where did December 25 originate for celebrating Christmas and when was it established?

Question

It was my understanding that Christ was born in the spring and not the winter. I have never read up on the history of establishing December 25th as the designated birthday of Jesus and am curious to know the details. Thanks!

Answer 1

The truth is that all of the customs of Christmas pre-date the birth of Jesus Christ, and a study of this would reveal that
Christmas in our day is a collection of traditions and practices taken from many cultures and nations.

The date of December 25th comes from Rome and was a celebration of the Italic god, Saturn, and the rebirth of the sun god.

This was done long before the birth of Jesus.

It was noted by the pre-Christian Romans and other pagans, that daylight began to increase after December 22nd, when they assumed that the sun god died.

These ancients believed that the sun god rose from the dead three days later as the new-born and venerable sun.

Thus, they figured that to be the reason for increasing daylight.

This was a cause for much wild excitement and celebration. Gift giving and merriment filled the temples of ancient Rome, as sacred priests of Saturn, called dendrophori, carried wreaths of evergreen boughs in procession.

In Germany, the evergreen tree was used in worship and celebration of the yule god, also in observance of the resurrected sun god.

The evergreen tree was a symbol of the essence of life and was regarded as a phallic symbol in fertility worship.

Witches and other pagans regarded the red holly as a symbol of the menstrual blood of the queen of heaven, also known as Diana.

The holly wood was used by witches to make wands.

The white berries of mistletoe were believed by pagans to represent droplets of the semen of the sun god.

Both holly and mistletoe were hung in doorways of temples and homes to invoke powers of fertility in those who stood beneath and kissed, causing the spirits of the god and goddess to enter them.

Answer 2

Christianity was under scrutiny by the Roman Empire (Rome, you cannot have Rome without Rome) for the birth of Christ. Even before the birth of Christ, Judaism was not always considered a valid option by the Roman Empire. Out of all the relgions assimilated by the Roman Empire, Christianity found disfavor with most of the Roman Emperors and thus was always under strict scrutiny as being a valid religion. If you were not assimilated by the Romans, you were considered an opposition and thus to be enslaved. Christianity occassionally made its rough transpasses through these times, in which the symbol of a fish was even drawn on the ground to secretly denote the identity of a Christian. To avoid disruption of religious practices, many Christians eventually attempted a peaceful resolution and adopted December 25 as their day to celebrate the birth of their Christ and their God.

Answer 3

The date of 25th December for celebrating goes all the way back to 451, when a lot of countries priests met in some country (sorry i forgot where it was), to settle one date they all agreed on, which had something to do with another holiday for some Sun-God. If some of you wonder why the Armenian Christmas is celebrated January 6th, or if you didn't know at all, it is because we weren't present at that meeting, we were busy with a war.
Much like blapath already stated.

Answer 4

I think it has something to do with the Winter Solstice and Druids. I think celebrating a birth or something like that goes back thousands of years, before the arrival of JC.

Answer 5

It was placed on the 25th of December to coincide with the old Pagan Feast of Yule and the "Great Mother". It helped to transform (co-opt? depending on your viewpoint) old Pagan festivals into Christian Festivals

Answer 6

Jeremiah 10:2
Thus saith the LORD, Learn not the way of the heathen, and be not dismayed at the signs of heaven; for the heathen are dismayed at them. 3 For the customs of the people [are] vain: for [one] cutteth a tree out of the forest, the work of the hands of the workman, with the axe. 4 They deck it with silver and with gold; they fasten it with nails and with hammers, that it move not.

2 Corinthians 6:14-18
Be ye not unequally yoked together with unbelievers: for what fellowship hath righteousness with unrighteousness? and what communion hath light with darkness?
And what concord hath Christ with Belial? or what part hath he that believeth with an infidel?
And what agreement hath the temple of God with idols? for ye are the temple of the living God; as God hath said, I will dwell in them, and walk in [them]; and I will be their God, and they shall be my people.
Wherefore come out from among them, and be ye separate, saith the Lord, and touch not the unclean [thing]; and I will receive you,
And will be a Father unto you, and ye shall be my sons and daughters, saith the Lord Almighty.

Are you Christian or pagan?

CHRISTMAS AND PAGANISM
The Winter Solstice Why did the catholic church choose December 25 for the birth date of Christ? It was chosen in order to compete with the pagan winter solstice festivals. It was not chosen because it is the correct historical date for the birth of Jesus. When was Jesus born? No one knows. There seems to have been too many calendar errors for anyone to be exact. The traditional date of the year 1 A.D. for his birth stands greatly in need of correction. Before the mode of reckoning time "by the year of our Lord," or A.D., which was introduced by Dionysius Exiguus, a Roman, time was computed from the founding of the city of Rome, usually designated by A.U.C. Dionysius made his New Era to begin on the first day of January in the 753rd year from the building of Rome; because in that year he supposed Christ to have been born. St. Matthew says Jesus was born in Bethlehem of Judea in the days of Herod the King. According to the best authorities this monarch died a short time before the Jewish Passover 750 U.U.C. Someplace the birth of Jesus between the years 748 and 747 A.U.C., this is, 5 and 6 B.C. Others go as far back as 8 B.C.

