Episode 125, The Christmas Special (Part III - Further Analysis and Discussion)

The Panpsycast Philosophy Podcast

Jack Symes | Andrew Horton, Oliver Marley, and Rose de Castellane

Euthanasia, Kierkegaard, Nietzsche, Existentialism, Marxism, Kant, Ethics, Davidpapineau, Dennett, Marx, Evilgodchallenge, Cosmological, Mind, Consciousness, Courses, Nagasawa, Education, Johnstuartmill, Jeremybentham, Aristotle, Ocr, Camus, Josephfletcher, Conscience, Society & Culture, Kantianethics, Philosophy

4.8 • 604 Ratings

🗓️ 14 January 2024

⏱️ 27 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

Days grow shorter, rain turns to sleet, and nature’s creatures are forced into hibernation. Winter is here; when the world wages war on us, through darkness, danger, and impending depression. But from the clouds of winter’s despair, therein shines a light: gatherings among families and friends, spirits of fellowship and forgiveness, and scenes of feasts and festivities.

It is Christmas, who shepherds us together – when we would otherwise be apart – and spares us from the cold, and into loving arms. As we shall see, the festival of Christmas has snowballed with the passing of many winters – from the early celebrations of the Romans and Vikings to the Christian nativity and commercialisation – but what has held this snowball together?

Let us burn candles, logs, and line our homes with dancing lights; let us bring in trees and celebrate the hope of new life; and let us give generously and extend goodwill to our neighbours here, and around the world.

Contents

Part I. The Nativity

Part II. The Nativity Continued

Part III. Further Analysis and Discussion

Links

Pope Benedict XVI, Jesus of Nazareth: The Infancy Narratives (book)

Raymond E. Brown, The Birth of the Messiah: A Commentary on the Infancy Narratives in the Gospels of Matthew and Luke (book)

Judith Flanders, Christmas: A History (book)

Bruce Forbes, Christmas: A Candid History (book)

Brent Landau, Revelation of the Magi: The Lost Tale of the Wise Men's Journey to Bethlehem (book)

Robert J. Miller, Born Divine: The Births of Jesus and Other Sons of God (book)

Richard C. Trexler, The Journey of the Magi: Meanings in History of a Christian Story (book)

Attributions

The following sounds were used with the permission of the copyright holder.

Medieval City, OGsoundFX; Night Farmfields, klankbeeld; Baby Breath, m3fuss; all other sounds were produced by Epidemic Sound and The Panpsycast.

Transcript

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0:00.0	Part 3, further analyses and discussion.
0:06.0	Happy Saturnalia! Part 3. Further analyses and discussion.
0:22.7	Happy Saturnalia!
0:24.9	Hello.
0:25.8	Do you know what that means?
0:28.4	Can you tell us a little bit about what Saturnalia is, Andrew?
0:32.0	Don't ask me?
0:33.8	You can do this part, don't you?
0:36.1	I can, yeah.
0:37.6	I don't really know why you asked him, but again, just to be clear, I have done no...
0:41.3	I can offer nothing.
0:43.7	Christmas is like a snowball, says Forbes in his great book, Christmas, a candid history,
0:49.1	in which it rolls through Europe and the Americas and elsewhere,
0:53.1	picking up some features and dropping others.
0:55.4	So you wanted to start with the history, the roots of the Christmas festival, perhaps in Roman times?
1:02.5	Sure. So let's just start talking about the date, shall we? So obviously, we know that in the West, quote, unquote, Christmas is celebrated on the 25th of December.
1:09.9	Now, we might be thinking, why this specific date, why is Christmas celebrated on the 25th of December? Well, the first thing we want to say is not all Christians celebrate Christmas on the 20th December. Quite a lot of Christians celebrate on the 6th of January, which is sometimes known as the Feast of Epiphany as well. Where does this date the 25th of December come from? So quite a lot of Christian thinkers and theologians have done a lot of work on this and trying to figure out Jesus' birth date and birthday. St. Augustine, who's a thinker we've looked at before, who's obviously quite well known within Christianity, famous for saying in his book on the Trinity, for Jesus is believed to have been conceived on the 25th of March, which is also the day he suffered. So there was quite a lot of work being put into figure out that his conception and death were on the same day, which was the 25th of March, which is quite interesting. And some Christians argue that because of that, this would place his birth nine months before, which is in some random date in December. Now, this coincides with what we would call the Roman Festival of Saturnalia, which, for those
2:03.3	of you who are unaware, would begin on the 17th of December and last for about three to seven
2:06.9	days.
2:07.6	It's a festival to worship the god Saturn and started off as quite a small festival, but then really
2:12.3	gained in popularity.
2:13.7	This festival would include public banquets.
	...

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