Halloween: The Real Story

Where it really comes from

Halloween is short for "All Hallows' Eve," the evening before All Saints' Day on November 1. "Hallow" is an old word for saint, as in "hallowed be your name." Christians had remembered martyrs on special days since the 300s. In the 700s Pope Gregory III dedicated a chapel in St. Peter's in Rome to all the saints, and in 835 the feast on November 1 was made official across the Western church. October 31 is also Reformation Day: on that day in 1517, Martin Luther posted his 95 Theses, which led many to rediscover salvation by grace through faith.

What people say vs. what history shows

Myth: “Halloween is a satanic holiday.”

Solid: nearly all historians agree.

There's no historical basis for this. Halloween grew up around a Christian feast. Modern groups that call themselves satanic didn't appear until the 1960s, and they borrowed the date; they didn't create it. Dark or occult themes in some modern celebrations are worth avoiding, but they aren't the holiday's origin.

Myth: “Halloween is really Samhain, a Celtic festival honoring a ‘god of the dead.’”

Likely: strong case, some debate.

Samhain was a real Irish festival marking the end of the harvest around November 1, and some of its folk customs probably blended into Halloween in Ireland and Scotland. But there was no Celtic god named Samhain. That idea was invented by an 18th-century writer and repeated ever since. Lurid stories of Druid human sacrifices on Samhain also come from much later writers, not ancient evidence.

Myth: “The church picked November 1 to take over Samhain.”

Debated: scholars disagree.

Possibly, but it's not clear. The November 1 date started in Rome, far from Celtic lands, and some historians think it came from Germanic practice instead. Earlier All Saints commemorations were held in May.

The customs, honestly

• Trick-or-treating (Mixed roots): It grew out of "souling": on All Hallows' Eve and All Souls' Day, poor people and children went door to door for "soul cakes" and promised to pray for the household's loved ones who had died. Shakespeare mentions it in the 1590s. Scottish and Irish "guising," going out in costume, mixed in too. The phrase "trick or treat" appears in North America in the 1920s.
• Jack-o'-lanterns (Folk custom): An Irish and Scottish folk custom: lanterns carved from turnips, tied to a folktale about "Stingy Jack." Immigrants to America switched to pumpkins.
• Costumes (Mixed roots): Folk custom with mixed roots, from guising to medieval plays about saints and the devil. Plenty of Christian families today choose costumes of Bible heroes or simply fun characters.

For kids

Halloween means "the night before the saints' day." Saints are people who loved Jesus. It's also the day Martin Luther helped people understand that God saves us as a gift, not because we earn it!

Talk about it

Should Christians celebrate Halloween? Christians disagree, and that's okay (Romans 14:5). How could your family use the night to show kindness to neighbors?

Read it in the Bible

Hebrews 12:1 · Ephesians 2:8-9 · Romans 14:5 · 1 Thessalonians 4:13-14

Sources

• Ronald Hutton, The Stations of the Sun: A History of the Ritual Year in Britain (1996)
• Nicholas Rogers, Halloween: From Pagan Ritual to Party Night (2002)
• Shakespeare, The Two Gentlemen of Verona 2.1 ("to speak puling, like a beggar at Hallowmas")