關於萬聖節的閱讀理解初中英語
⑴ 一篇關於萬聖節的英語短文，5句話
實用英語作文-萬聖節
Halloween
Halloween is an autumn holiday that Americans celebrate every year. It means "holy evening," and it comes every October 31, the evening before All Saints' Day. However, it is not really a church holiday, it is a holiday for children mainly.
Every autumn, when the vegetables are ready to eat, children pick large orange pumpkins. Then they cut faces in the pumpkins and put a burning candle inside. It looks as if there were a person looking out of the pumpkin! These lights are called jack-o'-lanterns, which means "Jack of the lantern".
The children also put on strange masks and frightening costumes every Halloween. Some children paint their faces to look like monsters. Then they carry boxes or bags from house to house. Every time they come to a new house, they say,"Trick or treat! Money or eat!" The grown-ups put treat-money or candy in their bags.
Not only children, but most grown-ups also love Halloween and Halloween parties because on this day,they can disguise themselves as personages or ghost as their imaginations will lead them. This bring them the satisfaction of being young.
萬聖節前夕
萬聖節前夕是美國人年年都會慶祝的秋季節日。它的意思是「神聖的夜晚」，在每年的10月31日，也就是萬聖節前夜。但實際上這不是一個真正的宗教節日，而主要是孩子們的節日。
每年秋天蔬菜成熟可以食用的時候，孩子們就會挑出大個兒的橙色南瓜。然後在南瓜上刻上一張臉，把一根點燃的蠟燭放在裡面。看起來就好像有人在向南瓜外面張望。這些燈就叫做「iack-o'-lantems」，意思也就是「傑克的燈」。
每年萬聖節前夕孩子們還戴上奇怪的面具，穿上嚇人的服裝。有些孩子把臉刷成怪物。然後他們拿著盒子或袋子挨家挨戶串門。每來到一個新房子他們就說：「不款待就搗亂!給錢還是吃的!」大人們就會把用來招待的錢或糖放在他們的袋子里了。
不僅孩子，許多成年人也喜歡萬聖節前夕和萬聖節前夕晚會。因為這一天他們可以根據自己的想像把自己裝扮成名流或幽靈。這會帶給他們年輕的快感。
⑵ 關於萬聖節的英語段文
先來一段英文的:
Halloween
October 31
On October 31st, dozens of children dressed in costumes（節日服裝）knock on their neighbors' doors and yell "Trick or Treat" when the door opens. Pirates and princesses, ghosts and popular heroes of the day all hold bags open to catch the candy or other goodies that the neighbors drop in. As they give each child a treat the neighbors exclaim over the costumes and try to guess who is under the masks.
Since the 800's November 1st is a religious holiday known as All Saints' Day（萬聖節）. The Mass that was said on this day was called Allhallowmas. The evening before became known as All Hakkiw e'en, or Halloween. Like some other American celebrations, its origins lie in both pre-Christian and Christian customs.
October 31 st was the eve of the Celtic（凱爾特人的）new year. The Celts were the ancestors of the present-day Irish, Welsh and Scottish people. On this day ghosts walked and mingled with the living, or so the Celts thought. The townspeople baked food all that day and when night fell they dressed up and tried to resemble the souls of the dead. Hoping that the ghosts would leave peacefully before midnight of the new year.
Much later, when Christianity spread throughout Ireland and October 31 was no longer the last day of the year, Halloween became a celebration mostly for children. "Ghosts" went from door to door asking for treats, or else a trick would be played on the owners of the house. When millions of Irish people immigrated to the United States in the 1840s the tradition came with them.
Today' school dances and neighborhood parties called "block parties" are popular among young and old alike. More and more alts celebrate Halloween. They dress up like historical or political figures and go to masquerade parties（化妝舞會）. In larger cities, costumed children and their parents gather at shopping malls early in the evening. Stores and businesses give parties with games and treats for the children.Teenagers enjoy costume dances at their schools and the more outrageous the costume the better!
