Editing Coptic calendar (section)

== Date of Christmas ==
Coptic Christmas is observed on what the Julian Calendar labels 25 December, a date that currently corresponds with 7 January on the more widely used [[Gregorian Calendar]] (which is also when Christmas is observed in many [[Eastern Orthodox]] countries such as Russia). The 25 December Nativity of [[Christ]] was alleged very early by [[Hippolytus (writer)|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 at 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."{{Refn|group=note|Correction: the actual quote from Hippolytus is "For as the times are noted from the foundation of the world, and reckoned from Adam, they set clearly before us the matter with which our inquiry deals. For the first appearance of our Lord in the flesh took place in Bethlehem, under Augustus, in the year 5500; and He suffered in the thirty-third year."<ref>{{Cite book |url=https://ccel.org/ccel/schaff/anf05/anf05.iii.iv.i.x.ii.html |publisher=Christian Classics Ethereal Library |title=Ante-Nicene Fathers |volume=5 |last1=Schaff |first1=Philip |page=446 |access-date=2022-03-02 |archive-date=2022-03-02 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20220302124046/https://ccel.org/ccel/schaff/anf05/anf05.iii.iv.i.x.ii.html |url-status=live}}</ref> The insertion of "eight days..." is from "[[Chronography of 354]]" and the insertion of the "forty-second year" is from [[Eusebius]].}} "Another early source is Theophilus Bishop of Caesarea (115–181): "We ought to celebrate the birth-day of our Lord on what day soever the 25th of December shall happen."<ref>Magdeburgenses, Cent. 2. c. 6. Hospinian, de origine Festorum Christianorum</ref>{{refn|group=note|Another correction: Theophilus of Caesarea only said the following: "We would have you know, too, that in Alexandria also they observe ''the festival'' on the same day as ourselves. For the ''Paschal'' letters are sent from us to them, and from them to us: so that we observe the holy day in unison and together." No mention of Dec. 25th.}} However, it was not until 367 that 25 December began to be universally accepted. Before that, the Eastern Church had kept 6 January as the Nativity under the name "Epiphany." 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.<ref>{{cite web |url=https://earlychurchtexts.com/public/john_chrysostom_homily_in_diem_natalem_domini_nostri_jesu_christi.htm |title=John Chrysostom - Homily on the Date of Christmas, sections 1 and 2 |last=Maguire |first=Revd Andrew |access-date=13 September 2022 |archive-date=13 September 2022 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20220913055145/https://earlychurchtexts.com/public/john_chrysostom_homily_in_diem_natalem_domini_nostri_jesu_christi.htm |url-status=live}}</ref> [[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, or Old Style, calendar and the nominal vernal equinox (it had been the actual equinox at the time of the Decree of Canopus in terms of the Julian calendar which adopted it without correction when originally designed). Considering that Jesus was thought to have been conceived on New Year's Day of the Old Style calendar, 25 March was recognised 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.

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, 21, 22 and 23 December. In AD 274, Emperor [[Aurelian]] had declared a civil holiday on 25 December (the "[[Sol Invictus#Festival of Dies Natalis Solis Invicti|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]]).<ref name="MacMullen1997">Bishop Jacob Bar-Salabi (cited in ''Christianity and Paganism in the Fourth to Eighth Centuries'', [[Ramsay MacMullen]]. Yale:1997, p. 155)</ref>

Until the 16th century, 25 December coincided with 29 [[Koiak]] of 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).<ref>{{Cite web |url=https://aa.usno.navy.mil/faq/calendars |title=Introduction to Calendars |website=[[United States Naval Observatory]] |access-date=2022-09-30 |archive-date=2022-06-17 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20220617074100/https://aa.usno.navy.mil/faq/calendars |url-status=live}}</ref> This is the reason why Old-Calendarists (using the Julian and Coptic calendars) presently celebrate Christmas on 7 January, 13 days after the New-Calendarists (using the Gregorian calendar), who celebrate Christmas on 25 December. From AD 2101, the Coptic Christmas will be on the Gregorian date of 8 January.