Speaker 1: Oh bed of Bard, Hello, and welcome to the show.
Speaker 2: This is the Cult of Conspiracy and I'm the Cage
Speaker 2: to Night And today we are continuing with our holiday
Speaker 2: season extravaganza, and today we are going to be talking
Speaker 2: about Chris Proper, and by that we mean the American
Speaker 2: traditions of Christmas that we all know and love. So
Speaker 2: let's just go ahead and get this out of the
Speaker 2: way now. There is a lot of controversies surrounding some
Speaker 2: of the traditions of modern Christmas, specifically among the Christian community.
Speaker 2: We've had for years now, we've had people talk about
Speaker 2: how Santa and Satan are actually the same thing. They're
Speaker 2: both red, they're both drunk, they both love children. It's
Speaker 2: a whole thing, you know, whatever, right, and you just
Speaker 2: change the words around and it's the same thing. It
Speaker 2: is a take. It is a take. We have had
Speaker 2: people talk about how bringing trees into your home during
Speaker 2: this time is actually satanic and has spoken about in
Speaker 2: Jeremiah ten. So it there is a section of the
Speaker 2: Bible where they're talking about this. However, uh, there's a
Speaker 2: bit of context missing from that section. So at the
Speaker 2: gift giving, obviously it's try to recreate Saturnalia in all
Speaker 2: these which is not exactly correct. It's obviously a combination
Speaker 2: of so many winter Solstice traditions and that's why and
Speaker 2: how Christmas became what it is. Historically speaking, that's also
Speaker 2: not accurate, and today we're going to talk about that
Speaker 2: and peel back some of the layers on this. So Raven,
Speaker 2: I know that you have some opinions as far as
Speaker 2: this is concerned. I mean, we've talked about the Yule
Speaker 2: time of year, yes, which we are going to go
Speaker 2: in depth on this episode of cult members, and some
Speaker 2: of these traditions do overlap absolutely, but as we'll learn
Speaker 2: here today, it's not just because there is a correlation
Speaker 2: doesn't mean there's absolutely a connection. And that's that's something
Speaker 2: that I feel like a lot of people miss overall.
Speaker 2: For one, the solstice ends December twenty first every year.
Speaker 3: But that's also a point of contention and argument because
Speaker 3: of the Julie calendar and the other calendar that yeah,
Speaker 3: they that actually the original solstice is actually the twenty
Speaker 3: first and twenty fifth, but it's.
Speaker 2: The day of the month or the actual date because
Speaker 2: the sun is the shortest across the sky on the
Speaker 2: same day regardless of whatever day we want.
Speaker 3: To call it the day of the month.
Speaker 2: Actually, so you're saying on the Julian count well, it
Speaker 2: wouldn't be the Julians, the Gregorian, and the because the
Speaker 2: Julian is a three sixty five calendar, so like there's
Speaker 2: no months.
Speaker 4: Here's the article that I actually gave to you.
Speaker 3: It actually does talk about the specific solstice day, okay,
Speaker 3: and the old day and how it ties into each other.
Speaker 2: Okay, Well, I'm excited to learn more about this. I
Speaker 2: got a couple of articles pulled up. Ravenly as a
Speaker 2: couple of articles pulled up, and we are going to
Speaker 2: be talking about all this in depth. How much of
Speaker 2: what we know about modern Christmas as far as American
Speaker 2: traditions go, how much of that is rooted in paganism,
Speaker 2: and how much of that is rooted in Christendom, Because,
Speaker 2: as we've said, there's a few things that are they're
Speaker 2: just fraught with misunderstanding, honestly, on both sides of that conversation.
Speaker 2: To be completely honest here, I've seen so many scholars
Speaker 2: come out and say that actually a lot of the
Speaker 2: traditions that people think are pagan were actually adopted from
Speaker 2: Christianity into pagan cultures as a way to prevent more
Speaker 2: of their followers from turning Christian. But then we've also
Speaker 2: heard other scholars say that the flip opposite is true
Speaker 2: and that so many Christian churches started adopting pagan practices
Speaker 2: to easily convert the pagans into Christendom. So I feel
Speaker 2: like on this episode, as we peel back the layers,
Speaker 2: we're going to answer some of those questions together, and
Speaker 2: I'm excited.
Speaker 3: Yeah, Christmas everyone.
Speaker 2: Merry Christmas everyone.
Speaker 3: We're gonna go ahead and get started here.
Speaker 2: We're going to share the screen for anybody who would
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Speaker 2: lives we host every Tuesday night at nine pm Central.
Speaker 3: We hope to see you there.
Speaker 2: It's always a blast, it's always unhinged, and we will
Speaker 2: be doing it on the week of Christmas as well.
Speaker 2: Which of that episode, as you know, gets dropped in kind,
Speaker 2: that episode will be dropping as you're listening to this tomorrow,
Speaker 2: will be dropping on Friday. But anyway, let's get into
Speaker 2: a good cult members without any further ado. All right,
Speaker 2: So to get started here, we had this article pulled
Speaker 2: up yesterday as a matter of fact, but we felt
Speaker 2: like it would actually do better on tonight's episodes. So
Speaker 2: fifteen fascinating Winter Solstice traditions from around the world. Because
Speaker 2: as we talk about Christmas, a lot of times Winter
Speaker 2: Solstice comes up in the conversation. So let's learn a
Speaker 2: little bit more about some of these more obscure traditions together.
Speaker 2: So this is from readers Digest Winter Solstice traditions from
Speaker 2: around the globe. Christmas isn't the only time for a
Speaker 2: magical celebration. There's also Winter Solstice, a mystical event marking
Speaker 2: the shortest day and longest night of the year. Across
Speaker 2: the globe, people come together to honor this special day
Speaker 2: with the unique Winter Solstice traditions, and we're excited to
Speaker 2: share some of the most fascinating ones with you. In
Speaker 2: the Northern Hemisphere, the winter Solstice usually falls around December
Speaker 2: twenty first or December twenty second. In twenty twenty five,
Speaker 2: it will be on December twenty first, while in the seconds.
Speaker 3: It's tomorrow as of time recording.
Speaker 2: Yeah, as listening to this on Christmas Day, which Merry
Speaker 2: Christmas to everybody, But yeah, we recorded this on the
Speaker 2: twentieth but uh yeah, so tomorrow is the solstice?
Speaker 3: It is? It is.
Speaker 2: Indeed, while in the southern hemisphere it's around June, ones
Speaker 2: create creating festive wreaths and lighting candles to welcome the
Speaker 2: return of longer days. From China to England, Guatemala and beyond,
Speaker 2: people embrace the season with traditional foods, lively festivals, and
Speaker 2: even more time honored rituals like sharing a cozy winter
Speaker 2: quote or two. So keep reading to learn all about
Speaker 2: the winter solstice, All right, cool, get reader to digest.
Speaker 2: So now we have in British Columbia, Vancouver, they have
Speaker 2: the Winter Solstice Lantern Festival.
Speaker 3: I absolutely love the lantern festivals. I thought it's so gorgeous.
Speaker 3: I thought the outlawed them because of all the forest
Speaker 3: fires and shit. I don't believe. I think some countries
Speaker 3: still have them. Some places still have them. They're beautiful though.
Speaker 3: When they actually do have them, they actually have biodegradable
Speaker 3: ones now, so that way they don't pollute anything.
Speaker 2: That makes sense.
Speaker 3: Yeah, they actually like kind of crumble with the water
Speaker 3: and it's a whole thing.
Speaker 2: So hell yeah. So if anybody doesn't know what this
Speaker 2: is or doesn't know what it looks like, first of all,
Speaker 2: just come to patreon dot com slash could conspiracy and
Speaker 2: see for yourself. But if you've ever seen the movie Tangled, the.
Speaker 4: Oh man, my favorite is that your favorite?
Speaker 3: I love the love scene, the whole song. Oh yeah,
Speaker 3: I know.
Speaker 4: I immediately almost was like, mm, don't mind me.
Speaker 3: As soon as I saw it, I was like, oh no,
Speaker 3: But I'm also a sucker for romances, so I know
Speaker 3: I might not look.
Speaker 2: At Ryder was kind of a piece of shit though, true, true, true,
Speaker 2: but I like super like the romance of the scene
Speaker 2: itself was really great.
Speaker 3: Fair Fair Yeah, he was kind of a hot, flipping mess.
Speaker 2: It'd be like that sometimes, you know, but then you
Speaker 2: know they change for the good ones where some do anyway,
Speaker 2: But anyway, So the Winter Solstice Lantern Festival British Columbia
Speaker 2: Vancouver or Vancouver, British Columbia. To honor the many culture
Speaker 2: cultural Winter Solstice traditions, Vancouver's Secret Lantern Society created the
Speaker 2: city's annual Winter Solstice Lantern Festival. Participants can attend workshops
Speaker 2: to create their lanterns. On the night of the Solstice,
Speaker 2: processions march through the city, culminating in fire performances. Attendees
Speaker 2: can also try to find their way through the Labyrinth
Speaker 2: of Light, a maze of six hundred candles that invites
Speaker 2: visitors to let go of old thoughts and find new
Speaker 2: possibilities for the new year. This year, the festival is
Speaker 2: taking place on Saturday, December twenty first.
Speaker 3: Okay, I want to do that so bad.
Speaker 2: I think it's cool.
Speaker 4: I think it's such a cool tradition.
Speaker 2: That means we'd also have to go to Canada for
Speaker 2: December though it's cold.
Speaker 3: Yeah, that's like freezing. That's like negative forty degrees like
Speaker 3: it' to us.
Speaker 2: It might as well be an Arctica. I know people
Speaker 2: in BC are gonna be like, oh, oh, you folcan
Speaker 2: Americans down there, you're so pussy. Yeah, okay, fine, fine, yeah.
Speaker 3: But like they have special boots that their kids have
Speaker 3: to weird to get on the bus so that they
Speaker 3: don't freeze.
Speaker 2: Listen if I have to shit.
Speaker 3: I know this for a fact because my girlfriend lives
Speaker 3: in Alberta and no Calgary, excuse me, and she used
Speaker 3: to drive a bus and we talked to had a
Speaker 3: huge conversation. She's like, yeah, we have to go buy
Speaker 3: these the boots, And I was like, what boots? She's
Speaker 3: like every year we have to buy these, you know,
Speaker 3: expensive boots so that way the kids don't their feet
Speaker 3: don't freeze because it's so cold outside when they have
Speaker 3: to go get down the bus. And I'm like, no, no, listen,
Speaker 3: buy me out, bro count me the fuck out. Like
Speaker 3: I love snow, but not that much.
Speaker 2: If I got to wear a special face mask because
Speaker 2: the air going inside my lungs is so cold that
Speaker 2: it might collapse my lungs. Otherwise, I don't need to
Speaker 2: live there. That's that is that's psychotic, you know what.
Speaker 3: There's a lot of awesome things though up there, but
Speaker 3: he has She has so many cool adventures and stuff
Speaker 3: that she goes and does. And I'm just jealous every
Speaker 3: time that she tells me all all this cool stuff.
Speaker 2: But and don't think I'm just shitting on Canada. Chicago.
Speaker 2: They have to do the thing because the air is
Speaker 2: too cold and will collapse their lungs. Like I don't
Speaker 2: know why people live in Chicago either, So like, just
Speaker 2: so we're clear, I'm not just shedding on our neighbors
Speaker 2: to the Great White North. I'm talking about people even
Speaker 2: in certain states in America. I don't understand why people
Speaker 2: live that far away from the equator. It makes no
Speaker 2: sense to me. People live everywhere that again, I get it.
Speaker 2: I know this makes no sense that that doesn't even
Speaker 2: make logical.
Speaker 3: Sense to me.
Speaker 2: Such a baby brow if you're literally fighting for survival
Speaker 2: to breathe, to breathe.
Speaker 4: But God, where is it.
Speaker 3: It's not Norway Finland probably them too well, know the
Speaker 3: ones that they leave all their babies out in the
Speaker 3: strollers and those cool little the little zip up things,
Speaker 3: and they all their babies that you can see like
Speaker 3: little strollers all over the place of the baby sleeping outside.
Speaker 2: So they want their children to get kidnapped.
Speaker 3: They have it does not happen.
Speaker 2: They don't only have a lot of crime there.
Speaker 3: Now you should really I forget where it's at. And
Speaker 3: I don't want to misspoke speak, but somewhere in the
Speaker 3: great white north of your over there, there's a whole
Speaker 3: cool thing you can watch about it like a whole
Speaker 3: bunch of babies are just see little strollers with all
Speaker 3: the little babies out there sleeping and the little vests
Speaker 3: and stuff. And they yeah, it's to help, like they
Speaker 3: actually change the body chemistry to be able to survive
Speaker 3: in the colder environments and they sleep better though, So
Speaker 3: to that.
Speaker 2: Point, why would you live there if you have to
Speaker 2: like train your infant child to survive there?
Speaker 3: Perhaps, but they actually all sleep way better like they
Speaker 3: do because of the cold your body. Have you ever
Speaker 3: been really cold in your house and under your blankets
Speaker 3: and you sleep so much? Sound like more soundly?
Speaker 2: No, if I had my way, I would sleep in
Speaker 2: eighty degrees every night.
Speaker 3: You're absolutely discussing. I am aware.
Speaker 2: I don't do that because my children are like, it's
Speaker 2: so hot, and I'm like, you're in the south.
Speaker 3: But is hot? Who sleeps? Who wants to sleep in
Speaker 3: eighty to.
Speaker 2: Your weather under a thick ass comforter live in my
Speaker 2: best life?
Speaker 3: You know what? Yeah, you're of the devil.
Speaker 2: No, I am meant for tropical climates. I am just
Speaker 2: simply not meant for the cold, that's all it is.
Speaker 2: And for the record, I'm not Mexico. Their babies have
Speaker 2: to get a climated to the parasite when they get
Speaker 2: born because the water is so shit there, so like
Speaker 2: it's not the same thing that's even closer to the
Speaker 2: equator than us.
Speaker 3: So I guess I don't know.
Speaker 2: People are just people in the just complaining. Yeah, maybe
Speaker 2: I'm just bitching little bit.
Speaker 3: What this is Christmas? These people want holidays. Yeah, but
Speaker 3: you're some cold weather. It's sorry, it isn't even affecting you.
Speaker 3: Not right now.
Speaker 2: It's like eighty outside. It's wonderful.
Speaker 3: Yeah it is.
Speaker 4: It is actually really hot. Yesterday it was cold as balls.
Speaker 3: Today it's hot because I'm telling you, the South is
Speaker 3: a hormonal like menopausal woman. Yeah, straight up. That's what's happening.
Speaker 3: Every two seconds is a hot flash. It's freezing cold,
Speaker 3: it's raining, it's not it's like you you have to
Speaker 3: pack everything in your car for whatever event might be
Speaker 3: happening with the goddamn weather down here.
Speaker 2: So seriously, Louisiana, and I know that a lot of
Speaker 2: places have weather that swing's crazy. I get that Louisiana
Speaker 2: has when Ravenlee is very much on par here. So
Speaker 2: we have had sub freezing halloweens before, and we've had
Speaker 2: ninety five degree halloweens before. Now cut to December. We
Speaker 2: have had twenty degree decembers before. We have also had
Speaker 2: ninety degree decembers. Like Christmas is Christmas morning, you wake up,
Speaker 2: you go outside and like shorts in a tank and
Speaker 2: like not because like, oh you just love the cold.
Speaker 3: No, no, like it's that hot. And then there's other
Speaker 3: times we're by the pool today, yeah, like the kids
Speaker 3: were playing in the pool because it was in the
Speaker 3: eighties and it was it was actually really nice weather
Speaker 3: though it was not too humid, it was not too hot.
Speaker 3: It was just the right temperature outside.
Speaker 2: So but we're also in that time where the morning
Speaker 2: time will be balls cold.
Speaker 3: Yes, it was forty No, it's like forty one degrees
Speaker 3: this morning, so forty one to eighty. Yeah, and it
Speaker 3: only it happens within hours, like you're talking like two hours.
Speaker 3: It can change and then all of a sudden it
Speaker 3: will rain sometimes and then all like mon soon, which,
Speaker 3: by the way, for the people that don't live in
Speaker 3: the South, that have never experienced an actual monsoon down here,
Speaker 3: I tried to explain it to people when I first
Speaker 3: moved to the South, I'm like, what kind of weather
Speaker 3: is happening right now?
Speaker 2: For the days of the sky telling you to go fuck.
Speaker 4: Yourself, I've lived in the rain.
Speaker 3: Actually currently shout out to all of my Oregonians right
Speaker 3: now that are currently dealing with the flood. My family
Speaker 3: is actually dealing with a lot of flood issues. They're
Speaker 3: evacuating a lot of places. So I hope that you
Speaker 3: all are safe, and I hope that everything is working
Speaker 3: out now that it's been a few days from what's
Speaker 3: happening as of current right now, but as of right
Speaker 3: now it is flooding big time and organ and is
Speaker 3: expected to flood more. So hopefully you're all doing well.
Speaker 3: But that being said, they down here when it rains,
Speaker 3: like when it the little term rains cats and dogs
Speaker 3: is what it's doing. It's such bad rain you can't
Speaker 3: even see your hood of your car, Yeah, which is
Speaker 3: completely different than the rain that I've experienced until I
Speaker 3: moved down here. And then I try to explain it
Speaker 3: to them. You don't understand, like it's it's it doesn't
Speaker 3: just like kind of rain. It's like motherfucker ray.
Speaker 2: And then we even have rain when the sun's out,
Speaker 2: like yeah, every day when the devil's beating his wife,
Speaker 2: and that's the expression in the South, when it's raining
Speaker 2: and the sun is shining.
Speaker 3: That happens a lot every single day, though at about
Speaker 3: two o'clock. At about two o'clock, without fail, from two
Speaker 3: to four, you'll likely have it happen in the summer.
Speaker 3: In the summer, yeah, it just it will be what
Speaker 3: it is, and it will be nice outside. It might
Speaker 3: the humidity might not be too bad, but then that
Speaker 3: motherfucker rains, and then it's so god awful you can
Speaker 3: like taste it in your mouth. Oh.
Speaker 2: The worst is whenever it's just a fifteen to twenty
Speaker 2: minute days and then it just lifts and the sun's
Speaker 2: out shining. It's just enough to make everything super wet
Speaker 2: and now superhumid.
Speaker 3: It's some mosquitoes. It's some mosquitoes that pissed me off
Speaker 3: the most.
Speaker 2: You got to make peace with them. You gotta make
Speaker 2: a deal with them.
Speaker 4: No, they're bastards, like they should all die.
Speaker 2: And then there's that chemical biological thing where some people
Speaker 2: just don't get.
Speaker 3: Bit Yeah well I have that. I don't have that.
Speaker 3: I have that blood you got, I got that blood type.
Speaker 3: They're like hmm, it's all good girl, And I'm like, no, bitch,
Speaker 3: go away. Yeah, that's a thing.
Speaker 2: That a thing anyway, All right, back to the Christmas
Speaker 2: conversation here. Christmas midwinter day in Antarctica, whyes on the solstice.
Speaker 2: Antarctica has a tradition believe it or not.
Speaker 3: Wait, there's no settlements, so that are permanently They don't
Speaker 3: have permanent residence of Antarctica.
Speaker 2: But they have had people working there quite some time.
Speaker 2: This goes back to eighteen ninety eight.
Speaker 3: Eight turned narder Hurt in the year of all Old.
Speaker 2: Indeed, on June twenty first, in the heart of Antarctica,
Speaker 2: which is their winter solstices in June, right the heart
Speaker 2: of Antartica comes alive with the winter solstice tradition of
Speaker 2: celebrating midwinter. For most national bases, this is the biggest
Speaker 2: event of the year, out shining even Christmas or other
Speaker 2: traditional holidays. The very first midwinter celebration dates back to
Speaker 2: eighteen ninety eight and is still a time filled with
Speaker 2: icy swims, gift exchanges, warm greetings, and plenty a festive fun.
Speaker 4: Sounds like you just want to be there, no icy,
Speaker 4: icy swims.
Speaker 3: I'm good, yummy.
Speaker 2: So this is these people in Antarctica in the eighteen
Speaker 2: hundreds celebrating this. But I know it's ice wand nobody
Speaker 2: can go there, but whatever. Anyway, moving on, Saturnalia in
Speaker 2: Rome in Rome, which and you'll see on screen right now,
Speaker 2: these are people that are re enacting a Saturnalia parade
Speaker 2: for lack of better words, although they do not do
Speaker 2: the traditions of like the slaves and the masters swap
Speaker 2: roles for a day, and like all. There was a
Speaker 2: lot of things that went into Saturnalia, and it became
Speaker 2: it was supposed to be like a two day festival.
Speaker 2: Before it was all said and done, it became like
Speaker 2: a ten day free for all in Roman society. It
Speaker 2: was just wild things. So let's read about it together
Speaker 2: here in Rome. Saturnalia is an ancient Roman festival and
Speaker 2: is often seen as a forerunner to modern Christmas celebrations.
Speaker 2: This lively holiday was a time for honoring their Roman
Speaker 2: gods Saturn and embracing pagan winter Solstice traditions. Originally hailed
Speaker 2: on December seventeenth, the festivities were so beloved that they
Speaker 2: were extended to last from the seventeenth to the twenty third,
Speaker 2: filled with feasts, gift giving and more. While Saturnalia isn't
Speaker 2: widely celebrated today, the city of Chester in the UK
Speaker 2: keeps the tradition of live in honor of its Roman history. Yeah,
Speaker 2: let UK be doing the Roman holidays. Yes, I understand
Speaker 2: they had of settlement out that way, but like that
Speaker 2: is the outermost borderland of the Roman Empire for a
Speaker 2: very small snippet of time. But okay, sure, each year
Speaker 2: Roman soldiers marched through the city center, handing out glow
Speaker 2: sticks and adorning their homes with greenery, bringing a touch
Speaker 2: of ancient festivity to the modern times. Okay, okay, I
Speaker 2: honestly didn't know. I thought that was in Rome.
Speaker 4: I actually thought it was Rome too, so I didn't
Speaker 4: know it was the UK.
Speaker 2: Leave it to the British. Tell me more about your
Speaker 2: cultural appropriation anyway. Saint Lucia Day, okay. In Scandinavia, as
Speaker 2: with many modern celebrations, ancient festivals observing the winter solstice
Speaker 2: merged with the newer winter solstice rituals to create the
Speaker 2: holiday season as we know today. In Scandinavia, Saint Lucia Day,
Speaker 2: also known as Saint Lucie's Day, on December thirteenth is
Speaker 2: the solstice. By the old calendar, it marks the start
Speaker 2: of the Christmas season. So the old calendar that you
Speaker 2: were referring to earlier puts solstice at the thirteenth, not
Speaker 2: the twenty first. That's interesting, now, that might be a
Speaker 2: Nordic calendar as opposed to a Greek or Roman, because
Speaker 2: that's the other thing too. The Gregorian was the Roman.
Speaker 2: I forget what the Greeks had it listed as. But
Speaker 2: then in this is just Scandinavia, maybe like the Normans
Speaker 2: had a different one, maybe the Danes had a different one.
Speaker 2: That's you know, especially with the Viking cultures, a lot
Speaker 2: of things do traverse, but there are some very key
Speaker 2: differences from tribe to tribe. So maybe that's something here.
Speaker 3: I don't know.
Speaker 2: The Solstice, by the old calendar marks the start of
Speaker 2: the Christmas season. A procession of young women in white robes,
Speaker 2: red sashes and wreaths of candles on their heads lights
Speaker 2: the way through the darkness of winter, honoring Saint Lucia
Speaker 2: aka Saint Lucy. This festival incorporates pagan winter solstice traditions,
Speaker 2: marked by bonfires, ginger snaps, saffron flavored buns, and glog.
Speaker 3: Glog is that like a grog. It's a it's an ale, okay,
Speaker 3: so it's a drink.
Speaker 2: It's a drink, are traditionally served. Interesting Moving on, the
Speaker 2: dong Z Festival in China. So the dong Z Festival
Speaker 2: is a that is eight thousands. Yeah, it says a thousands,
Speaker 2: which is weird. So yeah, it's one thousands of years
Speaker 2: old festival that takes place between December twenty first and
Speaker 2: December twenty third each year. The day is celebrated with
Speaker 2: family gatherings and a big meal including rice balls called
Speaker 2: tang wan probably mispronounced it, my apologies. Thought to mark
Speaker 2: the end of the harvest season. The holiday also has
Speaker 2: roots in Chinese concept of ying and yang. After the solstice,
Speaker 2: the abundance of darkness in winter will begin to be
Speaker 2: balanced with the light of the sun.
Speaker 3: I don't know if you've ever seen the festival and
Speaker 3: how they do it. It's not, oh, it's really cool
Speaker 3: people making like rice ball. Yeah, but they have a
Speaker 3: whole bunch of like cool stuff that they do with it,
Speaker 3: and the decorations are so vibrant and all out and
Speaker 3: stuff like that. So yeah, I know it's it's actually
Speaker 3: a really cool festival that's cool as hell.
Speaker 2: And that's not really around the Chinese New Year, if
Speaker 2: I'm not mistaken. There's is like in was like September
Speaker 2: or something as the Chinese New Year.
Speaker 3: I actually don't know. I just actually know that that
Speaker 3: festival in particular.
Speaker 2: Google that because I want to misspeak on that, because
Speaker 2: I remember seeing Chinese New Year stuff every so often.
Speaker 2: It's like, wait, this is when they celebrate it and it's.
Speaker 3: Not Stone Hinge.
Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, let's talk about this when the Stone Hinge
Speaker 2: gathering yet again.
Speaker 3: England, I cannot wait to go, yeah to the festivals.
Speaker 4: There's three festivals that they are.
Speaker 3: They have now made such a big thing that you
Speaker 3: can actually travel to and I know a couple people
Speaker 3: that are going next year. Hell yeah.
Speaker 2: So in England, although no one knows exactly why the
Speaker 2: ancient circle of stone Hinge was built, there's no denying
Speaker 2: it lines up with the movement of the sun. It's
Speaker 2: only it's one the global monuments built around the summer solstice.
Speaker 2: So we're talking about summer solstice and archaeological research suggests
Speaker 2: that winter solstice festivals happened there.
Speaker 3: That makes sense. Oh it says the first day of
Speaker 3: the Chinese New Year falls on the new moon that
Speaker 3: appears between the twenty first of January and the twentieth
Speaker 3: of February.
Speaker 2: Oh, I was off, I said September. So it's in January,
Speaker 2: but later in January it's the Chinese New year. H okay,
Speaker 2: fair enough.
Speaker 3: So it says as of twenty twenty six, it will
Speaker 3: be February seventeenth.
Speaker 2: Got you wow, middle of February. Yeah, that's interesting.
Speaker 3: I don't know.
Speaker 4: Sorry everyone, I interrupted the Stonehenge.
Speaker 3: Sorry.
Speaker 2: So they say that Winter Solstice festivals happened at Stonehenge
Speaker 2: as well. Historically speaking, modern rivelers have taken up the
Speaker 2: tradition gathering at dawn the day after the longest night
Speaker 2: to witness the magical occurrence of the sun rising through
Speaker 2: the stones. The best part, it's free of charge, although
Speaker 2: parking as limited. Visitors can even walk right up to
Speaker 2: the stones, an area usually roped off for the peaceful
Speaker 2: and sacred Winter Solstice celebration.
Speaker 3: Yeah. So last year they had this really cool gathering
Speaker 3: that they did and they I watched the whole thing
Speaker 3: live while it was happening, and they were actually able
Speaker 3: to all go up to stone, the actual stones, and
Speaker 3: they had like about a thousand people gathered, and it
Speaker 3: was a really cool festival that they had, and they
Speaker 3: had one they had the certain performers that were being
Speaker 3: the stars of the whole festivities and stuff.
Speaker 2: That's really cool.
Speaker 3: Yeah, they all got dressed up everyone was in you know, garb.
