Yasir Qadhi – The Historical Origins of Christmas

			Today As you're all aware, it is our national holiday. There is nowhere else to be all restaurants
are closed, shopping centers are closed. So we have nothing else to do other than come here and
inshallah to Allah not only increase our Imam by praying together by remembering ALLAH SubhanA wa
Taala but also by educating ourselves as Muslims about what we believe, especially for our youth,
our children, they need to know this, what do we believe about Isa Jesus? And what do we do as
muslims when a person we're also respecting and venerating Jesus Christ, he is being celebrated but
in a way or a manner that we don't agree with. So today I wanted to therefore, talk very plainly
		

			very boldly about how Muslims should view this celebration of Christmas and of course primarily as
you know, this is really meant for primarily our youth, but inshallah everybody will be inshallah
educated and learn something about today's today's festival. Now, of course, for us as Muslims, the
key question is as follows. This is the question. We all know, Jesus or ISA did not preach anything
of what modern Christians believe about him. Jesus never taught the Trinity. Jesus never talked
redemption, Jesus never taught the 25th of December as his holy day and festival, yet the bulk of
those who follow Him are believing and doing things that he did not do. So, we as Muslims should
		

			understand and learn where is this coming from? Where what is the origin of these ideas, these
beliefs and obviously, today's 20 minute lecture is not going to be a full you know, survey that
that will take many many dissertations many many lectures and there are many books out there I'll
recommend one of them inshallah today, but very briefly, just so that we understand what is going
on. We of course, believe Isa, his Arabic name is Risa his Aramaic name is Esau. And of course, it
has been Latinized to Jesus. If you call Jesus Jesus, he wouldn't even recognize the name because
the job letter did not exist in his language. He never called himself Jesus. This is a Latinised
		

			a lotta nice transliteration of Esau, he saw is most likely how he pronounced it in Aramaic, and in
Arabic Isa, so we all believe that a seven Imodium, Jesus, the son of Mary was one of the most
blessed human beings to ever walk the face of this earth we believe he was one of the mightiest
prophets. We believe ALLAH chose him. We believe that out of the five greatest messengers, our
profit system and Jesus are amongst them. And we believe that the Prophet Jesus had one speciality
no other human being had at all. And that is he was the only human being to be born without any male
intervention, no male intervention and the mother who gave birth to him. We also believe as Muslims,
		

			she was the most pious lady in all of human history. She's so pious, The Quran mentions her by name,
and does not mention any other woman by name. The Quran does not mention any other lady by name.
She's so holy. There is a whole chapter of the Quran Chapter 19 called meridiem. So Mary, Madame and
of course, even Mary is an anglicized Latinised, her name was medium or medium. The Aramaic would be
medium or medium. And, of course, Mary is again the Latinized version. We believe that Maria was the
most pious lady to ever walk on the face of this earth. And she was raised in the temple. She was
raised in the Temple of Solomon, the aunt, where we now of course the Masjid Al Aqsa is that which
		

			is holy, for all of us. It was holy because Allah made it holy. She was raised there as a child, her
whole life. She was worshipping Allah, she never lived and interacted with society. She was raised
as a worshiper, and her whole life was just a bada. And the Quran tells us that there was no need to
even bring food. Allah would feed her directly when her uncle's Korea would bring food to feed her.
Lo and behold, there would already be beautiful sumptuous food over there. And Zekeriya would ask
where's this food coming from? And Madame would say, Allah, you just gave it to me. It's right
there. It's not even something that she needed to have. So in this story, as we know, Risa was born
		

			a miraculous birth. Maria was shocked. How am I gonna give birth I have never been married. I've
never been with a man. And Allah said through Gibreel that this is the decree of Allah coolfire.
Kuhn, you will give birth without any male intervention. So she leaves the town because she doesn't
want people to suspect or what is going on with her pregnancy. She leaves the town she gives birth,
and then she comes back into Jerusalem and she has the
		

