Does Santa exist?

Our tour on the 6th of December traced along the footsteps of German Christmas traditions, examining their traces in Leipzig. We took a fresh look at the christian and non-christian roots of traditions, markets, music, and myths — with a golden thread provided by Eric Kaplan’s quest concerning the existence of Santa: »Does Santa exist?«

What are your Christmas traditions?

The excursion started on the Hugo Gaudig square in front of the Old St. Peter’s Church. We started by briefly commemorating Gaudig’s 165th birthday on December 5, and his eminent contributions to reform pedagogics, school reformation, and the education of women after he came to Leipzig in 1900.

Then we set the scene for our main topic based on a Christmas tradition that started merely 30 years ago, Der Andere Advent. A initiative established an alternative Christmas calendar that strives to give Advent a different form amid its usual glitter and commercialism. It uses words and images to create a space for silence, depth, and anticipation. An impression of its approach was provided by an ad hoc translation of present years entry page

We cast a light up into the sky
We cast perspectives into souls, friendliness into hearts
We listen
At times we say a word
or we fry an egg for somebody in need
or we repair his bike, just like this
We take our time
with the sky above
and the ground below.
At times rain is dripping through the roof.
The wind is cleaning dust from the shelves.
Soon snow will be falling.
We are cold.

BIRGIT MATTAUSCH

But, what does Advent mean? The four lights may symbolize seasons, or the moon phases! The winter was the time of completing the old and the birth of the new year. Since long the 12 days of mismatch between the sun and the moon year — the time around the winter solstice — was a time to pause commemorating death and renewal. In ancient German customs they are known as Rauhnächte, and no German who is following the old customs would ever do laundry during this season.

We also stick to other strange habits in the Western world, like making children believe in Santa. Do we lie when we tell them about Santa? It is a while lie to provide the small with a happy childhood? …or a malicious misled and toxic approach of indoctrination, as advocated by Alice Miller? …or do we still believe in Santa? …maybe not conciously, but still deep in our hearts or in our subconscious minds? With his mind-boggling book, »Does Santa Exist?«, the script writer and trained philosopher Eric Kaplan explored these questions from the perspective of our modern living circumstances, old and not-so-old philosophical ideas. Hence, we provided our participants with a task for the way to the next site: Exchange ideas, impressions, and insights about your childhood experiences, and the side that you presently take in this debate.

Passing on and tempering with traditions

Religious traditions travel through space at time. and the importance of role models and peer pressure is often seriously underestimated when looking at our own believes.

Passing on traditions to other countries was beautifully illustrated at the site of the Institute of British Studies of Leipzig University: The German tradition of Christmas trees in Britain, is commonly connected to Prince Albert of Saxe-Coburg and Gotha — the royal consort of Queen Victoria. The evolution of our believes in the course of our life can be discussed based on Charles Dickens’ »Christmas Carol«.

On the other side of the block, in the Academy of Fine Arts Leipzig (HGB) we discussed the impact of our environment on (the transformation of) our beliefs. This was illustrated by Victor Klemperer’s keen observations in his »LTI – Lingua Tertii Imperii« where he describes how the change of language in Nazi Germany affected also his personal perception of language. The active intervention of the Nazi government was discussed by revisiting Sven Bergelt’s 2022 multimedia art installation »Großer Gott wir loben dich – Eine Relektüre« that addressed the editing of the hymnal of the protestant church by the »Institute for the Study and Elimination of Jewish Influence on German Church Life«.

The actions of the Nazi government were further elaborated in front of the HGB with concrete examples about the rewriting of Christmas carols, the implementation of new Christmas carols, and rules about the appropriate decoration of Christmas trees. The Nazis strifed to systematically replace symbols and notions with Christian or Jewish connotations by counterparts derived from Germanic mythology.

In their implementation of propaganda they meticulously made use of psychological advertisement strategies that were implemented in the US by Sigmund Freud’s nephew Edward L. Bernays (1890–1995). He became famous for his campaigns to transform cigarette smoking into a symbol of women’s independence. A similar advertisement campaign established the presently adopted outfit of Santa Claus in an effort to establish Coca Cola as a winter drink.

Bach: his music, his life, his legacy.

