On the question of the calendar

[George Australia]

George - please would you read this page. Does this mean that neither Jews nor Christians actually remember the exact day of 14th Nissan?

No. It can never be said that no one can remember the date of 14th Nissan, because we know how to calculate it. What we are talking about when we refer to "the Jewish Passover" in calculating our Pascha is the "Nomical Jewish Passover" that is, the Jewish Passover as defined by the Scriptural Calendar. In Exodus 13:4 Nissan is "the month of new corn" (that is, Spring), therefore Passover should always fall on the first Full Moon of the northern Spring. Originally, the Jewish Calendar was calculated according to actual astronomical observations, hence, 14th Nissan was "the first Full Moon after the Vernal Equinox", since Nissan was the first Vernal lunar month. Unfortunately, like the Julian Calendar, The Jewish Calendar was later divorced from the actual observations of the Vernal Equinox when it was standardized in the 4th Century by Rabbi Hillel II, and, like the Julian Calendar, algorithmic calculations were introduced to predict the Vernal Equinox (which have subsequently been found to be innacurate, as is the Julian calendar), and, like the algorithmic Julian Calculation of Pascha, the Jewish Calendar goes through a 19 year Cycle. Because of the innacuracies, the Jewish Calendar since the 4th century has been moving out of step with the actual Siderial or Tropical Year at about half the rate which the Julian Calendar is. Currently, the Calculation of Jewish Passover misses the first vernal full moon in 3 years out of every 19 years. However, the Church is concerned with the Nomical Passover, and not the erroneously calculated Passover of the modern Jewish Calendar. And remember also, that the Canons decreed that we should celebrate Pascha "not with the Jews" after the reform of the Jewish Calendar. This is interesting, because the decree of the First Ecumenical Council means that we should never be celebrating Pascha more than a week after the Jewish Passover (yet we sometimes currently celebrate Pascha two or moe weeks after Passover). But if the calculation of Passover was changing at the time of the First Ecumenical Council, it was necessary for the Fatrhers to decree how the Nomical Passover should be determined (the first full moon after the vernal equinox) and decree that Pascha should fall on the Sunday after this. Given the change in the way Passover was calculated, the question has been raised as to whether the injunction that we celebrate Pascha "not with the Jews" actually means that we should not rely on Jewish calculations at all to determine Pascha, not that they should never fall on the same day...but that's a whole other thread in itself....
So getting back to the original question, the answer is "no". We can always determine the Nomical Passover by observing (or correctly calculating) the Vernal Equinox and observing (or correctly calculating) the first Full Moon after this. Unfortunately, at present, we on the Julian Calendar neither observe nor correctly calculate either the Vernal Equinox, nor the first Vernal Full Moon.
God Himself defined Nissan and Pascha by the Season of the Northern Spring ("the month of new corn") and the Fathers of the First Ecumenical Council ratified this. Yet both the Julian Calendar and the modern Jewish Calendar will eventually place Pascha outside of Spring through the Cycle of the other Seasons, and it will be about 78,000 years before Pascha will be celebrated in Spring again.

[Myrrh]

No. It can never be said that no one can remember the date of 14th Nissan, because we know how to calculate it.

I thought I worded that badly as I posted it, I was trying to grasp the idea of remembering as a base for calculation. Does the Hillel II take into consideration the vernal equinox or does it calculate from the new moon only?

And remember also, that the Canons decreed that we should celebrate Pascha "not with the Jews" after the reform of the Jewish Calendar.

I've wondered about this before. I've looked it up, Hillel II created the Jewish Calendar in 4119 which I make to be 358 AD. And the Julian was created after this?

