** Click here for Episode 159 **
What says Christmas more than a spot of linguistics? Lots of things. But ignore those, and concentrate on the following question from Nick in Norway:
Do Christians get offended when people write Xmas instead of Christmas?
I can imagine that if I was a massive Jesus fan, I would get a little annoyed if people replaced the name of my no.1 saviour with an X.
Personally, I’d’ve been more offended when Xtina Aguilera appropriated the device. But linguistically-nettled Christians have got a massive back-catalogue about which to be aggrieved, as this abbreviation for Christmas has been in common use since the 16th century. And the ‘X’ shorthand for Christ has been in use way before that, after Emperor Constantine I took a fancy to the ancient Greek chi rho christogram* in an ecclesiastical dream, then made his troops slap it all over their armour to help them win the Battle of the Milvian Bridge in 312AD. Not sure Jesus would have loved that either.
*NB a christogram is not some sort of service where Jesus shows up at your door and sings Happy Birthday to you.
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Answer Me This! Podcast 
December 9, 2010 at 4:24 pm |
Helen’s spot on. The “X” abbreviation was used throughout the Middle Ages. After all, vellum isn’t cheap, so the more space you can save by using abbreviations the better.
December 8, 2010 at 3:42 pm |
I did a theology degree, and in all our lectures as shorthand we would use “xians” and “xtology”. No one was offended to my knowledge, and it saved on handcramps!