The True Origin of Christmas

INTRODUCTION

Where did Christmas originate? From the Bible or paganism? What is the real origin of
Chrismass.

Every year after Thanksgiving, most people's thoughts turn to Christmas. It is the time when
professing Christians are supposed to focus on Jesus Christ. After all, it is the Christ-mass
season.

Christmas is thought by most to be a wonderful time, focusing the participants on giving, family
togetherness, beautiful music and decorations, feasting on special foods and singing Christmas
carols throughout the neighborhood. All of this is supposedly centered on the worship of Christ.
Surely the Bible instructs us to do all these.

Pagan Origin

Nearly all aspects of Christmas observance have their roots in Roman custom and religion. The
earliest reference to Christmas being marked on Dec. 25 comes from the second century after
Jesus' birth. It is considered likely, the first Christmas celebrations were in reaction to the Roman
Saturnalia, a harvest festival that marked the winter solstice the return of the sun and honored
Saturn, the god of sowing.

In the Scriptures, no one is recorded to have kept a feast or held a great banquet on his birthday.
It is only sinners (like Pharaoh and Herod) who make great rejoicings over the day in which they
were born into this world. The Roman Governor having see that Jesus Birthday is not Known a
feast was established in memory of this event [Christ's birth] in the fourth century.

Was Christ Born on December 25th?

Christ was born in the fall of the year. Many have mistakenly believed He was born around the
beginning of winter December 25th they are wrong. It was custom among Jews to send out their
sheep to the deserts about the Passover [early spring], and bring them home at the
commencement of the first rain.

therefore it is improper for the shepherd to watch over their flocks by night if Jesus was born on
25th Dec.which is the beginning of the Winter season Luke 2:8 explains that ,when Christ was
born, there were in the same country shepherds abiding in the field, keeping watch over their
flock by night. Note that they were abiding in the field. This never happened in December.
Both Ezra 10:9-13 and the Song of Solomon 2:11 show that winter was the rainy season and
shepherds could not stay on cold, open fields at night.
Integration into Christianity

Finally, let's examine what God told His people about sharing, caring and support of each
neibour.the Spirit of the conversion of paganism to the worship of God the almighty is borne out
of a genue love and respect to celebrate the only sinless son of GOD who is and was without sin.

Let us embrace such a well thought innovation to project Christ and emulate the same.

Thank You.

REFRENCE SOURCE: By David C. Pack

COMPILED BY: REV DAVID ASHITEY AHULU

PRESENTED BY:
The True Origin of Christmas

By David C. Pack

Where did Christmas originate? From the Bible or paganism? What is the real origin of Santa
ClausmistletoeChristmas treesholly wreathsand the custom of exchanging gifts? Many
are concerned about putting Christ back into Christmas. Was He ever there? Here are the
stunning answers!

Every year after Thanksgiving, most people's thoughts turn to Christmas. It is the time when
professing Christians are supposed to focus on Jesus Christ. After all, it is the Christ-mass
season!

Christmas is thought by most to be a wonderful time, focusing the participants on giving, family
togetherness, beautiful music and decorations, feasting on special foods and singing Christmas
carols throughout the neighborhood (as my family did every year). All of this is supposedly
centered around the worship of Christ. Surely the Bible instructs us to do all thisright?

The answers will shock you!

Why do people think that Christmas is wonderful? Most never reflect on why they believe what
they believe or do what they do. We live in a world filled with customs, but few ever seek to
understand their origin. We generally accept them without question. Most people basically do
what everyone else doesbecause it is easy and natural!

Let's carefully examine the roots of Christmas. Let's look at why people follow the customs
associated with it. Why is it kept on December 25th? Did the early New Testament Church keep
it? This article is filled with facts from history that, when placed together, paint a complete
picture. Let's avoid all assumptions and only accept what can be PROVEN!

Pagan Origin

In 1990, the Solon, Ohio (a Cleveland suburb) school board banned all nativity and other
Christmas scenes on any school property because they felt it violated the separation of church
and state. They were challenged in court when outraged parents opposed them, feeling that
Christmas was being stolen from their children and the community. The board lost the case! The
citizenry had contended that Christmas was a worldwide tradition that was not part of, and
transcended, religion. It was deemed to be seculara part of virtually all cultures worldwide.

