Savior's birth - April 6 vs December 25

[Robert F. Smith]

2 hours ago, boo said:

I think you are missing something. Lehi left Jerusalem in the first year of the reign of king Zedekaih . That is clear. however the Babylonian Chronicles make it clear that that was 597 BC.

Correct, boo.  We have contemporary cuneiform records.  I covered all that in my “Book of Mormon Event Structure: Ancient Near East,” FARMS Preliminary Report/Study Aid, SMI-84 (Provo: FARMS, 1985/1986); 31pp., published in JBMS, 5/2 (1996):98-147. online at http://scholarsarchive.byu.edu/jbms/vol5/iss2/5/ .  Zedekiah takes the throne in early 597 BC, so that his first year is a window extending into the following year.  Don Bradley's research on the missing 116-page Book of Lehi even suggests that Lehi left during Passover of 597 BC.  Whatever the case, the superscription to III Nephi clearly has it in the first year.

2 hours ago, boo said:

The 600 hundred year prophecy only works if you accept that it was based on the Jewish lunar calendar.

That theory doesn't work because the Jewish luni-solar calendar is still a solar calendar with intercalated months on a regular cycle.  600 luni-solar years is still 600 solar years.  Even a Muslim lunar calandar, which is a true lunar calendar, doesn't work.  The math doesn't work.  Lefgren, Chadwick, Pratt, and others have failed repeatedly to do the math.

2 hours ago, boo said:

If you use 600 solar years like the Gregorian calendar you have Christ being born in 3 Ad 6 years or more after the death of Herod. I have done the math using the Jewish year count and it works exactly showing Christ being born in late 5 or early 4 BC. I think that if you look at the gospel account Luke 1 ;26 it appears Mary became pregnant about the 6 month of the Jewish year ( Nissan or Mar-April ) and would have delivered9 months in the middle or end of Dec . Exactly as the earliest Christian traditions have it I think it was probably the winter Solstice . The symbolism is compelling . think of when Joseph was born Dec23

Luke does not in fact tell us when Mary became pregnant.  So we are left wondering how to calculate the true date of Jesus' birth.  Three clues in the BofM do, however, give us the exact date:  (1) First year of Zedekiah, (2) the 600-year prophecy, and (3) the death of Jesus in the 34th year and 4th day.  Rigid adherence to those three correlates leave only one conclusion and method -- the 360-day Mesoamerican Long Count is the only calendar which can possibly apply.  By that method, the death of Jesus at Passover in Spring forces his birth to have taken place in Autumn 5 BC.  The 6 solar months lost in 33 years of Jesus' life are lost due to the 360-day count over those 33 years, taking us from Spring to Autumn.  Kind of like astronomical precession.

[rpn]

I think the reason is that it doesn't matter when we celebrate Christmas.   And there is no reason to give cause for anyone to say we don't worship Jesus Christ, which would happen if we decided not to celebrate with everyone else.

I also don't think we have the info to definitively say the date he was born, and without that, it is just dumb to cause a brohaha over the date.

[MiserereNobis]

I don't really care about the actual historical date (that would be for the scholars to hash out). However, I love the liturgical year cycles. And the liturgical year cycle doesn't care much about the historical date, either (hence the variable dates for the "moving feast" of Easter).

It's about the symbolic sanctification of time. Years, days, and even hours become divine and connected to the divine.

Edited December 21, 2019 by MiserereNobis

[2BizE]

Both dates are just made up and are wrong. Even if Elder Bednar thinks April 6 is the date, he is mistaken.  I think people are realizing this now.

[strappinglad]

Ask the Chinese. 

All I know about calendars is that accuracy was iffy over 2000 years. The Mayans had a 360 day year and at the end had a big party for about 5 days until their priests saw the Sun line up to where it was supposed to be for the start of the new year. 

