The Census of Publius Sulpicius Quirinius, Roman governor of Syria, took place in 6 or 7 B.C. The Gospels cite the reign of Roman client king Herod the Great and the Roman census of Judea occurring at the time of the Nativity.
The new calendar was used throughout Christianized Europe by A.D. 525, Scythian monk Dionysius Exiguus proposed a new calendar dating system based on the assumed birth date his savior. The Western World still looked to the Byzantine emperors for calendar dates after Rome fell to the Goths. Most of the Western world still used the Julian calendar during and after the fall of Rome, dating years after the Roman consul in power, imperial regnal dates based on the year of the Roman emperor’s reign or year since the founding of the city of Rome in 753 B.C. Consequently, local converts incorporated their traditions into the holiday.Īfter the fall of the Roman Empire, the church was the one cultural remnant holding Europe together during the Dark Ages, making religious festivals ever more important. As more and more Gentiles joined the small Jewish communities founded and guided by Pauline teachings and transformed it into Christianity, the Pauline church expanded to pagan regions of Europe and beyond. 70, the splinter church sect founded by St. James the Just, was annihilated by the Romans in the Siege of Jerusalem in A.D. Most ancient people just counted themselves a year older based on the seasons, with actual “birth days” a more modern convention.Īfter the church sect formerly led by Yehoshua’s brother Ya’akov, aka St. While moving the birth date of a historical figure seems odd to us now, it was not so to the Romans, who worshipped a pantheon of gods in the state religion and regularly moved holy days based on the calendar’s convenience. It fell on the shortest day the year, symbolically making Yehoshua the Christ, or the bringer of light, and falling about nine months after Nisan. 25, conveniently coinciding with Roman winter solstice festivals of Saturnalia, Sigillaria and Dies Natalis Solis Invicti, or “Birthday of the Unconquered Sun,” commonly observed by Roman citizens. 200, most churches had moved the date to Dec. Various churches throughout the Roman Empire used different dates coordinating with local festivals.Īs the early church gained followers, power and political clout in the Roman Empire, it became Christianity’s second holiest day after Easter.Īround A.D. The early church placed the date of the nativity on the 14th of the month Nisan in the Hebrew calendar, around the Fast of the Firstborn, which falls in March or April of the modern Gregorian calendar, depending on the lunar and solar year. 25, is Christmas, the celebration of the birth of Yehoshua, a poor Jewish carpenter’s son, in the backwater Hebrew village of Bet Lehem south of Jerusalem just over 2,024 years ago.
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