Passover v. Easter

766 Words2 Pages

Passover v. Easter

Today, millions of people celebrate Easter as an important religious holiday, while Passover is almost universally ignored. Many people will be surprised to find that the day God commanded us as believers to observe in the Bible is the Day being ignored. In this essay, I will compare this observance (holiday) with the instructions about worship found in the Bible regarding His “Holy Day” of Passover.

The word Easter is the English word for “Ishtar” it is found only once in the King James Version Bible, (Acts 12:4) and there, it was mistranslated from the Greek work Pascha, which literally means Passover. In 325AD through a ruling council of the Roman Catholic Church, Emperor Constantine established “Easter” as their feast day. His prime motivation for establishing “Easter” as a replacement in practice and dating from Passover was a desire to abandon all things “Jewish”. When Constantine was questioned he stated, “Let us then have nothing in common with the most hostile rabble of the Jews”. (Mason and Lane, 1839)

Easter celebrations were not new; it had been celebrated by pagans for thousands of years before the birth of Christ Jesus. This pagan festival “Easter/ Ishtar” originated from a religious celebration to the pagan “Queen of Heaven”, Goddess Ishtar. She represented fertility and life. (Jeremiah 7: 17-20) These festivals were filled with sexual overtones and ungodly indulgences.

For more than a century before the Easter tradition had fully prevailed in the church, thousands of Christians all over the Roman world use to observe what they called pascha “Passover”. This is the holiday which would correctly commemorate what God told his children. He commanded that it be obser...

... middle of paper ...

...y the sins of the world.” In Jerusalem that year they took the Lamb of God on the tenth day of the first month and sacrificed Him at the ninth hour of the fourteenth day, (Mark 15: 34) at the same time the priests were killing the Passover lambs in the temple.

By His crucifixion at the time of “Passover”, Christ became the final sacrifice for sins of those who would deny themselves and follow Him. Regardless of where we come from ethnically or what others my say on this issue, God himself commanded that His children keep this HOLY FEAST DAY. Passover is to be celebrated in remembrance of what God has done for us through Christ Jesus. Giving thanks to Him for delivering us from spiritual death and slavery to sin.

Mason, T and Lane G: A Historical View of the Council of Nice; 1839; pp.51-54 - New York

More about Passover v. Easter

Open Document