Board index ‹ Resurrection of Christ

[Karen]

Do you have any idea why we say Happy Easter rather than something like Happy Resurrection? From where did the word Easter come?

I’ll ask about Easter eggs another year

[jimwalton]

It’s a great question about Easter, and I’m glad to answer. “Easter” is actually quite a pagan word, and shouldn’t really be part of our Christian practice. It’s a form of the name of a goddess, “Eostre,” who was celebrated at the beginning of spring. (This was before Jesus.) Later, a British monk named Bede (7th century AD) wrote that the month Christians celebrated the resurrection had been called “Eosturmonath” (the month of Spring) in Old English. Apparently somewhere along the road, the name stuck, and this celebration of the pagan goddess of the season became the name of the celebration of the resurrection. No one ever calls spring “Eosturmonath” any more, but we still call our resurrection celebration “Easter.” It’s really kind of icky. The Puritans of New England refused to celebrate Easter at all because it had become so tainted with non-Christian baggage. I know some pastors who refuse to call it “Easter” (because they know this background), and instead call it “Resurrection Sunday.”

There’s another theory that “Easter” came from the German “Ost” (“east”). Apparently “oster” had some kind of roots in an older word “auferstehen”, which means “resurrection”: “Ester” meaning “first” and “stehen" meaning “to stand.” The two words combine to form “erstehen” (an old German form of “auferstehen”), a word meaning resurrection.

Who knows, I guess. So maybe it’s pagan, and maybe it’s not. Most scholars, as far as I can tell, say it’s pagan.

Regardless, I’m not sure we’ll ever change the culture. The label is too entrenched. I guess most people don’t know, and so the label “Easter” has been redefined. Now, to many people, it means “resurrection.”

As far as the eggs, that started back in Medieval times. Eggs were a symbol of new life (for obvious reasons). And they were a common food. They were sometimes dyed red to symbolize the crucifixion. Then they were painted. Soon it became tradition, and even a form of art. Hiding eggs and finding them was like burial and resurrection (and, it was just fun for the children).

The Easter bunny dates back to the 17th century. Bunnies were associated with fertility and were often part of spring (Eosturmonath) celebrations. All three (resurrection, eggs, and bunnies) got associated, and we still have all of this non-Christian stuff tied in with our Christian worship. We’ll never make it go away, so we roll with it as a fun part of the weekend without thinking about what it was really about several centuries ago.