The Origin Of Easter
Easter is an event that is honored by nearly all of contemporary Christianity as the resurrection of Yahusha (Jesus) the Messiah. This tradition is so well established that it is believed to have begun with the resurrection of our Saviour and instituted by His apostles in the first century in commemoration of that event.
Actually, the apostles kept Passover until the mid 2nd century when a debate broke out about separating Christian celebrations from Jewish ones. Churches in the east still celebrated Passover (quartodeciman churches) while western churches began celebrating the resurrection on the first Sunday after Passover.
The name Passover comes from the German month in which Passover fell in -Eosturmonath.
The name spread through Europe until is became standardized as the name of the Resurrection day known as Easter in English.
The Mystery Religion
Nimrod was killed because of his violence and iniquity against the true and living God and his body was cut in pieces and sent to various parts of his kingdom. His wife/mother told the people of Babylon that Nimrod had ascended to the sun and was now to be called "Baal", the sun god. Semiramis was creating a mystery religion, and with the help of Satan, she set herself up as a goddess. Semiramis claimed that she was immaculately conceived. She taught that the moon was a goddess that went through a 28 day cycle and ovulated when full and that she had come down from the moon in a giant moon egg that fell into the Euphrates River at sunrise at the time of the first full moon after the spring equinox, on a Sunday. Semiramis became known as "Ishtar" which is pronounced "Ish-tar" referred to as Ashtoreth in scripture, and her moon egg became known as "Ishtar's" egg." One of her titles was the Queen of Heaven, and two of her fertility symbols were the rabbit and the egg. She soon became pregnant and claimed that it was the rays of the sun-god Baal (the ascended Nimrod) that caused her to conceive.
The son that she brought forth was named Tammuz. Tammuz was believed to be the son of the sun-god, Baal. Tammuz, like his supposed father, became a hunter. The day came when Tammuz was killed by a wild pig. Queen Ishtar told the people that Tammuz was now ascended to his father, Baal, and that the two of them would be with the worshipers in the sacred candle or lamp flame as Father, Son and Spirit.
Ishtar, who was now worshiped as the "Mother of God and the Queen of Heaven", continued to build her mystery religion. The queen told the worshipers that when Tammuz was killed by the wild pig, some of his blood fell on the stump of an evergreen tree, and the stump grew into a full new tree overnight. This made the evergreen tree sacred by the blood of Tammuz.
She also proclaimed a forty day period of time of sorrow for each year prior to the anniversary of the death of Tammuz. During this time, no meat was to be eaten - this is what became known as Lent" in Roman Catholic tradition. Worshipers were to meditate upon the sacred mysteries of Baal and Tammuz, and to make the sign of the "Tau" (a cross) in front of their hearts as they worshiped. They also ate sacred cakes with the marking of a "T" or a cross, on the top. Every year, on the first Sunday after the first full moon after the spring equinox, a celebration was made. It was Ishtar's Sunday and was celebrated with rabbits and eggs. Ishtar also proclaimed that because Tammuz was killed by a pig, that a pig must be eaten on that Sunday.
Ishtar, (Semiramis, widow of Nimrod, mother of Tammuz) came to be represented as the bare breasted pagan fertility goddess of the east. The original pagan festival of "Easter" was a sex orgy that celebrated the return of life via the fertility of Ishtar's conception of Tammuz. Worshipers of the Babylonian religion celebrated the conception of Tammuz on the first Sunday after the Full Moon that followed the Spring Equinox. They celebrated it by baking cakes to Ishtar, getting drunk, engaging in sex orgies and prostitution in the temple of Ishtar. Women were required to celebrate the conception of Tammuz by lying down in the temple and having sex with whoever entered. The man was required to leave her money. Babies were sacrificed in the honor of these pagan gods and their blood was consumed by the worshipers. The priest of Easter would sacrifice infants (human babies) and take the eggs of Easter/Ishtar, as symbols of fertility, and die them in the blood of the sacrificed infants (human babies). The Easter eggs would hatch on December 25th (nine months later), the same day her son Tammuz the reincarnate sun-god would be born.
