To use a nativity set that is not ethnically accurate?

[Yellownotblue]

Old fashioned nativity sets typically have the family as white, and the three kings as Asian/brown/black. The black wise man is literally black.

We are a mixed heritage household, but the nativity set doesn’t bother me as that’s what I grew up with. Would it make you wince, or am I okay to use it? Not that I’m planning to have any guests at Christmas, judgemental or otherwise - it just got me thinking.

YANBU: it’s okay to use the set
YABU: don’t use it

Jesus was born in part of the Roman Empire (Augustus? Tiberius?), ruled by Herod as governor

We're told the RE was multi ethnic, even to its extreme borders, so I dont think it would matter if all the figures are blue eyed and blonde, or all are black, or whatever ethnicity. Maybe they were all Chinese or from Germanica or Nubia, and had moved to Bethlehem a generation earlier or nomads visiting

Not that up on remembering Mathew Mark, Luke and John etc really but I dont think it matters too much

@Flaxmeadow, for some reason this has reminded of the old joke:

“Letter from the Corinthians to Saint Paul

Please stop writing to us. The mailbox says No Circulars.”

YANBU, and frankly I can’t even believe you’re asking.

How ludicrously woke has our culture become when people are frightened to use their own nativity sets?!

@VestaTilley, thank you for your view.

I don’t think it’s unreasonable to ask if it might cause offence. Would you give a child your old golliwog doll? Decorate your house in Banania adverts?

The consensus seems to be that it’s fine to use the nativity set. I suspect in 20 years’ time people will find it offensive. In the meantime I will keep using it, but I’m prepared to put it away as and when attitudes change.

@picklemewalnuts

Everyone except possibly the wise men (who travelled from afar) would be semitic in appearance.

This.

Mary, Joseph, and Jesus were Jewish.
So the set could be accurate afterall.
I think there are some blonde haired blue eyed Jews?

My cat stole the Baby Jesus from ours so we used a Lego replacement. We found the OG recently and realised he looks like Bod.🤷

I bought one from Tesco. It has two baby Jesus figures. Ethnicity seems irrelevant in the face of that revelation.

@safariboot

And in Catalonia, they include a man doing a crap .

I bought a pooping man xmas decoration when I was on holiday and it takes pride of place on my tacky tree.

Best option for a nativity set is Star Wars figures. Most of them have helmets on or are droids so they could be any race.

We gave away a traditional one a few years ago and bought a more accurate one. I’m a Christian and it’s important to me that my children don’t subconscious pick up wrong ideas about Jesus as some sort of white saviour who would probably worship in a mega church and support Trump . He was a Middle Eastern refugee carpenter who spoke repeatedly about the hypocrisy of the religious right of the time and that we should care most about the poor.

I’ve just brought the Lakeland advent nativity calendar I’ll be using it every year.

I think Nativity sets tend to echo the region or culture you’ve purchased it in.

Mine is a pretty European-centric/CofE variant (white, brunette Mary, bearded Joseph, Wise Men are of African & Middle Eastern skin tones, no coal black Kings in sight. Camels, donkeys, sheep. And a few added characters from places I’ve worked around the World.

Ours also contains The Christmas Stegosaurus. He appeared over 20 years ago. It’s best not to ask.

Does it really matter that much?

@justicedanceson

We gave away a traditional one a few years ago and bought a more accurate one. I’m a Christian and it’s important to me that my children don’t subconscious pick up wrong ideas about Jesus as some sort of white saviour who would probably worship in a mega church and support Trump . He was a Middle Eastern refugee carpenter who spoke repeatedly about the hypocrisy of the religious right of the time and that we should care most about the poor.

I don't disagree with your sentiment. But just wrt accuracy, many Middle Eastern people are white skinned. I don't believe Jesus was a refugee either? They were simply visiting their home town for the census. That aside, yes the message is the most important.

@CentrifugalBumblePuppy
I NEED a Christmas stegosaurus!

my memory of our childhood set is a very white Mary with bright rosy red cheeks. I wouldn't be over bothered by it.
I don't think our set had animals, or not many, so I supplemented it with animals from the farm set - which had got a bit mixed up with zoo animals, so our nativity always had a growing collection of lions, elephants and my favourite sealion.

You’re right at the time of his birth he wasn’t but as a child he was a refugee in Egypt.

There are lighter skinned people in the Middle East but in the vast majority they are not blond and blue eyed as often portrayed in the nativity scene.

I don’t think it’s socially unacceptable or anything so YANBU to use it, just explaining my thinking why we don’t anymore.

I think that the Roman Empire was very multiethnic. I’m sure there were fair, blue eyed folks around but I reckon most people would be of fairly olive complexion with dark hair and eyes. The Jesus in my Children’s bible had incredible fair hair and blue eyes. Of course, all the Apostles had fair skin, hair and blue eyes too, except Judas, who had dark hair, dark eyes and olive skin. I don’t think that people, ordinary people, would have travelled too far though. So probably married fairly close to home.
I get that a childhood crib set would be a sentimental thing of course, and I think you’d have to be incredibly looking to be offended by it.

JemimaDuddlepuckkk

Cheddar Man was 10,000 + years ago but that's not how the Roman's 2,000 years ago described all North Western Europeans.

Its ironic that we see constant references in papers like the Guardian as to how multi ethnic and diverse Roman's in Britain were but when it's suggested opposite far reaches of the empire might have been diverse, that's considered offensive

@SheepandCow

1. Have son that’s bonkers about dinosaurs 2) Try to argue against said son that while yes, if at Sunday School he learned God made all things, they wouldn’t be around at the time Jesus was born (as we believe in evolution too)
2. Lose argument when son’s eyes fill with tears & his lip begins to wobble
3. Christmas stegosaurus is born.

Feeling glum so out the decs up at the weekend. Here’s Steggie, with the Wise Men.

I also have 2 Jesuses (Jesi? Not sure of the plural) when combining sets after The Nativity Massacre of 2003 involving a smug cat & a hardwood floor.

CentrifrugalBumble

And what a bookshelf backdrop your Nativity has. Very eclectic.

“Mary and Joseph, Steggie and their twin Jesu’ pass through Sodom on the way home to Nazareth, where the Marquis de Sade offers them a dungeon for the night....”

All our angels have red hair. Because, as everyone knows, red heads are angelic beings (if you’ve ever listened to Old Harry’s Game).

Our nativity is wood too so there isn’t any colour.

Explain to your kids that it's a colour blind set.

God came to earth in flesh incarnate, as a human baby, in the most momentous event in history - and you seriously think the important bit is what colour His face was?!
I knitted a set of nativity figures when my DC were toddlers. They’re 30 now, and the grubby old figures still make their appearance every Christmas, as a much loved tradition.
I only had enough brown wool scraps for the Magi’s faces and the shepherds’ sacking robes, so the holy family’s faces were made of left over white from knitting the sheep. They look like anaemic albinos, but are just representative of figures whose actual appearance we will never know until we meet them in heaven!
OP, and everyone- just enjoy your timeless nativity sets and your lovely family traditions. Anyone who zooms in on the skin colour is spectacularly missing the point of it all.

You can buy one carved out of olive wood without any painting on. Looks a bit more abstract.