History of Easter
Last Modified: 10/04/2019
An important holiday in the Christian calendar is celebrated with spiritual and fun traditions.
- 1Easter, the holiest day of the Christian calendar.
- 2A celebration of Jesus Christ's Resurrection from the dead.
- 3So what does this miracle have to do with a bunny delivering painted eggs?
- 4The answer lies in a hundred generations of rituals and customs.
- 5According to the Gospels of the New Testament,...
- 6...Jesus Christ and his apostles entered Jerusalem to observe Passover,...
- 7...the Jewish holy season that celebrates the Hebrews' release from slavery.
- 8After the Passover supper, Jesus was arrested...
- 9...and on what is now called Good Friday, he was crucified.
- 10Two days later, he rose from the dead.
- 11Those of Jewish origin were the first to celebrate the Resurrection,...
- 12...likely as a new facet of the Passover festival.
- 13In fact, the Easter celebration was called Pascha.
- 14It's derived from the word Pesach, the Jewish translation for Passover.
- 15Originally, Easter was celebrated two days after Passover, so it fell on any day of the week.
- 16But "Easter Wednesday" just didn't feel right.
- 17In 325 A.D., Roman emperor Constantine and the Council of Nicaea...
- 18...ruled that Easter must fall only on a Sunday, the day when Christ rose.
- 19Easter Sunday would be the first Sunday to follow the full moon after the spring equinox.
- 20It could occur anywhere between March 22nd and April 25th.
- 21Around this same time...
- 22...Christians began one of the first recorded rituals of the modern Easter celebration:...
- 23...the lighting of the Paschal candle.
- 24Its flame, a reminder of Christ's Resurrection, light out of darkness.
- 25As Christianity spread throughout Europe,...
- 26...different pagan customs blended into the holidays.
- 27In fact, the actual word Easter may have come from Eostre,...
- 28...the goddess of spring and fertility.
- 29Which brings us to the Easter egg.
- 30Eggs have been a mythological symbol of birth for thousands of years.
- 31Christians adopted the egg as an Easter custom sometime around the 13th century.
- 32The yolk inside a shell represented Christ's emergence from the tomb.
- 33Eggs were painted red to represent the blood Christ shed on the cross.
- 34The colorful Easter eggs soon hatched its own traditions.
- 35A popular one was egg rolling.
- 36In 1876, Congress prohibited kids from playing on the Capitol grounds.
- 37So President Rutherford B. Hayes opened the White House lawn to the little rollers.
- 38After that, the White House Easter Egg Roll became a tradition.
- 39So when did that Easter bunny hop into the scene?
- 40The fertile rabbit had long been a symbol of new life in European pagan celebrations.
- 41Beginning around the 16th century, parents told children that if they behaved,...
- 42...on the eve of Easter the Osterhase would come and lay colorful eggs.
- 43Children built nests in their homes to entice the rabbit to visit.
- 44And so began the customs of the Easter egg hunt and the Easter basket.
- 45To help fill out those baskets,...
- 46...19th century European chocolatiers began making egg shaped chocolates.
- 47The sweet trend quickly spread throughout the world.
- 48Today, billions of dollars are spent each year on Easter candy.
- 49Easter: it's a joyful day when Christians celebrate the Resurrection.
- 50For 2,000 years, customs have been at it, some spiritual and some fun.
- 51But Easter is also the time for families to gather and welcome spring,...
- 52...when new life emerges after the dead of winter.
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