Speaker 3: Everyone had their face painted and it was really cool.
Speaker 2: Yes, indeed, hmm. So moving on, let's go into shab
Speaker 2: I Yalda in Iran. Okay, this's an ancient Persian festival,
Speaker 2: so this probably has its roots in Zoroastrianism rather than
Speaker 2: the Iranian you know, Muslim takeover that took place. But anyway,
Speaker 2: an ancient Persian festival, like many other winter solstice holidays,
Speaker 2: celebrates the end of the shorter days and the victory
Speaker 2: of light over darkness meaning bird y'all dub is marked
Speaker 2: by family gatherings, candles originally fires lit all night, poetry readings,
Speaker 2: and a feast to get through the longest night of
Speaker 2: the year. Nuts and fruits, including watermelon and pomegranates, are
Speaker 2: traditionally eaten. Legend has that eating these fruits of summer
Speaker 2: will protect you from the illness in winter.
Speaker 4: I really like that. Actually, wow, I'm not gonna lie.
Speaker 3: That's something I might want to adopt.
Speaker 2: Eating watermelon for the solstice. Yeah, that's I didn't know.
Speaker 3: Cool.
Speaker 2: The pomegranates I could see, you know, that's that's definitely
Speaker 2: a thing.
Speaker 3: Oh, hey, did you get the log? I did the
Speaker 3: poop dog will commence. I did. I did. I tell
Speaker 3: my kids all about it today. We actually I had
Speaker 3: pulled the article and they're like, Okay, we're pumped to
Speaker 3: do this, we need to do this.
Speaker 2: I told my family about it, and they looked at
Speaker 2: me like I had a dick growing out in my forehead.
Speaker 3: My kids were like, we wait, show me the picture.
Speaker 3: So I showed them the picture.
Speaker 2: Not my kids, because we just came from a family
Speaker 2: get together, and I was telling my brother and my
Speaker 2: brother in law and my dad and they're like, they
Speaker 2: do what now? Shit out of this log knit poops,
Speaker 2: candy and presents and they're like, that's weird.
Speaker 3: So I'm here for it though.
Speaker 2: Even the article said the more you think about, the
Speaker 2: less sense it makes. Just roll with it, and they're like, nah,
Speaker 2: we're good, we're gonna I'm.
Speaker 3: Like, I think we're gonna have to do tomorrow. Maybe
Speaker 3: we'll grab a watermelon. I think it's gonna have to
Speaker 3: happen if you can find one Walmart.
Speaker 2: Does Walmart sell watermelons right now?
Speaker 3: Probably they have no seasonal shit anymore. Really, they pretty
Speaker 3: much year round.
Speaker 2: You can find chunks. I don't know if you'll be
Speaker 2: able to find a whole one, but you'll definitely able
Speaker 2: to find like chunks for sure.
Speaker 3: All right, yeah, we'll make it, we'll make it. Oh yeah.
Speaker 2: So if you eat summer fruits during the winter solstice,
Speaker 2: it will prevent you from.
Speaker 3: What is it, kem burrow on the screen for.
Speaker 2: Let's talk about that kaby bara toji, which is a
Speaker 2: festival in Japan the winter solstice in Japan called toji.
Speaker 3: Do they eat them? Uh? Oh no?
Speaker 2: Which you know, that's a thing that the Catholic Church
Speaker 2: had to give the blessing one.
Speaker 3: To eat the kabby barro.
Speaker 2: Okay, so tangent side tangent. This is so listen, listen, listen, listen, Linda. Okay,
Speaker 2: here's what happened. Everybody, listen, Linda, listen. So back in
Speaker 2: the day, back in the day when there was Jesuit
Speaker 2: missionaries that were working in Latin America Lent what happened
Speaker 2: and they had to get special permission to eat this
Speaker 2: animal during Lent because you're only supposed to eat fish.
Speaker 2: And they're like, listen, Pope, this animal spends more time
Speaker 2: in the water than on land. I think we should
Speaker 2: call that a fish. And the Pope's like send it
Speaker 2: good to go. So they started being able to eat
Speaker 2: the cappy bar during limp because they was classified as
Speaker 2: a fish by the Catholic Church.
Speaker 3: Wild shit, y'all. Yep, I'm gonna leave that where it is.
Speaker 2: Oh, it's ridiculous. It's fucking ridiculous. Although I want to
Speaker 2: try it, I'm assuming it tastes like neutra, which is delicious.
Speaker 3: I don't know.
Speaker 2: How are they nasty?
Speaker 3: Is it the look they look like the beavers look
Speaker 3: better than they do.
Speaker 2: They look like a stumptail beaver.
Speaker 3: They just they crazy as shit looking.
Speaker 2: They only eat fresh vegetation. They never eat anything rotten
Speaker 2: or bad.
Speaker 3: It's just nasty looking. Every time I see when, I'm
Speaker 3: just like, oh, cru they're so tasty. They remind me. God,
Speaker 3: they remind me that movie where they had those big
Speaker 3: ash rats that would come across the screen. That's what
Speaker 3: they remind me.
Speaker 2: Of, Princess Bride. Yes, yeah, all right.
Speaker 3: I know, so sad, that's what it reminds me of,
Speaker 3: doing fucking nasty things. Anyway, So moving on here.
Speaker 2: This is called toji in Japan, and it has a
Speaker 2: few interesting customs associated with it. Traditionally, a winter squash
Speaker 2: called kobacha is eaten, one of only a few crops
Speaker 2: that would have even been available in the days of old.
Speaker 2: You'll feel as if you were on a warm winter
Speaker 2: getaway after taking a hot bath with uzu yuzu uzu
Speaker 2: citrus frind fruits. So I guess it's like a their
Speaker 2: version of orange.
Speaker 3: Okay.
Speaker 2: The bath is believed to refresh the body and spirit,
Speaker 2: ward off illness and soothe dry winter skin.
Speaker 3: It's actually really nice.
Speaker 2: Apparently, rodents called kapy barrows love yu zoo bats as well,
Speaker 2: and in a modern twist on an age old tradition,
Speaker 2: some Japanese zoos will throw the fruit into the warm
Speaker 2: waters that the animals will soak in on the winter solstice.
Speaker 3: Thank god they're not eating them, man, cause I mean
Speaker 3: Japan be and Japan was just out there for a second.
Speaker 3: I was like, oh God, they're like so beloved by
Speaker 3: the kids nowadays, and I'm like, oh real, Oh.
Speaker 2: My daughter hates them because of what happened when we
Speaker 2: met them. Oh no, last Christmas or two Christmases ago.
Speaker 2: Excuse me. There was like this glorified massive petting zoo
Speaker 2: where you could also do pancakes with Santa, which for
Speaker 2: the record, I've never been to a positive pancakes with
Speaker 2: Santa get together.
Speaker 3: There's none.
Speaker 2: The pancakes are always super cold. There's always a massive line.
Speaker 2: You pay all this money to do this whole experience
Speaker 2: and then like it's it's yeah, it's kind of a waste.
Speaker 2: But the kids had fun for the most part. There
Speaker 2: was kapy bars and you could totally go up and
Speaker 2: pet them, and my daughter, having her long curly hair,
Speaker 2: was petting one of them and was kind of looking
Speaker 2: at it. Another one it came up and started eating
Speaker 2: her hair and it took a chunk.
Speaker 3: Yeah.
Speaker 2: Yeah, so she says, fuck those cat bonas.
Speaker 3: So when I was younger, I went on a zoo
Speaker 3: trip to the zoo and I had really long hair,
Speaker 3: it was past my butt, and goats happened to super
Speaker 3: love long hair, and like I didn't have just one goat,
Speaker 3: I had multiple goats. I still don't fuck with goats. Well,
Speaker 3: I mean, I've worked with goats though that liked to
Speaker 3: scream at me while I was trying to clean horse
Speaker 3: stalls the entire time.
Speaker 4: I don't know if you've ever heard goats screams.
Speaker 3: They've gone viral multiple times. Yeh, No, but like obnoxiously.
Speaker 3: Like you hear the screaming goats, They're like, what cool?
Speaker 3: Unless you work with one.
Speaker 1: You can't.
Speaker 3: Even with death metal on, you'll hear this in the
Speaker 3: background non fucking stop, and it's like, okay, you shit, Yeah,
Speaker 3: it's the babies. Aren't even that bad, just certain ones.
Speaker 3: Alex Alex the goat. No, no offense to anybody named Alex,
Speaker 3: but yes, the goat was named Alex. His name is
Speaker 3: still Alex. He's alive, but yeah, he's a shit. Yeah,
Speaker 3: and I eat plastic.
Speaker 2: My daughter does not fuck with kafy bars ever since then.
Speaker 2: But I mean to be fair with the Japanese culture
Speaker 2: of toji uh the whole kapy bar thing, that could
Speaker 2: have gone one of two ways.
Speaker 3: I really thought they were gonna eat them.
Speaker 2: But I saw the fruit. I saw them swimming in water.
Speaker 2: I'm like, oh, is that a pot?
Speaker 3: Oh?
Speaker 2: No, just eating just yes, shit, that's not the weirdest
Speaker 2: thing Japan has ever done.
Speaker 3: Nope, you know.
Speaker 2: But anyway, So now let's go to the next one,
Speaker 2: the Santo Tomas festival in Guatemala. Although the Catholic Church
Speaker 2: now observes the Feast of Saint Thomas on July third
Speaker 2: in Chichi Custennango, Chichi Cosenango. I think I might have
Speaker 2: killed it. Guatemala. The festival is still celebrated for a
Speaker 2: week leading up to the winter solstice on December twenty first.
Speaker 2: Why likely because it's a mix of the Catholic ceremony
Speaker 2: with the native Mayan rituals that may have been timed
Speaker 2: to the solstice today. The feast features brightly colored traditional costumes, masks, parades, fireworks,
Speaker 2: and music, making Guatemala a great winter destination. The highlight
Speaker 2: of the death defying custom of the flying pole dance
Speaker 2: climbing up a one hundred foot pole, trying on a
Speaker 2: rope and jumping or tying on a rope and jumping
Speaker 2: off the top.
Speaker 3: I like this, good for them?
Speaker 2: What?
Speaker 3: Yeah? No, I like this, this is this is wonderful.
Speaker 3: Good job.
Speaker 2: I don't want to try bungee jumping like that. That's crazy.
Speaker 2: I wanted to jump bungee jumping, but not just for
Speaker 2: the fuck of it.
Speaker 3: I mean, it's for the festival. So you know, here
Speaker 3: we go, and.
Speaker 2: There's no way of knowing if that pole, that rope
Speaker 2: is like stretchy or if it's just going.
Speaker 3: To cut hard. That's just a you know, it's one
Speaker 3: of those fucker and find out moments.
Speaker 2: Guatemalans are wild, Okay, hell yeah? Continuing on soil from
Speaker 2: the Hopi tribe, which very very interesting tribe as far
Speaker 2: as the Native Americans are concerned. The indigenous Hope people
Speaker 2: of present day the northern Arizona celebrate the winter solstice
Speaker 2: as part of their religious tradition honoring kachina or catsina,
Speaker 2: which are ancestral spirits representing the natural world. During the
Speaker 2: soil Solstice ceremony, which is led by a tribal chief,
Speaker 2: the sun is welcomed back to its summer path with
Speaker 2: ritual dances, gift giving to children, prayers for the coming year.
Speaker 2: Singing and storytelling are also part of the festivities. Prayer
Speaker 2: sticks and kachina dolls are often made in preparation for
Speaker 2: the celebration, so these would be the dolls in question. Wow,
Speaker 2: been nice, I like it. Moving on, burning of the
Speaker 2: clocks in Brighton, England. So I'm just gonna point this out.
Speaker 2: Three of these obscure solstice traditions are all in England,
Speaker 2: and almost none of them connect.
Speaker 3: I bet yeah.
Speaker 4: The English be wild. They be doing a lot of
Speaker 4: weird shit.
Speaker 2: They just be taking cultures from here and a little
Speaker 2: bit from there, and now it's British. It's not though,
Speaker 2: it's not. Y'all are just mixing and matching over here.
Speaker 2: They took over the entire world with all the spices
Speaker 2: and used none of them. But whatever, that's a thing, yo.
Speaker 3: They eat some weird ass ship.
Speaker 2: They just be boiling everything for the fuck of it.
Speaker 3: Oh my god. Some of their food though, some of
Speaker 3: their food is just why. Yeah, I don't under don't understand,
Speaker 3: but that's I mean, that's every culture has a lot
Speaker 3: of weird shit. Though.
Speaker 2: They put beans on toast and breakfast.
Speaker 3: I was sitting here thinking about beans on toast, but
Speaker 3: I wasn't. The dishwashing thing, though, What you've never heard
Speaker 3: about the dish washing. Break it down, okay real quick
Speaker 3: before we get back to this. So they don't rinse
Speaker 3: their dishes after they wash them, after they wash them,
Speaker 3: after they wash them. Now, you guys might all think
Speaker 3: that I'm crazy. Go to fucking TikTok and Instagram and
Speaker 3: look at them tons of people.
Speaker 2: Wait, when you get your dishes out of the dishwasher,
Speaker 2: you rinse them.
Speaker 3: No, they're hand washing them. Oh, and they're not rinsing them.
Speaker 3: They're hand washing and not rinsing. They're ye like, let it.
Speaker 2: Then, I'm trying. I'm trying to make sure I understanding yourself.
Speaker 3: The leave residue on it, They leave the soap residue
Speaker 3: on it. And I've seen so many videos of people
Speaker 3: agreeing that this is what they do, and they're like,
Speaker 3: why are you guys crashing out about this? What the
Speaker 3: fuck you mean? Why are we crashing out about that?
Speaker 3: That's like the people that wash the chicken all weird
Speaker 3: and they like bleach it out or whatever. Yeah, yeah,
Speaker 3: that's you know, have you seen people make the Oh god,
Speaker 3: have you seen people make the lasagna in the dishwasher?
Speaker 2: You listen, listen, oh white people, let's have a conversations, not.
Speaker 3: Just why it's not just white people. I've seen what No,
Speaker 3: it's not just white.
Speaker 2: Name a culture that's doing the other than the white people.
Speaker 3: Well, this this is a mixed race, uh you know
Speaker 3: country and no time out, time out.
Speaker 2: You're telling me there is black and Hispanic people that
Speaker 2: are making lasagna and dishwashers.
Speaker 3: One of them that I saw was of a different
Speaker 3: ethnicity than white. So yeah, no, there's some wild shit
Speaker 3: going on.
Speaker 2: What the only acceptable thing? And I will give a
Speaker 2: weird caveat to this. I've never done it, but I
Speaker 2: have seen it done, and I could maybe have this
Speaker 2: conversation steaming vegetables no soap, but you're basically running the
Speaker 2: dishwasher and you're steaming like a massive amount of vegetables
Speaker 2: at the same time for like a big party. It
Speaker 2: sounds crazy, but it does work.
Speaker 3: I don't even understand now, but yeah, so apparently this
Speaker 3: is a thing that happens in England with some people.
Speaker 3: Now I cannot speak to being ever over there, so
Speaker 3: I don't know if this is like actually base, but
Speaker 3: I have seen a whole bunch of people and content
Speaker 3: creators say that this is a real thing. Then I
Speaker 3: read the comments of people from England being like, yet, no,
Speaker 3: I don't know why you're crashing out about this. I'm sorry, what.
Speaker 2: What's that's a little absurd, Like they're just leaving giant
Speaker 2: clumps of like soap resident in the bubbles like on
Speaker 2: the side, and it just dries.
Speaker 4: I guess I don't know any especially.
Speaker 3: So just like diarrhea, especially especially you with like how
Speaker 3: crazy you are with your dishes. I can only imagine
Speaker 3: how you'd feel how.
Speaker 2: Crazy I am with my dishes.
Speaker 3: You No, No, I mean all of us are like cleanly about, but.
Speaker 2: There's only a few things in my house I really
Speaker 2: care about as far as like cleanliness goes.
Speaker 4: My mom is one of those people that triple wash
Speaker 4: their dishes.
Speaker 3: Like she'll wash it, rinse it off, potentially wash it again,
Speaker 3: then put it in the dish washing And I'm like, white,
Speaker 3: why are you doing all that work? Mom?
Speaker 2: No, I'll hand washed to get like the chunks off
Speaker 2: and stuff. But like that's and usually it's no soap
Speaker 2: unless it's needed. If it's a dish you have to
Speaker 2: hand wash or whatever. He's like, you know, a scrub
Speaker 2: Daddy will go hard and then like you put in
Speaker 2: the dish washer and it's good to go.
Speaker 3: But anyway, I had to just tell you about that
Speaker 3: since we were talking about England and they're weird shit
Speaker 3: now for the England, because I know we do have
Speaker 3: English listeners, cult members, cult members, so if you can
Speaker 3: confirm or deny this is a real.
Speaker 4: Thing, that would be great because.
Speaker 2: Also for the Australian and New Zealand people, because so
Speaker 2: many cultural things from Britain have made their way and
Speaker 2: then there are certain very different cultural things. But just
Speaker 2: curious that this is the thing for Australia, New Zealand
Speaker 2: anything in the British Commonwealth.
Speaker 3: Apparently it's literally own in English.
Speaker 2: I should hope he we have Irish listeners too, Yo,
Speaker 2: hit us up in Ireland. Do y'all be rinsing your
Speaker 2: dishes when you're done because this is kind of a
Speaker 2: thing we need to talk about.
Speaker 3: Well, I knew you're gonna have a fit about it.
Speaker 2: I'm not having a fit. That's just it makes no sense,
Speaker 2: that's absurd.
Speaker 3: Yeah, no, I get it.
Speaker 2: These people just love tearing their stomachs up.
Speaker 3: What about the rice thing about rinsing rice or not
Speaker 3: rinsing rice, that's a heavily debated topic about people.
Speaker 2: So some people have issues with extra starch. I don't
Speaker 2: understand it.
Speaker 3: But whatever, you know, there's a lot of different people
Speaker 3: do a lot of weird stuff, and include.
Speaker 2: You know, washing the chicken. That is the thing that
Speaker 2: I didn't realize was such a cultural divide between white
Speaker 2: and black America.
Speaker 3: I mean, I washed my chicken sometimes when it has
Speaker 3: that slimy residue to it. That's the only time I'll
Speaker 3: actually wash it. But I mean i'll cut the I'll
Speaker 3: cut the bad parts off of it and the fact
Speaker 3: I'll trim it up and stuff like that. But if
Speaker 3: it has like that weird feeling to it, I'm just
Speaker 3: gonna rinse it off real quick. I'm not gonna sit
Speaker 3: there and scrub my shit. I have seen people use
Speaker 3: dond dishwash soap online. I'm not joking you, Okay, I'm
Speaker 3: not joking. I've seen all sorts of weird shit.
Speaker 2: Ye know, A squirt of lemon and then rinse it
Speaker 2: under the sink real quick before you wash. That's all
Speaker 2: it really takes, y'all. We don't have to do all this. Extorists.
Speaker 2: You don't need to use bleach. I saw the video
Speaker 2: somebody using bleach. I genuinely thought I thought it was satire.
Speaker 3: I thought it was for the content. Yeah. No, I've
Speaker 3: seen a lot of stuff that I believe is actually
Speaker 3: fake and satire. But you see so many people do
Speaker 3: it over and over again. It's like, Okay, is that
Speaker 3: is that fake? Or is that not?
Speaker 4: Because it's kind of confusing, But I don't know.
Speaker 2: We fucked up someone.
Speaker 3: Hopefully while you are eating your beautiful Christmas dinner right now.
Speaker 3: You are not having weird soapy food or you are
Speaker 3: not having weird bleached chicken either. You're having delicious, amazing food.
Speaker 2: Like could you imagine?
Speaker 3: Tell me what you're eating, by the way, like I
Speaker 3: want to hear what other everybody else? Yeah, because I've
Speaker 3: already currently I'm having a situation with a turn at
Speaker 3: my house because I'm cooking in Turkey tomorrow for the
Speaker 3: Christmas celebration, and somebody, not to mention names myself, I
Speaker 3: forgot to pull it out. So we're doing the rapid
Speaker 3: defrost situation right now.
Speaker 2: And so what do you mean rapid defrost like in
Speaker 2: a pot of hot water.
Speaker 3: In the bathtub?
Speaker 2: Fuck it, I've done it.
Speaker 3: I've done it before. Don't worry everybody. I cleaned out
Speaker 3: the bathtub. It's still in the wrapper. It's still on
Speaker 3: the wrapper. But I know. But people are like, no,
Speaker 3: I washed the bathtub first.
Speaker 2: And then with all the we've talked about these people
Speaker 2: and soap, do not come at us for.
Speaker 3: Apparently I forgot to put it back in the I
Speaker 3: forgot to take it out of the freezer. I thought
Speaker 3: I did, and then I was got home tonight and
Speaker 3: I looked at it and went, oh my god, I
Speaker 3: have like ten hours. Ah, so it's a vibe right now.
Speaker 3: But I'm doing the you know, deviled eggs and the
Speaker 3: cast role because I'm what, you know, I hate that
Speaker 3: I'm allergic to a because I used to so good
Speaker 3: then they're my favorite. I'm doing the rice crispy treats.
Speaker 3: I'm doing the cool Lot cheese. I'm doing the cheese.
Speaker 3: Oh I did get my hoghead cheese tonight. I actually went.
Speaker 2: And look at you assimilating to the culture. Wait where
Speaker 2: did you get it? This is important?
Speaker 3: Oh?
Speaker 4: I got it way out in like Port Vincent area.
Speaker 3: I went. I went to like those little mom Paw
Speaker 3: shops and I was like, I don't.
Speaker 2: Know it's called it's got a giant pig on the sign.
Speaker 3: Yeah good, yeah, yeah. I was like, hey, you got
Speaker 3: some hoghead cheese? They had two blocks left, and I
Speaker 3: was like, oh, I got one, secured it. I love it.
Speaker 2: For anybody who doesn't know what hoghead cheese is, you
Speaker 2: are missing out. It's also the same as saying like
Speaker 2: you don't know what budhan is, Like listen, you're missing out,
Speaker 2: and that's okay. If you ever come through Louisiana, you
Speaker 2: do need to try both. And it's it's uh, it's
Speaker 2: just the way it.
Speaker 3: Just what about the blood, uh, the blood put it? Yeah,
Speaker 3: the blood pudding.
Speaker 2: Uh so black black and white pudding, which is blood
Speaker 2: sausage and pork sausage. I'm gonna be honest with you.
Speaker 2: I've tried it. People make it out to be nasty.
Speaker 2: Shit's good, Shit's good. I fuck with it.
Speaker 3: I've only actually seen it made twice by two different people.
Speaker 2: I've never seen it made. Now, calm down, you mean
Speaker 2: cooked or you mean like like tubed up.
Speaker 4: Like tubed up and like actually like made.
Speaker 2: I don't want to know. I never want to see
Speaker 2: the sausage getting made. Just tell me if it's so.
Speaker 3: I saw so. I saw somebody make it one time,
Speaker 3: and then I actually saw like the after like they
Speaker 3: just got done making it, and I was like, you know,
Speaker 3: it's it's one of those things where it's like I
Speaker 3: don't I don't think I canna like make my mouth not.
Speaker 2: Stop watering, and you can't watch how it's made that
Speaker 2: us everything.
Speaker 3: It does, it really does.
Speaker 2: Now I've had some blood sausage to where it's like
Speaker 2: black pudding, uh to where it is a lot more
Speaker 2: sage heavy, and that's like all you can taste. And
Speaker 2: I've had some that's a little more on the blood side,
Speaker 2: and it's it's got more of a savory vibe.
Speaker 3: Yeah, more of an iron tang to it.
Speaker 2: It depends some of its dog shit, some of it's
Speaker 2: really good, depends on you.
Speaker 3: Know, my dad had it.
Speaker 4: Actually, my dad got it for us an Organ.
Speaker 2: I believe it. You you're talking about how Organ is
Speaker 2: such an eclectic place. I could understand.
Speaker 3: It has a lot of different cultures to it. And
Speaker 3: he loved like Polish dogs and all this stuff. So
Speaker 3: he would like find all these little weird places to
Speaker 3: get food in Washington and Organ.
Speaker 2: And be honest with you, I put brought worst over
Speaker 2: kill bossa any day. That's just my Oh.
Speaker 3: My dad was a brought worst fiend. I get down
Speaker 3: every every kind of sausage you could think of. He
Speaker 3: was like a connoisseur of sausage. So it was his
Speaker 3: whole vibe.
Speaker 2: And then I also like on Dewey.
Speaker 3: But actually like on Dewey but speaking of sausages, back
Speaker 3: to England, what a weird segue. I don't know. I
Speaker 3: don't know. I just think of like they would maybe
Speaker 3: potentially fuck with sausage. But oh yeah, yeah, I thought
Speaker 3: they did.
Speaker 2: The Bangers show, that's why. And blood blood pudding is sausage.
Speaker 3: Okay, see, okay, okay, fair enough.
Speaker 2: So now getting back to the list here. Burning the
Speaker 2: Clocks in Brighton, England, fire needed to light the dark
Speaker 2: days of winter has traditionally been a part of winter
Speaker 2: Solstice celebrations. The modern day Burning of Clocks festival in
Speaker 2: the seaside town of Brighton took up that notion for
Speaker 2: its early or for its yearly Solstice parade, bonfire and
Speaker 2: fire show. Okay, a parade of bonfire and a fire
Speaker 2: show in Brighton, I like it. People wearing costumes representing
Speaker 2: clocks and the passage of time marched to the beach
Speaker 2: with lanterns made of wood and paper. There the lanterns
Speaker 2: are burned in a huge bonfire, symbolizing the wishes, hopes,
Speaker 2: and fears that all will be passed into the flames.
Speaker 4: It's like a burning man for them.
Speaker 2: It seems like, look, these are the lanterns. These are huge.
Speaker 2: You got a witch doctor over here. You got a
Speaker 2: hot air balloon, you got a Star.
Speaker 3: You know what, that sounds really fun. I love all
Speaker 3: these different festivals that we've been learning about. It sounds
Speaker 3: like great times everywhere around the world.
Speaker 2: It really does. I don't know when that started, but
Speaker 2: that's legit. Oh, this is one. This is one of
Speaker 2: my favorites. And as much as you want to go
Speaker 2: to the burn not burning man, I'm sorry for a
Speaker 2: stone in trecked, Yes, So as much as you want
Speaker 2: to go to Stonehenge, I want to go to New Grange.
Speaker 3: Oh I know where this is, and yeah, I know
Speaker 3: what you're talking about. I know what this is.
Speaker 2: So let's talk about New Grange and the gathering there
Speaker 2: in Ireland.
Speaker 3: This tomb is so cool, by the way it is.
Speaker 2: And oh, it's so amazing. Let's read into it. So
Speaker 2: the five thousand, two hundred year old New Grange Passage
Speaker 2: tomb and ancient temple are aligned to the winter solstice.
Speaker 2: I'm going to say that again for those in the back.
Speaker 2: This tomb predates the Pyramids five two hundred year old.
Speaker 3: It is a really cool story to the whole background
Speaker 3: and history of it.
Speaker 4: They have a really cool YouTube video all about this.
Speaker 2: And they have a couple of different beliefs as far
Speaker 2: as what it may have been used for, right, they
Speaker 2: think it was a tomb. It may have like it said,
Speaker 2: it was a tomb and temple. I think it may
Speaker 2: have been used for multiple things over the years.
Speaker 3: For sure, I think it was a temple, to be
Speaker 3: honest with you.
Speaker 2: But there's also like little I don't want to call
Speaker 2: them cubby holes, but there's like little spots where they
Speaker 2: have found human remains. So are these the remains of
Speaker 2: whatever ruling family there was? Is this the remains of
Speaker 2: whatever high priest or high druid was there at that time?
Speaker 4: Like there's so many killing off people to sacrifices.