			Baby. And the priests recognize this is Miriam, who we raised in our temple, the priests recognize
what are you doing with the baby? And they said, your family as a holy family, we never have thought
that you would give birth outside of marriage. How can you have a child outside of marriage? And
because Allah had told her through Jibreel, you're not allowed to speak. She could do nothing other
than point to the heaven and to the baby, meaning Allah gave me the baby, but you couldn't say
anything more, and they didn't get the sign. I mean, how would we get such a sign? They didn't get
the sign. And so Allah blessed Isa, with the first of his many, many, many miracles. And of course,
		

			that was that he spoke as a newborn. He spoke and he said, all that in the Abdullah tourney al
Kitab. Allah need to be here. He said, I am Allah's chosen servant. He has revealed a book unto me
and he has made me a Nebby and watcher, Eleni Mubarak and a NEMA come to he has made me blessed
wherever I go. Allah's blessings will go wherever I go, there will be Allah's Baraka, which I didn't
eat without a camera Quinto Sani was Salatu was the karate modem to a year and he has commanded me
to pray and be generous as long as I live. What about rhombi Walidah T and to be good to my mother,
this isn't isa giving a whole tuba as the baby Salah Zakka kindness to parents, this is generic
		

			hotbar across all civilizations and prophets, Salah Zakah and be good to parents. And then he says
was Salam o Allah Yeah, Yama will lead to what you're about to hear, and there shall be peace on me
the day I was born. This is the real Islamic Christmas. We don't need 25th of December I'm gonna
talk about where they came from. We don't need it. Allah has declared the birth of Jesus and the day
he was born to be was salam, O Allah, your piece will be on me. This day, the day I was born, there
will be Salam. And the day I shall die there shall be Salam. And the day I shall be resurrected,
Allah Salam will be upon me. And then of course we know that Jesus ASA preached for around 30 plus
		

			years. And what did he preach? He taught the people of Israel, the children of Israel, that unless
they repent to Allah, their status in the eyes of Allah would be gone.
		

			They had committed too many sins. And Jesus said to them, I am the Messiah, and the Messiah, they
were waiting for him, they were waiting for the Messiah to come. What is the Messiah? A Messiah is
one whom Allah has chosen. And the Jewish people knew there would be a chosen one, there would be
the best of their prophets to come. There would be a prophet like unto David because David is their
main prophet, and like unto David, like unto Moses, there would be somebody coming, and there would
be a number of miracles that he would do. When they saw the miracles, they rejected the Messiah,
they rejected Jesus. And instead of supporting him, they made up lies, and they cause they
		

			engineered the execution of Jesus in their eyes. They thought they had killed Jesus, but we don't
believe this. We believe ALLAH SubhanA wa Taala saved him but the Quran has a phrase here. Well, now
Cthulhu who mo Salah boo hoo, Allah can shoot Behala home, they neither killed him, nor did they
crucify him. Now listen to the Quran. But it was made to appear that he had been killed and
crucified. This is what the Quran says, While I can shoot be alone, it was made to appear that
something happened and they thought Jesus had been killed and been crucified. And the Quran does not
tell us what this means later or there might have given interpretations. And there are a number of
		

			interpretations. We don't want to go into that today. But we firmly believe the message of Jesus was
follow the law that Moses gave you worship your Lord, be pious and righteous, that's it, nothing
else. Jesus did not come with anything that modern Christians believe in that is separate to
Judaism. In fact, Jesus was himself a practicing Jewish person. He was circumcised, He ate kosher.
He practiced kosher. He practiced Jewish law. He did not work on the Sabbath, which is Jewish law,
even in our Shediac. Allah says, We ordained for the Jewish people that they must worship on the
Sabbath. What is the Sabbath, the Sabbath? Saturday, you're not allowed to work. You're not allowed
		

			to do anything other than worship and vicar and not do any work. Not to any thing for your risk for
your sustenance. You're supposed to take it as a literal holy day, you're supposed to just do a bada
and that's it. And Allah says, We ordained the Sabbath for the Bani Israel. So it's there for them.
Jesus Himself worshiped the Sabbath. He did not work on the Sabbath, and he observed Jewish law. How
did all of this
		

