#82 the Nativity Icon Tells the Whole Story of Christmas + Father Michael Butler

This is going to be an intense episode. Today we're going to talk about the nativity scene. In the Protestant world, we see the barn, we see the animals, we see the manger.

No, it's not a farm. Look, I'll get there. I'll get there. It's a cave. Nothing in the whole story and nothing in the icon is accidental.

That old man wrapped in fur that's there in front of him, that is the death disguised as an old man.

I didn't know that until just now, actually. I've never connected that. The birth and the death of Christ are joined together in yet another visual element in this icon.

How did I miss that? Ain't that fun? This is just so much fun. I love doing this. Hi, it's Cass. I wanted to first start off by saying thank you for listening.

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Thank you so much for listening. Now let's get to the show. Hello, hello. Welcome to Biblically Speaking. I'm your host,

Cassian Blino. And today we're going to talk about the nativity scene. You know, that thing that you pull out once a year at Christmas time.

Like I was raised in a Protestant household. My mom has a ton of them from around the world and each have a different style.

And you know, it's the bard, it's the hay. We even do a tradition where we find baby Jesus. Where did that come from?

Is that it? You know, why don't we have that, you know, for Easter? Why don't we have that for all of the events in the

Bible? What is it specifically about the nativity scene? Is it just that or is there more? I'm sitting down with Father Michael Butler.

Welcome back to the show. You have been on this, oh my gosh, so many times. I'm so glad that we booked three episodes.

You know, you came on to talk about orthodoxy so much. You've come to talk about so many things.

And now we're going to talk about the nativity scene. How much symbolism is in it? How much it alludes to Jesus's death?

What else is going on? And specifically about the orthodox nativity icon, which to me is a very specific image.

Because again, in the Protestant world, we see the barn, we see the animals, we see the manger.

No, if you are listening at home, pull up on Google orthodox nativity icon. And that's what we're going to be referencing specifically, because that is alluding to so much more than the basic manger that I was raised in the household.

So I'm really excited to discuss something that has potential for so much more meaning. Just in case you haven't listened to any episode with Father Michael Butler, go back, just go back right now because they're all so good.

I think we've done four at this point. This is a fourth. Yeah, I think so. And we talk, yeah, what is the difference between Protestant and orthodoxy, understanding sin, understanding communion.

But for those that haven't listened, you are more than qualified to talk about this. And you're just such a good friend.

I'm so glad that we're connected. You've served as a clergyman of the orthodox church for 37 years, six years as a deacon, 31 as a priest.

And you're actually going to be retiring soon. Congratulations. Yes, thank you, thank you. But your studies have been an undergraduate in archetypal psychology.

You have a Ph .D. in church history and patristics. You've taught at university level. And then you train men for ministry.

You've done interdisciplinary work in economics, environmentalism, other areas. But you've just been so involved in self -development.

You're not just a good priest, you're a good friend. So welcome to the show. I'm so glad you're back. Thank you. Well, it's a joy to be here.

It's such a joy. Yeah, and as we sort of wind down the last couple of weeks before Christmas comes, yeah, the orthodox keep a fast before Christmas.

And slowly the appointed hymns and all to be sung at our services are increasingly have references to the upcoming nativity.

So everyone is starting to get the feel for the season. It's not just the

Christmas jingles at the supermarket or at the shopping mall or whatnot. But when it begins to show up in church, that's really kind of nice.

And we know it's getting near. So this is like a very like this is a hot topic in the orthodox church right now.

Like you guys are winding into the church season and already discussing the nativity icon. Oh, yeah.

Okay. Yeah. Well, because actually, if in some of our services, there have been references to the nativity going back,

I think, into the end of November. There's a little bit there there. Because it's because sort of I remember all the old

Roman Catholic archbishop Fulton Sheen. He had this, God rest his soul. I loved listening to him.

And I wish I could preach like him. We had this marvelous observation one time. He says, the way of the world is the feast and then the hangover, you know.

But the way of the church is first the fast and then the feast. And so we always prepare for major celebrations.

You know, like, you know, Pascha Easter has 40 day fasting period, Great Lent, you know, which precedes it.

And Christmas actually has a period of preparation. And the Western church has called Advent. You know, so I think it's four weeks long.

Forgive me. It's been 40 plus years since I was a Roman Catholic. I kind of forget some of the details about that.

But for us, it's 40 days long. And so it's a fasting period of preparation. So that when the joy of the feast comes, it's even that much more joyful.

And we've prepared our hearts as well. And our spiritual lives to participate as fully and as attentively as we can, you know, in these events in salvation history.

In the economy of salvation, what Christ has done for us is kind of what we're prepping here.

OK, so help us prepare, because this is going to be released on December 23rd.

So we're right on the brink of Christmas. You know, in the Protestant world, Jesus is about to be born. And, you know, we're looking at that nativity scene.

We're thinking about the story of Mary. And typically when I go to church this time of year,

I'm looking at a very peaceful farm scene. Like, I don't mean to be gross about it, but that's as simple as it gets.

You know, like, let's make it complicated. But before we do, where does that come from? Like, could you just offer a little bit of history here?