Speaker 2: Maybe the druids weren't known for human sacrifice, but it
Speaker 2: wasn't a thing that they They definitely did, but it
Speaker 2: wasn't like their main thing. So maybe I don't know.
Speaker 3: Maybe they are special sacrifices, or maybe they are high
Speaker 3: priests and you know, high priests or something like that.
Speaker 2: Yeah kings, I mean, who knows, who knows? But anyway,
Speaker 2: so this temple slash tomb in in Ireland, rather a
Speaker 2: small opening above the entrance fills with light on several
Speaker 2: sunrises surrounding the solstice gradually extending throughout the chamber to
Speaker 2: illuminate it. The dramatic effect lasts for seventeen minutes. Although
Speaker 2: the exact reason the tomb was created this way isn't known,
Speaker 2: it's speculated that it marks the beginning of a new
Speaker 2: year and the triumph of light over darkness. Today, visitors
Speaker 2: can apply for a lottery drawing to be inside the
Speaker 2: temple at the moment of the sunrise. Others will gather
Speaker 2: outside the monument.
Speaker 3: I've I've seen it in the inside and will I
Speaker 3: would totally want to do it and be able to
Speaker 3: see it. It's really cool for seventeen minutes, and it
Speaker 3: makes you really believe. I mean, it makes you really question,
Speaker 3: you know, why and how do they decide to do
Speaker 3: all these things?
Speaker 2: And see this is using sacred geometry in building structures.
Speaker 2: I one hundred percent get down with this. So many
Speaker 2: people on the internet take sacred geometry to mean so
Speaker 2: many things that have no basis in facts whatsoever. When
Speaker 2: we have actual architectural buildings that still stand today that
Speaker 2: use sacred geometry.
Speaker 3: Thinking geometry is really fascinating too. Really, I forget why
Speaker 3: I had to read into it. We did an episode
Speaker 3: with somebody base forg Yeah, and that's why I ended
Speaker 3: up reading a whole bunch into it even more because
Speaker 3: I kind of had a base knowledge of it, but
Speaker 3: I wanted to know more before went into that. It's
Speaker 3: super fascinating and I mean, it's interesting how it was
Speaker 3: used in the time periods in which it was used
Speaker 3: in and how they knew so much, and that kind
Speaker 3: of goes ties into how I feel like we've lost
Speaker 3: history or lost something with us or been reset. But
Speaker 3: that's just my own personal opinion. But I think this
Speaker 3: is a really cool way to celebrate Solstice.
Speaker 2: Agreed, Absolutely, agreed. Moving onward. Illuminations California's mission churches, Okay,
Speaker 2: an illumination effect similar to that scene in Ireland's New
Speaker 2: Grange Tomb have been discovered halfway around the world in
Speaker 2: more recent though still old structures mission churches in California
Speaker 2: and Latin America, such as Old Mission San Juan Bautista,
Speaker 2: built by Spanish missionaries in the late eighteenth and early
Speaker 2: nineteenth centuries to convert Native Americans to Catholicism. At dawn
Speaker 2: on the winter solstice, a shaft of light enters the
Speaker 2: church and illuminates the altar or a sacred object.
Speaker 3: The church appears.
Speaker 2: The churches appear to have been built purposely to align
Speaker 2: with the sun's path and what could have been an
Speaker 2: effort to merge the indigenous people's reverence for the solstice
Speaker 2: with the Christian beliefs. Today, people gather at the churches
Speaker 2: to witness this recently rediscovered phenomenon and celebrate with the
Speaker 2: Native American and Catholic traditions.
Speaker 3: You know what it reminds me of is Uh Indiana Jones.
Speaker 3: You know when they have to put the poll in
Speaker 3: and has the eye. You know how they put the
Speaker 3: pull in and with the eye and they have the mirror. Yeah,
Speaker 3: and the mirror and it comes through the light and
Speaker 3: it shows in. Yeah. It just I don't know, maybe
Speaker 3: totally think of that.
Speaker 2: I like it.
Speaker 3: I like it a lot.
Speaker 2: Now, let's go to South Korea and let's talk about dong.
Speaker 4: G It's like gridbeans and rice, isn't it.
Speaker 2: It kind of looks like that, right. But also I think,
Speaker 2: are these of these dates and peanuts?
Speaker 3: I think that's states and peanuts.
Speaker 2: Yeah, interesting, Okay. In South three of the winter solstice
Speaker 2: is known as Donge. One of the winter solstice rituals
Speaker 2: includes eating red bean porridge called pot joke. Red is
Speaker 2: considered to be a lucky color, so the dish is
Speaker 2: meant to keep bad spirits away while embracing good wishes
Speaker 2: for the coming year. Other Dongy traditions include giving calendars,
Speaker 2: as Korean kings used to do, and socks. Okay, so
Speaker 2: the kings would give calendars, that seems like a weird gift.
Speaker 3: That's a weird gift for a keen to give. But
Speaker 3: the socks thing makes sense because I give socks every
Speaker 3: single year for Christmas. Every year, without fail, I'm giving
Speaker 3: people socks. I don't know why either. It's been a
Speaker 3: thing though since I was a child. I got socks
Speaker 3: every year. I still get socks. And then I give
Speaker 3: my kids socks, yeah, and my mom. So I don't know,
Speaker 3: it's weird.
Speaker 2: It's a weird thing that like this makes sand America too,
Speaker 2: for sure, the socks, But like the kings giving people calendars. Hell,
Speaker 2: I mean, there's a we have a family member that
Speaker 2: will make calendars every year for like the upcoming year,
Speaker 2: and like put and people all of the family members
Speaker 2: pictures on like birthdays and all this stuff. And that's
Speaker 2: like a really thoughtful gift. I'm not shitting on the
Speaker 2: calendar as a gift, but for ancient Korean kings, always.
Speaker 3: To let them know that, like, hey, you have to
Speaker 3: work Monday through Friday, don't worry, but I extended every
Speaker 3: single day of the year. Yeah, just so you know
Speaker 3: that you have no days off.
Speaker 2: And this is a day where Korean's wish for snow
Speaker 2: as cold weather on the winter solstice is said to
Speaker 2: bring a bountiful harvest. Okay. Interesting. And the last on
Speaker 2: this list is the Montola England in Cornwall, England. Jesus England,
Speaker 2: y'all love, y'all Solstice shit, I love this a reinterpretation
Speaker 2: of ancient Cornish winter Solstice rituals. The Winter Solstice festival
Speaker 2: of Montol, begun in two thousand and seven in the
Speaker 2: town of Penzance, celebrates the culture of England's westernmost peninsula.
Speaker 2: Wearing carnival like costumes, geysers, those wearing disguises, form a
Speaker 2: procession with lanterns, creating a river of fire quote unquote,
Speaker 2: meant to celebrate the return of the sun. In the
Speaker 2: old custom, guysers would roam the streets, putting on skits,
Speaker 2: singing songs and pulling pranks. Part of the fun was
Speaker 2: trying to guess who was who. Today, traditional music, dancing,
Speaker 2: and performances add to their festive Winter Solstice traditions.
Speaker 3: Okay, so I guess we're gonna need to make a
Speaker 3: trip to England for all the Winter Solstice activities.
Speaker 2: Yeah, but we're gonna have to be in four places
Speaker 2: at once.
Speaker 3: Are they all on the same day, all on.
Speaker 2: The Solstice the twenty first?
Speaker 3: Well, I mean it's not like England's that big though.
Speaker 3: You can literally drive the whole thing.
Speaker 2: That's very true.
Speaker 3: And I mean, shit, we drove twenty four hours. We
Speaker 3: could make a three hour drive. It's like boom boom way,
Speaker 3: It's not that it's that big. I couldn't believe when
Speaker 3: so many they made a comparison of like how big
Speaker 3: this the country is versus how big a state is here, and.
Speaker 4: I was like, no way, Yeah, well you could easily
Speaker 4: drive that bitch.
Speaker 3: You could take the damn trains and like all in
Speaker 3: one day.
Speaker 2: People in the schol Festival. If fuck, people in Europe
Speaker 2: don't really get like grasp how large America is, because
Speaker 2: I mean, if you live in France, you could jump
Speaker 2: on a train and be in three different countries over
Speaker 2: the course of a weekend and just go out and
Speaker 2: do your thing. In America, it's like, yo, it will
Speaker 2: take you give or take twelve hours to drive across Texas.
Speaker 3: My god, I hate driving across Texas. I hate drive.
Speaker 3: I will say that again. I passionately hate with every
Speaker 3: fire room my being driving across Texas. I have been
Speaker 3: like it so many times.
Speaker 2: There's so many BUCkies and so many as I hate.
Speaker 3: I hate driving across that state. It just takes way
Speaker 3: too long. And I just it's never ending because.
Speaker 2: They don't want you to leave. That's the point.
Speaker 3: I I'm good. I'm really good. I'll say that though.
Speaker 3: I just I love all the little memes and stuff
Speaker 3: where you see people make on the internet of you know,
Speaker 3: of people from Europe and they're like, oh man, it's
Speaker 3: never ending. And they're driving across like one of our
Speaker 3: small estates. Yeah, and they're like so long, and I'm like, no,
Speaker 3: you're in and out in like four or five hours.
Speaker 3: What are you talking about.
Speaker 2: I've been driving for three hours and I'm still in Delaware, Like,
Speaker 2: oh brother, oh man, you just made some traffic.
Speaker 3: That's all. Yeah too.
Speaker 4: Wait wait, till you get to some of the other states.
Speaker 3: It takes so long.
Speaker 2: So now let's go into the Pagan festival of Yule.
Speaker 2: And I do think this would be a good place
Speaker 2: for us to start before we start kind of peeling
Speaker 2: back the layers on some of these things. This is
Speaker 2: from the Orton Academy, which is a UK publication. Again
Speaker 2: UK doing the things.
Speaker 3: Is this one I gave you yep, oh, okay, it's
Speaker 3: an eight minute read.
Speaker 2: Okay, So the Pagan Festival of Yule. In our last
Speaker 2: post we dived into the debate about pagan origins of Christmas,
Speaker 2: but it's also illuminating and fairer to both Christians and
Speaker 2: Pagans to think about the festivals separately. So this week
Speaker 2: we are taking a look at the pagan festival of Yule.
Speaker 2: For Northern European Pagans, the season of Yule was a
Speaker 2: time for feasting and merrymaking vowels, ghosts and witches. The
Speaker 2: power of the spirits was at its height on Yule's Eve.
Speaker 2: Not only was it a season of darkness in the
Speaker 2: winters of the cold North, but it also but it
Speaker 2: is also a dark time historically, as we don't have
Speaker 2: a lot of written description of pagan practices in pre
Speaker 2: modern times. Doctor Orton investigates, so let's dive in here.
Speaker 2: Written evidence isn't everything. Oral tradition can be invaluable, as
Speaker 2: is archaeological evidence in research about religious history. When we're
Speaker 2: looking at the pagan history of Europe, written evidence is
Speaker 2: particularly hard to find. But can we at least use
Speaker 2: written sources to start to build a picture of the
Speaker 2: festival of Yule. Yule and Christmas are often used as synonyms,
Speaker 2: and there is a common argument that Christians or excuse me,
Speaker 2: Christmas is derived from Pagan festival of Yule. Having said this,
Speaker 2: the two have very different origins. Christmas was originally Mediterranean festival,
Speaker 2: of which we have written evidence from the at least
Speaker 2: fourth sent Yule is actually a season, not just a festival,
Speaker 2: but this season includes feasting and celebration. The earliest mention
Speaker 2: of Yule is from the sixth century in Northern Europe,
Speaker 2: so Christmas itself goes back to the fourth century as
Speaker 2: far as written documentation goes. Keep this in mind, and
Speaker 2: at least written documentation Yule only is written about in
Speaker 2: the sixth century in Northern Europe. This is from a
Speaker 2: calendar of Saints Days from the five hundreds, and it
Speaker 2: is from a palimpspet a recycled manuscript. I honestly didn't know.
Speaker 3: What that word was me either. When I read it,
Speaker 3: I was like, palm, I'm gonna have to look that up,
Speaker 3: but thankfully they gave us a translation.
Speaker 2: So yeah, and it contains the phrase fruma Yules, which
Speaker 2: means either first part of Yule or before Yule. The
Speaker 2: Old English Martyrology The Study of Martyrs Wow, a collection
Speaker 2: of saints biographies written in the late ninth century, calls
Speaker 2: the twenty fifth of December the first Yule day. December
Speaker 2: is called former Yule, in January is called after Yule.
Speaker 2: Very interesting, Minnie. Pagans today celebrate Yule on the winter solstice.
Speaker 2: The Julian calendar, named after Emperor Julius Caesar, was the
Speaker 2: common European calendar until the late sixth century, and under
Speaker 2: this calendar, the solstice fell on December twenty fifth. This
Speaker 2: was replaced by the Gregorian calendar from fifteen eighty two,
Speaker 2: according to which the solstice usually falls on the twenty
Speaker 2: first or twenty second of December.
Speaker 3: Okay, so that so the Jewelian Yeah, yes, That's what
Speaker 3: I was getting at.
Speaker 2: Very interesting. Bede's detor I'm not Gonna The Reckoning of Time,
Speaker 2: written around seven point thirty a d. Says that the
Speaker 2: lunar month of Guile corresponds with December and January, and
Speaker 2: that the English calendar began on the twenty fifth of December. Wow.
Speaker 3: Yeah, So this dude, from everything that I can find,
Speaker 3: he is he is the one of two people that
Speaker 3: is commonly referred to the discussion of Yule is brought up,
Speaker 3: the Betty guy, and this other one is a monk
Speaker 3: that's been brought into it too. So there's two people
Speaker 3: that they've found the most literature about Yule and when
Speaker 3: potentially it could have been or could not have been started.
Speaker 3: And so you'll see his name. He gets brought up
Speaker 3: a lot throughout this whole thing. But because they were
Speaker 3: the ones that wrote everything down right verse just being
Speaker 3: oral translations.
Speaker 2: And the Yule season absolutely predates the written documentation vibe.
Speaker 3: I'm sure a long show goes into more about it.
Speaker 3: This is actually a really interesting read I found. But
Speaker 3: there's a lot of different ones that I did find
Speaker 3: of scholars arguing back and forth about the specific dates
Speaker 3: the Yule, its celebration itself and the festivities and what happened,
Speaker 3: what didn't happen, and if it's pre your post Christian influence.
Speaker 3: So there's a lot of there's still even today they're
Speaker 3: still arguing over specifically when it is an if Christianity
Speaker 3: either adopted it or they or they stole it kind
Speaker 3: of you know, they adopted it into their own thing,
Speaker 3: or it was pre them, and then it kind of
Speaker 3: trended in this whole other thing. And that's so it's
Speaker 3: a long standing issue, I guess you could.
Speaker 2: Say, but that is what we are diving into on
Speaker 2: this very episode. Good cult members, so continuing here, says
Speaker 2: Beid Betty or beide No, I'm not sure how to
Speaker 2: pronounce that b E d E. He also mentioned the
Speaker 2: Pagan festival of mandrain Act, which is Mother's Night, which
Speaker 2: he says the Pagan celebrate on the eighth calends of January,
Speaker 2: which is the twenty fifth of December. Somehow, when he
Speaker 2: when we celebrate the birth of the Lord, that very
Speaker 2: night which we hold so sacred, they used to call
Speaker 2: by the heathen word mandrain Act, that is Mother's Night,
Speaker 2: because we suspect of the ceremonies they enacted all that night.
Speaker 2: Mandrain Act was the new year in the English calendar. Interesting,
Speaker 2: this was the twenty fifth of December in the Julian calendar.
Speaker 2: It's possible that the festival celebrated ancestral goddess of the
Speaker 2: Anglo Saxons, which that would stand to reason personally. However,
Speaker 2: there are good arguments that historically Yule Fest was based
Speaker 2: on the lunar solar calendar, so that date change or
Speaker 2: the date changes every year. Historian of religion Andreas Nordberg
Speaker 2: argues that the pre Christian Yule feast occurred at the
Speaker 2: first full moon after the first new moon following the
Speaker 2: winter solstice, based on his study of pre Christian Nordic
Speaker 2: calendars and ritual practices. Interesting. So now let's get into Odin,
Speaker 2: kingship and sacrifice. Odin is one of the most important
Speaker 2: pagan gods to be associated with Yule. According to the
Speaker 2: archaeologist Neil Price, two of Odin's many names show his
Speaker 2: association with midwinter yu'll near yula Heara, meaning master of Yule. Interesting.
Speaker 2: Odin is also associated with kingship in England.
Speaker 3: Wodin.
Speaker 2: The English version of Odin was considered to be an
Speaker 2: ancestral chieftain from whom the Anglo Saxon Kings were descended,
Speaker 2: so much so that Beade includes him in his genealogy
Speaker 2: of the Anglo Saxon Kings. This is important because youll
Speaker 2: feasts are connected to the king in pagan texts in
Speaker 2: Helmscrilla heimskrilla Springla.
Speaker 3: I've I am terrible with the saying this word. It's
Speaker 3: like heimspringler, Okay, something like that. Yeah, that's the it's
Speaker 3: the sagas. Yeah.
Speaker 2: So this is a thirteenth century collection of sagas about
Speaker 2: Norwegian kings by Snorley Stirluson. We get a description of
Speaker 2: a ritual banquet. Quote. At this banquet everyone had to
Speaker 2: take part in the ale drinking. All kinds of domestic
Speaker 2: animals are slaughtered there, including horses, and all the blood
Speaker 2: that came from them was called halt, which is lot
Speaker 2: and what the blood was contained in halt bowls and
Speaker 2: haught twigs. These were fashioned like holy water sprinklers. With
Speaker 2: these at the altars were to be reddened all over,
Speaker 2: and also the the walls of the temple outside and inside,
Speaker 2: and the people also were sprinkled, while the meat was
Speaker 2: to be cooked for a feast. There would be fires
Speaker 2: down the middle of the floor in the temple with
Speaker 2: cauldrons over them. Okay, end quote. We also hear about
Speaker 2: the toasts that were made which link Odin, other gods
Speaker 2: and the king direct quote. First would be Odin's toast
Speaker 2: that was drunk to victory and the power of the king.
Speaker 2: And then Nyonders, which is the Norse god of the sea,
Speaker 2: wind and wealth. I'm trying to remember who is that
Speaker 2: supposed to be? Is that supposed to be Thworp? Now
Speaker 2: new orders? Okay, the Norse god of the sea, wind
Speaker 2: and wealth, toast Freyers toasts for prosperity and peace. Then
Speaker 2: after that was common for many people to drink the bragafol,
Speaker 2: which is the chieftain's toast. People also drank toast to
Speaker 2: their kinsmen, those who have been buried in mounds, and
Speaker 2: these were called mini or memorial toasts. In the same collection,
Speaker 2: the Saga of Hakon the Good tells the story of
Speaker 2: Norwegian king Hakon Hakkon, who converted to Christianity in England.
Speaker 2: When he went back to Norway, he tried to convert
Speaker 2: his people, even though quote the country was all Heathen,
Speaker 2: and there was a great deal of pagan worship end quote.
Speaker 2: Hakkon quote made it law that observance of Yule should
Speaker 2: begin at the same time as Christian people observed Christmas,
Speaker 2: and then everyone was to have a measure of ill
Speaker 2: or else pay a fine, and keep holiday as long
Speaker 2: as the ale lasted. But previously, observance of Yule began
Speaker 2: on the midwinter night and continued for three nights end quote.
Speaker 2: Some of Hakon's friends, out of friendship to him, allowed
Speaker 2: themselves to be baptized and laid aside sacrifices, and Hakon
Speaker 2: had several churches consecrated, so he is the reason why
Speaker 2: certain cultures have moved when these toasts would be given
Speaker 2: to when the Christians observed Christmas. Even though, like it
Speaker 2: said previously, the observance of Yuele began on midwinter night
Speaker 2: and continued for three nights, which makes sense. The Solces
Speaker 2: is supposed to be like a three day festival, isn't it.
Speaker 3: Yeah, And this guy actually did a lot of things,
Speaker 3: pissed off a lot of people because he forced Christianity
Speaker 3: on so many people in a really not pleasant way.
Speaker 2: On his own people, let's keep that in mind his
Speaker 2: own tribesmen. Yeah, and I've so this.
Speaker 4: Is the same dude we talked about the other day.
Speaker 3: Yeah, that there's a lot of different debates about why
Speaker 3: he decided that this was like this is a fucking way,
Speaker 3: and let's destroy all of our actual beliefs that we've
Speaker 3: had for so long.
Speaker 2: So I've looked into him. I can't find any evidence
Speaker 2: to say if this was a strategic move for him,
Speaker 2: and I absolutely understand that argument for sure. He didn't
Speaker 2: gain anything from it. He gained the favor of Rome,
Speaker 2: but that didn't help him in any of his endeavors.
Speaker 2: That didn't help his tribe or his nation get put
Speaker 2: on the map in any noticeable way. He didn't whenever
Speaker 2: he would call his banners to wage war on like
Speaker 2: the other Nordic tribes. He didn't get like the hold
Speaker 2: of Roman Church to come and help him by any means.
Speaker 2: Doing this helped him, not even a little bit. But
Speaker 2: he still went out of his way to do this,
Speaker 2: which I find to be very interesting.
Speaker 3: He could have just, I don't know, taken it upon
Speaker 3: himself to just be Christian then and leave everyone else
Speaker 3: alone to be able to practice the way that they
Speaker 3: want to practice their faith.
Speaker 2: But you know they could have but the live and
Speaker 2: let live ideals of Christianity, that might be what the
Speaker 2: church was founded on. But then when you get to
Speaker 2: the Middle Ages, that kind of went by the wayside,
Speaker 2: And now we're at a level of Christianity now where
Speaker 2: we're kind of back to it by a lot of standards.
Speaker 2: There are those that are outliers that absolutely are trying
Speaker 2: to force conversions on people. I know this, but by
Speaker 2: and large, most Christians are not trying to force conversions
Speaker 2: on people. This in today's modern day and age, the
Speaker 2: Muslims are doing that in moral mass than anybody. But yeah,
Speaker 2: the Middle Ages was very much convert at sword point. Yeah,
Speaker 2: so I mean, and this guy, he wasn't forced into conversion,
Speaker 2: he but he by some accounts, absolutely forced some of
Speaker 2: his people to convert. But then even this article says
Speaker 2: that his friends, out of friendship to him, got baptized
Speaker 2: and set aside sacrifices.
Speaker 3: I don't think that's because they saw the light some
Speaker 3: of their friends.
Speaker 2: Well, yeah, some of his friends. I don't think that's
Speaker 2: because they just saw the love of Christ and they
Speaker 2: saw the light by any means, And I don't they
Speaker 2: don't say that it was based out of fear either,
Speaker 2: but those are like his close croup, right, that's like
Speaker 2: his top dogs. I suppose the lower levels of his
Speaker 2: tribes they had a different experience for sure. So anyway,
Speaker 2: continue sacrifices continue to be important. However, because at another
Speaker 2: sacrificial feast, Hakone, who had previously confused people by making
Speaker 2: the sign of the cross over the horn at the
Speaker 2: first toast, refused to eat horseflesh. En quote was at
Speaker 2: the point of being attacked end quote. I don't know
Speaker 2: why you would refuse to eat horse flesh. There's nothing
Speaker 2: of biblical relevance.
Speaker 3: I would say, so is hedonistic.
Speaker 2: Eating horse flesh is not hethenistic.
Speaker 3: It was viewed as such.
Speaker 2: Well, if it was the horse that was sacrificed for
Speaker 2: this purpose, then like, okay, it's seen as like maybe tainted.
Speaker 4: Yeah, I know that's they they sacrificed the sacrifice, it for.
Speaker 3: The blood, and it's viewed as he's a inistic so
Speaker 3: he refused to partake, and at that point, like you're
Speaker 3: shitting all over your people and their customs, and yeah,
Speaker 3: fuck you.
Speaker 2: But he's also a king and his power is the
Speaker 2: ultimate authority. So that's also kind of crazy that they
Speaker 2: were thinking of attacking the king during a Yule feast,
Speaker 2: which goes against the Nordic tradition as well of hospitality.
Speaker 2: You don't attack somebody at a feast.
Speaker 3: Well, I mean, he pissed off enough people and like,
Speaker 3: I mean he was forced converting people, but was.
Speaker 2: Racing them to not eat the horse. He just chose
Speaker 2: that he wasn't going to eat the horse.
Speaker 3: True, but if you look into everything else he did,
Speaker 3: he pretty much told them that you will buy by Christianity,
Speaker 3: or you will pay a fine, or you'll die from
Speaker 3: Eventually he's he attacks his people that didn't convert.
Speaker 2: So no, yeah, yeah, I mean to what all like
Speaker 2: went into that as far as like did he get
Speaker 2: to a point because it just says now at the
Speaker 2: next Yule feast, eight Norwegian chiefs resolved to root out
Speaker 2: Christianity and to oblige the king to offer sacrifice to
Speaker 2: the gods. Priests were killed and churches burned, and the
Speaker 2: king was told that he should offer sacrifice under threat
Speaker 2: of violence. So keep in mind this was the first Yule.
Speaker 2: He's like, nah, I'm just not going to take part
Speaker 2: in that. They got so mad at him that the
Speaker 2: very next Yule they decided to attack him and kill
Speaker 2: priests and then threaten him. So his response was to
Speaker 2: come after the people that were threatening him.
Speaker 3: Sure, I mean when your entire I mean, we don't
Speaker 3: know the context, but when your entire way of life
Speaker 3: is being forcibly taken from you and told that you
Speaker 3: can't practice the way that you've practiced for generations. Because
Speaker 3: this one person decided to go convert to Christianity as
Speaker 3: it's spreading across.
Speaker 2: But hold on, he wasn't taken away the Yule feast
Speaker 2: the very next Yule feast does.
Speaker 3: Though, like after this, okay, but listen, but he says
Speaker 3: it says right here though that h he wants to
Speaker 3: change it so that it's in that it's the same
Speaker 3: time as the Christian people observed a Christmas. And then
Speaker 3: he's he's wanting to convert it into Christian holiday and
Speaker 3: not and take away from Yule.
Speaker 2: But nothing about taking away sacrifices. He just said that
Speaker 2: he wasn't going to participate all these other kings.
Speaker 3: When but then if you look at it, though, Odin
Speaker 3: and the king are tied and won, and so if
Speaker 3: you're not if the King is not participating, then it's
Speaker 3: basically saying fuck you to Odin and fuck you to
Speaker 3: his people.
Speaker 2: But he's allowing everybody to practice in their own way.
Speaker 3: But he is the he is the closest to Odin,
Speaker 3: and so that's it's basically like saying if it was
Speaker 3: a Catholic priest or you know, the pope, for example,
Speaker 3: saying if the Pope was like, you know what, fuck
Speaker 3: you God today, I'm not going to do the most
Speaker 3: sacred thing in our in one of our practices, and
Speaker 3: everyone else just has to like deal with it.
Speaker 2: We had that with the last before he died.
Speaker 3: Okay, but I'm I'm simply saying these people were very true,
Speaker 3: like rooted in traditions, and if you win against the gods,
Speaker 3: you brought bad luck and everything else to everybody. And
Speaker 3: they're very superstitious, and so for him, that is the
Speaker 3: closest to got to their one of their gods pretty
Speaker 3: much says fuck you, I'm not going to participate in
Speaker 3: this because now I decided to become a Christian and
Speaker 3: if you don't do what I want and do it
Speaker 3: at this time, then you're gonna have to pay a fine.
Speaker 3: And then all that like at the same time at
Speaker 3: as during between the mules, he is like mass converting people,
Speaker 3: forcing them to convert. So like during the whole year,
Speaker 3: he's pissed off enough people that they're like, you know, no, no, no.
Speaker 2: Is there any record to say that that happened between
Speaker 2: the mules, because all we hear is the first you
Speaker 2: when he got Christianized, he said he's not going to
Speaker 2: participate the next day violence.
