Sabbath Message 290131120

Dear Friends,

In the course of establishing its theological position to observe the Biblical Holy Days, the Worldwide Church of God (WCOG) under the ministry of Herbert Armstrong rightfully acknowledged an historical event that it used to support the observance of Passover. That early historical event is the well-documented Quartodeciman Controversy.  For an in-depth analysis of this pivotal controversy refer to the paper The Quartodeciman Disputes (No. 277).

The introduction to this informative study paper reads: “The Quartodeciman disputes were seen as pivotal to the determination of the Christian Faith. They were the second series of innovations to occur in the Christian Church and perhaps the most fundamental. After Sunday worship had been introduced from Rome in the middle of the second century, the Roman system then set about introducing the pagan Easter system over the Passover. In 664 CE at Whitby in England, they finally succeeded by force of arms in having the British or Celtic Church accept Easter.”

History records that the Quartodeciman Controversy (ca. 154-192), which split the Church, was addressed by the Council of Nicea in 325 CE, and the Lord’s Passover on the 14th of Nisan was consequently replaced by Easter Sunday worship within the developing Greco-Roman Church system. 

This Sabbath message will focus on neglect of the ministry of WCOG to either understand or relate the importance of the calculation for Easter observance, and the method of the calculation’s relevance to the Temple calendar in existence during the Messiah’s ministry. The WCOG ministry either missed or ignored or did not fully grasp the importance of the resolution by the Nicean Council in determining when to observe Easter. 
  
The Quartodeciman Disputes study paper states the following: “The method of calculating the day of the Sun at the vernal equinox was similar to the calculation of the Wave-Sheaf Offering of Leviticus 23, but it was not quite the same. That is why there is a slight difference between the Passover and the Easter system.”

Continuing:
“The Universal Oxford Dictionary gives the method for determining Easter Sunday or Easter day, which is the true Day of the Sun as Easter.

It is observed on the first Sunday after the calendar full moon, i.e. the 14th day of the calendar moon - which happens on or next after 21 March. Applied colloq. to the week commencing Easter Sunday (1964 print, p. 579).

This is the rule for determining the Easter or Ishtar festival and not the rule for the biblical Passover”.

The Catholic Encyclopedia records:  “According to this rule, Easter Sunday is the first Sunday which occurs after the first full moon (or more accurately after the first fourteenth day of the moon) following the 21st of March. As a result, the earliest possible date of Easter is 22 March, the latest 25 April.”

It summarizes:

• that Easter must be celebrated by all throughout the world on the same Sunday.
• that this Sunday must follow the fourteenth day of the paschal moon;
• that that moon was to be accounted the paschal moon whose fourteenth day followed the spring equinox;

The Catholic Encyclopedia further states: “The 14 Nisan practice which was strong among the churches of Asia Minor, becomes less common as the desire for Church unity on the question came to favor the majority Roman practice. By the 3rd century the Church in general, which had become gentile-dominated and wishing to further distinguish itself from Jewish practices, began a tone of rhetoric against 14 Nisan/Passover date (e.g. Anatolius of Laodicea, c. AD 270; 6.148,6.149 "Ante-Nicene Church Fathers"). The tradition that Pascha was to be celebrated "not with the Jews" meant that Pascha was not to be celebrated on 14 Nisan”  (http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/05228a.htm).

Another pertinent source of information comes through The World Council of Churches’ report from its Middle East Council of Churches Consultation in Aleppo, Syria on March 5 - 10, 1997.  It states: “By the end of the 2nd century some churches celebrated Easter/Pascha on the day of the Jewish passover, regardless of the day of the week, while others celebrated it on the following Sunday. By the 4th century, the former practice had been abandoned practically universally, but differences still remained in the calculation of the date of Easter/Pascha. The ecumenical council held at Nicea in 325 AD determined that Easter/Pascha should be celebrated on the Sunday following the first vernal full moon. Originally passover was celebrated on the first full moon after the March equinox, but in the 3rd century the day of the feast came to be calculated by some Jewish communities without reference to the equinox, thus causing passover to be celebrated twice in some solar years. Nicea tried to avoid this by linking the principles for the dating of Easter/Pascha to the norms for the calculation of passover during Jesus' lifetime.”  (Emphasis added)

The report included the following recommendations:
(a) to maintain the Nicene norms (that Easter should fall on the Sunday following the first vernal full moon), and
(b) to calculate the astronomical data (the vernal equinox and the full moon) by the most accurate possible scientific means,
(c) using as the basis for reckoning the meridian of Jerusalem, the place of Christ's death and resurrection. (http://www.oikoumene.org/index.php?id=2677) 

