The History of Christmas
Rev. Sanjay Paul
Christmas as we know it today was reinvented in the Victorian Era. Probably the most celebrated holiday in the world, even though the Bible does not mention any date for Christ’s birth the festival is however a product of hundreds of years of both secular and religious traditions from around the globe.
When Christianity became a tolerated religion in the time of Roman Emperor Constantine, the first Roman Emperor who converted to Christianity in A.D. 312, worship and festivals had not yet been rigidly formalized. The main festivals of the Christian year were Easter and Pentecost. Gradually more changes took place in Christian worship and festivals. Constantine in A.D. 321 made the first day of the week a holiday, he called it ‘the venerable day of the Sun’ (Sunday) hence Sunday became a public holiday similar to other Roman holidays. Pilgrimage to Holy Land was also introduced which made a great impression.
The root of Christmas also goes back to the Roman Era when the Christian church took over many pagan ideas and images from them. The celebration of people’s ‘birthday’ was a Roman practice and therefore the celebration of the birth of Christ was unheard of for well over the first hundred years of the life of the church. It is important to understand Constantine’s previous religion, the worship of the Unconquered Sun. Constantine continued to identify the sun with the Christian God in some way – a belief made easier by the tendency of Christian writers and artists to use sun imagery in portraying Christ. From sun-worship came the celebration of Christ’s birth on the 25th December, the birthday of the Sun. Sun-worship hung on in Roman Christianity and Pope Leo I, in the middle of the 5th century, rebuked worshippers who turned round to bow to the sun before entering St. Peter’s basilica. Some pagan customs which were later Christianized, such as the use of candles, incense and garlands, were at first avoided by the church because they symbolized paganism. Saturnalia, the Roman winter festival of 17-21 of December, provided the merriment, gift-giving and candles typical of later Christmas holidays.
The first mention of Christmas as a festival of the church on 25th December refers to A.D. 336. It comes in the Philocalian Catalogue (354), a civil and religious calendar compiled at Rome.
In the East, 6th January, known as Epiphany, was favored as the anniversary of Christ’s birth and baptism. Bishop of Constantinople John Chrysostom, a great Christian preacher born at Antioch, introduced the Western date into the East near the end of the 4th century. Subsequently both East and West celebrated the birth of Christ on 25th December. Meanwhile Epiphany had come from the East to the West, where it commemorated the revealing of Jesus to the gentiles-originally to the Wise Men.
In the early 17th century, a wave of religious reform changed the way Christmas was celebrated in Europe. When Oliver Cromwell and his Puritan forces took over England in 1645, they vowed to rid England of decadence and, as part of their effort, cancelled Christmas. By popular demand, Charles II was restored to the throne and, with him, came the return of the popular holiday.
The pilgrims, English separatists that came to America in 1620, were even more orthodox in their Puritan beliefs than Cromwell. As a result, Christmas was not a holiday in early America. From 1659 to 1681, the celebration of Christmas was actually outlawed. Anyone exhibiting the Christmas spirit was fined.
After the American Revolution, English customs fell out of favor, including Christmas. It wasn't until the 19th century that Americans began to embrace Christmas. Christmas wasn't declared a federal holiday until June 26, 1870. Americans began to celebrate Christmas, and changed it from a raucous carnival holiday into a family-centered day of peace and nostalgia.
Sources: web: biblical-life, historychannel, Lion handbook to The history of Christianity.
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