Doctrine of Halloween
A. Halloween's Origins
1.
Halloween's origins date back to the early Celtic civilization. The Celts, who
occupied
2.
The Celts observed their New Year on November 1, which marked the end of the
harvest and summer (“the season of the sun”), as well as the beginning of the
cold, dark winter ahead (“the season of darkness and cold”).
3.
The celebration was known as Samhain (in English pronounced, sow-in), where the Gaelic
pronunciation of "mh" in the middle of a
word was "w". The term derives from the name of the month in the
ancient Celtic calendar marking the end of summer. It is also a reference to
the pagan "lord of the dead", who would assemble the souls of those
who had died during the previous year and decide what form they would take for
the next year. The souls would either pass on to human bodies or would be
condemned to live within animals (the most evil of the bad souls or spirits
would take the form of cats). Hoping to coax Samhain
into giving lighter sentences, the Celtic worshippers tried to bribe him with
gifts and prayers.
a) Who is the “lord of the dead”?
God tells us about Samhain "the lord of the
dead" in
b) Today, Jesus Christ is Lord of
the Dead! In order to make the resurrection possible, “Christ died and rose and
lived again, that He might be Lord of both the dead and the living” (Rom 14:9).
Christ became the Lord and Master of the dead through His resurrection, and
gained the keys of the grave and death (
4. Samhain was celebrated before and
after the arrival of Christianity, when they had finished the last of their
harvesting, and butchered their excess stock (so the surviving animals would
have enough food to make it through the winter). They held great feasts, had
large bond fires, invited their (deceased) ancestors to join them, decorated
family graves, told ghost stories, and went house to house in search of cakes,
nuts or fruit.
5. The day before Samhain
is the last day of summer (or the old year) and the day after Samhain is the first day of winter (or of the New Year).
Being “between” seasons or years, Samhain was
considered a magical time, when the dead walk among the living and the veils
between past, present and future may be lifted in prophecy and divination.
6. Many important mythological events are said to have occurred on
that day. Many of these events had to do with the temporary victory of the
forces of darkness over those of light, signaling the beginning of the cold and
dark half of the year.
7. The Encyclopedia
Britannica says the following: “Samhain (Celtic:
‘End of Summer’), one of the most important and sinister calendar festivals of
the Celtic year. At Samhain, held on November 1, the
world of the gods was believed to be made visible to mankind, and the gods
played many tricks on their mortal worshippers; it was a time fraught with
danger, charged with fear, and full of supernatural episodes. Sacrifices and
propitiations of every kind were thought to be vital, for without them the
Celts believed they could not prevail over the perils of the season or
counteract the activities of the deities. Samhain was
an important precursor to Halloween.”
B. Cultural and Religious
Influences
1. Celts and Druids
a) Samhain, as
were three other festivals in their culture (all related to season intervals),
was lead by the Druids who were members
of the priestly and learned class in the ancient Celtic societies. Druids
combined the duties of priest, judge, scholar, and teacher.
b) The Celtic communities that Druids served were
polytheistic and animistic (the worship of nature and/or the dead) in their
reverence for various aspects of the natural world, such as the land, sea and
sky, and their veneration of other aspects of nature, such as sacred trees and
groves (the oak and haze were particularly revered), tops of hills, streams,
lakes and plants such as the mistletoe. Fire was regarded as a symbol of
several divinities and was associated with cleansing. Ritual killing and human
sacrifices were aspects of druidic culture.
c) The Druids thought that a three-day period, (to
include the day before and after Samhain) had special
quality. The veil between this world and the world of the ancestors was drawn
aside on these nights, and for those who were prepared, journeys could be made
in safety to the ’other side’. They believed that the spirits of the dead
revisited their earthly homes on that evening. The Druid rites, therefore, were
concerned with making contact with the spirits of the departed, who were seen
as sources of guidance and inspiration.
d) The Celts and Druids also believed that on the
evening of Samhain, Saman,
the lord of the dead, called forth hosts of evil spirits. They customarily lit
great fires for the purpose of warding off all these spirits.
e) Among the Celts it was regarded as a propitious
time for examining the portents of the future. "The phase of the dark moon
at this time represented a time in which mortal sight needs to be obscured in
order to see into other worlds." (Philip Carr-Gomm,
Elements of the Druid Tradition).
f) This festival also aligns
with the Indo-European pattern of worshiping the “Three Kindreds”
of Deities, Ancestors, and Nature Spirits.
2.
Roman influence
a)
During the first century, the
b) Feralia, which was held
on February 21, was a Roman holiday designed to honor the dead, but essentially
amounted to mass drunkenness and orgies, not unlike the other Roman holidays.
c)
d) Over the next three centuries, the customs of the
festival of Samhain mixed with the practices of Feralia and Pomona Day. That is, until they were
“white-washed” and “cleansed” by another religious power.
