Selected quad for the lemma: christian_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
christian_n	day_n	sunday_n	week_n	1,361	5	9.9152	5	false

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A66482	The Julian and Gregorian year, or, The difference betwixt the old and new-stile shewing, that the reformed churches should not alter their old-stile, but that the Romanists should return to it.	Willes, John, 1646 or 7-1700.	1700 (1700)	Wing W2808; ESTC R8290	14,247	34

that was to be done they seem antiently to have had no other Rule but when their Corn was Ripe and though that might not be so certain a Guide for the True Measure of a particular Year yet in Ten thousand Years would never err much but was as fixed and certain as their Seasons and Harvests BUT after the Jews had been Conquei'd by the Babylonians Persians and Greeks and carry'd Captives into all Nations they saw the different Seasons of Harvests in the several Climates and so in order to an Uniformity were forced to establish their Year upon Astronomical Rules and Reduce it into Tables that so the Jews in their Disperson all the World over might be Vnited in their Feasts and keep their Passover as they now do at the same time ONE Principal thing agreed on was the Dependance of their First Month upon the Vernal Equinox or the Suns entrance into Aries and particularly that the 15th Day of that Month should be always after it and When that was the Jews in the Time of Our Saviour seem to have taken from J. Caesar's Calendar For that Emperour and his Successor Augustus were very kind to the Jews indulged them the use of their own Law excused them from Tribute every Seventh Year and sent Sacrifices to Jerusalem for the Daily Oblation For which Reasons the Jews were extreamly Fond of them and as even Suetonius Relates Lamented many Days and Nights together at the Funeral of the former This was it that made them so readily comply with the New Calendar of Julius Caesar as far as their Law would give leave and at least take the time of the Vernal Equinox and Suns entrance into Aries from thence the first of which was there fix'd at March the 25th the other at the 18th Day of the same Month. And whatever Rules of this nature were once agreed on by the Sanhedrim or Chief Council at Jerusalem they took care to Communicate to the Jews all the World over NOW its evident from the Gospels that Our Saviour was Crucified on Friday at the Jewish Passover and Rose again from the Dead on the Sunday following being at that time call'd The first day of the Week Mat. 28. 1. Mark 16. 1 2 c. And when the Christians thought it necessary to keep up the Memory of so great a Deliverance by a Solemn Festival they call'd theirs also the Passover and had no other Rules for the finding of it but what the Jews had for theirs and left the Calculation of it to them For most of the First Christians were Converts from Judaism and Zealous for the Rites of the Law of Moses Acts 21. 20. and one Philip giving an Account of a Paschal Synod in the Second Century begins his Epistle with this Observation That the Apostles being wholly taken up with Preaching of the Gospel to the several Nations of the World did not establish any Rules among Christians for the exact time of Easter And Epiphanius farther relates That there was an old Apostolick Constitution by which the Christians were forbidden to trouble themselves with scrupulous Calculations but keep it at the same time as the Christians of Jerusalem who being Converts from the Jews understood the Methods and Rules that were used by them for the discovery of the Passover Now all the Bishops of Jerusalem till Adrian destroy'd it were originally Jews as is observed by Eusebius and so long the Christian World received the time of Easter thence but after Jerusalem had been quite Ruin'd by the Emperour and there were no more Bishops there of the Circumcision every Church began to have Rules of their own and the Christian World was divided about their Feast of Love and though many SYNODS were Assembled to determine this Matter by Pope Victor at Rome Theophilus at Cesarea and other Bishops in other Churches yet still the Dissension continued and Disputes increased till at last A. D. 325 they were happily ended by Constantine the Great in the First General Council at Nice Rules establish'd and Tables drawn up for the exact discovery of the Time of EASTER for ever THAT the Christians even from the Beginning did observe this Feast is evident from St. Paul 1 Cor. 5. 