/////That Dec 25 was the historical Christ's birthday is a notion dismissed by anyone who has done even a meager amount of study. That that date was a pre-existing feast of the winter solstice in many cultures certainly has significance, and to me the evidence of an attempt by the early Christians to co-opt these disparate traditions, including the essential Roman Saturnalia celebration, into a unified birth of Jesus celebration was simply good marketing.////

Here's the problem: why didn't any of the gospels tell us when this greatest of all men was born instead of leaving it to later generation to co-opt the birth of a solar deity? And by doing so, doesn't that just prove he wasn't historical or why would they do flippantly obscure this supposedly real man under strata of pagan astrological gobbledegook? Wouldn't the genuine memories have been meticulously guarded and preserved??

The reason is, of course, that there was nothing to preserve. The birth stories in Matthew and Luke were provably of later origin. Mark was the earliest of the gospel and he knew nothing of it. John knew nothing of it Paul knew nothing of it. The author of James and Hebrews--all earlier than Matthew and Luke--knew nothing of it. What about Revelation? Here is the birth story according to Revelation:

1And there appeared a great wonder in heaven; a woman clothed with the sun, and the moon under her feet, and upon her head a crown of twelve stars:

2And she being with child cried, travailing in birth, and pained to be delivered.

3And there appeared another wonder in heaven; and behold a great red dragon, having seven heads and ten horns, and seven crowns upon his heads.

4And his tail drew the third part of the stars of heaven, and did cast them to the earth: and the dragon stood before the woman which was ready to be delivered, for to devour her child as soon as it was born.

5And she brought forth a man child, who was to rule all nations with a rod of iron: and her child was caught up unto God, and to his throne.

6And the woman fled into the wilderness, where she hath a place prepared of God, that they should feed her there a thousand two hundred and threescore days.

The author clearly states that the birth of Jesus Christ is a celestial event. The woman with the crown of 12 stars is the virgin of the zodiac--Virgo. Clothed with the sun means that the sun was occupying her sign. That she was ready to give birth means that the sun was just about to leave her sign to enter the next and that sign is scorpio--the great dragon of darkness. Where was Libra? Some early cultures didn't have a Libra. So the sun is about to pass into the winter months were darkness reigns over the light. So the sun had to be hidden away and there is your Hamlet angle again--the prince has to be exiled or feign madness to avoid being killed by the usurper of the light.

Now if Libra is absent then there must be only 11 signs. Where's the 12th. That sign is Ophiucus who occupies the space between Scorpio and Sagittarius. He is shown wrestling a huge serpent. And in Revelation 12, we read:

7And there was war in heaven: Michael and his angels fought against the dragon; and the dragon fought and his angels,

8And prevailed not; neither was their place found any more in heaven.

9And the great dragon was cast out, that old serpent, called the Devil, and Satan, which deceiveth the whole world: he was cast out into the earth, and his angels were cast out with him.

So the sun returns and assumes his rightful rulership. The statement of the dragon drawing down a third of the stars with his tail and casting them to the earth is a reference to cauda draconis or "tail of the dragon" which is the moon's south node, i.e. on the side of the earth away from the sun where the moon falls within the earth's shadow causing a lunar eclipse. But there is also a seasonal cauda draconis:

"Cauda Draconis, the Moon's South Node or Dragon's Tail, is associated with the negative sides of Saturn and Scorpio. It can show misfortune and the need to pay for past debts. Cauda Draconis favors the termination of something."

http://accessnewage.com/articles/astro/tlouis4.htm

In this case, the termination of the sun and the light. As the sign of Scorpio is more than halfway passed, i.e. the rear half or tail of the dragon, he sweeps down a third of the stars as the year progresses towards the winter solstice of which Saturn is the ruler. That is, a third of the stars seen during the spring and summer months move steadily southwards (as does the sun) during winter and hence they appear to be falling to earth as it were.

The child of the heavenly virgin, like Hamlet, must flee either bodily or mentally, to weather out the reign of the king of darkness but ultimately will return to conquer him and resume his rightful rule.