What is the correct calendar? Which calendar is correct? When the year ends a more accurate calendar

Your attention is invited new lunar calendar for 2020 indicating the days of the new moon, full moon, what phase of the moon is today, the position of the moon in the signs of the zodiac, and also favorable lunar days. The lunar calendar 2020 will help you today to determine the unfavorable and favorable days of each month of 2020, orient you to planning things with the least loss of time and effort. Find out what lunar day it is today and read what its action and characteristics are.

LUNAR CALENDAR FOR TODAY March 27, 2020

The table shows the unfavorable and favorable days of the lunar calendar 2020 for daily affairs.

Today tenderness, a feeling of love will appear in you, your appetite will increase. A good time to continue and complete matters, especially those related to property, for commercial activities, stock transactions, investments, making and signing a will. A good time to negotiate, conclude contracts, announce an engagement or marry. Today you need to please your body - get a massage or eat delicious

Season of the Moon: "Spring". The first phase of the moon can be compared with the first years of a person's life - his childhood and adolescence. During this time, all people are at a low level of activity, tend to be in a depressed mood, which worsens for no apparent reason. If work is the main thing in your life, rest assured that the first phase is the best time to think about new projects. It is too early to start them, but you can already do planning. If the main priority is love and personal life, then know that in the first phase, promises are made, joint plans are made, hopes are born, new acquaintances are made, and the old ones move to a more serious level.

Solar/Lunar eclipse- No

CHARACTERISTICS OF THE MOON DAY:

Exactly 100 years ago, the Russian Republic lived the first day of the new style. Due to the transition from the Julian calendar to the more accurate Gregorian, which was adopted in most European countries back in the 17th century, the first 13 days of February 1918 simply fell out of the calendar, and after January 31, February 14 immediately came. This not only helped to synchronize the national calendar with the calendars of other countries, but also led to the fact that the day of the Great October Revolution in the Soviet Union, despite the name, began to be celebrated on November 7, Pushkin's birthday in June, although he was born, as you know, May 26, and in mid-January, an incomprehensible holiday appeared - the Old New Year. At the same time, the Russian Orthodox Church still uses the Julian calendar, so, for example, Orthodox and Catholics celebrate Christmas on different days.

On January 26, 1918, a decree was adopted, according to which the young Soviet Russian Republic switched to the Gregorian calendar generally accepted in Europe. This led not only to a shift in dates, but also to some amendments in the definition of leap years. In order to understand where the discrepancy between the two calendars comes from, let us first consider the natural processes that were used in their development.

Astronomy and calendar

The most common calendars are based on the ratio of the times of three cyclic astronomical processes: the rotation of the Earth around its axis, the rotation of the Moon around the Earth, and the rotation of the Earth itself around the Sun. These three processes lead to periodic changes that are clearly visible on Earth: the change of day and night, the change in the phases of the moon and the alternation of the seasons, respectively. The ratio of the durations of these time intervals underlies the overwhelming number of calendars used by mankind. It is clear that there are other astronomical events visible to humans on Earth that occur with convenient regularity (for example, in ancient Egypt, the ascent of Sirius was observed, which had the same annual cycle), but using them to develop a calendar is still rather an exception.

Of the three indicated intervals, from an astronomical point of view, it is easiest to deal with the shortest of them - the length of the day. Now, for the period of time, on the basis of which, in particular, calendars are compiled, they take the average solar day - that is, the average period of time during which the Earth rotates around its axis relative to the center of the Sun. Solar days are because the center of the Sun is used as a reference point, and it is necessary to average a day over a year due to the fact that, due to the ellipticity of the Earth's orbit and its perturbation by other celestial bodies, the period of revolution of our planet changes over the course of the year, and the longest and most short days differ from each other by almost 16 seconds.

A method for determining the duration of a solar day, which are calculated by changing the orientation of the Earth relative to the initial position (1) not by a complete turn of 360 degrees to position (2), but by one revolution relative to the center of the Sun to position (3)

Wikimedia Commons

The second of the time intervals needed for the calendar is the year. Of several possible options for determining a gap of one year, when compiling a calendar, a seasonal cycle is used, which can be observed when looking at the position of the Sun in the sky from Earth - the so-called tropical year. It is determined by the change in the ecliptic coordinates of the Sun, and one annual cycle corresponds to a change of 360 degrees in its ecliptic longitude (that is, its longitudinal position on the celestial sphere, measured from the vernal equinox, at which the plane of rotation of the Earth around the Sun and the equatorial plane of the Earth intersect). At the same time, the length of the year may vary slightly depending on the choice of the starting point, and, as a rule, the point of the vernal equinox is chosen as the starting position, because for it the error in determining the length of the year is minimal.

