As the Texas state director of American Atheists, I am concerned about Dwayne Bohac and his “Merry Christmas” bill, the one encouraging teachers to reveal their particular religious beliefs before students and faculty. While those with the most popular majority religion in this region could use this to earn brownie points with some parents and co-workers, those in the minority position would effectively be ‘outed’ one way or another; whether they chose to participate or whether they chose not to. We know by experience and example that there are many administrators in this state who will discriminate against non-Christian teachers on the basis of religion -especially if you don’t have any religion at all. It isn’t just mangers and menorahs. Even if it were, there is still a lot of anti-Semitism in this state, and no point in inciting cultural conflicts in the classroom. Would this include Chinese New Year? How about Hindu teachers daring to promote Diwali amid all the Halloween decorations?
The only reason Bohac wants to pass this bill is to force people to give special recognition to his own religious beliefs with state endorsement. He claims to take offense at calling it a “holiday” tree; he wants everyone to call it a ‘Christmas’ tree. That’s not the problem. In the eyes of pagans or atheists, Christians erecting ‘Christmas’ trees only highlights their hypocrisy, since the Bible forbids such practice in Jeremiah 10:2-4. No, the problem is that it would marginalize non-Christian students even more than they already are. It also forces teachers to reveal what may in many cases be privately-held beliefs which should not be scrutinized by principles, pupils, or the PTA.
There aren’t many atheist teachers who are bold enough to celebrate the solstice along with everyone else, and it would be wrong to politicize the classroom by doing so. Most atheist teachers -at least here in Texas- are cautious not to reveal what it is they don’t believe, and believers consider it a violation of their own rights just to hear *why* we don’t believe.
This bill fails all three prongs of the ‘lemon test’ (Lemon v. Kurtzman). It has no secular legislative purpose. It will not only advance the already dominant religion in this country, but will also invariably inhibit less-popular faiths, and it will certainly result in “excessive government entanglement” with religion. It’s not like Muslim teachers will be welcome promoting Ramadan in the classroom. Wiccan teachers will only attract criticism by celebrating Yule or Saturnalia with all the traditional symbols which were originally pagan -including the manger scene (thank you, Horus), and which were later appropriated by Christianity. In other words, it was never a Christmas tree to begin with, and there is no defensible reason to back this bill.
I think it requires a very careful and precise misreading/quote-mining of Jeremiah to conclude that it concerns Christmas trees rather than wooden idols.
So they cut down a tree out of the forest, drag it into their house, nail it to a stand, and decorate it with their fancy garland and such. So how do you “carefully misread” that so that it doesn’t describe a Christmas tree?
aronra: That’s the King James Version. Other versions translate it slightly differently. Where KJV says working the tree with an axe, other versions translate it as carving with a craftman’s tools, such as carving an idol.
Yes Joe, I’m aware of that. A couple weeks ago, I ran across this site addressing your very concern there.
http://av1611.com/kjbp/ridiculous-kjv-bible-corrections/Christmas-Trees.html
I like to point out to them that the passage is really about not adopting the practices of the heathen, not about how much whittling can be done.
And paying all this attention onto a decorated tree instead of jesus is not idolatry?
I agree that this could easily put non-Christian teachers on the spot. In a place that does a better job of appreciating diversity this might fly; when I was in college, around Dec the university put up displays for Christmas, Yule, Winter Solstice, Chanukah and Kwanzaa (at least that I can recall) but it was a very liberal school with a very different climate. Texas politicians seem keen enough on theocracy that rather than this being a case where religious minorities might get to step out of the shadows a bit, it’s more like putting them on the spot. I mean, why Chanukah and not Yom Kippor, or Sukkot, or any other Jewish holidays which are actually a bigger deal? O, yeah, because other religions must schedule their ‘holiday we notice’ around Christmas. Plus, anybody who doesn’t use the time to tell the class about their Christian beliefs will be effectively outed as non-Christian.
Like I said, I don’t think this is a bad idea absolutely, but it’s a bad idea in this case because it’s not about diversity, but about the majority throwing their weight around.
Keep reading for the context.
