I’ve always been intrigued by the interplay of darkness and light in the Christmas story. While Jesus is born amid the rejoicing of angels, shepherds and magi; King Herod responds with fear and hostility, killing defenceless children, and forcing
Joseph and Mary, with the newborn Saviour, to flee Judea and take refuge in Egypt. And, even before Herod shows up, God’s gift to the world is laid in a manger because there is no room in Bethlehem’s inns. Today, January 6th, is the Feast of the Epiphany. The word is from Greek epiphaneia, which means "manifestation". In this context it refers to the coming of the Magi and the first manifestation of God in Christ to the Gentiles. But even in this idyllic story there is an unsettling ambiguity; the gifts the magi bring. Gold is valuable for obvious reasons, and frankincense is an incense used in prayer and meditation, but myrrh is a resin used chiefly for embalming. This hint of foreboding is the subject of the fourth verse of the carol We Three Kings:
Myrrh is mine, its bitter perfume
Breathes of life of gathering gloom
Sorrowing, sighing, bleeding, dying
Sealed in the stone-cold tomb
Some have imagined that the promise of the manifestation of God is a promise of pure, heavenly bliss. – Karl Marx so imagined and, thus, condemned religion as an opiate designed to placate the oppressed and subvert the Revolution. – But the story of Jesus is not so naive or sentimental, and neither is the response of the church to the story. For example, the day after Christmas (Boxing Day) has become, in our consumer culture, the culmination of “Consumerfest”, better known as “The Holiday Season”. But in the church calendar it is the Feast of the first Christian martyr, Saint Stephen, and an occasion for the wealthy to share with the poor (see previous post, Jan. 3).
And the story of the coming of the Magi, with its Myrrh, King Herod, slaughtered children, and refugee family, is a reminder in the midst of the celebration that there are forces in the world that do not welcome the arrival of the Prince of Peace. With the Magi, shepherds and angels, we raise a hymn of praise; there are some, however, who are going to raise hell.
2 comments:
There is a poem that has been much on my mind through this Christmas season. It's by Dorothy Parker, which may be one of the most amazing things about it, and it goes
Prayer for a New Mother
The things she knew, let her forget again
The voices in the sky, the fear, the cold
The gaping shepherds and the queer old men
Piling their clumsy gifts of foreign gold
Let her have laughter with her little one
Teach her the endless, tuneless songs to sing,
Grant her the right to whisper to her son
the foolish names one dare not call a king.
Keep from her dreams the rumble of a crowd
The smell of rough cut wood, the trail of red
The thick and chilly whiteness of the shroud
that wraps the strange new body of the dead.
Ah, let her go, kind Lord, where mothers go
And boast his pretty words, and ways, and plan
the proud and happy years that they will know,
together, when her son is grown a man.
I read this first many years ago, I might have been in my teens. It had a big impact then. Not sure why it's been so on my mind this Christmas, but I suspect it's all the new babies, and especially my own new granddaughter. Much as I love the arrival of each new little one, I am always acutely aware that it's really just another hostage to the universe.
Thank you, Mary. Such a wonderful poem. Dorothy Parker had an interesting, but hard and even tragic life. As you say, a hostage to the universe.
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