Easter Through the Ages

After our long winter of 2022-23, spring is a time to celebrate. The birds are back from their southern wintering grounds, the snow is melting and the grass is beginning to green. What better way to celebrate spring than to celebrate Easter, the time of resurrection.

Whether you take in a sunrise service at your church, or enjoy watching youngsters search for Easter Eggs, or both, it is fun to learn about some of the origins of this spring-time holiday. It is a way to celebrate the end of winter, the melting of snow, and the return of the warm weather.

This from the Cheyenne Weekly Sun, April 10, 1890 –Easter Days Facts, Fancies and Quaint Customs Relating to Easter. The World’s Tide of Joy Over the Risen Savior. The Season of the Social Whirl to Recommence. Vanity Fair. April 5, 1890. Mr. Editor: The closing days of Lent put a stop to society’s busy whirl and having but little social gossip it may not be amiss to give you some thoughts, facts and fancies about Easter day

EASTER HISTORY. Easter derives its Teutonic name from the Pagan goddess Ostera or Eastre. She was the personification of the morning or east and also the opening of spring. The worship of Easter seems to have struck deep root in Germany and was brought into England by the Saxons. With its usual policy the Church endeavored to give a Christian significance to such of the Pagan rites as could not berooted out and here the conversion was easy.

Joy at the rising of the natural sun, and the awakening of nature from the death of winter, beamed joy at the raising of the Son of Righteousness— at the resurrection of Christ from the grave. It typified with the raising of the Savior, a refreshing of love, arrival of life here, and a renewal of hope for life hereafter.

EASTER OBSERVANCES. The proper time for the observance of Easter easily caused controversies and in the second century a dispute arose between the eastern and western churches. The great mass of eastern Christians celebrate Easter on the fourteenth day of the first Jewish moon, considering it the same as the Jewish Passover, while the western church kept Easter the Sunday after the fourteenth day commemorating the resurrection of Jesus. The Council of Nice (325 A.D.) decided in favor of the western usage, holding the eastern usage heresy.

The Passover – One reason for making Easter a movable feast was that it might never fall on the same day as the Jewish Passover. They did occur together on April 14th. 1805, in 1825, on April 3, and will do so again 1903 and in 1925 on April 1. The latest Easter this century and the following, occur in 1886 and 1943 on the 25th of April.

Quaint Easter Customs – All through the old countries there abound quaint and curious customs of keeping Easter, but perhaps the most characteristic Easter rite and the one most widely diffused is the use of Pasch or Easter eggs; they are dyed of all colors, and people make presents of them, they are sometimes kept as amulets and games are played with them by striking them together.

This practice is not confined to Christians; the Jews use eggs in the feast of the Passover, and the Persians present colored eggs to each other when they celebrate the festival of the solar new year in March.

The Egyptians considered the egg a sacred emblem of man’ new life and his release from the burden of sin. His bondsmen, the children of Israel accepted the emblem, from them it has come to the Christians who use it with a different belief. (Christians also use the egg to demonstrate the Trinity. An egg has a shell, the white and the yolk, but it is one egg. The Trinity includes the father, son and holy spirit, and they are one in the same.)

Easter-Tide In Egypt – I passed one Easter-tide in Cairo, Egypt, in 18—, and was much interested in the ceremonies in the Greek, Roman Catholic and Coptic churches. At midnight on Easter eve the members of the Greek church marched through the streets with torches and candles and crosses and chanting in unison when the processions met. The leaders would embrace each other, crying In Arabic, “Christ Has Risen.”

From midnight until day the Greek church was illuminated as brilliantly as possible and the service celebrated with great splendor and magnificence, and on Easter day the celebration of the mass was a grand pageant.

The service in the Roman Catholic and Episcopal churches was much like that we have in America. A week later I went with our dragoman, Hassen, to the Coptic church to see the celebration of their Easter. Their service seemed to be a jumble of many others. Like the Moslem they put off their shoes on entering the place of worship. They stand always in the church and the service is ‘ four or five hours long. The church was very ancient, dark and uninviting, having an altar screen of wood, elaborately carved, and considered a wonderful piece of workmanship.

Colored eggs are a traditional part of Easter, as we see in this article from The Wheatland World, April 2, 1909. Eggs and Easter. – The egg has from time immemorial been connected with this season of the year. The custom of using eggs is supposed to have originated with the ancient Greeks and Romans, who colored them lo use in their pagan festival.

Marvelous stories may be found of bewitched eggs, said to be able to fly straight toward the sun, and one famous variety was said to have been laid by a rabbit. So even in those remote times the Easter “bunny” had a place.

In Gerrnany he has been known these many years. The children of the fatherland watch eagerly for the hare who hides his eggs so carefully for their finding on Easter morning.

Russia is really the paradise of the Easter egg. Everyone carries one on the street and presents to his friends, saying “Christ is risen,” the recipient responding: “He is risen, indeed.”

In practical bustling America this season is becoming a much-looked-for occasion. We are beginning to live up to many of the beautiful traditions of the past, of which the legends concerning Easter are the most beautiful of all.

Easter Egg Hunts are held in nearly every town, large or small. Even even the White House hosts an annualEaster Egg Roll which takes place on the South Lawn. President Rutherford B. Hayes, in 1878, was the first president who agreed to open the White House lawn to all children who wanted to roll Easter eggs.

By 1887 the custom was well-accepted as we see in this small notation in The Lusk Herald, April 22, 1887

Easter lilies are a popular decoration at Easter, especially in Churches. Lilies are mentioned in the Bible. In the Rock River Review, March 26, 1920 there is an article about Easter Lilies. In the Sermon on the Mount Jesus spoke of the “lilies of the field,” which, though they neither toiled nor spun, out did King Solomon in the beauty of their raiment. It has been popularly supposed that the lily of the valley was the one he meant.

In Catholic countries the lily was sacred to the Virgin Mary, because It is a symbol of purity. The angels painted by the old masters frequently carry lilies in their hands. And legend tells that, when the disciples looked into the tomb of Jesus after the resurrection, it was filled with lilies. The lilies that appear in the paintings of Murlllo and other old masters are not callas. They are of the familiar Easter Lily type, and are easily recognizable as the Madonna or annunciation Lily— the latter name being given them because of the belief that the angel of the Annunciation appeared to the Virgin Mary with these lilies in his hands.

Other traditions include dressing up as fine as possible to attend Easter services, Easter bonnets were especially popular with well-dressed women and girls. Many towns, including New York, had and still have Easter parades.

In 1933, Irving Berlin wrote a song “Easter Parade”, which became an Easter standard, and in 1948 it was the basis for the film ‘Easter Parade’ a Technicolor musical starring Judy Garland and Fred Astaire.

Cheyenne State Leader, April 4, 1920: The possibilities for an Easter parade in Cheyenne were rather remote following the snow on the last two days and the threatening appearance of the elements last night.

Cheyenne Daily Leader, April 23, 1905:New York, April 22— The Easter parade on Fifth Avenue tomorrow will eclipse those of former years In brilliance, If the weather is fair. It is estimated that nearly $3,000,000 have been spent by women of this for Easter finery alone. Special services will be held in the churches, all of which have been gorgeously decorated for the occasion.

So, no matter what tradition appeals to you at Eastern enjoy the season. It is a time of resurrection and renewal, like the grass and flowers of spring. And remember also that many of the traditions we celebrate go back into antiquity.