Translation of the calendar to a new style. Orthodox calendar - old and new style

January 13 is the last day of the year in the Julian calendar. With what we congratulate you! It's time to deal with the causes of temporary cretinism, which for centuries "sick" the inhabitants of Russia.

How it all began

The ancient Roman Julian calendar was introduced in Rome as a result of a reform initiated by Julius Caesar in 46 BC. In Kievan Rus, the Julian calendar appeared during the time of Vladimir Svyatoslavovich almost immediately with the beginning of the introduction of Christianity. Thus, in The Tale of Bygone Years, the Julian calendar is used with the Roman names of the months and the Byzantine era. The chronology was from the Creation of the world, taking 5508 BC as a basis. - Byzantine version of this date. And the beginning of the new year was decided to be calculated from March 1 - in accordance with the ancient Slavic calendar.

dual calendar

To put it mildly, the people did not experience obvious delight from the innovation, managing to live according to two calendars. A sufficient number of samples of wooden folk calendars have been preserved, on which one can find the simultaneous designation of church holidays according to the Julian calendar, and local events based on the pagan folk calendar.

The Julian calendar was used primarily in cases where it was necessary to find out the date of church holidays.

The old calendar, based on the lunar phases, the solar cycle and the change of seasons, reported the dates of vital matters, first of all, the beginning or completion of field work. In modern life, for example, such pagan holidays as Shrovetide, associated with the lunar cycle, or "solar" celebrations - Kolyada and Kupala, have been preserved.

Trying is torture

For almost 500 years, Russia tried to live according to the Julian calendar. In addition to a large number of discrepancies, the confusion that arose in the annals was also a problem: the Russian chroniclers relied on dating according to the Slavic calendar, while the invited Greeks used the dates of the new calendar.

No prohibitions of the old calendar, up to the execution of its especially zealous adherents, helped.

The reigning Grand Duke of Moscow Ivan III tried to "settle" discrepancies. In the Summer of 7000 from the Creation of the World, that is, in 1492, the Moscow Church Council approved the transfer of the beginning of the year from March 1 to September 1 (a decision that is still in effect in the Russian Orthodox Church).

The shortest year

Another attempt to transform the chronology was made by Peter I. By his decree of 1699, he moved the beginning of the year from September 1 to January 1. Thus, the year 1699 lasted only 4 months: September, October, November and December. The year was also shortened by the Soviet authorities, which on January 24, 1918 corrected the error of the Julian calendar of 13 days, introducing the Gregorian calendar, according to which Catholic Europe has lived since 1582. After January 31, 1918, it was not February 1, but immediately February 14.

Everyone is playing!

Fearing to be once again misunderstood, Peter I made an attempt to "disguise" the introduction of a new chronology with grandiose festivities.

It was ordered to decorate the “Reigning City” “from trees and branches of pine, spruce and juniper” and to organize “fiery fun”: launching “rockets, whoever has how much happens” and firing from cannons, muskets and “other small guns”.

On New Year's Eve, the king personally gave the signal for the start of the celebrations. In addition to spectacles, Peter offered the people "various meals and vats of wine and beer" - a treat was organized in front of the palace and at the three triumphal gates. According to the tsar's decree, honest people walked for a week, and when they came to their senses after noisy undertakings, "a rather significant murmur arose" in Moscow. Many wondered: "How could the king change the solar current?"

Many of those who were firmly convinced that "God created the light in the month of September" still lived according to the old reckoning.

Peter decided not to captivate the people, making a reservation in the decree: “And if anyone wants to write both those years, from the creation of the world and from the birth of Christ, in a row freely.”

old style

Today, according to the Julian calendar, only four Orthodox churches live: Russian, Jerusalem, Georgian and Serbian. An attempt to replace the calendar was made by Patriarch Tikhon on October 15, 1923.

True, the “new style” lived in the Church for only 24 days, since already on November 8, 1923, the patriarch ordered “the universal and mandatory introduction of the new style into church use should be temporarily postponed.”

The modern Orthodox church calendar (Paschalia) consists of two parts: a fixed Monthly Book associated with the solar cycle, and a mobile Paschalia based on the lunar calendar. The Julian calendar, which differs from the Gregorian in 13 days, forms the basis of the fixed part - it includes non-passing Orthodox holidays and the days of commemoration of saints. Paschalia determines the date of Easter, which changes annually, and with it the transitional holidays that depend on it.

