Friday, 09 December 2011
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Christmas: What Are We Really Celebrating?
I'm sure by now I've really made some people angry. I'm taking the Christ out of Christmas. But I feel that if we are truly followers of Christ, then we must be searching for the Truth. I can't sit aside and say nothing. So what are we celebrating? What we're actually celebrating is a true American holiday. Don't get your panties in a bunch over that; I simply mean that the U.S. is known as the melting pot. Our Christmas holiday is a mixture of traditions from all parts of the world, brought together for your enjoyment.
Ancient Babylon: They celebrated the Feast of the Son if Isis on Dec 25. Partying, feasting, and gift giving were a part of this celebration.
Rome: The Winter Solstice, feast of Saturnalia (god of agriculture), Feast of Juvenalia (honoring children), and celebration of Mithras. Mithras you will find to be most interesting, I believe. He is the god of the Unconquerable Sun, born on Dec 25. It was their most sacred day of the year. Candle lighting, yule logs, mistletoe, and hollyberries were parts of his celebration.
In 350, Pope Julius 1 decided to blend the pagan celebrations with the worship of Christ. He thought that pagans would be more likely to convert to Christianity if they had similar festivals. So Mithras' celebration became the celebration of the birth of Christ.
St. Boniface is responsible, according to legend, for the first Christmas trees. He convinced the pagans worshiping Thor that the evergreen tree was a sign and symbol of Christ. They eventually became associated with the Paradise Tree, used in early plays about the Fall of Man (Garden of Eden story).
The story of Yahsua's birth is Truth. Was He born on December 25? No. But several pagan gods were. I can understand the early Christians' attempts at converting the masses. But that is also why we have the verse "Ye shall not add unto the word which I command you, neither shall ye diminish ought from it, that ye may keep the commandments of the Lord your God which I command you." (Deut 4:2) If the early Christians would have followed that, our version of Christianity would be much different.
So now you know what we're really celebrating with our Christmas traditions. Pagan beliefs. Is there another way to celebrate it? You betcha. But I'll cover that in another post. Oh, and feel free to Google "The Origins of Christmas", if you don't trust what I've written.
Did you know that the day of Christmas and some of its traditions are pagan in origin? Does this make you want to change the way you celebrate Christmas?
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- From: greene_lily@xanga
- About Me: I'm a stay-at-home mom of two small children, a cat named Only, and a score of fish. I'm happily married to my high school sweetheart, celebrating 10 years of friendship and love. We're expecting a baby girl in January 2013. I love to sing, dance, and learn about old-school home keeping methods. We're into homeschooling, homesteading, and learning about Messianic Judaism. I'm a little strange and enjoy a bit of weirdness every now and again. Hope we'll hit it off and find something in common!
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Comments (61)
I feel that celebrating with things borrowed from other cultures is ok. Just because I like visiting with family and decorating my house and baking cookies doesn't mean that I am pagan. It means I have an excuse to do those things. There are other examples besides Christmas: every year in my undergraduate dorm my RA held a Chinese Moon Festival for our floor. I loved making paper lanterns and eating moon cakes and learning about the Chinese culture. Even if I didn't understand what was behind it, I enjoyed hanging out with friends and participating.
I don't think of pagan gods when I'm decorating a Christmas tree any more than I'm thinking anything else when I'm decorating a Christmas tree other than "OOH SHINY LIGHTS AND SPARKLY TINSEL!" These things are the secular part of the holiday season. My celebration of Christ coming to Earth takes place outside of these other traditions, even though it is remembered around the same time.
You might also mention that Mithra was born of a virgin mother and his father was a God. But hey, so was Hercules and both of them descended into Hell just as Jesus did for three days after his/their deaths.
So what, they started the 12 days of Christmas at the same time of the 12 days of Pagan festivities. If you cannot get the rum out of the punch, no use throwing out good punch.
Early Christians didn't even celebrate his birth but rather his life, death and resurrection. Its a great holiday. It generates love, good thoughts, a nearing of family and friends and good will towards all men. Who cares about why it is and when it started.
