Paschal full moon

Paschal full moon is the first full moon after the vernal equinox . This is important for determining the date of Easter . Easter falls on the first Sunday after the Easter full moon.

In the course of the third century, Easter tables in use, tables with which data of Easter Sunday can be found. At the beginning of the third century, time calculators of some churches, including the Church of Rome and that of Alexandria, will calculate their own periodic rows of data Easter full moon, in order to determine their own dates of Easter Sunday. This Sunday was more or less similar to the fourteenth day of Nisan ;this preparation day of Passover was the first day of Passover.

Because in Europe at that time was unable the Jewish calendar calculation, replaced the church of Rome these dates by dates of Easter full moon that were adapted to the Julian calendar . The Church of Alexandria applied in a similar manner the data to the Egyptian calendar on. Obviously could (periodic) rows of data Easter full moon and (unpredictable) rows of data from the fourteenth day of Nisan in no way entirely consistent with each other, although they originally differed as little as possible.

Eventually, in connection with the determination of the spring equinox on March 21, both the "adaptation of Nisan" to the Egyptian calendar (around AD 300) as to the Julian calendar (around AD 400) was associated with a relatively significant shift time: roughly two days. For four centuries, when rows used by the various churches could show dates of Easter full moon big differences, which was the main reason that the Easter tables when the various churches were propagated too often differed greatly and did not lead to the same data the celebration of Easter Sunday.