Every religion honors special days of the year set aside for
celebrations of various events that are important to the specific religion's
theology, and Wicca is certainly no exception. The Wiccans annually celebrate
eight special holidays, or Sabbats, derived from the French word meaning "to
frolic and revel." The purpose of this section is to provide information on each
Sabbat, the day it is usually celebrated on (minor disagreements are evident
among different traditions and practitioners), various other names of each
Sabbat, and what the holiday is actually celebrating. Most of these Sabbats will
be familiar to the non-Wiccan, as the Christians have adapted most Pagan
celebrations into its own holidays, making a few cosmetic changes in the
process, and I have endeavored to specify the Christian equivalent of each
holiday wherever possible. The Roman Catholic Church undoubtedly did this in
order to make it easier for the Pagans to be converted to the new religion.
Hence, most Pagan holidays have been "Christianized" by the clergy of the
Church. All of these holidays encompass the Wheel of the Year (sometimes called
the "Wheel of Life" for obvious reasons), a circular symbol used to illustrate
the holidays and their effect on the Wiccan consciousness throughout the year.
You will notice that each of the Sabbats taken together is symbolic of human
existence, as well as every living thing in nature, utilizing the Goddess and
God to personify the travel from birth to death to eventual rebirth in an
unending, oscillating cycle.
Here, then, are each of the Sabbats:
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Associated Stones: Obsidian, onyx, carnelian
Other
Names: All Hallow's Eve, Ancestor Night, Feast of the Dead,
Halloween
Christian Equivalent: All Saint's Day (Halloween itself is
celebrated commercially, but is not considered a holy day by Christianity), and
All Soul's Day
Day: October 31
Purpose: Samhain (which is
supposed to be pronounced sow-en, though some modern Pagans pronounce it as
spelled) is the most important holy night of the year. In fact, it is considered
the Celtic New Year. It is believed to be the evening in which the veil between
the realm of the living and the dead is thinnest, allowing members of the spirit
realm to walk the earth in great numbers. It is thereby considered the evening
where our loved ones who have gone over to the other side of the veil are
honored with a special feast. This is certainly the reason All Saint's Day was
created by the Roman Catholic Church to celebrate honored individuals who have
passed on, as well as the similar All Souls Day, which honors the memories of
our individual loved one's who have passed on. The association with spirits of
the dead walking the earth, as well as faeries and other etheric beings roaming
the material plane in large numbers that evening, is probably the basis for the
modern Halloween's emphasis on ghosts and goblins, and the popular stereotypical
image of the witch as a swarthy old crone with green skin was derived from
negative images of real witches as being corrupt harbingers of evil or mischief.
The jack o' lantern, a still popular decoration, is derived from the image used
by ancient Pagans to keep unwelcome spirits from the hearth during the
celebration. Calls to your ancestors and loved ones for assistance is
appropriate for those practicing spellwork on this day, as is spellwork for
endings and calling upon the Crone aspect of the Goddess.
The God
symbolically dies of old age at this point, though the Mother Goddess is now
pregnant with the reborn Sun God in her womb.
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Associated Stones: Bloodstone, garnet, ruby
Other
Names: Yule, Winter Finding, Saturnalia
Christian Equivalent:
Christmas
Day: December 21
Purpose: Winter Solstice
celebrates the rebirth of the Sun God into infancy. All the major pantheons of
deities have their version of the Sun God: The Greco-Roman Dionysus/Bacchus, the
Egyptian Osiris, and the Norse Balder, just to name a few. Many myths exist to
describe a kind and beloved being who dies and is subsequently reborn. The
Christians adapted this day as the "official" birthday of Jesus Christ, the
great prophet that Christian theology revolves around, and who has been deified
as the Christian equivalent of the Sun God (the death and resurrection story of
Jesus was by no means original, but has its variants in Pagan religions far
older than Christianity). This day also celebrates the return of the sun, as the
days begin to grow longer.
The Christian practice of putting up a
Christmas Tree derives from the ancient Pagan tradition of bringing a yule tree
in the home in order to welcome the nature spirits into the festivities of the
day. The burning of the yule log derives from an ancient Germanic custom in
honor of the god Thor, to whom yule wood was considered sacred.
The
concept of Santa Claus is also distinctly Pagan. The image of this portly,
joyous being derives from three main sources, each described below.
