The Origins of Christmas Tree

The Grove Tree

The Christmas tree has an ancient history many centuries before Messiah was born. The veneration and worship of trees as reincarnated dead human beings is as ancient as Babylon, the beginning of false religion.

In the Bible, the worship of these sacred trees is called the worship of the grove. The pagans would build their temples on high places and then plant the sacred trees representing reincarnation near their altars. The *hex* or *hexagram* became a symbol of their high places and the ritual. It remains so among the occult to this very day who trace their emblems and rituals to this ancient religion.

In the book THE TWO BABYLONS, page 98, Hislop reports:

"The Christmas tree, as has been stated, was generally at Rome a different tree, even the fir; but the very same idea as was implied in the palm-tree was implied in the Christmas fir. . . .Now the Yule Log is the dead stock of Nimrod, deified as the sun-god, but cut down by his enemies; the Christmas tree is Nimrod redivivus-the slain god come to life again" (reincarnated).

The worship of the grove or sacred tree of Baal-Nimrod in Israel is rebuked numerous places in the Scriptures:

• 2KI 23:6 And he brought out the idol (Baalmas tree) from the house of the LORD, without Jerusalem, unto the brook Kidron, and burned it at the brook Kidron, and stamped it small to powder, and cast the powder thereof upon the graves of the children of the people (BJV).

• 2KI 23:7 And he brake down the houses of the homosexuals and lesbians, that were by the house of the LORD, where the women wove hangings for the idol (Baalmas tree).

Symbols of Nimrod and Baal-Berith

At the winter solstice, the sacred tree was cut down in remembrance of Nimrod's death and decorated, as a king would adorn himself. So, the tree represents Nimrod and decorating it is a symbol of adoring the pagan god with the beauty fit for a king. When the tree died (the needles fell and it was naked), all fires in the village were extinguished, ...put out. The worshipers would gather and the Baalmas tree was set on fire. A "holy meal" was cooked upon the flames. Sacred fire from this sacrifice was taken back home to re-fire the hearth, as a reminder of Nimrod's rebirth (reincarnation) and sovereignty over the home. This is the meaning of the Yule log fire. The pagans would take the residue of the burned tree and carve an idol out of it. Part of this practice is even mentioned in the Scriptures:

• ISA 44:16 He burneth part of the idol in the fire; with part thereof he eateth flesh; he roasteth his meat, and is satisfied: yea, he warmeth himself, and saith, Aha, I am warm, I have seen the god-fire:

• ISA 44:17 And the residue thereof he maketh a god, even a graven image of him: he falleth down before it, and worshippeth it, and prayeth unto it, and saith, Save me; for thou art my god (BJV).

Although the heathen reported that anyone who did not venerate or worship the Nimrod Bush was in danger of disease or death, the Prophets calmed the fears of God's people by predicting that avoiding these Baal idols would bring them no curse or harm. Because there is no danger of idols bringing upon God's people disease and death, some modern liberals are now teaching it is permissible to have these Nimrod Bushes (groves), in the home and in the house of God. They are teaching that since no curse of the tree can harm us (we being protected by the Spirit of God), it is acceptable to decorate the Nimrod Baalmas Bush with gold and silver like the pagans, exactly what Jeremiah warned the Jews NOT TO MIMIC OR FOLLOW. Read carefully what the Prophet Jeremiah wrote concerning the ancient practice of decorating the Baalmas tree. Remember it was not called the Christmas tree until the Catholic Church gave it that name:

• JER 10:1 Hear ye the word which the LORD speaketh unto you, O people of Israel:

• JER 10:2 Thus saith the LORD, Learn not the way of the Gentiles, and be not afraid of the signs of the zodiac; for the Gentiles are afraid of them.

• JER 10:3 For the customs of the Gentiles are vain: for one cutteth a tree out of the forest, the work of the hands of the workman, with the axe.

• JER 10:4 They deck it with silver and with gold; they fasten it with nails and with hammers, that it not fall down.

