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The Nativity of the Lord

Feast · lord

  • 25 December (Roman Catholic Church)
  • 25 December (Eastern Orthodox Church)
  • Koiak 29 (Coptic Orthodox Church)
  • 25 December (Syriac Orthodox Church)
  • 25 December (Church of the East)

The birth of Christ, kept on 25 December in Rome and Byzantium alike, on Koiak 29 by the Copts, and on 6 January by the Armenians, who never separated it from the Theophany. The Julian-calendar churches keep the same nominal day thirteen later, which is why Christmas reaches Moscow on 7 January.

After The Typikon, ch. 48, the Menaion — 25 December, «Є҆́же по пло́ти ржⷭ҇тво̀ гдⷭ҇а бг҃а и҆ сп҃са на́шегѡ і҆и҃са хрⷭ҇та̀», p. 339.

Commemorating

Where this is recorded

  • Roman Catholic Church — the day, after Universal Norms on the Liturgical Year and the Calendar
  • Eastern Orthodox Church — the day, after The Typikon, ch. 48, the Menaion — 25 December, «Є҆́же по пло́ти ржⷭ҇тво̀ гдⷭ҇а бг҃а и҆ сп҃са на́шегѡ і҆и҃са хрⷭ҇та̀», p. 339; the rank, after A Manual of the Orthodox Church's Divine Services, pp. 34-35, The Twelve Feasts
  • Coptic Orthodox Church — the day, after Le Synaxaire arabe jacobite (rédaction copte), PO III.3, p. 537 — 29 Kihak (25 décembre); the rank, after Kalendarium manuale utriusque ecclesiae orientalis et occidentalis (vol. II), II p. 693, «Festivitates majores numerantur septem» — Annuntiationis, Nativitatis, Baptismi, Olivarum, Resurrectionis, Ascensionis, Pentecostes
  • Syriac Orthodox Church — the day, after Liturgical Calendar of the Syriac Orthodox Church
  • Church of the East — the day, after The Ḥudra

Glosses

  • The Twelve Great Feasts, and the one that is not among them The Byzantine year is framed by twelve feasts — the Dodekaorton — running from the Nativity of the Theotokos on 8 September to her Dormition on 15 August, some fixed to a date and some moving with Pascha. They are not…
  • Thirteen days apart Constantinople and Moscow keep the Nativity on the same day and celebrate it a fortnight apart. Both say 25 December; one reads that off the Revised Julian calendar, which has agreed with the Gregorian since 1600 and…