Lee Hunter writes in response to Professor Ronald Hutton, an historian from University of Bristol, who is quoted as saying, "almost all cultures have a festival of light in the darkest season and the birth of Christ was deliberately moved to fit in with this" (How Scotland's witches will be celebrating their own version of Christmas this Wednesday, News, December 18).
Lee Hunter points out that "Yule was a Pagan festival long before the church hijacked it" and "methinks Christians and a great many others will have been celebrating their version of Yule on December 25 (Yule existed long before Christmas, letters, January 1).
Surely these are examples of disrespecting and even insulting Jesus. How disrespectful is it to move the commemoration of Jesus to a date
over three months after the date on which he was born. Anyone who genuinely wanted to celebrate his birth would do so in September [when some scholars estimate the event probably took place]. Also, does not the religion of Christianity itself disrespect and insult him? Jesus was a Jew. Those who genuinely want to follow him would not invent a new religion, irrespective of its many links to Judaism. They would follow Jesus's religion. If the Jewish religion was good enough for Jesus, it should also be considered good enough for his followers.
Sandra Busell
Edinburgh
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