JOHANNES NICAENUS's Memoirs upon Christ's Birth, directed to Zachary, a Christian of Armenia.
THIS Author handles this Question; Why the Festival of Christ's Birth is kept on the 25th. day of December; tho' the Constitutions of S. James and the Apostles, appointed * 1.1 that Feast-day on January the 6th, upon which day Christ's Baptism is celebrated. He pre∣tends, that the custom of keeping that Festival on the 6th. of January, came from this, That John Baptist's Disciples, seeing Christ baptized on that day, and having heard, he was then 30 years old, they imagined it was also his Birth-day; That S. Cyril, Bishop of Jerusalem, did write of it to Pope Julius, who, grounded upon some of Joseph's Memoirs, in which it was observed, That in the 7th. Month of the Jews, in the Feast of Tabernacles, the Angel had appeared to the High-priest, and stricken him dumb, until that Elizabeth had brought forth a Son; having cast up the Days and Months, he found that Christ's Birth-day fell on the 25th. of December, and established that custom in Rome; That S. Basil was of the same Mind, and wrote to S. Gregory Nazianzen, to procure the approbation of that practice in the Council of Constantinople, but that many would not receive it; That Honorius the Emperor persuaded his Brother to follow the use of Rome in that; That S. Chrysostom had approved it, and with S. Epiphanius had appointed Christmas to be kept on the 25th. of December; That afterwards, this was confirmed into a Synod held in Constantinople, which writ of it to all the Patriarchs, who did all embrace this Practice. Much might be said against this Historian's Observations, which are almost all false. But we must not seek for Exactness nor Truth in the Memoirs of these modern Greeks.