Rachel Weeping for her Children, and Would not be Comforted Because They are Not

The story of the flight into Egypt was read in Chapel this week (Matt. 2.13-18). Central to that story is the slaughter of the children of Bethlehem. It is a shocking story, perhaps made even more shocking when you realize that it is actually a Christmas story! Christ is God’s “great little one,” as Richard Crashaw says, whose “all-embracing birth lifts earth to heaven and stoops heaven to earth” God becomes a child to remind us that we are all the children of God. But at what cost?

 

This story challenges all the sentimental emotions and feelings of hyggelig, of cozy cheer and comfort which seems to overwhelm the celebrations of Christmastide. It does not simply negate such things but deepens our understanding of the radical nature of God’s engagement with our humanity in the birth of the child Christ. It speaks directly to our divided and violent world in the oppressor/oppressed framework of our current ideologies. The story of the death of the little ones of Bethlehem stands as a striking indictment of the powers of this world, past and present, who out of fear and resentment destroy innocent lives. It is also a story that speaks to the griefs and sorrows of our wounded and broken hearts and points us to the greater comfort that can only come from God to us.

 

The hymns and carols of the Christmas season do not conceal this side of the Christmas story, yet it often gets overlooked and ignored. It also challenges and corrects a mistaken view of the Incarnation. It signals in no uncertain terms that Jesus Christ in the Christian understanding is the God who becomes human to redeem and save. The Incarnation, God made flesh, is not the affirmation of our existential lives and aspirations, of ourselves in all of the conflicts and divisions of our self-interests. The wonder and mystery of Christmas does not hide from view the world of sin and evil, of violence and death, of sorrow and loss both within and without. “Jesus Christ was born for this.” For what? To overcome the darkness of our hearts and world. He comes to redeem and save by means of his sacrifice on the Cross. His life was “a continuous cross,” as Lancelot Andrewes notes; “his Christmas Day and his Good Friday were but the evening and the morning of one and the same day,” as John Donne puts it, reminding us that his whole life was but “a continual passion.” This is the necessary corrective. It means seeing the centrality of the Passion, the suffering of Christ, in the mystery of Christmas. 

 

The story is graphic and disturbing but points in the direction of the doctrine of substituted love. The little ones of Bethlehem are killed in the name of Christ, the one whom Herod fears as a rival to his reign. In his wrath, he “slew all the children that were in Bethlehem” and beyond. They are killed in the place of Christ. He is the target of our disaffection, of our resentment and envy at his goodness and mercy. He is the scapegoat, the victim who is ultimately the victor through his sacrifice which transforms sin into grace. In other words, Christ’s birth challenges all our expectations and turns the world on its head. In so doing it gathers us to God in the mystery of God with us. It is why we need the twelve days of Christmas; to ponder the meaning of Christ’s holy birth in all its fullness, “all wonders in one sight,” as Crashaw puts it.

The theological point is that the sufferings and deaths of the little ones of Bethlehem participate by anticipation in the sacrifice and death of Christ. They are defined by Christ as those who “follow the Lamb whithersoever he goeth,” as the Book of the Revelation of St. John the Divine puts it in a kind of commentary on this story. Christ is the Lamb of God. He goes to the Cross for the salvation of the world, the whole world, we might say, which includes the past and the future. At the very least, this feast suggests that their lives and deaths are not meaningless but find their truth and meaning in Christ. And so for us.

 

The Gospel story of the slaughter of the Innocents also highlights the reality of our human griefs and sorrows: “Rachel weeping for her children, and would not be comforted because they are not.” There is no human comfort that will satisfy and overcome our griefs and sorrows in the face of loss and death. The only comfort is found in Christ and in our being found in him. Such is the radical meaning of Christ as Saviour. He is “the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world.”

 

The story builds upon the Exodus story of Pharaoh instituting a policy of infanticide against the ancient Hebrews. Why? Out of resentment and fear of the Hebrews whom he saw as a threat to his power. With both Pharaoh and Herod there is the desperate need to preserve and protect their privilege and power at all costs, including the use of unspeakable violence. The story of Moses drawn out of a basket in the bulrushes belongs to that setting. The little ones are simply inconvenient to us in our self-interests. Here the Holy Family flees into Egypt only to return later. “Out of Egypt have I called my Son.” Yet another reminder of the radical nature of Christ’s holy birth and death.

 

“We rejoice and mourn at once, in the Birth and in the Passion of our Lord,” as T.S. Eliot puts it in his play ‘Murder in the Cathedral,’ noting explicitly the centrality of the Passion of Christ. It means his embrace of the sufferings of the world, perhaps especially the sufferings of the little ones who do no harm but are seen as inconvenient and disposable with respect to the agendas and concerns of the world in its disarray. The story is a standing indictment of the powers of the world in every age but it also has the power to convict our hearts. At the very least, it might make us a wee bit more thoughtful about the seriousness of Christ’s holy birth for it means God’s radical engagement with human suffering, especially the sufferings of the little ones. And perhaps that shall be our true comfort and joy.