176 



FESTIVALS AND HOLIDAYS. 



As to the time when the celebration of Christmas- 

 day (see Christmas) was introduced, and the occasion 

 of its origin, the opinions of the learned are divided. 

 The birthday of Harpocrates among the Egyptians, 

 and that of Mithras among the Persians, and also 

 among the Romans, were kept on the 25th of 

 December; and all the festive solemnities of Christ 

 mas-eve, and of the next twelve days, were already 

 in use among the plays and amusements customarily 

 observed in those seasons by the Egyptians, Indians, 

 and Persians. The birthday festival of Christmas 

 is immediately followed by three anniversaries of 

 deaths ; that in memory of the martyr Stephen, 

 introduced about the fourth or fifth century, that of 

 John the Evangelist, and that of the Holy Innocents. 

 Eight days after Christmas, the feast of the circum- 

 cision and naming of Jesus is observed, with which 

 is connected the celebration of the commencement of 

 the year, or new year's day. The festival of Epiph- 

 any, kept on the 6th of January, with which, betore 

 the origin of Christmas-day, the celebration of the 

 nativity was connected, was one of the most eminent. 

 It united, in itself, the most remarkable occurrences 

 in the life of Jesus, in which the divine provisions 

 for attestation to his character as the Son and Mes- 

 senger of God were manifested, from the first moment 

 of his earthly existence, until his entrance on his 

 ministry. The whole of the youthful life of Jesus 

 was historically represented in this festival, with a 

 view to practical effect. That the adoration of 

 Christ by the Magi, his baptism in Jordan, and his 

 performance of his first miracle at Cana, in Galilee, 

 should be united in one festival, will appear by no 

 means strange, if we reflect how long- it was before 

 any particular festival was instituted in commemora- 

 tion of such an important circumstance of sacred 

 history as the birth of the Saviour. It is worthy of 

 remark, too, that the very same day, the 6th of Janu- 

 ary, was the greatest festival of the Egyptians, on 

 which they solemnized the epiphany of Osiris a day 

 of rejoicing for the finding of Osiris. 



The second division, or period, is that of Easter 

 (see Easter), or the holidays kept in memory of the 

 death and resurrection of Jesus Christ. After the 

 preparation of the forty days' fast of lent, palm Sun- 

 day opens the Easter holidays. The Greek church 

 kept this day at an early period, but the Latin church 

 first began to celebrate it about the seventh century. 

 On Maundy Thursday, the institution of the Lord's 

 Supper, and the washing of the feet of the apostles 

 by our Saviour, are commemorated. Traces of this 

 festival are discoverable in the African church as 

 early as the fourth century, and in the following cen- 

 turies in the other churches. Next follows Good 

 Friday, the anniversary of the death of Christ, kept 

 as a day of grief and mourning. The celebration of 

 this day is as ancient as that of Easter arid of Sun. 

 day. The holy Sabbath, or Easter-eve, is the only 

 one of all the Jewish Sabbath days that the Christian 

 church has retained as a holiday. Last of all comes 

 Easter, the feast of the resurrection of Jesus Christ, 

 the oldest Christian festival, and the greatest, since 

 all the other Sundays of the year are kept as octaves, 

 or weekly representatives of it. As to the etymo- 

 logy of its name, there is much disagreement among 

 the learned. Easter is a day of rejoicing : the ex- 

 pressions of this joy are peculiarly lively among the 

 Greeks. The season of Easter is divided into two 

 weeks the week before Easter, or the black week, 

 and the week after Easter, or the white week. This 

 latter week is closed by the Whitsunday, or octave of 

 Easter. 



The third division, or period, is that of Whitsun- 

 tide, or Pentecost (q. v.), commemorative of the 

 descent of the Holy Spirit on the apostles, as describee 



in the Acts. The earthly life of Christ, represented 

 to the senses, and historically celebrated with festive 

 solemnities by the church, was now ended. Christ 

 now dwelt with the Father, and had sent the Com- 

 forter to enlighten and strengthen the hearts of men. 

 The most eminent festival in the season of Whitsun- 

 tide is Ascension-day; and, on the octave of Whit- 

 sunday, the season ends with the festival of the Holy 

 Trinity, which was introduced not earlier than the 

 ninth century in the Roman Catholic church ; but is 

 now the groundwork of the ecclesiastical computa- 

 tion of the time till Advent. As to the Ascension 

 and Whitsunday, we may, with certainty, consider 

 them as having been especially and generally observed 

 as early as the fourth century. 



Thus the three divisions are completed. These, 

 however, relate only to the festivals of our Lord. 

 The other festivals occur in different parts of these 

 >eriods. The worship of the virgin Mary began in 

 he fifth century, at the time when the expression 

 toroxes, being opposed by Nestorius,and sanctioned by 

 he council of Ephesus (431) and that of Chalcedon 

 ,451), acquired a peculiar importance. The expres- 

 sion itself was already of long standing. The origin 

 of this worship is enveloped in darkness. The festi- 

 vals relating to the virgin and the other Mary in the 

 atholic church, are nine : 1. the feast of the annun- 

 iation ; 2. the purification of the virgin, or Candle- 

 mas ; 3. the feast of the visitation of Our Lady ; 4. 

 the commemoration of Mary Magdalen ; 5. the feast 

 of the immaculate conception ; 6. the nativity of the 

 virgin ; 7. the martyrdom of the virgin Mary ; 8. the 

 assumption of the virgin ; and 9. several smaller fes- 

 tivals in honour of the virgin. The first three are 

 also kept in some Protestant churches. There are 

 also days observed in memory of martyrs and apos- 

 tles, and some others, in honour of different saints, 

 and angels, and of Christ. The 1st of November is 

 the feast of All-Saints. As early as the fourth cen- 

 tury, the Greeks observed the octave of Whitsunday, 

 now Trinity Sunday, as a general festival in honour 

 of all martyrs and saints. (See ^Ill-Saints.) On the 

 2d of November, the festival of All-Souls is observed 

 in the Catholic church, as a day of mourning and 

 commemoration of such of the dead as are not yet 

 admitted to the contemplation of their Maker. Odilo 

 of Clugny seems first to have introduced it in his 

 monasteries in 998, after which it gradually obtained 

 reception in the church. The 29th of September is 

 the festival of St Michael (Michaelmas), which is 

 kept as a general festival in honour of the angels, 

 and may be considered partly as a commemoration of 

 the victory of the good principle over the bad, and 

 partly as a children's feast (according to Matt, xviii. 

 1 11). August 6th is the festival of the transfigu- 

 ration of Christ, which was celebrated with great 

 rejoicing, particularly among the Greeks. The wor- 

 ship of the cross has introduced two festivals; that of 

 the invention of the holy cross (May 3), and that of 

 the exaltation of the cross (September 1). The fes- 

 tival of the holy body of Christ, or corpus Christi (see 

 Corpus Christi), established in 1264, is observed on 

 the Thursday after Trinity Sunday. On this day, in 

 Catholic countries, the eucharist is carried in solemn 

 procession, the object of the festival being the pre- 

 servation of the belief in the eucharist. Luther 

 himself says, in his Table Talk, page 359, " The 

 feast of corpus Christi has, of all others, the greatest 

 and best appearance." 



In the eighteenth century, many feast days of the 

 Catholic church were abolished, or transferred to 

 Smidays. When the national convention of France 

 had, in 1793, on the motion of Robespierre, acknow- 

 ledged the existence of a Supreme Being and the 

 immortality of the soul, and dedicated a national 