[3DOP]

On 12/20/2019 at 11:58 AM, marineland said:

Why does the church continue to commemorate the birth of Christ on December 25
when the 2014 General Conference says April 6 is the actual and accurate date?
 
https://www.churchofjesuschrist.org/study/general-conference/2014/04/bear-up-their-burdens-with-ease?lang=eng
 
"Today is April 6. We know by revelation that today is the actual and accurate  
date of the Savior’s birth. April 6 also is the day on which The Church of Jesus  
Christ of Latter-day Saints was organized"

Thanks
 
Tony

Hi Tony. I have some thoughts on why Latter-day Saints do well to celebrate Christmas in December. They would be no different from my own. They would be similar to a great Eastern bishop, whose "Christmas sermons" helped make the celebration of Christmas in December extend from the West to the East. I would consider it to be "neighbourly" of you all, if you keep the birth of Jesus with us, for the simple sake of custom, and a certain desire to celebrate some kind of unity with non-LDS Christians.

It seems fitting that an event which is important to so many might be celebrated on the same day. It wasn't until the late 4th Century that the well-known bishop of Constantinople, St. John Chrysostom sought to carry out a reform in the churches of the East that would make it possible for the whole Christian world to celebrate the birth of Christ on the same day as the churches of the West. He argued that the church at Rome had kept the feast of Christmas on Dec. 25th since the commencement of the Church. He points out that the Christians in Rome would be best situated for discovering the date because the acts of the Enrollment taken by Caesar Augustus in Judea, as everyone knows took place at the time of Jesus' birth, would be found in the public archives, naturally in Rome. I do not say that this is historical proof, but it seems interesting as an argument coming from an Eastern Church Father, trying to persuade Eastern Christians to adapt their liturgical calendar to correspond with the Western churches.

For me, Chrysostom gives a better argument for December 25th, which as all know, is no where mentioned in Scripture. However, we do know from the message of the Angel to the Blessed Virgin Mary, that whatever the date for the birth of Christ is, it will be six months after the birth of John the Baptist. That is why Mary hurried off to her cousin Elizabeth's house after she conceived in her womb, so she could be an help to her who was thought to have been barren, and now she was six months with child. St. Chrysostom explained in one of his Christmas sermons another reason why the Christians at Rome would appoint a day close to Dec. 25th for the birth of God's Son. This information comes to me from a 14 volume work called the Liturgical Year, which explains the history, mystery, and practice of the ancient Christians as it relates the the church calendar up to the time when it was written, which was then at the latter half of the 19th Century. I will use the words of its author, Dom Prosper Gueranger O.S.B., as he explains his understanding of St. Chrysostom's second argument:

"The holy doctor adduces a second argument, which he founds upon the Gospel of St. Luke, and he reasons thus: we know from the sacred Scriptures that it must have been in the fast of the seventh month that the priest Zachary had the vision in the Temple; after which, Elizabeth his wife, conceived St. John the Baptist: hence it follows that the Blessed Virgin Mary having, as the Evangelist relates, received the Angel Gabriel's visit, and conceived the Saviour of the world in the sixth month of Elizabeth's pregnancy, that is to say, in March, the birth of Jesus must have taken place in the month of December." ---The Liturgical Year, Vol. 2, p. 2, republished by St. Bonaventure Publications, Great Falls, Mt., year 2000

I do not have the tools to understand how we can be certain that Zachary's vision had to have been in the seventh month, corresponding to our September. I do not dismiss the argument though, just because I do not understand it. I suppose my position is that it is fitting, if we lack knowledge of the date, to celebrate Christmas at this time of year. It seems possible that those who share my view, like my much beloved Dom Gueranger, as well as the great St. Chrysostom have occasionally tried to go beyond "fittingness" to "historicity." That said, if I had one chance out of 365 to bet on the date Christ was born, I would go with Dec. 25. Being non-LDS, I think there is a good possibility of it.  

Dom Gueranger also makes the case throughout his writings that there is a fitting analogical correspondence between the laws of nature, and the life of the Church. I share his view that it would be fitting if the Son of God, who was born in a dark stable, hidden and unknown, at a time in history when aside from the people of the Old Covenant, the children of Adam were laboring in travail and weariness unknowingly awaiting the fulfillment of the promises to Abraham for a light to the Gentiles. If Jesus came in December, and John the Baptist arrived in June, nature would have imitated supernature, if you will. John came in summer, and must decrease as he said. Jesus came in December, and He must increase, as the Baptist said. Catholic hymnology and theology has long understood the sun, and the moon, and the stars to be analogous to Christ, whose brilliant light, like the sun's, is not borrowed, and Mary, who is the speculum justitiae, mirror of justice, who, like the moon, reflects the light of the sun/Son. And of course, the stars can correspond to the saints in heaven, whose light, while significant and comforting at night, are visible only while the brilliant rays of the sun/which cannot even be beheld by the naked eye, are absent.

