Contemplating the Calendar
Happy New Year!
It is 2007. But it is 2007 years from what or when? Some say the birth of Christ, but now most agree that probably wasn’t when he was born.
And another question is why there wasn’t a year 0 or zero. That one was pretty easy when they realized that there is no Roman numeral for zero. And most of the influence on what is today's secular calendar system stems from Roman influence.
There is an interesting accounting of this history excerpted from Wikipedia:
Bede was the first historian to use a BC year and hence the first to adopt the convention of no year 0 between BC and AD. Previous Christian histories used anno mundi ("in the year of the world"), or anno Adami ("in the year of Adam", beginning five days later, used by Africanus), or anno Abrahami ("in the year of Abraham", beginning 3,412 years later according to the Septuagint, used by Eusebius), all of which assigned "one" to the year beginning at Creation, or the creation of Adam, or the birth of Abraham, respectively. All began with year 1 because the counting numbers begin with one, not zero. Bede simply continued this earlier tradition relative to the AD era
Bede did not sequentially number any other calendar units (days of the month, weeks of the year, or months of the year — but he was aware of the Jewish days of the week which were numbered beginning with one (except for the seventh which was called the Sabbath) and partially numbered the days of his Christian week accordingly (Lord's day, second day, …, sixth day, Sabbath in English translation).
And then what about the months on the calendar most of us refer to?
The names of the months on the Gregorian or Julian Calendar are usually understood to be Greek and Roman based. July and August are named after Julius Caesar and Augustus Caesar, while the rest are Latin for the seventh, eighth, ninth and tenth months, i.e., “sep” means seventh, “oct” means eighth. This of course is no longer true, as September is the ninth month from January. However, the calendar originally consisted of only ten months, and two were added at a later point. May is named after Maia, a goddess of spring and fertility, and June is named after Juno, a mother goddess. Why would this basis be so universally accepted in today’s world where we don’t believe in those gods and the time of the Caesars is long gone?
The names of the days of the week present similar histories. According to infoplease: "The seven-day week originated in ancient Mesopotamia and became part of the Roman calendar in A.D. 321. The names of the days are based on the seven celestial bodies (the Sun, the Moon, Mars, Mercury, Jupiter, Venus, and Saturn), believed at that time to revolve around Earth and influence its events. Most of Western Europe adopted the Roman nomenclature. The Germanic languages substituted Germanic equivalents for the names of four of the Roman gods: Tiw, the god of war, replaced Mars; Woden, the god of wisdom, replaced Mercury; Thor, the god of thunder, replaced Jupiter; and Frigg, the goddess of love, replaced Venus." These names are still problematic to observant Jews today.
The Hebrew calendar is 5767 years since Adam, or some say Abraham and others say since creation. And who knows which is really true? Does it matter?
During the Babylonian exile, immediately after 586 BCE, Jews adopted Babylonian or Persian names for the months. The Babylonian calendar was the direct descendant of the Sumerian calendar. These names were brought back when the Jews returned and rebuilt the second Temple. The Torah specifically did not name the months, rather called them by number, The Babylonian names are more common today rather than names dictated in Tanakh. In fact there are a few months that have alternate names, Iyar is also referred to as Ziv and Nissan is also Aviv.
When is the first month in the Hebrew calendar? This also has history and some controversy. The first month (today's Nissan) had always started following the ripening of barley; according to some traditions, in case the barley had not ripened yet, a second last month would have been added which compensated for the difference in the cycle of the year. Only much later was a systematic method for adding a second last month, today's Adar I, adopted. Nevertheless, the first month of Nissan is specifically set to remember the time when we left Egypt or Mitzrayim. Giving the months names does not contradict the mitzvah to count the months from Nisan. We can call the first month Nisan and the second month Iyar. With the Babylonian names of the months on the calendar it is also a reminder of the return from Babylonia.
The Jews resisted the use of the ‘secular’ calendar. This would be understandable because they were not to recognize those pagan god’s whose names represented the months on the Julian and Gregorian calendar. It is noted that it was only about 300 years ago when Jews started putting secular dates on grave stones which was very controversial. Even today the most Orthodox Jews do not feel comfortable with the secular calendar and debate its use due to the understanding of the year implication of its connection to Jesus as well as the pagan names of some of the months. Some even now will write “l’minyanom,” “according to their counting,” when referring to secular dates to emphasize the fact that we are not following non-Jewish practices.
There is much more on this subject to explore. Then there are many other calendars to consider:
Chinese calendar
Islamic calendar
Hindu calendar
Iranian/Persian calendar
Icelandic/Old Norse calendar
French Republican calendar
Sources: wikipedia . com, infoplease . com, Halacha Talk Using the Secular Date By Rabbi Avraham Rosenthal
It is 2007. But it is 2007 years from what or when? Some say the birth of Christ, but now most agree that probably wasn’t when he was born.
