Thanksgiving Day

  
A civil holiday observed annually in the United States of America on the last Thursday in November. The president issues a proclamation, calling on the citizens, all Federal officials, and others subject to Federal authority to observe the day as one of national thanksgiving and prayer .The governors of states concur in the president's proclamation and also recommend the citizens to observe the holiday, and all public business is suspended.

     The custom originated in 1621, when Governor Bradford of the Plymouth colony appointed a day for public praise and prayer after the first harvest, and the practice spread throughout the other New England colonies. The first national observance was when President Washington, at the request of Congress, recommended Thursday, 26 November, 1789, to the people of the United States "as a day of public thanksgiving and prayer to be observed by acknowledging with grateful hearts the many and signal favours of Almighty God ". This proclamation exhorted the people to "beseech Him to pardon our national and other transgressions , to promote the knowledge and practice of true religion and virtue and to grant unto all mankind such a degree of temporal prosperity as He alone knows to be best". It was the first observation of the day on the date that present custom holds it.

    In 1817 Thanksgiving Day was first officially noticed in New York State and by 1859 its observance had spread to twenty-eight states and two territories. In 1863 President Lincoln made his first proclamation, naming the last Thursday of November as a day of national observance, which President Johnson also selected in 1867 and President Grant in 1870. Since then there has been no change, the last Thursday in November being named in each year's proclamation.

    Recognition of the day by special religious features has only been of comparatively recent date and not as yet (1911) of official general custom. Historians of the day attempt to trace the origin of Governor Bradford's idea (1621) back to the old Hebrew Feast of the Tabernacles and through the ages to the ancient Greek Harvest Feast, Thesmophoria, the Roman Cerealia, and the English Harvest Home.

    Called Harvest Home in England, this 'holy' time falls on the fall equinox. Harvest falls in the middle of harvest in some areas, for others it is the end. 
    For this reason, it and Winter Nights share some customs like the Last Sheaf. Harvest home also shared many customs with Lammass. Again a procession with the last sheaf as the harvest doll took place. 
    Other Harvest customs are unique to it alone such as its version of the Mummer's Play called "RiseUp, Jock." It has much in common with the Yule mummer's plays in that a young king dies and is brought back by a healer with a bag of tricks much like Saint George. 
    In England songs like Harvest Home were sung when the last load came in, as songs similar to John Barleycorn would have been sung while harvesting. It was at this time beer was started brewing, while the barley was still fresh, and a symbol probably would have been in order. 
    In parts of Germany, a goat was slaughtered and roasted at this time, and meant to symbolize the "oats goat." In modern Germany, Erntefest is their Thanksgiving taking place on the first Sunday in October Several customs survived. 
    One very strange custom in Germany involved building an oak leaves gate, and hanging on it a dead cock. Men would then race for the gate and try to tear a wing off the cock. The one that got a wing and made in thru the gate was the Kral. 

The Last Sheaf

    As the festival closing harvest, Winter Nights has many customs connected to the last sheaf. In areas as varied as Sweden and Germany, the last sheaf was left for Woden's horse. 
    Often this was done at Winter Nights, though it could be the three harvest festivals, Hlafmaest, Harvest, and Winter Nights celebrated the harvest of three different kinds of crops. Wheat, barley, and other grains do not all ripen at the same time. Therefore there could easily be a Last Sheaf for each grain crop.

Is Thanksgiving Day Pagan!?

Before getting into the actual history of Thanksgiving, which may shock and surprise, let us look at two arguments for keeping it:

'I don't keep Thanksgiving Day as a holy day. It's a national day of giving thanks for what God has provided. It's not a holy day.'

    Is this the response people also use for justifying Christmas and Easter? Many who observe those pagan days do not even think of them as pagan holy days. Is it right to keep them? The Catholic Church expects all good Catholics to be in church those days and Thanksgiving Day also. Most of the Protestant churches keep the day as holy days also. (Holy meaning 'set apart' and in this case, for religious observance, by attending church.)

    Thanksgiving Day is an American holiday and therefore is not pagan. We are at free to keep it, and surely YHWH will appreciate it.'

    We are warned to not be like the pagans and heathens, to not worship Him like they do (Deuteronomy 12:28-32).

    Pagan people set up their own or have their own 'holy days.' Never forget that fact.

    Let's pretend this holiday did not hearken back to pagan times. First consideration here is have pagan times ended? Once these pagan 'holy days' were only a few years old. Did that make them anymore right because they were new?

    Thanksgiving Day is not one of YHWH's ordained or authorized Feasts. A great many people believe this day is a 'holy day'. Do we make a good witness when we uplift this day as 'set apart'?


    For those of us who keep YHWH's set apart days, found in Leviticus 23, consider : 'The Church' (read Catholic here} proclaims thanksgiving a holiday (holy day), for the purpose of giving thanks for the many blessings we have received.

    For those whom He has called out of Babylon, this ought to be cause for concern.

    Is this truly a religious day? Where does Tanakh tell us to celebrate it?

    Although the U.S. have nationalized Thanksgiving, celebrations were held in ancient times to give thanks for the bountiful harvest. The Greeks honored Demeter, the goddess of agriculture, with a 9 day celebration; the Romans honored Ceres, Anglo-Saxons rejoiced with a feast to celebrate the reaping of the harvest

    Churches of all denominations are open for services on this 'holiday' every year...


    Long before biblical times the ancient people of the Mediterranean Basin held festivals at harvest time in honor of the earth mother. The goddess of the corn ('corn' being the European term for any grain; , was always one of the most important deities in the hierarchy of the gods, and her child was the young god of vegetation.'