But the Season in which he was born definitely was not winter. The Gospels tell us that at this time Caesar Augustus had decreed that all the world should be taxed. We may be assured that Rome would not order a census to be taken at the worst possible period for travel; but Luke's account that the shepherds were abiding in the field keeping watch over their flocks by night lets us know that Jesus was born in summer or early fall. Since December is cold and rainy in Judea, it is likely the shepherds would have sought shelter for their flocks at night. So December 25 is no more the correct historical date for the birth of Jesus Christ than any other date.

December 25th was sacred, not only to the pagan Romans, but to the religion from Persia, Mithraism, whose followers worshipped the sun and celebrated its return to strength on that day. Mithras had attained such popularity and favor in the eyes of the emperors that Aurelian proclaimed the cult of Sol Invictus the Roman Empire's official state religion. December 25 fell between the week long feast of the Saturnalia and the Kalends of January, and it coincided more or less closely with all those mid-winter festivals at which the primitive peoples of Europe and Asia had celebrated, from time immemorial, the sun's rebirth at the Winter Solstice.

To the pagans, the Saturnalia were fun. To the "Christians" the Saturnalia were an abomination in homage to a disreputable god who had no existence anyway. The "Christians" were now dedicated to the slow task of converting the pagan Romans. There were many immigrants into the ranks of the Church by this time, but the Church Fathers discovered that they were facing an invasion of pagan customs. Christianity and Paganism began contending, and for a while Mithraism was Christianity's greatest contender. But how did the catholic church convert the pagans with their December 25th sun-worship festival? It became the policy of the church to "transform" pagan festivals wherever possible instead of trying to abolish them and give the ancient practices a "christian" significance. It definitely was a clever trick.

The Church, in choosing December 25th to celebrate the birthday of Christ, would persuade the followers of Mithras to forsake him and turn to Christ as a the true "light of the World." The Catholic Church chose this date to celebrate the rising of the sun of Righteousness that she should thus strive to draw away to His worship the adorers of the god whose symbol and representative was the earthly sun!. The Church Fathers sought to point the pagan festival in worship of the sun toward the "Christian" Sun of Righteousness, and if these could be done then the festival in its turn must of necessity grow worthy of him it celebrated. The Church finally succeeded in taking the merriment, the greenery, the lights, and the gifts from saturn and given them to the babe of Bethlehem.

By choosing December 25th, the indications are, that the Catholic Church grasped the opportunity to turn the people away from a purely pagan observance of the winter solstice to a day of adoration of Christ the Lord. She simply made the old heathen festival of the sun analogous to the birth of the "sun of Righteousness" The birth of Christ as the "Light of the World" was linked to the rebirth of the sun. The Church by making the pagan festival also the Feast of the Nativity, "sanctified" it, and thus as Christianity gained ground slowly but surely changed its ancient worship of the material sun into that of the true Light of the World.

That the new festival should not be lacking in splendor and appeal the days between December 25 and January 6 (the days between the Saturnalia and the Kalends of January) were caught up into one "holy" season, with the birth of the divine Child at the beginning and the coming of the Magi (the three Wise Men) at the end. The days between Christmas and Epiphany became known as the Twelve Nights of Christmas.

The word, "Christmas," came into use through the medieval custom of celebrating MASS at midnight on Christmas Eve, the only time in the year when this was permitted. BECAUSE OF THE OPPOSITION TO THE TRACES OF PAGANISM SURVIVING IN THE CHRISTMAS CUSTOMS, THE CHURCH CREATED SPECIAL MASSES TO BE PERFORMED AT MIDNIGHT, DAYBREAK, AND MORNING. Hence, the word, Christmas.


Christmas Candles The Yule candle was burned as a companion to the Yule log. The modern candles set in windows have their origin in the Yule candle.

The tradition was brought to this country by the Irish. In Ireland, during the years of religious suppression, candles were put in the windows to attract fugitive priests who would know it was safe to enter the houses and to say mass.

Modern candles used for decoration, though electric and not waxen, incorporate the same principle the catholic church set forth as Christ the Light of the World.

Evergreens, houses and public places were decorated with evergreens during the Saturnalia and Kalends of January. They were never sought merely for their decorative capabilities. The evergreens were used as defense against demons and witches they thought were especially prevalent during this time of year. They thought the winter demons were afraid of the greens because they stayed green all year. Green belongs in the realm of summer and life; winter kills most of summer's vegetation, but the evergreens remain steadfast. They were symbols of everlasting life to the heathen.

At first the Church frowned upon this intrusion of paganism into the sacred season on account of the superstitious sentiments which were bound up with them. But it was too deeply rooted for prohibitions to have permanent effect, and in due course they were annulled or forgotten. Instead of banning them she more often permitted their continuance, directing her efforts toward investing them with a new "sanctity" and meaning. While they were often made to represent higher and "holier" things, the older notions were not always discarded; hence, the mixture of ideas, pagan and "christian" which became entwisted with the greenery of the season. The plants, which more than any others, entwined themselves about the festival are holly, ivy, mistletoe, and rosemary.