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Our guest today is Kenneth Calvert, Professor of History and
director of the Oxford Program at Hillsdale College. In this
blessed season, let us pause to reflect on the miraculous
birth and times of course and the first Christians, and
Professor Calvert is here to help us do just that.
Thank you so much for joining us on this edition
of the Federalist Radio Hour.
Speaker 2: You're welcome, Matt, thanks for having me.
Speaker 1: Let's begin really at the beginning, shall we, Actually it
goes back a ways, but you'll understand where I'm coming
from when I read the book of Luke two eight
through twenty, and it is this. There were in the
same country shepherds abiding in the field, keeping watch over
their flock by night, and lo, the Angel of the
Lord came upon them, and the glory of the Lord
shown round about them, and they were sore afraid. Thus
begins Luke chapter two eight through twenty. It was a
at least the start of this sequence is a bit
unnerving for the shepherd's watching over their flocks, was it not.
Speaker 3: That's right, it was, And the shepherds are being addressed
by angels, and of course in that moment, the idea
that they're frightened is entirely understandable. But they're being invited
to the most important event in human history, the birth
of God Incarnate in Bethlehem and the night of the
Night of his birth. Of course it was just angels
and shepherds. The magi I wouldn't show up for another
two years, and so we have to remember that. And
what's wonderful about Luke is just the simplicity, straightforward nature
of the na of the message. And if I may,
I'd like to actually start with the time of Zechariah,
the husband of Elizabeth.
Speaker 2: Certainly, yes, yeah, yeah.
Speaker 3: So we go back to Zechariah and we look at
the announcement that he receives. He's a priest serving in
the temple. We're not quite sure what event it is,
but it could very well be if this is if
this is somewhere around six or seven BC, we're looking
at either the day of the Atonement or the Feast
of the Tabernacles, and he is he is serving in
the temple, and he is told by the Angel that
he was going to have a child, that he and
Elizabeth would have a child, and of course he didn't
believe it, and he was struck dumb as compared to Mary,
who was visited by Gabriel, and she accepts it and
she says, yes, I am the handmaid of the Lord right,
And so you have this contrast between these the two
receptions of this message. But we are told then Mary
is told to go visit her relative Elizabeth, and we're
not quite sure how they're related, but they are related,
and she's to go visit her, and she's already six
months pregnant. So if we look at Zachariah at the
temple in somewhere around six b C, which is about
the time when Jesus was born, and we look at
when he was there sometime in September, this means that
the incarnation of God, the visitation of Gabriel to Mary,
took place sometime in March. And then of course what's
nine months from March, well, December, and so when we
talk about the celebration of this most important event in
human history, the arrival of God incarnate, and we're talking
about December twenty fifth, as about the approximate correct date
of his birth, and we look at scripture and we
look at the foundations of it, we're not far off.
And I think that it's very important for us to understand.
Quite often we hear that it was Constantine who somehow
established December twenty fifth as the date of Christmas, which
there is absolutely no historical evidence for that at all,
and that always befuddles me a little bit as an
ancient historian, and especially one who studies the early Church,
because by the second and third centuries AD, you have
a number of these early Christian scholars, early Christian leaders,
identifying specifically March twenty fifth as the date of the incarnation.
And that's what they're most interested in, of course, is
the very moment when God becomes man. And this is
why in early Christianity and all down through Christian history
we've believed and assert and of course science shows that
human life begins at conception, and there when we talk
about God incarnate conception, that's what the early Christians held
on to. You look at people like Hippolitists or Tertullian,
Clement of Alexandria. A number of these early Christian scholars
are looking at March twenty fifth as the date of
the conception of God Incarnate, and then of course December
twenty fifth, nine months later, as the date of his
amazing birth and the announcement to those shepherds who Matthew
and Luke give this wonderful contrast, matt between the God
of the universe, the true King of the Universe, being
born in Bethlehem, right, and this baby, this baby who
is not only the second member of the Trinity, but
you know, now here in flesh, as compared to the
guy further down the Mediterranean Sea in Rome, Caesar Augustus,
who is proclaimed by his people to be a god,
to be a son of a god, of Julius Caesar.
