Friday the 13th, the story of a superstition you shouldn’t believe in

For those who don’t believe it’s just a number. It is the worst that can happen for those who fear superstition, especially in Anglo-Saxon countries, since here we fear the 17th much more. Today is Friday the 13thwhich falls in the middle of September. It’s not science that wins in these casesrather it is the randomness. Something bad can happen on any Monday the 11th, a day without curses, as on a Friday the 13th, in which you always had a red croissant in your hand. The only advice is not to believe it and for those who believe it, not to suffer too much. In a few hours it will be over.

The numbers

The art of numbers is varied. Does anyone really think that Cristiano Ronaldo would play football worse if he didn’t wear his number 7 jersey? No one. Just as no one should believe in lucky and unlucky numbers that vary depending on the country you are in. If for us it is the 17 and for the Anglo-Saxons the 13in the East many fear the number 4 and in very Catholic Spain it is not Friday that is scary, but Tuesday.

The unmotivated fear of the number 13 is called triskaidekaphobia, the fear of Friday the 13th is called parascevedekatryaphobia, the fear of the number 4 is called tetraphobia. Even the superstitious people of the world should know that chance is inevitable. Friday 13th or 17th there will always be some. At least one a year, math and calendar say.

The origins

What makes Friday the 13th unlucky, especially in Anglo-Saxon countries, has various and distant origins. None scientifically proven. The 13th at the Last Supper is the traitor Judah and in Scandinavian mythology the 13th demigod is the bad guy LokiThor’s half-brother, who arrives uninvited at the banquet of the gods. He comes after the perfect 12, perfect like the labors of Hercules and the tribes of Israel.

He died on Friday Jesus and it is the day when hangings were carried out in Great Britain. All coincidences. There are 13 lunar months against the 12 of Sun. There are even those who say that 12 was the number of primitive men’s counts with their fingers and two feet. You couldn’t get to 13 without putting your head on it and for this reason it brought bad luck.

Cases of history

They are all coincidences, but, as in many other dates, there are historical facts that all happened on Friday the 13th. It was also a Friday the 13th when Philip the Fair, king of France, ordered the arrest of the Knights. Templars. He also tells it, fantasizing, Dan Brown. Obviously the book is The Da Vinci Code. Also on the same date, it was September 1940, the Nazis bombed Buckingham Palace. A cyclone hit Bangladesh on November 13, 1970. It was a Friday like October 13, 1989, one of the Black Fridays of the Stock Exchange. It was November 13, 2015 in Paris, the day of the Bataclan. It was Friday.

It goes without saying that tens of thousands of other historical events have occurred on other dates: from the outbreak of world wars to dozens of attacks. There is also an anecdote that proves the opposite. In 1976, Daz Baxter of New York was apparently so scared of a Friday the 13th that he decided to stay safe in his bed. Mister Baxter was killed by the collapse of the floor of his building.

The Benefits of a Friday the 13th

If you don’t let yourself be convinced by myths and superstitions, a Friday the 13th can bring countless advantages. Things done on days when no one wants to expose themselves to the risks of fate are less. The greater the offer, the fewer the prices. This applies to travel as well as weddings. Friday the 13th is a loss for the economy because it causes less business (an estimate says 900 million dollars), but an advantage for the consumer who is not intimidated by superstition. If there are people who do not leave their homes, traffic decreases and with it the risk of accidents.

Literature

There is a quote from Unlucky Friday in Canterbury Talesbut it has been a permanent fixture in Western literature since the 17th century. The day and the number do not appear together until the 20th century with the 1907 novel Friday the Thirteenth.

There are even those who think that those who wanted to destroy superstitions helped Friday the 13th become more famous. A group from Philadelphia, the Friday the 13th Club, was made up of 13 men who met between 1936 and 2000 every Friday the 13th at 1:13 PM. They had lunch, walked under stairs, threw a little salt and broke mirrors. They stopped in 2000 because according to the calendar they had created, everyone would be dead by that date.

Even older is the New York Skeptics’ Club, dated January 13, 1882 by Captain William Fowler. It was called The Thirteen Club and the membership fee was 13, cents a month or dollars for a lifetime membership. 1300 members including President Theodore Roosevelt. There are London and Paris versions. The other President Roosevelt, Franklin Delano, did not travel on the 13th and feared it as did Napoleon.