This e-mail is a response that I sent to a defender of new Bible versions who asked about "Easter" versus "Passover" in Acts 12:4.

What Was Easter Originally?

The word Easter is found one time in the entire authorized King James Bible:

Acts 12:4, And when he [King Herod] had apprehended him [Peter], he put him in prison, and delivered him to four quaternions of soldiers to keep him; intending after EASTER to bring him forth to the people.

The word "Easter" here does NOT refer to Easter as we know it nor does it refer to the Passover as it is wrongly translated in other Bible versions.

Though many Christians celebrate "Easter" in remembrance of the resurrection, Easter was originally a pagan festival (etymology of your dictionary should confirm this) which is what Acts 12:4 refers to and not the Passover. We will determine this by looking at the passage.

The Webster's New World Dictionary gives the following etymology (origin and development of a word) for the word "Easter":

originally, name of pagan vernal [spring time] festival ALMOST COINCIDENT in date with paschal [passover] festival of the church,

--Eastre, dawn goddess --Austro, dawn

In other words, Easter was originally a pagan festival celebrated in the spring time.

Easter Only Translated Correctly in AKJV

The word, "Easter" has been incorrectly translated "Passover" in all Bible versions except for the authorized King James version (AKJV). How do I know this? The Bible shows it. In the passage Acts 12:1-4, King Herod killed James and when he saw that it pleased the Jews, he took Peter DURING the DAYS OF UNLEAVENED BREAD and was going to bring him forth to the people AFTER Easter.

Easter could not be Passover because Passover occurs BEFORE the days of unleavened bread which is when they arrested Peter. Passover had come and gone. Herod decided to bring Peter forth AFTER Easter. This is the sequence:

1. PASSOVER

2. DAYS OF UNLEAVENED BREAD

3. EASTER

Passover only comes once a year on one day, the 14th of Abib ( Num 28:16). After the Passover comes the days of unleavened bread (Numbers 28:17) for the fifteenth through the twentieth day of Abib. So when Peter was arrested during the days of unleavened bread (Acts 12:3) Passover had come and gone! The Bible says that Herod was going to bring him forth AFTER Easter which had not come yet.

When the AKJV says EASTER in Acts 12:4 it is correct. When the other versions say PASSOVER in Acts 12:4 they are incorrect. Easter in this passage is referring to the pagan festival (remember the etymology says that the pagan Easter is almost coincident with paschal (passover)...

Adios for now, I'm signing off for the night. Take it easy. Write anytime.

In Jesus' Name,

Tracy
http://www.jesus-is-lord.com

The following is a Watch Unto Prayer response to a false report on Rapture Watch. First is the Rapture Watch assertion and then the Watch Unto Prayer response.

EASTER

RAPTURE WATCH: On such mistranslation we are convinced concerns their use of the word “Easter” in Acts 12:4.  The original word is absolutely not “Easter”, and the translators were careful everywhere else to translate it properly as “Passover”.  

“EASTER:  PASCHA, mistranslated “Easter” in Acts 12:4. A.V., denotes the Passover (R.V.).  The phrase “after the Passover” signifies after the whole festival was at an end.  The term Easter is not of Christian origin.  It is another form of Astart, one of the titles of the Chaldean goddess, the queen of heaven.  The festival of Pasch held by Christians in post-apostolic times was a continuation of the Jewish feast, but was not instituted by Christ, nor was it connected with Lent.  From this Pasch the Pagan festival of Easter was quite distinct and was introduced into the apostate Western religion, as part of the attempt to adapt Pagan festivals to Christianity.”4

PASSOVER:  PASCHA, the Greek spelling of the Aramaic word for the Passover, from the Hebrew pasach, to pass over, to spare, a feast instituted by God in commemoration of the deliverance of Israel from Egypt, and anticipatory of the expiatory sacrifice of Christ.  The word signifies (I) the Passover Feast, e.g., Matt. 26:2, John 2:13, 23; 6:4; 11:55; 12:1; 13:1; 18:39; 19:4; Acts 12:4; Heb. 11:28;  (II) by metonymy, (a) the Paschal Supper, Matt. 26:18, 19; Mark 14:16; Luke 22:8, 13;  (b) the Paschal lamb, e.g., Mark 14:12 (cp. Ex. 12:21); Luke 22:7;  (c) Christ Himself, I Cor. 5:7.”5

