October 19, 2005
Subject: Halloween
Name: Rroniae Maye
Message: It's a deep and truthful article. The sad thing is, if I'm not mistaken, isn't the origin of Christianity based on those same pagan and Roman gods? Some of the Christian holidays coincide with the Grecco Roman and other pagan holidays as well. So who and what are we celebrating really?
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This is the news report to which she was responding:
HTTP_REFERER: http://www.tzemach.org/articles/halloween.htm
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Dear Rroniae Maye,
Thank you for your response to the article: "Should Christians Celebrate Halloween?" For the sake of the time commitment, I usually respond only to e-mail responses with questions.
Christianity hid behind the pagan Roman celebrations during the time of the persecution of the early church, which was from the destruction of Jerusalem in 70 A.D. until acceptance under Constantine in the early 300's. Unfortunately, many pagan practices were adopted, but the biblical festivals are founded in God's invitation to keep his feasts (Leviticus 23). It is probable that Jesus was born during the eight day feast of Sukkot (Booths). He clearly was not born on December 25 (Roman birthday of the Sun god). Although Hanukkah is not a commanded feast, Jesus kept it (John 10:22). The word "dedication" in Hebrew is "Hanukkah."
Halloween is Celtic, which precedes Ireland and Great Britain. There is no pagan Roman correlation to it.
At your leisure you may want to read these other articles on this subject:
Christmas - http://www.tzemach.org/articles/chrsmas.htm
God's Plan of Redemption - http://www.tzemach.org/articles/godsplan.htm
Blessings from the Tzemach Institute for Biblical Studies,
Jim Wingerter
Director of Multimedia Communications