Certain pranks（惡作劇）such as soaping car windows and tipping over garbage cans are expected. But partying and pranks are not the only things that Halloweeners enjoy doing. Some collect money to buy food and medicine for needy children around the world.
Symbols of Halloween
Halloween originated as a celebration connected with evil spirits. Witches flying on broomsticks with black cats, ghosts, goblins（小精靈）and skeletons have all evolved as symbols of Halloween. They are popular trick-or-treat costumes and decorations for greeting cards and windows. Black is one of the traditional Halloween colors, probably because Halloween festivals and traditions took place at night. In the weeks before October 31, Americans decorate windows of houses and schools with silhouettes（輪廓）of witches and black cats.
Pumpkins are also a symbol of Halloween. The pumpkin is an orange-colored squash, and orange has become the other traditional Halloween color. Carving pumpkins into jack- o'lanterns is a Halloween custom also dating back to Ireland. A legend grew up about a man named Jack who was so stingy（吝嗇的）that he was not allowed into heaven when he died, because he was a miser（吝嗇鬼）. He couldn't enter hell either because he had played jokes on the devil. As a result, Jack had to walk the earth with his lantern until Judgement Day（審判日）. The Irish people carved scary faces out of turnips（蕪菁根）, beets（甜菜根）or potatoes representing "Jack of the Lantern," or Jack-o'lantern. When the Irish brought their customs to the United States, they carved faces on pumpkins because in the autumn they were more plentiful than turnips. Today jack-o'-lanterns in the windows of a house on Halloween night let costumed children know that there are goodies（糖果）waiting if they knock and say "Trick or Treat!"
Halloween Treats
Dried Pumpkin Seeds
After carving your pumpkin, separate the pulp from the seeds. Rinse（沖洗）the seeds and spread them out to dry. The next day, add enough melted butter or margarine（人造黃油）to coat each seed. Spread the seeds onto a cookie sheet（甜酥餅干）and bake for 20 minutes in a 300 degree oven for 20 minutes or until they are slightly brown.
Caramel Apples
Take the paper wrapping off about 100 caramels（飴糖）and put them in a saucepan（燉鍋）. Put the saucepan over a pan of boiling water. Boil the water until the caramels melt. Put a wooden stick into the top of each apple, dip the apple into the caramel. Let them cool on wax paper and enjoy!
Scary Stories
No Halloween party is complete without at least one scary story. Usually one person talks in a low
voice while everyone else crowds together on the floor or around a fire. The following is a retelling of a tale told in Britain and in North Carolina and Virginia.
"What Do You Come For?"
There was an old woman who lived all by herself, and she was very lonely. Sitting in the kitchen one night, she said, "Oh, I wish I had some company."
No sooner had she spoken than down the chimney tumbled two feet from which the flesh had rotted. The old woman's eyes bulged with terror.
Then two legs dropped to the hearth and attached themselves to the feet.
Then a body tumbled down, then two arms, and a man's head.
As the old woman watched, the parts came together into a great, tall man. The man danced around and around the room. Faster and faster he went. Then he stopped, and he looked into her eyes.
"What do you come for? she asked in a small voice that shivered and shook.
"What do I come for?" he said. "I come for YOU!"
The narrator shouts and jumps at the person near him!