Like where that nativity, like how did it get here? Yeah, I think, I think. And here, please do not cite me as an authority on this, because I really didn't think about the history of the nativity scene in churches the way that it's done in a lot of Western churches.

But I think it actually goes back to the days of St. Francis of Assisi in the early 13th century that he, in fact, brought animals into the church, which we will not do.

But no, in the Orthodox Church, our worship is a rational worship. It's only, it's for humans.

It's for rational creatures, which are humans. Irrational animals really don't have a part in our worship.

So we do not let them into the church. But Francis apparently set up something like a manger scene at Christmas when you're with, you know, live animals in there.

And I guess it sort of took off and became somewhat of a regular feature there.

You know, for someone who is in a tradition that is so heavily invested in imagery of all kinds,

I always find it just a little strange that, you know, my Protestant brethren who accuse me of continuous idolatry because we have icons in our church, very, very happily put out images of baby

Jesus and Mary and Joseph. And not only that, but camels and donkeys and pagan wise men and all in front of their churches and even act them out in real life.

You know, there's a couple of churches around me for these, God bless them, these, you know, these poor church volunteers freezing themselves in sub -zero, you know,

Michigan winters to put on a fine nativity scene for people to drive by in the warmth of their cars.

You know, I think they've earned a high place in heaven for that. But, you know, it just seems odd that somehow this is the one, this is the one image that seems to be okay.

Interesting. But at any rate, I think that's where it comes from. Yeah. The long history of it. It just goes back, it goes back to that.

And I think it points - You think that was just a more relatable, like it was just a more warming image to say like, ah, look at this home birth with animals around.

It's organic and GMO free. Like, is that really just what you think people latched on to? Like, how is this, you know,

I'm - No, people didn't care about GMO stuff a while back. I mean, I know. Sort of the homeliness of it.

I think that's a, I think that's a very contemporary thing for deracinated, you know, contemporary people.

Of course. Particularly younger people who don't have the strong sense of roots or belonging in place or time or in families.

I think it was simply a seasonal thing. And you said earlier, you know, well, why don't we do something like this?

You know, at Pascha, at Easter. Actually, the Christian tradition did. You know, there were, you know, we changed the color of our vestments.

And in the temple, you know, we brought out palm branches. We decorate our churches with greenery on Pentecost. You know, we carry palms on Palm Sunday.

On the Feast of the Death of the Mother of God in August 15th, you know, we bring flowers into the church and we bless flowers.

We bless grapes at the Feast of Transfiguration. You know, there are things that we do around the year.

It's just that with everything else that the Protestant churches threw out when they, you know, threw off the liturgical trappings of worship and the

Christian tradition, they threw those things away as well. And so I think it's just an easy thing because it's a bit sentimental, you know, and it feels good.

And, you know, everybody kind of likes that. That I think, you know, it just, it has an appeal.

And so it's one place to start back with the sort of, and it reminds us that it is Christmas time. You know, it isn't something that a lot of church put out on the front yard and say, look, you know, this is a religious season.

There's something, there's something Jesus happening now. And, you know, it's a way of witnessing to it.

Like many churches will put out, you know, a cross with a, you know, a swath of purple cloth hanging on it in the, on the front yard of their churches around, around Good Friday and Easter.

So, you know, it is, isn't somewhat of a witness. And I think. Okay. But the image, the image itself that like,

I think most people have in their heads right now, you know, the manger, the animals, the three wise men, the star, the drummer boy, how does that differ from what actually happened?

What scripture actually says is happening? Well, I think for just sort of the average

American mangers or typical contemporary manger scene, I think it's simply separated from the, the scriptural basis for it, the traditional basis for it.

And from any deeper understanding about why all of those elements are in fact there. So that is a beautiful segue.

You set me up just perfectly, you know, to begin to talk about the Orthodox icon of the nativity.

And I suppose most of your, most of your people are listeners. Yes. So this is, this is not a visual podcast.

This is just an audio podcast. Yes. Okay. So I will, I will describe simply the nativity icon.

It has basically five or six sections in it. So, and again, I'll encourage your people.

Yeah. Go on, go to Google's, you know, and say, put in nativity icon and you'll get it.

There's a variety of different images out there, but you can, they almost all have basically the same.

I'll also post it on the Instagram. It'll be up there. So you can easily access since this will be live by the time you see it.

But, but for those who maybe aren't looking, so it's divided into five panels. Okay.

There's one in the center, which is Jesus in the cave with his mother lying in the manger with the ox in the ass, sort of the typical, yes.

No, it's not a farm. I'll get there. I'll get there. It's a cave. All right.

And then, so that's right in the middle, immediately below it is a small tree. We'll talk about the little tree later on too, but the central figure is

Christ with his mama in the, in the manger with the, with the two animals. Okay. And the light of the, the, the, the star shining down from heaven, piercing into the darkness of the cave.

And then there are four panels in the four corners of the icon. So the upper left shows the wise men who are following the star.

So we get the wise men over in one corner, the upper right -hand corner, we see the angels who are out in their fields, guarding their flocks by night being visited by the angels.