Besides, it is not written in the Bible so it does not have to be perfect. But wait, love, good thoughts, a nearing of family, good will, it is perfect after all.
I have looked it up. These are not truly the beginning of Christmas. I nearly wrote a post on it myself a few days ago after hearing all these allegations of Christmas being merely a way to convert the pagans around them celebrating unholy holidays. This is SPECULATION & cannot be confirmed or denied.
The following (in italics & quotations) is from Wikipedia.
"In the early 18th century, scholars began proposing alternative explanations. Isaac Newton argued that the date of Christmas was selected to correspond with the winter solstice, which the Romans called bruma and celebrated on December 25. In 1743, German Protestant Paul Ernst Jablonski argued Christmas was
placed on December 25 to correspond with the Roman solar holiday Dies Natalis Solis Invicti and was therefore a "paganization" that debased the true church. In 1889, Louis Duchesne proposed that the date of Christmas was calculated as nine months after the Annunciation,
the traditional date of the conception of Jesus, which itself was based
on a traditional belief that he was conceived and crucified on the same
date, 15 Nisan.
In the early 4th century, the church calendar contained Christmas on
December 25 and other holidays placed on solar dates: "It is cosmic
symbolism...which inspired the Church leadership in Rome to elect the
winter solstice, December 25, as the birthday of Christ, and the summer
solstice as that of John the Baptist, supplemented by the equinoxes as
their respective dates of conception. While they were aware that pagans
called this day the 'birthday' of Sol Invictus, this did not concern
them and it did not play any role in their choice of date for
Christmas," according to modern scholar S.E. Hijmans."
So I hope you see that there is a strong possibility that Christmas was not simply a way to push the pagan out of a holiday. It is very possible Christmas in another form was already in existence.
By the way - the links in my comment/reply were not created by me but were created by Wikipedia & simply transferred over in the copy & paste.
My intentions, when I celebrate Christmas, are to honor Christ and show love to family and friends.
I believe this is like the issue of meat offered to idols that Paul talked about in the Bible. For people who feel like it's just fine, it's just fine for them. For people who feel guilty about it, then they shouldn't do it.
I do not have a conviction against celebrating Christmas in this way, I honor Christ while doing it, and I plan to keep doing it. If another Christian feels it's wrong, then for them it may be, and they should follow their conscience.
I don't support the idea of trying to convince people to think differently on this, since it's a disputable matter.
Furthermore - here is the info on the origins of the Christmas tree.
Again, the following words in italics & quotations are from Wikipedia. The hyperlinks are not my own but came along from wikipedia with the copy & paste. If you further look up the upside down Christmas tree origins on wiki, you'll see that it also states that with the tree being a triangular shape, that the Christians of old tried using the tree to illustrate the Holy Trinity.
"While some take it that the Christmas tree is a Christianization of a pre-Christian winter rite,
in particular the Donar Oak and Saint Boniface, others see its origin in the "tree of Paradise" used as a prop in the medieval mystery plays that were given on 24 December, which as well as
being Christmas Eve is in some countries the day of the liturgical commemoration and name day of Adam and Eve. To suggest the Garden of Eden, a tree decorated with apples (to represent the forbidden fruit) and wafers (to represent the Eucharist and redemption) was used as a setting for the play. Like the Christmas crib, the Paradise tree was later placed in homes. The apples were replaced by round objects such as shiny red balls.
The modern Christmas tree . . . originated in western Germany. The main prop of a popular medieval play about Adam and Eve was a fir tree hung with apples (paradise tree) representing the Garden of Eden. The Germans set up a paradise tree in their homes on December 24, the religious feast day of Adam and Eve. They hung wafers on it (symbolizing the host, the Christian sign of redemption); in a later tradition, the wafers were replaced by cookies of various shapes. Candles, too, were often added as the symbol of Christ. In the same room, during the Christmas season, was the Christmas pyramid, a triangular construction of wood, with shelves to hold Christmas figurines, decorated with evergreens, candles, and a star. By the 16th century, the Christmas pyramid and paradise tree had merged, becoming the Christmas tree."
I didn't know that intentions don't matter when it comes to how we worship. So as long as we're doing something that isn't influenced by pagan beliefs, and do it with impure intentions, we'd be fine by your argument, right?
