What’s So Hallowed about Halloween
The
name means "hallowed evening." But is it really? Where did it come
from? What is it all about? And is it really good for children?
Creepy
goblins, ghosts and demons, witches on brooms,
spiders and bats, dead men's bones,
flickering jack-o'-lanterns, black cats, eerie costumes and parties.
What a weird festival this is! And an increasingly costly and dangerous
one, too. Each year following this strange celebration, gruesome
accounts surface of the giving of booby-trapped "treats" to children:
apples with concealed razor blades, candy bars
with hidden needles, cookies containing ground glass, bonbons
laced with poisons. This is to say nothing of the cases, reported and
unreported, of muggings and molestations that occur on the eve of "All
Hallows."
In addition, there are those incidences of bodily harm
inflicted accidentally during the course of Halloween festivities: the
automobile driver failing to see the child dressed in black crossing
the street at night, the burns from a flammable costume that is ignited
by a candle in a jack-o'-lantern.
In many cases, extensive destruction is done to private and public property by vandalism.
Are these instances unrelated to the theme and purpose of this festival?
Is it good?
The
Halloween period is big business. It is one of the three lop
candy-selling seasons of the year. Hundreds of millions of dollars
sweeten the cash register tills in exchange for hundreds of millions of
pounds of confections.
Greeting card companies, manufacturers
and retailers of costumes and decorations take their share of the
profits, too. For them it pays well to keep the Halloween "spirit"
alive.
But in calculating the price of Halloween, we can't stop
there. We must include the added cost — impossible to calculate — that
all of those refined, chemical laden "treats" ultimately exact in
dental and medical bills.
Besides whatever physical harm
children may suffer from Halloween, there is an as yet unmeasured
damage inflicted on the child's standard of values. After all are not
children taught by Halloween to beg? Isn't it an attempt to get
something for nothing? And what is "trick or treat" but extortion?
"Give me something — or else!"
Impressionable minds cannot fail
to see how richly it pays off. and then may expect the same to continue
in the days and weeks that follow.
Still, every
year millions of people refuse to let these negative aspects stand
in the way of their Halloween fun and frolic. Children and adults alike
adorn them-selves with bizarre and frightening costumes and engage in a
hectic night of partying, merrymaking and general mayhem.
But just how did these strange goings-on gel started anyway?
The origin of Halloween
It
really is no secret that Halloween has been around for thousands of
years. Centuries before the birth of Christ, ancient Druids performed
mystical riles and ceremonies in honor of the dead on (heir "New Year's
Eve" (October 31).
History books and encyclopedias openly describe
this pagan origin. Even newspapers, as an item Of curiosity, print
articles at Halloween time explaining the pagan beginnings and their
parallels to today's customs.
The point is, Halloween is pagan.
Still,
most people, particularly those who are parents, will justify
Halloween's observance by saying, in effect, something like this; "So
what? So it was started by pagans. We aren't thinking about pagan gods
today. We're just having fun. And it's great for the children, What
difference does ii make where it came from?"
Well, it doesn't make any difference unless . . .
Unless
you care what God says on the subject! For if you accept the teachings
of Jesus Christ and true Christianity, then it does make a great
deal of difference.
God's Word, the Bible, as we shall see, has
a great deal to say about why you should not be involved with customs
such as those centering on Halloween.
Let's be honest. One only
has to look at Halloween costumes and decorations to see that they
celebrate death, devils, witches and darkness, true Christianity stands
for the exact opposite of these things! Christians are supposed to
conduct themselves in a way that exemplifies light and life, not
darkness and death.
The diametric contradiction between these
two approaches is noted by Ralph Linton in Halloween Through
Twenty Centuries: "Among all the festivals which we celebrate today,
few have histories stranger than that of Halloween. It commemorates
beings and rites with which the church has always been at war." He then
goes on to describe Halloween festivities as customs that were "once
forbidden to good Christians."
Somewhere along the line, these alien pagan customs worked their way into what the world considers Christianity.
G.W. Douglas discloses in The American Book of Days
the shocking fact that "the mystic rites and ceremonies with which
Halloween was originally observed had their origin among the Druids
centuries before the dawn of the Christian era in the celebration on
the eve of the festival of Samhain (the lord of the dead — Satan)....