Okay. I think I can actually share. Okay. Yeah. In the lower left corner, this is actually

St. Joseph with an old man dressed in, in kind of a furry garment. We're going to talk about who that is because it's very surprising.

And in the lower right corner, we have two midwives washing baby Jesus in a basin of water and with a, with a pitcher and other sorts of things that are rubbed.

Oh, this is baby Jesus. Yeah. There's baby Jesus. So he shows up twice in the, in the picture, in the center and then in the lower right.

Okay. I thought that was John the Baptist. Nope. Nope. That's Christ. And you can tell because always in the icon of Christ, he has the, the, the three little

Greek letters that spell ho -on, he who is. So there's always a cross in Christ's halo.

And there's always those three letters and ho -on stands for he who is. Okay. Okay. So that is, you know, the

God, the name for God in the old Testament, you know, cause we know that that is Christ. But in the whole icon, you know, if you look at the whole icon, baby

Jesus in the cave is right in the center of the whole icon. If you measure it out with a ruler and put cross lines and everything,

Jesus is right at the very center of it. So we know he's the most important figure there. Okay. Okay. Now there's also another little, little interesting at the very top of the icon in the, in the center of the top edge, it's this little half circle thing there with stars.

Okay. That's an epiphany or a theophany. That is a stylistic iconographic way of saying that heaven is breaking into this scene.

That somehow heaven is being made manifest on earth in this way. Because you see the little stars of heaven up there and we see these rays of a very unnatural light.

So we know that's heavenly light. And so the star is coming down out of heaven to shine into the cave there.

All right. So this is a manifestation of God is what this is telling us in the icon.

So of course, with the birth of the God -man, clearly we have a manifestation of God there.

And then in the bottom center, as I said, there is this little tree. And that is the, that is the tree of Jesse, which we have in Old Testament prophecy.

That from Isaiah chapter 11 verses 1 through 10, there shall come forth a rod from the stem of Jesse and a branch shall grow out of his roots.

The spirit of the Lord shall rest upon him, the spirit of wisdom and understanding, the spirit of counsel and might, the spirit of knowledge and the fear of the

Lord. And in those days there shall be a root of Jesse who shall stand as a banner to the people.

For the Gentiles shall seek him and his resting place shall be glorious. So the little tree isn't there as decoration.

And it's not simply showing that old Jesus is somewhere outside and there are plants around. That's the tree of Jesse.

And it's the prophecy about the son of Jesse, the son of David is the one who will be born as the

Messiah of Israel. So that tree is the tree of Jesse. And that's what it's there to remind us of.

So this ties the birth of Christ back to all of the prophecies in the Old Testament about Christ coming from the line and lineage of David, which we know that's why he was born in Bethlehem, because that was the city of David.

And he went there, you know, as Joseph and Mary went there to take him there to be taxed. Okay. So it's more symbolic.

Absolutely. Yeah. And if we shouldn't look at this as a accurate depiction of the scene, it's saying, look at all the things that are playing a role in this very huge world altering moment.

Yeah. These are all the things that we should be considering. Yes, it's very composite. And there are a lot of things going on at the same time.

Exactly. Because it's forming this comprehensive impression.

And so we're going to bring in all of the imagery, all of the Old Testament prophecies, all of these things that are going to come together.

And it's going to create this tapestry, this mosaic of all of these images that all go in to show just how important this moment is.

I think that is like a very different way that maybe I and maybe Protestants look at the imagery that you see in the

Orthodox Church is like, oh, this is a scene. It's like a photo. Snap. This is what it looked like, you know. But I think that the

Orthodox Church, and correct me if I'm wrong, is looking at this as look at all the things that play a role in this moment.

It's not a photo. It's not a still image in time. It's all the things that God is working in, kind of representative of this moment and why it's important.

Would that be a correct way? Yes. Yeah. Okay. Yeah. And actually to push it, you're absolutely correct in all of that.

And so if you know the scriptures and you know the hymns and you know your tradition, you will see all of that reflected in here.

So what the icon does is it brings together a lot of scriptural imagery and a lot of scriptural prophecy and all, and brings it all together into one image so that it becomes a very pregnant.

Okay. Yeah. Yeah. Sometimes I slay me. A very pregnant image because it's, it's, it's fecund with meaning.

Okay. So it's not a picture. Oh yeah. That's just Christmas. No, it, when you look at it and you really get into it, it's the layers of meaning keep revealing themselves deeper and deeper and deeper until you see that what it is, it's like the tip of an iceberg.

And so when you understand it fully, you see all this depth that's, that's there behind it. Oh, perfect.

That's exactly what I want to do. Yeah. And to carry it one step further, Orthodox icons are not just pictures.

The difference between a photograph and an icon is that an icon makes present the event or the person that's depicted in the icon.

That's how we understand it. So when we look at the icon of the nativity of Christ, we are there.

It makes that event present to us here and now so that we can participate in it. It's not just, it's not just a, you know, a, a, you know, a plot, a wistful sort of feeling of,

Oh, well, we're born 2000 years too late to have participated in the birth of Christ.

The last for us, you know, no. In the icon, the nativity is made present here and now.

