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Particularly so in English…
The surprise — in English — about Christmas is that nobody says Christ-mas. Everyone says Crissmas.
Looking around at other European languages, it is near impossible to find the word Christ in the celebratory name folks use for the darkest time of the year.
- Weihnachten in German can be translated into something like Holy Nights.
- Noel in French indicates the new life, birth. Same for Navidad in Spanish, birth.
- Yul in Scandinavia lasts for 12 days and starts at the darkest day of the year.
- Kerstmis in Dutch is perhaps most like our word Christmas, but Kerst does not mean Christ. It means a change for the better, a change that is a significant improvement.
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So, who stole Chrissmas?
It turns out that the Christians were jealous of the pagan celebration of chasing away the darkest demons of the year.
These deepest felt experiences of the dark (particularly the further north one goes) was of such magnitude it could not be erased.
The clever solution was to have baby Jesus be born on December 25th. This way, the good news about the longer days ahead coincided with the Christian message.