這里還有中英文對照的哈:
關於萬聖節有這樣一個故事。是說有一個叫傑克的愛爾蘭人，因為他對錢特別吝嗇，就不允許他進入天堂，而被打入地獄。但是在那裡他老是捉弄魔鬼撒旦，所以被踢出地獄，罰他提著燈籠永遠在人世里行走。
在十月三十一日愛爾蘭的孩子們用土豆和羅卜製作"傑克的燈籠"，他們把中間挖掉、表面上打洞並在里邊點上蠟燭。為村裡慶祝督伊德神的萬聖節，孩子們提著這種燈籠挨家挨戶乞討食物。這種燈籠的愛爾蘭名字是"拿燈籠的傑克"或者"傑克的燈籠"，縮寫為Jack-o'-lantern現在拼寫為jack-o-lantern。
現在你在大多數書里讀到的萬聖節只是孩子們開心的夜晚。在小學校里，萬聖節是每年十月份開始慶祝的。
孩子們會製作萬聖節的裝飾品：各種各樣桔黃色的番瓜燈。你可以用黑色的紙做一個可怕的造形--一個騎在掃帚把上戴著尖尖帽子的女巫飛過天空，或者是黑蝙蝠飛過月亮。這些都代表惡運。當然黑貓代表運氣更差。有時候會出現黑貓騎在女巫掃帚後面飛向天空的造形。
在萬聖節的晚上，我們都穿著爸爸媽媽的舊衣服和舊鞋子，戴上面具，打算外出。比我們小的孩子必須和他們的母親一塊出去，我們大一點的就一起鬨到鄰居家，按他們的門鈴並大聲喊道?quot;惡作劇還是招待！"意思是給我們吃的，要不我們就捉弄你。里邊的人們應該出來評價我們的化裝。
"噢！這是鬼，那是女巫，這是個老太婆。"
有時候他們會跟我們一起玩，假裝被鬼或者女巫嚇著了。但是他們通常會帶一些糖果或者蘋果放進我們的"惡作劇還是招待"的口袋裡。可是要是沒人回答門鈴或者是有人把我們趕開該怎幺辦呢？我們就捉弄他們，通常是拿一塊肥皂把他們的玻璃塗得亂七八糟。然後我們回家，數數誰的糖果最多。
還有一個典型的萬聖節花招是把一卷手紙拉開，不停地往樹上扔，直到樹全被白紙裹起來。除非下大雪或大雨把紙沖掉，紙會一直呆在樹上。這並不造成真正的傷害，只是把樹和院子搞亂，一種萬聖節的惡作劇。
One story about Jack, an Irishman, who was not allowed into Heaven because he was stingy with his money. So he was sent to hell. But down there he played tricks on the Devil (Satan), so he was kicked out of Hell and made to walk the earth forever carrying a lantern.
Well, Irish children made Jack's lanterns on October 31st from a large potato or turnip, hollowed out with the sides having holes and lit by little candles inside. And Irish children would carry them as they went from house to house begging for food for the village Halloween festival that honored the Druid god Muck Olla. The Irish name for these lanterns was "Jack with the lantern" or "Jack of the lantern," abbreviated as " Jack-o'-lantern" and now spelled "jack-o-lantern."
The traditional Halloween you can read about in most books was just children's fun night. Halloween celebrations would start in October in every elementary school.
Children would make Halloween decorations, all kinds of orange-paper jack-o-lanterns. And from black paper you'd cut "scary" designs ---an evil witch with a pointed hat riding through the sky on a broomstick, maybe with black bats flying across the moon, and that meant bad luck. And of course black cats for more bad luck. Sometimes a black cat would ride away into the sky on the back of the witch's broom.
And on Halloween night we'd dress up in Mom or Dad's old shoes and clothes, put on a mask, and be ready to go outside. The little kids (children younger than we were) had to go with their mothers, but we older ones went together to neighbors' houses, ringing their doorbell and yelling, "Trick or treat!" meaning, "Give us a treat (something to eat) or we'll play a trick on you!" The people inside were supposed to come to the door and comment on our costumes.
Oh! here's a ghost. Oh, there's a witch. Oh, here's an old lady.
Sometimes they would play along with us and pretend to be scared by some ghost or witch. But they would always have some candy and maybe an apple to put in our "trick or treat bags." But what if no one come to the door, or if someone chased us away? Then we'd play a trick on them, usually taking a piece of soap and make marks on their windows. .And afterwards we would go home and count who got the most candy. One popular teen-agers' Halloween trick was to unroll a roll of toilet paper and throw it high into a tree again and again until the tree was all wrapped in the white paper. The paper would often stay in the tree for weeks until a heavy snow or rain washed it off. No real harm done, but it made a big mess of both the tree and the yard under it. One kind of Halloween mischief.
