Rän Qiu asked Zhongni, saying,
‘Can it be known
how it was before heaven and earth?’

The reply was,
‘It can. It was the same of old as now…

[Zhongni] Was that which was produced before Heaven and Earth a thing?
That which made things and gave to each its character was not itself a thing.
Things came forth and could not be before things,
as if there had (previously) been things;
– as if there had been things (producing one another) without end.

Zhuangzi by Zhuang Zhou, trans. By James Legge

The Adam and Eve story in the book of Genesis is an origin story.  The Nativity story in Matthew’s Gospel and Luke’s Gospel are origin stories.  There are two versions.  Origin stories are told from different angles of view and it is not surprising that various versions convey different, but important points.  Matthew’s Gospel features the Magi, astrologer/mathematicians who traveled some distance to give gifts to the infant who was no longer kept in a manger.  I assume the Magi were into geometry since this is the oldest branch of mathematics.

An origin is a point of beginning.  The quotation from the Zhuangzi concerns a question asked about how things were before “the beginning.”  To the student’s question the teacher replies, if I could paraphrase, “about the same as they are now.”

The story of St. Nick, a rotund, kindly, bearded senior male who gives gifts to children, gifts which they open on Christmas day, –is another origin story.  The Magi after all journeyed to present valuable gifts to an infant. 

If we choose to wonder about things before the beginning, — the beginning is the beginning.  We are left with the world that we know, that of cause and effect, getting old, will-to-power, kindness and gift giving.  This “mixed bag” derives from the origin.

How about a song to light our way onward toward the solstice, and to Christmas Eve several days afterward? This by Bruce Springsteen, is a gritty story, a story that lights me up.  Santa Claus Is Comin’ To Town.