• JER 10:5 These idols are upright as the palm tree, but can not speak: they must be carried, because they cannot walk. Be not afraid of them; for these idols can do no evil against you, neither also is it in them to do any you good (BJV).

The above verses identify the ancient practice of the Baalmas bush worshipers. This practice is exactly reproduced with the Christmas tree today. If the Christmas tree was not at the birth of Messiah and was not used by the Apostles and the first Christians, how did this pagan practice of having or commemorating a false god come into the Churches? It came via the Catholic Church and everyone knows this. This idolatry is far worse than the trinity doctrine, yet it receives little or no attention from alleged scholars and writers of Church doctrine. Why?

It is claimed that Martin Luther was first to bring the Baalmas tree celebration out of paganism of the German people and bring it into the Protestant Church. This cannot be proven and is indeed false. The Baalmas tree was used in Catholic celebrations centuries before Martin Luther. The first traces of using the evergreen tree among the Catholics is when they adopted the fc of the ancient Latin pagans. The word * Saturnalia* comes from the planet Saturn for which our day *Saturday* was named. Saturn was also Nimrod according to Alexander Hislop in his book on pages 31 and 32. Saturday is Nimrod's day. While the first day of the week is Messiah's Day! Saturnalia, the Latin feast of Nimrod, was celebrated at the winter solstice. It lasted five days and included December the 25, the great Baalmas day.

The tree appears to be a triangle and the Egyptians worshiped triangle and pyramid figures. Bill McLain wrote "On Demember 21st, the shortest day of the year, ancient Egyptians decorated their homes with green branches to symbolize life's triumph over death."

The Pagan story says that Saint Boniface found a group of Pagans worshiping an oak tree and became angry. He cut the tree down and a small fir tree sprouted from the stump and reached to the sky. Thus, Saint Boniface told everyone to worship the tree because it is holy, evergreen and a symbol of everlasting life.




Related Links

1. http://jesus-messiah.com/html/christmas2.html#Zoganes%20The%20Red-Robed%20Lord%20Of%20Misrule
2. http://www.blowthetrumpet.org/
3. http://www.mail-archive.com/ctrl@listserv.aol.com/msg00112.html
4. http://www.agministries.org/2008/11/merry-paganism.html
   

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Pagan History of December 25 - Jesus Christ Was NOT Born On December 25th (Christmas Day)

Did you know that Jesus Christ was not born on December 25th?

Did you know that we can prove from the Scriptures that Jesus was not born in the winter?

Did you know that there is a holiday that was instituted over a thousand years before Jesus was born that prophetically foreshadowed the circumstances of His birth?

So why do we celebrate Christmas on December 25th?

The truth is that there was a late December pagan holiday that was celebrated long before Jesus was ever born. The Roman Catholics decided to "christianize" that pagan holiday starting in 336 A.D. as a celebration of the birth of Christ. The Christian Church and much of Judaism is entrenched deep in the ancient Babylonian mystery religion, only today it is referred to as 'culture' or 'traditions.' Most Christians and Jews either don't know or care to know the truth of these pagan ties.

A recent news article from the Scripps Howard News Service states in their article, "Christmas Celebration Crosses All Faiths."

• "Christmas remains America's favorite holiday-a religious celebration that transcends the nation's increasingly multicultural society. Eighty-three percent of the adult residents of the United States-including Jews, Muslims and atheists-say they put a decorated tree in their homes. Fifty-nine percent say there is no holiday they love more than Christmas."

What is Christmas and from where did it originate? Yule is the Chaldean name for 'infant' or 'little child.' In ancient Babylon, the 25th of December was known as Yule day or the birth of the promised child day. This was the day of the birth of the incarnate sun, who appeared as a baby child to redeem a world bound in darkness. It was an essential belief of the Babylonian religious system, that the sun god, also known as Baal, was the chief god in a polytheistic system. Tammuz was also worshipped as the god incarnate, or promised baby son of Baal, who was to be the Savior of the world.

