The Third Saturday in Advent -- Annie Dillard

A Reflection on Annie Dillard’s Bethlehem (pp. 214-17)

Several years ago Pat and I visited the Holy Land for the first time, and one of our must-see stops was Bethlehem. As Annie Dillard notes, today it is not an easy place to get to, as it is in Palestinian territory and remains a contested piece of land. What a perverse irony: for Jesus’ birthplace to be the subject of continuing conflict and violence. 

The Church of the Nativity, too, is far from the prettiest church I’ve ever seen, and as Dillard relates, both the architecture and the diversity of visitors reflects competing claims being made on the place by Christians of every conceivable denomination and cultural context. The place is almost always teeming with tourists, which gives it a carnival atmosphere that feels wildly inappropriate to what happened here.

But notwithstanding all these human efforts to debase the place, as Rabbi Nachman of Bratslav says: “Every day the glory is ready to emerge from its debasement.” (217)

Over the centuries, Bethlehem has captured the imaginations of writers, artists and musicians from around the globe. In our own time and place, perhaps the best known artistic rendering of Bethlehem is the beautiful Christmas carol, “O little town of Bethlehem,” which was written by the former Bishop of Massachusetts and one-time Rector of Trinity Church, Copley Square, Phillips Brooks.

On Christmas Eve in 1865, Brooks visited the Holy Land himself and rode the perilous journey from Jerusalem to Bethlehem, to assist at the midnight service in the Church of the Nativity. Two years later, back in Massachusetts, he was inspired by the experience to write the now-famous carol for his Sunday school. A renowned preacher and storyteller, Brooks was a favorite with adults and children alike.  As the legend goes, when Brooks died, a child in the congregation was overheard to say: "O how happy the angels will be."

Here are the lyrics to the popular hymn:

O little town of Bethlehem,
How still we see thee lie!
Above thy deep and dreamless sleep
The silent stars go by;
Yet in thy dark streets shineth
The everlasting Light;
The hopes and fears of all the years
Are met in thee tonight.

O morning stars, together
Proclaim the holy birth,
And praises sing to God the king,
And peace to men on earth.
For Christ is born of Mary;
And, gathered all above,
While mortals sleep, the angels keep
Their watch of wondering love.

How silently, how silently,
The wondrous gift is given!
So God imparts to human hearts
The blessings of his heaven,
No ear may hear his coming;
But in this world of sin,
Where meek souls will receive him, still
The dear Christ enters in.

O holy child of Bethlehem,
Descend to us, we pray;
Cast out our sin, and enter in:
be born in us today.
We hear the Christmas angels
The great glad tidings tell:
O come to us, abide with us,
Our Lord Emmanuel.

Annie Dillard (b. 1945) is an American writer. In 1974, she won the Pulitzer Prize for Nonfiction with Pilgrim at Tinker Creek.

Comments

  1. graceDecember 23, 2017 at 1:19 PM

    Ah, it is a beautiful carol! "The hopes and fears of all the years....." and "how silently....."

    ReplyDelete

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