At the heart of the solar calendars most common now (including the Julian and Gregorian) is the ratio of the time of the daily and annual periods. This ratio, that is, the duration of the tropical year in days, is, of course, not an integer and amounts to 365.2422. And how close the calendar can adjust to this value directly depends on its accuracy.

It is worth noting that despite the fact that the duration of one tropical year is almost constant, due to small perturbations in the Earth's orbit, it still changes slightly. These perturbations are associated with the influence of the celestial bodies closest to the Earth, primarily Mars and Venus, they are all periodic and have an amplitude of 6 to 9 minutes. The period of each of the perturbations is two or three years, which together give a 19-year nutation cycle. In addition, the duration of the tropical year does not coincide with the time of the Earth's revolution around the Sun (the so-called sidereal year). This is due to the precession of the earth's axis, which leads to a difference that is now about 20 minutes (the length of a sidereal year in days is 365.2564).

The third of the periods of time used for compiling calendars is the synodic month. It is measured as the time between two identical phases of the moon (for example, new moons) and averages 29.5306 solar days. The phases of the moon are determined by the mutual position of the three celestial bodies - the Earth, the Moon and the Sun and, for example, do not correspond to the periodicity of the position of the Moon on the celestial sphere relative to the stars. Also, like the tropical year, the synodic month varies greatly in length.

Lunar calendars based on the phases of the moon were used quite widely, but in most cases they were supplanted by solar or solar-lunar calendars. This is explained both by the inconvenience of using lunar calendars due to noticeable variations in the length of the month, and by the natural binding of human activity to seasonal weather changes, which can be associated with the position of the Sun in the sky, but not with the phase of the Moon. Today, lunar calendars are used mainly to determine the dates of religious holidays. In particular, the Muslim calendar is lunar, and the dates of Old Testament Christian holidays, especially Easter, are also determined by the lunar calendar.

Any calendar is based on attempts to link at least two of these time intervals. But since any of these ratios cannot be represented as an ordinary fraction, it is impossible to compile an absolutely accurate calendar. This problem can be solved in a relatively simple way, without resorting to any calendars at all, but using only one interval, for example, the length of a day. This is suggested by, for example, astronomers who simply count the days starting from a certain point in the past (according to the modern calendar, this point corresponds to noon on November 24, 4714 BC). In this case, any time point is determined by the Julian date - a fractional number that corresponds to the number of days that have passed since the start of the reference.

Wikimedia Commons

In the figure above: A method for determining the ecliptic coordinates of a celestial body (for example, the Sun) on the celestial sphere. They are measured from the vernal equinox.

Julian calendar

But counting time only by days is still not very convenient, and I want to have time intervals on a larger scale at hand. Even realizing that no calendar will allow us to describe with absolute accuracy the relationship between the duration of a solar day, a tropical year, and a synodic month, one can achieve satisfactory accuracy from it. It is precisely in the degree of accuracy in describing the ratio of two of these three intervals that the difference between the Julian calendar and the Gregorian one lies.

Both of these calendars are solar, they are designed to link the length of the mean solar day and the tropical year. We know that from an astronomical point of view, the length of a tropical year is approximately 365.2422 days. To make a calendar, this number must be somehow described so that in each calendar year there is an integer number of days. The easiest way to do this is by varying the length of the year.

The roughest acceptable rounding gives 365.25 days, and it is on this that the Julian calendar is built. If, with this rounding of the average length of the year, we divide the year into 365 days, then for every four years an error of one day will accumulate. It is from here that the structure of the calendar appears, in which every fourth year is a leap year, that is, it includes one day more than usual. The full cycle of such a calendar is only four years, which makes it very easy to use.

The Julian calendar was developed by Alexandrian astronomers, named after Julius Caesar and put into use in 46 BC. It is interesting that initially an extra day in a leap year was added not by introducing a new date - February 29, but by duplicating February 24.

Of course, the Julian calendar is far from the first version of the solar calendar. So, the ancient Egyptian solar calendar served as the basis for all modern solar calendars. It was counted according to the position of the rising Sirius in the sky and included 365 days. And although the Egyptians understood that with such a counting system, for example, a shift in the dates of the solstices and equinoxes occurs very quickly, for convenience, the length of the year did not change. Therefore, every four years there was a shift by one day, and after 1460 years (this interval was called the Great Year of Sothis), the year returned to its original position.