We find in the Catholic encyclopedia that Christmas was not even among the earliest church festivals. It was not until the latter part of the fourth century that the Roman Church began observing December 25th as Jesus' birthday. By the fifth century A.D., the Roman Church ordered the birth of Messiah to be forever observed on December 25th. At the time of this decree, the Roman Church knew full well that the pagan religious cults throughout the Roman and Greek worlds celebrated the pagan sun god, Mithra, on this self same day. This winter festival was known as the Nativity of the Sun. It was also known in the Roman Empire as Saturnalia [another name for sun worship].

Note: In 46 BC, when the Roman "Julian Calendar" was adopted, December 24th was the shortest day of the year. Therefore, December 25th was the first annual day that daylight began to increase. Thus, the origin of the REBIRTH or Annual Birthday of the Invincible SUN.

In accordance with the Roman "Julian calendar," the "Saturnalia" festival appears to have taken place on December 17th; it was preceded by the "Consualia" near December 15th, and followed by the "Opalia" on December 19th. These pagan celebrations typically lasted for a week, ending just before the late Roman Imperial Festival for "Sol Invictus" (Invincible Sun) on December 25th.

In 1582 AD. Roman Catholic Pope Gregory the XIII caused the current "Gregorian Calendar" to be adopted, in order to eliminate the solar time shift error introduced by the "Julian Calendar."

By December 1582 AD the shortest day of the year had shifted 12 days on the Roman "Julian Calendar" to Wednesday, December 12, 1582.

However, the Original December 25th 'Birth Date' was retained for all pagan Sun gods by the Roman "Saturnalia" and "Sol Invictus" traditions; which were now called the "Twelve Days of Christ Mass."

On the new Roman Catholic Gregorian calendar the shortest annual day was numerically shifted back 10 days to the 22nd of December, where it remains to this day; while the original order of the days of the week remained unchanged.

Therefore, Wednesday, December 12th, 1582 AD, became Wednesday, December 22nd, 1582 AD, and the True Sabbath Day remained unchanged.

Yahweh, the Only True Self-existent Eternal Creator, would never have allowed The True Messiah to be born on or near the December 25th birthday period of the pagan Sun gods; during the time in which virgins were sacrificed, murder was commonplace, and orgies the norm. This would be an entirely unacceptable association.

The winter festival was very popular in ancient times, and marked a time of rejoicing and festivity. Much of our present day customs involved in the Christmas season are a direct inheritance of the Roman winter festival of Saturnalia. These days involved gift giving, colored lights to ward off evil spirits, festive meals, and of course, decorated trees.

The present day Christmas tree also goes back to the worship of sacred trees in the ancient Babylonian system. The green evergreen symbolized the incarnate Baal coming to life through the incarnate baby Tammuz. The custom of decorating and worshipping trees spread throughout the known world, with the variety of tree used selected according to the natural growth of each area of the world. The Druids worshipped the oak tree, the Egyptians worshipped the palm tree, while in Rome it was the fir tree.

There are at least ten references in the Bible warning that these green trees were associated with idolatry and pagan worship. Jeremiah 10:1-4 details the Israelites following the very pagan customs practiced today.
The very term, Christmas, comes from the sacred Christ-mass, where the Pope in the role of the High Priest of the mystery Babylon religion introduces the people to the concept of trans-substantiation. Using the wine and round wafers to reflect the life of Baal, the sun god, the name of Jesus replaces the ancient pagan custom. The wine and wafers are now said to be the transformation of the actual blood and body of Messiah within the person who ingests them. People, thereby, relive again and again the death and resurrection of the incarnate god.

Israelites performed this same ritual in their worship to the Queen of heaven and the incarnate god Tammuz.

Calvin, in 1550, instigated an edict concerning church holidays. A ban was passed against observing various church festivals, which included Christmas. In a tract on the necessity of reforming the church, Calvin exclaimed: "I know how difficult it is to persuade the world that Yahweh disapproves of all modes of worship not expressly sanctioned by His Word." John Knox, in the Scottish reformation, repeatedly confronted the Catholic Church, contending that true worship must be instituted by God, not derived from the traditions of men. At the heart of his argument was an appeal to Torah, especially, references to Deuteronomy 4 and 12, which states that one must not add to nor subtract from God's word.

