Author: facts / Source: Facts Daily
Learn Christmas facts about the holidays that will alter the way you see it! Find out the relatively unknown origins of Christmas and many of its most beloved symbols.
Christmas is arguably the most important holiday in America. No other day commands the reverence and spending that December the 25th does, not even close.
But, how much do you know about the day? In theory, the holiday is over 2,000 years old. Christmas went through some changes in its meaning and how we celebrate it.Of course, the way we celebrate the holiday today is our choice, and it likely won’t change anytime soon. But it is important to know where we have come from so that we aren’t doing anything under pretenses. Let’s dive into some lesser known Christmas facts that will change the way you see this holiday forever.
Jesus Wasn’t Born on Christmas
Or, more accurately, he wasn’t born on December 25th. He wasn’t even born in the winter. If Christmas was the day when Jesus Christ was born, then we are celebrating it on a wrong day. Furthermore, he wasn’t even born in the year 1 A.D. as math might suggest. The Christmas facts are quite different.
Scientists do not agree on when Jesus was born, but they know it wasn’t on the 25th of December.
Some scientists go by the fabled Star of Bethlehem, which could be some things. Chinese records show that a slow moving comet appeared in the sky around 5 B.C. which could account for the sign that heralded Jesus’s birth.
Other researchers suggest that Jupiter and Venus coming together may have created the illusion of a bright star in the sky, but that happened in June of 2 B.C.
It could also have been a convergence of Jupiter and Saturn, but that occurred in the Autumn of 7 B.C. If the star is what notes the birth of Christianity’s founder, then December is all wrong.
But what if it was just a normal star that was exaggerated or something that was unpredictable, like a meteor?
Well, then let’s look at the legend itself, in which shepherds are watching over their flocks during Jesus’s birth. This is not something that you do in winter but in the spring. Flocks are safely corralled during the winter months when there is no grass to eat in the pastures.
If we will follow the biblical narrative, then Jesus’s birth was closer to what we consider Easter than December 25th. This evidence does not suggest that Jesus was not real, however. It merely points out that we are wrong in attributing December 25th as Jesus’s birthday. The bible never mentioned December 25th also.
If you want to get super technical (and we do), Jesus’s December 25th was even different than ours. It was in the 16th century when the modern Gregorian Calendar we use today was introduced. So, why do we celebrate Christmas on December 25th? Well…
Christmas Is a Pagan Holiday That Was Appropriated by Christianity
Long before the birth of Jesus Christ, there was a holiday right around December 25th. People call this holiday, Saturnalia. This Roman holiday celebrated, as the name suggests, the god Saturn, with feasts and revelry. We would also like to note that these Saturnian celebrations were not very Christian by today’s standards. The Christmas facts don’t lie.
The festival celebrated life and the coming of the new year by the Julian Calendar, and it is not a coincidence that this festival took place near the Winter Solstice. This is a natural time of rebirth…
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