			Ange what happened? Very brief summary. And every Muslim should know this, every Muslim should know
this. There are two people you should know, that are the primary causes of the corruption of
Christianity. And these two people, they helped formulate doctrines that eventually led to what we
now do and Christmas. The first of them was Paul Paul. He is mentioned multiple times in the New
Testament because He has authored more than a dozen books of the New Testament. Paul was one of the
earliest converts, but he never met Jesus. He never saw Jesus, the actual disciples of Jesus, Paul
does after them. He interacted with the disciples, he didn't interact with Jesus. And there's
		

			clashes that took place between the actual followers and between Paul, read your Christian history,
you will, early history you will know this. What did Paul introduce? So how did Paul become famous?
Paul said he saw Jesus in a vision on his way to Jerusalem, he saw him in a vision, like he had a
live interaction with him in a vision. After Jesus left this earth, Paul said, Oh, but I saw him and
he told me you are, you know, the apostle, I'm sending you so he proclaimed himself that Jesus chose
me. And when he began, came to Jerusalem, he began preaching a different version of Christianity.
What did he say? So
		

			Paul said, Jesus wasn't just the Messiah for the Jewish people. Jesus was the salvation to all of
mankind. This is the fundamental difference. Paul is saying, Jesus was sent because Paul was
claiming now that Jesus is meant for all of mankind, whereas Jesus himself and the Quran tells us, I
had been sent to the children of Israel. Paul said no, he sent to the Romans as well. And he sent to
the Chinese he sent to the Asian he said to everybody, and he came to abolish the law. You don't
have to follow halal and haram. There is nothing halal and haram, there is no kosher, no Sabbath, no
circumcision. You don't have to do anything of the laws of God. All you have to do is to believe
		

			that He came to save you. This is redemption, they call it so the doctrine of redemption, and the
abolishment of the law. This is coming from Paul, what happened? I'm just being very simplistic
here. Christianity split into multiple groups. For our purposes, we'll mention two of them. There's
more than two. For our purposes, we'll mention two of them. The first of them is called Pauline
Christianity, Paul's Christianity, and the other is called Jewish Christianity. Jewish Christianity
is Islam. What we believe Jewish Christianity is, we are the followers of Moses and Abraham and
Jesus, we must follow the laws of God. We must be pious and righteous, we must pray we must give
		

			charity. It's exactly what we believe. And these groups, there were multiple groups. They continued
to believe in Jesus as the Messiah, and they practice Judaism. Pauline Christianity, began preaching
to the Romans, and began converting Roman pagans to Christianity. And in the process, a new theology
developed this theology had nothing to do with monotheism, Trinity begins to be introduced other
gods, there's multiple gods, there's not one that will lead heaven, there are three and Jesus and
God the Father, and in early Pauline Christianity, some group said, Jesus, Mary, and God, the Father
or the Trinity, I'm not making this up early Christian group, some of them said, this is the
		

			Trinity. And others said, Jesus, God, the Father, and the Holy Spirit, and other set others they had
their different interpretations of how of how to understand the Trinity, until finally the second
major figure comes along, and this is the Roman Emperor Constantine. So Paul, we're talking about
around 4050 CE, like after Jesus Christ right of the Christian era, and then the Emperor Constantine
around 300 CE. These are the two figures you need to know the Emperor Constantine coming 300 years
after Jesus Christ. Now you have to realize another thing a lot of Muslims are not aware of this.
Early Christianity was persecuted by the Roman Empire. The Roman Empire is pagan. They believe in
		

