"The Truth About Easter"
Is Easter an innocent little holiday, or is there more to it? Is it the day Christ was resurrected? Should we as Christians be celebrating this day? Well let’s start with Colossians 2:8 and see what it says, “Beware lest any man spoil you through philosophy and vain deceit, after the tradition of men, after the rudiments of the world, and not after Christ.” Most Christians think the whole purpose of Easter is because of the death and resurrection of Christ, however Easter was around for thousands of years before Christ ever walked this Earth. It is a pagan holiday, and it started back with Nimrod. Nimrod is a descendent of Noah’s son Ham, and was a builder of cities (Study Genesis chapter 10). Some of those cities included: Ninevah, Babel, Asshur (Assyria), and Calah, all of which were known for their evil, perverse acts. Nimrod’s wife Semiramis, who was also called "Ishtar, Ostara, Isis, or the Queen of heaven" is where we get the word Easter from.
When her husband Nimrod died, she deified him, and called him the "sun god". You can do a search of different cultures throughout history and find reference to him, usually called Baal, Molech, Saturn, Osiris, etc. Ishtar claimed to have "a miraculous conception" from the rays of the son, her husband, the sun god, and she gave birth to Tammuz. Being that Ishtar was the wife of the sun god, she was called the moon goddess, or goddess of fertility. Her son Tammuz was a mighty hunter just like his father Nimrod, but at 40 years of age, he was killed by a wild boar. To honor his death, Ishtar required her followers to weep and mourn for him 40 days each year, and to eat a pig "as revenge" for the wild boar that killed her son. These 40 days would start at the spring equinox each year. This is where Catholics get their 40 days of lent from. It is also where the tradition of the “Easter ham” came from.
What does God think about these practices?
He speaks very clearly against it in Jeremiah 44. He even mentions Ishtar, the Queen of Heaven.
Jeremiah 44:17-19 “But we will certainly do whatsoever thing goeth forth out of our own mouth, to burn incense unto the queen of heaven, and to pour out drink offerings unto her, as we have done, we, and our fathers, our kings, and our princes, in the cities of Judah, and in the streets of Jerusalem: for then had we plenty of victuals, and were well, and saw no evil. But since we left off to burn incense to the queen of heaven, and to pour out drink offerings unto her, we have wanted all things, and have been consumed by the sword and by the famine. And when we burned incense to the queen of heaven, and poured out drink offerings unto her, did we make her cakes to worship her, and pour out drink offerings unto her, without our men?”
God was angry with the wicked acts that His children began partaking of because of traditions of men that were passed down and had worked their way into the True Word of God. God also speaks of the evil workings of those taking part in these traditions of men in Ezekiel 8, verse 14 even speaks specifically of the weeping for Tammuz, “Then He brought me to the door of the gate of the LORD'S house which was toward the north; and, behold, there sat women weeping for Tammuz.”
So we’ve established where the name "Easter" came from, and how some of these pagan traditions started, but what about the egg and the bunny? The egg was a symbol that was sacred to the Babylonians. Eggs are also used as a symbol of fertility, and during this time in the spring, the pagans would often participate in an orgy in the groves as part of their “religious” practices. As if all of this wasn’t bad enough, there is a more sinister background of eggs and the practices of dying them. The classic poets are full of the fable of the "mystic" egg of the Babylonians, and its tale is told by Hyginus, the Egyptian, the learned keeper of the Palatine Library at Rome, in the time of Augustus, who was skilled in all the wisdom of his native country.
At the Sunrise service (Ezekiel 8:13-17) the priest of Ishtar would impregnate young virgins on the altar and during that service they would take the babies that were now three months old from the previous year and sacrifice those children on the altar to Ishtar and take the eggs of Ishtar and dip those eggs with the blood of those young infants. This is also where we get our Sunday sunrise service from. You can see how ANGRY this made God in Ezekiel 8.
Where did bunnies come from, and what do they have to do with Easter? The rabbit is a pagan symbol of fertility and a sexual symbol. We all know that rabbits reproduce quickly which is why pagans use this as their fertility symbol. Here’s a quote from a pagan/wiccan website where they state it themselves, “Spring equinox, or Ostara, is a time for fertility and sowing seeds, and so nature’s fertility goes a little crazy. The rabbit — for good reason — is often associated with fertility magic and sexual energy.” This again is why they had their sexual orgy rituals in the groves.
It’s important to note that the word "Easter" was never meant to be in our Bibles. It is in it only ONCE, and that’s in Acts 12:4 “And when he had apprehended him, he put him in prison, and delivered him to four quaternions of soldiers to keep him; intending after Easter to bring him forth to the people.” This word "Easter", is a deliberate mistranslation, it should say Passover. The word is Pascha in the greek, and you can find it in your Strong’s concordance G3957.
https://biblehub.com/greek/3957.htm
What is another way we can know this to be true? Look in Acts 12:3 “And because he saw it pleased the Jews, he proceeded further to take Peter also. (Then were the days of unleavened bread.)” The days of unleavened bread is Passover! Luke 22:1 “Now the feast of unleavened bread drew nigh, which is called the Passover.”
Keeping Easter instead of Passover is AN ABOMINATION to the Lord. These traditions of Easter make void the very Word of God, Mark 7:13, “Making the Word of God of none effect through your tradition, which ye have delivered: and many such like things do ye.”
