Christmas was originally intended to celebrate Jesus Christ’s birth — however, it is a bit of a historical mystery why December 25 was chosen as the official date.
Some speculate early Christians could have chosen the date because it fell shortly after the northern hemisphere’s winter solstice.
Other theories suggest that Christians appropriated the date from pagan holidays, like the birthday of Mithras — a Persian sun god who many Roman soldiers worshiped, with some claiming that Christians “took advantage of the popularity of the 25 December date to celebrate the birth of their own influential religious figure.”
Still, some are skeptical of a supposed cynical piggy-backing off of paganism.
“The various pagan religions all had festivals spanning the calendar. Whatever month the early Christians might have otherwise chosen would still place Christmas near some pagan celebration, and oppositional theorists would still be making the same claims,” wrote Jon Sorensen in an article for Catholic Answers.
Case in point, according to one theory, the date was taken from the feast day of Sol Invictus — the Roman sun god.
However, historical evidence suggests that the feast of Sol Invictus may have started after Christians began celebrating Jesus’ birth on December 25. In fact, there is evidence that Christians commemorated Christ’s birth on that date as early as the second century.
Hippolytus of Rome wrote in his Commentary on the Book of Daniel (c. 204), “For the first advent of our Lord in the flesh, when he was born in Bethlehem, was December 25th, Wednesday, while Augustus was in his forty-second year, but from Adam, five thousand and five hundred years.”
Some Christians observed Christ’s birth on different days, however. While his birth was celebrated in the West on December 25, Christians in the East celebrated it in January. That tradition lives on today, as this holiday season, Eastern Christians will celebrate Christmas on January 7.
Regardless of the exact date that Christ’s birth is commemorated, Christmas remains a vibrant holiday celebrated by the vast majority of Christians the world over who worship, rejoice, and make community, just as their predecessors did some 2,000 years ago.