CHRISTIANITY | Understanding the Julian calendar (2024)

FAQs

Did Jesus follow the Julian calendar? ›

The Julian calendar is the one that was introduced in the year 46 BC by Julius Caesar to all of the Roman Empire, and it is the calendar that was used during the life of Jesus Christ and at the time of the early Church.

Much of the world came to officially recognize the Gregorian calendar, but Orthodox churches, primarily in Greece, Cyprus, Russia, Romania, Bulgaria and others, continue to observe Easter according to the Julian calendar.

The problem with the Julian calendar was that it was slightly longer than the solar year. The Julian calendar was 365.25 days long, whereas the solar year is 365.24219 days long. As a result of this, the Julian year produced 1 extra day every year.

They had no problem with the calendar itself, only with the way the decision was made. There needed to be an ecumenical council to decide the issue, but what with the Russian Revolution, etc., that wasn't possible at the time. So that's why 90 percent of the Orthodox world-is on the old calendar.

The Church calendar keeps our focus where it should be, on Jesus Christ. A church that follows the Church calendar and a lectionary is going through the life, death, resurrection, and ascension of Jesus and the gift of the Spirit every year.

The Julian calendar is still used as a religious calendar in parts of the Eastern Orthodox Church and in parts of Oriental Orthodoxy as well as by the Amazigh people (also known as the Berbers).

In the year 1582, Pope Gregory XIII made changes to the Julian calendar, which came to be known as the Gregorian calendar and became the institutional calendar of the Catholic church and the most widely used calendar in the world.

Some Orthodox churches, like the Orthodox Church in Russia, still use the Julian Calendar today to calculate the dates of moveable feasts. Others who still use the "Old Style" calendar include the Berber people of North Africa and on Mount Athos.

The United States and the rest of the Western Hemisphere use the Gregorian calendar. The Gregorian calendar was initially implemented by the Catholic Church in 1582. At that point, Spain and its overseas colonies in the Americas abandoned the Julian calendar in favor of the Gregorian calendar.

The Julian calendar is the name given to the revised Roman calendar that was introduced by Julius Caesar (with the advice of an astronomer) in 46 BCE and took effect in 45 BCE. The calendar fixed the length of a year at 365 days, divided into twelve months, with a leap day added to February every fourth year.

How accurate is the Julian calendar? ›

The Julian Calendar

The difference between the tropical and the Julian year is about 11 minutes per year, amounting to an error of 1 day every 128 years. Because of this inaccuracy, the Julian calendar was eventually replaced by the Gregorian calendar.

The Persian calendar has been called “one of the world's most accurate calendar systems.” Like the Islamic calendar, it dates back to Muhammad's Hegira in 622 CE, but it is otherwise quite different. It's a solar calendar, rather than a lunar one, with the year beginning at midnight of the vernal equinox in Iran.

Jesus therefore died on Friday, April 3, AD 33 at about 3 p.m., a few hours before the beginning of Passover day and the Sabbath. This is the date in the Julian calendar, which had been introduced in 45 BC, and follows the convention that historical dates adhere to the calendar in use at the time.

The Revised Julian calendar has been adopted for ecclesiastical use by the Ecumenical Patriarchate of Constantinople, the Orthodox Autocephalous Church of Albania, the Greek Orthodox Church of Alexandria, the Greek Orthodox Church of Antioch, the Bulgarian Orthodox Church, the Romanian Orthodox Church, the Cypriot ...

It went into effect in October 1582 following the papal bull Inter gravissimas issued by Pope Gregory XIII, which introduced it as a modification of, and replacement for, the Julian calendar.

Jesus used the calendar that the Jews and many other nations used at that time. It was based on the cycles of the moon not the sun. They measured the years according the reigns of kings. They did not use BC or BCE or AD or CE as is commonly used today.

Nearly all Eastern Orthodox churches use the Julian calendar to establish the dates of movable feasts such as Easter. The current discrepancy between the Julian and Gregorian calendars is 13 days. However, the difference will become 14 days in 2100.

This calendar era is based on the traditionally reckoned year of the conception or birth of Jesus, AD counting years from the start of this epoch and BC denoting years before the start of the era. There is no year zero in this scheme; thus the year AD 1 immediately follows the year 1 BC.

The Biblical Year

God's calendar is thus solar-lunar. The lunar reckoning uniquely tied His calendar to the rain seasons in Israel, which makes sense knowing that God's feasts, outlined in Leviticus 23, centered on agriculture in Israel and the ripening of certain harvests.