The True Saint Nicholas: Why He Matters to Christmas - Hardcover

Bennett, William J.

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 1416567461 ISBN 13: 9781416567462

Publisher: Howard Books, 2009

Synopsis

If you've ever been asked, "Who is Saint Nicholas?"...

If you've ever wondered if he is just a commercial invention...

If you've ever thought there is no such person...

You may be surprised to know the true Saint Nicholas.

You'll never again think of Santa Claus in quite the same way.

An instant classic by one of America's most respected thinkers, The True Saint Nicholas is a book to be shared with family and friends every year to evoke the true spirit of Christmas.

About this title

About the Author

William J. Bennett served as Director of the Office of National Drug Control Policy under President George H. W. Bush and as Secretary of Education and Chairman of the National Endowment for the Humanities under President Reagan. He holds a bachelor of arts degree in philosophy from Williams College, a doctorate in political philosophy from the University of Texas, and a law degree from Harvard. He is the author of such bestselling books as The Educated Child, The Death of Outrage, The Book of Virtues, and the two-volume series America: The Last Best Hope. Dr. Bennett is the former host of the nationally syndicated radio show Bill Bennett's Morning in America and the current host of the popular podcast, The Bill Bennett Show. He is also the Washington Fellow of the Claremont Institute and a regular contributor to CNN. He, his wife, Elayne, and their two sons, John and Joseph, live in Maryland.

Excerpt. © Reprinted by permission. All rights reserved.

CHAPTER ONE
Answered Prayers and Secret Alms

Like many good things, this story begins with a mother's prayer.

During the days of the Roman Empire, in a province called Lycia, in what is now the country of Turkey, a husband and wife longed for a child. Theophanes and Nonna, their names are said to have been. Their home was Patara, a flourishing town at the mouth of the river Xanthos on the Mediterranean coast, a place where the forested hills sloped down to the clear blue sea.

Theophanes and Nonna were a well-to-do couple. Perhaps they inherited land and money. Theophanes may have run a prosperous trade in cloth or milled grains. History does not tell us. We know only that, according to one old chronicle, they were people "of substantial lineage, holding property enough without superfluity."

Their comfortable lives were troubled by one great unhappiness: though they had been married for many years, they had never managed to have children. As time passed, they wept and waited, but no child came. Still, Nonna refused to give up hope. Instead, she did something very wise. She prayed. Like Hannah in the First Book of Samuel in the Bible, she poured out her soul to God, asking him to remember her.

It must have seemed like a miracle when late in life, after so many hopes and tears, Nonna's prayer was answered around the year A.D. 280 with the birth of a son. She surely recalled how Hannah, who was finally blessed with the boy Samuel, had vowed to "give him unto the Lord all the days of his life" (1 Samuel 1:11 KJV).

Some say that when Nonna's child was placed in his bath right after birth, he stood up by himself and raised his arms as if in praise of God. Others say that on Wednesdays and Fridays, traditional days of fasting for early Christians, he refused to nurse until after sundown. Such are the legends. But there must have been something that made the proud parents hope that their child would someday serve God and his fellow men in some remarkable way. They christened the baby Nicholas, a name that in Greek means "people's victor," after an uncle who was an abbot at a nearby monastery.

Patara was a good town to grow up in, a bustling center of trade full of sights for a boy to explore. Wide avenues lined with columns and paved with stones led from town gates past houses, shops, and temples to busy agorai (market squares). Beneath brightly colored awnings, merchants arranged their goods: grapes, olives, cheese, herbs, dyed wool and cotton, pottery, jewelry, leather, glassware, skins of wine. The shoppers who haggled with vendors and the men who swapped news in the shade of roofed colonnades all spoke Greek, the dominant language of that part of the world. Young Nicholas must have spent many hours listening to the shouts of the tradesmen advertising their wares and the talk of women filling jugs with water at the public fountains.

As he roamed the streets of Patara, the boy saw reminders of both his proud Greek heritage and imperial Rome's wide reach. A temple to Apollo drew travelers hoping to divine the future from a revered oracle. The grand assembly building, where officials from all over Lycia met to debate, could seat one thousand people. Elegant baths with rooms covered by marble tiles dotted the city. A massive monument with three Roman arches, built to honor a governor of Lycia, supported an aqueduct that brought water to Patara's inhabitants.

On a hillside near the sea stood the favorite spot of many Patarans, the amphitheater. More than two dozen tiers of stone seats rose above a raised stage where actors spoke or sang their lines. The crowds that gathered to enjoy comedies, tragedies, and dances could be a rowdy bunch, stomping their feet when pleased or throwing olive pits when disappointed by the show.

But Nicholas's favorite spot may well have been the port, where the boy could watch fishing boats unload the day's catch and merchants' ships arrive from points around the eastern Mediterranean: Rhodes, Cyprus, Antioch, Alexandria, and beyond. Occasionally seaman who had made it as far as Rome itself sailed into Patara. They brought news of Roman armies on the march, edicts of emperors, and tales of distant places like North Africa and Gaul.

