_Christmas Day_ (Vol. iii., p. 167.).--Julian I. has the credit of
transferring the celebration of Christ's birth from Jan. 6th to Dec. 25th;
but Mosheim considers the report very questionable (vol. i. p. 370.
Soames's edit.). Bingham, in his _Christian Antiq._, devotes ch. iv. of
book xx. to the consideration of this festival, and that of the Epiphany;
but does not notice the claim set up on behalf of Julian I.; neither
Neander (vol. iii. pp. 415-22. Eng. Translation). It would appear that the
Eastern Church kept Christmas on Jan. 6th, and the Western Church on Dec.
25th: at length, about the time of Chrysostom, the Oriental Christians
sided with the Western Church. Bingham also cites Augustine as saying that
it was the current tradition that Christ was born on the eighth of the
kalends of January, that is, on the 25th of December. Had, therefore,
Julian I. dogmatically fixed the 25th of December as the birthday of our
Saviour, it is scarcely possible to suppose that Augustine, who flourished
about half a century later, would allege current tradition as the reason,
without any notice of Julian.
N. E. R. (A Subscriber).
[See Tillemont's _Histoire Ecclésiastique_, tome i., note 4., for a
full discussion of this question. Also Mosheim's _De Rebus
Christianorum ante Constantinum Commentarii_, sæculum primum, sec. 1.;
and Butler's _Lives of the Saints_, article Christmas-Day.]
_Christmas-day_ (Vol. iii, p. 167.).--St. John of Chrysostom, archbishop of
Nice (died A.D. 407), in an epistle upon this subject, relates (tom. v. p.
45. edit. Montf. Paris, 1718-34) that, at the instance of St. Cyril of
Jerusalem (died A.D. 385), St. Julius (Pope A.D. 337-352) procured a strict
inquiry to be made into the day of our Saviour's nativity, which being
found to be the 25th Dec., that day was thenceforth set apart for the
celebration of this "Festorum omnium metropolis," as he styles it. St.
Tilesphorus (Pope A.D. 128-139), however, is supposed by the generality of
ancient authorities to be the first who appointed the 25th Dec. for that
purpose. The point is involved in much uncertainty, but your correspondent
may find all the information he seeks in _Baronii Apparatus ad Annales
Ecclesiasticos_, fol., Lucæ, 1740, pp. 475. et seq.; and in a curious
tract, entitled _The Feast of Feasts; or, the Celebration of the Sacred
Nativity of our Blessed Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ; grounded upon the
Scriptures, and confirmed by the Practice of the Christian Church in all
Ages_. 4to. Oxf. 1644. This tract is in the British Museum. J. C. makes a
tremendous leap in chronology when he asks "Was it not either Julius I. or
II.?" Why the one died exactly 1161 years after the other!