Реферат: Easter (Пасха)

<span Bookman Old Style",«serif»;mso-ansi-language:EN-US">Plan.

<span Bookman Old Style",«serif»;mso-ansi-language:EN-US">

<span Bookman Old Style",«serif»;mso-fareast-font-family:«Bookman Old Style»; mso-bidi-font-family:«Bookman Old Style»;mso-ansi-language:EN-US">I.<span Times New Roman"">          

<span Bookman Old Style",«serif»; mso-ansi-language:EN-US">The moral lessons given us by Jesus.

<span Bookman Old Style",«serif»;mso-fareast-font-family:«Bookman Old Style»; mso-bidi-font-family:«Bookman Old Style»;mso-ansi-language:EN-US">II.<span Times New Roman"">       

<span Bookman Old Style",«serif»; mso-ansi-language:EN-US">When is an Easter?

<span Bookman Old Style",«serif»;mso-fareast-font-family:«Bookman Old Style»; mso-bidi-font-family:«Bookman Old Style»;mso-ansi-language:EN-US">III.<span Times New Roman"">     

<span Bookman Old Style",«serif»; mso-ansi-language:EN-US">Eastertide.

<span Bookman Old Style",«serif»;mso-fareast-font-family:«Bookman Old Style»; mso-bidi-font-family:«Bookman Old Style»;mso-ansi-language:EN-US">IV.<span Times New Roman"">    

<span Bookman Old Style",«serif»; mso-ansi-language:EN-US">Easter egg and Easter hare.

<span Bookman Old Style",«serif»;mso-fareast-font-family:«Bookman Old Style»; mso-bidi-font-family:«Bookman Old Style»;mso-ansi-language:EN-US">V.<span Times New Roman"">       

<span Bookman Old Style",«serif»; mso-ansi-language:EN-US">Thoughts from Ireland.

<span Bookman Old Style",«serif»;mso-fareast-font-family:«Bookman Old Style»; mso-bidi-font-family:«Bookman Old Style»;mso-ansi-language:EN-US">VI.<span Times New Roman"">    

<span Bookman Old Style",«serif»; mso-ansi-language:EN-US">Easter in England.

<span Bookman Old Style",«serif»;mso-fareast-font-family:«Bookman Old Style»; mso-bidi-font-family:«Bookman Old Style»;mso-ansi-language:EN-US">VII.<span Times New Roman"">  

<span Bookman Old Style",«serif»; mso-ansi-language:EN-US">Easter in Ukraine and Russia<span Times New Roman",«serif»;mso-fareast-font-family:«Times New Roman»; mso-ansi-language:EN-US;mso-fareast-language:RU;mso-bidi-language:AR-SA">

I. Themoral lessons given us by Jesus.

CelebratingEaster, seeing the happy faces of people around, hearing the joyfulannouncements “Christ is risen”, and, on the whole, enjoining these God-blessedsunny spring days, let us pause for a moment and ponder on some of the morallessons given us by Jesus.

We well know that Christianity isethical through and through, but strange as it may seem, the moral teaching ofChrist himself is not very circumstantial. On the contrary, He appears ratherterse on these matters, and it is in His deeds, not words, that the larger partof His mission found its expression. As a person, with all His inclinations andintentions, He does not seem to be a determined moral reformer, not to speak ofa revolutionary; and he was not in the least a scholar or a man of letters. Hewrote nothing. He mowed quietly and slowly along the highways and among thevillages of Galilee and Judea and spoke to people not about any intricateproblems of human existence, or theology, or the mysteries of life and death,but about things which belonged to the realm of daily life; and the words hechose for that were the words of common men, not those of a professor ofethics.

He summed up His “theology” in anamazingly short and simple phrase “God is love”; and meeting people He veryoften did not teach them, as He actually did from time to time, but offeredthem a ready sympathy and understanding, even to the degraded and the outcast.To them He spoke in the language of tolerance and benevolence, forgiveness andmercy. That was His love – and that was the beginning of the moral revolutionthat transformed the world.

