And you assume god forbade celebrating birthdays. So??
Whether people are apostates or not- they can still write historical data. If you think they are wrong prove it.
A serious questions for the Jehovah's Witnesses on these threads.
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Whether people are apostates or not- they can still write historical data. If you think they are wrong prove it.
We celebrate good friday and resurrection sunday1 are you saying that all these are pagan as well.
we celebrate birthdays. No JW has shown from history where God forbade this or that it is pagan in origin. Nor anniversaries, nor thanksgiving!
If one celebrates Christmas and new Years in honor of Bacchus or Saturnalia- I agree 100% with you! If one gives sweets or flowers to their spouse in honor of Cupid or Eros on Valentines day, I would agree with you 100%. I am sure thewre are people who do that, but most just celebrate teh holiday. bible belieivng christians honor the Lord on all days. Trees and flowers and chocaltes do not become evil on a certain day and okay the rest of the time!
If I found out that a christmas tree lot dedicated his trees to Saturnalia- I would not buy from him as paul said not to. But you need to show how a Christmas tree put up to celebrate the birth of the Lord Jesus Christ is andof itself inherently evil.
I do not bow to Bacchus or Saturnalia on 12/;25- that is having communion with the cup of devils.
Once again from you rshallow heart you cannot see that it is the hearts intent that matters to God and not the stuff.
Wrangler
Well-Known Member
Roman proverb. Victory has 1000 fathers. Defeat is an orphan.
I’m pretty liberal when it comes to cars for celebration. Celebrating is not the same as worship.
Keiw
Well-Known Member
Jesus words show they remain apostocised. They must do this-Matt 23:39--they refuse.
Birthdays promote-self--God is not for that. He deserves the celebration before any creation does. There are 2 examples of birthdays in the bible--both by the wicked.
I have a Jewish background and we do celibrate birthdays.
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Birthday festivals were not considered by the Rabbis as "ḥukkot ha-goyim" (customs of the heathen; see Maimonides, Yad ha-Ḥazaḳh, 'Akkum we-Ḥuḳotehem, xi. 12), although Lightfoot held a contrary opinion ("Horæ Hebr." on Matt. xiv. 6).
Biblical References.
A close study of the Biblical text shows that the Bible is not altogether wanting in references to the subject; for, while it lacks positive accounts, it contains passages from which it may be inferred that the custom of remembering birthday anniversaries was not wholly unknown among the Jews. "The day of our king" (Hosea vii. 5), on which the princes made the king sick with bottles of wine, and the king himself "stretched out his hand with scorners," alludes more probably to a birthday festival than to a solemn occasion, such as the anniversary of his installation, which would have been observed with more decorum (see Josephus, "Ant." xv. 9, § 6).
Birthdays might not have been celebrated by the common people with great solemnity, yet they did not pass wholly unnoticed, and were remembered by congratulations, as in modern times. Jeremiah not only cursed the day of his birth, but wished that it should not be blessed (Jer. xx. 14), as though such had been the custom.
It is said of Job, "and he cursed his day" (Job iii. 1). The emphatic and determining expression "his day" implies the idea that he, like everybody else, had a certain day of the year singled out for a certain purpose, which we learn further was the anniversary of his birth.
Weaning on Second Birthday.
The second or third birthday of a child whose coming into the world was very much desired by his parents was usually made the occasion of a feast, because the child was then weaned, and had consequently passed the dangerous and uncertain stage of infancy. Abraham made a great feast on the day Isaac was weaned (Gen. xxi. 8). This occurred, according to Rashi, at the expiration of twenty-four months. Bishop Ely ("Holy Bible Com." l.c. on the passage) says: "By comparing I Sam. it would seem that this was very probably a religious feast." Hannah postponed the yearly family feast at Shiloh until she had weaned Samuel, in order to celebrate his birthday at the same time (I Sam. i. 23, 24). According to Rashi and Midr. R. Samuel, l.c., this also occurred at the end of twenty-four months. Yet from II Chron. xxxi. 16 it may be inferred that Samuel was weaned at the end of his third year; for only from that age were children admitted to the service of the Temple.
In Post-Biblical Times.
Two instances of birthday celebrations are mentioned in post-Biblical literature, from which it may be assumed that this was customary in the Herodian family. They used to celebrate birthdays with great pomp, and in the same manner as the Egyptian kings had done more than 2,000 years earlier (Gen. xl. 20), by extensive public entertainments, which were made the occasions of granting favors to friends and pardons to those in disgrace. Agrippa I. solemnized his birthday anniversary by entertaining his subjects with a festival, and decreed the recall of his banished general Silas, which recall, by the way, the latter stubbornly declined (Josephus, "Ant." xix. 7, § 1). Herod the Tetrarch celebrated his birthday with a great feast, at which the daughter of Herodias danced before the guests, the king promising "to give her whatsoever she would ask" (Matt. xiv. 6).
The Bar Miẓwah.
