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  • Calendar and Church

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    In 324, the Roman Emperor Constantine( ca. 285-337) proclaimed Christianity as the state religion. A year later, in 325, he convened a church council in the city of Nicaea( now Izvik in Turkey), at which the question of the date of the celebration of Easter was also discussed.

    Disputes about the date of Easter. The reasons for the Nicaean cathedral were many. After all, almost every province of the great Roman Empire had its own ideas about when to celebrate this holiday and how to determine its date. And to make the essence of these disputes clearer, we will dwell on some of the "subtleties" of this issue. Moreover, his decision subsequently had quite a certain influence both on the introduction in 525 of the era of our era( the era of the "Nativity of Christ") and on the reform of the calendar in 1582.

    First of all, many Christians of Asia Minor and Palestinein some places celebrated the Passover together with the Jews on the night of 14 to 15 Nisan, regardless of the day of the week it happened( these Christians were called "fourteen").In this regard, by the end of the II century.n.e.a fierce dispute arose between the churches, especially when the Bishop Victor of Rome appealed to the Minasian bishops with the demand to join the Roman practice - to celebrate Easter only "on the great and gracious Sunday" after 14 Nisan. Then the scandal was hushed up.

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    In Alexandria, then the capital of Egypt, Easter was celebrated on Sunday, from 15 to 21 Nisan. To calculate the date of the spring full moon( 14 Nisan), the Alexandrians in the III century. At first they used a very inaccurate octaetheride, and from the end of the III c.switched to the 19-year lunar cycle. The beginning of its count was taken on August 29, 284 AD.e. - the first year of the Diocletian era, the limits of Easter - from March 22 to April 25.In Syria they also used the metonic cycle with the same alternation of simple and embolismic years. However, the beginning of the cycle with respect to the Alexandrian cycle, as can be seen from the table, was shifted by three years( with an asterisk marked embolism years):

    Alexandria cycle: 1, 2, 3 *, 4, 5, 6 *, 7, 8 *, 9, 10,

    The Syrian cycle: 17 *, 18, 19 *, 1, 2, 3 *, 4, 5, 6 *, 7,

    The Alexandrian cycle: 11 *, 12, 13, 14 *, 15, 16, 17*, 18, 19 *,

    Syrian cycle: 8 *, 9, 10, 11 *, 12, 13, 14 *, 15, 16,

    As a result, due to the inconsistency of the insert in the 5th and 16th years of the Syriancycle spring full moon accounted for respectively on 19 and 18 March, while in the Alexandrian circle they corresponded on 18 and 17 April. Therefore, twice every 19 years, Christian Easter, calculated according to the Syrian circle( and strictly following the Jewish!) Was 4 and 5 weeks earlier than in the Alexandrian. Moreover, these two full moons of the Syrian cycle, strictly speaking, could not be considered spring( in the dispute about this the Syrians were called "protopaschits").

    In turn, the Roman bishops until the V century.n.e.did not allow the celebration of Easter later than April 21, so that the parilly - the feast of the "foundation of Rome"( XI day before the May calends = April 21) did not fall on the "passionate week".But the main thing is that for the Easter calculations, they replaced the rather rough 8-year cycle with 84-year-olds, and did not switch to 19-year-olds, as did the Alexandrians. This inevitably led to discrepancies in the calculation of the date of the spring full moon.

    In addition, many prominent representatives of the Western church II-V centuries.(bishop of Rome Ippolit, Tertuliai, Augustine, etc.) received "on faith" information from fake "Acts of Pilate", as if "Christ suffered on March 25"( ante diem VII Kal. Apr.- eight days before the April calends).In the Roman martyrology( memorial list of martyrs) on March 25, the memory of the "wise robber" was even noted, and Hippolytus calculated that "the first Christian Easter" fell on 29 AD.e. However, according to the Alexandrian Easter on March 27, Easter could only happen in 1, 12, 91 and 96 AD.e. Probably, therefore, many theologians of the Eastern Church in their writings claimed that Jesus Christ died on the cross on March 23 on Friday and resurrected on March 25( in 313 the well-known western writer Lactantius, who lived long in the Christian East, also wrote).Their desire to attribute the "first Easter" - the "resurrection of Christ" to March 25 will be understandable if we recall that then the views were formed that as if on this day, on March 25, the world was "created", that on the same day there was also "the Annunciation".That is why Easter, falling on March 25, was called kiryopasha - "the Passover Lord", thus emphasizing this triple coincidence. Further we will see that Dionysius the Lesser, introducing chronology in our era, just took the "first Easter" on March 25.One of the sects of Christians in the III-IV centuries.was constantly celebrating the Easter on March 25, regardless of the day it was.

    A serious reason for disputes about the date of Easter is also found in the texts of the Gospels. Thus, the first three evangelists( Matthew, Mark and Luke) say in almost the same words that Christ, along with his disciples, "tasted the legal Easter", which the Jews prepared in the evening of the 14th Nisan. It followed that he was crucified 15, and "resurrected 17 Nisan."But the fourth evangelist John quite definitely speaks of the "secret supper" 13( i.e. on the night of 13/14) of Nisan, the death of Christ on the eve of the Jewish Passover - 14 Nisan and his resurrection of 16 Nisan.

