Why Passover Was Changed to Easter Sunday

In English, Easter and Passover are two different words. But most languages only have one word to describe Passover and Easter. For example, in Greek and Latin, the word Pascha can mean Passover or Easter.

Are Easter and Passover the same thing, or are they two different festivals?

What is Passover?

The first direct mention of Passover in the Bible is in Exodus 12. Moses and Aaron told Pharaoh that God would kill all of the firstborn in Egypt if he would not let the Israelites leave Egypt. Then God gave the Israelites instructions for keeping the Passover.

Each family, together with their neighbors, were to choose a perfect lamb and kill it after sunset at the beginning of the 14th day of the first month of the Hebrew calendar. Then they were required to brush some of the blood of the lamb around their door, and eat the lamb inside their home that night. (Exodus 12:1-8)

That night, when an angel came to kill the firstborn in Egypt, the angel passed over the houses that were marked with blood (Exodus 12:23, 29).

In the Gospels we learn that the lamb represents Jesus, who is “the Lamb of God who takes away the sins of the world” (John 1:29). Jesus kept the Passover with His disciples on the night that He was betrayed (Matthew 26:17-30).

What is Easter?

An English Monk named Bede wrote a book about the English calendar 725 AD. He explains that in England, the Passover season was called Easter because in former times the people had celebrated a spring festival at that time in honor of a goddess named Eostre. (Bede, The Reckoning of Time, chapter 15). In addition to changing the name from Passover to Easter, many traditions were added to this festival, such as Easter eggs, rabbits, and hot crossed buns. These customs were borrowed from pre-Christian spring holidays that celebrated fertility.

So Easter began as the Passover, but over time many customs were added or changed. So now the connection between Easter and the original day of worship is hard to recognize.

What Was the Original Christian Passover Like?

If you open your Bible, you will see that Jesus celebrated the Passover with His disciples on the night before He was crucified (Matthew 26:17-30). This was at the normal time for the Passover, in the evening, at the beginning of the 14th day of the first month of the Hebrew calendar. The apostle John tells us that the day that began the next evening at sunset was a “high day” Sabbath (John 19:31), which was the first day of the Feast of Unleavened Bread, which begins on the 15th day of the month.

Now look at 1 Corinthians 11 to see how Christians celebrated the Passover after Jesus rose from the dead. Here the Apostle Paul explains what he learned directly from Jesus:

For I received from the Lord that which I also delivered to you: that the Lord Jesus on the same night in which He was betrayed took bread; and when He had given thanks, He broke it and said, “Take, eat; this is My body which is broken for you; do this in remembrance of Me.” (1 Corinthians 11:23-24, NKJV)

Jesus told His disciples to remember Him by following the example He gave to them that night. In other words, in original Christianity, Christians celebrated the Passover with the symbols of bread and wine, and with foot washing (John 13:15). All of the apostles, did exactly what Jesus taught them. They kept the Christian Passover, with the New Covenant symbols of the bread and wine, on the night of the 14th day of the first month of the Hebrew calendar.

We find that more than 150 years later, the churches in Asia Minor (western Turkey), were still keeping the Christian Passover in the same way and on the same day as the apostles.

Around 190 AD, leaders from other areas tried to force the Christians in Asia Minor to keep the Passover on Sunday, instead of on the 14th day of the first month on the Hebrew calendar. Polycrates, a leader in the church at Ephesus wrote to the bishop of Rome, and gave along list of names of people in Asia Minor who all kept the 14th day, including Phillip and John who were among the original 12 Apostles of Jesus. This is what Polycrates wrote next:

”All these observed the fourteenth day of the passover according to the Gospel, deviating in no respect, but following the rule of faith. And I also, Polycrates, the least of you all, do according to the tradition of my relatives, some of whom I have closely followed. For seven of my relatives were bishops; and I am the eighth. And my relatives always observed the day when the people put away the leaven.

I, therefore, brethren, who have lived sixty-five years in the Lord, and have met with the brethren throughout the world, and have gone through every Holy Scripture, am not affrighted by terrifying words. For those greater than I have said ‘We ought to obey God rather than man.‘” (Eusebius, Church History, 5.23.6-7)

Polycrates confidently declared that the date he and the others in Asia Minor kept was confirmed by the Bible and by tradition going all the way back to the 12 Apostles of Jesus.

More than 100 years later, the Council of Nicaea decreed in 325 AD that Easter must be kept on the first Sunday after the first full moon after the spring equinox, and that the Hebrew calendar must not be used to determine the date of Easter. After that time, everyone who continued to keep the Christian Passover on the original date was called a heretic. That is how the Easter Sunday date finally became law.

People who still practice original Christianity celebrate the Christian Passover on the 14th day of the first month of the Hebrew calendar.

But how did the tradition of celebrating the Christian Passover on Sunday begin? And why? Continue reading to find out the surprising history of the Easter Sunday tradition.

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