Posted on 12/23/2003 3:20:28 PM PST by blam
Three centuries before Christ's birth, people celebrated 25 December, archaeologists claim
By David Keys Archaelology Correspondent
24 December 2003
Archeologists say they have traced the origins of the first Christmas to be celebrated on 25 December, 300 years before the birth of Christ. The original event marked the consecration of the ancient world's largest sun god statue, the 34m tall, 200 ton Colossus of Rhodes.
It has long been known that 25 December was not the real date of Christ's birth and that the decision to turn it into Jesus's birthday was made by Constantine, the Roman Emperor, in the early 4th century AD. But experts believe the origins of that decision go back to 283 BC, when, in Rhodes, the winter solstice occurred at about sunrise on 25 December.
The event was preserved by academics on Rhodes or in Alexandria, and seems to have been passed to Caesar by the Hellenistic Egyptian scientists, who advised him on his calendrical reforms.
The date was chosen because the emperor seems to have believed that the Roman sun god and Christ were virtually one and the same, and the sun's birthday had been decreed as 25 December some 50 years earlier by one of Constantine's predecessors, the Emperor Aurelian. He, in turn, seems to have chosen 25 December because, ever since Julius Caesar's calendar reforms of 46 BC, that date had been fixed as the official winter solstice, even though the real date for the solstice in Caesar's time was 23 December.
Dr Alaric Watson, one of the British historians involved in the current research and author of the major book on the period, Aurelian and the Third Century, said: "Constantine's choice of 25 December as the day on which to celebrate the birth of his divine patron, Christ, must be viewed in terms of the tradition on which Aurelian had drawn and which may well have originated in the celebration of the winter solstice at Rhodes some six centuries earlier.
"Constantine clearly saw his divine patron, initially Sol Invictus but later Christ, in much the same way as Aurelian had done. The imagery of Christ, like that of the ruler cults of the Hellenistic and Roman worlds, owed much to solar theology."
Jesus's real date of birth is not known, although various different pre-4th century traditions and computations put it either in the January to March period or in November.
I was wondering the same thing. Where were those growling dogs?
Read Grant. Lol. Rundown of the facts. Constantine called the council to quell arguments within the Empire's biggest religion. He couldn't risk civil unrest that could put the empire in further straits than it was already in. He was holding an empire together by threads. He had to keep the military happy and the people from having any reason to rebel against him or put him down like so many Emperors before him.
That said, attendance was required and enforced - at least in the east. Of some 2000 bishops said to attend, only about 6 of them arrived from the west. The term "pope" didn't as yet exist as an office. Nor did the Bishop of Rome have any part in the calling of this council.. it was compelled by the Emperor. And no one was allowed to leave until matters were settled. Now, it's said that other matters were discussed. It's difficult to imagine getting that many people together and not having that happen. It rather seems unlikely you could shut them up. The issue they were called to address was the Arian issue over the nature of Christ vs that of God. Now, The majority liked pretty strict language that would box Arius in, while Constantine suggested looser language that tended to give Arius breathing room. Arius, it must be said, was pals with the Emperor; but was head strong and set on his postion. The double tongued nature of the loose language Constantine suggested only ticked off Arius. And when he blew up, the Emperor banished him.
The fun thing in all this that nobody wants too much light on is that Eusebius was an Arian, as were all of Constantine's closest advisors. And Constantine far and away preferred the Arians. Arius wasn't banished for heresy. He was banished for causing disunity in the Empire. Whether he was right, wrong or indifferent didn't much enter into things, just as it hadn't with the Donatists.
You should note that the Big crime of the Donatists is largely bunk. The truth paints a somewhat less attractive story. Under prior persecution Christian sects were ordered by the emperor to turn over their religious texts to the empire and to honor the pagan gods of Rome like any other 'good citizen'. Many of the sects did so. Donatus was at the head of the line to both decline to follow the emperor's directive and to call it for the sin it was amongst the others. This earned him the indignation of the majority and though he was right, he had to be silenced.