I've just found a reference to Hillel II creating the Jewish calendar in response to Constantine forbidding the Jews to announce the new moons.

http://individual.utoronto.ca/kalendis/hebrew/molad.htm

This is interesting, because the decree of the First Ecumenical Council means that we should never be celebrating Pascha more than a week after the Jewish Passover (yet we sometimes currently celebrate Pascha two or moe weeks after Passover). But if the calculation of Passover was changing at the time of the First Ecumenical Council, it was necessary for the Fatrhers to decree how the Nomical Passover should be determined (the first full moon after the vernal equinox) and decree that Pascha should fall on the Sunday after this. Given the change in the way Passover was calculated, the question has been raised as to whether the injunction that we celebrate Pascha "not with the Jews" actually means that we should not rely on Jewish calculations at all to determine Pascha, not that they should never fall on the same day...but that's a whole other thread in itself....

Assuming we were both working to the Nomical our Pascha is the day of resurrection, not strictly the same Passover day as 14 Nissan, so even if these coincided we wouldn't be celebrating with the Jews, right? But, also just found this might explain it:

The Encyclopaedia Britannica, 9th edition, article Calendar, has this to say:

The [spring] equinox is fixed on the 21st of March, though the sun enters Aries generally on the 20th of that month, sometimes on the 19th. It is accordingly quite possible that a full moon may arrive after the true equinox, and yet precede the 21st of March. This, therefore, would not be the paschal moon of the calendar, though it undoubtedly ought to be so, if the intention of the Council of Nice [Nicea] were rigidly followed. The new moons indicated by the epacts [extra days needed to determine Easter Sunday] also differ from the astronomical new moons, and even from the mean new moons, in general by one or two days.... The epacts are also placed so as to indicate the full moons generally one or two days after the true full moons; but this was done purposely, to avoid the chance of concurring with the Jewish Passover, which the framers of the calendar seem to have considered a greater evil than that of celebrating Easter a week too late (p. 599).

So getting back to the original question, the answer is "no". We can always determine the Nomical Passover by observing (or correctly calculating) the Vernal Equinox and observing (or correctly calculating) the first Full Moon after this. Unfortunately, at present, we on the Julian Calendar neither observe nor correctly calculate either the Vernal Equinox, nor the first Vernal Full Moon.
God Himself defined Nissan and Pascha by the Season of the Northern Spring ("the month of new corn") and the Fathers of the First Ecumenical Council ratified this. Yet both the Julian Calendar and the modern Jewish Calendar will eventually place Pascha outside of Spring through the Cycle of the other Seasons, and it will be about 78,000 years before Pascha will be celebrated in Spring again.

Thanks for all this, and for your continuing patience here...

But, doesn't the addition of Adar I compensate for this on the Jewish calendar?

http://www.jewfaq.org/calendar.htm

From something I read in all these pages I've been looking at, but don't recall which so can't check. I think, on the Jewish Calendar the Sunday following Nissan 14 is the day of Wave Offering from which Pentecost is calculated. Could this be behind the idea of Sunday as Pascha do you think? Bread of Life and Resurrection. If this came from Alexandria it could well have been as there was a strong Jewish presence in the early centuries, so Christian Jews there could have influenced this.

Which brings me back to thinking of what you said earlier:

It means that if, when we calculate the date of Pascha we find that the Jewish Passover (14th of Nissan) falls on the same day as Pascha, then Pascha must be celebrated the following Sunday. The Calculation of Pascha which the Fathers decreed ensured that the Jewish Passover never comes after Pascha, but it can mean that they fall on the same day, in which case, Pascha has to be observed the following Sunday

And the Encyclopaedia quote above. I think I read that the Jewish calendar states the 14th Nissan can't be a Sunday, I could have this wrong I'll try and find it again. If that's the case, I wonder if, regardless of the antisemitic Roman theme brought into the Church, the Julian Calendar was actually calculated to accord with the tradition of the Jews?

Mixed metaphor coming up: I'm still floundering in the deep end clutching at straws.

Myrrh

[1937 Miraculous Cross]

Dear Myrrh,

I'm not trying to engage you in a "tit for tat" dialogue in this matter about the Church Calendar. When I said that the matter is not complicated, I was not referring to the complexities of merging the Jewish lunar calendar with the solar calendar, or calculating the date of Nissan, nor even the fact that earlier patristic traditions existed prior to the 1st Ecumenical Council.

