Ash Wednesday
Ash Wednesday is a holy day of prayer and fasting in many Western Christian denominations. It is preceded by Shrove Tuesday and marks the first day of Lent, the six weeks of penitence before Easter.[1]
This article is about the day of fasting. For other uses, see Ash Wednesday (disambiguation).Ash Wednesday
Many Western Christians
Christian
Holy Mass, Divine Service, Holy Qurbana, Service of worship
Fasting and abstinence
Placing of ashes on the head
46 days before Easter Sunday
22 February
14 February
5 March
18 February
Annual
Ash Wednesday is observed by Catholics, Lutherans, Moravians, Anglicans, and United Protestants, as well as by some churches in the Reformed, (including certain Congregationalist, Continental Reformed, and Presbyterian churches), Baptist, Methodist and Nazarene traditions.[2][3][4]
Ash Wednesday is traditionally observed with fasting and abstinence from meat in several Christian denominations.[5][6][7] As it is the first day of Lent, many Christians begin Ash Wednesday by marking a Lenten calendar, praying a Lenten daily devotional, and making a Lenten sacrifice that they will not partake of until the arrival of Eastertide.[8][9]
Many Christians attend special Ash Wednesday church services at which churchgoers receive ash on their foreheads or the top of their heads, as the wearing of ashes was a sign of repentance in biblical times.[10] Ash Wednesday derives its name from this practice, in which the placement of ashes is accompanied by the words, "Repent, and believe in the Gospel" or the dictum "Remember that you are dust, and to dust you shall return."[11][12] The ashes are prepared by burning palm leaves from the previous year's Palm Sunday celebrations.[13]
Biblical significance of ashes[edit]
Ashes were used in ancient times to express grief. When Tamar was raped by her half-brother, "she sprinkled ashes on her head, tore her robe, and with her face buried in her hands went away crying" (2 Samuel 13:19). The gesture was also used to express sorrow for sins and faults. Ashes could be symbolic of the old sinful self dying and returning to the dust. In Job 42:5–6, Job says to God: "I have heard of thee by the hearing of the ear: but now mine eye seeth thee. Wherefore I abhor myself, and repent in dust and ashes."
The prophet Jeremiah calls for repentance by saying: "O daughter of my people, gird on sackcloth, roll in the ashes" (Jer 6:26). The prophet Daniel recounted pleading to God: "I turned to the Lord God, pleading in earnest prayer, with fasting, sackcloth, and ashes" (Daniel 9:3). Just before the New Testament period, the rebels fighting for Jewish independence, the Maccabees, prepared for battle using ashes: "That day they fasted and wore sackcloth; they sprinkled ashes on their heads and tore their clothes" (1 Maccabees 3:47; see also 4:39).
Examples of the practice among Jews are found in several other books of the Bible, including Numbers 19:9, 19:17, Jonah 3:6, Book of Esther 4:1, and Hebrews 9:13. Jesus is quoted as speaking of the practice in Matthew 11:21 and Luke 10:13: "If the mighty works done in you had been done in Tyre and Sidon, they would have repented long ago (sitting) in sackcloth and ashes."
A woman receives a cross of ashes on Ash Wednesday outside an Episcopal church, 2015
A priest has an "Ashes to Go" station for commuters at a train station
National No Smoking Day[edit]
In the Republic of Ireland, Ash Wednesday is National No Smoking Day.[149][150] The date was chosen because quitting smoking ties in with giving up a luxury for Lent, and because of the link between ash and smoking.[151][152] In the United Kingdom, No Smoking Day was held for the first time on Ash Wednesday in 1984[153] but is now fixed as the second Wednesday in March.[154]
