QR Codes for Christmas

An overview on Christmas traditions & history

Christmas has a history that dates back thousands of years, so it makes sense that it’s also steeped in cultural traditions. One of the most widely celebrated holidays around the world, here is a deeper look into how the concept of Christmas began and how it’s related traditions developed.

When is Christmas celebrated?

• Hinduism: there is a religious holiday that begins on December 21st that celebrates Pancha Ganapati, the lord of culture and new beginnings with an elephant head. Though originally not related to the Christian concept of Christmas, some Hindu families have begun incorporating Christmas festivities into Pancha Ganapati by hosting parties and giving gifts.
• Judaism: Jewish people celebrate Hanukkah instead of Christmas. Although it occurs at around the same time, the holidays are entirely separate. Jewish traditions for Hanukkah involve going to the synagogue for prayers and lighting one candle per night over eight nights.
• Jehovah’s Witness: a form of Christianity, Jehovah’s Witness believes that Christmas has pagan origins and there is no command from the Bible to celebrate the birth of Jesus. Many members of this religion don’t celebrate any holiday whatsoever, which also means they don’t celebrate or give each other gifts for Christmas.
• Islam: the Islamic God (Allaah) had a messenger named Muhammed who wasn’t born on December 25th, so they don’t celebrate Christmas as a religious holiday.
• Secularism: people who don’t associate Christmas with religion celebrate Christmas as a holiday to spend time with loved ones and give gifts, especially with the help of Santa Claus and his reindeer.

When did Christmas begin?

The concept of the birth of Jesus occurring on December 25th has unclear origins, especially because the New Testament doesn’t mention anything about this topic. It was only later in 221 AD that the birth of Jesus on this date became the universally accepted date according to Sextus Julius Africanus, the first Christian scholar to document a universal chronology.

One popular explanation for his thinking involves the integration of “Christmas” with the Roman holiday known as Saturnalia, which was celebrated on the week prior to winter solstice. When Christianity was a new religion, Easter was a much more prominent holiday and the celebration of Christmas as we now know didn’t exist. However, as the Roman Catholic Church grew in power, Pope Julius I named December 25th the birth of Jesus in order to absorb some of the more pagan traditions related to Saturnalia. Originally referred to as the “Feast of the Nativity”, traditions surrounding the holiday became so popular that it quickly spread across Egypt and England, and then later on across Scandinavia.

Christmas took hold on a global scale after Charles Dickens published “A Christmas Carol” in 1843, which intertwined the Christmas holiday with charity and goodwill towards mankind. As families became more aware of children’s emotional needs during the 1800s, Christmas also took on a new form that involved lavishing children with gifts without “spoiling” them too much.

That same idea took hold in America and became popularized throughout both the Christian Church and among families. This involved giving all family members gifts, decorating trees, sending holiday cards, and visiting the church for Christmas Eve mass.

Who invented Santa Claus?

Although he only became popular in more recent times, the idea of Santa Claus stems back to 280 AD in Turkey with a monk named St. Nicholas. He was well known for traveling the countryside and giving away his inherited wealth to the poor and sick, as well as protecting children.

In 1822, the poem “An Account of a Visit from St. Nicholas” written by Clement Clarke Moore described Santa Claus as a jolly old man who flew around on a sled led by reindeer and gave out toys to children. Later on, in 1881, Santa Claus was shown wearing red and white and was toting a long beard in a political cartoon drawn by Thomas Nast that appeared next to the published poem. And the rest was history.

Which country started the tradition of decorating Christmas trees?

As huge celebrators of Christmas, Germany is credited with starting the tradition of decorating Christmas trees during the 16th century. One theory is that Martin Luther, the Protestant reformer, added lit candles to a Christmas tree one evening and composed a sermon that awed his audience with the brilliance of the twinkling lights. A few hundred years later, German settlers in America brought the idea of decorating Christmas trees along with them, which was then popularized across American society.