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Halloween

A night of costumes and candy that grew out of the Christian eve of All Saints, carrying Irish and Scottish folk customs whose older roots historians still debate.

Should Christians keep Halloween?

Halloween’s name is Christian: it is the eve of All Saints. Whether its customs go back to Samhain, historians still debate[source 1][source 2]. But as far back as its folk customs are recorded, the night has centered on the dead and on telling the future[source 1]. Burns’s “Halloween” is a catalog of fortune-telling charms[source 4], and today’s Halloween still trades in ghosts, witches and fear[source 10]. The Church of Satan keeps it as one of its major holidays: its own FAQ calls October 31 “the Fall climax” and says Satanists “embrace what this holiday has become”[source 11].

God told Israel, “There shall not be found among you any one that . . . useth divination, or an observer of times, or an enchanter, or a witch” (Deuteronomy 18:10). Paul wrote, “have no fellowship with the unfruitful works of darkness, but rather reprove them” (Ephesians 5:11), and “Abstain from all appearance of evil” (1 Thessalonians 5:22).

So we don’t keep Halloween, and we encourage believers to set the night aside. Paul also tells believers not to judge one another over days (Romans 14:5–6), so we offer this as a conviction to weigh, not a test of anyone’s faith.

Historical origin

Halloween is a contraction of “All Hallows’ Eve,” the night before All Saints’ Day (All Hallows) on November 1. Christians had long remembered martyrs on the anniversaries of their deaths, and in 609 or 610 Pope Boniface IV dedicated Rome’s Pantheon to Mary and all the martyrs[source 3][source 8]. A feast of all saints on November 1 appears in England and the Frankish lands in the eighth and ninth centuries, and in 835 the emperor Louis the Pious, at the request of Pope Gregory IV, ordered it kept throughout his empire[source 1]. In the early eleventh century (traditionally dated to 998), Abbot Odilo of Cluny ordered his monasteries to commemorate all the faithful departed, a day that spread as All Souls’ Day on November 2[source 7].

Samhain (Old Irish samain), the start of winter in the medieval Irish calendar, also fell at the beginning of November. Irish tales written down by Christian monks from about the tenth century set royal assemblies and encounters with the otherworld at Samhain[source 1][source 2]. Much earlier, a bronze calendar from Coligny in Gaul (2nd century AD) names a month SAMON(I), often reconstructed as Samonios, though how it relates to the Irish feast is uncertain[source 5].

By the early modern period, Hallowe’en in Scotland and Ireland was a night for fortune-telling, bonfires and going door to door in disguise (“guising”)[source 1]. Robert Burns’s poem “Halloween,” published in 1786, describes the fortune-telling charms of a Scottish country Halloween: pulling kail stalks, burning nuts, sowing hemp seed[source 4]. In parts of England, children and the poor went “souling” at Hallowtide, the days around All Saints, asking for soul cakes in return for prayers for the dead[source 1]. Irish and Scottish immigrants carried these customs to North America in the nineteenth century, where Halloween became a community and children’s holiday; the phrase “trick or treat” is first recorded in Ontario in 1917[source 9].

Timeline

  1. 2nd c. ADA Gaulish calendar, later found at Coligny in France, names a month SAMONIOS.
  2. 609 or 610Pope Boniface IV dedicates the Pantheon in Rome to Mary and all the martyrs.
  3. 835Louis the Pious orders All Saints’ Day kept on November 1 throughout his empire.
  4. early 11th c.Odilo of Cluny orders a yearly commemoration of all the faithful departed, later All Souls’ Day.
  5. 10th–12th c.Irish monks write down tales that set assemblies and otherworldly events at Samhain.
  6. 1786Robert Burns publishes “Halloween,” describing Scottish fortune-telling charms.
  7. 1917The phrase “trick or treat” is first recorded, in Ontario, Canada.

In scripture

The early church, AD 30–100

Nothing like Halloween appears in the New Testament or in Christian writings before AD 100. The earliest Christians did remember their dead: the New Testament speaks of a “great cloud of witnesses” (Hebrews 12:1) and of the souls of martyrs (Revelation 6:9–11), and in the mid-second century the church at Smyrna planned to gather each year on the anniversary of Bishop Polycarp’s martyrdom[source 6]. A single feast for all the saints came centuries later[source 3].

Popular claims

Each claim is rated against the evidence. About the ratings

  • “Halloween is the Celtic festival of Samhain under a new name.”

    Debated

    Halloween’s name and date come from the Christian feast of All Saints, but some of its customs (bonfires, divination, spirits abroad) echo what medieval Irish texts associate with Samhain[source 1][source 2]. How much of that is pre-Christian, and how much attached itself to the night later, is disputed: nearly everything known about Samhain was written down by Christians centuries after Ireland’s conversion[source 1].

  • “The church set All Saints’ Day on November 1 to replace Samhain.”

    Unverified

    No surviving source gives that reason. The November 1 date first appears in England and the Frankish lands, and historians disagree over whether Celtic or Germanic custom shaped it[source 1]. The motive is undocumented.

  • “Samhain was named for a Celtic lord of the dead.”

    Contradicted

    No Irish or Gaulish source names a god called Samhain; the word names a date. Its meaning is itself disputed: traditionally “summer’s end,” though some linguists connect it with a word for “assembly.” The death god first appears in eighteenth-century antiquarian speculation, not in any ancient or medieval text[source 1][source 10].

  • “Trick-or-treating is an ancient pagan ritual.”

    Unverified

    Going door to door in disguise, or for soul cakes, is documented in Britain and Ireland from the early modern period, often tied to prayers for the dead[source 1][source 4]. A line from these back to pre-Christian practice is not documented, and trick-or-treating in its modern form took shape in North America in the twentieth century[source 2].

Sources

  1. Hutton, Ronald. The Stations of the Sun: A History of the Ritual Year in Britain. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1996. Link to this source
  2. Rogers, Nicholas. Halloween: From Pagan Ritual to Party Night. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2002.
  3. The Book of Pontiffs (Liber Pontificalis), life of Boniface IV. Translated by Raymond Davis. Liverpool: Liverpool University Press, 1989.
  4. Burns, Robert. “Halloween” (written 1785, published 1786). In Poems and Songs of Robert Burns, Project Gutenberg eBook #1279. Link to this source
  5. Olmsted, Garrett S. The Gaulish Calendar: A Reconstruction from the Bronze Fragments from Coligny. Bonn: R. Habelt, 1992.
  6. The Martyrdom of Polycarp 18. Ante-Nicene Fathers, vol. 1, via New Advent. Link to this source
  7. Mershman, Francis. “All Souls’ Day.” The Catholic Encyclopedia, vol. 1. New York: Robert Appleton Company, 1907, via New Advent. Link to this source
  8. Mershman, Francis. “All Saints’ Day.” The Catholic Encyclopedia, vol. 1. New York: Robert Appleton Company, 1907, via New Advent. Link to this source
  9. “trick or treat.” DCHP-3: A Dictionary of Canadianisms on Historical Principles, 3rd ed. University of British Columbia. Link to this source
  10. Morton, Lisa. Trick or Treat: A History of Halloween. London: Reaktion Books, 2012. Link to this source
  11. Church of Satan. “F.A.Q. Holidays.” churchofsatan.com. Link to this source

Last reviewed October 25, 2026.