Grafted-In Ministries

by Jerold Aust

The Surprising Story

Most people know the Bible doesn’t direct us to celebrate Christmas. Does it make any difference as long as it’s intended to honor Elohim and bring families together?

 

A

t this time of year it’s fairly common to see programs like the one titled “Christmas Unwrapped: The History of Christmas,” which aired on the A&E (Arts & Entertainment) cable television channel. The promo for the program read:
“People all over the world celebrate the birth of Messiah on December 25th. But why is the Savior’s nativity marked by gift-giving, and was He really born on that day? And just where did the Christmas tree come from? 

“Take an enchanting journey through the history of the world’s favorite holiday to learn the origins of some of the Western world’s most enduring traditions. Trace the emergence of Christmas from pagan festivals like the Roman Saturnalia, which celebrated the winter solstice.” This program addressed the fact that Santa Claus is fictitious and that Christmas and its trappings emanate from pagan Roman festivals, as many other sources corroborate. 

Is there more to these ancient traditions and practices than meets the eye? And, more important, does it make any difference whether we continue in them? 

Celebration of the sun Elohim 

It may sound odd that any religious celebration with Messiah’s name attached to it could predate Christianity. Yet the holiday we know as Christmas long predates
Yeshua Messiah. Elements of the celebration can be traced to ancient Egypt, Babylon and Rome. This fact certainly calls into question the understanding and wisdom of those who, over the millennia, have insisted on perpetuating its observance throughout the Christian world. 

Members of the early Church would have been astonished at the customs and practices we associate with Christmas being incorporated into a celebration of Messiah’s birth. Not until centuries after them would His name be attached to this popular Roman holiday. 

As Alexander Hislop explains in his book The Two Babylons: “It is admitted by the most learned and candid writers of all parties that the day of our Lord’s birth cannot be determined, and that within the Christian Church no such festival as Christmas was ever heard of till the third century, and that not till the fourth century was far advanced did it gain much observance” (1959, pp. 92-93). 

As for how Dec. 25 became associated with Messiah’s birth, virtually any book on the history of Christmas
will explain that this day was celebrated in the Roman Empire as the birthday of the sun Elohim. For example, the book 4000 Years of Christmas says: “For that day was sacred, not only to the pagan Romans but to a religion from Persia which, in those days, was one of Christianity’s strongest rivals. This Persian religion was Mithraism, whose followers worshiped the sun, and celebrated its return to strength on that day” (Earl and Alice Count, 1997, p. 37). 

Not only was Dec. 25 honored as the birthday of the sun, but a festival had long been observed among the pagan nations of celebrating the growing amount of daylight after the winter solstice, the shortest day of the year. The precursor of Christmas was in fact an idolatrous winter festival characterized by excess and debauchery that predated Christianity by many centuries. 

Pre-Christian practices incorporated 

This ancient festival went by different names in various cultures. In Rome it was called the Saturnalia, in honor
of Saturn, the Roman Elohim of agriculture. The observance was adopted by early Roman church leaders and given the name of Messiah (“Christ mass,” or Christmas) to permit pagans converting to Christianity to continue in their former practices, helping to swell the number of nominal adherents of Christianity. 

The tendency on the part of third-century Catholic leadership was to meet paganism halfway—a practice made clear in a bitter lament by the Carthaginian theologian Tertullian. 

In A.D. 230 he wrote of the inconsistency of professing Christians, contrasting their compromising practices with the pagans’ strict adherence to their own beliefs: “By us who are strangers to Sabbaths, and new moons, and festivals once acceptable to Elohim [referring to the biblical festivals spelled out in Leviticus 23, which they failed to embrace], the Saturnalia, the feasts of January, the Bruilmalia, and Matronalia are now frequented; gifts are carried to and fro, new year’s day presents are made with din . . . Oh, how much more faithful are the heathen to THEIR religion, who take special care to adopt no solemnity from the Christians” (Hislop, p. 93, emphasis added throughout). 

Failing to make much headway in converting the pagans, the religious leaders of the Roman church began compromising by dressing the heathen customs in Christian-looking garb. But, rather than converting them to the church’s beliefs, the church largely converted to non-Christian customs in its own practices. 

Although the early Catholic Church at first opposed this celebration, “the festival was far too strongly entrenched in popular favor to be abolished, and the Church finally granted the necessary recognition, believing that if Christmas could not be suppressed, it should be preserved in honor of the Christian Elohim. Once given a Christian basis the festival became fully established in Europe with many of its pagan elements undisturbed” (Man, Myth & Magic: The Illustrated Encyclopedia of Mythology, Religion, and the Unknown, Richard Caven-dish, editor, 1983, Vol. 2, p. 480, “Christmas”). 

Celebration wins out over Scripture 

Some resisted such spiritually poisonous compromises, but it was not enough: “Upright men strove to stem the tide, but in spite of all their efforts, the apostasy went on, till the Church, with the exception of a small remnant, was submerged under Pagan superstition. That Christmas was originally a Pagan festival is beyond all doubt. The time of the year, and the ceremonies with which it is still celebrated, prove its origin” (Hislop, p. 93). 

