The Ancient Origins of the Holiday Season

I came across this quote recently (from Tertullian, "On Idolatry") that is the smoking gun I was looking for in my search for evidence of idolatry and syncretism regarding the holiday season, specifically in the very early church. Read this quote multiple times considering what is would mean if the church were, even today, leading heathens "into the fold" by means of false doctrines and idolatrous traditions.

But, however, the majority (of Christians) have by this time induced the belief in their mind that it is pardonable if at any time they do what the heathen do, for fear the Name be blasphemed. Now the blasphemy which must quite be shunned by us in every way is, I take it, this: If any of us lead a heathen into blasphemy with good cause, either by fraud, or by injury, or by contumely, or any other matter of worthy complaint, in which the Name is deservedly impugned, so that the Lord, too, be deservedly angry. Else, if of all blasphemy it has been said, By your means My Name is blasphemed, we all perish at once; since the whole circus, with no desert of ours, assails the Name with wicked suffrages. Let us cease (to be Christians) and it will not be blasphemed! On the contrary, while we are, let it be blasphemed: in the observance, not the overstepping, of discipline; while we are being approved, not while we are being reprobated. Oh blasphemy, bordering on martyrdom, which now attests me to be a Christian, while for that very account it detests me! The cursing of well-maintained Discipline is a blessing of the Name. If, says he, I wished to please men, I should not be Christ's servant. But the same apostle elsewhere bids us take care to please all: As I, he says, please all by all means. 1 Corinthians 10:32-33 No doubt he used to please them by celebrating the Saturnalia and New-year's day! [Was it so] or was it by moderation and patience? By gravity, by kindness, by integrity? In like manner, when he is saying, I have become all things to all, that I may gain all, 1 Corinthians 9:22 does he mean to idolaters an idolater? to heathens a heathen? to the worldly worldly? But albeit he does not prohibit us from having our conversation with idolaters and adulterers, and the other criminals, saying, Otherwise you would go out from the world, 1 Corinthians 5:10 of course he does not so slacken those reins of conversation that, since it is necessary for us both to live and to mingle with sinners, we may be able to sin with them too. Where there is the intercourse of life, which the apostle concedes, there is sinning, which no one permits. To live with heathens is lawful, to die with them is not. Let us live with all; let us be glad with them, out of community of nature, not of superstition. We are peers in soul, not in discipline; fellow-possessors of the world, not of error. But if we have no right of communion in matters of this kind with strangers, how far more wicked to celebrate them among brethren! Who can maintain or defend this? The Holy Spirit upbraids the Jews with their holy-days. Your Sabbaths, and new moons, and ceremonies, says He, My soul hates. By us, to whom Sabbaths are strange, and the new moons and festivals formerly beloved by God, the Saturnalia and New-year's and Midwinter's (Brumae) festivals and Matronalia are frequented — presents come and go — New-year's gifts — games join their noise — banquets join their din! Oh better fidelity of the nations to their own sect, which claims no solemnity of the Christians for itself! Not the Lord's day, not Pentecost, even it they had known them, would they have shared with us; for they would fear lest they should seem to be Christians. We are not apprehensive lest we seem to be heathens! If any indulgence is to be granted to the flesh, you have it. I will not say your own days, but more too; for to the heathens each festive day occurs but once annually: you have a festive day every eighth day. Call out the individual solemnities of the nations, and set them out into a row, they will not be able to make up a Pentecost. (Tertullian. On Idolatry, Chapter XIV, c. 155 – c. 240 AD)

Epiphanius, bishop of Salamis (c. 310–320 - 403AD) says that at Alexandria Aion's birth from Kore the Virgin was celebrated January 6:[13] "On this day and at this hour the Virgin gave birth to Aion." The date, which coincides with Epiphany, brought new year's celebrations to a close, completing the cycle of time that Aion embodies...In Ptolemaic Alexandria (305 BC-30 BC), at the site of a dream oracle, the Hellenistic syncretic god Serapis was identified as Aion Plutonius. The epithet Plutonius marks functional aspects shared with Pluto, consort of Persephone and ruler of the underworld in the Eleusinian tradition.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aion_(deity)

In the Eleusinian tradition, dating back to the 4th century BC, Persephone was taken to the underworld in the winter months, causing her goddess mother Demeter to withdrawal her blessing on the land so that it would get cold and nothing would grow. Nothing but the evergreen and holly, of course, which are symbols in Norse and Germanic cultures of life even in the dead of winter. You can see this in the tradition of the Holly King and the Oak King, although much of these ancient traditions is only speculative. There is, however, enough glimpses into ancient tribal and pagan cultures to make an educated guess at what they were about. One such celebration is Calennig. "Machen traces the Calennig to the Roman Saturnalia and suggests that the custom was brought to Caerleon by the Romans." (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Calennig)

https://youtu.be/QD8xtoVbAg8 (A modern telling of ancient stories surrounding Calennig).

