what is paganism?

Question

i would like to know about paganism and its origins in england.how or if they celebrated christmas halloween and easter. what were there reasons for coming up with these festivals and how did christinanity come and take over?
and also is paganism withcraft?(heard rumours not sure)
thank you.

Answer 1

Paganism is an umbrella term for a wide variety of earth-based, reconstructionalist, and relatively new religions that cover the gamut from Wicca to Asatru to Hellenism to countless others.

Paganism does not = witchcraft. Some Pagans practice witchcraft, but not all do. Witchcraft is a totally separate thing.

I don't know much about English Paganism. The closest I can think of is Anglo-Saxon Heathenry. There's some information about it at http://www.ealdriht.org

Answer 2

paganism is worshiping the land and what it gives. Life, warmth, light, everything that is natural they worship.

Christmas is the winter solstice (dont think ive spelt that proper) and christmas is a celebration of getting through the coldest part of the year, because after then it starts getting warmer. It was originally called Yuletide, because they would sit infront of a fire next to a Yew tree and give presents to each other (sound similar to any other celebration you know).

Halloween (or all hallows eve as the full title is) is not, i dont think, a pagan festival. It is debateable for where it came from, but it is thought it came from spain or the spanish region and they believed that for that night the living and the spirit realms where the closest they could be all year, so spirits could take this closeness as an oportunity to come to the living world. people would unbury their dead friends/ family and have a meal with their bones it is thought, but whether or not this is just a myth, i dont know.

easter is thanking the earth for giving new offspring and plants etc. More food basically. the eggs we have now is eggs as in birds and inside female mammals. its just a way of showing new life.

Paganism is not withcraft or devil worshipping. this was made up by the christians when they first came to britain to try and convert people. It has stuck because we believed them and took the suckers in and accepted their beliefs.

Answer 3

A pagan is simply someone who follows a non-Judeo Christian religion. They never celebrated Christmas, Halloween, or Easter. In England, some pagans (the ones of Germanic descent) celebrated a holiday called Yule around the same time as Christmas, but Christmas was being celebrated in the south of Europe long before those Christians had ever heard of Yule. Other pagans in England (the Celts) celebrated Samhain at harvest's end, which is generally around the end of October. However, Halloween descends from the Catholic All Hallows Eve and the meanings between the three holidays are significantly different. There is a mention by an English historian named Bede that the pagans celebrated a spring holiday called Eostre. However, there's some debate whether this holiday even existed, we have almost no info as to what was involved and, again, Easter was already being celebrated throughout Europe long before Bede wrote about Eostre. MAYBE the name was borrowed, but the entire holiday certainly wasn't. Only in some Germanic languages is the word for Easter anywhere close to Eostre. In other languages the word is a deriviative of "Passover."

You can't really discuss origins of paganism, since it isn't a distinct belief system. It's any system that isn't Judeo-Christian. Any religion that came before Jews and Christians is, of course, pagan.

Witchcraft is a magical practice, not a religion. From the1929 to 1969 an anthropologist named Margaret Murray got to write the Encyclobedia Britannica's entry on witchcraft, and she claimed that it was actually a pagan religion surviving in secret. However, her evidence was flimsy, editted, taken out of context, and occasionally flat out made up, and this became obvious as soon as the historical witch trials started being studied by academics. Britannica described her description as merely one of many theories in 1970 and removed it entirely by 1974.

Answer 4

Pagan origins in England (or UK or English Isles) are as diverse as the Abrahamic religions and many books have been written on the subject as well as many articles available on the internet.
What Paganism (often interchanged with Neopaganism) is today is a mix of traditions handed down through generatiosn, archeological evidence, Songs and Poetry and changes in current thoughts. Although there is little "hard" evidence about early Paganism in Europe, this is often due to the fact that such evidence was either destroyed or hidden for fear of persecution.
That Pagans did exist is proven, What their exact rituals or even what thier lives were like is subject to debate. Without a clear consensus Paganism has taken many different forms including Druidism, Reconstructive Celtic Paganism, and Wicca/Witchcraft. Most of these forms are still persecuted today and perverted by lies spread by fundamentalist Christians who claim that all forms of Paganism are perpetrated by satan. A few hours of research will quickly dispell this myth, but many devout Christians simply write off such work as more attempts by the devil (Which most Neopagans have no belief in) to corrupt them

Answer 5

Your question seems to suggest that Paganism is one religion. It is not. There are many Pagan religions, and they vary quite a lot.

Pagans celebrate Winter Solstice. The timing and *some* of the Christmas traditions seem to be based on this one.

Pagans celebrate Samhein. Some would say that Halloween is a watered down Samhein celebration.

Wicca is a branch of Paganism. So Witches are Pagans, but not all Pagans are Witches.

Answer 6

Paganism is an umbrella term that includes other religions such as Wicca, Reconstructionists, Druidry, Shamanism, and others.

(These are the Wiccan meanings; it may vary depending on the branch of Paganism) Easter was celebrated as Ostara (circa March 21) and was symbolic of fertility returning to the earth as the God grows and matures. Halloween was celebrated as Samhain (Oct. 31-Nov1) and was symbolic of the God's death and the shortening days.Christmas was celebrated as Yule (the winter solstice) and was symbolic of the God being reborn to bring longer days. These are only three of eight sabbats and esbats. Christianity took many of these holidays over as a means to more easily convert Pagans to Christianity. The early church thought that if Pagans could see many of their own rituals and practices in Christianity, that they would be more eager to convert.

Witchcraft is not solely pagan. Witchcraft does not require a certain belief system to be practiced. Witches aren't always pagan, and pagans aren't always witches

I know this is long, but I hoped it helped!

Answer 7

for anglo saxon paganism and its history, would be best if you look up this on wiki, youll get alot of inaccurate responses here, the paganism article on wiki does not really talk about anglo saxon paganism in particular. Maybe you might have to look to a more reputable source and not wikipedia. Easter is named after 'Eostre' the anglo saxon goddess of spring. She was a hare and was worshipped for new life, her symbol was an egg, hence easter eggs. Read about 'king ethelbert and st augustine' on google for the 2nd to last question. No for the last question.
Lily- your answer is wrong, druids didn't live in england, because england didn't exist then, it was called 'britain' and was uninhabited by angles jutes and saxons until 410 ad, also, the druids and celts were preceded by bronze age people, druids were not the original inhabitants.

Answer 8

to christians paganism is any religion that doesn't accept that jesus was the only son of god and died for our sins. in reality, pagans are nature worshipers. the druids were originally the pagan religion in england until the romans came and converted most of the country to christianity. the christians did schedule festivals on what were formally pagan "holydays" (holidays) and that helped to spread christianity. by " christians" i am talking about catholics in ancient england. now the word "pagan" is used by all sects of christianity. paganism can incorporate witchcraft, but not always.

Answer 9

Christianity took over the holidays or Holy days of the pagan or pre-christain religians to make christianity more acceptable to people who enjoyed their holy days. And pagan doesn't always mean witchcraft. Christmas is the solsice holiday which by the way, Happy solstice and Merry Christmas!

Answer 10

a pagan can be any of a number of things...

many adherents to the Big Three (Judaism, Christianity, Islam) consider ANY religion not IN the Big Three to be a pagan belief. To them, Hinduism, Buddism are paganistic

Believers in old religions... and folk religions are usually considered pagan. Polytheists are pagan...

My favorite are Druids, because you can solo well with one.