II. When is a Easter?

The greatest Christian festival ofthe year is Easter. It is either in March or in April, and millions of peoplejoyously observe Christ’s resurrection. This holy day never comes before March22 or after April 25.

When is an Easter? That, of course,is celebrated on the first Sunday after the paschal moon, which is the firstfull moon that occurs on or next after the vernal equinox, March, 21st.So all you need to do is look at the sky? Afraid not. For the moon in questionis not the real moon, but a hypothetical moon. This one goes round the earthone month in 29 days, the next in 30 days, though with certain modifications tomake the date of both the real and fictional full moons coincide as nearly aspossible. It yields a date for Easter that can be as early as March 22ndand as late as April 25th. Today, Easters variability suitsantiquarians, and the makers of pocket diaries, many of which devote a Fullpage to the calculation of Easter in perpetuity. But, nearly 1,700 years on, itdoes not suit those in (mostly European) countries such as Britain and Germanywhere both Good Friday and Easter Monday are public holidays. Early Easters aretoo cold to enjoy. Late Easters are jammed up against the May Day publicholiday.

III. Eastertide.

Passion Sunday or Care Sunday twoSundays before Easter, is still known as Carling Sunday in parts of the northof England. Carlings are small dried peas, which are soaked in water overnightand then fried in an almost dry pan – when they start to burst they are ready.Greengrocers sell them, pubs serve them, and people eat them at home in a basinwith a small piece of butter and plenty of pepper and salt. There seems to beno good reason, apart from the strength of the tradition, why they are eaten onthis day. 

Palm Sunday is the Sunday beforeEaster; for people near Marlborough in Wiltshire it meant following along-established custom in which willow hazel sprays – representing palm – werecarried up Martinsell Hill.

Maundy Thursday is the Thursdaybefore Easter: the ‘royal maundy’ describes the gift which for the last fivehundred ears or so has been given out by the sovereign on Maundy Thursday to asmany men and woman as there are years in his or her age. Once it was clothingwhich was given out, now it is a sum of money; on odd – numbered years theceremony usually takes place at Westminster Abbey, in even – numbered ones at achurch or cathedral elsewhere in the country – though 1989 seems to have beenan exception, for the distribution took place at Birmingham Cathedral in honorof the centenary of the city’s incorporation.

On GoodFriday, the day of the crucifixion, hot cross buns are always eaten as a signof remembrance, and in some baker’s shops and supermarkets they are on sale formany weeks before. It is a nationwide tradition, though hot cross buns wereunknown in some places – Bath, for example – until the twentieth century. Thebuns may in fact pre – date Christianity, since bread consecrated to the Romangods was marked with lines intersecting at right angels.

People celebrate the holidayaccording to the beliefs and their religious denominations. Christianscommemorate Good Friday as the day that Jesus Christ died and Easter Sunday asthe day that He was resurrected. Protestant settlers brought the custom of asunrise service, a religious gathering at dawn, to the United States.

Today on Easter Sunday, children wakeup to find that the Easter Bunny has left them baskets of candy. He has alsohidden the eggs that they decorated earlier that week. Children hunt for theeggs all around the house. Neighborhoods and organizations hold Easter egghunts, and the child who finds the most eggs wins a prize.

In England, children rolled eggs downhills on Easter morning, a game which has been connected to the rolling away ofthe rock from Jesus Christ’s tomb when He was resurrected. British settlersbrought this custom to the New World.

One unusual Easter Sunday traditioncan be seen at Radley, near Oxford, where parishioners ‘clip’ or embrace theirchurch – they join hands and make a human chain round it. It is Easter Monday,however, which sees a veritable wealth of traditional celebrations throughoutthe country: to name bat’ a few, there is morris dancing in many tows,including a big display at Thaxted in Essex; orange rolling, perhaps adescendant of egg roiling, which takes place on Dunstable Downs inBedfordshire; and for perhaps eight hundred years or more there has been adistribution of food at the Kent village of Biddenden, ten miles from Ashford.