• • •

AT ABOUT AGE SEVEN, Nicholas was placed under the charge of a pedagogue, a trusted slave who took him to school, helped him with lessons, and kept him out of mischief. The boy gathered with other students under a roofed colonnade to study grammar and arithmetic. He practiced writing with a stylus on a wooden tablet covered with beeswax, and listened intently as the schoolmaster told ancient stories such as how Achilles killed Hector outside the walls of Troy.

But there was one part of the boy's education not to be trusted to a pedagogue or schoolmaster, and that was the matter of faith. Theophanes and Nonna had embraced a new and growing religion, one that required utmost devotion. They were members of Patara's Christian community.

In the two and a half centuries since the time of Jesus, Christianity had spread from the remote province of Judea on the eastern Mediterranean to much of the Roman Empire. The story of the carpenter from Galilee had won converts from Palestine to Britain. His message of love brought new hope to believers. Christianity welcomed all races and classes into a community that offered refuge in a tempest-tossed world.

On Sundays, Nicholas and his parents attended services in a neighbor's house, where they prayed, sang hymns, and studied scripture. They loved the Book of Psalms for its soul-stirring verses, such as, "Make a joyful noise unto the Lord, all ye lands. Serve the Lord with gladness: come before his presence with singing" (Psalm 100:1-2 KJV). They carefully memorized the words of Jesus: "Inasmuch as ye have done it unto one of the least of these my brethren, ye have done it unto me" (Matthew 25:40 KJV). They shared bread and wine in remembrance of the Last Supper so they would be one with Christ. At the end of prayers they said Amen (so be it), and they sounded praise with the word Alleluia (God be praised).

Nicholas loved hearing stories about the boy David slaying the giant Goliath, Daniel standing unharmed in the pit of hungry lions, and the friends of the paralyzed man lowering him through the roof of a crowded house so Jesus might heal him. He learned that the Apostle Paul, traveling on the road to Damascus, was struck down by a blinding light and heard a voice saying, "Saul, Saul, why do you persecute me?" The tireless missionary had visited Patara on one of his famous journeys and left behind a small group of converts. Christians copied the letters that Paul wrote to congregations in places such as Corinth, Galatia, and Philippi, and passed them from church to church, pouring over words such as, "[Love] bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things" (1 Corinthians 13:7 NASB).

Nicholas's parents taught him early on that Christians served God by serving the less fortunate. In an age when the general rule of existence was "Fend for yourself or die," a Christian's duty was to help others. Churches organized to care for the poor and sick. "See how those Christians love one another!" pagans marveled.

At times it was dangerous to be a Christian. The Roman Empire, though vast and mighty, faced desperate problems: a series of weak emperors, outbreaks of plague, generals who fought each other for power, attacks by barbarians along the empire's borders. When officials needed scapegoats to take the brunt of public frustrations, it was all too easy to single out Christians who refused to worship the old gods of Rome and sacrifice to the emperor.

The boy Nicholas heard stories of how the emperor Nero had blamed Christians for a disastrous fire that swept Rome in A.D. 64, and how he had made human torches of Christians to light his garden at night. He heard about Polycarp, bishop of Smyrna in Asia Minor, who was seized by the proconsul Statius Quadratus and ordered to curse Christ.

"I have wild beasts," the proconsul threatened. "If you do not repent, I will have you thrown to them."

"Send for them," Polycarp replied.

"If you do not despise the wild beasts, I will order you to be burned alive."

"Why do you delay? Bring on what you will."

They burned him alive while the crowd shouted, "This is the father of the Christians! This is the destroyer of our gods!"

In times of persecution, Christians might live one edict away from imprisonment or death. In years when rulers let them alone, they remained a close-knit community, protective of each other and wary of rumors of official displeasure.

But if being a Christian brought occasional scorn or danger, it also brought immeasurable rewards. As Nicholas grew, his faith grew. The old writers tell us that he began to spend less time following boyish pursuits, and more time pondering the message that Jesus had brought to the world. As he approached manhood, he discovered that the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, and peace.

• • •

THEN SOMETHING HAPPENED THAT surely must have tested his faith: a plague swept through Lycia, passing from town to town, cutting down whole families, striking rich and poor alike. Theophanes and Nonna were among the dead.

Nicholas, left alone in the world, went to live with his uncle at the monastery to recover from the blow. Slowly, bewilderment and despair gave way to acceptance. He asked God for strength and discovered that it came to him. As he healed, he resolved to train for the priesthood. As a first step, he made up his mind to give away his possessions, including the inheritance left to him by his parents. This decision gave rise to the most beloved story about Nicholas.

In Patara, there lived a family that had fallen on hard times. They had once been wealthy, but misfortunes had overtaken them, and now they were so po...

Edition details

• Publisher: Howard Books
• Publication date: 2009
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 1416567461
• ISBN 13: 9781416567462
• Binding: Hardcover
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 128