The aforementioned Tertullian wasn’t alone in objecting to compromise. “As late as 245 Origen, in his eighth homily on Leviticus, repudiates as sinful the very idea of keeping the birthday of Messiah as if he were a king Pharaoh” (The Encyclopaedia Britannica, 11th edition, Vol. 6, p. 293, “Christmas”). 

Christmas was not made a Roman holiday until 534 (ibid.). It took 300 years for the new name and symbols of Christmas to replace the old names and meaning of the winter festival, a pagan celebration that reaches back so many centuries. 

Was Yeshua born in December? 

Most Bible scholars who have written on the subject of Yeshua’ birth conclude that, based on evidence in the Bible itself and knowledge of the climate of the Holy Land, there is no possible way Messiah could have been born anywhere near Dec. 25. 

Again we turn to Alexander Hislop: “There is not a word in the Scriptures about the precise day of [Yeshua’] birth, or the time of the year when He was born. What is recorded there implies that at what time soever His birth took place, it could not have been on the 25th of December. At the time that the angel announced His birth to the shepherds of Bethlehem, they were feeding their flocks by night in the open fields . . . The climate of Palestine
. . . from December to February, is very piercing, and it was not the custom for the shepherds of Judea to watch their flocks in the open fields later than about the end of October” (Hislop, p. 91, emphasis in original). 

He goes on to explain that the autumn rains beginning in September or October in Judea would mean that the events surrounding Messiah’s birth recorded in the Scriptures could not have taken place later than mid-October, so Yeshua’ birth likely took place earlier in the fall (Hislop, p. 92). 

Further evidence supporting Yeshua’ birth in the autumn is that the Romans were intelligent enough not to set the time for taxation and travel in the winter. And it would have been quite hazardous for Joseph and his expectant wife Mary to have made the trip from Nazareth to his ancestral home of Bethlehem so late in the year. As recorded by Luke, Mary delivered Yeshua in Bethlehem during the time of census and taxation—which, again, no rational official would have scheduled for winter. 

What difference does it make? 

The Bible gives us no reason—and certainly no instruction—to support the myths and fables of Christmas. They are contrary to the ways of Messiah and His holy truth. “Learn not the way of the heathen,” Elohim tells us (Jeremiah 10:2, King James Version). 

Messiah reveals that Satan the devil is the father of lies (John 8:44). Parents should tell their children the truth about Elohim and this world’s contrary and confusing ways. If we don’t, we only perpetuate the notion that it’s accept- able for parents to lie to their children. 

Elohim specifically commands His people not to do what early church leaders did when they incorporated idola- trous practices and relabeled them Christian. Before they entered the Promised Land, Elohim gave the Israelites a stern warning to not worship Him with pagan practices: “Take heed to yourself that you are not ensnared to fol- low them [the inhabitants of the land], . . . and that you do not inquire after their elohims, saying, ‘How did these nations serve their elohims? I also will do likewise.’ 

“You shall not worship Yehovah your Elohim in that way; for every abomination to Yehovah which He hates they have done to their elohims . . . Whatever I command you, be careful to observe it; you shall not add to it nor take away from it” (Deuteronomy 12:30-32). 

Many centuries later the apostle Paul raised up church- es in many gentile cities. To the members of the Church of Elohim in Corinth, a Greek city steeped in idolatry, Paul wrote: “. . . What fellowship has righteousness with law- lessness? And what communion has light with darkness? And what accord has Messiah with Belial [or Wickedness personified, here in reference to Satan]? Or what part has a believer with an unbeliever? And what agreement has the temple of Elohim with idols? 

“For you are the temple of the living Elohim . . . Therefore ‘Come out from among them and be separate, says the Lord. Do not touch what is unclean, and I will receive you.’ . . . Therefore, having these promises, beloved, let us cleanse ourselves from all filthiness of the flesh and spirit, perfecting holiness in the fear of Elohim” (2 Corinthians 6:14-17; 7:1). 

Instead of approving of any notion of church members renaming and celebrating customs associated with false elohims as now Christian, Paul’s instructions were clear: They were to have nothing to do with such practices. He similarly told Athenians who were steeped in idolatry, “Truly, these times of ignorance Elohim overlooked, but now commands all men everywhere to repent” (Acts 17:30). 

Elohim alone has the right to decide the special days on which we are to worship Him. Yeshua Messiah plainly tells
us that “Elohim is Spirit, and those who worship Him must worship in spirit and truth” (John 4:24). We cannot honor Elohim in truth with false practices adopted from the worship of false elohims. 

Yeshua said: “This people honors Me with their lips, but their heart is far from Me. And in vain they worship Me, teaching as doctrines the commandments of men” (Mark 7:6-7). Even if Christians mean well when they observe Christmas, that does not make it okay. Elohim is not amused or pleased! 

The knowledge of how to truly honor Elohim the Father and His Son Yeshua Messiah has been made available to you. Will you live by the revealed truth of Elohim or follow the wayward traditions of mankind?