Re: Telling time (wasRe: The English/French counting system (WAS:number systems fromconlangs))

>\> I believe that the Gregorian reforms also made some slight changes
> > to the methods used to reckon the date of Easter.
>
>Slight?  Ha!  Overcomplicating something that was needlessly complex
>to begin with.  I have no idea why both churches don't just abandon
>the whole calculation business and just celebrate Easter on the first
>Sunday after the first ACTUAL full moon after the ACTUAL spring equinox.
Well, there are several reasons for the Eastern Churches.  One is that
there is an ancient concilliar canon (sorry I can't give the citation)
stating that Pascha (Easter) must fall *after* the Jewish
Passover.  Adherence to this canon nixes the use of the Gregorian calendar
(and any associated reforms) for the reckoning the date of Pascha for
Orthodox.  (BTW, I have been told that the Church Fathers who agreed upon
the calculations for the date of Pascha were aware that the Julian calendar
was not *complely* precise -- and that it didn't matter to them.)

Another reason not to do it according to precise astronomical observation
instead of basing the dates on calendars, as you recommended above, is that
the Eastern Orthodox Churches are at all times in the midst of an
incredibly intricate liturgical cycle that *exactly* repeats itself only
every 532 years.  (532=19x29, and the period of 532 years is called the
Great Indiction.  A regular Indiction is one year, which begins on (Julian)
September 1st.  I have never yet learned why the Orthodox liturgical year
begins in September.  An interesting fact is that, until just a few
centuries ago, the Western New Year used to begin on March 25, whch makes
*perfect* sense: it's Annunciation.  On the Annunciation the Orthodox sing
"Today is the beginning of our salvation.  Today the Son of God becomes the
son of the Virgin..."  A perfect time for New Year.  There's nothing
special, OTOH, about Sept. 1st, except that it is Church New Year.)  In any
case, this immensely intricate liturgical cycle that we are involved in is
created by the interaction of the "fixed feasts," (like Annunciation) which
occur on fixed dates of the year and the "movable feasts," (like Ascension)
whose dates vary from year to year according to the date of Pascha.  Today
is the 3rd of September; it is the 13th week after Pentacost, which means
that it is a Tone 4 week and we are doing the Scripture readings for the
13th week after Pentacost; the main Saints commemorated today are the
Hieromartyr Anthymus and companions, St. Theoctistus, and the Martyr Edward
of England.  This is a Tuesday, which means that certain hymns are sung
during certain parts of the services that are not sung on any other day of
the week.  With all of this going on, it is not possible simply to reckon
the date of Pascha according to strict astromical observations: it would
completely break the flow of things and we'd be hopelessly confused.  (I
suspect that you may think that we are hopelessly confused already, but
everything is really very orderly, just very intricate.)

Some Orthodox Churches do not use the Julian calendar anymore except for
reckoning the date of Pascha.  This hybrid system has some serious
flaws.  Among other things it can lead to absurdities such as the New
Calendar Apostles' Fast last year, which ended before it began.  (The
Apostles' Fast begins on the day following All Saints -- our All Saints is
the Sunday after Pentacost -- and ends on the feast day of the Holy
Apostles Peter and Paul on June 28th.)

Isidora

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