This is where the practice of coloring "easter eggs" came from. Many babies would be born around Dec 25 from the sex orgies that began on the feast of Ishtar in the Spring and many of these babies would be sacrificed the following Easter/Ishtar feast .
It was also common for pagans to bake cakes to offer to her (the Queen of heaven) on the Friday before the Easter festival. This is where we gained the custom of 'hot cross buns', with the “cross” symbol indicating the female (the Babylonian symbol for the “female” was, and is, a circle with a crux/cross beneath). The cross also indicated the Equinox, when the Earth’s orbit “crossed” the celestial equator.
Jeremiah spoke against this practice and pronounced God's judgment against them for these practices (Jeremiah 7:17-19; 44:19-29). Ezekiel also speaks against the celebration of the rites of Ishtar which were taking place in the temple and the weeping for Tammuz (Ezek. 8:14) refers to the mourning process of the death/resurrection symbolism of Easter, Ishtar weeping for the death of her son Tammuz which the women were obliged to emulate.
The fertility rites were extended to agricultural processes and to ensure a prosperous growing season, Pagans rolled eggs decorated with the bright colors of Spring in their fields, hoping to imbue fertility. These eggs were then hidden from “evil spirits” in rabbits’ nests, another symbol of fertility.
The Easter or Ishtar symbolism of the Sunday resurrection of the spring fertility cult (Easter, the Anglo-Saxon form of Ishtar), is a pagan system of worship that first penetrated Christianity in the second century. The symbolism stems from the death of Tammuz (or Dumuzi) on Friday and his resurrection on Sunday. This mirrors the grain and new shoot symbolism of the corn harvest which occurred at this time of the year. The 40 days of Lent were picked as one day for each year of his life since he died at age 40. The rest of the traditions of Easter were "Christianized" into the story of the death and resurrection of Yahusha the Messiah.
The Infiltration Into The Church
Says Alexander Hislop, "It was an essential principle of the Babylonian system, that the Sun or Baal was the one only God. When, therefore, Tammuz was worshiped as God incarnate, that implied that he was an incarnation of the Sun" (p.96). Connected with his worship was a pagan "Lent" of forty days. Hislop adds, "Among the Pagans this Lent seems to have been an indispensable preliminary to the great annual festival in commemoration of the death and resurrection of Tammuz, which was celebrated by alternate weeping and rejoicing . . . being observed in Palestine and Assyria in June, therefore called the 'month of Tammuz;' in Egypt, about the middle of May, and in Britain, some time in April. To conciliate the Pagans to nominal Christianity, Rome, pursuing its usual policy, took measures to get the Christian and Pagan festivals amalgamated, and, by a complicated but skillful adjustment of the calendar, it was found no difficult matter, in general, to get Paganism and Christianity -- now far sunk in idolatry -- in this as in so many other things, to shake hands" (ibid., p.105).
The New Catholic Encyclopedia comments: "Since the majority of the early Christians were Jewish converts, it is understandable that from the outset the Christian calendar was governed by the fact that the death and Resurrection of Christ had taken place at the time of the chief Jewish feast, the Pasch, or Passover, celebrated on the 14th day of the month of Nisan, i.e., at the full moon following the Spring equinox. " (ibid., McGraw Hill, N.Y., 1967; pp. 1062-3). They go on to explain why they changed the date for uniformity in celebrating it on the same day each year and later to incorporate the pagan Easter Festival.
The historian Eusebius of Constantine's era, records "When the question relative to the sacred festival of Easter arose, it was universally thought that it would be convenient that all should keep the feast on one day; for what could be more beautiful and more desirable, than to see this festival, through which we receive the hope of immortality, celebrated by all with one accord, and in the same manner?" (Vita Const., Lib. iii., 18-20) Obviously Eusebius regarded the festival of Easter as 'sacred' and rejected the God-ordained festival of Passover which the true believers had kept along with the Jews up to that time from the apostolic era.