At the same time, in Ancient Rome itself, the Julian calendar replaced the previously used Roman calendar, which consisted of ten months and included 354 days. To bring the length of the calendar year into line with the length of the tropical year, an extra month was added to the year every few years.

The Julian calendar turned out to be much more convenient than the Roman one, but it was still not very accurate. The difference between 365.2422 and 365.25 is still large, so the inaccuracy of the Julian calendar was noticed quite soon, primarily due to the shift in the date of the vernal equinox. By the 16th century, it had already moved 10 days from its initial position, established by the Council of Nicaea in 325 on March 21. Therefore, in order to improve the accuracy of the calendar, it was proposed to amend the existing system of leap years.

Wikimedia Commons

Graph of the shift in the time of the summer solstice depending on the year according to the Gregorian calendar. Years are plotted along the abscissa, and the calculated actual time of the summer solstice in calendar notation is plotted along the ordinate (a quarter of a day corresponds to six hours).

Gregorian calendar

The new calendar was put into use by Pope Gregory XIII, who issued the bull Inter gravissimas in 1582. To more accurately match the calendar year to the tropical number of leap years in the new Gregorian calendar compared to the Julian decreased by three for every 400 years. Therefore, leap years ceased to be those whose serial numbers are completely divisible by 100, but are not divisible by 400. That is, 1900 and 2100 are not leap years, but, for example, 2000 was a leap year.

Taking into account the introduced amendments, the duration of one year in days according to the Gregorian calendar was 365.2425, which is already much closer to the required value of 365.2422 compared to what the Julian calendar offered. As a result of the proposed amendments, a difference of three days accumulates between the Julian and Gregorian calendars for 400 years. At the same time, the correction was carried out according to the shift of the day of the vernal equinox in relation to the date established by the Council of Nicaea - March 21, 325, so it was only 10 days (the next day after October 4 in 1582 immediately became October 15), and the zero difference between the calendars does not correspond to the first century AD, and the third.

The transition to a more accurate Gregorian calendar in Europe occurred gradually. First, in the 80s of the 16th century, all Catholic countries switched to the Gregorian calendar, and during the 17th and 18th centuries, gradually Protestant states. Despite the fact that the reform of Gregory XIII was a measure of the Counter-Reformation, symbolically subordinating calendar time to the bull of the Roman pontiff, its objective advantages were too obvious to be resisted for a long time on religious grounds.

In Russia, the process of transition to the revised calendar was somewhat delayed: until 1700, when most European countries already lived according to the Gregorian calendar, the Byzantine chronology was still adopted in the Russian kingdom. In terms of the definition of leap years, the Byzantine calendar, developed in the 7th century, corresponded to the Julian calendar, but differed in the names of the months, the date of the beginning of the year (September 1) and the reference point of the chronology. If the Julian and Gregorian calendars consider January 1 of the year in which Jesus Christ was born, then in the Byzantine version, the time is considered “from the creation of the world”, supposedly in 5509 BC. (Note that in determining the exact year of the birth of Christ, a mistake of several years was probably made, because of which, according to the Julian calendar, this should not be the first year of our era, but 7-5 years BC).

Russia was converted to the Julian calendar by Peter I in 1700. On the one hand, he saw the need to "synchronize" the historical time of Russia with the European one, on the other hand, he had a deep distrust of the "papist" calendar, not wanting to introduce a "heretical" Paschal. True, the Old Believers did not accept his reforms and still count the dates according to the Byzantine calendar. The New Believer Orthodox Church switched to the Julian calendar, but at the same time, until the beginning of the 20th century, it opposed the introduction of a more accurate Gregorian.

Due to the practical inconveniences that arose in the conduct of international affairs, as a result of the discrepancy between the calendars adopted in Europe and the Russian Empire, the issue of switching to the Gregorian calendar was raised, especially during the 19th century, more than once. For the first time, such a question was discussed during the liberal reforms of Alexander I, but then it never reached the official level. The problem of the calendar was raised more seriously in 1830, a special committee at the Academy of Sciences was even assembled for this, but as a result, Nicholas I chose to abandon the reform, agreeing with the arguments of the Minister of Education Karl Lieven about the unpreparedness of the people to switch to another calendar system due to insufficient education and possible indignations.

"Decree on the introduction of the Western European calendar in the Russian Republic"

The next time a serious commission about the need to switch to the Gregorian calendar in the Russian Empire was collected at the very end of the 19th century. The commission was formed under the Russian Astronomical Society, but, despite the participation of prominent scientists in it, in particular Dmitri Mendeleev, it was still decided to abandon the transition due to the insufficient accuracy of the Gregorian calendar.