Citizens of the Soviet country, having gone to bed on January 31, 1918, woke up on February 14. The "Decree on the introduction of the Western European calendar in the Russian Republic" came into force. Bolshevik Russia switched to the so-called new, or civil, style of timekeeping, which coincided with the church Gregorian calendar used in Europe. These changes did not affect our Church: she continued to celebrate her holidays according to the old, Julian calendar.

The calendar split between Western and Eastern Christians (believers began to celebrate the main holidays at different times) occurred in the 16th century, when Pope Gregory XIII undertook another reform that replaced the Julian style with the Gregorian one. The purpose of the reform was to correct the growing difference between the astronomical year and the calendar year.

Obsessed with the idea of ​​world revolution and internationalism, the Bolsheviks, of course, did not care about the Pope and his calendar. As stated in the decree, the transition to the Western, Gregorian style was made "in order to establish in Russia the same time calculation with almost all cultural peoples" .... At one of the first meetings of the young Soviet government in early 1918, two draft reforms of time were considered "The first proposed a gradual transition to the Gregorian calendar, each year dropping 24 hours. This would take 13 years. The second provided for doing it in one fell swoop. It was he who liked the leader of the world proletariat Vladimir Ilyich Lenin, who surpassed the current ideologist of multiculturalism Angela Merkel in globalist projects.

Competently

Religious historian Alexei Yudin on how Christian churches celebrate Christmas:

First, let's make it clear right away: to say that someone celebrates on December 25, and someone on January 7 is incorrect. Everyone celebrates Christmas on the 25th, but according to different calendars. In the next hundred years, from my point of view, no unification of the celebration of Christmas is to be expected.

The old Julian calendar, adopted under Julius Caesar, lagged behind astronomical time. The reform of Pope Gregory XIII, which from the very beginning was called papist, was perceived extremely negatively in Europe, especially in Protestant countries, where the reformation had already firmly established itself. The Protestants were opposed primarily because "it was conceived in Rome." And this city in the XVI century was no longer the center of Christian Europe.

Red Army soldiers take out church property from the Simonov Monastery on a subbotnik (1925). A photo: wikipedia.org

The reform of the calendar, if desired, can, of course, be called a split, bearing in mind that the Christian world has already split not only along the East-West principle, but also within the West.

Therefore, the Gregorian calendar was perceived as Roman, papist, and therefore unsuitable. Gradually, however, the Protestant countries accepted it, but the process of transition took centuries. This is how things were in the West. The East paid no attention to the reform of Pope Gregory XIII.

The Soviet Republic switched to a new style, but this, unfortunately, was due to the revolutionary events in Russia, the Bolsheviks, of course, did not think about any Pope Gregory XIII, they simply considered the new style to be the most adequate to their worldview. And the Russian Orthodox Church has an additional trauma.

In 1923, at the initiative of the Patriarch of Constantinople, a meeting of Orthodox churches was held, at which a decision was made to correct the Julian calendar.

Representatives of the Russian Orthodox Church, of course, were unable to travel abroad. But Patriarch Tikhon nevertheless issued a decree on the transition to the "New Julian" calendar. However, this caused protests among believers, and the decision was quickly canceled.

You can see that there were several stages of searching for a match on a calendar basis. But this did not lead to the final result. So far, this issue has not been included in a serious church discussion at all.

Is the Church afraid of another schism? Undoubtedly, some ultra-conservative groups within the Church will say: "The sacred time has been betrayed." Any Church is a very conservative institution, especially when it comes to everyday life and liturgical practices. And they rest against the calendar. And the church-administrative resource in such matters is ineffective.

Every Christmas, the theme of switching to the Gregorian calendar pops up. But this is politics, profitable media presentation, PR, whatever you want. The Church itself does not participate in this and is reluctant to comment on these issues.

Why does the Russian Orthodox Church use the Julian calendar?

