Easter Symbols

A little perspective is needed on some pagan traditions that have entered Christian traditions.  On a day that is set aside to celebrate the resurrection of Jesus Christ, I have often wondered why there are eggs and bunnies.  I could never really figure out the connection.  The truth is:  there is no connection.  Some say the egg represents the resurrection, but the egg is hard boiled and therefore dead.  And even if the chick were allowed to come out of the shell, it’s a birth, not a rebirth. 

 

So, what is the real symbolism?  As we’ve seen with other Christian traditions, as Christianity spread people still hung on to some of their pagan symbols.  Even the word “Easter” is pagan.  Easter, or Esther, is another name for Ishtar, the Babylonian goddess of fertility.  She’s also the guardian of prostitutes and probably had priestess-prostitutes in her temples.  The egg is the symbol for fertility and the animal symbol for fertility is the rabbit.  Now you know why there is a rabbit delivering eggs.

 

So, in the spring of the year when everything is coming back to life, Ishtar is worshipped, and her symbols are seen everywhere.  So what do eggs and rabbits have to do with Jesus dying on the cross and rising three days later?  Absolutely nothing.  Also, the Persians (Babylonians) painted eggs for Nowrooz, their New Year celebration falling on the Spring Equinox.

 

So, should I still hide eggs and let my children find them?  It’s something they look forward to at this time of the year.  They also like to get their picture taken with the Easter Bunny at the mall.  And I can’t leave out getting their baskets on Easter morning.  The Easter bunny always visited me when I was younger and I’m not worshipping Ishtar today.  So, is it okay or not, and I don’t buy the argument that it’s up to each person.  Either it’s right or it’s wrong, perception doesn’t matter.  Or is it the emphasis that matters?  My children know the true reasons for our celebrations.  They know the story of Jesus’ crucifixion, burial, and resurrection.  I don’t know, but now that I have a deeper understanding of the symbols, I do feel convicted for it.

 

What’s your conviction?

Never Miss Topics

In continuing my notes from a writer’s conference, the following comes from Dr. Dennis Hensley about non-fiction writing.  He gives 7 Never Miss Topics and 4 Fairly Safe Categories.

 

Never Miss Topics

1. Lifestyles:  People what to know how and why people live the way they do.  For example, why do people give up careers to do missions?
2. Money:  How to make it, collect it, invest it, handle it etc.
3. Personal advancement ideas and plans:  telling people how to get ahead in life.
4. Activities:  individual, family, group.  People don’t know what to do without a TV.  What to do on trips.
5. Physical Fitness:  Exercise, diet, living longer, how to look and feel better.
6. Mental health and emotional fitness:  how to deal with stress, find peace
7. Entertainment:  the cheaper the better, how do you have a good time without spending much money?  What to do with your family.

 

Fairly safe categories

1. Profiles:  people enjoy reading about people, has to be someone interesting, not necessarily famous
2. Unusual events:  get an angle
3. Crime:  people are worried about crime.  How can they prevent it?
4. Schooling and schooling innovations:  why are there big movements in dealing with public school?  How do parents help students with homework?

 

Pearl S Buck Day 1

I also read Pearl S. Buck:  A Biography by Theodore F. Harris in consultation with Pearl S. Buck.  I love reading author biographies and catch little snippits that ring true to my life and my writing.  There were a lot of great quotes from Pearl Buck that I think all writers could benefit from. 

 

At one point Harris asks, “Are you conscious of style?”  She replies, “I hear word clearly, as though they were spoken to me, and I write down what I hear.  People who knew me in college never thought I would write prose, they thought I would write poetry.  I very nearly didn’t write prose, but thank God for my pocketbook’s sake, I did.”

 

Harris talks about how Buck is as a writer, which I find to be a truth in my life.  “She is a woman different from the world around her and no matter how she resents these differences, they exist, nonetheless, and she has had to learn how to live with herself.  Being different from others is not easy, for then one is never completely close to other human beings.  No matter how intimate may be some of her external relationships, she still has that inner place where she lives alone with her people - the people she has created.  She experiences their likes and dislikes, their loves and hates, their lives, and while this creation is going on she must not have a life of her own, for if she does, it influences the writing. . . . She cannot share the creative process with anyone.  I suppose one could say that she experiences much vicariously - if on can create and then experience vicariously from creation!

