Why People Prefer Christmas To Easter

Regardless of whether you have that preference yourself or approve of it, it seems that most people have it. I think Susan Roll is right about some of the reasons for that preference:

Video Resources On The Non-Pagan Origins Of Christmas

Some good videos on the subject have come out in recent years, and some of them haven't gotten much attention. Here and here are a couple of interviews with Philipp Nothaft, a scholar who's done a lot of work on the early history of the Christmas holiday. And here's an interview with Tom Schmidt, another scholar who's done a lot of work on the subject, especially on Hippolytus. Here's Tim O'Neill and a couple of other skeptics of Christianity discussing the evidence against the pagan origins of Christmas.

Does Christmas have pagan origins?

In my last post, I discussed some disagreements I have with Jozef Naumowicz's recent book on the origins of the Christmas holiday, The Origin Of The Feast Of The Nativity In The Patristic Perspective (Berlin, Germany: Peter Lang GmbH, 2024). I now want to quote some portions of his book that I'm more in agreement with, where he argues that paganism didn't have any significant influence on the origins of Christmas. I can't quote every relevant part of the book here, but I'll cite some significant parts of it.

Is there support for December 25 as Jesus' birthdate prior to the Council of Nicaea?

A book on the origins of the Christmas holiday came out earlier this year, Jozef Naumowicz's The Origin Of The Feast Of The Nativity In The Patristic Perspective (Berlin, Germany: Peter Lang GmbH, 2024). A section of the book describing the author refers to Naumowicz as "a member of the Committee of Historical Sciences of the Polish Academy of Sciences. He is the author and editor of many publications in the field of ancient Christianity and patrology, as well as the editor of the Library of the Church Fathers series." He argues that the December 25 date for Jesus' birth and the celebration of his birth on that day aren't found in any source prior to the Council of Nicaea, but he also argues that the date and the holiday weren't influenced by paganism in any significant way. So, he assigns a late date to the holiday, but denies that it's pagan or an attempt to compete with paganism. I disagree with him on the first point, but agree with him on the second. I'll explain why I disagree with him in this post, then I'll cite some of his comments where I agree with him in a later post. The book is worth getting for his material on the pagan influence issue, even if you disagree with him on the dating of the December 25 date and the holiday.

Reformation Resources

Reformation Day is coming up later this month. Here's a collection of resources on Reformation issues. I occasionally update that post. Since last October, I've added a new link on infant baptism. I also updated the eternal security link to go to a series I wrote on the topic earlier this year. The collection of links on baptismal regeneration has been updated as well. And I added a link to a post about the claim that Luke 1:34 reflects a vow of perpetual virginity Mary had taken. I also added a new link on sola scriptura. A new link was added on Roman Catholic miracles. One of the posts on the perpetual virginity of Mary had a link added concerning ongoing opposition to Mary's perpetual virginity in the late patristic and early medieval eras, from the fourth century onward. And I added a link about how those who believed in some form of justification through works before the Reformation disagreed about which works justify.

Christmas And Paganism

Michael Jones (InspiringPhilosophy) has been doing some good work on the subject and has recently put out more videos about it. Here's a shorter one. Here's one that's longer.

Videos On Christmas And Paganism

Wesley Huff and Michael Jones recently put out videos arguing against the supposed pagan nature of Christmas.

Lessons From Other Holidays

We can learn some lessons from other holidays about how to make the most of Reformation Day. Holidays like Memorial Day and the Fourth of July are as influential as they are partly for reasons that are applicable to Reformation Day as well. Themes like risking and sacrificing and individuals laying down their lives for a good cause resonate with people, earn their respect, and often move their emotions, form lasting memories, and motivate them to do good things they wouldn't do otherwise. The principles, events, and movements of the Reformation should be discussed, but also the stories of the individuals involved.

A good resource to use in homes, churches, and other contexts is Ken Connolly's documentary The Indestructible Book. It's about the history of the Bible, especially how it got to America in the English language. It starts at the time of Moses and concludes with Plymouth Rock. It doesn't go into much depth, but it's good for introductory and motivational purposes. It often touches on themes like the ones I mentioned in the opening of this post, and there are many segments of the documentary that would be good to use in that context. It's good at conveying the work that went into giving us the Bible, the significance of scripture, and the cost many people paid to bring it to us. Some parts of it, like the segments on John Wycliffe and the ones on Thomas Bilney and other martyrs around the time of the Reformation, are especially moving. You can watch the whole thing here. It gets especially good starting here, with the material on Wycliffe. And here's a section on the martyrdom of Wycliffe's followers. Here's an account of Bilney's conversion, and here's the segment on his martyrdom. Those are just a few examples. The whole thing is worth watching, though the quality varies from one portion to another.