			Gods Jupiter and Zeus and all those holes uses the Zeus is the Greek god but they believe in the
Saturn, for example, they believe in the Roman god Jupiter, they have the entire pantheon of gods
and when Christianity comes along, the empire begins to persecute the Christians as heretics. In
fact, I recited to slaughter borouge And Allah subhana wa Tada describes torturing of pee
		

			pulled to death via fire. In the Surah Bucha, Allah describes that they made a big fire and they
threw people into it only because they believed in Allah. If you look at the tafsir This is Allah
praising the early true Jewish Christians, the real Christians, they were persecuted for their
beliefs, and the pagans killed them. One of the worst emperors, his name is Nero Emperor Nero look
this up in one anger, a fit that he had, he ordered all of the Christians of the city of the town to
be gathered and use them as lanterns at night, pour oil on them, and use them as lanterns as lights.
Literally, this is an some MUFA city and say the Quran is referencing that other facilities say
		

			another Christian group was persecuted another time, but the reference can apply to both because it
talks about burning to death, and the pagans would burn people to death that they considered
heretics. So for 300 years, Christianity was a persecuted religion because it was persecuted. The
beliefs and the doctrines were not codified. You didn't have famous Buddha and theologians writing
treatises, it's underground, because it's underground. Christianity had many weird interpretations,
because it's a hidden religion. It's not a religion that is public, and this facilitated bizarre
beliefs facilitated beliefs of Pauline Christianity and others. When Emperor Constantine comes to
		

			power, Constantine's mother was from this Christian sect, Pauline Christianity, Constantine's
mother, his father was a Roman emperor, a pagan, his mother, as you know, the Roman Empress has
plenty of wives and mistresses. So this particular lady was a Christian. And he was raised.
Obviously, the father has so many children, he's raised from the mother, and it shows you the
influence of the mother here. Constantine was raised by his Christian mother. And when he comes to
power, he then makes Christianity the default religion of the Roman Empire. This is a key point in
human history. One of the most important historical events we should all be aware of, is around
		

			310 315 ce not Ah, not Hijra. See. This is 200 years before the process, I'm trying to figure out
whether the Emperor Constantine officially declares that Christianity is the state religion.
		

			And this is what provoked a mass conversion across the Roman Empire, up until 300 ce II, the bulk of
Roman Empire is paganistic, England is paganistic Rome itself pips paganistic, Europe is paganistic
in 310, or to be more precise, 314. See, Constantine comes to power and his most important decision.
Christianity is now the religion of the empire. And because he's the Emperor, and because the Roman
Empire is at its pinnacle, within two three centuries, paganism had died out. It took a while there
were clashes, some of the pagans went to war with the Christians. England remained pagan for another
two, three, the Nordic countries are in pagan further 500 years. So it wasn't immediate. It was not
		

			immediate. It took 3456 centuries for the clash between idolatry and paganism. Pause here footnote,
how long was the clash between Islam and paganism?
		

			How long was the clash?
		

			If you want to say 23, you're accurate, accurate, but the actual clash Yanni from the conquest of
Makkah, basically, until all of Arabia accepting Islam is three years
		

			from the conquest of Makkah, until there is no paganism in Arabia, it's three years in the lifetime
of Abu Bakar. paganism is eliminated from Arabia, there are no out of machinery con. There are no
out of any idol worshipers of a Latin or is that they're gone. Our religion took two three years has
gone. Christianity took in some places in Norway. 600 years. The Vikings were pagan, and the Vikings
attacked Muslim lands. The Vikings interacted with the salons. And they're pagan, they're not
Christian. This is Norway. They're not Christian. So it took a while for Christianity and paganism
to interact with one another, but the main decision was Constantine's Jade. Now Constantine what
		

			does he do? Constantine had to decide which version of Christianity to follow. Because remember, we
said there's multiple versions you still had, you still had Jewish Christianity, and you had Pauline
Christianity, and you had others I don't want to go there. May Gnosticism and others are multiple
strands. And Constantine decided to convene a group of Christian theologians in the land or the city
of Nicaea, which is
		

			is now in modern Turkey. Because Turkey back then, of course, Turkey is a modern name for it. Back
then, that land was the bastion of Christianity. Constantinople was the capital named after himself.
He's such a humble guy. He named the city after himself, right? Constantine, Constantinople,
Istanbul, that was the capital. And they see as a distance away from their Constantine called the
clerics, he wanted to call. And he basically said to them, This is what I want. And they then made
forth what is called the Nicene Creed. And the Nicene Creed is the fundamental creed of Christianity
that caused all other Christian movements to die out, including Jewish Christianity. What is the
		

