The Connection Between Halloween and the Celts

Everyone knows that October 31st is Halloween. Thousands of children across America will hit the streets to see how much candy they can come home with but has Halloween, which was mainly for children been ruined for them? I believe it has. With the first razor blade reported in an apple to people that believe Halloween is a devil worshippers night. Lets just examine the true meaning of Halloween to see if it really is satans night for ghosts and goblins to walk the earth.

Webster dictionary defines Halloween as: "holly person, hence saint" the evening of October 31, which is followed by All Saints Day, or Allhallows. Now lets define saint: 1. A holy person. 2. A person who is exceptionally meek, charitable, patient, etc. 3.those with God. 4. In the New Testament, any Christian, a member of any certain religious groups calling themselves Saints. 5. In certain Christian churches, a person officially recognized as having lived an exceptionally holy life, and this as being in heaven and capable of interceding for sinners; canonized person to make a saint of; canonize. Within these definitions do you see anything that gives you Halloween as a devil worshipers night? I can't find anything!

Now where did Halloween come from and how did it start? Lets examine this. Thousands of years ago the Celts who resided in the lands, which is now called Ireland, United Kingdom and France joined together every year in celebration for the end of the summers harvest and the beginning of winter. This celebration was held every November 1, which really represented the end of their old year and the beginning of the new year. Now what do we do today? We celebrate Thanksgiving, which is basically part of the same as the Celts celebration; the end of this years harvest only the Americans have added to this celebration their founding of their country. We have just separated the starting of winter and the arrival of the new year into two separate days.

Now the Celts believed the night before the new year, October 31, that the ghosts of the dead returned to earth. This was only one night of the year that they believed this. What do a lot of people believe today? All you have to do is check out the television stations and I will guarantee you that you will find shows about ghost haunting. Go to your local book store, the shelves are filled with ghost stories. There are people that are consumed with the subject.

The Celts believed that the priests or Druids predictions for the future were easier to be told by the ghosts of the dead returning to earth. These Celtic people were people that believed in the natural world. They were vulnerable to mother natural with the destruction of crops by weather and the spread of plague. Today we are fortune enough for the technology we have and through the years people today know more than back in the Celts time. With the predictions that the priests made it gave the Celt people a sense of comfort to make it through the hard winter months. Predictions, people today make predictions for their new year. All want health and happiness, success for good fortune just like the Celts did.

For the actual celebration the Druids would have bonfires blazing, the Celts would gather together to watch the burning of crops and the sacrifices of animals to the Celtic gods. What do we do now, no we do not sacrifice animals and burn crops but we gather together on December 31 to celebrate the coming of the new year just like the Celts did. The only difference is that the Celts had bonfires, burned crops and animals. We party all night, people end up drunk and totally forget the true meaning of what we are celebrating. Again humans have advanced to where we believe what the Celts did was wrong and cruel but if you look at the time of there lives what else did they have, nothing but nature.

So now do you think that Halloween is evil? Not by a long way, there is no evil involved with Halloween from the beginning. From the Celts time period to today, yes time has changed in the way we think and believe but what the Celts believed in came from nature and that's all they had; today we have so much more. People of today believe that they are right and there's no wrong way of doing things. People of today have no idea what it meant to have a successful crop one year and make it through the winter with a full belly; or have crops destroyed and go hungry. People of today take everything for granted and do not have the respect for times long ago!