John Milton’s “On The Morning of Christ's Nativity,” also known as the "Nativity Ode," is a poem about the birth of Christ, and also a poem about the birth of a poet. When Milton wrote the poem in 1629, he was 21 and had not yet published a collection of poems. In many ways, the “Nativity Ode” is about the poet preparing to leap into the world and begin his career. The poem’s chronology constantly jumps forward and pulls back, as Milton imagines everything that Christ will bring, then recalls that he is still an infant in a manger. As he describes the world anticipating the birth of Christ, he is also describing his own sense of anticipation—his eagerness to begin his life’s work. Though the “Nativity Ode” was not the first poem Milton wrote, in many ways it marked the beginning of his career. When Milton published his first collection of poetry in 1645, he placed the “Nativity Ode” at the beginning of the book, as if to say that it was the first page in his literary life, the poem from which all the rest were born.
During the seventeenth century, it was common for poets to write odes celebrating the birth of Christ. Some of the most famous ones were written by Ben Johnson, Torquato Tasso, and Robert Herrick. Most of them were shorter than Milton’s ode, and focused on the miracle of Christ’s birth and Mary’s love for her son. Though Milton hits both of these themes in his ode, they aren’t the focus of the poem. Milton is more interested in the history of Christianity, and the role the birth of Christ plays in it: his poem is about the capacity of a single person to change the world.
As Milton writes about how Christ served humanity, he’s also concerned with his own service—his sense of obligation to England. Milton was deeply involved in politics, and would later put his poetic career on hold during the English Civil Wars to write political pamphlets against King Charles. At the time Milton wrote the “Nativity Ode,” the wars were just beginning. The English parliament resented King Charles for attempting to create taxation laws without their approval, and for bringing ceremony back into the church. One month before Milton wrote the “Nativity Ode,” King Charles called parliament to ask for money to fund his wars, and the parliament refused. It was the first in a chain of events that eventually led the parliament to execute the king.
In the “Nativity Ode,” Milton is deeply enmeshed in his political moment. Though he’s writing about the birth of Christ, he constantly takes his reader from the manger to the English court with the language of statebuilding. The wars were only beginning at the time Milton wrote the “Nativity Ode,” but his poem looks forward to what a revolution against King Charles might bring. One of the enduring themes of the “Nativity Ode,” and the rest of Milton’s work, is whether revolution can bring about change. As Milton imagines Christ’s place in Christian history, he’s hopeful that one event—the birth of Christ—can change everything. In Milton’s retelling of the nativity scene, the birth of Christ is a model for revolutionaries, and a roadmap for his own life’s work.
