by Bobby Brown

Created on: December 20, 2011

Every Christmas season the debate over the use of the abbreviation Xmas resurfaces and gets more attention than what it probably deserves. For many people Christians and infidels alike, the assumption is that the X is an attempt to remove Christ from Christmas figuratively if not literally.

That idea is based on our modern interpretation of the symbol "X". "X" means to cross out, eliminate, delete, disregard, remove dissociate, kill, nullify, In mathematics, x represents a value that you are unsure about. Wilhelm Röntgen who "discovered" a new type of electromagnetic energy did not know what to call it-how different our world would be without X-rays! Who was Malcolm Little? Not knowing and or refusing to accept the lineage of the last "Little" he changed his last name to the symbol "X". These are all fairly modern examples of the usage of the symbol

The abbreviation Xmas is much older than any of the previously mentioned e"X"amples. The "X" literally means Christ-X being the first letter of the word Christ in Greek. Many biblical societies used the first letter of words to describe people and ideas. INRI, which is seen on many religious items, literal means Jesus the Nazarene King of the Jews, translated from the Latin IESVS NAZARENVS REX IVDAEORVM

Still, as mentioned earlier, I don't believe that this is the current use of the abbreviation. I concede that from a marketing standpoint it has great benefits., few letters take up less advertising space which equates to more revenue for businesses. Yet I know there are many people who want nothing to do with the religious aspect of the holiday and purposefully use the abbreviation in a cynical and mocking manner. Is there any wonder that many Christians view such actions as an attack on Christianity.?

December 25th is an unusual holiday in its on right. That is the day that we celebrate the birth of Christ (no one really knows when Christ was born) but that particular day was chosen because it corresponds to a pagan celebration / holiday. Christianity had been proclaimed as the official religion of the Holy Roman Empire-the ONLY religion in fact. Many concessions were made concerning pagan observances and voila, Jesus' birthday became December 25th. So, I guess another twist on the history of Christmas, Xmas and Christ is warranted though misunderstood by many.

So whether you use Christmas or Xmas you can't get rid of Christ!

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