10:8-9 “But they are altogether stupid and foolish in their discipline of delusion—their idol is wood! Beaten silver is brought from Tarshish, and gold from Uphaz, the work of a craftsman and of the hands of a goldsmith”
10:14-15 Every goldsmith is put to shame by his idols; For his molten images are deceitful, and there is no breath in them. They are worthless, a work of mockery”
And while pre-Christian pagan rites did feature evergreen trees the trees were not hacked down, taken home, erected and then decorated with silver, gold or lights so unless we really believe that Jeremiah is actual prophecy it cannot be seen as forbidding a practice which did not originate until something like the fifteenth century.
What a lot of people overlook is that much of this Xmas stuff makes life an absolute misery for children of some puritannical xtian families – mainly Jehovah’s Witnesses, but they’re not the only ones.
It’s really sad in kindy or primary schools here to see little muslim and hindu kids happily splodging paint and sprinkling glitter all over themselves as well as their cards/ pictures for xmas along with everyone else, except the poor little JW kids and a few others. Banished to some joyless extra homework hellhole, sometimes accompanied by the kids from similarly purist, but atheist, families. .
Of course, the JW kids also miss out on birthdays and other significant celebrations so it really rubs their noses in it.
Any way you slice it, this is a creepy piece of mischief that recommends the declaration of religious beliefs in a work environment.
Lemon test? This doesn’t even pass the sniff test.
I gotta wade in here, as I’ve invoked Jeremiah 10:3-4 a few times while arguing with Christians, and I’d rather like to test my interpretation. I suspect that passage could easily refer to a Christmas tree.
1. “êṣ” or “eta,” the word translated as wood, is used interchangeably with tree throughout the OT. In Jeremiah, however, it’s usually associated with “tree” except in 23:18 where the context makes it clear they’re talking about a wooden yoke.
2. “mî·yā·‘ar” or a variation of “ya’ar” is consistently translated as “from a/the forest,” but doesn’t appear often in the OT. The other two times refer to a living thing of or from the forest.
3. “ḥā·rāš” or “charash” can mean someone who shapes wood, but also someone who works in stone, metal, or simply works. It can also mean a constructor of idols. Note that while there are longer variations of that word, the shortest type is used in Jeremiah 10:3.
4. 10:4 refers to the item being fastened down, to keep it from tottering. The original Hebrew explicitly includes the words for fasten (yə·ḥaz·zə·qūm) and totter (yā·p̄îq); both occur exactly once in the OT, though the former is similar to many common words.
5. I’d summarize Jeremiah 10 as such: God says don’t do what other people do. They make this specific idol [10:4-5]. Don’t worry about them, they’re stupid. God’s pretty cool and smart. They worship wood! [10:8] They buy silver and gold from elsewhere, and wear purple clothes. But God’s pretty strong and stuff. He can do wicked powerful things. Every heathen’s dumb, even blacksmiths making false idols of metal; they’ll get punished when the time comes. [10:14-15]
6. When “charash” does show up again in 10:9, it’s in the middle of a passage referring to metal work, and not too far from a word that refers to physical labour.
7. While it’s true the Christmas tree originated in the fifteenth century or so, it was long common practice across the Middle East and Europe to use evergreen boughs in their decorations, and the Norse in particular would bring entire evergreens inside.
In the context of all that are two theories: A) 10:3-4 refers to a Christmas tree, B) it instead refers to a wooden idol. B has some problems; why would a hand-carved idol need to be steadied (4), as it could be shaped so that it would stand on its own. Why did the passage mention the forest (2), as other passage which discuss idols don’t care about where they came from. Why use a general term for labour (3) when referring to a specific crafted item of high value (as it was decorated with imported gold and silver).
A, in contrast, has no such problems with (2), (3), and (4). There was a long-standing tradition of using evergreens during that time of year (7), as well. While (6) supposedly conflicts with A, the second craftsman reference in 10:8 could also refer to the metalwork and physical labour involved there, and 10:14 refers to a metallic idol. There’s also a change of subject (5) between 10:4-5 and 10:8-9, so it’s not even clear the two passages describe the same thing. (1) is ambiguous, but does not contradict A either.
On the whole, I have to disagree with most modern translations; 10:4-5 more probably refers to a Christmas tree instead of a wooden idol.
