As Rosh Chodesh finally arrives, bringing along with it the biblical new year, according to Torah, we find everyone preparing for the first holiday of Spring. For Christians, it is “Easter”, and for both, Jews and Messianic Jews (believers), it is Pesach (Passover). Facebook, and other social media platforms like it are being flooded with memes, and random posts on this holy day. Some for it, some against it. Even I found myself considering adding to the craze, but then decided to go about it in a different manner. As always, while doing this article, I am pulling from both, my experiences growing up in a Christian Church and my new understanding as a Messianic Believer. What is quite interesting about this is that I have found that most people that debate against what I post are usually only privy to one side, having never even looked into the matter for themselves, and then for those who actually did dare to study, it was done with a biased mind, fully persuaded that anything outside the realm of what their Pastors have taught them can not be true. It really grieves me seeing this. My mind falls back to my last service in the Christian Church before I walked away. My former pastor taught on whether or not the feast days were for Christians or not. As he began his teaching, he let the congregation know that there were many arguments against what he was about to teach, “But, I am going to show you why they do not apply to us”. In this statement, he basically took away their ability to decide for themselves based off of the evidence for both arguments. They were then taught his view, and accepted it as truth because of his position. Yes, I believe in some cases, this can be acceptable, but when it comes to your spiritual growth, I whole heartedly believe that we have to, as the Book of Acts states, search those things daily to see if they are so. Many pastors I believe, rob their members of their will do study for themselves, thereby causing many to walk in err due to pastoral ignorance. I do not say this in a sense to belittle any church leader, but am pointing that when they cause a member to put that much confidence in them that they no longer “fact check”, it keeps the body of Christ in a state of ignorance due to thier own ignorance (lack of understanding). It is this mindset that has kept the church in a state of err as far back is the 3rd or 4th century. This being said, rather than trying to bash ones personal belief on what they celebrate and how they do it, I am going to give you something to consider instead.
First of all, I want to point out something that many may not know. It was during the Council of Nicea, where the Hebrew roots of Christianity were stripped away. You won’t find this on wikipedia, surprisingly, but then again, should this really surprise you? Only when you really begin to dig, does the truth actually begin to unfold. Some would ask, what does this have to do with anything? Well, considering that we all proclaim to be Christians, then we need to understand what really went on. So then, just why did they want to strip away the Hebrew roots of “Christianity”? Well, for this, we need to go back to Constantine’s “so called” conversion. You really don’t have to dig to far to find credible sources that let us know that his conversion was not what we were taught to believe. In fact, his pagan Rome practices continued on until his death. Furthermore, this was a tactic used to unite his empire under “one religion”. Doing a little study on the paganism of the Roman Catholic Church, we learn that all of their pagan deities’ names were changed to reflect alleged “saints”. One of the biggest was Mary, which actually dates back to the time of Nimrod and his wife, Semiramis. I really don’t want to get to far off topic by getting into this, so I’ll just wrap it up in a brief summary. After Nimrod’s death, it was said that he had become the sun. The story goes that he, as the sun had impregnated her with the rays of the sun. She later gave birth to a son, named Tammuz, who was actually supposed to be Nimrod reborn. In any case, statues began to be erected of her holding her baby, who was supposed to be Nimrod reborn. It was this act that raised her to the status of a deity. From then on, countless cultures began to spawn similar stories about this “mother and child” deity. Apparently, since she gave birth to a “god”, she too, must be a god. Sound familiar? Fast forward to Mary. If indeed Yeshua was the Messiah, and Mary, His mother, she too must be a deity. For this cause, Mary is prayed to above Yeshua, and in any painting of her, there He is also, as a child, still dependent on His mother. This was typical Roman theology. All peoples under the banner of Rome accepted their theology, everyone, except those Messianic followers. Constantine had declared that ALL people worship on the “venerable day of the sun (Sunday)”, and that anyone who did not would be punished. Needless to say, these Torah observant, Sabbath observant, Feast Day of the YHVH celebrating, dietary law keeping Messianic believer refused to bow, thus becoming a problem. This monotheistic mindset of the Messianic believers was a huge problem for Rome. So much of a problem that from it spawned a terrible hatred for them. The outcome of this hatred was a unanimous decision to not only expel them by any means necessary, but to even strip away any and every Jewish trace from the faith. Jewish names of people were changed, as well as feasts. In fact, it was decided that although Easter coincided with Passover, (sometimes), this would become the new non Jewish Christian observance. The method of tracking this holy day was contrary to how the Torah laid it out. Whereas Torah teaches moon observances and Aviv (maturing of barley) to track when Passover would be, the Romans chose the balancing of the equinox, when day and night were exactly 12 hours long. They would then begin their count, using a system that would always put Easter on a Sunday. It’s quite interesting that the day they make it falls on their self proclaimed sabbath.
