Science Santa History: The Pagan Origins of Christmas

Millions of millions of people celebrate Christmas, but do you know how the holiday actually
started? Most people think it’s a Christian celebration but the truth is a bit more complicated – and interesting.

For most people, Christmas is a holiday deeply rooted in Christianity – but is that really the case? It’s been celebrated for more than two millennia, so it’s pretty safe to assume that the holiday we celebrate today is a mixture of different cultures and religions.

The earliest history of Christmas is composed of “pagan” (non-Christian) fertility rites and practices which predate Jesus by centuries. Most of the traditions we associate with Christmas are actually not Christian at all, including decorating Christmas trees, singing Christmas carols, and giving Christmas gifts.

So then, is Christmas not when Jesus was born? The answer is probably ‘yes’. The New Testament gives no date or year for the birth of Jesus, and the first year was determined by Dionysius Exiguus, a Scythian monk, “abbot of a Roman monastery”. In the Roman, pre-Christian era, years were counted from ab urbe condita (“the founding of the City”). Thus 1 AUC signifies the year Rome was founded, 10 AUC signifies the 10th year after Rome was founded and so on. Rome was founded in 753 BC, so what we consider today as year 0 would be year 753 AUC. But Dionysius Exiguus, basing his calculations on Roman history, estimates that Jesus was born in 754 AUC. However, Luke 1:5 places Jesus’ birth in the days of Herod, and Herod died in 750 AUC – four years before the year in which Dionysius places Jesus birth. Pretty much anyway you take it, it seems very unlikely that Jesus was born in what we consider year 0.

Joseph A. Fitzmyer – Professor Emeritus of Biblical Studies at the Catholic University of America, member of the Pontifical Biblical Commission supports this idea:

“Though the year [of Jesus birth is not reckoned with certainty, the birth did not occur in AD 1. The Christian era, supposed to have its starting point in the year of Jesus birth, is based on a miscalculation introduced ca. 533 by Dionysius Exiguus.”

So what about the date? Irenaeus (c. 130–202) viewed Christ’s conception as March 25 in association with the Passion, with the nativity nine months after on December 25. The Bible doesn’t speak about the date, but the references in the Bible show it most likely did not take place in winter. Rather it is because this was the date that the Romans historically celebrated the winter solstice.

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Science Santa History: The Pagan Origins of Christmas