And the amazing contrast there of the human view of power,
the human view of authority, as compared to the true
authority in that baby in Bethlehem.
Speaker 2: It's just so.
Speaker 3: Powerful, and any Christian reading that in the first century,
first century AD would understand that contrast. And indeed one
of the reasons why Herod sent his troops to kill
babies at Bethlehem was to try and get rid of
this king of the Jews who had arrived because the
Senate had made him quote unquote the king of the Jews.
And so there again a contrast in the real power
versus the human claims to authority. It is a very
very powerful message, and sometimes here, you know, twenty one,
one hundred years later, almost forget just how powerful that
message was in the first century.
Speaker 2: Oh, it is so powerful.
Speaker 1: And you mentioned, you know, the two very interesting narratives
that are the same, but they're told with you know,
you can tell that these are different people telling this
story in Luke and in Matthew, but it comes down
to the same message that it is a humbling experience.
It is, you know, filled with humanness, but filled with
divinity at the same time. And I think I always
think about that silent night, and every time I hear that,
I I feel those words that you know, the Gospel
describing this scene, because indeed, a I'm sure that around
everyone you know, was you know, perhaps some noise and
maybe some cacophony in the background, right, but you know,
in this in this setting, in this manger, this was
as they say in German, you know, well the translation
is still still still right. It's a calm in this moment.
Speaker 3: Yeah, yeah, and this is the God of the universe. Well,
let's put it this way. All of the Old Testament
points ahead to this, and then all of the rest
of history is defined by this moment, by this still moment,
in this in this, in this manger where one, you know,
just from from human eyes, one would never expect the
God of the universe to arrive, right it is. It
is so contrary to everything that we think is powerful
and important.
Speaker 1: Absolutely, and we think about well here, as you mentioned before,
these assumptions of divinity in these very flawed, very flawed
human beings. Well it wasn't you know, it was at
this moment where you have the crossroads of this history
going on. You talked about Elizabeth and who was Elizabeth's son?
Speaker 2: They you know, And it's.
Speaker 1: Always interesting to me because the you know, the Old
Testament is filled with God fulfilling his promises, especially around
older people, right right, run out of time, the biological clock.
And it's always interesting to me that you have two
people in this particular instance saying there's no way that
could have we're too old to have children. Right exactly,
here comes John the Baptist right right.
Speaker 3: And you know, Sarah Abraham look at Samuel's mother Samson's mother.
You know, there are these miraculous births all down through
the Old Testament, and then of course in Isaiah the
promise that the virgin will be birth, be giving birth
to God with us right in Manuel Manuel.
Speaker 2: And here is the fulfillment of all of that.
Speaker 3: And God takes on flesh, and by doing that, you know,
he sets up the whole salvation history, the whole drama
pointing ahead to his taking on flesh. Therefore able to
die and dies you atoning for our sin. And then
is able also in the flesh to rise from the
dead and have victory over death.
Speaker 1: And if I can go back for a moment, because
you talked about the chronology of this, and I think
that is a critical point, I want to focus on
this a bit because we have heard from some modern
day historians. Oh no, no, Christ was not born on
December twenty fifth. You know, this was just the emerging
of some you know, pagan winter solstice festivals with as
you mentioned before, the Roman calendar tying this stuff in.
Where did they come up with this stuff? Because we
have in the early Christian historians, as you mentioned from
the beginning, talked about the moment of that immaculate conception,
and that Immaculate Conception being in March, which would take
the Mary's all women's gestation period up to you know
the end of December.
Speaker 2: Right.
Speaker 3: Well, you know, there's there's all kinds of things that
might be pointed to. Probably they're the strongest evidence for
a Constantinian era establishment of December twenty fifth is a
calendar that it's actually not in Constantinople, where Constantine is
ruling from, but in Rome. And what it does show
is that Christmas was being celebrated alongside the celebration of
a god, Soul Invictus, and I believe also the Saturnalia.
Now that doesn't mean that they were all established at
that moment and that they were all seen as equal,
and that is important. It's just a calendar that lists
what's going on at that moment, right.