Many debate the connection between Ishtar and Easter being the same thing. Assuming that you all have heard both sides of this argument, instead of citing questionable facts from the internet or even books, I am going to use Scripture. It is a well known fact that the Church of Rome is notorious for rebranding pagan days as holy days under the guise of reaching the pagans. It should be no surprise then, that just as Christmas’ date reflects a pagan day established long before there was an idea of Christmas, that the same was done for Easter as well. Without citing various gods’ names, we will just look at the practices observed on these days. Can we agree that rabbits and colored eggs have nothing to do with Yehsua, or for that matter, YHVH? Just looking into the origins of many of the easter traditions, we find countless connections to pagan rituals, just was we do for Christmas traditions. Is there any Scripture between Genesis to Revelation where we can see YHVH commend Israel for honoring Him after the manner of the “nations”? Quite the opposite. In fact, before Israel even entered the Promised Land, YHVH told Moses to let them know to not learn of the way (traditions) of the nations you are about to replace. He told them to destroy their idols and their high places. In other verses, YHVH reiterates, “learn not the way of the nations”. These same warnings went unheard by Israel, as they proceeded to do exactly what He told them not to do, resulting in them being exiled from their land countless times. In my opinion, we aren’t to far from Israel in that we are doing the exact same thing that they were told NOT to do. Just in the fact that we are celebrating Yeshua in our own way, can we even do that? Is there any verse of Scripture that tells us to celebrate Him the way we choose, after our own traditions? Looking at Israel, as His chosen people, how did they celebrate Him? Was it in their own way, or in accordance to Torah? Well, these Feast Days that we say are of the Jews, Torah calls them “Feast of YHVH”. So, whose are they, The Jews, or YHVH? He then outlines what is to be done on these days, and this was what He expected. Anything less was sin in His eyes. So, my question is this, can we choose how and when to celebrate Him? If so, what verse affirms it? Based off of YHVH ‘s reaction to Israel intermingling themselves with pagan practices, are we to think we are exempt on the basis that we are not Jews? YHVH says He will not share His glory with anyone, so if Easter is for the most part shrouded in paganism, wouldn’t the celebration of it be like sharing His glory with pagans?
Because of Rome, we have been taught to disband all Jewish roots (in accordance to Scripture), yet we established Easter, a name totally NOT connected with the concept of Passover, as a time to celebrate the risen Messiah, as if oblivious to the fact that Passover, although established during the time of Moses, was a foreshadow of what Yeshua would do on the cross. The Passover commemorates what YHVH did for Israel, while at the same time acknowledges Yeshua as our sacrificial Lamb. Whereas we observe Passover as a time to celebrate His sacrifice, Christians are taught that Easter celebrates His resurrection. Interestingly enough, none of the Apostles or early church fathers made any mention of celebrating the the Resurrection. While it is true, Easter does parallel Passover to a degree, one honors YHVH according to His will while the other attempts to honor Him according to our will. While Rome would have us believe that Yeshua rose on a Sunday, and was crucified on a Friday, this couldn’t be further from the truth. This isn’t even possible! From Friday to Sunday is NOT 3 days. Yeshua said He would be in the earth 3 days and 3 nights. That means 3 full days, and 3 full nights. Already this theology is faulty, yet many accept it as a fact, having never fully caught what Messiah said about 3 days and 3 nights. They further assert that He rose on Sunday morning. Well first of all, if Sunday was indeed the Sabbath, and He arose, He would have violated Torah, thereby nullifying His claim to be the Messiah. We also need to realize that just because Rome changed the way the world views days, this did NOT change how YHVH does. From the beginning, Genesis records that the evening and the morning were the first day. We read that, but yet miss it. What is it saying? Easy, the evening, which begins at sunset begins the day. I bet this is really throwing some people off the merry go round. Well, bear with me. If YHVH views the day as such, how does that affect our view on the resurrection? We will have to get into this another time, but I will break it down this way. We understand that Peter, John and both Mary’s went to the tomb early on the “first” day of the week. Can we agree this was Sunday? Cool, in doing this we just shattered the idea that Sunday is the sabbath also. Based off of Scriptural evidence, the Passover that Yeshua was crucified on, was on a Wednesday, and being that He was to be the sacrificial Lamb, He had to be “prepared” around the same time as the Passover lamb was, which would be Tuesday night. By 9 am (Wednesday,) the time of the morning sacrifice, Yeshua was on the cross. At the same time, the passover lamb was also being killed. By 3pm, Yeshua was dead. This was also the time of the evening sacrifice. The first day of Passover is a Sabbath, so for this reason the chief priest wanted Him taken off the cross. Sunset Wednesday began Passover, and also His first night in the grave. Thursday was a regular day, but at the same time a prep day for the weekly Sabbath. Thursday was His second night in the grave, making Thursday day His first day in the grave. Friday, day made the second day, and that night (after sunset), made night 3. This was also the weekly Sabbath. Saturday day made day 3. By sunset Saturday night, all 3 days and nights were completed. So, that being said, Yeshua was out the grave at sunset Saturday night, no need to stay another day. Just because Peter and the rest came early Sunday morning does not mean He got up then. They had to wait because it was a Sabbath, so by first light Sunday they went to the grave.
I know this is so not what many have been taught, but when you study for yourself, and not just take what people tell you at face value, you would be amazed what you learn. All things considered, I’m just wondering, with what I have shared, how many are curious enough to fact check? I didn’t put sources in here, not because I don’t ave any because I have plenty, but I want you to do your own study. If I tell you something, it means nothing, but if you find it for yourself, it becomes truth. Blessings!
