While the fact of Jesus’ birth is clearly recorded in the Bible, primarily in Matthew 1–2 and Luke 1–2, there is no explicit mention of a specific date when Jesus was born in Bethlehem of Judaea. Furthermore, as previously mentioned, the Bible never even suggests, let alone requires or commands that Christians should “observe” the birthday of Jesus Christ in any religious sense whatsoever. With this line of thinking clearly in mind, Ezra Stiles, the seventh president of Yale College, one of the founders of Brown University, and a Congregationalist minister and theologian astutely noted in his diary, December 25, 1776:
“This day the nativity of our blessed Savior is celebrated throughout three quarters of Christendom… but the true day is unknown. On any day I can readily join with my fellow Christians in giving thanks to God for his unspeakable gift, and rejoice with them in the birth of a Savior. Tho’ [if] it had been the will of Christ that the anniversary of his nativity should have been celebrated, he would have at least let us have known the day.”[1]
Ezra Stiles, 7th President of Yale College, personal diary, December 25, 1776
[1] Nissenbaum, Stephen. The Battle for Christmas: A Cultural History of America’s Most Cherished Holiday (New York: Vintage Books, 1996), 36, citing (fn 74) F.B Dexter, ed., The Literary Diary of Ezra Stiles, (3 vols., New Yor, 1901), II, 103.