Passover Prt1

[ViaCrucis]

Ēostre - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

The evidence seems fairly solid to me. English holiday names are unusual in that way. It doesn't mean that Easter is in any way pagan, however (actually, in Slavic countries, Pascha is associated more with their "halloween", since the Slavic pagan day of the dead fell around that same time period).

In no way, though, is Easter named after Ishtar. Ishtar was unknown to Europeans and didn't feature in their pantheon.

Easter eggs are common to both East and West in Christendom, with the Russian peoples being fond of them in particular. They probably came from the early Church adopting Persian customs of decorating eggs. The eggs were dyed red in honor of Christ (there is an apocryphal story of Mary Magdalene that involves turning an egg red as a miraculous sign, which may be an allusion to this tradition).

The closest I see to any evidence given in the Wiki article is in the opening paragraphs,

"Additionally, scholars have linked the goddess's name to a variety of Germanic personal names, a series of location names (toponyms) in England, and, discovered in 1958, over 150 inscriptions from the 2nd century CE referring to the matronae Austriahenae."

But no citations, no references, and no sources are linked to.

A Google search concerning "the matronae Austriahenae" provided this: The “Matronae Austriahenae” and a supposed link to “Eostre”

Most of the other decent results seem to be papers in journals behind a paywall.

I'm not going to straight up say Bede is wrong, but I'm unsure what evidence there is that you find compelling. I'm not seeking to be combative, but genuinely would be curious about any evidence that does exist. Because I've consistently been unable to find anything.

-CryptoLutheran

 

[FireDragon76]

The closest I see to any evidence given in the Wiki article is in the opening paragraphs,

"Additionally, scholars have linked the goddess's name to a variety of Germanic personal names, a series of location names (toponyms) in England, and, discovered in 1958, over 150 inscriptions from the 2nd century CE referring to the matronae Austriahenae."

But no citations, no references, and no sources are linked to.

A Google search concerning "the matronae Austriahenae" provided this: The “Matronae Austriahenae” and a supposed link to “Eostre”

Most of the other decent results seem to be papers in journals behind a paywall.

I'm not going to straight up say Bede is wrong, but I'm unsure what evidence there is that you find compelling. I'm not seeking to be combative, but genuinely would be curious about any evidence that does exist. Because I've consistently been unable to find anything.

-CryptoLutheran

The linguistic evidence mentioned in the article. Though I admit, it's probably not the kind of ironclad proof we'ld hope to see. But it does explain why the name is different in England and Germany, than in other parts of Christendom.

At any rate, an etymology of a word has nothing to do with its meaning. Today, most people don't associate the word "Easter" with paganism, and it's disingenious to imply they do.

 

[PsaltiChrysostom]

Easter eggs are common to both East and West in Christendom, with the Eastern Orthodox peoples being fond of them in particular. They probably came from the early Church adopting Persian customs of decorating eggs. The eggs were dyed red in honor of Christ's Passion (there is an apocryphal story of Mary Magdalene that involves turning an egg red as a miraculous sign, which may be an allusion to this tradition).

Since we fast from all animal based foods, no meat, fish, or dairy, the Orthodox Easter basket is filled with meat, cheese and eggs for the breaking of the Lenten and Holy Week fast. So that's the origin of the Easter Basket. The baskets are brought into the church or in the fellowship hall and the priest will bless them with the following prayer.

O Master, Lord our God, Author and Creator of all things: Bless Thou
the cheese and with this also the eggs, and preserve us in Thy goodness, that,
as we partake of them, we may be filled with Thy gifts, ungrudgingly
bestowed, and with Thine ineffable goodness. For Thine is the might, and
Thine is the Kingdom, and the power, and the glory, of the Father, and of the
Son, and of the Holy Spirit, now and ever and unto ages of ages.

Christ is Risen! Truly He is Risen!

 

[ViaCrucis]

The linguistic evidence mentioned in the article. Though I admit, it's probably not the kind of ironclad proof we'ld hope to see. But it does explain why the name is different in England and Germany, than in other parts of Christendom.

The thing though is that Ostara was coined by Jacob Grimm, he was speculating, and his only source was Bede too. The article mentions inscriptions that are possibly and tenuously linked to Eostre, but the article I gave argues that there is likely nothing connecting the stone inscriptions with Eostre. The article also mentions toponyms, There is mention of a proposed proto-Germanic name, but again that's conjecture.

The absence of evidence is not absence of absence--so I don't want to seem like I'm making that argument. But it's not even about not being ironclad evidence, it's that virtually everything, outside of Bede, is pure guesswork; there's nothing outside of Bede that indicates that the Anglo-Saxons or any Germanic people worshiped a goddess named Eostre (or some other Germanic variant). All that exists is hypotheses without evidentiary support, or highly tenuous. So while Bede is possibly/probably right, there just doesn't seem to be anything corroborating him; the best we have is conjecture. Nothing wrong with conjecture, I offered my own conjecture earlier. I just don't think we can take that conjecture as evidence.

At any rate, an etymology of a word has nothing to do with its meaning. Today, most people don't associate the word "Easter" with paganism, and it's disingenious to imply they do.

That's true, regardless of whether the Anglo-Saxons worshiped a goddess named Eostre is ultimately moot.

Whether they did worship such a goddess is simply a question I find interesting as an aside, and it's a curiosity from a purely anthropological perspective.

-CryptoLutheran