圣诞节的由来（英语）
圣诞节的由来（英语）谁有？
参考答案:In Britain the 25th of December was a festival long before the conversion to Christianity, for Bede (_De temp. rat._ ch. 13) relates that "the ancient people of the Angli began the year on the 25th of December when we now celebrate the birthday of the Lord; and the very night which is now so holy to us, they called in their tongue _modranecht (modra niht)_, that is, the mothers' night, by reason we suspect of the ceremonies which in that night-long vigil they performed." With his usual reticence about matters pagan or not orthodox, Bede abstains from recording who the mothers were and what the ceremonies. In 1644 the English puritans forbad any merriment or religious services by act of Parliament, on the ground that it was a heathen festival, and ordered it to be kept as a fast. Charles II. revived the feast, but the Scots adhered to the Puritan view.