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Chur ch Mat ter s : Ret r i ev i ng the Great Trad i t i on

Appendix 36 Easter in Christian Liturgy

Easter (in Gk. pascha , which also means Passover ). The earliest and greatest annual festival of the Christian calendar. On the basis of the evidence quoted by Eusebius (EH 4.24.1-8), its existence can certainly be traced back to the time of Anicetus and Polycarp (c. 155) and probably to the time of the birth of Polycrates (c. 125). The reference in Epistle of the Apostles 15 may also date from c. 125. It is likely that the festival arose at Antioch c. 110, out of the weekly commemoration of Christ’s resurrection on Sunday, the intention being to give special prominence to that Sunday which fell nearest to the actual season of the resurrection, i.e. the Sunday next after the Jewish Passover on 14 Nisan. In the 2nd century, the small province of Asia observed Easter on 14 Nisan itself, whereas virtually the whole of the Christian world outside observed it on the Sunday following, and this has given rise to an alternative explanation of the origin of Easter. It has been supposed, notably by B. Lohse, that the practice of the province of Asia was the original Christian practice, and was a continuation of the observance of the Passover itself by Jewish Christians in NT times. However, it is very hard to understand why Jewish-Christian practice should have been preserved in Asia (a largely Gentile area, evangelized by the author of Col. 2:16-17 and Gal. 4:9-11) but not in Palestine or Syria (where there were more Jews than anywhere else, and where Jewish Christianity had its centre). So it is better to see the practice of Asia as presupposing the existence of Easter Sunday, and as an attempt to achieve greater precision than the rest of the Christian world, by transferring Easter from the Sunday after the Passover to the Passover itself. There is no evidence, incidentally, for the hypothesis that the church of Asia was celebrating Christ’s death and the rest of the church his resurrection. The ancient Easter day celebrated both events (the separate Good Friday first appears in the 4th century). The practice of Asia gave rise to an internal controversy between Melito and Claudius Apollinaris (c. 150-60) and to the world-wide Quartodeciman (‘about the fourteenth’) controversy (c. 190) in which the non-Asian view prevailed. Up to this point, all Christians dated Easter by following the decision made each year by the Jews about the Passover, which was still being fixed by observation; so