What are rabbits associated with at Easter?

Answer 1

There is no REAL Christian relation between them. The whole thing about bunnies and Easter comes from pagan religions that were popular in ancient times. The bunny was a fertility symbol, associated with pagan worship. The Roman Catholic church, in around the year 300 AD, merged some non-Christian beliefs and customs with their version of what they believe Christianity to be. The Protestants did not accept these changes at the time, but only much later (centuries later) started to accept them. The celebration of the resurrection of Christ is a good thing, but not with bunnies and eggs and other symbols used in pagan worship. And even the very term Easter is from the name of a pagan goddess, Ishtar.

Answer 2

The Easter bunny and the Easter eggsBoth eggs and rabbits have to do with fertility. Spring festivals tend to be about fertility and rebirth. This is a tradition that is older than Christianity and was coopted by Christianity when it was becoming a popular religion. As a recent religion, Christianity was usually smart enough not to mess with the local celebrations but just adapt them a little bit. That made it easier for people to go along.

From pagan religion, both the egg and the bunny are symbols of fertility. In the pagan religion, Easter was the "spring festival", celebrating fertility and requesting that the Gods give good crops. It makes sense that the rabbit and the egg would be symbols of spring festival.

Easter is also a symbol of the Anglo-Saxon goddess, Eostre, as the holiday was originally named after. Easter is a relatively new adoption of spelling which was used, as said above, to help make the coexistence and/or transition of religions go much smoother.

Answer 3

The bunny rabbit is a prolific reproducer because the species is prey for a number of other animals and therefore is a symbol for the pagan goddess Easter, a variant of Astarte/Ishtar/April.

The original Easter Bunny was probably associated with the Pagan equinox festival that predated Easter. The Saxons devoted the month of April to celebrating their goddess of spring and fertility, who was, not coincidentally, named Eastre. Eastre's sacred animal was the hare (a rabbit) - not surprising since the rabbit is one of the most common symbols of fertility and rebirth.

The colored eggs carried by today's Easter bunnies have another, even more ancient origin. Eggs have long been associated with fertility and springtime festivals - for so long, in fact, that the precise roots of the association are unknown. Ancient Romans and Greeks utilized eggs in festivals celebrating resurrected gods. The egg also featured prominently in the Jewish rituals of Passover - and still today the roasted egg has prominence on the seder table as an essential symbol of springtime and rebirth.

Scholars believe that the pairing of the hare and the egg together in Easter may also have Pagan roots. During springtime, when days and nights were equal length, the hare was identified with the moon goddess and the egg with the sun god. Pairing the two together offered a kind of ying and yang to spring equinox celebration.

Answer 4

The bunny was used in many pagan holidays to represent fertility and growth, and spring is when many things grow and are born. When Christians made their celebrations on pagan holidays the bunny was just inter grated in.

Answer 5

Originally Easter was a festival that had to do with spring and fertility Rabbits have a bit of a reputation in the fertility side of things as do eggs. the Christians made their festival a part of Easter at a later date.

Answer 6

Rabbits and eggs are pagan fertility symbols of extreme antiquity.

Birds lay eggs and rabbits give birth to large litters in the early spring these became symbols of the rising fertility of the earth during the spring season.

Since Easter also occurs in the early spring, people brought the beloved pagan symbols into the Christian celebration of Easter.

These pagan symbols have become part of the Christian tradition. They do not take anything away from the Resurrection of Jesus Christ and they add to the celebration.

Christianity has frequently absorbed the positive and neutral symbols of pagan religions while leaving the negative symbols behind, similar to Christmas trees and Halloween costumes.

awswer by annmargaret williamson on easter 2012

Answer 7

The Easter Bunny brings the eggs and the Bunny Rabbit eats them!

Answer 8

A baby rabbit and eggs symbolize Easter because they both symbolize new life, and Easter is the day Jesus Christ rose from the dead. so naturally, Easter is a day known for new life.

Answer 9

because it symbolizes a new life