Father Vladimir (Vigilyansky), rector of the Church of the Holy Martyr Tatiana at Moscow State University:

Orthodox churches can be roughly divided into three categories: those that serve all church holidays according to the new (Gregorian) calendar, those that serve only according to the old (Julian) calendar, and those that mix styles: for example, in Greece, Easter is celebrated according to old calendar, and all other holidays - in a new way. Our churches (Russian, Georgian, Jerusalem, Serbian and Athos monasteries) never changed the church calendar and did not mix it with the Gregorian, so that there would be no confusion in the holidays. We have a single calendar system, which is tied to Easter. If we switch to celebrating, say, Christmas according to the Gregorian calendar, then two weeks are “eaten up” (remember how in 1918, after January 31, February 14 came), each day of which carries a special semantic significance for an Orthodox person.

The church lives according to its own order, and in it many significant things may not coincide with secular priorities. For example, in church life there is a clear system of progression of time, which is tied to the Gospel. Every day, excerpts from this book are read, in which there is a logic associated with the gospel story and the earthly life of Jesus Christ. All this lays down a certain spiritual rhythm in the life of an Orthodox person. And those who use this calendar do not want and will not violate it.

A believer has a very ascetic life. The world can change, we see how before our very eyes fellow citizens have a lot of opportunities, for example, for recreation during the secular New Year holidays. But the Church, as one of our rock singers sang, "will not bend under the changing world." We will not make our church life dependent on the ski resort.

The Bolsheviks introduced a new calendar "in order to calculate the same time with almost all cultural peoples." A photo: Publishing project of Vladimir Lisin "Days of 1917 100 years ago"

The old and new style of the calendar in our time has a difference of 13 days. Such a difference occurred in 1582, when civilized Europeans, at the insistence of the Pope, changed the Julian calendar to the Gregorian.

In general, the whole history with calendars and chronology stretches into hoary antiquity. Peasants who were engaged in agriculture were very dependent on the time of year. So they were the first and began to try to systematize and streamline time.

The great Mayan civilization achieved great values ​​in the accuracy of calendar calculations. They accurately determined the days of the summer and winter solstices and could calculate the time for several millennia in advance. But we did not accept their achievements, but adopted the Roman (Julian) calendar.

When Rome was the center of civilization and enlightenment, during the reign of Julius Caesar, when the state was at its peak of development, the Roman Senate decided to replace the old Greek calendar, which had only ten months, with the Julian one, which Caesar, on the advice of Egyptian astrologers, adopted for the most convenient option. The fact is that the priests were engaged in chronology in Rome.

The beginning of the year was considered the month of March, named after Mars (the Greek god of fertility). And once every four years, an additional month of Mercedoni was added. Firstly, no one knew when the end of mercedony would come, and secondly, the payment of taxes and the return of debts was too delayed due to the extra month.

There is information that the priests received solid gifts and rewards for postponing the end of the year. It is precisely because of the instability of the replenishment of the state budget (treasury) that fundamental changes have taken place.

When was the Julian calendar introduced in Russia?

This event happened in 1918. This year there were simply no dates: 1, 2, 3, etc. before February 13th. It was January 31st, and the next day was February 14th.

This was done for rapprochement with Europe. The party leadership hoped for world communism and tried to merge as closely as possible with the West.

What is today's date according to the old style

With each century, the gap between the Gregorian and Julian calendars grows, if the number of the previous century is not divisible by 4 with the whole result.

For example, from 1700 to 1800 to determine the date of the event according to the new style, 11 days should be added, from 1800 to 1900 - 12 days, and from 1900 to 2100 - 13. After 2100, the gap will increase by one more day and will be 14 days.

Difference between Julian and Gregorian calendars

There is no particular difference in these time measurement systems, but Orthodox Christians have completely abandoned the use of the Gregorian calendar to determine the dates of holidays.

In 1923, the Soviet government put strong pressure on His Holiness Patriarch Tikhon, but was never able to get the Church to agree to the use of the Gregorian calendar (new style).

How to Easily Convert Dates from Julian to Gregorian Calendar

To do this, you need to know the date of the event. If the date is earlier than 1700, then 10 days must be added, if from 1700 to 1800 - 11, from 1800 to 1900 - 12, and from 1900 to 2100 - 13 days. But it is worth noting that in Russia, in connection with the transition to a new style of chronology, there were no numbers from 02/01/1918 to 02/13/1918 at all.

They changed the old style of the calendar to a new one after the revolution. The decree on the introduction of a new calendar system was proposed at a meeting of the Council of People's Commissars and approved personally by V. Lenin.