The early [medieval] Christian church adopted the eve and the day
following and gave new names to them, as it did with many other
Christian observances."
Writer Dorothy Wood of the Wichita
Beacon stated the case clearly: "This ancient night of revelry for the
devil and his cohorts has degenerated. ... It's the Christians who are
to blame. For centuries, they've been grabbing off all the old heathen
festivals. The midwinter feast with its greens and feasting and
drinking has become Christmas. The wild spring festival has become
Easter and the worshipers of Christ boldly use the old pagan symbols of
fertility — chicks and rabbits and eggs. Now they've completely taken
over Halloween."
God does not look at this lightly . He does not
want His people to borrow pagan customs (Deuteronomy 12:29-31) with
their inevitable detriment to the development of spiritual character.
He plainly and directly commanded through the prophet Jeremiah. "learn
not the way of the heathen" (Jeremiah 10:2. Authorized Version).
Through Moses
God condemned as abominable all that has to do with witchcraft,
necromancy (black magic) and other demonic works of darkness
(Deuteronomy 18:9-12).
In view of this biblical condemnation, we
should want to stay as far away as possible from whatever falls into
these categories. Instead, all across the land, children and adults
dress as witches, demons and other manifestations that honor the "lord
of death" on his special night.
People do not seem to realize that Satan and his demons are the enemies of God, while Halloween purposefully honors Satan.
The
apostle Paul summed up the proper attitude that true Christians should
have and should teach to their children: "For you were once darkness
[in the past — before becoming Christians], but now you are light in
the Lord. Walk as children of light [not dressed as demons.
witches, zombies and other beings
of darkness] (for the fruit
of the Spirit is in all goodness.
righteousness, and truth), proving what is acceptable to the Lord. And
have no fellowship with the unfruitful works of darkness, but rather
expose them [by letting your light Shine]. For it is shameful even to
speak of those things which are done by them in secret [let alone to
participate in them]" (Ephesians 5:8-12).
Counterfeit days
Few
seem to realize that Halloween and the other religious "Christian"
holidays are actually counterfeits that have been subtly introduced to
take the place of the Holy Days God instituted (for a complete
explanation of the days God ordained, write for a free copy of our
booklet Pagan Holidays — or God's Holy Days Which?)
The
Holy Days of God are listed in Leviticus 23. These are the days that
were observed by Jesus, the apostles and the early New Testament
Church. Shortly after the death of the apostles, however, the keeping
of these days was discontinued by a developing great counterfeit
religious System a system that ultimately brought in its own sacred
days adapted from heathen religions.
It seems that throughout
history man has sought to replace that which God originally gave for
man's good with that which is inferior and a corruption of the truth.
Halloween is a classic example of such a counterfeit.
Some of
the feast days God established (see Leviticus 23:24, 27-34) fall in the
seventh month of the sacred calendar, at a period that varies slightly
from year to year but centers on early October. Ancient Israel was
ordered to observe these God-ordained days. But instead of keeping the
feasts of God in the seventh month, King Jeroboam ordained his own
feast one month later (I Kings 12:27-33).
This counterfeit festival, in the middle of the eighth month, was approximately equivalent time-wise to Halloween today!
A
provable connection? No. But the point is, God rejected the inferior
substitute that was made for something He had instituted — and rejected
the whole people because they had rejected Him.
There is a lesson in that for us.
What
could be better for children and adults, too - than restoring the
observance of God's Holy Days according to His instructions? Better
than Halloween, Christmas, Easter or any of the other humanly devised
false substitutes.
During the early part of October, while
commercial advertisements begin to prepare people for yet another
Halloween, the members of the Worldwide Church of God observe the Feast
of Tabernacles. One of God's festivals. They enjoy themselves in good,
clean fun at some of the most beautiful locations on earth, while
rejoicing in light and truth, learning how to give and share the exact
opposite of the "get" mentality of death-oriented Halloween observance
and preparing themselves for the soon-coming world tomorrow.
Once
a person properly keeps the days God has commanded, He realizes what
cheap, inferior, meaningless substitutes are the religious holidays of
the world. If you haven't yet experienced them, you're really
shortchanging yourself and your children. You're missing something
inestimably good!
by Clayton D. Steep Good News October-November 1985
Brought to you as a Study
Resource by the