Would Jesus Christ Celebrate Easter?

Each spring the excitement of Easter fills the air. Many churches prepare special Easter programs about the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ. At home mothers color eggs, and parents hide the brightly colored symbols of Easter around the house and lawn so that, come Easter morning, their children can excitedly hunt for them.

Stuffed Easter bunnies and chocolate rabbits are seen everywhere in the weeks leading up to this major religious observance. Then there are the Easter sunrise services, where churchgoers gather to hear about Jesus' resurrection and honor that miraculous event by watching the sun come up in the east.

But what do colored eggs and the Easter Bunny have to do with Jesus Christ's resurrection? How did these seemingly irreligious symbols come to be associated with that event?

Can we find any historical or biblical record of Jesus or His disciples observing Easter or teaching parents and children to dye eggs and display bunnies on this holiday? Did Jesus or His apostles instruct any of His followers to meet to honor His resurrection at sunrise on Easter Sunday—or at any other time, for that matter?

If Easter was not sanctioned by Jesus or instituted by His apostles, then where did Easter come from? In other words, if Jesus were living among us as a flesh-and-blood human being, would He celebrate Easter or encourage others to do so?

Answers to these questions are readily available. Some may take a little research, but they become clear when we look into history and the Bible.

As surprising as this may sound, nowhere in the New Testament can you find any reference to Easter. In the King James Version of the Bible (in Acts 12:4) you do find the word Easter, but it is a blatantly erroneous mistranslation that has been corrected in virtually every other Bible translation.

The original Greek word there is pascha, correctly translated as "Passover" in virtually every modern version of the Bible everywhere it appears in the Scriptures. It refers to the biblical Passover originally instituted when God freed the Israelites from slavery in Egypt (Exodus 12:1-14).

The original apostles, from the inception of the New Testament Church to near the end of the first century, when the apostle John died, left absolutely no record of observing Easter or teaching others to do so. From Jesus to John, not one of the apostles gave even the slightest hint of celebrating or advocating the observance of what we know today as Easter Sunday.

However, that doesn't mean the early Church did not hold to specific religious observances. The apostle Paul, some 25 years after Jesus' death and resurrection, plainly told members of the church at Corinth that they should continue to observe the Passover as Christ commanded.

Paul wrote: "For I received from the Lord that which I also delivered to you: that the Lord Jesus on the same night in which He was betrayed took bread; and when He had given thanks, He broke it and said, 'Take, eat; this is My body which is broken for you; do this in remembrance of Me.' In the same manner He also took the cup after supper, saying, 'This cup is the new covenant in My blood. This do, as often as you drink it, in remembrance of Me.'

"For as often as you eat this bread and drink this cup, you proclaim the Lord's death till He comes. Therefore whoever eats this bread or drinks this cup of the Lord in an unworthy manner will be guilty of the body and blood of the Lord" (1 Corinthians 11:23-27).

Paul was concerned that the Church members in Corinth observe the Passover in the right way, with reverence and proper comprehension of its meaning.

The writings of Paul and of Luke, his traveling companion and author of the book of Acts, regularly mention keeping the weekly Sabbath day and the biblical festivals listed in Leviticus 23. But Easter is conspicuously absent (1 Corinthians 5:6-8; 16:8; Acts 2:1-4; 13:42, 44; 17:1-3; 18:4; 20:6, 16).

Since Easter wasn't introduced by Jesus or the apostles, where did it come from, and how did it come to be such an accepted part of traditional Christianity?

It's not that difficult to trace the surprising origins of Easter and what it really represents. Many scholarly works show that Easter is a pre-Christian religious holiday, one that was created and developed long before Jesus' time and carried forward to the modern era through such empires as Babylon, Persia, Greece and finally Rome.

Vine's Complete Expository Dictionary of Old and New Testament Words notes: "The term 'Easter' is not of Christian origin. It is another form of Astarte, one of the titles of the Chaldean [Babylonian] goddess, the queen of heaven. The festival of Pasch [Passover] held by Christians in post-apostolic times was a continuation of the Jewish feast . . . From this Pasch the pagan festival of 'Easter' was quite distinct and was introduced into the apostate Western religion, as part of the attempt to adapt pagan festivals to Christianity" (W.E. Vine, 1985, "Easter").