At the same time, the commission considered the issue of switching both to the Gregorian calendar and to an even more accurate version developed by astronomer Johann Heinrich von Medler, a professor at Dorpat University, in 1884. Medler proposed to use a calendar with a 128-year cycle containing 31 leap years. The average length of a year in days according to such a calendar will be 365.2421875, and an error of one day accumulates over 100,000 years. However, this project was not accepted either. According to historians, the opinion of the Orthodox Church played a significant role in the rejection of reforms.

Only in 1917, after the October Revolution and the separation of church and state, did the Bolsheviks decide to switch to the Gregorian calendar. By that time, the difference between the two calendars had already reached 13 days. Several options were proposed for the transition to the new style. The first of them involved a gradual transition over 13 years, in which each year an amendment would be made in one day. However, in the end, the second, more radical, option was chosen, according to which, in 1918, the first half of February was simply canceled, so that after January 31, February 14 immediately came.

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Graph of the offset time of the vernal equinox according to the New Julian calendar. Years are plotted along the abscissa, and the calculated actual time of the vernal equinox in calendar notation (a quarter of a day corresponds to six hours) is plotted along the ordinate. The blue vertical line marks the year 1923, when the calendar was designed. The time period before this date is considered according to the proleptic New Julian calendar, which extends the dating to an earlier time.

Julian calendar and the Orthodox Church

The Russian Orthodox Church still continues to use the Julian calendar. The main reason why she refuses to switch to the Gregorian calendar is the linking of a number of church holidays (primarily Easter) to the lunar calendar. To calculate the date of Easter, the easter system is used, which is based on a comparison of lunar months and tropical years (19 tropical years are quite exactly equal to 235 lunar months).

The transition to the Gregorian calendar, according to representatives of the Russian Orthodox Church, will lead to serious canonical violations. In particular, in some cases, when using the Gregorian calendar, the date of the Catholic Easter turns out to be earlier than the Jewish date or coincides with it, which contradicts the Apostolic canons. After the transition to the Gregorian calendar, Catholics celebrated Easter four times before the Jews (all in the 19th century) and five times simultaneously with them (in the 19th and 20th centuries). In addition, Orthodox priests find other reasons not to switch to the Gregorian calendar, such as reducing the duration of some fasts.

At the same time, part of the Orthodox churches at the beginning of the 20th century switched to the New Julian calendar - with amendments introduced by the Serbian astronomer Milutin Milanković (known primarily for describing climatic cycles). Milankovitch suggested that instead of subtracting three leap years every 400 years, subtract seven leap years every 900 years. Thus, the full cycle of the New Julian calendar is 900 years, which makes it even more accurate, but also more difficult to use, even in relation to the Gregorian.

Milankovitch's amendments lead to the fact that the date according to the New Julian calendar may differ from the Gregorian both up and down (in the foreseeable future - no more than one day). At the moment, the dates of the New Julian and Gregorian calendars coincide, and the nearest discrepancy between them will appear only in 2800.

The accuracy of the New Julian calendar leads to an error accumulation of one day in 43,500 years. This is much better than the Gregorian calendar (one day in 3280 years) and, of course, the Julian (one day in 128 years). But, for example, the already mentioned Medler amendments, which were also considered by the Russian Orthodox Church as an alternative to the Julian calendar, make it possible to achieve twice the accuracy (one day per 100 thousand years), even despite a much shorter cycle of 128 years.

Returning to the issue of dating the October Revolution and Pushkin's birthday, it is worth noting that they are dated according to the new style (that is, according to the Gregorian calendar), indicating the date in brackets according to the old (Julian) style. Similarly, they do in European countries to date even those events that occurred before the introduction of the Gregorian calendar, while using the so-called proleptic Gregorian calendar, that is, expanding the Gregorian chronology for the period up to 1582.

The difference between the dates of the Catholic and Orthodox Christmas is now fully consistent with the difference between the Julian and Gregorian calendars. Accordingly, after the year 2100, Orthodox Christmas will shift from January 7 to January 8, and the difference in dates will increase by one more day.

Alexander Dubov

As you know, the Orthodox Church in Russia and a number of other countries does not recognize the secular calendar that is familiar to us. The Church adheres to the "old", Julian style, according to which the world lived even during the earthly life of Christ. However, the difference between the Julian and modern (Gregorian) calendars is now as much as 13 days. So which one is more correct and optimal?

Miracles as evidence

Among my acquaintances there are categorically not accepting the new style, and even celebrating the New Year on the night of January 13-14 - according to the "only true and true" Julian calendar. They are sure that the whole world lives according to the “wrong” time. As evidence of their correctness, they cite miracles that occur on Orthodox holidays precisely according to the old style.

