The history of Christmas
Ahhh Christmas. The special time of year when Santa Claus, gifts drops eggnog makes you under the mistletoe do bad things, we get ugly gifts, we put a tree, and ... oh yes ... we celebrate the birth of Jesus. On December 25, Christians around the world is to honor and celebrate the birth of Jesus and the Spirit of the Lord.
But Christmas has turned into a mass market vacation where everyone has expensive gifts to give and receive, and everyone wants to know, "what you have." But it does not matter. It's not about the commercialization of the holiday. Let's talk about Christmas itself
(Note: .. If you are religious, stop reading this post will probably offend).
when Christians celebrate Christmas a time of the year around the world, the birth of Jesus. But the holidays origins have very little to do with Jesus. For starters, no one is really sure when he was born. New research computer and star maps suggests that he might have been born in June, giving it the second coolest twins after it would really make it yours. But no one is really sure. The Bible does not go into detail. So why do we celebrate it in December then?
Well, back at the beginning, Christianity was seen as just another kind of Judaism. But over the centuries, was the religion popular (for a number of reasons), but it still needs to convert a majority of the Roman population. One way to do that, it was easy to make for the Romans, by aligning all Christian holidays with Pagan holiday.
In ancient pagan times, the last day of winter was when the night celebrated the Great Mother goddess of childbirth are the baby Sun God. In Roman times, it was in the celebrations honoring Saturnus (the harvest god) and Mithras (the ancient god of light). The holiday symbolizes that the winter was not continue forever and life. The Romans called it Saturnalia and celebrated there between December 17 and 24 originally started (birthday of Saturn) with a ceremony on December 17, but was extended with a hard to end on 25 December (Sol Invictus). Many Christian writers connected to the rebirth of the sun to the birth of Jesus.
to avoid persecution, the early Christians decked their homes with Saturnalia holly. But actually, the early church did not celebrate the birth of Christ in December until Telesphorus, the second bishop of Rome, stated that worship should be kept during this time, but to celebrate "The birth of our Lord and Savior." Since no one was quite sure Christ was born in which month, people observed for more than 300 years, the birth of Jesus on various dates in the month.
And what about the tree?
The tradition of decorating trees with many different people occurs. The first recorded Christmas (as we know it) is going back to Riga in Latvia, in 1510. In the last quarter of the 16th century, Martin Luther is a small Christmas tree with candles have decorated to show his children how the stars twinkled through the dark Night.
Christmas is a day of symbols and coopted Pagan may be symbols, but for the most part, it is a time that we get together with our friends and family celebrate the end of the year and the beginning of a new. And when Christian to Jesus. No matter what, there is something festive this time of year. No matter what may be the origin, this is a beautiful time of year. I do not celebrate the holiday, but I enjoy going to Christmas parties. After you take the gifts, the holiday is to be real to eat with friends and family and good food. It is indeed a wonderful time of year.
Happy Holidays!
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