Christmas Day, on December 25, is one of the most festive Christian holidays in many countries around the world. It celebrates Jesus’ birth. It is that time of the year again! You can feel it in the air. Around mid-December every year, the atmosphere slowly starts changing from mundane to festive. Those who live away from their family start packing their bags to get back home and those who can’t make it start feeling nostalgic thinking about all the happy times. Home decorations take full steam and so does shopping for new clothes and presents for loved ones. Kids begin to get excited about a visit from a certain jolly saint dressed in red. No matter where you go, you get a hint that Christmas is just round the corner. Christmas is undoubtedly the world’s biggest festival. It is celebrated with a lot of zest and enthusiasm all around the globe. After a year full of hard work, ups and downs, and the many challenges life brings with it, this is the time when people begin to forget all their worries and feel good and grateful for all that they have. Celebrated on a wide scale on December 25 to commemorate the birth of Jesus Christ, it is difficult to escape the Christmas festivities wherever you are in the world. It is a public holiday across most countries in the world.
While Christmas is celebrated on December 25 to commemorate the birth of Jesus Christ, the fact is that Jesus’ birth date is actually unknown. According to the New Testament, Jesus was born in a stable in Bethlehem when Joseph and Mary took shelter there as there were no rooms available at the inn. Angels then proclaimed this news to shepherds who then disseminated the message of Christ’s birth furthermore. Even though the date of the birth is not mentioned in the Bible, by the early to mid 4th century, the Western Christian Church placed Christmas on December 25 and the East slowly came to adopt the same date. Today, Christmas is commonly celebrated on December 25 as per the Gregorian calendar although some Eastern Christian Churches still follow the older Julian calendar, according to which Christmas date corresponds to January 7 in the Gregorian calendar. This day happens to fall one day after the Western Christian Church celebrates Epiphany. So, in order to be universal, the Church declared the twelve days between Christmas and Epiphany to be one unified festal cycle thus giving significance to both the Western and Eastern dates of Christmas.
There are several hypotheses on why December 25 could have been chosen as the date for Christmas. The major and commonly accepted ones are that December 25 was the date of the winter solstice on the Roman calendar; it was about nine months after March 25, the date of the vernal equinox and a date linked to the conception of Jesus; and that it was the date of a Roman pagan festival in honor of the Sun god Sol Invictus. The winter solstice hypothesis gathered steam from Jesus’ title as the ‘Sun of righteousness’. It came to be believed that Jesus chose the shortest day of the year for his birth as he was the light of the world and the days after his birth kept increasing in length. The Calculation hypothesis proposed by French writer Louis Duchesne in 1889 is based on the celebration of Annunciation on March 25 which is the traditional date of equinox. Annunciation is the Christian celebration of the announcement by the angel Gabriel to the Virgin Mary that she would conceive and become the mother of Jesus, the Son of God. According to the the calculation hypotheses, an earlier holiday held on March 25 became associated with the incarnation thus making December 25 (nine months later) the day of Christmas. The third hypothesis called the ‘history of religions’ hypothesis suggests that December 25 was the date selected as Christmas in order to appropriate other Roman festivities held in honor of the Sun god Sol Invictus. In 1743, German Protestant Paul Ernst Jablonski argued that Christmas was placed on December 25 in order to correspond with the Roman solar holiday Dies Natalis Solis Invicti. He inferred that Christmas was therefore a paganization. As a counter argument, Christians affirmed that, on the contrary, the Emperor Aurelian instituted the holiday of the Dies Natalis Solis Invicti in 274 as an attempt to give a pagan significance to an important date which had already gained prominence for Christians in Rome. A manuscript of a work by 12th-century Syrian bishop Jacob Bar-Salibi mentions that “It was a custom of the Pagans to celebrate on the same 25 December the birthday of the Sun, at which they kindled lights in token of festivity. In these solemnities and revelries the Christians also took part. Accordingly when the doctors of the Church perceived that the Christians had a leaning to this festival, they took counsel and resolved that the true Nativity should be solemnized on that day.”
Santa Claus
Santa Claus, also known as Father Christmas, Saint Nicholas, Saint Nick, Kris Kringle, or simply Santa, is a legendary character originating in Western Christian culture who is said to bring gifts to the homes of well-behaved children on the night of Christmas Eve (24 December) or during the early morning hours of Christmas Day (25 December) and coal to naughty kids.
The modern character of Santa Claus was based on traditions surrounding the historical Saint Nicholas (a fourth-century Greek bishop and gift-giver of Myra), the British figure of Father Christmas, and the Dutch figure of Sinterklaas (himself also based on Saint Nicholas). Some maintain Santa Claus also absorbed elements of the Germanic deity Wodan, who was associated with the pagan midwinter event of Yule and led the Wild Hunt, a ghostly procession through the sky. Santa Claus is generally depicted as a portly, jolly, white-bearded man—sometimes with spectacles—wearing a red coat with white fur collar and cuffs, white-fur-cuffed red trousers, red hat with white fur, and black leather belt and boots and carrying a bag full of gifts for children. This image became popular in the United States and Canada in the 19th century due to the significant influence of the 1823 poem “A Visit from St. Nicholas.” Caricaturist and political cartoonist Thomas Nast also played a role in the creation of Santa’s image. This image has been maintained and reinforced through song, radio, television, children’s books, films, and advertising.
Christmas Tree
The evergreen fir tree has traditionally been used to celebrate winter festivals (pagan and Christian) for thousands of years. Pagans used branches of it to decorate their homes during the winter solstice, as it made them think of the spring to come. The Romans used Fir Trees to decorate their temples at the festival of Saturnalia. Christians use it as a sign of everlasting life with God.
Nobody is really sure when Fir trees were first used as Christmas trees. It probably began about 1000 years ago in Northern Europe. Many early Christmas Trees seem to have been hung upside down from the ceiling using chains (hung from chandeliers/lighting hooks).
Other early Christmas Trees, across many parts of northern Europe, were cherry or hawthorn plants (or a branch of the plant) that were put into pots and brought inside so they would hopefully flower at Christmas time. If you couldn’t afford a real plant, people made pyramids of woods and they were decorated to look like a tree with paper, apples and candles. Sometimes they were carried around from house to house, rather than being displayed in a home.