As a Christian holiday, the night of December 24-25 has a single meaning - to honor the birth of the young god Jesus Christ. In this sense, this holiday has nothing to do with the annual calendar and with the end of the past year and the beginning of the next.
In fact, among many European nations and especially among the Bulgarians, this holiday has preserved elements of an older pagan holiday that was celebrated on this day and had content related to the end of the past and the beginning of the new calendar year.
The New Year's content of the holiday on December 25 comes from the pre-Christian era, when it was widely known and revered by the old Sapian peoples - Egyptians, Mesopotamians, Persians, Caucasian, etc. but with another meaning. For these peoples, the Sun is the main god and the basis of their annual calendar.
In this regard, these peoples celebrated December 25 as the festival of the Rising Sun and associated it with the day of the winter solstice (December 21-22), which has the meaning of the passing year and the beginning of the new one. This holiday is most popular among the Persians, who call the Sun god Mithras.
Later, the feast of the god Mithras was also taken over by the Romans. It was believed that on the day of the winter solstice, the Sun (Mithra) goes for three days to visit his mother, where it dies and is reborn on the night of December 24-25. The annual cycle of the birth of the Sun, its growth, aging and death was very popular with the ancient peoples of the Near East.