Alexander Hislop, in his book The Two Babylons (1959), explores the origins of Easter. He discovered that a form of Easter was kept in many nations, not necessarily only those that professed Christianity: "What means the term Easter itself? . . . It bears its Chaldean origin on its very forehead. Easter is nothing else than Astarte, one of the titles of Beltis, the queen of heaven, whose name, as pronounced by the people of Nineveh, was . . . Ishtar" (p. 103).

Easter and the practices associated with it can be traced back to various pagan rituals. Hislop explains that "the forty days' abstinence of Lent was directly borrowed from the worshippers of the Babylonian goddess" (p. 104). In Egypt a similar 40-day period of abstinence "was held expressly in commemoration of Adonis or Osiris, the great mediatorial god" (p. 105).

How, then, did 40 days' abstinence come to be associated with a resurrection? Hislop continues: "Among the pagans this Lent seems to have been an indispensable preliminary to the great annual festival in commemoration of the death and resurrection of Tammuz, which was celebrated by alternate weeping and rejoicing" (p. 105).

Tammuz was a chief Babylonian deity and husband of the goddess Ishtar. Worship of Tammuz was so widespread in ancient times that it even spread into Jerusalem. In Ezekiel 8:12-18 God describes that worship and calls it an abomination—something repugnant and disgusting to Him.

The Babylonians held a great festival every spring to celebrate Tammuz's death and supposed resurrection many centuries before Christ walked the earth (see "The Resurrection Connection" on page 18). Hislop comprehensively documents evidence showing that Easter's origins precede the modern Christian holiday by more than 2,000 years!

Hislop cites the fifth-century writings of Cassianus, a Catholic monk of Marseilles, France, on the subject of Easter's being a pagan custom rather than a New Testament observance. "It ought to be known," the monk stated, "that the observance of the forty days [i.e., the observance of Lent] had no existence, so long as the perfection of that primitive Church remained inviolate" (p. 104).

Sir James Frazer describes Easter ceremonies entering into the established church: "When we reflect how often the Church has skillfully contrived to plant the seeds of the new faith on the old stock of paganism, we may surmise that the Easter celebration of the dead and risen Christ was grafted upon a similar celebration of the dead and risen Adonis [the Greek name for Tammuz], which . . . was celebrated in Syria at the same season" (The Golden Bough, 1993, p. 345).

What about other customs associated with Easter? One Catholic writer explains how eggs and rabbits came to be connected with Easter. You will quickly notice an absence of any link or reference to the Holy Bible when it comes to these rituals:

"The egg has become a popular Easter symbol. Creation myths of many ancient peoples center in a cosmogenic egg from which the universe is born. In ancient Egypt and Persia friends exchanged decorated eggs at the spring equinox, the beginning of their New Year.

"These eggs were a symbol of fertility for them because the coming forth of a live creature from an egg was so surprising to people of ancient times. Christians of the Near East adopted this tradition, and the Easter egg became a religious symbol. It represented the tomb from which Jesus came forth to new life" (Greg Dues, Catholic Customs and Traditions, 1992, p. 101; emphasis added throughout).

Like eggs, rabbits came to be linked with Easter because they were potent symbols associated with ancient fertility rites. "Little children are usually told that the Easter eggs are brought by the Easter Bunny. Rabbits are part of pre-Christian fertility symbolism because of their reputation to reproduce rapidly. The Easter Bunny has never had a religious meaning" (p. 102).

Honest Bible scholars freely admit that Jesus never sanctioned this pre-Christian holiday, nor did His apostles. In the centuries to follow among those who called themselves Christian, Easter eventually supplanted the Passover, the biblical ceremony Jesus and the apostle Paul told Christians to observe.

