A short-ish
word:
On easter
WHAT I DIDN’T
KNOW THAT I DIDN’T KNOW, ABOUT passover
(based
on conversations I have had with professing christians)
-two-
In our last meeting, we
looked at the very first Passover
& the miraculous way in which YHWH delivered Israel from Egypt, while
simultaneously judging their false gods & stripping their supreme
deity, Amun-Ra, of its potency. In broad terms, The Church at large
accepts this history as highly symbolic, but how many among us truly
believe that Almighty God actually
performed these acts & laid down a foundation
for the future sacrifice of The True Pascal Lamb;
The Lord Jesus Christ? I would
dare to venture that our beliefs are clearly revealed in our doctrines & in
our practices. Passover, The Lord’s Supper & the ultimate vicarious death of Jesus Christ are all foreshadowed in the Exodus account.
Through The Gospel, we witness a glorious
recapitulation of truths that have their underpinnings
forged in the fists of The Lord, when He systematically
annihilated Egypt’s pantheon of false gods. The Lord says, ‘Ye have
seen what I did unto the Egyptians, and how I bare you on eagle’s wings, and
brought you unto myself.’ (Exodus 19:4). Passover & the doctrines
it holds are no less relevant, prevalent or powerful today, than they were at the first. We The Church
ought to recognise & realise this, instead of simply going
along to get along. If The Church at large continues to allow this to slip, as it has other issues, it is simply sawing through the branch upon
which it is perched.
Once again, the problem
we have is one of Gentile interference with the root
into which they have been grafted. In this, we have been
challenged by some who have said, ‘..we are
not Jewish, so why do we need
to follow Jewish customs?’.
This is a valid question, to which there is an equally valid
answer. In the first place, the Christian acknowledgement &
celebration of Passover, which is the matter in hand, is not
participating in a Jewish custom; it is
partaking in a Jewish covenant.
YHWH
made His covenant with the Jews, not with the Gentiles.
We covered some of these aspects in our articles titled ‘a short word on fashionable
anti-zionism & emergent christian neo-christofacism’. The
Gentiles who have come to believe in The Jewish Messiah are grafted
into that covenant, but they do not have any right to formulate
their own terms & conditions.
If you don’t believe me, I suggest you read Romans 11.
The Church at large today is for the most part
wilfully ignorant of this. Furthermore, The Lord did not decimate Egypt’s
pantheon of false gods to then allow The Gentile Church to swing its doors open
& invite them back in! Yet here we are. Before we make any attempt to keep The Feast, we ought to know exactly
what it is. This is only right & fair.
In
the Exodus, we see the defeat of the powers of darkness & the Divine deliverance of Israel through
the lamb; they had the encapsulation of the Old Covenant, in its blood. Because
of the atonement of Jesus Christ & His finished work at the cross, we have
the realisation of the New Covenant, in HIS blood.
Jesus
Christ conquered any & all in the breaking of His body & the shedding of His blood. All of this
was for the benefit of the recipients of His salvation, not for His own sake. In prescribing
& describing The Feast,
YHWH also establishes how He is approached & worshipped. We often forget this to our detriment.
There is no logical
or theological reason for
we The Church at large to christianise
ungodly elements in our doctrine
or practise. However, if
ifs & buts were sweets & nuts, eh. This ought not to be a point of
contention, yet it is. Why? Don’t ask me. Ask those who have introduced their
traditions to The Faith
& insist on their inclusion to The Feast, often misguidedly citing
Scripture that has been twisted out of all reasonable context.
Passover
& its elements reveal the
redemptive role & finished work of The Lord Jesus Christ in type & in shadow. When Jesus gave His life,
bled, died & rose again from the dead as the Captain of our salvation (Hebrews 2:10), we had a marvellous fulfilment of a promise
YHWH made in Eden; ‘And I will put
enmity between thee and the woman,
and between thy seed and her seed;
it shall bruise thy head, and thou
shalt bruise his heel.’ (Genesis 3:15). Almighty God cuts a covenant & seals it in
blood. The blood of His Son,
Jesus Christ!
Easter
& its elements reveal
the themes of Spring. New
beginnings. New life. After the first full moon of the Vernal Equinox, The
Church at large dusts off its bells & whistles. These dates will vary
depending upon whether you use a Julian
or Gregorian calendar. Just
ask anyone who attended The Council of
Nicaea. Someone thought that it would be a great idea to conjoin the resurrection with the start of the new season. Cheers guys.
In Easter, it isn’t the resurrection that is being seen.
It is the pantheon. Say what you will. Twist & turn it at your own leisure
& for your own pleasure, but the truth is that much of The Church at large
has embraced the world
& ignored The Word. Just
ask the Emperor Constantine
about his shift.
It is impossible to successfully divorce Gentile devilism
from its demonic stem, simply because its symbolism can be conveniently recycled
& repurposed. There should never have been a marriage between them in the
first place.
YHWH smashed the gods of Egypt for a
purpose. Christ’s resurrection from the dead is not akin to the rebirth
of Spring. In this I take note of the words of Bede, the Venerable, who made comment concerning the changing of the name of the season.
