Matthew says that when the wise men visited Herod he diligently inquired of them the time when the star which announced the birth of Jesus first appeared. When he determined to destroy Jesus and massacred the infants of Bethlehem and the surrounding country, he slew those “from two years old and under, according to the time which he had diligently inquired of the wise men,” clearly indicating that Jesus was nearly or quite two years old at this time.
In attempting to reconcile Matthew’s visit of the wise men to Jesus at Bethlehem with the narrative of Luke, which makes his stay there less than six weeks, it has been assumed that this visit occurred immediately after his birth, whereas, according to Matthew, it did not occur until about two years after his birth.
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In what month and on what day of the month was he born?
Not one of his biographers is prepared to tell; primitive Christians did not know; the church has never been able to determine this. A hundred different opinions regarding it have been expressed by Christian scholars. Wagenseil places it in February, Paulius in March, Greswell in April, Lichtenstein in June, Strong in August, Lightfoot in September, and Newcome in October. Clinton says that he was born in the Spring; Larchur says that he was born in the Fall. Some early Christians believed that it occurred on the 5th of January; others the 19th of April; others still on the 20th of May. The Eastern church believed that he was born on the 7th of January. The church of Rome, in the fourth century, selected the 25th of December on which to celebrate the anniversary of his birth; and this date has been accepted by the greater portion of the Christian world.
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What determined the selection of this date?
“There was a double reason for selecting this day. In the first place it had been observed from a hoary antiquity as a heathen festival, following the longest night of the winter solstice, and was called ‘the Birthday of the Unconquerable Sun.’ It was a fine thought to celebrate on that day the birth of him whom the Gospel called “the light of the world”.... The second reason was, that at Rome the days from the 17th to the 23d of December were devoted to unbridled merrymaking. These days were called the Saturnalia.... Now the church was always anxious to meet the heathen, whom she had converted or was beginning to convert, half-way, by allowing them to retain the feasts they were accustomed to, only giving them a Christian dress, or attaching a new and Christian signification to them” (Bible for Learners, vol. iii, pp. 66, 67).