Speaker 3: So the one article that I read did go into him,
Speaker 3: I'll have to I could pull it up again, and
Speaker 3: probably that did talk about his reign, and he pretty
Speaker 3: much went from like it's okay, I'm Christian. This is
Speaker 3: what I want to do to every one of you
Speaker 3: have to be Christian, burn every single long house, do
Speaker 3: all of this note like this I could imagine. So no,
Speaker 3: this was before they attacked him, before they said this
Speaker 3: was like during the year span. He pretty much was like, screwt,
Speaker 3: I'm doing what I want to do, and like you better,
Speaker 3: you better bend the knee.
Speaker 2: So so this is all after or before the Norwegian
Speaker 2: chiefs resolved to route out Christianity and murder priests in
Speaker 2: their churches and burn them to the ground and force
Speaker 2: a cone to eat horse liver.
Speaker 3: Well, maybe don't be a dick and try to erase
Speaker 3: your entire history.
Speaker 2: I would like to see the dates to see. I'm
Speaker 2: not saying that you're wrong. I don't know this now.
Speaker 3: I'm gonna have to look it up.
Speaker 2: It's very possible that this did happen in that one
Speaker 2: year time span, but if you look at the entire
Speaker 2: reign of his time, this all could have taken place
Speaker 2: after he got Christianized.
Speaker 3: Well, we will, we will look, we will. While you're reading,
Speaker 3: I will be looking up.
Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, let's do that. So next toasts, oath and
Speaker 2: the sacred boar, three important elements of the pagan festival
Speaker 2: of Yule. Where toasts, oaths and the sacred boar. There
Speaker 2: is evidence of this North literature the Helga helgakevita, Oh
Speaker 2: Jesus Christ. I'm not going to do that. The poem
Speaker 2: of Helgi schorwolf Son of the poetic Eda and collection
Speaker 2: of Old Norse poems, largely from the nine hundreds, describes
Speaker 2: Yule eve, on which quote the great vowels were taken,
Speaker 2: the sacred boar was bought brought in, and the men
Speaker 2: laid their hands thereon and took their vows at the
Speaker 2: king's toast. The kravs Mal, traditionally dated to nine hundred
Speaker 2: AD as well, is a fragmented Skaldic or Old Norse
Speaker 2: Icelandic verse form poem about part of a dialogue between
Speaker 2: a valkyrie, a female warrior who serves the god Odin,
Speaker 2: and a raven. The courageous leader wants to toast the
Speaker 2: Yule tide at out at sea if he alone has
Speaker 2: his way. The practice uh to the sport of Freyer. Interesting,
Speaker 2: so he wanted to practice Yule out at sea by himself.
Speaker 2: I guess the time of traditional.
Speaker 3: Oaths, that people that they survived being able to take
Speaker 3: their boats in such dangerous waters. It blows my mind.
Speaker 2: I mean a lot of that is towards the really
Speaker 2: crazy engineering that went into those So that's dope. But wait,
Speaker 2: wait is that what is that article source? By the way,
Speaker 2: because that looks very similar to the one we're going
Speaker 2: to read in a bit.
Speaker 3: Oh, I'm just trying to find one that actually goes
Speaker 3: into his his reign, because there's there's two different one,
Speaker 3: two different Hakna or how you say his name. Yeah,
Speaker 3: so there's the one that we're reading right now, it's
Speaker 3: h a k o N. And then there's the last
Speaker 3: standing Norwegian Viking chief that is h a a k
Speaker 3: o N and he is like really renowned for being
Speaker 3: like the last stronghold of paganism and the vikings and stuff.
Speaker 2: So yeah, not this guy, No, this guy.
Speaker 3: So there's there's this, So there's different years in between
Speaker 3: when this happened and stuff.
Speaker 4: So I'm currently trying to see exactly for this one.
Speaker 2: I'm trying to remember the Norwegian king Hakone convert to
Speaker 2: Christianity in England.
Speaker 3: Yeah, I didn't see his dates. I think that he's
Speaker 3: in the five hundreds. Maybe I need to see exactly.
Speaker 3: I'm trying to see when it was.
Speaker 2: Do your thing, raven uh. The sacred Boar was an
Speaker 2: important part of the Yule festival. It was consecrated to Frere,
Speaker 2: the Norse got of fertility, prosperity, peace, sunshine, and good harvest. Okay,
Speaker 2: Frere rode on a boar called gul and Bursty. In
Speaker 2: a prose Eta or in the pros at A, a thirteenth
Speaker 2: century collection of Norse mythology associated with Icelandic historian and
Speaker 2: poet Snorley Sirlison. The Guilfen nae ning Yep says that
Speaker 2: Frere drove in his chariot with the boar called gold
Speaker 2: Maine or fear tusk. Fearful tusk, that's a badass name
Speaker 2: for au for a bore. In the same collection, the
Speaker 2: Skaldska par Mal says that Frere's boar could run through
Speaker 2: the air and water better than any horse, and could
Speaker 2: never become so dark with night or gloom of the
Speaker 2: murky regions that there should not be sufficient light where
Speaker 2: he went, such was the glow from its main embristles. Interesting.
Speaker 3: So this does say that if this is the right
Speaker 3: correct person. Hawk On, son of Harold Finnhair, brother to
Speaker 3: Eric blood Axe, became king in nineteen thirties. His attempt
Speaker 3: to convert his subjects was met with such success that
Speaker 3: he actually ended up becoming a pagan again. Yeah, so
Speaker 3: I don't know if this is the correct one or not,
Speaker 3: so I'm trying to find more information on him. Okay,
Speaker 3: but it's possible that this is the same one. They
Speaker 3: kind of all have the same goddamn names. Yeah, So
Speaker 3: it's kind of challenging, but fair.
Speaker 2: Enough, fair enough. So that's what I'm saying, is, if
Speaker 2: that is the guy which I don't think it is, honestly,
Speaker 2: because if that's the guy, you're telling me that he
Speaker 2: went on a mass raid and murdered a ton of
Speaker 2: his people, just convert to paganism at the end. That
Speaker 2: that sounds very unlikely to me. But Vikings be doing
Speaker 2: Viking shit, I don't know. One of the few vestiges
Speaker 2: of the sacred Boar of Yule today can be found
Speaker 2: at the Queen's College at the University of Oxford. The
Speaker 2: Queen's College performs the Boar's Head Carol at the Boar's
Speaker 2: Head Ceremony every year, a week before Christmas. The ceremony
Speaker 2: is inspired by pagan custom and commemorates the killing of
Speaker 2: a boar by a student who is said to have
Speaker 2: shoved a volume of Aristotle down a boar's throat. What what?
Speaker 2: The boar found it too hard to digest and died,
Speaker 2: saying grakham est or it is Greek hmm that they
Speaker 2: still do that to this day. The Boar's Head Carol,
Speaker 2: all right, that's a thing. That is a thing you,
Speaker 2: you British people at Oxford. I'll be wiling' all right.
Speaker 2: So the Spirits of Yule Mule is also a season
Speaker 2: of spirits and the supernow natural. Odin was the god
Speaker 2: of the dead, and Yule is a season when people
Speaker 2: can come closer to the dead. The Grittier Saga, a
Speaker 2: fourteenth century Icelandic Sanda saga, says that Yule is a
Speaker 2: time of the greatest mirth and joyants among men, but
Speaker 2: it is also a time of hauntings and supernatural activity.
Speaker 2: The saga also links Yule to the Christian tradition. No
Speaker 2: Christian man is wont to eat meat this day, because
Speaker 2: that is the morrow is the first day of Yule.
Speaker 2: Is that on the morrow is the first day of Yule?
Speaker 2: Wherefore must men first fast today? That the language didn't
Speaker 2: make a lot of.
Speaker 3: It didn't make lost sense either.
Speaker 2: So it's saying that Christian men won't eat meat the
Speaker 2: day before Christmas because they feast on the following day.
Speaker 2: I guess that's what I extrapolated from that one. But
Speaker 2: all right, Glam a dead man who has become a
Speaker 2: restless spirit, became because he refused to follow Christian customs
Speaker 2: and committed evil deeds in his life. Uh, he lay
Speaker 2: not quiet, and his supernatural activity was all the worse
Speaker 2: during Yule. Glam took to writing the house roofs at night,
Speaker 2: so that he went nigh to breaking them in. Now
Speaker 2: he walked well nigh night and day. Hardly durst Men
Speaker 2: fare into the dale. Though they had errands enough there
Speaker 2: and much scathe. The men of the countryside deemed all this.
Speaker 2: You know, old English is.
Speaker 3: Old English is rough. Man, it is, it's rough to understand. Sometimes.
Speaker 2: I've had to reread Dante's Inferno so many times just
Speaker 2: to make sure that I like got all of it,
Speaker 2: because it's written in such ways, and I'll have to
Speaker 2: stop and be like, all right, what the fuck is
Speaker 2: durst men? Like, are we talking Fred.
Speaker 3: Durst Durstman fire up into the dale?
Speaker 2: What the fuck is the dale? I don't know, actually,
Speaker 2: and I know people in the comment section, No, the
Speaker 2: dale is this you're so don't listen. I don't fucking know.
Speaker 2: I barely speak American English or right, calm down, But anyway,
Speaker 2: it is what it is, so continuing on, it, says
Speaker 2: today's Yules. Association with the supernatural can be seen in
Speaker 2: the English tradition of watling, which involves singing, drinking, bonfires,
Speaker 2: and banging pots and pans. The idea is to do
Speaker 2: this in the orchard, although it can sometimes take place
Speaker 2: in homes. It also might involve going to the doors
Speaker 2: of wealthy people to seeing in exchange for alcohol, food,
Speaker 2: or money. During the winter months, this was thought to
Speaker 2: wake up the trees and ensure a bumper crop. I'm
Speaker 2: assuming that's a better crop, and also the route out
Speaker 2: to root out the evil spirits lurking among the fruit trees.
Speaker 2: All right, what'd you find? You got a look?
Speaker 3: Oh, there's just so much literature that I'm gonna have
Speaker 3: to like read through because there's like two different ones.
Speaker 3: But then they say one of them says that they're
Speaker 3: the same person, but the other ones say that that's
Speaker 3: two different people, two different kings.
Speaker 2: Yeah, so what the source is?
Speaker 3: And yeah, I would have to sit and read it.
Speaker 3: And I'm wanting to like listen to this, and so
Speaker 3: it's one of those scenes of if I misspoke, I
Speaker 3: might have misspoken. But from the one text that I
Speaker 3: did read was from Where Is She From? She's a
Speaker 3: scholarly lady that was talking about it, and she said
Speaker 3: pretty much that this person was seen as at first
Speaker 3: really good for his people, and then he converted. He
Speaker 3: decided to quote convert to Christianity. Then he went on
Speaker 3: a terror pretty much, and then I didn't really read
Speaker 3: like further into it. I was like, okay, whatever, I
Speaker 3: didn't really think he was going to get brought up.
Speaker 3: And then the other one that I was looking at,
Speaker 3: he was actually really good for his people. He held
Speaker 3: onto the pagan ways, but he was a very good
Speaker 3: politician and was able to like navigate being like, yeah,
Speaker 3: we're kind of Christian, but we're not, and like, so
Speaker 3: I don't know I need to. I would actually have
Speaker 3: to spend time and sit and read through all the
Speaker 3: literature before I just am like, hey, this is this dude.
Speaker 3: So as of right now, I don't know if that
Speaker 3: man did or did not intentionally piss off his people.
Speaker 3: But even in the context of potentially not being a
Speaker 3: threat to his people during that time, I could see
Speaker 3: why people would be very upset with somebody that they
Speaker 3: hold in such a high regard, that has such a
Speaker 3: high powerful position towards their gods, that decided just suddenly, hey,
Speaker 3: this is what we're doing, and I'm not going to
Speaker 3: participate in our in our deep rooted beliefs, and I'm
Speaker 3: not going to do the things that we hold sacred
Speaker 3: in pretty much fuck you guys, And.
Speaker 2: I mean we have to question this source as well,
Speaker 2: honestly like to say that, oh well, he didn't stop
Speaker 2: his people from participating in the ule sacrifices. He just
Speaker 2: wasn't going to do it himself. So I know, how incredible.
Speaker 3: This is just one of like fifteen different sources I
Speaker 3: found just right off the top, and I picked it
Speaker 3: because it had a lot of different aspects to the
Speaker 3: mule traditions overall, because I thought it just brought in
Speaker 3: a lot of different characteristics. But I did read different
Speaker 3: stuff from different sources when we were looking the other day,
Speaker 3: and so it's kind of one of those scenes that
Speaker 3: there's certain certain things that everyone can say without a doubt.
Speaker 3: You know, this monk and the beady guy beat guy
Speaker 3: were the ones that talked about it in written language,
Speaker 3: and that this is what they're saying that they observed
Speaker 3: or that they've heard and this and that. But you know,
Speaker 3: nobody was there, none of us. None of us were there,
Speaker 3: so we don't truly know unless we were physically there
Speaker 3: what actually transpired.
Speaker 2: So indeed, all right, so let's continue with this English.
Speaker 2: There are a lot of suggestions about the other pagan
Speaker 2: Yule traditions that survive at Christmas time today, but many
Speaker 2: of these are from oral narratives rather than historical texts.
Speaker 2: Vernacular narratives themselves are really valuable, but these pre modern
Speaker 2: texts can also help us to make an uh make
Speaker 2: help us to make a start in understanding the historical
Speaker 2: pagan festival of Yule.
Speaker 3: H okay. And so then, like you'll see, they have
Speaker 3: like religious if you go back up going so fast,
Speaker 3: I'm sorry right there, no find out more, find out more.
Speaker 3: It has like religious studies, history, anthropology, it has like
Speaker 3: this doctor that talks about it. They have there's just
Speaker 3: all sorts of different links that you can keep clicking
Speaker 3: on and like throughout this this article in particular, they
Speaker 3: have links to go to like different things to learn
Speaker 3: more about stuff. And then it's it's one of those
Speaker 3: things that they feel like you would keep reading. I
Speaker 3: wish we could talk to people that actually live over there,
Speaker 3: because they have their own because I follow a whole
Speaker 3: bunch of them on Instagram, and even even with the
Speaker 3: like ten that I watch all the time, all of
Speaker 3: them say something different. Yeah, so cause they live in
Speaker 3: different sectors in different places.
Speaker 2: In Sweden's backstory is completely different than Danish backstory.
Speaker 3: It's it's interesting, yeah whose story, which story is correct
Speaker 3: or which version is correct?
Speaker 2: So agreed. So now, good cult members, we are going
Speaker 2: to go to this article and I'm gonna be honest
Speaker 2: with you. It is lengthy, and I promise we are
Speaker 2: going to be stopping for some conversation throughout it. This
Speaker 2: is History for Atheists, which is the name of the
Speaker 2: website here, and it talks about pagan Chris Smith's.
Speaker 4: Again now twenty twenty four.
Speaker 2: This was written right, and so this is going to
Speaker 2: break down a lot of these myths that we've heard
Speaker 2: on the internet so many times about oh, this is
Speaker 2: clearly pagan in origin because dot dot dot, and there
Speaker 2: may be a kernel of truth to that statement. But
Speaker 2: then if you look at the historical context to it,
Speaker 2: it actually doesn't take from the Pagans. If anything, it
Speaker 2: was a Christian thing that might have been close to
Speaker 2: the Pagan thing. Maybe they were next to each other,
Speaker 2: maybe one was adopted by the other, or vice versa
Speaker 2: in a lot of cases.
Speaker 3: So I think the problem is is the term pagan
Speaker 3: and the term yule. I was thinking about this earlier
Speaker 3: tonight about why this conversation kind of like irks me
Speaker 3: a little bit, is because I guess when you're talking
Speaker 3: about Abrahammick religions, they essentially have demonized anything that isn't pertaining.
Speaker 4: Specifically to the way that they practice.
Speaker 3: And Yule has been demonized as this you know, pagan
Speaker 3: potentially which satanic thing that has transpired, and so people
Speaker 3: have been persecuted and have been you know, even probably
Speaker 3: potentially killed. I'm not going to say outright, but yeah,
Speaker 3: but killed over this, over these one of these beliefs,
Speaker 3: and there seem to be demonic or you know, practicing
Speaker 3: Satanism or something like that because they aren't adhering specifically
Speaker 3: to the Abrahamic religion. And then to find out that
Speaker 3: this is could be by all your accounts and stuff,
Speaker 3: that this could have been created by the Christian Church,
Speaker 3: just like a Halloween is created by the Catholic Church.
Speaker 3: And then to think about how many people have suffered
Speaker 3: at the hands of these specific religions because they have
Speaker 3: deemed it being a pagan thing. It's quite frustrating to
Speaker 3: me that I say that I want to string up
Speaker 3: some you know, oranges and cranberries with some popcorn and
Speaker 3: somehow that is demonic and you know that is evil,
Speaker 3: and it's just like, okay, but why can't if this
Speaker 3: is truly a Christian thing and you're still practicing in
Speaker 3: a Christian way quote unquote these pagan ways, then what
Speaker 3: are we talking about? Why are we having this discussion
Speaker 3: and why is it seen as such negative when you
Speaker 3: want to do these things You're you're talking about nothing harmful,
Speaker 3: nothing enacting. You're still having rituals within the churches, so
Speaker 3: you're still participating in rituals. So I guess that's my
Speaker 3: my hang up here is it's very frustrating to me
Speaker 3: to learn about that. You know, it's not it's not frustrating,
Speaker 3: but it's just frustrating that I hear so many devout
Speaker 3: Christians being here in the Bible Belt you say that
Speaker 3: you want to practice Yule, like I have a little
Speaker 3: mule sign that I put outside and it's Heaven Forbid.
Speaker 3: And it's like, I don't understand, Like if this is truly,
Speaker 3: I get it's it's ignorance.
Speaker 2: It is because for the record, everybody, Yule is a season.
Speaker 2: It is it's like a calendar month. It's from like
Speaker 2: the middle of December to the middle of January, give
Speaker 2: or take depending on which calendar you're looking at. It's
Speaker 2: not the pagan winter fire festival or the time where
Speaker 2: they are summoning thor And it is literally a calendar date.
Speaker 2: It's a month. They'd be like saying, we're celebrating the
Speaker 2: month of February. You hear that it's the it's the
Speaker 2: wildest shit. But to your point, it's a lot of
Speaker 2: ignorance and it's a lot of listening to whatever they've
Speaker 2: been told. We live in the day and age of
Speaker 2: information and the day and age of misinformation. That's why
Speaker 2: this show is what it is. But to look at
Speaker 2: the historical background to it, it doesn't take away there's
Speaker 2: no need yet what are you.
Speaker 3: Doing with the camera? Oh, it's like it was like
Speaker 3: falling down. I mean, there's it's just it's interesting to
Speaker 3: me that this is something that has been And.
Speaker 2: That's also why I don't like demonizing pagan cultures. There
Speaker 2: are some pagan deities that we can look at and say,
Speaker 2: you know what, that might be based in some sort
Speaker 2: of demonology there, I could see it. There's other pagan
Speaker 2: deities that yeah, and I have to admit at one
Speaker 2: point in time, I was that when I say this,
Speaker 2: like back in my youth, when I believe that pretty
Speaker 2: much every pagan deity to ever be spoken of, written
Speaker 2: about drawing whatever is clearly a demon incarnate in this
Speaker 2: way that presented itself to this tribe from way back
Speaker 2: in the day. But I've grown since then. I realized
Speaker 2: that some of them, maybe Ball for sure, Molek got you, like,
Speaker 2: there's there's a multiple Egyptian gods, Like there's ones that
Speaker 2: absolutely this was a demon. I could see it. Then
Speaker 2: others where it's like this is probably just like a
Speaker 2: symbol for the culture itself and these people, regardless of
Speaker 2: how they came up with it or how they got
Speaker 2: the iconography or whatever. To write off all of these
Speaker 2: deities as a demon is to take away thousands of
Speaker 2: years of culture and heritage and tradition that got to
Speaker 2: these people to where they were when the written I
Speaker 2: could finally caught up with them. And it's a bit
Speaker 2: of a misnomer.
Speaker 3: I just find it interesting that even now, you know,
Speaker 3: paganism in different forms of paganism, neopaganism is on the rise,
Speaker 3: and it's still being sought out after the I mean
Speaker 3: specifically I'll just use Christianity because that's the one that's
Speaker 3: like really pushing its agenda on social media platforms that
Speaker 3: this is of the devil. Anybody that practices any of
Speaker 3: this is of the devil. I mean, you're talking about
Speaker 3: you make a wreath, you know, And I just actually
Speaker 3: I had a girlfriend of mine just come over and
Speaker 3: we did we dried out oranges, which, by the way,
Speaker 3: we we messed up a little bit on some of
Speaker 3: the stuff, but we did oranges and cranberries and we
Speaker 3: did popcorn, and we strain our stuff together and you
Speaker 3: know whatnot. And I don't see anything wrong with that.
Speaker 3: I don't feel that there is anything inherently evil when
Speaker 3: you're celebrating the earth, and you're celebrating being connected to
Speaker 3: these things, and you're celebrating the solstices, and you're celebrating
Speaker 3: tradition that has been around for thousands of years, and
Speaker 3: it's just it's interesting seeing that so many people are
Speaker 3: so against all of these things and view it as
Speaker 3: such a negative thing because it doesn't adhere strictly to
Speaker 3: their religion, and it's like, well, that doesn't make any
Speaker 3: sense to me.
Speaker 2: Wreaths are based in Christianity, they're literally based off the
Speaker 2: Catholic candelabra that they use on a yearly basis. That's
Speaker 2: where the wreath with the evergreens first started. That's insane
Speaker 2: that people think that wreaths are pagan or satanic for
Speaker 2: that matter.
Speaker 4: Oh, I mean, you name it anything that is the eulog.
Speaker 2: Friends, we're gonna I'm gonna get him out of itself.
Speaker 2: This article goes into all of it. But like I said, yeah,
Speaker 2: we'll get back to the article, but I'm sure we
Speaker 2: are going to be stopping to have a good little
Speaker 2: conversation about so many things that are brought up on
Speaker 2: this article. But like we're talking about here, even Halloween, right,
Speaker 2: and we talked about that on the Halloween episode.
Speaker 3: A jack O.
Speaker 2: Lantern, Well that's because the Pagans and that was skulls.
Speaker 2: The story of the jack O lantern is a Catholic
Speaker 2: who made a deal with the devil and he made
Speaker 2: a lantern out of a turnip. That's why his name
Speaker 2: was jack That's a very popular Irish treat. But somehow, yes,
Speaker 2: pumpkins are clearly satanic. People are fucking retarded.
Speaker 3: Well, I mean that's the big push though the last
Speaker 3: few years the Christian Church has been against so against Halloween,
Speaker 3: and so many people have been turning away from Halloween.
Speaker 3: We don't celebrate it. It's of the devil, it's evil, it's demonic.
Speaker 2: People do take it too far, And I'll give you that. Like,
Speaker 2: I mean, I'm not saying like you shouldn't have the
Speaker 2: blood and the guts and do whatever. Do who celebrated
Speaker 2: however the hell you want to. Okay, fine, if you
Speaker 2: are putting up demonic iconography and you're doing that to
Speaker 2: like lean that way into Halloween, then like okay, maybe
Speaker 2: not do that. Maybe, but also like do you as
Speaker 2: a free country, you do a joint? You can worship
Speaker 2: the devil freely if you so choose. It's your prerogative,
Speaker 2: you know.
Speaker 3: I think it's just really frustrating to a lot of
Speaker 3: people that are struggling with wanting to be potentially in
Speaker 3: the church or they're shying away from the church because
Speaker 3: it's such man, they're just a bunch of judgmental that's
Speaker 3: the best way to say it. I don't know how
Speaker 3: to be nice about and politically correct.
Speaker 2: I don't understand it. They're like afraid of losing their
Speaker 2: congregates even though Christianity is the number one rising religion
Speaker 2: on Earth right now, and it's not even close.
Speaker 3: It's just very It's just I don't I don't know.
Speaker 3: They are so judgmental that so many of them, not
Speaker 3: all question all even no, I don't want it. I'm
Speaker 3: not going to use you know, whole terms of everyone
Speaker 3: is this now. There are some that are very judgmental,
Speaker 3: that are very.
Speaker 2: Oh I've met Pagans that are super judgmental as well.
Speaker 2: I don't doubt it.
Speaker 3: I mean, at this point, everyone's kind of out for
Speaker 3: their own religion and there's no just simple conversation of
Speaker 3: you know, hey, you believe what you want to believe.
Speaker 3: I believe what I want to believe. We can just
Speaker 3: kind of like chill and do whatever together and that
Speaker 3: just be what it is.
Speaker 2: But that's also part of the human condition, isn't it.
Speaker 2: It's like everybody is seeking that validation like, oh, you
Speaker 2: claim that you're a Christian, well, how Christian are you?
Speaker 2: Oh you claim that you're a pagan, Oh how pagan
Speaker 2: are you? When's the last time you've dot dot dot?
Speaker 3: Do you do this?
Speaker 2: And it's they have that my own thing? But no, no, no, I.
Speaker 3: Truly I truly just do my own thing. And I
Speaker 3: know that people have asked me. I've seen a couple
Speaker 3: of the comments ask me where I'm at, and I've
Speaker 3: kind of talked about it when I first took over
Speaker 3: and stuff. I just personally do my own stuff, and
Speaker 3: like I have no problem with whatever you know you
Speaker 3: want to do. It's just I just find it this
Speaker 3: conversation to be interesting because when I first because I came,
Speaker 3: I grew up in a very Christian home, and so
Speaker 3: when I first talked about doing pagan traditions, it was
Speaker 3: definitely not well received, right. It was very much of
Speaker 3: the word pagan is so it is synonymous with Satan
Speaker 3: and the devil.
Speaker 2: And non Christian pagan by definition just means non Christian.
Speaker 3: No, no, it's but for people that are raised in the
Speaker 3: Christian Church, and like that's what you've been brought up
Speaker 3: when at least in my in my instance, is that
Speaker 3: word in particular is synonymous with the devil, and you're
Speaker 3: you're definitely practicing witchcraft. You're trying to summon demons, you're
Speaker 3: trying to turn you're trying to sell your soul. Like
Speaker 3: you're just like completely.
Speaker 2: Because there's a duality. There's either side of the light
Speaker 2: or the side of the dark. And if you're not
Speaker 2: of Christ, then you're obviously of Satan. And that's what
Speaker 2: people have been taught for centuries. So like, I get it,
Speaker 2: I absolutely do. But again, I think that a lot
Speaker 2: of the especially historic paganism, some of it you can see,
Speaker 2: is based in something of a darker nature. A lot
Speaker 2: of it is more nature based, a lot of it
Speaker 2: is just not even necessarily worshiping the trees, being more
Speaker 2: respectful of nature and appreciating what it gives you.
Speaker 3: Yes, And to be fair though, I will say that
Speaker 3: blood sacrifice of animals and then putting the blood in
Speaker 3: does actually help grow plants. So like when they would
Speaker 3: sacrifice animals and they would drain their blood and they
Speaker 3: would take it out to their crops and they would
Speaker 3: feed the plants the blood, that actually does scientifically work. Yes,
Speaker 3: So I'm you know, now, do I say human sacrifices
Speaker 3: of the vibe? No, let's not human sacrifice people.
Speaker 2: But then you get these people like, so what's the
Speaker 2: difference between an animal life and a human life? I'm like,
Speaker 2: there's literally a whole lot, Like you know, planes and
Speaker 2: cars and buildings and shit air conditioning.
Speaker 3: I mean, there's a lot to be said between the
Speaker 3: two and stuff, but that's that. Conversation has been brought
Speaker 3: up on the cold a few times about souls, and
Speaker 3: we've talked in depth about it on lives and things
Speaker 3: like that. But yeah, no, anyways, to the Christian, Pagan
Speaker 3: Christians and Christmas again.
