.—The Author’s Views respecting the Celebration of Easter, Baptism, Fasting, Marriage, the Eucharist, and Other Ecclesiastical Rites.
we have touched the subject
I deem it not unreasonable to say a few words concerning Easter. It
appears to me that neither the ancients nor moderns who have affected
to follow the Jews, have had any rational foundation for contending so
obstinately about it. For they have not taken into consideration the
fact that when Judaism was changed into Christianity, the obligation to
observe the Mosaic law and the ceremonial types ceased. And the proof
of the matter is plain; for no law of Christ permits Christians to
imitate the Jews. On the contrary the apostle expressly forbids it; not
only rejecting circumcision, but also deprecating contention about
festival days. In his epistle to the Galatians
he writes, ‘Tell me ye that desire to be under the law, do ye not
hear the law?’ And continuing his train of argument, he
demonstrates that the Jews were in bondage as servants, but that those
who have come to Christ are ‘called into the liberty of
sons.’
Moreover he exhorts them in no way to regard ‘days, and months, and years.’
Again in his epistle to the Colossians
he distinctly declares, that such observances are merely shadows: wherefore he says, ‘Let no man judge you in meat, or in drink, or in respect of any holy-day, or of the new moon, or of the sabbath-days; which are a shadow of things to come.’ The same truths are also confirmed by him in the epistle to the Hebrews
in these words: ‘For the priesthood being changed, there is made
of necessity a change also of the law.’ Neither the apostles, therefore, nor the Gospels,
have anywhere imposed the ‘yoke of servitude’
on those who have embraced the truth; but have left Easter and every
other feast to be honored by the gratitude of the recipients of grace. Wherefore, inasmuch as men love festivals, because they afford them cessation from labor: each individual in every place, according to his own pleasure, has by a prevalent custom celebrated the memory of the saving passion. The Saviour and his apostles have enjoined us by no law to keep this feast: nor do the Gospels and apostles threaten us with any penalty, punishment, or curse for the neglect of it, as the Mosaic law does the Jews. It is merely for the sake of historical accuracy, and for the reproach of the Jews, because they polluted themselves with blood on their very feasts, that it is recorded in the Gospels that our Saviour suffered in the days of ‘unleavened bread.’
The aim of the apostles was not to appoint festival days, but to teach
a righteous life and piety. And it seems to me that just as many other
customs have been established in individual localities according to
usage. So also the feast of Easter came to be observed in each place
according to the individual peculiarities of the peoples inasmuch as
none of the apostles legislated on the matter. And that the observance
originated not by legislation, but as a custom the facts themselves
indicate. In Asia Minor most people kept the fourteenth day of the
moon, disregarding the sabbath: yet they never separated from those who
did otherwise, until Victor, bishop of Rome, influenced by too ardent a
zeal, fulminated a sentence of excommunication against the
Quartodecimans
in Asia. Wherefore also Irenæus, bishop of Lyons in France, severely censured Victor by letter for his immoderate heat;
telling him that although the ancients differed in their celebration of
Easter, they did not desist from intercommunion. Also that Polycarp, bishop of Smyrna, who afterwards suffered martyrdom under Gordian,
continued to communicate with Anicetus bishop of Rome, although he
himself, according to the usage of
his native Smyrna, kept Easter on the fourteenth day of the moon, as
Eusebius attests in the fifth book of his Ecclesiastical History.