Then there is Leicestershire’s famoushare – pie scramble and bottle – kicking which also takes place on EasterMonday; and another custom kept up in many parts of England and Wales andcalled ‘lifting’ or ‘heaving’ was taken by some to symbolize Christ’sresurrection. On Easter Monday the men lifted any woman they could find, andthe women reciprocated the following day; the person was taken by the fourlimbs and lifted three times to shoulder height. When objections were made thatthis was ‘a rude, indecent and dangerous diversion’ a chair bedecked withribbons and flowers was used instead – it was lifted with its victim, turnedthree times, and put down.

The Easter parade.

The origin of this very picturesquetraditional occasion, known affectionately as Easter Parade and starting at 3o’clock in the afternoon of Easter Sunday, is not as remote, or mysterious, asmany of the traditions and customs of England; there is no religious, orsuperstitious significance attached to it whatsoever.

In 1858 Queen Victoria gave it theultimate cachet of respectability and class by paying it a state visit in thespring. For the occasion she wore, of course, a new spring bonnet and gown.This set the fashion for a display each spring of the newest fashions inmillinery and gowns, and from then onwards that traditions has expanded; everysociety lady vied with her rivals to appear in something more spectacular thananything that had seen before.

IV. Easter egg andEaster hare.

An egg has a symbolical meaning inmany centuries. It’s well known that eggs had a special significance even inthe times of ancient Romans. Eggs were their first disk during meals (“ab ovo”) and they were also inthe center of competition as a memory of Zeus’s sons, who hatched from eggs.Such competition took place in France, Germany, and Switzerland. Eggs was asign of hope, life fertility even in the early epoch. In Christianity, theLord’s gift, which has begun in Jesus Christ. Eggs’ spreading as the Eastersymbols turned to be possible because they sewed as an original rent or as atax. The Easter was one of the days when this pay could be accomplished.

Excavations witness that traditionsof paintings on eggs have been existing for 5000 years and have their regionalpeculiarities. Especially in Slavonic countries eggs are decorated with manycolored pictures of Christian motives. As expensive souvenirs it was a habit togive eggs made of noble metals, marble, was and wood.

The Easter hare, which, children believe,brings the Easter eggs, may be understood as a transformed Easter lamb. Inthose places, where there was no sheepbreeding, ahare substituted for a sheep in the Raster meal. Due to its ability not tosleep the hare become a symbol of resurrection of Jesus Christ.

Easter Eggs.

Wherever Easter is celebrated, thereEaster eggs are usually to be found. In their modern form, they are frequentlyartificial, mere imitations of the real thing, made of chocolate or marzipan orsugar, or of two pieces of coloured and decorated cardboard fitted together tomake an eggs-shaped case containing some small gift. These are the Easter eggsof commerce, which now appear in shop-windows almost as soon as, and sometimeseven before, Ash Wednesday is past, and by so doing lose much of their originalfestival significance.

This is a real egg, hard-boiled, diedin bright colours, and sometimes elaborately decorated. In still appears uponcountless breakfast-tables on Eater Day, or is hidden about the house andgarden for the children to find. In some European countries, including England,the Easter Hare is said to bring the Easter eggs, and to conceal them in oddcorners of the gardens, stables, or outbuildings.

Because eggs are obvious symbols ofcontinuing life and resurrection, the pagan peoples of ancient China, Egypt,Greece, and Persia used them, centuries before tile first Easter Day, at thegreat Spring Festivals, when the revival of all things in Nature wascelebrated.

