In the Netherlands, we actually celebrate Sinterklaas (St Nicolas) on december 5th. It is when this guy comes to the houses of children to give them presents, like Santa does in the US, for instance. I even heard people say that Santa was derived from the figure of Sinterklaas, but I am not sure whether it is true.
In the weeks before Sinterklaas comes to the house, children put their shoes near the fireplace (and if they do not have a fireplace usually near the heater). They might sing some special Sinterklaas songs and put a carrot in their shoe for the which horse that Sinterklaas rides. Then during the night Sinterklaas and/or his helper Piet come on through the chimney and put smallngifts in the shoes. There are also a lot of other traditions around the Sinterklaas celebrations and there are cadies and cookies that are only eaten around this time like pepernoten and speculaas.
Sinterklaas has become controversial over the last few years, because according to the stories, he has helpers who are all called ‘zwarte Piet’ (black Pete). White people playing this character painted their phases brown or black and put on colorful clothing and black curly hair as well as making their lips red and put rings in their ears sometimes. One side of the argument says that they were representing black people or even slaves and basically that this was a case of blackface. The other side of the argument said that Piet was black because he came through the chimney and that this was not blackface. They also say that it does not matter to children whether Piet is black.
The people saying that Piet is racist seem to be winning the discussion. In most of the larger cities, Piet now looks less like a charicature of a black person and more like someone who came through the chimney. In other places they still have the traditional zwarte Piet. There is even some violence in some cases, where the people who think that Piet is a racist charcter will protest against it during the public parts of the celebrations for the children. They then get violently attacked by the people wanting to keep the tradition as it is
Well, some of them are. However, I think one of the problems is that if you grow up with this celebration, it is a normal part of your life. White children do not get confronted with racism a lot, so they might not think about it and not notice that it is racist. At least, that was the case for me. Zwarte Piet was just the nice helper of Sinterklaas who brought me presents. I loved Sinterklaas and Zwarte Piet.
But as soon as someone said something, I knew they were right and I have been against Zwarte Piet ever since. For some people, it seems very hard to change their view of Zwarte Piet. It someone you loved when you grew up and now all of a sudden that makes you a racist? And they get defensive and even aggressive, unfortunately. It is still a heated debate, but the people wanting to change Zwarte Piet are winning, fortunately.
Wait, Sinterklaas has a witch horse? How does that work?
Like, does the horse cast spells or curse people? Does it wear a pointy black hat? Does Sinterklaas ride a horse that, in turn, rides a broom?
Or is it a horse he adopted after a witch didn’t want it anymore? If so, what did the witch need a horse for when she had the broom? As a pack animal? For companionship? To disguise the fact that she’s a witch while traveling above walking speed?
The 5th of December?? In Germany, we celebrate it on the 6th in the morning, and we are the people who celebrate Christmas on the 24th (evening or afternoon)
Tbf this was before nation states so the modern borders of Spain didn’t exist yet so why no include modern day Turkey (which existed neither, nor was it populated my the linguistically and culturally ancestors of the modern Turks).
Necromancy is fine with Christians when their God does it, but evil when other gods do it. The Abrahamic god is the god that conquers all other gods, stealing their power for himself and turning them into his servants. Then the asshole encourages his followers to turn against each other so they have more motivation to keep him central to their lives.
Gods in general aren’t really necessary anymore, but they’re kind of like meta organisms, quasi living things. They fights back against threats to their own existence, encouraging humanity to remain subservient instead of recognizing our true place as the highest authority.
I’m fine, but my description isn’t that far off from how Abrahamic religions took over the globe. People used to have patron gods that they followed or favored, but it wasn’t as common to deny the existence of other gods until Christianity popularized it, demanding that only God exists. Other gods were retconned into angels, demons, or saints. Gods often had aspects of reality they controlled, but the Abrahamic God became the master of everything, with all former gods only acting to fulfill God’s will. Zeus or Thor were once gods that controlled lightning, but Christians asserted that “It was me, Dio!”
Explicit organizations and informal cultures behave like living organisms at large scales. They evolve, adapt, and reproduce in the minds of people. Humans made ideas as tools for aiding our survival, but the ideas and organizations themselves often use people like tools to ensure their own existence. That’s the wild thing about these meta organisms: They don’t physically exist in reality, but it’s helpful to think of them that way because they’re mechanically similar to real lifeforms. The ideas that don’t adapt or prove useful die out, while the ones that stay useful or adapt to new environments survive. It was never a marketplace of ideas, but an ecosystem of ideas.
Revivify at 5th, Raise Dead at 9th, Resurrection at 13th, and True Resurrection at 17th. The different spells have their own requirements. Revivify has to be cast within one minute and can’t restore missing limbs, for example. True Resurrection doesn’t even require a body, just speak their name.
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