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had their Saturnalia , and gave loose to recreation , the Christians honoured it with the name of their Saviour . Happy had it been if they had sanctified their joy , and not made him a minister of sin . However , it is plain there was no regard in these appointments to the real time of-the } r ear wherein the commemorated events happened - , and indeed it is impossible there should , for there is no evidence that they know any thing oi the kind . if
Some learned men have attempted to discover the time of our Saviour ' s birth in the way Pope Julius did . Having corrected his mistake , they begin with the conception of John , whose father was of the course ot Abia , the eighth in David ' s list , 1 Chron . xxiv . ; and then calculating the revolution of the courses , to find when Zacharias must be in Waiting , they conclude that the birth of Christ must have
been the latter end of September . But there can . be no certainty in this ; for the classes were greatly altered afterwards , as may be seen by comparing the different lists in Chronicles and Nehemiab , where , particularly , the house of Abia , which was first the eighth after the captivity , is called the twelfth . Upon the whole , all that we can conclude with any probability from . Scripture is , that pur Lord was not born in the winter season . We are assured the shepherds were out in the night , guarding their flocks : now the Jews assure us , in the Talmud , that the flocks were not turned out into the deserts till after the Passover , and were taken home again before the rainy season —that is , our November , . Now it was only when these flocks we ' re
at large upon the deserts or commons that they were guarded in the night by shepherds ; for when they were brought near the villages , there was no occasion for such attendance . This , you see , must place the birth of Christ between our Easter and November , but gives no further satisfaction , though it demolishes the common tradition , which , indeed , did not commence till nearly five hundred years after our Saviour ' s time . * Tis true , there is a more ancient account which is less
objectionable , and , if we pay any regard to tradition , hath the best claim . It is that of Clement . Alexand . one of the most learned lathers , who flourished about 200 years after Christ , and reports two opinions which then prevailed : the one placed the birth of Christ upon the 20 th of April , the other on the 20 th of May . The former hath its difficulties , because the flocks might not then be turned out ; but no considerable objection arises against the latter , and he too seems
to prefer it . His words are these— ' Those who Lave most curiously or exactly proposed not only the year , but also the day , of the birth of our Saviour , have said that it happened in the 28 th year of Augustus , and I he 2 / 1 th ofPacbon / Now counting from the battle of Actium , alter which Augustus reigned alone , the 28 th year of his reign will be three years and four months before the vulgar aera ; and if we follow the Egyptian calendar , which they observed at Alexandria , the 25 th of Pachon answers to the 20 th of IVJay in our account .
" This is the most we can learn from antiquity as to the birth of our Lord ; from all which it appears that God , in his wise providence , seems to have concealed the bjrth of Christ , ns He did the body of Moses , that it might not be abused to superstition . The nativity of our Saviour is , indeed , so transcendapt a blessing to mankind , that the remembrance of it , and thanksgiving for it , should be habitual , and mingle with all our devptiops : out if any abuse this season of the year tp luxury and sensuality , and thus eat and drink not unto the Lord , but unto devils , whilst Uiey pretend to honour Christ , they really offer ; him the greatest insult , and make him a minister of sin ;"
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632 Origin of Christmas .
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Citation
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Monthly Repository (1806-1838) and Unitarian Chronicle (1832-1833), Dec. 2, 1806, page 632, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse.ac.uk/periodicals/mruc/issues/vm2-ncseproduct1731/page/16/
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