‘Eosturmonath
(Easter month) has a name
which is now translated
"Paschal month", and which was
once called after a goddess
of theirs named Eostre, in whose honour
feasts were celebrated in that
month. Now they designate that
Paschal season by her name, calling the
joys of the new rite by the time-honoured name of the old observance.’.
De Temporum Ratione, Bede the
Venerable 725 A.D. (emphasis added).
Historically, there is little of nothing said about
a goddess named Eostre, even though the name bears some resemblance to Easter.
Yet it remains true that for reasons unknown, the Gentile Church decided to part ways with the Jewish root of its faith. In doing
so, they have also abandoned Passover
& pay lip service to the truth.
Now, we have nothing more or less that an illegitimate priesthood, making unnecessary sacrifices, on unsanctified altars, that are literally monuments to syncretism. Just as sure as eggs is eggs. Speaking of which; where do we get the association of eggs with easter? We could bash paganism again & wag our fingers in its face for introducing the fertility symbols of eggs & bunnies to The Feast. However, after a little research, it turns out that we can also look a little closer to home for some answers. Before that though, let’s go back to Egypt. Brace yourselves & see why YHWH smashed the pantheon.
‘The Hermopolitan cosmology arose at the site of
Hermopolis in Middle Egypt. Hermopolis was a city sacred to Thoth, the god of
wisdom. The ancient Greeks equated Thoth with their god Hermes, which gives us
the name Hermopolis, or “city of Hermes.” The ancient Egyptian name for this
city was Khemnu, or “Eight-Town.” The number eight in this
place-name makes references to the eight deities (the Ogdoad) who
are the main characters in this version of the creation story. The Ogdoad
consisted of four frog-headed male gods
and their serpent-headed female counterparts. This divine group represented the dark, watery, unknown, and
eternal state of the cosmos prior to creation. Nun and Naunet
represented water. Heh and Hauhet expressed the notion of infinity. Kek and
Kauket stood for darkness. Amun and Amaunet reflected the concept of
hiddenness. These eight gods existed
within the watery chaos of pre-creation. Within this unchanging “nothingness,”
there was the potential for creation. The Egyptians believed that from these
eight gods came a cosmic egg that
contained the deity responsible for creating the rest of the world, including
the primeval mound—the first land to arise out of the waters of pre-creation.
In some versions of the myth, the egg was laid by a goose named “the
Great Cackler,” while in other versions an ibis, the bird associated
with the god Thoth, is responsible for the egg.’.
Glencairn Museum. The Academy of the
New Church. Copyright © 2009-2026 (emphasis added)
Out of the egg hatches the sun god, Ra. Later he became known as Anum Ra. Eggs hatching gods. What a convenient metaphor for resurrection. Christ breaks out of His tomb, just as a chick breaks out of its shell. Cheers guys. Hence the Latin
tag omne vivum ex ovo; all life comes from an egg. There’s more.
‘Like human beings always have, the ancient
Egyptians knew and valued this important symbol. Indeed, one of the euphemistic names for the innermost sarcophagus (the one
right next to the mummy) was “the
egg.” For them, the coffin was merely the eggshell protecting the human being until
she or he is ready to break free and be reborn as a Shining One
among the Deities. Geb, father of Isis, with the goose upon
His head. As daughter of Geb (the Earth God, one of Whose symbols
is the goose), Isis is called “the
Egg of the Goose.” Yes, I know. God.
Egg. But it is what it was, and, by tradition, Isis is the Divine Egg of Her father. Yet Isis
is a Bird Goddess Herself and has eggs of Her own, most
notably Horus and the Horus-king. In the Pyramid Texts, Isis
discusses with Nu, the God of the primordial abyss, how the king will be reborn by breaking out of his egg. (Remember
that this is the name for the innermost sarcophagus.) First Nu states
that Isis has borne and shaped the king
within the egg, then asks how the Deities
shall break the egg so that he can be
reborn. Isis answers, telling Nu about all the Divine help the
king will get and eventually declaring, “Behold,
the king is in being; behold, the king is knit together; behold, the king has
broken the egg.”. After
breaking out of his egg, the king is reborn, flying up from the nest like a
young bird beneath the watchful gaze of his mother Isis. We find
these kinds of references to the deceased as a chick in the egg throughout the funerary texts.’.
© Isiopolis 2026 (emphasis added).
As it stands, eggs
are a definite part of easter, but not a part of Passover. In our next
meeting we’ll look at The Church’s
contribution to the debacle we’re faced with & seek a biblical solution. But what about
those cute bunnies? Don’t fret, we’ll get there. I will leave you with the
words of The Apostle Paul.
1 Moreover, brethren, I declare unto you the gospel which I preached unto you,
which also ye have received, and
wherein ye stand; 2 By which also ye are saved,
if ye keep in memory what I preached unto you, unless ye have
believed in vain. 3 For I delivered
unto you first of all that which I also received,
how that Christ died for our sins
according to the scriptures; 4 And that he was
buried, and that he rose again
the third day according to the scriptures
(1st
Corinthians 15:1-4).
copyright © by
david Samuel Parkins mmxxvi all rights reserved.
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