J. N. LOUGHBOROUGH by John Norton Loughborough

Seventh-day Adventist Publishing Association · Battle Creek, Mich. · Mar 7, 1871

J. N. LOUGHBOROUGH

By John Norton Loughborough

Festivals.

I NOTICED in REVIEW No. 1, of present volume, an article from Bro. Cornell on Festivals, in which he quotes testimony to prove that Christ mas day, Dec. 25, was the day on which the ancient heathens celebrated the birth of Sol, or the sun.

The same is confirmed by the additional testimony of Gibbon. In his History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire, Chap. 22, part 9, we read:

“The churches of Egypt, Asia, and perhaps Gaul, celebrated on the same day (the 6th of January) the nativity and the baptism of their Saviour. The Romans, as ignorant as their brethren of the real date of his birth, fixed the solemn festival to the 25th of December, the Brumalia or winter solstice, when the pagans annually celebrated the birth of the sun.”