The Evidence For The Reformation And Evangelicalism

Reformation Day is coming up at the end of the month. Several years ago, I posted a collection of resources on the historical roots of the Reformation and Evangelicalism. I occasionally update it. Here's a collection of posts about the papacy, and you can go to the comments section to see what's been added over the years, including some that I added within the last several months. And here's one I recently added on ecclesiology. Here's one on Josephus and Roman Catholicism. And this one discusses Catholicism and liberalism.

The Alleged Pagan Roots Of Holidays

David Wood recently interviewed Michael Jones (of InspiringPhilosophy) about the supposed pagan background of Christmas. Michael has done a lot of research on the topic, and they discussed many of the issues that are often brought up in this context (the origins of the December 25 date, whether certain Biblical passages are opposed to Christmas trees, etc.).

I've done some work on the history of the December 25 date, but I haven't looked into most of the other issues much. That's partly because I don't think a lot is at stake. Even if things like Christmas trees and the use of mistletoe in the context of Christmas had the sort of pagan roots that people often allege, the association with paganism would be too distant to have the implications those people often suggest. Similarly, there are distant pagan connections to the calendar names we use (names of months, names of days, etc.), the food we eat, the clothing we wear, and so on. The people who are so upset about the supposed paganism of Christmas don't seem nearly as upset, if they're upset at all, about other pagan connections, like the ones I just mentioned. Meat sacrificed to idols had a relationship to paganism, but Paul considered it acceptable to eat such meat (1 Corinthians 8, 10). The relationship was distant enough to not be significant.

Many good points are made during David's discussion with Michael, and a lot of what they discuss is relevant to holidays (and other issues) in general, not just Christmas. Apparently, Michael has done similar work on Valentine's Day and Easter and is planning a discussion of objections to the history of Thanksgiving. I don't know enough about some of the Christmas issues they discuss to make much of a judgment of the accuracy of Michael's conclusions, but there's enough good material during the program to make it worth listening to.

Christmas Resources 2019

The issues surrounding the childhood of Jesus are important, but often neglected. For over a decade now, I've been putting together a collection of resources for each Christmas season:

2008
2009
2010
2011
2012
2013
2014
2015
2016
2017
2018

You can also click here for an archive of all of our posts with the Christmas label. Keep clicking on Older Posts at the bottom of the screen to see more. Or you can view the text of the infancy narratives with links to relevant material from our archives. Go here for Matthew and here for Luke.

Here's a collection of our reviews of Christmas books. Some of the reviews are on Triablogue, but others are on Amazon or Goodreads.

Since Raymond Brown's book on the infancy narratives is still widely considered the standard in the field, it's important to know what to make of it. See here for a collection of responses to the book.

I've compiled some responses to skeptical misrepresentations of the church fathers, including on issues related to Christmas. You can find the collection here.

For more about the importance of apologetics in general, not just Christmas apologetics, see this post I wrote several months ago.

And here are some examples of the posts we've written on Christmas issues over the years:

UFO sightings

It looks like UFO sightings spike on the 4th of July.

It's tempting to think that's because people mistake fireworks for UFOs. That'd be a hasty conclusion to draw.

I suspect the truth is aliens love to party and Earth on the 4th is lit.

In any case, Mulder and Scully will have to investigate.

Old School Presbyterians

Christmas Resources 2016

Each year, I post a collection of resources for the Christmas season. Here are the posts from previous years:

2008
2009
2010
2011
2012
2013
2014
2015

The 2008 post is foundational to the others. You may want to start there.

And here's an archive of our posts with the Christmas label. Keep in mind that you can scroll all the way down and click on Older Posts to see more.

Here are some representative examples of our posts on Christmas issues:

Responding To Raymond Brown On The Infancy Narratives
Reviews Of Books On Christmas Issues
Do Passages Like Matthew 2:1, 2:11, 2:22-3, And Luke 2:39 Prove That The Infancy Narratives Are Inconsistent?
How Much Matthew And Luke Agree Concerning Jesus' Childhood
What Sources Outside The Infancy Narratives Say About The Childhood Of Jesus
The Origins Of The Christmas Holiday And Its December 25 Date
The Genre Of The Infancy Narratives
Typology And The Infancy Narratives
The Authorship Of Matthew
The Authorship Of Luke
The Virgin Birth
Jesus' Davidic Ancestry, The Genealogies
Evidence For The Bethlehem Birthplace
The Historicity Of Luke's Census
The Star Of Bethlehem
The Slaughter Of The Innocents

