Letter to our Readers from:
Shelley Gotterer
Teacher of the oral tradition of stories and folklore enthusiast
The ancient festivals of the Celts are only partially known.
Their history was kept alive orally with no written records. Our
understanding can be, therefore, only partial as well. We gain this
partial
understanding from oral traditions and Celtic art and archeology.
Celts did not worship Satan. They had no such name or concept in their
mythology. They did know about the complexity of life and the
struggles of
living and dying. This idea of their worshipping Satan came from
Medieval
times along with witch hunts and the subsequent killing of old women,
the
mentally impaired, the different, the envied, the outcast. Read a
little
about how many people King James tortured and killed because of his
firm
belief in "witches."
Halloween is a reduced word which once meant "All Hollow's Evening."
Ancient Celts never used the word "Halloween." It was a Christian
concept.
In fairness, please consider what research has discovered:
Samhain pronounced "SOW- an ( sow rhymes with cow)" is not the name
of
the lord of death. Samhain means "end of summer." It was a harvest
festival
and the beginning of the Celtic new year. The Celts of Ireland and
Scotland
were deeply aware that out of the death of the year, the dark of
winter, the
cold and ice, would come new life, warmth, a new planting season.
"To the Celts, time was circular rather than linear. This is reflected
in
their commencing each day, and each festival, at dusk rather than dawn,
a
custom comparable with that of the Jewish Sabbath. It is also reflected
in
their year beginning with the festival of Samhain on 31 October, when
nature
appears to be dying down. Tellingly, the first month of the Celtic year
is
Samonios, ŒSeed Fall¹: in other words, from death and darkness springs
life
and light."
The Celtic festivals
Samhain (end of summer) to the lambing time at Imbolc ( January), from
Imbolc to the fires of Beltain (May), and from Beltain to the harvest
time
of Lughnasadh (July), and from then to Samhain.
This cycle is perhaps the most exciting aspect of the Celtic approach
to
time, and certainly the one that we can most easily follow nowadays. In
our
time, most of us are out of touch with the seasons, and the one big
Western
festival has become more of a time for ringing tills than ringing the
changes. We can bring a greater sense of rhythm and continuity into our
lives by observing the Celtic festivals.
Samhain
The Celtic year began with Samhain. Celebrated around 31 October, it
was a
time of deliberate misrule and contrariness, rather like the Roman
Saturnalia. It was also a time when the veil between this world and the
Otherworld was thought to be so thin that the dead could return to warm
themselves at the hearths of the living, and some of the living -
especially
poets - were able to enter the Otherworld through the doorways of the
sidhe,
(the shee) or the fairies such as that at the Hill of Tara in
Ireland.
At Samhain cattle were brought in for the winter, and in Ireland the
warrior
élite, the Fianna, gave up war until Beltain. It was a sacred time,
whose
peace was normally broken only by the ritualized battle of board games
such
as fidchell.
(Meat was prepared for the winter, and piles of bones were burned
during
this time. Therefore, "bone fires" or "bon fires" were common.)
Our modern Hallowe¹en stems from Samhain, and one explanation of the
traditional pumpkin lanterns is that the Celts once placed the skulls
of
ancestors outside their doors at this time.
(The skull was so important because is was associated with the soul.
The
Jack of the Lantern stories came much, much later.)
The Christians took over the Celtic festival and turned it into All
Saints
Day. Even the modern English celebration of Guy Fawkes Day has echoes
of the
ancient fire festival.
Do practice your faith with vigor. Please do not vilify that which you
clearly do not take the time to understand and which perpetuates
misunderstanding. One need not believe this ancient religion, but
rather
one can try to learn and understand without losing ones own beliefs.
Sincerely,
Shelley Gotterer
Teacher of the oral tradition of stories and folklore enthusiast