			Nicene Creed, there are three that rule in heaven, God, the Father, God, the Son, and the Holy
Ghost. And these three are not three, but one. This is the Nicene Creed. It's not in the Old
Testament. It's not in the New Testament, as it originally was. This is the Nicene Creed. So the
Nicene Creed, then the emperor said, any other version of Christianity shall be persecuted shall be
expelled. So one remnant of that went all the way to under loose by the way, and that's why when
Islam came to Andalus, they were still following a version of Christianity that was closer to Islam.
And that's why so many Muslims and so many people converted and unbelievers because they fled the
		

			Roman Empire. They fled as far as they could, how far could they go? They went all the way to Spain.
And these were the Visigoths. These were they they followed what is called the Aryan Christianity,
and Aryan Christianity is the closest version to Islam. When Islam came to Andalus. Aryan
Christianity Islam is like, very similar. And that's one of the reasons why so many Andalusi Ian's
converted to Islam, but that's another point not related to our talk today. So So Constantine, what
did Constantine introduce? Constantine introduced the Trinity. Even Paul did not introduce the
Trinity. Constantine introduced the Trinity. And Constantine introduced Christmas, and Constantine
		

			introduced Sunday. All of this is coming from Constantine. What year is this guy's what year
		

			325? Roughly? 325 330. Why Sunday? Because in paganism, see, Constantine was his mother's Christian,
his father's pagan, so be very simplistic. He's, I'm being very simplistic. So an academic would be
very angry at me now. But I'm being very simplistic here. He's kind of sort of merging the paganism
of his father and the Christianity of his mother. This is too simplistic, but it's also true. It's
not untrue. It's factually correct, because what is he doing? The Trinity is a pagan notion. Not
even Paul has the Trinity. Paul does not talk about the Trinity. The Trinity is a pagan notion.
Greek paganism and Roman paganism had a trinity.
		

			So Constantine wanted something his people would recognize. Sunday was a holy day for the pagans.
That's why it's called Sunday, son, meaning Son, and the Holy Day of the Sun. Sunday was the holy
day of the Roman Empire. And so it was Constantine who said, for the first time ever, Sunday shall
be the holy day for us new Christians. And ever since then, Christianity has said Sunday, otherwise,
before Constantine, it wasn't Sunday, there was no Sunday. And where did then this? Also, by the
way, some of the symbolism of the papacy and the clergy roles and the robes and all that some of
this also comes from that timeframe, the liturgies and the some of the motifs of modern
		

			Christianity, it comes from Constantine's timeframe, but for our purposes, we're talking about
Christmas here for our purposes. What did what did he introduce when it comes to Christmas here? Why
did he introduce Christmas? So he introduced Christmas, because around this time, was one of the
most popular festivals of the Roman Empire, and it was called Saturnalia, the festival of Saturn
Saturnalia, the festival of Saturn, and it was a festival of gifts and wine and merriment, and it
took place around the winter solstice, what is the winter solstice in the Northern Hemisphere, the
shortest day of the year means the longest night, the shortest day of the year is December 2122. The
		

			shortest day of the year, right? You all know this, the, the the days and the nights they change.
And so in the Northern Hemisphere, the shortest day is 21st or 22nd. Around this timeframe, the
Roman pagans would celebrate why would they celebrate that now the sun is becoming stronger. They
had this mythology mythological notion that the sun the sun was a god for them. Remember, they
worship the sun, that the sun comes weak and strong. We
		