In 2007, I posted the text of the infancy narratives in Matthew and Luke with links to relevant Triablogue posts. For example, you could click on the text of Luke 2:1 to read a post about Luke's census account. After my 2015 post linked above, I posted an update to both indexes, so that both now include material beyond 2007. Steve Hays put up a post about common objections to Halloween and Christmas, including Santa Claus issues. I posted another response to Colin Nicholl on the star of Bethlehem. And here's something I wrote about how the Mary of the infancy narratives differs from the Mary of Roman Catholicism. I also posted some ideas for Christmas sermons. Steve wrote about Zechariah's prophecy in Luke 1:71-4. I posted a collection of Stephen Carlson's material on Christmas issues. I also put up a collection of posts responding to Raymond Brown's work on the infancy narratives. Patrick Chan posted a video about four kinds of Christmas. I linked a response by John Byl to Colin Nicholl's book on the star of Bethlehem. Patrick posted a video about the Help Chris See Christmas effort, involving a right to life case in Texas. I posted a link to my 2015 collection of Christmas resources and commented on the apologetic significance of the last several days of the Christmas season. Peter Pike wrote about some implications Arminianism has for the humanity of Christ. And here's something I wrote about a Time article and media bias on Christmas issues. I posted about Hebrews 2:11 and the incarnation. Steve wrote about Isaiah 7:14. He also addressed the issue of whether Mary was too young to get married when she did. I posted about the death of Acharya S on December 25 of 2015. Steve addressed the reasoning behind the virgin birth. He also wrote about the virgin birth and John 8:41. And here and here are responses he wrote to Bart Ehrman, parts of which address Christmas issues. His response to Ehrman here addresses the genealogies of Jesus, among other issues. And here's another post he wrote on the genealogies. I put together a collection of links to our material on Matthew's authorship of the first gospel. Steve wrote about an inconsistency on the part of some critics of Luke's census account. He also addressed the subject in another post about Bart Ehrman. And here's something he wrote on Andrew Lincoln's motives for questioning the virgin birth. Here's a thread that addresses Jonathan Pennington's comments about how little the infancy narratives agree with each other. I discussed a recent book about the star of Bethlehem here and here. That book has a chapter by Annette Merz, in which she makes a radically skeptical case against the historicity of the infancy narratives. I wrote several posts in response to her, which you can access here, addressing historiography, why Jesus' family reacted so negatively to him, why Nazareth rejected him, whether he was a descendant of David, and other issues. Steve responded to Graham Oppy's comparison between the accounts of Jesus' birth and the unreliable accounts of the births of other figures. Steve also linked an article he wrote for another web site on the virgin birth. He also posted a link to a page about a hipster nativity set.

Labor Day For A Lazy Nation

You can be a hard worker in one context, but lazy in another. However hard Americans work on their jobs, and many of them are lazy even in that context, they're horribly negligent when it comes to the most important matters in life. You can click on our label for posts on Time Management for documentation of what Americans' priorities are, how they spend their time, how ignorant they are of religion, politics, and other important issues, etc. We shouldn't just look at the current state of our nation, but also its state relative to its potential. We're better than other parts of the world in many ways, but often largely because of what we received from our forefathers rather than what we achieved ourselves, and we fall far shorter of our potential. "From everyone who has been given much, much will be required" (Luke 12:48).

I've written in the past about how parents, pastors, and others in positions of so much influence often fail to make good use of holidays. Valentine's Day, Mother's Day, and Father's Day, for example, could be put to so much good use as opportunities to teach people about the differences between the genders, the nature of marriage, parenting, etc. But we don't make much use of those holidays. The Supreme Court's Obergefell decision was announced the same week as Father's Day. I rarely see people make an issue of that, even though it has so much potential for teaching and providing illustrations of how absurd the Court's ruling is.

Labor Day is another holiday that has a lot of potential for good use, but instead is wasted. Often, it's used to do the opposite of what it should be used for. Instead of using it to refocus people on the areas of life where hard work is the most important and so neglected, we use the holiday as an opportunity to encourage laziness in those contexts while commending people for being such hard workers on their jobs. When the book of Proverbs warns about laziness, for example, does it only do so in the context of employment? No, it addresses the subject more broadly. Most of the people who will be spending today at barbecues, watching sporting events, reading romance novels, getting drunk, doing housework, watching trivial television programs and movies, etc. are so ignorant of the Bible that they can't name the four gospels and so ignorant of history, politics, and current events that they can't name the three branches of government. They're also ignorant of a lot of other important things, as I've been documenting for years. Instead of commending them for being such hard workers on their jobs while encouraging laziness in more important contexts, we should make better use of the holiday.

For example, it would help if pastors would stop commending their congregations as hard workers when the evidence for that commendation is so lacking. It would be good if they'd stop encouraging people to spend so much time on sports, movies, etc. when Americans have such a major problem with spending too much time on such things. Instead of joking about how you'll be sure to have the sermon finished before the football game starts or frequently making comments to your congregation about how many movies you watch, why don't you encourage them to be more wise in their use of time (Ephesians 5:15-6)?

We need to rethink our use of holidays, including Labor Day.