THE EVOLUTION OF CHRISTMAS.

Evening Star, Issue 15064, 21 December 1912, Page 2

THE EVOLUTION OF CHRISTMAS.

We arc on the verge of Christmas. In a day or two the joy-bells will be ringing all over the Christian world, and multitudes will be wishing each other a happy Christmas It may be worth while to ask where Christmas came Jrom and what is its true significance. Most people suppose that it is a. Christian festival, and had its origin at the birth of Christ. Up till about a generation ago that, at any rate, was the prevalent idea, and it is probably still the belief of the average man. Yet educated people know that it is an entire misconception. Let us see. * « . *. .•*> . » If -x-

Three stages in the evolution of Christmas may bo distinguished. The first stage takes us back to primitive man. Christendom celebrates iti Christmas tho Incarnation. lor a long time it was supposed that this idea was peculiar to .Christianity. But a wider historical knowledge brought to light the fact that it is almost co-oxten-sive with tho human race. Long before Christ was horn Egypt had been celebrating on the 25th December a festival strikingly resembling the Christian one. Wo read of Horns, virgin born, his mother represented with 12 stars round her head, exactly as in many Catholic churches of to-day. From India came the storv of Buddha, immaculately conceived of May a, and at whoso birth angels sang. A similar talc is told of Mithra in Persia and Dionysus in Greece. More surprising still, away in the far western world, we find among the ancient Mexicans a Saviour, Quetziilcatl, worshipped as of miraculous birth, and on tho very same day also, the 25th of December. What is the meaning of. tins surprisingly widespread idea? Critics tell us that it is all different embodiments of a solar myth. The first efforts of primitive man, as of children, to interpret the natural phenomena is to personalise them. In December came the wintersolstice. As tho sun-worshippers watched lus steady decline, and with it the gradual growth Oi cold, and snow', and storms, and so the failure of food, and tho peril o of hunger, life’s outlook grew dark. Winter brought with it its apprehensions and depressions. The struggle of the sun-god with gloom and darkness and his apparent overthrow were interpreted as a celestial tragedy. But by the 25th of December there came signs of victory. The defeat of the sun-god was arrested. Ho was recovering himself. and recapturing his lost domain in the heavens. Chaos and old night were being once more repulsed, and hope rose upon tho world. So we may suppose grew- up the great festival of the Roman Saturnalia. It was in full swing when Christianity came- into the world. It was a period of solemn worship and of uproarious eating, drinking, and rejoicing. On that day Jack was as good as his raastei I lie slave could insult his lord, ic loater of the Forum could jostle the „ ” on ; 1,ol ’> v?h,,e everywhere riot and profamty held sw-ay, and tho festival i "I Saturnalia ’ resounded.” So a the beginning of January unlimited Inland feasting marked the Dios Kalendanie The streets and houses were decoded withevergreens. Gifts were given “irrf’ can<Ucs and iam P s iiLii. nated the houses and tho streets, votive offerings were made to the gods, while the market* plied a roaring trade, and the populace gave themselves up to banqueting masquerading, and universal merriment. \Ve thus perceive that when we send our Christmas cards, and hang up our mistletoe and give way to, unlicensed fun and fro he at this season of the year, we are really, as scientists say, reverting to type. he instincts thus set moving within ns aro a race memory. They are the survivals of our pagan ancestry **** * * *

M hen Christianity came into the world R- encountered the problem of how irv^ to relate itself to those pagan superstitions. Were there no germs of" truth hi them. Mere they wholly fake, and to be denied and denounced? Or were theyrto be taken over from these errors arid snpnlemented and completed by the fuller: and more perfect revelation of Christ-? ■ This latter was tho policy of the early. Christian Church. Its leaders were wise enough to perceive that joy and merriment were fundamental instincts in human nature. All that was needed was to purify them and direct them to right ends. There is on record tho historic letter of Gregory the Great to the British Abbot Mellitus, in which he sets forth tho importance of capturing tho heathen holidays for tho Church, so that the worship of fake gods might be turned to that- of the living and true God revealed in Jesus Christ. Tho pagan festival of Christmas lent itself well to assimilation. The passing of the cold and dark winter and tho new sun rising in Hie heavens were peculiarly tilted to he prophecies and symbols of” tho rising of “ the Sun of Righteousness, with healing in His wings. Tho process of absorption and accumulation was slow; is not, indeed, by any means complete yet lb was not till 554 a.d. that "the Roman Bishop Liberius established the great feast of Christmas. Tho Church further heralded the least of the austere seaeon of Advent in order to eviscerate the Saturnalia of its wicked and sensual pleasures. In Britain the celebration of Christmas as a Christian feast does not appear to begin till after the Norman Conquest In tho ‘Saxon Chronicle’ it is mentioned for tho first time as “ Christos Maessa ” in 1091, and in 1131 for the first time in on© word, “ Cliristenm-iso.” The ancient Britons no doubt preserved many of the customs of their former conquerors, the Romans. The Saxons and Danes brought theirs. So w© find woven into our Christmas celebrations a medley of pagan observances, composed of Roman, Druidic, and Scandanavian mythology. On tho top of these is the layer of Christianity. It is not yet entirely at home there, and has not succeeded wholly in assimilating these old customs and mythologies of pagan time to its own likeness. * * * * * * * But it is making headway. A little while ago many lost their heads and faith amid the discoveries of tho similarities between the Christian Incarnation and the incarnations oi other races and peoples. It seemed to them as though they were all on the same plane—all part and parcel of myths and legends, thrown up by man in. his searches after the Divine. William Watson’s poem on ‘ Christinas Day ’ indicates the position;— Fated among time’s fallen leaves ha stray, We breathe an air that savors of the tomb, Heavy with dissolution and decay, “Waiting till some new world-emotion rise, And, with tho shattering might of the simoom. Sweep clean the dying. Past, that never dies. But most educated men and women have cleared this fog-bank, and have come within sight of tho true light. And Hi© true light reveals to us the fact that there is an infinite difference between the Christian Incarnation and the other gropings after the truth which it embodies. It is not asserted that, these others are wholly J

