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Is it true that Prophet Isa (pbuh) was born on 25th of December?

Prophet Jesus
Is it true that Prophet Isa (pbuh) was born on 25th of December?
Amina Inloes, Amina Inloes is originally from the US and has a PhD in Islamic Studies from the University of Exeter on Shi'a hadith. She is the program leader for the MA Islamic Studies program at the... Answer updated 6 years ago

Good question!

Shi'i texts give the following dates on the Islamic lunar calendar for the birth of Jesus:

(a) 10 Muharram. From the chain of narration from 'Ali ibn al-Hasan, from Muhammad ibn 'Abd Allah ibn Zurarah, from al-Bizanti, from Aban ibn 'Uthman, from Kathir al-Nawa', from Abu Ja'far [al-Baqir] (A). He said: "The Day of Ashura is the day that Jesus the son of Mary (A) was born on." [Bihar al-Anwar, vol. 14, p. 206] <- Personally I think this is less likely, but it's there.

(b) 25 Dhu al-Qa`dah. From Ibn al-Walid, from al-Saffar, from Ibn 'Isa ibn Hashim, from al-Washa', from [Imam] al-Rida (A). He said: "The night of the 25th of Dhu al-Qa`dah is when Ibrahim (A) and Jesus (A) were born." [Also Bihar al-Anwar, vol. 14, p. 206]

Historians say that Jesus was born around 5 BC, which would correspond to -645 / -646 AH. So, this would correspond to either 22 October (10 Muharram -645 AH) or 8 September (25 Dhu al-Qa`dah -646 AH).

 If one takes 1 AD as the date of birth of Jesus (since the year 0 AD is not used in the calendar), it would be August 20th (10 Muharram -639 AH) or July 7th (25 Dhu al-Qa`dah -640 AH).

In either case, the resulting date is not 25 December. 

That being said, I don't think there are any historians who argue that Jesus was actually born on 25 December; it is just the time of the year that the birth was eventually commemorated on. Also, the specific date on which Christmas has been celebrated has historically varied between countries. 

(Disclaimer: It is possible that these calendarical conversions are somewhat off since there have been some adjustments to the Gregorian calendar in the past couple thousand years, however they should provide a rough estimate of dates.)