John Knox, History of the Reformation in Scotland, 1950, Vol. 1, page 91 states the following: "That Yahweh's word damns your ceremonies it is evident; for the plain and straight commandment of Yahweh is, 'Not that thing which appears good in thy eyes, shalt thou do to the LORD thy Yahweh, but what the LORD thy Yahweh has commanded thee, that do thou; add nothing to it; diminish nothing from it.' Now unless that ye are able to prove that Yahweh has commanded your ceremonies, this His former commandment will damn both you and them."

The holidays of Christmas and Easter were banned from the Church of Scotland.
David Calderwood [1511-1651], representing the Scottish ministries, asserted in reference to Christmas and Easter: "The Judaical days had once that honor, as to be appointed by Yahweh Himself; but the anniversary days appointed by men have not like honor. This opinion of Christ's nativity on the 25th day of December was bred at Rome."

David Calderwood then exposed the Roman claims made for the 25th of December as the day of Messiah's birth. He argues that the Apostles never ordained it. He said the following: "Nay, let us utter the truth, December-Christmas is a just imitation of the December-Saturnalia of the ethnic [heathen] Romans, and so used as if Bacchus [another name for the sun god], and not Messiah, were the Yahweh of Christians."

George Gillespie [1613-1649], a premier Scottish theologian, wrote in a book published in 1637 called A Dispute Against the English Popish Ceremonies Obtruded Upon the Church of Scotland. "The holidays [reference to Christmas and Easter] take a severe beating on a number of accounts. Sacred significant ceremonies devised by man are to be reckoned among images forbidden in the second commandment in regards to worshipping idols."

It is certainly clear from all that we have read, that an end time apostasy has come upon both Jews and Gentiles. Both have strayed far from the original precepts of the faith, and there will be a heavy accounting before the LORD for this. These holidays represent only part of the great apostasy that has come upon God's people in the latter days.

Watch this video with an open mind - perhaps it is time for all of us to learn the truth.

Asatru
MandMEvangelists
Paganism/XmasHistory

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THE TRUTH BEHIND CHRISTMAS

THE TRUTH ABOUT CHRISTMAS

Most professing Christians believe that Christmas is one of the most important holidays. without question, many people blindly follow its observance. Moreover, they assume that Jesus was actually born on December 25. Because we look to Christ as our Savior, it is important to take a deeper look into his birth. We often hear people say, "Let's put Christ back into Christmas!" Perhaps we should investigate just how Christ got into Christmas in the first place.

Most Bible scholars agree that Christmas is of pagan origin. In his book 4000 Years of Christmas, Earl W. Count, Professor of Anthropology at Hamilton College, explains the origin of the Christmas celebration:

"We do not know its beginning . . . we do not really know when the Christ child it venerates was born: or the time and place when Christmas was first celebrated: or exactly how it was that, over the centuries, a bishop saint of Asia Minor, and a pagan god of the Germans merged to become Santa Claus."

"although the Christmas story centers in the Christ child of Bethlehem, it begins so long before his coming that we find its hero arriving on the scene after more than half of the time of the story has gone by. Christmas began over 4000 years ago, as the festival which renewed the world for another year. The 12 days of Christmas, the bright fires and probably the yule log; the giving of presents; the carnivals with their floats; their merry makings and clowning; the mummers who sing and play from house to house, the feasting; the church processions with their lights and song —all these and more began three centuries before Christ was born. And they celebrated the arrival of a new year" (ibid., page 18).

"For that day [25 of December] 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. The church finally succeeded in taking the merriment, the greenery, the lights, and gifts from Saturn and giving them to the "babe of Bethlehem" (ibid., page 27).

