Jeg får spat af Valentines Day
14. februar 2007Jeg er imod Valentine’s Day.
På samme måde som jeg er imod Halloween.
Ikke fordi jeg er modstander af kærlighed, festligholdelse og traditioner, men fordi amerikanernes kommercialisering af kristne traditioner frastøder mig.
Hvis Valentins dag var forblevet en europæisk tradition uden først at være en tur omme på den anden side af dammen kunne jeg måske have accepteret den. Det ville i så fald have været noget jeg var vokset op med og ikke noget som Interflora og andre med interesser i den slags havde genindført.
Hvis festligholdelsen af Allehelgensaften havde været en tradition på linje med Fastelavn, ville jeg måske også kunne se ideen i at klæde sig ud to gange om året og budlre rundt og tigge penge og slik fra mine naboer…
Men sådan er det ikke.
Måske er jeg bare “den gamle fyr, der forarges i sin grundvold - og føler sit verdensbillede truet” men jeg vil alligevel mene at det er ok at skelne mellem kommercielle og kulturelle traditioner.
Og her er så historien bag Skt. Valentinus dag:
As early as the fourth century B.C., the Romans engaged in an annual young man’s rite to passage to the God Lupercus. The names of the teenage women were placed in a box and drawn at random by adolescent men; thus, a man was assigned a woman companion for the duration of the year, after which another lottery was staged. After eight hundred years of this cruel practice, the early church fathers sought to end this practice… They found an answer in Valentine, a bishop who had been martyred some two hundred years earlier.
According to church tradition St. Valentine was a priest near Rome in about the year 270 A.D. At that time the Roman Emperor Claudius-II who had issued an edict forbidding marriage.
This was around when the heyday of Roman empire had almost come to an end. Lack of quality administrators led to frequent civil strife. Learning declined, taxation increased, and trade slumped to a low, precarious level. And the Gauls, Slavs, Huns, Turks and Mongolians from Northern Europe and Asian increased their pressure on the empire’s boundaries. The empire was grown too large to be shielded from external aggression and internal chaos with existing forces. Thus more of capable men were required to be recruited as soldiers and officers. When Claudius became the emperor, he felt that married men were more emotionally attached to their families, and thus, will not make good soldiers. So to assure quality soldiers, he banned marriage.
Valentine, a bishop , seeing the trauma of young lovers, met them in a secret place, and joined them in the sacrament of matrimony. Claudius learned of this “friend of lovers,” and had him arrested. The emperor, impressed with the young priest’s dignity and conviction, attempted to convert him to the roman gods, to save him from certain execution. Valentine refused to recognize Roman Gods and even attempted to convert the emperor, knowing the consequences fully.
On February 24, 270, Valentine was executed.
“From your Valentine”
While Valentine was in prison awaiting his fate, he came in contact with his jailor, Asterius. The jailor had a blind daughter. Asterius requested him to heal his daughter. Through his faith he miraculously restored the sight of Asterius’ daughter. Just before his execution, he asked for a pen and paper from his jailor, and signed a farewell message to her “From Your Valentine,” a phrase that lived ever after.
Valentine thus become a Patron Saint, and spiritual overseer of an annual festival. The festival involved young Romans offering women they admired, and wished to court, handwritten greetings of affection on February 14. The greeting cards acquired St.Valentine’s name.
The Valentine’s Day card spread with Christianity, and is now celebrated all over the world. One of the earliest card was sent in 1415 by Charles, duke of Orleans, to his wife while he was a prisoner in the Tower of London. The card is now preserved in the British Museum.
Ledbrusken i mine hasers glideled nedbrydes af Valentine’s Dag
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