Little known facts about Christmas

Little did you know!

Gospel writers Mark, Luke, and John don’t even mention the Three Wise Men. The one who does mention them, Matthew, does not specify how many wise men there were. We came up with the number three. In fact, historical accounts reveal the Wise Men and the shepherds visited the Christ child at separate times. There were no warm, sentimental manger scenes as depicted in today’s art.

The visit of the Wise Men, who were known for their knowledge of astrology, was indirectly responsible for the slaughter of male children under the age of two in Bethlehem.

Mark does not even mention the stories that circulated at the time about the birth of Christ. Mark picks up the story of Christ starting with John the Baptist. Since Mark is considered the earliest Gospel account, are we to believe he was unaware of the birth accounts?

The shepherds who came to see the baby Jesus were rough and tough dudes. God decided the announcement of the birth of his son was to be made to societal outcasts who were not permitted even to testify in court proceedings because their word could not be trusted.

Since Joseph and Mary had not had sex, when he found out the news of Mary’s pregnancy, Joseph could have divorced Mary without any embarrassment to himself or his family. It was Joseph’s dreams that kept him on the Godly path.

Some three months of her pregnancy Mary stayed with her relative, Elizabeth, who also was expecting a child. John the Baptist and Jesus, therefore, were cousins as well as brothers in the Kingdom of God.

The manger was no more than a wood feeding trough. Mary laid her son in a manger where animals had slobbered all over as they ate their food. Surely Joseph or perhaps the innkeeper had cleaned up this special manger.

The Gospel writers do not tell us Mary’s age. Some speculate she could have been as young as 12. Please tell me not! But it could have been. It’s another scandal amid the larger scandal of the birth, life, death, and resurrection scandal.

Jesus was probably not born in December, but we do not know for sure. We know for sure more about the time of year when he died than when he was born. December 25 was a man-made date.

So, maybe this would be a good time to take down the Bible and re-read the three accounts of the birth of Jesus. Maybe we will get our facts straight and our faith renewed.

By the way, Merry Christmas!

Well you have it almost all

Submitted by gordman on Wed, 11/14/2007 - 8:54am.

Well you have it almost all figured out, I am not that pragmatic, I like Christmas time because it represents the perfect joy in the middle of our family. There are so many things I still want to say. I'll just add something else, I don't like the commercial part of the Christmas, I don't like people cut the forests for that when they have the artificial Christmas trees alternative.

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Christmas tales

Submitted by Sailon on Sat, 12/17/2005 - 7:26pm.

Well, I have no way of knowing those details you presented any more than you do---someone wrote them down--but be assured those who want their religion wrapped up in pretty neat packages aren't going to be happy with some of your tales. The story has been neatly packaged in the past (three Kings, swaddling clothes in a manger- no mention of cleanliness, etc.) that some feel their faith flow out when they read something different. Details aren't important any more in this day of communication.

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RE: Christmas Tales

Submitted by PTC Guy on Sat, 12/17/2005 - 9:11pm.

Christ was probably actually born in September.

December 25th was the Roman Catholic transformation of the Festival of Saturnalia to help absorb some pagans into Catholicism. As did the Christmas tree and such.

The Wise Men did not visit Christ in the manager. Another tradition invention. Christ was actually more like 3 years old and living in a house at the time.

The Magi did not travel alone at that time period. They would have had a military escort.

So, instead of going on I will let that suffice to inform many of us are well aware of the facts.

Want to talk about other religions, including Humanism? Well, not here. Wrong forum.

There are better ones for this kind of conversation. More suited to it.

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