3.
The Catholic Church
a) Throughout the early years of the Catholic Church,
worshippers observed special anniversaries for martyrs who had been executed
for their beliefs. Soon there weren’t enough days in the calendar year to
dedicate a specific day for each individual martyr, so the Catholics observed
one feast day for all martyrs. “In the fourth century, neighboring dioceses
began to interchange feasts, to transfer relics, to divide them, and to join in
a common feast; as is shown by the invitation of St. Basil of
b) Tired of admonishing the Romans for engaging in
drunken revelries as an excuse to honor the dead (and desiring more converts),
Pope Boniface IV, in A.D. 609, declared Feralia to be
Christian. Instead of honoring all of the dead, they were now just to honor
dead “saints.” Instead of drunken revelries, it would be a day of prayer and
meditation. Instead of calling it Feralia, he changed
it to All Saints’ Day. And he moved the date of its observance from February 21
to May 13. “Boniface IV, [on]
c) Pope Gregory III, who reigned
731-741, “consecrated a chapel in the Basilica of St. Peter to "all the
saints" and fixed the anniversary for 1 November” (Catholic
Encyclopedia). He broadened “the festival [of All Saints’ Day] to include
all saints as well as all martyrs” (Encyclopedia Britannica).
d) Pope Gregory IV (827-844) extended the festival to
the entire church and All Saints’ Day became known as All (Holy) Hallows Day,
while October 31 became All Hallows Eve and, eventually, Halloween. (Catholic Encyclopedia).
e) It was common for the Catholic church to give new names to festivals, as they did with
other Paleopagan holidays and customs like
Valentine’s Day / Lupercalia, Easter / Eostre, and Christmas / Yule, which also have many Paleopagan elements associated with their dating and/or
symbols.
f)
The white-washing process was not
finished. In A.D. 988, the Catholic Church instituted another day. "All
Souls’ Day", to commemorate “all the faithful departed, those baptized
Christians who are believed to be in purgatory because they have died with
guilt of lesser sins on their souls. It is celebrated on November 2. Roman
Catholic doctrine holds that the prayers of the faithful on earth, almsdeeds and especially the
sacrifice of the Mass will help cleanse these souls in order to fit them for
the vision of God in heaven. The date, which became practically universal
before the end of the 13th century, was chosen to follow All Saints’ Day.
Having celebrated the feast (All Saints’ Day) of all the members of the church
who are believed to be in heaven, the church on earth turns, on the next day,
to commemorate those souls believed to be suffering in purgatory” (Encyclopedia
Britannica) (See also Catholic Encyclopedia web site www.newadvent.org). Now all of the souls of the dead had
their own day of worship, saints, martyrs, and even lowly believers who were
not worthy to be declared either saints or martyrs.
As
with the festival of Samhain, the Catholic believers
celebrated with huge bonfires, parades and costumes, masquerading as dead
saints, angels and demons. Altogether, All Saints’ Eve (October 31), All
Saints’ Day (November 1), and All Souls’ Day (November 2) combined into
Hallowmas, mirroring the Celtic Vigil of Samhain!
What was proclaimed Christian and clean and wholesome originated from drunken
revelries, pagan superstitions and false doctrines dating back to the Garden of
Eden.
The
Hallowmas festival, and especially Halloween, was so popular that, in 1517,
Martin Luther chose Halloween night to post his ninety-five theses on the door
of the church in Wittenberg, Germany (which effectively started the Protestant
Reformation). He picked this night because he understood that large crowds of
people would be moving through the streets that evening!
C. The Festival of Samhain
The Druids (Celtic priests)
met on hilltops in the dark oak forests (they viewed oak trees as sacred), and
built huge sacred bonfires to frighten away evil spirits and to honor the sun
god. Next, the people would burn crop and animal sacrifices to their gods,
dancing around the fires as the “season of the sun” passed and the “season of
darkness” began. The Celts wore costumes of animal heads and skins, and told
each other their fortunes. The next morning, they re-lit their cooking fires
from the sacred bonfires, in order to free them from evil spirits, as well as
to help protect them during the coming winter season. It was the occasion for
one of the ancient fire festivals when huge bonfires were set on hilltops to
frighten away evil spirits. The souls of the dead were thought to revisit their
homes on this day, and the autumnal festival acquired sinister significance,
with ghosts, witches, hobgoblins, black cats, fairies, and demons of all kinds
said to be roaming about.
