I ask this because I have some relatives who are members of a fundamantalist church. Every October, they start in on the shit about Halloween being a satanic celebration. They don’t let their kids go out trick or treating, and generally make life miserable for everybody. I have tried to explain to them, that Halloween is just a custom from the celtic countries, and is actually a harvest/new year festival. In any case, why are the fundies so opposed to kids and grownups having a little fun on Oct. 31? I really enjoy costume parties, and I like giving candies to the kids-who are these killjoys mad about anyway?
Halloween is a pagan holiday, having roots in european pre-christian harvest celebrations, if this qualifies as “satanic” so be it. But so are Christmas and Easter. Christianity just appropriated various dates and celebrations. It’s probably not worth arguing with dimwits like these. The revenge will come when their children freak out from a lifetime of oppression.
The modern conception of Halloween has little to do with anything except an opportunity for both children and adults to enjoy themselves and indulge in sweets. It lacks any religious significance whatsoever, having lost the original, pre-Christian conception. It could never have been called Satanic, though, as its origins pre-dated the Christian conception of Satan. It also is conspicuously lacking in anything more evil than pranks and stress on dentists. It also caters to a human desire to be frightened every so often, yet still safe.
Fundamentalists are opposed to the festival for their own reasons, independent of any meaning that Halloween has now or ever had. I think H.L. Mencken put it best: “There is only one honest impulse at the bottom of puritanism, and that is to punish the man with the superior capacity for happiness.”
Fuck yeah, dude! \m//
Here’s a site that may have a truthful explanation. If you are at work, turn down your sound, it’s got the music from “A Nightmare Before Christmas”
[fixed coding]
[Edited by bibliophage on 10-18-2001 at 04:56 AM]
Oh, no! I thought I was in the Pit. Please excuse the above irresponsible outburst until someone can clean up after me. My apologies.
The holiday that’s given Halloween the “satanic” image is Walpurgis Night, a German superstition that witches gather in the Hartz Mountain Range every year in (May 24? April 24?)
But that’s got nothing to do with pagan religion or devil worship. It’s Christian myth.
Sofa King, I almost spit coke on the monitor laughing when I read your post.
Interestingly, the Puritans and Calvinists that were in power in Britain during the 16th and 17th centuries seem to have agreed with these fundamentalists. Christmas was more or less banned in Scotland (that’s why Scots have such a big celebration at Hogmannay / New Year), and I think that the bonfire festival was moved from Hallowe’en to Guy Fawkes Night (Nov 5) to remove its pagan connotations. By the by, did Americans celebrate Guy Fawkes Night before independence?
May Day Eve.
Walpurgis night, like Halloween, is an eve and may owe some of its associations to the way days were counted by the Celts and the early Christians.
(I don’t have the ref. material with me, but…) IIRC, the Celts counted days from sundown to sundown (similar to Jewish practice). The early Christians counted (I think) dawn to dawn (midnight being a later change). When the Christians overlaid their festivals on the older pagan ones (such as Samhain), this left a 12-odd hour window for the old festival.
November 1 may be All Hallow’s Day, but the night before is still Samhain.
History Channel on the Origins of Halloween
Now let’s have no more of this rampant specter-lation… 
As a Christian, I am well-versed in the traditions of anti-Halloween propaganda. As posted above, it is a pagan holiday and that alone makes it synonymous with satanism in many Christian’s eyes (as everything that is “worldly” is ultimately of the devil). However, there is a distinction to be made since true satanists probably don’t think of the holiday any differently than you or I.
I think the question comes from misunderstanding ‘Satanism’. Most of what people think of when the topic comes up is a fetish for Heavy Metal music, pet mutilations, etc. Which has as much to do with Satanism as eating jewish babies has to do with Christianity, ie, bad press. It has to do with a philosophy of non-supression of the self. Satan’s defiant ‘Non Serviam’, I will not serve. True, it makes the Satanists I know seem Arrogant A**holes, but it’s core is self reliance, Not needing a society, God, or his representatives dictate one’s thoughts or behaviour. Contrary to popular belief, they don’t ‘Worship’ Satan, they would consider that silly, the whole thing is a metaphor for rejecting group-think, and the power of other’s opinions.
SAtanists throw the best Haloween parties.
Another good thread:
http://www.neopagan.net/Halloween.HTML
Actually, Halloween as we know it comes from the good old U.S.A. Modern European celebrations emulate what Americans have been doing for quite awhile. Dressing up in costumes, going trick-or-treat, haunted houses and stuff.
I have heard that its roots are primarily celtic. Which makes sense considering the Irish immigration. But most cultures have a version of the harvest/pre-winter festival. And the north is commonly seen as mysterious.
Satanic? Nore more than rock-and-roll.
I disagree; the Hallowe’en you describe is pretty similar to what we’ve always done in Scotland (a country that is both Celtic in part and modern European!). We call going round houses in costumes “guising”). Some people in England think Hallowe’en there is an American import, but that’s only partly true.
It strikes this American as strange, actually, that now that Halloween is making itself known here in the land of Norge, it is doing so in its American version and not in a British/Irish version. When I questioned fella bilong missus flodnak, he said that most Norwegians are familiar with Halloween from “Peanuts” comic strips and thus assume that it’s an American holiday.
Hmph.
When I were a lad (in England), Halloween was an excuse to roast chestnuts, play silly games like ducking for apples, and tell ghost stories. All this trick-or-treat stuff is new-fangled nonsense, and nowt good’ll come of it, I tell 'ee…
Excuse me a moment.
[/exaggerated English regional accent]
Oh, that’s better. By the way… [off-topic] Odoreida? Do I detect a Stephen Potter fan here?[/off-topic]
As was discussed in another thread several weeks ago, the whole Samhain/Celtic New Year theory has come under heavy attack from academic historians.
http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?threadid=86383
This revisionist interpretation undercuts the entire fundamentalist argument - its origins were neither pagan nor satanic.
Sorry to say this, but I have an awful feeling that the Scottish Halloween traditions are just as much an American import and, worse, an American import via England. Is there any evidence that they pre-date the nineteenth century or even the twentieth century?
You may find this site of interest.
Here in the UK, Halloween ‘celebrations’ have been low key affairs over my lifetime. It tended to be a non-event. They seemed to become much more popular after the ET movie. Now they are ‘big’ and getting ‘bigger’.
However, some youngsters have seen them as an opportunity to ‘extort’ cash from the elderly or weak, or to use generally threatening behaviour. Satanic… who knows? Scary for the elderly… definately!
All my christian comrades think so.
no one I know (from church) sends their kids out on halloween.
They have harvest parties.
They think its evil.
I am the only christian I know IRL who takes her son out for it.
To him, it is “dress up and get candy day”.
I agree. I’ve always loved it. (its tough being a liberal christian)