New Years

Janus and The New Year

When you research "New Years" and where the name January comes from, you will find Januarius, also known as January, named after Janus (Ianus) the Roman god of doors and gates, and beginning and endings. This so-called god is also symbolically known as the god of change and transitions, usually depicted with a face looking into the future and a face looking into the past. However, the bible has a different account of who this God is.

Revelation 1:8 “I am Alpha and Omega, the beginning and the ending, saith the Lord, which is, and which was, and which is to come, the Almighty.”

A depiction of Janus, the so-called God of beginnings and endings

Another figure is the Greek god Cronos (Khronos). This is also where you get the term chronograph. Chrono, relating to time and graph dealing with measurement or calculation. Cronos became who we know as father time, and father time became who you know as the grim reaper. Usually depicted as carrying a scythe, in addition to occasionally being depicted as having an hour glass or clock, symbolic for the passing of life and time. And was first said to be cannibalistic and reap children. But everything has a time (Ecclesiastes 3:1-8), but the Most High is not affected by time and space.

Deuteronomy 33:27 “The eternal God is thy refuge, and underneath are the everlasting arms: and he shall thrust out the enemy from before thee; and shall say, Destroy them.”

Alcohol and the god Dionysus

The Greek god Dionysus known as the god of drinks and wine. Is usually depicted as a baby in a diaper or as you guessed it! Baby New Year's! Who in reality is a grown man. One of the customs was to parade a baby around in a basket, symbolic for fertility of crops. Now, although he is associated with drinking and wine, is it lawful to drink and if so how should one watch their intake? (Isaiah 5:11)

Ecclesiasticus 31:27-28 [27] Wine is as good as life to a man, if it be drunk moderately: what life is then to a man that is without wine? for it was made to make men glad. [28] Wine measurably drunk and in season bringeth gladness of the heart, and cheerfulness of the mind:

Tobit 4:15 “Do that to no man which thou hatest: drink not wine to make thee drunken: neither let drunkenness go with thee in thy journey.”

Yes! it is lawul to consume alcoholic beverages! As long as you are not drinkng with the intention to be drunk and are minful of your level of consumption, you fair well.

Midnight

Midnight is the time when people celebrate New Year’s and the time set for a day to end and begin in modern day society. But what did the Most High say and ordain?

Ecclesiasticus 33:7 Why doth one day excel another, when as all the light of every day in the year is of the sun? 

 Leviticus 23:32 “It shall be unto you a sabbath of rest, and ye shall afflict your souls: in the ninth day of the month at even, from even unto even, shall ye celebrate your sabbath.”

From evening to evening, sundown to sundown is a day. When the sun sets, a day ends and a new day begins, and this was not for the Sabbath day only but every day.

Genesis 1:5 “And God called the light Day, and the darkness he called Night. And the evening and the morning were the first day.”

Night and midnight have long been associated with magic, chaos, death, and hell. Sorcery has always been thought best to be performed at midnight!

When is the New Year

So When does the year actually start? We have seasons, (Genesis 8:22) but what you may not have known, is that it is important to keep the feast days in their respective seasons or times (Leviticus 23:4). I am sure you have heard of the holy day Passover and the feast of unleavened bread. Let us examine when this feast occurs to better understand in what month the year begins.

Exodus 12:2, 18 [2] “This month is to be for you the first month, the first month of your year. [18] In the first month you are to eat bread made without yeast, from the evening of the fourteenth day until the evening of the twenty-first day.” 

Leviticus 23:5 “In the fourteenth day of the first month at even is the Lord’s Passover.”

Deuteronomy 16:1 “Observe the month of Abib and keep the Passover unto the Lord your God: for in the month of Abib the Lord thy God brought thee forth out of Egypt by night.”

The first month is Abib, also known as Aviv and Nisan. In this month, starting with the 14th day of this month, at sundown (which would make it the 15th day of the month) you keep the Passover (which is the first day) and the feast of unleavened bread (which starts the first day and continues for seven). This feast is kept in the spring season. This is the start of the New Year, as spring is the season when nature is flourishing and budding forth. Wheras in the winter everything is dead in comparison. (Ecclesiasticus 50:8; Song of Solomon 2:11-12)

The Passover will occur around what we know today as March and April. Reason being, is that Abib begins sometime in what we know as March but can even take place sometime in April. Also, keep in mind that the biblical/ Hebrew/ Lunar/ Canaanite calendar takes place at different times of the Gregorian calendar months that society follows today. For now, let us examine the word "abib" using the Strong’s Concordance:

24  אָבִיב ’āḇîḇ, n.m. GK: 26 [cf.8512]. (month of) Abib, the first month of the Canaanite calendar equal to Nisan (March/April); head (of grain), already ripe but still soft: - Abib [6], green ears of corn [1], in the ear [1]

As shown above, the month Abib starts sometime in March or possibly April. It is also synonymous with Nisan, they are the same month. But let us get an account of Aviv meaning the same thing.

Aviv \a-viv\ as a boy's name is of Hebrew origin, and the meaning of Aviv is "springtime". Aviv was the original name of Nisan,the first month of the Hebrew calendar which corresponds with March and April. It can also mean "young grain".Read more at http://www.thinkbabynames.com/meaning/1/Aviv#PZJPUMqcVwevrXfL.99

Now we have knowledge based on the sources above that Aviv, Abib and Nisan are synonymous and are the first month of the year which occurs in the spring time. In the winter however, a different feast day is kept aside from the weekly Sabbath and New Moon.

“John 10:22 And it was at Jerusalem the feast of the dedication, and it was winter.”

I hope this was edifying and that you remember to do your due diligence and research these things for yourself.

2 Timothy 2:15 “Study to shew thyself approved unto God, a workman that needeth not to be ashamed, rightly dividing the word of truth.”