[1155] First edited from ancient manuscript by Ægidius Bucherius, of the Society of Jesus.
[1156] Circulos. [Note the reference to Hippolytus.]
[1157] Gressus. Vol. v. p. 3; also Bunsen, i. pp. 13, 281.]
[1158] [It seems probable that the hegemony which Alexandria had established in all matters of learning led to that full recognition of it, by the Council of Nicæa, which made its bishop the dictator to the whole Church in the annual calculation of Easter. Vol. ii. 343.]
[1159] i.e., "smith" or "brasier," probably from his assiduity.
[1160] Lunæ vii. Perhaps, as Bucher conjectures, Lunæ xiv., fourteen days, &c.
[1161] The text is doubtful and corrupt here.
[1162] Aliquid stillicidii.
II.
There is, then, in the first year, the new moon of the first month, which is the beginning of every cycle of nineteen years, on the six and twentieth day of the month called by the Egyptians Phamenoth. [1163] But, according to the months of the Macedonians, it is on the two-and-twentieth day of Dystrus. And, as the Romans would say, it is on the eleventh day before the Kalends of April. Now the sun is found on the said six-and-twentieth day of Phamenoth, not only as having mounted to the first segment, but as already passing the fourth day in it. And this segment they are accustomed to call the first dodecatemorion (twelfth part), and the equinox, and the beginning of months, and the head of the cycle, and the starting-point [1164] of the course of the planets. And the segment before this they call the last of the months, and the twelfth segment, and the last dodecatemorion, and the end of the circuit [1165] of the planets. And for this reason, also, we maintain that those who place the first month in it, and who determine the fourteenth day of the Paschal season by it, make no trivial or common blunder.
[1163] [The Church's Easter-calculations created modern astronomy, which passed to the Arabians from the Church. (See Whewell's Inductive Sciences.) They preserved it, but did not improve it, in Spain. Christianity re-adopted it, and the presbyter Copernicus new-created it. The court of Rome (not the Church Catholic) persecuted Galileo; but it did so under the lead of professional "Science,'" which had darkened the human mind, from the days of Pythagoras, respecting his more enlightened system.]
[1164] The word is aphesis, which Valesius makes equivalent to apheteria, the rope or post from which the chariots started in the race, and so = starting-point.--Tr.
[1165] periodou.
III.
Nor is this an opinion confined to ourselves alone. For it was also known to the Jews of old and before Christ, and it was most carefully observed by them. [1166] And this may be learned from what Philo, and Josephus, and Musæus have written; and not only from these, but indeed from others still more ancient, namely, the two Agathobuli, [1167] who were surnamed the Masters, and the eminent Aristobulus, [1168] who was one of the Seventy who translated the sacred and holy Scriptures of the Hebrews for Ptolemy Philadelphus and his father, and dedicated his exegetical books on the law of Moses to the same kings. These writers, in solving some questions which are raised with respect to Exodus, say that all alike ought to sacrifice the Passover [1169] after the vernal equinox in the middle of the first month. And that is found to be when the sun passes through the first segment of the solar, or, as some among them have named it, the zodiacal circle.
[1166] pros auton--others read pro, before them.
[1167] Anatolius writes that there were two Agathobuli with the surname Masters; but I fear that he is wrong in his opinion that they were more ancient than Philo and Josephus. For Agathobulus, the philosopher, flourished in the times of Adrian, as Eusebius writes in his Chronicon, and after him Georgius Syncellus.--Vales.
[1168] 'Aristoboulou tou panu--Rufinus erroneously renders it Aristobulum ex Paneade, Aristobulus of Paneas. Scaliger also, in his Animadversiones Eusebianæ, p. 130, strangely thinks that the text should be corrected from the version of Rufinus. And Bede, in his De Ratione Computi, also follows the faulty rendering of Rufinus, and writes Aristobulus et Paniada, as though the latter word were the proper name of a Jewish writer, finding probably in the Codex of Rufinus, which he possessed, the reading Aristobulus et Paneada, which indeed is found in a very ancient Paris manuscript, and also in the Codex Corbeiensis. But that that Aristobulus was not one of the seventy translators, as Anatolius writes, is proved by Scaliger in the work cited above. This Aristobulus was also surnamed didaskalos, or Master, as we see from the Maccabees ii. 1. For I do not agree with Scaliger in distinguishing this Aristobulus, of whom mention is made in the Maccabees, from the Peripatetic philosopher who dedicated his Commentaries on the Law of Moses to Ptolemy Philometor--Vales. [See vol. ii. p. 487, and Elucidation II. p. 520, same volume, this series.]
[1169] ta diabeteria thoein.
IV.
But this Aristobulus also adds, that for the feast of the Passover it was necessary not only that the sun should pass the equinoctial segment, but the moon also. For as there are two equinoctial segments, the vernal and the autumnal, and these diametrically opposite to each other, and since the day of the Passover is fixed for the fourteenth day of the month, in the evening, the moon will have the position diametrically opposite the sun; as is to be seen in full moons. And the sun will thus be in the segment of the vernal equinox, and the moon necessarily will be at the autumnal equinox.
V.
