Why egg symbolizes easter

Today in China, red and other brightly coloured eggs continue to figure in traditional naming ceremonies. In Eastern Europe, decorating Easter eggs remains a widespread tradition and in Orthodox churches, priests still bless the eggs as a Resurrection symbol. Elsewhere, Easter egg hunts, egg rolling and other decorated egg traditions persist beyond the more widespread chocolate egg commercialism.

While the modern world with its practical, scientific knowledge of biological forms could perhaps never view eggs with the wonder they aroused in our ancestors, we can understand their powerful symbolism. Their magic is also in some ways inseparable from the beauty and mystery of the birds that produce them — creatures that soar to the heavens and were once widely viewed as instruments and even personifications of the gods. Sign up for the FolkloreThursday newsletter for details of how to win a copy valid October By Rachel Warren Chadd.

October 6, Want a chance to win a copy of this wonderful new birdlore book? The following two tabs change content below. An even older myth, dating back to the pre-Hellenic people of Greece, tells a version of a similar story, in which the goddess Eurinome, fertilized by the snake Ofione, deposited the universal egg into the whirling womb of chaos.

According to the Celts, an egg called Glain was the origin of the cosmos. In northern Europe there was a custom of rolling eggs from the top of a hill to Beltane, to imitate the movement of the sun in the sky.

For the Hindus too, the two parts of the shell of the cosmic egg, one of gold, the other of silver, gave rise to the heaven and earth. The Egg of the World also appears in the Chinese Taoist religion, where Pangu, the creator of the world, was born from the cosmic egg, in which Chaos coagulated, and which contained within it the primordial principles Yin and Yang.

These two principles, stabilised until they reached a perfect equilibrium, gave rise to Pangu, who later, with his axe split the Cosmic Egg in two, creating the Earth Yin and the Sky Yang and placed himself between them to keep them separated, with the help of a turtle, Qilin a kind of Chimera of the Phoenix and a dragon.

The egg as the origin of the world, therefore, is a symbol of eternal life, which is renewed cyclically, and regenerates itself, throughout time and the seasons. The Greeks, the Chinese, the Egyptians and the Persians exchanged eggs, sometimes decorated and coloured, as a gift for spring festivals, like the spring equinox, to greet the beginning of the new season.

The egg is also a symbol associated with the Female, in all the cults of the Mother Goddess , since it is the role of women to generate the egg, and with it, life. This tradition may have had a considerable boost from the ban, during Lent, of eating eggs.

So as not to waste them entirely, Christians may have begun to boil and decorate them. Over time, the tradition of bringing these eggs to church to bless them began. In the Middle Ages, especially in Germany, it was customary to give away simple or decorated eggs for Easter. Throughout the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries they continued to give children coloured and decorated eggs and hen, or egg-shaped toys, while it was only at the beginning of the nineteenth century that chocolate eggs made their appearance.

However, the tradition of painting hard-boiled eggs during springtime predates Christianity. In many cultures around the world, the egg is a symbol of new life, fertility and rebirth.

For thousands of years, Iranians and others have decorated eggs on Nowruz , the Iranian New Year that falls on the spring equinox.

Some claim that the Easter egg has pagan roots. Some also point to the Venerable Bede, an English monk who wrote the first history of Christianity in England, for evidence of this connection. For Christians, the Easter egg is symbolic of the resurrection of Jesus Christ. Good thing there are so many other foods one can eat for brunch. Wonder how the bunny fits into all of this?

Seeker believes that the main character of Easter is a bunny because rabbits are known for being pretty fertile. So in combination with the eggs, you can see how that derived. Come here often? Subscribe to our newsletter. Click any recipe to shop it with. By: Karen Belz.