(For the lyrics to the “Let It Begin” spiral dance song, click here)
I am the hallow-tide of all souls passing,
I am the bright releaser of all pain,
I am the quickener of the fallen seed-case,
I am the glance of snow, the strike of rain.
I am the hollow of the winter twilight,
I am the hearth-fire and the welcome bread,
I am the curtained awning of the pillow,
I am unending wisdom’s golden thread.
~ Song of Samhain, Celtic Devotional:
Daily Prayers and Blessings, by Caitlín Matthews
The Wheel of Time has turned, and we are now in the magical period that ancient Celts and modern Witches call Samhain. The Great Sabbat of Samhain (pronounced SAH-wen, SAH-ween, or SOW (rhymes with cow) -wen) is the third and final harvest, marking Summer’s end.
It is the celebration of the New Year in both the old Celtic calendar and also in many traditions of the Craft. In the Northern Hemisphere, this marks the midpoint between Autumn Equinox and Winter Solstice (although by strict astronomical reckoning that falls on Nov. 6-7 this year (depending on your time zone).
Samhain is the opposite point of the year from the celebrations of life and fertility of May Day, or Beltane, which our friends below the equator are celebrating today.
Merry Beltane to you all!
A Witch’s View of Human Nature
As most educated people know, neither Witches nor Samhain have anything whatsoever to do with “satan,” who is strictly a Christian invention. While our stories have plenty of tricksters and even a few nasty villains, there is no entity of supernatural evil in the beliefs or practices of Witchcraft or Paganism.
More importantly, most Witches and Pagans do not believe in the myth of fundamental wrongness being at the heart of the world, or human nature.
For centuries, our culture has been haunted and manipulated by the terror that a taint of evil lurks in even the most innocent of us.
Sadly, the fallout from this is that most people are alienated from, and deeply afraid of, the natural cycles of living, aging, and dying. And yet a morbid fascination with violence, death, and horror are central to popular entertainment pastimes.
For our ancestors, as well as in cultures not dominated by the Abrahamic religions, when you eliminate the fear that there is a stain of evil or accursedness dwelling within every single one of us (mediated only by the Church), then you have a very different relationship to the fact of death.
Death may bring deep grief to those left behind, but it is not the grotesque horror that we have turned it into, in our modern, “enlightened” times.
On the contrary, we sense that the boundary that lies between the living and the departed, and between what is past, present, and future has become thin.
This is not a spooky, terrifying thing to us. Consensual reality shifts, and other dimensions are revealed, enabling us to welcome and commune with our beloved dead, as well as our Otherworldly guides and allies.
Origins
Halloween and All Saints Day have their origin in the ancient Celtic feast of Samhain. The All Saints ceremonies had originally been in the Springtime, but the Catholic church, in an attempt to stamp out the Pagan rites of Samhain, superimposed it to that time. We do not, in fact, really know what went on at those most ancient rites, as the wise Ronald Hutton reminds us.
In the modern Gaelic languages, the name of the feast means “summer’s end.” In the modern Brythonic languages, it means “the first day of winter.” 
It is the end of the end, the beginning of the beginning. The Celts honored the intertwining forces of existence: darkness and light, night and day, cold and heat, death and life.
Celtic knotwork art represents this intertwining. The old ones observed time as proceeding from darkness to light. Thus, the Celtic day began at dusk, the beginning of the dark and cold night, and ended the following dusk, the end of a day of light and warmth.
Similarly, the Celtic year began with An Geamhradh (“an gyow-ragh”), the dark Celtic winter, and ended with Am Foghar (“am fu-ghar”), the Celtic harvest. So Samhain marks the beginning of both An Geamhradh and the new Celtic year.
Throughout history and across cultures, this is a time for making peace with one another, and with the inevitability of death.
This would have been the third and final harvest of the growing season, with Lughnasadh (Aug. 1) being the first harvest of grains and Mabon (Equinox) being the final harvest of fruits and vegetables. Samhain marked the blood harvest of cattle, pigs, and other animals that had to be culled in order to survive the encroaching Winter.
Thus, stories with a theme of the death and the transformation cycle, as well as rituals honoring and welcoming the spirits of our beloved dead Ancestors are central to our rites.
