to weaken your affections. They slander the good and holy people who engaged in such practice so as to alienate and confuse. Whoever posted this trash delighted Satan much.
>> It was never kept in the bible. And as the article points out, it wasn't settled officially until 325 AD that Easter was to be kept by Christians. <<
False. Prior to 325 AD, there were differences in how to set the date of Easter. Do you celebrate it March 28th (3 days after March 25th, the date Jesus was crucified)? Do you wait for the following Sunday? Do you use the Julian calendar, or the Hebrew calendar?
But the celebration of Easter was celebrated since the first century.
>> All the other stuff came long before. Fertility rites, pagan symbols and such long predated Christ. <<
Yes, but these particular practices were unknown to Christians who established the recognition of Easter, so it is ridiculous to say that Easter stems from those practices. Suppose I asked you, "How could Thomas Jefferson have killed JFK? He was dead long before JFK was shot?" and you answered, "Murder, and treachery, and treason have been around since long before Jefferson or Kennedy!" It's true, but nonsensical as a response.
>> Jesus commanded us how to remember his death. His death was the most important thing. I don't think the resurrection was unimportant, but without his sin free life and his atoning death the resurrection would have been meaningless. That's why we are told to remember his death, not his resurrection and that's the reason God created the Passover. <<
He commanded his followers that God died? Of course not! the good news is that through his death, Christ conquered death, and established that there is life afterward! Look to the examples of the apostles! Did they preach that Christ died, or did they preach that he died and was resurrected? Where did their hope lie? In his death, or in his resurrection? For without the resurrection, his death is mere tragedy; Paul says we'd have to be fools to practice Christianity without remembering his resurrection!
We most do both.
In reality, the holiest day of the Early Christians was considered Pentecost, for Easter and Good Friday were celebrated every week.
>> Long ago, the rabbit was the earthly symbol of the pagan goddess Eastre, and was worshipped in the pagan festival of Eastre <<
The belief in Eostre was long dead by the time Bede wrote of the customs of the English people.
Did you know that neither Astarte nor Eostre were related to bunnies, or eggs, or chocolate? It was a German humanist by the name of Jacob Grimm who asserted that Eostre was Ostara, based purely on the supposed similarity of their names. It was Ostara who was associated with eggs.
Both Eostre and East came, however, from a word meaning to "enlighten, as with the break of dawn." But it was the disciple John who referred to Christ as light, so we know the relationship between East and Easter ties Easter to Eostre only secondarily.
[It should be noted that Bede, writing in the 7th century, noted a relationship between Easter and Eostre, but this because of the Eostremon, the month Easter fell in, was named after the crossing of the rising sun through the equator.]
Such suppositions are as Grimm's are as flimsy as if I were to asser that Austria was so named because they worshipped Austra... In fact, Austria is really "Austereich," the "Southern Kingdom" in relation to Germany... even though Auster quite possibly is linguistically related to Austra.
>> The ancient Egyptians, Persians, Phoenicians, and Hindus all believed the world began with an enormous egg, thus the egg as a symbol of new life has been around for eons. <<
What difference does it make why the Egyptians liked eggs, if we know it was God's people, the Jews, who associated eggs with Passover?
>> The legend of the Easter Bunny is far from a modern invention. Long ago, the rabbit was the earthly symbol of the pagan goddess Eastre, and was worshipped in the pagan festival of Eastre <<
No, Eastre was NOT associated with the bunnies. To find any association with bunnies, you have to find a German god, Ostare. An 18th-century humanist was the first person to associate the two, and he did so on the basis of the meager similarity of their names. Of course, Ostare was not associated with the first lunar month after the equinox, nor with the direction East. So what Ostare would have to do with anything is unknowable.
By the way, springtime in northern climes is when flowers, trees, and hibernating animals are risen to new life from the dead... and in doing so create new life and new fertility. (This is much less so in Israel.) Echoes of such correlations are, therefore, not necessarily evil.
The heavens and earth proclaim the good news of God. And the ignorant peoples attributed such proclamations to false gods. But there should be no scandal made to true religion that such a time of the year as Spring, when even the pagans notice that the world teems with new fertility and new life, happens to also be the time of the year when Christ was conceived within the womb of Mary by the power of the Holy Spirit (March 25th), and when Christ re-emerged from the grave.
Did God command His people to have an egg with the Passover meal (NO!) or was it something they picked up in Babylon (PROBABLE)? The egg goes back to Babylon as a symbol of the life cycle. This is a problem when man puts traditions in place of Gods Word.
Maybe they just like eggs?
Also, don't forget days of the week are also of very Pagan.
>> Did God command His people to have an egg with the Passover meal (NO!) or was it something they picked up in Babylon (PROBABLE)? <<
PROBABLE? Tell me, when the Hellenic Jews dispersed across the whole Roman world were Christianized, did the apostles warn them that they had picked up pagan elements into their religious celebrations? Did Joseph and Mary use eggs in their Haggadeh? If not, how old was Jesus when he told them not to?
There is much in the Haggadeh that is not spelled out in the book of Exodus. When you GUESS that it must be pagan, because, gosh, pagans like eggs, you make a very grave and wholly unsubstantiated accusation against the people who became the first Christian.
