Hi, Myth. Am Pagan and 'plain no-denomination Christian' is my main path. Mostly agree with your observations.
You can't put Christ back into Christmas, because he was never there. Truth is, the celebration adopted by the early Christian church -- and which was later renamed "Christmas" -- is really the pagan winter solstice celebration known as Saturnalia.
Or Yule. On the other hand the Church prevailed. It became "Christmas". That's a plain fact of the history of Western civilization. Who knows what Winter Solstice was called before it was "Yule"?
Christ's birthday is not -- and never was -- mentioned as an occasion for celebration. The nativity story was not intended as reason for celebrating a birthday. Birthdays are not a Biblical reason for celebration. There is no command or directive to celebrate this occasion.
There were not three wisemen visiting the baby Jesus. That's an assumption drawn from the fact that three gifts were bestowed on the Christchild by wisemen from "The East." Just because wisemen gave gifts of gold, frankincense and myrrh doesn't mean there were only three of them, it only means they gave three kinds of gifts.
Yep. We do not know how many wisemen showed up. For one thing, if they were wise, they would at least travel with a few guards. And, we cannot be sure that gifts of gold, frankincense and myrrh were the only gifts they gave.
The Christmas tree is not a Christian tradition. The idea of decorating an evergreen tree in the middle of winter is a concept predating Christianity. Early Germanic tribes celebrated the holiday of Yule which fell on the winter solstice and signified the coming greening of the earth hereafter. There is some evidence that the practice may have reached the the Mesopotamian basin during Biblical times, since some scholars believe Jeremiah's condemnation of the practice of decorating trees cut from the forest reflects this influence. (Jeremiah 10:2-4)
Yes and no. From readings it's clear that Christians did not originate the idea of decorating evergreen trees. However, it seems, they were the ones who decided to chop down small ones and drag them indoors to be decorated.
The tradition of exchanging gifts is a not Christian. This one also predates Christianity by several centuries, possibly more. The celebration of Yule included the giving of gifts, but many middle eastern traditions embraced similar practices. Gift-giving is an ages-old tradition, despite modern commercialization of it.
The Virgin Birth story isn't "new" to the birth of Jesus. This is a concept common to many ancient pagan religious sects. Biblical scholars believe the concept of a virgin birth may have entered the Old Testament lexicon from Egyptian mythology during the Hebrew exile. In Egyptian lore, Queen Mut`emua was a virgin when she bore Amenophis III, the s o n of the god Kneph (also known as the Holy Spirit). This virgin birth is announced beforehand by the god Taht and the child is visited by wisemen from the East, bearing gifts. Sound familiar?
Jesus wasn't born on December 25th. Not only that, but he was probably born in August or September. Remember, the shepherds were in the hills watching their flocks by night. That's not where they kept their flocks in snowy late-December.
Wonder why so many people miss that? You gotta admit it is kind of a nice cozy idea (for those sitting around a fireplace on Christmas Eve)-- shepherds out in the fields under a brittle clear Winter Solstice night sky tending their absolutely insane sheep in the icy cold.
The chronology of the Gospel of Luke makes it clear that Jesus was conceived right around Winter Solstice and born in late September.