Our Magical Legacy
While the revelry of Halloween can be fun, it is not Pagan. Instead, Halloween is a commercialized, secular event. It is ironic that some conservative churches are trying to clean up what they fear is the Pagan influence of this night by having “Fall Harvest Festivals,” since that is actually much closer to the Pagan observances.
Instead, this night is our most holy, reflective, and deeply sacred time.
So to my friends who love to party, dress up, and carouse on this night, I appreciate your invitations, but my feelings and sensibilities at this time could hardly be further away from those activities.
Instead, like most other Witches, Druids, and Pagans, I will
be in sacred space on this most spiritual of nights.
Tonight, we’ll be bidding welcome to our beloved departed ones, freshening our altars in their honor, preparing their favorite foods, perhaps hosting a dumb supper, and lighting candles to show them the way.
We review the old year’s triumphs and shortcomings, and we may burn symbols or actual items in our bonfires representing that which we wish to release for good. We gather with our communities and dance the Spiral Dance.
The Divine Ones
At Samhaintide, we mark the transformation of the Goddess to Her Dark Mother and Crone aspects. We give thanks for the many gifts of Cerridwen, Hecate, Hel, Kali, the Norns, the Morrigan, and the Baba Yaga, to name but a few.
These are the Wise Ones who brook no nonsense, and challenge us to grow beyond our comfort zones, to face our truth, and be fully engaged in the sacredness of our lives.
One of the first known festivals commemorating the light descending into darkness was held at this time among the ancient Sumerian people. 
It is now that Inanna, Goddess of Life and Queen of Heaven, enters the underworld to spend the next six months with Her sister, Ereshkigal the Lady of Death and Rebirth — but on the condition that She spend the other six in the green places with Her summer lover Dumuzi.
This story, of course, echoes in the ancient Greek tradition of Demeter, and Her daughter Persephone, who must spend six months in the Underworld, thus creating Winter.
In the Egyptian calendar, festivals of the sun God Ra, the cat Goddess Bastet and the lion Goddess Sekhmet are all honored on this day. Sekhmet, in Her fierce aspect as Goddess of magic, the Lady of Fire, and punitive destroyer of evil, is the protector of women against rape and all sexual violence.
It is also the Norse festival of the Thin Veil, so named for the belief that on this night, the opaque barrier separating the worlds of the living and the dead becomes transparent, allowing the two realms to see and interact with each other. This time also marks the annual death of Baldur and His beloved Nanna, the Goddess of flowers, both of Whom will be born again in the Spring.
The Start of the Wild Hunt
This is a night of great power, when we may seek wisdom through divination and sacred contact with the Otherworlds.
It is a time to contemplate our own ephemeral existence in this Middle World of life, and to accept with grace our place in the Spiral Dance of life and death.
Our predecessors took Samhain quite seriously. Any crops not harvested by this day were known to belong to the “Shrouded One” and left alone.
Ancestors not honored at this time could be expected to plague the living with ill luck. Thus, tonight is an important time to set a place at the table for your beloved dead, and give offerings to those who have crossed over to the Summerlands.
The most fierce Faery races, led by the Lord of the Faery, Finvara, King of the Dead, ride forth, beginning on this night, with the hosts of the dead, sweeping up all the souls of those who have died within the past year.
Commonly known as The Wild Hunt, this fabled activity continues until Yule, so beware of dark, lonely places in the night, lest you be taken by mistake.
Invoking Alliances of the Wild Hunt
However, I was also struck by a beautiful re-imagining of The Wild Hunt, as expressed in the Samhain rites I attended over the weekend with my friends at the Church of the Earth.
In response to these dark times, when so many of us are in harm’s way or dwell on the edge of despair, the Priestesses invoked the riders of The Wild Hunt as powerful Ancestors, bringing fierce courage and heroic support to those who are working on behalf of justice, healing, wisdom, and the environment of our sacred Mother Earth. So mote it be.
We Honor the Witches
In addition, on this day, we remember all those men, women, and children who have been burned, hanged, imprisoned, beaten, drowned, tortured, and murdered as Witches.
Let’s be clear.
Witchcraft continues to be misunderstood and persecuted today. In some countries, suspected Witches are still routinely put to torturous death.
But we will continue to strive for justice and understanding for all in danger. And we vow — Never again the Burnings!