This came to a head with the Emperor Constantine and the Council of Nicaea—almost three centuries after Jesus was killed and rose again.

Says The Encyclopaedia Britannica: "A final settlement of the dispute [over whether and when to observe Easter or Passover] was one among the other reasons which led Constantine to summon the council of Nicaea in 325 . . . The decision of the council was unanimous that Easter was to be kept on Sunday, and on the same Sunday throughout the world, and 'that none should hereafter follow the blindness of the Jews'" (11th edition, pp. 828-829, "Easter").

Constantine 's decision was a fateful turning point for Christianity. Those who remained faithful to the instruction of Jesus and the apostles would be outcasts, a small and persecuted minority (John 15:18-20). A vastly different set of beliefs and practices—recycled from ancient pre-Christian religions but dressed in a Christian cloak—would take hold among the majority.

Since Easter (with all the pagan symbols that have come with it) was adopted by the Catholic Church centuries after Christ's ascension, should Christians observe this holiday and encourage others to do so?

To answer that question, let's go back to the title of this article, "Would Jesus Christ Celebrate Easter?"

He certainly could have told us to. So could the apostles, whose teaching and doctrine are preserved for us in the book of Acts and the epistles written by Paul, Peter, James, Jude and John. But nowhere do we find a hint of support for Easter or anything remotely resembling it. What we do find, as pointed out earlier, is clear instruction from Jesus and Paul to keep the Passover and other biblical—and truly Christian—observances.

Holy Scripture does not support this pre-Christian holiday and, in fact, condemns such celebrations. Because Scripture condemns pagan practices and the worship of false gods (Deuteronomy 12:29-32), we know that God the Father and Jesus His Son have no interest in Easter and do not approve of it.

Jesus, in fact, is diametrically opposed to religious rituals that supposedly honor Him but in reality are rooted in the worship of false gods. He makes clear the difference between pleasing God and pleasing men: "Well did Isaiah prophesy of you hypocrites, as it is written: 'This people honors Me with their lips, but their heart is far from Me. And in vain they worship Me, teaching as doctrines the commandments of men . . . All too well you reject the commandment of God, that you may keep your tradition'" (Mark 7:6-9).

Easter is a tradition of men, not a commandment of God. But it's more than that. It is a pagan tradition of men that, like other traditions involved in the worship of false gods, is abhorrent to the true God. Jesus and His apostles would never sanction its observance because it mingles paganism with supposedly Christian symbolism and ritual. It is rooted in ancient pre-Christian fertility rites that have nothing to do with Jesus.

In reality, most of the trappings associated with Easter reveal that the holiday is actually a fraud pawned off on unsuspecting and well-intentioned people. God wants us to worship in spirit and truth (John 4:23-24), not to recycle ancient customs used to worship other gods.

Even the timing of the events used to justify celebrating Jesus' resurrection on a Sunday morning—that He was crucified on the afternoon of Good Friday and resurrected before dawn on Sunday morning—are demonstrably false, as an examination of the Scriptures shows.

For those who want concrete proof that He was indeed the Messiah and Savior of mankind, Jesus made a promise: "An evil and adulterous generation seeks after a sign, and no sign will be given to it except the sign of the prophet Jonah. For as Jonah was three days and three nights in the belly of the great fish, so will the Son of Man be three days and three nights in the heart of the earth" (Matthew 12:39-40).

Try as some might, there is no way to calculate three days and three nights from late Friday afternoon to Sunday morning before daylight. At most, this amounts to barely more than a day and a half. Either Jesus was mistaken, or those who say He was crucified on a Friday and resurrected on a Sunday are mistaken. You can't have it both ways.

If Jesus walked the dusty roads of Galilee today, would He celebrate Easter? Certainly not. But He would be consistent because He does not change (Hebrews 13:8). For instance, He would keep the annual Passover in the same manner as He instructed His followers to keep it (1 Corinthians 11:23-26; John 13:15-17). And Jesus would observe the Days of Unleavened Bread in the way He inspired Paul to instruct early Christians (1 Corinthians 5:6-8).

