Krasnaja Gorka, the "beautiful Mountain" of Easter time
Pagan observances mix with Christian symbolism to exalt the Resurrection of Christ who gives life. Colored eggs, the wedding season, proofs of the Resurrection.
Moscow (AsiaNews) - At the end of the Octave of Easter, last Sunday 5 May, the Orthodox celebrated the so-called "Antipascha", the end of the Easter week, which in the popular tradition is also called the "Beautiful Mountain", Krasnaja Gorka.
In the festival, Christian motifs and ancient suggestions of Slavic paganism merge, with Easter egg hunts. The eggs are rolled, thrown and trampled upon by the cheering crowd. Easter time is also the season of weddings (photo 4) and of wedding banquets, which last a whole week.
Ekaterina Dorokhova, vice president of the Center for Russian folklore, says that this time of celebration is linked to the pagan rituals of the Slav divinity Jarylo, the god of the sun, of strength and fertility, although not everyone agrees with this attribution .
Protoierej Artemij Vladimirov, chaplain of the Alekseevsky female monastery in Moscow, argues that "it was Christianity that exalted these natural rituals of life in the fields, illuminating them with the joy of Christ's resurrection; in these days we continually reread the homily of St. John Chrysostom, in which we proclaim that life is renewed ".
"It is the time of new life and of the family", recalls the protoierej Vladimir Vigilianskij, pastor of the church of Saint Tatjana at the Lomonosov university. The principle of procreation and the multiplication of the human species is associated with the Easter season, today threatened by the dramatic demographic crisis of Russia and the whole of Europe. This is also why the festival is called "Beautiful Mountain", playing on the double meaning of the Russian word krasnyj, which means "beautiful" and also "red", like the liturgical color of Easter time, and the color with which the boiled eggs gifted in these days, as a symbol of the concept of life, are decorated.
The celebrated "mountain" probably derives from the use of rolling eggs from a slope, trying to hit others as they roll downwards, in a cheerful childish game, also described by some Russian writers, such as Shmelev and Artemev. A more "competitive" variant consists in throwing the eggs one against the other, a gesture remembered by the common use of reciprocally crushing the tops of the eggs, in a gesture of hope. Many popular traditions are linked to eggs; being an Easter symbol, they are considered particularly soothing for all kinds of diseases, simply by placing them on the sick part of the body.
The Orthodox tradition attributes to St. Mary Magdalene the preparation of the first decorated Easter egg (photo 3), "which she would have given to the emperor Tiberius in Rome, exclaiming Christus resurrexit a mortuis!", as recalled by Father Artemij. A different tradition holds that after the resurrection of Christ the eggs would miraculously be colored red, after some Jews demanded proof of the resurrection itself. The chosen proof were the eggs, which became the color of the blood of Christ on the cross.
The "proof" of the resurrection is in fact the theme of the Antipascha, which in the East also corresponds to the "Sunday of Thomas", the apostle of the doubt of faith, who would then go to preach the Gospel to the lands of India. The apocryphal tales, particularly widespread in the Eastern Churches, tell us that Thomas suffered martyrdom after being stabbed in the side with a spear, at the very point where he wanted to put his finger to obtain the certainty of faith.
.png)
07/04/2018 16:37
