Saturday, April 15, 2006
A Movable Feast
Easter is what is termed a "movable feast". A celebration that is not fixed to a given day. This is because Easter is defined as the first Sunday after the first full Moon after the Vernal (Spring) equinox (the Paschal Full Moon). The Paschal Full Moon is an ecclesiastical full Moon (based on tables drawn up by helpful astronomers), and can differ from the Astronomical full Moon by a day or so. The Western and Eastern (Orthodox) Christian churches use Georgian and Julian calendars respectively, so their dates for Easter can be one or two weeks different from each other.
Once, on a radio interview, I was asked how to calculate the date of Easter. Embarrassingly, I had no idea at the time (other than it was the first Sunday after a particular full Moon). If you want to calculate the date of Easter yourself, here is a good page from the Astronomical Society of South Australia on calculating Easter (you can do it with a pocket calculator). This BBC site gives you computer code to do it, and finally this site calculates it for you (and all the sites give fascinating historical details of calculating Easter).
Once, on a radio interview, I was asked how to calculate the date of Easter. Embarrassingly, I had no idea at the time (other than it was the first Sunday after a particular full Moon). If you want to calculate the date of Easter yourself, here is a good page from the Astronomical Society of South Australia on calculating Easter (you can do it with a pocket calculator). This BBC site gives you computer code to do it, and finally this site calculates it for you (and all the sites give fascinating historical details of calculating Easter).
# posted by Ian Musgrave @ 8:21 am 
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