Slow down and have fun this Christmas, says Tom Hodgkinson, and the Devil be damned!

The angry Christmas-hating Puritans of the 17th century loved nothing more than a pun on “idle” and “idol”. To indulge in the first was a deadly sin and gave the Devil an opportunity to seduce you. And to worship the second made you into a superstitious, pagan, Popish heathen who was going straight to Hell.

In 1656, the radical preacher Hezekiah Woodward raged against the celebrating of Christmas Day. He called it:

“The old Heathen’s Feasting Day, in honour of Satan their Idol-God, the papist’s Massing Day, the Profane Man’s Ranting Day, the Superstitious Man’s Idol Day, the Multitude’s Idle Day, Satan’s – that Adversary’s – Working Day, the True Christian Man’s Fasting Day… We are persuaded, no one thing hindereth the Gospel work all the year long, than doth the observation of that Idol Day once in a year, having so many days of cursed observation with it.”

The true Christian, we note, far from celebrating Christmas with a party, should abstain from food and drink and, we presume, engage in solemn piety.

Hezekiah Woodward abhorred the day partly because it licensed idling – and that is surely one of the main points of Christmas: it’s a festival during which you are allowed to do nothing.

Yes, I realise that there is a lot of domestic work involved, and present-buying and so on. But if the work is sensibly shared, then everyone in the household should be given a lot of time off, time to play games, watch telly, sleep and drink and dance and sing, rather like that great mates’ Christmas described in Sir Gawain and the Green Knight. At Camelot, says the poet, Christmas went on for over two weeks:

For there the feast was alike full fifteen days,
with all the meat and mirth men could devise:
such clamour and glee glorious to hear
dear din in the daylight, dancing of nights;
all was happiness high in halls and chambers
with lords and ladies

Note the fun that was involved. Men “devised” all sorts of “meat and mirth”, which I take it is a reference to ingenious culinary experiments and the making up of games. This creativity resulted in a glorious clamour and din. It was this 15 days of noise and riot that the Puritans objected to.

You can hear further discussion of these issues in last week’s Radio 4 special on “Idleness” (to which I contributed). Matthew Sweet chaired a lively episode of Free Thinking on this fascinating subject, which you can listen to here.

I hope you have an idle Christmas. And thanks for your support in 2025.

Live well,

Tom

PS This newsletter is taking a break and will be back on 8 January.

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