I see the many pagan traditions associate with Christmas and now given new meaning in the light of Christ's truth as a sign of great VICTORY over the dark shadows of ancient belief. If much of our society has forgotten the truth that Christ gives to Christmas trees, gift-giving and the like is it a call to abandon it all together or is it a challenge to us who desire to worship in spirit and truth to evangelize and witness to those who have forgotten? Has He come to abolish or fulfill? After all, even Paul admits that the Gentiles were reaching for the True God without knowing it; is not the middle of winter, when all the world seems to die, a perfect time to celebrate the Birth of our Messiah? Is not the evergreen tree a perfect symbol of life in the midst of death? Did not even the pagan Magi bring gifts on the day of His birth? Should we abolish a day dedicated to the celebration of Christ's birth in the world simply because He may or may not have actually been born on that day and wait instead for someone to discover the actual date? Let us not fall into the temptation of letting our fear of error outweigh our LOVE for the TRUTH that Jesus Christ was born, and let's make sure the world never forgets it by endeavoring to witness to the reality of Christmas instead of caving in to what our world seeks to make it.
"Was He born on December 25?"
We might be a week or two off, but I can see, and have made the case in previous years for Christ to have been born around Deceber 25th. I will try and sum up those posts here, without making a post myself in your comment section
Do you know when lambs are born in the middle east? the most common answer is during the spring. this is incorrect I know it is incorrect, because I was curious enough a few years back to actually ask someone. I e-mailed the National Zoo in Israel, and asked them when sheep would be born, and how long does it take to wean a baby sheep. The weaning time for sheep, usually now, takes place when the baby sheep is 8-10 weeks of age, although some sheep have been successfully weaned when the baby is only 14 days old. But the zoo continued, and said some of the success between 14 days and 10 weeks is because of modern tech. In the time period in question, (I asked about 1st century in particular) there is some archeological finds that have given rise to the belief of more natural weaning where the baby is weaned slowly over a period of the first 6 months of life. In order for this more natural method, there must be green grass for the baby to eat when being weaned. this means that the baby cannot be born during the spring, because if the baby is born in april let's say than it would be winter at the end of the 6months . So the zoo said, baby sheep were actually born in December, so that there would be plenty of young green shoots for the baby to gnaw on, during the weaning time that would end in June. The most popular time was the last two weeks of december.
So if the Lamb of God, was born during the lambing season, than He would have to be born from December 15th-January 1st. This would also explain why the shepherds were outside with the flocks by night, if the sheep were locked up, there may or may not be room enough for the shepherds to help if needed the mother to give birth.
So, I am not saying anything for sure, but it is possible that God could have sent the Lamb of God, to be born during lambing season, and sent His light, during the Festival of Lights.
"He convinced the pagans worshiping Thor that the evergreen tree was a sign and symbol of Christ"
I don't know about Christ, But the Bible does ay that God referenced Himself as an evergreen tree in Hosea 14:8 So what is wrong with using a tree, as a symbol for God, when God uses the same thing?
"So now you know what we're really celebrating with our Christmas traditions. Pagan beliefs"
no, what we have are some people claiming that some of the things done, may have a pagan history. When I go to Church on December 25th, I will be singing songs of Praise to God, not Mithras, I will be tithing to God, not Thor. I will be telling people about a God, that started a plan of salvation with a baby boy born and placed in a manger. No where in my discussion will the unconquerable sun come into the discussion. So how can you say, that I am celebrating pagan beliefs? If I am celebrating Pagan beliefs, by worshiping the God on Deceber 25th, then you are worshiping Saturn when you go to church on Saturday, or the Sun if you go to church on Sunday.
Well, if you're talking origin - Jesus never instructed us to celebrate/remember His birth, only His death for us on the cross: 1 Corinthians 11:24-26
This concept we have of having to celebrate Jesus' birthday is all man-made (we like to celebrate our own birthdays). But we must remember that Jesus is God. God has no beginning nor end, how can we restrict His "birth" to one day of the year and compare Him to man? The fact that almost everyone knows now that Christmas originated from pagan traditions really just seems like we're compromising to keep the traditions we've grown up in.