Take, for example, the miracle of dried lilies coming to life. For many years now, everyone can watch it in two places in Ukraine: in the Transcarpathian town of Mukachevo and in the village of Kulevcha near Odessa.

One of the main shrines of the church "Joy of All Who Sorrow" in Mukachevo is the miraculous myrrh-streaming icon of the Virgin, famous for numerous healings. A few years ago, a tradition arose: on Easter, put white lilies, which are considered the flowers of the Virgin, in the icon case of this icon. Lying under the glass of the icon, the flowers, as expected, dry up. For the first time, they already wanted to remove them, when suddenly, two weeks later, the astonished parishioners noticed that the dry lilies ... sprouted and turned green again! And then the flowers bloomed! This miracle has been happening every year since then.

A similar phenomenon is observed in the Kulevchansky St. Nicholas Church. On the Friday before Easter, white lilies, cut in the garden of the temple, are solemnly placed in the kiot of the miraculous icon of the Kazan Mother of God. Without roots, earth, moisture and fresh air, they lie under glass for many weeks. At the end of spring, dry stems suddenly give young shoots and flowers bloom right on Trinity! Several months pass, and bulbs are born from the dried stems, and living leaves appear again from the bulbs, delighting parishioners until spring. And only a week before the new Easter, having spent a whole year without water, the lilies finally dry up completely. They are distributed to people, and fresh lilies are placed in the icon. In 2007, green shoots grew especially strong and entwined the icon so that only the face of the Mother of God remained open, neatly framed by stems and leaves.

From the point of view of science, such miracles seem fantastic. Over this phenomenon, specialists of the Botanical Garden of ONU named after A.I. Mechnikov, but scientists cannot give clear explanations. For believers, all this reminds that nothing is impossible for God, and that the human soul, like a flower, can bloom even when, it seems, nothing can help it ...

A curious natural phenomenon can be observed on the eve of the feast of the Entry into the Church of the Most Holy Theotokos, on the night of December 3-4. Around midnight, despite any frosts, buds swell on willows and lambs bloom! A few hours later they close back. If such a branch is cut, it will remain loose. Such phenomena were repeatedly filmed on photo and video equipment. In some pictures, you can see an unusual glow around the tree, as if hundreds of small lights stretched from the branches somewhere up...

Another miracle has been observed in Israel for 2,000 years, on the feast of the Transfiguration of the Lord. As is known from the Gospel, on this day the Savior, together with two disciples, ascended Mount Tabor and was transformed, appearing before the apostles in a dazzling radiance. And the top of the mountain, on which they were, was enveloped in a lush cloud. Since then, every year on this holiday according to the Julian calendar, a cloud has invariably descended to the top of Tabor, covering the Orthodox church built on the mountain. On all other days of the year, there are practically no clouds in this area ...

Epiphany phenomenon

I have a collection in my closet, consisting of bottles of Epiphany water. Every year on January 19 (January 6, O.S.), I pour a bottle of water straight from the tap. Years pass, but it does not deteriorate at all and does not go rotten! The oldest samples are already 15 years old, but even such water can be safely poured into a glass and drunk without risking poisoning. At the same time, the water in the “control” bottles poured on other days, as expected, becomes rotten after a couple of months.

Anyone can verify this. On the feast of the Epiphany of the Lord, as if at the behest of a magician, the water in all the reservoirs of the world is mystically consecrated and becomes imperishable. Poured into vessels, it is able to remain fresh for an arbitrarily long time.

According to the conclusions of scientists trying to find an explanation for this phenomenon, Epiphany water changes its biological properties in an incomprehensible way, becoming almost sterile, as if it had been treated with silver ions. According to biophysicist Stanislav Zenin, the reason lies in the special radiation from space. In his opinion, it is on January 18-19 that the Earth enters a stream of the strongest cosmic radiation that changes the properties of water. And if prayers are also read over the water in temples, then its unique and healing qualities are even more enhanced. The water is transformed on Epiphany Christmas Eve, from 17.30 to midnight and keeps them until the next evening. After that, the water in natural reservoirs quickly returns to its normal state.

There are other miracles on the feast of Epiphany. On January 19, 2006, several thousand pilgrims witnessed an amazing phenomenon that took place on the Jordan River. During the service, silver crosses were lowered into the river, and a whirlpool suddenly appeared on the hitherto calm surface of the water, the water began to boil, and the current ... turned back for several minutes! This incident recalled an event two thousand years ago. According to legend, when Jesus Christ entered the waters of the Jordan for baptism, the water of the river for a short time, contrary to the laws of physics, flowed in the opposite direction ...