The court decision affirmed that Christmas has no Christian roots! However, the court's opinion
also noted that Bible reading and prayer obviously are associated with Christ-ianitya
remarkable admission! The court concluded that Christmas-keeping and manger scenes could
remain because they are not really part of either Christianity or religionbut prayer and Bible
reading, which are, must remain excluded from schools!

Nearly all aspects of Christmas observance have their roots in Roman custom and religion.
Consider the following admission from a large American newspaper (The Buffalo News, Nov. 22,
1984): The earliest reference to Christmas being marked on Dec. 25 comes from the second
century after Jesus' birth. It is considered likely the first Christmas celebrations were in reaction
to the Roman Saturnalia, a harvest festival that marked the winter solsticethe return of the sun
and honored Saturn, the god of sowing. Saturnalia was a rowdy time, much opposed by the
more austere leaders among the still-minority Christian sect. Christmas developed, one scholar
says, as a means of replacing worship of the sun with worship of the Son. By 529 A.D., after
Christianity had become the official state religion of the Roman Empire, Emperor Justinian made
Christmas a civic holiday. The celebration of Christmas reached its peaksome would say its
worst momentsin the medieval period when it became a time for conspicuous consumption
and unequaled revelry.

Consider these quotes from the Catholic Encyclopedia, 1911 edition, under Christmas:
Christmas was not among the earliest festivals of the Churchthe first evidence of the feast is
from Egypt. Further, Pagan customs centering around the January calends gravitated to
Christmas. Under Natal Day, Origen, an early Catholic writer, admitted, In the Scriptures,
no one is recorded to have kept a feast or held a great banquet on his birthday. It is only sinners
(like Pharaoh and Herod) who make great rejoicings over the day in which they were born into
this world (emphasis mine).

The Encyclopedia Americana, 1956 edition, adds, Christmaswas not observed in the first
centuries of the Christian church, since the Christian usage in general was to celebrate the death
of remarkable persons rather than their birtha feast was established in memory of this event
[Christ's birth] in the fourth century. In the fifth century the Western Church ordered the feast to
be celebrated forever on the day of the Mithraic rites of the birth of the sun and at the close of the
Saturnalia, as no certain knowledge of the day of Christ's birth existed.

There is no mistaking the origin of the modern Christmas celebration. Many additional sources
could be cited and we will return to this later. Let's begin to tie some other facts together.

It was 300 years after Christ before the Roman church kept Christmas, and not until the fifth
century that it was mandated to be kept throughout the empire as an official festival honoring
Christ.

Can Christ Be Honored by Christmas?

The most common justification that one will hear regarding Christmas is that people have
replaced old pagan customs and intents by asserting that they are now focusing on Christ. I
have heard many say that they are honoring Christ in their Christmas-keeping. The problem is
that God does not say this is acceptable to Him! Actually, He plainly commands against it!
Keeping Christmas dishonors Christ! He considers everything about it to be an abomination! We
will soon see why.

Christ said, But in vain they do worship Me, teaching for doctrines the commandments of men
(Matt. 15:9). Christmas is not a command of Godit is a tradition of men. Christ continued,
Full well you reject the commandment of God, that you may keep your own tradition (Mark
7:9). Every year, throughout the world, on December 25th, hundreds of millions do just that!

We will see that God plainly commands, Follow not the way of the heathen. But most people
do not fear God, and He allows them to make their own decisions. Human beings are free moral
agentsfree to obey or disobey God! But woe to those who ignore the plain Word of God!

Was Christ Born on December 25th?

Christ was born in the fall of the year. Many have mistakenly believed He was born around the
beginning of winterDecember 25th! They are wrong! Notice the Adam Clarke Commentary,
volume 5, page 370, New York edition: It was custom among Jews to send out their sheep to the
deserts about the Passover [early spring], and bring them home at the commencement of the first
rain. The first rains began in early-to-mid fall. Continuing with this same quote: During the
time they were out, the shepherds watched them night and day. Asthe first rain began early in
the month of March-esvan, which answers to part of our October and November [begins
sometime in October], we find that the sheep were kept out in the open country during the whole
summer. And as these shepherds had not yet brought home their flocks, it is a presumptive
argument that October had not yet commenced, and that, consequently, our Lord was not born on
the 25th of December, when no flocks were out in the fields; nor could He have been born later
than September, as the flocks were still in the fields by night. On this very ground, the nativity in
December should be given up. The feeding of the flocks by night in the fields is a chronological
factSee the quotations from the Talmudists in Lightfoot.