In Remembrance – Nov. 2016 – Oct. 31, 2017
On this day, we especially remember the beloved dead — the many people we have loved and honored, the Mighty Ones of the Craft who have departed our world since last Samhain, and those who might not be known, but whose crossings matter, including (to name a few):
Raymond Buckland – responsible for introducing Gardnerian Witchcraft into America in 1964, and which spread like wildfire across all States. A decade later he founded his own tradition of Witchcraft called Seax-Wica and for a time operated his own Museum of Witchcraft. He was a leading author and spokesman for the Craft in America for more than five decades. Angela Magara – writer, teacher, and mystic who lived in peace among tall trees and hidden springs, and author of the gorgeous Earth Psalms, a rewrite of the biblical psalms, but rooted in the Goddess and the heart of Earth-based spirituality. Dolores Stewart Riccio – author of the rollicking Cass Shipton mystery series, featuring a coven of talented sleuths.
We also give honor and farewell to:
Robert Pirsig – author of Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance. Louise Hay – founder of Hay House Publishing and pioneer for the New Thought movement. Robert Osbourne – brilliant, gentlemanly host of Turner Classic Movies. Gwen Ifill – host of Washington Week and PBS News Hour (Nov. 2016).
Many talented entertainers, including Leon Russell (Nov. 2016), Greg Allman, Tom Petty, John Hurt, Chuck Berry, Fats Domino, and Mary Tyler Moore.
And let us resolve to never forget the many unarmed citizens killed by police, often men and women of color, including Jordan Edwards, a 15-year-old high school freshman who was shot in April by a police officer in a Dallas suburb. Jayson Negron – unarmed 15-year old shot and killed by Bridgeport, Connecticut police. And Darius Smith – unarmed 15-year old, repeatedly shot and killed execution style, by Arcadia, California police. #BlackLivesMatter
The wars in the Middle East and elsewhere drag on and on, while horrifying acts of domestic terror increase. Let us remember this night the dutiful warriors and innocent victims, even as we work towards dialogue, peace, and more compassionate and enlightened leaders and policies.
Last but certainly not least, no matter if the current administration tries to erase the global climate change information from their government websites, there is no erasing the staggering loss of life we are now enduring, including countless non-human family members dead, dying, and becoming extinct.
Let us give honor to them, as well as the memory of the men, women, and children who have perished this year due to Earth changes, though their names, and sometimes the events, may not be known to us. They include:
- 82 deaths from Hurricane Harvey.
- 134 dead from Hurricane Irma, including 10 from the Hollywood, FL nursing home that lost power, causing these fragile elders to succumb to the deadly heat of over 110 degrees. Efforts to enact a law requiring emergency generators as a result of this tragedy were overturned this week, because it would have been too expensive.
And the number of dead also includes the entire population of Barbuda.“A civilization that has existed on that island for over 300 years has now been extinguished,” according to Ronald Sanders, ambassador to the U.S. for Antigua and Barbuda. - The official count in Puerto Rico from Hurricane Maria is 51, but funeral directors have reported that more than 900 cremations have occurred since Sept. 20. A death is only reported to be hurricane-related if a medical examiner determines it to be so.
On an island where only 20% of the citizens have power yet, including air conditioning and body preservation services, examinations of those dead, perhaps a month or more after the fact, would be impossible to say the least. - 42 dead in California wildfires.
- 500 dead in the August mudslides in Sierra Leone.
- Over 200 dead in the September Mexico City (and vicinity) earthquake.
My apologies to any I may have overlooked or failed to include.
What is remembered lives.
And of course, the last day of every month, and most especially this night, is sacred to Hecate, Goddess of Witches, She who guards the crossroads.
It is Hecate, Goddess of the Night, who teaches us the ancient Mysteries. Honor Her with a supper prepared in the dark of the Moon and left at a crossroads. Step this night across the threshold into your own sacred Unknown, with Her love.
Blessed Be
This day and night, may the transformation you most need come to you gently, lovingly, and surely. May you celebrate with your beloved dead and merry meet at the crossroads of your destiny.
Rather than shun or fear them, may you embrace the quiet, needful gifts that the endarkenment offers. And with the blessings of the Dark Mother’s infinite compassion and wisdom, may you begin a very Happy New Year.
To you, and all your beloveds, I wish you a most blessed Samhain!
