The 13th and most infamous guest to arrive, Judas Iscariot, was the disciple who betrayed Jesus, leading to his crucifixion on Good Friday. Hundreds of the Knights Templar were arrested on October 13, , and many were later executed. Dan Brown's "The Da Vinci Code" popularized the erroneous theory this is the original of the Friday the 13th superstition. In Biblical tradition, the concept of unlucky Fridays, stretches back even further than the crucifixion: Friday is said to be the day that Adam and Eve ate the forbidden fruit from the Tree of Knowledge; the day Cain murdered his brother, Abel; the day the Temple of Solomon was toppled; and the day Noah's ark set sail in the Great Flood.
It wasn't until the 19th century, however, that Friday 13th became synonymous with misfortune: As Steve Roud explains in "The Penguin Guide to the Superstitions of Britain and Ireland," the combination of Friday and the number 13 is a Victorian invention. In , the publication of Thomas W. Lawson's popular novel "Friday, the Thirteenth" captured the imagination with its tale of an unscrupulous broker who took advantage of the superstitions around the date to deliberately crash the stock market.
In the s, superstition went pop with the launch of the "Friday the 13th" slasher franchise, starring hockey-masked killer Jason Voorhees. Credit: Alamy. Fast forward to the s, and a hockey-masked killer by the name of Jason Voorhees in the slasher flick franchise "Friday the 13th" ensured notoriety.
Then came Dan Brown's novel "The Da Vinci Code," which helped popularize the incorrect claim that the superstition originated with the arrests of hundreds of members of the Knights Templar on Friday, October 13, An alternative history. Given the mass of doom-laden lore, you'd be forgiven for thinking that Friday 13th is indeed ominous. If we dig deeper, though, we also find evidence that both Fridays and the number 13 have long been regarded as a harbinger of good fortune.
While the other 3 out of 4 Americans might scoff at this, there is actually psychological science to back superstition. Psychologists at Kansas State University say superstitions are all about trying to control your fate. People often use superstitions to try to achieve a desired outcome or to help alleviate anxiety. A perfect example of this is performers and athletes who perform specific and sometimes quirky rituals before a big event. Mathematician and author Joesph Mazur explains how having superstitions can actually promote a healthy and positive mentality.
People hold on to those objects as a sense of security. One study conducted by psychologist Stuart Vyse tested a group of people on various memory tasks. The group of people who were allowed to carry their lucky charms with them performed better on the memory tests than the people who had their lucky charms taken away. By that logic, Friday the 13th could be just as lucky as it is unlucky, depending on your outlook.
So, instead of being scared of this eerie date, try incorporating some positive rituals in your life and see what happens! While a serious form of this phobia is rare, there's such widespread uneasiness about the number that many hotels and buildings will skip the 13th floor, and some airlines, including Lufthansa, will jump from 12 to 14 when numbering rows on their planes.
Of course, there's still a 13th floor or row, but some people presumably feel better that it's not named as such. Folklore and the cultural pervasiveness of the superstition are what darken our feelings about the number 13, says Janet Whitney, a licensed therapist and author of Facing Your Fears: Following Your Dreams and Finding Success.
She points to its role in ancient tales of death: In Norse mythology, Loki, the god of mischief, was the 13th guest to arrive at dinner, and another god was killed that day. In the Bible, Jesus Christ was betrayed by Judas, his 13th disciple. And, of course, there are the TV series, video games, books and movies — most notoriously, the Friday the 13th slasher-film franchise — that perpetuate triskaidekaphobia and friggatriskaidekaphobia.
Meanwhile, terrible incidents involving the number, like Apollo 13's aborted mission to the moon in , are pointed to, proliferating these negative associations. Join today and get instant access to discounts, programs, services, and the information you need to benefit every area of your life. He noted that he's especially wary of years with three Fridays falling on the 13th, the most possible. As we approach the one-and-only Friday the 13th for , some people may feel anxious.
If so, Whitney says it may help to try to disassociate the number and day from negativity and consider positive things that happened on the 13th day of the month in the past. The singer Taylor Swift has done just that. Although superstitions can be arbitrary-a fear of ladders or black cats, for example-"once they are in the culture, we tend to honor them," said Thomas Gilovich , a professor of psychology at Cornell University in Ithaca, New York.
The trepidation surrounding Friday the 13th is rooted in religious beliefs surrounding the 13th guest at the Last Supper-Judas, the apostle said to have betrayed Jesus-and the crucifixion of Jesus on a Friday, which was known as hangman's day and was already a source of anxiety, Vyse said.
The two fears merged, resulting "in this sort of double whammy of 13 fallingon an already nervous day," he said. The taboo against the number 13 spread with Christianity and into non-Christian areas, noted Phillips Stevens, Jr.
More interesting, he noted, is why people associate any Friday the 13th with bad luck. The answer, he said, has to do with what he calls principles of "magical thinking" found in cultures around the world. One of these principles involves things or actions-if they "resemble other things in any way of resemblance-shape or sound or odor or color-people tend to think those things are related and in a causal way," he explained.
In this framework, there were 13 people present at the Last Supper, so anything connected to the number 13 from then on is bad luck. Thomas Fernsler , an associate policy scientist in the Mathematics and Science Education Resource Center at the University of Delaware in Newark, said the number 13 suffers because of its position after According to Fernsler, numerologists consider 12 a "complete" number.
There are 12 months in a year, 12 signs of the zodiac, 12 gods of Olympus, 12 labors of Hercules, 12 tribes of Israel, and 12 apostles of Jesus.
Fernsler said 13's association with bad luck "has to do with just being a little beyond completeness. The number becomes restless or squirmy. Then there's Friday.
Not only was Christ crucified on that day, but some biblical scholars believe Eve tempted Adam with the forbidden fruit on a Friday. Perhaps most significant is a belief that Abel was slain by his brother Cain on Friday the 13th.
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