Is Christmas Pagan?

[ChristineM]

Oh my gosh. You just don't know when to stop pushing. They are not the same holy day, and we weren't discussing Easter. Enough.

I guess i pushed your button too hard. But facts are facts aren't they

 

[Jayhawker Soule]

Easter and the annunciation can occur on the same day but don't bother, i have found the answer myself.

Best I can tell, the last time Easter fell on March 25th was back in 1951. It won't happen again until 2035. What's the point?

 

[ChristineM]

Best I can tell, the last time Easter fell on March 25th was back in 1951. It won't happen again until 2035. What's the point?

It happens

 

[Jayhawker Soule]

It happens

Therefore?

 

[ChristineM]

Therefore?

No therefore about it, it happens, end of story

 

[Jayhawker Soule]

... facts are facts aren't they

They certainly are, and it's particularly fortuitous when they are relevant.

 

[ChristineM]

They certainly are, and it's particularly fortuitous when they are relevant.

All facts are relevant

 

[Bear Wild]

Basically from Easter (which has nothing to do with "Eostre" unless we want to continue the Northern Eurocentrism and assume Early Christianity was an English religion. "Easter" is some variant of pascha in almost all languages which derives from pesach: passover.)

Early Christians liked to compute dates for significant events long before The Roman Empire became Christian.

These dates were due to a calculation from the crucifixion and an assumption that Jesus lived a 'perfect number of years in the flesh' (2nd or 3rd C at the latest).

Thanks to the paschal table of Hippolytus, we can be sure that 25 March played an important role in Christian chronology as the date of the crucifixion since at least the early third century, thus laying the ground for an influential calendrical tradition in the Western church.

Since it was established early on that Jesus died on 25 March, and since it was also assumed, based on Luke’s annunciation narrative, that he was born in winter, early Christians would have been tempted to re-interpret 25 March as the day of conception, whereby they could then arrive at 25 December as the date of the nativity. The attractiveness of 25 March and 25 December – the vernal equinox and the winter solstice – as cardinal points in the life of the Savior was naturally further underscored by a widespread solar symbolism, which viewed Christ as the “sun of righteousness” and is clearly present in chronological texts such as De pascha computus and the aforementioned On the solstices. CP Nothaft - Early Christian Chronology and the Origins of the Christmas

Explain how Luke's narrative makes his birth in winter? And how to that compare with Mathews version?

 

[Augustus]

Explain how Luke's narrative makes his birth in winter? And how to that compare with Mathews version?

How you think 2nd/3rd C Christians should have interpreted their texts is irrelevant. What matters is how they interpreted their religion, and there are multiple sources that attest to this.

So far you have steadfastly ignored every bit of secular scholarship provided to you and simply asserted it was "stolen from the [Northern European] pagans", despite the 25th long predating the Christianisation of Northern Europe.

Why do you believe (Northern) European paganism has anything to do with the dates for Christmas (or Easter)? What actual evidence is there?

 

[Jayhawker Soule]

How you think 2nd/3rd C Christians should have interpreted their texts is irrelevant. What matters is how they interpreted their religion, and there are multiple sources that attest to this.

^ pretty much this

 

[amorphous_constellation]

Why do you believe (Northern) European paganism has anything to do with the dates for Christmas (or Easter)? What actual evidence is there?

Well there is Bede, who wrote out the pagan months. And he lived way closer to to the thing we're discussing than any modern scholar. So I trust that guy, even though he probably disliked the culture of his immediate antecedents. I took the time to read his ecclesiastical history of the english people, which I might even read again

Yet another problem with the 'Christmas is pagan' narrative is that we look at modern Christmas practices and assume they have a long, unbroken tradition since late-antiquity, rather than being things people started doing 1000+ years after the decline of paganism.

