Friday the 13th is a day of tainted lore. It’s a day when evil prevails and superstitions abound. A day when ladders, black cats and broken mirrors should be avoided at all costs. A day when people should be scared to set foot outside.

Well, at least in theory.

At Syracuse University, students aren’t exactly frightened of the alignment of the 13th day of the month with the sixth day of the week. To most SU students, today is just like any other Friday – an excuse to get to the bars a few hours earlier than normal so they can enjoy happy hour.

‘I had no idea that it was even Friday the 13th,’ freshman speech communications major Sean Hyland said.

Hyland isn’t alone. With Valentine’s Day coming up tomorrow, most students are looking past today’s viable foe and ahead to tomorrow’s equally treacherous one.

It’s certainly ironic that the two dates line up on this year’s calendar, but in head-to-head competition Friday the 13th blows Valentine’s Day out of the water. A slipup on V-Day leads to heartbreak – but hearts heal with time. On today’s day of misfortune, a mishap could mean bad luck for the rest of your life. And unless Cupid’s been on the juice since last year, horror movie villain Jason would take the love-struck cherub to the proverbial house.

So, why the lack of respect? It’s mainly due to the lack of publicity. No students really understand the history behind the day. But then again, neither do the historians.

Some say the stigma surrounding the day has religious origins, but even religion department chair Richard Pilgrim said he couldn’t provide any hard evidence. So the beginnings of the superstitious connection between Fridays and the 13th day of the month remain highly debated.

Some historians believe the tradition started as recently as 1307, when the King of France ordered thousands of members of the Knights Templar society to be arrested on Friday, Oct. 13. Others claim that the superstition began with Good Friday and the fact that there were 13 people in attendance at Jesus’ Last Supper.

Still others complain that the negative connotations with Fridays – a day when it’s considered bad luck to get married, give birth or buy a house – and the number 13 – which Scots refer to as the ‘Devil’s Dozen’ – combine to make this coincidental date both mysterious and unlucky.

Yet most students are unaware of any of this. They’re just concerned that luck might not go their way today.

And chances are that students having bad days today will look first to the superstitions as their excuse.

‘If somebody has a shitty day, and they later find out that it’s Friday the 13th, they’ll be like, ‘Oh, that’s why my day was so bad and I failed two tests and lost my wallet and my car was stolen,” freshman computer science major Matt Wilkofsky said.

While Wilkofsky says he isn’t afraid of the day, he admits fearing its power.

‘You see a black cat and you get kind out freaked out because it’s Friday the 13th,’ he said.

However, Kyoko Kawajiri, an international relations and economics graduate student, is aware of today’s significance.

‘It’s my birthday,’ Kawajiri said. ‘When I was eight or nine, it was Friday and everybody made fun of me, calling me a devil kid or whatever. I don’t take it that way, because I’m just so used to the fact that it’s my birthday and I’ve been dealing with it for over 20 years. Nothing really happens, though.’

But Kawajiri, who was born in Japan, doesn’t quite have a grasp on the importance of Friday the 13th.

‘I know that Friday the 13th is bad,’ Kawajiri said, ‘but I don’t really know the background. (Growing up) the only information I had about the 13th was through the movies.’

Kawajiri was able to compare the superstition of the number 13 to one she was used to back home.

‘In elevators here, you don’t have the 13th floor,’ she said. ‘In Japan, we don’t have the fourth floor.’

Kawajiri’s fellow international relations and economics graduate student, Youn-Kyung Cho, helped explain this somewhat similar superstition.

‘China, Korea and Japan all don’t have the fourth floor,’ Cho said, ‘because in Chinese character, that means death.’

While the superstition is clearer across the Pacific, the Western world’s lack of understanding adds to the day’s mystique. And that mystique is something most people prefer to not mess with.

‘I’m not going to aggravate it,’ he said. ‘If you’re walking by and there’s a ladder, you’re not going to walk underneath it. If it is there, why fuck with it? There’s always that chance.’

Published on February 12, 2004 at 12:00 pm