Nathair: It all smells of post hoc rationalization. But that’s OK, the NT has quite a few of them.
Some of the cultures that worshipped the tree as a symbol (or idol) of life itself originally did decorate their trees but hadn’t yet adopted the habit of cutting them down to drag into the house. That tradition was integrated from somewhere else. Similarly Eostre eggs weren’t always made of chocolate. Regardless we can still recognize Eostre eggs and we can still recognize Jeremiah’s reference as clearly pertaining to the tradition leading to Christmas trees.
“we can still recognize Jeremiah’s reference as clearly pertaining to the tradition leading to Christmas trees.”
So Jeremiah tells us that the “wood cut from the forest” worked by workmen’s chisels into “idols”, clad in gold and silver by smiths who’s “molten images”/”idols” are a mockery of God because they have “no breath in them”. According to you that is clearly and obviously, beyond any possible argument, not a caution against idolatry (such as we find throughout the OT), not about the carved wooden idols or gold clad idols which we know were ubiquitous at that time in that region. No it is clearly and obviously about the hypothetical practices of the (then) mesolithic hunter-gatherer culture which would eventually become the pagan Norse and eventually lead (around two thousand years after Jeremiah was written) to the early Christmas Tree.
To use the Bible against Christians we are taking a huge risk. We must be well read on the arguments and responses and we must be right. Otherwise we allow them to fall back on the favourite “Those atheists, they just don’t know what they’re talking about when it comes to God/faith/Christianity” and wave us away. Offering horribly weak, oft rebutted “arguments” like “Jeremiah forbade Christmas Trees” is an automatic own-goal and yet you make it here for no reason other than the sophomoric “Gotcha!” of calling Christians hypocrites.
Chopping those two sentences out of the article is pure win.
@Nathair
You completly ignored hjhornbeck’s post (#7) that concludes it more likley to be a xmas tree. Can you refute any of his post?
Actually, I went straight to the bottom to look for a response and missed it, but now that you pointed it out…
First, let’s look at what was not mentioned, like 10:8 which explicitly describes not “trees” nor “decorated trees” but “worthless wooden idols”. As rational skeptics are you really suggesting that Dan Brownesque between-the-lines theories about “why would the idols be wobbly?” trumps the fact that the text explicitly calls the items in question “idols” three separate times?
Also not mentioned is that the Norse, who brought evergreens inside etc., were a people separated from Jeremiah by three thousand kilometers and fourteen or so centuries. We don’t know a lot about the religious practices of the bronze age Scandinavian ancestors of the Norse who were living in “Germany” when Jeremiah was written and we certainly have no reason to believe that they were already decorating trees. There is also little reason to believe that “Jeremiah” would have been aware of such a trivial custom of some distant and obscure tribal people if they did already do it nor that it would be such common knowledge to the early Jewish people that it must be held up and warned against. Contrast that danger with the worship of idols which, it should go without saying, is a constant major theme hammered time and again throughout the book.
As to the supposed change of subject in mid-chapter, I don’t see it. If you wish to believe it is there, more power to you but it is rather more convenient than explicit and that is the point: While you can, if you squinch your eyes up just right and turn your head this way and ignore or dismiss the occasional word or phrase or gap of fourteen hundred years, manage to stretch the text so that it says what you want. (After all, Christians have been doing exactly that since the beginning.) But the problem is that when you attempt to throw that at Christians and Christian apologists they are going to, quite correctly, point out that your interpretation is just that, an interpretation and a rather strained one at that. They are going to point out that their own interpretation is (to be generous) at least as likely as yours and they are going to suggest that you are wilfully misinterpreting the text solely to score points (and they’ll be right.)
Your “argument” is going to accomplish absolutely nothing other than to distract from the point you are trying to make, exactly as has happened here.
Time demands I stop, will check back in again.
As I pointed out earlier, Hebrew uses the same word for “wood” and “tree.” The full context of 10:8-9 doesn’t make it clear which meaning is being implied:
The Christmas tree did come much later than Jeremiah (which was written sometime around 600BCE), but that was because Christian missionaries took advantage of an existing ritual to help convert Germanic pagans. I can’t get a firm bead on when Yule began, as those tribes didn’t have a written language, but I do know they practiced Horse Sacrifice in the form of Blot; the former was a common tradition of the proto-Indo-Europeans, who spread it all the way from Northern Europe to the Indus valley in India.