A lot of people might disagree with me on my next riff about that, but here goes.. I don't think any tradition really goes through time without being mutated. That's why when you read the poetic edda, the saga of the volsungs, and the nibelungenlied, you get a whole variety pack about who the descendants of the volsungs were.. And that's actually what's great about it. I think point is, that you can see that present is not spiritually irrelevant in the creative sense, as we can think of spiritually metaphors today that probably just as good, if we want. I don't think we have to go back a thousand years, to some dude's spiritual story who's alone in a cave, to get the real mccoy. The real mccoy can be all of us, now. And the narratives we live now are those the probably matter the most , to us

Even in the bible, the very early stories about Jesus showed far more creative potential than what we now have boiled it down to. Ever read the pistis sophia? It's absolutely wild

The santa story seems to be radiation of several folk themes, as mythic animals are often made to pull the moon or sun. Sleipnir flew, for example. Odin changed into an eagle, and rained down magic beer that conveyed different abilities as gifts, you might read about that in the skaldskaparmal, in the prose edda. In the poetic edda, you can read the 'escape of volund,' which a rather grim story about elf who apparently makes a flying machine. In my read of the bible, I don't recall that there were too many supernatural things like this that flew, save maybe god, who looks down at people who ' look like little ants. ' I'm not sure where that passage appears, but it's somewhere in there

 

[amorphous_constellation]

^ pretty much this

pretty much what? That's probably the most exotic era of Christian theology.. the pistis sophia figures Christ as doing battle with hordes of angels as he goes the through the aeons, shining 49 times brighter each time or something.. that seems to the period where scriptures were being generated, so that's a weird place to look for theological concrete

 

[Bear Wild]

How you think 2nd/3rd C Christians should have interpreted their texts is irrelevant. What matters is how they interpreted their religion, and there are multiple sources that attest to this.

So far you have steadfastly ignored every bit of secular scholarship provided to you and simply asserted it was "stolen from the [Northern European] pagans", despite the 25th long predating the Christianisation of Northern Europe.

Why do you believe (Northern) European paganism has anything to do with the dates for Christmas (or Easter)? What actual evidence is there?

Yes they do. Solstice was well established long before Christianity was even a thought. So yther4 you are incorrect. But you did not answer how Luke placed the birth if Jesus in winter. Please help me understand and correlate it with the interpretation from Mathew. What is the evidence that Jesus was born in the winter.

 

[Bear Wild]

How you think 2nd/3rd C Christians should have interpreted their texts is irrelevant. What matters is how they interpreted their religion, and there are multiple sources that attest to this.

So far you have steadfastly ignored every bit of secular scholarship provided to you and simply asserted it was "stolen from the [Northern European] pagans", despite the 25th long predating the Christianisation of Northern Europe.

Why do you believe (Northern) European paganism has anything to do with the dates for Christmas (or Easter)? What actual evidence is there?

Of course not that would reveal the reality and why would you want to do that.

 

[Bear Wild]

Not really sure why March 25 was chosen for the Feast of the Assumption. All I know is that this date was chosen for that Feast Day long before people began to celebrate Christmas.

Wikipedia says:

From the earliest recorded history, the feast[of the annunciation] has been celebrated on March 25, commemorating both the belief that the spring equinox was not only the day of God's act of Creation but also the beginning of Christ's redemption of that same Creation. All Christian antiquity held 25 March as the actual day of Jesus' death.​

For those in Europe this was the return of life to the land. It was an important time with rituals and symbols that were retained despite the efforts of the Roman Catholic Church to suppress these rituals. By tying in the myth of Jesus then the rituals and symbols could continue with a new symbolism to tie it in with the growing religion to make conversion easy.

 

[Bear Wild]

Oh my gosh. You just don't know when to stop pushing. They are not the same holy day, and we weren't discussing Easter. Enough.

But the symbolism of Eostre was clearly associated with symbolism of Easter. And the death of Jesus was then associated with his birth in a very Greek symbolic way. There is no evidence for the birth of Jesus on December 25 whic would have been still associated with the celebrations of Solstice. How convenient to connect critical solar times with the life and death of Jesus and convert the symbolism of Pagan celebrations to Christian. Jesus was Jewish and professed Jewish belief and values which these holidays have no meaning.

