- CHRISTIAN EASTER CONTROVERSIES
It is only in the context of Christianity that the calendar became, in late
Antiquity, the object of wide-scale, protracted controversies and polemics
that were related in many cases to divisions within the Church, sectarian
schisms, and the proliferation of‘heresies’.Why Christianity, and not early
Judaism, is an important question that needs to be addressed. It is not
sufficient to argue that by virtue of its monotheistic and exclusivist religious
stance, Christianity was naturally disposed to accept as‘true’a single, unitary
calendar and not to tolerate any calendar diversity: for the same should
equally have applied, in the same measure, to Judaism.^57 If an explanation
is to be sought, it must be more specific to early Christianity. In this chapter,
I shall argue that the rise of calendar controversy and calendar heresy in
early Christianity was largely due to political factors, i.e. the integration of
Christianity into the Roman State, which only really began in the fourth
century.
Christian calendar controversies mainly concerned the date of Easter, which
affected also a number of related dates in the Christian liturgical calendars (in
particular, the dates of the fast of Lent that preceded it, and of Pentecost that
followed). These controversies are well documented in early Christian sources,
including not only the ecclesiastical histories of Eusebius and his successors,
Christian heresiologies, synodal canons, and other Patristic works, but also a
range of Christian texts, many of unclear authorship and date, that were
transmitted in early medieval manuscripts under titles such asDeRatione
PaschaeorDeRatione Paschali(‘On the calculation of Easter’) and of which
the main purpose was to establish the so-calledcomputus(a shorthand term
for computation of the date of Easter). This abundance of evidence, as well as
the inherent importance of the subject for Christian history and Christian
practice, has led to prolific research in modern times, starting from the
Renaissance but with increased vigour from the later nineteenth century,
and with no signs of abating even today. In this half-chapter, I cannot do
justice to the subject and the scholarship that it has generated, or enter the
intricacies of computus in any great detail. My purpose will be more general,
to explain the origin and development of Easter controversies in the context
of the formation of Christian orthodoxy and heresy. For reasons of economy,
I shall not go beyond the earlyfifth centuryCE.^58
(^57) But see my remarks above, near n. 3.
(^58) For various attempts to present a comprehensive account of the subject, see E. Schwartz
(1905), C.W. Jones (1943), Strobel (1977), Lejbowicz (2006), and most successfully, Mossham-
mer (2008).
380 Calendars in Antiquity