12th Day of Christmas: The Twelve Days of Christmas

Well with me preaching last Sunday, having a funeral, a holiday, and too many bowl games to watch this week, I fell behind in posting a Christmas carol for each of the twelve day of Christmas. However, I wanted to get one last post in since it was this carol that gave me the idea in the first place.

We have all sang "The Twelve Days of Christmas" and gotten confused over whether it was eight maids a milking or eight ladies dancing, but is their any meaning to the nonsense we are singing?

Well that depends on what you read. It's commonly believed that this song was used during a period of persecution of Roman Catholics in England as a way of teaching Roman Catholic beliefs to children with a code language. Thus, each line in the song has a meaning hidden with in it. For example, the partridge in a pear tree is Jesus Christ on the cross. It is Roman Catholic priest Fr. Hal Stockert who is the one given credit for discovering the hidden meanings in this song while we was doing research on Jesuit priests in England.

However, according to Snopes.com there is no substantive evidence that the song was ever used in this way. I think the best point that Snopes makes on this is that the traditional Christian beliefs that the song is said to represent are beliefs held by both Roman Catholics and the Church of England. (And by every mainline Christian denomination for that matter). So there would be no reason to "code" these teachings since you couldn't tell the difference from an Anglican and a Catholic based on these beliefs. They also point out that Fr. Stockert is not able to produce the original documents or notes that he used in his research.

What we do know for sure about the song is that it was first published in 1780 in a book entitled Mirth without Mischief. And apparently it was a song used to play a memory or forfeit game by children at twelfth night parties on January 5th to celebrate the end of the Christmas season. However, the song apparently has a much older tradition than 1780 and may have been originally written in French as three French versions of the song are known.

Now Snopes does go on to suggest that "The Twelve Days of Christmas" may be influenced by another song that has definite Christian meaning "A New Dial." It's also called "In Those Twelve Days." This song attributes a Christian meaning to each of the twelve numbers on the dial of a clock. In this song for example, one is for the one God alone. Two is for the two testaments, and three is for the trinity. And in referring to the song "A New Dial" even Snopes goes on to say that it was a common practice to assign Biblical meanings to ordinary objects.

Which brings me to a part of the argument that Snopes appears to miss. That the twelfth night celebrations were Christian celebrations. And even if "The Twelve Days of Christmas" may not have been a Catholic catechism, it very well could have still been a song that assigned Biblical meanings to ordinary objects so that as children played the memory or forfeit game they were also having some of the basic Christian teachings reinforced.

So what are the "secret" meanings of the words? Well here they are.

The "true love" is God. And as mentioned above the partridge is Christ. The other meanings are:

2 Turtle Doves = The Old and New Testaments
3 French Hens = Faith, Hope and Charity, the Theological Virtues
4 Calling Birds = the Four Gospels and/or the Four Evangelists
5 Golden Rings = The first Five Books of the Old Testament, the "Pentateuch", which gives the history of man's fall from grace.
6 Geese A-laying = the six days of creation
7 Swans A-swimming = the seven gifts of the Holy Spirit, the seven sacraments
8 Maids A-milking = the eight beatitudes
9 Ladies Dancing = the nine Fruits of the Holy Spirit
10 Lords A-leaping = the ten commandments
11 Pipers Piping = the eleven faithful apostles
12 Drummers Drumming = the twelve points of doctrine in the Apostle's Creed