"The Burning Babe" by Robert Southwell

The Eternal Surprise of Christ's Birth

Merry, merry Christmas, dear readers.

I’m taking the week off to celebrate Christ’s birth and enjoy the gifts his coming has made possible.

Thank you, all, for the gift of being with me at The Priory. It has been a kind of salvation for me in a year of suffering and pain. But Jesus is Lord, and he is good. And because of him, my mourning has turned into dancing. (See my postscript for a tune that will surely get you dancing, too.)

I’m linking this week to a post I wrote a few years back at The Public Discourse celebrating the evocative poem “The Burning Babe” by Elizabethan priest and poet Robert Southwell (1561-1595).

First, here’s the strange, lovely poem. Enjoy.

As I in hoary winter’s night stood shivering in the snow,
Surpris’d I was with sudden heat which made my heart to glow;
And lifting up a fearful eye to view what fire was near,
A pretty Babe all burning bright did in the air appear;
Who, scorched with excessive heat, such floods of tears did shed
As though his floods should quench his flames which with his tears were fed.
“Alas!” quoth he, “but newly born, in fiery heats I fry,
Yet none approach to warm their hearts or feel my fire but I!
My faultless breast the furnace is, the fuel wounding thorns,
Love is the fire, and sighs the smoke, the ashes shame and scorns;
The fuel Justice layeth on, and Mercy blows the coals,
The metal in this furnace wrought are men’s defiled souls,
For which, as now on fire I am to work them to their good,
So will I melt into a bath to wash them in my blood.”
With this he vanish’d out of sight and swiftly shrunk away,
And straight I called unto mind that it was Christmas day.

Next week, we discuss The Second Shepherd’s Play ←— I’ve linked an online pdf. But I also recommend this cheap Dover edition if you, like me, prefer a book. It’s a Christmas story—and Christmas runs all the way into January, so we are still in the season.

P. S. For many years, my husband and I were part of a church that held a Celtic Christian service every Sunday. There I read poetry and other readings, and my husband accompanied the Celtic worship music with guitar. Our most attended service was our Christmas Eve service. Here is my favorite part of that annual service, a performance of “Righteous Joseph.” It’s one of my favorite (but little-known) Christmas songs.