Ghoulies, ghosties, trick or treat, and evil

"From ghoulies and ghosties and long-leggedity beasties, Good Lord deliver us." This old Scottish prayer thus begins my second promised Halloween column. This week, rather than discussing scary films and the like, I will focus on Halloween customs.Halloween grew out of the old Celtic pre-Christian holiday of Samain or Samhain, as observed in Ireland and Scotland and likely elsewhere. As the prayer I quoted illustrates, the supernatural was quite real to most folks in ancient and medieval times, and belief in it persists to this day. (My paternal grandmother, for example, firmly believed in ghosts and was convinced she had heard one or more, even if she hadn't seen anything.)In any event, the old Celtic holiday marked the beginning of winter, and the Celts believed that on the night before Samain, spirits, including evil spirits, roamed freely. They built huge bonfires to drive them off. When Christianity entered, the early Church co-opted the holiday, as it did many other folk holidays, and thus Samhain became All Hallow's Eve, the day before All Saints Day on Nov. 1.This year, as every year, kids will go trick or treating. These days, most trick or treating is done in the company of a parent, older sibling, or other responsible adult. That's a big contrast with the long-ago days when I was a kid, in which we were allowed to run wild around every neighborhood within reach of our legs. In our present disturbing time of child kidnapping and infanticide, I can hardly blame modern parents for being more careful.According to my online research, trick or treating began at least as long ago as the 16th century in Ireland and Scotland with the custom of "guising." Children would don costumes and go from house to house, where they were expected to enact short skits to earn their treats. The custom of Halloween costumes for people of all ages dates from about the same time.But even earlier, in Britain and elsewhere in Europe, there was a similar practice called "souling," in which folks would go from door to door begging for "soul cakes," small pastries baked to celebrate "Hallowmass" or All Saints' Day.Use of the words "trick or treat" is a much more recent development. It apparently originated in Canada in the late 1800s or early 1900s. The phrase did not catch on in the British Isles until this century. Prior to that, children in Ireland, for example, would say, "help the Halloween party." The words were different; the concept was the same.The only non-English speaking country in which something like trick or treating is practiced, as near as I can tell from my research, is Mexico. There children knock on doors and ask, "give me my little skull," referring to small chocolate candies in the shape of a skull.Tonight, in addition to trick or treat for the kiddies, there will be costume parties for adults. Even during the day today, some offices will allow or encourage their employees to dress up. You can walk into a business today and see gypsies, witches, superheroes, cowboys, pirates and so on. It's all harmless fun and a far cry from lighting bonfires to ward off evil.I am not going to speculate about the reality or non-reality of ghosts, evil spirits or demonic possession. I have an open mind on all of the above, but I note that we don't need any of them to see and recognize real evil. Human beings manage to work enough evil on their own without the need for supernatural creatures.There have always been wars, and reading about the historic wartime practices of the Romans, the Huns, the Turks and the Mongols can turn one's stomach. Yet the relatively enlightened 20th century brought two devastating World Wars and a number of smaller ones. That's not counting the Holocaust of the Jews brought about by the Nazis under Hitler and the starvation of millions of Ukrainians by the Russian communists under Josef Stalin, or to mention the killing fields of Cambodia at the behest of Pol Pot.On Oct. 7, 2023, Hamas terrorists descended on Israel, killing men, women and children indiscriminately, raping women, and taking hostages. Misguided people elsewhere, included some in the United States, celebrated what they did.Looking around, we can see mass murders and human trafficking — slavery practiced openly in parts of Africa and secretly even in the United States.We may enjoy the imagined chills of Halloween. But we don't need them to see real evil. It's right in front of us.Bob Arrington is a Kingsport attorney. You can email him at r_arrington@chartertn.net.