In reference to the Holy Fathers, I'm referring to all the Councils, and this includes the Pan Orthodox councils of the 16th and 19th Centuries, as well as the several local churches that made a decree on the matter of the Orthodox Calendar.

Sure, the specifics of astronomy and pre-Nicene traditions is "complicated", but the essence of understanding that the Holy Fathers guided by the Holy Spirit saw that it was best to have a uniform Calendar is not. In this sense, I'm using the term 'patristic'. In this sense, it is a no-brainer. the so-called 'new" Calendar is an aberation. It was a tool of ecumenism and adopted unilaterally by uncanonical means and was the first great schism in the modern times. This is not complicated to understand. What I find amazing is how New Calendarists like to mentally twist and rationalize the existence of the New Calendar, when it is the obvious "pink elephant' in the living room so-to-speak.

Rostislav, myself and others have given good perspectives for people to understand this on the previous pages. I hope you will understand it in time, if you do not at the present. The problem, as I wrote in an earlier post, is what do you do if you are in a church that follows the New Calendar? I know what I would do, but unfortunately too many people let their emotions govern them on this, plus there is the general confusion from amoung the various TOC's who are in sad disarray.

in Christ,
nectarios

[Myrrh]

Dear Myrrh,

Rostislav, myself and others have given good perspectives for people to understand this on the previous pages. I hope you will understand it in time, if you do not at the present. The problem, as I wrote in an earlier post, is what do you do if you are in a church that follows the New Calendar? I know what I would do, but unfortunately too many people let their emotions govern them on this, plus there is the general confusion from amoung the various TOC's who are in sad disarray.

in Christ,
nectarios

Dear Nectarios - I do understand the arguments against the New Calendar. I'm OC myself and when I first discovered there were New Calendarists I took an interest and explored the history of its introduction - and I'm no more impressed with the Meletios Metaxakis connection now than I was at the time, nor with the direction the EP went subsequently as its arrogance shows in the current treatment of Esphigmenou. If it's simply old against new then I think the NC need to apologise in all humility for their schismatic acts and the blood spilt in introducing it. But on further exploration I'm not at all convinced that the Julian wasn't introduced in same spirit...

I was born in England and have taken an interest in the history of the early Church there, (which was brought to Britain by St Joseph of Arimathea Apostle to Britain; St Aristobulus, Peter's father in law, was the first bishop; Linus son of Caractacus was the first bishop in Rome) and this remained quartodeciman until it was forced to change over some centuries by increasing Roman domination which from Gregory I's time rejected its antiquity and traditions; again by the desire to dominate and expand claims to territory, its sphere of interest, much as the EP is doing now . Britain wasn't out of the loop as far as Nicaea was concerned, some three bishops attended. Yet the Celtic Church continued to be of the same tradition as Polycarp, Polycrates and the rest of the East, the tradition of St John. This isn't simply a matter of changing to the calendar calculations under Constantine, but a profound difference in remembering Passover. We still remember Christ as the Passover Lamb in our theology, but look where this went in the West - the primary common understanding is of Christ as some kind of Yom Kippur sacrifice. But here again, Augustine's doctrines are inextricably interwoven with this, creating as it does a wrathful God that needs appeasement..

And so on. So for me this is really is far more complicated than even the calculations - and I'm still struggling with those! In this argument I've decided to take a stand with the tradition of St John and Britain and, until I have a reason for thinking otherwise, I consider both old and new calendar schismatic.

And, to that end, acknowledgement by the Orthodox for their waywardness in the quartodeciman controversy, I'll continue looking for information which is quite difficult now that the winners have written the history and established their view as a rule over the Church for so many centuries.

I've just found an earlier reference to the argument.

http://vision.org/visionmedia/article.aspx?id=1054

What is really getting my goat here is that Orthodox scholars who should know better, educated in the history of the Church which I'm not, have remained silent about this - unless you know of any who have brought this to everyone's attention?

