A quintessential Christmas tradition in the Western world is the crèche. The ubiquitous nativity scenes come in all shapes and forms, from the beautifully carved to the cheaply made, brightly colored, inflatable ones. Perhaps surprising to some, one would be hard pressed to find visual representations of the familiar Bethlehem crèche in the first one thousand years of the Church’s life. Art historians trace the roots of these crèches to Francis of Assisi, who, on Christmas Eve in 1223, organized a living nativity-scene in Greccio, Italy, to foster devotion among the faithful. The rest, as they say, is history.
The Gospels do not give specific details of the “manger”— other than being in or near the village of Bethlehem; however, early iconography of the Feast of the Nativity depicts the Christ Child and Mary in a cave on the side of a rocky hill. The oldest-functioning church structure in the world today—the Church of the Nativity—is at the site of this cave in Bethlehem. Under the joint oversight of both the Orthodox Church of Jerusalem and the Roman Catholic Church, this structure was constructed by the Emperor Saint Constantine the Great in 327 A.D., two years after the First Ecumenical Council. The cave below the surface is where the very spot of Christ’s birth is revered by the faithful, with the church structures on the ground above.
The tradition of Christ being born in a cave rather than in a wooden barn (crèche) is ancient. The early Christian philosopher Saint Justin Martyr (circa 150 A.D.) tells us in Dialogue with Trypho:
“Along with Mary he (Joseph) is ordered to proceed into Egypt, and remain there with the Child until another revelation warn them to return into Judea. But when the Child was born in Bethlehem, since Joseph could not find lodging in that village, he took up quarters in a certain cave near the village; and while they were there, Mary brought forth the Christ and placed Him in a manger, and here the Magi who came from Arabia found Him.”
And, finally, the hymnography of the Church affirms that the Christ Child was born in a cave. The Kontakion of the Nativity, composed in the sixth century by Saint Romanos the Hymnographer, was sung every year at the imperial banquet on that feast by the joint choirs of Hagia Sophia and of the Church of the Holy Apostles in Constantinople until the twelfth century:
Today the Virgin gives birth to the Transcendent One,
And the earth offers a cave to the Unapproachable One!
Angels with shepherds glorify Him!
The wise men journey with a star!
Since for our sake the Eternal God was born as a Little Child!
— Kontakion of the Nativity, Tone 3
May we all receive with joy the blessed Incarnation of our Lord, Who was born in a cave for our salvation!
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