The True Meaning of "Christmas"

'Tis the reason for the season.

In “Christmas” (Word Ways #6.4, 1973), a tongue-in-cheek Darryl Francis wrote, “Many people tend to lose sight of the true meaning of Christmas. In an effort to instill into the minds of our readers some contemplative thoughts about Christmas, we offer the following list of things that Christmas means to us. Naturally, as a logologist, we checked the word Christmas in a number of references to gain some idea as to its true range of meaning…”

Following Darryl’s example, I present my own findings from 2024 resources. Christmas is:

• A festival or holiday commemorating the birth of Jesus Christ and incorporating various Christian, pre-Christian, pagan, and secular customs, usually celebrated on December 25.

• The larger “Christmas season,” running through the lead-up to December 25 and sometimes a few days after.

• A twelve-day period beginning on December 25.

• A quarter-day celebration in England, Wales, and Ireland.

• An uninhabited mining community in Gila County, Arizona.

• A census-designated place in Orange County, Florida.

• An unincorporated community in Au Train Township, Alger County, Michigan.

• An unincorporated community in Bolivar County, Mississippi.

• A first name or last name, as seen in real-life figures like Christmas Humphreys and Stephen Christmas and in movie characters like Bond girl Christmas Jones and Jim Carrey’s comical doofus Lloyd Christmas.

• Christmas-style decorations.

• Red and green.

• Having a sauce made with red (ripe) and green (unripe) chili peppers (chiefly in New Mexico).

• To decorate with Christmas-style decorations.

• To celebrate Christmas.

• To spend Christmas or the Christmas season someplace special.

• To subject to Christmas celebrations.

• Numerous albums, EPs, and songs, including a Cher album from last year and songs from The Who and many others.

• The birth of Jesus Christ, or the day on which it occurred.

A few other quick notes about the word Christmas:

The “t” in it—that is to say, the letter that most closely resembles the cross—is silent. Fill in your own social commentary about that.

As long as you’re in a social-commentary mood, note that Christmas contains the TM symbol.

Some people pronounce the “Xmas” abbreviation like “Christmas,” some pronounce it as “exmuss.”

Christmas has a secret rhyme: isthmus. I say “secret” because a lot of eye-readers probably think isthmus is pronounced with no silent letters—I did too until I looked into it.

One letter different: CHRISTMASTIDE and CHRISTMASTIME have similar enough meanings that I used them in a “Schrodinger” crossword once, as two different possible answers for the same clue.

Although Wiktionary lists the only Christmas anagram as Chartisms, I think a more useful one is mischarts. The aptest anagram is probably its charms.

A Christmas lipogram: Artistic trim, star. Charismatic Aramaic matriarch. Arctic tarmac. Ham, rich hash. Crass cash-aim, cash-thirst attracts critics. (Mithras?)

Ambigram by Brett Gilbert:

Mirror ambigram by Punya Mishra:

Tomorrow: What time is it when it looks like an elephant sat on your phone? Time to get a new phone…and a new way of looking at the world!