What is Passover and what has it got to do with Easter?

1) The Lamb. Jesus chose to be the lamb without defect that was sacrificed for our sins, in the same way that the Israelites had had to kill a lamb per family for God to save their lives (1Corinthians 5:7).


2) The Four Cups. In the Passover there are four cups of wine to drink, two before the meal and two after the meal. These are to remember the events of Exodus 6:6-7: I will bring you out; I will free you; I will redeem you; and I will take you as my people. These are things Jesus also promised.


3) The First Fruits. The resurrection of Jesus happened as the priests were presenting an offering of the first sheaf of the newly ripened barley harvest. Jesus was the first fruits from the grave.


Some Christians, particularly Messianic Jews (ie. Jews who have become Christians), celebrate "Easter" by observing the actual Passover meal ("the Seder" or "Haggadah" or "Last Supper"), drawing out the references to Jesus in this Old Testament festival.



richmondparkchurch.org.uk an evangelical pentecostal church in Boscombe, Bournemouth, Dorset, UK

What is Passover and what has it got to do with Easter?

The Jewish celebration of Passover, or "Pesach" in Hebrew, was started about 1200 years before Jesus. The origins and form of this festival are described in the Bible, in chapter 12 of the book of Exodus. It is from when Moses was asking the Pharaoh to let the Jews -who were at that time slaves- leave Egypt, and because Pharaoh kept refusing, God punished the Egyptians by killing all their first born sons. The Jewish families were kept safe by daubing lamb's blood on their door-posts - when God saw this blood he "passed over" those homes.

It is not a coincidence that the crucifixion and resurrection of Jesus happened at the same time as Passover. The festivals in the Old Testament (that Jewish people still observe today) were both celebrations of how God had helped the Israelites and pictures of what Jesus was going to do. Parallels between Passover and Jesus include:


richmondparkchurch.org.uk an evangelical pentecostal church in Boscombe, Bournemouth, Dorset, UK

Why is it called Easter?

Why is it called "Easter"?


Long before Jesus, many pagan cultures already celebrated at this time of year to welcome the return of spring and the new plant life that grew and the animals that were born. The pagans worshipped gods of fertility and new life, such as the Druidic Ishtar, Egyptian Osiris, Babylonian Astarte (who sprung from an egg which fell from heaven), and the Saxon goddess of dawn with a hare's head (or hare companion) called Eostre, from which we get the name "Easter".


It is unhelpful that the anniversary of the resurrection of Jesus is commonly known as "Easter", a name derived from a pagan god. A more appropriate name might be the "Christian Passover". Many other modern languages derive their name for Easter from the Latin pascha, in turn taken from the Hebrew pesach or Passover, eg the French "Paques", the Spanish "Pascua" and the Italian "Pasqua". This acknowledges that the Christian feast is a successor to the Jewish Passover.



richmondparkchurch.org.uk an evangelical pentecostal church in Boscombe, Bournemouth, Dorset, UK

Origins of Easter

History records show that Jesus was crucified outside of the city of Jerusalem in around 33AD, just before the Jewish festival of Passover. He was executed after Jewish religious leaders accused him of being a would-be revolutionary who wanted to overturn Roman rule. But Christians believe that God planned for this to happen and that in the spiritual realm the death, and then resurrection, of Jesus was necessary to conquer sin and enable believers to live a life guided by God's forgiveness and Holy Spirit.



"Without the feeding of the five thousand or the walking on water, we'd still have Christianity. But without the resurrection, it would be just a minor cult in first-century Judaism." (Michael Symmons Roberts, "The Miracles of Jesus" )


richmondparkchurch.org.uk an evangelical pentecostal church in Boscombe, Bournemouth, Dorset, UK

History of Easter

These are things Jesus promises us today. In Old Testament days a lamb had to be killed as an offering to God to make up for people's sins. When Jesus was crucified he took the role of a sacrificial lamb, and the Bible says he was the last lamb that would need to be sacrificed. Christians believe that when Jesus died, he died for all our sins, and when he came back to life he showed he had conquered sin once and for all.


And that's what we celebrate on Easter Sunday!