false, bat it is contended that the Christian Incarnation takes up tho germs of truth in them all, and adds that which was lacking to make them fruitful and effective. That is the method by which Christianity has advanced. A revelation wholly original would be wholly useless. As has -been truly said, , ■< When there breaks upon the scene of time a new and higher stage of development, it never begins by obliterating the old one; on tho contrary, it takes up the old life, and makes it new in its own light. Manhood does not destroy the years of childhood; it retains them as the very roots of its- being. Sunshine, does not extinguish tho light of the night planets; it gathers up that light into itself and reveals it anew as part of its own glory.

This has been pre-eminently true of the Spirit of Christianity. This is how it has acted upon social evils and imperfect moralities. It has disentangled the truth from the errors encrusted upon it, and set it in its right relationship and effective power. Thus it has dealt with war, for instance, with slavery, and other wrongs. Thus, also, it has taken over Christmas, cleansed it of its vicious customs, illumined it with a now life and light. It is tree, indeed, that for great multitudes the observance of Christmas lias not advanced much beyond what characterised it in the Roman Saturnalia. The boisterous mirth, the giving full sway to the animal side of nature, to plunges into pleasure, many of them of a. gross and sensuous kind—these and nothing higher still, constitute Christmas for vast masses. But there is leaven at work permeating this pagan element with higher ideas and a nobler spirit. On© of the most notable evidences of this is the profound, discontent with social conditions—tho'spreading passion for lettering the lives and giving, justice as well as charity to the toiling masses of the world. This new consciousness that refuses to take a heaven, haunted by shrieks- of faroff misery, what is it but tho very central thought in the Christian Incarnation ? All the ancient religious place their gods far away above the sorrows and strifes of men.

They haunt the lucid interspace of worlds Mhere never creeps a, cloud, nor moans a wind.

And nothing mounts to mar their sacred Everlasting calm.

But the assumption in tho Christian Incarnation is that God conies down to man in drier to lift man. up to God. In the accomplishment of that design He will go as low as ever man lias sunk. Ho will not refuse to sliare with him even his sin i f He can only save him from its sham© and guilt and make him a son of His own, not merely in name but in nature. It is this which gives dignity to human life arid inspires hope- in and for the hopeless. *******

But it is just here that multitudes find their difficulty. This stupendous thought of the “All Great being the All Loving too” staggers the reason. The mind finds itself unable to conceive of the Infinite and Eternal One coming into one of His worlds in the form of a child. And yet, why should it? The difficulty arises largely from confounding bulk with greatness. We are pointed to the vast worlds amid which this earth of ours is but a opeck- Is it not absurd we are asked to credit the Incarnation story in the presence of these immensities ? But what has space or bulk to do with mind or love ? A baby is not much bigger than a couple of bricks, but what mother would consent to have its value assessed by the size of a brickfield ’ Moreover, if tho Maker of all these worlds is also a Father, as Christianity assumes, is.it not most reasonable to expect that He will somehow contrive to make Himself known_ to His children? The universe does, indeed, reveal His thoughts and power m a more or*** indistinct wav. Em- Ho will surely find out some other method of revealing Himself in life or spin;. .Art requires. that there should be duo proportion between- the parts of its creation. -A statue, e.g. ; , with feet as bm V<*W‘lbo a,'laughing .stock. I giant with the brain of a flea or the heart of a monkej'would be a ; monstrosity. And tho Maker and sustainer Of these vast immensities of space and matter must have a mind and heart, a wisdom and a love greater than these, else we have a Creator who is a moral dwarf amid His worlds. Once wo admit that God’s lore is equal at least to His will and wisdom it inevitably postulates tho- Incarnation. And so w© have reached a point where a mystery indeed still remains, but where Nature also utters its reason.. To the earlier, mind incarnation was expressed in terms of physical power, in prodigy; to ours, it needs to be put- in that of will and character. And in character, lovo is supreme. Once tins is admitted the road, is oponedrio the cradle in Bethlehem and the Gross on Calvary. They thus become not legends and mytlis, but merely tho issues which reason and Nature alike demand. And the progress of Science seems every day to confirm tho assumption of the Christian Incarnation. It is revealing to us the infinities in the little as well as in the great. A specie of matter that we call Radium has packed up in it energies that resemble a physical omnipotence. Hero is a pulse that can go on beating for millions of years. And if

Jhe Creator can thus hid© a revelation of His omnipotence in a. speck of matter hardly bigger than a pin’s head, is it inciedible that at the bidding of love He could somehow stoop to wear for a moment th© nature of His children that lie might reveal to them His own nature and bring them into possession of the Iff© which is life indeed? That, at any rate, from Hi© Christian standpoint, is Hie deeper secret in th© heart of Christmas, and that- will one day redeem it from tho pagan myths and errors that still creep and cling about it.