What is b.c.e

Standardized under the Julian and Gregorian calendars, the system spread throughout Europe and the Christian world during the centuries that followed. These abbreviations have a shorter history than BC and AD, although they still date from at least the early s. Since the Gregorian calendar has superseded other calendars to become the international standard, members of non-Christian groups may object to the explicitly Christian origins of BC and AD. It is widely accepted that the actual birth of Jesus occurred at least two years before AD 1, and so some argue that explicitly linking years to an erroneous birthdate for Jesus is arbitrary or even misleading.

In , education authorities in Australia were forced to deny that such a change had been planned for national school textbooks amid a similar controversy triggered by media reports. Passions are usually highest among those who see the adoption of a new system as an attempt to write Jesus Christ out of history.

They argue that the entire Gregorian Calendar is Christian in nature anyway, so why should we attempt to obscure that fact? Others ask why such a well-established and functional system should be replaced, arguing that the existence of two competing abbreviations is likely to cause confusion. Since there are compelling arguments for each system and both are in regular use, we do not recommend one over the other. Given the choice, writers are free to apply their own preference or that of their audience, although they should use their chosen system consistently, meaning BC and CE should not be used together, or vice versa.

There are also some typographical conventions to consider:. In particular, the language inconsistency noted above has given birth to a widely-held misconception that AD is an English abbreviation for after death i. Obviously this is wrong, but it was actually the first explanation I heard as a child, which then caused great confusion when I encountered a teacher telling me that it meant something else in some obscure dead language.

I'm not alone in having heard this false etymology, as many internet discussions will attest. They're literally wrong. As noted in a previous answer, the birth of Jesus Christ is now estimated by most scholars to have occurred at least a few years earlier. I've seen everything from 7 to 2 BCE -- and yes, in this particular sentence, using the abbreviation BC seems to me an oxymoron.

In any case, "common era" solves this problem by just admitting that we're using a common convention, which even Christian scholars now widely regard as inaccurate. But it's still a convenient and "common" way of referring to our "era" of year reckoning. Insisting that we hold onto the older style too seems to be promoting ignorance of the fact that the abbreviations are literally false.

They cause confusion. One item of confusion occurs because of the erroneous after death etymology above. I distinctly recall asking someone about this when I was a small child: "So how do they number the years while Jesus was alive?

But even if we understand what AD means, the convention can create confusion even when Christian scholars are trying to refer to, well, the years around the time of Jesus Christ. Dates in the early Church are a bit uncertain anyhow, but if a Christian scholar is trying to relate a possible date to the timeline of Jesus Christ's life, you have to do a little conversion in your head.

In other words, when a reference to the timing of Christ's birth should have maximum usefulness due to proximity of the dates, it actually breeds confusion. Any one of these reasons alone wouldn't be enough to argue for a new convention.

After all, there are all sorts of inconsistent and illogical stylistic elements in English usage. But when you take into account that the old meanings are widely believed even by Christians to be actually wrong, you now have a convention that's actively creating confusion.

BC is "before christ", whether you believe in him or not. It's just as good as the Nth year of reign of Pharaoh Whoever - doesn't require you to believe in the deity of a particular egyptian. Archaeologists also use BP - before present - which is confusingly set as Astronomers of course have the best solution - just count days.

Well, successful in that the name changed, but not so successful since the numbers are still exactly the same, and still have an end and start at the traditional year of the birth of Christ.

Today, many cultures continue to use their traditional calendars for marking holidays and cultural events, the day-to-day dates of events is based Gregorian calendar. Christianity was spread through the Roman Empire by the early followers of Jesus so year 1 will always have implication of the birth of Christianity no matter what letters your choose place after number; so I don't understand how changing letter removes the connection to Christianity birth date.

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