Easter echoes the eons-old human festivity that celebrates the spring equinox. The cold and dark days of winter are gone, the bright time of fertility has come.
Ishtar, a Mesopotamian goddess of love, stepped down into the underworld of death but was revived:
Inanna-Ishtar's most famous myth is the story of her descent into and return from Kur, the ancient Sumerian underworld, a myth in which she attempts to conquer the domain of her older sister Ereshkigal, the queen of the Underworld, but is instead deemed guilty of hubris by the seven judges of the Underworld and struck dead. Three days later, Ninshubur pleads with all the gods to bring Inanna back, but all of them refuse her except Enki, who sends two sexless beings to rescue Inanna. They escort Inanna out of the Underworld, but the galla, the guardians of the Underworld, drag her husband Dumuzid down to the Underworld as her replacement. Dumuzid is eventually permitted to return to heaven for half the year while his sister Geshtinanna remains in the Underworld for the other half, resulting in the cycle of the seasons.
The Christian resurrection of Jesus is probably an adaption of this old tale. Today's fertility symbols of Easter, the egg and the hare, relate to the old Germanic fertility goddess Eostre (Ostara).
When the Christian message developed from its eastern Mediterranean origin it incorporated older local gods and fables to convert the multi-theistic societies to the new monotheistic* believe. The gods of the pre-Christian religions were not completely discarded but their tales transformed to support the new uniting message the Christian preachers were spreading.
Whatever. It's spring, the darkness has vanished and this is my favored holiday.
Happy Easter
Faberge egg with flowers – bigger
The greatest work of German literature is Johann Wolfgang von Goethe's Faust. In part one Dr. Faust and his famulus Wagner take an 'Easter Walk' (Charles T. Brooks' translation, original version). Each Easter Sunday my dad recited this poem for us. I continue that tradition.
Faust:
Spring's warm look has unfettered the fountains,
Brooks go tinkling with silvery feet;
Hope's bright blossoms the valley greet;
Weakly and sickly up the rough mountains
Pale old Winter has made his retreat.
Thence he launches, in sheer despite,
Sleet and hail in impotent showers,
O'er the green lawn as he takes his flight;
But the sun will suffer no white,
Everywhere waking the formative powers,
Living colors he yearns to spread;
Yet, as he finds it too early for flowers,
Gayly dressed people he takes instead.
Look from this height whereon we find us
Back to the town we have left behind us,
Where from the dark and narrow door
Forth a motley multitude pour.
They sun themselves gladly and all are gay,
They celebrate Christ's resurrection to-day.
For have not they themselves arisen?
From smoky huts and hovels and stables,
From labor's bonds and traffic's prison,
From the confinement of roofs and gables,
From many a cramping street and alley,
From churches full of the old world's night,
All have come out to the day's broad light.
See, only see! how the masses sally
Streaming and swarming through gardens and fields
How the broad stream that bathes the valley
Is everywhere cut with pleasure boats' keels,
And that last skiff, so heavily laden,
Almost to sinking, puts off in the stream;
Ribbons and jewels of youngster and maiden
From the far paths of the mountain gleam.
How it hums o'er the fields and clangs from the steeple!
This is the real heaven of the people,
Both great and little are merry and gay,
I am a man, too, I can be, to-day.
—
*The Christian Trinity, the three aspects of the one God as Father, Son and Holy Spirit, is a doctrinal addition of the 4th century. It just adds an explanatory layer on top of the Abrahamic core of the monotheistic Christian message.
