Creation can’t be true, since I lack the mental capacity to understand it and am not at all interested in studying it; moreover, to accept its truth would cause me to be uncomfortable
I'm still waiting for the one discussion on creationism I lack the mental capacity for to understand. Maybe you could start one?
hamilcarr
JoinedPosts by hamilcarr
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Yet more proofs of God's nonexistence- When will the believers get it?
by BurnTheShips inhundreds of irrefutable proofs for god's nonexistence.... http://www.tektonics.org/guest/300proof.html.
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hamilcarr
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Let's ask a question about Jesus
by hamilcarr inwhy are some of the pivotal events of jesus' life as recorded in the gospels shamelessly borrowed from pagan predecessors?
the following list is not supposed to be exhaustive: immaculate conception, son of god, death and resurrection, the last supper celebrated with bread and wine, an incarnate god who dies on a cross to redeem all sins, .... h. .
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hamilcarr
I'm sorry Leolaia, I overlooked the hyperlink. Very exciting post and a good overview of the attested and reconstructed forms.
I don't wonna play the devil's advocate, nevertheless I have some remarks on your argument:
I discuss there how the Semitic root for Ishtar/Astarte/Athtart/etc. is philologically unrelated to the Indo-European root for Aurora/Eos/Östern, etc.
The hypothesized (P)IE root form is based on the wrong assumption that the Sanskrit (uvasa-) and Greek (Eos) forms are closest to the original. This runs into problems because 1) replacing 'oldest' by 'closest to the original' is an oversimplification and 2) the assumed root form fails to explain the consonantal clusters in Proto-Germanic and the rhotacized forms in Italic because of the general trend towards avoiding these clusters throughout the evolution of IE languages.
Thanks for the reference to Hislop, I wasn't aware he was the first to come up with these correspondences.
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Let's ask a question about Jesus
by hamilcarr inwhy are some of the pivotal events of jesus' life as recorded in the gospels shamelessly borrowed from pagan predecessors?
the following list is not supposed to be exhaustive: immaculate conception, son of god, death and resurrection, the last supper celebrated with bread and wine, an incarnate god who dies on a cross to redeem all sins, .... h. .
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hamilcarr
My post shows that the two are linguistically unrelated.
No, you simply said 'there is no connection' without any further explanation. It may be someone told you there is no connection, but I was taught that the Indo-European root form which can be retraced in Greek Aurora, Latin Eos and Germanic Easter/Östern (modern forms) is related to the Semitic root of Isjtar/Astarte.
Bear in mind too that Christianity was not one homogenous thing. And there wasn't any one "Jesus story". I believe different parts of Christianity drew on different influences.
That's why I used the word 'intertextuality', it's an example of Eliots 'These fragments I have shored against my ruins', i.e. the Gospels are scrapebooks made up of heterogeneous elements or fragments. The Jewish tradition is of course the predominant source, certainly in Matthew, but I suppose most christians accept these similarities, so I disagree it would be an interesting topic to discuss. The pagan sources come second and are certainly more challenging to investigate, because of Christian's deep-rooted hatred toward paganism.
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Let's ask a question about Jesus
by hamilcarr inwhy are some of the pivotal events of jesus' life as recorded in the gospels shamelessly borrowed from pagan predecessors?
the following list is not supposed to be exhaustive: immaculate conception, son of god, death and resurrection, the last supper celebrated with bread and wine, an incarnate god who dies on a cross to redeem all sins, .... h. .
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hamilcarr
were there any pagans who were resurrected?
In point of fact it appears from the testimony of an anonymous Christian, who wrote in the fourth century of our era, that Christians and pagans alike were struck by the remarkable coincidence between the death and resurrection of their respective deities, and that the coincidence formed a theme of bitter controversy between the adherents of the rival religion, the pagans contending that the resurrection of Christ was a spurious imitation of the resurrection of Attis, and the Christians asserting with equal warmth that the resurrection of Attis was a diabolical counterfeit of the resurrection of Christ. In these unseemly bickerings the heathen took what to a superficial observer might seem strong ground by arguing that their god was the older and therefore presumably the original, not the counterfeit, since as a general rule an original is older than its copy. This feeble argument the Christians easily rebutted. They admitted, indeed, that in point of time Christ was the junior deity, but they triumphantly demonstrated his real seniority by falling back on the subtlety of Satan, who on so important an occasion had surpassed himself by inverting the usual order of nature - Frazer, J. (1922 [1993]) The golden bough, p. 361.