From the page above:

Eusebius, bishop of Caesarea, who recorded the events of the Council of Nicea for us in his Ecclesiastical History, establishes the first pretext for changing the keeping of the Passover. He records the testimony of Irenaeus, a bishop of Lyon in the late second century, who stated that the start of the controversy was in the days of Xystus (c. A.D. 115–125), from whose days the observance of the 14th was no longer followed in the West (Ecclesiastical History, 5.24).

Please read the rest of the article to get an idea of the history I'm now exploring.

Myrrh

[1937 Miraculous Cross]

Dear Myrrh,

you wrote:

And so on. So for me this is really is far more complicated than even the calculations - and I'm still struggling with those! In this argument I've decided to take a stand with the tradition of St John and Britain and, until I have a reason for thinking otherwise, I consider both old and new calendar schismatic.

I definitely have a great love and admiration for the ancient Celtic Church and their traditions, plus I do agree that their calculation for Pascha made more sense. the idea of a full moon on Pascha and its brightness makes esthetic sense. Nonetheless, there is no longer an authentic Celtic Church, and the Synod of Whitby was the beginning of their end. This proposition that both the New and Old calendars are in schism is not Orthodox, for obvious reasons. The current Orthodox calendar is indeed Patristic, and the whole church accepted it and think of all the saints throughout the centuries that have been on the Orthodox Calendar! . To think otherwise and to hold on to a different calendar because it represents an earlier patristic tradition of a certain local is kind of like the Old Believers stance.

Anyway, I do appreciate the fine distinctions you are interested, but in the long run, there is something to be said about quieting the mind, focusing on relinquishing our self-will, and entering into more and more prayer, and less time on internet activities (...myself included here.)

in Christ,
nectarios

[George Australia]

Does the Hillel II take into consideration the vernal equinox or does it calculate from the new moon only?

Neither. It now solely depends on mathematical rules, and has no relationship with observed phenomena other than the Sunset in order to determine the beginning of the day

I've wondered about this before. I've looked it up, Hillel II created the Jewish Calendar in 4119 which I make to be 358 AD. And the Julian was created after this?

The Julian Calendar was in use prior to this. The First Ecumenical Council decreed that Pascha should be celebrated "not with the Jews" because prior to this, in some places, the Church was celebrating Pascha on the actual day of Passover (no matter what day of the week it was). These were the "Tessareskaedecatites" (literally "Fourteenth-ites") who celebrated Pascha on the 14th of Nissan, rather than the Sunday which followed it.

Assuming we were both working to the Nomical our Pascha is the day of resurrection, not strictly the same Passover day as 14 Nissan, so even if these coincided we wouldn't be celebrating with the Jews, right?

Correct, Pascha and the Nomical Passover can never coincide by their respective definitions. The Nomical Passover occurs on the night of the first Full Moon after the Vernal Equinox (14th Nissan), and Pascha is the Sunday after the first Vernal Full Moon (i.e., the Sunday after the Nomical 14th of Nissan), so, if the first Vernal Full Moon falls on a Sunday, the Pascha is the following Sunday. This is also why Pascha should never be a week later than the Nomical Passover.

But, doesn't the addition of Adar I compensate for this on the Jewish calendar?

No, because the error is in the mathematical calculation of the Metonic Cycle of 19 years used to calculate it. The Cycle assumes that 19 Siderial (or "Tropical") Years exactly equals 235 lunar months, when in fact, they don't. The average length of the 19 year Cycle is too long by 2 hours, thus, the Jewish Calendar shifts itself forward by approximately one day every 216 years ever since the 4th Century when it was no longer based on actual solar and lunar observations. The result is the same as the Julian Calendar, but at a slower rate. But already, because of the error, Passover is not celebrated on the correct day for 3 years out of every 19 years, and is in fact, a month late on those three years.

