About
Since 1949, Durhamites have slept soundly, secure in the knowledge that, in our town, erection can be depended upon. Now, thanks to the power of the internets, we can spread that security all over the world.
About Me
- Name: Barry
- Location: Durham, North Carolina, United States
For such an enlightened, tolerant guy, I sure get pissed off easy. Contact: DependableErection AT gmail DOT com
3 Comments:
There goes another Christian-American church ignorant of its own history. For more on this, I present the following from www.cresourcei.org/symbols/xmasorigin.html:
I have no doubt that some people write "Xmas" because they are too busy or too lazy to write out the whole word. And no doubt some secular people, who are just as uninformed as Christians, see "Xmas" as a way to avoid writing "Christ." And certainly there are secular and commercial motives in the fact that "XMAS" appears in ads and signs because it can be larger and more attention getting in the same amount of space (more bang for the buck). But those factors do not take away the thoroughly Christian origin of the word "Xmas." In this instance, all of the hype and hysteria over supposedly taking Christ out of Christmas by writing "Xmas" instead of spelling out "Christmas" is both uninformed and misdirected.
Abbreviations used as Christian symbols have a long history in the church. The letters of the word "Christ" in Greek, the language in which the New Testament was written, or various titles for Jesus early became symbols of Christ and Christianity. For example, the first two letters of the word Christ (cristoV, or as it would be written in older manuscripts, CRISTOS) are the Greek letters chi (c or C) and rho (r or R). These letters were used in the early church to create the chi-rho monogram (see Chrismons), a symbol that by the fourth century became part of the official battle standard of the emperor Constantine.
Another example is the symbol of the fish, one of the earliest symbols of Christians that has been found scratched on the walls of the catacombs of Rome. It likely originated from using the first letter of several titles of Jesus (Jesus Christ Son of God Savior). When combined these initial letters together spelled the Greek word for fish (icquV, ichthus).
The exact origin of the single letter X for Christ cannot be pinpointed with certainty. Some claim that it began in the first century AD along with the other symbols, but evidence is lacking. Others think that it came into widespread use by the thirteenth century along with many other abbreviations and symbols for Christianity and various Christian ideas that were popular in the Middle Ages. However, again, the evidence is sparse.
In any case, by the fifteenth century Xmas emerged as a widely used symbol for Christmas. In 1436 Johannes Gutenberg invented the printing press with moveable type. In the early days of printing typesetting was done by hand and was very tedious and expensive. As a result, abbreviations were common. In religious publications, the church began to use the abbreviation C for the word "Christ" to cut down on the cost of the books and pamphlets. From there, the abbreviation moved into general use in newspapers and other publications, and "Xmas" became an accepted way of printing "Christmas" (along with the abbreviations Xian and Xianity). Even Webster’s dictionary acknowledges that the abbreviation Xmas was in common use by the middle of the sixteenth century.
So there is no grand scheme to dilute Christianity by promoting the use of Xmas instead of Christmas. It is not a modern invention to try to convert Christmas into a secular day, nor is it a device to promote the commercialism of the holiday season. Its origin is thoroughly rooted in the heritage of the Church. It is simply another way to say Christmas, drawing on a long history of symbolic abbreviations used in the church. In fact, as with other abbreviations used in common speech or writing (such as Mr. or etc.), the abbreviation "Xmas" should be pronounced "Christmas" just as if the word were written out in full, rather than saying "exmas." Understanding this use of Christian symbolism might help us modern day Xians focus on more important issues of the Faith during Advent, and bring a little more Peace to the Xmas Season.
-Dennis Bratcher, Copyright © 2007, Dennis Bratcher - All Rights Reserved
----Merry Xmas!-----
By
Tony, at 9:00 AM
That doesn't even begin to take into account the other half of the equation: that by all available evidence (including biblical) Jesus wasn't even born in December, and that the seasonal celebrations common to many cultures which we still partake in predate Jesus by centuries. Early Christians celebrated when they did because the romans were also celebrating the Saturnalia at the same time.
Many Christian traditions also eschewed celebrating Christ's birth because of the association of the holiday with pagan rituals.
Eat drink and be merry is what i say. And don't burn the house down.
By
Barry, at 9:15 AM
Tony: thanks for the comments about the use of "X" to mean "Christ." I was all ready to ladle on about it. Well, ok, I'll ladle on a bit more. :)
It's been used for a really long time. The word "Christ" in Greek is Χριστός (Christós), with the letter Rho -- symbol "X" -- representing a phoneme that in English would be spelled and pronounced like "ch." As in "Christ." Get a clue, people. I know it's been in use since the middle ages, but because of the above, I bet it's been in use since the word "Χριστός" has been -- i.e., since the word Christ was ever written in Greek. [By the way, that "i.e." is a Latin abbreviation. I don't think that makes me a Satanist. :) ]
There's also the matter of the letter actually looking like a cross. Can I get a "Duh," people?
It's commonly used in writing by divinity students, who aren't so stupid as to forget that they're also writing the letter Rho when they write "X".
I think it's actually kind of cool: you're speaking Greek and making a graphical representation of the cross at the same time.
I don't think of myself as a Christian [or Xian :) ], but I use Xmas as much as I can. And if it offends anyone -- well, those people are dumb. I know of exceptions, but most of those people are the same people who think that the Xian Bible was written in English. :)
Xian churches, in some cases, used to be repositories of knowledge and centers of learning. Currently, the opposite seems to be closer to the truth.
By
Joseph H. Vilas, at 11:41 AM
Post a Comment
<< Home