You talk as if Babylonians invented eggs! ("The egg goes back to Babylon as a symbol of the life cycle.")
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Aunt Nattie doesn't care. |
Was the Haggadeh written after God pronouced that His Gloy has left Israel? Ichabod?
If you're asking that to assert that the Haggadeh is not scripture, don't bother. No-one ever claimed it was. But it WAS what Jews were using at the time of Christ. Seems funny neither Jesus, the apostles, or His church ever made mention of the fact if it was true that they had incorporated pagan rituals.
And, by the way, even according to the fallacious Protestant notion of his glory having left Israel for good several hundred years before his glory was born unto Israel, there was a gap of a couple hundred years between leaving Babylon and this de-Glory event.
Come to think of it, have you ever even BEEN to a seder? The notion that the Hagdadeh is a Babylonian thing is just so absurd. It's not like the Easter Bunny where you ask, "Well how did he become a part of this?"
The problem with that concept is this: Easter is always celebrated on a Sunday. The resurrection was not on a Sunday!
Bottom line is thus: A Holy celebration (Passover) ordained by the Lord (Leviticus 23) has now been changed substantially (with no Biblical authority) to be what "Man" wants it to be, because man has been hoodwinked to believe the Messiah was resurrected on a Sunday morning. If you want to celebrate the resurrection....at least observe it on the day it happened!
This is the reason the Hebrews always called them by their number....and not by their common name. Sabbath, of course, means seventh. When they wanted to refer to Monday, i.e. they would say, "The second day"....etc. This was also done by the Apostles and the Early Church. They never referred to the days of the week by their pagan names.
They will be playing for the Stanley Cup in Hell before an article such as this prevents my Church from celebrating the resurrection of Jesus Christ on a certain Sunday morning with the joyous cry "Christ is Risen!"
"The GOLDED BOUGH"..***..I had never heard of it. ***
What! I have a copy of it and read it quite often! Even Col. Kurtz was reading it in APOCALYPSE NOW. The making of a priest of Attis is a real hoot!
*** The goal is to come up with something unique about your product, and to convince the suckers -- I mean congregation -- that this unique aspect is somehow critical.***
Been there, seen that, done that, glad I'm out of it!
***The problem with that concept is this: Easter is always celebrated on a Sunday. The resurrection was not on a Sunday! ***
Aw, not this crap again!
That's something you'll have to determine. If you go strictly by scripture I think you'll come to see the truth. If you elevate tradition over scripture, then you won't.
You posit that "God doesn't create in vain and he didn't create holy days only to have man ignore them." Yet Jesus himself (God incarnate) said in Mark 2:27 "Then he said to them, "The Sabbath was made for man, not man for the Sabbath." holy days exist not to lock man down into a formula, but to connect man relationally with God... to fellowship with him.
Exactly.
When I read the entirety of Romans 2, what I come away from it with is an appreciation for the propitiation of Christ's sacrifice and the fact that accepting his sacrifice sets us free from the law of sin and death.
Couldn't agree more.
The laws of the OT exist to point the way to the Cross, to show us each the need for Christ, because we are unable to uphold every item of the law, and as James said (2:10), that anyone who fails to keep even one point of the law has failed to keep all of the law.
You're right again...James did say that. But he said it in the context that our works should reflect our faith. James believed that our works should reflect our faith and that faith without works is dead.
Lastly, if we accept that God's law (which we know to primarily be the law of Love, as seen in I Cor 13) is written on our hearts, then Romans 2:29 rings loudly in our ears, that true circumcision (adherence to God's law, as I understand it) is circumcision of the heart by the spirit, not by a written code
Yes again. However, the point of these scriptures is that if you are practicing Godly love, then you will naturally uphold the law:
Rom 13:8 Owe nothing to anyone except to love one another; for he who loves his neighbor has fulfilled the law.
Rom 13:9 For this, "YOU SHALL NOT COMMIT ADULTERY, YOU SHALL NOT MURDER, YOU SHALL NOT STEAL, YOU SHALL NOT COVET," and if there is any other commandment, it is summed up in this saying, "YOU SHALL LOVE YOUR NEIGHBOR AS YOURSELF."
Rom 13:10 Love does no wrong to a neighbor; therefore love is the fulfillment of the law.
What Paul is saying is that IF you are loving as you should, then your life will reflect the written law. The written law IS the objective, written, definition of Godly law. The physical reflects the spiritual. And IF you are practicing love toward God then your life will reflect the following:
Exo 20:3 "You shall have no other gods before Me.
Exo 20:4 "You shall not make for yourself an idol, or any likeness of what is in heaven above or on the earth beneath or in the water under the earth.
Exo 20:5 "You shall not worship them or serve them; for I, the LORD your God, am a jealous God, visiting the iniquity of the fathers on the children, on the third and the fourth generations of those who hate Me,
Exo 20:6 but showing lovingkindness to thousands, to those who love Me and keep My commandments.
Exo 20:7 "You shall not take the name of the LORD your God in vain, for the LORD will not leave him unpunished who takes His name in vain.
Exo 20:8 "Remember the sabbath day, to keep it holy.
