Some years Easter and Passover can be as much as a month apart. This year, for instance, Easter is on March 27 while Passover is April 22-30.
The Bible portrays Jesus’ trial and crucifixion taking place during the Jewish celebration of Passover. What happened? The short answer: We use different calendars.
The Lunar Calendar
The Old Testament calendar, like most ancient calendars, was based primarily on the cycles of the moon. The month lasted 29 days, from new moon to new moon, and celebrations often took place when the new moon appeared (hence the mention of “new moons” in passages like Isaiah 1:13 “I hate your new moon festivals and your appointed feasts).
The problem with this calendar was that the lunar year of twelve months was 11 days shorter than the solar year, the time that it takes the earth to go around the sun, so the months gradually moved out of their normal season. Since Passover must always occur in the spring, the Jews inserted an extra month every two or three years to bring the two calendars back into alignment.
The Roman Problem
Like the Jews, the Romans began with a lunar calendar and they also added extra days to balance their calendar with the solar year. It was the duty of the priests to keep track of the calendars and insert extra days when needed, but as the empire grew, the system began to fail miserably. Priests could be bribed to manipulate the calendar for political ends, inserting days and even months into the calendar to keep the politicians they favored in office or to change the length of time before voting on legislation. Or, since adding days was considered unlucky, the priests might refuse to add them at all in a time of crisis, like the war with Carthage.
The Birth of the Solar Calendar
In the midst of this calendar chaos, Julius Caesar proposed a better idea (which he got from the Egyptians)—a solar calendar of twelve months of varying lengths so that they would almost equal a solar year. The slight discrepancy could be corrected by adding an extra day every fourth year—Leap Year. No one had to make any decisions about adding months or days and the months always fell during the same season. With some adjustments, this is the calendar we use today.
As part of the Empire, Jews had to deal with the Roman (Solar) calendar, but they kept their own religious calendar. Since Christians were Jewish initially, they followed the Jewish (Lunar) calendar as well. But from the beginning, Sunday was a day of special meaning for Christians, a day of remembering the resurrection of Jesus and it’s significance. At first, they observed both the Jewish Sabbath and the Resurrection Feast. But as the center of Christian life moved away from Jerusalem and Judea, Christians were increasingly Gentile in background and firmly entrenched in Roman society. They developed their own holy days, particularly Easter, the celebration of the Resurrection, and Pentecost, celebrating the giving of the Holy Spirit.
What Calendar do Christians Follow?
Of course, people being people, Christians argued over which calendar was most appropriate until the council of Nicaea settled it in 325 AD. Christians would follow the solar calendar. That kept Easter on a Sunday, the original day of Christ’s resurrection, and it also served to create a distinct separation between the Christians and the Jews, which both Christians and Jews desired at that point.
Of course the most important aspect of Easter is not the date on which it is celebrated, but the recognition that it reminds us of God’s greatest gifts—in the form of Jesus who willingly died for us, and his resurrection that proclaims God’s victory over all human powers and even over death.
Author: Phyllis Tippit
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