For All Hallows Eve

Do you know the history of All Hallows Eve? I may not have it exactly right but as I recall it began as a commemoration of the Christian martyrs of the early persecutions, All Hallows Day, or All Saints Day, so many of them they got a day on the calendar as a group in contrast to the usual practice of giving a single saint a day of his or her own. I don't know how the "Eve" part got emphasized but it morphed from a general honoring of "the dead in Christ" to a celebration of "the dead," period, then acquired all the ghostie-ghoulie-beastie stuff. It became the favorite day for witchery and demonic activity and superstitious Europeans carved ferocious-looking jack o'lanterns to ward off the demonic nasties that threatened to do them harm if they weren't placated with a "treat" or sacrifice or some such. Same idea as the gargoyles on the cathedrals. It no doubt got blurred with earlier pagan rites as well. Something like that as I recall. From a day to honor the early Christian martyrs to a celebration of ghoulishness. Anyone please feel free to correct my memory.Edited by Faith, : No reason given.Edited by Faith, : No reason given.Edited by Faith, : No reason given.Edited by Faith, : No reason given.

It is closer to Mardi Gras or Fat Tuesday, a time of joy and celebration. Ghoulies were always there.It's one of the great Christian Holidays and almost as nice as the Spring May Pole celebration. Always loved that one at St Paul's.AbE: For the Spring May Pole celebration the school had to bus in a passel of vestal virgins from the Girl's School that was a few miles away since at the time we were an all boys school. In my senior year they were building the St Paul's Girls school slightly down the hill in the old cow pasture. At least we thought it was a girl's school based on the barbed wire fence, towers with search lights, guards with dogs patrolling the boundary and the Achtung Minen signs.Edited by jar, : see AbE:

As I understand it, Mardi Gras is a day to carouse and glut and commit every sin you can think of before Ash Wednesday, which begins the period of Lent when you have to fast and otherwise afflict yourself in anticipation of Easter. In a way it's been Satan's holiday from its inception, but Halloween morphed into that from its basically Christian beginnings. There do seem to be some elements in common but their history is different.Edited by Faith, : No reason given.Edited by Faith, : No reason given.

LOLSatan's holiday?Sheesh.

Well what would a day to celebrate and indulge in sin be but a Satan's holiday? And what would a day to celebrate ghosties and ghoulies be but the same? The former was consciously devised as a day to indulge the flesh which is a sort of complaint about the anticipated strictures of LentOf course all of this is very Catholic, all the days to honor saints being perhaps innocent enough in the beginning but contrary to Christian doctrine in spirit. Lent was also a Catholic invention the RCC imposed on the people, but Mardi Gras was a simple pagan response to all that.I was just reading up on the Day of the Dead in Mexico, which started out as an indigenous observance and later got aligned with Halloween. At first it was a day to honor dead ancestors, and the Catholic Church opposed it, which it may still or at least some traditional elements of the RCC may, I'm not sure about that. But it got blurred with Catholicism in the minds of the people, as so often happens.The images of skulls that are part of the celebration, same as the images of ghosts at Halloween, are certainly at odds with any true Christian spirit. Delebrating the martydoms of Christians just has nothing to do with death as such, since we know they are all with the living Lord Jesus waiting for the final resurrection, and their bones are meaningless.Ghosts and bones both contrast with the Chrsitian views of salvation and resurrection. And of course so do the images of witches and devices to ward off demons. Christ defeated Satan and his demons at the cross, and the witches who consort with them, and all we have to do is appeal to Him for protection if needed, there is no need for pagan devices for protection from them, which are powerless anyway.But of course the original meaning of all these things is pretty much lost in today's celebrations anyway, which are just an excuse to have fun, dress up and eat candy.Edited by Faith, : No reason given.Edited by Faith, : No reason given.Edited by Faith, : No reason given.

How utterly silly.

The period starts at sundown October 31st. It's a three day celebration however: All Hallows Eve, All Hallows Day, All Souls Day. I believe the tradition started as preparations for the three day event Allhallowtide/Hallowmas. When the sun went down, people would seek to protect themselves from those souls were not martyred, canonized or saved through Christ. Those that were neither condemned to hell nor in heaven were thought to be particularly restless during the festival. I guess people feared they might feel left out or something. Many of the methods were hangovers from the original pagan celebrations, where others evolved over time.Thus various superstitious behaviours for warding of restless spirits before the Feast and subsequent days dedicated to saints and other Christian souls morphed into what we know today.As I understand it, at least. It actually morphed from a general honoring of the 'dead' to a specific 'honoring the martyrs' then 'honoring martyrs, saints and Chrisitans'. The original festival never truly disappeared and it came back, as ever, as a time of silly fun. The older carvings weren't ferocious, they were just faces I believe. They served the dual purpose of lighting the way for souls of the dead to return home for the celebration and to ward of evil spirits.Trick or treating seems to be a 20th Century invention, with roots probably in the practice of visiting other houses asking for food in exchange for prayers.

Moose

As per most (all) other Christian holidays/feasts Halloween has been appropriated from mainly pagan origins.In this case the celtic feast of "Samhain" which was at it's heart a harvest festival of sorts.
Neolithic passage tombs in Ireland and elsewhere are aligned with sunrise around the time of samhain.

quote:

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It was the time when cattle were brought back down from the summer pastures and when livestock were slaughtered for the winter. As at Bealtaine, special bonfires were lit. These were deemed to have protective and cleansing powers and there were rituals involving them.[1] Like Bealtaine, Samhain was seen as a liminal time, when the boundary between this world and the Otherworld could more easily be crossed. This meant the Aos S, the 'spirits' or 'fairies', could more easily come into our world.

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Samhain - WikipediaEdited by Heathen, : No reason given.

Borrowed Feasts is a long tradition with religions and Christianity has never found a feast it could not adopt. Christmas and Easter and Pentecost and Lent and Maundy Thursday and Good Friday and All Hallows Eve and All Saints Day and Advent are all simply re-purposed pagan holidays.

Today Samhain just means "November". I know a story of my older relations being asked about rituals on Samhain by a Canadian and thinking he had crazy ideas of Ireland in November.Oche Shamhna being the name for actual Halloween. By the 1800s at least, Oche Shamhna was basically just "Snap apple night" where people gathered in one neighborhood house and bobbed for apples. Ironically given the amount of fundamentalist Christian stuff about Oche Shamhna, the only supernatural event associated with the night was that the house would shake from the amount of prayer that night, as you had a bunch of people in one house saying a long string of "Hail Mary"s and "Our Father"s at the end of the night.Wikipedia is wrong on one thing though, there wasn't any stronger association with the Aos Sidhe* on that night than any other.*often given as elves or fairies in English, but really meant anything supernatural that wasn't an angel or demon, so included the souls of the deadEDIT: I just asked my wife and in her area it was "Oche na nll", or "Apple night" and nothing else was associated with it. Faith, it's kids asking for sweets at doors.Edited by Son Goku, : Minor addition

Or going car to car at St Matthew's Trunk or Treat where members decorate their car trunks, wear costumes and kids are kids but not on the street in traffic. Then the adults gather in the church for the Fourth Sacrament; Baptism, Confirmation, Eucharist & coffee hour/cleanup.

I never heard of Trunk or Treat, looks like a lot of fun.

It let's kids celebrate, wear costumes, be kids and not out at night where there is traffic.