Please note above that the Nicean Council’s methodology to establish Easter dates was linked “to the norms for the calculation of Passover during Christ’s lifetime.”  The norms for the calculation of Passover were set at the Temple.  Christ calls the Temple in Jerusalem his Father’s House (Jn. 2:16).  He and His family journeyed year after year to the Temple for Passover (Lk. 2:41-43) where they kept the Passover Feast for the full eight days according to the Law in Deuteronomy 16.  Christ kept the Feasts according to the calendar established at the Temple, otherwise he would have been in breach of God’s Laws that he delivered to ancient Israel at his Father’s direction.  He would have sinned, but we know he did not.  Christ knew and observed the correct calendar that was utilized by the Jews during the Temple period before its destruction in 70 CE. 

The Temple calendar is with us today for the gates of the grave will not prevail against Christ’s called out ones, the ecclesia (Mat. 16:18).  He shepherds those given to him by his Father to keep and worship on the correct days that are declared to be holy by God.

During the Temple period of Christ’s ministry, Abib1 or Nisan1, which was the beginning of the new year, was determined by the new moon (conjunction) nearest the vernal equinox providing that the Passover sacrifice on the 14th of Abib at the ninth hour (approximately 3 p.m.) in the afternoon of the 14th when the first Passover lamb (representing the Messiah) was killed by the High Priest at the Temple DID NOT precede the vernal equinox.  This was to prevent two Passover sacrifices from being observed within the same calendar year  (see the study paper God’s Calendar (No. 156)).

The Nicean Council understood the Temple calendar. Its participants drafted a methodology to replicate the Temple calculation but fit it to their Easter observance so that the Passover and Easter would occur close together.  History records this to be the case, and so does the World Council of Churches acknowledge this fact in their conference report cited above.

Now, let’s look at the Hillel calendar which had its beginnings in 358 CE and is currently observed by the WCOG off-shoots and which was implemented during Herbert Armstrong’s reign of Worldwide COG.

The Hillel calendar methodology will first calculate when Tishri 1 (the seventh month) is to be declared.  It looks at which day of the week the new moon of Tishri would occur, and if the day is a “forbidden day” by Hillel reasoning, then Tishri 1 would be “postponed” for a day and possibly by two days depending on the four rules of postponements.  Rule 1 in the Hillel calculation does not allow for the new moon of Tishri to occur on a Sunday, Wednesday, or a Friday.  If Tishri 1 would fall on any of these days, then it is postponed and advanced one day to a Monday, Thursday, or Saturday (Sabbath) respectively.  The postponement rules will be listed later in this message.

After Tishri 1 is declared, the Hillel calculation will then count backwards from its Tishri 1 date 177 days to declare Abib 1.  The Hillel calendar calculations with its postponement rules can delay Abib 1 by up to 2 days as previously mentioned.  In some years, the Hillel begins Abib 1 a month later than the Temple calendar, as it does this year in 2008. 

It is obvious to see why the Nicean Council wanted to replicate the norms for the calculation of Passover during Christ’s lifetime according to the Temple calendar for their Easter observance.  After the destruction of the Temple and the Jews having rejected the Messiah, the Jews strayed from the Temple calendar and developed their own calendars within the various Jewish sects.  The Hillel calendar became the major one accepted after much consternation within Judaism. To their shame, some spurious ministers within the WCOG system make the claim that the Temple calendar at Jerusalem contained postponements.  This is absolutely false as historical references prove it to be false  (see the study paper Tishri in Relation to the Equinox (No. 175)).

The following article titled, “Evidence for the ongoing use of the Jewish calendar in Gentile Christianity”, posted on WikiPedia, relates to the Jewish (Temple) calendar in use by the Apostles. It reads:

“Saint Paul, writing to his Gentile flock in Corinth, notes that "I will stay in Ephesus until Pentecost" (1Cor. 16.8) clearly assuming that his Gentile hearers will know what "Pentecost" is. The author of Acts notes that navigation on the Mediterranean had become dangerous because "the fast had already gone by" (Acts 27.9) referring to the Day of Atonement without any explanation. The same author earlier noted that Peter had undergone a sort of death and resurrection in the form of an imprisonment and release (Acts 12.1-17), and noted also that "this was during the days of Unleavened Bread" (Acts 12.3). This shows that Gentile Christians continued to keep track of the Jewish year and could be expected to know when its most important festivals were. Yet Gentiles would have no obvious reason to keep track of the Jewish calendar, unless they had inherited from Jewish Christians not only the calendar, but some reason to maintain it. An annual festival depending on that calendar would is at least a possible explanation for Paul's ability to refer to a Jewish festival in passing and expect Gentile Christians to know what he meant.”  (Emphasis added) (http://christianity.wikia.com/wiki/Easter#Evidence_for_the_ongoing_use_of_the_Jewish_calendar_in_Gentile_Christianity)

That Temple calendar has been maintained through the centuries and is with us today.  It is not difficult to understand the Temple calendar and it contains no postponements, which are a much later invention by Jewish rabbis.