Mosaic of Jesus Christ depicted as Sol, a Sun god, in Mausoleum M in the pre-fourth-century necropolis under St Peter's Basilica in Rome. It is named Christo Sole (Christ the Sun) and is dated to the late 3rd century by the Italian archaeologists

"It happened that the date [December 25] did fall in the midst of the Saturnalia. Far from being an invention to compete against Roman and Persian paganism, the birthday of Christ ran the danger of being swallowed up in pagan merry making. The [church] fathers tried strenuously to keep Christmas strictly a churchly celebration. It was part of their unremitting struggle to break the grip of the pagan gods upon the people. And as they broke, Romans became Christians . . . but the Saturnalia remained" (ibid., page 28).

In Rome, the Winter Solstice was celebrated many years before the birth of Christ. The Romans called their winter holiday Saturnalia, honoring Saturn, the God of Agriculture. In January, they observed the Kalends of January, which represented the triumph of life over death. This whole season was called Dies Natalis Invicti Solis, the Birthday of the Unconquered Sun. The festival season was marked by much merrymaking. It is in ancient Rome that the tradition of the Mummers was born. The Mummers were groups of costumed singers and dancers who traveled from house to house entertaining their neighbors. From this, the Christmas tradition of caroling was born.

"When was Jesus born? No one knows. December 25 is no more than the historical date of his birth than is any other" [page 50]. "Christmas, as we have seen, is of the Mediterranean . . .for the Mediterranean world already had not merely centuries, but millennia behind it, when Christ was born; and even the religion which he founded had traveled several centuries before it discovered its need of Christmas" (page 86).

"Renewal and rebirth: After 4000 years, the festival that has grown about the birth of the Christ child remains an affirmation that all things can be made anew" (ibid., page 91).

although no one knows the exact date of Christ's birth, there is evidence that he was not born in the winter: "And there were in the same country shepherds abiding in the field, keeping watch over their flocks by night" (Lk.2:8). This never could have occurred in the month of December in Palestine. The shepherds usually brought their flocks from the mountainsides and fields and corralled them no later than the middle of October to protect them from the cold, rainy season that followed. The Song of Solomon 2:11 and Ezra.10:9, 13 show that winter was a rainy season during which shepherds could not have remained in open fields at night:

"It was an ancient custom among the Jews of those days to send their sheep to the fields, and deserts about Passover [early spring] and bring them home at commencement of the first rain . . .During the time they were out, the shepherds watched them night and day, . . .The first rains began early in the month of Marchesvan, which answers to part of our October and November [begins in the middle of October] we find that the sheep were kept out in the open country during the whole summer, and as these shepherds had not yet brought home their flocks, it is a presumptive argument that October had not yet commenced, and that consequently, our Lord was not born on the 25 of December, when no flocks were out in the fields by night. On this very ground, the nativity in December should be given up. The feeding of the flocks by night in the fields is a chronological fact" (The Adam Clarke Commentary, Volume 5, page 347).

The Birthday of the Ligth of the World - PDF

There is no command in the whole Bible that tells us to observe Christmas. Under the inspired teaching of Paul and Peter and the other apostles, the Christians of the first century never observed Christ's birth date. Christmas came to us through the Roman Catholic Church, which is where it gets its authority as a religious holiday. According to the Catholic Encyclopedia, which is published by the Catholic Church: "Christmas was not among the earliest festivals of the church . . .The first evidence of the feast is from Egypt. "We find this truth acknowledged further in the Encyclopedia Britannica: "Christmas [i.e., the Mass of Christ] was not among the earliest festivals of the church."

The Encyclopedia Americana states:

"Christmas, . . .it was, according to many authorities, not celebrated in the first centuries of the Christian church, as the Christian's usage in general was to celebrate the death of remarkable persons rather than their birth . . ." (The communion, which is instituted by New Testament authority, is a memorial of the death of Christ.) ". . .A feast was established in memory of this event (Christ's birth) in the fourth century. In the fifth century, the Western church ordered it to be celebrated forever on the day of the old Roman feast of the birth of Sol, as no certain knowledge of the day of Christ's birth existed."

How did the pagan custom get into the church? Most recognized authorities agree that Christmas was not observed by the early church for the first two or three hundred years and that its origin began in the western segment of the Roman Church in the fourth century A.D.. However, it was not until the fifth century that the Roman Church ordered it to be celebrated as an official Christian festival.

