Moveable feast

Source: Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia.

A moveable feast is an observance in a Christian

liturgical calendar which occurs on different dates in different years.[1]

Spring paschal feasts

Often considered the most important Christian observance, Spring paschal feasts are a fixed number of days before or after

synoptic gospels
).

Lord's day, as the two are not mutually exclusive. However, due to intense persecution from Nicene Christianity after the Easter controversy
, the practice had mostly died out by the 5th or 6th century, and only re-emerged in the 20th century.

In Eastern Christianity (including the Eastern Orthodox Church, the Oriental Orthodox Churches, the Assyrian Church of the East, and the Eastern Catholic Churches), these moveable feasts form what is called the Paschal cycle, which stands in contrast to the approach taken by Catholic and Protestant Christianity.

Pentecost

Moveable solemnities

Not all observances are feasts, and among those that are moveable is the

Lenten fast
, which is held for the 40 days prior to Easter.

Relationship to solar fixed feasts

Most other

Saint Sarkis the Warrior
in the calendar of the Armenian Church.

See also

  • Liturgical year
  • Movable Eastern Christian observances
  • Movable Western Christian observances

In other religions

The

ripening.[2]

The traditional Chinese calendar is lunisolar, as are others in East Asia based on it. This causes the timing of the Chinese New Year, the Mid-Autumn Festival, and several other holidays—all traditionally associated with various rituals and offerings—to vary within the Gregorian calendar, usually within a space of two months.

In

traditional calendar move relative to the Gregorian calendar, again usually within a space of two months. In addition, there are two observances that are moveable within both systems, being based on the Shmuelian tekufot approximations of the equinoxes and solstices established by Samuel of Nehardea. Samuel fixed them to the Julian calendar, which slowly slips out of alignment with the Gregorian over a span of several centuries. The first is the annual commencement of the sh'elah period during which diaspora Jews add a petition for rain to their daily prayers, which occurs on 23 November (Julian) in most years and on 24 November (Julian) when the following year will be a Julian leap year. The second is the Birkat Hachama ("Blessing of the Sun"), a ceremony performed once every 28 years, which always occurs on Wednesday, 26 March (Julian), in a Julian year of the form 28n+21.[citation needed
]

In Islam, all holidays fixed to the lunar Islamic calendar vary completely within the Gregorian calendar, shifting by 10 or 11 days each year and moving through the entire Gregorian year over the course of about 33 years (making 34 Islamic years).

References

  1. ^ John Ayto Oxford Dictionary of English Idioms (2010), p. 123. 019954378X: "a movable feast an event which takes place at no regular time. In a religious context a movable feast is a feast day (especially Easter Day and the other Christian holy days whose dates are related to it) which does not occur on the same calendar date each year."
  2. ^ Michels, Agnes Kirsopp Lake (1949), "The 'Calendar of Numa' and the Pre-Julian Calendar", Transactions & Proceedings of the APA, vol. 80, Philadelphia: American Philological Association, pp. 320–346.

External links