Colouring and decorating the festivaleggs seems to have been customary since time immemorial. And old Polish legendsays that Our Lady herself painted eggs red, blue, and green to amuse theInfant Jesus, and that since then all good polish mothers have done the same atEaster. A Romanian tale says that the vivid red shade, which is a favoritealmost everywhere, represents the blood of Christ.

There are many ways of tinting anddecorated the eggs, some simple and some requiring a high degree of skill. Theycan be dipped into a prepared dye or, more usually boiled in it, or they may beboiled inside a covering of onion-peel. Ordinary commercial dyes are often usedtoday for coloring, but originally only natural ones, obtained from flowers,leaves, mosses, bark, wood-chips, or other sources, were employed. In England,gorse-blossom was commonly used for yellow, cochineal for scarlet, andlogwood-chips for a rich purple.

In Switzerland, minute flowers andleaves are sometimes laid on the egg underneath the onion-peel to make a whiteflower-pattern on the yellow or brown surface.

The decoration of Easter eggs is atraditional peasant art in Eastern and Central Europe. Favorite designs vary indifferent regions. In Hungary, red flower-patterns on a white ground are oftenseen; sometimes the decorated eggs are fitted with tiny metal shoes, withminute spurs attached, and curious little metal hangers. In Yugoslavia, theletters XV usually form part of the design. They stand for Christos Vaskrese,meaning ‘Christ is risen’, which is the traditional Easter greeting of EasterEurope. Russian eggs are sometimes elaborately decorated with miniature pictureof the saints, or of Our Lord. Polish designs are often geometrical, orabstract, or they may include Christian symbols, like the Gross or Fish, mixedwith pagan emblems of new life. Painted eggs of this type, know as pisanki,always appear on the Easter Table.

In some East European countries,scarlet eggs, as symbols of resurrection, are placed on, or buried in, thegraves of the family dead. The latter custom was known in northern Englanduntil about the middle of last century. One or two of the most beautifullyornamented Pace-eggs – the name by which Easter eggs are still most commonlycalled in the northern counties – would be saved and kept in tall ale – glassesin a corner cupboard, or some other place where they could be easily seen. InScotland, Easter eggs are often called Peace or Paiss eggs. ‘Pace’ and ‘Paiss’are all corruptions of Pasch, or Paschal, of which the original root is theHebrew word pisach meaning Passover.

In parts of Germany during the early1880s, Easter eggs substituted for birth certificates. An egg was dyed a solidcolor, then a design, which included the recipient’s name and birth date, wasetched into the shell with a needle or sharp tool. Such Easter eggs werehonored in law courts as evidence of identity and age.

Easter Bunny.

That a rabbit, or more accurately a hare, became aholiday symbol can be traced to the origin of the word “Easter”. According tothe Venerable Bede, the English historian who lived from 672 to 735, thegoddess Easter was worshiped by the Anglo – Saxons through her earthly symbol,the hare.

The custom of the Easter hare came toAmerica with the Germans who immigrated to Pennsylvania in the eighteenth andnineteenth centuries.

From Pennsylvania, they graduallyspread out to Virginia, North and South Carolina, Tennessee, New York, andCanada, taking their customs with them. Most eighteenth – century Americans,however, were of more austere religious denominations, such as Quaker,Presbyterian, and Puritan. They virtually ignored such a seemingly frivoloussymbol as a white rabbit. More than a hundred years passed before this TeutonicEaster tradition began to gain acceptance in America. In fact, it was not untilafter the Civil War, with its Legacy of death and destruction, that the nationas a whole began a widespread observance of Easter it self, led primarily byPresbyterians. They viewed the story of resurrection as a source of inspirationand renewed hope for the millions of bereaved Americans.

V. Thoughts fromIreland.

By tradition, Good Friday has alwaysbeen a day of mourning and fasting, for decorating churches with branches ofyew (palm) and other evergreens, and the ceremonial distribution of gifts tothe poor.

Many Christians fast and attendservices between noon and 3 p. m., the hours Jesus is believed to have spent onthe cross, since the day commemorates the crucifixion of Jesus.

