Why is there an easter bunny? Seriously.

Farout Foolio

Not even wikipedia knows! :O
At this point I'm willing to accept explanations up to and possibly exceeding the
silliness of the South Park 'St Peter....rabbit' explanation.

truck-a-sauras

Didn't Jesus resurrect from the dead on Easter? And aren't all rabbits also zombies? Hoping someone here has a real explanation as I was interested when I saw your thread.

Kate of Lokys

Did you read the special version of Wikipedia that has all the text stripped out or something?

Wikipedia wrote:

The idea of an egg-laying bunny came to the United States in the 18th century. German immigrants in the Pennsylvania Dutch area told their children about the "Osterhas," sometimes spelled "Oschter Haws." "Hase" means "hare," not rabbit, and in Northwest European folklore the "Easter Bunny" indeed is a hare, not a rabbit. According to the legend, only good children received gifts of colored eggs in the nests that they made in their caps and bonnets before Easter.[3] In 1883, Jakob Grimm wrote of long-standing similar myths in Germany itself. Noting many related landmarks and customs, Grimm suggested that these derived from legends of Ostara.[4]

Easter is a Christianized adaptation of pagan spring fertility rituals. Rabbits are near-universal symbols of fertility because they, well, fuck like bunnies. Ergo, rabbits became associated with the rituals, and as folklore developed, it became increasingly complex, featuring special magical rabbits which lay eggs for good little children.

Seriously, it's right there.

bychance

Kate of Lokys wrote: »

Did you read the special version of Wikipedia that has all the text stripped out or something?

Wikipedia wrote:

The idea of an egg-laying bunny came to the United States in the 18th century. German immigrants in the Pennsylvania Dutch area told their children about the "Osterhas," sometimes spelled "Oschter Haws." "Hase" means "hare," not rabbit, and in Northwest European folklore the "Easter Bunny" indeed is a hare, not a rabbit. According to the legend, only good children received gifts of colored eggs in the nests that they made in their caps and bonnets before Easter.[3] In 1883, Jakob Grimm wrote of long-standing similar myths in Germany itself. Noting many related landmarks and customs, Grimm suggested that these derived from legends of Ostara.[4]

Easter is a Christianized adaptation of pagan spring fertility rituals. Rabbits are near-universal symbols of fertility because they, well, fuck like bunnies. Ergo, rabbits became associated with the rituals, and as folklore developed, it became increasingly complex, featuring special magical rabbits which lay eggs for good little children.

Seriously, it's right there.

Interesting.

Now I'm off to research Santa Claus/St. Nicholas and what that has to do with the birth of Christ.

Daenris

http://altreligion.about.com/cs/alchemy/a/mpreviss.htm

No idea how correct it is, but it's something. And it's reasonable, since Christianity does have a history of consuming pagan holidays/symbols and using them for their own purposes.

Theungry

This is not factual or historical, but my best guess is that it has to do with Easter (like all modern holidays) stealing conventions from earlier pagan traditions. The spring equinox is a time to celebrate the rebirth of life. Spring is the mating season for most mammals. Rabbits, being notorious for their copulation and powers of multiplication were probably at some point embraced as a symbol of spring.

I dunno, it seems like good math to me.

MagicPrime

*opens a can of worms*

Most people don't realize that most of the "Christian" holidays we celebrate are in fact re-imaginings of pagan holidays like Solstices, Equinoxes, Harvests and (like above) spring fertility.

And ofcourse by "most people" I don't mean the denizens of the P-A forums.

Nobody by chance has a link to a yt of that episode of Boondocks where Huey talks about Christmas do they?

Jenosavel

*shrugs* My Christian family knows that quite a bit of the symbols and imagery were stolen from pagans, and they don't seem to mind. At least, they don't mind as long as you're talking about clearly defined things like the Easter Bunny. Now when my younger brother tried to say that the story of fishes and loaves meant Jesus was stolen from Pisces... well, that gets an entirely different reaction (and not necessarily unwarranted).

Farout Foolio

Sorry, stopped reading the Wiki one after "The Easter Bunny is a mythological rabbit who brings gifts and candy to children on the Easter holiday. Its origin is unknown. "

Nitsuj82

Jenosavel wrote: »

*shrugs* My Christian family knows that quite a bit of the symbols and imagery were stolen from pagans, and they don't seem to mind. At least, they don't mind as long as you're talking about clearly defined things like the Easter Bunny. Now when my younger brother tried to say that the story of fishes and loaves meant Jesus was stolen from Pisces... well, that gets an entirely different reaction (and not necessarily unwarranted).

Not to mention telling them that Jesus was actually born in the Spring. My Catholic family hates that.

MagicPrime

The Romans wanted to keep their Winter festival.

Bloods End

Easter Beagle.

Steel Angel

Nitsuj82 wrote: »

Not to mention telling them that Jesus was actually born in the Spring. My Catholic family hates that.

My atheist relatives still seem to be surprised that they celebrate Christmas while me and the other Christians in the families don't.

Thankfully we're not all that big on gift giving since I left high school so there's not THAT bit of awkwardness when I wasn't showing up with presents.

There's basically a long history of Europeans wanting to hang onto their pagan or secular traditions and the Roman Catholic church finding some way to shoehorn it in.

Echo

On a similar note, Valentine is about blood and horny werewolves.

Cowboy Bebop

Bunnies are easier to market than a walking corpse.