Anyone who wants to be right with God, who wants to be a true disciple of Christ, the Master Teacher, will carefully examine his beliefs and practices to see whether they agree with the Bible. Such a person will not try to honor God with ancient idolatrous practices, violating His explicit commands (Deuteronomy 12:29-32; 2 Corinthians 6:14-18; 7:1). Easter, as we have seen, is filled with idolatrous trappings.

Simply claiming that something is Christian or is done to honor God doesn't make it acceptable to God. Easter doesn't represent a resurrected Jesus Christ. Rather—difficult as it may be to admit—it merely continues the practices pagans followed thousands of years ago to honor their nonexistent gods. If we are to escape the calamities prophesied to come on those who place the ways of this world ahead of God, then we must repent of following traditions that dishonor Him (Revelation 18:1-5).

God wants us to honor and obey Him according to His instructions in His Word. Then He can use us to represent His holy Son, our Savior and the Messiah, who will return to the earth. No greater calling can be extended to human beings. May you have the heart to seek understanding and God's perfect will! GN

DouglasKC is a disciple of Moses.

That’s one of the highest compliments I have ever seen.

(be sure to read v. 28-29)

Joh 9:1 And as Jesus passed by, he saw a man which was blind from his birth.
Joh 9:2 And his disciples asked him, saying, Master, who did sin, this man, or his parents, that he was born blind
Joh 9:3 Jesus answered, Neither hath this man sinned, nor his parents: but that the works of God should be made manifest in him.
Joh 9:4 I must work the works of him that sent me, while it is day: the night cometh, when no man can work.
Joh 9:5 As long as I am in the world, I am the light of the world.
Joh 9:6 When he had thus spoken, he spat on the ground, and made clay of the spittle, and he anointed the eyes of the blind man with the clay,
Joh 9:7 And said unto him, Go, wash in the pool of Siloam, (which is by interpretation, Sent.) He went his way therefore, and washed, and came seeing.
Joh 9:8 The neighbors therefore, and they which before had seen him that he was blind, said, Is not this he that sat and begged?
Joh 9:9 Some said, This is he: others said, He is like him: but he said, I am he.
Joh 9:10 Therefore said they unto him, How were thine eyes opened?
Joh 9:11 He answered and said, A man that is called Jesus made clay, and anointed mine eyes, and said unto me, Go to the pool of Siloam, and wash: and I went and washed, and I received sight.
Joh 9:12 Then said they unto him, Where is he? He said, I know not.
Joh 9:13 They brought to the Pharisees him that aforetime was blind.
Joh 9:14 And it was the sabbath day when Jesus made the clay, and opened his eyes.
Joh 9:15 Then again the Pharisees also asked him how he had received his sight. He said unto them, He put clay upon mine eyes, and I washed, and do see.
Joh 9:16 Therefore said some of the Pharisees, This man is not of God, because he keepeth not the sabbath day. Others said, How can a man that is a sinner do such miracles? And there was a division among them.
Joh 9:17 They say unto the blind man again, What sayest thou of him, that he hath opened thine eyes? He said, He is a prophet.
Joh 9:18 But the Jews did not believe concerning him, that he had been blind, and received his sight, until they called the parents of him that had received his sight.
Joh 9:19 And they asked them, saying, Is this your son, who ye say was born blind? how then doth he now see?
Joh 9:20 His parents answered them and said, We know that this is our son, and that he was born blind:
Joh 9:21 But by what means he now seeth, we know not; or who hath opened his eyes, we know not: he is of age; ask him: he shall speak for himself.
Joh 9:22 These words spake his parents, because they feared the Jews: for the Jews had agreed already, that if any man did confess that he was Christ, he should be put out of the synagogue.
Joh 9:23 Therefore said his parents, He is of age; ask him.
Joh 9:24 Then again called they the man that was blind, and said unto him, Give God the praise: we know that this man is a sinner.
Joh 9:25 He answered and said, Whether he be a sinner or no, I know not: one thing I know, that, whereas I was blind, now I see.
Joh 9:26 Then said they to him again, What did he to thee? how opened he thine eyes?
Joh 9:27 He answered them, I have told you already, and ye did not hear: wherefore would ye hear it again? will ye also be his disciples?
Joh 9:28 Then they reviled him, and said, Thou art his disciple; but we are Moses’ disciples.
Joh 9:29 We know that God spake unto Moses: as for this fellow, we know not from whence he is.
Joh 9:30 The man answered and said unto them, Why herein is a marvelous thing, that ye know not from whence he is, and yet he hath opened mine eyes.

