Does your tradition or religion teach anything about the "real" Saint Nicholas? If so, what?

Answer 1

Here is a nice booklet for giveaway on the life of Nicholas, the Wonderworker of Myra.

He is interesting for a number of reasons. His life overlapped both the Christian persecutions and the peace of Constantine. His image is purposefully deleted from icons of the first Council at Nicaea because he punched Arius during the deliberations and was expelled. However, this may be legend since his name does not appear in the lists of bishops attending. About all we know for sure is that he was the bishop of Myra.

He appears to have been reasonably wealthy and used the wealth to provide for the poor of his diocese. The gifts in the stockings appear to have a basis in fact, as well as the naughty or nice story though not in the way we use it. It appears that Nicholas gave away substantial amounts to a particular village and rather than be open and freely giving with one another, they behaved greedily.

In the following year, he brought a bag of stuff for the town, but came in the clothes of a poor old man carrying a heavy burden. He asked passers by to help him carry it, but everyone was too busy, except one person carrying logs back to town, who put down his logs to carry Nicholas' burden and then return to get his logs. When the man returned to town, Nicholas announced to the town that he brought gifts, but only one man was charitable enough to help him, so he gave the entire bag to the log carrier.

There are a variety of miracles associated with Nicholas including two variant stories on a pending execution in which Nicholas intercedes with the Emporer, as both men are innocent. It turns out, it is later discovered the men were innocent and so the story has a happier ending than had it occured AFTER they were executed.

Answer 2

In addition to the link below what I teach my duaghter of Saint Nicholaus was that his coloars represent elements of the gospel. The red stand for the blood Jesus shed and the white is that we are cleansed as white as snow. All of the aspects of the santa story including the tree and decorations have truthful elements to them. The candy Cane is in the shape of a shepherd's crook which represents Jesus our great Shepherd and of course we know what the whiote andd red mean. The tree is an Evergreen which represents our eternal life won over by Jesus who was nailed to a tree or timber. The gold and silver represents our rewards of heaven laden with streets of gold and is as precious as silver. I love the story of our patron saint and his generosity to give to those impoverished.

Answer 3

In the 50's, in Germany, he was very popular to teach about. Our Christmas's were always revolved around St. Nick
I have watched him morphed into a joke. Losing the meaning of his giving nature. Now I don't celebrate or believe.
But I have memories of a happier, simpler time, in my early years.

Answer 4

What's there to teach about him? He was a bishop end of story.

Answer 5

Yeah, he was a hero of the faith. (Christianity -- guaranteed to work from here to eternity)