			weak and strong, that's what they believe. So the winter solstice, the weakness is over and the
strength is coming back. And when the sun becomes strong, what happens? The crops will grow, and
we're gonna get food. So they celebrated the coming back of the sun on the winter solstice, and
therefore, around this time, December 22 23rd, eventually became 25th. This is why December 2015,
was decided in this timeframe in Constantine's era, he decided this is going to be the holy day of
the year 25th December, complete, straight out of paganism. 100%, no Christian before Constantine
celebrated the birth of Jesus, much less on the 25th of December. This is completely a pagan idea, a
		

			pagan notion that he's now again, he's trying to bring a hybrid because He wants His people to
convert, what's the easiest way to convert? You package something that they understand. So the
Trinity they understand it, and the symbolisms they understand it, and the Sunday they understand
it, it's the same day it's just different gods No, you just do the you holy day hold the the and the
Saturnalia festival, we will convert it into what is now called Christmas. But by the way, footnote
here, not every Christian sect is exact on the date, the timeframe is the same, but exact dates are
different. So for example, the Armenian churches, January 6, the Oriental Orthodox is January 7, and
		

			the Eastern Orthodox is January 19. So there's different days but the season is the same, ie the sun
is coming back, the sun is getting stronger. So all Christian groups that celebrate Christmas, are
actually celebrating the return of the sun and the strength of the sun, SUN Su and not so Ensign,
right, Sun Su and the sun. It goes back to this pagan festival and Saturn in particular Saturnalia,
Saturn was the god of agriculture. For the Romans. Saturn was the god of agriculture. And so that's
why the festival was called Saturnalia. Now another point that you should be aware of. By the way
before we move on, the book I want to recommend for you is a very important book and it's very easy
		

			to read. Very, very educational book before I move on to the issues of Christmas. The best book I
can recommend for every person to read is written by Bart Ehrman B AR t h r ma N Bart Ehrman, he's
written 12 best selling books. One of the best ones is how Jesus became God, you will find it for $5
on Amazon a used copy. And it's actually very easy language even though he himself is an
intellectual but he wrote this book for the average Christian the average person to understand and
his story is also very story very interesting and his ideas of Jesus are literally as if they are
Quranic. Literally, I even asked him, I met him once I asked him how do you explain your research
		

			and conclusions matches exactly with the Quran? And he didn't have an answer to me and he just said,
Well, he didn't have a direct answer to me. I make dua for him. Honestly, he's such a, his research
is so close to what we believe. And it's amazing to me that he hasn't converted yet. And the Quran
actually mentions this reality what reality that your version of Christianity is not from Jesus.
It's from different people in Surah tilma Aida, Allah says, Allah Hillel Kitabi, Lata Hulu feeding
them are children of the book. Do not exaggerate the status of Jesus in your religion. And don't say
about Allah accept the truth. Wala tiberiu wa Coleman, a double lumen blue Waldo Luca Theon Waldo
		

			unserviceable do not follow the false opinions of other people who went astray took others astray,
and they became misguided from the correct understanding. Allah literally calls Christianity the
misguided opinions of other people. The Prophet sallallahu sallam was at a time in place. Nobody
knew this history. Everybody thought Jesus taught Christianity. Everybody thought this nobody did
the research was not there. And Allah says these ideas are not coming from Jesus. These ideas came
from people miracle they came after Jesus and they invented these doctrines. And literally you can
pinpoint now that we have all this information you can pinpoint to this reality now very briefly
		

			before we conclude because I know mashallah all of you here also for the samosas and Chai I know
that as well inshallah. So let's finish up inshallah as well, very briefly just out of interesting
sake, that okay, we got the idea of Sunday where it came from, we got the idea of of Christmas,
where it came from, but how about the motifs? How about the symbolisms, the, you know, St. Nicholas,
or Santa Claus and the elves and all of this, how is this coming about? This is another interesting
story, and it shows you that actually modern Christianity is a hodgepodge. A mixture of ancient
Paganism, European mythology, you know, different things come
		