 

“Her people!  She knows them all.  They were there in her inner being, ready for her to bring them to life.  Were they to live?  She saw the possibility of her life’s ending in Nanking with her people never having lived.  She knew she must write.  She bought that desk and put it in an attic room of the house wehre she could go and be alone with her people.”

 

How true is that for the writer?  People think we’re strange, perhaps aloof, when we are really dealing with the characters begging for attention, asking for their stories to be told.  And if we don’t write, we explode and over time the characters fade away and die.  They beg for life on the page that only the writer can create, and if it’s done correctly, and with honesty and creativity, then that character has the chance of living forever.  And even if no one ever reads the story, you have still given birth to a new creation and that leads to even more, and often better, creations. 

 

 

Published Again

“The Overpass” was reprinted in the winter quarter of The Vision.  That was lucky number 13.  Praise God for all he has done.

 

 

Christmas Symbols: Christmas Card

My hand is about to fall off from addressing envelopes and signing the names of all six family members to the Christmas cards.  This is the first time we’ve done Christmas cards in a long time and time is quickly fading away.  It’s like I suddenly looked up at we’re only two weeks from the big day.  I’m not worried about the shopping, that comes much later, but we do need to hurry up and get these cards out or we’ll have to hold them until next year.  We even did a newsletter with everything that’s been going on.  I don’t if anyone will read it, but it’s there for their perusal.

 

Now I’m not getting off subject.  I bring up Christmas cards to talk about the history of them.  In London in 1843 Sir Henry Cole was too busy during the holiday season to do the writing he would normally do.  So, he ordered the first set of Christmas cards, which featured an illustration by John Callcott Horsley.  The card was of a family drinking wine, which did cause some controversy.  These cards read “merry Christmas and a happy New Year to you.”  The cards were printed in black and white, then colored by hand.  1,000 cards were produced, of which 12 exist today. 

 

The early cards that took off from that point rarely had winter scenes or religious themes.  They were usually of children and animals.  In 1875 Louis Prang became the first printer to sell Christmas cards in America.  His cards had pictures of floral arrangements and were expensive.  The cards didn’t take off in America and the cheap penny Christmas postcards from Germany ran him out of business.  Of course the German domination ended after World War 1 and American companies took over.

 

According to one website that was researched, today more than two billion Christmas cards are exchanged annually, just within the United States.  This year there will be two billion and sixty because of the Slagle effort.

 

 

Friday Night Lights A Hit With Me

Today is Wednesday, so I feel like I should be writing about a book for the CFBA.  But we are taking a Christmas break, which is nice to be able to read some books I’ve put on hold.  Since I don’t have a book to talk about, I thought I would talk about a TV show that has really caught my interest this season - “Friday Night Lights.” 

 

Not only are the characters great and the storyline real, the show doesn’t apologize for portraying faith.  I believe the show to be fair toward the Christian influence of the players.  There has been at least one prayer in every show and they pray to Jesus, not just something generic.  The students go to church, and deal with their problems in a way that is reflective of the real world.  Some may say that they took the good Christian cheerleader and turned her into someone who was having sex with her crippled boyfriend’s best friend.  But let’s take another look at that issue.  Do Christian teenagers have sex?  Yes.  If you don’t believe me, you are not living in the real world.  Are there teenagers who are strong enough to stay away?  Yes.  There are those students in the show as well.  Let’s get back to the cheerleader.  She is a Christian, the earlier episodes established that.  She made the mistake of having sex.  There were consequences for that mistake.  In Numbers 32 Moses is talking to his army and he warns them that if they do not do as the Lord commands, they “will be sinning against the Lord; and you may be sure that your sin will find you out” (23).  In last night’s episode, which I assume was the fall finale since there were no previews, Lyla’s sins found her out and she paid dearly for her sins.  She was repentant to the ones that sin hurt and realized that she must endure the pain.  There was no scene of her at the alter or even of her praying for forgiveness, but I got the feeling that she had done that at some point behind the scenes.  And at the end of the show, there was a strong redemptive quality.  We all sin and come short of the glory of God.  When children disobey, they are punished (at least they should be if the parent loves them).  God is not different toward his children.  There are consequences to our actions, but there is also repentance and redemption.

