Bible Questions and Answer

Christians celebrated the resurrection from the very beginning. Every Sunday was a weekly remembrance of it. But an annual Easter festival also developed early, in the second century, linked closely with the Jewish Passover. Paul wrote, "Christ, our Passover lamb, has been sacrificed." In the 100s, a dispute arose over the date. Churches in Asia Minor, following a tradition they traced to the apostle John, celebrated on the fourteenth of the Jewish month Nisan, whatever day of the week it fell on. Rome and most other churches celebrated on the Sunday after. This became known as the Quartodeciman controversy, from the Latin for "fourteenth." Polycarp of Smyrna visited Rome around AD 155 to discuss it, and they agreed to differ. In AD 325, the Council of Nicaea decided that Easter should be celebrated on a Sunday by all churches. Today, Western churches celebrate Easter on the first Sunday after the first full moon following the spring equinox.