Naturally Jesus would celebrate the passover being a Jew and under the Mosaic Law but with His resurrection that Law was fulfilled and the opportunity to become part of ‘spiritual Israel’ went out to non-Jews. Christians do not celebrate the passover but commemorate Christ’s death.

Christ intended that his death be commemorated on Passover, the anniversary of his death. Many in the early church continued to observe Passover. In fact, Passover was not "officially" banned until 325 AD, when the The Council of Nicea officially said not to observe the Passover on Nisan 14.

After that those who believed in observing the word of God and not the judgment of men went underground and were labeled heretics for doing God's will.

And Christians, not being under that fulfilled Mosaic Law, are thus not bound to observe a weekly sabbath.

The law of God is written in the hearts and mind of those who are under the new covenant.

Heb 8:10 For this is the covenant that I will make with the house of Israel after those days, saith the Lord; I will put my laws into their mind, and write them in their hearts: and I will be to them a God, and they shall be to me a people:

One of those law, one of those commandments written in the hearts of those who follow Christ is the 4th commandment:

Exo 20:8 Remember the sabbath day, to keep it holy. Exo 20:9 Six days shalt thou labor, and do all thy work:
Exo 20:10 But the seventh day is the sabbath of the LORD thy God: in it thou shalt not do any work, thou, nor thy son, nor thy daughter, thy manservant, nor thy maidservant, nor thy cattle, nor thy stranger that is within thy gates:
Exo 20:11 For in six days the LORD made heaven and earth, the sea, and all that in them is, and rested the seventh day: wherefore the LORD blessed the sabbath day, and hallowed it.

The sabbath is the Lord's sabbath.

The real meaning of the sabbath was discussed in the third and fourth chapters of Hebrews.

It certainly is. And Hebrews 4:9 says there still remains a sabbath keeping for the people of God.

When I was a kid it was fun to color eggs and fun to hunt for them. And what kid doesn’t like candy? When my mom and us colored the eggs, nobody was around telling us they were symbols of fertility and a pagan practice. In our church, there is nothing spooky or pagan about the service. It’s just another service with a specific message, which is all about worshiping God. I don’t believe Jesus would have a problem with most services on Easter and I’m positive he wouldn’t have a problem with kids having harmless fun.

It might seem harmless. And it might seem to be fun. But God doesn't condone mixing pagan practices with worship of him.

Jer 10:2 Thus saith the LORD, Learn not the way of the heathen, and be not dismayed at the signs of heaven; for the heathen are dismayed at them.
Jer 10:3 For the customs of the people are vain: for one cutteth a tree out of the forest, the work of the hands of the workman, with the axe.

Ah, yes! This article comes from "The Good News: A Magazine of Understanding." This would be the magazine of a splinter-group successor to Herbert W. Armstrong's Worldwide Church of God, yes?

The magazine is published by United Church of God. This is from A Brief History of the United Church of God

: Many of the current ministers and members of the United Church of God were once members of the Worldwide Church of God, a nonprofit corporation under the leadership of Herbert W. Armstrong until his death in 1986. A subsequent unwarranted shift toward nonbiblical practices and beliefs led numerous ministers and members to leave the fellowship of that organization.
Concerned with uneven administrative practices of the former assembly, more than 100 ordained ministers developed a new administrative structure that was more directly accountable to members and the ministry.