Historically, it seems plausible but uncertain if Christ was born in December. But if the date were chosen because it corresponds to a pagan celebration of the return of the sun, it would not be inappropriate for Christians to take the same season and apply it to their Saviour. There is nothing wrong with celebrating that the days are getting longer, even as the pagans, so long as one celebrates and worships "the true light which enlighteneth every man that cometh in to this world." (Jn. 1:9) If it is uncertain that Christ was born in December, what is certain is that those who have celebrated Christmas on Dec. 25th since at least the 4th Century, have made the necessary distinction between sun worship and Son worship. 

A Happy and Holy Christmas Season to all. God bless.

Rory       

 

   

Edited December 21, 2019 by 3DOP

[MiserereNobis]

15 minutes ago, 3DOP said:

A Happy and Holy Christmas Season to all. God bless.

Rory

To you, too, Rory. Thank you for the great post!

[3DOP]

3 hours ago, MiserereNobis said:

I don't really care about the actual historical date (that would be for the scholars to hash out). However, I love the liturgical year cycles. And the liturgical year cycle doesn't care much about the historical date, either (hence the variable dates for the "moving feast" of Easter).

It's about the symbolic sanctification of time. Years, days, and even hours become divine and connected to the divine.

Dom Gueranger talks about this. I am not quoting but he speaks of the importance to certain feasts with the connection to days of the week. We celebrate Easter Sunday, and every Sunday because Christ was resurrected on Sunday. We celebrate Corpus Christi on Thursday because our Lord celebrated the first Mass on Thursday. Saturdays have a special importance to our Lady, especially in her sorrows, because it is at this time that she suffered her greatest hours. And of course Fridays are always a day of penance because of our Lord's suffering. Thus do the days the week remind us of the history of the Gospel and of the Church. But Gueranger points out that the day of the week is not significant with regards to Jesus' birth, rather it is at the time and season of the solar year, which as I mention above corresponds mystically with the coming of the "Sun of justice", as spoken of with a personal pronoun in Mal. 4. And so, there are seasons, as there was also in the Old Covenant, usually in 40 day periods, like the Christmas season, and Lent, and the time from the Resurrection to the Ascension. I do not know how the reformers could have been tolerated if for no other reason, without reason, they stole this legitimate patrimony of all Christians. Even if Zwingli and Luther and Calvin were right where they differed with Catholics on theology, they were WRONG about throwing out the beautiful pageant that comes to Catholics and Orthodox by way of the church calendar in its fullness.  

The purpose of Gueranger's work is to bring the child of God to a place of confidence in the prayers of Holy Mother Church, whose liturgy is inspired by the Holy Spirit. How can a faithful Catholic doubt that such lovely prayers as belong to us in the liturgy will be answered when we pray them. The introits and collects, the gradual and the alleluia, the offertory and secrets, the communion and postcommunion, of each Sunday are enough to provide a feast for the soul for an entire week, especially under the guidance of the great Benedectine abbot of Solemnes, whose religious order has always sought to elevate the value of liturgical worship to its proper place. Jesse,  you would love Dom Gueranger if you don't already. You sound like him so often! He only wants for the divine union for each of us, and he insists, that in an age when the the liturgy has so far developed, attention to the liturgy is our way, our springboard that mustn't be set aside. He laments in the general preface to his entire 14 volumes at what has happened to the poor peoples of the Reformation. Okay. One long quote and I'll stop gushing:

(WARNING: The following words are not meant for LDS or Protestants. Gueranger had only Catholics in mind. Surely all of us believe that the other person in a different religion, the wrong one, is somehow impoverished. This is one of the ways Catholics ought to feel bad for well-meaning non-Catholics. No offense is meant toward those who lack what is perhaps our most prized possession, a "divine property".)  