7 8. Christ our Passover is Sacrificed for us therefore let us keep the Feast not with old Leven neither with the Leaven of Malice and Wickedness but with the Vnleavened Bread of Sincerity and Truth And Origen an early Christian Writer in his Comments on St. John's Gospel Explains those words Now the Passover a Feast of the Jews was at hand to have been used by the Evangelist to distinguish that from the Christian Passover which was then observed THE greatest part of the Christian World since the First Council of Nice have conform'd themselves to the Paschal Rules that were there establish'd and the whole Western Church at the time of our Reformation from the Church of Rome knew of no other As in other things so in this also it was the Method of our Reformation to depart no farther from the Church of Rome than she had from the Truth see Can. 30. publish'd A. D. 1603. and in keeping of Easter conform'd her self to the same time that was then observed in Italy France Spain Germany and most other Churches of the Christian World and all this in Obedience and Conformity to the Decrees of the First General Council And to prevent all difference upon this Subject our Church hath in her very Liturgy Establish'd by Act of Parliament not only from that Council at Nice inserted this General Rule That Easter-Day is allways the First Sunday after the First Full Moon which happens next after the 21st day of March and if the Full Moon happen upon a Sunday Easter-Day is the Sunday after But also lest any difference should arise about the New-Moons hath in the First Column of the Calendar put down all the New-Moons for a Complete Cycle of 19 Years with Direction to take the Paschal New-Moons from that TABLE for ever and all this according to the Decrees of the First Council at Nice and Practise of the Vniversal Church AND though the Vernal Equinox since the time of that Council be gotten from the 21st to the 10th of March and this TABLE of New-Moons is now above Four Dayes false yet in things undetermin'd by God's Law we have alwayes Preferr'd Peace and Unity and the Communion of Saints before a Needless Separation and Division IT was once the Objection of Mr. Baxter and his Party That our Church did not keep Easter according to our own Rules and that some Years our Easter was not the First Sunday after the First Full Moon that was after the 21th Day of March But had that Scrupulous Person understood the Cycle of New Moons inserted in the First Column of our Calendar and that the Paschal Moon is to be taken thence he would have seen his Mistake and been ashamed of the Objection NOW because the Nicene Council

ought not to have reduc'd them to the Order of the Heavenly Bodies at the time of the Nicene Council 325 Years after Christ which is all that is pretended to by Pope Gregory but to the time of our Saviour and the first Christian Passover to the end that Equinox should not have been brought back to March the 21th but to March the 25th where it was at the time of our Saviours Crucifixion And whereas the Romanists now commemorate our Saviour's Resurrection on the first Sunday after the first Full-Moon that is after the 21st of March our Saviour did not rise from the Dead till the first Sunday after the first Full-Moon that was after the 25th of March if the Equinox in that Age was their Guide for the Passover This was certainly a great oversight of the Infallible Chair and may be a sufficient reason why we should not join with them Secondly THERE is great reason for us to suspect that the Jews in the time of our Saviour did not mind the Equinox but the Sun's entrance into Aries which according to the prevailing opinion of that Age was Eight days before it Thus Josephus Antiq. l. 2. c. 10. saith That the Jewish Passover was the 14th Day of the first Month the Sun being in Aries and Anatolius from several old Jewish Authors relates That that was the first Month among the Jews in which the Sun entred the first Sign of the Zodicak and perhaps the Jews might think that their Paschal Lamb which was always to be a Male might have some relation to the Sign of Aries in the Heavens Now its certain that about the time of our Saviour Learned Men distinguish'd betwixt the time of the Equinox and of the Suns entrance into Aries and made this last Eight Days before the other as appears from Varro Ovid Manilius Columella Pliny and the very Calendar of J. Caesar in which the Sun's entrance into Aries is March the 18th and the Vernal Equinox March the 25th When Anatolius plac'd the Equinox March the 22d he expresly said that the Sun was then got Four Degrees in Aries and therefore entred Aries March