It seems like I see this come around every year. Some people seem to salivate at the chance to tell others that, even though they love Christ and seek to honor Him, that they really are indeed worshiping some false god unbeknownst to themselves! This is almost a novelty of Christmas and Easter to me...and I somewhat enjoy watching it.
I'm going to continue to light up my tree, sing my carols, drink my eggnog, buy and receive gifts, put up my nativity scene, go to Christmas Eve mass, and even deck the hall a bit :) And I still love Jesus and will seek to honor Him with my life and actions.
For by this God demonstrated His love for...that while I was still a sinner (a pagan!) Christ died for me (redeemed me). Thank God for redemption of the old ways!
@jinglingling@xanga - Do you believe that Jesus is the Son of God who was literally born of a virgin?
The fall of paganism and the rise of Christianity is one of history's greatest stories. That Christianity assimilated pagan religions and brought social stability and an entirely new civilization is a testament to its greatness.
The pagan quality of Christmas is long forgotten while Christian charity rules the season.
@jinglingling@xanga - "how can we restrict His "birth" to one day of the year"
At Christmas we celebrate how Jesus, The Light, came to us. He was born of the Virgin Mary -- birth happens at a specific time, in a specific place, so there is no room for vague abstractions. Because He was born on one day of the year does not mean that He isn't there for us on all days, all the time -- God does not forget about us. It is we who forget about our Loving God. And so we have Advent and Christmas to remind us to think about God, about how He came to us in our darkness to be our Light. So when ya light us your Christmas trees, let those lights remind you of Jesus, the True Light of the world.
@hectoramemnon@xanga does the following reply to Proud Christian Fruitcake provide "Christian clarity" for you? @ProudToBeAChristianFruitcake@xanga - the lamb of god....the good Shepard, the bread of life, the son of man, the word, the fisher, only begotten son of God, mothers name was Meri, he was the savior of humanity. He was transfigured on a mountain and his keynote address was called the sermon on the mound. He was crucified with two thieves, buried in a tomb, and his resurrection was announced by women. After his death he descended into Hell for three days...............all these names, titles and events were first bestowed/credited to/upon a man/god thousands of years before Jesus and your worried about when Jesus was born?
All that was the PAGAN GOD Horus. Sound familiar? The power of Jesus lies in you....with your belief. I praise this power and rejoice in it for you and with you. But it is you that generates the love by using this story of Jesus that gives you those endearing qualities that knows that as displayed for us in the story of the Prodigal son, (obviously the "Good" son was a little bit slow to get this lesson) a fathers door is always open to all of his kids no matter what. And we know from the Book of Revelations that you will be judged by your actions, (not a mention of your faith is made).
Also, didn't Jesus say, Thank you father for showing the children what the learned have forgotten? I spend time with kids every day and they never mention, debate, or argue what faith, color or nationality you are. They simply accept and love unconditionally. (As opposed to accept your presence there condition subsequent to you accepting Jesus). Plus I seem to remember that they say that the way to enter and excel in Heaven is to do so as a child would. Kids don't care about what the learned transfix upon. They only suffer the consequences of the learn-eds obsessions.
But feel free to go ahead and do as you choose as I get the lesson from the Prodigal Son and the 2 Golden Rules as stated by Jesus. Hey, you ever think about when he stated those rules? Seems to me that when he told the Rabbi's these Golden Rules, that this might have been a good time to mention the take me into your heart in order to obtain a presence in Heaven, don't you think? Something like, "Hey, there are these two rules and by the way, applying them all day, every day is fruitless unless you accept me into your heart." Don't you think?