Speaker 2: So what we have to look at actually is.
Speaker 3: An emperor named Aurelian who ruled from two seventy to
two seventy five. And Aurelian actually introduced a god that
had been debated over by the Romans for a while
named Soul Invictus, which is the invincible Sun. So that
solar worship and what he does is established December twenty fifth,
the winter solstice, as the moment or the day in
which that God is worshiped. And so you know, there
are a number of things going on here, because there's
persecution of the Christians going on at the same time
under Aurelian, Christianity is growing leaps and bounds in this period.
And so what you might look at her a couple
of things. Number one, is he trying to cover up
Christianity by establishing a new solar worship or is he
trying to maybe co ot Christianity and bring Christianity into
the Empire, which is a possibility but unlikely. Or is
he just establishing a new God. You know, those are
our options. But what is often confusing to those who
look back at this time is that it is a
December twenty fifth celebration and therefore seems to be, you know,
coordinated somehow with the Christian celebration. What I think is
also important is that the Christians had a certain amount
of solar imagery attached to Christ. In the Book of Numbers,
the Messiah is called a star. In I believe it's Malachi,
he is called the sun. The s u n of righteousness.
And then in the Gospel of John, you know, the
light comes into the world, you know, the darkness, you know,
you know fhades because of the light coming into the world.
There is this light imagery and even solar imagery that
the Christians do discuss and talk about, and ultimately it
will work its way into their art. But that doesn't
mean it's the same as the pagan idea of soul
and Victus or the invincible sun.
Speaker 2: You see.
Speaker 3: And one thing I always, you know, scratch my head
about is, you know, people who are saying that this
is the same thing, that they're all intertwining and this
is proof of you know, pagan roots of Christianity. I
think that's really hard to argue because remember that the
Christians are being persecuted. Yes, why would the Christians want to,
you know, intertwine themselves with paganism. In fact, if I
can just say one more thing about, you know, the
celebration of Christmas by the early Christian early Christians. In fact,
there's a wonderful hymn of the Father's Love Forgotten written
by Prudentius. That's our earliest known Christian hymn in the
fourth century, and I've heard that song in every Christian church.
It's just a wonderful hymn. And the Christians set themselves
aside in terms of their celebration of Christmas as compared
to the celebration of Soul and Victis or the celebration
of the Saturnalia. The Christians, Jerome of Jerusalem says this.
He says, they have debauchery, they have corruption. They drink
too much wine, you know, they drink too much, they
eat too much food. It is just absolute corruption. Whereas
we Christians and the celebration of Christ at this time
of the year, we're giving to the poor, We're remembering
Christ and why he came, you know, we're remembering the
reason for the incarnation. You know, it's such a drastic
contrast to that pagan celebration. And so the Christians were,
i would argue, very much aware that what they were
doing was different, even though it was around the same
time of year.
Speaker 1: Yeah, it is really played out in the notion of
walk in the spirit and not in the flesh. Absolutely
only one human being, flesh born human being, who was
ever perfect. The spirit is always perfect, and the spirit
lived of course in Christ.
Speaker 2: God incarnate.
Speaker 1: But you know that is what Paul and others urged,
so exactly you walk in that spirit, and that must
have been well, to say the least, quite a challenge
in those early days when they weren't walking. A lot
of times in some places they were running from villages
where they were being throwing rocks at them and trying
to take their lives.
Speaker 3: And again in the two fifties AD, just before Aurelian
there was empire wide persecution of the Christians. They were
being dragged out into the streets and it was.
Speaker 2: Really a horrible time.
Speaker 3: And so you know, I think that we have to
recall that the Christians are going to separate themselves, distance
themselves from their persecutors. Now, one thing I also have
to add is whereas March twenty fifth, the date of
the conception of God Incarnate, is the date that they
look to most reverently.
Speaker 2: The other, of course, is.
Speaker 3: Easter, and they set that date very early and have
a couple of councils in which they want to establish
the date of the celebration of Easter. There are some
differences between the West and the East, but mostly based
upon the fact that we're using different calendars.
