Talk:Easter

Autumn

"It occurs during the spring, in and around the month of April." Can someone please edit that? It occurs in the Autumn. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 14.201.34.143 (talk) 05:16, 10 April 2011 (UTC)

Easter does not occur in autumn. ZabiggyZoo (talk) 20:05, 15 April 2011 (UTC)

Well, maybe it does if you're in Australia.... :) Do they reverse the seasons down under? ~Amatulić (talk) 23:35, 15 April 2011 (UTC)

Yes can someone please change it to "It occurs during Northern spring". —Preceding unsigned comment added by 60.242.123.156 (talk) 23:28, 17 April 2011 (UTC)

Shouldn't that be "It occurs during the northern spring and southern autumn"? Why should the north get precedence? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 203.82.92.83 (talk) 02:07, 24 April 2011 (UTC)

Lead section

The lead section of this article, which should be one of main articles about Christianity, is simply below standard. I am not enough knowledgeable, both with English terminology and the topic to edit it myself, but someone please address the issues:

• Some[who?] Christians celebrate this resurrection on Easter Day or Easter Sunday (also Resurrection Day or Resurrection Sunday), two days after Good Friday and three days after Maundy Thursday.

  Which Christians do not celebrate Easter on this day? Most do, and the "some" is highly misleading. We should state the global facts first, and exceptions only later, depending on significance.

The plain truth is that the vast majority of Christians celebrate Easter on this day. "Some" is flat-out dishonest. This should be fixed. One can consult every Christian group in the world, and those that represent well over 90% of Christians will agree that Easter Sunday is the day in which the Resurrection of Christ is celebrated.ZabiggyZoo (talk) 20:05, 15 April 2011 (UTC)

• Why are Good Friday and, worse still, Maundy Thursday, relevant for the date of Easter? If anything, the Friday and Thursdays are ones which by definition come before the Easter, not the other way round? The whole sentence is upside down.

• Easter also refers to the season of the church year called Eastertide or the Easter Season. Traditionally the Easter Season lasted for the forty days from Easter Day until Ascension Day. The first week of the Easter Season is known as Easter Week or the Octave of Easter. The week from Palm Sunday to Easter is known as Holy Week. Easter also marks the end of Lent, a season of fasting, prayer, and penance.

  I am not aware that anyone refers to Eastertide as the Easter. Why is so relevant for the lead how the two weeks surrounding it are called? Why is it not in chronological order:

  Easter marks the end of Lent, a forty-day period of fasting, prayer, and penance. The last week of the Lent is called "Holy week", and it contains Good Friday, observed before the Easter Sunday. Easter is followed by fifty-day period called Eastertide or the Easter Season, which lasts until the Pentecost Sunday.

• Secular customs, such as the Easter Bunny and Easter egg hunts, have become part of the holiday's modern celebrations and are often observed by Christians and non-Christians alike. There are also some Christian denominations who do not celebrate Easter. (See section below.)

  Apples and oranges. Both facts are worth mentioning, but not in the same paragraph.

No such user (talk) 07:27, 11 April 2011 (UTC)

Edit request

{{edit semi-protected}}

The text "Some Christians celebrate this resurrection on Easter Day or Easter Sunday" should be replaced by "The vast majority of Christians celebrate this resurrection on Easter Day or Easter Sunday". Rationale: It's the truth. "Some" in English almost always means a quantity short of the majority. As any amount of research on modern Christian practices will reveal, the vast majority (indeed, probably over 90%) of Christians celebrate the resurrection of Christ on Easter. The use of "some" is blatantly dishonest.ZabiggyZoo (talk) 22:52, 15 April 2011 (UTC)

 Done but not the way you asked. "Vast majority" is an inappropriate term. ~Amatulić (talk) 23:05, 15 April 2011 (UTC)

I daresay that any Christians who disregard Easter are not really Christians. The Resurrection is central to the Christian religion. Without that, it's just a "philosophy", not a religion. ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 23:10, 15 April 2011 (UTC)

Quakers believe in the Resurrection but do not celebrate Easter. Instead they celebrate the Resurrection every day of the year. — Joe Kress (talk) 07:35, 19 April 2011 (UTC)

Easter Not Equivalent of Passover

In the right hand column under the picture of Jesus in the Related To section, it says "Passover, of which it is regarded the Christian equivalent". This information is wrong. What it should read, is that "Easter and the Jewish holiday, Passover fall around the same time, but are not similar related in any way", or something like that. They are completely different holidays with no similarities, except some minor modern adopted customs, such as Easter's egg hunt and Passover's traditional matzoh hunt. Since Easter mourns the crucifixion and death of Jesus and celebrates his resurrection, while Passover commemorates the Israelites' plight from Egypt and their journey through the desert to Israel. comment added by Choopchick (talk • contribs) 17:59, 24 April 2011 (UTC)

Secular (Commercial) Easter

Don't suppose we could get a separate page or even a paragraph dedicated to easter as a children's holiday/candy holiday. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 67.160.123.254 (talk) 06:49, 17 April 2011 (UTC)

Sounds like Easter customs may be the article you want. Rwflammang (talk) 15:20, 18 April 2011 (UTC)

Isnt going to church an "Easter custom", just like the Wiccan/Pagan Holiday? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 98.100.82.254 (talk) 07:35, 24 April 2011 (UTC)

Commercial Easter in introduction?

