| |  Halloween, Christmas (Yule) and Easter are all Pagan holidays with millennia old roots going back to early agricultural days predating even the Indo-Europeanization (Aryanizing) of Europe with the emergence of the Olympic sky gods. Rather, they date back to the earlier worship of the Earth Mother by early farmers, the triple goddess of virginity, fecundity and death.
The combination of the harvest festival and the day of the dead (right, a Mexican oferta from the Dia de los Muertos) reflects the 'dying' of the year as the deciduous trees drop their leaves and the sun appears to weaken as it sinks in the sky. Yule is a celebration of the rebirth of the year as the sun begins to return after the Winter Solistice. Easter (the name of the Anglo-Saxon goddess of the dawn, which occurs in the East) is a celebration of the leafing out of the deciduous forests along with the birthing season and the appearance of flowers.
The presence of the dead at Halloween is not in its origins a mockery. In Mexico and Latin America the day of the dead is one of respect for ancestors, and similar holidays where graves are visited and cleaned and small 'sacrifices' of food and flowers are left occur world wide, In Japan, even aborted fetuses are buried and mourned.
But of course, the American sense of life has made this holiday one of joy and celebration. Few non-Catholics know that November 1st is a "Holy Day of Obligation" (or was at least in my youth) when attendance at Mass in addition to Sunday liturgy was mandatory.
for those interested in such matters, I recommend:
The White Goddess Robert Graves
The Mists of Avalon Marion Zimmer Bradley &
the various works of Marija Gimbutas.
Ted Keer
(Edited by Ted Keer on 11/19, 8:25am)
(Edited by Ted Keer on 11/19, 4:41pm)
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