Back in the fourth century AD the church devised a whole Easter calendar to remember all the different events in the lead up to the crucifixion and resurrection, things like Pancake Day to eat up all your good food before fasting during the weeks of Lent.



richmondparkchurch.org.uk an evangelical pentecostal church in Boscombe, Bournemouth, Dorset, UK

History of Easter

Later, about 350 years after the crucifixion of Jesus, an important meeting of church leaders met to decide whether Easter should be celebrated the day after Passover, even if it fell on a week day, or whether Easter Day should always be on a Sunday. They didn't set a definite fixed yearly date for Easter, or stick to the old Jewish calendar. Instead they made-up their own formula to calculate the date to complicate matters further. Are you ready for this? Pay attention!

Easter Sunday is always the first Sunday after the full moon that directly follows the Spring Equinox.

Despite it's name, Christian "Easter" has much more to do with the Jewish Passover than pagan spring-time festivals. God instructed Jewish people to celebrate Passover to remember their escape from slavery in Egypt about 1200 years before Jesus. At that time God promised: I will get you out of the mess you've made; I will lead you to a freer life; I will treat you as my own children; and I will save you spiritually.


richmondparkchurch.org.uk an evangelical pentecostal church in Boscombe, Bournemouth, Dorset, UK

The History of Easter

The pagans celebrated the arrival of spring, encouraging their gods to bless the re-birth of plants and animals at this time of year.

We know that Jesus was killed at this time of year because the Bible and other historical records tell us he was crucified just before the Jewish festival called Passover.

The exact date of Passover shifts about a bit as it is calculated on the old Jewish calendar which was based on what the moon was doing, and this doesn't tie-in exactly with the modern calendar.


richmondparkchurch.org.uk an evangelical pentecostal church in Boscombe, Bournemouth, Dorset, UK

Easter

This is also the origin of the Easter Bunny, and strangely, Easter Eggs (what? no chickens?!) - all life was thought to have originally come from an egg, and eggs were another favoured symbol of fertility. The "spirit" Easter Bunny/Hare was supposed to lay its eggs in the grass, and people would go searching for them - the fore-runner of modern day Easter egg hunts.


richmondparkchurch.org.uk an evangelical pentecostal church in Boscombe, Bournemouth, Dorset, UK

Easter

Easter is the spring-time holiday associated with chocolate eggs and bunny rabbits. For Christians it is also the anniversary and celebration of the resurrection of Jesus.
Easter gets it's name from the Saxon goddess of spring called "Eostre". This goddess had a hare's head, or a hare companion, which makes sense when you remember that pagan worship centred on nature and fertility, and hares and rabbits breed like....well, rabbits!


richmondparkchurch.org.uk an evangelical pentecostal church in Boscombe, Bournemouth, Dorset, UK

Pancake Day to Pentecost

The holy days of the seven weeks of Easter observances that the traditional churches still follow were made up during the fourth century AD. Some independent evangelical churches, like Richmond Park Church, choose not to stringently follow traditions that were made up by the fourth century church, but which are not spelled out in the Bible. There is nothing inherently wrong with these traditions, if they are designed to point people in the direction of the example and life of Jesus, but neither is it compulsory to observe these created "holy days" to be a faithful Christian. However, after several decades of making a conscious effort to separate themselves from things which are merely "tradition", and not specifically Biblical, many evangelical churches are coming round to the idea that these traditional ceremonies are not without merit. Some are being re-introduced into independent churches and traditional churches, in a slightly revised fashion focusing on doing something pro-active to help others during Lent as a constructive way of not focusing on our selfs, eg the "Buy Less" "credit card".



richmondparkchurch.org.uk an evangelical pentecostal church in Boscombe, Bournemouth, Dorset, UK

Pancake Day

Shrove Tuesday / Mardi Gras (French for "Fat Tuesday") / "Pancake Day" - 47 days before Easter Sunday



This is the last day before Lent. "Shrove" means to 'have heard confession, assigned penance and absolved'. From the Middle Ages until the late Renaissance, eating all animal products except fish (which were considered bloodless) was forbidden during Lent. In more modern times the Lenten fast was confined to Ash Wednesday and all Fridays during Lent, and abstinence from meat did not include other animal products (eggs, milk and cheese, for example). Therefore on Shrove Tuesday people made pancakes to use up their supplies of eggs, milk, butter and other fats. These cakes were made in flat pans (hence pancakes) and were seen as a sign of self-indulgence before the fast!




richmondparkchurch.org.uk an evangelical pentecostal church in Boscombe, Bournemouth, Dorset, UK