Should we include a paragraph mentioning the commercial/secular aspect of Easter in the intro? I'm sure there was one there before, but it has disappeared. Most references to Easter heard in the media (TV commercials, programs, news, public sphere) refer to the commercial/secular aspect without once mentioning the Christian side that this article defaults with. Any opinions?. — CIS ^(talk | stalk) 08:29, 19 April 2011 (UTC)

I've just removed it, because it was rather poorly written, but I agree that it deserves a mentioning. No such user (talk) 08:52, 19 April 2011 (UTC)

Reinstated [1]. Feel free to tweak it. No such user (talk) 09:02, 19 April 2011 (UTC)

"In most European languages the feast called Easter in English is termed by the words for passover in those languages and in the older English versions of the Bible the term Easter was the term used to translate passover"

The first mention of "Passover" is correctly capitolized as a Proper Name. Further in the paragraph, it appears incorrectly uncapitolized as "passover." This should be corrected. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 68.198.39.2 (talk) 11:54, 20 April 2011 (UTC)

I made a few changes. Some of the lower-case "passover" seem to be direct quotes, so I left those alone. However, I'm not 100% certain about the changes I made. I'm not sure if it's the holiday name or just the word(s) "pass over" that they're referring to. ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 12:05, 20 April 2011 (UTC)

It sounded rather convoluted, so I tried to simplify it [2]. No such user (talk) 12:39, 20 April 2011 (UTC)

Eostre etymology

I humbly request you include that Eostre is the Goddess of the Dawn in your etymology section. Yes, you can get there through a link, but it's no mistake that this Goddess has given the name to the Christian festival, symbolizing as she does, REBIRTH. Credit where it's due, guys! :-)Etymology freak (talk) 23:12, 21 April 2011 (UTC)

Actually, it is a mistake. The only source of that information is Bede, and that's not what he said; he said the name came from the name of the month. There is also no evidence that she was a Goddess of the Dawn, beyond the assumption that the name is related to the word "East." Carlo (talk) 04:15, 22 April 2011 (UTC)

It's worth mentioning since the month of April was Eostre and Christianity is known to incorporate local traditions into it's own canon. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 71.197.58.7 (talk) 22:39, 23 April 2011 (UTC)

A few comments:

1. A mistake? Bede, in fact, did say that; see Ēostre. "Assumption"? Ēostre is generally held by modern scholars to be an Anglo-Saxon descendent of a Proto-Indo-European dawn goddess. Bede was not some sort of early medieval linguist and Anglo-Saxon paganism continued to exist during his time.
2. The etymology is already here, in the "English and German" section, although unrepresented in the lead.

A hope that answers your questions. :bloodofox: (talk) 22:49, 23 April 2011 (UTC)

Isn't Bede the same person quoted as finding the roots for East and West? - why does the OED have this definition, yet this page does not? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 98.100.82.254 (talk) 07:33, 24 April 2011 (UTC)

I am not sure what you're asking here, but for the complete Bede attestation, see Ēostre. :bloodofox: (talk) 17:06, 24 April 2011 (UTC)

Multiple issues

I think this article should mention the Easter Bunny. Before Easter, families dye hard-bioled eggs many colors. The night before easter, they leave them in baskets by the front door. That night the Easter bunny puts candy into the baskets as well. People then dress up and go to church where they hear that Jesus was brought back to life. Then, people go home and feast at in the early afternoon with their family. This sometimes occurrs while visiting relatives. Saying that Easter is all about Christianity does not seem true to me. It may be more about Springtime than the salvation of Jesus. Leaving out the easter basket and the dinner with family seems to be leaving out the main part of Easter. References might be found in newspapers and magazines rather than religious history books. The easter bunny even shows up in various department stores, which are selling candy. Easter has never been even half about church. It's about relatives visiting each other. It's about jelly beans. Leaving that out makes the article very biased. It may be that some people who celebrate Easter don't go to church. It does occur after winter when the sleeping plants seem to come back to life. Also, a lot of the words in the article I don't know, so easier words could be used because this is supposed to be an encyclopedia. I also wonder about how the article knows some of what it says. Like etymology. As far as I can tell from studying French and Spanish, English is a real language, and those languages seem younger to me. Therefore, books that say an English word is based on ancient greek and latin I very much doubt, and I think the reading level of the word-history section could be lower. Those big words are as meaningless to me as a dog barking. Otherwise the article is impressive. It must have taken a lot of work to write, looking up all those big words.--Rhbsihvi (talk) 05:55, 24 April 2011 (UTC)

