Easter Night should be spent in the church in prayer so as to show the inner joy. On Easter morning, by tradition, the parishioners return from church with a burning candle in their hands and with blessed food. They can eat such food as Easter bread and cakes, red painted eggs and lamb only after these are blessed with holy water. The food brought to the church on Easter Night symbolizes welfare, teacher of pedagogy at the Cahul University “B.P.Hașdeu” Maria Barbă has told IPN.
Before siting at the holiday table, the Christians need to wash one cheek with a red painted egg and another cheek with a white egg so as to be strong and have a clean soul. They can also wash with coins so as to have plenty of money throughout the year, explained the teacher.
The decorated eggs should also be present on the Easter table. The paintings made on eggs show elements of nature, inching insects and birds, the sky, Earth, leaves of greens, events related to the return to life of Jesus Crist and his face. They say nature also returns to live on Easter.
The eggs are painted only red as the legend says that Maria Magdalena came with a basket full of eggs when she saw Jesus Christ crucified and blood from his hands and legs poured down on those eggs.
They say the cock jelly prepared on Easter should not be too gluey. “The cock was the first that announced the return to life of Christ at 4am. All the apostles sat at the table and Virgin Marry entered and told them that Christ returned to life. One of the apostles said Christ will return to life when that cock from the jelly would revive. And a miracle was witnessed – the cock revived and splashed jelly on the apostles,” said Maria Barbă.
Ahead of Easter, they butcher a lamb because God decided a pig should be sacrificed on Christmas and a lamb should be sacrificed on Easter, namely a healthy lamb. Other nations put rabbit on the table for the people to be gentle and quiet like a rabbit.
According to the teacher, the Easter bread and cake should be round as they signify the sky, the sun, the light. The roulade is given a rectangular shape to represent the tomb in which Jesus Christ was laid.
The Christians greet each other with “Christ is Risen!” with the answer “He is Risen Indeed” during 40 days since Easter until the Ascension Day.
