The Pagans Did It Too

Did you know that the phrase, "bless you" when someone sneezes, comes out of paganism?

In ancient days there was a belief that when someone sneezed it was the bodies way of expelling evil spirits from within the one who sneezed.

As children we were taught this practice in German, in order to bless a person, but didn't know why someone needed a blessing just because of a sneeze, the word we used was "gesundheit."


We thought we were being kind but never knew why it was kind. We never stopped to ask why we were not saying this word when someone coughed, only when they sneezed.

Some people believed that when someone sneezed they were expelling a piece of their soul, so they sent a blessing their way to help them regain or keep their soul.

Others believed that evil spirits took the moment of sneezing to gain entrance into the soul of a person.

Pope Gregory believed that a sneeze was a sign someone was in danger of contracting the plague, so to combat that he said "God Bless you."

Interesting isn't it? So often we do things that were once a pagan myth based on demonic thinking and incorporated it into our culture, after several generations no one really knew why we did something but continued to do it anyway. "It's just our culture" we would say, as though that gives it validity.

The people I know today are not thinking in these pagan ways when they do it, and neither was I, but my guess is, if we asked them why they extend a blessing for a sneeze, that they wouldn't know why.

I have decided never to do it again, because it really has no meaning and purpose for the believer, except to be polite. We can be polite in other ways that make sense, such as " be careful going home the traffic is awful", or "Lord go with you on your travels."

It is permissible to drop all the practices that came out of paganism, that are used for "politeness" and frankly, make no sense at all for believers. We can be polite in sensible ways that have meaning, purpose and are Biblical.

Romans 12:2
"Do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewal of your mind, that by testing you may discern what is the will of God, what is good and acceptable and perfect."

If we take seriously that last phrase in Romans 12:2 "what is good and acceptable and perfect", we will no longer defend something simply because it is the culture and makes people feel good. What we do will have purpose and meaning and be a REAL blessing!