Unfortunately for the late Mr. Armstrong, his many novel doctrines are all over 1900 years too late in their formulation to be expositions of "authentic, primitive" Christianity, and most of the others that he borrowed seldom have, in turn, more than a 200 year-old pedigree themselves, which is equally incapable of establishing apostolic origins to the doctrines!

I would say that Armstrong didn't really come up with any new or original doctrine. Instead his strength was to publicize biblical doctrine that had been trivialized and ignored by the traditional church. Ideas such as observing God's holy days and not man created holy days were nothing new.

Armstrongism is little more than a cult, in which an appreciation for historical Christianity is of no concern whatsoever.

I can't argue what "Armstrongism" holds because I'm not an "Armstrongite". However, I do know that traditional Christianity has decided that in many cases tradition should trump the bible.

What utter rubbish this article is! It makes objections that never existed for very near 1900 years since the time of Christ, and still dares to complain of the novelty of Easter celebrations! Whew!

The only things that need to be addressed are:

1. Was Easter observed by Christ?

2. Did the Lord specify which days are holy and which days to observe?

3. Did the traditional church stop observing these days and substitute their own?

I ridiculed nothing. I pointed out that Armstrong's ideas about the Sabbath and Easter, as well as his excessive affinity for neo-Judaizing, all have very tenuous connections to any form of Christianity that can even vaguely span the 2000 years of the Christian Era. That, I would say, creates for his theories a rather compelling "problem." Either that, or Christ had no idea what He was doing when He established His Church, and promised to send the Holy Spirit to preserve it and guide it. I submit that neither of us would want to say that Jesus had no idea what He was doing, right? Ergo, His promises were efficacious and followed-through on. Ergo, to claim that the Church has erred in its doctrines, or allowed toxic practices into its life like celebrating Easter, is precisely the kind of thing that, logically, must imply a very shallow trust in God's Providence for His Church. This is a place to which no true Christian should ever want to go!

Armstrong had more than a few novel ideas of his own creation, and was an avid proponent of still more ideas that do not pre-date him by very much - which is another way of saying that all such novelties miss having a connection to the Apostolic Era by some 1900 years. Armstrong's embrace of, and expansion of, the concept of "Anglo-Israelism" is perhaps the most ludicrous and notorious of these ideas, and serves well to demonstrate the dismally low level of scholarship and credibility that he has overall.

1. Was Easter observed by Christ?

This is a rather silly question, when you think about it. He certainly "observed" His own Resurrection, if that's what you mean! But, no, He did not observe Easter (or the anniversary of His resurrection) while He lived here on earth for the simple reason that He was no longer here as a walking, talking God/Man after His ascension! That, you will recall, was only 40 days after His resurrection, and therefore missed reaching even the first anniversary of His resurrection by 325 days.

2. Did the Lord specify which days are holy and which days to observe?

No, He did not. Neither did He prohibit observations of the days commemorating His birth, death and resurrection, which the Church established very early on.

3. Did the traditional church stop observing these days and substitute their own?

Yes, they did. Certainly St. Paul implies, in Romans 14, that the holy days of the Jews were no longer mandated in the New Covenant. There is absolutely no evidence that the universal Church celebrated even one of them after the destruction of the Temple in Jerusalem, and even the ethnic Jews who were Christians had become absorbed into the general Christian population and stopped their observances by the mid-second Century. To resuscitate these Old Covenant holy days, and imply they have some mandate to this day, bespeaks a special kind of arrogance, and implies a very poor reliance on the the providential care of God for His own Church.

Herbert W. Armstrong, among others, had just such that kind of a lack of understanding of God's Providence. The groups that splintered off from his Worldwide Church of God, such as the one which published this article, continue in that fundamental lack of understanding. Furthermore, their use of such highly discredited sources about "Catholicism" like Alexander Hislop betrays an ignorance of even the most basic understanding of Church and world history, the development of world religions, and a methodology for the cultivation of even the most elementary logic about pretty much anything.

The article heading this thread is ludicrous at all levels. I would not trust its authoritativeness on even a single point. Dig deeper.

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