A viewer asks: “The Irish legend of Jack-O-Lanterns is that: One night, a conniving local drunkard named Jack trapped the Prince of Darkness in a tree by hacking a sign of the cross into the bark. In exchange for letting Satan climb down, Jack had him vow to never claim his soul. Jack proceeded to act like a jerk his whole life. When he died, he was not allowed in heaven. So he tried to return to his old pal, the Devil. But Satan upheld his end of the deal, hurling a piece of coal from hell at the dead man, for good measure. Left without anywhere to go, Jack placed the blazing coal in a turnip to use as a lantern. The dead man then set out, doomed to wander until he can find an eternal resting place. Can Creator comment on this legend, how much truth there is to it, and how it really came about?”

This is a folktale based on reality although the experience described was not truly accurate with respect to names and places and the actual encounter—those were storytelling. The contest is between the light and darkness in the form of spirits representing humans wishing to return home to the heavenly realm, but being waylaid by demonic forces of the dark in the form of spirit meddlers, the fallen angelics who seek to cause trouble to anyone they can—human in the physical or in spirit form—and will hold spirits back in their journey home and torment them quite savagely in many cases. So this folktale is a metaphorical description of this contest between light and darkness experienced by a transitioning lost soul human spirit and then having a struggle and needing guidance and assistance to recover and return back home to be with Creator of All That Is. It is unfortunate that the original meaning of the Halloween night has been obscured through the passage of time. This is no accident that the awareness and knowledge has been suppressed because the darkness does not want humans to know of this hazard and so be prepared to prevent it happening. They want as many people as possible to suffer and become trapped in this way. So this becomes a cautionary tale for people to rediscover the roots of the tradition and appreciate the significance so that prayers and healing requests can be mounted and people be informed so they can make better preparation for their own passing one day and avoid this dark fate of becoming earthbound.