Many of the issues you ask about are in the article Easter customs. Beeswaxcandle (talk) 06:27, 24 April 2011 (UTC)

OK, I re-read the article. Toward the end it says ". . . secular or commercial aspects of the holiday such as the Easter Bunny." And, the last paragraph on the introduction briefly mentions decorating eggs, egg hunting and Easter Bunny, as if secondary. The article also used the word "feast" a couple of times. The article spends a lot of words saying that different languages have different words for Easter, that the date of Easter is determined somehow by someone, and that different Easter church services are somewhat different. At one point the article mentions the date of Easter is always near "spring equinox". However, it says Easter is about "Christ's resurrection" rather than that being on Easter, which is about the miracle of Springtime. After Winter, the plants come back to life, rabbits are miraculously around again at least in the country. There is more to Easter than church. The candy industry, the travel industry. The bunny. The candy. The Easter eggs nothing to do with church, except in Greece. And, dying them to stand for blood I find heresy. Also, I think the mid-day dinner was probably not based on Passover. In fact, the opposite is probably true, since springtime is a lot older than the Bible. Someone ought to find sources about the "secular" Easter celebrating springtime. I find the article is easier to read if the browser is used to enlarge the letter to 300 percent. That way there are only four or five words per line, and the article is easier to pay attention to. Anyhow, I think the article should not be considered finished, because it has too much about church, foreign languages, has too much jargon and is ambiguous about who decides when Easter is.--Rhbsihvi (talk) 20:37, 24 April 2011 (UTC)

Dear editors, please do not feed the troll. Dogface (talk) 06:11, 25 April 2011 (UTC)

Google result

Did anyone know that if you search for "zombie jesus day" in google, this is the second result? Larryisgood (talk) 12:00, 24 April 2011 (UTC)

Lent

Lent starts on Ash Wednesday. 40 days later is Palm Sunday, which is 7 days before Easter. The 40 days is to do with Jesus spending 40 days and nights fasting. He arrived back in Jerusulem on Palm Sunday, so that actually marks the end of Lent. Then is Holy week, and Easter Sunday is, in effect, day 47 of Lent! (Might want to correct that bit - page is locked so I can't edit it myself) —Preceding unsigned comment added by 79.97.159.9 (talk) 13:35, 24 April 2011 (UTC)

See Lent Rklawton (talk) 13:58, 24 April 2011 (UTC)

Lent does not always start on Ash Wednesday. Ash Wednesday is a product of the Latin calendar. Christians of Eastern traditions, by and large, do not have an Ash Wednesday unless later introduced by Latin tradition (Roman Catholic, Protestant) sources. The Latin calendar does not count Sundays within Lent. Other calendars do, and their Lent starts on a different date.Dogface (talk) 06:13, 25 April 2011 (UTC)

Pagan Association

Where are the pagan celebrations of Easter? They shouldn't be relegated to the Easter Customs page. Why does Christianity have a monopoly on knowledge about Easter? There is nothing about the origin of the holiday as a spring festival honoring a pagan God or about the practices these people did on this holiday. There should be an entire section devoted to this whether believers can stomach it or not. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Tastybrain (talk • contribs) 18:51, 24 April 2011 (UTC)

I agree, go for it. Larryisgood (talk) 22:48, 24 April 2011 (UTC)

The main point is that the pagan festivals and the Good Friday-->Resurrection Christian event & holiday are completely separate topics. The original location of Christ's ministry would have been - except for Roman occupying forces and administrators, and the few "Greeks" in the land for commercial purposes - totally devoid of pagan practices and worship. The superficial use of the name "Easter" during the times post-2nd Century A.D. was simply a calendar date, and the "bunny" and so forth is not part of the Christian canon. — Preceding unsigned comment added by HammerFilmFan (talk • contribs) 01:26, 25 April 2011 (UTC)

Easter did not originate as a pagan holiday. It originated from Passover.Dogface (talk) 06:14, 25 April 2011 (UTC)

There is strong evidence that Easter did, in fact, originate as an Anglo-Saxon holy event, thus the name, and that the Christian event was grafted on to it, the name relatively unchanged (i.e. minus "month"); see Eostre. :bloodofox: (talk) 08:41, 25 April 2011 (UTC)

"Easter", as in "Rites of Spring", is obviously pagan. Passover and the Resurrection are both associated with spring also. The Catholic Church usurped various pagan traditions and overlaid them with Christian references. Eggs, rabbits, springtime and the Resurrection all have in common the idea of "rebirth", "renewal", etc. ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 08:51, 25 April 2011 (UTC)