I am aware that very many other matters were discussed by them, some of them with considerable probability, and others of them as matters of the clearest demonstration, [1170] by which they endeavour to prove that the festival of the Passover and unleavened bread ought by all means to be kept after the equinox. But I shall pass on without demanding such copious demonstrations (on subjects [1171] ) from which the veil of the Mosaic law has been removed; for now it remains for us with unveiled face to behold ever as in a glass Christ Himself and the doctrines and sufferings of Christ. But that the first month among the Hebrews is about the equinox, is clearly shown also by what is taught in the book of Enoch. [1172]
[1170] kuriakas apodeixeis--Christophorsonus renders it ratas; Rufinus gives validissimas assertiones. The Greeks use kurios in this sense, kuriai dikai, doxai, &c., decisive, valid, judgments, opinions, &c.
[1171] The text gives apaiton hon perieretai, &c.; various codices read ap' auton, &c. Valesius now proposes hulas apaiton; ho peri heretai, I shall pass on without...for the veil is removed from me.
[1172] An apocryphal book of some antiquity, which professes to proceed from the patriarch of that name, but of whose existence prior to the Christian era there is no real evidence. The first author who clearly refers to it by name is Tertullian. [Vol. iii. p. 62, and iv. 380.]
VI.
And, therefore, in this concurrence of the sun and moon, the Paschal festival is not to be celebrated, because as long as they are found in this course the power of darkness is not overcome; and as long as equality between light and darkness endures, and is not diminished by the light, it is shown that the Paschal festival is not to be celebrated. Accordingly, it is enjoined that that festival be kept after the equinox, because the moon of the fourteenth, [1173] if before the equinox or at the equinox, does not fill the whole night. But after the equinox, the moon of the fourteenth, with one day being added because of the passing of the equinox, although it does not extend to the true light, that is, the rising of the sun and the beginning of day, will nevertheless leave no darkness behind it. And, in accordance with this, Moses is charged by the Lord to keep seven days of unleavened bread for the celebration of the Passover, that in them no power of darkness should be found to surpass the light. And although the outset of four nights begins to be dark, that is, the 17th and 18th and 19th and 20th, yet the moon of the 20th, which rises before that, does not permit the darkness to extend on even to midnight.
[1173] xiv. luna. The Romans used the phrase luna prima, secunda, &c., as meaning, the first, second day, &c., after new moon.--Tr.
VII.
To us, however, with whom it is impossible for all these things to come aptly at one and the same time, namely, the moon's fourteenth, and the Lord's day, and the passing of the equinox, and whom the obligation of the Lord's resurrection binds to keep the Paschal festival on the Lord's day, it is granted that we may extend the beginning of our celebration even to the moon's twentieth. For although the moon of the 20th does not fill the whole night, yet, rising as it does in the second watch, it illumines the greater part of the night. Certainly if the rising of the moon should be delayed on to the end of two watches, that is to say, to midnight, the light would not then exceed the darkness, but the darkness the light. But it is clear that in the Paschal feast it is not possible that any part of the darkness should surpass the light; for the festival of the Lord's resurrection is one of light, and there is no fellowship between light and darkness. And if the moon should rise in the third watch, it is clear that the 22d or 23d of the moon would then be reached, in which it is not possible that there can be a true celebration of Easter. For those who determine that the festival may be kept at this age of the moon, are not only unable to make that good by the authority of Scripture, but turn also into the crime of sacrilege and contumacy, and incur the peril of their souls; inasmuch as they affirm that the true light may be celebrated along with something of that power of darkness which dominates all.
VIII.
Accordingly, it is not the case, as certain calculators of Gaul allege, that this assertion is opposed by that passage in Exodus, [1174] where we read: "In the first month, on the fourteenth day of the first month, at even, ye shall eat unleavened bread until the one-and-twentieth day of the month at even. Seven days shall there be no leaven found in your houses." From this they maintain that it is quite permissible to celebrate the Passover on the twenty-first day of the moon; understanding that if the twenty-second day were added, there would be found eight days of unleavened bread. A thing which cannot be found with any probability, indeed, in the Old Testament, as the Lord, through Moses, gives this charge: "Seven days ye shall eat unleavened bread." [1175] Unless perchance the fourteenth day is not reckoned by them among the days of unleavened bread with the celebration of the feast; which, however, is contrary to the Word of the Gospel which says: "Moreover, on the first day of unleavened bread, the disciples came to Jesus." [1176] And there is no doubt as to its being the fourteenth day on which the disciples asked the Lord, in accordance with the custom established for them of old, "Where wilt Thou that we prepare for Thee to eat the Passover?" But they who are deceived with this error maintain this addition, because they do not know that the 13th and 14th, the 14th and 15th, the 15th and 16th, the 16th and 17th, the 17th and 18th, the 18th and 19th, the 19th and 20th, the 20th and 21st days of the moon are each found, as may be most surely proved, within a single day. For every day in the reckoning of the moon does not end in the evening as the same day in respect of number, as it is at its beginning in the morning. For the day which in the morning, that is up to the sixth hour and half, is numbered the 13th day of the month, is found at even to be the 14th. Wherefore, also, the Passover is enjoined to be extended on to the 21st day at even; which day, without doubt, in the morning, that is, up to that term of hours which we have mentioned, was reckoned the 20th. Calculate, then, from the end of the 13th [1177] day of the moon, which marks the beginning of the 14th, on to the end of the 20th, at which the 21st day also begins, and you will have only seven days of unleavened bread, in which, by the guidance of the Lord, it has been determined before that the most true feast of the Passover ought to be celebrated.
[1174] Exod. xii. 18, 19.
[1175] Exod. xii. 15; Levit. xxiii. 6.
[1176] Matt. xxvi. 17; Mark xiv. 12; Luke xxii. 7.