On the Eve of Christmas
1. When communicating with brothers and sisters from other Christian denominations, especially with Catholics and Protestants, it is important to emphasize that we, Orthodox Christians, truly celebrate the Nativity of Christ. For among them there is a widespread belief that Orthodox Christians celebrate only Theophany.
Since approximately half of Orthodox Christians follow the Julian calendar, while the other half follow the Gregorian calendar, it turns out that Christmas in Orthodoxy is celebrated not only twice — on January 7 and December 25 — but also, thanks to the Christmas period, that is, the great festal season from Nativity to Theophany, it lasts almost four weeks, which is practically equal to the time of preparation for Christmas, the sacred Advent.
“Christ is risen!” By analogy with this apostolic Easter greeting, with which Orthodox Christians greet one another from Pascha to the Ascension, during the Christmas season it is customary to exclaim: “Christ is born! Glorify Him!”
2. The Gospel narrative of the Nativity of Christ has for almost two thousand years inspired theologians, saints, artists, poets, and musicians to create original works of art dedicated to the central event in human history.
One of the central works in the oeuvre of the German-language writer Edzard Schaper (1908–1984) is The Legend of the Fourth Magus, in which the fourth magus turns out to be a Russian prince.
The legend, in a fairy-tale form, describes the journey of the Russian prince going to worship. He learned in time of the impending birth of Jesus. But, having spent too much time on gifts, among them Russian honey, he gradually gave them all away to those in need. On his way he went through various ordeals and was so delayed that he arrived only at the moment of the Crucifixion.
The legend of Edzard Schaper is undoubtedly inspired by Russian religious thought. How can one not recall the great painting by the Russian artist Mikhail Nesterov (1862–1942), Holy Week, painted in the tragic 1930s, where against the backdrop of a Russian landscape the Crucifixion rises, before which stand Dostoevsky and Gogol, a priest, and the artist’s wife, who holds in her hands a small child’s coffin with the body of their child.
The Russian fourth magus was late, and, like him, in relation to the “commonly accepted Christmas” on December 25, the Julian calendar so important for the Russian Church is also “late.”
3. This “delay” is unique, since it is largely thanks to it that the outside world, knowing almost nothing about Christianity, pays attention to the astonishing, magnificent uniqueness of Orthodox Christianity.
By analogy with the Second Coming of Jesus, which, according to Scripture and dogma, is about to occur but is still at the threshold so that as many people as possible may be saved (cf. 1 Timothy 2:4), the Churches of the “old calendar,” by God’s providence, “suspend” the beginning of the celebration so that the world may see Orthodoxy in its sovereign beauty.
Sovereign is the one who declares a state of exception and suspends the course of events. Like the Fourth Magus, the Russian Church celebrates Christmas with a formal astronomical delay.
Thus, the faithful bow before the Nativity scene when other Christians, Catholics and Protestants, are already celebrating Theophany as the adoration of the Magi. In Orthodoxy, the adoration of the Magi coincides with the moment of the Nativity. The delay does not become lateness, and the Legend of the Fourth Magus is fulfilled, but not according to a prewritten script.
For despite all their differences and divisions, all Christians still come to the manger together. “Christ is born! Glorify Him!”