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"...The church of the living God, the pillar and ground of the truth."
I Timothy 3:15
Easter
Mike Dixon
(1) A pagan holiday (Acts 12:4). This is the only place in which "Easter" appears in the Authorized Version. Some say that this should be translated "passover" and they point to this as an error in the KJV, but they are wrong. The Easter of Acts 12:4 occurred after the Passover. We know this because Acts 12:3 says it was "the days of unleavened bread."
The feast of unleavened bread followed the Passover (Num. 28:16-25), but this Easter was after the feast of unleavened bread. It refers to a pagan holiday, probably the celebration of Tammuz, the sun god (Jack Moorman, Easter or Passover?).
"Easter" is a proper translation to distinguish it from the Jewish Passover, and the KJV translators were wise in their choice of this word. In using the term "Easter" in Acts 12:4, The King James Translators merely left intact the reading of Tyndale, Matthews, and the Geneva Bible:
"Then were the days of unleavened bread, and when he had caught him, he put him in
prison, and delivered him to four quaternions of soldiers to be kept, intending after
Easter to bring him forth to the people"
(The New Testament by William Tyndale, 1526,
John Wesley Sawyer, The Martyrs Bible Series).
(2) An occasion observed by many Christians commemorating the resurrection of Christ. It is observed on the Sunday immediately after the first full moon that occurs on or after March 21. Originally Easter was a pagan holiday in the name of the goddess of spring, but it was "Christianized" by the Catholic Church and adapted to the remembrance of Christ's resurrection. Sunrise services are adaptations of the ancient worship of the sun.
The entire Easter celebration is extra-biblical. "Good Friday," which is the supposed day that Christ died, is fictitious in that Christ could not have died on Friday. He was three days and three nights in the tomb (Matt. 12:40; 16:21; 17:22-23; 20:17-19; 27:62-64; Luke 24:1-8; Jn. 2:19).
He arose before daylight on Sunday morning at the end of the sabbath (John. 20:1; Matt. 28:1; Mark. 16:2).
Thus he must have been crucified on Wednesday or Thursday. The Jewish day begins in the evening (Gen. 1:5,8,13,19,23).