Examples of translation to a new calculus style

For example, let's deal with Taras Shevchenko's birthday. Everyone knows that he was born on February 25, 1814, according to the old style. This year was not a leap year and had 28 days in February. We add 12 days to this date and get March 9 according to the new style (Gregorian).

Errors with date translations to the new style

When translating the events of bygone days into a new style, a colossal number of errors are made. People did not think about the growing difference between the Gregorian and Julian calendars.

Now such errors can be seen in very authoritative sources - Wikipedia is no exception. But now you know how you can easily and quickly calculate the date of an event, knowing only its date according to the old style.

Since 46 BC, the Julian calendar has been used in most countries of the world. However, in 1582, by decision of Pope Gregory XIII, it was replaced by the Gregorian. In that year, the day after the fourth of October was not the fifth, but the fifteenth of October. Now the Gregorian calendar is officially adopted in all countries except Thailand and Ethiopia.

Reasons for adopting the Gregorian calendar

The main reason for the introduction of a new system of chronology was the movement of the vernal equinox, depending on which the date of the celebration of Christian Easter was determined. Due to discrepancies between the Julian and the tropical calendar (a tropical year is the length of time during which the sun completes one cycle of the seasons), the day of the vernal equinox gradually shifted to ever earlier dates. At the time of the introduction of the Julian calendar, it fell on March 21, both according to the accepted calendar system and in fact. But by the 16th century, the difference between the tropical and Julian calendars was already about ten days. As a result, the day of the spring equinox was no longer on March 21, but on March 11.

Scientists drew attention to the above problem long before the adoption of the Gregorian system of chronology. Back in the 14th century, Nikephoros Gregoras, a Byzantine scholar, reported this to Emperor Andronicus II. According to Grigora, it was necessary to revise the calendar system that existed at that time, because otherwise the date of the celebration of Easter would continue to shift to an ever later time. However, the emperor did not take any action to eliminate this problem, fearing a protest from the church.

In the future, other scientists from Byzantium spoke about the need to switch to a new calendar system. But the calendar continued to remain unchanged. And not only because of the fear of the rulers to provoke indignation among the clergy, but also because the further the Christian Easter was pushed back, the less chance it had to coincide with the Jewish Easter. This was unacceptable according to church canons.

By the 16th century, the problem had become so urgent that the need to solve it was no longer in doubt. As a result, Pope Gregory XIII assembled a commission, which was instructed to carry out all the necessary research and create a new calendar system. The results obtained were displayed in the bull "Among the most important". It was she who became the document with which the adoption of the new calendar system began.

The main disadvantage of the Julian calendar is its lack of accuracy in relation to the tropical calendar. In the Julian calendar, leap years are all years that are divisible by 100 without a remainder. As a result, every year the difference with the tropical calendar increases. Approximately every one and a half centuries, it increases by 1 day.

The Gregorian calendar is much more accurate. It has fewer leap years. Leap years in this system of chronology are years that:

1. divisible by 400 without a remainder;
2. divisible by 4 without a remainder, but not divisible by 100 without a remainder.

Thus, 1100 or 1700 in the Julian calendar are considered leap years because they are divisible by 4 without a remainder. In the Gregorian calendar, of the past, after its adoption, 1600 and 2000 are considered leap years.

Immediately after the introduction of the new system, it was possible to eliminate the difference between the tropical and calendar years, which at that time was already 10 days. Otherwise, due to errors in the calculations, an extra year would run every 128 years. In the Gregorian calendar, an extra day only occurs every 10,000 years.

Far from all modern states, the new chronology system was adopted immediately. The Catholic states were the first to switch to it. In these countries, the Gregorian calendar was officially adopted either in 1582 or shortly after the decree of Pope Gregory XIII.

In a number of states, the transition to a new calendar system was associated with popular unrest. The most serious of them took place in Riga. They lasted for five whole years - from 1584 to 1589.

There were also some funny situations. So, for example, in Holland and Belgium, due to the official adoption of the new calendar, after December 21, 1582, January 1, 1583 came. As a result, the inhabitants of these countries were left without Christmas in 1582.

Russia adopted the Gregorian calendar one of the last. The new system was officially introduced on the territory of the RSFSR on January 26, 1918 by a decree of the Council of People's Commissars. In accordance with this document, immediately after January 31 of that year, February 14 came on the territory of the state.

