Ramadan, Passover, Easter converge: 5 things to know
According to Pew Research, Christianity, Judaism, and Islam are the three most-practiced religions in the United States, and each religion celebrates its own major holiday this time of year.
During the week of Passover and Easter, Christians commemorate the crucifixion of Jesus on Friday, and celebrate Easter on Sunday, marking their belief in his resurrection. On Friday, Jewish people celebrate the eve of Pesach, commonly called Passover, which commemorates the exodus of the Israelites from Egypt and the end of their slavery. Meanwhile, Muslims around the world mark another Friday, their weekly holiday, within the month of Ramadan.
Here are 5 things to know about these major holidays and why they’ve converged in this way:
1) This coincidence of dates happens only about every 33 years. This rare conjunction of holidays is possible because unlike the Christian calendar, which is determined by the course of the sun and is widely used in the Western world, the Islamic calendar is aligned with the moon and the lunar year. Twelve months in the solar year last 365 days, in the lunar year, on the other hand, only 354 days. Thus the Islamic cycle of holidays moves across the Western calendar over the course of a good three decades.
2) The Jewish holiday of Pesach and the Easter date of the Western churches always occur quite close together. But they don’t often fall on precisely the same date. The difference is due to the fact that the Christian calendar dates Easter to Sunday since the year 325 CE, more specifically to the first Sunday after the spring full moon. In the Jewish calendar, on the other hand, Passover can begin on any day of the week.
3) Passover is the oldest tradition of the three and represents a renewal of Jewish identity. The story traces back to a battle fought by God in the Biblical books of Genesis and Exodus, which freed the Hebrew people from slavery under the Egyptian empire. Each year the Jewish people renew their faith on Passover, and this theme of renewal is one that is shared with the closely related Christian holiday of Easter.
4) The Christian celebration of Easter is celebrated on the first Sunday following the Paschal Full Moon or the first full moon after the spring equinox. The holiday commemorates the resurrection of Jesus Christ, who served as a sacrifice so that the sins of Christians may be forgiven. After this weekend, however, the Easter celebrations are not over. In the Orthodox churches and some of the Eastern churches associated with the Catholic Church, the commemoration of the death and resurrection of Jesus is not held until the following weekend.
5) Ramadan is a lunar month in the Islamic calendar where Muslims acknowledge the fourth pillar of Islam, which is to fast throughout the entire month. Fasting during Ramadan serves to allow Muslims to focus their attention on the deep commitment they have made to submit every aspect of their life to the will of Allah and to give themselves time to meditate on that commitment due to the constant reminder of it via their hunger. While Muslims fast during the day, Ramadan also includes feasts after dusk where traditional food like kibbeh, stuffed vegetables, and more are served. It is tradition to break a day’s fast with dates, teaching that comes from the Islamic Prophet Muhammad.
While each of these holidays has different religious significance to their practitioners, they all serve as a reminder to the followers of each religion of their commitment to their faith and to the God they worship. It is a time for people of each religion to become renewed in their faith, a theme that aligned with the spring season in which each holiday takes place. It’s also a time to be in awe and to celebrate the many ways that the One God has communicated His love and his messages to humanity.
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