From something I read in all these pages I've been looking at, but don't recall which so can't check. I think, on the Jewish Calendar the Sunday following Nissan 14 is the day of Wave Offering from which Pentecost is calculated. Could this be behind the idea of Sunday as Pascha do you think? Bread of Life and Resurrection. If this came from Alexandria it could well have been as there was a strong Jewish presence in the early centuries, so Christian Jews there could have influenced this.

Actually, it was the Apostles who influenced this. The "Wave-Sheaf" offering or "Omer" is commanded in the Old Testament (Leviticus 23:9-14). The "omer" was originally a unit of measure, which came to mean the "Wave-Sheaf". On the morning after the Sabbath of the Passover (i.e. Sunday Morning, or what should be our Pascha), the firstfruits were brought to the Temple to be offered to God. This consisted of a sheaf of Barley which was the "first-fruit" to ripen after the Winter. The priest would wave the sheaf before the God to offer it, and only after the Omer offering could food made from that year's fruits be eaten (only dried grains, legumes, fruits etc from the previous year could be eaten until the "Wave-Sheaf" or "Omer" was offered). So this was a firstfruit offering made on the day which came to be the day on which Christ Rose from the Dead. And the Apostle St. Paul makes this connection between the Resurrection and the Firstfruits when he says:
"But now Christ is risen from the dead, and has become the firstfruits of those who have fallen asleep." (1 Corinthians 15:20.)
The days and weeks after the Wave-Sheaf offering had to be counted each day for seven weeks, (Leviticus 23-15-16) and this is known as "Counting the Omer". So, for example, on the 9th day after the Wave Offering, the announcement is made during prayer that "Today is the ninth day, which is one week and two days of the Omer (i.e. the "Wave-Sheaf"). After the Seven Weeks of the Omer (49 days) came the Feast of Shavu'ot on the 50th day or "Pentecost". This day was the harvest festival of the first-fruits, when the firstfruits would be harvested and brought to the Temple. It was also the Day which commemorated the giving of the Law to Moses on Mount Sinai. And on this Day in AD 33 the Holy Spirit, Who teaches Truth, descended on the Apostles and established the Church, and through the Truth of the Holy Spirit, the Church is where the "firstfruits" of all creatures are gathered (or "harvested") as an offering to God, as the Apostle St. James says:
"Of His own will He brought us forth by the word of truth, that we might be a kind of firstfruits of His creatures." (James 1:18 )

If that's the case, I wonder if, regardless of the antisemitic Roman theme brought into the Church, the Julian Calendar was actually calculated to accord with the tradition of the Jews?

The assumption is often made that the decree that we should celebrate Pascha "not with the Jews" is antisemetic, but in fact, it isn't. If we were calculating Pascha as the Fathers of the First Ecumenical Council decreed we should, then our Pascha would always fall on the day of the Wave-Sheaf offering.
Think about it: the first day of Passover is actually the 15th of Nissan, remembering that the Day begings at sunset, so Sunset on the 14th of Nissan is actually the start of the 15th. The Wave-Sheaf had to be offered in the Morning of the Sunday after the Saturday in Passover. Therefore if 14th Nissan was a Saturday, then the Wave-Sheaf would not be offered the next day, but on the following Sunday, since that 14th Nissan was not the Saturday in Passover, but the Saturday before it (and this most recently occured in 2001). Therefore, "the Sunday following the first vernal full moon" (or the Nomical Christian Pascha) is the Nomical Day of the Omer or "Wave-Sheaf" offering.
Therefore "not will the Jews" cannot mean anything other than not celebrating Pascha on any day other than Sunday (unlike the Jews who celebrate thier Passover on any day of the week). Yet, our Pascha (if we calculated it correctly) would always falls on the Nomical day of the Wave-Sheaf Offering, so it cannot be said that the decree "not with the Jews" was meant to be antisemetic, since we would always be celebrating Pascha on the same Jewish Holiday every year, and always during the Passover Week (or "Days of Unleaven Bread").
The conclusion of all this is that the Fathers of the First Ecumenical Council decreed that we should be celebrating the Resurrection for Pascha, and the Resurrection of Our Lord took place on the day of the Wave-Sheaf (Omer) Offering. Our Pascha is a Resurrectional Pascha, whereas, if we celebrate "with the Jews", it would be a Crucifixional Pascha.