And so we can stand there at the cave with the wise men and we can behold the infant

Jesus. And we can, and we can worship the newborn child. That's what the icon allows us to do.

Because in Christ and in literature, and this is what, I mean, we could have a whole discussion on liturgical time and space, but that's what, that's what all of this is here for is so that we can participate in the saving work of Christ and not just as a memory of something that happened a long time ago, but that is a present event in reality that we can encounter here and now.

Well, to do that, I think I need to understand what I'm looking at. So let's walk through a couple elements here that stand out starting off.

And I kind of already. Yeah, let me, I sort of have it sketched out here in my notes. If you don't mind, let's start in the middle.

No, please, please. Okay. We can start wherever you want. Yeah, yeah, yeah. So we'll start in the middle. Okay. Which is there is a little mountain and there is a cave in it and it depicts a scene in the wilderness.

This is a cave near Bethlehem where St. Joseph took his wife because there was no room for them in the inn.

There is an ancient document called the Proto -Evangelion of James, which explicitly written about the year 125, which explicitly says that they went to a cave.

And so that's part of the reason why the nativity icon shows a cave. But there's a second reason as well.

Because caves, if you have a cave or something that's got a black background, like the cave does, the color black represents the fallen world, the unredeemed world, the world without Christ, without God.

And so the world without the light of Christ. So when Christ is born in the darkness of the cave, it shows the coming of the light of Christ into the world.

The true light who enlightens every man has come into the world. That's what's being shown here with Jesus in this black cave.

And notice, too, also that the light of the star, you know, the star of Bethlehem is right there over Christ.

It's not up in heaven. The light comes down and pierces the darkness inside the cave.

So we know this heavenly light comes down and fills the darkness of this world. With the light of with the light of grace.

Okay. Oh, boy. So we have to draw this parallel Christ.

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Take a breath, slow down, and dwell in the good things. Now back to the show. So we have a parallel between the burial of Christ and the birth of Christ.

And we'll see that there's a lot more parallels between the birth of Christ and his death as we go through this discussion.

Okay. So Christ born in a cave, Christ buried in a cave. Okay. So in the center of the cave -

Wait, just a moment. Like that, even like black in an icon represents the fallen world.

I, in 2025, would never think that. Yeah. Well, this is because, you know, first of all, you're not immersed in the tradition, but after a while you begin to see it because black is very rarely used in icons.

It's used in the Pentecost icon. I know that because in the icon of Pentecost, it shows sort of this arch where the 12 apostles are sitting around, you know, with the little tongues of flame over their head showing, you know, the enlightenment of the

Holy Spirit on Pentecost. But in the center of it, there is this black space with a guy called

Cosmos, the world, you know, holding in his hands, this cloth with all of these little scrolls in it, which represents the souls of all of the people in the world who are waiting for the illumination of Christ and for the preaching of the gospel.

And so the world is there in darkness at Pentecost, waiting for the preaching of the gospel. So there are a few places where black shows up.

And so, again, there's a symbolism to the color. I mean, if we take, for example, the color, this wasn't part of my description, but I'll talk about it.

In almost every icon where the mother of God is depicted, she is wearing blue and red, okay?

And they're in a particular order. As you notice in this icon, her undergarment is blue and there's an outer garment, which is red, right?

Blue is the color of the sky and represents heaven and symbolically represents divinity.

Red is the color of blood. And so it represents humanity. And so the fact that Mary wears red with blue on the inside reminds us that she is a human woman who bore the divine son of God within herself.

And since she bore God in her womb, the blue has to go on the inside and the red of her humanity on the outside.

So the colors are there, yeah. All right, let's go on a little more.

So there's Jesus in the very center lying in a manger. A manger comes from the

French, manger, which means to eat. So it's a food trough. Literally, that's what it is, it's a food trough where you put the grain to feed the animals, all right?

Yeah. Okay, question, where else is Jesus found as food?

You mean just like as the bread of life? As in the Eucharist, exactly. So there is a bit of Eucharistic imagery going on here, okay?

Is the true bread which came down from heaven, you know? So that's meaningful there as well.

Never connected that. Yeah, and so we see also here the condescension and the humility of our

Lord taking on our humanity. The eternal God born in abject poverty, lying in a cave for his nursery and a feeding trough for a crib, looking up at an ox and an ass, okay?

We'll come back to the ox and the ass in just a moment. I want to point out what baby Jesus is wrapped in because it's swaddling cloth, okay?

So if you can see the icon carefully, it's like little strips. It's long strips of cotton or linen, you know, like we have bandages where you wrap a bandage around and around and around.

Mm -hmm, he's like a mummified. It's like mummy wrappings, okay? Swaddling is what was used to wrap dead bodies for burial, okay?

What was Jesus wrapped in when he was taken down from the cross and laid in a tomb? Exactly the same kind of thing, swaddling cloths.

Weren't all babies swaddled like this? I don't know that all of them were, but in the icon of Christ, it clearly was.

And I think it mentions that he was wrapped in swaddling cloth, okay? Okay. Maybe they were. I don't know.

That's a good question. But the parallel is Jesus when he was born was wrapped in swaddling cloths.