May good thoughts fill your heart and mind and the hearts and minds of all you come into contact with.
justmarty
@Ooglick@xanga - @AMIGOS_WE_THREE@xanga - @AMIGOS_WE_THREE@xanga - @monobeam@xanga - @hectoramemnon@xanga - @NightCometh@xanga - @jinglingling@xanga - @ProudToBeAChristianFruitcake@xanga - @Ancient_Scribe@xanga - @QuantumStorm@xanga - @Pickwick12@xanga - @MyTwoCentss@xanga -
I'm doing this response as a massive reply because I want all of you to know that this was actually a three part mini-series. This, apparently, is the only one that revelife decided to post even though I have submitted all three to them. I've decided that I'm not going to read comments on this at this time because I would like to give everyone a chance to read the final part of what I wrote. In order to understand where I was coming from and where I was going with this message, I encourage you to read the final chapter. I don't know if they will post it at a later date or not. I'll be back on here in a couple of days to reply. Frankly I'm a bit irritated that this one was what they chose to post, and not the rest. That's why it was a series, there's more to it than just discussing the pagan origins. Here's the link to the final part of what I wrote. "The Christ in Christmas-Final Chapter"
@ProudToBeAChristianFruitcake@xanga - Wow, thanks. This is the first argument I have heard that actually refutes the arguments against Christmas. Well done.
@AMIGOS_WE_THREE@xanga - Since Christianity has its roots in Judaism, it predates Mythra. It is more logical to conclude that Myrtha borrowed from Christianity than the other way around.
Pagan advocates don't seem to realize that by 100AD Christianity was beginning to become an institution. Nero's 64AD decree that established Empire-wide persecution of Christians, only strengthened Christianity.
Mithra was but one of innumerable pagan cults found in the ancient world.
You folks are just concocting a narrative that conforms to your dislike for Christianity. And that narrative is not historic and it isn't reasonable. That makes it unbelievable to anyone who takes an unvarnished look at history.
Hilariously, Jeremiah 10:2-4 commands the enlightened not to decorate a severed tree because it is a ritual performed by the heathens.
"[2] Do not learn the ways of the nations or be terrified by signs in the heavens, though the nations are terrified by them. [3] For the practices of the peoples are worthless; they cut a tree out of the forest, and a craftsman shapes it with his chisel. [4] They adorn it with silver and gold; they fasten it with hammer and nails so it will not totter."This argument has been going on for almost two millenia, and frankly, I think that it deviates from what Christ said regarding rituals: they don't matter, they're not the issue. You're not condemning yourself or others by putting up a Christmas tree, or by refusing to.
What matters is what's in our hearts. How we go around with our lives. Do you not celebrate Christmas because you feel it's sinful and pagan-like to do so? Congratulations, you just did the exact opposite of what Jesus wants us to do, which is giving ourselves a false sense of righteousness over acts that, when it comes down to it, doesn't matter one bit.
You do make a neat point, and I appreciate the time and effort you put into this, because I'm sure you did so with the best of intentions, but let's not miss the forest for the trees.
@ProudToBeAChristianFruitcake@xanga - @NightCometh@xanga -
"So how can you say, that I am celebrating pagan beliefs? ""Some people seem to salivate at the chance to tell others that, even though they love Christ and seek to honor Him, that they really are indeed worshiping some false god unbeknownst to themselves!"
well, when i was Wiccan, all of my Christian "friends" liked to accuse me of being a Satanist... even though there is no version of Satan in Wicca, or paganism as a whole. and that was simply because of what i wasn't doing, not because of what traditions i did uphold as part of my religion. so, i guess it's tit for tat :) if i can unknowingly worship Satan, regardless of what is in my heart, you can unknowingly worship Osiris or Mithra in the same way.
also, @ProudToBeAChristianFruitcake@xanga, i appreciate your address if the issue of the date of birth, but you didn't provide a good explanation why shepherds would have taken their pregnant sheep out into the desert in the middle of the night in winter. even though it's the desert, it gets very cold at night.
@too_pretty_to_die@xanga - No one can confess that Jesus is Lord and be worshiping Satan. THAT is the difference.
@NightCometh@xanga - so, you believe that anyone who does not worship the Christian god is, by default, worshiping Satan?
@too_pretty_to_die@xanga - Yes I do. And all will perish and go to hell who aren't following Christ.
@NightCometh@xanga - ok... then, as i said, if non-Christians can unknowingly worship something, Christians can too. also, i didn't ask for your opinion on the state of their afterlives. but thanks for reminding me why i'm not Christian :)