Christmas and the myth of pagan origins
As Christmas approaches I have started to see more and more posts repeating that persistent myth that Christmas either started as a pagan festival or incorporated pagan elements. Every year this myth gets refuted, but it never dies. So here it is again, another year, another refutation. I expect most people will angrily downvote this without reading it. But for those who are interested in learning, here's the facts.
TLDR: There is no reputable historical evidence that December 25th was ever the date of any pagan festival. Nor is there any reputable evidence that any traditional Christmas customs were taken from pagan practices.
There is little historical evidence that can trace the origins of Christmas back to any Pagan festival or particular celebratory customs. Saturnalia has no link at all, being a festival that preceded the midwinter solstice. It was held on 17th December, and the celebrations continued for an irregular span, from two days to a maximum of seven days in total, so would have never lasted longer than the 23rd December.
Julius Caesar did fix the Solstice at the 25th but there appears to have been no festivities set for the date. The Romans did not celebrate the Solstice, but rather had two flanking festivals, the Saturnalia, which had to finish by the 23rd, and the Kalendae, from 1st to 3rd January. The period between the two festivals was not marked by any festivals, and the Solstice itself was not celebrated. It appears to have been considered an unpropitious time for the Romans, who avoided the period between the two festivals.
The evidence suggests that the calculation of the date of Christmas was not based on the Solstice. As the Church had no historical date for Christ’s Nativity they had to invent a date for this and they did so by using an old tradition that associated the day of a holy man's death as being the same day as his conception.
Thus they believed that Jesus' conception was the same day as Paschal, and calculating exactly nine months from there gave them his birth date. Therefore in the east where Paschal was celebrated several days later than the West, Jesus' nativity was calculated as 6th January. In the West it was calculated as 25th December.
If the Christians had been interested in appropriating Saturnalia, then they would have certainly used the correct date. And while Yule was the Norse/Germanic name for the month in which midwinter fell, there is no contemporary evidence that it was the name of a particular religious festival.
As Christmas approaches I have started to see more and more posts repeating that persistent myth that Christmas either started as a pagan festival or incorporated pagan elements. Every year this myth gets refuted, but it never dies. So here it is again, another year, another refutation. I expect most people will angrily downvote this without reading it. But for those who are interested in learning, here's the facts.
TLDR: There is no reputable historical evidence that December 25th was ever the date of any pagan festival. Nor is there any reputable evidence that any traditional Christmas customs were taken from pagan practices.
There is little historical evidence that can trace the origins of Christmas back to any Pagan festival or particular celebratory customs. Saturnalia has no link at all, being a festival that preceded the midwinter solstice. It was held on 17th December, and the celebrations continued for an irregular span, from two days to a maximum of seven days in total, so would have never lasted longer than the 23rd December.
Julius Caesar did fix the Solstice at the 25th but there appears to have been no festivities set for the date. The Romans did not celebrate the Solstice, but rather had two flanking festivals, the Saturnalia, which had to finish by the 23rd, and the Kalendae, from 1st to 3rd January. The period between the two festivals was not marked by any festivals, and the Solstice itself was not celebrated. It appears to have been considered an unpropitious time for the Romans, who avoided the period between the two festivals.
The evidence suggests that the calculation of the date of Christmas was not based on the Solstice. As the Church had no historical date for Christ’s Nativity they had to invent a date for this and they did so by using an old tradition that associated the day of a holy man's death as being the same day as his conception.
Thus they believed that Jesus' conception was the same day as Paschal, and calculating exactly nine months from there gave them his birth date. Therefore in the east where Paschal was celebrated several days later than the West, Jesus' nativity was calculated as 6th January. In the West it was calculated as 25th December.
If the Christians had been interested in appropriating Saturnalia, then they would have certainly used the correct date. And while Yule was the Norse/Germanic name for the month in which midwinter fell, there is no contemporary evidence that it was the name of a particular religious festival.
-
1
- Show all