Jesus when he died and was laid in his tomb was wrapped in swaddling cloths. Jesus born in a cave, wrapped in swaddling.

Jesus buried in a cave, wrapped in swaddling. Do you see the parallels here? I guess, no,

I totally see the parallels. I guess in my head, I'm like, weren't, isn't that common? Wasn't everybody being born kind of in a swaddling cloth and buried in a swaddling cloth in a cave?

Or is that like not common at all? I don't know how common it was, but in the case of Christ, it was definitely done.

I don't know that everybody could afford to be buried in a cave. We know it belonged to, what was it, Joseph of Arimathea?

I see, I see. I think, yeah, or Nicodemus, one who had bought a new cave, you know, for himself.

Wealthy people could afford that. And I don't know if swaddling cloth might have been something cheap for poor people.

I'm not really sure. But just notice the parallels between his birth and his death, okay?

Then we have the ox and the ass, you know. The ox and ass kept time. No, it didn't.

It wasn't just because this was, you know, a place where animals were kept. It's basically a stable where he was born.

No. Prophet Habakkuk chapter three, verse two, in the midst of two living beings, you will be known.

And in Isaiah chapter one, verse three, the ox knows its owner and the ass his master's crib.

But Israel does not know. My people does not consider. So the ox and the ass are there in fulfillment of prophecy.

And you got to break that one down. That is so confusing to me. What do you mean? No, Isaiah says that the ox knows his owner and the ass knows his master's crib.

So there's the ox and the ass there in the scene with baby Jesus pointing to the fact that this is the

Messiah of Israel and that the animals know who it is. But the people, the people of Israel didn't know who it was.

And look who came to visit him. The wise men who were not even Jews, you know, and bought the shepherds because the angels told them to come.

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Thank you so much. Now back to the show. No. Okay. Thank you.

Wise men who are smart enough to know they didn't know everything. And the shepherds who, you know, didn't know anything.

And even when the wise men went to Herod, he says, where is the newborn king of the Jews? Did any of the theologians knew the

Jewish scribes, the scholars knew? Did any of them show up at the cave in Bethlehem? No. Only foreigners and the ignorant peasants out in the field.

It's curious, you know, very curious. So we have that there.

And again, there's Mary, his mother lying on a pallet after her childbirth. Her importance in the birth of Christ is shown because she's like the largest figure in the whole icon, just, you know, physically larger than everybody else.

And it's a very curious thing. Notice that she is in this icon. This isn't universal, but in this icon, she is not looking at Jesus.

Right. She's looking down at Joseph, who looks distressed. She's looking at Joseph, who's distressed.

And we will get to that in a minute and you'll find out why. Okay. Yeah. So we have her there.

Yeah. So she's lying there fully dressed. And let's see. So there's the star again.

So let's stay with the center image. So there's a star coming down out of heaven and the ray of light shooting straight down into the darkness of the cave.

All right. Yes. The one of our hymns for Christmas calls Jesus the

Orient or the Day Star from on high. In Numbers chapter 24, verse 17, the pagan prophet

Balaam is prophesying about Israel. And he says, I see him, but not yet.

I behold him, but not near. A star shall come out of Jacob. A scepter shall rise out of Israel.

So even from the book of Numbers, there is somehow a star is associated with the

Messiah. In Revelation chapter 22, verse 16, Christ says, I am the root and the offspring of David, the bright and morning star.

And in 2 Peter chapter 1, verse 19. And so we have the prophetic word confirmed, which you do well to heed as the light shines in a dark place until the day dawns and the morning star arises in your hearts.

So the morning star, the day star, the Orient from on high. This is Christ. And so the star itself, while the biblical account says led the wise men.

In fact, perhaps the star is Christ himself. Well, OK, because it is not just the star which leaves them, but it's

Christ who draws all men to himself. Like he says in John's Old Testament points to this.

This is so cool. Oh, it is. And then you see it because Christ is on every page of the

Old Testament, every page. And, you know, this is this is where 2000 years of Christian tradition can really flesh out what's going on in the

New Testament when we know how to read the Old Testament in a way that illumines what's going on in the new.

All right. And we remember prophet Isaiah chapter 9, the people who sat in darkness have seen a great light, you know, and even in in Luke chapter 1, verse 78 and 79.

This is in the Song of Zechariah when John the Baptist is born. Through the tender mercy of our God, with which the day spring, literally the dawn from on high has visited us to give light to those who sit in darkness and in the shadow of death to guide our feet into the way of peace.

And so all these references to dawn in the morning star and the star and the light and the

Orient from on high and all this all has to do with the star there. And the coming of Christ.

It's beautiful, isn't it? So much star imagery. I mean, it's I totally overlook it.

It's I you know, you think about the Protestant version of like the story of Christmas is like, oh, they followed the

North Star. And that's really the only role that it plays in our version. No, it's just it's full of because you've forgotten the

Old Testament references to it. OK, yeah, yeah. It really does add so much color when you tie it in.

Nothing in the whole story and nothing in the icon is accidental. It all points to deeper truth.

And in some way, it all points to the coming of Christ. OK, so we're just we're just fleshing out.

