Christmas observations

I think the message is important, that “modern” holidays have ancient roots, is important to pass along as many people do not in fact know this information. What is the issue for me is the delivery :p You are absolutely right that the War on Christmas fox newsish network story was beyond annoying and rediculous, and the rebound from the pagan community is equally annoying. The delivery should be “hey, look at our similar connections, similar celebrations and see how our beliefs are in harmony with one another”. This is the perfect time of year for SOMEONE to extend the olive branch, which has meanings in many many spiritual faiths 😉

Nice to hear a voice of reason in the matter. If Neo-Paganism wish to be an intellectually honest alternative (and to a certain extent a reaction) to the Fundamentalist variety of Christianity many Neo-Pagans experienced in childhood, it isn’t useful if a certain portion of Neo-Pagans behave as Fundies themselves.

I am very tired of hearing from certain quarters that Christmas didn’t exist before the 10th and 11th centuries, when it was appropriated from Norse Pagans in order to make conversion of the Scandinavian countries easier. Excuse me? The Feast of the Nativity of Christ was invented in the 330’s in northern and middle Italy, not in 10th century Denmark. The sophisticated populations of Milano and Rome were most probably unaware of the Scandinavian religious festival-cycle, and they had no reason to religiously appease tribes far beyond the borders of the Roman Empire. When Christianity reached Scandinavia to a greater extent (lesser extent is another matter) Christmas was already 600 years old, so it wasn’t a recently invented cunning tactic aimed at the Norse. And besides, the Norse Winter Sacrifice didn’t occur on neither 21th nor 25th of December, but in the middle of January when transport by sleigh had become feasible since lakes had been given the time needed to freeze.

Nor was the Roman feast of the Unconquered Sun on 25th of December a feast with an origin in an immemorial past: It was invented in ca 275 AD, so it was half a century old when the Italian province of the Church decided to place a Christian festival on the same date.

The same goes with the claim of an uninterrupted continuity between pre-Christian Irish Samhain and the medieval Christian All Soul’s Day. Ireland converted in the 5th century, and All Soul’s Day wasn’t invented until 998 AD, and then in Cluny, France, not in Ireland.

When it comes to Santa Claus, Jason, he has a mixed origin. The red clothes (but not the cap), the beard and the distribution of gifts are all borrowed from the Dutch cult of an Anatolian Christian saint: St. Nicholas, bishop of Myra in the 4th century. On his alleged date of death, 6th of December, someone used to dress up as St. Nicholas in episcopal attire and bring gifts to children. It was the Dutch who originally founded New York, and they brought St. Nicholas to the U.S.

Meanwhile in Britain, renaissance and baroque culture took delight in using allegorical figures in poems and copperplate engravings. Among these allegorical figures, known since the middle of the 15th century but far more popular since 1660 when the Puritan ban on Christmas was abolished, was ‘Father Christmas’, the personification of the celebration of the nativity of Christ, including the heavy amount of drinking and eating which followed morning service, and including the spirit of benevolence and charity to fellow human beings during the Christmas season. Since a large portion of the population in the U.S. are of English, Scottish or Welsh descent, the figure of Father Christmas became a part of Northern American culture, but began to merge with St. Nicholas in the 19th century, and the original day of gift giving, 6th of December, was transferred to Christmas night.

Meanwhile in Scandinavia, some elements of northern Germanic Pagan religion survived the conversion to Christianity in the 10th and 11th centuries, and some elements even survived the Reformation era, when the Scandinavian countries adopted the Augsburg confession (i.e. Lutheranism). In the worldview of 16th and 17th century Swedes, at least among farmers, the Holy Trinity governed the world, and the angels were his messengers, but under that plane of reality pre-Christian entities like the elves, the brook wight, the forest wight and the farm wight were thought to exist as well. The Enlightenment era in the 18th century and early 19th century brought death to what was viewed as ‘superstition’, but then came the Romantics and revived these pre-Christian entities as bittersweet figures in poems and art. The study of folklore rose as a part of this cultural pattern.

What concerns us here is the Swedish farm wight. In 1875 Swedish author Viktor Rydberg published a didactic and moralistic childrens’ tale about a selfish little boy, Vigg, who is brought on a supernatural journey by the farm wight on Christmas Eve. When the boy returns he has become a caring person. The plot doesn’t differ greatly from Dickens’ ‘Christmas Carol’, with Vigg in the stead of Scrooge and the Swedish farm wight in the stead of the three temporal Christmas spirits. From then on, the farm wight was connected with Christmas in the mind of Swedes, but more important were the illustrations. The artist Jenny Nyström produced the illustrations to Rydberg’s tale, and then proceeded to re-use the image of the farm wight, with the characteristic red cap, on Christmas cards. Nyström influenced Haddon Sundblom, a fellow Swedish illustrator, who migrated to the U.S. and began to, among other things, design commercials for Coca Cola, including Christmas commercials depicting a Nyström-influenced Santa Claus. The episcopal mitre of St. Nicholas was changed into the red cap of the farm wight.

Then, the figure of the synthesised Santa Claus was re-exported from the melting pot of the U.S. to the rest of the world, including Netherlands and Scandinavia (and recently UK, although Father Christmas has shown himself far more resilient to americanisation than the Dutch St. Nicholas and the Swedish farm wight have). It would therefore be reasonable to say that Santa Claus is two-thirds a Christian Dutch-British figure, and one-third a Pagan Scandinavian figure.

This is so ridiculous.

This is the time of year when my emails and letters say : Happy Chanukah, Solstice, Festivus, Christmas, Pancha Ganapati, Hogwatchsnight.

Being friend and family to a ridiculous amount of people from diferent creeds, I get to celebrate all of them.

And my pork recipe for Hogswatchnight has become the stuff of legend among my Chaote friends 🙂

Frater Benedict, I enjoyed your comment very much as well and passed it on to some friends. Have you written anything about this or do you have any citations I can pass on to some of these folks who are looking for more?

I’ve come to a point where I see Christmas as a secular holiday. At least, the way everyone I know celebrates it. It’s become the identifying word for a winter holiday that our culture puts up lights, trees, exchanges gifts, sings songs, and brings together family and friends for food and drink. There is WAY more discussion of Santa and his elves than of any religious figure in all the circles I walk. That included Christians, Pagans, and Atheists alike. There’s no competition (outside family bingo) or even prayer. Just good times, laughter, and love inside a warm home while the world turns bleak and cold outside. All of that satisfies my personal spiritual needs for the occasion. No pissing contest required.

I’m angry with you Jason, you forgot to mention that Hanukkah Harry was also born on the 25th of Dec. And you live in New Jersey! Tisk Tisk. =)

Is Fox News getting tired of the “War on Christmas” thing? Here’s a recent Fox segment blaming the War on Christmas on gays, grouchy heathen atheists, and of course, those insidious potheads:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UONy3l3NGo8&feature=youtube_gdata

Laisse ta m猫re pleurer dans 1 semaine ca sera oh ma ch茅rie je t’aime .