Luke 2:8 explains that when Christ was born, there were in the same country shepherds abiding
in the field, keeping watch over their flock by night. Note that they were abiding in the field.
This never happened in December. Both Ezra 10:9-13 and the Song of Solomon 2:11 show that
winter was the rainy season and shepherds could not stay on cold, open fields at night.

Numerous encyclopedias plainly state that Christ was not born on December 25th! The Catholic
Encyclopedia directly confirms this. In all likelihood, Christ was born in the fall! A lengthy
technical explanation would prove this point.
Since we now know that December 25th was nowhere near Christ's actual birthdate, where did
the festival associated with this date come from?

Now read this quote under Christmas: In the Roman world, the Saturnalia (December 17) was
a time of merrymaking and exchanging of gifts. December 25 was also regarded as the birthdate
of the Iranian mystery god Mithra, the Sun of Righteousness. On the Roman New Year (January
1), houses were decorated with greenery and lights, and gifts were given to children and the poor.
To these observances were added the German and Celtic Yule rites when the Teutonic tribes
penetrated into Gaul, Britain and central Europe. Food and good fellowship, the Yule log and
Yule cakes, greenery and fir trees, gifts and greetings all commemorated different aspects of this
festive season. Fires and lights, symbols of warmth and lasting life, have always been associated
with the winter festival, both pagan and Christian (Encyclopedia Britannica, 15th ed., vol. II, p.
903).

A final quote about the selection of December 25th as the birthdate of Christ is necessary. Note
an article in The Toronto Star, December 1984, by Alan Edmonds, entitled, We owe a lot to
Druids, Dutch: The Reformation cast a blight on Christmas. By then, of course, clever
ecclesiastical politicians had adopted the Pagan mid-winter festival as the alleged birthdate of
Jesus, of Nazareth, and thrown in a few other Pagan goodies to make their takeover more
palatable.

December 25th was not selected because it was the birth of Christ or because it was even near it.
It was selected because it coincided with the idolatrous pagan festival Saturnaliaand this
celebration must be carefully examined. In any event, we do not know the exact date of Christ's
birth. While God certainly could have made it known, He chose to hide it from the world's eyes!

What About Santa Claus?

Parents reason that they owe the whole Christmas myth to their children! Christmas traditions are
focused primarily on kids, and they are certainly the center of most of what happens. I know
because I kept seventeen Christmases. My older sister and younger brother and I were the
recipients of much and the givers of very little on that dayand it all started with the Santa
Claus lie.

Some years ago, a priest in New Jersey told his Sunday school class that Santa was a myth. The
outrage from parents and his supervisors was swift. He had killed Santa! He had destroyed
family tradition! He had usurped family authority, the article continued. He was officially
censored by his superiors for being overzealous and insensitive.

His crime? He told the truth!

According to Langer's Encyclopedia of World History, (article Santa), Santa was a common
name for Nimrod throughout Asia Minor. This was also the same fire god who came down the
chimneys of the ancient pagans and the same fire god to whom infants were burned and eaten in
human sacrifice among those who were once God's people.

Today Santa Claus comes from Saint Nicholas. Washington Irving, in 1809, is responsible for
remaking the original old, stern bishop of this same name into the new jolly St. Nick in his
Knickerbocker History of New York. (Most of the rest of America's Christmas traditions are even
more recent than this.) Old Nick has long been recognized as a term for the devil.

In Revelation 2:6 and 15, we read about a doctrine of the Nicolaitanes, which Christ twice tells
His Church [He] hates. Let's analyze the word Nicolaitane. It means follower of Nicholas.
Nikos means conqueror, destroyer. Laos means people. Nicolaitanes, then, are people who
follow the conqueror or destroyerNimrod. If you have believed that following Christmas is an
innocent Christian custom, let this truth sink in!

Is It Scriptural to Exchange Gifts?

Merchants regularly report that over 60% of their annual retail sales occur during the Christmas
shopping season. This represents a tremendous amount of gift buying. Most today believe that
gift-giving comes from the Bible example of the three wise men (the Bible gives no number)
presenting gifts to Christ. Is this true? Where did exchanging gifts come from, and what does
God's Word say about it?