Speaker 2: Let's talk about it. So the Pagan Christmas. Again, Every year,
Speaker 2: without fail, we find endless articles, memes, and claims on
Speaker 2: social media that about the supposed pagan origins quote unquote
Speaker 2: of Christmas. As with Halloween and Easter, anti theis or
Speaker 2: atheists activists find themselves in furious agreement with neo Pagans
Speaker 2: and even some evangelical Christians that the date and virtually
Speaker 2: all of the main customs of tradition and traditions of
Speaker 2: Christmas are actually pagan. Pop history articles and books are
Speaker 2: full of these breathlessly confident claims, except in fact, very
Speaker 2: little about Christmas is ancient, less still is pre Christian,
Speaker 2: and almost nothing about it is pagan. Yes, that is correct.
Speaker 2: On screen right now, we got Odin doing his thing right.
Speaker 2: We got him with the holly wreath and he's wearing
Speaker 2: the pentacle medallion, and he's got a cup, and he's
Speaker 2: got a little goat dude playing a fiddle down here.
Speaker 2: He's doing his thing right. The idea that Christmas and
Speaker 2: its traditions are pagan in origin is one of those
Speaker 2: pervasive ideas that quote unquote everyone knows. It is repeated
Speaker 2: endlessly in news articles, seasonal filler segments on TV, online
Speaker 2: pop history, and of course memes. So many anti theists
Speaker 2: social media accounts present a succession of smug memes reminding
Speaker 2: Christians that everyone that and everyone else that Christmas was
Speaker 2: actually a pagan festival hijacked by Christianity. The date of
Speaker 2: the twenty fifth of December, the giving of gifts, feasting
Speaker 2: and drinking, the Christmas tree, holly mistletoe, and even Santa Claus,
Speaker 2: we are assured, all have pagan origins. Atheisluminaries like Seth
Speaker 2: Andrews and Aaron ra quote unquote go into gleeful detail
Speaker 2: informing their viewers and listeners about the pagan origins of
Speaker 2: all these things, in presentations that are noticeably heavy on assertions,
Speaker 2: but light in evidence, and totally free of any reference
Speaker 2: or scholarship. You would think these last elements would ring
Speaker 2: alarm bells for their audience of supposed quote unquote skeptics.
Speaker 2: But it seems most just accept this message without question.
Speaker 2: After all, everyone knows this is all true, right, except
Speaker 2: when it comes to history, what everyone knows often turns
Speaker 2: out to be mostly or even entirely wrong.
Speaker 3: So on screen, right now, we have an.
Speaker 2: Image, right a meme mistletoe pagan fertility ritual. Tree decorations,
Speaker 2: lights and baubles are a Roman Saturnalia tradition. An angel
Speaker 2: on top of the tree derived from Greek and Assyrian gods.
Speaker 2: The tree pagan fertility symbol. The yule log symbolic of Mithra,
Speaker 2: god of the sun, most likely born in September. By
Speaker 2: the way, Jesus not December, dropped wholesale over the Roman
Speaker 2: Saturnalia festival was the reason for the season gifts Babylonian tradition.
Speaker 2: And we've heard all of these things. So what is
Speaker 2: the actual history behind the origins of these things and
Speaker 2: how many of them, if any, actually have pagan origins.
Speaker 2: The answer is surprisingly few, But in this article we
Speaker 2: will take each of them in turn and look at
Speaker 2: what the actual evidence and scholarship tells us. So let's
Speaker 2: get into it here. We're gonna cover just briefly here,
Speaker 2: Roman Saturnalia, the birth of Mythris, Brumalia, Yule, soul, and Victis,
Speaker 2: the calculation thesis, and then there's some conclusions about that.
Speaker 2: Then we're going to talk about some Christmas traditions in totality,
Speaker 2: gift giving, feasting, holly, ivy and mistletoe, yule logs, Christmas trees,
Speaker 2: Santa Claus. All of this is to be broken down,
Speaker 2: and we're going to get to the real historical and
Speaker 2: scholarly background to all of this. Now, the date of Christmas,
Speaker 2: as we talked about here, depending on what calendar you
Speaker 2: look at, right, the winter solstice typically goes to the
Speaker 2: twenty first. So where did the twenty fifth of December
Speaker 2: come from? Traditional calendars had it on this date, Gregorian
Speaker 2: calendars put it on this date. The Julian versus Gregorian conversation.
Speaker 3: All the things.
Speaker 2: And we know that Jesus was born in September give
Speaker 2: or take probably, so why did they just decide on
Speaker 2: December twenty fifth. Let's get into it here. A remarkable
Speaker 2: number of these quote unquote pagan Christmas ideas are ultimately
Speaker 2: Christian in origin. This is because much of the Protestant
Speaker 2: tradition adopted the sola scriptura, which means by scripture alone position.
Speaker 2: Unless a doctrine or practice could be found in or
Speaker 2: based on something in the Bible, it was to be rejected.
Speaker 2: So many Catholic doctrines and traditions which they saw as
Speaker 2: being without biblical foundation were abandoned in Protestant areas. Unfortunate,
Speaker 2: some of these traditions, feast days and practices, as well
Speaker 2: as folk traditions associated with.
Speaker 3: Them, were very popular, particularly.
Speaker 2: Ones involving the feasting and fun, so sometimes Reformers and
Speaker 2: Puritans had to go through great lengths to convince people
Speaker 2: that they were a bad idea. Christmas was certainly one
Speaker 2: example of something well established and very popular that the
Speaker 2: Reformers had to preach against. One argument was that December
Speaker 2: twenty fifth as a date of jesus birth has no
Speaker 2: basis in scripture, and that the Gospels even prove it
Speaker 2: could not be the correct date, in an argument we
Speaker 2: still here repeated today even by non Christians, Jesus could
Speaker 2: not have been born then because this date is in
Speaker 2: the middle of winter and shepherds would not have been
Speaker 2: in their fields with their sheep as the gospel details.
Speaker 2: In fact, this element is only found in one of
Speaker 2: the two gospels that give an account of jesus birth, Luke,
Speaker 2: Chapter two, verses eight through twenty. Of course, critical scholars
Speaker 2: are hardly highly skeptical about whether this or any of
Speaker 2: the elements in the two highly contradictory infancy narratives quote
Speaker 2: unquote of the Gospel Luke and the Gospel Mattter you
Speaker 2: can be seen as historical. But even if we leave
Speaker 2: that on one side, the claim that shepherds here is
Speaker 2: actually wrong. The hills of Jodea are fairly arid most
Speaker 2: of the year, but November and December see the highest
Speaker 2: rainfall in the region, which means it is a period
Speaker 2: of good pasture for shepherds to this day still pasture
Speaker 2: their sheep in there in December, and there is good
Speaker 2: evidence that they have long done so. Of course, this
Speaker 2: does not mean that the traditional date of Christmas does
Speaker 2: not have a foundation in the gospels, just that this
Speaker 2: particular objection is based on a false premise. In fact,
Speaker 2: the two infancy narratives give no time of year for
Speaker 2: their stories, and notoriously contradict each other on the year
Speaker 2: Jesus was born, with a ten year gap between the
Speaker 2: historical reference points in the Gospel of Matthew, the story
Speaker 2: of Herod the Great and he died in four BC,
Speaker 2: and the ones in Luke which talks about the census
Speaker 2: of Soulplicius Cornerinus excuse me, hailed in the years of
Speaker 2: AD six and seven. So finding a specific date in
Speaker 2: these stories is pretty much impossible. So also that's another
Speaker 2: thing too, when they talk about Herod, who was the
Speaker 2: dude that sent Ince Jesus to death, that was like
Speaker 2: Herod junior, Herod the Great himself, he died in four BC,
Speaker 2: and there's outside sources that would verify that claim. So anyway,
Speaker 2: so weird side tangent, which raises the question where did
Speaker 2: the December twenty fifth date come from? If multiple pop
Speaker 2: history articles, newspaper pieces, and atheist memes can be believed,
Speaker 2: the Christians simply stole a Pagan feast date and rebadged it.
Speaker 2: Simple which pagan feast? Here are things that get confusing
Speaker 2: because multiple differing answers are given in these popular sources,
Speaker 2: and the stories told about them are highly inconsistent. So
Speaker 2: let's see here. So what about Roman Saturnalia the pagan
Speaker 2: festival perhaps nominated most often as the origin date of
Speaker 2: Christmas is the Roman festival of Saturnalia. This was we
Speaker 2: are regularly informed the origin of both the date and
Speaker 2: the traditions we associate with chriss On the traditions see below,
Speaker 2: But what was the date of Saturnalia? Was it December
Speaker 2: twenty fifth? Well, No, Sarennalia was a very ancient Roman festival.
Speaker 2: Saturn was one of the earliest Italian gods, and even
Speaker 2: the Romans were unclear about the origin or even the
Speaker 2: meaning of many of his rites and traditions. He was
Speaker 2: associated with the ancient Golden Age, and his festival in
Speaker 2: December was definitely very popular, continuing to be celebrated into
Speaker 2: at least the sixth century, so two centuries after the
Speaker 2: Roman Empire's conversion to Christianity. But Sarennalia fell on December seventeenth,
Speaker 2: not December twenty fifth. Macrobius's book Saturnalia, a fictional symposium
Speaker 2: hailed by a group of nobles on the feast, states
Speaker 2: it originally lasted but one day and was hailed only
Speaker 2: on the fourteenth day before the calends of January, so
Speaker 2: that is December seventeenth. But it was a fun festival.
Speaker 2: People kept the party going for several days after the seventeenth,
Speaker 2: and its most extended it went all the way to
Speaker 2: a final day of celebration called Sigliara, singly Sigalaria. Excuse me,
Speaker 2: but that was the twenty third of December, so we
Speaker 2: are still short of the twenty fifth. Augustus tried to
Speaker 2: reign in the festivities in the and limited to three
Speaker 2: days from the seventeenth of the twentieth, and Caligula, who
Speaker 2: loved a party, extended it again to four days. But
Speaker 2: even in its most extended form, it never got to
Speaker 2: December twenty fifth. However you cut it. Saturnalia was near Christmas,
Speaker 2: but it does not work with the origin for its date. Now,
Speaker 2: what about the birth of Mithris? Again? Plenty of pop
Speaker 2: history and memes assure us that December twenty fifth was
Speaker 2: the birthday of the Roman god Mythrs, and this is
Speaker 2: definitely the origin date of Christmas. Mythris is one of
Speaker 2: a number of gods who, it is often claimed, had
Speaker 2: their birth celebrated on December twenty fifth, including Horus, Attis, Tummus, Dionysus,
Speaker 2: and others. Unfortunately, if anyone bothers to check these claims,
Speaker 2: no evidence for them can be found. They can be
Speaker 2: traced through a range of highly unreliable modern sources, from
Speaker 2: comedian Bill Maherr, though through the notorious online conspiracy documentary
Speaker 2: Zeitgeist in two thousand and seven and the crackpot Jesus
Speaker 2: Mystic writer A Chorea s and ultimately the largely imaginary
Speaker 2: claims of Kursey Graves in his eighteen seventy five work
Speaker 2: of Estorika the Works the World's Sixteen Crucified Saviors or
Speaker 2: Christianity before Christ which I've actually looked into that book before.
Speaker 2: It is it's based in a lot of how could
Speaker 2: I put this? Old boy was making some very very
Speaker 2: bold claims without like ever reading a history book from
Speaker 2: what bullshit well to say, Like, for instance, Odin is
Speaker 2: brought up in this book because he was hung from
Speaker 2: a tree and all this is like yep, he etn
Speaker 2: die he like it wasn't the same story of Jesus
Speaker 2: like at all, And it doesn't make sense mythr is
Speaker 2: the same thing. There's so many of these stories of
Speaker 2: these virgin births and died on a tree of some
Speaker 2: type and then rose from the dead, and it's this
Speaker 2: whole thing, and it's like, I see what you're trying
Speaker 2: to do here, and I get it. But looking at
Speaker 2: the storyline, the cultural importance of every aspect of that
Speaker 2: story of Odin for instance, it doesn't even come close
Speaker 2: to the story of Jesus. And I'm not even talking
Speaker 2: about for personal religious beliefs. It's literally comparing the story
Speaker 2: of how vampires in Europe came about and the Choctaw
Speaker 2: narrative of where vampires came from. There you have one
Speaker 2: or two details and you're using that as a commonality
Speaker 2: to make the entire picture, when that's crazy out loud.
Speaker 2: So anyway, but all this, this is all nonsense. Far
Speaker 2: from being born of a virgin on December twenty fifth,
Speaker 2: Roman sources and depictions have mythrusts leaping fully formed from
Speaker 2: a rock, the so called petrogen genetrics, and given no
Speaker 2: date at all for this event, despite being repeated endlessly
Speaker 2: by popular sources. Mithraick scholar Roger Beck refers to a
Speaker 2: claim that Mithris born boorth I think I might be
Speaker 2: birth was celebrated on December twenty fifth, with some exasperation
Speaker 2: as the horriest of facts. Uh, that's a direct quote.
Speaker 3: Wow, uh.
Speaker 2: Also they give the sources for this mercle Box Mithrus
Speaker 2: by Roger Beck, and they talk about the pages as well.
Speaker 2: There are simply no references at all to Mithris being
Speaker 2: born on December twenty fifth, or any celebration of his
Speaker 2: birth on that day, so Bromalia. A less common claim
Speaker 2: is that the date of Christmas derives from the ancient
Speaker 2: Roman festival of Brumalia. This fell, or we are told,
Speaker 2: on the winter solstice, so traditionally that is December twenty fifth,
Speaker 2: and went on for a full twenty four days. Unfortunately,
Speaker 2: for these claimants, there are no references to this festival
Speaker 2: in any pre Christian sources, and all references to it
Speaker 2: are quite late and all are Eastern Roman. This seems
Speaker 2: to be a later festival that began in the eastern
Speaker 2: half of the Empire, well after both Christianity and Christmas
Speaker 2: had become adopted by Romans. In his comprehensive book Roman
Speaker 2: Festivals in the Greek East from the Early Empire to
Speaker 2: the Middle Byzantine era this is from Cambridge in twenty fifteen.
Speaker 2: Fritz Graf is categorical about this, stating through Bumalia are
Speaker 2: attested only in Byzantaneum the Byzantine Empire. Byzantine churchmen certainly
Speaker 2: disapproved of these festivals, and some believed it was ancient.
Speaker 2: John the Leadian that was from a. D. Four ninety
Speaker 2: to five sixty five sixty five seem to have thought so,
Speaker 2: but there are no references to it before his Given
Speaker 2: that the pre Christian period is the one where we
Speaker 2: have the most extensive evidence of ancient festivals, it does
Speaker 2: not make sense that we have no references to this
Speaker 2: one earlier than the sixth century if it was ancient
Speaker 2: and widespread, as is sometimes claimed. This is why scholars
Speaker 2: conclude it was a later development, which is accurate as
Speaker 2: far as the When we're talking about like the Nordic
Speaker 2: pagan rituals and rites, we're going off of third party sources.
Speaker 2: In some cases, some of them, like the prose Eta
Speaker 2: and the sagas and like those are first person accounts.
Speaker 2: Sometimes they talk about times of year in festivals, but
Speaker 2: mostly it's about the stories of the gods and the
Speaker 2: stories of the heroes. Right, it's not a big like
Speaker 2: a step by step tatorial on how to conduct a
Speaker 2: blow or blow ton I pronounce it, or how to
Speaker 2: do a sacrifice. It would talk about why sacrifices were done,
Speaker 2: and to which god you would sacrifice a certain animal.
Speaker 2: That's true, but it's not like they don't say how
Speaker 2: it's to be done or necessarily when it's supposed to
Speaker 2: be done either.
Speaker 3: So.
Speaker 2: Anyway, so when we're looking at Roman history, they have
Speaker 2: a very long description on a lot of their gods,
Speaker 2: their their pantheon, how they worship them, all these things,
Speaker 2: and they have dates for specific fas. So this sixth
Speaker 2: century thing saying that it's a long standing ancient tradition
Speaker 2: when they have no record of it before the six
Speaker 2: hundredths ady, that kind of doesn't stand to water either.
Speaker 2: Some try to claim evidence of earlier attestation by citing
Speaker 2: various references to the Bruma and claiming these are pre
Speaker 2: sixth century references to Bromelia. But these refer to the
Speaker 2: date of the start of the winter season on November
Speaker 2: twenty fourth, and are a general term for winter overall,
Speaker 2: that is bruma. Or it might be mispronouncing, maybe it's
Speaker 2: Brama and the solstice are not the same date. And
Speaker 2: it's made very clear by Varro, and it's a direct
Speaker 2: quote from Varro. Broma is so named because the day
Speaker 2: is Brevisimus' shortest and the slum because on that day
Speaker 2: the soul sun seems sistere or to halt on which
Speaker 2: it is nearest to us. When the sun has arrived
Speaker 2: midway between the Brahma and the solstium, it is called
Speaker 2: the equinoctium or the equinox, because the day it becomes
Speaker 2: aqueous or equal to the knox, which is night. So
Speaker 2: basically they're saying that these two dates are not the
Speaker 2: same whatsoever. So both his etymology and his astronomy are
Speaker 2: pretty dubious here, but the passage makes it clear that
Speaker 2: the Brahma or Bruma fell before the winter solstice and
Speaker 2: marked the beginning of the winter season.
Speaker 3: Again.
Speaker 2: Fitz Grafts discussion notes evidence mainly in Tertullian, that there
Speaker 2: was a celebration on the earlier Bruma, but shows the
Speaker 2: date for this was November twenty fourth, not December twenty fifth,
Speaker 2: or it perhaps ran until December twenty third. There's evidence
Speaker 2: of that one. But this aside. It seems that the
Speaker 2: more general use of the word bruma refers to the
Speaker 2: season of winter, which is what gave the later Byzantine
Speaker 2: festival of Brumalia its name. There was no Broomalia early
Speaker 2: enough to give it date or dates to Christmas, and
Speaker 2: earlier Brama fell on the wrong dates. So now what
Speaker 2: about Yule? Given that the name Yule is a synonym
Speaker 2: for Christmas to this day, the claim that there was
Speaker 2: a pagan festival called Yule and that this is the
Speaker 2: origin of the date of Christmas seems to make sense
Speaker 2: too many people, despite the fact that this is often
Speaker 2: claimed along with some other pagan origins claims above, which
Speaker 2: actually makes no sense at all. That aside, here we
Speaker 2: are on some slightly more solid ground regarding a possible
Speaker 2: but not certain December twenty fifth date for Yule. So
Speaker 2: classist Peter Gainsford details in a very useful online article
Speaker 2: concerning Yule, the eighteenth of December twenty eighteen is when
Speaker 2: it was posted that our earliest mention of any Yule
Speaker 2: is in a Gothic calendar of Saints Days for the
Speaker 2: five hundreds. This text mentions fruma Julius, which Gainsford reads
Speaker 2: as the beginning of Yule, and says this falls in
Speaker 2: November or December, though not on a specific date. This
Speaker 2: is not certain, however, and the Gothic language scholar David
Speaker 2: Landau notes many linguistic problems with the reading of Julius
Speaker 2: as a cognate with various Germanic words for Yule, and
Speaker 2: thinks it's probably not connected at all. There's the source
Speaker 2: of the Gothic month named Julius and cognates that's the
Speaker 2: name of the book. Gains For disputes this, but what
Speaker 2: both agree is the reference is very much a Christian context.
Speaker 2: It also does not indicate any particular date and seems
Speaker 2: to refer to the start of a season. Before I continue,
Speaker 2: the earliest reference is a Catholic Gothic text. That's the
Speaker 2: first time that Yule is even brought up. What are
Speaker 2: your thoughts?
Speaker 3: That's what we read in the other article. But then
Speaker 3: there is the month that brought it up too. I'd
Speaker 3: have to find exactly who brought it up. What was
Speaker 3: his name? I'll have to find it though.
Speaker 2: But even a monk brought it up. Though that might
Speaker 2: be the text they're talking about. To be honest, it
Speaker 2: might be, But they're then talking about it being a
Speaker 2: seasonal thing. Which we have agreed is that was the
Speaker 2: name of that time of year. It was like mid
Speaker 2: November to mid December, and it was the month of Yule.
Speaker 3: It was a jewel, and I left my notes at home.
Speaker 3: I had like seven pages of notes that I took
Speaker 3: on this too, that I did a lot of different
Speaker 3: research on. But the word it's jol joel.
Speaker 2: But in the in the Nordic you had pronounced the
Speaker 2: jay like.
Speaker 3: A y, right, So yeah, so it was mentioned before.
Speaker 3: I'm actually going to see if I can find the guy.
Speaker 3: But yeah, there's a lot of different Uh, there's him,
Speaker 3: and there's the other one of the b B bead yeah, med, Yeah.
Speaker 4: That's the one that mentions. The five hundred tea theory.
Speaker 2: Is right there, Okay, so let's get into it here.
Speaker 2: The next reference is what appears to be mules in
Speaker 2: the beds or beads on the Reckoning of Time from
Speaker 2: around seven thirty AD. So the first source you have
Speaker 2: is from the five hundreds. That's the first time Yule
Speaker 2: was ever brought up. The next reference is from seven thirty.
Speaker 2: In chapter fifteen, he lists the traditional Anglo Saxon month names,
Speaker 2: starting with the first months with is, which in Latin
Speaker 2: called January is gwilly okay, but that's January, and then
Speaker 2: ending with December Gweley, the same name by which January
Speaker 2: is called, so Gweeley seems to span both December and
Speaker 2: January and be a name for the winter season generally.
Speaker 2: But more importantly, Bee goes on to say, they the
Speaker 2: pagan Anglo Saxons began the year on the eighth calends
Speaker 2: of January, which is December twenty fifth, when we celebrate
Speaker 2: the birth of the Lord. So keep in mind they
Speaker 2: celebrate on December twenty fifth, and that was completely separate
Speaker 2: from this, but let's talk about it. Similarly, the old
Speaker 2: English martyrology, like we talked about from the late eight
Speaker 2: hundreds or first to December twenty fifth as the first
Speaker 2: day of Yule, that's from the eight hundreds and says
Speaker 2: like b that both December and January are called Yule,
Speaker 2: but that December is called Arowgiola, which is before Yule,
Speaker 2: and January is called aftera Goal, which is after Yule.
Speaker 2: So while the word Yule is used to refer to
Speaker 2: the whole winter season, these two Anglo Saxon references placed
Speaker 2: Yule properly was on a central date December twenty fifth.
Speaker 3: Okay, so this guy is the monk. Is the monk bead? Yeah?
Speaker 3: He monk? So the Pagan Temple website says medieval Icelandic
Speaker 3: sagas these stories were written down by Christian Icelanders in
Speaker 3: the twelve twelve to twelve to thirteen hundreds described pre
Speaker 3: Christian practices. The sagas mentioned Yule feast, sacrifices and customs.
Speaker 3: Even after it is written after Christianization, they preserve the
Speaker 3: pagan memories. It talks about poetry that was written down
Speaker 3: in some of the sagas that refer to Yule. It
Speaker 3: talks about archaeological evidence. Festive halls, sacrifice sites, barrel grounds
Speaker 3: from the Viking ages and earlier earlier give us physical
Speaker 3: evidence of winter celebrations at ritual practices. Later, folklore of
Speaker 3: Scandinamian skin and even and dramatic folkal or collected in
Speaker 3: later century preserves the echoes of the older Yule traditions
Speaker 3: through mixed though mixed in with Christian elements right.
Speaker 2: Right, So like they said, this has a little more
Speaker 2: like legs to it. But then it goes on to
Speaker 2: continue it. So there is later evidence which complicates this.
Speaker 2: The Icelandic collection of sagas of the Swedish and Norwegian kings,
Speaker 2: which we talked about that in the last article, and
Speaker 2: I think is what you were just referencing talks about
Speaker 2: King Haken, which we're not going to go over it again.
Speaker 2: He was confirmed Christian when he arrived in Norway, but
Speaker 2: since the land was altogether healen and much ideology prevailed,
Speaker 2: he had it established in the laws that the Yule
Speaker 2: celebration was to take place at the same time as
Speaker 2: the custom with the Christians, and at that time everyone
Speaker 2: was to have ale for the celebration, a measure of grain,
Speaker 2: or pay fines.
Speaker 3: We talked about this.
Speaker 2: Already before that Yule was celebrated on midwinter night and
Speaker 2: for the duration of three nights. So the first issue
Speaker 2: here is when the account says Yull originally fell midwinter night,
Speaker 2: that Haken moved it to at the same time as
Speaker 2: the custom with the Christians. The latter was clearly December
Speaker 2: twenty fifth, which means that midwinter night must have fallen
Speaker 2: on some other date. Samuel Lang's eighteen eighty nine translation,
Speaker 2: which is widely available online, give this as December fourteenth, okay,
Speaker 2: So Alison Finlay and Anthony Falks in twenty eleven translates
Speaker 2: put it at the twelfth of January, which is very interesting.
Speaker 2: They give a reference for this one the beginning of
Speaker 2: Alfler Trevison Viking Society of Northern Research University actually.
Speaker 3: Took So there's old boy hackeen Heiken whatever he was
Speaker 3: a king, then there was Earl was next, and then
Speaker 3: after that was Olfur or whatever that's who took over.
Speaker 3: So there's there's a certain time period in which they
Speaker 3: were all kind of in the same grouping.
Speaker 2: But the principle that they just brought up as very
Speaker 2: accurate though, So they practiced the Yule celebration at midwinter.
Speaker 2: He made its way. They practice it on Christmas, which
Speaker 2: means that the December twenty fifth date for Christmas itself
Speaker 2: predated the mixture of Yule and Christmas, which is interesting.
Speaker 2: And they're debating on if it was a December fourteenth
Speaker 2: or January twelfth, because, like we said, the month of
Speaker 2: Yule or the time of Yule kind of spanned a
Speaker 2: gap like that. So when they say mid do they
Speaker 2: mean January or December?
Speaker 3: Right? And I get this.
Speaker 2: So whichever it was, it was clearly not December twenty fifth.
Speaker 2: So the second issue here is the late date of
Speaker 2: this text and what it might mean. The Helmskrigla is
Speaker 2: usually attributed to the medieval Icelandic scholar Snowy Sterlson, who
Speaker 2: lived from eleven seventy nine to twelve forty one, though
Speaker 2: this has been disputed as the text never claims that
Speaker 2: he is the author. Even if true, we know that
Speaker 2: Sirlison reworked or drew on earlier texts and sources when
Speaker 2: producing his versions of the sagas. So is this account
Speaker 2: of King Haken moved moving the date to Yule historical?
Speaker 3: And how do we.
Speaker 2: Square with the Anglo Saxon evidence already noted, which explicitly
Speaker 2: places Yule on December twenty fifth. It could be that
Speaker 2: the Hemskrigla author is completely mistaken. If so, it seems
Speaker 2: an odd element to include in the saga if it
Speaker 2: has no basis. Alternately, or alternatively, rather, the date of
Speaker 2: Yule proper could have been celebrated on different dates within
Speaker 2: the broader midwinter season, in different places and or in
Speaker 2: different periods across the Germanic world. So perhaps it was
Speaker 2: traditionally on December twenty fifth in Pango at Pagan Anglo Saxon, England,
Speaker 2: and on January twelfth or December fourteenth in pre Christian Norway,
Speaker 2: which that makes sense. Like we talked about, although the
Speaker 2: Nordic tribes had a lot of similarities between them, they
Speaker 2: also were some distinct differences, So that might be where
Speaker 2: we're getting the mix up here. Maybe Norway did it
Speaker 2: this way, Denmark did it this way, Iceland did it
Speaker 2: this way, and the Anglo Saxon English did it this way.
Speaker 3: No, I mean, it's the same conversation we've had before,
Speaker 3: just here in different parishes. What people do differently, how
Speaker 3: they speak differently, things like that, it's the same conversation.
Speaker 3: So I mean, you can't hell within the same town.
Speaker 3: You could say, within the same street, how does this
Speaker 3: little cool sack? How many people practice Christmas the exact
Speaker 3: same way? Do the exact same thing to each other?