Exo 20:9 "Six days you shall labor and do all your work,
Exo 20:10 but the seventh day is a sabbath of the LORD your God; in it you shall not do any work, you or your son or your daughter, your male or your female servant or your cattle or your sojourner who stays with you.
Exo 20:11 "For in six days the LORD made the heavens and the earth, the sea and all that is in them, and rested on the seventh day; therefore the LORD blessed the sabbath day and made it holy.
In the case of Easter, there is a blatant disregard for the word of God and a blatant usage of the same symbols that worshippers of false gods use. This does not reflect love for God.
So, if we commemorate the resurrection of our Lord annually on Easter Sunday (despite the English usage of a pagan holiday to describe that date) and celebrate in our hearts the resurrection of our Lord each day through the testimony of our lives, then there can be no doubt in my mind that the law of the Lord has been written on our hearts more indelibly and deeply than any etchings on stone tablets.
Sounds good, but that doesn't mean the writing disappeared. It's been written somewhere else, which should make it EASIER to comply with. Jesus Christ himself created holy days which he himself told us to observe. And when he incarnated on the earth, he kept these same holy days, as did his followers. You can either follow Christ or follow tradition.
That's something you'll have to determine. If you go strictly by scripture I think you'll come to see the truth. If you elevate tradition over scripture, then you won't.
You posit that "God doesn't create in vain and he didn't create holy days only to have man ignore them." Yet Jesus himself (God incarnate) said in Mark 2:27 "Then he said to them, "The Sabbath was made for man, not man for the Sabbath." holy days exist not to lock man down into a formula, but to connect man relationally with God... to fellowship with him.
Exactly.
When I read the entirety of Romans 2, what I come away from it with is an appreciation for the propitiation of Christ's sacrifice and the fact that accepting his sacrifice sets us free from the law of sin and death.
Couldn't agree more.
The laws of the OT exist to point the way to the Cross, to show us each the need for Christ, because we are unable to uphold every item of the law, and as James said (2:10), that anyone who fails to keep even one point of the law has failed to keep all of the law.
You're right again...James did say that. But he said it in the context that our works should reflect our faith. James believed that our works should reflect our faith and that faith without works is dead.
Lastly, if we accept that God's law (which we know to primarily be the law of Love, as seen in I Cor 13) is written on our hearts, then Romans 2:29 rings loudly in our ears, that true circumcision (adherence to God's law, as I understand it) is circumcision of the heart by the spirit, not by a written code
Yes again. However, the point of these scriptures is that if you are practicing Godly love, then you will naturally uphold the law:
Rom 13:8 Owe nothing to anyone except to love one another; for he who loves his neighbor has fulfilled the law.
Rom 13:9 For this, "YOU SHALL NOT COMMIT ADULTERY, YOU SHALL NOT MURDER, YOU SHALL NOT STEAL, YOU SHALL NOT COVET," and if there is any other commandment, it is summed up in this saying, "YOU SHALL LOVE YOUR NEIGHBOR AS YOURSELF."
Rom 13:10 Love does no wrong to a neighbor; therefore love is the fulfillment of the law.
What Paul is saying is that IF you are loving as you should, then your life will reflect the written law. The written law IS the objective, written, definition of Godly law. The physical reflects the spiritual. And IF you are practicing love toward God then your life will reflect the following:
Exo 20:3 "You shall have no other gods before Me.
Exo 20:4 "You shall not make for yourself an idol, or any likeness of what is in heaven above or on the earth beneath or in the water under the earth.
Exo 20:5 "You shall not worship them or serve them; for I, the LORD your God, am a jealous God, visiting the iniquity of the fathers on the children, on the third and the fourth generations of those who hate Me,
Exo 20:6 but showing lovingkindness to thousands, to those who love Me and keep My commandments.
Exo 20:7 "You shall not take the name of the LORD your God in vain, for the LORD will not leave him unpunished who takes His name in vain.
Exo 20:8 "Remember the sabbath day, to keep it holy.
Exo 20:9 "Six days you shall labor and do all your work,
Exo 20:10 but the seventh day is a sabbath of the LORD your God; in it you shall not do any work, you or your son or your daughter, your male or your female servant or your cattle or your sojourner who stays with you.
Exo 20:11 "For in six days the LORD made the heavens and the earth, the sea and all that is in them, and rested on the seventh day; therefore the LORD blessed the sabbath day and made it holy.
In the case of Easter, there is a blatant disregard for the word of God and a blatant usage of the same symbols that worshippers of false gods use. This does not reflect love for God.
So, if we commemorate the resurrection of our Lord annually on Easter Sunday (despite the English usage of a pagan holiday to describe that date) and celebrate in our hearts the resurrection of our Lord each day through the testimony of our lives, then there can be no doubt in my mind that the law of the Lord has been written on our hearts more indelibly and deeply than any etchings on stone tablets.
Sounds good, but that doesn't mean the writing disappeared. It's been written somewhere else, which should make it EASIER to comply with. Jesus Christ himself created holy days which he himself told us to observe. And when he incarnated on the earth, he kept these same holy days, as did his followers. You can either follow Christ or follow tradition.
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