Three thousand kilometres is no big deal, even to ancient cultures. Speaking of the Indus valley, we know the settlers there had a trading network which reached Iran 2000km away, over two thousand years before Jeremiah was written. There’s some evidence they may have connected with Egypt, too, which was 4,000km away. If you’d prefer a Christian example, how about First Corinthians 16? Paul outlines an itinerary which would require 1,000km of walking, or 260km of sailing, and implies he’ll pull it off in a year.
Would you mind explaining to me how 10:6-7 are specific to the worship of a wooden idol or tree decorated in silver and gold, then?
It wasn’t trivial or distant; as one of my links pointed out, even Hebrews used evergreen trees in worship. That area of the Middle East was prime trading ground, which meant the goods and beliefs of quite distant cultures could have percolated in.
All history amounts to interpretation from limited data. There’s no way to establish absolute truth, at best we can hope for plausibility. I think I’ve done a very reasonable job of establishing the plausibility of my hypothesis; can you come up with something more plausible, and reference it as well as I have?
I think it is best if we all drop the buyBull is against XmasTrees because even really delusional believers can see that it aint when they decide to read it. But the buyBull is against the USE of Xmas Trees as that section of the buyBull says that idols are not allowed nor idolatry. Look in any Xtian home at Xmas and what is the BIGGEST most central thing there??? Not the nativity but the TREE!!! So which is being paid attention to? the most? That is idolatry. One of the biggest arguments the protestants have against the satanist RCC is the blatant idolatry with all the saints, angles, virgins, etc in the churches. And when the trees are put up they and the secular decorations are bigger then any thing religious, pure idolatry!!!! So Easter with the egg-laying bunny, Halloween with the ghosts & monsters, and Xmas with the tree and other decorations are all self proclaimed idolatry! Which they claim is NOT allowed. They claim these are holy days but most xtians will join right in, and then claim WE are declaring a war on their holy days, and that they are moral (& we have non) when they are violating their book.
If you can find any indication of it earlier than, say, 700 AD I’d be excited to see it. Further, if you can find some sort of evidence of tree decoration instead of the actual Yule practice of burning evergreens (Yule log, you know?) that would be great. Of course that would still be hundreds and hundreds of years after Jeremiah and still only be a vaguely similar tradition, but it would be a small step in the right direction.
Sure, I find it really quite plain. The text is a warning against idolatry. To paraphrase: Don’t be like those people, they worship foolish wooden idols. The idols are mere carved and made things with no life or breath, they can’t walk or do anything they are “like a scarecrow in a cucumber field” there’s no reason to fear them! God, on the other hand, he’s a pretty scary dude, nations should fear him, but those silly idolaters “they are altogether stupid and foolish in their discipline of delusion—their idol is wood!” It might be clad in silver and gold,the people might wear fancy clothes and their craftsmen might be talented but God can cause earthquakes and nations should be afraid of him, not some idol! Now you better toe the line!
That bit about “Like a scarecrow in a cucumber field” is another crystal clear indication, by the way, of what is actually under discussion.
Wreathes and garlands, not Christmas trees. Are you now taking the position that any use of evergreen leaves, boughs or logs is the same thing as a Christmas Tree? Is your new position that Jeremiah is merely describing midwinter evergreen wreaths or the Egyptians decorating with green palm leaves? Goalposts moving a bit?
I have done so. The text is warning against the worshipping of idols. Idols as in Graven Images. The significance of which, to the early church, can not possibly be overstated. Remember that we are discussing the imposition of monotheism on these people. The Bible hammers again and again and again that people have to stop worshipping all these idols and stick to God. The first three or the Top Ten Rules are about exactly that. Me only! No other gods and no more idols! Yet, in a passage which repeatedly makes direct and explicit reference to idols, the worship of idols, wooden idols, mere carved wood and crafted metal and worshipping silly things no better than scarecrows you deduce that they don’t really mean idols at all but Christmas trees! Or rather Jeremiah is warning against Norse tree worshipping practices that would eventually lead to Christmas trees. Or rather Jeremiah is warning against the entirely hypothetical and undocumented practices of the ancestors of the Norse that would lead to the tree worshipping practices that would lead, fifteen hundred years after Jeremiah, to the Christmas tree.