⑶ 求一篇關於萬聖節的簡單介紹的英語小短文
Halloween (or Hallowe'en) is a holiday celebrated on October 31. It has roots in the Celtic festival of Samhain and the Christian holy day of All Saints. It is largely a secular celebration, but some Christians and Pagans have expressed strong feelings about its religious overtones. Irish immigrants carried versions of the tradition to North America ring Ireland's potato famine of 1846. The day is often associated with the colors orange and black, and is strongly associate with symbols such as the jack-o'-lantern. Halloween activities include trick-or-treating, ghost tours, bonfires, costume parties, visiting haunted attractions, carving jack-o'-lanterns, reading scary stories, and watching horror movies.
或者
Halloween
Halloween is an autumn holiday that Americans celebrate every year. It means "holy evening," and it comes every October 31, the evening before All Saints' Day. However, it is not really a church holiday, it is a holiday for children mainly.
Every autumn, when the vegetables are ready to eat, children pick large orange pumpkins. Then they cut faces in the pumpkins and put a burning candle inside. It looks as if there were a person looking out of the pumpkin! These lights are called jack-o'-lanterns, which means "Jack of the lantern".
The children also put on strange masks and frightening costumes every Halloween. Some children paint their faces to look like monsters. Then they carry boxes or bags from house to house. Every time they come to a new house, they say,"Trick or treat! Money or eat!" The grown-ups put treat-money or candy in their bags.
Not only children, but most grown-ups also love Halloween and Halloween parties because on this day,they can disguise themselves as personages or ghost as their imaginations will lead them. This bring them the satisfaction of being young.
萬聖節前夕
萬聖節前夕是美國人年年都會慶祝的秋季節日。它的意思是「神聖的夜晚」，在每年的10月31日，也就是萬聖節前夜。但實際上這不是一個真正的宗教節日，而主要是孩子們的節日。
每年秋天蔬菜成熟可以食用的時候，孩子們就會挑出大個兒的橙色南瓜。然後在南瓜上刻上一張臉，把一根點燃的蠟燭放在裡面。看起來就好像有人在向南瓜外面張望。這些燈就叫做「iack-o'-lantems」，意思也就是「傑克的燈」。
每年萬聖節前夕孩子們還戴上奇怪的面具，穿上嚇人的服裝。有些孩子把臉刷成怪物。然後他們拿著盒子或袋子挨家挨戶串門。每來到一個新房子他們就說：「不款待就搗亂!給錢還是吃的!」大人們就會把用來招待的錢或糖放在他們的袋子里了。
不僅孩子，許多成年人也喜歡萬聖節前夕和萬聖節前夕晚會。因為這一天他們可以根據自己的想像把自己裝扮成名流或幽靈。這會帶給他們年輕的快感。
⑷ 關於萬聖節資料(英語)
Halloween (or Hallowe'en) is an annual holiday observed on October 31, primarily in Ireland, Scotland, Canada and the United States. It has roots in the Celtic festival of Samhain and the Christian holiday All Saints' Day, but is today largely a secular celebration.
Common Halloween activities include trick-or-treating, wearing costumes and attending costume parties, carving jack-o'-lanterns, ghost tours, bonfires, apple bobbing, visiting haunted attractions, committing pranks, telling ghost stories or other frightening tales, and watching horror films.
History
Historian Nicholas Rogers, exploring the origins of Halloween, notes that while "some folklorists have detected its origins in the Roman feast of Pomona, the goddess of fruits and seeds, or in the festival of the dead called Parentalia, it is more typically linked to the Celtic festival of Samhain, whose original spelling was Samuin (pronounced sow-an or sow-in)". The name is derived from Old Irish and means roughly "summer's end". A similar festival was held by the ancient Britons and is known as Calan Gaeaf 。
Snap-Apple Night by Daniel Maclise showing a Halloween party in Blarney, Ireland, in 1832. The young children on the right bob for apples. A couple in the center play a variant, which involves retrieving an apple hanging from a string. The couples at left play divination games.The festival of Samhain celebrates the end of the "lighter half" of the year and beginning of the "darker half", and is sometimes regarded as the "Celtic New Year".