As
for the first source, Santa Claus is partly an updated version of the Pagan
Holly King, a benign and possibly devalued god-form who rules the year from the
Summer Solstice to the Winter Solstice. On this day, he engages his rival, the
Oak King, who rules from just after Winter Solstice to the beginning of the
Summer Solstice, in a symbolic "combat," ending with the Holly King's "death"
(he will be reborn and retake rulership of the Wheel of the Year from the Oak
King in the summer). The modern image of Santa Claus in many ways resembles the
Holly King, since the latter's colors were green and red (today considered the
official "Christmas colors," as well as colors being popular for the garb of
many types of elves and nature spirits), reindeers were a sacred animal to him
(note the mostly Germanic names of Santa's reindeer), and who was said to be
accompanied by elves who worshipped nature alongside him. Elves are a staple of
Pagan belief, but are absent in modern Christian theology, which further
underscores the Pagan origins of the Santa Claus image. This, of course, is the
origin of the idea that elves were the "helpers" of Santa Claus in his
toy-making duties.
The second source for the modern image of Santa Claus
is the king of the Norse deities, Odin, who, according to Germanic tradition,
walked the earth this night and granted "gifts" such as wisdom and prosperity to
the virtuous; this is the original origin of the act of gift giving on
Christmas. Though Odin was far from a joyous being, and his sometimes severe
sense of justice was often beyond the ability of mortals to comprehend, he bore
a superficial resemblance to the modern image of Santa Claus in that he was
often depicted in the Germanic myths as resembling an elderly (albeit quite
robust) man with a white beard, though unlike the modern image of Santa Class
(often referred to today as "Sinter Klass" in some Northern nations), Odin
wasn't corpulant, and was missing one eye (he sacrificed it to the Well of Mimir
in exchange for the gift of omniscience), thus causing him to wear an eye patch.
The third source of the modern version of Santa Claus (which cemented
the gift giving legend in the eyes of modern Christians completely) are from
historical records of a kindly 6th century bishop who made toys and distributed
them to needy kids each year at a certain time of the year, which more or less
established the popular idea that Christmas is primarily for kids. This bishop
was thus canonized by the Catholic Church as Saint Nick. It should be noted that
the imagery associated with the modern Santa Claus in the Dark Ages and Middle
Ages often depicted a violent hairy man of the wild, also emblmatic of various
Pagan species of solitary fay (or "faerie"), before the modern, jolly image
based on more benign imagery and archetypes took its place.
The
evolution of these various images finally reached their apex by the 19th
century, and it was then that modern, familiar image of Santa Claus was born.
Hence, due to the fact that Santa Claus is in many ways a 'modernized'
version of the classical Holly King, it can be said that he actually exists as a
part of astral reality, and modern Wiccans pay homage to him in this manner,
rather than contriving a whimsical story to children that Santa Claus is
actually a seemingly immortal flesh and blood elderly man of material reality
who literally physically travels to every home in the world on Christmas night,
enters via the chimney, and leaves physical gifts behind for the children [which
put's many parents in the position of explaining the popular company logos
adorning the boxes of many of those gifts; this conundrum was actually dealt
with in an animated Christmas commercial in the early 1980's, where Santa Claus
was depicted as actually shopping in contemporary toy stores, such as K-Mart and
Toys 'R' Us, for all of these gifts, rather than building them from scratch, as
many of the popular stories describe his elves as doing! Both building or
shopping for that number of toys every year would end up costing Santa many
millions of dollars per year if he was truly a being of material reality, and
astute children will often pick up on this discrepancy!].
As stated
above, the God is a newborn at this time, being dutifully nursed by the Goddess.
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Associated Stones: Amethyst, turquoise
Other
Names: Sometimes spelled Imbolg.
Christian Equivalent:
Candlemas
Day: February 2
Purpose: Imbolc celebrates the
eventual return of spring. Fertility rites are important and appropriate now.
The ancient Celts honored the fertility goddess Brigid at this time, who was
adopted into Catholic theology as Saint Bridget. The God is now being raised by
the Goddess as a young boy.
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Associated Stones: Aquamarine, moonstone, rose
quartz
Other Names: Ostara, Eostre's Day
Christian
Equivalent: Easter
Day: March 21
Purpose: Ostara is a
celebration of the thriving fertility of the land. The holiday is named after
the Norse fertility goddess Eostre, also called Ostara, to which this day was
held sacred by the Germanic tribes. Spellwork for abundance is appropriate, as
are continued fertility spells. The word 'Easter' derives from the name of the
goddess Eostre, who was honored on this day. The rabbit and eggs are ancient
Pagan symbols of fertility for obvious reasons, and were adapted by Christianity
into the whimsical image of the Easter Bunny delivering colored eggs, as the
decoration of eggs was also an old Pagan custom of celebrating the holiday. The
origin of the concept of the Easter Bunny and his famous practice of delivering
Easter eggs can be traced back to the following story from Germanic legend.
