Page 19 - EM 1 Oct Nov 2019_june_july_2009_Neat

5 Myths About Halloween 19

5 Myths About Halloween

By Jack Santino

Halloween is a holiday shrouded in darkness,
linked to the supernatural and known for
inspiring fear. So it’s not surprising that there are
many misconceptions about its traditions,
origins and meaning. Here are some of the most
common.

1. Beware of razor blades in candy
apples.

Police in Denver this year are warning parents
about the prospect of pot-infused candy. “We
advise that you should thoroughly check your
children’s candy,” the department posted on its
Facebook page, “and not just for homemade,
opened, or suspicious items, but also for any
marijuana edibles that look eerily close to
mainstream candies kids eat every day.”
bonfires to welcome wandering souls. It was and souls, fairies, witches and demons. As the
This is just the latest iteration of a
remains a family celebration in Ireland. centuries wore on, people began dressing like
perennial concern. A 2011 Harris Interactive poll
Few early American settlers observed these creatures, performing antics in exchange
found that 24 percent of parents were fearful that
Halloween. It was Irish immigrants in the 19th for food and drink. By the Middle Ages, masked
their children might be poisoned by tampered-
century who were responsible for bringing many solicitations were associated with All Souls’ Day
with or spoiled treats. In fact there is little, if
Halloween customs to the United States. and other holidays in countries influenced by
any, evidence that this has ever happened.
Catholicism.
Joel Best, a sociology and criminal
3. Halloween is Satanic. But, according to folklorist Tad Tuleja,
justice professor at the University of Delaware,
trick-or-treating did not descend directly from
has examined reports of “Halloween sadism”
This is a concern especially for some those traditions. By his account, the practice as
going back as far as 1958. “I have been unable
Evangelical Christians. “Halloween is a festival we know it in the United States is largely a
to find a substantiated report of a child being
for demonic spirits,” Pat Robertson said this product of an effort by local governments and
killed or seriously injured by a contaminated
month. “The whole idea of trick-or-treating is businesses in the 1930s and ’40s to promote an
treat picked up in the course of trick-or-
the druids would go to somebody’s house and alternative to pranking and the rowdier aspects
treating,” Best writes. There have been
ask for money, and if they didn’t get money, of Halloween. “Trick or treat has gradually
examples of product tampering, but not related
they’d kill one of their sheep. I mean, that was replaced buggy stealing as the ‘appropriate’ way
to Halloween. And there was one 1974 death
the trick. So it was serious stuff. And all this for children to enjoy the holiday,” he writes.
blamed on poisoned Pixy Stix — though the 8-
business about goblins and jack-o’-lanterns and Indeed, early descriptions of Halloween
year-old Texas boy was actually murdered by his
all that all comes out of demonic rituals of the in the United States generally don’t reference
father, who was trying to cash in on his son’s life
druids and the people who lived in England at any activities that resemble knocking on doors
insurance. Other reports of Halloween sadism
that particular time.” to ask for treats. The practice became
have turned out to be hoaxes or have had more
Actually, the devil wasn’t part of the ubiquitous, however, in the post-World War II
benign explanations.
Samhain festival celebrated by the Celts — or years, after the lifting of sugar rations and as
While it should be reassuring to know
the druids, who made up their priestly caste. suburbanization made going from house to
that contaminated candy falls squarely into the
They made sacrifices in honor of the dead, but house easier than when people lived far from
category of urban legend, it’s a sad commentary
those sacrifices more often took the form of their neighbors.
on our society that homemade treats are
burned crops rather than animals. Contrary to
considered suspicious and only mass-produced
some accounts, there was no human sacrifice. 5. You can’t have Halloween without
candy bars are seen as safe.
It was only when the Catholic Church pumpkins.
tried to supplant Samhain and other native
2. Halloween is a quintessentially
holidays that the church branded practitioners of In Ireland and Scotland, jack-o’-lanterns have
American holiday. rival religions as devil-worshippers. Beliefs in traditionally been made out of large turnips.
the wandering dead persisted, but the They are hollowed out, carved with a face,
Traditions focused on accumulation and supernatural beings honored by the Celts carried as lanterns and set in spooky places, such
consumption may seem very American, and became associated with evil. And the Celtic as graveyards. European settlers first
certainly an American-style Halloween has underworld became associated with the encountered the pumpkin in the New World.
evolved. But the origins of the holiday can be Christian hell. Because it is already hollow, it is much easier to
traced back to a pre-Christian Celtic festival Yes, devils remain a symbol of carve. So pumpkins replaced turnips in America.
called Samhain (pronounced “SAH-wen”). For Halloween — and you may see a few of them Why have a jack-o’-lantern at all? The
the Celts, Nov. 1 marked the end of the harvest scurrying from door to door. But Halloween is a symbolism goes back to an old European folk
and the beginning of the new year. They time when people project their fears in a safe tale. A blacksmith named Jack scoffed at Saint
believed that the souls of the dead mingled and playful way. When else will you see images Peter and tricked the devil, and so was denied
among the living at that time. And so they of death on suburban lawns? entrance to both heaven and hell. He scooped up
associated the fruits of the harvest with death, a coal from the embers of hell in a turnip and
the afterlife and the supernatural. 4. Trick-or-treating has long been a uses it to light his way as he wanders, endlessly,
Later, after Saint Patrick and other
central feature of Halloween. between two worlds.
missionaries converted Ireland to Christianity,
So the jack-o’-lantern symbolizes a
Nov. 1 became All Saints’ Day, or All Hallows
Wearing costumes and demanding treats can marginal creature, a trickster, dangerous but
Day, and the eve of All Hallows became known
also be traced to the Celtic period and the first fascinating, like so much else in this ancient and
as Halloween. It featured feasts, the blessing of
few centuries of the Christian era, when food modern tradition of Halloween. []
the hearth, and the lighting of candles and
and drink were left out to placate wandering