The Bibliotheca Sacra states, The interchange of presents between friends is a like
characteristic of Christmas and the Saturnalia, and must have been adopted by Christians from
the pagans, as the admonition of Tertullian plainly shows (Vol. 12, pp. 153-155).

Like every other aspect of Christmas, the shocking truth is that even this supposed Christian
custom does not come from the Bible. It is an irony that people love to believe they are following
the custom of the wise men giving to Christ, when actually they are giving almost exclusively to
each other! What hypocrisy! Christ is completely forgotten.

The Bible actually teaches that Christians should not keep birthdays. Numerous scriptures make
this principle clear. (Read our article Are Birthday Celebrations Christian?) However, what if
you went to a birthday party that had been prepared for you and everybody gave gifts to each
other and you were left out? The idea is ridiculous! If this happened, you would say that people
were being selfish and forgetting you. In fact, most people give to others on Christmas merely
because they expect to receive gifts themselves!

Let's briefly return to the wise men who gave gifts to Christ. The scripture describing this is
Matthew 2:1-11: Now when Jesus was born in Bethlehem of Judaea in the days of Herod the
king, behold, there came wise men from the east to Jerusalem, saying, Where is He that is born
King of the Jews?And when they were come into the house, they saw the young Child with
Mary His mother, and fell down, and worshipped him: and when they had opened their treasures,
they presented unto Him gifts; gold, and frankincense, and myrrh.

It is commonly supposed that these were birthday presents for baby Jesus. But is this what the
Bible actually says? Absolutely not! First, it is important to note that they did give the gifts to
Jesus. They did not stand in his presence and exchange gifts among themselves or give them to
others. The gifts were presented unto Him. Also, they arrived well after his birthday. This is
another reason these could not have been birthday presents.

A long-standing, ancient custom of the East was to present gifts when coming before a king.
These men understood they were in the presence of the King of the Jews. The Bible carries
many examples of people sending gifts to kings or presenting them upon arrival into their
presence. This custom is common today when ambassadors or others come into the presence of a
world leader.

Finally, notice what the Adam Clarke Commentary, volume 5, page 46, states about what really
happened on this occasion: Verse 11. They presented unto him gifts. The people of the east
never approach the presence of kings and great personages, without a present in their hands. This
custom is often noticed in the Old Testament, and still prevails in the east, and in some of the
newly discovered South Seas Islands. Gifts were customarily presented to kings.

What could be more plain?

Origin of the Christmas Tree

No article about Christmas is complete without some explanation of the Christmas tree. We
have touched on it without directly focusing on it. The modern Christmas tree originated in
Germany. But the Germans got it from the Romans, who got it from the Babylonians and the
Egyptians.

The following demonstrates what the Babylonians believe about the origin of the Christmas tree:
An old Babylonish fable told of an evergreen tree which sprang out of a dead tree stump. The
old stump symbolized the dead Nimrod, the new evergreen tree symbolized that Nimrod had
come to life again in Tammuz! Among the Druids the oak was sacred, among the Egyptians it
was the palm, and in Rome it was the fir, which was decorated with red berries during the
Saturnalia! (Walsh, Curiosities of Popular Customs, p. 242).

Frederick J. Haskin's Answers to Questions states, The Christmas tree is from Egypt, and its
origin dates from a period long anterior to the Christmas Era. Did you know thisthat the
Christmas tree long preceded Christianity?
Most aspects of Christmas are not referred to in the Bible. Of course, the reason is that they are
not from Godthey are not part of the way He wants people to worship Him. The Christmas
tree, however, is directly mentioned in the Bible! Turn to Jeremiah 10:2-5, Thus says the Lord,
Learn not the way of the heathenFor the customs of the people are vain: for one cuts a tree out
of the forest, the work of the hands of the workman, with the axe. They deck it with silver and
with gold; they fasten it with nails and with hammers, that it move not. They are upright as the
palm tree, but speak not: they must needs be borne, because they cannot go. Be not afraid of
them; for they cannot do evil, neither also is it in them to do good.

This plain description of the modern Christmas tree is clear. God directly refers to it as the way
of the heathen. Just as directly, He commands His people to learn not the way of the heathen,
calling these customs vain. Verse 23 adds a remarkable and powerful statement: O LORD, I
know that the way of man is not in himself: it is not in man that walks to direct his [own] steps.
God must teach people how to live. Man simply cannot figure out God's ways for himself.