On Easter Sunday the churches arebeautifully decorated with white lilies. Joyful religious music is heard andsermons ring with hope. Children and their parents traditionally attend church,usually wearing new spring clothes. The mothers and their daughters wearcolorful flowered hats. Many other traditions and popular customs, whichprobably go back to pagan times, are also associated with Easter throughoutEurope, for example, the sending of Easter cards and the giving of Easter eggs.Eggs are a symbol of life and fertility or recreation of spring. It was nothowever until the 19th century, that the practice of giving andexchanging eggs at Easter was introduced in England.

Eastercustom, the barrels are gratefully emptied by the participants. In London thereis Easter Parade in Battersea Park. What used to be merely an occasion forsporting the latest fashions in the park on Easter Sunday has now developedinto one of the most spectacular carnival processions of the year, withmilitary bands, decorated floats, Easter Princess, and all.

Another thing English peopletraditionally eat at Easter is hot cross-buns. One would hardly use them tocure whooping cough, but in bygone days buns, which had been baked on GoodFriday, were thought to have magical healing powers. Because of the spices theycontain, hot cross-buns seldom go moldy, and even today country housewives hanga few from the kitchen beams to dry. When needed, the buns can be powdered,mixed with milk or water and given as a medicine. Of course, for the magic cureto work, they have to be buns that were actually baked on Good Friday. ForEaster dinners at family reunions Englishmen traditionally eat baked ham orchicken with a famous English apple-pie to follow/

For a good apple pie you will need:

1 lb apples (500 gm)

4 oz flour (100 gm)

2 oz butter or margarine (50 gm)

3 oz sugar (75 gm)

2 oz sultans (50 gm)

1 oz chopped nuts (25 gm)

1-teaspoon cinnamon.

Now you can make a real English apple– pie. Here are the instructions. Put them in the correct order, and number theinstructions 1 to 6:

Mix the nuts, sultanas, cinnamon andhalf the sugar with the apples. Bake in a medium oven (300F) for 30 minutes.Peel and core the apples. Cut them into small pieces and put them into a bakingdish. Sieve the flour into a mixing bowl. Sprinkle the mixture over the apples.

Rub the soft butter into the flourwith your finger – tips. When the butter melts, the mixture will look likebread – crumbs. Add the rest of the sugar. And now serve the pie hot withcream. Enjoy it! And as Russians say, Christis risen! Expecting the answer, Christis risen indeed!

VI. Easter inEngland.

Easter it is a time for the givingand receiving of presents which traditionally take the form of an Easter eggand hot cross buns. The Easter egg is by far the most popular emblem of Easter,but fluffy little chicks, baby rabbits and spring time flowers like daffodils,dangling catkins and the arum lily are also used to signify the Nature'sawakening.

Nowadays Easter eggs are usually madeof chocolate or marzipan or sugar. True Easter eggs are hard-boiled, dyed in brightcolours, and sometimes elaborately decorated. Colouring and decorating thefestival eggs seems to have been customary since time immemorial They can bedipped into a prepared dye or, more usually, boiled in it, or they may beboiled inside a covering of onion peel Natural dyes are often used for coloringtoday. They are obtained from flowers, leaves, mosses, bark, and wood-chips.