Speaker 2: But it's really the same day, and.
Speaker 3: And it is it is that that moment of his
atonement and resurrection that the Christians very early on viewed
as the most important. The celebration of Christmas and of
the Incarnation really was a secondary celebration. But I think
it is important for us to understand that as we
celebrate it, we do celebrate it in communion with our
early brothers and sisters in Christ, and that this is
not something to be taken as just made up by
the Emperor Constantine and some some group of group of people.
I'm not sure even who would you know who would
put that together and say therefore it's a pagan celebration.
Speaker 2: That's just that's just not correct.
Speaker 1: Now, sir, are you telling us that this event that
we celebrate every year as Christians, we it's so dear,
is not about you know, your your prime membership. It's
not about heading to the mall and buying up as
much of the latest stuff as you can for the
kids or whoever it's it's it's not about that.
Speaker 2: It's believe it or not, it's not.
Speaker 3: Although I have to say that if we if we
truly associate all of that with God's gifts to us
and God's grace towards us. If that's if that's really
the meaning that we understand for all of this in context,
then I think we're heading in the right direction, right, Yeah.
Speaker 2: I think that we.
Speaker 3: I don't want to be I don't want to be
too curmudgeonally right, but it is it is important for
us in the end to focus on why this all happened.
In fact, I was asked the other day what I
thought that the most important symbol for Christmas might be,
And of course I think the crash the Nativity scene
is very important. But I think too that Christians should
display across in my tradition as a Catholic, of course,
a crucifix, so that we remember what Paul says, I
boasted nothing but Christ and him crucified. That this is
really at the core the true meaning of Christmas, That
this is what it all points ahead to, and that
is the real gift right that has been given to
us and the real gift that we proclaim to the
world at this time of year.
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Speaker 1: And so many gifts. I never want to lose track
of that. You know. The gift obviously is our Lord
and our Savior.
Speaker 2: That's appradiable.
Speaker 1: But I think about all of the miracles then took
place in order for this birth to be, in order
for this child to survive a very dangerous time, that
this child would grow up to do such miraculous works,
if you would, I mean, I'm not asking you to
count the miracles, but to talk about the miracles surrounding
this faith.
Speaker 2: Right.
Speaker 3: So, one thing that always jumps out at me, and
of course I'm a historian and I think about these things.
The empire has been established by Caesar Augustus at this time,
and there's a border, a border that stretches between Egypt
and the territory overseen by Herod. And of course the
Holy Family going down to Egypt is a fulfillment of scripture.
They need to go down to Egypt because the Lord
would call his son out of Egypt. Right, this is
this is important. But what I find amazing is that
Egypt is the is the closest place, the nearest part
of the Empire to which the Holy Family might go
for safety and be outside the jurisdiction of Herod. And
so by going from Bethlehem down to Egypt, and we
don't know what part of Egypt they were in, they
had just been given gold, frank and sense and murder
by the by the magi. But the fact that they're
called down to there is in my mind a beautiful
confirmation of so many things of prophecy, of gods, of
God's providence, of God looking you know, the Joseph being
faithful to his calling as a father, as an earthly father,
and Herod can't touch them there, and so you know,
Matthew tells us that after Herod dies, then the Holy
Family comes back and goes up to Nazareth. Again it
is it's perfect in the way that all unfolds his
his his real Uh. Ministry and miracles don't begin till
the wedding of Cana in which he you know, produces
the wine for that wedding. And then his public miracles begin,
and all of them focused on what on, on healing,
on health, on on not only spiritual healing, but but
excuse me, not only physical healing, but spiritual healing as
well of driving out those demons and those those things
that possess us. It is it's beautiful and Uh, just
three years of preaching of miraculous healing, he shows his
control over nature. John in the Gospel of John, were
told that he was there. He was present at creation.
Right this again, this is that baby. That baby was
present at creation and as an adult Jesus president, he
had been president at creation. He walks on the water,
he calms the waves, and his disciples are just in
awe and sometimes in fear of what this person is
able to do and what he represents.