			together, there's nothing of original Jesus. So when Christianity spread to Europe, the Vikings you
all know the Vikings, right? Famous people, right? The Vikings had a whole different mythology then
the ancient, the ancient Romans, and of their mythology, the Vikings were Celtic people, they had a
whole different mythology. And they believed in the God Odin, god of war, and they had their own,
you know, sacred symbols. Now, the Vikings believed that the god Odin during the winter solstice
would actually come to the peoples and give them gifts. And he would use reindeers because they're
up in the north, the Vikings, so they had this image of their God and their God. They portrayed him
		

			as an old man with a big beard. They portrayed their god is an old man with a big beard. That's our
version, the Christian version of Santa Claus. This is where the reindeer comes from, as well.
Because again, Americans reindeer, come on What is reindeers the Nordics. It's the Celts, it's the
the P the Vikings, right? So when they converted to Christianity, again, they added their twist, and
they brought in the god Odin, and they brought him the reindeers. And this became eventually, there
was a version of Christianity that they also had their version of this is getting I'm going to
confuse you because multiple legends coming together. There was a sect of Christianity that
		

			venerated a saint called St. Nicholas, St. Nicholas. And St. Nicholas was known to be very generous,
and he would give gifts to the children. So St. Nicholas become Santa Claus. The god Odin becomes
the figure, and the reindeer and all of this put together along with the 25th winter solstice of, of
constant Constantine. And slowly but surely this mythology comes up now, haven't other Christians
seen this? Yes, they have. And that is why very interestingly, that is why a number of early
Christians were anti Christmas. In fact, this is something we should all be aware of. When Europeans
first came to this country, our high schoolers know, what version of Christianity did they follow?
		

			Which version of Protestant
		

			puritanism England the Puritans are high school kids know this. Our uncles and aunties haven't
studied, understandably, you have a different that's fine. That's that's the way it is.
		

			Our high school kids told us the first version of Christianity where the puritanical, the Puritans,
the most hardcore. They were the ones who founded New England, Massachusetts, whatnot. In 1659,
listen to this. The governor of Massachusetts enacted a law declaring anybody who celebrates
December 25 is going to be find.
		

			Why?
		

			Why? Who can tell me why?
		

			Because they said it is a pagan festival.
		

			I'm not you can look this up the Puritans in Massachusetts. They had a decree because you have to
realize before America was founded, you had the Christians here, and they wanted that portion of
land to be hard, strict Christianity. And that's why there were 13 colonies. Every colony had
different stripes of Christianity, you would migrate depending on which version of Christianity you
followed only in the 1770s when the Founding Fathers said no, no, we don't want religion. We wanted
to be a secular state, the actual original people, they had a very strict interpretation. And so the
Puritans of Massachusetts were the most hardcore, and they made a law if you celebrate Christmas, we
		

			will find you penalize you any decoration. It goes into detail. You cannot hang this, you cannot do
that a long, detailed list. If you had a Christmas tree in Massachusetts, the police would come and
arrest you and find you. Why? Because this is a pagan festival has nothing to do with Christianity
who I'm not saying this. Puritans said this. So then how did it become mainstream? Well, where did
the notion of St. Santa Claus will not come from from Northern Europe, from Norway, and that spread
to other regions in particular than Germany and Germany was the primary place where this notion of
Christmas and Santa Claus and whatnot comes from. And in fact one of the main catalysts Believe it
		

			or not, very interesting. One of the main catalysts how it came about just interest interesting
story is actually Queen Victoria, Queen Victoria, why Queen Victoria. So again, an interesting
tidbit here, Queen Victoria and the
		

			Royal Family of England. Where are they from?
		

			Where's the royal family of England from England? No, they're not from England. Germany? No, not
Scotland. Germany. A lot of people don't know this, the Royal House of Windsor. It only changed this
name in 1917. Because of World War One. And World War One. This is a whole different tangent, but
just an interesting you should be aware of it in World War One, because the Germans and the British
are fighting. The royal family is a German royal family, you know, the British royalty. They're all
interconnected to one family. Every one of them. They're all distant cousins and whatnot. The royal
family of England is actually German. Queen Victoria spoke only German for the first part of her
		

			life. She did not speak English as their first language. The royal family is German.
		

