Scuba_Ben, you are correct. There are no optional length months between Nisan and Tishrei, so the start of Passover is nailed to the start of the following Rosh Hashanah. I was trying to see some relation between Passover and the previous Rosh Hashanah, which is hard to do.
Passover is 7 days long (8 outside Israel). According to the story given in the Christian Bible, Thursday (the night of the Last Supper) was either the first night of Passover or the day preceding the first night. In the latter case, Passover would have begun Friday night (the evening after the crucifixion) and not ended until the Friday night after the Resurrection. I have never before heard a theory that the Last Supper took place at the end of Passover.
Registered: Apr 1999
Location: Chatham, NJ, USA
Posts: 1227
A) If you concede that the old celebration of Easter is pre-1054, then it is not logical to pick out the Eastern Church as being responsible for it, especially since the main impetus actually came from Rome.
the church as a whole, east and west was responsible.
B) Jews, as such, were not persecuted by pagan Rome, because they were a legally recognized ethnic minority; the Jewish wars were, from Rome’s viewpoint, a political dispute over the Province of Judea. Christians, on the other hand, were not an ethnic group, and enjoyed no such protection – which they had had for as long as they were regarded as a Jewish sect.
at least you’re partly correct this time.
the jews have been persecuted by nearly everyone throughout history.
in the ancient world conquered peoples were expected to adopt, or at least add the religious beliefs of the conquerors.
the jews however, stubbornly held to their beliefs which became a problem for them, but not just because of simple religious intolerance.
the real problems stemmed from the fact that their faith kept them from meeting what were perceived as their civic responsibilities. for example: sacrificing to the fashionable deities, marching on the sabbath, etc., etc…
during the roman period they enjoyed intermittent periods of protection as the throne’s pets, broken by periods of ruthless persecution depending on who was sitting on the throne in rome.
however, during the jewish revolts in judea, no emperor could have, or would have protected them from public wrath.
:bounce:
Actually, to the best of my knowledge, there is no record whatever of resident Jews being persecuted, treated as enemy agents, etc., in the city of Rome during the Jewish Wars.
ritchiepage, it is fair to say that the Eastern Orthodox Church has anti-Jewish leanings. It is fair to say anti-Jewish sentiments played some role in motivations for setting the date of the Easter. What I believe John Kennedy is objecting to is the assertion that the Eastern Orthodox are responsible for setting Easter based upon anti-Jewish leanings. The Eastern Orthodox dating of Easter is based upon the earlier church dating of Easter that predates the Eastern/Western split. All of Catholicism (or Christianity in general, because they were one and the same) is to blame, not one offshoot. Which does nothing to excuse any current or past anti-Jewish sentiments expressed by the Eastern Orthodox church, or the Catholic Church.
Welcome to the Straight Dope, ritchiepage. Since our focus around here is in fighting ignorage, we tend to avoid relying simply on memory and personal anecdotes. In that spirit, can you provide a cite for your assertion, please?
I’ve also gone to the website for the Orthordox Christian Information Centre, but haven’t found anything that supports your assertions. For example, at this link, this is all that they say about the bread used in the eucharist:
None of which rules out anti-semitism, but I wonder if you could provide some examples of doctrinal acceptance of anti-semitism by in Othrodox teachings?