To start with, the ordinary meaning of “new” is something fresh; something that has never been seen or heard of before. It is all about beginning something. But, on January 1, the sun still rises from the East the same way it did on December 31 or any other day. You wake up on January 1 to meet the same People you encountered on December 31 or any other day. You still go to your office or visit friends or relations as normal as it has always been. The problems that confront you as an individual and the world generally are still there; they do not go away at the onset of January 1.
In short, there is practically nothing special that happens on January 1 to indicate its newness or its deserving of celebration more than any other day of the year. As a matter of fact, there can be nothing new for a person who has been bed-ridden long before the January 1 or for an applicant that would still be pounding the street looking for anything to do to survive.
Though, scientists have done well by inventing or setting certain parametre for measuring space and time as against spacelessness and timelessness in the nature, the idea of electing a certain day for the people of the world to remember as if it is the beginning of another journey into the future, seeks to belittle the human sensibility. Sad, even that humanity falls for such trap hook, line and sinker.
As a matter of fact, the New Year, according to the historical accounts, is built around event that could be described as sadness. The first celebration of what today is regarded and celebrated as New Year was done by Julius Caesar, a 46 B.C Roman emperor, ordering the violent routing of revolutionary Jewish forces in the Galilee. It was believed that blood of the innocent people flowed in the streets and that in later years, Roman pagans observed the New Year by engaging in drunken orgies—a ritual which they believed constituted a personal re-enacting of the chaotic world that existed before the cosmos was ordered by the gods.
Julus Caesar was the Roman god of doors and gates, and had two faces, one looking forward and one back. Caesar felt that the month named after this god known as Janus (“January”) would be the appropriate “door” to the year.
As Christianity spread, pagan holidays were either incorporated into the Christian calendar or abandoned altogether. By the early medieval period most of Christian Europe regarded Annunciation Day (March 25) as the beginning of the year. According to Catholic tradition, Annunciation Day commemorates the angel Gabriel’s announcement to Mary that she would be impregnated by G-d and conceives a son to be called Jesus.
Throughout the medieval and post-medieval periods, January 1 – supposedly the day on which Jesus’ circumcision initiated the reign of Christianity and the death of Judaism – was reserved for anti-Jewish activities: synagogue and book burnings, public tortures, and simple murder.
In reality, the universalisation of the concept of New Year has always confused people with analytical minds for the reasons one of which is the fact that it is presupposed that all humanity should be jubilating on January 1, irrespective of the mood and circumstances of life of individuals.
This question would continue to be asked: is there really anything new in the New Year or on January 1st?
All the same, Happy New Year to all our invaluable readers and fans. [myad]