    For almost 20 centuries, many attempts were made to reconcile this striking contradiction in evangelical evidences, but all of them ended in failure. And yet today it can not be regarded as a proof of the myth-making of evangelists in deed. In 1875 Professor D. Khvolson, a professor of the Petersburg Theological Academy, drew attention to the fact that on the eve of the Jewish Passover several thousand lambs were "hardened" on the territory of the Jerusalem temple( Joseph Flavius ​​spoke even about 256 500 - the number is obviously exaggerated).The very preparation of the "Paschal lamb" took another two to three hours. But, as already noted, the Bible prohibits Jews from preparing food on the Sabbath, which began virtually on Friday after sunset. And if the Jewish Passover was on the Sabbath( and this happened in the year of Christ's death), then, according to D. Khvolson, the Easter sacrifices were brought on Thursday evening, the same Easter could be eaten on the night of Thursday to Friday, Fridays on Saturday.

    This assumption of D. Khvolson has no clear confirmation, since after the destruction of Titus in 70 AD,e. Jerusalem Temple sacrifices were no longer brought, and many customs were gradually forgotten. Of course, there is the Talmud, and there the case of "Easter on Saturday" is provided: if Easter falls on Saturday, then first at 6 1/2 hours( 12.30 pm on our calculation) is tempered and in 71/2 hours the daily evening sacrifice is brought, after that the sacrificial victim is slaughtered. Further it is said quite definitely that "if the Easter is celebrated before noon, then it is unfit."And again: "13 Nisan can not be cut, and 14 can not be cut in the morning."However, all talmudist literature was largely created and edited much later - in the III-V centuries.n.e. Therefore, the refutation of the hypothesis of D. Hvolson on its basis looks unconvincing.

    But in the II-IV centuries.n.e.the mentioned discrepancy between the evangelists led to the fact that in the Christian West, Easter was not allowed to pass before 16 Nisan, whereas in the East it was believed that it could be assigned to 15 Nisan. Because of this, Easter in Rome was often celebrated a week later than in other churches.

    Decisions about the Passover. The original text of the Nicene resolution was not preserved. He was not in the archives of the Church of Constantinople at the beginning of the 5th century. As an official document, there is only a message from the emperor Constantine of Nicaea to bishops who were not present at the cathedral. In this message it is affirmed that the council "seemed indecent to perform this holy feast as the Jews used to do. ..", because they "in the same year do the Passover twice instead of the proper correction."Here it was the following: if according to the Jewish calendar 14 Nisan was immediately after the vernal equinox, and the next calendar year has 12 lunar months, the next 14 Nisan will come already before the spring equinox. This creates the illusion of celebrating Easter "twice a year."For example, just before the Council of Nicaea in 321, the Jewish Passover fell on March 30, in 322 - on March 20, in 323 - on April 7.Thus, between the equinoxes( March 21!) 321 and 322 years. Easter was celebrated twice, while between equinoxes 322 and 323 years - never. This event was repeated until the end of the 5th century.n.e.every 19 years. In this message we also read: "The general opinion is recognized for the good - to all Christians, in whatever country they live, to make a saving holiday on the same day."

    Still, the question of when exactly the rule of celebrating Easter was formulated only after the vernal equinox remains open.

    In the XIV century. On the rule of celebrating Easter, the Byzantine monk Matthew Vlastar said: "Regarding our Passover, we need to pay attention to four decrees, of which two are contained in the Apostolic Rule, and two lead from an unwritten tradition. First, we must celebrate Easter after the vernal equinox. The second is not to celebrate it with the Jews on the same day. The third is to celebrate not just after equinox, but after the first full moon, which has to be after the equinox. And the fourth, after the full moon, only on the first day of the week. "

    Analysis of these rules shows that only the first of them is definitely established by the "fathers of the church."The second in the IV - VIII centuries.was understood only in the sense of "not celebrating the Passover until the spring equinox" and on other days except Sundays, as is the case with the Jews. Suffice it to recall that the Alexandrian Church in the next few years after the Council of Nicaea - in 343, 347, 367, 370, 374, 394 years.- celebrated the Passover in one day with the Jews. Such coincidences ceased after 783( !) Only because the cycle adopted for the calculation of Christian Passover metonyms is less accurate than the Jewish calendar.

    The second wish of the Council of Nicaea was not realized very soon, so that all Christians would perform a "saving holiday on the same day."For example, even in the V-VI centuries - in 475, 495, 496, 516 years.- In Rome, Easter was celebrated a week later than in the eastern churches. Part of this was due to the discrepancy between the cycles of the 84-year-old and the 19-year old. But in 457 Bishop Victoria of Aquitaine, on the instructions of Pope Leo the Great, compiled the Paschal Table for as many as 532 on the basis of the 19-year cycle, and the differences still remained: they were due to the fact that the Western Church still did not agree to schedule Easter for 15Nisan. And only in the Paschalia, composed by Dionysius the Small, Sunday 15 Nisan was already considered an Easter day.

    In conclusion, we note that in the III century.the very methodology of calculating Easter dates has already been reliably developed. The main thing was to draw up a table of spring full moons on the basis of the 19-year cycle. After that, in each specific year the number of the month, which accounts for the first full Sunday after this full moon, was set. For this, a 28-year solar cycle was used.

    So, since the IV century.n.e.the Christian church linked its annual cycle of holidays with the Julian calendar, and the most important of them - Easter( and the accompanying cycle of posts and "transitional" holidays) - with the lunisolar calendar. But both systems of time counting turned out to be inaccurate. Therefore, the church also initiated the subsequent calendar reform.