So how did these traditions of men, these pagan traditions, get tied into Christianity? The emperor Constantine in 325 A.D. is a good place to start. Emperor Constantine in the Council Nicaea ordered all Churches to celebrate the Resurrection of Christ on Easter Sunday. The ancient Church had celebrated the Resurrection during the Passover [Nisan 14], which could fall on any day of the week, but the Churches near Rome had abandoned the practice because they hated the Jews (those from the bloodline of Judah, not the religion of Judaism), and fixed the date to the first Sunday after the first full moon of Spring. They also called the celebration "Easter", after the pagan goddess of spring. All of this is verified by the following quote from the Encarta Encyclopedia:
“An important historical result of the difference in reckoning the date of Easter was that the Christian churches in the East, which were closer to the birthplace of the new religion and in which old traditions were strong, observed [the Resurrection] according to the date of the Passover festival. The churches of the West, descendants of Greco-Roman civilization, celebrated Easter on a Sunday.
Constantine the Great, Roman emperor, convoked the Council of Nicaea in 325. The council unanimously ruled that the Easter festival should be celebrated throughout the Christian world on the first Sunday after the full moon following the vernal equinox; and that if the full moon should occur on a Sunday and thereby coincide with the Passover festival, Easter should be commemorated on the Sunday following. Coincidence of the feasts of Easter and Passover was thus avoided.
The name [Easter] probably comes from Eastre, the Anglo-Saxon name of a Teutonic goddess of spring and fertility, to whom was dedicated a month corresponding to April. Her festival was celebrated on the day of the vernal equinox; traditions associated with the festival survive in the Easter rabbit, a symbol of fertility, and in colored Easter eggs, originally painted with bright colors to represent the sunlight of spring, and used in Easter-egg rolling contests or given as gifts…” – Encarta Encyclopedia, article: Easter.
After the council of Nicaea, Constantine outlawed Passover, his goal being to "remove Jesus from the context" of Passover. The church fought against this for centuries after Constantine. In the 6th century, Justinian sent the Roman army to enforce the "prohibition" of Passover. Thousands of men, women, and children were murdered simply for refusing to stop celebrating Passover. The Roman church would eventually get involved in attempts to stamp out Passover.
So this is why churches celebrate the "pagan" holiday of Easter today. The Roman church brought in MANY pagan practices, and then “Christianized” them so that they could please both the pagans and the Christians. These "traditions of men" were then passed down from generation to generation. Easter is not the only pagan holiday that is celebrated here today, but we will go over the others in a different teaching.
Jesus Christ and His apostles would have never taken part in the type of celebration that goes on today. Jesus and the apostles took part in 3 feasts that God commanded in Exodus 23, Passover, Pentecost, and the Feast of Tabernacles. Exodus 23:14-16, “Three times thou shalt keep a feast unto me in the year. Thou shalt keep the feast of unleavened bread: (thou shalt eat unleavened bread seven days, as I commanded thee, in the time appointed of the month Abib; for in it thou camest out from Egypt: and none shall appear before me empty:) And the feast of harvest, the firstfruits of thy labours, which thou hast sown in the field: and the feast of ingathering, which is in the end of the year, when thou hast gathered in thy labours out of the field.” As Christians "these" are the days that we should keep holy as well. Satan wants people to “stay in Egypt” and keep celebrating these pagan holidays. Satan and his children love it when we mix pagan worship with the worship of God, Christianity with babylonianism, "the Truth with a lie", but God will not mix with evil. What are we doing when we attempt to “Worship Jesus” with the traditions of Babylon? Mark 7:7-9, “Howbeit in vain do they worship Me, teaching for doctrines the commandments of men. For laying aside the commandment of God, ye hold the tradition of men, as the washing of pots and cups: and many other such like things ye do. And He said unto them, Full well ye reject the commandment of God, that ye may keep your own tradition.” In 2 Corinthians 6:17-18 God commands: “Wherefore come out from among them, and be ye separate, saith the Lord, and touch not the unclean thing; and I will receive you, and will be a Father unto you, and ye shall be My sons and daughters, saith the Lord Almighty.”
If you did not know these things before, and the Lord has opened your eyes to His Truth regarding them, please do not continue celebrating these pagan traditions of men. Turn from these evil practices so God can use you!
Study God’s Word "yourself" so that you may "know" the Truth.
Don’t put your trust in the man at the pulpit, put your trust in God almighty!
2 Timothy 2:21, “If a man therefore purge himself from these, he shall be a vessel unto honour, sanctified, and meet for the Master’s use, and prepared unto every good work.”
Additional resources to consider:
World Events and The Bible (Brandon)
Answers reader's Question;
"What Is The First Month On The Hebrew Calendar?"
(In-depth Bible study)
First Council of Nicaea
(where Pagan "Easter/Ishtar" began)
Its main accomplishments were settlement of the Christological issue of the divine nature of God the Son and His relationship to God the Father,[2] the construction of the first part of the Nicene Creed, "mandating uniform observance of the date of Easter",[6] and promulgation of early canon law.[3][7]
"Another result of the Council was an agreement on when to celebrate Easter, the most important feast of the ecclesiastical calendar, decreed in an epistle to the Church of Alexandria in which is simply stated:
We also send you the good news of the settlement concerning the Holy "Pasch" (PASSOVER), namely that in answer to your prayers this question also has been resolved. All the brethren in the East who have hitherto followed the Jewish practice will henceforth observe the custom of the Romans and of yourselves and of all of us who from ancient times have kept Easter together with you.[15]"
Full Bible Study