 

[Augustus]

Well there is Bede, who wrote out the pagan months. And he lived way closer to to the thing we're discussing than any modern scholar. So I trust that guy, even though he probably disliked the culture of his immediate antecedents. I took the time to read his ecclesiastical history of the english people, which I might even read again

The date of Jesus' birth on 25 Dec began in the Eastern Med by sometime between the 2nd and 4th C.

Yule seems to refer to a season in Northern Europe, and was first attested to in the 9th C in Northern Europe.

Pointing at Yule to be the origin of Christmas seems to be based on 2 very flawed premises a) that it clearly predates Christmas b) that Northern Europeans were the drivers of Early Christianity (see the ludicrous claim made in this thread that the dating of Easter relates to stealing the feast of some English goddess).

The santa story seems to be radiation of several folk themes, as mythic animals are often made to pull the moon or sun. Sleipnir flew, for example. Odin changed into an eagle, and rained down magic beer that conveyed different abilities as gifts, you might read about that in the skaldskaparmal, in the prose edda. In the poetic edda, you can read the 'escape of volund,' which a rather grim story about elf who apparently makes a flying machine. In my read of the bible, I don't recall that there were too many supernatural things like this that flew, save maybe god, who looks down at people who ' look like little ants. ' I'm not sure where that passage appears, but it's somewhere in there

Santa's reindeer were more a 19th C US invention than some long standing European folk tradition though.

Most of the "stolen from Yule" claims about Christmas traditions either seem to be either be modern or are simply asserted to be 'pagan' with minimal actual evidence.

It wouldn't be surprising if some pre-Christian traditions continued, but the case that basically everything is "stolen" seems to be assumed more than based on historical evidence as far as I can see.

A lot of people might disagree with me on my next riff about that, but here goes.. I don't think any tradition really goes through time without being mutated.

I agree with you on this point, traditions adapt to their cultural context and take on new forms.

These forms are no less legitimate or creative than the 'true' cultures they emerged from (which in any case got aspects of their culture from somewhere else).

A culture that appeared out of a vacuum would make little sense and find little popularity after all.

The idea some people seem to hold that any similarities require "stealing" or "appropriation" seems a bit silly to me though given they tend to relate to groups of people "stealing" their own culture

 

[Augustus]

Yes they do. Solstice was well established long before Christianity was even a thought. So yther4 you are incorrect.

The first culture that noticed the solstices as a tangible astronomical phenomenon get to "own" them forever and everyone else "stole" them?

We know that hundreds of cultures independently assigned significance to the same astrological phenomenon, so its obviously fallacious to claim "There were pagans in Northern Europe before the 3rd C, therefore people in the Eastern Med stole Christmas from them".

Also sources for Christmas 25th predate those for Yule by half a millennium.

But you did not answer how Luke placed the birth if Jesus in winter. Please help me understand and correlate it with the interpretation from Mathew. What is the evidence that Jesus was born in the winter.

As I'm an atheist I don't feel the need to testify to the accuracy of the Gospel narratives because they are not actual history. But neither do I feel the need to uncritically buy in to pseudo-historical narratives that largely emerged from Protestant polemic and are now commonly repurposed to try to delegitimate Christianity as parasitic.

Instead, I prefer to look at the evidence that actually exists regarding why Early Christians chose 25 Dec.

Of course not that would reveal the reality and why would you want to do that.

Seeing as I have presented plenty of secular academic scholarship on the issue, if you are interested in 'revealing the reality', you could address the actual historical evidence presented.

But the symbolism of Eostre was clearly associated with symbolism of Easter.

Why do you think that the most logical explanation is that in the 2nd C, an Eastern Mediterranean religion, Christianity, was stealing from English paganism even though there weren't actually any Christians in England, and England was a backwater on the fringes of the known world?

