By Seyyed Ali Shahbaz
Today is the 1st of January of the Gregorian calendar, a day celebrated as New Year in the West and in countries following the culture of their former colonial masters.
Of course, January 1 is not the New Year of the Muslims. Neither has it any significance for any other religion anywhere in the world, such as Judaism, Zoroastrianism, Hinduism, Buddhism, Taoism, Shamanism, Animism, and even Christianity.
In other words, none of the religious texts of the said creeds or their principle figures, including Prophet Jesus, have said anything about the 1st of January.
Then whose New Year is it? How did it find its way into Christianity? When was it imposed on world countries? What purpose does it serve?
Interesting questions indeed, in view of the sad fact that since last night wild celebrations are underway in most of the world, with the oldest sins being committed in the newest ways, in the most un-Christian manner!
These depravities, coupled with the diabolical policies of the revelers in the White House and their accomplices in the Old World, who relish lies, threats, sanctions, torture, wars, bloodshed, occupation, usurpation, state terrorism, ethno-religious discrimination, nuclear weapons proliferation, economic exploitation and the resulting recession, family disintegration, spread of narcotics, promiscuity, sodomy, blasphemy, and every conceivable crime against humanity, warrant us to open our eyes to the realities of January 1 and the Gregorian New Year on which the height of hypocrisy is evident in the messages released by 'world leaders'.
To begin with, it was in 45 BC that Julius Caesar ordered the change of the Roman calendar from the spring of March to the gloom of winter by fixing January 1 as the start of the New Year in order to commemorate one of his military exploits.
The origin of January 1 is thus a celebration of brutal military force in a part of central Europe that had resulted in such human misery as massacre of men, rape and enslavement of women, orphaning of children and destruction of homes and hearths.
Over three centuries later when Emperor Constantine imposed on the Roman Empire the concept of Trinity – coined by Paul the Hellenized Jew, who had artfully emptied the message of Jesus of its monotheistic contents – the Church after 'Christianizing' the Julian calendar by renaming pagan festivals (e.g. Christmas for the day of the wild bacchanal festivities of Dionysius and Mithra), changed the beginning of the New Year to various dates in the subsequent eras, ranging from December 25 to Easter in March-April, and finally to September.
A millennium later in 1582, Pope Gregory after some revisions of the Julian calendar launched a new calendar in his name (Gregorian) on February 24 of that year, but strangely, he neither chose the Spring Equinox nor the Autumnal Equinox, and decided to revert to the pagan practice of January 1 as the New Year.
This is how the wintry gloom of the pagan Roman New Year appeared for the first time among the Christians, although it took several more centuries for January 1 to be accepted as the start of the New Year for most European countries.
For instance, the Netherlands adopted the Gregorian or so-called Christian calendar in 1698; Britain and its colonies including what is now the US in 1752; Russia in 1918, a after the atheist Bolshevik Revolution, and Greece as late as 1923.
Interestingly, September 2, 1752, is often called the day of the 12-day sleep in British history. That Wednesday night millions in England and the colonies went to sleep and when they woke up the next morning on Thursday, it was the 14th of September instead of September 3.
At any rate, it was only in the 20th century between the Two World Wars that the Gregorian calendar along with January 1 as New Year Day was forced upon the rest of the world, so that the globe would be held in ransom to the policies of the neo-Roman imperialists in London and Washington, who, while paying lip service to Christianity, hate from the depth of their hearts the Virgin-born Messiah and his monotheistic message of peace, virtue, and social justice.
It is worth noting that none of the Orthodox Churches – Greece, Cyprus, Constantinople (Istanbul), Alexandria (Egypt), Antioch (Syria), Cyprus, Russia, Armenia, Georgia etc – have accepted the Vatican's imposition of the Gregorian calendar and January 1 as New Year Day.
No doubt, January 1 has come to be known as the Day of Depraved because of its pagan Roman origins and the indulgence of the misled on this occasion in the most cardinal sins that the Bible frowns upon.
