The Santa Code
  by David Eller, Ph.D.

One of the great mysteries of the ages is-was Santa Claus married? And did he ever have children? There are rumors and references about a "Mrs. Claus," but there is no documentary evidence to support or refute the existence of a wife or any little Clauses for Kris Kringle. All we have is speculation. Some people say Saint Nick was too good, too pure, and too busy to have been a family man, while others say that he was a true proponent of "family values" and as such could and even should have had one of his own. Undoubtedly the debate will go on for a long time.

Is it silly to argue about the marital status and sex life of Father Christmas? Of course. He is a mythical figure, a figment of human imagination. As such, he is neither married nor unmarried. Or perhaps better yet, he is married or unmarried if we say he is. He is our creation; we can do with him what we will.

Now along comes a popular new novel, The Da Vinci Code, built on the premise that the Christian figure of Jesus was really married and had children and that there has been a vast conspiracy to conceal those facts. The book asks, and a flurry of public and official debate has asked, if it is really true. The correct answer is neither yes nor no, but "Santa."

Wondering whether Jesus was married or not, had children or not, is a pointless exercise, exactly equivalent to wondering what toga size Hercules wore, if Adam and Eve had navels or what color their hair was, or what the Easter Bunny does the rest of the year. They are all mythical characters about which there is no "true" information. Adam and Eve were not actual human individuals; the words "Adam" and "Eve" were not even originally proper names but Hebrew words that came to be used as proper names.

Such questions as the marital status and sex life of Jesus or the clothing size of Hercules suffer from three problems. First, they presuppose the unproven-that a being called Jesus or Hercules actually existed. Then, they engage us in impossible speculation, since no data is available to resolve the questions. Finally, they distract us with trivia, taking us away from the really important tasks, such as discerning fact from fantasy.

Some questions are an utter waste of time: "What color is four?" is an example. Some questions are intentionally leading and misleading: "If god did not create you, who did?" is one. Who says anyone created anything? A much more interesting and important question is the one of conspiracy and cover-up and of the need to believe. If Christianity had evidence that there never was a Jesus, or that he did not die, or that he did not rise again, or that there is no heaven and hell, don't you think they would suppress that information? The moral of The Da Vinci Code is not the "facts" about some fictional being but the all-too-human propensity to believe without facts and even to manipulate the facts in defense of the belief. In the end, we humans invent our heroes and create their stories, clinging to them as if they were real.

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