The Jewish people in general may have had reasons to avoid feasting on birthdays in the times of the Tannaim and Amoraim: first, because they had been at one time grievously offended on such festivals (according to II Macc. vi. 7, the Jews were forced, in the time of Antiochus, to eat of the sacrifices which were offered "in the day of the king's birth every month"); secondly, because no "Talmid ḥakam" would attend as a guest at such a feast, since the Rabbis condemn the Talmid ḥakam who partakes of a meal or feast which is not a "se'udat miẓwah" (commendable meal). And to the son of him who frequented feasts were applied opprobrious epithets, such as "son of an oven-heater," "son of a market-dancer," etc. Since the fifteenth century (Löw, "Lebensalter," p. 210) the thirteenth birthday of a boy has been made the occasion of a family feast because it coincides with his religious majority (Bar Miẓwah).
Special Birthdays of Scholars.
In modern times the widely spread custom of celebrating some particular birthday of a great man by a banquet or by some literary production has enriched Jewish literature with many gems of Hebrew learningand poetry. Jewish scholars of great renown have become the recipients of marks of deference and homage on the part of their friends and admirers on their seventieth or eightieth or ninetieth birthday by the publication of a jubilee-book, to which scholars from far and near have contributed some of their best work. Of these publications are: (1) "Jubelschrift zum Neunzigsten Geburtstag des Dr. L. Zunz," Berlin, 1884, produced on the occasion of Dr. Zunz's ninetieth birthday; (2) "Jubelschrift zum Siebenzigsten Geburtstag des Prof. Dr. H. Graetz," Breslau, 1887, in celebration of Graetz's seventieth anniversary; (3) "Festschrift zum Achtzigsten Geburtstag des Dr. Moritz Steinschneider," Leipsic, 1890, on the eightieth birthday of Dr. Steinschneider; and (4) "Shay la-Moreh" (A Present to the Teacher), Berlin, 1890, dedicated to Dr. Israel Hildesheimer by his friends and students on his seventieth birthday.
Some have confined themselves to the sending of a letter of homage or a poem. Smolenskin remembered Dr. Zunz on his ninetieth birthday with a letter of congratulation, "Miktab Shalom" ("Ha-Shaḥar," xii. 327). H. S. Slonimski was greeted on his seventieth birthday by a letter of homage, "Iggeret Ḥen," signed by twenty-eight of his friends, all poets and "maskilim" ("Ha-Ẓefirah," vii.). S. Scherschewski wrote a magnificent poem on the same occasion (ib.). There is a poem by A. Gottlober dedicated to the famous ḥazan and musical composer, Solomon Sulzer, on his seventieth birthday ("Ḳol Shire Mahallal," vii. 29). Gottlober also wrote six poems on several birthdays of his own (ib. pp. 31-40). There are several birthday poems in the "Shire Sefat Ḳodesh," by A. Lebensohn ha-Kohen, most of them dedicated to his son Michael Joseph (ib. i. 220; ii. 162, 163-184).
The birthday anniversaries of heathen kings, , are considered by the rabbis of the Talmud as legal heathen holidays, which count among those holidays on the three days preceding which Jews are by Talmudic law required to abstain from concluding any business with a heathen (Mishnah 'Ab. Zarah i. 3).
About the meaning of of the Mishnah, which seems to correspond with ἡμέρα γενεσεώς (LXX., Gen. xl. 20), some doubts have been raised because, by the side of ("birthday of the king") mention is also made of ("the day of birth and the day of death"). In the Babylonian Talmud ('Ab. Zarah 10a) the decision is reached in favor of as meaning "the day of coronation." It is accepted by Maimonides (see Commentary to the Mishnah, and Yad ha-Ḥazaḳah, 'Akkum we-Ḥukotehem, ix. 5). The glossary "Kesef Mishneh," ad loc., thinks that Maimonides may have read ("assembly") for . Rasḥi explains as equivalent to "the birthday of the king"; while the Talmud Yerushalmi ('Ab. Zarah i. 39) explains as "birthday." This agrees with the use made of the word in many instances (Gen. R. lxxxviii.; Ex. R. xv.; Yer. R. H. iii. 8; Yalḳ., Job. 584; Compare Rashi, Gen. xl. 20). Graetz (in "M. G. Y." 230) is of the opinion that means the day of death of the king.
All these difficulties and differences may be obviated if be explained as indicating Christian festivals of the early Church. By may be understood the Nativity, or Christmas, and by Easter, or the Resurrection. Cave (in "Primitive Christianity," part 1, vii. 194, cited in McClintock and Strong's "Cyclopedia," s.v. "Christmas ") traces the observance of Christmas to the second century, about the time of the emperor Commodus. According to David Ganz ("Ẓemaḥ David," i., year 3881), Commodus reigned 183-185, at the time of Rabbi Meïr of the Mishnah, who counted those days as legal holidays."
