What You Don’t Know About Halloween Can Hurt You

Halloween is celebrated on Oct. 31 every year in many nations, even by believers who are completely unaware of its origins or the spiritual implications. This is the night when most paganists honor the spirits of the dead, offer human sacrifices and make pacts and covenants with demonic forces.

It originated among the ancient Celts of Europe and was called the festival of “Samhain” or “All Hallowtide” (the feast of the dead). It started on the evening of Oct. 31, signaling the end of harvest and the beginning of winter and also the beginning of the New Year for the Celts.

During this turning of the year, the “veil between the worlds” was believed to be at its thinnest so the living could communicate with the dead. It was a time when deceased ancestors and other “friendly” spirits were invited to join in festivals and be reunited with loved ones.  

It was also a time when faeries were active. Faeries were seen as those angels who did not side with either God or Lucifer and were condemned to walk the earth until Judgment Day. The Celtic people believed that chaos reigned on this night since it was a time between one year and the next. It was a night of magic charms and divinations, reading the future and many other rites.

Trick or Treat: Since it was the belief that spirits had to be appeased by giving them a type of offering (food or milk), people would imitate the faeries and go from house to house begging for treats. Failure to provide the treats would result in practical jokes being visited on the owner of the house, such as blocking the chimney, leading off cattle and throwing cabbages. Another way to fool or scare away the evil spirits was to dress up to look like them. It was believed the spirits would bring them no harm then. 

Jack-o-Lantern: Jack was an Irish scoundrel who liked to eat big red turnips. On Halloween day, he trapped the devil in a tree and would not let him down until the devil promised Jack would never live in hell. The devil agreed, and a year later Jack died. Because he did not believe in God, he did not go to heaven, and the devil did not allow him into hell either. To help Jack find his way back to earth, the devil gave him a fiery coal. Jack put this fiery coal in a lantern he had carved from a big turnip. This first “Jack-o-Lantern” was supposed to help Jack find his way back to Ireland, but he never found it and is therefore still roaming the earth with his lantern. 

Fire ceremonies: Halloween was one of the four great fire festivals of the Celts. All the fires in hearths were extinguished and then rekindled from a central bonfire started ceremoniously by the Druids. During this time, the Druids would wear animal skins and heads to disguise them from the spirits. The extinguishing of the fires symbolized the “dark half” of the year, and the rekindling symbolized the return of hope. Fires or candles were left burning all night to honor and welcome the dead.

The early Christian church tried to eliminate the Druid celebration by offering All Saints’ Day as a substitute. It was to no avail. Although the outward forms of such worship disappeared, the belief in these gods did not. In the mid 1900s, paganism returned to the Western world, and the pagan feasts were reintroduced.

The uninformed Christian has no idea that demonic spirits that are contacted are actually activated as people call out to them in jest or in seriousness. Every act surrounding Halloween honors false gods and spirits, and praying for the dead is totally against Scripture. 

Satanists have adopted the Druidic High Days and celebrate Halloween as follows: 

October 22-29: preparations for the sacrifices
October 30: Satanic High Day, related to Halloween with human sacrifice
October 31: All Hallow’s Eve, blood and sexual rituals with demons; animal or human sacrifices

Scriptural Prayer Guidelines:

• 2 Timothy 1:7: God has not given us a spirit of fear, but of love, power and a sound mind. Resist the spirit of fear that seems to surface in the time of Halloween and is enhanced by movies portraying either the occult or extreme situations of fear.

• Deuteronomy 18:9-14: Do not imitate the detestable ways of the nations through sacrifice, divination, omens, witchcraft, casting of spells, mediums or consulting the dead. Resist the temptation to be drawn into seemingly harmless celebrations of this ancient demonic feast. If you were involved in the past, confess it. Ask the Lord for a revelation of His ways to people around you. Ask the Lord for forgiveness for the countless ways your town will be involved in this practice. Speak up and warn people of the danger of getting involved in any kind of occult practices.

• Please pray the Lord will silence the voices of the underworld so that witches, wizards, shamans, etc., will be unable to make contact with the spirit world.

• Isaiah 8:19: Should a people not consult their God? Why speak to the dead on behalf of the living? Call upon the name of the Lord Jesus Christ. Submit to His ways, and ask for a deeper revelation of His love. Ask Him to reveal to you His plan and purpose for your town, and pray until He manifests His power in your area.

• 1 Chronicles 10:13-14: Consulting the dead is being unfaithful to God and can result in judgment. Commit yourself and your family once again to love and serve the Lord Jesus Christ and Him alone. 

• Ask the Lord to expose all evil, especially on the night of Halloween, so that works of the kingdom of darkness will weaken. 

• Ask for protection for those targeted for human sacrifices. Pray for all Christians to be protected against curses directed at them; pray especially for pastors, ministers and Christian leaders.

• Pray for the salvation of many who practice the occult, that they will be confronted with the love, purity and holiness of God the Father through Jesus Christ.

• Petition the Lord against the resurgence of serial killers, escalation of crime, especially violent crimes against children and women, tribal disputes, increased trade in narcotics and pornography, increased abortion, drought and spoiled harvests, financial destruction to the church, calling up of spiritual forces to begin mass bloodshed and war in countries all over the world, evil forces meeting together to generate power to deceive the masses, and the revival of the practice of magic, especially by teenagers and pre-teens.