We are the ones always talking about confirmation bias and fooling yourself and the need for objective analysis of the facts. They are supposed to be the ones who revel in wishful thinking and wilfully distorting the facts to support whatever they would rather believe. When you produce this kind of argument and point the thundering “Ye hypocrites!” finger at Christians you are, in my opinion, making all of us look a bit sophomoric and silly and, really, no better than them.
So you want me to prove a certain ritual featuring a perishable item has been performed in exactly the same way for several thousand years, the bulk of which was done in a culture without writing, and the remainder of which was under the influence of a religion hostile to the previous culture’s rituals?
If I could do that, I’d have a Nobel Prize in Archeology; no such prize exists, but given the magnitude of that discovery they’d probably invent it just for me.
All traditions change over time. Things that we think are incredibly stable, such as the eucharist or Christian views on abortion, have evolved over the centuries. The Christmas tree itself has seen many changes; two hundred years ago, for instance, they were small affairs that sat on a table.
Rather than say Jeremiah was referring to the Christmas/Yule tree as we know it today, which is impossible, I’m saying it was referring to a similar tradition, specifically an evergreen tree taken from the forest and modified to stand upright, which over time became the tradition as we knew it today. I thought this was obvious, and something we’d implicitly agreed upon. Or was I wrong, and do you think Christians invented the practice of bringing a tree inside whole-cloth, without any pagan influence, despite the two sources I keep pointing to which claim otherwise?
You misunderstand. Here, let me use Exodus 20:17-23 as an example:
We’re on opposite footing here. I would argue that passages 18-21 do not constitute a change of focus; God is still dictating commandments before and after that passage, the people listening just got freaked out a little and moved back, and so the commandments afterwords are on equal footing with the ones before. As a consequence of this, and other evidence, the Christian focus on only Ten Commandments is not grounded in the Bible. Most Christians would argue the contrary, that this is a clear change in focus; God has stopped dictating the first (and presumably more important) set of commandments, and begins a secondary set. I’m not interested in arguing on that, so I’ll go no further.
Something like that example, however, is what I want from you in regards to Jeremiah 10:6-7. This time, I’m the one arguing for a change of focus; the passage shifts subject from silly pagans to the strength of God. It shifts away from the worship of gods, to what God can do. Thus it’s reasonable to conclude that the next passages are talking about something different, specifically a separate silver and gold idol. The point-form structure of what follows reinforces this. You are arguing that there is no change of focus, that passage still refers specifically to the worshiping of idols. What evidence do you have for that?
It is, actually. Look at the original Hebrew; there is no reference to a field, at all! “kə·ṯō·mer” or “scarecrow” only shows up once in the OT, but Strong’s concordance says it is related to a second word, which I’ll highlight in Judges 4:4-5:
The NASV decided to translate that word in such a way that it obscured the connection to trees, and even added words to the passage that weren’t in the original text to throw people further off the trail. Older translations, which predate the widespread practice of Christmas trees in the English-speaking world, have no problem translating that word straight-up as “palm tree.”
Not hypothetical, and quite well documented, as I keep repeating. Or would you like a few more links?
No, though there may have been a misunderstanding about what exactly I was arguing. Perhaps I should have been more clear there, though since the alternative interpretations are absurd I didn’t think it was necessary.
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Howdy;
I’m a former TX resident now living in VA.
I learned today of H.B. No. 308. I’m deeply concerned for school kids in Texas and TX state Government promoting religious displays in TX classrooms via H.B. No. 308,
Which appears to have been added as an amendment to the TEC:
SECTION 1. Subchapter Z, Section 29.920 of the Texas Education Code.
Has this been challenged in court yet?
The only info I’ve found is that that the Texas ACLU would “keep an eye on it,
but there is no mention on the aclutx.org website.
Could someone please update me on HB 308 status?
Thanks!
-Sean Lynch