61. Easter Sunday
TRANSLATION
epacts are less [than 14], let him count upwards day by day until he reaches the number 14, and let him not doubt that he has there the fourteenth Moon of Easter. But if the epacts are more than 15, let him count upwards day by day up to 30,which is the end of this month.Then, beginning at the ¢rst Moon and arriving in sequence at the fourteenth, he will
¢nd the day duly ordained for the Paschal rites. Note also that if it is a common year, the fourteenth Moon will recur eleven days earlier than in the previous year, and if it is an embolismic year, nine days later.
There is, however, one exception: the ¢rst year of the 19-year cycle, in which, because of the ''leap of the Moon'', it customarily precedes its course of the previous year by twelve days.
61. EASTER SUNDAY
Easter Sunday is contained under the seventh heading [titulo] of the 19year cycle. It originates in the Sunday on which our Lord rose from the dead. For although in the Old Testament the Paschal season is ordained to be observed according to three formulaic criteria [argumentorum indiciis] ^ namely, it has to be celebrated after the equinox, in the ¢rst month, and in the third week of this [month], that is, from sundown of the fourteenth Moon, which is the beginning of the ¢fteenth Moon, up to the evening of ending of the twenty-¢rst Moon62 ^ a fourth rule for its observance has been imposed upon us from the time of our Lord's Resurrection. Hence when we have seen the fourteenth moon of the ¢rst month rise in the evening (the equinox having been passed), we should not immediately jump up to celebrate Easter. Rather, waiting for that Lord's Day on which He himself deigned to make that Pasch ^ that is, the ''passing over'' from death to life, from corruption to incorruption,63 from punishment to glory, by his rising ^ let us celebrate upon that day the solemnities be¢tting Easter.
Should anyone /451/ object that the lawgiver enjoined the remembrance not of the equinox but rather only of the ¢rst month and of the third week within that month,64 let him know that although [Moses] does not mention the equinox explicitly, nevertheless by the very fact that he orders the Pasch to be kept at the full Moon of the ¢rst month, he proves
62 Cf. Exodus 12.1^3 and 17^19.
63 Cf. I Corinthians 15.42^43.
64 The supporters of Victorius could have used such an argument.
THE RECKONING OF TIME
by thorough-going logic that the equinox has passed. For it is agreed beyond any doubt that the Moon of the ¢rst month is the ¢rst one to show its full orb after the equinox has passed. So on any occasion when we have a Sunday after the ¢fteenth Moon, our Easter season in no way disagrees with what is prescribed in the Law, although we honour the solemnities of this same Easter withother kinds of sacraments.For whenever Sunday occurs on the second or third or fourth or ¢fth or sixth or seventh day from this [¢fteenth Moon], we do not thus dismiss the Law and the prophets, but rather ful¢l the sacraments of Gospel grace. For as Theophilus (the venerable bishop of Alexandria I mentioned earlier) writes: For indeed, our Saviour was betrayed on the fourteenth day of the Moon, the¢fth afterthe sabbath; and He was cruci¢ed onthe ¢fteenth day of the Moon. On the third day He rose again, that is, on the seventeenth day of the Moon, which at that time seems to have fallen on a Sunday, as we learn by examining the Gospels. Therefore we have the assurance that we can rightly celebrate Easter, even though a delay has befallen because of an intervening necessity, so that whether the fourteenth Moon of the ¢rst month falls on the sabbath, or on other days before the sabbath on the following week, we may celebrate Easter without any hesitation. But if it falls on a Sunday, let us always put it o¡ until the following week, as has often been said, for the reasons we have mentioned above.65 Thesethings, therefore, have been demonstrated and made plain. But there is also this to consider: in cases of necessity the Law often commands those who cannot celebrate the Pasch in the ¢rst month because of lack of time to do it in the second month.66 But it is better for those who ¢nd themselves in necessity to follow what is higher than what is lower, for the lower is contained in the higher, but the higher is not included in a lower number. To repeat what we said earlier, /452/ the number ten contains nine within it, but nine cannot contain ten. If the Law commands us to pass over to the second month if we cannot celebrate the Pasch in the ¢rst month because of some necessity, I do not understand why we ought not reasonably to delay Easter until the following week if the fourteenth Moon occurs on a Sunday, given that it was in the ¢rst month and on the ¢fteenth day of the Moon that our
Saviour was cruci¢ed, and given also that it was the seventeenth day when He rose again afterthethree days.67
65 Cf. ch. 59.
66 Numbers 9.10.
67 Prologus Theophili 4 (225^226).