"The
largest pagan religious cult which fostered the celebration
of December 25 as a holiday throughout the Roman and
Greek worlds was the pagan sun worship -- Mithraism... This winter festival was called 'the
Nativity' -- the 'nativity of the sun' "
-
The Golden Bough, by James George Frazer, p. 471
"the
time at which we fix the birth of Jesus Christ, the 25th of December,
when the sun has risen one degree above the solstitial
point: which answers to a moment to the births of the
Egyptian Osiris, the Grecian Bacchus, and the Mithra of the
Persians. These mystic births are manifestly identical,
being metaphorical of the Sun's annual birth at the winter
solstice, after which he gradually becomes, not only
figuratively, but positively, the Savior of the world."
- The Christian mythology unveiled, lectures
by
Logan Mitchell, p.86