It was odd to read that “Some Christians balk at Halloween on Sunday” (The Herald, Oct. 29) and then shift their celebration to Saturday to avoid celebrating a pagan event on God’s day.
Sunday, named for the Sun, is still being called God’s Day, although the Jewish Sabbath is Saturday.
Saturday, in the English language, is named after the Roman God of agriculture, Saturn. In other languages it is called Bathing Day or Laugir Dag, not because it became the habitual bathing day of the citizens but of their god or goddess.
The first century Roman historian Tacitus tells of the worship of the goddess Nerthus and the celebration and the bathing of the goddess whose final act was the drowning of her attendants at the bath because they had viewed the naked goddess. Thank God we have dropped some of the original Halloween traditions but retained the fun ones.
FINN HEDIN
Everett
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