62. The Moon of that day
TRANSLATION
However, when the Sunday of Christ's Resurrection took place is variously related.68 As we have mentioned above, some assert that it took place on the 8th kalends of April [25 March], but others on the 6th and some on the 5th kalends of the same month [27 or 28 March].69
Here it should be noted that if the Lord's Resurrection took place on the 8th kalends [25 March], as the older [authorities] write, it would then assuredly have been the ¢fth year of the 19-year cycle, having 7 as its concurrent and the fourteenth day of the Moon, as usual, on the 11th kalends of April [22 March].70 But if the Lord rose on the 6th kalends of April [27 March], it would have been the 13th year of the aforementioned cycle, having 5 as its concurrent and the fourteenth Moon, as usual, on the 9th kalends of April [24 March].71 On the other hand, if the Resurrection of Christ was celebrated on the 5th kalends of the month [28 March], it being the second year of the 19-year cycle, then the year had four concurrents and the fourteenth Moon as usual was on the 8th kalends of April [25 March].72 All the mysteries of the 17th day of the Moon, wherein on a Sunday the ¢rst deeds of His most holy Resurrection took place, are set forth in unambiguous sequence. Only [let us be] extremely careful lest, by a⁄rming as do some that this was accomplished on the 16th Moon,73 we incur not only an inevitable loss to our computation, but a very great danger to the catholic faith.74
62. THE MOON OF THAT DAY
The Moons of Easter Sunday are shown in the ¢nal column [meta] of this oft-mentioned cycle, enclosed, because of variations in the occurrence of 68 Cf. ch. 47.
69 Cf. Cologne Prologue (Krusch, Studien I, 230) (25 March); Carthaginian computus of 455, 7 (ibid. 289) and Martin of Braga, Tractatus paschalis 4 (ed. Barlow, 272.57)
(27 March); Victorius of Aquitaine, Prologus 9 (25.7^8) (28 March). Dionysius Exiguus'
Easter for AD 34 is 28 March, but the age of the Moon (21) does not match the Gospel data.
70 I.e. AD 42.
71 I.e. AD 12. Both of Jones' editions of De temporum ratione read XI kalendarum here, but the older editions (e.g. PL 90.513C) as well as the manuscripts I have consulted
(e.g. Oxford, St John's College 17 fol. 101r) all read IX kalendarum, which is evidently correct.
72 AD 191 is the earliest year following the birth of Christ which ful¢ls these criteria.
73 The reference is to Victorius.
74 A similar warning is issued in the Cologne Prologue (230).
THE RECKONING OF TIME
that Sunday, /453/ within a span of seven days, that is, from the ¢fteenth to the twenty-¢rst [Moon]. To be sure, these days are ¢xed in advance by a statement frequently [found] in the Law. There the Lord says: In the ¢rst month, on the fourteenth day of the month, you shall eat unleavened bread until the twenty-¢rst day at sundown. For seven days, no leaven shall be found within your houses.75 Now the rule governing this ¢rst month, and the seven days of Unleavened Bread within it, is such that the ¢fteenth Moon that follows after the equinox is to be understood as belonging to the ¢rst month. And this [rule] will put forward whatever
Sunday it ¢nds within the seven days up to the twenty-¢rst Moon as suitable for the joys of the Paschal feast. I repeat this frequently because there were certain people who, observing Easter Sunday, for instance, on the 7th kalends of April [26 March], with the Moon 20 days old, would say: ''And what error in establishing the date of Easter can you show us, when no computist [calculator] ever forebade that Easter be celebrated on the 7th kalends of April? Everyone agrees that the equinox is passed, and no one has denied that the twenty-¢rst Moon is appropriate for Easter Sunday.''76 To these people we reply that Easter
Sunday may indeed fall on the 7th kalends of April when the Moon is in accord, and on the twentieth day of the Moon when an opportune date is favourable. But because the Moon which on the 7th kalends of April is twenty days old was full before the equinox, it is not permitted to celebrate Easter Sunday on the 7th kalends of April when the Moon is twenty days old. The Sunday following the full Moon which falls on or after the equinox will give the lawful Easter.
The same mistake gets the same response when these computists decree that Easter should take place on the 11th kalends of April [22
March] with a Moon 16 days old, on the 10th kalends of April [23 March] with a Moon 17 days old, on the 9th kalends of April [24
March] with a Moon 18 days old, on the 8th kalends of April [25 March] with a Moon 19 days old, on the 7th kalends of April [26 March] with a Moon 20 days old, on the 6th kalends of April [27 March] with a Moon
21 days old, or on the 5th kalends of April [28 March] with a Moon 22 days old. They often do this in a year when they have a Moon 25 days old on the kalends of January. When they claim that the Moon on this
75 Exodus 12.18^19.
76 Their argument, and Victorius', is that the equinox is the terminus of Easter, not the terminus of the Easter full Moon: see Introduction, section 3.