A winter tradition resembling Yultide is illustrated partly in Jeremiah 10. We see nature worship there and pagan winter holidays were clearly a long standing tradition before the book of Jeremiah was written. God told us not to worship as the heathen do. Do not declare a feast day unto Yahweh, and do not presume that God is pleased with your "holy" day. Holy = “apartness, set-apartness, separateness, sacredness.” Christians have inserted Christ into something Christ was not in to begin with.

The true origin of the "Holiday Season..."
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brumalia


The smoking gun I have been looking for taken with the mountain of evidence one can present along with it should be enough to convict the church as "guilty" of idolatry by any righteous jury. Evidence does not get clearer than this. Christians were widely syncretizing with pagan customs in the early church. Not only that but apparently they were trying to Christianize them by bringing them into the church in order to lure in heathens to the fold. These two quotes by Tertullian and Epiphanius say it all, but let's end with some more modern support for forsaking Christmas.

Charles Spurgeon on Christmas:
“We have no superstitious regard for times and seasons. Certainly we do not believe in the present ecclesiastical arrangement called Christmas. First because we do not believe in any mass at all, but abhor it, whether it be sung in Latin or in English: Secondly, because we find no scriptural warrant whatever for observing any day as the birthday of the Savior; and consequently, its observance is a superstition, because not of divine authority. Superstition has fixed most positively the day of our Savior’s birth, although there in no possibility of discovering when it occurred. It was not till the middle of the third century that any part of the church celebrated the birth of our Lord; and it was not till long after the western Church had set the example, that the eastern adopted it. Because the day is not known. Probably the fact is that the “holy” days were arranged to fit in with the heathen festivals. We venture to assert that if there be any day in the year of which we may be pretty sure that it was not the day on which our Savior was born it is the 25th of December. Regarding not the day, let us give God thanks for the gift of His dear Son.” —C. H. Spurgeon Dec. 24, 1871 (Spurgeon, Metropolitan Tabernacle Pulpit, p. 697)

“No evidence remains about the exact date of the birth of Christ. The December 25 date was chosen as much for practical reasons as for theological ones. Throughout the Roman Empire, various festivals were held in conjunction with the winter solstice. In Rome, the Feast of the Unconquerable Sun celebrated the beginning of the return of the sun. When Christianity became the religion of the Empire, the church either had to suppress the festivals or transform them. The winter solstice seemed an appropriate time to celebrate Christ’s birth. Thus, the festival of the sun became a festival of the Son” (Holman Bible Dictionary, entry for Christmas)

The basic premise that appears to go back as far as Babylon and Egypt is that in the winter the sun shines its light the least in the cycle of the year, essentially dying, and therefore everything else withers and dies, except the evergreen. Pantheists believe that God is in everything and that there are spirits in the evergreens which help them survive the winter. That is why they are central to this season and why they are brought indoors and worshiped. You are bringing that "life" into your home as a... guess what? What is all paganistic idolatry about? Fertility. Fertility of the land and fertility of the womb to conceive. God told us not to worship as the heathen do. This is why I personally want nothing to do with Christmas and I find it difficult even to worship with those who do because they are inviting a spirit into their lives by participating in the holy-daze. This spirit stays around. If you clean out your home and don't fill it with the Holy Spirit then 7 more unclean spirits will come inhabit you. What you become is an idolator by the works of your own hands and by the traditions of men. What does the Bible say about associating with those who call themselves brethren but are idolators? It would behoove the "church" (not "circe" or "kirk" but rather ekklesia or assembly) to consider exactly why they do what they do. Is your worship based on what God has shown you by the Holy Spirit or by vain traditions of men?

I would like to conclude with a video from Skywatch TV. It is a good starting point for most Christians and I really appreciate what they say about division, a subject I struggle with when it comes to serious concerns like idolatry. Personally, I think a person should do everything they can to share the truth with the elders at their church, IN LOVE and PATIENCE, in order to help them see the truth. If they just flat out refuse to hear then it mioght be time to take it to God for direction from the Spirit whether you should "kick the dust from your heals."

https://youtu.be/UmRy831ZVOQ


Here is an additional note I'd like to add to Tertullian's quote from "On Idolatry". Some have argued that Bruma or Brumalia have no connection to Saturnalia and there are no descriptions of this festival. They say it simply means Winter time. See the Latin text for a reference to Brumae as the "Midwinter's festivals" and note that Tertullian gives a fairly detailed description of these events:

Nobis, quibus sabbata extranea sunt et numeniae et feriae a deo aliquando dilectae, Saturnalia et Ianuariae et Brumae et Matronales frequentantur, munera commeant et strenae, consonant lusus, conuiuia constrepunt.