The ancient Celts believed that the border between this world and the Otherworld became thin on Samhain, allowing spirits (both harmless and harmful) to pass through. The family's ancestors were honoured and invited home while harmful spirits were warded off. It is believed that the need to ward off harmful spirits led to the wearing of costumes and masks. Their purpose was to disguise oneself as a harmful spirit and thus avoid harm. In Scotland the spirits were impersonated by young men dressed in white with masked, veiled or blackened faces. Samhain was also a time to take stock of food supplies and slaughter livestock for winter stores. Bonfires played a large part in the festivities. All other fires were doused and each home lit their hearth from the bonfire. The bones of slaughtered livestock were cast into its flames.Sometimes two bonfires would be built side-by-side, and people and their livestock would walk between them as a cleansing ritual.
Another common practice was divination, which often involved the use of food and drink.
The name 'Halloween' and many of its present-day traditions derive from the Old English era.
Origin of name
The word Halloween is first attested in the 16th century and represents a Scottish variant of the fuller All-Hallows-Even ("evening"), that is, the night before All Hallows Day.[10] Although the phrase All Hallows is found in Old English , All-Hallows-Even is itself not attested until 1556.
⑸ 關於萬聖節的英語作文60字3篇。謝謝
1.Halloween means Hallows' Evening. It is the evening before All Hallows' Day (now called All Saints'Day) , a Christian holiday, celebrated on the November 1st.
History traces Halloween back to the ancient religion of the Celtics. The Celts were the ancestors of the present-day Irish, Welsh and Scottish people. In the 5th century BC, in Celtic Ireland, summer officially ended on October 31st. On the November 1st, Celtic peoples celebrated the festival of Samhain,which marked the beginning of winter and the Celtic New Year. Celts thought the division between the natural world and the supernatural world became very thin and all time and space was abruptly suspended on October 31st, and then the spirits of the died would come back and move freely looking for living bodies to possess.
或者
2.Halloween is a western festival. It』s on Oct.31st. It』s a happy time for children because at night they put on the masks to attend the party. After the party, they knock at someone』s door and say: 「trick or tread」. It means if you don』t give me the candies, I will play trick on you! At last kids can get enough candies for one year.
3.It is Halloween tomorrow. We want to buy some things for a party
We need a pumpkin, a vase, some candies , some flowers, some masks and so on. So we go to the supermarket
we go there by car . I like the rabbit mask very much. My mother likes the horse mask
we have a big garden . It is behind our house . There are many beautiful flowers in it. We put them in the vase
We have many things to eat and drink . Do you like our party? come to our house at seven in the evening tomorrow!
三篇你挑一個吧。呵呵。
⑹ 關於萬聖節的英語小短文，越少越好！！！！！！急急急！！！！
One story about Jack, an Irishman, who was not allowed into Heaven because he was stingy with his money. So he was sent to hell. But down there he played tricks on the Devil (Satan), so he was kicked out of Hell and made to walk the earth forever carrying a lantern. Well, Irish children made Jack's lanterns on October 31st from a large potato or turnip, hollowed out with the sides having holes and lit by little candles inside. And Irish children would carry them as they went from house to house begging for food for the village Halloween festival that honored the Druid god Muck Olla. The Irish name for these lanterns was "Jack with the lantern" or "Jack of the lantern," abbreviated as " Jack-o'-lantern" and now spelled "jack-o-lantern." traditional Halloween you can read about in most books was just children's fun night. Halloween celebrations would start in October in every elementary school.Children would make Halloween decorations, all kinds of orange-paper jack-o-lanterns. And from black paper you'd cut "scary" designs ---an evil witch with a pointed hat riding through the sky on a broomstick, maybe with black bats flying across the moon, and that meant bad luck. And of course black cats for more bad luck. Sometimes a black cat would ride away into the sky on the back of the witch's broom. And on Halloween night we'd dress up in Mom or Dad's old shoes and clothes, put on a mask, and be ready to go outside. The little kids (children younger than we were) had to go with their mothers, but we older ones went together to neighbors' houses, ringing their doorbell and yelling, "Trick or treat!" meaning, "Give us a treat (something to eat) or we'll play a trick on you!" The people inside were supposed to come to the door and comment on our costumes.Oh! here's a ghost. Oh, there's a witch. Oh, here's an old lady.Sometimes they would play along with us and pretend to be scared by some ghost or witch. But they would always have some candy and maybe an apple to
⑺ 一篇萬聖節的英語文章
希望有用，希望你看得懂。
Halloween is an autumn holiday that Americans celebrate every year. It means "holy evening," and it comes every October 31, the evening before All Saints' Day. However, it is not really a church holiday, it is a holiday for children mainly.
