British actress Diane Morgan has created the hilarious character of Philomena Cunk, the world’s most clueless investigative reporter. Here she quizzes children on Father Christmas and offers her opinion about where St Nick might source his toys.
Month: June 2024
George Herbert on Christmas and Time
The Christian sects that object to the celebration of Christmas (and there have been many of those throughout history) often use as an argument that the faithful are instructed by St Paul (Galatians 4:10; Colossians 2:16-17) not to be mindful of the observance of certain days and seasons.
As a counter to such strictures the seventeenth-century Anglican poet and priest George Herbert took a different view. According to Isaac Walton, Herbert’s biographer:
He instructed them also what benefit they had by the Church’s appointing the celebration of holy-days and the excellent use of them, namely, that they were set apart for particular commemorations of particular mercies received from Almighty God; and — as Reverend Mr. Hooker says — to be the landmarks to distinguish times; for by them we are taught to take notice how time passes by us, and that we ought not to let the years pass without a celebration of praise for those mercies which those days give us occasion to remember, and therefore they were to note that the year is appointed to begin the 25th day of March; a day in which we commemorate the angel’s appearing to the Blessed Virgin, with the joyful tidings that “she should conceive and bear a son, that should be the redeemer of mankind.” And she did so forty weeks after this joyful salutation; namely, at our Christmas; a day in which we commemorate his birth with joy and praise: and that eight days after this happy birth we celebrate his circumcision; namely, in that which we call New Year’s day. And that, upon that day which we call Twelfth day, we commemorate the manifestation of the unsearchable riches of Jesus to the Gentiles: and that day we also celebrate the memory of his goodness in sending a star to guide the three wise men from the east to Bethlehem, that they might there worship, and present him with their oblation of gold, frankincense, and myrrh.
An Interesting Artefact
There has always been tension in popular culture between an emphasis on the Nativity as the central feature of Christmas and the focus on the Gift-Bringer (Santa Claus, Père Noël, De Weihnachtsmann, etc. and his or her gifts. Religiously conservative Americans have tried to show subordination of Santa to the Baby Jesus by showing him kneeling by the cradle as in this ornament.
Another approach, unique in my experience, is the work of a Russian wood-carver who has the Father Christmas figure revealing the Nativity scene beneath his robe.
The First Christmas Trees In History?
The question of where the first Christmas tree was erected has had three contestants: an outdoor pole of greenery in London and trees set up by German merchants in Latvia and in Estonia. The following article can be found on this site: https://www.flowerstation.co.uk/the-first-christmas-trees-in-history/. No sources are given for any of the claims here and I’m more than a little doubtful of them but I will be checking them out.
Evergreen trees have played a part in human beliefs over millennia. The Christmas tree as we know it, though, is a quite recent invention. The Honourable Guild of Bakers in Freiburg is credited with setting one up first in 1419. At the time, Freiburg was part of the Holy Roman Empire; it is situated in the former Grand Duchy of Baden in the modern state of Baden-Wurttemberg in Germany.
According to tradition, a fir tree was put up in the Hospital of The Holy Ghost for The Poor for Christmas in 1419. The tree was then decorated with honey cookies, nuts, and dried fruits. It is said to have remained standing until New Year’s Day when it was ‘shaken down’ and the children were allowed to eat the decoration. While it is possible that it happened that way, there is no supportive evidence to be found anywhere but is still included in history works as late as 2007.
In fact, the good bakers of Freiburg were contravening church law. During the first millennium, the Christian Church had forbidden the adornment of trees on all kinds of occasions as heathen superstition. Despite that, adorning the home with evergreens during winter never went out of fashion. In the Brocarda, the canonical legal code for the Diocese of Worms written by Bishop Burchard between 1008 and 1012, the prohibition was included as a matter of course. Its inclusion shows that the matter was still of relevance.
As late as 1508, priests in Alsatian churches were preaching sermons against the heathen superstition of keeping evergreens in homes and giving presents to people. But a copper plate print by Lucas Cranach the elder of 1509 shows the first picture of a Christmas tree that we recognise as such; he showed it adorned with stars and lights. There must have been a market for selling a print like that with a profit or he wouldn’t have done it.
The accounts of the Humanistic Library of Sélestat situated 30 miles from Freiburg in the Alsace shows an entry in 1521 reading: “Paid four Shillings to the forester to guard the trees as of St. Thomas” (21st of December). The entry shows that the amount of trees taken from communal woods was becoming a problem.
First proof positive of a Christmas tree in writing is provided for Strasburg Cathedral (Alsace, France) in 1539; it is at the same time the first instance of a public display of a tree for Christmas documented anywhere. By 1600, Christmas trees could be found in the houses of rich citizens all over Strasburg.
It was Duchess Dorothea Sibyl of Brieg (part of the Kingdom of Bohemia) who first adorned a Christmas tree with candles in 1611. Continental European princes took to the idea and the Imperial family in Vienna had a tree set up for each member of the family separately to display their individual Christmas presents underneath.