On Thursday October 30, 2008, the Vice Principal at L. Grade School in Newark gave a strong announcement about Halloween, saying that it would not be celebrated in the school this year, that teachers should not celebrate it in class. That it "would not be tolerated," in the school. The reason, he said, was because of the personal and religious beliefs and requests of many of the parents.

Here are some historical facts about the origin of Halloween:

Halloween's origins date back to the ancient Celtic festival of Samhain. It is said to have started with the Celts. The Celts lives around 2,000 years ago in what is now the United Kingdom, Ireland and northern France. The celebration at that time was on November 1 or October 31.[2]

This was associated with the commencement of a cold winter, dark and associated with human death. The Celts had superstitious ideas and truly believed that on  the night before, the boundary between the world of the living and dead became blurred. They believed that the ghosts or souls of the dead returned to the earth or revisit their homes. In addition to the malevolence associated with these bad spirits, Celts felt that the presence of these spirits made it easier for the Druids, or Celtic priests, to be able to predict the future. These prophecies were important for a primitive and uneducated people, largely illiterate, such as these. The took on sinister significance, with ghosts, witches, hobgoblins, black cats, fairies, and demons of all kinds, which were thought to be roaming about on that night. [1]

Bonfires were burned on hilltops to scare off evil spirits,[1] and people sacrificed both crops and animal sacrifices to the Celtic gods.[2] Costumes were worn during these ceremonies, and they usually consisted of animals heads and skins.  Halloween was believed to be the best time for divination, and they endeavored to tell each other’s fortunes on that night. This was all around the time of Jesus and before and  by A.D. 43, the Romans had conquered the majority of Celtic territory.[2] During the four-hundred years previous, there were two festivals of Roman origin which were combined with the Celtic celebration known as  Samhain, of which we are speaking.

These two holidays were  Feralia, when the Romans traditionally commemorated the passing of the dead and the second was a day to honor Pomona, the Roman goddess of the harvest who is pictured as sitting on a basket of fruit and flowers, apples being her sacred fruit. Bobbing for apples is thought to have originated with this festival, which evolved from Samhain, also  a Harvest Festival as well.

By the 9^th Century, the festival had influenced the mixture of paganism and Christianity that had become incorporated in the Roman Catholic Church during the Dark Ages. [3]

Halloween has always been a holiday with  superstition, magic, and  fright. Because  people felt especially close to deceased relatives and friends at this time,  they set places at the dinner table, left treats on doorsteps and along the side of the road and lit candles to help loved ones find their way back to the spirit world. This led to the practice of trick-or-treating, which is practiced today in many parts of the earth. Halloween Masks were worn to frighten off the wicked spirits when misfortune came upon pagan peoples.[1] In Scotland the spirits were impersonated by young men dressed in white with masked, veiled or blackened faces. [4]

Getting back to the history of Halloween and the Catholic Church, in the seventh century, Pope Boniface IV designated November 1 All Saints' Day, a time to honor saints and martyrs. Like many other pagan festivals, it is believed  the pope was trying to replace this Celtic festival of the dead with a related, but church-sanctioned holiday.  This celebration was called All-hallows or All-hallowmas (from Middle English Alholowmesse meaning All Saints' Day) and the night before it, the night of Samhain, began to be called All-hallows Eve and, eventually, Halloween.[2]  In A.D. 1000, the church would make November 2 All Souls' Day, a day to honor the dead. It was celebrated similarly to Samhain, with big bonfires, parades, and dressing up in costumes as saints, angels, and devils. Together, the three celebrations, the eve of All Saints', All Saints', and All Souls', were called Hallowmas. The name Halloween itself has its origins in the Catholic Church.

Immigrants brought the practice to the United States, in particular the Irish,[4] who introduced Halloween customs to the U.S., which became popular around the late 19^th century. At that time, the mischief that was common at that time involved overturning sheds and outhouse and breaking windows,. The damage to property was sometimes severe. As time went on, trick –or-treating has become more of a meaningless threat, and is as Halloween is practiced now in the U.S., children request treats or threaten with tricks, which are more likely not to be carried out, everyone plays along with the game. [1] Horror movies have become associated with Halloween today as well. [4]

The superstition of avoiding crossing paths with black cats has it origins from the Middle Ages, when people believed that witches avoided detection by turning themselves into cats.

Other superstitions surrounded with the mysteries of Halloween were:

Young women tossed apple-peels over their shoulders, hoping that the peels would fall on the floor in the shape of their future husbands' initials; tried to learn about their futures by peering at egg yolks floating in a bowl of water; and stood in front of mirrors in darkened rooms, holding candles and looking over their shoulders for their husbands' faces. [1]

The Jack-O-Lantern, commonly seen in the United States, was in the form of a turnip in Scotland, and in the U.S., it is typically carved into “a demonic face,” sometimes with a candle inside of it. [1]  One legend of the origin of the Jack-O-Lantern involves Stingy Jack, from Ireland, a greedy, gambling, hard-drinking old farmer, he tricked the devil into climbing a tree and trapped him by carving a cross into the tree trunk. In revenge, the devil placed a curse on Jack, condemning him to forever wander the earth at night with the only light he had: a candle inside of a hollowed turnip.[4] Today, horror stories such as that of Frankenstein and Dracula, have also become associated with Halloween. [4]

Although Halloween is celebrated in a number of countries, including the U.S., its celebration is not universal, and for many countries, the celebration is either not celebrated or looked down upon. Traditional Judaism frowns upon the celebration of Halloween.[4] Jehovah’s Witnesses [5] as well as some evangelical Christians and some Pentecostals in the United States also do not celebrate Halloween.  The Bible associates all the customs associated with Halloween, the festival of Samhain being celebrated at the time the  Bible was written, with originating with the wicked spirits which lost their physical bodies at the flood of Noah’s day, and which continued to exert a strong influence on the earth afterwards, according to the Bible, until this day. Genesis 6:1-4.

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Oct 30, 2009 - Halloween link:

How faiths unmask Halloween

The spooky holiday has origins rich in diverse religions

by Scott Taylor, Desert News

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Bibliography

1. Halloween, (1988). Encyclopedia Britannica. Chicago: The University of Chicago. p. 646

2. Halloween, Ancient Origins. History.com (Retrieved October 2008).

http://www.history.com/minisites/halloween/viewPage?pageId=713

3. Halloween History.  Halloween is Here. (Retrieved October 2008).

http://www.halloweenishere.com/history.html

4. Halloween. Wikipedia.org (Retrieved October 19, 2009). http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Halloween

5. Should We Celebrate Holidays. (2005). Jehovah's Witnesses, Watchtower.org. http://www.watchtower.org/e/bh/appendix_14.htm

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Bible scriptures that relate to Halloween:

Ephesians 6:11,12 -   “Put on the complete suit of armor from God that YOU may be able to stand firm against the machinations of the Devil; 12 because we have a wrestling, not against blood and flesh, but against the governments, against the authorities, against the world rulers of this darkness, against the wicked spirit forces in the heavenly places.” NWT

Revelation 12: 7-12 “And war broke out in heaven: Michael and his angels battle with the dragon, and the dragon and its angels battled, 8 but it did not prevail, neither was a place found for them any longer in heaven. 9 So down the great dragon was hurled, the original serpent, the one called Devil and Satan, who is misleading the entire inhabited earth; he was hurled down to the earth, and his angels were hurled down with him. 12 On this account be glad, YOU heavens and YOU who reside in them! Woe for the earth and for the sea, because the Devil has come down to YOU, having great anger, knowing he has a short period of time.” NWT

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Page updated: November 4, 2009