Below is a chart for the years 2004 through 2025 showing Easter dates and comparing the dates of Abib 14 by years between the Temple calendar and the 358 CE Hillel calendar.

Note that in the years 2005, 2008, 2016, and 2024 the Easter dates established through the Nicean Council are more accurate by comparison in their dates for Easter compared to the Temple calendar than the Hillel calendar is for Abib 14.  The Hillel calendar is late by a month in these years. 

In the years 2004, 2006, 2007, 2011, 2012, 2014, 2015, 2019, 2020, 2021, 2022, 2023, and 2025 the Hillel calendar is off by 1 to 2 days due to their invented postponement rules.

Postponement rules are:
Rule 1: When the molad of Tishri or advancement occurs on a Sunday, Wednesday, or Friday, the declaration of Tishri 1 is advanced one day to a Monday, Thursday or Saturday (Sabbath) respectively.
Rule 2: When the molad of Tishri occurs at noon or later, the declaration of Tishri 1 is advanced to the next day.
Rule 3:  When the molad of Tishri of a common year falls on a Tuesday, at or after 9 hours and 204 parts, the declaration of Tishri 1 is advanced to Wednesday.  The application of Rule 1 advances the declaration one more day to Thursday.
Rule 4:  When the molad of Tishri of a common year immediately following an intercalary year occurs on a Monday, at or after 15 hours and 589 parts, the declaration of Tishri 1 is advanced to Tuesday.

Postponements are not authorized by Scripture and many of the members in the off-shoots of WCOG are probably not familiar with its purpose in the calendar their Church utilizes to determine the Holy Days.  See the paper The Calendar and the Moon – Postponements or Festivals? (No. 195) for an historical background on postponements.

I had an Elder in one of the WCOG off-shoots, who was a former professor at Ambassador College, tell me that we must always count backwards from Tishri to determine the Holy Days.  My response to him was God shows us how to count by the example of the creation week.  God did not create the seventh day first and then create His way backwards to the first day.  No, He created day one and then progressed to day seven.  He expects us to follow His instruction in the same manner as stated in Exodus 12:2: “You are to begin your calendar with this month; it will be the first month of the year for you” (Complete Jewish Bible - CJB).  The Temple calendar first determines the beginning of Abib 1, and then moves forward in progression to determine month two by the new moon conjunction, etc. It never counts backwards to determine a Holy Day, as the Hillel calendar will do.

The ministry in Worldwide taught that the Jews at the Temple in the time of Christ were observing Passover on the wrong day while teaching that the Jews were entrusted with the calendar by authority of Romans 3:1-2.  Even though they claim the Jews were entrusted with the calendar, WCOG never kept Passover and Pentecost according to the Hillel calendar, which the ministry claimed is God’s calendar.  The ministry was very inconsistent in this matter due to their complete lack of understanding of the Temple calendar.

The Hillel calendar with its postponement rules and backward count is in gross error.  It is not God’s Calendar and never was, and the Jews of today admit that it needs to be replaced.  It is a tremendous mistake with enormous spiritual consequences.  It is time for the WCOG off-shoots to correct their error in using the false Hillel calendar.  A wise man once said, “An error doesn’t become a mistake until you refuse to correct it.” (Orlando Battista)

Sabbath messages of recent weeks which relate to the Temple calendar at Jerusalem during the time of the Messiah’s ministry are being written for the benefit of all those who simply could not see the false premise and errors of the teachings by the ministry that led the 20th-century Worldwide Church of God to adopt the rabbinical Hillel calendar with its postponement rules (see Sabbath messages of 03/08/08 and 02/23/08 at:

http://www.ccg.org/_domain/ccg.org/Sabbath/2008/sabbath2008.htm).

There is a saying that I would like to address to the WCOG off-shoots who persist in using the Hillel calendar.  “The truth knocks on the door and you say, ‘Go away, I’m looking for truth,’ and so it goes away.”  Puzzling.  – Robert Perzig.

Tom Schardt