Egg-rolling is a traditional Easterpastime which still flourishes in Britain. It takes place on Easter Sunday orMonday, and consists of rolling coloured, hard-boiled eggs down a slope untilthey are cracked and broken after which they are eaten by their owners. In somedistricts this is a competitive game. But originally egg-rolling provided anopportunity for divination. Each player marked his or her egg with anidentifying sign and then watched to see how it sped down the slope. If itreached the bottom unscathed, the owner could expect good luck in the future,but if it was broken, unfortune would follow beforethe year was out, Eating hot cross buns at breakfast on Good Friday morning isa custom which is also flourishing in most English households. Formerly, theseround, cakes marked with a cross, eaten hot, were made by housewives who roseat dawn; for the purpose, or by local bakers who worked through the night tohave them ready for delivery to their customers in time for breakfast. There isan old belief that the true Good Friday bun — that is, one made on theanniversary itself — never goes moldy, if kept in a dry place. It was once alsosupposed to have curative powers, especially for ailments like dysentery,diarrhea, whooping cough, and the complaint known as «summersickness». Within living memory, it was still quite usual in countrydistricts for a few buns to be hung from the kitchen ceiling until, they areneeded. When illness came the bun was finely grated and mixed with milk orwater, to make a medicine, which the patient drank.

VIII.<span Times New Roman"">          

Easter in Ukraine and Russia.

In Ukrainian, Easter is calledVelikden (The Great Day). It has been celebrated over a long period of historyand has many rich folk traditions that are no longer fully preserved. The lastSunday before Easter (Palm Sunday) is called Willow Sunday (Verbna nedilia). Onthis day pussy-willow branches are blessed in the church. The people tap oneanother with these branches, repeating the wish: ‘Be as tall as the willow, ashealthy as the water, and as rich as the earth’.

The week before Easter, the GreatWeek (Holy Week), is called the White or Pure Week. During this time an effortis made to finish all fieldwork before Thursday, since from Thursday on work isforbidden. On the evening of ‘Pure’ (also called ‘Great’ or ‘Passion’ [Strasnyi]) Thursday, the passion (strasti)service is performed, after which the people return home with lighted candles.Maundy Thursday, called ‘the Eater of the dead’ in eastern Ukraine and Russia,is connected with the cult of the dead, who are believed to meet in the churchon that night for the Divine Mass.

On Passion (Strasna)Friday – Good Friday – no work is done. In some localities, the Holy Shroud (plashchanytsia) is carried solemnly three times around thechurch and, after appropriate services, laid out for public veneration. Forthree days the community celebrates to the sound of bells and to the singing ofspring songs – vesnianky. Easter begins with the Easter matins and high mass,during which the pasky (traditional Easter breads) and pysankyand krashanky (decorated or colored Easter eggs) areblessed in the church. Butter, lard, cheese, roast-suckling pigs, sausage,smoked meat, and little napkins containing poppy seeds, millet, salt, pepper,and horseradish are also blessed. After the matins all the people in thecongregation exchange Easter greetings, give each other krashanky,and then hurry home with their baskets of blessed food.

The pysankyand krashanky are an old pre-Christian element andhave an important role in the Eater rites. They are given as gifts or exchangedas a sign of affection, and their shells are put in water for the rakhmany (peaceful souls); finally, they are placed on thegraves of the dead or buried in graves and the next day are taken out and givento the poor. Related to the exchange of krashanky isthe rite of sprinkling with water, which is still carried on in WesternUkraine. During the Easter season in Ukraine and Russia the cult of the dead isobserved. The dead are remembered on Maundy Thursday and also during the wholeweek after Easter. For the commemoration of the dead (provody)the people gather in the cemetery by the church, bringing with them a dishcontaining some food and liquor or wine, which they consume, leaving the restat the graves.

  

<span Times New Roman",«serif»;mso-fareast-font-family:«Times New Roman»; mso-ansi-language:RU;mso-fareast-language:RU;mso-bidi-language:AR-SA">

Список литературы.

1.<span Times New Roman"">   

Газета  “TheEnglish”, April№14/1996.

2.<span Times New Roman"">   

Газета  “The English”,March №12/1997.

3.<span Times New Roman"">   

Газета  “TheEnglish”, March №12/1995.

4.<span Times New Roman"">   

Газета  “EnglishLearner’s digest”, April, 1995.

5.<span Times New Roman"">   

Газета  “EnglishLearner’s digest”, April, 1997.
еще рефераты
Еще работы по иностранным языкам