Long ago, according to legend, many animals attempted to win the favor
of the goddess Eostre, but as she is so difficult to impress, all of them failed
utterly. However, one day on March 21, a rabbit decided to attempt to impress
her by taking an egg from a local hen's nest and decorating it beautifully with
paint. Much to the surprise of the other animals, Eostre was extremely enamored
by the beautiful gift, and as a result, she gave the rabbit the task of creating
and delivering such beautifully decorated eggs, which he carried in a basket, to
everyone in the local villages on this same day every year in the future.
The God is now grown into adolescence, and he feels the first yearnings
for the Goddess, who is no longer viewed as his mother.
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Associated Stones: Bloodstone, sapphire
Other
Names: May Day, Walpurgisnacht, sometimes spelled Bealtaine
Christian
Equivalent: May Day
Day: May 1
Purpose: Beltane
celebrates the successful beginning of the growing season, as well as honoring
human sexuality (which the Christians disdained, and still do in matters of
religion, though to a lesser extent, today). Many May Day traditions culled from
the ancient Pagans are still carried on in various forms at the present time.
The nut hunt that goes on today is a variation of ancient symbolism: the nuts
symbolized the human testicles to the ancient Pagans (and is probably where the
modern slang for testes being referred to as "nuts" comes from...honest!). The
ancient Greeks honored the promiscuous nature god Pan and the nymphs at this
time, and spellwork for love and sex would be especially powerful now.
Other modern practices carried over from ancient times for this holiday
include dancing around the maypole, which was symbolic of the male phallus to
the Pagan cultures in the past, and of jumping over the fire, something women
used to do for blessings and fertility (as a masculine element, the fire was
also seen as a symbolic phallus). Of course, modern people in societies with a
Judeo-Christian ideology have obviously long since forgotten the original basis
of these activities.
At this time, the God and the Goddess have now become
young lovers.
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Associated Stones: Emerald, jade, lapis, tiger's
eye
Other Names: Midsummer, Litha
Christian Equivalent:
None
Day: June 22
Purpose: The Summer Solstice is the
celebration of the full growth of the harvest. The growing season is in full
bloom and nature is most bountiful. Spellwork for childbirth and good health are
very appropriate, as is spelling for abundance and money. The Christians,
curiously, have not adapted this holiday into a corresponding summer
celebration, though they probably have a day for saints earmarked for the
occasion.
The Holly King retakes the rulership of the seasons from the
Oak King at this time.
During this time of the Wheel of the Year, the
God is now middle aged, and the Goddess remains his consort.
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Associated Stones: Citrine, peridot
Other
Names: Lughnasadh, Lunasa
Christian Equivalent: None, except for
any celebration honoring St. Michael
Day: August 1
Purpose:
Lammas is the celebration of the darkening of the year, as winter comes ever
closer, and it entails the thanking of the Goddess and God for the past harvest
and bounty of the land earlier in the year. Spellwork for the arts is very
appropriate, as this holiday honored the Celtic god Lugh, which is why it is
often called Lughnasadh (though I refer to it by its alternate name Lammas here
to be responsive to those readers who are not Celtic Wiccan). Lugh was later
adopted by the Roman Catholics as Saint Michael.
At this time, the God
is elderly, and his time with the Goddess is near its end.
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Associated Stones: Amethyst, topaz
Other Names:
Mabon
Christian Equivalent: Thanksgiving (though it occurs much later
on the Christian calendar in America)
Day: September
21
Purpose: This day celebrates the second harvest. The Greek god
Dionysus, the patron god of wine and revelry, and his Roman equivalent, Bacchus,
was honored here. Thus, spellwork for happiness and revelry (i.e., partying!),
along with invocations of gratitude to the Goddess and God (or any deity who
embodies the harvest and abundance) for having sufficient food on the table this
year and the company of many loved one's with whom to share it with, is very
appropriate at this time.
It is a common opinion in the Wiccan community
(which I wholeheartedly share) that the Christian celebration of Thanksgiving,
which ostensibly celebrates the ill-fated peace between the Pilgrims and the
Native Americans, though not truly religious in a strict sense (but nevertheless
celebrated by modern Christians, particularly since the Pilgrims themselves were
Christian), is the modern equivalent of the Mabon celebration of abundance.
Hence, due to the similarity of celebration and the aforementioned thanks for
abundance, which is what the Pilgrims were celebrating, I can state my belief
that this holiday is a takeoff of the Autumn Equinox without stretching the
imagination too far.
This day is named for the Celtic god Mabon, the
divine child of the Celtic war goddess Morrigan, who was later "Christianized"
by the Roman Catholic Church as Saint Andrew (which is also an amalgamation with
the well known friend and disciple of Jesus Christ).
At this point in
the Wheel of the Year, the God has died of old age, but the Goddess is pregnant
with the reincarnated Sun God, who will be reborn on the Winter Solstice.
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