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Let's ask a question about Jesus
by hamilcarr inwhy are some of the pivotal events of jesus' life as recorded in the gospels shamelessly borrowed from pagan predecessors?
the following list is not supposed to be exhaustive: immaculate conception, son of god, death and resurrection, the last supper celebrated with bread and wine, an incarnate god who dies on a cross to redeem all sins, .... h. .
.
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hamilcarr
were there any pagans who were resurrected?
Resurrection is probably one of the most famous pagan motives. Well-known are the narratives about Osiris (Egyptian origin), Adonis (Phoenician), Attis (Phrygian) and Demeter/Persephone (Greek).
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Let's ask a question about Jesus
by hamilcarr inwhy are some of the pivotal events of jesus' life as recorded in the gospels shamelessly borrowed from pagan predecessors?
the following list is not supposed to be exhaustive: immaculate conception, son of god, death and resurrection, the last supper celebrated with bread and wine, an incarnate god who dies on a cross to redeem all sins, .... h. .
.
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hamilcarr
Your association of Eostre with Astarte/Ishtar is one such example. There is no connection between them.
The origin of Easter
The English word Easter and the German Ostern come from a common origin (Eostur, Eastur, Ostara, Ostar), which to the Norsemen meant the season of the rising (growing) sun, the season of new birth. The word was used by our ancestors to designate the Feast of New Life in the spring. The same root is found in the name for the place where the sun rises (East, Ost). The word Easter, then, originally meant the celebration of the spring sun, which had its birth in the East and brought new life upon earth. This symbolism was transferred to the supernatural meaning of our Easter, to the new life of the Risen Christ, the eternal and uncreated Light. Based on a passage in the writings of Saint Bede the Venerable (735), the term Easter has often been explained as the name of an Anglo-Saxon goddess (Eostre), though no such goddess is known in the mythologies of any Germanic tribe. Modern research has made it quite clear that Saint Bede erroneously interpreted the name of the season as that of a goddess.
Source: Francis X. Weiser, Handbook of Christian Feasts and Customs (New York: Harcourt, Brace & World, Inc., 1958), p. 211. Copyright 1952 by Francis X. Weiser.
At least linguistically there is a clear connection between these names. The same is true for Jesus and Joshua, linguistically there are similarities, but of course there are few connections as to the literal events of their lifes. I think one should look further than the narative elements and also include the more symbolic parallels. Jesus can for example be seen as an anti-militaristic counterpart of the original Jewish belligerent hero. The Gospels are good examples of intertextuality because so many different mythological motives are intricately intertwined.
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Let's ask a question about Jesus
by hamilcarr inwhy are some of the pivotal events of jesus' life as recorded in the gospels shamelessly borrowed from pagan predecessors?
the following list is not supposed to be exhaustive: immaculate conception, son of god, death and resurrection, the last supper celebrated with bread and wine, an incarnate god who dies on a cross to redeem all sins, .... h. .
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hamilcarr
I can tell you what they think -- they've seen lengthy lists of so-called parallels, seen them slashed to nothing by research, and walked away feeling like there are no parallels at all.
It works quite well with the JWs I know. A lot of their debunking of catholicism and traditional christianity is based on these very reasons, i.e. the pagan origins of Christmas, Easter (Astarte, Isjtar, Eostre), the cross. So if you say 'take it just one step further and come to the conclusion most of the motives found in the Bible itself are pagan too', they are open to further reasoning. The conclusion of these conversations is 'well it's in the Bible, so it can't be pagan' or 'these pagan elements are crafty imitations by Satan to deceive upright christians', statements you can refer to in further discussions.
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Let's ask a question about Jesus
by hamilcarr inwhy are some of the pivotal events of jesus' life as recorded in the gospels shamelessly borrowed from pagan predecessors?
the following list is not supposed to be exhaustive: immaculate conception, son of god, death and resurrection, the last supper celebrated with bread and wine, an incarnate god who dies on a cross to redeem all sins, .... h. .
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hamilcarr
Why not start us off with a few good ones?