 

Last night’s show also talked openly about sex and how boys and girls are viewed differently because of the things they do.  There was also a scene in the classroom in which a preacher’s daughter (I don’t recall her name because last night was her first appearance) explained how boys think that it’s okay to spread their seed because that is human nature, but humans are to rise above nature and be stronger than those urges.  She called it higher evolution.  I thought that was really good and met the secular views on secular grounds.  She didn’t mention the Bible or God or that sex should wait until marriage.  She made her point within the confides of the secular argument about human nature and she won.  Again, it was very well done.

 

This is a show that everyone should start watching.  It moves to Wednesdays in January.  Hopefully, the move will up the ratings because I hate to see a good show like this hit the can.  If you want to know more about the show or watch the episodes online go to the link below:

 

http://www.nbc.com/Friday_Night_Lights/

 

 

 

 

Christmas Symbols: The Christmas Tree

As we get closer to Christmas I am reminded of how symbolic everything really is.  So many people think that symbols are just things that writers and English teachers think up to make their lives more enjoyable.  While there may be some truth to that, in reality, symbols are everywhere.  Especially in the church and especially at Christmas time.  I want to take a look at some of the symbols surrounding the Christmas season and shed some light on where the symbol came from and what it means. 

 

What better place to start than the Christmas tree? 

 

It seems the Christmas tree had its humble beginnings in Germany, which really interests me because I’ve done a lot of research on my family history in America as well as Germany.  Our family line has close ties with the church, and so when I talk about when the tradition of the Christmas tree began, I am probably also looking at a piece of family history.  Anyway, the tree began as part of “The Paradise Plays.”  These plays were performed in churches and town squares during Advent and told the story of the human race from Adam and Even until Jesus in a manger.  So the tree was center stage from the beginning, where apples were hung on it to represent the tree of knowledge of good and evil.  The tree represented many things, such as the original tree in the Garden of Eden, the tree made into the cross of Jesus, the tree the Apostle John saw in Revelation.

 

The modern Christmas tree comes from Germany.  Because of the tree in “The Paradise Plays,” German families set up a Paradise tree in their homes on December 24, the feast day of Adam and Eve.  They hung wafers on it, which symbolized the bread eaten during communion.  Since the Christmas holiday was right after that day, people put candles in the tree to represent that Jesus came as a light to the world.  I don’t know how they kept the trees from burning down.  Have you ever thrown an evergreen into a fire?  It goes up immediately in a flash.

 

There is also the legend of St. Boniface that takes the Christmas tree back to the 7^th century in Germany.  During the 7^th century, Boniface went to German to teach the word of God.  According to the legend, he used the fir tree to describe the Holy Trinity because of its triangular shape.  Once converted, the people began to see the fir tree as God’s Tree.  This could also be why the trees were used in “The Paradise Plays.”

 

The Christmas trees first came to England with the Georgian Kings who came from Germany.  I want to add on a personal note that we have a direct connection to Electress Sophia of Hanover through the church.  Her son was King George I.  The custom did not catch on because the British were not fond of the German Monarchy, so it wasn’t until the mid-1800’s that the tradition caught on.  Queen Victoria and Prince Albert were very popular and made the Christmas tree fashionable.

 

The Christmas trees in America were introduced by the Hessian soldiers.  The Pennsylvanian German settlements had community trees as early as 1747.  Most Christmas traditions in American followed the immigrants who settled the area.  But once mass communication really got going in the 19^th century, customs began to spread.

 

Now there are all types of trees from manufactured to real, but they all have a place in homes, whether the people are Christians or not.  Stores may try to rename them Holiday Trees, but we know the difference and know the deep heritage they have in the Christian community.