At a time when so many traditions are crumbling and everything is undergoing such transformation, parliaments are being overthrown, more or less primitive dictatorships are arising, religious problems are being discussed, life's highest, occult or spiritual issues are on occasion being invoked in support of swindle or humbug, when nations are preparing for war and building up their store of armaments to a previously unheard of degree, and the very factors of any real importance for world peace are unpopular, there still remains, amidst this tumultuous confusion, a trace of a voice from the past, an echo of a song from the hills of Palestine: Unto you is born this day a saviour. On Earth peace, good-will toward men.

This divine song and its words would resound over the whole Earth, making its way right into the farthest times and kingdoms. And it is this resounding that, each year with recurring force, in the form of "Christmas" sends its "waves" right up to the present generations in Christian countries. With the ringing of bells, the swell of organ music and Christmas carols it resonates into the very hearts of human beings. It unlocks the great treasure house of memory so that people become jubilant, telling each other about happy experiences from previous Christmases, about meeting kind and loving people, about charitable deeds, presents, festivities and happiness. These are the notes of a song about love. But they are also the undogmatic interpretation of the entry into the history of the Earth of the beginnings of an epoch of love. They are the impartial birthday song for the incipient birth of a world redemption or for the incipient advent of a luminous world morality's confirmation of the great commandment of love: Love one another. They are a reminder of the beginnings of the neutralisation of the principle of killing, of revenge, war and mutilation.

It is therefore not so surprising that all this kindness and all this divine spirit, should penetrate into the mentality of almost everybody, since the vibrations of Christmas have despite everything gradually gained so much influence that, when seen with cosmic sight, they actually constitute a visit for some few hours of nothing less than the true, great "peace on Earth". For a brief while, from the sounding of the first chimes of Christmas until a little after midnight on Christmas Eve,* some of the great peace is visiting the world. For these few hours it seems as if the atmosphere of a higher world really comes closer. This divine atmosphere embraces, permeates and inspires all those people with open minds and loving hearts, all those people who, in contact with both the old and the new world-impulses, are engaged in transforming the Earth into a place where love, peace and true harmony can permanently dwell. But even though it is not directly visible to the physical eye, this atmosphere is nevertheless identical to the true "spirit of Christmas", which is felt by all truly spiritually-minded people, as well as constituting the wonderful atmosphere that on Christmas Eve can be felt to be resting everywhere, whether town or country.

As mentioned earlier, many traditions are at present on the decline, and consequently it will be a question of relevance to many of my readers as to whether Christmas and all its traditions will continue to be maintained and accepted by the world culture that is now coming into being. As a consequence, I have felt compelled to provide a few words of guidance in answer to this question.

In the Christian countries Christmas is celebrated in remembrance of the birth of the world redeemer, Jesus Christ. This birth became the factor that gave rise to the beginnings of an idealism or a morality whose solid contours or most profound analysis pointed towards a one-hundred-percent rejection of the principle: to kill. Consequently, a festival honouring and remembering the birth of such a morality cannot possibly be one-hundred-percent in contact or in harmony with this morality as long as it is not celebrated in a form that depends on a correspondingly one-hundred-percent rejection of killing. This means that to the extent that you celebrate Christmas, whether consciously or unconsciously, on the basis of the principle: to kill, your celebration will to the same degree be the expression of a different world morality than the one you really think you are commemorating, and for which you are actually claiming to celebrate Christmas. And this other world morality will be in direct contrast to the morality of love that teaches you to love everything and everyone, and as such, to the degree that it is manifested on the basis of the principle: to kill, it must be considered as more or less "heathen".

Several weeks prior to Christmas the shops begin to be packed with mutilated, dead animals, beings that have been deprived of a life in healthy, physical bodies, beings that are so far advanced in their physical development that they have the initial qualifications for experiencing marital happiness, together with the joy of being parents that have the ability to love their offspring, at the same time as having the beginnings of an ability to use their bodies to express the nuances of their soul, possessing an embryonic form of "language", these beings are now only a row of corpses destined for human beings' "Christmas dinners". Illuminated in bright, electric light, amidst sparkling Christmas trees, some decorated with shining "Christmas candles", which are in reality symbols of "the holy spirit", we find the severed limbs of pigs, plucked poultry, geese, ducks, hens, turkeys etc. piled high, sometimes artificially dressed up and decorated to look as if the animals are still alive. Why? Is this perhaps done in order to conceal or reduce the impression that we are in fact looking at carcases? Is there perhaps something in the depths of the subconscious that is causing the shopkeeper to think that it would have been better and more beautiful if the animals were still alive?