the 18th and in Bede the Sun's entrance into that Sign is the 15th of the Calends of April or March the 18th Nor was this the opinion of the Greeks and Romans only but of the Egyptians also as appears from Manetho's Apotelesmata who l. 2. v. 73 74 75. expresly saith that the Summer Solstice was when the Sun was in the 8th Degree of Cancer And this Entrance of the Sun into Aries was what both Jews and Christians chiefly looked after in discovering the time of the Passover Hippolitus was the first Christian Writer that publish'd Paschal Tables and in them imitated the Jews these Tables are now extant and in every 16 Years Easter twice fell upon March the 18th long before the Equinox but not before the Sun's entrance into Aries St. Cyprian in his Book de Paschate gives the Rules for discovering of Easter both among the Jews and Christians and its evident that he begins the Paschal Month at March the 4th so that the 14th day of the Paschal Month may be March the 17th and the 15th day on March the 18th For so the Jews agree that the 15th day of Nisan may be upon that day that the Sun enters Aries Maimon de Consecr Cal. Victorius particularly explains the Paschal Terms according to the Christians both in Egypt and Rome and with small difference from the Jews makes the Paschal Term begin at March the 5th and so the 14th day of the first Month might be March the 18th The Christians at length about A. D. 260 began to understand that the Sun entred Aries at the Vernal Equinox and Dionysius Bishop of Alexandria inform'd the Christian World that they ought not to keep Easter before the Vernal Equinox After this was compiled that Canon that forbad the Christians to keep Easter as the Jews did before the Equinox for which the Jews were blamed also by the Emperor Constantine they still keeping their old way of the Sun's Entrance into Aries 8 days before the Equinox I shall only add that the Acts of Pilate a very Old Book quoted by Justin the Martyr and other early Fathers had our Saviours Crucifixion on the 18th of March as appears from Epiphanius which would have been very absurd if the Jewish Passover could never have been so early If therefore its evident that the Jews in the time of our Saviour and the Christians of the 1st and 2d Century did not mind the Equinox in computing of Easter but the Sun's entrance into Aries 8 days before it then this will be a convincing Argument against the Truth of the Gregorian Account that makes Easter depend upon and succeed the Equinox Nor is it to any purpose for the Romanists to reply that the Jews err'd in keeping the Passover at that time since all that the Christians can do is to keep their Easter at that time when our Saviour was Crucified and rose again which was at the Jewish Passover whether they observed the right time or not Thirdly THE Gregorian Rule for finding of the Equinox makes the Precession come to three days in 400 Years that is one day in 133 â…“ Years Now I think it may be prov'd that the Precession is much greater and comes to one whole Day in 120 Years For the Demonstration of this I shall refer my Reader to that excellent Book of Lidyat's de Anni Solaris Mensura and may my self hereafter confirm what he there layeth down with other convincing Arguments which that Learned Man never thought of For these Reasons I take the Gregorian Account to be very injudicious and false and therefore not to be follow'd by Protestants Not to mention that if we would have reduc'd our Easter to what it was at the Nicene Council there had been an easier method and free from the inconveniences of the Gregorian There need have nothing else been done but declaring the 11th of March to be the Paschal Equinox and that in every 120 Years it should have advanc'd one day farther for it s not material what day of our Solary Month we call the Equinox so that we be agreed of the time And then instead of introducing perplex'd and difficult Tables of Epacts the New-Moons might be discover'd for ever by the Old Tables only going backward one Day in 312 Years from the time of the Nicene Council at this time 4 Days according to that known Rule in Caelis est hic This had really answer'd the whole design of the Church of Rome in restoring of Easter to the measures of the Nicene Council and yet had neither disturb'd the Julian Account nor perverted the Old Order of the Dominical Letter nor destroyed the use of those Old Tables of New-Moons and the Golden Number To conclude therefore this short Dissertation It s very observable that when God Almighty order'd the Jews to keep the Passover and