Christmas, both the historical event described in Holy Scripture, when the eternal son of God was incarnated as Jesus the Messiah, and the church’s annual celebration of that blessed event with “tidings of comfort and joy,” has been an inspiration not only to preachers, but to poets, painters, and composers for centuries. Some second commandment strictures aside, we continue to be blessed by many of their efforts with aesthetic pleasure and spiritual edification. By far one of the most unusual poetic reflections on the Christmas event is “The Burning Babe” by English poet Robert Southwell (c. 1561–1595). Its truth is as penetrating to the heart as its imagery is disturbing to the imagination.

The poem (see below) is comprised of four sentences: The first introduces us to the poet’s situation and startling vision. The second and third contain the Babe’s explanation of what the poet sees. The fourth returns us to the poet’s situation as the vision disappears and he comes to realize the importance of it all.

The Poet’s Situation and Startling Vision

The setting is a “hoary winter’s night.”  The poet is not trying to place his experience in December’s “bleak midwinter.” (Despite the tradition, we do not know the season of Christ’s birth.) Rather, the external coldness of the setting is a reflection of the poet’s view of his own heart—and those of his readers. Here we are called to take note that, by nature, we are all spiritually “shivering in the snow” of unbelief and indifference.

The poet’s vision is felt before it is seen—“Surpris’d I was with sudden heat which made my heart to glow.” An external heat suddenly (and surprisingly) touches the inward person of the heart. We—for now we readers are one with the poet—look to see the source of this unnatural warmth. Such an unexpected blast of heat understandably provokes a sense of danger. We anticipate a threat—like a dragon swooping in with fiery breath to incinerate us! But, no. Instead,

lifting up a fearful eye to view what fire was near,
A pretty Babe all burning bright did in the air appear;

No threat from such a “pretty Babe,” but wait—the baby itself is on fire (“in fiery heats I fry”)—and yet not consumed! (In that day, “pretty” meant something small and precious rather than attractive.)

As one might expect, the baby is crying “floods of tears” by reason of the excessive, burning heat. But instead of putting out the fire, the Babe’s tears feed the flames.

Who, scorched with excessive heat, such floods of tears did shed
As though his floods should quench his flames which with his tears were fed.

The suffering of this heavenly Babe seems only to intensify his sorrows. What is going on? This is no ordinary reality. It is a portent, full of meaning.

The Babe Speaks

“‘Alas!’ quoth he, ‘but newly born, in fiery heats I fry.’” We are led to the heart of the poem and the poet’s message for us. The fires that burn so intensely, and afflict the Babe so, are the flames of a purifying furnace. It has been stoked and fanned to melt and refine the defiled souls of men. This is the “work” of cleansing and transformation—a work, however painful, that will bring us good.

The metal in this furnace wrought are men’s defiled souls,
For which, as now on fire I am to work them to their good,

The furnace also gives off a wondrous heat, by which one might warm oneself. But alas, the Babe laments that no one is willing to come near him and be so warmed.

The allegory of the furnace is then explained, element by element.
My faultless breast the furnace is, the fuel wounding thorns,
Love is the fire, and sighs the smoke, the ashes shame and scorns;
The fuel Justice layeth on, and Mercy blows the coals,

What a startling, wonderful picture is evoked by that last line, bringing the justice and mercy of God together to service the furnace that will accomplish the work of our salvation!

Here we have compressed in three lines and their striking imagery the biblical doctrine of atonement. This heavenly Babe has been sent to burn away from fallen hearts all the guilt and corruption of sin.

Then abruptly the imagery changes from a furnace to the molten product: “So will I melt into a bath to wash them in my blood.”

The New Testament makes frequent mention of the blood of Jesus Christ as the instrument of God’s cleansing our guilt, the costly price paid to pardon our offenses. “Without the shedding of blood there is no forgiveness” is a principle well established by the sacrificial system of the law of Moses (Heb. 9:22). Jesus is the final sacrifice of atonement, his blood “precious . . . like that of a lamb without blemish or spot” (1 Pet. 1:19). This blood alone can “purify our conscience from dead works to serve the living God” (Heb. 9:14). We are thus “justified by his blood” (Rom. 5:9).

For the poet, the faultless breast of the infant Savior is melted down by supernatural flames into a bloody bath that washes away our sin. An almost grotesque picture that nevertheless speaks the comforting truth of the gospel—“the blood of Jesus his Son cleanses us from all sin” (1 John 1:7).

The Vision Departs and the Poet Reflects

With this he vanish’d out of sight and swiftly shrunk away,
And straight I called unto mind that it was Christmas day.

The visionary Babe vanishes as quickly as he had appeared. We are left in puzzled amazement at what we (through the poet’s imagination) have felt, seen, then heard. The last line brings Jesus’s self-sacrificing, atoning, purifying work together, not with Good Friday or Easter, but with Christmas.

The “true meaning of Christmas” that so many traditionalists are zealous to guard has everything to do with our need as sinners, and God’s provision through the death of his Son.

The metaphysical wonder that is the incarnation of the eternal Son of God is not an end in itself. It was a necessary step in the accomplishment of salvation by the triune God. As the author of Hebrews explains, “Since therefore the children share in flesh and blood, he himself likewise partook of the same things. . . . Therefore he had to be made like his brothers in every respect, so that he might become a merciful and faithful high priest in the service of God, to make propitiation for the sins of the people. . . . We have been sanctified through the offering of the body of Jesus Christ once for all” (2:14–17; 10:10).

The writing of the sixteenth-century English metaphysical poets, including Southwell, is not everyone’s cup of tea. The imagery is often so unusual, even shocking, as to be off-putting. But sometimes it is good for us to be shaken out of our sleepy contemplations about everything to do with Christmas.

The gracious Babe of the poem laments, “Yet none approach to warm their hearts or feel my fire but I!” No wonder. We’ve heard it all before. We can be left hardened by the very celebrations that are intended to express our gratitude and devotion. Perhaps a poetic shock is in order.

Robert Southwell reminds us that by nature we all live “in hoary winter’s night . . . shivering in the snow” of our spiritual deadness and indifference. The “burning Babe” has appeared and invites you to come and warm yourself at his fire. That is, believe in him. Trust in his blood to take away your sins. Give thanks. And remember this is why he came that first Christmas Day.   

The author is pastor of Bayview OPC in Chula Vista, California.

The Burning Babe

by Robert Southwell

As I in hoary winter’s night stood shivering in the snow,
Surpris’d I was with sudden heat which made my heart to glow;
And lifting up a fearful eye to view what fire was near,
A pretty Babe all burning bright did in the air appear;
Who, scorched with excessive heat, such floods of tears did shed
As though his floods should quench his flames which with his tears were fed.
“Alas!” quoth he, “but newly born, in fiery heats I fry,
Yet none approach to warm their hearts or feel my fire but I!
My faultless breast the furnace is, the fuel wounding thorns,
Love is the fire, and sighs the smoke, the ashes shame and scorns;
The fuel Justice layeth on, and Mercy blows the coals,
The metal in this furnace wrought are men’s defiled souls,
For which, as now on fire I am to work them to their good,
So will I melt into a bath to wash them in my blood.”
     With this he vanish’d out of sight and swiftly shrunk away,
     And straight I called unto mind that it was Christmas day.

New Horizons, December 2022.