Halloween Lost

I was reading about Halloween as the night fast approaches and thought I'd make a post about how we have lost the traditional meaning of Hallows Eve.

This special night preceding All Hallows day (November 1st) has been considered for centuries as one of the most magical nights of the year. A night of power, when the veil that separates our world from the Otherworld is at its thinnest.

This is the time when things are supposed to go bump in the night and many traditions around the World really enhance their spirituality for that specific night and time. Do any of you believe in the powers of Hallows Eve? Do you do anything specifically related to spirituality?

As ubiquitous as Halloween celebrations are throughout the world, few of us know that the true origin of Halloween is a ceremony of honoring our ancestors and the day of the dead. A time when the veils between the worlds were thinner, and so many could "see" the other side of life. A time in the year when the spiritual and material worlds touched for a moment, and a greater potential exists for magical creation.

In ancient times, this day was a special and honored day of the year.

In the Celtic calendar, it was one of the most important days of the year, representing a mid point in the year, Samhain, or "summer's end".

The Samhain celebrations have survived in several guises as a festival dedicated to the harvest and the dead. In Ireland and Scotland, the Féile na Marbh, the 'festival of the dead' took place on Samhain.

The night of Samhain, in Irish, Oíche Shamhna and Scots Gaelic, Oidhche Shamhna, is one of the principal festivals of the Celtic calendar, and falls on the 31st of October. It represents the final harvest. In modern Ireland and Scotland, the name by which Halloween is known in the Gaelic language is still Oíche/Oidhche Shamhna. It is still the custom in some areas to set a place for the dead at the Samhain feast, and to tell tales of the ancestors on that night.

Traditionally, Samhain was time to take stock of the herds and grain supplies, and decide which animals would need to be slaughtered in order for the people and livestock to survive the winter. This custom is still observed by many who farm and raise livestock.

Bonfires played a large part in the festivities celebrated down through the last several centuries, and up through the present day in some rural areas of the Celtic nations and the diaspora. Villagers were said to have cast the bones of the slaughtered cattle upon the flames. In the pre-Christian Gaelic world, cattle were the primary unit of currency and the center of agricultural and pastoral life. Samhain was the traditional time for slaughter, for preparing stores of meat and grain to last through the coming winter.

So as noted here, the Samhain festival of the dead on October 31st was spiritual for live stock owners and the community of the local villages would come together to decide what livestock needed to be slaughtered so that meat could be used to survive the up and coming Winter. It just sounds so much more and means a greater thing that children running around bothering you, asking for sweets.

The Celts believed that the normal laws of space and time were held in abeyance during this time, allowing a special window where the spirit world could intermingle with the living. It was a night when the dead could cross the veils and return to the land of the living to celebrate with their family, or clan. As such, the great burial mounds of Ireland were lit up with torches lining the walls, so the spirits of the dead could find their way.



As the Church began to take hold in Europe the ancient Pagan rituals were co-opted into festivals of the Church. While the Church could not support a general feast for all the dead, it created a festival for the blessed dead, all those hallowed so, All Hallow's, was transformed into All Saints and All Souls day.

Today, we have lost the significance of this most significant time of year which in modern times has turned into a candy fest with kids dressing up as action heroes. It maybe just me, but it seems things in this day and age, especially in the Western culture revolve around material goods and items. We have lost so much of our bond with the spiritual World and doing things for spiritual reasons. Alignment of planets, moon sequences etc all seem to be lost.

Many cultures have ceremonies to honor their dead. In so doing, they complete a cycle of birth and death, and keep in line with a harmony and order of the universe, at time when we enter into the cycle of darkness for the upcoming year. Halloween though is looked as an easy opportunity for children to get their hands on sweets. So much of the tradition has been lost. So much of the depth.

What about the spiritual reasons for Halloween? Remembering the past loved ones who are 'on the other side,' slaughtering live stock to pass the cold Winter months. Everything just seemed 'to click' and have a reason for being in the past. Everything is materialistic in Western culture and sometimes I wish it was reversed.



As you light your candles this year, keep in mind the true potency of this time, one of magical connections to the other side of life, and a time to remember those who have passed before us. A time to send our love and gratitude to them to light their way back home.

That sounds great and all, but what's your point?!?! These days Halloween is just about having fun, no one wants to sit around pondering what other people did in "ancient times" or what Halloween really is.

People just wanna have fun on Halloween, dress up in ridiculous costumes and run around gettin free candy!! Whats wrong with that?!

Originally posted by cj6
People just wanna have fun on Halloween, dress up in ridiculous costumes and run around gettin free candy!! Whats wrong with that?!

You just proved my point. Materialism rules! You asked me my point so I'll answer very simply below.

These days people in the Western World in particular revolve around material possessions and I feel that spirituality and meanings of events and festivals has been lost.

Sad, but true. Everything is viewed on a very simple, materialistic level.

LOL I can't argue with that!

hmm , atleast it could give us older people something to do i'm 21 and im too tall to go trick or treating... not to mention , halloween is really dead in montreal canada.... i mean , you have to walk forever to find houses that celebrate halloween... kids stopped going out because of how cold it gets each year , like -3 to -10 if it rains ... 10 years ago almost everyone went out, now its like... no one cares anymore

[edit on 30-10-2007 by master_mind]

i have some friends who celebrate Samhain every year. sometimes i go with them sometimes i don't this year ill be spending Halloween at home watching a scary movie with the wife and kid, thats what they wanted to do.

I hear ya Arawn......I feel like I really missed the spiritual boat being born in a time of corperatism and rampant consumerism.

People these days have no regard to ritual, for anything sacred, it is all about tossing tradition in exchange for immediate gratification. Somewhere along the way modern man kind has lost it's sense of ceremony and tradition and replaced it with dumb, cheesy, meaningless BS.

Modern man has no concept of what it is to truly live asa spiritual being

But I admit that I still manage to have fun and I love Halloween, or todays watered down version of it (cant beat free candy)

Happy Halloween to all ATS'rs everywhere!!!