Speaker 3: So very well could be that there was a very
Speaker 3: narrow scope of what was being told, if it was
Speaker 3: even correct, what was being accounted for, what was written
Speaker 3: down accurately verse, what was actually happening. And you got
Speaker 3: to think of all the different tribes and what they
Speaker 3: did was different from each other. They had a similar basis,
Speaker 3: but they sure did a lot of different things, and
Speaker 3: so it very well could be the day was different
Speaker 3: it could be. It could be at all different things.
Speaker 3: So it's interesting trying to figure out how the twenty
Speaker 3: fifth of like twenty fifth became Christmas.
Speaker 2: So a third possibility is that the Hemskrigla account is
Speaker 2: accurate and something similar happened centuries earlier in the Anglo
Speaker 2: Saxon England, with the Pagan date being moved to coincide
Speaker 2: with the Christian one. Bed was writing about one hundred
Speaker 2: and thirty years after the first conversions of the Anglo Saxons,
Speaker 2: and the Old English martyrology is over a century later still,
Speaker 2: so that gives a lot of time in which the
Speaker 2: Pagan and Christian feest could come together on December twenty fifth,
Speaker 2: with Bide and the later writer simply assuming the pagan
Speaker 2: feasts had always been on the state, that could also be.
Speaker 2: Who knows, so was Yule on December twenty fifth. The
Speaker 2: very best we can say is maybe even if it was. However,
Speaker 2: this does not mean we have finally found the pagan
Speaker 2: origin of the date of Christmas, one stolen from the
Speaker 2: Germanic and Norse pagans from the far North. This is because,
Speaker 2: as you will see, Christians were already marking the birth
Speaker 2: of their Christ on December twenty fifth, way back in
Speaker 2: the third century, long before they came into any significant
Speaker 2: contact with German paganism. Both the Christians who converted Anglo
Speaker 2: Saxon England and the Christian king Hakhnu, both of their times,
Speaker 2: were already celebrating Christmas on this date. So the German
Speaker 2: Norse yule is not the origin date, and if it
Speaker 2: did perhaps coincide with it, it was just that a coincidence,
Speaker 2: which I also that's the other thing too. There's record
Speaker 2: of Romans in the third century AD celebrating Christmas or
Speaker 2: the birth of Christ on December twenty fifth. This is
Speaker 2: long before the Middle Ages and the commersion.
Speaker 4: The twenty fifth. He was born in September.
Speaker 2: Why indeed, why indeed, Raven, we're gonna talk about that.
Speaker 2: So anyway, Soul and victis, this is another conversation that
Speaker 2: they always hear. Oh, it's just the celebration of Soul
Speaker 2: and Victis, the Sun God and his victory, and that's
Speaker 2: it was on December twenty fifth, So let's talk about
Speaker 2: it here. The evidence indicates that the date of December
Speaker 2: twenty fifth was adopted by Christians relatively early and in
Speaker 2: the Mediterranean region, so much later contact with the German
Speaker 2: date of Yule cannot be the date's point of origin.
Speaker 2: But one of the few contenders for a pagan origin
Speaker 2: of the date that actually rests in evidence rather than
Speaker 2: assertion may seem to fit this bill. There certainly is
Speaker 2: evidence of a celebration of the sun god Soul under
Speaker 2: his title Soul Invictus the Unconquered Sun on this date
Speaker 2: by the Romans in the Mediterranean, and fairly early. So
Speaker 2: is this the origin date of the date of Christmas?
Speaker 2: The key evidence cited in the Calendar of Philosalus Sure Philipalus,
Speaker 2: one of the several calendrical texts and regional lists collected
Speaker 2: in the fourth century almanac known as the Chronograph of
Speaker 2: three point fifty four. The Phallocan calendar is the significant
Speaker 2: is significant here because it's entry for December twenty fifth
Speaker 2: reads and I'm not going to give you all the
Speaker 2: number designation which usually transcribed as in natilis, which is
Speaker 2: birth or nativity or perhaps dedication date in Victi of
Speaker 2: the Unconquered one serenus missus which means games ordered and
Speaker 2: thirty or thirty games were ordered for the birthday slash
Speaker 2: dedication of the unconquered one that's the overall and duro
Speaker 2: this one. So yeah, there's a inn invicti dot com xxx,
Speaker 2: but that's what it actually translates to. This single reference
Speaker 2: is the point of origin for the claim that December
Speaker 2: twenty fifth is the birthday of Mithris noted above, because
Speaker 2: Mithris was one of a number of gods given the
Speaker 2: title invictus or unconquered, but many modern scholars agree that
Speaker 2: here is the title refers to Soul, the Roman sun god,
Speaker 2: not Mythris. Soul was regularly depicted traversing the skies in
Speaker 2: a chariot, and so was associated with the popular sport
Speaker 2: of chariot racing. The massive Circus Maximus in Rome was
Speaker 2: the site of the chariot races for up to one
Speaker 2: hundred and fifty thousand spectators, and it included the city's
Speaker 2: main temple to Soul in its complex.
Speaker 3: For anybody that would like to get.
Speaker 2: A really good look at what those chariot races look like,
Speaker 2: look at the original Charlton Heston's Ben Hur. I think
Speaker 2: it's an excellent movie Juda Judah Ben which also like
Speaker 2: yo rewatching that as a kid, I'm watching this, like
Speaker 2: this is so cool. As an adult, I'm like, yo,
Speaker 2: these stuntmen like they might have actually died.
Speaker 3: I'm convinced that some of them died. It's pretty intense,
Speaker 3: Like I don't know how they did those stunts without
Speaker 3: getting broken limbs and fucked up. It's it's pretty intense.
Speaker 2: And I've looked into the chariot racing, like, yeah, gladiators
Speaker 2: were super big, super popular. No sport drew as much
Speaker 2: attention as the chariot races and they had and they're
Speaker 2: so brutal too though. They had four teams and like
Speaker 2: we talk about sports riots, right, like your team wins
Speaker 2: the Super Bowl, so you tear your town apart, Yo,
Speaker 2: that's nothing. Romans actually had like whole wars start because
Speaker 2: there was the Red, the Greens, the Whites, and the Yellows.
Speaker 2: If I'm not mistaken, these four teams were like the
Speaker 2: shit and there was multiple accounts of the Greens and
Speaker 2: the Whites going to actual blood in the streets over
Speaker 2: their support of their chariot team. Wow, yeah, Romans got
Speaker 2: they went hard shit.
Speaker 3: But then that's probably where the British and Irish got
Speaker 3: it from with their soccer teams.
Speaker 2: What the British and Irish hate each other for other reasons.
Speaker 3: But colors go yet yet No, I meant just like
Speaker 3: in the sense of, like, you know, they're so gung
Speaker 3: ho when it comes to soccer.
Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, Cooligan football firms or it's crazy. Have you
Speaker 2: ever seen Green Street Hooligans?
Speaker 3: Yes?
Speaker 2: Yes, I love the movie. I love it Death Anyway,
Speaker 2: I'm moving on. So it would make sense that the
Speaker 2: cherry races would be held to celebrate the birth of
Speaker 2: the Sun God on December twenty fifth, which was the
Speaker 2: traditional date for the winter solstice and the date thought
Speaker 2: to mark the lengthening of the days of the year.
Speaker 2: This is why nineteenth century. In the nineteenth century, some
Speaker 2: prominent German Protestant scholars what is known as the I'm
Speaker 2: not going to read that it's the History of Religious
Speaker 2: school or Religion's School, argued this was the origin date
Speaker 2: of Christmas. This was an influential school of thought in
Speaker 2: the nineteenth century that saw Christianity as one ancient religion
Speaker 2: among many, and saw to understand it in an ancient
Speaker 2: religious context. The scholars of the school tended to assume
Speaker 2: a high level of sink gitim syncretism. Yeah and borrowing
Speaker 2: of earlier pagan elements by Christianity, to the extent that
Speaker 2: the scholars often went to great and often fanciful links
Speaker 2: to find quote unquote pagan influences and parallels, even when
Speaker 2: they really were not there. This school of thought had
Speaker 2: a huge impact on later religion studies and is the
Speaker 2: origin of many of the pop history claims about pagan
Speaker 2: origins still in circulation today. In this case, the main
Speaker 2: early prominent idea that Christianity borrowed the Feast of Soul
Speaker 2: and Victus and turned it into Christmas was Hermann Uncer.
Speaker 2: In eighteen eighty nine, he wrote, it's a big German word,
Speaker 2: but he cited a chronograph of three point fifty four
Speaker 2: text and two other sources to support this idea. The
Speaker 2: first was a passage from the twelfth century Syriac Orthodox
Speaker 2: writer Dionysus bar Salibi, who was a bishop in what
Speaker 2: was now southeastern Turkey. In his commentary on the Four Gospels,
Speaker 2: bar Salibi states that in the month of January, the
Speaker 2: Lord was born on the same day on which we
Speaker 2: celebrate the Epiphany January sixth, since this was the date
Speaker 2: of Jesus birth. According to Barslibi, Eastern Christian tradition, they
Speaker 2: do celebrate that. They celebrate the birth of Christ on
Speaker 2: January sixth in the Eastern Orthodox.
Speaker 3: I don't know why. My thought immediately thought about January sixth,
Speaker 3: the whole thing here in America, and I was like,
Speaker 3: there's some people where I was like, what are the coincidence?
Speaker 3: As soon as you said that, I was just sitting
Speaker 3: here listening to you. I was like, what are the
Speaker 3: odds that this is somehow tied together in some.
Speaker 2: Way, shape or form. There are some connections that people
Speaker 2: have made before.
Speaker 3: Now.
Speaker 2: I don't think that the Ortho Bros. Were the actual
Speaker 2: masterminds behind the jan sixth, quote unquote insurrection, but it's
Speaker 2: it's funny to talk about, for sure.
Speaker 4: I mean, I was just it was just random.
Speaker 3: And when you read that date, I was like, hmm,
Speaker 3: that's a weird date to be coincidentally with that.
Speaker 2: Yeah, it'd be like that. But he goes on to
Speaker 2: explain why other Christians hold that he was born on
Speaker 2: December twenty fifth, The reason why the aforesaid solemnity was
Speaker 2: transferred by the fathers from the sixth of January to
Speaker 2: the twenty fifth of December, they say was this, it
Speaker 2: was traditional for the Pagans to celebrate the birth of
Speaker 2: the Sun on this very day, twenty fifth of December.
Speaker 2: To further enhance the celebration of the day, they used
Speaker 2: slight fires, to which rights they were accustomed to invite
Speaker 2: and admit even Christian people. When therefore the doctors noticed
Speaker 2: that the Christians were inclined to that custom, they devised
Speaker 2: a plan to establish on that day the feasts of
Speaker 2: his birth, But on the sixth of January they ordered
Speaker 2: that the epiphemy be celebrated. In addition, he noted an
Speaker 2: anonymous fourth century sermon titled on the Solstices and the Equinoxes,
Speaker 2: often wrongly attributing to John Christism. This sermon tries to
Speaker 2: tie key elements to the lives of Jesus and John
Speaker 2: the Baptist to the astronomical turning points of the year.
Speaker 2: The sermon noted that the Lord was born on December
Speaker 2: twenty fifth in the winter. They also called this date
Speaker 2: the birthday of the Invictus. But who is invictus on
Speaker 2: co if not our Lord who suffered death and then
Speaker 2: conquered it. Or when they call the birthday of the Sun, well,
Speaker 2: Christ is the son of the Righteous and that the
Speaker 2: prophet Malachi spoke of. So basically they're just trying to
Speaker 2: make these connections from taking cherry picked verses and the
Speaker 2: Roman pagan worship. Okay, so taking these references with the
Speaker 2: calendar of Philococcus, Unser argued that December twenty fifth was
Speaker 2: an established festival for the birthday of Sol Invictus, celebrated
Speaker 2: by Terrus races and unsurped by or usurved rather by
Speaker 2: Christianity as the birthday of Jesus Christ, thus the date
Speaker 2: of Christmas. But there are multiple problems with this argument.
Speaker 2: The Dionysus Barsalabi text is very late, dating a full
Speaker 2: eight hundred and fifty years after any festival of Sol
Speaker 2: Invictus offer over in a far off Rome. Barsleibi also
Speaker 2: has a polemiic polemical acts to grind the date of
Speaker 2: Christmas was a point of contingent between Eastern and Western
Speaker 2: traditions of Christianity, and Barsilebi considers January six to be
Speaker 2: the correct and original date. So his association with December
Speaker 2: twenty fifth, alternatively with pagan festival as an attempt to
Speaker 2: denigrate and discredit it. And that's something that you'll see
Speaker 2: a lot with the early church fathers of what would
Speaker 2: become the Western or Roman Catholic Church. In the Eastern
Speaker 2: or Eastern Orthodox, they would go out of their way
Speaker 2: to draw comparisons and pull punches with each other just
Speaker 2: to make a point, and a lot of them you
Speaker 2: could tell their biases outright. So this checks out on
Speaker 2: the solstices and equinoxes at least dates to the right
Speaker 2: period to be more reliable. But it does not actually
Speaker 2: state that this is the birthday of the sun was
Speaker 2: appropriated by Christians. It just notes that the date had
Speaker 2: that pagan designation and then gives it a Christian exegetical spin.
Speaker 2: So does the calendar of Philocaccus actually refer to an
Speaker 2: ancient pagan festival of Sole Invictus that the Christians appropriated. Unfortunately,
Speaker 2: for Usner's thesis and all the pop history sources that
Speaker 2: have repeated it, it does not seem so. On the contrary,
Speaker 2: it appears that this December twenty fifth solar feast was
Speaker 2: actually very new and possibly not very significant at all.
Speaker 2: The modern historian who is the leading scholar were on
Speaker 2: Roman solar cult, Stephen Hidgemans, has literally written the book
Speaker 2: on the Roman Sun God's Soul. His two volume work
Speaker 2: Soul and the Meaning of the Sun in Roman Art
Speaker 2: and Religion collects the relevant material on the Roman worship
Speaker 2: of the Soul of Soul and shows the evidence for
Speaker 2: various very ancient feasts for this deity. These fell on
Speaker 2: August eighth and ninth, August twenty eighth, October nineteenth and
Speaker 2: twenty second, and December eleventh. Higman's shows strong evidence that
Speaker 2: these were the ancient, significant and well established feast days
Speaker 2: for the cult of Soul, and an article specifically on
Speaker 2: the relationship between the date of Christmas and Soul in
Speaker 2: Victus reference the document. He says one must conclude that
Speaker 2: in the early on fourth century a d anyone surveying
Speaker 2: festivities in honor of Soul would identify the period from
Speaker 2: October nineteenth to twenty second as far more important than
Speaker 2: December twenty fifth, and the festival of August as far older.
Speaker 2: This is because, with the exception of the calendar of
Speaker 2: Philicaucus and perhaps the on the Solstice sermon, there are
Speaker 2: no references to a feast of Soul on this date.
Speaker 2: This indicates this was a less significant and seemingly very
Speaker 2: new established feast So when was this rather new feast established.
Speaker 3: The short answer is, we really.
Speaker 2: Don't know, but it is very possible that the word
Speaker 2: Nautilus in the calendar of Philic Caucus does not refer
Speaker 2: to a birthday but to the anniversary of an establishment.
Speaker 3: Of a temple of a temple. Huh.
Speaker 2: So the whole conversation about Soul and Victus and that's
Speaker 2: where Christmas comes from. When you look at actual Roman
Speaker 2: document documentary documentation, thank you. I was gonna say documentary, Yeah, yeah, num.
Speaker 4: I can never say that word.
Speaker 2: I get this mixed up.
Speaker 4: I'm terrible with that word for some reason, and it
Speaker 4: just is a tongue tie for me.
Speaker 2: Words are hard. We're gonna skip ahead a little bit.
Speaker 2: But long story short, the Sole and Victis conversation has
Speaker 2: no actual credibility outside of two sources that were clearly
Speaker 2: biased and trying to shit on Roman Catholicism.
Speaker 3: Okay, so she and then it says right there that
Speaker 3: it notes that it's most most likely dating note earlier
Speaker 3: than two hundred and seventy.
Speaker 2: Four eighty Yeah, excuse me, actually that so yeahs went
Speaker 2: for the December feast was not important. The thirty Chariots
Speaker 2: as a significant number, and all of that they agree
Speaker 2: and reinforce this idea that the festival is relatively new
Speaker 2: to seventy four a d. So okay, again, the whole
Speaker 2: Christian conversation as far as December twenty fifth predates that.
Speaker 2: And this is significant because we have a reference to
Speaker 2: Christians noting December twenty fifth as the birth of Jesus
Speaker 2: well before two seventy four a d. Which means the
Speaker 2: idea that they simply usurped the Sole and Victis festival
Speaker 2: for their Christmas date really does not work. So the
Speaker 2: calculation thesis. If we do the rather obvious thing and
Speaker 2: actually turn to Christian sources to find what they say
Speaker 2: about the date of jesus birth, we find they had
Speaker 2: a great interest in the dates of key events in
Speaker 2: his life and the symbolic and comological significance of these dates.
Speaker 2: I think that might supposed to mean cosmological.
Speaker 4: I am not sure.
Speaker 3: To be honest with you, I thought that was a
Speaker 3: weird word too.
Speaker 2: As early as the second century we find lively discussion
Speaker 2: in various calculations of these important events and their dates.
Speaker 2: We also find a variety of conclusions and a great
Speaker 2: deal of disagreement and debate. This is because the Gospels,
Speaker 2: the main source of information about jesus life, are not
Speaker 2: very detailed regarding dates and years, and actually contain confusing
Speaker 2: and sometimes contradictory information on the subject. So reconciling these
Speaker 2: issues and working out when things happened in Jesus' life
Speaker 2: became a major scholarly puzzle for early Christian writers, and
Speaker 2: this sacred chnography carnography became an important element in Christian
Speaker 2: writings in this period. One of the few precise dates
Speaker 2: reference in Christian chronographers had to work with was found
Speaker 2: in John nineteen fourteen, which states that Jesus was executed
Speaker 2: on the day of preparation of the Passover, which is
Speaker 2: all which was also a Friday. From this and other
Speaker 2: gospel references, several of these scholars fitted the lunar Jewish
Speaker 2: calendar to the solar Roman calendar and calculated that Jesus
Speaker 2: died on March twenty fifth in twenty nine a d
Speaker 2: Another dates and years were proposed by Christian scholars and
Speaker 2: still are, but March twenty fifth has a cosmological significance
Speaker 2: because it was the traditional date of the spring equinox,
Speaker 2: making it a propitious date. Propitious, Yeah, for what Christians
Speaker 2: regarded as the turning point in cosmic history. We think
Speaker 2: that prosperous, propitious, maybe propitious, this person being he'd been
Speaker 2: doing some words, dude.
Speaker 3: Ye.
Speaker 2: We then find an increasing acceptance of March twenty fifth
Speaker 2: as also being the date of Jesus conception. So this
Speaker 2: day is the date of the feast of the Annunciation
Speaker 2: or Lady Day, and virtually all Christian liturgical traditions. Not
Speaker 2: only was this date the traditional spring equinox, it also
Speaker 2: it's also regarded as the date of God's creation of
Speaker 2: the world, giving it multiple layers of tradition and significance.
Speaker 2: Now I don't know where they would pull that from.
Speaker 2: What Why would March twenty fifth be the day that
Speaker 2: God created the world? I don't get it, But hey,
Speaker 2: if this is what the early Church followers did for
Speaker 2: whatever reason, then cool. But this also goes back, and
Speaker 2: I think they're going to talk about it in this article,
Speaker 2: But it was seen as proper and holy for you
Speaker 2: to die on the day that you were conceived, not born,
Speaker 2: but conceived.
Speaker 3: The fuck are they going to know that? Well?
Speaker 2: I don't understand that, but that is what these people believe.
Speaker 2: I think they're going to talk about it here in
Speaker 2: a minute. But anyway, not only was this the date
Speaker 2: of the true I talked about that already. It appears
Speaker 2: this date was arrived at via a long standing idea
Speaker 2: that holy men lived perfect and therefore highly symmetrical lives,
Speaker 2: being born and dying on the same date. In addition
Speaker 2: to this, there was a very early Christian tradition, based
Speaker 2: on largely on references in the Gospel of Luke's accounts
Speaker 2: on the conception of the birth of John the Baptist
Speaker 2: and of Jesus, that Jesus was born in winter, meaning
Speaker 2: his conception was in the previous spring. So continuing on, hey.
Speaker 3: But how would you know the exact date to the
Speaker 3: day they know?
Speaker 2: I mean, depends on the sources here. And that's what
Speaker 2: I wanted to go in on this one, because it's
Speaker 2: very thorough. Recent work by Thomas Schmidt has strengthened the
Speaker 2: argument made by Ferdinand Piper in eighteen fifty six and
Speaker 2: then in more detail by Lewis Duschen in eighteen eighty eight,
Speaker 2: that for Jesus it was a thought his symmetrical life
Speaker 2: meant that he was conceived and died on the same date.
Speaker 2: Schmidt makes a detailed study of the use of the
Speaker 2: word genesis among contemporaries of the influential chronographer Hoppolitus of Rome.
Speaker 2: I think I'm mispronounced it, but whatever, finding that when
Speaker 2: referring to a person, it meant conception and not birth, okay. Furthermore,
Speaker 2: Schmidt notes that Hoppolitis chronicon appears to place the birth
Speaker 2: of Christ exactly nine months after the anniversary of the
Speaker 2: creation of the world, ie March twenty fifth. This would
Speaker 2: indicate that the idea was conceived on March. Yeah, that
Speaker 2: he was conceived on March twenty fifth and was born
Speaker 2: after a perfect nine month gestation on December twenty fifth
Speaker 2: was something that developed in the Western Christian tradition very
Speaker 2: early on, at least by the first decades of the
Speaker 2: third century.
Speaker 3: Yeah, because that totally happens. There's no babies that are
Speaker 3: ever just late. Wait, you feel like that, no doubt,
Speaker 3: no doubt birth early.
Speaker 2: But hear me out. Though, the idea of December twenty
Speaker 2: fifth is documented in the early two hundreds AD, so
Speaker 2: the conversation that the Christians threw it on that date
Speaker 2: because of this pagan or this group or this god
Speaker 2: or this feast or whatever they.
Speaker 3: Did math to come to that.
Speaker 2: It's a guestman though, it's a guestimate, but it was
Speaker 2: a Christian guestimate. It had nothing to do with pagan
Speaker 2: influences my point. Okay, Right, so we talk about the
Speaker 2: We can go more into this and all this, but
Speaker 2: essentially that is the conclusion as far as the December
Speaker 2: twenty fifth conversation goes. Now, let's talk about Christmas traditions. Okay,
Speaker 2: and this one also a lot of these pop art
Speaker 2: history groups and the documentaries and all these people regurgitate
Speaker 2: information to say that this is super pagan, This is
Speaker 2: super pagan, this is super pagan, all these things that
Speaker 2: we have as far as Christmas iconography. This is going
Speaker 2: to break this down a little bit, and again I
Speaker 2: expect that this will lead to some very decent conversation
Speaker 2: about the subjects. So let's get into it here. There
Speaker 2: are several problems. Let's see, so the date of Christmas
Speaker 2: is not actually derived from anything pagan. What about our
Speaker 2: various Christmas customs and traditions? Yet every year, again, every year,
Speaker 2: we hear and read a plethora of articles about the
Speaker 2: origins of Christmas customs, assuring us that everything from gift
Speaker 2: giving to Christmas trees actually have pagan origin quote unquote.
Speaker 2: So how much of this is true? There are several
Speaker 2: problems here. Firstly, it is actually very difficult to trace
Speaker 2: the origin of a custom. The best we can do
Speaker 2: is usually work out when it first appeared and tried
Speaker 2: to discern its possible origin from context. Despite what journalists
Speaker 2: assure us in these seasonal quote unquote origin articles, most
Speaker 2: elements of our traditional Christmas are actually quite recent, usually
Speaker 2: dating back no more than the Victoria error, which that
Speaker 2: checks out. Secondly, the logic of these claims assumes that
Speaker 2: anything traditional is very old, anything very old is pre Christian,
Speaker 2: and anything pre Christian is religious in origin and so pagan.
Speaker 2: There are three large leaps of assumption that at play here.
Speaker 2: As already noted, most of our Christmas traditions are not
Speaker 2: very old at all, let alone ancient. Further, even the
Speaker 2: genuinely old traditions are not necessarily pre Christian. The idea
Speaker 2: that all old traditions develop before Christianity and then no
Speaker 2: further traditions appeared makes absolutely no sense. Finally, even in
Speaker 2: the few cases where we can trace a traditional back
Speaker 2: to some or a tradition back to something genuinely pre Christian.
Speaker 2: Ascribing actual quote unquote pagans significance to it is very difficult.
Speaker 2: Much of what we find in pop history about pagan
Speaker 2: origins of our traditions simply repeats claims that, as we
Speaker 2: will see, are dubious at best or often simply made up,
Speaker 2: and things which may look both ancient and possibly pagan
Speaker 2: usually or not. In a thousand years, people may well
Speaker 2: read plausible sounding claims that the elf on the shelf
Speaker 2: tradition is ancient and pagan in origin. It's clearly just
Speaker 2: like Labubu's. They're clearly demonic in nature, right, And we've
Speaker 2: talked about this too, and a thousand years when people
Speaker 2: read back the texts that we have in our day
Speaker 2: and age, what the fuck are they going to think
Speaker 2: we put real significance behind I.
Speaker 3: Don't know, I mean, I have no idea. I wonder
Speaker 3: what they're they're gonna say. I mean, it just depends
Speaker 3: on who rates the history very true and goes from there.
Speaker 2: So with lots of references to the pre Christian folklore
Speaker 2: of elves, yeah, I can see the elf on the
Speaker 2: shelf becoming a whole thing. Oh yeah, one thousand years
Speaker 2: from now, they're going to say that they brought back
Speaker 2: pagan worship in America.
Speaker 3: Maybe, and it was a demon that was watching over
Speaker 3: the children, ready to take their soul to the fiery
Speaker 3: depths of hell if they didn't, you know, I don't
Speaker 3: know pray correctly.
Speaker 2: It was said that they moved on their own at
Speaker 2: night and got into all kinds of mischief and all that.
Speaker 3: Yeah. Yeah, they didn't have a they didn't have enough
Speaker 3: crucifixes on the walls.
Speaker 2: Right, But we know the origin of this popular modern tradition.
Speaker 2: It was marketing. It was a marketing campaign for a
Speaker 2: two thousand and five American picture book.
Speaker 3: Really two thousand and five, Yeah, I told you this
Speaker 3: was well, you told me, but I had no idea
Speaker 3: that it was. It was around then. Well, I mean, honestly,
Speaker 3: I thought it was sooner than that. I was like
Speaker 3: maybe like twenty ten.
Speaker 2: It was a marketing campaign in the mid two thousands,
Speaker 2: but it didn't really take root and like get popular
Speaker 2: until like their early twenty teens.
Speaker 3: Yeah.
Speaker 2: Yeah, but anyway, our future pop folklores would be wrong.
Speaker 2: We have to be aware of superficial similarities and glib
Speaker 2: associations and pay attention to the evidence. So now let's
Speaker 2: talk about gift giving, which I think is to say
Speaker 2: that they the Christians started giving gifts because Pagans did it.
Speaker 2: That's ridiculous to me personally. I think we could probably
Speaker 2: skip over this because giving gifts is not a pagan practice.
Speaker 2: That's a that's a love language.
Speaker 3: For a lot. I mean, that's everybody practice. So I
Speaker 3: mean you had chiefs give each other gifts, you know,
Speaker 3: as a sign of respect in all different types of cultures.
Speaker 2: So yeah, so we could skip over the gift giving one.
Speaker 2: That's that's just extra for me, super long too. Oh yeah,
Speaker 2: shit feasting again, I think we could skip over. So
Speaker 2: you're telling me that you're celebrating something in you.
