Keeping the Holiday Spirit Alive

by Liv Stecker

In the midst of the bright bustle of the holiday season, families are unpacking decorations that have been handed down through generations, singing carols that were born centuries ago and wrapping trinkets large and small as gifts for loved ones.

Over time, traditions have become such fixtures in our holiday celebrations that we forget why we do them. Our actions and words and the foods that we eat are all steeped in meaning that has been long abandoned, if we ever knew it in the first place. Because we live in a multicultural world full of easily offended proponents of every religion, non-religion and worldview, we find ourselves forced to either tiptoe cautiously around each other or boldly proclaim our own expression without apology. Maybe remembering why we do so many of things would help make them less offensive, or at least more easily defended, understanding that at the heart of it all, the holidays are all about peace on earth and goodwill toward men.

To start with, let’s look at the Christmas Tree: Much like cut flowers or garlands of greens, it no longer strikes most of us as odd that we like to bring vibrant, living plants into our homes where they can wither and die and drop needles like a harbinger of the end of Holiday Cheer. However, historically speaking, humans have decorated their homes with evergreen boughs in the winter ever since the decorating of human homes has been documented. In the pre-Christian world, the green branches represented both the promise of everlasting life and the hope for spring and new growth after the death of winter. The first full-on Christmas trees were brought indoors by German Christians in the 16th century, as a token of the same hopes and beliefs that the earlier pagans held. It was Martin Luther, after a walk outside in the brilliant winter starlight, who first adorned his Christmas Tree with lighted candles in an attempt to capture the beauty of nature in the warmth of his home for family and friends. The Christmas Tree has faced its share of enemies over the years, but none so cantankerous as the early American puritans who heralded the tradition as heathen debauchery and outlawed it for many years in our young nation. Reason won out eventually as European immigrants moved across the continent, rekindling warm family traditions and bringing Tannenbaum back to our repertoire of traditions.

Martin Luther and family enjoying a glowing Christmas Tree

Wassailers in Olde England

The tradition of traveling door to door through snowy neighborhoods singing Christmas Carols (carol derives from the French word carole, which is a circle dance with singers) is another that pre-dates Christianity but has merged solidly with religious practices throughout the years. Christmas Carols began sometime in the 4th century as liturgical chants at Christmas church services. Over time, the church branched out and borrowed tunes from popular music to set religious and holiday themed lyrics to, and then joined in the much older Anglo-Saxon tradition of wassailing, which is toast that means “be in good health”, where neighbors would travel door to door singing tunes in exchange for food and drink, a custom in the winter and at harvest time. Similar to trick-or-treating, wassailing was believed to bring households good luck as they blessed their neighbors with goodies and beverages by which to be toasted and blessed. Hence the odd, greedy sounding lyrics demanding figgy pudding, among others.

In Jewish tradition, the holiday of Hanukkah, or the Festival of Lights, celebrates an eight day miracle during the dedication of the reclaimed temple after a fight for religious freedom in the 2nd century BC. The Temple was destroyed during the fight, and the Macabee warriors found only enough oil to light the lamp for one day, but the flame miraculously flickered on for eight days. The candles of the menorah represent the eight days of light, with a ninth, the shamash or helper candle, to help light the others. Traditional Hanukkah foods, such as latkes (potato pancakes) and jelly filled sufganiyot donuts, are fried in oil that symbolizes the miraculous substance that brightened the temple for eight days.

A 1902 rendition of Santa Claus

Whether you call him Sinterklaas, Pere Noel, Father Christmas, or Santa Claus, most cultures with any european roots preserve the long held tradition of a jolly old soul who visits the homes of good little girls and boys to deliver gifts during the Yule Season. The real Saint Nicholas was a 4th century Greek Bishop who dedicated his life to the care of the poor, feeding and providing for the impoverished people in his parish. Prior to the advent of Christianity, Germanic peoples celebrated the Yuletide with appearances of Langbaror, or “long beard”, a Norse name for the god Odin, who not coincidentally bears the long white beard and robes of the Santa Claus we’ve come to know and love. The merging of the Norse Jolnir, or “yule figure”, the Dutch Sinterklaas (Saint Nicholas) and Father Christmas, who was born as the emblem of good cheer in old England eventually burgeoned into a globally recognizable character. True to the mission of Saint Nicholas, the portly man with rosy cheeks is the representation of joy, giving and goodwill toward men. It was once again the influential Martin Luther who moved the traditional gift-giving to children from Saint Nicholas’ name day on December 6th, to the 24th of December, and suggested the gift giver as Christkind, or “Christ child”, which has been loosely translated into Kris Kringle in North America… and the alias of jolly old St. Nick.

The Magi travel with gifts to the Christ Child

The tradition of exchanging gifts with friends and family  is attributed not only to the influence of Saint Nicholas and his generous spirit, but can be traced back to the Roman holiday Saturnalia, which was observed with gift exchanges in late December and later replaced with the official Christmas holiday by the Roman Catholic Church. In a move to make the transition from traditional holiday celebrations to Christian holidays, the church kept some of the old customs in place and assigned them new meaning. In this case, the tradition of gift giving became symbolic of the gifts brought to the infant Jesus by the Magi, or wise men from the east.

The Christmas holiday did not enjoy widespread observance in North America until the mid 1800’s, due largely to the influence of early puritan settlers in the United States. In the late 17th century, Christmas celebrations were actually outlawed in Boston, one of the largest cities at that time. After the revolutionary war, Christmas in the United States took another blow as it was seen largely as a British Holiday. In the early 1800’s the holiday began to make a resurgence with a little boost from emerging literature that rekindled the spirit of Christmas. Washington Irving, Charles Dickens, and Clement C. Moore, the author of “A Visit From Saint Nicholas” (commonly known as The Night Before Christmas) all contributed to a nostalgic return to British and European traditions that were rich in family and community celebration.

In the light of so many beautiful and festive traditions that bring us together from so many cultures, it’s heartwarming to realize that behind every one is the common theme of generosity and joy toward our fellow man. Whether the customs we observe spring from the roots of our European ancestors before the Angels heralded the birth of Christ, or they evolved from the kindly acts of a devoted bishop, or they tell the story of a the triumph of a people to be free in their worship, all of our holiday traditions serve the purpose of bringing us together with loved ones in peace and harmony. Embrace the history steeped in all of the practices that we observe during the holiday season, enjoy the richness that our collective backgrounds grant us, and find value the roots that go back centuries to make us who we are as human beings. And God bless us, every one.