I haven't a clue what will satisfy you, so I just quote from wikipedia:
Parallels with Christianity
Statue of Dionysus (Sardanapalus), in the Museo Palazzo Massimo Alle Terme in Rome, Italy Several deities that predate Christianity are believed by some to display very close similarities to Jesus; Osiris-Dionysus, Asclepius, Apollo, Helios, Hora, Mithras are among them. [25] Dionysos, who was also worshiped long before Jesus, has also many similar features to him: [26] For example, he was worshipped on December 25th (Rustic Dionysia) (Christmas), the day of the winter solstice in ancient Greek times, and his major holiday was in March called City Dionysia (Easter). [citation needed] Some sources even claims that Dionysus died on the cross. [27]
Dionysian religion and Christianity are significantly parallel; according to Martin Hengel, "Dionysus had been at home in Palestine for a long time", and Judaism was influenced by Dionysian traditions. [28]
The modern scholar Barry Powell thinks that Christian notions of eating and drinking the "flesh" and "blood" of Jesus were influenced by the cult of Dionysus. In another parallel Powell adduces, Dionysus was distinct among Greek gods as a deity commonly felt within individual followers. Another example of possible influence on Christianity, Dionysus' followers, as well as another god, Pan, are said to have had the most influence on the modern view of Satan as animal-like and horned. [29]
Wine was important to Dionysus, imagined as its creator; the creation of wine from water figures also in Jesus's Marriage at Cana. In the 19th century, Bultmann and others compared both themes and concluded that the Dionysian theophany was transferred to Jesus; Heinz Noetzel's Christus und Dionysos disagrees, [30] arguing Dionysus never actually did turn water into wine. Martin Hengel replied that opposing traditions would be anachronistic, and that since all Palestinians were familiar with the transformation of water to wine as a miracle, it was expected from the Messiah to perform it.
Peter Wick argues that the use of wine symbolism in the Gospel of John, including the story of the Marriage at Cana at which Jesus turns water into wine, is intended to show Jesus as superior to Dionysus. [31]
Paralelles can also be seen between Pentheus' arrest and questioning of Dionysus in Euripides' Bacchae and the arrest and questioning of Jesus by Pontius Pilot. The attitude of Dionysus is similar to Jesus' attitude as presented in the Gospels.
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Let's ask a question about Jesus
by hamilcarr inwhy are some of the pivotal events of jesus' life as recorded in the gospels shamelessly borrowed from pagan predecessors?
the following list is not supposed to be exhaustive: immaculate conception, son of god, death and resurrection, the last supper celebrated with bread and wine, an incarnate god who dies on a cross to redeem all sins, .... h. .
.
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hamilcarr
You're certainly right about Mithra but you shouldn't forget the worship of Mithra spread throughout Roman Empire in the 1st century AD, so it can hardly be called a pagan pre-decessor. The influence of Mithra on the post-constantine christian church can't be underestimated though. The celebration of Christmas on the 25th of December may (partly) be influenced by Mithra. The most interesting parallels can be observed when comparing christian symbols and metaphors with elements from Greek and Phoenician mythology: for example the mystery cults of Dionysus and Adonis, among others. Dionysus was, for example, the Son of God, born from a virgin. Also real Greek heroes like Alexander the Great were believed to be born from a virgin, conceived by God. Wine and bread were widely used symbols of redemption of sins in a variety of mystery cults. I was curious to hear what some of the christians on JWD think about this.
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Let's ask a question about Jesus
by hamilcarr inwhy are some of the pivotal events of jesus' life as recorded in the gospels shamelessly borrowed from pagan predecessors?
the following list is not supposed to be exhaustive: immaculate conception, son of god, death and resurrection, the last supper celebrated with bread and wine, an incarnate god who dies on a cross to redeem all sins, .... h. .
.
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hamilcarr
You're right, Sademo. I mistranslated it from my native language, it should be virginal conception.
You have to be careful in building a list like this. There are many such lists roaming the internet that are less-than-well-documented and ultimately false. My advice would be to very carefully research each point, validate it, THEN post it.
A list of 100 things, 90% of which prove to be false (or even just dodgy), is counter-productive. The same list culled down to just 10 true items would be valuable.
That's something I often hear when talking to JWs or ex-JWs. They want everything to be well-quoted, even the most obvious and self-evident statements. Anyone who has a more-than-average knowledge of Greek and Phoenician mythology knows there are a lot of similarities between Christianity and mediterranean mystery cults. I could quote a number of books, but that would be counter-productive as well, because there would arise much debate on the reliability of the sources involved. For instance, one of the important reference works about this issue is Frazer's The golden bough. However, whenever the name Frazer pops up in this kind of discussions most people start critizing the messenger, not the message. I could recommend works like 'The pagan Christ' by Tom Harpur or the quite tendentious books by Freke and Gandy, but I'd rather encourage people to go back to the sources.
