Merry Christmas from Ed Man

[RegisterMe]

Isn't it. Still, I paid for it, I need to think of something to do with it (cooking, before anybody gets clever .

[EmperorJon]

Doh, I was going to suggest you leave it out for Santa!

[Dave500]

Isn't it. Still, I paid for it, I need to think of something to do with it (cooking, before anybody gets clever .

On a more serious note, BBC Good Food.

[berth]

.....Jesus was almost certainly born in Spring rather than winter....

I don't intend to derail the thread but where's the evidence for either date?

Feliz Navidad a todos

[amtct]

.....Jesus was almost certainly born in Spring rather than winter....

I don't intend to derail the thread but where's the evidence for either date?

Feliz Navidad a todos

Mayor's office

[The_Abyss]

Merry Christmas to all.

[Asmayus]

Happy christmas folks!

[Usenko]

.....Jesus was almost certainly born in Spring rather than winter....

I don't intend to derail the thread but where's the evidence for either date?

Feliz Navidad a todos

Happy Christmas to the bulls? Oh, wait . . . that't be toros!

Okay, simple enough. I am entirely using internal scriptural evidence, which in the absence of anything else is as good as we're going to get[1].

What we know about the birth of Jesus is that shepherds were keeping sheep out on the hillside in the night time. This all but eliminates winter (where it was too cold to do so). Generally speaking today you will find shepherds with their flocks between March and October. There are other textual minutiae that corroborate this in other ways, so we're looking at September - October (spring in that part of the world).

It's also worth mentioning that 25th December was originally meant to be a comemmoration of Jesus' birth and not an anniversary as such. It was basically an appropriation of the feast of Saturnalia, to give Christians a holiday to celebrate at the same time as their Roman neighbours.

[1] Remember in matters of ancient history, we have less than 1% of the evidence that was available at the time. There are four Gospels (biographies of Jesus) in the Bible, each giving a different perspective of his life and ministry, but only two mention his nativity, and both focus on different aspects, neither contradicting nor supporting each other. Whilst it'd be nice to have other accounts (especially independant ones), in Ancient History you're happy to find a particular person's name mentioned in a list of citizens, never mind a biography of them, so let's keep the perspective.

[khaakbaiter]

Merry Christmas Guys.

This year instead of making a fruit cake christmas cake, we made a chocolate cake instead, we didnt forget the fish shaped crackers and the sediment shaped sediment =P

A Merry Christmas to you all!

[supakillaii]

Also to "contribute" to the Jesus talk; Do you have proof that he was born exactá 2009 years ago?
I'd more likely think that he was born around bc. 10. Give or take a few years.

[RegisterMe]

Happy Christmas all . Stock's on. And thanks for the link Dave .

[Usenko]

Also to "contribute" to the Jesus talk; Do you have proof that he was born exactá 2009 years ago?
I'd more likely think that he was born around bc. 10. Give or take a few years.

Once again, the evidence is from the Gospels. We have two clues:
1) Matthew's Gospel places the Nativity within the reign of Herod.
2) Luke's Gospel reports that it happened during a census during the reign of Augustus Caesar - specifically mentioning Quirinius, implying that there was more than one census in this period.

Now we have some idea of how to date these. I won't go into the details, but there are two possible ways to make everything cross over just right, and one (the majority opinion) puts it in 4BC, the other in 1BC.

What makes it tricky is that both 4BC and 1BC have planetary movements which would be of significance to ancient astrologers seeking the birth of a king in Judea; We have excellent candidates for the Star of Bethlehem in both years. One would be a conjunction of Jupiter and Venus in Leo (1BC), the other a conjunction of Jupiter, Saturn, the Sun and the Moon in Leo (culminating in an eclipse of Jupiter and Saturn by the moon.

[Belgarath]

The wife and I are spending Christmas with the Grandkids. I think I hear them coming downstairs now so I need to do this quickly.

Merry Christmas all.

From Belgarath, Poledra, Polgara, Durnik, Belgarion, Ce'Nedra, Beltira, Bekira, and the seven Gods!