D. History of the Name
The term Halloween is shortened from "All Hallows' Even" (both "even" and "eve"
are abbreviations of "evening", but "Halloween" gets its
"n" from "even") as it is the eve of "All Hallows'
Day", which is now also known as All Saints' Day. It was a day of
religious festivities in various northern European Pagan traditions, until
Popes Gregory III and Gregory IV moved the old Christian feast of All Saints'
Day from May 13 (which had itself been the date of a pagan holiday, the Feast
of the Lemures) to November 1. In the ninth century,
the Church measured the day as starting at sunset, in accordance with the
Florentine calendar. Although All Saints' Day is now considered to occur one
day after Halloween, the two holidays were, at that time, celebrated on the
same day. Liturgically, the Catholic Church traditionally celebrated that day
as the Vigil of All Saints, and, until 1970, a day
of fasting as well. Like other vigils, it was celebrated on the previous day if
it fell on a Sunday, although secular celebrations of the holiday remained on
the 31st. The Vigil was suppressed in 1955, but was later restored in the
post-Vatican II calendar. (Wikipedia)
E. Origin of Trick or Treating.
The tradition of trick or treating also dates back to Celtic days
when celebrants would go from farmhouse to farmhouse looking for a handout of
bread cake, fruit or nuts. Often these were used for offerings to the spirits
or their ancestors.
In more recent traditions, Kevin Danaher, in his book "The
Year in
A familiar
sight in
A couple of
generations ago, in parts of Dublin and in other areas of Ireland, the groups
would have consisted of young men and grown boys, who often traveled
considerable distances in their quest, with consequently greater reward. The
proceeds were usually expended on a “Hallow E’en
party,” with music, dancing, feasting and so on, at some chosen house, and not
merely consumed on the spot as with the children nowadays.
Irisleabhar na Gaedhilge, ii, 370, states that in parts of Count
Waterford, Hallow E’en is called oidhche na h-aimléise,
“The night of mischief or con.” It was a custom in the county, it survives
still in places, for the “boys” to assemble in gangs, and, headed by a few
horn-blowers who were always selected for their strength of lungs, to visit all
the farmers’ houses in the district and levy a sort of blackmail, good humoredly asked for, and as cheerfully given. They
afterward met at some rendezvous, and in merry revelry celebrated the festival
of Samhain in their own way. When the distant winding
of the horns was heard, the bean a’ tigh [woman of the house] prepared for their reception,
and got ready the money or builín (white bread) to be handed to them through the
half-opened door. Whoever heard the wild scurry of their rush through a
farm-yard to the kitchen-door, there was always a race amongst them to get
possession of the latch, will not question the propriety of the word aimiléis
[mischief] applied to their proceedings. The leader of the band chanted a sort
of recitative in Gaelic, intoning it with a strong nasal twang to conceal his
identity, in which the good-wife was called upon to do honor to Samhain.
F. Halloween Customs and their Ancient Roots
1. Ghosts:
have always made perfect sense, for Samhain was the
festival where the Gates between the Worlds were open wide and departed friends
and family could cross over in either direction. From Paleopagan
tradition, people invited their ancestors to join them in celebration. The only
ones who would cower in fear would be people who had wronged someone dead and
who therefore feared retribution of some sort.
2.
Skeletons and Skulls: Samhain was
the time to cull the livestock for winter and thus became imbued with symbolism
of these annual deaths. So skeletons and skulls joined the ghosts as symbols of
the holiday.
3. Jack-o’-lantern: This one is
traced back to Celtic mythology and the account of Stingy Jack and his
deception of the Devil, (You can research the full folktale on our own). In the
4. Mischief-making, playing tricks: Celts
believed that the ghosts of the dead who returned to earth on the night of Oct.
31 caused trouble and damaged crops; they also believed that their gods played
tricks on them. These were used as excuses for the bad behavior of the
celebrants.
5. Black cats: Celts
believed that bad spirits would take the form of cats and other animals on the
night of Oct. 31. The lord of the dead would place the souls of those who were
bad into animals, especially cats, verses being placed in new born babies.
6. Witches / Sorcerers: Paleopagan
“witches” were usually local herbalists, midwives, healers and fortune tellers,
who might sometimes be suspected of doing evil magic. As diviners, they were
consulted on the best divination night of the year, Samhain.
(The following are scriptures dealing with witches,
7. Brooms have long been connected with witchcraft, almost
universally portrayed as medieval-style round brooms and associated with female
witches. The broom served another
purpose during periods of persecution. Witches and other magic practitioners
would disguise their wands as broomsticks to avoid suspicion. It is also a
tradition that brooms have been used by some as receptacles to harbor
temporarily a particular spirit. They also are a phallic symbol originating
from ancient phallic cults.
8. Costumes: Celts (and
other Europeans) wore masks when they left their homes after dark to avoid
being recognized by ghosts who might mistake them for fellow spirits. “Guisers” dressed up to impersonate the returning dead,
singing and dancing to keep evil spirits away. Catholics dressed up as saints,
angels and devils during Hallowmas.
