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Monday, 5 January
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Wednesday, 7 January
Beheading of John the Baptist
The Beheading of John the Baptist is commemorated in Christian churches, with varying amounts of ceremony, on 29th August each year, the date on which the Church of St John in Sebaste, Samaria (located at the traditional burial site for St John) was dedicated.
The Beheading of John the Baptist is a biblical story, reported in the Gospels. As is usual in this case, details are very few. Most children who grew up in the Christian tradition will know the story well: St John the Baptist was a preacher in the fire and brimstone style, and he railed against Herod for divorcing his wife to marry his brother's wife, Herodias.
Herod had him arrested and thrown into prison (according to scholars, this was most likely at Machaerus fortress), but did not kill him. It is said that Herod spent time talking to John while he was a prisoner, and found him persuasive and thought-provoking. This state of affairs did not suit his wife Herodias, however.
One evening, Herod threw a feast (not an uncommon event), at which Herodias' daughter - usually referred to as Salome, although there is no evidence that this really was her name - performed a dance. Even by the standards of the day, it seems this was a particularly rousing little number, so much so that Herod promised to give her a gift of her own choosing - with no limit as to value.
Surprised, and with no real clue as to what to ask for, Salome asked her mother, Herodias, for advice - and was told to ask for John the Baptist's head on a plate. Though it seems macabre in the extreme to modern ears, apparently, she returned to the hall and asked for this grisly gift. Herod, afraid of losing face, ordered John's execution, and the presentation of his head on a silver platter, as she had requested.
These are the bare facts as presented in the Gospels. But there are some other snippets which can be picked up in other places.
The historian Josephus states that the execution occurred in order to quell an uprising - which dates it around 36CE. Herod's brother died around 34CE, and he is supposed to have married Herodias after that, which would fit reasonably well. However, as the death of John the Baptist took place before Jesus' Last Passover, in 33CE, there is something wrong with the dates somewhere.
John's disciples took the body and buried it in a tomb, and then reported his death to Jesus. According to St Jerome, Herodias kept the head for a long time, occasionally stabbing the tongue with a dagger. This seems of a piece with the vindictiveness which prompted her to get her daughter to do what she did.
The traditional burial place of John the Baptist was desecrated and burnt by Julian the Apostate, and the remains taken to an abbot in Jerusalem called Philip. There are "relics" in many places. How many of them are really relics is open to conjecture.
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