BIRTHDAY - JewishEncyclopedia.com
Complete contents the 1906 Jewish Encyclopedia.
Aunty Jane
Well-Known Member
If what you celebrate is pagan worship in disguise, who gets the honor?
Does changing the name make it more acceptable to God who told us not to TOUCH spiritually "unclean" things? (2 Cor 6:14-18)
If we want to be accepted as God's "sons and daughters" we are told to SEPARATE ourselves from those things....all I am seeing is justification.....I guess you all will have to tell it to the judge. (Matt 7:21-23)
How can any celebration honor God or his son when they were both present when the originals were held by those who worshipped false gods? What is "unclean" remains "unclean", because God doesn't change to accommodate to desires of selfish humans......we cannot "touch" those things no matter what we call them, and no matter how much we love them.
I believe that they are offensive to God and I will not uphold what is clearly false religion in disguise. Others can make their own decisions about these and many other things. We will be judged on those decisions.
JW's are guilty of the copycat thesis which is pure nonsense.
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Aunty Jane
Well-Known Member
Since there is no command from either God or his son to hold such commemorations, there is no valid reason to observe them. What did Christ himself ask us to remember? It was his death, just his death.....not his resurrection. His death was what paid the price of mankind's redemption....his resurrection was to facilitate his return to heaven....to be reunited with his God and Father. Where does he tell us to celebrate that?
Jesus was arrested on Passover night, so the memorial of his death should also coincide with Nisan 14 on the Jewish calendar, which began at sundown on Thursday evening and ended on Friday evening at sundown, when the Sabbath began. It will never fall on a Friday every year, so to hold it on the wrong date to preserve a man-made tradition is not doing what Christ commanded..... if it doesn't fall on the correct date, you are not celebrating Christ's sacrifice at all....not to mention that name "Easter" has nothing to do with Christ and its pagan customs are observed by most of Christendom.
Birthdays were associated with astrology and predictions of the future which was forbidden to God's people. Read Deuteronomy 18:9-12....The Israelites were told NOT to adopt the ways of the pagan nations.....astrologers cast horoscopes according to birthdates and alignment of the planets to predict a child's future. Good enough reason for the Jews never to mention them, and why there are NO birthdates ever recorded in the scriptures.
No one knows the day or the date when Jesus was born, but we do know the day he died because it was the only commemoration we are told to observe.
Justification.
Justification. Tell it to the judge...not me.
So the personal insults replace any meaningful dialogue....as it always does when you run out of argument.
I find your excuses are completely empty, but as I said...tell it to the one who was there when all that pagan stuff was part of false worship ....and still is. All that changed was the name....
The heart is not a good indicator of what God wants...only what WE want. (Jer 17:9) It is a "treacherous" partner in crime that can easily be used to justify all manner of things.
Wrangler
Well-Known Member
This is Mothers Day weekend. It is to honor mothers, not pagan gods. Still, it is not worship.
Wrangler
Well-Known Member
Show me where in Scripture where it says God is not for one celebrating birthdays.
Wrangler
Well-Known Member
POU - Philosophy of Use.
Is it better to Paganize Christian celebrations or Christianize Pagan celebrations?
Keiw
Well-Known Member
He showed by the only 2 examples in the bible by the wicked doing it. The wicked are the world, Jesus said to be no part of.
Wrangler
Well-Known Member
Not exactly a ringing prohibition. Seems to me the opposition to celebrating birthdays goes against life. All glory to God yes. Celebrate people’s lives who are important to you.
In 2 months I’m expecting my 18th grandchild to join our family. We plan to give glory to God AND celebrate her enthusiastically.
Keiw
Well-Known Member
Always much better to show love from the heart, not forced by a calender date like most holidays do. Congrats on your 18th.
When my wife tossed me away because i wouldn't celebrate my daughters birthday at 1 years old. I asked her before i left. Which would my daughter choose a father 365 days a year or a one day celebration a year.
Wrangler
Well-Known Member
It doesn’t seem nearly like a hill worth dying on.
I’m going to celebrate at the slightest provocation. I see it as part of living joyfully.
Praise God 365. Praise God during pagan and secular, festivals and celebrations. It may be the pathway that brings others closer to Christ.
Keiw
Well-Known Member
1Cor 10:21--nothing with pagan additives brings one closer to Christ. It does just the opposite.
Wrangler
Well-Known Member
Demons. Not Pagans.
1 Corinthians 10:21
New Living Translation
21 You cannot drink from the cup of the Lord and from the cup of demons, too. You cannot eat at the Lord’s Table and at the table of demons, too.
Wrangler
Well-Known Member
Demon. Not Pagan.
1 Corinthians 10:21
New Living Translation
21 You cannot drink from the cup of the Lord and from the cup of demons, too. You cannot eat at the Lord’s Table and at the table of demons, too.
This has to be reconciled with 1 Corinthians 9:19-23, be all things to all people so some might be saved.
Keiw
Well-Known Member
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