Was Jesus really born on December 25th?

you know like most Christians I'd love to know the date of the birth of Christ I'd know I'd love to know exactly when Jesus was born but I don't and really that date has been lost in history to my knowledge there's no way to exactly precisely recover that date but I'd like to talk about the birthday of Jesus Christ and kin and what's involved in seeing what we can learn about it to start with I'd like to go to an unusual verse let's go to Ezekiel please chapter 8 verse 1 if you're if you've got your Bible there ezekiel chapter 8 verse 1 says in the sixth year in the sixth month on the fifth day while I was sitting at my house with the elders of Judah etc etc well here's Ezekiel chapter 8 verse 1 and I I've looked at I guess I would say a dozen study Bibles and commentaries and sources and there's very very little disagreement that this is September of 592 BC and why is this important this is important because God could have done the exact same thing for the birth of Jesus Christ this is his only begotten Son he could have said in the year of Tiberius in the month so-and-so which is the Roman month so and so on the day so and so I mean he could have told us and he didn't and what does that tell us what what does that tell us from God's perspective if he could have told us and he didn't it tells us that he's wanting us to look at a bigger picture you know the information of the birth of Christ is not chronological its theological it's the birth of the savior of the world and so God could have told us when it was and he didn't that should tell us that for all of our efforts to try to find out exactly when it was really we ought to be more interested in the theology of it and that had happened and celebrate that it happened then wrangle with each other about trying to pin down an exact date nevertheless like everybody else I like a date to hang my hat on and so in my research I've come up with one but let's let's talk about what we know historically clement of alexandria a bishop of the early church lived 150 to 215 ad mentions that by his time okay 280 some christian groups had tried to pin down the birth of christ interesting here we are less than less than 200 years after the birth of Christ and the various groups that he mentioned none of them be mentioned December as the date of the birth of Christ well it wasn't even on the radar scope that the month of December would be the month of the birth of Christ and that's it in 280 by 480 however we find December 25th is one of the dates chosen for the birth of Christ another one by the way that was in the Western Church the Western Roman Church had had pretty much said okay December 25th then the Eastern Church had said January 6th and so there was some disagreement there back and forth now I'm aware of a couple major theories as to why December 25th was chosen the most common most popular and may be true you know this is the thing about theories it you don't really know whether they're true or not we don't have an exact statement from an early historian but one is that December 25th was chosen because of the pagan winter festivals that were celebrated on December 25th and this there was a desire for Christianity to move into pagan worlds they wanted to make it more acceptable they did need to celebrate the birth of Christ sometime so they picked a pagan winter festival so that the Christianity would be more acceptable to pagans and that's certainly one of the theories and maybe possible there's another theory which is very interesting about how December 25th was selected and that's that's that the early Christians and you can date this from there's a an anonymous Christian treatise comes out of North Africa from the from the fourth century that's the 300s and it's the name of the treatise is on solstices and equinoxes and it says March 25th was the date of the crucifixion and listen to this because this is an early Christian document at them states for on that day he was conceived and on the same he suffered now we know that that was an early Christian belief because Augustine of Hippo was familiar with that and in his treatise called on the Trinity he writes quote for he and we're talking about Jesus is believed to have been conceived on the 25th of March on which day he also suffered so the early church there were there were people in the early church in the early centuries that believed that the day Christ was born also was also the day on which he or I'm sorry the day he was conceived was the day he was also died and if you run March 25th forward nine months you end up with December twenty-fifth and so those are two theories of how December 25th got chosen my personal belief was that Christ would have been born sometime in September and there's a number of reasons that I believe this one is if you look at Luke chapter 1 verse 5 says this and the time of Herod the king of Judea there was a priest named Zechariah who belonged to the priestly division of Abijah now without going into a lot of information about priests they served twice a year and in 4 BC the and I believe Christ was born in 3 BC and again Ernest Martin has a book called the star that astonished the world that has a lot of very technical information about this that I think he's probably right on but in 4bc the course of Abijah served the last week of May which meant Jesus that Zachariah would have gone home and his wife Elizabeth would have been impregnated in June 9 months after or six months after June is December and it was in the sixth month of John the Baptist's conception with you if you will after his conception that Mary was impregnated so that would mean that Christ would have been Mary would have been impregnated in December and then born in September also remember the record of the Shepherd's in the fields by night well I've got I've been to Israel a number of times and it snows many times in December and it's cold in December outside of Bethlehem in the hills of Judea it is cold so the chances are that the shepherds aren't just going to be in the fields at night they would have been in the sheepfold it was traditional that the shepherds were in the fields at night after the harvest the harvest would have would have all been completed by August but then before the cold months settled in and then at that point they'd bring them inside into a sheepfold so the fact that the Shepherd's were out in the fields by night points to September also it was the fall of the year if you're if you're traveling with a pregnant woman and I believe Joseph had a window of time in which he could have traveled with Mary but I believe that as Mary got more and more pregnant there was more and more pressure in Bethlehem against her and so Joseph would have travelled in the fall of the year is a good time to travel you're past the heat but before the cold of the year and then revelation 12 has an interesting statement talks about a sign in heaven and Ernest Martin has done some good work to show that this would point to the two early September of three BC do we really know when Christ was born No we have some theories on why December 25th was chosen but this I know God could have told us if he wanted to what he'd rather have is us to be thinking about his son every day of the year for my part I'm glad that we in our Western culture have picked a date and said this is the day we're gonna celebrate the birth of Christ and I wish that every Christian home instead of kids just rushing down the stairs and tearing into presents and the parents going and getting a cup of coffee and sitting with the kids if the if the parent of that home the the single parent or the or the dad of the family or whatever would just hey kids before eat everything up and get into our presence and get into our stuff can we take time we'll take time and pray as a family and thank God for the birth of Jesus Christ God could have told us when it was he didn't the day you picked to celebrate it let's make sure we actually celebrate it it's Christ's birth let's pray and thank God for it some days I forget that I'm free sometimes my feet don't wanna carry me

Channel: Spirit & Truth

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Keywords: Jesus, born, December 25th, Christmas Story, birth of Jesus, theology, research, truth, tradition, questions, bible, answers, god, Christ, Christianity, question, scripture, christian, verses, study, savior, lord, holy, spirit, biblical, Apologetics, fulfill, messiah, Yahweh, Yahshua, Elohim, preaching, gospel, truthortradition.com, bible study, biblical research, Word of God, religion, John Schoenheit, Christmas, Bethlehem, birth of Christ, myth, Clement of Alexandria, Luke 1:5, conceive

Id: Vetl5s4B0_o

Length: 10min 19sec (619 seconds)

Published: Wed Dec 16 2009