WHAT ARE THE ORIGINS OF HALLOWEEN?

– and can it be reconciled with Christianity?

 

Around the time of Jesus, the Celts covered a rather large part of France, northern and western Europe, and the British Isles. The faith/religion of the Celts is similar to present-day shamanism in several ways – i.e. worshipping nature and all the gods they believe are part of nature. In addition, the Druids had many rituals and mysterious ceremonies that were performed by priests: Druids. The religion is known as Druidism – and one of the large ceremonial venues of Druidism is very well known even today as Stonehenge in England, where you can see the remains of their circular sacrifice site.

Around the time of Jesus, the Celts covered a rather large part of France, northern and western Europe, and the British Isles. The faith/religion of the Celts is similar to present-day shamanism in several ways – i.e. worshipping nature and all the gods they believe are part of nature. In addition, the Druids had many rituals and mysterious ceremonies that were performed by priests: Druids. The religion is known as Druidism – and one of the large ceremonial venues of Druidism is very well known even today as Stonehenge in England, where you can see the remains of their circular sacrifice site.

Primarily, the Druids had two significant days for rituals, May 1 and the last day of October (October 31). Particularly the latter celebration in October was called Samhain and was the festival of the sun where they worshipped the sun god Baal, which is actually known from the Old Testament as well under the name Baʿal.

October 31 was the last day of the year for the Celts. If you look back at history, you can find two versions of what took place that particular night:

  1. The Druids did not just worship Baal, but also used this particular day and night to summon the ruler of the underworld, so all those who had died in the previous year could come to visit their families. In other words, they wanted to contact all the spirits – both good and evil spirits.
  2. The dead came back to take over the body from a living individual for the entire upcoming year. If they didn’t, the Druids believed it impossible to experience life after death.

Since there weren’t too many living people looking to be possessed by a spirit, they dressed up in scary costumes in order to – as naïve as it sounds – scare away the evil spirits of the underworld.

At the same time, this night was a night where screaming was heard everywhere, as the Druids burned witches on the hilltops – not just because they were witches, but as offerings to Ba’al. At the same time, people shared among themselves all the supernatural and occult experiences they had had the previous year.

Another important part of Halloween was to see into the future by using many psychic rituals. They say that priests (Druids) cut up animals and were able to read the future in the intestines. The young people peeled an apple into one long peel, through it over one shoulder, after which they could psychically see the initials of their intended.

Looking more closely at ancient Ba‘al worshippers, they often sacrificed their children to their god – precisely we see it in hard-core Satanism of today, where people avoid seeing a physician during the pregnancy and the child is subsequently sacrificed to Satan.

In black Satanism (not just egocentric Satanism), Halloween is every bit as important as Easter (the resurrection of Jesus) is to Christians. This is the precise holiday when Satanists inaugurate their chief priests and perform some of the worst sacrifices all year. This is also when blood rituals and human sacrifices take place, as described by former Satanists like Fiona Barnett and John Ramirez etc.

In the 9th century when the Catholic Church started to become more prolific, they decided to keep the feast days by changing it to “All Hallows Eve”, where they chose to celebrate the Catholic saints – i.e. the “major Catholic personalities”. The church then made November 2 “All Souls’ Day”, where you pray for all those who aren’t saints. Back then, Catholics believed that the souls of the dead were in Purgatory for some time after death. It was believed that by praying for them, their souls could be brought into heaven. This “souling” meant that the Catholic beggars went door to door begging for so-called soul cakes”: Square rolls baked with Zante currants. The more soul cakes the beggars got, the more prayers they promised to offer for the dead relatives of the giver of the cakes.

Today the Danish State Church uses “All Hallows Sunday” to read the names of all those who died in the past year.

Why pumpkins at Halloween?

Today, pumpkins have become a “cult symbol” for Halloween. This is due to an old wives’ tale from Ireland, where they would make turnips into lanterns. There are two parallel folk legends about young Jack, who, according to one legend teased the devil, who then threw glowing embers into Jack’s lantern, and he was unable to blow them out. In the other folk legend, the devil again puts glowing embers into Jack’s lantern after his death, allowing him to find his way through the freezing darkness.

People soon figured out that pumpkins are more easily carved than turnips… and therefore they ended up as “Jack-o-lanterns” – from which the “light of the devil” shines out at people.

So, you might ask… Why celebrate Halloween..? Just because it’s an old custom which was adopted first by the occult Druids, then by the church, and finally by commercial interests…? As a Christian, does it make sense to celebrate it? And does it make sense to dress up your beloved children in devilish costumes?

Yes, if you are on fire for Jesus, and if you stay close to Him, you are protected against the Satanist spiritual world, but the minute you are actually searching out spiritual openings such as Halloween – things like dressing up, the pumpkin burning with the light of the devil, and going trick-or-treating, you will have problems…! So, think twice before sending your kids off dressed like the devil or letting them carve a pumpkin…

…and if in doubt, check it out on Google by searching for “samhain pagan“, which is the heathen Halloween.


Sources:
Christian Resource Centre.
Halloween Online.

Andreas Slot-Henriksen
October 2018