Every autumn, when the vegetables are ready to eat, children pick large orange pumpkins. Then they cut faces in the pumpkins and put a burning candle inside. It looks as if there were a person looking out of the pumpkin! These lights are called jack-o'-lanterns, which means "Jack of the lantern".
The children also put on strange masks and frightening costumes every Halloween. Some children paint their faces to look like monsters. Then they carry boxes or bags from house to house. Every time they come to a new house, they say,"Trick or treat! Money or eat!" The grown-ups put treat-money or candy in their bags.
Not only children, but most grown-ups also love Halloween and Halloween parties because on this day,they can disguise themselves as personages or ghost as their imaginations will lead them. This bring them the satisfaction of being young.
⑻ 關於萬聖節的英語短文
Halloween
Halloween is an autumn holiday that Americans celebrate every year. It means holy evening, and it comes every October 31, the evening before All Saints『 Day. However, it is not really a church holiday, it is a holiday for children mainly.
Every autumn, when the vegetables are ready to eat, children pick large orange pumpkins. Then they cut faces in the pumpkins and put a burning candle inside. It looks as if there were a person looking out of the pumpkin! These lights are called jack-o『-lanterns, which means Jack of the lantern.
萬聖節前夕
萬聖節前夕是美國人年年都會慶祝的秋季節日。它的意思是「神聖的夜晚」，在每年的10月31日，也就是萬聖節前夜。但實際上這不是一個真正的宗教節日，而主要是孩子們的節日。
每年秋天蔬菜成熟可以食用的時候，孩子們就會挑出大個兒的橙色南瓜。然後在南瓜上刻上一張臉，把一根點燃的蠟燭放在裡面。看起來就好像有人在向南瓜外面張望。這些燈就叫做「iack-o『-lantems」，意思也就是「傑克的燈」。
每年萬聖節前夕孩子們還戴上奇怪的面具，穿上嚇人的服裝。有些孩子把臉刷成怪物。然後他們拿著盒子或袋子挨家挨戶串門。每來到一個新房子他們就說：「不款待就搗亂!給錢還是吃的!」大人們就會把用來招待的錢或糖放在他們的袋子里了。
不僅孩子，許多成年人也喜歡萬聖節前夕和萬聖節前夕晚會。因為這一天他們可以根據自己的想像把自己裝扮成名流或幽靈。這會帶給他們年輕的快感。
⑼ 關於美國萬聖節的英語短文
關於萬聖節有這樣一個故事。是說有一個叫傑克的愛爾半蘭人，因為他對錢特別的吝嗇，就不允許他進入天堂，而被打入地獄。但是在那裡他老是捉弄魔鬼撒旦，所以被踢出地獄，罰他提著燈籠永遠在人世里行走。 在十月三十一日愛爾蘭的孩子們用土豆和羅卜製作「傑克的燈籠」，他們把中間挖掉、表面上打洞並在里邊點上蠟燭。為村裡慶祝督伊德神的萬聖節，孩子們提著這種燈籠挨家挨戶乞計食物。?這種燈籠的愛爾蘭名字是「拿燈籠的傑克」或者「傑克的燈籠」，縮寫為Jack-o'-lantern ?在拼寫為jack-o-lantern。 現在你在大多數書里讀到的萬聖節只是孩子們開心的夜晚。在小學校里，萬聖節是每年十月份開始慶祝的。 孩子們會製作萬聖節的裝飾品：各種各樣桔紅色的南瓜燈。你可以用黑色的紙做一個可怕的造形??一個騎在掃帚把上戴著尖尖帽子的女巫飛過天空，或者是黑蝙蝠飛過月亮。這些都代表惡運。當然黑貓代表運氣更差。有時候會出現黑貓騎在女巫掃帚後面飛向天空的造形。 在萬聖節的晚上，我們都穿著爸爸媽媽的舊衣服和舊鞋子，戴上面具，打算外出。比我們小的孩子必須和他們的母親一塊出去，我們大一點的就一起鬨到領居家，按他們的門鈴並大聲喊道：「惡作劇還是招待！」意思是給我們吃的，要不我們就捉弄你。里邊的人們應該出?評價我們的化裝。 「噢！這是鬼，那是女巫，這是個老太婆。」 有時候他們會跟我們一起玩，假裝被鬼或者女巫嚇著了。但是他們通常會帶一些糖果或者蘋果放進我們的「惡作劇還是招待」的口袋裡。可是要是沒人回答門鈴或者是有人把我們趕開該怎麼辦呢？我們就捉弄他們，通常是拿一塊肥皂把他們的玻璃塗得亂七八糟。然後我們回家，數數誰的糖果最多。 還有一個典型的萬聖節花招是把一卷手紙拉開，不停地往樹上扔，直到樹全被白紙裹起?。除非下大雪或大雨把紙沖掉，紙會一直呆在樹上。這並不造成真正的傷害，只是把樹和院子搞亂，一種萬聖節的惡作劇。
