Is the Nativity a Palestinian Story?
Earlier this year, the Vatican stirred controversy when it displayed a Nativity scene by a Palestinian artist that featured the baby Jesus lying in a keffiyeh-laden manger. The black and white keffiyeh, a covering traditionally worn by men, has become a symbol of Palestinian national identity and resistance of the Israeli occupation. The Vatican isn’t the only one portraying the Christ-child in a light sympathetic to the Palestinian cause. Various Nativity scenes around the world have depicted Jesus wrapped in keffiyehs and/or lying in the ruins of bombed out buildings resembling the devastation in Gaza. These displays have earned the ire of many ardent supporters of Israel claiming that they erase Jesus’ Jewish identity, but they have also prompted some to ask, is the Nativity story a Palestinian story?
A depiction of the the Holy Family among the ruins of a bombed out Palestinian village.
Last Christmas the Palestinian Christian minister, Munther Isaac made waves comparing the baby Jesus to the children of Gaza trapped under the rubble of Israel’s bombardment. This year Isaac drew on the Nativity story to critique Israel’s occupation. In a social media post, Isaac compared the census ordered by Augustus as a means of tracking, controlling, and extracting resources to the method’s of Israel’s occupation and later compared Herod’s order to kill all the children in Bethlehem forcing the holy family to flee to Egypt to Israel’s assault on Gaza which has killed more than ten thousand children and forced thousands of Palestinians to flee their homes. According to Isaac, “Jesus was born among the occupied, Jesus was born among the oppressed.” There are several compelling similarities between the two stories.
In spite of these similarities, there are challenges comparing historical events. Generally speaking, often the comparisons don’t hold up to scrutiny. In writing this, I must admit that I don’t have the requisite knowledge of the antiquity to adequately assess this comparison, but I can say that rarely do event two-thousand years apart neatly mirror each other. However, the powerful imagery of the Nativity provides a compelling backdrop to critique Israel’s occupation.
I’m sorry that I don’t have a definitive answer to the title question of this blog post, but I think it is a question worth asking ourselves. It is likely that our answer to the question will likely conform to our own pre-existing ideas about both the Nativity and the Palestinians. However you answer the question above, I hope that you have a merry Christmas.
