One of the more colorful debates between sacred and secular historians, as well as the clergy of differing denominations, invariably emerges at this time a year concerning the date of Jesus’ birth and the solemn festival of Christmas.
Why is the birth of Jesus of Nazareth celebrated by Christians on Dec. 25? Given that no one actually believes it was Christ’s actual day of birth, how did this particular date get selected? On this debate there has been an ocean of ink spilled over the centuries. The answer oddly lies in the early church’s concern for the calculation of other holy days.
The earliest person to suggest that Jesus’ actual birthday occurred on Dec. 25 was the theologian Clement of Alexandria, who lived from about 150-215 A.D. Clement notes that people of his time believed that Jesus was born in the 28th year of the rule of Augustus. If we begin counting the years of Augustus, we might cite the Battle of Actium, in which Octavian Caesar defeated Marcus Antonius. This would give us a year of about 2 B.C. on modern calendars. Clement goes on to cite several proposed days of the year on which speculations proposed a day. These are May 20, April 20 or 21, and Dec. 25.
Because Dec. 25 was the date in the imperial Roman calendar on which the solstice occurred, some Christians living in Rome asserted that Jesus must have been born on the shortest day of the year, as a sign of his great humility. Their argument did not convince a lot of people at first.
In north Africa, this discussion was taken up by a priest named Tertullian, who died around the year 200 A.D. In Tertullian’s time, most Christian central beliefs were celebrated according to the Jewish calendar on 14 Nisan, which was the day before the Jewish Passover of 15 Nisan. They translated this date to March 25 on the Roman calendar for the crucifixion.
In 221 A.D., a theologian named Sextus Julius Africanus took the Easter date one step further, and asserted that both the crucifixion and the incarnation of Christ in the womb of the Virgin appropriately were on the same day of the year. This assertion opened the door to what follows.
Around 243 A.D., in a related debate, an anonymous Christian author asserted that the incarnation of Christ must have occurred on March 28. He went further to assert that this incarnation must have occurred on a Wednesday. This date was selected on the basis of a colorful interpretation of the Book of Genesis. This view asserted that God began creation on March 25, and by the time the Almighty got to creating the sun it must have been March 28. We note that the spring equinox falls on March 25; the Jewish Passover often occurs around this time as well, a bit of symbolism not neglected by early Christianity. If God began creation on or right after March 25, it was also the appropriate date for the world to be remade by the incarnation of Christ. This assertion in 243 about the incarnation of Christ into the womb of the Virgin on March 25 appears to have inspired a belief that nine months later Jesus was born, on Dec. 25.
This admittedly curious way of assigning a date for Christmas was challenged in the era of the 18th century enlightenment. The philosophers of this modern period had a great respect for the classical world of pagan Greece and Rome. They thought less of Christianity, and so they were quick to point out anything Christian must have had roots in pagan antiquity. No less than Sir Isaac Newton simply dismissed Christmas as being the day of the solstice.
In 1743, a progressive Protestant theologian in Germany observed that in Roman times, Dec. 25 was the festival of the pagan sun god Sol Invictus, or the “unconquered sun.” He was joined in this belief by a number of other reformed theologians who argued that it was transfer of pagan holy days into Christian ones which proved that true and original Christianity had been debased and paganized. The Roman festival of Sol Invictus was not introduced to Rome, however, until the reign of the Emperor Aurelian in 274 A.D., a generation after Christians were settling on that date for their holy day. Aurelian was a persecutor of the church, which has led other historians to suggest that Aurelian instituted the pagan festival to oppose Christianity’s festival on Dec. 25.
What is not mentioned in the debate is the fact that Christmas was not a very important holy day until well into the middle ages. For imperial Roman Christians, Good Friday and Easter were the main holy days. In the year 800 A.D., Pope Leo III crowned Charlemagne as the “Holy Roman Emperor” in recognition of the king’s conquests and expressing the hope of an end to centuries of violence after the fall of Rome. Not to be outdone, the Anglo-Saxon King Edmund had himself crowned on Christmas day in 855. King William I of England was crowned in Westminster on Christmas day in 1066.
This association of the earthly kings’ power and the birth of the King of kings became very popular among medieval royalty. It became quite the thing for medieval kings to throw festivals and banquets on Christmas day, with lots of food and specially brewed ales. A great deal of ale, I might add. This drinking and feasting led to a great deal of frisky and naughty behavior. Both medieval and Reformation writers condemned the drunkenness and they argued that this riotous behavior was nothing more than the old Roman drunkenness of the December Festival of Saturnalia.
Both the actual date of Jesus’ birth and the original development of the feast in honor of it will probably never be known. But doubtless Christians will assert that the important thing is not the day Jesus was born, but whether or not He is born in the hearts of men and women.