There is no room in Jeremiah 10 to believe, as some have tried to suggest, that because these
trees are powerless of themselves, it is not really forbidden to have a Christmas tree. God
condemns the putting up of pagan (Christmas) trees with this plain Bible command!

The Source of Holly Wreaths, Yule Logs and Mistletoe

The Encyclopedia Americana states, The holly, the mistletoe, the Yule logare relics of pre-
Christian time. In other words, paganism! The Yule log was commonly used in a rite of
Teutonic nature worship.

Frederick Haskin further states, The use of Christmas wreaths is believed by authorities to be
traceable to the pagan customs of decorating buildings and places of worship at the feast which
took place at the same time as Christmas.

The Encyclopedia Britannica, under Celastrales, exposes the origin of the holly wreath:
European pagans brought holly sprays into their homes, offering them to the fairy people of the
forests as refuge from the harsh winter weather. During the Saturnalia, the Roman winter
festival, branches of holly were exchanged as tokens of friendship. The earliest Roman
Christians apparently used holly as a decoration at the Christmas season.

There are dozens of different types of holly. Virtually all of them come in male and female
varietiessuch as Blue Prince and Blue Princess or Blue Boy and Blue Girl or China Boy
and China Girl. Female holly plants cannot have berries unless a nearby male plant pollinates
them. It is easy to see why the holly wreath found its way into pagan rituals as a token of
friendship and fertility!
Christmas is incomplete to many unless it involves kissing under the mistletoe. This pagan
custom was natural on a night that involved much revelry done in the spirit of drunken orgies.
Just like today, this kissing usually occurred at the beginning of any modern
Saturnalia/Christmas celebration. I will never forget having to always kiss my friends' mothers
upon entering each of their houses every Christmas. It was the first thing that we did. I hated it
but it was something I had to do! Mistletoe was considered to have special powers of healing
for those who reveled under it.

The Encyclopedia Britannica, under Santalales, states, The European mistletoe is thought to
have had special ritual significance in Druidical ceremonies and lives in folklore today, its
special status as the Christmas mistletoe having come from Anglo-Saxon times. Mistletoe is a
parasite that lives on oak trees. (Recall that the Druids worshipped in oak tree groves.) The
ancient Celtics (associated with the Druids) used to give mistletoe as an herbal remedy to barren
animals to make them fertile. It is still referred to as all healer in Celtic.

Like mistletoe, holly berries were also thought to be sacred to the sun god. The original sun log
came to be called the yule log. Yule simply means wheel, which has long been a pagan
representation of the sun. No wonder people today commonly speak of the sacred yule-tide
season.

What Should You Do?

Finally, let's examine what God told His people they should do and the way they ought to teach
their children.

Human beings do not want to obey God (Rom. 8:7). They would rather follow their own
imagination. They do not understand that God wants their lives to go well. He wants
happiness, joy and blessings to flow into people's lives. All these are the results of obeying Him.

God inspired Moses to warn parents of the grave responsibility that they have in what and how
they teach their children. Notice His instruction in Deuteronomy 6:1, 6-7, 20-21, 25: Now these
are the commandmentswhich the LORD your God commanded to teach you, that you might do
them in the land where you go to possess itAnd these words, which I command you this day,
shall be in your heart: And you shall teach them diligently unto your children, and shall talk of
them when you sit in your house, and when you walk by the way, and when you lie down, and
when you rise upAnd when your son asks you in time to come, saying, What mean the
testimonies, and the statutes, and the judgments, which the LORD our God has commanded you?
Then you shall say unto your son, We were Pharaoh's bondmen in Egypt; and the LORD brought
us out of Egypt with a mighty handAnd it shall be our righteousness, if we observe to do all
these commandments before the LORD our God, as He has commanded us.
God took Israel out of Egyptout of the customs of the world around them and revealed His
Law to them. He does not want His people going back to the traditions, customs and ways from
which He has called them.

When all of the interconnected traditions, filled with the symbolism of worshipping an ancient
pagan, humanly devised god, are taught, this is not worshipping the true Creator.

The prophet Isaiah was inspired to write, Cry aloud, spare not, lift up your voice like a trumpet,
and show My people their transgression (58:1). I have done this.