The question then arises:  Why the blatant change from their previously correct translation of the original manuscript?  We have great difficulty with their explanation that they had a liberty to commodiously use a less fit word while translating,  and absolutely refuse to change the Word of God to accommodate their offered rationale which is  clearly outside the bounds of an error or difficult interpretation.   

RESPONSE: The critic's difficulty with the translators' explanation is due to a misreading and misquote of their words as taking "liberty to commodiously use a less fit word while translating."  The actual statement in the Translators' Preface is: ". . . why should wee be in bondage to them if we may be free, vse one precisely when wee may vse another no lesse fit, as commodiously?"

The Trinitarian Bible Society Quarterly Record credits William Tyndale with translation of the word "pascha" as "Easter" in twenty-nine places of his 1534 New Testament. Although this was not a literal translation, it is understandable considering the period of transition during which Tyndale produced this first printed bible. In `525, the Protestant Reformation was in its early stages and readers of the new Bible, being yet unfettered from the Roman Catholic strait-jacket, were unfamiliar with many facts of Old Testament history.     

"When Tyndale applied his talents to the translation of the New Testament from Greek into English, he was not satisfied with the use of a completely foreign word, and decided to take into account the fact that the season of the passover was known generally to English people as 'Easter', notwithstanding the lack of any actual connection between the meanings of the two words. The Greek word occurs twenty-nine times in the New Testament, and Tyndale has ester or easter fourteen times, esterlambe eleven times, esterfest once, and paschall lambe three times. 17.

The New Unger's Bible Dictionary confirms that the word "Easter" is often used in the English versions which predate the 1611 A.V.

"Easter. [Gk. pascha, from Heb. pesah] The Passover ..., and so translated in every passage except the KJV: "intending after Easter to bring him forth to the people" [Acts 12:4]. In the earlier English versions Easter had been frequently used as the translation of pascha. At the last revision [1611 A.V.] Passover was substituted in all passages but this. . .  

"The word Easter is of Saxon origin, the name is eastra, the goddess of spring in whose honor sacrifices were offered about Passover time each year. By the eighth century Anglo-Saxons had adopted the name to designate the celebration of Christ's resurrection." 18.

Two centuries prior to William Tyndale, John Wycliffe produced a hand written English translation of the Bible using only the Latin Vulgate. Again, the Trinitarian Bible Society explains the difficulty involved in the translation of the Hebrew word "pesach" into Greek and then into English:

This single occurrence of Easter in the Authorised Version as a translation of the Greek pascha, "passover", is an interesting reminder of the problems which have confronted translators of the Holy Scriptures for many centuries. When the scholars of Alexandria came to translate the Hebrew into Greek in the third century B.C. they could find in the Greek language no precise equivalent for the Hebrew pesach, and they decided to adopt the Hebrew word in a Greek form. When the Bible was first translated into Latin the same course was followed, and the Greek pascha was adopted without trnaslation. Centuries later, when Wycliffe translated the Bible into English from the Latin version, he could find in the English language no satisfactory equivalent, so he just gave the Latin word an English form -- pask or paske. In the 16th century the Rheims New Testament followed Wycliffe's example, but slightly changed the English form to pasche. None of these actually translated the word. . .

"When Tyndale began his translation of the Pentateuch he was again faced with the problem in Exodus 12.11 and twenty-one other places, and no doubt recognising that easter in this context would be an anachronism he coined a new word, passover, and used it consistently in all twenty-two places. It is therefore to Tyndale that our language is indebted for this meaningful and appropriate word. His labours on the Old Testament left little time for revision of the New Testament, with the result that while passover is found in his 1530 Pentateuch, ester remained in the N.T. of 1534, having been used in his first edition several years before he coined the new word passover."