The Schaff-Herzog Encyclopedia:

"How much the date of the festival depended upon the pagan Brumalia (December 25) following the Saturnalia (December 17-24), and celebrating the shortest day of the year and the "new sun " . . .cannot be accurately determined. The pagan Saturnalia and Brumalia were too deeply entrenched in popular custom to be set aside by Christian influence. The pagan festival with its riot and merrymaking was so popular that Christians were glad of an excuse to continue its celebration with little change in spirit and manner. Christian teachers of the West and Near East protested against the unseemly frivolity, while Christians of Mesopotamia accused their western brethren of idolatry and sun worship for adopting as Christian the pagan festival."

"The observance of December 25 (as a Christian festival) only dates from the fourth century and is due to assimilation with the Mithraic festival of the birth of the sun" (World Popular Encyclopedia, Volume 3).

"Gradually a number of prevailing practices of the [heathen] nations into which Christ came were assimilated and were combined with the religious ceremonies surrounding Christmas. The assimilation of such practices generally represented efforts by Christians to transform or absorb otherwise pagan practices" (The Zonderian Pictorial Encyclopedia of the Bible, Volume 1, page 805).

"The pagan symbolism was taken over and, in Christian view, elevated. Jesus became the "sun of justice" and the "sun of righteousness" (Celebrations: The Complete Book of American Holidays, Myers, page 310).

"Our annual Christian festival (Christmas) is nothing but a continuation under a different name of this old solar festivity (Saturnalia)" (The New Golden Bough, Frazer and Foster, page 653).

"Christmas was generally celebrated in the West only after the triumph of Constantine when the time of Christ's birth was reckoned with the Day of the Unconquered Sun on 25 December" (From Christ to Constantine, Smith, pages 150-151).

"The assimilation of Christ to the sun god, as sun of righteousness, was widespread in the fourth century and was furthered by Constantine's legislation on Sunday, which is not unrelated to the fact that the sun god was the titular divinity of his family" (A History of the Christian Church: Revised, Walker, Section 13, pages 154-155).

The Myth of Nimrod

Nimrod, the grandson of Ham and the great grandson of Noah, was the real founder of the Babylonian system of worship and government that continues to thrive throughout the world.

Ancient writings speak of Nimrod as the one who started a great, organized world apostasy against God, which still dominates the world. It is said that he was so wicked that he married his own mother, Semiramis. After Nimrod was killed, his mother-wife propagated the doctrine of the survival of Nimrod as a spirit-being. She claimed that a full grown evergreen tree sprang up overnight from a dead tree stump which symbolized the resurrection of Nimrod. On each anniversary of his birth (supposedly December 25), she claimed Nimrod would visit the evergreen tree and leave gifts upon it.

Mother and Child Theme

Through her scheming and planning, Semiramis became the Babylonian Queen of Heaven, and Nimrod, under many other names, became the Divine Son of Heaven. Through the generations, in this idolatrous worship, Nimrod also became the false messiah, son of Baal, who was the sun-god. In this false Babylonian religious system, the mother and child (Semiramis and the reborn Nimrod) became chief objects of worship. This worship of mother and child spread throughout the world. Only the names varied because of differing languages. In Asia they were known as Cybele and Diorus. In Rome they were Fortuna and Jupiter. In Egypt their names were Isis and Osiris. Long before the birth of Jesus Christ, the counterpart of the Madonna can be found throughout China, Tibet, and Japan.

The following are explanations of the origins of popular practices and symbols of the Christmas celebration.

Yule Logs

The yule log is in reality the sun log. Yule means wheel, which is applied as the pagan symbol of the sun. Today, professing Christians speak of the sacred yuletide season. There is nothing sacred about it! The symbols come from the worship of false gods.

The Christmas Tree

The Christmas tree was equally common in pagan Rome and pagan Egypt.In Egypt that tree was the palm tree and in Rome it was the fir tree. The palm tree denotes the pagan messiah, Baal-Tamar (Jdg.20:33), and the fir tree denotes the same pagan messiah under the name Baal-Berith. The mother of Adonis, the sun god and great divine mediator, was said to have been mystically changed into a tree. And when she was in that state, she brought forth her divine son.