Like I say, this is this is all the background of what's behind all of this. And alas, there's a way we only see the surface, alas, and we don't always penetrate to the depths of it.

OK, but there's more than so. We focus on the star, Jesus, the manger, the animals, Mary.

There's a lot more going on in this image. I mean, we've got angels. We've got these two guys over here. We've got the wise men.

We got more animals, the drummer boy right here. And then another scene, another scene. Let's get into it.

So we're sorry. Let's talk about the angels, then the ones up at the top, because there are two sets. OK, you're right.

The one on the right who are with those are shepherd boys on the upper right. And in many of the icons, they're like clinging to each other in abject terror, which

I always thought was a really, really kind of funny scene because this angel has suddenly come out of heaven. You know, you can totally see that.

Do not be afraid. Exchange. You say, yeah, don't be afraid. Don't be afraid. So it's OK. It's cool.

You know, who are these guys? Those are the shepherds out in the field. You see there they got their sheep with them. Oh, oh, that's like, go, you know, a son's being born and they're like, what's going on?

OK, OK. Yeah, we bring you tidings of great joy for today is born in the city of Bethlehem. You know, the savior and the shepherds say, oh, let's go see this great wonder.

I see it. You know, but there they are in their present because it's like all things all at once. Yes. And then the angels on the left hand side, those are the angels in heaven praising

God and saying glory to God in the highest and under the peace, goodwill towards men. So because you're from the same story and there appeared in heaven a great host of the angels, you know, praising

God and saying so. That's who those are. And then we have this is forgive me.

Wait, is there like a bunch of symbolism here with the colors of the angels?

I know this is getting to the nitty gritty, but it's like, is Gabriel green and Michael blue? Oh, quite possibly.

But I don't know what it is. OK, OK, OK. Yeah. OK. Who are the magic granularity, which we might not have time for in what we've got?

There we go. So here on the on the left side, in the upper left corner are the three wise men. And in this icon, they're on horses and you know what?

A couple of them are pointing. Look, there's the star. You know, sometimes they're writing.

Sometimes they're walking. Sometimes they stand in front of the cave. But and they usually carry their gifts. I think in this icon, they're like too far away really to see the gifts, but they were regarded as kings.

And this is from the Christian interpretation of Psalm 72, verses 10 through 15, versus the kings of Tarshish and of the isles shall bring presents.

The king of Sheba and Saba shall offer gifts and to him shall be given the gold of Sheba. And then again, in Isaiah 49, 7 and Isaiah 66, verse 6, all they from Sheba shall come.

They shall bring gold and incense and the gifts which the Magi bring, which is commemorated in song and is largely correct.

They're significant and they all refer to the incarnation of Christ as of God in his human form.

Because God is a gift appropriate to a king. Incense, however, is appropriate to worshiping

God and myrrh was used for burial. Okay, so again, a reference to the death of Christ, even at his birth.

Okay. Whoa, didn't know that. You didn't know that? Okay, so back it up.

You said gold was for a king. Incense was for God and myrrh was for a burial. Yeah. So is

Christ king? Of course he is. Of course he is. And was he born in order to suffer and die for us?

He actually was. So even the myrrh there is a prophecy about the death of Christ. So we have caves at the beginning and the end.

We have swaddling claws at the beginning and the end. And we have myrrh at his birth and at his death as well.

Ain't that swell? That's insane. Yeah, you see the imagery.

It begins to fill out and you see the delight in this. And I get really excited about it because I just love this stuff.

But this is what makes the Christian tradition so much fun. You begin to draw these lines.

You begin to see the similarities. You begin to see the pattern that repeats over and over again. The C .S.

Lewis said God has a certain family style. And you begin to see the way God works in the same way through prophecy in the

Old Testament and how it gets fulfilled in the new. And it's just delightful. And how can we not believe when we see how seamlessly all of salvation history is knit together?

I was raised Orthodox. How many times have I seen this icon not knowing what I was looking at?

Like this conversation just adds so much depth to the faith itself. Like this Orthodox faith is already so beautiful aesthetically.

I mean, this is a beautiful image, but understanding these little details until they're explained to me.

I mean, what a great God that we serve. What an amazing religion to be a part of. Like this faith is so colorful and detailed.

And the interwoven Old Testament fulfillment in the New Testament is so beautiful.

Yes, I just get giddy with delight over it, which is why I'm so glad you asked me to do this.

All right, let's go on a little more. It's worth comparing the Magi on the left side and the shepherds who are on the right side.

Because the shepherds, of course, were Jews and the Magi were Gentiles.

The shepherds were simple men who received the revelation of Christ's birth directly from the angels.

But the Magi were wise men who were led to our Lord to more perfect wisdom than what they already had, but through much study and through an arduous journey.

Okay, as the troparion or the one of the songs for our feast said, those who worship the stars were by a star taught to adore thee the son of righteousness.

And so the Magi, who were star worshipers in Persia, found the true star and were led to the true wisdom of Christ, even all of their worldly wisdom and their scientific knowledge, you know, which appropriate to their age, had led them only so far.

And then Christ, the true light, the true star himself, comes and leads them to the fullness of wisdom. And they come and they worship.

