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Soon, millions of revelers
will stay up late at night in their homes or participate
in huge national celebrations and parties to ring in the
"New Year". Have you ever considered why this is done in
the middle of winter, in the middle of the night? Why do
other nations and cultures celebrate the "New Year" on
different dates and in different ways than the western
Christian nations, including the United States? What
does God say about "New Year's Day"?
First, let's consider what people around the world do to
celebrate "New Year's".
Today, in the U.S., New Year's Eve celebrations have
become synonymous with excessive drinking along with
other immoral behavior a woeful model of behavior from
the people of a land that claims to be a nation under
God.
In Sri Lanka and Southeast Asia the New Year's Festival
is a major Buddhist religious feast. Included in their
practice is the bathing of images of Buddha in scented
water. This New Year's celebration is not observed on
January 1st but is normally held during the month of
April.
In regions of Nepal, Tibet, Mongolia, Northern India,
and parts of Western China people light torches or
firecrackers to chase away evil spirits on the Tibetan
New Year. Their New Year is not observed on January 1st
either, but is celebrated with the new moon that comes
during February.
The Chinese New Year is the longest and most important
of all the Chinese festivals. It is celebrated all over
the world in Chinese communities and begins with the new
moon that appears sometime between January 21 and
February 19. At midnight, families traditionally light
fireworks to scare away evil spirits and attract the
attention of friendly “gods”.
Why this vast array of dates and practices regarding the
new year? Simply put, they represent varying societys’
beliefs. But the Bible tells us in Proverbs 14:12,
"There is a way that seems right to a man, but,
its end is the way of death."
Man, for the most part, has ignored God's clear biblical
instruction regarding the time for the new year to begin
(See Exodus 12:2, Deuteronomy 16:1); and, instead, has
set a different time for the new year to start. The
Catholic Encyclopedia states, "Since there was no
necessary starting point in the circle of the year, we
find among different nations, and among the same at
different epochs of their history, a great variety of
dates with which the New Year began."
Theodore S. Gaster adds in his book, New Year, "There
is scarcely a people, ancient or modern, savage or
civilized which has not observed it... in one form or
another. Yet no other festival has been celebrated on so
many different dates or in so many seemingly different
ways."
New Year's celebrations stem from the oldest of all
pagan observances. History traces these celebrations to
Mesopotamia. In his book, 4000 Years of Christmas,
Earl Count writes, "Mesopotamia is the very ancient
Mother of Civilization. Christmas began there, FOUR
THOUSAND YEARS AGO, as the festival which renewed the
world for another year. The 'twelve days' of Christmas,
the bright fires...the carnivals with their floats,
their merrymaking and clowning, the mummers who sing and
play from house to house, the feastings, the church
processions with their lights and song -- all these and
more began there centuries before Christ was born and
they celebrated THE ARRIVAL OF A NEW YEAR!"
The customs that accompanied New Year's celebrations
eventually found their way to Rome. Sadly, the Romans,
not being accustomed to restraint, celebrated the new
year with orgies, drunken revelry, and even human
sacrifices.
In 46 B.C. Julius Caesar, in establishing the Julian
calendar, made January the first month of the new year.
But why January? In Roman mythology Janus was the god of
beginnings. Janus was such an important god to the
Romans that his statue stood in the temple in the forum.
The Romans offered prayers to him daily and sought his
assistance with all they endeavored to do. Sacrifices
were offered to Janus on January 1st so that he would
bless the new year. So the very first month of the new
year, January, was named for him.
Emperor Constantine (about 375 A.D.) "christianized" the
Roman world. What effect did that have on the
celebration of the new year? Earl Count continues,
"There were many immigrants into the ranks of the
Christians by this time...The church fathers discovered
to their alarm that they were also facing an invasion of
pagan customs." Instead of correcting the wrong
practices and customs, the church fathers compromised
and allowed the pagan practices to continue in an effort
to win over new converts.
In 1582 Pope Gregory made further reforms to the
calendar. This calendar (Gregorian) was adopted by all
Roman Catholic nations and is the same calendar we use
today. In this calendar, January 1st was confirmed as
the beginning of the new year. Some countries strongly
disagreed. The Catholic Encyclopedia states,
"Christian nations did not agree in the date of New
Year's Day. They were not opposed to 1 January as the
beginning of the year, but rather to the pagan
extravagances that accompanied it." The objections
didn’t hold up. Scotland accepted the Gregorian calendar
in 1600, Germany, Denmark and Sweden around 1700,
Britain and Ireland in 1752. Even the Soviet Union
acknowledged the day as late as 1918.
From all that has been written so far, we have seen that
New Year's always has been, and still is, celebrated in
various ways and on different dates. We have also seen
that its origins are pagan.
Why should we care?
Most people don’t care. But for those who look to the
Bible as their source for truth and guidance, there is a
need to be concerned. The Bible tells us God punished
His own nation, Israel, for their rejection of His
divine instructions and for their adoption of pagan
practices from the nations around them. His instruction
was precise, demanding, and clear He wanted no
confusion about who He was and how He was to be
worshipped but Israel chose another way.
Instead of following God, Israel chose the form of
worship that had come down to them through the ages from
those who had rebelled against God following the Noatian
Flood (from those descended from Noah’s son Ham who had
established their civilization in Mesopotamia, the
despot Nimrod being chief among them). Their way was
lascivious, demonic, and base the way that trivialized
God and exalted foolishness and revelry. That is the
form of worship that has affected the western world to
this very day.
