I. Who was There: It is Advent, the time of preparation for the festival of Christmas. At its heart is the story of the birth of Jesus, as told in the gospels of Matthew and Luke, and it is a story retold in that great seasonal tradition, the Nativity play. Advent is the time for Nativity plays. They are performed in schools, Sunday schools and churches – usually, (but not always) by children – with admiring families, especially parents and grandparents, in the enthusiastic audience. Not everyone likes Nativity plays in these days of secularist killjoy intolerance, but even when Christian conviction is absent they survive – often with an attempt to reinterpret the story in ways reflecting contemporary concerns – with issues like homelessness, refugees, diversity and inclusivity. This is no bad thing, and the story certainly allows for it, as long as the simple magic isn’t lost.
We have no Nativity plays here these days, which is a shame, but this is no reason not to give some thought to their dramatis personae, to the principal – and not so principal – characters who appear in them. What do we know about them? And what is their significance?
Reading: from, ‘Advent 1955’ by John Betjeman [OBCP p.17]
II. The Baby Jesus: Central to the whole thing is the baby Jesus. Traditionally, his humble birth to humble parents in humble circumstances was attended by supernatural signs and wonders proclaiming his role as Messiah, born at the initiation of the will and spirit of God, to bring liberation and salvation to the human race. The Bible has two, rather different, accounts of the Nativity, which we blithely merge in order to make one story, but one thing they do agree on is that Jesus was born and that Mary was his mother. But in the Nativity play Jesus doesn’t do much. His part is usually taken by a doll, but more adventurous productions may feature a real live baby. This is a risky strategy! It may give the lie to that line about “How silently, how silently, the wondrous gift is given”, which has always struck me as a bit unrealistic anyway. Childbirth and new-born babies are not silent – and shouldn’t be. So the silent baby Jesus of most Nativity plays must bear little resemblance to the real baby Jesus!. Matthew and Luke say nothing about any sounds made by the baby Jesus, but one Nativity story does. The Qur’an has a succinct account of the birth of Jesus, which ends with the baby speaking from his cradle: “I am the servant of Allah”, he begins, “He has given me the Gospel and ordained me a prophet.” This and what follows is a summary of the Islamic view of Jesus – and is well worth our attention, even if it is unlikely to feature in a Nativity play.
Reading\; Qur’an, from Sura 19 ‘Mary’ [pp. 33-34]
III. Mary: Mary, of course, is at the heart of any Nativity play. But who was she and what was her role? The gospels don’t give her much of a back-story, but some early Christian writers were happy to fill in the gaps. And even though the stories they told never made it into the Bible, they remained popular for centuries, providing a rich resource for artists, writers and poets right up to the Renaissance and beyond. The most important, detailed and influential of these documents is the 2nd-century ‘Protevangelium’ or ‘Infancy Gospel of James’. This supposedly takes Mary’s story back to her own miraculous conception, birth and childhood, and to her being betrothed, at the age of sixteen, to a carpenter named Joseph, an old man with sons of his own. The book then continues to give its own quite distinctive account of the Nativity.
Among the details we find the donkey, beloved of Nativity plays but not mentioned in Matthew or Luke, when we are told that, halfway through the journey to Bethlehem, Mary said, “Joseph, help me down from the donkey – the child inside me is about to be born.” This he does, and takes her into a cave to give birth. There is no mention of a stable. And at this point a character appears who isn’t mentioned in Matthew or Luke but who could be added to the cast of the Nativity, and that is a midwife called Salome. She is thus a witness to the birth of Jesus and also, so the story goes, the guarantor that Mary has remained a virgin!
Of the two gospel accounts themselves, Luke’s is by far the fullest when it comes to Mary. In Matthew she is someone to whom things happen whereas in Luke she is a much more active and assertive figure, a willing and thoughtful participant in what is going on. As Luke tells us, after the birth of Jesus, the proclamation of the angels, and the visit of the shepherds, “But Mary treasured up all these things and pondered over them” (Luke 2: 19). Luke’s Nativity account ends with Mary and Joseph taking the baby Jesus to be “presented to the Lord” in the Temple at Jerusalem, where an “upright and devout” man called Simeon speaks to Mary in particular about Jesus, and how he is “destined to be a sign that will be rejected” while she “will be pierced to the heart.” (Luke 2: 36), so prefiguring the scene at the foot of the Cross.
Reading: ‘Infancy Gospel of James’ from chaps. 11 & 12 [‘Complete Gospels’ pp. 388-389]
IV. Joseph: The third most prominent character in the Nativity play is Joseph, the strong silent figure standing by Mary and the baby Jesus. In the Infancy Gospel of James we have been told of the tradition that he was already an old man, a carpenter, a widower with sons by a previous marriage. That tradition also tells of his reluctance to marry the teenage Mary when she is allocated to him by the high priest, and of his anger when she is found to be pregnant, at least until her unlikely explanation is confirmed by an angel, a “messenger of the Lord”, in a dream. The Infancy Gospel of James gives all this in much greater detail than the very brief account in Matthew (chapter 1). But once all this has been sorted out Joseph is able to accept the situation, “celebrating and praising the God of Israel”. It was then that the imperial summons from Augustus sets Joseph and his pregnant and very young wife on the road to Bethlehem.
