{"id":4229,"date":"2009-01-09T04:54:58","date_gmt":"2009-01-09T04:54:58","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.allwillstand.org\/?p=4229"},"modified":"2026-01-25T05:11:43","modified_gmt":"2026-01-25T05:11:43","slug":"origins-of-st-valentines-day","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.allwillstand.org\/index.php\/2009\/01\/09\/origins-of-st-valentines-day\/","title":{"rendered":"Origins of St. Valentine’s Day"},"content":{"rendered":"

Origins of St. Valentine\u2019s Day<\/h3>\n

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Let us take a brief look at a holiday (holy day).\u00a0 This time we are going to turn our attention to St. Valentine\u2019s Day.\u00a0 Perhaps others have grown out of this holiday and no longer celebrate.\u00a0 When I was in grade school we used to hand out Valentine\u2019s to several of the opposite sex.\u00a0 There was an exchange of little candy hearts with various sayings and heart shaped boxes of candy.\u00a0 In my youthful ignorance I never once considered the origins of such folly.\u00a0 For me it was just another holiday that I looked forward to.\u00a0 Which girl would give me a Valentine; my mother would get us kids a box of chocolates.\u00a0 However should a Christian celebrate St. Valentine\u2019s Day?\u00a0 Should they allow their children to celebrate it?<\/h3>\n

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In this side study we are going to take a look at St. Valentine\u2019s Day from a historical perspective.\u00a0 We are going to use two sources that I obtained several years ago.\u00a0 The first will be from an old book, the second from an online source.\u00a0 Certainly there is much more information available online now than what there were several years ago, but this study is not meant to be in depth, rather just give you a basic overview.<\/h3>\n

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Origins of St. Valentine\u2019s Day <\/strong><\/h3>\n

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\u201cNow, there is no custom without a reason.\u00a0 But the reason for this cannot be found in the life of the good saint who is made to indorse the custom with his name.\u00a0 He wrote no love-songs.\u00a0 No one rises up to accuse him of casting sheep\u2019s eyes on any Roman maiden.\u201d1\u00a0So if St. Valentine\u2019s was not responsible for originating this holiday then exactly who was he?<\/h3>\n

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\u201cHe was a bishop or Pope of Rome who stood steadfast to the faith during the Claudian persecutions, and for that faith was cast into jail, where he cured his keeper\u2019s daughter of blindness.\u201d2\u00a0 Cupid is the centerpiece of St. Valentine\u2019s day, but did you also know that Cupid is portrayed blind?\u00a0 \u201cIt is the pleasure of Cupid, blind himself, to bring upon his votaries a similar blindness, not to cure it.\u201d3\u00a0As the story continues, \u201c\u2026the fate of St. Valentine when the miracle was made known to the authorities…was<\/em>\u2026they first beat him with clubs and then beheaded him.\u201d4\u00a0 Afterwards \u201cwhat was left of him is preserved in the church of St. Praxedes at Rome, where a gate, now known as the Porta del Popolo, was formerly named, in his honor, Porta Valentini, or Valentine\u2019s Gate.\u201d5\u00a0 To quite the surprise there is yet another Catholic saint whom claims a share in the day.\u00a0 His name like the first was also St. Valentine.<\/h3>\n

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St. Valentine, the second one, \u201c\u2026was the bishop who healed a son of Craton the rhetorician, and was choked to death bey a fish-bone.\u201d6\u00a0 Continuing, \u201ceither Valentine would be surprised to find himself a lovers\u2019 saint\u2026\u201d7\u00a0 So just where does St. Valentine\u2019s Day come from if neither of the Valentine\u2019s in the past have anything to do with the customs of today\u2019s holiday?<\/h3>\n

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\u201cSinging Cupids are thy choristers and thy precentors, and instead of the crosier the mystical arrow is borne before thee.\u201d8<\/h3>\n