"But in nothing is the excellence of the liturgy so apparent as in its being milk for children, and solid food for the strong; thus resembling the miraculous bread of the desert, and taking every kind of taste according to the different dispositions of those who eat. It is indeed a divine property, which has not unfrequently been noticed even by those who are not of the true fold, and has forced them to acknowledge that the Catholic Church alone knows the secret of prayer. Nay, might it not be said that the reason the Protestants have no ascetic writers, is that they have no real liturgical prayer? It is true that a sufficient want of unction, which characterizes all that the reformation has produced, is to be found in its denying the holy Sacrament of the Eucharist, which is the centre of all religion: But this is virtually the same as saying that Protestants have no liturgical prayer, inasmuch as the liturgy is so essentially and intimately connected with the Eucharist. So true is this, that wheresoever the dogma of the real Presence has ceased to be believed, there also have the canonical Hours ceased, and could not but cease." ---ibid from above, Vol. 1, p. 9 

Rory

[MiserereNobis]

42 minutes ago, 3DOP said:

Jesse,  you would love Dom Gueranger if you don't already. You sound like him so often!

Thanks for the recommendation. I’ll check him out!

[InCognitus]

12 hours ago, MiserereNobis said:

I don't really care about the actual historical date (that would be for the scholars to hash out). However, I love the liturgical year cycles. And the liturgical year cycle doesn't care much about the historical date, either (hence the variable dates for the "moving feast" of Easter).

It's about the symbolic sanctification of time. Years, days, and even hours become divine and connected to the divine.

I was thinking the same thing, the actual date isn't important and I tend to think that his birth would have coincided with some Jewish festival.  

I think about the dates in Latter-day Saint church history for example.  We have important dates like September 22, 1827, when Joseph Smith received the plates for the Book of Mormon.  In 1827 the 22nd of September was the first day of Rosh Hashanah, also known as the Feast of Trumpets.  Maybe that's one of the reasons (besides Revelation 14:6) that the angel Moroni is always shown with a trumpet (although maybe it should have been a shofar, but if Moroni had the ore and know-how to make plates then maybe he also made himself a cool trumpet, right? ).  But Joseph's preparation for receiving the plates took four years beginning in 1823, and he was instructed to go to the same place on the same date every year.  So for the first three years that date was insignificant other than that on the fourth year it landed on the Rosh Hashanah at the time he was allowed to obtain the plates.

And also it's no coincidence that the very day that Joseph received keys from Moses and Elijah in the Kirtland temple on April 3, 1836, happened to be the second day of Passover (pesach) that year.

So I am quite certain that the actual date that Jesus was born would also work the same way.  There is important symbolism in those festivals. 

Edit:  It's unfortunate that most Latter-day Saints (including myself) are mostly clueless about these festivals.  I'm personally trying to overcome that because there has been no mistake in how some of these dates have played out in history in connection with the festivals, and I suspect there is a lot more of that to come.  But our cluelessness on these things doesn't stop the Lord from using these events for good things.  It would just be better if we could maybe see it coming beforehand rather than having an "aha" moment after the fact.

Edited December 22, 2019 by InCognitus
typo fix

[The Nehor]

On 12/20/2019 at 11:58 AM, marineland said:

Why does the church continue to commemorate the birth of Christ on December 25
when the 2014 General Conference says April 6 is the actual and accurate date?
 
https://www.churchofjesuschrist.org/study/general-conference/2014/04/bear-up-their-burdens-with-ease?lang=eng
 
"Today is April 6. We know by revelation that today is the actual and accurate  
date of the Savior’s birth. April 6 also is the day on which The Church of Jesus  
Christ of Latter-day Saints was organized"

Thanks
 
Tony

We try to avoid being pedantic dweebs about exact dates that are in doubt. Hope this helps.

[MustardSeed]

Because can you imagine how difficult it would be to NOT celebrate with everyone else, and to actually celebrate in April? 

