Coptic Christmas

Coptic calendar, also called the Alexandrian calendar, is a liturgical calendar used by the Coptic Orthodox Church based on the ancient Egyptian calendar and still in use today in Egypt.  A reform of the ancient Egyptian calendar was introduced at the time of Ptolemy III (Decree of Canopus, in 238 BC) that consisted of the intercalation of a sixth (intercalary) day every fourth year. However, the Egyptian priests opposed this reform, and the idea was only adopted later in 25 BC, when the Roman Emperor Augustus formally reformed the calendar of Egypt, keeping it forever synchronized with the newly introduced Julian calendar. To distinguish it from the Ancient Egyptian calendar, which remained in use by some astronomers until medieval times, this reformed calendar is known as the Coptic calendar. Its years and months coincide with those of the Ethiopian calendar but have different numbers and names.

The Coptic year is the extension of the ancient Egyptian civil year, retaining its subdivision into the three seasons, four months each. Special prayers in the Coptic Liturgy commemorate the three seasons. This calendar is still in use all over Egypt by farmers to keep track of the various agricultural seasons (note: with accuracy to days).

The Coptic calendar has 13 months, 12 of 30 days each and one intercalary month at the end of the year of 5 days in length, except in leap years when the month is 6 days. Today, and until 2099, the year starts on 11 September in the Julian calendar or on the 12th in the year before Leap Years.

Coptic Christmas is observed on what the Julian calendar labels 25 December; a date that currently corresponds with January 7 on the more widely used Gregorian calendar (which is also when Christmas is observed in Eastern Orthodox countries such as Russia).

The 25 December Nativity of Christ was attested very early by Hippolytus of Rome (170–236) in his Commentary on Daniel 4:23: "The first coming of our Lord, that in the flesh, in which he was born in Bethlehem, took place eight days before the calends of January, a Wednesday, in the forty-second year of the reign of Augustus, 5500 years from Adam."

Another early source is Theophilus Bishop of Caesarea (115–181): "We ought to celebrate the birth-day of our Lord on what day so ever the 25th of December shall happen." (From origin Festorum Christianorum). However, it was not until 367 that December 25 has begun to be universally accepted. Before that, the Eastern Church had kept January 6 as the Nativity under the name "Epiphany."

FEBRUARY / MARCH

John Chrysostom, in a sermon preached in Antioch in 387, relates how the correct date of the Nativity was brought to the East ten years earlier. Dionysius of Alexandria emphatically quoted mystical justifications for this very choice. 25 March was considered to be the anniversary of Creation itself. It was the first day of the year in the medieval Julian calendar and the nominal vernal equinox (it had been the actual equinox at the time when the Julian calendar was originally designed). Considering that Christ was conceived on that date, 25 March was recognized as the Feast of the Annunciation which had to be followed, nine months later, by the celebration of the birth of Christ, Christmas, on 25 December.

Solstice 

There may have been more practical considerations for choosing 25 December. The choice would help substitute a major Christian holiday for the popular Pagan celebrations surrounding the Winter Solstice (Roman Sol Sticia, the three-day stasis when the sun would rise consecutively in its southernmost point before heading north, December 21, 22 and 23. The celebrations began a full week prior to the religious observance and the drunken revellers were expectantly sobered and orgies exhausted by the festivals close, prompting the eve or vigil of the 24th/25th as an optimally moral and safe time for the Feast of Christ's Nativity).

The religious competition was fierce. In AD 274, Emperor Aurelian had declared a civil holiday on 25 December (the "Festival of the birth of the Unconquered Sun") to celebrate the deity Sol Invictus. Finally, joyous festivals are needed at that time of year, to fight the natural gloom of the season (in the Northern Hemisphere).

DECEMBER / JANUARY

Until the 16th century, 25 December coincided with 29 of “Koiak” month in the Coptic calendar. However, upon the introduction of the Gregorian calendar in 1582, 25 December shifted 10 days earlier in comparison with the Julian and Coptic calendars. Furthermore, the Gregorian calendar drops 3 leap days every 400 years to closely approximate the length of a solar year. As a result, the Coptic Christmas advances a day each time the Gregorian calendar drops a leap day (years AD 1700, 1800, and 1900).

This is the reason why Old-Calendrists (using the Julian and Coptic calendars) presently celebrate Christmas on 7 January, 13 days after the New-Calendrists (using the Gregorian calendar), who celebrate Christmas on 25 December.

Starting AD 2100, the Coptic Christmas should be celebrated on January 8th according to the Gregorian calendar, if no harmonized Christians celebrations are put in place.

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COPTIC CALENDAR