HALLOWEEN One story about Jack, an Irishman, who was not allowed into Heaven because he was stingy with his money. So he was sent to hell. But down there he played tricks on the Devil (Satan), so he was kicked out of Hell and made to walk the earth forever carrying a lantern. Well, Irish children made Jack's lanterns on October 31st from a large potato or turnip, hollowed out with the sides having holes and lit by little candles inside. And Irish children would carry them as they went from house to house begging for food for the village Halloween festival that honored the Druid god Muck Olla. The Irish name for these lanterns was "Jack with the lantern" or "Jack of the lantern," abbreviated as " Jack-o'-lantern" and now spelled "jack-o-lantern." The traditional Halloween you can read about in most books was just children's fun night. Halloween celebrations would start in October in every elementary school. Children would make Halloween decorations, all kinds of orange-paper jack-o-lanterns. And from black paper you'd cut "scary" designs ---an evil witch with a pointed hat riding through the sky on a broomstick, maybe with black bats flying across the moon, and that meant bad luck. And of course black cats for more bad luck. Sometimes a black cat would ride away into the sky on the back of the witch's broom. And on Halloween night we'd dress up in Mom or Dad's old shoes and clothes, put on a mask, and be ready to go outside. The little kids (children younger than we were) had to go with their mothers, but we older ones went together to neighbors' houses, ringing their doorbell and yelling, "Trick or treat!" meaning, "Give us a treat (something to eat) or we'll play a trick on you!" The people inside were supposed to come to the door and comment on our costumes. Oh! here's a ghost. Oh, there's a witch. Oh, here's an old lady. Sometimes they would play along with us and pretend to be scared by some ghost or witch. But they would always have some candy and maybe an apple to put in our "trick or treat bags." But what if no one come to the door, or if someone chased us away? Then we'd play a trick on them, usually taking a piece of soap and make marks on their windows. .And afterwards we would go home and count who got the most candy. One popular teen-agers' Halloween trick was to unroll a roll of toilet paper and throw it high into a tree again and again until the tree was all wrapped in the white paper. The paper would often stay in the tree for weeks until a heavy snow or rain washed it off. No real harm done, but it made a big mess of both the tree and the yard under it. One kind of Halloween mischief.