Later than in Russia, the Gregorian calendar was introduced only in a few countries, including Greece, Turkey and China.

After the official adoption of the new chronology system, Pope Gregory XIII sent a proposal to Constantinople to switch to a new calendar. However, she was met with a refusal. Its main reason was the inconsistency of the calendar with the canons of the celebration of Easter. However, in the future, most Orthodox churches still switched to the Gregorian calendar.

To date, only four Orthodox churches use the Julian calendar: Russian, Serbian, Georgian and Jerusalem.

Date rules

In accordance with the generally accepted rule, dates that fell between 1582 and the moment the Gregorian calendar was adopted in the country are indicated both in the old and in the new style. In this case, the new style is indicated in quotation marks. Earlier dates are given in accordance with the proleptic calendar (i.e., the calendar used to denote dates earlier than the date the calendar appeared). In countries where the Julian calendar was adopted, dates prior to 46 B.C. e. are indicated according to the proleptic Julian calendar, and where it was not - according to the proleptic Gregorian.

God created the world outside of time, the change of day and night, the seasons allows people to put their time in order. To do this, humanity invented a calendar, a system for calculating the days of the year. The main reason for the transition to another calendar was the disagreement about the celebration of the most important day for Christians - Easter.

Julian calendar

Once upon a time, during the reign of Julius Caesar, in 45 BC. The Julian calendar appeared. The calendar itself was named after the ruler. It was the astronomers of Julius Caesar who created the chronology system, focused on the time of successive passage of the equinox point by the Sun. , so the Julian calendar was a "solar" calendar.

This system was the most accurate for those times, each year, not counting leap years, contained 365 days. In addition, the Julian calendar did not contradict the astronomical discoveries of those years. For fifteen hundred years, no one could offer this system a worthy analogy.

Gregorian calendar

However, at the end of the 16th century, Pope Gregory XIII proposed a different system of reckoning. What was the difference between the Julian and the Gregorian calendar, if there was no difference in the number of days for them? A leap year was no longer considered every fourth year by default, as in the Julian calendar. According to the Gregorian calendar, if a year ended in 00 but was not divisible by 4, it was not a leap year. So 2000 was a leap year, and 2100 will no longer be a leap year.

Pope Gregory XIII was based on the fact that Easter should be celebrated only on Sunday, and according to the Julian calendar, Easter fell on different days of the week each time. February 24, 1582 the world learned about the Gregorian calendar.

Popes Sixtus IV and Clement VII also advocated reform. The work on the calendar, among others, was led by the Jesuit Order.

Julian and Gregorian calendars - which is more popular?

The Julian and Gregorian calendars continued to exist together, but in most countries of the world it is the Gregorian calendar that is used, and the Julian calendar remains for calculating Christian holidays.

Russia was among the last to adopt the reform. In 1917, immediately after the October Revolution, the “obscurantist” calendar was replaced by a “progressive” one. In 1923, they tried to transfer the Russian Orthodox Church to the “new style”, but even with pressure on His Holiness Patriarch Tikhon, a categorical refusal followed from the Church. Orthodox Christians, guided by the instructions of the apostles, calculate holidays according to the Julian calendar. Catholics and Protestants consider holidays according to the Gregorian calendar.

The issue of calendars is also a theological issue. Despite the fact that Pope Gregory XIII considered the astronomical rather than the religious aspect to be the main issue, later arguments appeared about the correctness of this or that calendar in relation to the Bible. In Orthodoxy, it is believed that the Gregorian calendar violates the sequence of events in the Bible and leads to canonical violations: the Apostolic canons do not allow the celebration of Holy Easter before Jewish Easter. The transition to a new calendar would mean the destruction of Paschalia. Scientist-astronomer Professor E.A. Predtechensky in his work "Church time: reckoning and a critical review of the existing rules for determining Easter" noted: “This collective work (Editor's note - paschalia), in all likelihood by many unknown authors, was made in such a way that it still remains unsurpassed. The later Roman Paschal, now adopted by the Western Church, is, in comparison with the Alexandrian, so heavy and clumsy that it resembles a popular print next to an artistic depiction of the same subject. For all that, this terribly complex and clumsy machine still does not achieve its intended goal.. In addition, the descent of the Holy Fire at the Holy Sepulcher takes place on Holy Saturday according to the Julian calendar.