S4-Day 20: The Stable and its Political Overtones

I do not for one moment think that Jesus would have been born in a palace or any luxurious place had that been an option to consider. But I do wonder if Jesus being born in a poor and stinky stable was an act of solidarity with the poor and lowly or a political statement against the wealth and greed of the Empire. But then the two need not be independent of each other, after all every act of solidarity is a political statement. 

For many the stable reflects Jesus’ poverty. If the presence of the stable represents the absence of the most basic necessities, then the absence of a comfortable and healthy surrounding worthy of a new born baby should press us to question the conditions that gave rise to a deficit of essentials and a paucity of peace and liberty in first-century Palestine. Why were the poor poor? Why was there no safe and clean space for a new born baby? What was life like under the Roman rule? What accounted for Bethlehem’s low political influence? 

Jesus’ birth in a stable does not imply that poverty is a given or a legitimate condition that must be embraced by those already living it. Rather, being birthed in a stable is an act that tells people of today just as it did to those then that revolutions emerge from the margins: from hands and feet that toiled above and beyond requirement, from lips that spoke words none cared to count, and from bodies that knew pain and tribulation. The birth of Jesus in a stable of an impoverished city signaled the beginning of the end of the tyranny of forcibly exalted thrones. After all, it was the child of a stable that later grew up to overturn tables. 

To pluck Jesus out of the stable and wrap him up in royal and decorative robes is to abuse the meaning of the incarnation and do a disservice to the very people that Jesus was birthed amongst. Furthermore, to isolate Jesus’ birth from the death of children that followed (Matt. 2:16-17) is to ignore the encircling violence experienced and thrust upon ‘nonessential’ bodies. The stable, then, serves to remind us to remember the poor, the oppressed, the violated, the bruised and the conditions they live and survive in, even those in our own locales. Jesus’ birth in a stable is an act of political solidarity with the disenfranchised and we would be wise to pay attention to the politics of his birth. 

Prayer

God of the stable, forgive us for clothing you with riches and wealth and turning you into what you are not. Help us return to the heart of this season, remember the purpose of your birth, and care for the uncared and attend to the wounded. In your name we pray, Amen. 

Author: Arvind Theodore 

About the Author: Arvind Theodore is currently pursuing his Ph.D. in Social Ethics at Union Theological Seminary, New York. He is the author of Church and Human Sexuality and blogs at Reflections: Where the Personal is Political.