9. Trick or treat: In addition to what was noted above, prior to the
Protestant Reformation, women and girls went “souling,”
visiting houses and begging for “soul cakes.” Seventeenth-century Irish
peasants went door to door asking for donations for a feast to honor St. Columba (whom they believed had replaced the Lord of the
Dead). Up until the early 1900s, the Irish went about asking for contributions
in the name of “Muck Olla,” a legendary, gigantic boar.
10. Bonfires: Druids
built sacred bonfires to frighten off evil spirits on Oct. 31, eve of the New
Year. Worshippers used them to burn animal and crop offerings to their sun god.
They also rekindled their cooking fires to protect their homes from evil
spirits.
11. Fruits, nuts and other goodies: Handing out fruits and nuts also originated from
Pomona Day, named for the Roman goddess of fruits, trees, gardens, harvests and
fertility. Later used for divination games, much like
our Oui-ge board today.
12. Apple-bobbing: May have
come from Pomona Day; the Romans viewed the apple as a sacred symbol of their
goddess
13. Parades, parties: The Scots, Celts and Welsh built bonfires for
parading, dancing and merry-making; the Celts did so, wearing costumes made
from animal skins and heads. The Scots assembled marriage-minded young people
for divination games. Europeans who migrated to
G. Modern / Neopagan
Halloween.
Besides an annual march in
·
It's the modern
name for Samhain, an ancient Celtic holy day which
many Neopagans — especially Wiccans,
Druids and Celtic Reconstructionists — celebrate as a
spiritual beginning of a New Year.
·
Halloween is a
time to confront personal and cultural attitudes towards death and those who
have passed on before them.
·
Halloween is a
time to lift the veil between the many material and spiritual worlds in
divination, so as to gain spiritual insight about the pasts and futures.
·
Halloween is a
time to deepen connection to the cycles of the seasons, to the generations that
have come before and those that will follow, and to the Gods and Goddesses they
worship.
·
Halloween is a
time to let their inner children out to play, to pass on their childhood
traditions to their children, and to share the fun with their friends and
neighbors of many other faiths.
H. Engulfed in False Doctrines
1.
The Celts worshipped nature, the creation, rather than the one true God, who
created nature and everything in it.
2.
They had trusted the sun, as their god, to provide them with enough harvest
crops to get them through the winter, rejecting God as their Provider.
Mat
3.
They had put their trust in “sacred bonfires” to protect them from evil spirits,
instead of trusting God as their Protector. See Satan's counterfeit,
4.
The Celts believed in the immortality of the soul, a false doctrine Satan had
taught man in the Garden of Eden,
5.
There is no spending eternity in Purgatory, or some other humanly devised
in-between place:
I. God’s Viewpoint
Notice what God says about
pagan customs, traditions, practices and beliefs in general:
Then in verse 6 it says, “There is none like You, O
LORD; You are great, and great is Your name in might.”
God took a nation of slaves,
God ordered the Israelites
not to defile themselves with the practices and customs of the surrounding
nations.
God gave
God told the Israelites that
they would be blessed beyond human imagination if they carefully kept His laws,
In addition He said that they
would be greatly disciplined if they rejected Him and replaced His ways with
pagan customs, practices and traditions, no matter how innocent or harmless
they seemed, vs. 14-39 (5 cycles of discipline).
Yet, despite God’s warnings,
2 Chron
36:15-16, "The LORD, the God of their
fathers, sent word to them again and
again by His messengers, because He had compassion on His people and on His
dwelling place; but they continually
mocked the messengers of God, despised His words and scoffed at His prophets,
until the wrath of the LORD arose against His people, until there was no
remedy."
Because of their spiritual
adultery and affinity for pagan practices, calling them holy when God calls
them profane,
The one true God, the
Creator, Teacher, Lawgiver and Judge, does not take pagan practices lightly!
J. Satan Blinds the World
Most people do not believe
that Satan, the Devil exists; and that best suits his game plan. His goal is to
keep the people of his world, his cosmic system, blind
to his lies and deceits,
Satan wants us to be so
wrapped up in the customs and practices of this world, his cosmic system, that
when presented with the plain truth about Halloween, we will shrug our
shoulders and say, “I’m just celebrating it to have fun, what’s the big deal?”
Throughout mankind’s
turbulent history, Satan has always managed to find a way to separate man from
God,
Jeremiah said in
Even when the Roman Catholic
Church attempted to gloss over strange pagan practices of the Celts, Druids and
Romans, it introduced its own false Satanic doctrines,
passing them off as Christian. Halloween is riddled with deceit and falsehoods.
Yet, even after all the
historical evidence and Biblical insights are brought to light, there will
still be those who continue to view Halloween as just another harmless
childhood practice. Nothing will convince them otherwise. Like a gleaming,
white-washed tomb, Mat
No man or religious
organization has the power to “white-wash” Halloween and declare it to be
Christian. God unmasks Halloween and sees it for exactly what it is! And even
though we are in the Age of Grace remember