About Easter

The most important Christian holiday, the celebration of Jesus Christ's resurrection, will take place this year from March 29 to April 1.

What exactly does Easter entail?

Nowadays we view Easter as a Christian celebration that is inconspicuously infused with strong-rooted pagan customs celebrating the nature’s reawakening after a long dark winter. They are celebrations of joy, the beginning of the harvest and the feeling of hope the upcoming season should bring.

The history of Easter stretches far back into the past. The holiday arose from the Jewish holiday Passover or Pesach (the source of the Russian and Greek names for Easter paskha), celebrating the deliverance of the Jews from slavery in Egypt.

The Christians tried to differentiate their celebration of Easter from the Jewish holiday and thus focus on celebrating the resurrection of Jesus.

Similar celebrations can be found among the pagans who celebrated the arrival of spring that time of year. Their celebration was accompanied by a large number of customs and rituals which have remained practically untouched all the way up to the present day. The etymological meaning of the Czech word for Easter, Velikonoce, can be found in the name veliká noc – the Great Night celebration (which is still celebrated in the Orthodox Church). The German and English names of Ostern and Easter recall the Anglo-Saxon goddess of spring and fertility, Ostara, the counterpart to the Slavic mythological character Vesna (“spring”).

Determining the date of Easter

The First Council of Nicaea in 325 decided that Easter should fall on the first Sunday following the first full moon after the spring equinox. As a result, Easter is a moveable feast day which can occur anytime between 22 March and 25 April. The latest Easter was 25 April 1943; the earliest was 22 March 1818. Prague astronomer Johannes Kepler was the first in the Czech lands to draw up tables calculating the dates of Easter.