The Hartford herald. [volume] (Hartford, Ky.) 1875-1926, 1909-03-24
HOW TO COMPUTE
DATE OF EASTER
Movable Feast Day is a
Strange Problem.
WHEREIN THE TROUBLE Lies
The Widely Varying Date of
Easter Puzzles And Per-
plexeS Many.

l
: many people are wondering and ask
ing how the date of Easter is calcu-
lated. They know that Christmas al
ways comes upon the 25th OF Deem
Der, and that Thanksgiving is usually
, proclaimed for the fourth Thursday
in November, but the seemingly COM
pick calculation involved In determin-
ing the widely varying date of Eas-
ter puzzles and perplexes them. In
1918, for example, Easter fell on
March %; in 1886 it fell on April %;
and from year to year the date jumps
in the most irrational and apparent
ly incomprehensible manner
All the mystery and perplexity is
due to that inconstant orb, the moon.
The first factor in determining Eas-
ter is that it always falls on Sun
day, viz, the first Sunday after the
paschal full moon. This is the first
full moon in the ecclesiastical year,
which begins on March 81, the day of
the vernol equinox. If the full moon
occurs on a Sunday, Easter is the
Sunday after.
When the Gregorian calendar was
introduced, an attempt was made to
s,Ss. E:.EsY7 Id = sste2 .Sa4Gay after
March 81, but reverence for ancient
traditions prevailed and Easter still
remains a movable feast. Earlier
than this there had been a dispute
between the Eastern and Western
churches. The Greek Christians cele-
brated Easter on the 18th day of the |
first Jewish month, Nissan, treating
it as a Christian passover. The Roman
church celebrated it on the Sunday |
after the 14th day, because Sunday
was the day of Chrlst's resurrection.
The famous Council of Nice, 1876 AID,
decided in favor of the Western us
age, branding the other as the quar-
todeciman" heresy.
AN IMAGINARY MOON.
If you think that now you know all |
about Easter, you are sadly in error. |
The moon you see in the heavens is
not the moon by which the calcultion
is made. An imaginary moon, which
rises and sets in the ecclesiastical
calendar, is the determining factor.
This imaginary moon is sometimes
two or three days behind the real
moon. Since the days of Moses the
date of the passover has been thus
determined, the 14th day Of the cal
endar month being considered full
moon" for ecclesiastical purposes.
No wonder the fixing of the date
Of Easter has worried the church au-
thorities. The Council of Nice laid
the task upon the bishops OF Alexan-
Gria forever, that city being the
greatest seat of learning in the Chris
tian world. This work of computa-
ton, however, was done in a fashion
as sloven and unsatisfactory as the
bishops of a less learned city might
have done it, and the results were
confusion and chaos. In the year 3S7
the churches in Gaul observed Easter
on March 81, those in Italy on April
is, those in Egypt on April 20. There
were acrimonious controversies about |
it, and as has been seen, it was even
made the basis of heresy denuncia- [
tons. One branch of the church
would taunt the other with adherence ,
to Judaic custom; the other branch
would recriminate by accusing them '
of departing from the usage of Christ |
and the Apostles.
WHERE THE TROUBLE LIES.
The fundamental cause of all the
confusion is the impossibility, appar- [
emily, of getting the lunar periods to I
fit in with the length of the year For 1
purposes of calculation We say the I
year is 1855 IA days in length. It is /
really about eleven minutes less, and 1
these eleven minutes make a day in {
about 1870 years. s
Easter is calculated from the Me- |
tonic cycle OF nineteen years. Melton, 9
an Athenian philosopher, had found {
that every nineteen years the new
moons return on the same days in the 4
year. This discovery was considered a
so important that the Greeks in 4S2 J
B. C. inscribed it upon a tablet in G
gold, hence the year of this cycle is y
called the Golden Number" in our d
calendars. Still there are discrepan- I
cies between the lunar and the solar
year, and these, with the lunations q
Of the imaginary moon in the Jewish A
month of Nissan, still make the date y
Of Easter a puzzle for those who are b
not ecclesisastics or astronomers. q
Though we all know Easter is on the
Sunday following the first full moon v
IA