Constantine is credited as having put down Donatism; but, in truth it outlived him. Fact vs. fantasy. Donatus pointed out probably more than that. The roman religions didn't disappear or lose favor, they got a paint job and new names. Theodosius Made Catholicism an official religion and overnight, seemingly, the pantheon of gods for everything under the sun gave way to a pantheon of saints for everything under the sun. Instead of asking the god of dog bites for assistance, you instead would pray to the saint for dog bites. It didn't bother them that crafting idols was against the ten commandments. Nor was it a hindrance that according to scripture, dead people can't have anything to do with the goings on of the living. Regardless of whether they died righteous or evil.. a way had to be made to "keep unity" of the empire which meant inclusion. Thus the modern approach whereby Catholics find "objective truth" in all religions for sake of argument. The roman rites didn't dissapear, they just put on a new dress and pretended to be Christian. It kept the pagans happy with the new state religion that was all the rage. It kept some semblance of unity even if it had to be a lie to happen. And it ultimately led to Rome's bishop and followers defrauding the empire in Constantine's name later - thus the need for the fantasy side of the stories. In their lust for power, and piles of fruadulent documents to bolster their false claims, they goofed and included a fraudulent copy of the documents from nicaea. The Orthodoxers had the originals and rightly corrected the record. The fraud is web posted; but, nicaea has been fraudulently altered in many ways in order to paint a picture that simply was not so. I wouldn't limit my reading on the subject as I know of no single work that deals only with that issue personally. I also don't recommend not reading the Catholic versions. It's actually a good idea to read it and forget it, check your facts, then go back and read their version and compare. It's an eye opener.
Do you have a better site? As I said, I found very little on the Ulansey site to confirm, and several things that contradicted the athiest site which had Mithra as another version of Jesus.
True enough. But Dec 24 or 25 is when you can see the that Sun is starting to come back North again. It's not deserting us! We're not going to freeze to death this Winter! Let's have a party!
Yeah, it would've been a reason to celebrate. But calculating Jesus' conception in the bible it comes to Dec 25, not Dec 21, even though due to innacurate calandars in the Roman period then the Winter Solstice may have been on the 25th. If we wanted to time the conception to the Solstice, we'd celebrate it on the 21st, not the 25th. Therefore it is two separate holidays notwithstanding they happened to hit the same day then.
Of course. The Israelites were reknowned for their knowledge of the stars. When I say that the Course of Abia ended on June 19, that is a calculation from the actual Israelite dates of the time and it's proabably more accurate than what the Romans had. So the Course of Abia ended on June 19, Zachariah couldn't travel on June 20 because that was a Sabbath, so his journey home would've started on the 21st. He was an old man so it would've been a 2 or 3 day journey, we're already up to the 24th. Allow a day for rest/conception and you get the 25th. Elizabeth's 6th month of pregnancy would've began on December 25, not December 21. No matter how you slice it, the Solstice is missed by 4 days, innacurate Roman calanders notwithstanding.
like the other ancient "mystery religions," such as the Eleusinian mysteries and the mysteries of Isis, Mithraism maintained strict secrecy about its teachings and practices, revealing them only to initiates. As a result, reconstructing the beliefs of the Mithraic devotees has posed an enormously intriguing challenge to scholarly ingenuity. . . .
Owing to the cult's secrecy, we possess almost no literary evidence about the beliefs of Mithraism. The few texts that do refer to the cult come not from Mithraic devotees themselves, but rather from outsiders such as early Church fathers, who mentioned Mithraism in order to attack it, and Platonic philosophers, who attempted to find support in Mithraic symbolism for their own philosophical ideas. However, although our literary sources for Mithraism are extremely sparse,
What the athiests are spreading about Mithraism is a lot of bull fertilizer based on what Mr. Ulansey concedes is "extremely sparse" evidence. Mr. Ulansey himself seems to be rather eccentric and quite an enthusist for leftist causes and, for want of a better description, new age spirituality.
Should he celebrate carpentry with a mitre box?
Actually it's just the shortest day. Neither the latest rising nor earliest setting. Equation Of Time
The earliest sunset is about Dec 7 in the US and the latest sunrise about Jan 14. It has some latitude in its variation.
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