The History of the English Bible chronicles developments which made possible the mass publication of an English Bible from the Greek and Hebrew languages:

John Wycliff's hand-written manuscripts were the first complete Bibles in the English language (1380's). Wycliff (or Wycliffe), an Oxford theologian translated out of the fourth century Latin Vulgate, as the Greek and Hebrew languages of the Old and New Testaments were inaccessible to him. . .Wycliff spent many of his years writing and teaching against the practices and dogmas of the Roman Church which he believed to be contrary to the Holy Writ. Though he died a nonviolent death, the Pope was so infuriated by his teachings that 44 years after Wycliff had died, he ordered the bones to be dug-up, crushed, and scattered in the river!

Gutenburg invented the printing press in the 1450's, and the first book to ever be printed was the Bible (in Latin). With the onset of the Reformation in the early 1500's, the first printings of the Bible in the English language were produced illegally and at great personal risk of those involved.

William Tyndale was the Captain of the Army of English reformers, and in many ways their spiritual leader. His work of translating the Greek New Testament into the plain English of the ploughman was made possible through Erasmus' publication of his Greek/Latin New Testament printed in 1516. Erasmus and the printer and reformer John Froben published the first non-Latin Vulgate text of the Bible in a millennium. For centuries Latin was the language of scholarship and it was widely used amongst the literate. Erasmus' Latin was not the Vulgate translation of Jerome, but his own fresh rendering of the Greek New Testament text that he had collated from six or seven partial New Testament manuscripts into a complete Greek New Testament.

Erasmus' translation from the Greek revealed enormous discrepancies in the Vulgate's integrity amongst the rank and file scholars, many of whom were already convinced that the established church was doomed by virtue of its evil hierarchy. Pope Leo X's declaration that "the fable of Christ was very profitable to him" infuriated the people of God. . .

The Tyndale New Testament was the first ever printed in the English language. Its first printing occurred in 1525/6, but only two complete copies of that first printing are known to have survived. Any Edition printed before 1570 is very rare and valuable, particularly pre-1540 editions and fragments. Tyndale's flight was an inspiration to freedom loving Englishmen who drew courage from the 11 years that he was hunted. Books and Bibles flowed into England in bales of cotton and sacks of wheat. In the end, Tyndale was caught: betrayed by an Englishman that he had befriended. Tyndale was incarcerated for 500 days before he was strangled and burned at the stake in 1536. His last words were, "Lord, open the eyes of the King of England".

As previously stated, the English Bibles based on the Textus Receptus which preceded the 1611 Authorised Version were: William Tyndale's New Testament [1534], the Coverdale Bible [1535], the Matthews Bible [1537], the Great Bible [1539], Cranmer's Bible [1540], the Geneva Bible [1560] and the Bishop's Bible [1568].  

When considering the single use of "Easter" in the 1611 A.V., it is imperative that one also consider its multiple occurrences in the English Bibles which preceded it. Following the transmission of the word "Easter" in these early Bibles, it becomes apparent that the A.V. translators were helping to phase out this mistranslation -- but retained the word in Acts 12:4 for a good reason which will demonstrated shortly.

In the Textus Receptus, the Greek word "pascha" is found in the following verses:

Matthew 26:2, 26:17, 26:18, 26:19
Mark 14:1, 14:12, 14:14, 14:16
Luke 2:41, 22:1, 22:7, 22:8, 22:11, 22:13, 22:15
John 2:13, 2:23, 6:4, 11:55, 12:1, 13:1, 18:28, 18:39, 19:14
Acts 12:4
I Corinthians 5:7
Hebrews 11:28.

Occurrences of the word "Easter" in New Testament verses cited above: 

• John Wycliffe's translation based on the Latin Vulgate used the word "paske" or "pask" in all of the above New Testament verses.

• William Tyndale's translation used "Easter" in all the above verses except Mt. 26:17 and Jn 18:28.