Speaker 1: Do you ever think to yourself, I have done this.
I think I what hazard as they most Christians have,
What if you had lived at this time?
Speaker 2: Right.
Speaker 1: What if you had seen what these ancient people had seen,
heard what they had heard, in many cases, felt what
they had felt right.
Speaker 3: And you know, I, of course, as we all do,
would love to say, oh yeah, you know, I'd buy
into it.
Speaker 2: I'd be right there, right.
Speaker 3: But but you know, one of the problems that you know,
the Jewish leadership and Jews were having with Jesus was
his claim to divine authority.
Speaker 2: That he is God right, and so how how would
you take that and listen to this guy? Of course,
you would see on the one hand, the amazing miracles
that he is producing. On the other hand, he's claiming
that he is God. And therefore, you know, you've just
got this incredible tension. I would love to have said that,
you know, I'd fallen in with the other disciples and
been right there the whole way. But then you know,
at his at his trial and at his death, they
all faded away, except for John, except for his mother,
at hist at his crucifixion, they all faded away and
and had to come back and and be you know,
re reattached to him. We find Jesus and Peter on
the on the shore, and you know, Jesus asked Peter
three times, do you love me? Right?
Speaker 3: And there is this reconnection, this reaffirmation of that relationship.
Speaker 1: The number is striking, isn't it. Three times? Yeah, that's right,
that's right.
Speaker 2: Three days.
Speaker 1: Yeah, to be lifted up three days, three times that
Peter denied the Christ.
Speaker 2: That's right, that's right.
Speaker 1: It is truly the greatest story ever told, because it
is the greatest salvation known to man, certainly to.
Speaker 2: We who believe.
Speaker 1: And I so appreciate you sharing that with us. The
early times and life of Jesus Christ.
Speaker 2: Well, Matt, it's it's a pleasure. It's a pleasure to
talk to you about it. Absolutely.
Speaker 1: I hope to talk to you soon. Perhaps we can
do this on the eastern side of things.
Speaker 2: I would love to. That would be great.
Speaker 1: I would look forward to that. Thanks to my guest
today Hillsdale is Kenneth Calvert, Professor of History and director
of the Oxford Program at Hillsdale College. You remember the
gospel section I was referring to the Book of Luke
earlier on in our conversation. In fact, it's Luke chapter two,
verses eight through twenty. For those who grew up during
a certain time or for those young today who still
love the Peanuts Christmas made all the way back in
what nineteen sixty five, Well, there is a portion of
that wonderful Christmas special that you would never see on
average television, streaming whatever these days. In fact, if you
recall or if you haven't seen it, I hope you will,
because it's a holiday tradition in our house that the
Peanuts gang, Charlie Brown puts together a Peanuts pageant for Christmas.
He's getting more and more frustrated that nobody understands the
true meaning of Christmas. And you call Linus puts it
all in perspective for Charlie Brown and for us.
Speaker 5: And there were in the same country shepherds abiding in
the field, keeping watch over their flock by night. And lo,
the Angel of the Lord came upon them. The glory
of the lordshill round about them, and they were sore afraid,
and the Angel set into them. If you're not for behold,
I bring you tidings of great joy which will be
to all people. For unto you is born this day
in the City of David, a savior, Christ the Lord.
And this shall be a sign onto you. You shall
find the Babe wrapped in swaddling cloves, lying in an anger,
and suddenly there was with the Angel a multitude of
the heavenly host praising God. I'm saying glory to God
in the highest and on earth, peace goodwill toward me
in That's what Christmas is thought about, Charlie Brown, That's.
Speaker 1: That's what it means. Linus Well cartoon character carrying around
a blue blanket, Well, he put it all in perspective,
something that we should keep our minds and our hearts on,
I hope during this Christmas season.
Speaker 2: And again.
Speaker 1: Something you would never see in children's television in Christmas
specials these days. By any stretch, you've been listening to
another edition of the Federalist Radio Hour. I'm Matt Kittle,
Senior Elections correspondent at the Federalist. We'll be back soon
with more. Until then, stay lovers of freedom, anxious for
the fray