And when you say they worship men like the star, you're saying like a paganistic polytheistic type of worship.

And then they found the true God of all the gods they were worshiping. Is that? Yeah, yeah.

Okay, see there? So we can contrast. We can contrast. We've got here

Jewish. We've got Jews here in the shepherds. We have Gentiles and the wise men.

We have ignorant, uneducated people. We have extremely educated people.

So we have this interesting contrast here going on. So there's this little tension there that's being played out.

All right, let's go to the bottom of the icon. So that context really helps. We can wrap this guy. The guy with the trumpet on the right -hand side will remain largely a mystery to you.

I could go into it, but he actually is there. And if you remember, it will take too long to explain, but the 25 words or less is, you remember when

Moses in the book of Exodus went up the mountain to receive the tablets of the law. And it said a cloud covered

Mount Sinai. And there was this huge trumpet blast that blasted out as he went up the mountain.

It actually has some, that shepherd with the trumpet has some roots in that. But kind of teasing out the deep meaning of it, it would take us very far afield.

So we're going to leave the shepherd boy to play. Not the little drummer boy here. He's not the little drummer boy.

No, no, he's much more important than that. But we're going to leave him alone. And we'll go down to the two bottom scenes.

Let's talk about the midwives on the right. Okay, so here we got a couple of midwives who are washing a newborn

Jesus and tending to him. Part of the reason they are there is to underscore the reality that God really became flesh.

He was really born of a woman because he needs the ministry of midwives. This was a birth. Yeah, he was actually born there.

They also though recall the two midwives in the book of Exodus chapter one.

When you remember, Pharaoh said, kill all of the newborn boys in Israel. And the two midwives,

Shifra and Pua, refused to kill the male children. They said that beautiful line. Oh, Israeli or Hebrew women are not like Egyptian women.

They're robust and they give birth before the midwives can even show up. Which I just love the image.

But there's a parallel working here because you see the birth of Moses and the birth of Christ have some parallels here.

We remember when Moses was born, he was the great prophet of the old covenant. Pharaoh tried to kill him.

And when Christ, the great prophet of the new covenant is born, Herod sets out to kill him.

All right. And so there is actually, so there's that biblical parallel again working.

And there's a moral we can draw from this because whenever something great or some great conversion event, or whenever we have some great idea or some new resolution or we're about to make a major step in life, there is always comes up at the same time, some strong opposition that tries to kill it.

You know? Oh my gosh. You see, it happens, doesn't it?

Yeah, that's what, you know, we're about to make new year's resolutions. You know, whether, you know, that's noble you want to turn your life around or you find you're ready to give yourself to Christ more fully.

There's always opposition. Even if you just want six pack abs, there's always opposition.

Wait, okay. Hold on. Say that again. You said whenever something great is about to happen, there's great opposition.

You said it shows up too. Yeah. Well, you ever try to get more devout in your prayer life or, you know, give up some spiritual attacks.

Yeah. The spiritual attack. It's almost always comes. Same thing here. That's what happened when

Christ was born. What happened when Moses was born. Anytime something great is about to happen, there's usually resistance.

Yeah. There's another reason why the midwives are in the nativity icon. Because like I say, a lot of the elements in the nativity scene are present also at the death of Christ and his burial.

So I sent you also an icon of the resurrection, which is actually the visitation of the myrrh bearing women to the empty tomb of Christ.

Okay. So in both icons, there are caves because I told you Jesus is born in a cave.

Jesus is buried in a cave. Both have angels in the scene because you see in the nativity icon, of course, there's the angels in heaven.

Here, there is the angel who rolled back the rock and sat on the door of the tomb. You know, and says to the myrrh bearing women, why seek ye the living among the dead?

You know? And both have swaddling clothes. And you see there in that icon, you see there's the empty swaddling clothes that wrap the body of Christ.

Oh, they're empty. Got it. Yep. Okay. And so here are the myrrh bearing women often because they come to anoint the body of Jesus, you know, early on the first day of the week.

All right. They parallel the midwives that were at the birth of Christ.

So there are these women tending Jesus at his birth. And there are women tending Jesus at his death.

And the proteanagelion of James, again, that early Christian document said that one of the midwives was

Salome. Who shows up later in the gospels as one of the women who attends

Jesus. And she was one, she is one of those three myrrh bearing women in the icon.

No, what? So Salome is present at the birth of Christ and she's present at his death.

The only other one, of course, is his mother. But that's why those midwives are there.

Because they remind us of the same issues that happened when Moses was born. And it also ties these women to the death of Christ again.

So the birth and the death of Christ are joined together in yet another visual element in this icon.

Oh, gosh. Ain't that fun? This is just so much fun. I love doing this. This is so much fun.

Now let's go to the last. I thought you were going to, I just thought you were going to take it into the direction of like this, like we needed midwives there because this wasn't like a clean, squeaky clean birth because he's

God and Mary's super special. And so there was like barely any blood and he just popped right out. But this was a messy birth.

Like how much towel and hot water and like cleanliness was needed. It was a human birth. Yeah, it was a natural human birth.

So he needed all of that. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Okay, let's wrap up with the lower left corner.