• The Great Bible used "Easter" in 14 verses: [Mt. 26:2, 18; Mk. 14:1; Lk. 2:41,22:1; Jn. 2:13, 2:23, 6:4, 11:55, 12:1, 13:1, 18:39, 19:14; Acts 12:4].

• The Geneva Bible eliminated "Easter" altogether.

• The Bishop's Bible [1568] used "Easter" in 2 verses: John 11:55 and Acts 12:4.

• The Authorised Version of 1611 used "Easter" in only one verse: Acts 12:4.

The following table shows graphically the occurrences of the word "Easter" in these five English Bibles which preceded the Authorised Version of 1611. [The Coverdale Bible (not represented in graph) used "Easter" in Acts 12:4. We have not examined the other verses in the Coverdale Bible, nor the Matthews Bible. The Cranmer Bible is the 2nd edition of Great Bible which is shown in the table.]

So much for Rapture Watch accusation #5 that King James had the translators of the Authorised Version insert the word "Easter." The only instance the A.V. translators chose to retain "Easter" is Acts 12:4:

"And when he [King Herod] had apprehended him [Peter], he put him in prison, and delivered him to four quaternions of soldiers to keep him; intending after Easter to bring him forth to the people."

Why did the translators revert to the earlier -- Tyndale, Coverdale, Great Bible and Bishop's Bible's -- translation of "Easter" rather than "Passover"? The answer is found in Acts 12:1-3, which describes the scene and establishes the time-frame for this passage:

"Now about that time Herod the king stretched forth his hands to vex certain of the church. And he killed James the brother of John with the sword. And because he saw it pleased the Jews, he proceeded to take Peter also. (Then were the days of unleavened bread.)"

According to Exodus 12:6, the Passover lamb was slain on the 14th day of the first month which was Abib. Exodus 12:17 equates the Passover with the Feast of Unleavened Bread: "And ye shall observe the feast of unleavened bread; for in this selfsame day have I brought your armies out of the land of Egypt: therefore ye shall observe this day in your generations for ever."

Exodus 12:15 requires that Israelites eat unleavened bread for the full week following: "Seven days shall ye eat unleavened bread; even the first day ye shall put away leaven out of your houses: for whosoever eateth leavened bread from the first day until the seventh day, that soul shall be cut off from Israel."

The original Passover occurred on the 14th Abib and the exodus from Egypt began the following day, the 15th. Numbers 33:3 states: "And they departed from Ramses in the first month, on the fifteenth day of the first month; on the morrow after the passover the children of Israel went out with an high hand in the sight of all the Egyptians."

In Deuteronomy 16:6, however, God changed the day of celebration of the Passover to the 15th of Abib: "But at the place which the Lord thy God shall choose to place his name in, there thou shalt sacrifice the passover at even, at the going down of the sun, at the season that thou camest forth out of Egypt."

In the New Testament, Luke 22:1 also equates the Feast of Unleavened Bread with the Passover celebration and other Scripture verses indicate that these interchangeable terms referred to one day which would have been the 15th day of Nisan, which was 15 Abib before the Babylonian captivity. Mark 14:1,2 indicate that the Feast of Unleavened Bread and the Passover were identical and verse 12 refers to ". . .the first day of unleavened bread when they killed the passover."

The week following the Passover/Feast of Unleavened Bread is referred to in Acts 12:3 as "the days of unleavened bread." It was during this week that Herod imprisoned Peter, whom he intended to bring forth to the people -- not after the Passover, for that day was past -- but after Easter, the pagan festival of Astarte, which was yet to come.

It is important to note that Scripture differentiates between the Passover/Feast of Unleavened Bread which was only the first day of unleavened bread and the "days of unleavened bread." This explains why the AV translators did not confuse the "feast of Passover" with all seven "days of unleavened bread." [Although modern Jews commonly refer to a full week of Passover observance, there seem to be no Scriptural references to a week-long observance of Passover, but only one feast day followed by the "days of unleavened bread."] For this reason, it would have been less accurate for the translators to state that Herod would bring Peter forth after the Passover, which was already past.

Home