Speaker 3: I can I can skim really quickly. So I mean
Speaker 3: to say, I'd like.
Speaker 2: To say that we at the Christmas in American tradition,
Speaker 2: take away religious iconography for it, just the feast of Christmas.
Speaker 2: That's not taken from anybody. People are getting together for
Speaker 2: a Christmas party. Somebody's gonna throw some food on it. Yeah,
Speaker 2: there's gonna be drinks exchanged. Oh so pagan so.
Speaker 3: Pagan, I think, how dare you make a turkey that
Speaker 3: that satanic part?
Speaker 2: You see my point? You see you're baking a ham
Speaker 2: like Thor's ham. No, dude, what, No, it's a It's
Speaker 2: a fucking a giant piece of meat that feeds a party.
Speaker 2: What are we talking about here? So again to say
Speaker 2: that and.
Speaker 3: Talks about practical jokes and gifts and amusement for people
Speaker 3: you know later. Uh, let's see it says Saturny game
Speaker 3: is sometimes claimed to be the origin of the later
Speaker 3: medieval Christmas traditions of Lord of Misrule or the Boy Bishop. Yeah,
Speaker 3: that doesn't sound wrong at all.
Speaker 2: Yeah, this is that age like milk didn't it.
Speaker 3: This is potentially possible, but it's hard to establish a.
Speaker 2: Genuine line of derivation.
Speaker 3: Sorry I can't. I'm like, I'm squinting my contacts. I'm like, okay,
Speaker 3: I'm squinting from the pagan Roman practice to the medieval
Speaker 3: Christian ones. So yeah, it just kind of talks about the.
Speaker 2: Around for forever anytime it's a celebration.
Speaker 3: Another seeing, it does talk about Yule feasting.
Speaker 2: Okay, let's let's get to there.
Speaker 3: So another Pagan Yule feasting story is found in the
Speaker 3: same book that we talked about earlier, the hem I Scriggler.
Speaker 3: I even watched. I even watched how to Say It
Speaker 3: No Joke, like fifteen times before, just so I got
Speaker 3: it right. I know, I'm terrible with names, yeah and
Speaker 3: saying stuff. So the hymn screw screw Screwler, I don't know. Anyways,
Speaker 3: it involves the good old Handkun guy and being unable
Speaker 3: to avoid eating some of the horse meat from the
Speaker 3: Yule sacrifice. Okay, so he forced himself to eat some
Speaker 3: of the horse liver and drink yule oas drink yule
Speaker 3: oas without without making the sign of the crossover them Okay.
Speaker 3: So yeah, it just talks about that.
Speaker 2: And I have yet to see anyone try to claim
Speaker 2: eating horse meat at Yule is connected to any modern
Speaker 2: Christmas tradition. However, So again, I don't really know a.
Speaker 3: Bunch of people to eat horse meat. I mean, we
Speaker 3: did did cover the other people that wore the horse
Speaker 3: head around the Walsh, but yeah, the Welish, but I
Speaker 3: don't think they were eating horse meat.
Speaker 2: So I mean, so how pagan is eating and drinking
Speaker 2: on Christmas? There's no doubt Pagans did do some feasting
Speaker 2: at midwinter, and there is possibly our eating ham and
Speaker 2: pork at Christmas is a dim echo of Germanic sacrifices
Speaker 2: that you'll I did bring that up. But midwinter is
Speaker 2: also a logical time for people to stay indoors, eat
Speaker 2: and drink. The weather is colder, even in southern Europe.
Speaker 2: It is also a time when there are fewer major
Speaker 2: agricultural tasks other than repairing tools and waiting for the spring.
Speaker 2: A feast around the solstice simply makes sense, and people
Speaker 2: in all cultures like eating and drinking to mark festivals,
Speaker 2: So pagan, not particularly so. So fair enough. Now let's
Speaker 2: talk about holly, ivy and mistletoe. Now, this one is
Speaker 2: interesting and I don't know how this article is gonna
Speaker 2: play out, but there is a reference written by Roman
Speaker 2: scholars of druids climbing a scaffold and cutting a bit
Speaker 2: of mistletoe from a tree with a golden scythe so
Speaker 2: saying that mistletoe had some real significance to the Druids
Speaker 2: absolutely true. And there's references to the Nordics saying that
Speaker 2: mistletoe was also seen as sacred because it was one
Speaker 2: of the only things that wasn't agreed to, not was
Speaker 2: it Balder? The one plant that wasn't agreed couldn't harm Balder.
Speaker 2: So somehow Loki made a spear out of mistletoe. No
Speaker 2: fucking clue how that's possible, by the way, but it's
Speaker 2: myth that it doesn't matter, But like he actually killed
Speaker 2: Balder with a spear of mistletoe. So to say that
Speaker 2: holly ivy and mistletoe at Christmas have pagan origins, let's
Speaker 2: talk about it.
Speaker 4: I have holly at my house and mistletoe as well.
Speaker 2: Most Christmas celebrants do, regardless of what you call it.
Speaker 2: Most people at this time do that because that's a
Speaker 2: part of the iconography, especially in America. So let's get
Speaker 2: into it. This seasonal Origins of Christmas Customs article tend
Speaker 2: to be in agreement that the traditional use of holly,
Speaker 2: ivy and mistletoe as Christmas decorations has its origins in
Speaker 2: pre Christian times and emphasize any pagan association with them.
Speaker 2: Like we talked about holly, we are assured was sacred
Speaker 2: to the Druids. We talked about that, and it's regularly
Speaker 2: invoked these pagan origins claims. Despite the fact that we
Speaker 2: know about them from the ancient sources could be written
Speaker 2: on a very small piece of paper, which is true.
Speaker 2: We have no record, no record of Druidic practices. Yeah,
Speaker 2: I know, we have no idea which gods they actually worshiped.
Speaker 2: We can infer it based off of tribes that were
Speaker 2: around that area. We don't know that for a fact.
Speaker 2: We don't know to what level and extent anything about
Speaker 2: the Druids because they were viciously rooted out and murdered
Speaker 2: by the Romans, and that started pre Christian. Just gonna
Speaker 2: throw that out.
Speaker 4: The actually did have magic, and the Romans did not
Speaker 4: like it.
Speaker 2: We're talking pre Christian. Romans did not like the Druids,
Speaker 2: and they sought to genocidally murder all of them. I mean,
Speaker 2: then the Christians took up the Mantelin continued, I'm not
Speaker 2: going to deny that fact, but that I'm just saying
Speaker 2: it started pre Christian anyway, so much better. It's not better.
Speaker 2: I'm just saying, like to say that it was the
Speaker 2: Christians that tried to murder all these people and it
Speaker 2: was their fault, like they were picking up the mantle
Speaker 2: from their Roman predecessors. Not good but also there's it's
Speaker 2: not shit.
Speaker 3: Yeah, I mean, they still did a lot of horrible
Speaker 3: things in youry so much history.
Speaker 2: But the Druids also never wrote things down.
Speaker 3: To be fair, though, I wonder if the Druids really
Speaker 3: did have like actual magic and or did had I
Speaker 3: don't know, maybe they were tied to the Nephelo, maybe
Speaker 3: they were, like I don't know, they could have been
Speaker 3: something really special for them to still, like at least
Speaker 3: their name and like the myth of them to still
Speaker 3: be around. Yeah. Something.
Speaker 2: But it also kills me when I like neo pagans
Speaker 2: say oh I'm more into the Druidic practices of the
Speaker 2: Druidic teachings, no one has any fucking clue what those are.
Speaker 3: I think it more Yeah, it mostly means that you're
Speaker 3: more of the land, that you're more connected to the
Speaker 3: more spiritual things like of of Earth is what I
Speaker 3: think a lot of people would bring.
Speaker 4: What does that ri I've druid from is?
Speaker 2: But is that what the druids believed? Because in these tribes,
Speaker 2: to be a druid was to basically have a doctorate degree.
Speaker 3: So I mean, I think it's one of those things
Speaker 3: that again people don't have enough knowledge, and so they're
Speaker 3: filling in the gaps, like just at ie the Yule
Speaker 3: celebration and how it's been turned into a weaponized thing
Speaker 3: against people that is evil and demonic and and should
Speaker 3: not be practiced.
Speaker 2: Glad you brought it up, because the Yule log's coming
Speaker 2: up here, we go, Oh yeah. Anyway, So Holly, we
Speaker 2: are assured, was sacred to the Druids as well, a
Speaker 2: group that are regularly invoked in these pagan origins claims,
Speaker 2: despite the fact that what we know about them from
Speaker 2: ancient sources could be written on a very small piece
Speaker 2: of paper. Suffice it to say, none of those ancient
Speaker 2: sources make any mention of the sacredness of Holly at all.
Speaker 2: Ivy we are also informed with sacred to the Druids
Speaker 2: for various pagan traditions. It is sometimes claimed that Ivy
Speaker 2: was the feminine equivalent to holly for these Pagans, which
Speaker 2: is another fascinating detail that is found precisely nowhere in
Speaker 2: ancient source.
Speaker 4: You do realize that this person is extremely biased when
Speaker 4: they're talking about stuff.
Speaker 2: Right, but they're also showing their receipts. I know there
Speaker 2: is no ancient source to say that this whole duality
Speaker 2: of feminine and masculine with holly and ivy, that's that's
Speaker 2: made up. There's no historical background for that, Okay.
Speaker 3: I'm just simply saying, like, throughout this entire article, you
Speaker 3: can definitely tell there's an extreme biased tone in this
Speaker 3: whole thing.
Speaker 2: I see this, I do, okay, but it doesn't also
Speaker 2: take away from the facts.
Speaker 3: True. But I mean having a yin yang when it
Speaker 3: comes to masculine feminine view on things like that's and
Speaker 3: that's not a just new hot tape. I mean many
Speaker 3: for cultures have believed in the ying yang of female
Speaker 3: and men, and.
Speaker 2: Even ancient Mail and Brew alchemy talks about these divine
Speaker 2: feminine masculine qualities. I'm with you, But the conversation that
Speaker 2: holly and ivy are seen as that dualistic thing that
Speaker 2: has no basis in actual facts.
Speaker 3: That's just assumed. Okay, So fair enough.
Speaker 2: These claims appear to be a simply recent invention that
Speaker 2: we just get repeated endlessly. The most common claim is
Speaker 2: that the Romans merely decorated their homes with holly, ivy
Speaker 2: and mistletoe and hung up wreaths at Saturnalia, and this
Speaker 2: is the origin for our customary decoration. Unfortunately, if we
Speaker 2: search various references to Saturnalia customs and Roman sources, there's
Speaker 2: absolutely no references to holly ivy or missletoe or wreaths.
Speaker 2: Modern Christmas rereads were originally an Advent wreath, a decorated
Speaker 2: circle with four candles, which one lit on each of
Speaker 2: the fasting Sundays before Christmas. So it is completely Christian
Speaker 2: tradition with again no sign of any pagan order. Which
Speaker 2: if you've ever been in a Catholic church and you
Speaker 2: see the Advent candles, there's a pink one and there's
Speaker 2: three purple ones. That's always on a wreath. That's a
Speaker 2: thing that they do once for lynt it's the thing.
Speaker 2: So there's no indication that any of that came from Saturdanalia.
Speaker 2: There's no indication that the Druids did reads or anything
Speaker 2: like that either, which is interesting. This leaves us with mistletoe,
Speaker 2: and here the Pagan origins articles at least have a
Speaker 2: couple of pre Christian references that they can utilize with
Speaker 2: a bit of work. Unlike the holly claims, we actually
Speaker 2: do have an ancient source link in the ancient Celtic
Speaker 2: priestly class of Druids to missletoe in the first century
Speaker 2: AD encyclopedia Natural History, by Plenty of the Older he
Speaker 2: writes about missletoe, which before we get into that, plenty
Speaker 2: of the older shit on flat earthers in this book
Speaker 2: called Natural History, which by all accounts we can just
Speaker 2: say was the first encyclopedia ever written. I'm not saying
Speaker 2: it was all accurate, but I am saying that he
Speaker 2: was even shitting on flat earthers in that. And this
Speaker 2: was in the first century eighty. I think it was
Speaker 2: finally compiled in like seventy or seventy two ady, But anyway,
Speaker 2: it continues on. It gives a direct quote here, But
Speaker 2: this is what I was talking about earlier. Clad in
Speaker 2: a white robe, the priest ascends the tree and cuts
Speaker 2: the mistletoe with a golden sickle, which is received by
Speaker 2: others in a white cloak. Then they immolate the victims,
Speaker 2: offering up their prayers that God will render this gift
Speaker 2: of his propitious to those or his proprietas okay, to
Speaker 2: those whom He has granted it. It is the belief
Speaker 2: with them that the mistletoe taken in drink will impart
Speaker 2: fecundity to all animals that are barren, and that it
Speaker 2: is an antidote for all poisons, which is crazy, because
Speaker 2: mistletoe is actually a poison and if you ingest it,
Speaker 2: you will die. You might get very sick, but like
Speaker 2: the probability of you dying is extremely high. So the
Speaker 2: druids doing that, that leads me to believe some other stuff.
Speaker 2: But neither here nor they're moving on. So if any
Speaker 2: of this is accurate, and with plenty that is far
Speaker 2: from certain. Here is at least what we have some
Speaker 2: evidence of a pagan association with mistletoe. But has this
Speaker 2: got anything to do with the midwinter decoration or the
Speaker 2: origins of the Christmas tradition regarding mistletoe. No, it is
Speaker 2: not enough to gesture to some ancient pagan belief about
Speaker 2: mistletoe and then decide that this means our use of
Speaker 2: it is pagan in origin. There's actually no evidence here
Speaker 2: of any connection. So moving on here, we talked about
Speaker 2: the misstletoe, the holly, the ivy, these things, and we
Speaker 2: can keep reading it, but it does talk about in
Speaker 2: the seventeen hundreds this became a thing that more or
Speaker 2: less found its way into Christian and Christmas iconography. So
Speaker 2: moving on here.
Speaker 3: Yule logs.
Speaker 2: Now, this is an interesting one, to be honest with you,
Speaker 2: because I didn't know what the origins of this was.
Speaker 2: Let's break it down. Yule logs tend to be a
Speaker 2: traditional element of Christmas, more referred to and included in
Speaker 2: imagery than actual practice these days. It was a tradition
Speaker 2: of finding and dragging a large log into the home,
Speaker 2: making sure it was one sufficiently large to burn from
Speaker 2: Christmas Eve through the following day. In other iterations, it
Speaker 2: was burned incrementally each day from Christmas Eve to the
Speaker 2: twelfth night. In various versions of the tradition, the cutting, dragging,
Speaker 2: and lighting of the yule log was accompanied by drinking
Speaker 2: and singing, and the log was sometimes sprinkled with wine
Speaker 2: or spirits. Sometimes a fragment of the log was kept
Speaker 2: and used the next year to light the next Yule log,
Speaker 2: though its variants of the custom was simply kept for luck,
Speaker 2: or used to light fires on particularly stormy nights, and
Speaker 2: still some other versions its ashes were used to sprinkle
Speaker 2: over the fields. This all looks and feels rather pagan,
Speaker 2: and so it is usually claimed that the tradition, if
Speaker 2: now largely unpracticed, Christmas custom, was deep pagan roots. Back
Speaker 2: in seventeen seventy seven, the English antiquarian Henry Born declared
Speaker 2: the custom to be pagan in origin, but had to
Speaker 2: use a lot of speculative language to do so, noting
Speaker 2: Bead's eighth century references to pagan Yule following falling on
Speaker 2: December twenty fifth, the Yule clog, which is log, therefore
Speaker 2: hath probably been a part of these ceremonies which were
Speaker 2: performed the knights that night's ceremonies. It seems to have
Speaker 2: been used as an mblas of the return of the
Speaker 2: sun and the lightning or the lengthening of days, for
Speaker 2: as both December and January were called Gweley and Yule
Speaker 2: upon account of the sun's returning and the increase of days.
Speaker 2: So I am apt to believe the log had has
Speaker 2: had the name of the Eule Log from its being
Speaker 2: burnt as an emblem of the returning sun and the
Speaker 2: increase of light and heat. This is probably the reason
Speaker 2: for the custom among the Heathen Saxons. This means that
Speaker 2: Bourne does not actually find any ancient references to the
Speaker 2: ejule Log, so he assumes them and reads them into bead.
Speaker 2: All this really tells is that he is assuming pagan origins. Okay,
Speaker 2: so that's fair. Okay, it sounds like it is often
Speaker 2: stated that there is a much earlier German reference to
Speaker 2: the yule log tradition, dating all the way back to
Speaker 2: eleven eighty four. However, Peter Gainsford has tracked this back
Speaker 2: to its source, an edict from the privileges of the
Speaker 2: parish priest Alhan, Westphalia, and found it simply says a
Speaker 2: tree is to be provided to the priest at the
Speaker 2: nativity of the Lord, to be brought for his own
Speaker 2: fire at the festival. So this does not seem to
Speaker 2: be any reference to the Yule law custom and appears
Speaker 2: to simply be a utilitarian provision of firewood for the
Speaker 2: local priest. So continuing on this dude, Ronald Hutton notes
Speaker 2: fairly skepticism about, or fairly early skepticism about the ancient
Speaker 2: origins of the custom, pointing out to Alexander Till's observations
Speaker 2: in eighteen eighty nine that Herrick is the earliest reference
Speaker 2: to it in Britain Till notes some medieval German references
Speaker 2: to the provision of firewood at Christmas, which he had
Speaker 2: he and Hutton thinks may be the origin of the tradition,
Speaker 2: though these two seem largely utilitarian rather than ritual. Hutton
Speaker 2: also notes that the later references shown by the nineteenth
Speaker 2: century versions of the julaw tradition was found in France,
Speaker 2: the Italian Apps, and Serbia, but also was found in
Speaker 2: most parts of Europe. He believes the tradition began in
Speaker 2: medieval Germany, pointing to the fact that all iterations of
Speaker 2: it by the nineteenth century ringed German. So once again,
Speaker 2: while claims that this was ancient pagan custom, there's little
Speaker 2: evidence to support either idea. The yule log custom appears
Speaker 2: to be a local, you know, local variant or tradition
Speaker 2: that began as purely practiced aspect of a midwinter festival,
Speaker 2: making sure there is enough log to keep everyone.
Speaker 3: Warm for the duration.
Speaker 2: M I didn't know that, Honestly, I didn't either, But
Speaker 2: and that makes sense. Like as far as the decoration
Speaker 2: of the yule log, as we see people doing today,
Speaker 2: cool decorate your yule log, there's no problem.
Speaker 3: But also I don't have well, I don't have anywhere,
Speaker 3: like I don't have a fire pit or anywhere to
Speaker 3: be able to burn the log sure for the time needed,
Speaker 3: and you're supposed to burn it for a certain amount
Speaker 3: of time. I have no place to do that. So
Speaker 3: normally what I do with my little log is I
Speaker 3: have the colors for Yule. So I have three three
Speaker 3: candle holes, and I have the colors three different types
Speaker 3: of candles that I put in and I light every
Speaker 3: single day for a certain amount of time because I
Speaker 3: don't or I let them burn down and then I
Speaker 3: replace them every day, depends if I like I'm actually
Speaker 3: gonna be there or not. And then around the log
Speaker 3: it's so elf. I have orange slices, I have pine cones.
Speaker 3: I have mistletoe. I have we else do I have.
Speaker 3: I have a couple other.
Speaker 4: Things, cranberries probably cranberries.
Speaker 3: I have pomegranate. Yeah, I have pomegranate seeds. And I
Speaker 3: have one other thing too, it's a I don't know why,
Speaker 3: it's just skeep in my mind. It's another plant that's
Speaker 3: involved with mule. And I normally have it like set
Speaker 3: up all the way around it and stuff like that,
Speaker 3: and so that's kind of what I have is my
Speaker 3: little mule setup and what I normally do every single year,
Speaker 3: and it's on my counter because that's the only place
Speaker 3: I don't I don't have anywhere to be able to
Speaker 3: do the like the full tradition for it.
Speaker 4: So sure, but sometimes I get the little goat.
Speaker 3: I have two little goats too.
Speaker 2: Those Scannadian goats, yet little scan and.
Speaker 3: Even wooden goats. I have them, but I couldn't find
Speaker 3: them this year. Normally I have two of them that
Speaker 3: I put out on both sides.
Speaker 2: Of it, So no doubt. But again, there's nothing endemically
Speaker 2: saying that the yule log practice has any pagan origin.
Speaker 3: That's it's kind of disheartening.
Speaker 2: Tradition.
Speaker 3: I know, It's not like super disheartingment. It's kind of
Speaker 3: like ow all right, I mean, because man, it's like
Speaker 3: finding out Santa Claus is real.
Speaker 2: Wait what yep, it's finally out. The elf on the
Speaker 2: shelf is a la boo boo. Anyway, So now let's
Speaker 2: talk about Christmas trees. So many people talk about these
Speaker 2: Christmas trees demonitory clearly so decorating.
Speaker 3: Somehow a tree is gonna be of the devil it's
Speaker 3: gonna come and get you. It's going to drag you
Speaker 3: to hell. It's gotta be right.
Speaker 2: And that's also crazy because we talked about this, I
Speaker 2: think yesterday's episode. In the Philippines, they do like mangoes
Speaker 2: and banana trees, yeah, they do. And somehow these evergreen trees,
Speaker 2: yeah yeah, but somehow in Europe, these evergreen trees, you mean,
Speaker 2: like the Nordics, Like, wait, stop, bro, what what I just.
Speaker 3: It's just so wild to me, Like, I don't understand
Speaker 3: how so many themes have become so demonized and such
Speaker 3: a weapon against people of like you don't believe in
Speaker 3: this particular thing, and my blah blah blah blah. It's
Speaker 3: like wait, what so you could do frank and sense
Speaker 3: and murder and like feel some type of way about
Speaker 3: having that, but like we can't have some orange slices, bro,
Speaker 3: Like that orange slice is gonna get you. He's going
Speaker 3: to take you to hell.
Speaker 2: This is my issue with it. But again, it's like
Speaker 2: anything can be done with negative or evil intent, and
Speaker 2: I think we could both agree with that, right. I
Speaker 2: don't believe that when you're putting out your yule log,
Speaker 2: you're trying to imbuse aatan no.
Speaker 3: I mean, it's about rebirth. It's about starting your your
Speaker 3: new year in a better light. Like there's a there's
Speaker 3: a good tradition that a lot of people do where
Speaker 3: you write down all the things that you want for
Speaker 3: or you want to get rid of all the negative
Speaker 3: thoughts or all the negative things that have happened that
Speaker 3: year to you, and you burn them and release him,
Speaker 3: and then you plant you write down all this stuff
Speaker 3: that you want and then you plant it under a
Speaker 3: tree or any kind of plant you have in your house,
Speaker 3: and then I have it in my house. I have
Speaker 3: a couple of them that.
Speaker 2: You So the idea that the ulog is a pagan
Speaker 2: thing and we're going to learn this later on as
Speaker 2: far as the Christmas trees are concerned as well, these
Speaker 2: are things that were based off of at least Christian
Speaker 2: culture and then was adopted by Pagans later on. Okay,
Speaker 2: because Pagans were losing so many members to the Christianization
Speaker 2: of Europe that they try to start acting like Christians
Speaker 2: for lack of better words, to keep their pagan people.
Speaker 3: That's interesting because that's completely contradicting everything I've read. History
Speaker 3: is a bit of a lie. Sometimes well, I.
Speaker 4: Mean, but these are by scholars that I've read.
Speaker 2: We are quoting scholars, okay.
Speaker 4: But you're also I mean, we just have read like
Speaker 4: multiple different sources.
Speaker 2: Like I'm just so many scholars are going after the
Speaker 2: Christian faith because like, clearly Christians are the reason for
Speaker 2: all the bad shit in the world.
Speaker 3: I mean, I at least from the by they didn't
Speaker 3: seem like they had biased tones in the ones that
Speaker 3: I've read in the last few days. It's simply and
Speaker 3: it even said that there's two sides of it. It
Speaker 3: talked about both sides and both opinions. This one in
Speaker 3: particular woman she's a doctorate, Her doctorate is in like
Speaker 3: two different things, and she pretty much goes into this
Speaker 3: is one this one side is believing all of these things.
Speaker 3: This one side is believing all of these things. There
Speaker 3: is mixed information on all accounts, because there's so many
Speaker 3: things that were written down, not written down, that have
Speaker 3: been misconstruted that potentially could be this and and pretty
Speaker 3: much it was like a wash. You could say that
Speaker 3: this is a this is what these people believe, this
Speaker 3: is what this people wrote down. These people didn't really
Speaker 3: have a written language that they like went out of there.
Speaker 3: They had it, but they didn't go out of their
Speaker 3: way to discuss all of these things. They were trying
Speaker 3: to preserve their actual heritage and not talk about everything
Speaker 3: that was going on, and so it was just it
Speaker 3: was like a wash completely. When it came to who
Speaker 3: is right, it's aiss in the wind kind of a thing, like, okay.
Speaker 2: Yeah, that's fair, honestly, And again, there are some of
Speaker 2: these traditions that I could see why certain assumptions would
Speaker 2: be made, and there are certain ones that like we
Speaker 2: honestly don't have much of a source.
Speaker 3: It's just one of the things that came about.
Speaker 4: I mean, Christmas trees are dramatic.
Speaker 2: So Christmas trees are one of those things. It has
Speaker 2: become such a popular iconographal look of when you think
Speaker 2: of Christmas, you think of a decorated Christmas tree, right,
Speaker 2: So let's get into this one now. Decorating Christmas trees
Speaker 2: are so ubiquitous in modern Christmas traditions that they have
Speaker 2: become the de facto symbol of the season, and they
Speaker 2: are among the Christmas customs most usually declared to be
Speaker 2: pagan in origin, with confident pronouncements that they variously have
Speaker 2: their origins in Celtic tradition, Germanic mule customs, or yet
Speaker 2: again Roman saturnalia. After all, many ask what has putting
Speaker 2: up a tree in our home and hanging decorations when
Speaker 2: it got to do with the birth of Christ. Clearly
Speaker 2: it's assumed that this has been has to be pagan
Speaker 2: in origin. Some Christians are those most insistent of this
Speaker 2: pagan origin, even declaring it to be so ancient and
Speaker 2: pagan that these wicked trees are explicitly condemned in the Bible.
Speaker 3: They cite.
Speaker 2: The text sided here is Jeremiah ten two through four,
Speaker 2: and it is often given the King James version for
Speaker 2: the extra old world. Zing good people, I'm gonna I'm
Speaker 2: gonna break this down because I'm gonna jump ahead from
Speaker 2: what he's talking about here, but I'm gonna read the
Speaker 2: quote here. Thus saith the Lord, learn not the way
Speaker 2: of the heathen, and be not dismayed at the sign
Speaker 2: of heaven, for the heathen are dismade at them, or
Speaker 2: the customs of the people are vain. For one cuteth
Speaker 2: the tree out of the forest, the work of the
Speaker 2: hands of the workmen, with an axe. They deck it
Speaker 2: with silver and gold. They fasten it with nails and
Speaker 2: with hammers that it moved. Not okay, y'all, they are
Speaker 2: talking about making wooden idols, no shit, But clearly they're
Speaker 2: talking about cutting a tree down, carving a sculpture and
Speaker 2: idle out of it, and adorning it with silver and gold.
Speaker 2: How people took this and made it to be clearly
Speaker 2: a Christmas tree, I actually don't understand how they made
Speaker 2: that connection, especially when you look at the context of
Speaker 2: the time and place that Jeremiah was speaking. But anyway,
Speaker 2: we're gonna jump ahead here. There is no pagan Christmas
Speaker 2: tree to be found here as far as that conversation goes.