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According to an etymologist \u201cv and g were frequently interchangeable in popular speech, and as a notable instance produces the words gallant and valiant, which both spring from the Latin valens.\u00a0 He then explains that the Norman work galantine, a lover of the fair sex, or what in these slangy days might be called a masher, was frequently written and pronounced valantan or valentine.\u00a0\u00a0 And from these premises he concludes that by a natural confusion of names Bishop Valentine was established as the patron saint of sweethearts and lovers, although he has no real connection, not even an etymological one, with that class of beings.\u201d9\u00a0 While this can certainly explain how St. Valentine came to be associated with the holiday, it does not explain the origin of the customs.\u00a0 There is more to the story and for that we turn to a lexicographer.<\/h3>\n

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Looking at the first of the great English dictionaries, we will source Bailey from 1721.\u00a0 \u201cValentines (in England).\u00a0 About this time of the year \u2013 month of February \u2013 the Birds choose their Mates, and probably thence came the Custom of the Young Men and Maidens choosing Valentines, or special loving Friends, on that Day.\u201d10\u00a0 This is still not a good explanation so we will now turn to the antiquary, Francis Douce in his Illustrations of Shakespeare<\/em>, 1807.<\/h3>\n

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Douce \u2018suggests that St. Valentine\u2019s Day is the Christianized form of the classic Lupercalia, which were feasts held in Rome during the month of February in honor of Pan and Juno (hence known as Juno Februata\u201d, when amoung other ceremonies it was customary to put the names of young women into a box, from which they were drawn by the men as chance directed, and that the Christian clergy, finding it difficult or impossible to extirpate the pagan practice, gave it at least a religious aspect by substituting the names of particular saints for those of the women.\u201d11\u00a0 His claim is butter up by Rev. Alban Butler, a hagiologist.\u00a0 (\u2026the author of a worshipful or idealizing biography)<\/em>12<\/h3>\n

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According to the book, Lives of the Saints<\/em>, Butler explains that \u201cpastors of the Christian Church, \u2018by every means in teir power, worked zealously to readicate the vestiges of pagan superstition; chiefly by the simple process of retaining the ceremonies, but modifying their significance; and substituted, for the drawing of names in honor of the goddess Febrata Juno, the names of some particular saints.\u00a0 But as the festival of the Lupercalia took place during February, the 14 of that month, St. Valentine\u2019s Day, was selected for this new feast, as occurring about the same time.\u201d13\u00a0 To further evaluate the origin of this holiday we turn to John Lydgate and a poem in praise of Catherine, the wife of Henry V.<\/h3>\n

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Seynte Valentine of custome yeere by yeere<\/h3>\n

Men have an usuance, in this regioun,<\/h3>\n

To love andserche Cupides kalendere,<\/h3>\n

And chose theyr choyse by grete affeccioun,<\/h3>\n

Such as ben move with Cupides mocioun,<\/h3>\n

Takyng theyre choyse as theyre sort doth falle;<\/h3>\n

But I love oon whiche excelleth alle.14<\/h3>\n

(Fourteenth Century)<\/h3>\n

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Turning to a more modern day source we gather the following information, \u201cIn the days of the Roman Empire, the month of February was the last and shortest month of the year. February originally had 30 days, but when Julius Caesar named the month of July after himself, he decided to make that month longer and shortened February to 29 days while making July a month of 31 days. Later when Octavius Caesar, also known as Augustus, came to power, he named the month of August after himself, and not be outdone he also subtracted a day from February and gave the month of August 31 days. To this very day it remains that way. The ancient Romans believed that every month had a spirit that gained in strength and reached its peak or apex of power in the middle or ides of the month.\u00a0 This was usually the 15th day, and it was a day when witches and augurs, or soothsayers worked their magic. An augur was a person filled with a spirit of divination, and from the word augur we get the word \u201cinaugurate\u201d, which means to \u201ctake omens\u201d.\u00a0 Since February had been robbed by Caesars and had only 28 days, the ides of February became the 14th day of that month. Since the Ides of a month was celebrated on the preceding eve, the month of February was unique, because it was the 13th day that became the eve of the Ides that month, and it became a very important pagan holiday in the Empire of Rome. The sacred day of February 14th was called \u201cLupercalia\u201d or \u201cday of the wolf.\u201d\u00a0 This was a day that was sacred to the sexual frenzy of the goddess Juno. This day also honored the Roman gods, Lupercus and Faunus, as well as the legendary twin brothers, who supposedly founded Rome, Remus and Romulus. These two are said to have been suckled by wolves in a cave on Palatine Hill in Rome. The cave was called Lupercal and was the center of the celebrating on the eve of Lupercalia or February 14th. On this day, Lupercalia, which was later named Valentine\u2019s Day, the Luperci or priests of Lupercus dressed in goatskins for a bloody ceremony. The priests of Lupercus, the wolf god, would sacrifice goats and a dog and then smear themselves with blood. These priests, made red with sacrificial blood, would run around Palatine Hill in a wild frenzy while carving a goatskin thong called a \u201cfebrua.\u201d Women would sit all around the hill, as the bloody priests would strike them with the goatskin thongs to make them fertile. The young women would then gather in the city and their names were put in boxes. These \u201clove notes\u201d were called \u201cbillets.\u201d The men of Rome would draw a billet, and the woman whose name was on it became his sexual lust partner with whom he would fornicate until the next Lupercalia or February 14th.\u201d15<\/h3>\n

