These are special times we are living in. Information is literally at your fingertips. It is a wonderful time for epistemophiliacs (I googled this word, so don’t think I am a sesquipedalian) who no longer need to scour vast volumes of encyclopaedias to satisfy their craving for knowledge. However, this information, gleaned mostly from social media, is filled with internet folklore and viral memes. The internet fiction (mostly opinions) is strong during the Holy Week of Easter. This is where the claim that Easter has pagan roots mostly resides.
There are many Christians who are torn: Should we celebrate Easter in the way the modern world celebrates Easter? Should we be decorating eggs and scoffing chocolate? Should we be promoting bunny rabbits? Isn’t Easter pagan, as we hear so often?
Before we dive into this topic, it must be said that as Christians, our focus should be on Christ, not bunny rabbits and not chocolate eggs. Easter is the celebration of our Lord and Saviour who died for us by crucifixion and was raised three days later.
“The Spirit of God, who raised Jesus from the dead, lives in you. And just as God raised Christ Jesus from the dead, he will give life to your mortal bodies by this same Spirit living within you” (Rom 8:11 NLT).
I must, however, confess what got me interested in this topic, besides it being that time of the year, is the birth of my Grandson (and just a tiny bit, my love for chocolate easter eggs!). I so fondly remember as a child, and as a father, what joy the easter egg hunt elicited in my children and me, a joy I so wish to show my Grandson.
The claim that Easter has pagan roots is a common myth that collapses under historical, linguistic, and theological scrutiny.
Let’s look at the most common myths and the refutations:
One of the most viral myths is that “Easter” is derived from the Babylonian goddess Ishtar. This is factually incorrect for several reasons:
- The similarity in sound between “Easter” and “Ishtar” is superficial. Etymologically, Ishtar translates to Esther, not Easter.
- Ishtar is an Akkadian name derived from Sumerian, while Easter is an Old English word; they come from entirely different language families.
- Worship of Ishtar effectively died out by 400 BC, roughly 500 years before the early Church began commemorating the Resurrection.
- The English word “Easter” is a historical outlier. In nearly every other major language, the holiday is named after the Hebrew word for Passover (Pesach), such as Pasqua (Italian), Pascua (Spanish), and Pâques (French).
Another claim from critics is that the name comes from an Anglo-Saxon goddess named Eostre. However, the evidence for her existence is extremely weak:
- The only ancient mention of Eostre comes from the monk Bede in AD 725. There is no archaeological evidence, no inscriptions, and no other literary mentions of this goddess in Old English poetry or Germanic myths.
- The German equivalent, “Ostara,” was a 19th-century reconstruction by Jacob Grimm (as in the Grimm fairytales, which should tell you something); there is no historical evidence that such a goddess was actually worshipped in Germany.
- Many scholars believe “Easter” simply refers to the “dawn” or the “east,” or that it was brought to Germany by Anglo-Saxon missionaries rather than being a native pagan holdover.
Critics often claim Christianity copied myths like those of Osiris, Tammuz, or Mithras. Scholars argue these are false equivalencies:
- Osiris became king of the underworld and never returned to earthly life; Tammuz’s cycle was seasonal, not a once-for-all resurrection.
- Christianity is a historical faith based on eyewitness testimony of a specific event in real time (under Pontius Pilate), not a recurring seasonal metaphor for crops rising in the springtime.
- Early Christian writers like Paul were strictly monotheistic Jews who were hostile to pagan syncretism. Their writings show no trace of Greco-Roman or Babylonian mythology.
The Christian celebration of the Resurrection is not a repackaged pagan spring festival but is historically and theologically rooted in the Jewish Passover:
- All four Gospels place the death and Resurrection of Jesus during Passover week.
- Jesus is identified as the “Passover Lamb” who was sacrificed for the sins of the world. The Last Supper itself was a Passover meal.
Another claim is that the date of Easter coincides with pagan fertility festivals; however, the early Church originally calculated the date of the Resurrection by tying it directly to the Jewish Passover, as the Gospels record that Jesus’ death and Resurrection occurred during that specific week. In the Hebrew lunar calendar, these events were set at 14 or 15 Nissan, which meant the commemoration could initially occur on any day of the week.
Following the Council of Nicaea in AD 325, a new uniform rule was established to ensure the holiday always fell on a Sunday. The Church ruled that Easter should be observed on the first Sunday after the full moon occurring on or after the vernal equinox.
To maintain consistency in this calculation:
- The ecclesiastical vernal equinox was fixed as March 21, meaning Easter Sunday must fall between March 22 and April 25.
- The Paschal full moon was determined using a nineteen-year cycle.
- This specific cycle was first established by the Church in Alexandria and later refined in the sixth century by Dionysius Exiguus.
The timing was never intended to coincide with pagan fertility festivals but was a deliberate effort to mark the historical anniversary of the Resurrection within the context of the lunar calendar used during the time of Christ.
Okay, great, we can be more comfortable about Easter not being something Christianity stole from paganism. But what about the Easter eggs and bunny rabbits?
Symbols like bunnies and eggs, often cited as “pagan proof,” actually have much later origins:
- Eggs became popular because they were forbidden during Lent. When the fast ended at Easter, they were decorated and eaten as part of the feast. Our earliest reference to decorated Easter eggs dates to the late 13th century, when King Edward I decorated hundreds of eggs (hard-boiled) with golden leaves to hand out to friends and family at Easter.
- The tradition of the “Easter Hare” (Osterhase) first appeared in German folklore in the late 1600’s, over a thousand years after the conversion of Europe, and did not become popular in America until the 19th century. Once again, our brother Grimm tried to make a connection between the bunny and paganism by suggesting the fertility of bunnies was somehow connected to pagan fertility cults.
I don’t see how eating an easter egg or decorating your children’s baskets with bunny rabbits can lead you down a road of paganism. So, the only thing that is going to prevent me from devouring a whole box of chocolate bunnies and eggs is not paganism but my increasing waistline.
Never forget this truth written by Isaiah 700 years before the crucifixion:
“But He was pierced for our transgressions, He was crushed for our iniquities; the punishment that brought us peace was on Him, and by His wounds we are healed” (Isaiah 53:5 NIV).
Sources Used:
Easter Is Not Pagan, and Neither Are Its Origins – Rod D. Martin.
Easter is not a Pagan holiday – Wes Huff.
From Easter to Ostara: The Reinvention of a Pagan Goddess? – Richard Sermon