In our modern, educated world God’s instruction has been
almost totally ignored. Only a few continue to adhere to
it. For this reason, Bible prophecy reveals that we,
too, will face punishment for our refusal to follow
God's divine instructions, and for our acceptance and
celebration of pagan practices handed down to us from a
church whose roots go back to Mesopotamia and whose
practices are steeped in compromise.
Here is what we find recorded in II Kings 17:15: "And
they (Israel) rejected His statutes and His covenant
that He had made with their fathers, and His testimonies
which HE had testified against them; they followed
idols, became idolaters, and went after the nations who
were all around them, concerning whom the Lord had
charged them that they should not do like them."
God was very angry with Israel; and for their defection,
He removed His hand of protection and caused them to go
into captivity. II Kings 17:18,20 and 23, tell us,
"Therefore the Lord was very angry with Israel, and
removed them from His sight...And the Lord rejected all
the descendants of Israel, afflicted them, and delivered
them into the hand of plunderers, until he had cast them
from His sight...So Israel was carried away from their
own land to Assyria, as it is to this day."
The descendants of the ancient twelve tribes of Israel
are the modern nations of the United States and the
British Commonwealth along with certain other nations of
Western Europe, including the Jews of Israel (For more
information on this subject request our free booklet,
The United States and Britain in Prophecy available from
this web site).
Speaking to our nations today, God says, "For I am
with you, says the Lord, to save you; though I make a
full end of all the nations where I have scattered you,
Yet I will not make a complete end of you. But I will
correct you in justice, and will not let you go
altogether unpunished" ( Jeremiah 30:11).
The ancient prophet Jeremiah looked down through history
to our time and prophesied of a period called the time
of Jacob’s (Modern Israel’s) trouble. Here is what God
inspired him to say about it:
Jeremiah 30:5-7: 5 "For thus says the LORD: 'We have
heard a voice of trembling, Of fear, and not of peace. 6
Ask now, and see, Whether a man is ever in labor with
child? So why do I see every man with his hands on his
loins Like a woman in labor, And all faces turned pale?
7 Alas! For that day is great, So that none is like it;
And it is the time of Jacob's trouble, But he shall be
saved out of it. NKJV
We can be spared from the correction that will come from
God (See Jeremiah 7:28-34, Habakkuk 1:12). If we turn to
Him with all our heart (Deuteronomy 4: 29-30), and do
all God instructs through the Bible, our lives will be
fulfilled, enriched and truly blessed. (See Deuteronomy
28: 1-14).
All the world's most perplexing problems can be answered
through the pages of the Bible, because the Bible is the
inspired word of God: "All scripture is given by
inspiration of God, and is profitable for doctrine, for
reproof, for correction, for instruction in
righteousness, that the man of God may be complete,
thoroughly equipped for every good work" (II Timothy
3:16).
We have already seen that different cultures and nations
do not all observe the New Year on the same day, or even
the same month. Can we know what truly is the first
month of the year? Is it in the dead of winter? On
January 1st? Could it be in September? Or somewhere
between January 21 and February 19?
God clearly reveals the month on which the new year
begins. Notice Exodus 12:1-2, "Now the Lord spoke to
Moses and Aaron in the land of Egypt, saying, This month
shall be the first month of the year to you." It is
in this month that the Passover was to be observed
(verses 3-14 and 21-27). But, what month is this?
Deuteronomy 16:1 says, "Observe the month of Abib,
and keep the Passover to the Lord your God..." Abib
is the first month of God's calendar, the first month of
the sacred year. The month of Abib, or Nisan as it was
later called ( See Esther 3:7) corresponds to
March/April on our modern calendar. Abib means "the
month of young ears of grain" (International Bible
Encyclopedia). The beginning of this month is in the
spring. It is during this month that the first or early
harvest occurs.
New Year's Day and the celebrations and festivities that
currently surround it are of man's devising. They have
come down to us through a long history largely unknown
to modern celebrants. It is commonly believed that the
observations and festivities man has chosen for himself
are harmless. But God’s word tells us otherwise, and
that our willful ignorance of their pagan roots will not
excuse us (See 2 Peter 3:5-7).
Man does not naturally seek the ways of God (See Romans
8:7) though He longs for a relationship with Him. Thus
we have many forms of religion, but little that is based
on God’s clear instruction. God’s word is clear that the
new year starts in the spring, but man says it starts in
the middle of winter. Man's focus is on reveling rather
than true worship, and his festivals serve to satiate
the senses and pander to childish whims: they are
observed without regard for God. And God says He hates
human-devised holidays that mislead people:
Amos 5:21-23: 21 "I hate, I despise your feast days,
And I do not savor your sacred assemblies. 22 Though you
offer Me burnt offerings and your grain offerings, I
will not accept them, Nor will I regard your fattened
peace offerings. 23 Take away from Me the noise of your
songs, For I will not hear the melody of your stringed
instruments. NKJV
God clearly instructs those who worship him to reject
the practices of those in the world who observe, from
year to year, things that are ungodly (John 4:23). We
must do carefully all that God instructs, for in doing
so, we will be blessed. God gives us that choice: "I
call heaven and earth as witnesses today against you,
that I have set before you life and death, blessing and
cursing; therefore choose life, that both you and
your descendants may live." (Deuteronomy 30:19).
Which will you choose? |