Do Messianic Jews Celebrate Easter?

Messianic Jews view New Covenant faith in Yeshua through a Hebraic lens. Such an understanding reveals a marvelous continuity in the whole of God’s Word spanning from Old to New Covenants. Yeshua (Jesus) died at Passover, and He rose on the Feast of Firstfruits. Messianic Jews understand that this is more than coincidence; it’s God’s sovereign design.

Passover is the commemoration of God’s deliverance of the Hebrew slaves in Egypt. Each time Pharaoh refused to let the Children of Israel go, God sent a calamity on Egypt. The 10th and final plague was the worst: the death of the firstborn. God told the Hebrews what they must do to save their firstborn. They were to sacrifice an unblemished lamb and spread its blood on the doorframes of their houses. When the angel of death came upon Egypt, he would pass over every home under the covering of the blood, and spare the firstborn. God reached into human history and delivered the Jewish people from their bondage to Egypt, setting them free to live as a people and nation unto Him.

The Feast of Firstfruits was an agricultural observance a few days after Passover in which the Israelites brought the first of their spring barley harvest as an offering to God. They were not allowed to eat of the harvest until the very first had been offered to God.

Each of the biblical Feasts of Israel established by God in Leviticus chapter 23 has layers of meaning. Many of the Feasts are commemorative, honoring God’s provision and gifts in Israel’s history, and God commanded that they be observed throughout the generations. Within each Feast is also a prophetic foreshadow of God’s future redemptive plan.

The Feast of Passover contains a shadow of Yeshua’s sacrificial death. Yeshua fulfilled the imagery contained in Passover when He shed His blood to cover our sins. He fulfilled the prophetic picture of Firstfruits when He rose from the dead, the first of the resurrection that will be completed in the Last Days when the dead in Messiah will rise. Thus, Jesus is our Passover Lamb and the firstfruits of the resurrection from the dead.

“For Messiah, our Passover Lamb, has been sacrificed.”

―1 Corinthians 5:7

“But now Messiah has been raised from the dead, the firstfruits of those who have fallen asleep.”

―1 Corinthians 15:20

For this reason, Messianic Jews celebrate the resurrection of Yeshua during the Feast of Passover.

So, if Jesus died on Passover and rose on Firstfruits, how did we get Easter?

Jesus’ first followers were Jewish and considered members of a sect within Judaism. But by the fourth century A.D., most of “the Church” was composed of Gentiles and had become infected with anti-Semitic attitudes. In 325 A.D., the Council of Nicea concluded with a letter to the Emperor declaring – in remarkably malicious language – that they wanted nothing to do with the Jewish people.

Though the resurrection occurred on the Sunday following Passover, the Council abandoned the Jewish religious calendar for a new “Christian” calendar built on the Gregorian system. The group declared the resurrection would be celebrated the first Sunday after the new moon following the Spring Equinox. It adopted the date of an existing pagan holiday to the goddess Ishtar and separated the Messiah’s death and resurrection from the Jewish origins of Passover and Firstfruits.

The detachment obscured the intentional correlation designed by God to reveal His redemptive thread connecting Old and New Covenants. The Council overlooked that the Gospel was “for the Jew first” (Romans 1:16) and that Gentiles are grafted in to the covenant God made with the Jewish people (Romans 11) through Yeshua. The decision shows just how soon in history the Church let the apostle Paul’s words fade from their understanding.

For Messianic Jews, the death and resurrection of Jesus are inseparably tied to Passover week. So, while you won’t find Messianic Jewish congregations celebrating Easter, you will find them worshipping the Messiah Yeshua each Shabbat (Shah-BAHT), or Sabbath. And at Passover, Messianic Jews commemorate the biblical Feast commanded by God along with its prophetic fulfillment in Yeshua’s death and resurrection to deliver us from our bondage to sin and free us to eternal life.