How calendars were created

It turns out that the truth is that the Julian style is true?

However, not everything is so simple and unambiguous ...

Let's remember how calendars were created. The real tropical year, measured by the cycle of passage of the center of the Sun through the vernal equinox in the sky, is 365.242199 days. But after all, a person is used to thinking in whole numbers! Rounding the year to 365 days, we get a "makeweight" of 5 hours 48 minutes and 46 seconds. Because of this, people had to create special calendar systems.

There are about 40 variants of calendars on our planet - from "civil" to religious ones. For one and a half thousand years, the calendar created by the astronomer Sosigene, introduced under Julius Caesar in 45 BC, was considered one of the most convenient and accurate. e. It used a system of leap days added every 4 years. However, it was not completely accurate either. When rounding up the four-year “add-on weights” and adding them to an additional day, there were still unaccounted minutes and seconds, which every 128 years shifted the calendar relative to the vernal equinox point by one day ahead. Because of this, over time, the need to reform the chronology system began to mature.

The West decided to carry out a calendar reform under Pope Gregory XIII . The author of the new chronology, according to which they now live in most countries of the world, was the Italian physician, astronomer and mathematician Luigi Lillio. The calendar was named after the Catholic head and was introduced in 1582. The accumulated extra 10 days were “thrown out” in it, and so that the calendar would not move in the future, it was decided to complicate the system for inserting leap days. In each period of 400 years - 100, 200 and 300 years were excluded from the number of leap years, and their number decreased by 3 days. Thanks to this, it turned out that the Gregorian year is only 26 seconds longer than the tropical one, which means that the extra day accumulates over 3280 years, which is quite acceptable.

However, the Orthodox world accepted the Catholic innovations with hostility. Indeed, in addition to the calendar reform, Catholics also came up with a new system for calculating Easter days, abandoning the optimal and universal Alexandrian Paschalia and violating a number of patristic rules. In Orthodox Russia, even the civil calendar until 1918 was kept according to the Julian style, differing from global standards by 13 days.

Astronomers did not like the Gregorian calendar either, for which the more accurate is not the tropical, but the sidereal year measured by the stars, to which the old style was closer. For precise mathematical calculations, the Julian chronology turned out to be more convenient. Therefore, astronomers, mathematicians and chronological historians still prefer to make calculations according to Yu.S., and then add the corresponding number of days to the data obtained.

After the introduction of the new style in Russia, the Russian Orthodox Church still continues to live according to the Julian calendar. Because of this, Christmas, which was previously celebrated before the New Year, is celebrated in our country on the 7th day of N.G. And from the next century, it will have to be moved to January 8, and in the same way, with respect to the civil calendar, all other church holidays will shift. This, by the way, may well lead to church schisms. There will definitely be smart people who do not understand anything about calendar problems, who are eager to live the old fashioned way, but who do not want to switch to new dates regarding the new style. And several millennia later, if our Church does not abandon the Julian calendar, then Easter will have to be celebrated not in spring, but in early summer ...

In 1923, the New Julian calendar was adopted by most Orthodox Churches, until 2800 it completely coincided with the Gregorian, but even more accurate. It was developed by the Yugoslav astronomer, Professor Milutin Milanković. An error of 1 day accumulates in it after more than 40,000 (!) years. But not all Orthodox agreed to accept it, and this gave rise to schisms. For example, the "Old Calendarists" broke away from the Greek Church that had passed over to him, who, in turn, split into a number of sects and communities.

Curiously, they also tried to introduce a new style in Russia, and the decree on this was signed by none other than the holy Patriarch Tikhon (Belavin). But since the case smelled of protests and splits, after 24 days everything had to be canceled and returned to normal. Currently, only the Russian, Jerusalem, Georgian and Serbian Churches, plus the monasteries on Athos, use the Julian calendar. All other Local Churches live according to the New Julian style.

Miracles according to the new calendar

I have to disappoint those who are sure that miracles happen only on holidays according to the old style. In fact, they are also in those churches whose feast dates have been transferred to the new calendar. The most striking example of this is the amazing phenomena that the Greek island of Kefalonia is famous for.

