Easter Sunday

I live on the far suburban / rural edge of Philadelphia. Track housing to the east and large family farms to the west. From house it's an easy walk to over dozen churches, most of which are over a century old and half of them over two centuries old. This is God's Country or at least God's country in transition. Many of the churches are seeing attendance decline and this time of year they ram up their efforts to bring in "the great un-saved masses" that keep finding other things to do on the weekends.

The mailbox is already filled with invitations to sunrise service this Sunday. A trend I have noticed is some of the churches are moving away from "Easter" and now using "Resurrection Sunday".  The idea is to move away from any possible Pagan references.

Most people are at least a little bit aware of the old Pagan Goddess of Ostara or Eostre; Goddess of the dawn and where the word east comes from. She is also connected to spring and fertility. Often symbolized with the rabbit and the egg. Neopaganists like to point to this as the real origin of Easter and how Medieval Christianity conveniently cooped their holiday to create the modern Easter celebration.

A few of the local church ministers have grown more and more uncomfortable with Easter as we know it. Anybody with access to the internet can find information that was once only available in university and world class libraries. Of course anything on the internet shouldn't be taken at face value without collaborating evidence. A great deal of the Old Saxon and Scandinavian mythology was in the oral tradition and wasn't written down until long after they were replaced by Christianity and the old practices slipped into folklore.

One of the best examples is the Druids. Almost everyone knows who the Druids were. There are dozens and dozens of books written about them but almost all of those books rely on only a handful of historical sources that are questionable at best. Modern archeology has shed more light on the Druids than any historical records.

As one old friend who say "truth is a wonderful lubricant". Anyone who is mechanically inclined knows it doesn't take too much lubricant to keep a lot of moving parts in play.

In an online article in Live Science by Owen Jarus (owenjarus.com or owenjarus@gmail.com). A newly deciphered Egyptian text tells a different version of the crucifixion of Jesus. The text is written in the Coptic language and is about 1,200 years old. It's attributed to Saint Cyril of Jerusalem but historians believe it was written long after his death in the 4th century.

In the days of the early Christian Church there were many competing versions of the Gospel. There are three major and interesting variations from the traditional story.

First was Judas had to betray Jesus with a kiss so the Roman Guards would be completely certain they were arresting the right man. The text claimed Jesus did not have single shape but changed appearance constantly "sometimes he was ruddy, sometimes he is white, sometimes he is red, sometimes he is wheat coloured, sometimes he is pallid like the ascetics, sometimes he is a youth, sometimes he is an old man".

The second difference, Jesus was arrested on a Tuesday and his last supper was on Thursday with Pontius Pilate.

Third, Pontius Pilate is seen as a Saint in the Coptic Christian and Ethiopian Churches, and during that last supper with Jesus Pontius Pilate offers his son to take Jesus's place.

Part of the text:

"Without further ado, Pilate prepared a table and he ate with Jesus on the fifth day of the week. And Jesus blessed Pilate and his whole house," reads part of the text in translation. Pilate later tells Jesus, "well then, behold, the night has come, rise and withdraw, and when the morning comes and they accuse me because of you, I shall give them the only son I have so that they can kill him in your place."

The story itself is rich in symbolism. As far as what the truth is -well that's a matter of faith. As one Atheist I know would point out, even when you remove the idea of divinity out of the tale, the whole Easter story is still powerful and moving. Also hidden in the history of the Early Christian Church is the counter story that Jesus wasn't arrested and crucified but instead someone else took his place.

My personal favorite among the apocryphal versions, is Thomas (which is Greek for twin) was crucified in Jesus place, when Jesus was still out in the desert. Judas had Thomas arrested to protect Jesus but Jesus was distraught over what happened.  Judas then hung himself to death out of shame. The guilt that Jesus felt was so great he took the name Thomas and spread the Gospel all the way out to India.      

I guess that's not the story any of the churches around here will tell.

Faith takes on many forms and I hope when Easter comes you have what inspires you to be best person you possibly can be.