What are The Origins of Valentine's Day?
What is Valentine's Day?
Valentine's
Day has its origins in paganism and basically is a holdover of a Spring
fertility/fornication holiday.
Even the
old World Book Encyclopedia (Valentine's Day. Volume 19. 1966, pp.205-206)
states:
...the
customs of the day have nothing to do with the lives of the saints. They
probably come from an ancient
Roman festival called Lupercalia which
took place every February 15.
The festival honored Juno, the Roman goddess of
women and marriage, and Pan, the god of nature...The Romans celebrated their
feast of Lupercalia as a lovers' festival for young people. Young men and women
chose partners for the festival by drawing names from a box...After the
spread of Christianity, churchmen tried to give Christian meaning to the pagan
festival. In 496, Pope Gelasius changed the Lupercalia festival of
February 15 to Saint Valentine's Day February 14. But the sentimental
meaning of the old festival has remained to the present time.
Historians disagree about the identity of St. Valentine".
Furthermore
it also states:
"LUPERCALIA...was
celebrated on February 15 in
honor of Faunus, a rural Italian god. Faunus was later identified with Pan, the
god of herds and fertility...Priests...ran around striking all the women they
met.
The pagan
being named Cupid (a supposed son of Venus) was also involved. According to
pagan mythology, anyone being hit by Cupid's arrow falls in love with the first
person he/she sees. One source was bold enough to state,
The church
replaced elements of various love-gods (Juno Februata, Eros, Cupid, Kama, Priapus) with St. Valentine, an imaginary
Christian. A number of contradictory biographies were created for him...By
taking over some of the features of the Pagan gods and goddesses, St. Valentine
became the patron saint of lovers...St. Valentine's Day can be traced back to
Lupercalia, the Roman "festival of sexual license"
ST. VALENTINE AND
VALENTINE'S DAY
The
Apostle Jude warned that people claiming to be Christian leaders would turn
towards behaviors like sexual license:
For
there have been some intruders, who long ago were designated for this
condemnation, godless persons, who pervert the grace of our God into
licentiousness and who deny our only Master and Lord, Jesus Christ.
Notice
what the Roman
Catholics teach:
The roots
of St. Valentine's Day lie in the ancient Roman festival of Lupercalia, which
was celebrated on Feb. 15.
For 800 years the Romans had dedicated this day to
the god Lupercus. On Lupercalia, a young man would draw the name of a young
woman in a lottery and would then keep the woman as a sexual companion for the
year.
It is of
interest to note that the same Catholic source states:
The
Catholic Church no longer officially honors St. Valentine, but the holiday has
both Roman and Catholic roots.
