(|8) On the other hand, the use of the name for the whole season is also common. TertuUian ((/<• Bapt. 19) says that 'after Pascha, Pentecost is a very extensive (latissimum ; v.l. Icetissimum) space for conferring baptisms, wherein, too, the Resurrection of the Lord was repeatedly proved among the disciples, and the hope of the Advent of the Lord indirectly pointed to, in that at that time, when He had been received back into the heavens, the angels told the Apostles that He would so come as He had withal ascended into the heavens, of course at Pentecost.' But he goes on to say that Jeremiah signified ' the day of the Passover and of Pentecost, which is properly a feast day.' In de Cor. 3 he has 'from Pascha to Pentecost.' In de Idol. 14 he saj-s that the Jews would not have shared with Christians the Lord's Day, nor yet Pentecost. Thus he uses the word in both senses. Ori"en talks of ' living in the season of Pentecost ' in tne same passage (c. Ccls. viii. 22) in which he talks of observing certain days, as, for example, the Lord's Day, the Preparation, the Passover, or Pentecost. He refers to the Descent of the Spirit. The 20th canon of Niciea forbids kneeling in the 'days of Pentecost,' as on the Lord's day. This is unlike St. Paul's usage ; he knelt at this season (Ac 20^* 2P). The Testament of our Lord speaks of ' the days of Pentecost ' (i. 28, 42, ii. 12) ; it forbids any one to fast or kneel then, for these are ' the days of rest and joy.' St. liasil speaks of the 'seven weeks of the holy Pentecost' (On the Spirit, ch. 27, aliter § 66).
The quotations given aliove show that Pente- cost as a Christian festival goes back at least to Irenjeus. It is rather curious that there is no
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reference to it between the NT and tliat Father ; and witli this fact we may compare the silence of the earlier writers about Easter ; but, as Duchesne remarks {Orig. viii. § 4), Pentecost is implied rather than explicitly mentioned in early Christian writings.
(b) fli^ Ascension. ~T\\e fortietliday after Easter was not, so far as we know, observed as a com- memoration of our Lord's goin" up to heaven until at least the middle of the 4th centnrj. In the Eclessenc Canons (can. 9) the Ascension is observed with Pentecost : ' At the completion of fifty {ii.l. ' forty,' but this is clearly a later correction) days after His Kesurrection, make ye a commemoration of His Ascension.' And so in ' Silvia ' on the day of Pentecost there is a ' station ' at the Mount of Olives, at the church called Imbomon, ' that is in that place whence the Lord ascended into heaven,' where the lection of the Ascension is read. This 'station' is held after another 'in Syon,' where the lection of the Descent of the Holy Ghost is read. Thus in this account both events are com- memorated on the same day. The curious thinp; is that in ' Silvia ' there is also an observance of the fortieth day after Easter ; but then the ' station ' is at Bethlehem, and there is no mention of the Ascension. The coupling together of the two events, which has its parallel in the joining to- gether of Good Friday and Easter, as mentioned already, is illustrated by the passage from the Epistle of Barnabas cited above (I. § 1) ; the writer thought that the Ascension fell on a Sunday. Compare also Tertullian, do Bapt. 19 (see above, %2a).
Ascension Day is not found in the Tfslamevt of our Lord (c. 35U A.u. ?) or in any of tlie earlier Church Orders, but it is found in the Apostolic Constitutions, the author of which made it his aim to increase the festal cycle (v. 19, viii. 32). Sermons ' i found in the 4th cent., by Euse-
on the fortieth day after Easter. St. Augustine (Bp. liv. § ad Januar.) treats it as universal in a.d. 400 : • They are held as approved and instituted either by the Apostles themselves or by plenary councils ... for example, the annual commemoration by special solemnities of the Lord's Passion, Resurrection, and Aacensicn, and of the Descent of the HolySpirit from heaven.'
3. Christmas and Epiphany — (a) Their origin. —These festivals are of much later date than Easter and Pentecost, and were probably unknown till nearly a.d. 3U0. They were both, in their origin, one festival, and both were meant to com- memorate the Nativity of our Lord ; but the East fixed on one day and the West on another as the date of the birth of Christ, and so in course of time two separate festivals emerged.
Before we consider the evidence for the observ- ance of 25th December and 6tK January as festi- vals, it will be desirable to investigate the reason why these two days were chosen. The most prolj- able solution of the matter, in the light of our present knowledge, is that of Duchesne (Origines, ch. viii. § 5), whose theory is followed here. The date 25th December was hrst arrived at apparently by Hippolytus. Other calculations had fixed on 18th or 19th April or 29th May (Clement of Alex- andria, Strom, i. 147, ed. Potter, Oxford, 1715, p. 407 : ' on the 25th day of the month Pachon ' ; see the whole passage) ; and about A.D. 243 the treatise de Pascha ComjmUis of pseudo-Cyprian (see above, II. § 1 rf) named 28th March. The cal- culations of Hippolytus, which were his mature results (for he had formerly fixed on 2nd January),