[Myrrh]

I definitely have a great love and admiration for the ancient Celtic Church and their traditions, plus I do agree that their calculation for Pascha made more sense. the idea of a full moon on Pascha and its brightness makes esthetic sense. Nonetheless, there is no longer an authentic Celtic Church, and the Synod of Whitby was the beginning of their end.

Dear Nectarios, the authentic Celtic Church still exists in us, or have we rejected St Joseph of Arimathea...?

This proposition that both the New and Old calendars are in schism is not Orthodox, for obvious reasons. The current Orthodox calendar is indeed Patristic, and the whole church accepted it and think of all the saints throughout the centuries that have been on the Orthodox Calendar! . To think otherwise and to hold on to a different calendar because it represents an earlier patristic tradition of a certain local is kind of like the Old Believers stance.

We'll just have to agree to differ on this. I think it obvious that we are schismatics because we've rejected Apostolic tradition in remembering Passover. That 'patristic agreement' is put forward as legitimising the rejection of remembering Pascha as the actual Passover day is not proof of legitimacy according to Holy Tradition which is to continue in the traditions as taught as Paul mentions. Patristic agreement can and has erred in the past and time does not confer legitimacy - a heresy doesn't become true because might equals right has obscured its un-Apostolic origins in the intervening centuries. We are not the Church of patristic consensus...

..not least because there is no such thing nor has there ever been.

For example Basil doesn't agree with Cyprian:

St Basil later refers to the view of Cyprian regarding schismatics, and in effect rejects it (emphasis obviously mine):

The Cathari [Novatians] are schismatics; but it seemed good to the ancient authorities, I mean Cyprian and our own Firmilianus, to reject all these, Cathari, Encratites, and Hydroparastatæ, by one common condemnation, because the origin of separation arose through schism, and those who had apostatized from the Church had no longer on them the grace of the Holy Spirit, for it ceased to be imparted when the continuity was broken. The first separatists had received their ordination from the Fathers, and possessed the spiritual gift by the laying on of their hands. But they who were broken off had become laymen, and, because they are no longer able to confer on others that grace of the Holy Spirit from which they themselves are fallen away, they had no authority either to baptize or to ordain. And therefore those who were from time to time baptized by them, were ordered, as though baptized by laymen, to come to the church to be purified by the Church’s true baptism. Nevertheless, since it has seemed to some of those of Asia that, for the sake of management of the majority, their baptism should be accepted, let it be accepted. http://rathernot.classicalanglican.net/?p=138

We may hide this lack of consensus in the euphemism 'economy', but lack of consensus it most certainly is. But my point is still, 'patristic consensus' is not the authority of the Church - which as we still teach is guided by the Holy Spirit into all truth.

We are certainly schismatics because we have ruled against following the tradition of St John which was held from Apostolic beginnings.

Lest this become a worry for you, that you think we're without grace for example, remember Paul here:

"Beware lest any man spoil you through philosophy and vain deceit, after the tradition of men, after the rudiments of the world, and not after Christ."

First of all, Christ ruled that there is not system of hierarchy in the Church: no bishop or council has the right or power to impose rules on us and especially not rule us with or without grace. Secondly, it is imperative in this calendar argument to take into account political machinations in establishing a new tradition when centuries later claiming 'patristic consensus' for its legitimacy. If the Old Believers were wrong, why do we still write icons using the sign of the cross we decided was heretical? Isn't this simply hypocricy?

In this argument we can't afford to ignore the political history of the Julian calendar's imposition onto the Church because certainly to Polycarp's time there was no other tradition in the Church except in a minority view from Rome.. Where is there any discussion about this by the whole Church? Not at Nicaea, it wasn't on the agenda.

By whose authority did we rule against the Apostolic tradition of remembering Passover with Jews?

Myrrh