Mistletoe

"That mistletoe bough in the Druidic superstition, which was derived from Babylon, was a representative of the Messiah, "the man of the branch." The mistletoe was regarded as a divine branch, a branch that came from heaven, and grew upon a tree that sprang out of the earth. Thus by engrafting the celestial branch into the earthly tree, heaven and earth, which sin had severed, were joined together. Thus the mistletoe bough became the token of divine reconciliation to man, the kiss being the well known token of pardon and reconciliation" (The Two Babylons, Hislop, page 99).

The Encyclopedia Americana says:

"The holly, the mistletoe and the yule log . . . are relics of pre-Christian times."

Gifts

Many exchange gifts because the three wise men presented gifts to the Christ child. Did you know the Bible nowhere states there were three wise men? Did you know those wise men never appeared at the manger on Christ's birth night; they actually arrived many months later? They didn't appear at the manger, they appeared at Christ's house (Matt. 2:11).

although most people believe that the custom of giving gifts at Christmas is associated with the men that brought gifts to the child Jesus, the New Standard Encyclopedia, Christmas, says:

"In reality, at least so far as the English speaking people are concerned, it [gift giving at Christmas] is derived from an old heathen custom."

"The wise men gave their gifts to Christ, but did not exchange gifts with each other. The gifts presented to Christ were to a king, because of his royalty, and not because of his birthday. He was a king, and the people of the East never approached the presence of a king without a present in their hands" (Adam Clarke Commentary, Volume 5, Matt. 2:11, page 34).

The Christmas Wreath

The use of Christmas wreaths is believed by authorities to be traceable to the pagan customs of decorating buildings and places of worship at the feast which took place at the same time as Christmas. The Christmas tree is from Egypt and its origin dates from a period long anterior to the Christmas era(Answers to Questions, Frederick gentlemen. Haskins).

Christmas and many other holidays have come directly from paganism, but the annual observances and festivals of Leviticus 23 have come from God and should be observed today by the children of God. See our study papers about the annual festivals and commanded observances of God.

Santa Claus

The name Santa Claus is actually the corruption of the name St. Nicholas, a Roman Catholic bishop who lived in the fifth century.

St. Nicholas, Bishop of Myra. . .a saint honored by the Greeks and Latins on the 6th of December. . .a legend of his surreptitious bestowal of dowries on the three daughters of an impoverished citizen. . .is said to have originated the old custom of giving presents in secret on the eve of St. Nicholas (December 6) subsequently of Christmas and Santa Claus"(Encyclopedia Brittanica, 11th Edition, Volume 19, pp. 648-649).

Kris Kringle

“From the German people were to come those most universal of Christmas customs: the Christmas tree, and the portly beneficent Kris Kringle, known as Santa Claus.

Gradually the Presbyterians, Quakers and Puritans accepted such customs as the Christmas tree, the giving of small gifts and the Christmas feast. But they spoke violently against the corruption of the Christkindl, (the Christ Child) into Kris Kringle. After Kris Kringle was fully assimilated, there was much concern among all religious groups about the non-religious trend of the holiday”(Christmas Day: The Complete Book of American Holidays, Myers, pp. 314-316).

SUMMARY

Easter, Halloween, and Christmas are the three major religious celebrations of professing Christianity today. And all three violate the instructions of God concerning false Gods and false religious practices.

There are many holidays that are national or local in origin and are not forbidden in the Biblical record (e.g., Thanksgiving Day, Mother's Day, Father's Day). If a holiday does not violate God's law and is merely an observances of respect, honor, or gratitude, no spiritual issue is in question. However, if a person chooses to incorporate these days as part of their worship of God, there is an obvious violation of God's law.

The scriptures clearly record that the only worship acceptable to God is worship that conforms to his instructions concerning how he wants to be worshiped. Moreover, God's law imposes the death penalty on all who improperly worship him.

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