			In 1917, because of World War One, they changed their name from some German name, I forgot to the
House of Windsor to make it sound like British. The House of Windsor is pure German 100%. They are
German, German. And so Queen Victoria, her festivals are German. And so when she became queen, the
they didn't have photographs. They had lithographs that had paintings, and they had those things
that printed in papers. So they made a postcard of her and her husband with all of the kids and
their German, Christian, you know, decoration.
		

			historian say that postcard, I think was 1840 something. It went viral because it was a very
beautiful postcard. You have the queen, you have the the her husband, you have all the children, and
you had the Christmas tree, and you had the gifts. This is when the Christmas tree and the gifts are
introduced to the rest of Europe. Because when the Queen does it, everybody wants to do it. Right.
And from Queen Victoria, it came all the way to America as well. The Puritans are long gone, this is
1600. Now it's 1850. This is a modern people. And so slowly but surely it now spreads. And it is
what it is. But still there are some Christian groups such as the Quakers such as the Seventh Day
		

			Adventist they consider Christian Christmas to be a pagan holiday, and they do not celebrate it. And
there are many Christian genuine believing Christians are either trying to be pious people who who
bemoan the fact that Christmas has lost all spirituality is just a festival of pleasure of shopping
of materialism, and there's no spirit of giving to the poor and whatnot. And this is actually a
fact. So I'm going to conclude on this point. And that is, what do we learn as Muslims from all of
this, we learn how easy it is that ideas can creep in. And Christmas is actually a mixture of at
least four different you know, strands of paganism, at least four if not more. And slowly you know,
		

			we have the Nordics here, the ancient Romans here and this there the Germans here because I forgot
to tell you the mistletoe is German. The mistletoe is the German the reindeer is Nordic. So everyone
has its own little thing coming in. You know the gifts coming from here St. Nicholas is from Turkey.
To the Kia we say he's from Turkey is from Anatolia is the term there. So everyone's coming from a
different thing. But this is the reality of modern beliefs which is why we as Muslims, we thank
Allah Alhamdulillah our religion has been preserved. To give you one simple example. Christians were
debating who God is in 320 after Jesus Christ, how many gods who is by 300 Hijra. The schools of law
		

			are all codified. The books of Hadith are all written the books of tafsir are done. We have no
equivalent Alhamdulillah our religion has been preserved from the beginning. There was no major
controversy over God to this day, the Muslim ummah does not differ over God. Yes, we differ about
the Sahaba we know this, but can you compare to Christianity there are differing over who is God,
the nature of God, how many gods who's the third of the Trinity, there is no equivalency, much less
God, our books of Hadith and FCF are all compiled by 300 Hegira. Whereas Christians don't even know
their version of God and hold holidays and festivals and whatnot. So no wonder when there was so
		

			much chaos in the beginning. We have such you know, convoluted ideas that are so far removed from
the teachings of Jesus Christ, and therefore to conclude, we thank Allah we have the truth and not
only that, but we firmly believe that when Jesus comes back to earth, and He will come back to
earth, He will recognize his religion and his teachings amongst us, and He will recognize us we are
the real followers of Jesus Christ. And every person here when you meet your Christian friends, you
need to say that to them, we are the real followers of Jesus. We love Jesus the way Jesus should be
loved. And we genuinely celebrate his birth the way the Quran celebrates it was salam O Allah, yo mo
		

			will lead to where Yama moved to or Yo Ma to Hey,
		

			Yes, we are the followers of all the prophets, including Jesus Christ. So we ask Allah Subhana Allah
to Allah to allow us to preach the truth to allow us to be role models for our fellow colleagues and
citizens to allow other people to see the truth and beauty of our faith, which is our Kamala who
Clara was salam ala come Warahmatullahi Wabarakatuh.
		

			Either
		

			call
		

			me Mr. Heaton doll Seanie with
		

			me what to feed
		

			the
		

			field go Ruby to mimic journey tassa down to
		

			me down