Wominjeka fellow travellers, welcome again to FNF and thank you for traveling with me on the road to treaty and reconciliation as we explore a tiny fraction of the histories and lore of the world’s longest existing continuous cultures, that of the Aboriginal and Torres Straight Islanders.
Today some of you in Nillumbik and further afield may be celebrating the feast of All Hallows or better known as Halloween. Contrary to the views of many Australians Halloween is not in origin an American holiday. A night synonymous with dressing up in spooky outfits and going door to door ‘trick or treating’ while consuming large amounts of sugar candy.
The Eve of All Hallows or the evening before the Catholic holy day of All Saints was a day put forward by the Church to disrupt the ancient Celtic festival of Samhain. The feast of Samhain was a harvest festival celebrated by pagan people in Ireland, Scotland and variations of it existed throughout western Europe before the coming of Christianity.
One particular aspect of this feast was the belief that the world of the living and the world of the spirit were closely aligned for the month or so that the festival was held. Spirits might visit once more their relatives in the mortal world as the door between both worlds was now open.
The month of November in the ancient Irish language is called Mí na Samhna and Halloween is referred to as Oíche Shamhna.
Do Aboriginal and First Nations Islander People Believe in the Afterlife?
While there is no universally held belief, many Indigenous people believe that when we leave this world, we enter the Land of the Dead. This space does not have a heaven or hell, nor is admittance dependent on how a person lived while they were alive. Instead, the ceremonies and rites followed when somebody dies are crucial to the path of the spirit, clearing the way so that it can leave the body and travel on–using prayers, medicines, songs, and rituals.
The Eternal Dreaming is a worldview, which is the way many Aboriginal people perceive the relationship between the spirit, our physical environment, and our earthly bodies. Death may be sad for loved ones and communities, but it does not mean a spirit ceases to exist. With the right care and respect, the spirit can continue an ongoing cycle of life, death, transition, and rebirth.
Ancient people hold very distinct and sometimes unfamiliar belief structures to our modern way of engaging with the mortal and the spiritual worlds.
However, I am constantly surprised and indeed inspired with the similarities that exist between one ancient people and another, in this case the ancient Celts and the indigenous peoples of this vast land of Australia. The journey continues.
Till next week Triganin – see you soon.