Calendars
Monday morning is the time in the week that I do whatever I want, and last Monday I felt like writing blog posts. Knowing that this week would be pretty busy, I wrote several, and I'm parceling them out one by one. The following entry was actually intended as the second of a two-part explanation of Ukrainian Christmas. But considering that today is February 29, it seems appropriate to publish it today (even before you read Part I!)._____________________________________
For years, I thought that Orthodox Christmas took place on January 6, which is Epiphany. When we started learning about Ukrainian history and culture, we discovered that Orthodox Christmas is not January 6, but January 7. Why? I've been casually looking for the answer to this question for several years, but today I did some searching on the internet and found it! Read on . . .
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Creation of the Earth
The solar year, based on the length of time for the Earth to revolve around the sun, is 365.24219878 days. This represents the time from equinox to equinox.
8th c. B.C.
The Roman calendar is established, with March 1 as New Year's Day. The year is ten months long, and the months are mostly named after their numbers. Even today, the names of September, October, November, and December are based on the Latin words for 7, 8, 9, and 10. Eventually, the months of January and February are added, with New Year's Day changing to Jan. 1.
46 B.C.
After eight centuries of the Roman calendar, it no longer matches the solar calendar at all. That's because the Roman calendar has a year with only 355 days. The Roman emperor Julius Caesar appoints an astronomer to revise the Roman calendar, which is renamed the Julian calendar and starts on January 1, 45 B.C. Each year is now 365.25 days long, with the quarter day handled through the extra day of February 29 every fourth year (leap year).
Not only does Julius Caesar name the calendar after himself, he also uses his name for the seventh month (July). In 8 A.D., the emperor Augustus Caesar makes some further corrections to the leap year concept, and names the month of August after himself.
354 A.D.
Bishop Liberius of Rome establishes December 25 as the date for Christians to celebrate "Christ's Mass," or Christmas. The celebration replaces a Roman pagan festival worshipping a sun god. (By the way, the Annunciation found its place in the church year as March 25, nine months to the day before Christmas.)
1582 A.D.
Despite the innovation of a leap year, the calendar is still incorrect because the Julian year differs from the solar year by 11' 14''. That adds up to a day every 128 years. Over fifteen centuries, the discrepance is about ten days long. In 1582, Pope Gregory XIII establishes the Gregorian calendar (these guys sure liked to name things after themselves!). He eliminates the ten days from March 12 until March 20 of 1582. That means that the date after March 11 is March 21. From my own music history research, I know how much disturbance this caused emotionally among the populace, many of whom were illiterate. They felt that their lives had been shortened!
The pope's official power only extended to Roman Catholic countries, and other parts of the world changed calendars at different times. For example, Britain and its colonies (including today's United States) changed to the Gregorian calendar in 1782, almost two centuries later. Today, the Gregorian calendar is used in all Western countries, as well as for commerce worldwide. But many parts of the world function with a dual-calendar system, one for business and the other for cultural or religious purposes. For example, this year's celebration of Chinese New Year marked the year 4707 on the Chinese calendar. The Orthodox church in Ukraine still uses the Julian calendar for its church year. The gap of 11' 14'' between the Julian and solar calendars means that by the 21st century, the difference is about thirteen days.
That thirteen-day gap means that Christmas falls thirteen days after December 25, placing it on January 7! That's good timing for taking advantage of after-Christmas (oops--"after Dec. 25th") sales!
1969
In the Lutheran sphere of things, church bodies often split for theological reasons. But among Ukrainian churches, debates over calendars are just as heated. The Ukrainian Catholic church, which is predominant in western Ukraine and is affiliated with the Roman Catholic church, stayed with the Julian calendar much longer than other Western churches. The Ukrainian immigration to Chicago in the early 20th century came primarily from western Ukraine, and these immigrants built St. Nicholas Ukrainian Catholic Church as one of their primary places of worship. In 1969, the leadership of this church voted to change their church calendar from Julian to Gregorian. Traditionalists in the parish disagreed strongly and left to form a new church, Sts. Volodymyr and Olha, about two blocks to the south. Today both churches have strong, thriving congregations.
So you see, calenders are important!
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sources:
infoukes.com/culture/traditions/christmas
fourmilab.ch.documents/calender
posted by Stahlkes @ 12:57 PM
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