SPRING in the Northern Hemisphere is in-between March and April.
It marks the end of winter.
This is when the Hebrew festival called Pass Over is observed.
This is also the beginning of the year and is called Rosh-Hashanah.
It is equivalent to the Southern Hemisphere’s spring time which falls in-between September and October.
Nowadays, the March-April period is remembered for Easter which is honoured by the Europeans by going on holiday.
By way of partaking of the former coloniser and slave master’s religion, Africans also honour this festival by going on holiday.
It is claimed Easter is the anniversary of the death, burial and resurrection of Christ.
This is false.
Easter’s origins are wholly pagan.
The Easter festival predated the birth of Christ by thousands of years. The term Easter was derived from a goddess Ishta by the Assyrians and Astati by the Canaanites in ancient times.
Her worship began after Nimrod was called the Sun god and his wife Samerimus the goddess of heaven.
She was known by many names by different groups and in springtime, the pagans would celebrate fertility by honoring this goddess.
According to biblical books like Jeremiah 7 verse 17, the Israelites angered their God when they participated in the worship of the Assyrian and Babylonian goddess of heaven to whom they baked and offered cakes.
During Christ’s time, the Romans also observed the worship of the goddess of heaven and fertility in spring while the Israelites observed the Passover. Why then should there be any connection between Christ and this pagan holiday?
The rabbits and eggs are symbols of fertility because in spring the trees, grass, and animal population begins to rise.
This is the reason the season is called spring.
The hot cross buns usually creamed with a cross symbol, are the modern cakes that were offered to the goddess of heaven who was called Ishta by the Assyrians. Easter, like the winter solstice festival of Saturnalia, was observed even in the time of Christ but was forbidden according to scripture.
Saturnalia has been disguised as the anniversary of Christ’s birth and Easter the anniversary of his death and resurrection.
The scripture commands that the Israelites observe only three festivals, namely; the Passover, Sabbath Day and Feast of Harvest.
All this other nonsense is birthed in doctrines that were even condemned by Christ because he followed them not.
But why would the Romans go through so much trouble to secretly observe their pageantry in the guise of giving honour to Christ?
It is because after killing Christ by way of crucifixion, the Romans faced great instability in ruling the region encompassing Assyria, Judea and Egypt.
Even Rome and Greece had many Christian converts from the time of Paul and they were growing increasingly disloyal to the Roman Government.
Rome initially responded by way of violence to ascertain its control over the empire and Christians were fleeing to places like Arabia and as far afield as Ethiopia.
The Israelite kingdom of Axum was converted to Christianity by Syrian blacks fleeing Roman persecution over 200 years after the time of Christ.
The Ethiopian King who was converted was called Negus Ezana.
In the time of Roman Emperor Constantine, this friction between the Roman Empire and the growing number of Christians had reached its peak and threatened their regime.
As a shrewd politician, Constantine claimed to have seen a vision of a cross and decided to be a Christian.
This was done as a measure to bring stability in the Empire.
Shortly after consolidating power by the ‘if you can’t beat them join them’ tactic, Constantine soon found that there was some instability among the Christians themselves, particularly in Egypt.
The Egyptians were devout Christians and not only were they black, but they also depicted Christ as black.
Coptic Christianity actually rooted from Egypt and the term was derived from kub, the Arabic name for Hakuptah or Egypt.
The issue came when a Christian leader called Arius realised that Christians were wrongly equating Christ to God.
He argued that even Christ called himself the son for a reason.
He wanted to make clear that our Father was greater than all as he said in John 10:29.
Arius faced opposition from other Christian leaders such as Alexander the Bishop of Alexandria who believed and preached that Christ was God.
In 321 CE, Arius was declared a heretic and he moved to Israel which had been named Palestine by the Romans after the burning of the temple and dispersal of the Judeans in 70 CE.
There he gained a great following as people accepted his belief that Christ was a created being like any other but his doctrine was from God.
Meanwhile, Constantine was having problems legitimising his claim to be a Christian and sought advice from his advisor Eusebius who helped him arrange a meeting to settle the dispute between Arius and the other Christians.
In 325 CE, Constantine invited more than 1 000 Bishops to Nicaea in Turkey and 300 came.
The guising of Easter under the pretence of honouring Christ and the choosing of the date of observing Easter took place at this meeting.
The Christians outnumbered and overcame the followers of Arius and were known from that time onwards as Orthodox.
The Ethiopian Orthodox Church in attendance were also called Orthodox.
They signed a Nicene Treaty which would promote the orthodox view of Christ and suppress the one held by Arius.
The Orthodox Christians further developed their belief in Christ as God by establishing the trinity doctrine and this was shared by all the people who signed the Nicene Treaty.
Arius had only argued that Christ was wholly depended on God because the latter was greater and the followers of Christ ought to be wholly depended on God as well, not to partner God with his servants.
This view by Arius of Christ being a man is upheld by many Muslims and is the cause of dispute among the two groups today.