 

[Benjamin McGuire]

I am a little surprised in this thread that no one has mentioned the problems D&C Section 20 verse 1. The text was added as a header to the revelation after the fact by John Whitmer (he did this with several revelations) - it was never an actual part of the revelation, and the revelation itself was given on April 10, not April 6. It becomes a part of Section 20 effectively through later scribal error. This was all seen in the work done by the Joseph Smith Papers project.

So the idea that Section 20 tells us the day of Jesus birth isn't terribly reliable.

Ben McGuire

[The Nehor]

2 hours ago, Benjamin McGuire said:

I am a little surprised in this thread that no one has mentioned the problems D&C Section 20 verse 1. The text was added as a header to the revelation after the fact by John Whitmer (he did this with several revelations) - it was never an actual part of the revelation, and the revelation itself was given on April 10, not April 6. It becomes a part of Section 20 effectively through later scribal error. This was all seen in the work done by the Joseph Smith Papers project.

So the idea that Section 20 tells us the day of Jesus birth isn't terribly reliable.

Ben McGuire

Pssst......JAHS did in the second post.

[Thinking]

Regardless of when Christ was born, Merry Christmas everybody!

[3DOP]

On 12/23/2019 at 2:58 PM, MustardSeed said:

Because can you imagine how difficult it would be to NOT celebrate with everyone else, and to actually celebrate in April? 

 

Hey Mustard Seed, I think it would be too difficult. It would not work.

I was once involved with a church where the pastor had got hold of these ideas about how Christ might have been born any day of the year. He decided that for church services, we would sing Christmas carols periodically throughout the year. Any day might be the true Christmas. I don't think that experiment lasted past the spring of the year he wanted us to do it. It seemed so weird singing Christmas songs in springtime. Thirty-five or forty years later, I am just about ready to say that it seemed weird because it WAS weird.

The Christmas season is about good community traditions and cultural customs that go back nearly two millenia. It isn't only about precise history. That is part of why I think it is prudent upon the part of LDS leaders to maintain a remembrance of Christ's birth with everybody else, even if Latter-day revelation gives a different historical date (which seems debatable itself among you all?). This event cannot be proportionally minimized to one out of 365 days. There is too much to be remembered and deliberately pondered. There is a need among those claiming to be Christian for an extended Christmas season, as well as a single day which we principally celebrate. It isn't because the historical date is or was certain, but because the time of year is fitting in so many ways, that I believe the Catholic Church wisely chose this time of year to celebrate the Nativity of our Lord Jesus Christ. If any of you think we got it wrong, thanks for going along with us and not making a big deal out of it!

A Merry Christmas to you and all,

Rory

 

[theplains]

On 12/21/2019 at 3:54 PM, 3DOP said:

"The holy doctor adduces a second argument, which he founds upon the Gospel of St. Luke, and he reasons thus: we know from the sacred Scriptures that it must have been in the fast of the seventh month that the priest Zachary had the vision in the Temple; after which, Elizabeth his wife, conceived St. John the Baptist: hence it follows that the Blessed Virgin Mary having, as the Evangelist relates, received the Angel Gabriel's visit, and conceived the Saviour of the world in the sixth month of Elizabeth's pregnancy, that is to say, in March, the birth of Jesus must have taken place in the month of December." ---The Liturgical Year, Vol. 2, p. 2, republished by St. Bonaventure Publications, Great Falls, Mt., year 2000

Do you believe Jesus was conceived in the 6th month according to the Jewish calendar (Luke 1:26)?

Thanks,
Jim

Edited December 26, 2019 by theplains
fixed grammar

[3DOP]

5 minutes ago, theplains said:

Do you believe Jesus was conceived in the 6 month according to the Jewish calendar (Luke 1:26)?

Thanks,
Jim

I do not believe that. Nor do I disbelieve it. I limit my belief to the Scripture which shows why it is plausible to think that Jesus was conceived six months after the vision of Zachary. As to the vision of Zachary, I wrote the following in the same post you quote:

"I do not have the tools to understand how we can be certain that Zachary's vision had to have been in the seventh month, corresponding to our September."

[Latter Day Data]

Elder Bednar may have been wrong, and if so that’s okay! 

Even if he is wrong and still holds that wrong opinion, that just makes him human.