So over here in the lower left corner, we've got Joseph, husband of Mary. Okay. Yeah.

And you're right. He's shown with a worried or a sad look on his face. That's because that old man wrapped in fur that's there in front of him.

That is the devil. Disguised as an old man. Not what

I would have thought. How do we know that? And what is the devil doing? She's tempting

Joseph. Oh, you really believe she was conceived by the

Holy Spirit. You know, you were out working. You sure someone didn't slip into the house.

And, you know, she didn't have a little affair going on on the side. That's what the devil is saying to Joseph.

Okay. And here is why, because he's struggling with this.

And that's why in the, I love these icons where Mary is looking, not at baby Jesus, but she is looking at her husband.

Because she knows what he's going through. She does. She knows what's going through his head.

Yeah. And this is, and this I find especially, and I point this out to men all the time, since I do a lot of men's work.

Joseph is not in the center of the icon. He's not in the center of the scene, in the warmth and the security of the cave.

He is doing what men have always done throughout human history. He is on the perimeter.

He's on the frontier. He's on the edges guarding the women and the children that are inside.

Joseph is there encountering the devil. Joseph is being tempted. He's on the front lines.

He's taking it on the chin for the sake of his wife and that baby. He is protecting them.

And this is what men traditionally do. Okay. This is an extraordinarily masculine image of what a man is doing.

So this is not the sweet, and forgive me, it always seems saccharine to me, holy family that we sometimes find in Catholic theology and devotion.

Okay. We have no problem with Joseph as the foster father of Jesus. That's fine. You know, that's the common

Christian tradition. But he was much older than she was. We know that. And the tradition says he had other children.

He was a widower. He had other children from his first marriage who are the brothers and sisters of Christ or the brothers of Christ mentioned in the gospel.

Okay. Oh, I didn't know that. That's crazy. I didn't know that. Actually. Yeah. He never touched her.

Joseph never touched her. No, I just didn't know he was, had prior children. Yeah. Yeah. That's who the brothers of Christ are that are mentioned in the gospel.

They are Joseph's children. So yeah, I guess

I just assumed that that was from like, after Jesus, they had more children. Nope. He's not going to touch her.

Ever. Ever. Ever. Ever. She would be a virgin.

If you go back, it's very hard to see in the icon, unless you really blow it up. But every icon of the

Virgin Mary, where she's depicted in iconography, she has three stars on her, one star on her forehead and one star on each of her shoulders.

And that is to remind us that she was a virgin before, during, and after her childbearing.

How did I not know this? What? Because the Protestants don't like our devotion to the mother of God.

And they, oh, she bore Jesus. But after that, she's just a common woman. And yeah. Yeah. Joseph screwed her.

I'm sorry. She is perpetually a virgin. Always has been, always was.

And it's just Protestant resistance to Catholic and Orthodox devotion to the mother of God that's caused them to say these things.

Well, a little off topic, but that was insane. I had no idea about that. Yeah. Yeah. So what you see here, sort of to wrap it up a little bit, we have all of these, these coincidences.

First, the birth and the death of Jesus. We see all these parallels in these images. We have Gentiles and Jews.

We have wise and ignorant. We have heaven, you know, in the little half circle above. And we have earth below.

We have angels and the devil. We have rational creatures in the humans who are there.

We have irrational creatures in the ox and the ass. We have light and darkness. We have life and death.

All of these things are all held together with Christ at the center of it. And so I'll just wrap up my, you know, my part of this with one of the hymns that the

Orthodox sing on Christmas, which is these lines. What shall we offer you,

O Christ, who for our sakes has appeared on earth as man? Every creature made by you offers you thanks.

The angels, a hymn, the heavens, a star, the magi, gifts, the shepherds, their wonder.

The earth offers a cave and the wilderness, a manger. And we offer you a virgin mother.

Oh, pre -eternal God, have mercy on us. That's it. Now, ain't that fun?

I just ate a whole meal. Yeah, yeah. But that's it.

That's what's, that's what's all contained there. So, you know, the animals, like I say, it's fine. You want animals at the, you know, at your, at your manger scene, fine.

Just know they're, they're fulfilling prophecy. Isaiah prophesied that those animals would be there and that they would recognize their master.

You know, the star, the orient from on high, the prophecy of Balaam, I see him, a star shall rise out of, out of Jacob.

You know, all of those elements were all prophesied. They're all meaningful and they are literally pregnant, pregnant with meaning.

And when we kind of understand the history of, when we see how the scriptures all point to it, it makes it that much richer.

Oh my gosh. I don't even think we need to say anything else. I know. Yeah. So follow

Father Michael on Instagram, book with him. If you're a man and you want to grow up and you just need some like amazing mentorship and then go to his church.

And if you can't go to his church in Michigan, go to your local orthodox church. This is amazing. Thank you.

Thank you. Much obliged. It's always a pleasure to be with you. And you, you ask good questions and you, you give me the opportunity to talk about things that I get really passionate about.

So thank you for that. Well, let's find another thing to bring you back on. Thank you so much, Father. Here I am. Use me.

What's the good of having friends if you can't use them, right? I'll have everything regarding Father Michael in the show notes if you want to easily find him.