In the eastern part of Kefalonia, near the village of Markopulo, there is a temple in honor of the Assumption of the Blessed Virgin Mary. According to legend, pirates attacked the island several centuries ago. Wanting to rob the monastic cloister and outrage the nuns, they broke into the territory of the monastery. At this time, the nuns with tears prayed for the protection of the Mother of God. And a miracle happened - sea robbers in front of the entrance to the temple were met by a huge number of hissing snakes. Terrified, the pirates fled away from the island. The monastery itself has not survived to this day, but the miraculous icon, in front of which the nuns prayed, is still carefully kept in the temple. Since then, on the eve of the feast of the Assumption, snakes (including poisonous ones) crawl from all around and, as if spellbound, are drawn to this icon. Snakes become tame for a while - they are not afraid of anyone, they are given into people's hands and do not bite anyone. It seems that they are celebrating together with Christians, reminding them of the Garden of Eden, in which the first-created people in the world lived with animals as a single family.

After the end of the festive service, the snakes leave the church and go home. After that, their usual habits return to them again, they no longer let people in and are able to bite. When in the twentieth century Greece switched to the New Julian style, accordingly, they moved and holiday dates. And, most surprisingly, the snakes… also switched to the new calendar!

The second miracle echoes the amazing phenomena described above in Ukraine. Only lilies on Kefalonia decorate the icon of the Mother of God Panagia on the feast of the Annunciation. And dried lilies bloom with snow-white flowers after 4.5 months - on the feast of the Assumption of the Virgin.

From all this we can conclude: for God there are no calendar obstacles! And if the Church, by mutual agreement, switches to a new style, then miracles may well be corrected by Him for new dates.

Easter fire

One of the main Orthodox miracles is the Holy Fire descending in the Jerusalem Church of the Holy Sepulcher on Saturday before Easter according to the Julian style. So much has already been written about him and shown films and reports that, perhaps, there is no point in repeating.

However, not everyone believes in the divine origin of Fire. Many of my acquaintances who have been in Jerusalem and seen everything with their own eyes could object to such skeptics. Many facts speak in favor of the miraculous nature of this miracle. For example, the numerous cases of spontaneous combustion of candles and lamps seen and captured on video. Flashes of lightning in the temple before a sheaf of unearthly light descends from under the dome onto the Holy Sepulcher and lights the Holy Fire in the chapel in which the Patriarch prays. The first minutes, the Fire does not burn and you can even wash your face with it. Moreover, numerous cases of healing people after such fiery washings are known.

One of the ancient witnesses of the miracle can be considered a cracked outer column, from which in 1579, during the reign of the Turkish Sultan, who took a substantial tribute for admission to the temple, the Holy Fire came out - to the poor pilgrims who were not allowed to enter. According to another version, representatives of the Armenian Apostolic Church locked themselves in the temple, not letting Orthodox competitors inside. However, historians consider the first version to be the most reliable.

An attempt to study this miracle from a scientific point of view was recently made by Andrei Volkov, an employee of the Kurchatov Institute, who brought a device to the temple that records changes in the electromagnetic field. At the moment of the descent of the Holy Fire, a sharp powerful burst of electromagnetic radiation was recorded. According to the scientist, this can be considered proof of the miraculous nature of the miracle.

Since ancient times, the date of Orthodox Easter has been calculated according to the Alexandrian Paschalia developed by the holy fathers, taking into account the solar and lunar cycles, and the rules according to which it should be celebrated after the Jewish Easter in the period from March 22 to April 25, according to the old style. After the transition of most Orthodox Churches to AD. s., attempts were made to calculate paschalia in a new way, but ultimately settled on a compromise solution. Easter and related holidays with "floating" dates are still celebrated in the old fashioned way, within the framework of the Alexandrian Paschalia. And fixed holidays (including Christmas, Epiphany, etc.) have been postponed by 13 days.

The Russian Orthodox Church is not yet going to switch to the new style. It is believed that the Julian calendar is one of the important cultural features of the Russian church people and is so dear to most believers that it is better not to touch it for the time being.

If sometime in the foreseeable future our hierarchs decide to switch to a new style, then in any case it is not worth being afraid of this and worrying. None of our calendars will confuse God. If only the people themselves tried to live in peace and love, and did not quarrel because of different views, rules and traditions.

This page will always help you find out the date and day of the week for today. At the top of the page there is a calendar for the current month, today is marked in green. Pre-holiday days are marked in orange - the opening time is reduced by one hour. In red are weekends, and in dark red are holidays in the Russian Federation.

Every day has its own specific place and name in the human system. The day of the week, month, and year are the exact reference points in the system of time coordinates, thanks to which people plan their daily activities. To keep track of time, a person invented not only a clock, but also a calendar - a tool that counts days and years. The calendar allows you to represent time in the form of a ruler, and every student knows how to determine any date. However, this was not always the case.