⑽ 萬聖節英語短文
Halloween is an annual celebration, but just what is it actually a celebration of? And how did this peculiar custom originate? Is it, as some claim, a kind of demon worship? Or is it just a harmless vestige of some ancient pagan ritual?
The word itself, "Halloween," actually has its origins in the Catholic Church. It comes from a contracted corruption of All Hallows Eve. November 1, "All Hollows Day" (or "All Saints Day"), is a Catholic day of observance in honor of saints. But, in the 5th century BC, in Celtic Ireland, summer officially ended on October 31. The holiday was called Samhain (sow-en), the Celtic New year.
One story says that, on that day, the disembodied spirits of all those who had died throughout the preceding year would come back in search of living bodies to possess for the next year. It was believed to be their only hope for the afterlife. The Celts believed all laws of space and time were suspended ring this time, allowing the spirit world to intermingle with the living.
Naturally, the still-living did not want to be possessed. So on the night of October 31, villagers would extinguish the fires in their homes, to make them cold and undesirable. They would then dress up in all manner of ghoulish costumes and noisily paraded around the neighborhood, being as destructive as possible in order to frighten away spirits looking for bodies to possess.
Probably a better explanation of why the Celts extinguished their fires was not to discourage spirit possession, but so that all the Celtic tribes could relight their fires from a common source, the Druidic fire that was kept burning in the Middle of Ireland, at Usinach.
Some accounts tell of how the Celts would burn someone at the stake who was thought to have already been possessed, as sort of a lesson to the spirits. Other accounts of Celtic history debunk these stories as myth.
The Romans adopted the Celtic practices as their own. But in the first century AD, Samhain was assimilated into celebrations of some of the other Roman traditions that took place in October, such as their day to honor Pomona, the Roman goddess of fruit and trees. The symbol of Pomona is the apple, which might explain the origin of our modern tradition of bobbing for apples on Halloween.
The thrust of the practices also changed over time to become more ritualized. As belief in spirit possession waned, the practice of dressing up like hobgoblins, ghosts, and witches took on a more ceremonial role.
The custom of Halloween was brought to America in the 1840's by Irish immigrants fleeing their country's potato famine. At that time, the favorite pranks in New England included tipping over outhouses and unhinging fence gates.
The custom of trick-or-treating is thought to have originated not with the Irish Celts, but with a ninth-century European custom called souling. On November 2, All Souls Day, early Christians would walk from village to village begging for "soul cakes," made out of square pieces of bread with currants. The more soul cakes the beggars would receive, the more prayers they would promise to say on behalf of the dead relatives of the donors. At the time, it was believed that the dead remained in limbo for a time after death, and that prayer, even by strangers, could expedite a soul's passage to heaven.
The Jack-o-lantern custom probably comes from Irish folklore. As the tale is told, a man named Jack, who was notorious as a drunkard and trickster, tricked Satan into climbing a tree. Jack then carved an image of a cross in the tree's trunk, trapping the devil up the tree. Jack made a deal with the devil that, if he would never tempt him again, he would promise to let him down the tree.
According to the folk tale, after Jack died, he was denied entrance to Heaven because of his evil ways, but he was also denied access to Hell because he had tricked the devil. Instead, the devil gave him a single ember to light his way through the frigid darkness. The ember was placed inside a hollowed-out turnip to keep it glowing longer.
The Irish used turnips as their "Jack's lanterns" originally. But when the immigrants came to America, they found that pumpkins were far more plentiful than turnips. So the Jack-O-Lantern in America was a hollowed-out pumpkin, lit with an ember.
So, although some cults may have adopted Halloween as their favorite "holiday," the day itself did not grow out of evil practices. It grew out of the rituals of Celts celebrating a new year, and out of Medieval prayer rituals of Europeans. And today, even many churches have Halloween parties or pumpkin carving events for the kids. After all, the day itself is only as evil as one cares to make it.