Speaker 2: Another commonly repeated story of the origin of the Christmas
Speaker 2: tree is attributed to Saint Boniface in six seventy five
Speaker 2: and seven fifty four, and I'm gonna jump ahead on
Speaker 2: this one as well. Apparently this saint cut down a
Speaker 2: sacred oak to Odin as a sign of his power
Speaker 2: over the old gods, and finds an evergreen tree standing
Speaker 2: behind it, or miraculously growing in its place, and he declares,
Speaker 2: this little tree, a young child of the forest, shall
Speaker 2: be your holy tree tonight. It is the wood of peace.
Speaker 2: It is the sign of the endless life where it
Speaker 2: leaves our evergreen, so how it points upwards to heaven.
Speaker 2: So okay, here's the deal. There is no historical context
Speaker 2: to say that the oak is important to Odin. There
Speaker 2: are certain woods that were very sacred to the Nordic traditions.
Speaker 2: I'm not denying that whatsoever. There is no references to
Speaker 2: say that the oak tree was even like a thing
Speaker 2: for Odin whatsoever. So that connection to say that he
Speaker 2: was doing this as a trounce to the Nordic tradition
Speaker 2: and then took the fir behind it to be the
Speaker 2: replacement is on shaky ground at best. So again, as
Speaker 2: it's talking about the life of Saint Boniface circus seven sixty,
Speaker 2: but the Christmas tree element is not found there, and
Speaker 2: there is nothing in that or similar accounts that associates
Speaker 2: the pagan oak tree with the midwinter or Yule. Roger
Speaker 2: Pierce has tracked that ending of the story and that
Speaker 2: quote from the Saint back to a eighteen ninety one
Speaker 2: short story by Henry van Dyke called The Oak of Geismer,
Speaker 2: first published in Scribner's Magazine. The story was a hit
Speaker 2: and later published in expanded form as a novel, The
Speaker 2: First Christmas Tree, A Story of the Forest, in eighteen
Speaker 2: ninety seven. They don't even think the dude actually did this.
Speaker 2: This was a quote hundreds of years after he died
Speaker 2: that was made popular in the eighteen hundreds, so like,
Speaker 2: it's not a thing. So while this story is still
Speaker 2: repeated mainly by Catholic publications as the very first Christian
Speaker 2: origin of the Christmas Tree, it has also given rise
Speaker 2: to the idea that Boniface stole quote unquote the custom
Speaker 2: from the Pagans he converted. So it is claimed that
Speaker 2: the sacred oak cut down was the original Christmas tree,
Speaker 2: despite being an oak not associated with midwinter, Yule or
Speaker 2: Christmas time in any way. Most claims of the pagan
Speaker 2: origins of the Christmas Tree do not even bother with
Speaker 2: an origin story or even references to source at all.
Speaker 2: We are simply informed that these trees are set up
Speaker 2: by Pagans at midwinter and decorated, and that this is
Speaker 2: the origin of our custom. This is despite the fact
Speaker 2: that our few references to Saturdayalea or Yule or any
Speaker 2: midwinter festivals have absolutely no reference to any such thing.
Speaker 2: It is a claim that has strength and currency purely
Speaker 2: out of endless repetition.
Speaker 3: That's the thing.
Speaker 2: Even in the Nordics, the traditional Yule thing of cutting
Speaker 2: down a tree and bringing it they didn't do that.
Speaker 3: I don't know why they would, though. I would see
Speaker 3: them decorating a tree outside in the woods. In the woods,
Speaker 3: for sure, because they decorated a lot of the trees
Speaker 3: for the festivals, and they you know, they cut them
Speaker 3: down to be able to build stuff. But inherently you're
Speaker 3: more tuned with nature, So I don't see them just
Speaker 3: cutting it down and bringing it in for no reason.
Speaker 3: I could see them decorating the trees all outside, sure,
Speaker 3: and doing that kind of a thing.
Speaker 2: Well, let's get into it more, says once again. However,
Speaker 2: it seems this custom is relatively recent, not ancient, and
Speaker 2: not pigging in any way. The earliest evidence for a
Speaker 2: Christmas tree comes from the forestry regulations from the Rhineland
Speaker 2: cities of Sulfon and Bergen dating to the thirteen hundreds,
Speaker 2: so we're talking about Germany. Now, these put limits on
Speaker 2: people's collecting fur trees or branches in the period around Christmas.
Speaker 2: So long story short, we then get similar walls in
Speaker 2: the fourteen hundreds and also from the Upper Rhine region,
Speaker 2: limiting the number and size of trees people could take
Speaker 2: from the forest at Christmas. A couple of these specifically
Speaker 2: referred to them being used as decorated poles, probably much
Speaker 2: like may poles. Finally, in the fifteen hundreds we get
Speaker 2: descriptions of decorated trees or poles set up in public
Speaker 2: squares in cities in Latvia and Estonia. So I actually
Speaker 2: did more research into this. In the thirteen hundreds, it
Speaker 2: was so common for even the peasantry to go out
Speaker 2: into their lord's land and cut certain trees down to
Speaker 2: bring in to decorate.
Speaker 3: And again super Christian.
Speaker 2: At this time in the thirteen hundreds, there was already
Speaker 2: multiple crusades that had taken place.
Speaker 3: In all this.
Speaker 2: It was done to where they couldn't bring in a
Speaker 2: tree taller than seven foot.
Speaker 3: I forget, I actually looked into the tree thing long
Speaker 3: time ago, so I didn't actually look at any I
Speaker 3: knew you'd already have looked into this, but I remember
Speaker 3: the there is a story about where this actually came from,
Speaker 3: long long time ago, but it's a very it's a
Speaker 3: folk tale, so it's it's not. It's very obscure and
Speaker 3: most people don't hold me weight to it. But pretty
Speaker 3: much it's a story. It's a little short story about
Speaker 3: how this tree was sacred and how they brought it,
Speaker 3: like why they brought it in and why they decorated it.
Speaker 3: And they really didn't even decorate. They kind of just
Speaker 3: like put like little stuff up and little scraps up
Speaker 3: and stuff like that. But I don't know, it's it's
Speaker 3: been a long time since I read it, but it
Speaker 3: was way way, way way way back, but well before
Speaker 3: this time period, and it was like this little tiny
Speaker 3: story that there was a blip in this big book
Speaker 3: that I read about it, and it was kind of like,
Speaker 3: this is where we think it came from and why
Speaker 3: this kind of makes sense to us and why this happened.
Speaker 2: But and there may be something to that, especially in
Speaker 2: the in the northern Germany. I mean that there's all
Speaker 2: kinds of customs and traditions there that make no sense
Speaker 2: outside of that region. So I mean, who's to say it.
Speaker 3: Was it was? I wish I would have. I wish
Speaker 3: I know the actual name of the story. It's been
Speaker 3: a long time. It was in one of those books,
Speaker 3: you know, back in the day when we actually had
Speaker 3: like borders, yeah, Barnes and Noble. I'm talking like years ago.
Speaker 3: I read this and it was a It was a honestly,
Speaker 3: it was like a two page story, so it wasn't
Speaker 3: anything crazy. But they're like, this is where we kind
Speaker 3: of think this comes from. And I always thought years ago,
Speaker 3: I was like, hmm, I wonder if that's actually where
Speaker 3: trees come like this whole decorating of trees come from.
Speaker 2: Well, I mean, who's to say. It could be an
Speaker 2: old local folk lord it was.
Speaker 3: It was a folk lore. It was to ward off
Speaker 3: I think, spirits, and it had like another it was
Speaker 3: it was this little cabin in the wood, Like the
Speaker 3: picture that it had with it was this little cabin
Speaker 3: in the wood out in the middle of nowhere, and
Speaker 3: it had to do with the spirits, and it had
Speaker 3: to do with like this little this little old lady
Speaker 3: and two kids, and it was just like this. It
Speaker 3: was a really interesting little story.
Speaker 2: But and warding off spirits is not endemically Christian or pagan.
Speaker 2: All cultures have their own version of this. And if
Speaker 2: you question that, look at Gargoyle's on old Catholic churches.
Speaker 2: It goes across all cultural bounds, So if that is
Speaker 2: the origin story, it's not endemically one or the Other's
Speaker 2: just one of those things.
Speaker 3: No. I think it was just it was from this
Speaker 3: little bitty town and they had a little blurp of
Speaker 3: the story that they heard that it had been passed
Speaker 3: down and passed down and passed down, and so they
Speaker 3: kind of wrote down what they had heard from the
Speaker 3: locals and they're like, maybe this is where it comes from.
Speaker 3: And that was you know, but it's it's been like, honestly,
Speaker 3: like two decades, so it's been a long time since
Speaker 3: I read it, so Continuous says.
Speaker 2: By sixteen fifty seven, the practice have moved to private
Speaker 2: homes and was common enough for Protestant theologian Johann Conrad
Speaker 2: Donhauer to condemn Christmas trees as trifles and describe them
Speaker 2: as decorated with dolls and sugar. Exactly why the custom
Speaker 2: began is not clear. It could just be an extension
Speaker 2: of using evergreen branches as midwinter decorations, or it could
Speaker 2: be the medieval Christian Christmas Eve produced productions of the
Speaker 2: play of Atom with a tree of Paradise as its
Speaker 2: central prop usually a fur decorated with apples inspired the custom.
Speaker 2: Which that's another thing too, So back in these days,
Speaker 2: most of the people couldn't read, right, like the gift
Speaker 2: of the place. Yeah, the gift of illumination, i e.
Speaker 2: Being able to read was something only for the noble class.
Speaker 2: So how would you teach the peasantry about Jesus except
Speaker 2: give them plays? And so the story of the Play
Speaker 2: of Adam was very, very popular at this time, and
Speaker 2: it was done during the winter months as a celebration thing,
Speaker 2: especially because everybody's not going out into the fields, they're inside.
Speaker 2: And typically for the tree of the good of evil
Speaker 2: the fruit, excuse me, the tree of the knowledge of
Speaker 2: good and evil the fruit, they would need a tree
Speaker 2: to use as a prop. Typically they would cut down
Speaker 2: an evergreen tree and just kind of like place some
Speaker 2: apples in it. As the iconography. But there's that's kind
Speaker 2: of an idea of maybe where it came from, But
Speaker 2: there's actually no real backing to that one either. So
Speaker 2: this inspired that custom possibly. What we do know is
Speaker 2: that the earliest clear references to Christmas trees date to
Speaker 2: the early modern period. Claims of ancient pre Christian origins
Speaker 2: are fanciful Christmas trees had not become ubiquitous international custom
Speaker 2: they are today until the eighteen hundreds, after Queen Victoria
Speaker 2: made this previously German and Northern European custom fashionable across
Speaker 2: the English speaking world, also because she had German origins.
Speaker 2: It seems that because it was so common today, people
Speaker 2: assume it must have always been a traditional Christmas custom
Speaker 2: and so must be ancient and have Pagan roots. But
Speaker 2: there's just simply no evidence that this is the case.
Speaker 2: Most of the claims about the pagan origins of the
Speaker 2: Christmas trees are simply vague assertions, though the few people
Speaker 2: who try to make more specific claims can be highly creative.
Speaker 2: The idea that decorating a pine tree carried to the
Speaker 2: Temple of Cybel in Rome is the origin of the
Speaker 2: custom does not really work, given that this was done
Speaker 2: on March twenty second. When people attempt to claim Cato
Speaker 2: the Elder's instructions to cut oak polls for the cultivation
Speaker 2: of grape vines in midwinter in his second century BC
Speaker 2: farming manual, this is somehow related to the Christmas trees.
Speaker 2: To these people, its creativity is given a way to desperation.
Speaker 2: Christmas trees are a medieval Christian custom, not an ancient
Speaker 2: pagan one. So okay, there we have that we can
Speaker 2: get into Santa Claus. But honestly, there's so many different
Speaker 2: backstories to the Santa Claus thing. And that's the thing
Speaker 2: when we're talking about the American Santa Claus versus the
Speaker 2: French Papa Noel versus the Italian what was the name
Speaker 2: we learned last night, the Boga Pepero or something versus
Speaker 2: the British Father Christmas to the Russian Santa Cloch with
Speaker 2: his winter queen. There's so many different backgrounds to this one.
Speaker 2: I think we can all just kind of acknowledge that
Speaker 2: Santa Claus does not have pagan origins. If anything, that's
Speaker 2: just a culture thing country to country, So fair enough.
Speaker 2: Here there is that claim that the eight reindeer came
Speaker 2: from slept near right, which is Loki's son from when
Speaker 2: he turned himself into a female horse to stop the
Speaker 2: workhorse of the giant from creating the wall to keep
Speaker 2: the ice giants out, and slept near his eight legs.
Speaker 2: And during Ragnarok, Odin is supposed to ride slept near
Speaker 2: into battle, and that's clearly Odin is Sanna, and the
Speaker 2: eight legged slept near horse is the eight reindeer. Again,
Speaker 2: this is we are drawing at some very very thin
Speaker 2: threads of evidence to like back that claim. I think
Speaker 2: we can all, like actually with a logical brain, acknowledge that.
Speaker 2: So moving on, let's see, that's just kind of the
Speaker 2: conclusions on all of this. And again this kind of
Speaker 2: breaks it all down here. A lot of these things
Speaker 2: that people think are sober pagan are not at all
Speaker 2: pagan whatsoever, and if anything, are Christian in origin. And
Speaker 2: there is a disagreement whether the Pagans adopted some of
Speaker 2: these to seem like they were trying to keep their
Speaker 2: pagan roots and keep their people from becoming Christianized. I'm
Speaker 2: not sure if that's a how strong that claim is.
Speaker 2: But to say that the yule log or mistletoe, or
Speaker 2: Christmas trees, or gift giving or feasting or even December
Speaker 2: twenty fifth is pagan in origin, that's there's no credibility
Speaker 2: behind any of these claims.
Speaker 3: I feel, I honestly feel like it's the opposite, to
Speaker 3: be honest with you, Okay, what do you mean? I
Speaker 3: feel that this is Christianity adopted paganism or pagan I
Speaker 3: wouldn't even see pagan I would say winter Solstice traditions
Speaker 3: that potentially could have had, like you know, using evergreens
Speaker 3: or using different types of things to decorate and converting
Speaker 3: it into trying to meld Christmas and Mule or winter
Speaker 3: Solstice practices together to draw in more Pagans to becoming Christians.
Speaker 2: But was there any source, not even in that art
Speaker 2: or I'm asking you, is there any source to say
Speaker 2: that even the practitioners of Nordic paganism way back when,
Speaker 2: that they would bring evergreen trees into their homes, if anything,
Speaker 2: they would decorate him in the forest. And I agree
Speaker 2: one hundred percent with that. But the idea behind hell,
Speaker 2: the first Christmas tree properly decorated was done by Martin Luther.
Speaker 3: I know, I was just looking at that.
Speaker 2: Yeah, that's also pretty crazy. The first devout League guy
Speaker 2: to go against the Catholic Church is also the first
Speaker 2: dude to decorate a Christmas tree in Germany.
Speaker 3: Yeah. A famous piece of folklore credits the sixteenth century
Speaker 3: Protestant reform Martin Luther with the first being the first
Speaker 3: to put candles on the tree after being inspired by
Speaker 3: the side of the stars shining.
Speaker 4: Through an evergreen forest.
Speaker 3: Is noted, though that there is no definitive proof that
Speaker 3: he was actually the first, but he was commonly credited
Speaker 3: with making the practice more popular, and also because I
Speaker 3: was looking for I was looking for that story, honestly,
Speaker 3: it says Count Odin Vaughan Gorgas. One romantic legend from
Speaker 3: the seventh seventh century tells us of a cold hearted nobleman,
Speaker 3: Count Oda, who fell in love with a fairy princess.
Speaker 3: She appeared to him in a room where a magnificent
Speaker 3: tree stood, its branches glittering with diamonds and pearls. Though
Speaker 3: she eventually left him, he counted he continued to set
Speaker 3: up a tree, a lightened tree. Excuse me, every Christmas
Speaker 3: Eve in her memory is one of the is one
Speaker 3: of the German evolutions of folklore. The paradise tree is mentioned.
Speaker 3: I was looking for that small little story. I was like,
Speaker 3: can I find this story really quick?
Speaker 2: But also decorating a Christmas tree with candles inside your
Speaker 2: home that is fucking wild.
Speaker 3: It's not like they thought to probably put it in water,
Speaker 3: I mean, or had like a big enough pot to well,
Speaker 3: I mean they did, but they I don't think. They
Speaker 3: just were like, hey, you know what, let's put this
Speaker 3: pot of water to keep it alive. Bro Levage dries
Speaker 3: out so quick I.
Speaker 2: Have thrown freshly cut trees on a fire. They still
Speaker 2: take the fuck off. That sap is both yea like
Speaker 2: ancient gasoline. So for him to put candles, and I
Speaker 2: understand thea they didn't have electric lights. I get that
Speaker 2: decorating it with stuff cool cool broke candles on an
Speaker 2: evergreen bro You fucking wild, Martin Luther Okay.
Speaker 3: Allegedly, Apparently the Christmas tree in America really took off
Speaker 3: in New York City, the hub of Dutch and German
Speaker 3: and culture. Yeah, and tradition's final step for it, said,
Speaker 3: The tradition's final step for cultural practice to commercialize phenomenon
Speaker 3: came in December of eighteen fifty one. A woodsman from
Speaker 3: the Catskills called Mark Carr recognized the business opportunity and
Speaker 3: hauled two sleds loaded with fur trees to the street
Speaker 3: corner in New York City. He sold them. He sold
Speaker 3: all of them, becoming the first commercial Christmas tree vendor
Speaker 3: and solidifying the trees place as it ever, enduring at
Speaker 3: the Trees Place as an enduring American institution.
Speaker 2: Yeah, that's fair.
Speaker 3: I didn't actually know that, to be honest with you.
Speaker 3: I didn't know when it really made its way over
Speaker 3: here and how that really got started.
Speaker 2: To can continue on here this article from the Church Times.
Speaker 2: Here the Yule candle that is first mentioned in Scotland
Speaker 2: in eighteen oh eight, the Yule Games first mentioned in
Speaker 2: sixteen eleven, Yu'll log first mentioned in seventeen twenty five,
Speaker 2: and the Yule Tide is first mentioned in fifteen seventy two.
Speaker 2: All of these are super after the Christianization of Europe.
Speaker 2: So it's a lot of these. And yes, Yu'll being
Speaker 2: the season of the north to mark winter for its
Speaker 2: all of the winterness things, yes, one hundred percent, But
Speaker 2: there's so many sources to say that it is not
Speaker 2: in any way actually a pagan thing. It's just kind
Speaker 2: of one of those things. Now I'm talking about how
Speaker 2: December twenty fifth became Christmas. We kind of touched on
Speaker 2: it a bit. We really don't have to read this
Speaker 2: article here, but yeah, I mean to say that, but
Speaker 2: so many of our Christmas traditions are based in some
Speaker 2: sort of paganism. There's not much evidence to back that
Speaker 2: claim whatsoever. Your thoughts on this, Raven.
Speaker 3: I think it's interesting. I think that for so long
Speaker 3: we've been told that the story, the narrative that's been
Speaker 3: passed down is that all of this is from paganism
Speaker 3: or from pagans, and that this is uh, you know,
Speaker 3: inherently not a good thing because it's not from the Church. Right.
Speaker 3: So I think it's interesting that there's that the articles
Speaker 3: that you brought are saying that these are not pagan
Speaker 3: in root, that they are actually Christian root, and that
Speaker 3: the Church is the reason why for these specific traditions
Speaker 3: that have been believed and demonized as you know, inherently
Speaker 3: bad and they're weaponized against people that believe in anything
Speaker 3: other than Christianity or you know, Catholicism.
Speaker 4: And so I think it's a it's an interesting thing.
Speaker 3: I mean, I really did not believe. Honestly, I did
Speaker 3: not know. I still think it's interesting that scholars don't
Speaker 3: believe inherently or agree with each other that there's two
Speaker 3: different sides to this. But also history is what is
Speaker 3: written down and by who is it written like, who
Speaker 3: wrote it down? What influences do they have? The bias
Speaker 3: the biases that they showed what their background was, what
Speaker 3: information information was pertinent to them versus what actually was
Speaker 3: taking place. Did they speak the language correctly, did they
Speaker 3: understand all of the information. Who gave them the information?
Speaker 3: Did they go and actually observe with their own eyes
Speaker 3: or did they hear it secondhand? Did they you know?
Speaker 3: Everything about what we know is we don't know all
Speaker 3: of the historical context to it, So we only know
Speaker 3: I feel like a snibbet of what potentially would have
Speaker 3: been those winter solstice practices, and so at least if
Speaker 3: there is anything that was inherently from those cultures that
Speaker 3: is still around, it's still a good thing. I do
Speaker 3: think that maybe more people should get educated on this
Speaker 3: topic and stop believing that everything is of the devil,
Speaker 3: and anybody that believes in anything.
Speaker 4: Other than what they believe in is just evil inherent.
Speaker 3: I think it's we should all be practicing at least
Speaker 3: more customs that involve us at least recognizing that, you know,
Speaker 3: we we do belong here, and we do inherently live
Speaker 3: on earth, and we do connect with nature in many
Speaker 3: different ways, and so we should at least give some
Speaker 3: thanks to nature in and of itself.
Speaker 4: I don't feel like that is evil in any way possible.
Speaker 2: So no, same one hundred percent, even if you are
Speaker 2: a Christian acknowledging that nature is extremely important and extremely
Speaker 2: good for the soul. I don't think that takes away
Speaker 2: from your religious beliefs at all.
Speaker 4: But that being said, I do enjoy decorating my Christmas trees.
Speaker 3: I do have my yule logs out. I am a
Speaker 3: complex human being that likes to practicell different things, and
Speaker 3: I can't wait to put out the poop blog they bo.
Speaker 3: I'm so pumped about this damn pooplog. I think it's
Speaker 3: just like the best. It's so fun.
Speaker 2: I do have a log for you, but it's not massive.
Speaker 2: It's like this big.
Speaker 3: It's fine. We're gonna we're gonna make mini poop blog
Speaker 3: like it's gonna be great. It's baby snakes, little baby ones.
Speaker 2: I'm gonna have a little little little.
Speaker 3: Baby boo booz. I actually do have like a whole
Speaker 3: bunch of little babyluo boo booths. So I'm gonna have
Speaker 3: like the little ones coming out and like Christmas little
Speaker 3: Christmas hats on them like from the elves. That's gonna
Speaker 3: be awesome. No, yes, but as you're listening to this
Speaker 3: on Christmas, I hope you are enjoying your family, your friends,
Speaker 3: your time, and just you know, taking a moment to
Speaker 3: really just remember, you know what's important, whatever that is
Speaker 3: to you practice wise, you know, if you have a religion, if.
Speaker 4: You don't have religion. But yeah, that's kind of where I'm.
Speaker 3: At with it.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I mean I agree. Honestly, we have done multiple
Speaker 2: episodes on this show about the pagan origins of Christmas,
Speaker 2: and I and look any deeper, to be honest, like
Speaker 2: some of them like okay, sure, the trees, the evergreens,
Speaker 2: it's because of this there or the third I had
Speaker 2: never done any more digging onto it. This with the
Speaker 2: backing and the citations and all of this. And that's
Speaker 2: something that I want all the good cult members to
Speaker 2: take with them, not just with the Christmas traditions, but
Speaker 2: with everything. Look at the citations and look at their biases,
Speaker 2: look at the years where they were written. For instance,
Speaker 2: I personally would take plenty of the Elder speaking on
Speaker 2: behalf of Rome as way more of a credible source
Speaker 2: than somebody writing about Rome in the eighteen hundreds.
Speaker 3: Yeah, that being.
Speaker 2: Said, you gotta take plenty of the elder with a
Speaker 2: grain of salt. Because as he was writing about the
Speaker 2: druids and they were cutting down missletoe and they were
Speaker 2: giving it to people to drink or whatever the case was,
Speaker 2: keep in mind he was Roman, so he inherently hated
Speaker 2: the druids. So although he might have a first person
Speaker 2: account of them cutting missletoe down, was he giving them
Speaker 2: their fair due? Did he understand what they were doing
Speaker 2: or why?
Speaker 3: Clearly not.
Speaker 2: So all this is why the word context gets me
Speaker 2: so fucking worked up, because it's so important to everything
Speaker 2: we talk about. I'm just saying, especially when we're talking
Speaker 2: about ancient sources or religious texts, including the Sagas and Eda's,
Speaker 2: the context really matters. If you're reading it like a
Speaker 2: bedtime story, then like fine, you're only going to take
Speaker 2: it as a bedtime story. If you're looking for the
Speaker 2: lesson learned from that story, it has a lot more
Speaker 2: depth and meaning in the context behind everything really matters. So,
Speaker 2: good cult members, we want to hear from you. As
Speaker 2: Raven said, I hope that you are enjoying your Christmas.
Speaker 2: You're enjoying your festivities, whatever you are celebrating at this time.
Speaker 2: With your families, or your loved ones or whatever. I
Speaker 2: hope it's a good one. I hope you have a blast.
Speaker 2: I hope that you are safe, and I hope that
Speaker 2: you are getting fat and happy off of some good
Speaker 2: ass food. I think we can all agree on that,
Speaker 2: regardless of culture. So, with all this being said, good
Speaker 2: cult members, if you are looking to get your start
Speaker 2: in the buying and selling and trading of gold and
Speaker 2: silver bullion, than the best place to go is to
Speaker 2: go to the link in the description to coecsilver dot
Speaker 2: com and get your start today. Do you want to
Speaker 2: buy a little bit of golden silver, a lot of
Speaker 2: gold and silver? Listen, talk to your financial advisor, ask
Speaker 2: him what they earthed, her, what they think about the
Speaker 2: investing in precious medals, And I promise you they're going
Speaker 2: to tell you that at least a portion of your
Speaker 2: retirement portfolio needs to be invested in precious metals. We're
Speaker 2: not talking stock price, We're talking about having actual tangible
Speaker 2: silver and gold in your Handmail to your door once
Speaker 2: get the best place to get your start, but you
Speaker 2: go to CEC silver dot com. But good Colt members,
Speaker 2: we want to hear from you. What do you think
Speaker 2: about this episode. What do you think about these sources?
Speaker 2: What do you have that you hold as a Christmas
Speaker 2: tradition that may or may not have some sort of
Speaker 2: a background that most people don't know about.
Speaker 3: Let us know about it. The best place would be
Speaker 3: too Please.
Speaker 2: Hit the five stars, hit the shares like scotch comments,
Speaker 2: leave a post of reviews, shares at the friends and family,
Speaker 2: shares that we're here's the deal. The more activity the
Speaker 2: algorithm seats across all of our listening platforms, the more
Speaker 2: we get promoted, more potential listeners who can then become
Speaker 2: potential court members. Actor rest of you, fine ladies and gentlemen,
Speaker 2: why are you already? Go check out Menimistics Jonathan Show
Speaker 2: and give them the same lover respect over there with
Speaker 2: the five star reviews and the positivity in the comments.
Speaker 2: Come check out the Cajun Night and come join each
Speaker 2: of us for our individual Patreon lies we host every
Speaker 2: Wednesday night at nine pm Central. Links to those are
Speaker 2: in the description as well. And we thank you for
Speaker 2: everybody's already gone and have done so. And with all
Speaker 2: of this being.
Speaker 3: Said, we wish you a merry Christmas.
Speaker 2: Merry Christmas, a happy Yule a happy I'm not go
Speaker 2: whatever the fuck you're celebrating.
Speaker 3: We hope it's a goblin. And this happy Soltice whatever
Speaker 3: all of it blade when you read, when you hear this,
Speaker 3: it's seem to be blayed.
Speaker 2: But yeah, yeah, happy, happy, happy joy, joy to all
Speaker 2: the festivities. And this was another beautiful episode of the
Speaker 2: Cult of Conspiracy.
Speaker 3: And I am a Cajun night, I am ravingly.
Speaker 2: And there's one very important, extremely vital piece of information
Speaker 2: media learn just as soon as human if possible, sp