'Easter' is pascha which is derivative of Jewish pesach/passover. Resurrection, rebirth, eggs, etc. in a 2nd C Mediterranean religious tradition have nothing to do with obscure English goddesses only attested to in a single 8th C source.

If you are talking about "appropriating" cultural traditions, don't you see the irony of adopting such a [Northern] Eurocentric approach to a non-European religion (at that time)?

 

[joelr]

I think that is baseless claim.

It's well known in scholarship in 5BC the Israelites re-worked their beliefs and added concepts not yet in their religion but were already part of the Persian beliefs during the Persian invasion.

At 4:04 Professor Francesca Stavrakopoulou explains it nicely.

The leading scholar on the Persians, Mary Boyce details here the main concepts added to the OT (they appeared only after this period), from page 29 in her book Zoroastrianism: Their Practice and Beliefs:

"Historical features of Zoroastrianism, such as messianism, judgment after death, heaven and hell, and free will may have influenced other religious and philosophical systems, including Second Temple Judaism, Gnosticism, Greek philosophy,[7] Christianity, Islam,[8] the Baháʼí Faith, and Buddhism.[9]"

At 4:53 Richard Carrier goes over the same material and explains what was added to the OT from the Persian beliefs

And I think those ideas are not what Jesus taught.

This was magic blood atonement sacrifice but syncretic with the Jewish beliefs about sin and the annual temple ritual.
Getting entry to an afterlife through a demigod sacrifice is still a basic concept that was in mystery religions and sacrifice alone is an archaic barbaric concept that even in this version is ridiculous.

"“Truly, truly, I say to you, unless you eat the flesh of the Son of Man and drink his blood, you have no life in you. Whoever feeds on my flesh and drinks my blood has eternal life, and I will raise him up on the last day."

Obviously in this case it's metaphorical but the concept goes back to times when people actually did just that.
Interestingly the "last day" thing is one of the concepts taken from teh Persians. A resurrection and judgment at the end of time and a world savior were concepts in Zoroastrianism when they invaded the Israelites. Over the next few hundred years Jewish scribes start adding these to their beliefs.

 

[joelr]

Wrong guesses or wrong calculations does Not make the Bible as wrong, but makes the wrong guesses or calculations as wrong.
Since Pentecost the Israel of God is Not fleshly national Israel but 'spiritual Israel' Not found located on any map because the 'Spiritual Israel' of God is the Christian congregation wherever found on Earth. - 1 Peter 2:9,5
Afterlife is Not biblical. Resurrection is biblical.
Afterlife means: being more alive after death than before death.
Resurrection is future ( Acts of the Apostles 24:15 ) future during Jesus' 1,000-year governmental reign over Earth.
Those resurrected back to physical life on Earth are still sleeping in their graves -> John 11:11-14; Psalms 115:17; Isaiah 38:18; Ecclesiastes 9:5

No, it's wrong.

Arrogance or simply lacking in accurate knowledge, lacking in seeing the whole picture.
Never before in history has the good news of God's Kingdom (Daniel2:44) been proclaimed on such a grand-international scale as it is today.

Actually Islam is growing and will take over Christianity in numbers by2050.
With the internet the non-theist community is growing in incredible numbers because logic, scholarship and evidence are being promoted.

This coupled with the selfish-distorted form of love the world now displays as described at 2 Timothy 3:1-5,13 shows that Matthew 24:14; Acts 1:8 is nearing its ' final phase ' and this means we are nearing the ' final signal', so to speak, when the powers that be will be saying, " Peace and Security...." (1 Thessalonians 5:2-3) but this 'peace' will be the precursor to the coming great tribulation of Rev. 7:14,9.
To me then it is also Not vague that things will be looking 'rosy' before the out break of the great tribulation.

2 Timothy 3:1-5,13 Wow, so vague? This could be said of any time over the last 2000 years?

Apologists have been preaching this same stuff for centuries. They have always been wrong. You are making the same mistake.
RIght now the world has more peace than at any other time. So clearly fundamentalists will say this stuff no matter what.
Completely unconvincing. This actually makes my point.