It was at this point, while searching for a midwife, that Joseph is reported to have had an experience that ranks among the most sublime traditions of all the non-canonical material associated with the Nativity. As we read in the Infancy Gospel of James, the whole of creation pauses in anticipation of the birth of Jesus. As to whether Joseph ever had such a mystical experience I have no idea, but he should have done!
We are also told, in Matthew’s gospel, that Joseph had a dream after Jesus was born, warning him that the baby was in danger and that Joseph should take the baby and Mary to safety in Egypt, which he does, but Matthew doesn’t elaborate. However, other non-canonical sources go into some detail about what happened to Joseph and his family on the way to Egypt, and when they got there. One story in particular has always appealed to me. It would make some exciting additions to the usual animal characters in the Nativity play.
Like Joseph’s experience of the universe standing still, this story relates the birth of Jesus to the whole of creation, which surely has a pressing relevance for us today. So too do the ox and the ass who, in the so-called Gospel of Pseudo-Matthew, are said to have “adored” Jesus in the manger. This also explains the presence of the ox and the ass, not to mention the assorted horses, sheep, camels and other animals who appear in Nativity plays, even though they are not mentioned in the gospels.
Reading: ‘Infancy Gospel of James’ chapter 18 ‘Complete Gospels’ p. 392
Hymn 108 (purple) ‘Now Rejoice!
Reading: ’Gospel of Pseudo-Matthew’ chaps. 18 & 19 [‘Apocryphal NT’ pp. 74-75
V. The Shepherds & the Angels: But to return to the stock Nativity play characters, some, like the innkeeper and his wife, are not actually mentioned in any ancient account, canonical or non-canonical, but what can be said about those that are, namely the shepherds, the Wise Men and the angels? And what about that malign and brooding off-stage presence, King Herod?
In Nativity plays the first visitors to the stable are the shepherds, whose visit appears only in Luke’s gospel. It is significant that Luke chose shepherds. Not only were they ordinary working people, they also had the taint of ritual uncleanness. This means that the first humans to whom the birth of Jesus was announced were humble and marginalized, virtual outcasts on the edge of society, not the rich and powerful, the so-called ‘great and the good’ who ran things.. This accords with the words from Isaiah with which Jesus was to commence his ministry and which begin: “The spirit of the Lord is upon me because he has anointed me, he has sent me to announce good news to the poor” (Luke 4:18). Choosing the shepherds to hear the message of the angels and to be the first to visit Jesus and greet him as Messiah, was a radical, even revolutionary, act.
The angels of the “heavenly host” provide plenty of places for the cast of a Nativity play, with one “angel of the Lord” actually delivering their message of peace and goodwill to all humankind, which for most is still the abiding meaning of Christmas. The angel’s speech is a crucial element, beginning with the words, “Do not be afraid; I bring you good news, news of great joy for the whole nation” (Luke 2: 10), usually taken to actually mean the whole world. And both the nation and the world need that good news today as much as ever.
Reading: from, ‘The Shepherd’s Tale’ by James Kirkup [OBCP p. 42]
VI. The Wise Men & Herod: Next come the magi, or Wise Men. We are not told that there were three of them, but this number is implied by the number of gifts that they bring. The magi appear in Matthew’s gospel where their following of the Star clearly marks them out as astrologers. The Star itself usually becomes a character in Nativity plays, but what it was that the magi might actually have “followed” has been the subject of much debate. Several genuine astronomical phenomena have been advanced as possible candidates. But whatever it was, its significance for the Nativity story is astrological, not scientific. Astrology was almost universally accepted in the ancient world and the Star of Bethlehem was believed to be proof of the exalted spiritual, royal and even divine status of Jesus.
The gifts the magi brought to Jesus were further recognition of this, and relate to Old Testament prophecies. The idea that the magi were kings does not occur in Matthew’s gospel, which is the only place where they are mentioned in the New Testament. Rather it appears in later documents and probably indicates a desire to raise the status of Christ and of Christianity in the Graeco-Roman world. They also acquired names – usually given as Gaspar, Melchior and Balthasar – but these are only known to us from later documents, dating from the 6th century. The magi also acquired kingdoms – given in an Armenian gospel as Persia, India and Arabia respectively, making them gentiles and ‘foreigners’. Presumably this was to stress the universal nature of the Christian message and its potential to include all peoples and nations. The full significance of the magi is probably lost on us, but they are regulars in the Nativity play, where now they are usually taken to stand for the unity and diversity of the human race, and for the reconciliation of divisions based on ethnicity, nationality and religion.
One person spooked by the promised appearance of a rival was Herod, the client-king of Judaea under the authority of the Roman Empire. He doesn’t actually appear in Nativity plays, but the threat of this violent, murderous and paranoid tyrant is very much part of Matthew’s Nativity account. And the evidence bears out this picture of Herod. He is not without parallel in today’s world. What his fear of the appearance a new king led to, as told in Matthew’s gospel, is not suitable for the cosy atmosphere of a Nativity play.
This, then, is an attempt to explain the cast of the Nativity play. It is not a complete explanation, of course, but hopefully it will cast some light on this mostly Advent tradition and what it can mean.
Reading: ‘Innocent’s Song’, by Charles Causley [OBCP p. 63]
Music:
Ipswich Unitarian Meeting House 