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This concludes our brief look at the origin of St. Valentine\u2019s Day.\u00a0 As a Christian you will have to decide what to do with this information.<\/h3>\n

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\u201cAnd if it seems evil to you to serve Jehovah, choose for yourselves this day whom you will serve, whether the gods which your fathers have served that were on the other side of the River, or the gods of the Amorites, in whose land you are living. But as for me and my house, we will serve Jehovah.\u201d\u00a0 Joshua 24:15<\/strong>\u00a0 (From the VW-Edition, www.a-voice.org)<\/h3>\n

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References:<\/h3>\n

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    \n
  1. \n

    Curiosities of Popular Customs, Walsh, 1898<\/h3>\n<\/li>\n
  2. \n

    ibid<\/h3>\n<\/li>\n
  3. \n

    ibid<\/h3>\n<\/li>\n
  4. \n

    ibid<\/h3>\n<\/li>\n
  5. \n

    ibid<\/h3>\n<\/li>\n
  6. \n

    ibid<\/h3>\n<\/li>\n
  7. \n

    ibid<\/h3>\n<\/li>\n
  8. \n

    ibid<\/h3>\n<\/li>\n
  9. \n

    ibid<\/h3>\n<\/li>\n
  10. \n

    ibid<\/h3>\n<\/li>\n
  11. \n

    ibid<\/h3>\n<\/li>\n
  12. \n

    thefreedictionary.com<\/h3>\n<\/li>\n
  13. \n

    Curiosities of Popular Customs, Walsh, 1898<\/h3>\n<\/li>\n
  14. \n

    ibid<\/h3>\n<\/li>\n
  15. \n

    http:www.lasttrumpetministries.org\/tracts\/tract6.html, Last Trumpet Ministries, Pastor David Meyer, Beaver Dam, WI<\/h3>\n<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

    Origins of St. Valentine\u2019s Day   Let us take a brief look at a holiday (holy day).\u00a0 This time we are going to turn our attention to St. Valentine\u2019s Day.\u00a0 Perhaps others have grown out of this holiday and no longer celebrate.\u00a0 When I was in grade school we used to hand out Valentine\u2019s to […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_et_pb_use_builder":"","_et_pb_old_content":"","_et_gb_content_width":"","footnotes":"","_links_to":"","_links_to_target":""},"categories":[1328],"tags":[175,488,179,906,192,1330,1329],"class_list":["post-4229","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-holiday","tag-all-will-stand","tag-allwillstand-org","tag-bible","tag-book","tag-holy-days","tag-origin","tag-st-valentines-day"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.allwillstand.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4229","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.allwillstand.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.allwillstand.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.allwillstand.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.allwillstand.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=4229"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/www.allwillstand.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4229\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":4232,"href":"https:\/\/www.allwillstand.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4229\/revisions\/4232"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.allwillstand.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=4229"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.allwillstand.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=4229"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.allwillstand.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=4229"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}