    The ancient Semites called the earth mother Astarte...The Phrygians called her Semele. These deities were absorbed by the Greeks into the one great goddess, Demeter.' 'The Roman also had a harvest festival which they called the Cerelia, after Ceres, the Roman goddess of the corn.'


    The benevolent earth mother ... blended with the equally benevolent mother of 'Christ'. Local deities were blended with the christian tales of saints to patrons for villages.

    In Peru, the ancient Indians worshiped the 'Mother of Maize' and tried every year to persuade her to bring in another good harvest. In Europe, the Austrians also had a 'Corn Mother' doll, fashioned from the last sheaf of grain cut in the field and then brought home to the village in the last wagon.'

    In Upper Burma, the friends of the household are invited to the barn for a feast when the rice has been piled in the husks on the threshing floor. After a prayer to the 'father and mother' for a good harvest next year they hold a feast of celebration.

    Most of the pagan customs that gathered round the harvest season have either disappeared or have been obscured so the celebrants have no notion of what they are celebrating.

    The Feasts depict a panorama of the many gods and goddesses and those who worshipped them.

    The star in this drama is Ceres, the Roman Corn Goddess. The Britains changed her name, in fact names: the Maiden, the Harvest Queen, the Kern or Corn Baby, the Kern Doll, the Ivy Girl, the Neck and the Mare. Sometimes the stalks of corn and sometimes she was represented by a sheaf dressed in many colored clothes which were decorated with flowing ribbons and the finest lace.

    The Kern Baby' an image, 'was made either from the last of the corn left standing ... or from the biggest and ripest ears to be found in the fields. The spirit herself dwelt in the corn, and mere mortals wanted no part in cutting her down. This responsibility was avoided by each throwing their sickles at this last sheaf from a distance and therefore it was impossible to determine exactly who cut down the final sheaf. Some where in their memory, they still held the awareness of a death and resurrection cycle therefore vegetation deity needed to be propitiated by a human sacrifice.'

    To fulfill this propitiation , this new Kern Baby was taken to the farm house and kept there until the next harvest supper. Last years kern baby was ceremoniously burned in the farm yard.

    We are quite well aware that most Americans do not follow the rituals we have discussed but does that make Thanksgiving Day acceptable for us to observe? May I celebrate Christmas as long as I don't have a tree or yule log?

    In the book of 1st Kings 12:26-13:5 we read:

'And Jeroboam said in his heart, 'Now shall the kingdom return to the House of David: If this people go there to do sacrifice in the House of YHWH at Jerusalem, then shall the heart of this people turn again to Rehoboam, King of Judah, and they shall kill me, and go again to Rehoboam, King of Judah.'

'Whereupon the king took counsel, and made two calves of gold, and said to them, 'It is too much for you to go up to Jerusalem: behold your gods, Oh Israel, which brought you up out of the land of Egypt.'

'And he set the one in Bethel, and the other he put in Dan. And this thing became a sin: for the people went to worship before the one in Dan.'

'And he made an house of high places, and made priests of the lowest of the people, which were not of the Sons of Levi.'

'And Jeroboam ordained a feast in the eighth month, on the fifteenth day of the month, like the feast that is in Judah, and he offered upon the altar. He did so in Bethel, sacrificing to the calves that he had made: and he placed in Bethel the priests of the high places which he had made. So he offered upon the altar which he had made in Bethel, the fifteenth day of the eighth month, even in the month which he had devised of his own heart; and ordained a feast unto the Children of Israel: and he offered upon the altar, and burnt incense.'

'And, behold, there came a man of Elohiym out of Judah by the Word of Yahveh unto Bethel: and Jeroboam stood by the altar to burn incense. And he cried against the altar in the Word of Yahveh, and said, 'Oh altar, altar, thus says YHWH; Behold, a child shall be born unto the House of David, Josiah by name; and upon you shall he offer the priests of the high places that burn incense upon you, and men's bones shall be burnt upon you.'

'And he gave a sign the same day, saying, 'This is the sign which Yahveh has spoken; 'Behold, the altar shall be torn, and the ashes that are upon it shall be poured out. And it came to pass, when King Jeroboam heard the saying of the man of Elohiym, which had cried against the altar in Bethel, that he put forth his hand from the altar, saying, 'Lay hold on him. And his hand, which he put forth against him, dried up, so that he could not pull it in again to him.'

'The altar also was torn, and the ashes poured out from the altar, according to the sign which the man of Elohiym had given by the word of YHWH.'

    Jeroboam set up golden calves to be worshiped in place of YHWH, and non-Levites to the priesthood since the Levites wanted no part of idol worship The NIV states Jereboam set up, 'a month of his own choosing.' He instituted a feast 'like the festival held in Judah' (1st Kings 12:32).

 If our own 'set apart days' were not acceptable to 3,000 years ago, how can they be so today?

Could this be what YHWH is trying to tell us when we read:

Amos 5:21-22

21 "I hate, I despise your religious feasts; I cannot stand your assemblies.

22 Even though you bring me burnt offerings and grain offerings, I will not accept them. Though you bring choice fellowship offerings, I will have no regard for them.

    Must we not separate ourselves from all pagan days and walk in the Way of the Elohiym of Israel? For He has called us out of darkness. He is our Elohiym and we must follow Him. When we celebrate His Holy Days, we reflect to the world the One and Only True Elohiym. Do we dishonor Him when we celebrate any but His Set Apart Days?

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