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My eve of thoughts, your eve of thoughts, our eve of light

by Aqua

Long ago a night began, a night that was reserved for the triduum observance. This is a three day religious observance that stands in close relationship with the holy trinity that is known in Christian religion. The purpose to observe is to pray for those who passed away into the beyond. You could say with other words that it was a time that was specially aimed to remind those who stood close to God, reminding examples of mankind… These examples were known as saints, also known as hallow or halig. Another word for time was tide. Due to the thoughts of men, the triduum observance became known as the Hallowtide, or Allhallowtide… Eventually it became known as Halloween.

Some believe that the Christians created this triduum on the ancient Gaelic festival of Samhain. Whether that is correct, I do not know. But they happen on the same day… Samhain is a day dedicated to the end of the harvest season and beginning of the winter.

[Please take a moment to mind what observing death feels for you]

Live stands close to death. Maybe death is life in another way? How do you as Jedi look to death? Do you fear it? How can you fear that what you do not know? Let`s explore this in a story known as ,,Der Gevatter Tod’’, or ,,Godfather Death’’. Story 44 of the brothers Grimm.

A poor man has twelve children, and works just hard enough to feed each of them every day. When his thirteenth and last child is born, the man decides to find a godfather for this child. He runs out into the highway, and finds God walking on the highway. God asks to be the godfather, promising the child health and happiness. The man, after finding out that the man is God, declines, saying that God condones poverty. Then the man meets the Devil on the highway. The Devil asks to be the godfather, offering the child gold and the world's joys. The man, after finding out that the man is the Devil, declines, saying that the Devil deceives mankind.

The man, still walking down the highway, meets Death. The man decides to make Death the child's godfather saying that Death takes away the rich and the poor, without discrimination. The next Sunday, Death becomes the child's godfather.

When the boy comes of age, Death appears to him and leads him into the woods, where special herbs grow. There, the boy is promised that Death will make him a famous physician. It is explained that, whenever the boy visits an ill person, Death will appear next to the sick person. If Death stands at the person's head, that person is to be given the special herb found in the forest, and cured. But, if Death appears at the person's feet, any treatment on them would be useless as they would soon die.

The boy soon becomes famous, just as Death has foreseen and receives plenty of gold for his amazing ability to see whether a person would live or die. Soon, the king of all the lands becomes ill and sends for the famous physician.

When the physician goes to see the king, he notices immediately that Death is standing at the foot of the bed. The physician feels pity for the king, and decides to trick Death. The physician then turns the king in his bed so that Death stands over the head. He then gives the king the herb to eat. This heals the king and speeds his recovery.

Soon after, Death approaches the physician, expressing his anger for tricking him and disobeying Death's rules. But because the physician is Death's godchild, he does not punish him. Death then warns the physician that if he was to ever trick Death again, he will take the physician's life.

Not much later, the king's daughter becomes ill and the physician goes to see her as well. The king promises his daughter's hand in marriage and the inheritance of the crown if the physician cures her. When the physician visits the princess, he sees Death at her feet. Ignoring this, he is captivated by the princess's beauty and thoughts of being her husband. The physician then turns the princess so that Death is at her head. He then feeds her the herb.

Just as the princess is coming around, Death grasps the physician by the arm and drags him to an underground cavern. In this cave are thousands upon thousands of candles, each burned down to different lengths. Death explains that the length of each candle shows how much longer a person has to live. When Death shows the physician his candle, the latter notices that it is very short, showing that the physician doesn't have much longer to live.

The physician pleads with his godfather to light a new candle for him, so that he may live a happy life as king and husband to the beautiful princess. Death reconsiders and gathers a new candle to relight the flame of his godchild.

Just as he is about to light the new candle, Death takes his revenge on the physician by letting the flame of the first candle fall. As soon as the candle is extinguished, the physician falls dead to the ground.

[Please take a moment to mind about this]

Death comes in many ways, stories, religions, cultures and observances. Yet the question remains, can we fear death if we do not know him like if he were to be our dearest family member, our kind loving Godfather… Halloween often focuses on scary things for since more than three centuries, but is it really scary? Or is it something residing within life that we fear to lose? May this day remind us to not only remind those who passed into the Force, but also those in the Force itself being with our Journeys. May you all have a wonderful dark night, yet with bright candles shining your journeys from within and without.

Force shine with you,

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