I resist the urge to jump right into a list of songs I love to hate to favor instead the deserved confession that most well-known religious Christmas carols are both Biblically and historically accurate. More still are Biblically accurate, but misstep in terms of time of year (Jesus was born in the Spring not winter) or general timeline (the Christ child was in a house again by the time the wise men arrived with their gifts).
So, in the Spirit of the season, let's start with the good guys:
Biblically and Historically Accurate Christmas Songs:
- What Child is This?
- Candlelight Carol
- Joy to the World
- Oh, Come, All Ye Faithful
- Angels We Have Heard on High
- Silent Night
- Hark the Herald Angels Sing
- With Wondering Awe
- Far, Far Away on Judea's Plains
- It Came Upon a Midnight Clear
- Oh Little Town of Bethlehem
- While Shepherds Watched Their Flocks By Night (if you can excuse that they probably weren't "all sitting on the ground")
- Coventry Carol (possibly the saddest on this list)
- Sussex Carol
- We Three Kings
- Gabriel’s Message
- Gaudete
- The Wexford Carol
- Angels From the Realms of Glory
Now some brief commentary on the slightly errant:
Close, But...
- The First Noel:
- In addition to the familiar-but-false born in Winter trope, this hymn also asserts that the New Star shone with "great light...both day and night," which there is simply no evidence for.
- God Rest Ye Merry, Gentlemen; Go, Tell it on the Mountain
- "Christ our Savior" was not "born on Christmas Day," as Christmas didn't start being a day until more than 300 years after His death and resurrection.
- Some believe the Catholics replaced a pagan celebration by putting Christmas Day on December 25. I've also read that the Roman Emperor Constantine, in 336 AD, chose December 25 to celebrate Jesus’ birth.
- With Wondering Awe
- It seems this song's author got the wise men - who according to the Biblical record neither saw the baby in the stable nor heard angels - mixed up with the shepherds, who did both.
- In the Bleak Mid-Winter, The Holly and the Ivy, What Sweeter Music, 2000 Decembers Ago
- Christ was not born in the Winter. Some scholars place the date in the Spring based on the time of year when shepherds would be watching their flocks by night (Luke 2:8-20) at all, while others guess Fall, possibly during the Feast of Tabernacles.
- Side note: I especially appreciate that the author of "In the Bleak Mid-Winter," lyrics writes, "Angels and archangels may have gathered there," showing he knows this is part of the story he doesn't know, rather than just stating it as fact because it's fun to think about.
- Oh Holy Night
- The Bible states that the wise men found visited the Christ child in a house, not the manger (Matt. 2:11). Most scholars seem to agree it took about 2 years for the wise men to reach Him with their gifts from their far away homes.
- We often see the wise men present in nativity scenes - a convention we have Frances of Assisi to thank for (circa A.D. 1223) - merely as an artistic convenience.
Before I jump into the truly terrible songs, I'll add another autistically-fun list: a list of hymns I didn't assess for historical accuracy because their purpose isn't to "tell the story" anyway.
- I Heard the Bells on Christmas Day
- Oh Come, Oh Come, Emmanuel
- In Dulci Jubilo
- Shepherd Pipe's Carol
- Carol of the Bells
- Ding Dong! Merrily on High
Now Ladies and Gentlemen, the Moment You've All Been Reading For, the Worst of all Christmas Carols (Listed Roughly From Least to Most Egregious)
Off, But Forgivable
- Good Christian Men, Rejoice
- That title section is the only thing wrong with it, but...it really didn't age well.
- Once in Royal David's City
- The hymnal at my church wisely omits the fourth verse, which ends with a description of what it will be like when "his children" are with Him in Heaven, "when like stars His children crowned/all in white shall wait around." Not only is this not Biblical but...pardon me while I yawn...
- Little Drummer Boy
- No shade, it's lyrically cute (though many renditions simply never end). It's just not theologically...anything.
- Wait, though. If this boy was invited by the wise men - the only people who would have said "our finest gifts we bring" - to join them on their journey, and he was pa-rum-pum-pum-pum-ing all the way, the fact that he made it to his destination alive is a Christmas miracle in itself!
Dangerously Off Base
- Christmas Shoes, by NewSong
- Many souls more patient than mine have shed light upon the depths this song sinks to. To their true words I'll add only this: no "worst songs ever" list would be complete without this title on it.
- Homeless, by Michael McLane
- When I first heard this song on a soundtrack I didn't realize that in the music this number - which repeats the refrain "we are not homeless like the Christ child was" so many times that one becomes certain of its hypnotic intentions - is sung by a group of homeless characters warming themselves outside by a stereotypical garbage can fire at Christmas time. Ew.
- I should like to think it obvious that being born in a stable while His parents reported for the census does not make the Christ child homeless anymore than it makes someone homeless to be born in a hotel while their family is on vacation. So that's just careless. But for those of us who are now or ever have been homeless, the hypnotically incessant reminder that we're even worse off than a kid born in a stall hits as cruel.
- If that wasn't enough, it also says that his "homeless days on earth" only ended when He died. No amount of Jesus being a home for the homeless redeems the rest of this song.
- Away in a Manger
- It was my distaste for this beloved song that started my informal quest for honest Christmas songs for me, but I was in High School before I could put my finger on what I didn't like.
- I happened across an interview with Gladys Knight on my radio around Christmas time. This popular singer is a member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, to which I also belong. So I stopped turning the knob and paid attention. She said what I had never let myself fully accept before that moment: there's actually false doctrine in some Christmas hymns. She mentioned Away in a Manger specifically and stated with the cool confidence of an established professional and person of faith that if Jesus was a perfect baby, He most certainly Did cry. Because a perfect baby communicates, and a perfect baby experiences the full range of emotions available to all of us passing through mortality. She gave words to years of vague angst around this song for me, and I was never the same again. :)
- The "fit us for heaven" bit in the last verse wouldn't be too bad on its own, if we weren't taught in the same poem that perfect children don't even cry when awakened by loud animals. I don't think I want to go where their version of Jesus wants to send me!
- Mary, Did You Know?
- This one almost didn't make the naughty list. I like thinking about Mary as an active participant in her story, and this poem really is beautiful. But when I saw it on another blogger's "the worst" list and read why, I realized how patronizing it was.
- Based on the Bible alone, the answer to every question posed to Mary in the song is a resounding, unequivocable, "Yes!" She knew ALL of those things. Which leaves only one question remaining, and it's not for Mary: When is the last time you read Luke Chapter 1?
- Note: I'm seeing there's an unintentional theme in this last set of songs: a general distrust in Mary's intelligence.
- Do You Hear What I Hear?
- Talking sheep? A king happy to hear the news? Gold offered as a solution for a shivering baby? What alternate universe are we operating from? Also, Mary was smart enough to bring swaddling clothes on her trip - I'm sure she was also smart enough to bring enough of them and use them properly!
- While You Were Sleeping, by Casting Crowns
- At last we come to the song I wrote this whole piece to complain about.
- But as this treatise is already 4 pages long, I'll make it a separate post.
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