Christianity - a thoroughly ”pagan” religion

by Norm 27 Replies latest watchtower beliefs

• 

  daystar

  I think the problem is that so many Christians think that their religion sprang from nothing, that it has completely unique components.Littletoe, you admit that Christianity does not, though you contend that the results are unique. This, IMO, is a reasonable distinction. However, yours is also, in many an experience, a unique POV.
• 

  smellsgood

  Yes, there are elements of Jesus in pagan religions. Show me then where the Jews picked through the texts and which ones to construct their Jesus? What was their motivation?
  
  Why is it "based" on pagan religions. Why can't something be "similar" yet not "borrowed"?
  
  Even the plants demonstrate a dying rebirth pattern. Maybe this was a recognizable feature in nature for a reason. If the creator had this plan as the bible will say from the beginning, wouldn't this be perhaps spiritually recognizable to mankind because it is in the very fabric of nature herself?
  
  Can you point me to the SOURCE material on Dionysus and Mithras? I'm sorry, but the information I've sought out and read is woefully inaccurate and always second hand with NO source material ever sighted.
  
  Jesus is a unique figure. I don't see what the motivation would be for a Jew who fears G-d to base a semi/demi/ or full deity from Greek or Roman or any other mythology into the person of Jesus. It just doesn't work out in my mind.
• 

  smellsgood

  By the way.
  
  Dionysus? the god of wine, agriculture, fertility of nature?
  
  Are you thinking the borrowing is from the tale that since Zeus impregnated the human Semele and then killed her, Dionysus had to receive a "second birth" from Zeus thigh?
  
  I think any Jew would have been horrified by the cult of Dionysus in particular. The intoxicated orgies, the temple prostitutes etc. Why would they borrow from Dionysus myth?
  
  Other deities I've read Jesus has been based upon have always fallen short of the bullshit detector. Such as Krishna for example. I'm shocked at some websites flagrant disregard for Historical accuracy, and are instead to interested in proving their own fallacious position.
  
  Or how about Osiris? Having the body chopped up and scattered, them reassembled by Isis is the basis for the Jesus Myth as it is called?
  
  My biggest problem with all these claims is their disregard for historical integrety as best as it can be known. I am a HUGE fan of Greek and Roman history and practices, literature and people. So I think many things are bent and reworked to look more favorable upon theories of certain people, and are less than accurate. I'm not very sure about the research that produces these claims.
  
  However, I will say it again, there are similarities in the dying/rebirth. Duh. One difference of course is....Jesus was actually alive at a point in history in a place; Palestine; and not complete imaganation.
  
  So what I'm saying is bullshit is not that they have similarities. It's the charge of incorporation by Orthodox Jews, if you want to look at one guy, just look at Paul, of these stories into the life of Jesus. It just doesn't fly.
• 

  Sunspot

  All in all folks Christendom is in fact a 100% pagan religion, so all of you “true believers” out there might want to be careful when you libel something pagan as you belong to such a religion yourself.

  Hi Norm! How ya DOIN'?

  Admittedly, the WTS has a definite hate/hate relationship with the Roman Catholic religion and takes potshots at it every chance they get in the "always-humble and oh-so-righteous" WTS publications.

  To ME.....whether "a tree" is in my home with lights on it during a well-known holiday----or hanging on the front inside wall of the church up the road.....I simply cannot SEE where these are "hurting" anyone. To the contrary, they bring much in the way of joy and delight in one case and bring measures of comfort to others in the other case.

  For ones like the WTS to "pontificate" and chastise "all others" for their own beliefs and customs that do not HURT a soul.....I readily wonder how what THEY do that DOES deliberately and intentionally hurt others.....can be so easily overlooked?

  As other posters have mentioned....the WTS bends so far over backwards to paint all those "other religions on earth" in such a bad light....(while extolling THEIR OWN "virtues" all over the place) but neglect to acknowledge that they themselves are steeped in paganistic practices and will not admit to them.

  So.....which is worse.....knowing that somewhere back in the stream of time that SOME of these things done today were possibly founded in paganism and proceeding with this knowledge....

  ...or pointing haughty and extremely self-righteous fingers at others while still practicing the very same types of pagan rituals they condemn all others for doing?

  Annie
• 

  Gill

  May I mention the word 'Pyramid'?

  And how about 'Measuring Pyramids?'
• 

  Gill

  oooh, oooh!

  While we're at it 'Numerology', 'Pyramidology',' Egyptology'.....Here we have the roots of the WTBTS. We haven't even touched on ouija boards in Crooklyn, and some of the other past crazy goings on in that 'house of madness'!
• 

  Sunspot

  While we're at it 'Numerology', 'Pyramidology',' Egyptology'.....Here we have the roots of the WTBTS.

  Yes....but you then have to realize that "they be imperfect" and have been exceptionally tacky...erm....correction: "TACKING" for years to get the "undeniable TRUTH" out to their readers. They speak for GOD dontcha know, and have a soft spot in his heart...excuse me now while I go and lose my breakfast...
• 

  LittleToe

  Norm:For the most part I was agreeing with you

  What’s unique about Christianity?

  The fact that it is a unique combination of elements. Hinduism is similarly unique. While you point to the oft quoted cult of Dionysis, etc., it cannot be shown to be identical to Christianity, there are just several points of commonality.

  Why do you think other life forms inferior to you?

  I don't. I suggested that I might well be accused a hypocrite if I laid such a claim on the basis of them containing carbon (since I also contain carbon - "greetings carbon-based lifeform"). In the same way the WTS is hypocritically claiming other religions to be inferior since they contain pagan elements, when it's is abundantly clear that the WTS have their own pagan elements.

  Mixing all the different ingredients will still get you the same basic product namely, superstition.
  It might be dressed up differently, but it is basically the same 5 dollar hooker.

  That's a matter of opinion. They say that whichever way you cut it sex costs you. Is marriage another form of prostitution?
  "Superstition" is often rooted in ritual and warding off the unknown, and as a species we are very good at fixing a variety of rituals in our lives. To blow off the subject with the generalising "superstition" card is, IMHO disingenuous. It obviates a psuedo-rational mind from considering the deeper socialogical / psychological reasons for why religion / ritual is so prevalent among every human group, including the scientific community.

  Daystar:
  You caught my drift

  Satanus:Pastries and cakes are made of the same basic ingredients. Animals, including homo sapien sapien, are made of the same basic ingredients. Religions are made of the same basic ingredients. However in all these cases the resultant blend is unique, within its kind. The WTS is no different, no matter how much it might to claim otherwise.

  That's all I was saying
• 

  garybuss

  I read a history of religion once and I was interested to read of the many Christian core elements taken from Isis and Osiris mythology. I was also interested to read the connection to cannibalism and that association with communion.
  
  
• 

  SPAZnik

  So, each religion is a unique blend of pagan practises and customs, renamed according to it's kind, and hypocritical by denouncing each other for their pagan practises. I can't argue with that.