This article has of course not been written in order to make sarcastic remarks about human beings' attitude towards the Christmas celebrations, but this attitude is still so little advanced and so far from being in harmony with the real or innermost essence of Christmas that a true and impartial analysis of the real facts will inevitably appear somewhat ironical. But I wish to add in this connection that absolutely nobody can be blamed for having such an attitude to the Christmas celebrations. It is the expression of the specific developmental stage that the beings in question are at. And one cannot expect them to give expression to or to manifest details or realities that belong to a developmental plane or step that they have not yet reached. A little child cannot do the work of an adult. And the people in question still do not understand their imperfect attitude towards Christmas, since a recognition of the true analysis of Christmas has never yet been of vital importance to them. The inhabitants of Christian countries all of course know that Christmas is a festival honouring the birth of Jesus. This aspect of the matter is quite simple. But what these people have not fully realized is that this birth was, in reality, the birth of a new form of morality, whose innermost essence was, as mentioned in the first section of this article, "to love one's neighbour as oneself", "to turn the right cheek to him that smites you on the left", to find it "more blessed to give than to receive" and when crucified, whether mentally or physically, or when wronged in any way, to pray: "Father, forgive them, for they know not what they do" and to acknowledge that "greater love hath no one than this: to lay down one's life for one's friends".

It cannot be denied that the birth of the infant Jesus would have had no significance, and would never have become widely known, had he not been a being from a higher world, had he not been a "missionary" from a kingdom that is not of this world, a fact that made it possible for him, in the midst of the zones of darkness and hatred, in a world that is in reality one vast battlefield of bloodshed, to leave behind an example of how to put this morality of light into practice as a practical and theoretical reality, thereby giving it a solid confirmation on Earth as a seed in which all the peoples of the Earth will be blessed.

But even though terrestrial human beings have not yet arrived at the point of being in perfect contact with the moral standard that is commemorated at Christmas, they have nevertheless reached the stage where they are able to perform an infinite number of acts of kindness that are so blessed and so perfectly in contact with the true spirit of Christmas that, as I mentioned earlier, they cause a higher atmosphere to mingle for a few hours with the Earth's otherwise so dark and tragic mental atmosphere, making it so elevated, so pleasant and stimulating, that even people who are less sensitive and rather robust can be affected by it. These manifestations of kindness whereby mankind is in contact with the true standard of Christmas will eventually have come so far that the loving, mental atmosphere that pervades the Christian countries for a few hours on Christmas Eve will be extended further and further so that finally it stretches from one Christmas to the next. These manifestations that contribute to prolonging the true spirit of Christmas consist of all those realities that tend towards loving one's neighbour or truly practising "giving rather than receiving". And it is a symbol of the true Christmas form of existence that we experience in the form of "Christmas gifts". All Christmas gifts that are merely given because it is the custom, or because one has received Christmas gifts oneself and therefore feels obliged to give gifts in return, are not truly given out of love and can therefore in reality be merely a "symbol" of the true gifts. On the other hand, those gifts that are, for example, given to those in need, those gifts that consist of food, clothing and shelter to the poor, homeless and those who have fallen on hard times, be they human or animal, they are the true Christmas gifts. These are gifts that are in harmony with he who gave human beings the story of the good Samaritan, he who taught human beings that "he that is without sin among you, let him first cast a stone", he who gave the greatest gift of love and thereby the greatest Christmas gift possible, namely, to sacrifice of his own life in support of the "salvation" of mankind, that is to say in support of guiding mankind out of the dark zones of ignorance, naivety, superstition, intolerance, hatred and killing, and it is this very guidance that Christmas should rightly be a true remembrance of, both now and in the future.

As you can see from this article, Christmas is a festival of love or a festival commemorating the initial stages of the abolition of the killing principle, and as a result all those things connected with this festival that stimulate or promote this principle will not survive, but will "die out" or decline with the advancement of the new world-culture. Among the traditions that will be the first to "die out" will be Christmas dinners consisting of meat and fish. But the feelings and the sensibilities of human beings will steadily become more and more refined and will lead to the fir tree no longer being used as a Christmas tree, since people will eventually not be able to avoid feeling it to be a desecration to use the Christmas festivity as an opportunity for slaughtering plant-life in its prime. And one will eventually react in the same way towards the use of ordinary "Christmas candles", because also here it will be seen as wrong to celebrate the abolition of the killing principle by inflicting on the life-units in the candles an extremely unpleasant and unnatural death by burning such candles**.

I hope that you will be able to understand that this article is in no way intended as an injunction against meat-eating or the traditional form of Christmas trees and candles etc.; it is an objective and unambiguous analysis of some of the most important details in the process of refinement that Christmas celebrations will undergo as mankind progresses in its evolution. I therefore accept that acquiring this analysis is, on every point, completely a matter of conscience or something that everyone absolutely has to decide for him or herself. It cannot therefore be imposed on any being, but is intended solely for those people who think that they can learn from it. I therefore ask all my readers to receive this article as a friendly Christmas greeting together with my heartfelt thanks for all the support that, through your subscription to Kosmos, you have given to my work over the past year.

* In Denmark Christmas Eve is the highpoint of the Christmas celebrations.