In front of the Saxonian Academy of Sciences we addressed another centerpiece of German Christmas traditions: Nativity plays, Singspiele, Christmas cantatas, and Christmas oratorios. Arguably the most famous of the latter was written by Johann Sebastian Bach in 1734 as part of his duties as a Thomas cantor. In his life he fathered twenty children. Ten of them survived to adulthood. Four of his six surviving sons became eminent composers. The BACH research portal aims at providing an innovative documentation of the life and the reception of the Bach music family from its origins till 1810. It has been claimed that the some of the anguish about the death of his children found its way into the profoundly moving music he composed.

It appears to be virtually impossible to comprehend the living circumstances of a person like Bach who left a vast and relatively well-documented heritage merely 300 years ago. Why are we so confident then about the aftereffects of a person, St. Nicholas, who lived one and a half millennia earlier than Bach? How can we decide in a rational way what to tell? What to call out as a lie? In front of the Anna Magdalena Bach school we learned about the ethical and epistemological problems involved in these choices. The idea was illustrated with the »Dragon in My Garage«-argument that was put forward for instance by Carl Sagan in his book »The Demon-Haunted World — Science as a candle in the dark«. Subsequently, we scrutinized the physics of Santa.

Hidden influences: from the advent of commerce to Babylon

On our way to the city center we met Santa in the Petersbogen shopping arcade — in spite of the overwhelming scientific evidence against his existence! He appeared to be not hurried at all, and made a strong cause in favor of maintaining Santa as a Christmas holiday institution.

After this astounding exchange we proceeded to the Städtisches Kaufhaus, a monument with a commercial history of ample 500 years. At that time Leipzig established itself as a emporium of (international) trade. Landed gentry used the calmer winter period for a trip to Leipzig to buy household goods, textiles and clothing; and to visit the theater and concerts. The first building on the site was erected in the late 14-hundreds as a garment house, a trading post of foreign cloth merchants. 250 years later a new building was erected that hosted the first city library, and subsequently this structure was rebuilt into the first concert hall of the Gewandhaus Orchestra. It is attributed as the oldest civic concert orchestra, and it is and always has been one of the preeminent orchestras in the world, with a long list of famous music directors (e.g., Felix Mendelssohn, Wilhelm Furtwängler, Kurt Masur), commissioned music and first performances, like Beethoven’s Piano Concerto No. 5, Schubert’s Great Symphony, Wagner’s overture to The Mastersingers of Nuremberg, and Brahms’ A German Requiem. In 1884 the orchestra moved to a new larger venue, was designed by Martin Gropius, and the building was converted into the first exhibition premise of the new trade fair.

In the courtyard of the building we explored how the Leipziger “Positivistenkreis”, a circle of leading scholars of the university at the verge of the 20th century, might have approached the dispute concerning Santa’s existence, and then we contrasted their positivism with a deep dive into mythology: Connecting emergence and decay in nature with seasons of the year, with phases of the Moon, with menstruation cycles — connecting it to pregnancy, birth, growing up, growing old, death and rebirth — and representing of the waning of the old and emerging of the new by the coming together of an old man and a newborn child — very much in the spirit of the iconography of Joseph with the new-born Jesus.

On the way out of the passage we took a look at the portraits of Ostwald, and the memorial plaque of Wund — two eminent members of the “Positivistenkreis”.

Refugees and displaced persons, their education, and impact

The final topics addressed on the tour involved the mindset of European intellectuals and political figures towards the intellectual capacities and legal status of people who were not conceived as members of their circles. Arguably this played a mayor role in the Wars of the Reformation in the 16th and 17th century, the battles with the Ottoman Empire at that time, and the policies established towards the management of European colonies.

Cafe Riquet in Leipzig is a landmark that reminds us about the role of Leipzig’s merchants in colonial trade, and the Reformed Church about the enormous amounts of persons displaced by the wars. The church was the home of Huguenot community in Leipzig that maintained its language and traditions for far more than a century, and contributed to its rich cultural and industrial heritage till far into the 20th century. They are a prime example how a refugee family — like the holy family in their escape from the Massacre of the Innocents — seeks shelter and education in a foreign country, and how it makes an impact on the evolution of the country upon return.

We are immensely grateful to the participants who shared many experiences and ideas — and to Patrick McCafferty (TU Chemnitz) and Elmar Schenkel (Leipzig University) for joining the tour and generously sharing their vast knowledge about Mythology and the history of knowledge in Leipzig.
It was an amazing tour!

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• Guided Tour
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• 2025