Nowhere are the customs associated with Easter sanctioned in the Bible. Nowhere does God command us or encourage us to observe a custom memorializing or commemorating the DEATH of Messiah on the tree. Rather, we are commanded to observe the PASSOVER on the 15th of Nisan which celebrates Israel's Redemption. The final of the 10 plagues in Egypt was the death of the firstborn. Israel was told to kill the Egyptian deity - the lamb, on their soil, a provocative move indeed. Exodus 8:26 "But Moses said, “It would not be right to do so, for the offerings we shall sacrifice to the Lord our God are an abomination to the Egyptians. If we sacrifice offerings abominable to the Egyptians before their eyes, will they not stone us?" God said he would send the destroyer, the angel, that night, to kill all the firstborn that night, in exchange for Pharaoh not allowing His "firstborn" to go free. Exodus 4:22 "Then you shall say to Pharaoh, ‘Thus says the Lord, Israel is my firstborn son," Those who put the blood of the lamb on the doorposts that night, were "passed over". This was a bold proclamation that the Israelites trusted in YehoVah, the God of Israel to deliver them, so much so that they would deny and kill the Egyptian sacred animal on their soil.
Many in Hebrew roots and Messianic Jewish synagogues have errantly decided to make the focus of Passover about Jesus and his supposed payment on a cross, which also occurred on passover. The groups also make the claim that Jesus is the passover lamb. What they do not understand is that the Egyptians held the lamb as a deity, and the point of denying or killing the lamb was an act against the "gods of Egypt" Exodus 12:12 "For I will pass through the land of Egypt that night, and I will strike all the firstborn in the land of Egypt, both man and beast; and on all the gods of Egypt I will execute judgments: I am Yahuah."
This was also the premise behind Peter's denial of Christ 3 times before the cock crowed twice. (Mark 14:30) Passover has a second provision for those who are not in the land of Israel at the time or have been defiled by a dead body. Some years Passover is delayed a month due to the barley not being ready for a firstfruits offering. Thus the cock crowing twice and Peter denying him thrice refers to this situation. This is secretly the meaning - that if Jesus is allegorically the passover lamb, then all who choose Yahuah, would do as ancient Israel did - Deny the gods of Egypt, and boldly proclaim Yahuah as their God. Surely denying Jesus as one's God in Western cultures today would equally be as provocative, thus stands the test for all to "overcome." Passover is a victory for Israel's Redemption as well as a stand for all who call upon the name of Yahuah as their God!
Where did all of the strange customs come from, which have nothing to do with the anything Biblical? The forty days of Lent, eggs, rabbits, hot cross buns and the Easter ham have everything to do with the ancient pagan religion of Mystery Babylon. Satan is a master deceiver, and has filled the lives of well-meaning, professing believers with idolatry, even so much so that he has deceived billions to worship Jesus and partake in idolatry of the church - "Mystery Babylon" - as they worship the golden image Babylon, the church, has set up.
"Thus says Yahuah, 'Learn not the way of the heathen . . . For the customs of the people are VAIN" (Jeremiah10:2-3). The Jewish Tanakh has, "Do not learn to go the way of the nations . . . For the laws of the nations are DELUSIONS." The Moffat translation has, "Never learn to live like PAGANS . . . but their rites are inane." The Amplified Bible says: "Learn not the way of the heathen (nations) . . . For the customs and ordinances of the peoples are FALSE, EMPTY and FUTILE."
In Acts 15, when deciding what the Gentile Christians should observe, food offered to idols is first on the list.
The word “Easter” appears in the KJV translation, but in the Greek from which it is translated, it is 'pascha', and it means Passover, from the Hebrew word “Pesach”. All scholars admit that this is an error in translation, and it only appears ONCE, at Acts 12:4. Luke, who wrote almost 40% of the writings in the New Testament, didn’t put it there as “Easter”, he wrote it as "Pesach/Passover". The KJV is the only one with this error, since translators have since corrected it in all others!
"God is a spirit: and they that worship him must worship him in spirit and in truth." John 4:24
Yahuah said, Isaiah 29:13 Wherefore Yahuah said, Forasmuch as this people draw near me with their mouth, and with their lips do honour me, but have removed their heart far from me, and their fear toward me is taught by the precept of men:
It is so important nowadays that we keep the commandments and festivals that YehoVah gave us as Israel's Redemption nears!!