Julian calendar

The Roman Calendarium was a debt book that was settled on the calendar days. The Romans were guided within the month by the main events:

• kalendam — the first days of the month;
• nonam--fifth or seventh days;
• idam - on the 13th or 15th days.

There were 10 months in total, and March was considered the first - the month of the god Mars. This system was borrowed from the Greeks, whose calendar consisted of 12 months. The discrepancy between the solar and calendar years forced the Greeks to add the thirteenth month 3 times every 8 years: in the third, fifth and eighth year.

The Roman calendar in this regard was even more inconvenient, since it periodically required inserting an extra month. Mensis Intercalaris, or the thirteenth month of the Roman calendar, was introduced in February, but the decision to declare it was up to the pontiff. Sometimes politicians influenced the decision of the latter, and in times of unrest, the thirteenth was simply forgotten. As a result of careless handling of Mensis Intercalaris, calendar dates and seasons began to diverge, and by the time of Julius Caesar's reign they were more than 60 days behind each other.

To synchronize seasons and calendar dates Julius Caesar introduced a new system of calculus, which is called Julian. In this calendar, the months received a different number of days, and a special leap year was introduced to eliminate the out-of-sync error. The Julian calendar remains the main time system for some religious and non-canonical organizations, and also forms the basis of the Orthodox calendar. Today in Russia the Julian calendar is known as the "old style".

Gregorian calendar

Despite all efforts to synchronize dates, the Julian calendar still failed. With the advent of Christianity, Easter became the main holiday, the date of which, as you know, is calculated according to the spring equinox. But in the Julian calendar, the full moons were at odds with the astronomical ones, making it difficult to determine the floating date for Easter Sunday. That is why a modified version of Julius Caesar's calendar was developed, in which the rules for calculating leap years and calculating Easter were changed. To correct calendar errors on the day of adoption moved the date by 10 days. Every 400 years, the difference between the Julian and Gregorian calendar increases by 3 days.

Counting principles

The calendar is a system of calculation, which is based on the principles of the movement of celestial bodies. The change of day and night or the lunar cycle set the main guidelines for building the timeline. Why did the ancient Greek and Roman calendars accumulate errors and require extra months to be inserted? The thing is that when calculating the month, the change of lunar phases equal to 29.53 days was taken into account. Thus, the lunar year contains only 354.37 days, and every year there is a shift of dates by 11 days. To eliminate this problem, the days began to be counted not according to the movement of the Moon, but according to the Sun.

The solar calendar is based on an annual stellar cycle that lasts 365.25 days. It is obvious that every 4 years one extra day accumulates, and in order to level it leap years are introduced. To check the correspondence of dates and seasons, such a calendar uses the days of equinox and solstice. So, the spring equinox is stably fixed on March 20, and the June and December solstices allow an error of 1 day. The solar calendar is used in all new calculus systems, including the Gregorian.

Key landmarks

We understand how to count the years, but from what to count them? Depending on the era and civilization, the countdown was made in different ways. For example, the Romans determined the time of historical events according to the main landmark - the foundation of Rome. In, on the contrary, the countdown began each time anew, along with the accession to the throne of the next ruling dynasty. With the advent of Christianity, medieval Europe took the Nativity of Christ as a mark of the beginning of time, which is still used in most modern states.

Religious landmarks are the most popular timestamps from which time is kept in other countries. For example, in Islamic countries, years are counted from the Hijra - the date of the migration of the Prophet Muhammad from Mecca to Medina. Things are even more interesting with the Jewish calendar, which takes as its beginning the moment of the creation of the Universe. According to the adherents of Judaism, the world was created in 3761 BC. e, which was calculated on the basis of the life span of biblical heroes. India's religious calendar, the Kali Yuga, offers a more interesting starting point. According to Indian beliefs, the era of Kali Yuga began at the time of the departure of Krishna from this world, which happened on January 23, 3102 BC. e.

But the most curious is Mayan calendar. We still do not know exactly what point of reference the ancient Indians took for their calendar, although we found out on the basis of carbon analysis that the Mesoamerican calendar starts on August 13, 3114 BC. e. Another thing is curious. The Mayan calendar was calculated only until December 21, 2012, which gave rise to many eschatological theories about a global cataclysm that was supposed to happen on that day. Date 21.12.2012 the world waited with bated breath. But nothing happened, and another doomsday sank into oblivion.

Online service "What day is it today"

Our program allows you to determine not only today's date, but also learn interesting facts. So, the service displays data about what year it is according to the eastern calendar, whether it is a leap year or not, allows you to find out what day it is on the account or convert the date to the Julian calendar system. This is a convenient program with which it is easy to plan your affairs and learn interesting facts about today.