Poor younglings

Today’s Advent piece brings up the dark side of the Nativity story—the part that’s usually left out of the festivities.

On their journey following the star, the three Wise Men stopped for a spell in Jerusalem and asked King Herod for directions to where they might find the child about to be born who would rule the world. This turned out to be a costly mistake, because Herod—so the Gospels tell us—followed the time-honored Middle Eastern custom of ensuring security of his administration by ordering the slaughter of all male children up to two years of age in the vicinity of Bethlehem. (Joseph was warned by an angel, and he, Mary and Jesus fled to Egypt, where the government did not separate them or put them in cages.)

(On a side note, imagine Mary, having just endured an uncomfortable journey from Nazareth to Bethlehem and given birth to her first child, must have felt having to pick up and run all the way to Egypt. No returning to the comfort of her home and the support of friends. She's got to manage with a newborn, on that dag-blamed donkey for hundreds of miles, to a strange country where she doesn't speak the language, and where the hell is she going to get diapers? We should really hear more about this.)

“Coventry Carol” is from a mystery play put on annually in the city of Coventry. Not sure about the precise date, but it was documented in the 16^th Century. It’s the only song to survive from that particular play, and it was sung by three women, representing all the mothers trying to reassure the children they knew were doomed.

I’m giving you two versions. The first is pretty traditional, from the Irish choral group Anúna.

This version, by Annie Lennox and the African Children’s Choir is…different.