And another question is why there wasn’t a year 0 or zero. That one was pretty easy when they realized that there is no Roman numeral for zero. And most of the influence on what is today's secular calendar system stems from Roman influence.
There is an interesting accounting of this history excerpted from Wikipedia:
Bede was the first historian to use a BC year and hence the first to adopt the convention of no year 0 between BC and AD. Previous Christian histories used anno mundi ("in the year of the world"), or anno Adami ("in the year of Adam", beginning five days later, used by Africanus), or anno Abrahami ("in the year of Abraham", beginning 3,412 years later according to the Septuagint, used by Eusebius), all of which assigned "one" to the year beginning at Creation, or the creation of Adam, or the birth of Abraham, respectively. All began with year 1 because the counting numbers begin with one, not zero. Bede simply continued this earlier tradition relative to the AD era
Bede did not sequentially number any other calendar units (days of the month, weeks of the year, or months of the year — but he was aware of the Jewish days of the week which were numbered beginning with one (except for the seventh which was called the Sabbath) and partially numbered the days of his Christian week accordingly (Lord's day, second day, …, sixth day, Sabbath in English translation).
And then what about the months on the calendar most of us refer to?
The names of the months on the Gregorian or Julian Calendar are usually understood to be Greek and Roman based. July and August are named after Julius Caesar and Augustus Caesar, while the rest are Latin for the seventh, eighth, ninth and tenth months, i.e., “sep” means seventh, “oct” means eighth. This of course is no longer true, as September is the ninth month from January. However, the calendar originally consisted of only ten months, and two were added at a later point. May is named after Maia, a goddess of spring and fertility, and June is named after Juno, a mother goddess. Why would this basis be so universally accepted in today’s world where we don’t believe in those gods and the time of the Caesars is long gone?
The names of the days of the week present similar histories. According to infoplease: "The seven-day week originated in ancient Mesopotamia and became part of the Roman calendar in A.D. 321. The names of the days are based on the seven celestial bodies (the Sun, the Moon, Mars, Mercury, Jupiter, Venus, and Saturn), believed at that time to revolve around Earth and influence its events. Most of Western Europe adopted the Roman nomenclature. The Germanic languages substituted Germanic equivalents for the names of four of the Roman gods: Tiw, the god of war, replaced Mars; Woden, the god of wisdom, replaced Mercury; Thor, the god of thunder, replaced Jupiter; and Frigg, the goddess of love, replaced Venus." These names are still problematic to observant Jews today.
The Hebrew calendar is 5767 years since Adam, or some say Abraham and others say since creation. And who knows which is really true? Does it matter?
During the Babylonian exile, immediately after 586 BCE, Jews adopted Babylonian or Persian names for the months. The Babylonian calendar was the direct descendant of the Sumerian calendar. These names were brought back when the Jews returned and rebuilt the second Temple. The Torah specifically did not name the months, rather called them by number, The Babylonian names are more common today rather than names dictated in Tanakh. In fact there are a few months that have alternate names, Iyar is also referred to as Ziv and Nissan is also Aviv.
When is the first month in the Hebrew calendar? This also has history and some controversy. The first month (today's Nissan) had always started following the ripening of barley; according to some traditions, in case the barley had not ripened yet, a second last month would have been added which compensated for the difference in the cycle of the year. Only much later was a systematic method for adding a second last month, today's Adar I, adopted. Nevertheless, the first month of Nissan is specifically set to remember the time when we left Egypt or Mitzrayim. Giving the months names does not contradict the mitzvah to count the months from Nisan. We can call the first month Nisan and the second month Iyar. With the Babylonian names of the months on the calendar it is also a reminder of the return from Babylonia.
The Jews resisted the use of the ‘secular’ calendar. This would be understandable because they were not to recognize those pagan god’s whose names represented the months on the Julian and Gregorian calendar. It is noted that it was only about 300 years ago when Jews started putting secular dates on grave stones which was very controversial. Even today the most Orthodox Jews do not feel comfortable with the secular calendar and debate its use due to the understanding of the year implication of its connection to Jesus as well as the pagan names of some of the months. Some even now will write “l’minyanom,” “according to their counting,” when referring to secular dates to emphasize the fact that we are not following non-Jewish practices.
There is much more on this subject to explore. Then there are many other calendars to consider:
Chinese calendar
Islamic calendar
Hindu calendar
Iranian/Persian calendar
Icelandic/Old Norse calendar
French Republican calendar
Sources: wikipedia . com, infoplease . com, Halacha Talk Using the Secular Date By Rabbi Avraham Rosenthal
Labels: calendar Hebrew months weeks
posted by Chavarah @ 3:33 PM
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