Was Christianity copied from several mythologies that predate it by 1500 years?

[Union Yes]

Written in 1280 BC, the Egyptian "Book of the Dead" describes a God, Horus, son of Goddess Isis.

Egyptian mythology predates the birth of Christianity by 1500 years.

Horus..

-Born Dec 25th.

-Born to a virgin mother(Isis), a virgin birth.

-Birth marked by a bright star in the sky.

-Birth announced by angels. Jesus' birth was announced by angels.

-born in a cave. Caves were used as stables. Laid in a manger.

-birth event witnessed by 3 wise men bearing gifts whom traveled from afar.

-during infancy, Herut tried to have Horus murdered. Herod tried to have Jesus murdered during infancy.

-Earthly father named Seb. The name/word Seb translates into Jo-seph.

-Both Horus and Jesus were baptized at age 30.

- Horus was baptized in a river by Anup the Baptizer. The name/word Anup translates into John.. as in John the Baptist. Anup was beheaded shortly thereafter, like John the Baptist.

-at age 12 he was led to a temple for his "coming of age" ritual. At age 12 Jesus was led to a temple for the same. Now called the bar mitzvah.

-no data on his life between ages 12-30. No data on Jesus between ages 12-30.

-Both Horus and Jesus disappeared for 18 years from age 12-30.

-Horus wandered into the desert alone at age 30 and was tempted. Jesus wandered into the desert alone at age 30 and was tempted.

-Horus had 12 disciples. 2 named Anup and Aan. Both names translate into John.. the 2 Johns from the 12 disciples of Jesus.

-Horus walked on water.

-Horus healed the sick, the blind, cast out demons, performed miracles.

-Horus raised Asar/El-Azarus from the dead. El-Azarus translates into Lazarus.

-His personal epithet was "Iusa" the "ever-becoming son" of "Ptah," the "Father." He was called the "Holy Child."

-Horus was called "The Messiah"

-Horus' many Titles: Way, the Truth the Light; God's Anointed Son; Son of Man; Good Shepherd; Lamb of God; Word made flesh; Word of Truth.

-was a fisherman and associated with "Ichthys". Similar to Jesus.

-was called the "KRST" or the "Anointed One". KRST may be the root of the word "Christ".

-after age 30 Horus delivered a "Sermon on the Mount" and his followers recounted the "Sayings of Iusa."

-after the sermon, Horus was captured.

-Horus was crucified on a cross or tree between two thieves.

-after 3 days, 2 women announced Horus, the Saviour of humanity had been resurrected. Brought back from the dead to reign for 1000 years. The exact same destiny of Jesus.

Mithra- Persian god 600 BC

Mithra..

-born Dec 25th

-born to a virgin birth.

-Performed miracles

-crucified and resurrected 3 days later.

-known as the Lamb, The Way, The Truth, The Light, The Savior, The Messiah.

Krishna- India 1000 BC

-was a carpenter

-born of a virgin birth

-baptized in a river

Dyonisis, Greek mythological god.

Dyonisis..

-Born to a virgin mother, a virgin birth.

-turned water to wine, performed miracles.

-crucified and resurrected 3 days later.

-was called the Saviour of mankind.

-believed his followers should partake in a feast of his flesh and blood. The root of communion.

-his followers believed they could feel his presence inside them.


The strictest tenets of Christianity, the tenets used to proselytize the non-believer into becoming a Christian appear to be completely copied from various mythologies that predate Jesus by 1500 years.

The story of the miraculous life of Jesus is used to proselytize the non believer. The virgin birth, 3 wise men, the star in the sky, his baptism, his preformance of miracles, casting out demons, healing the sick, raising the dead, his crucifiction between 2 criminals, his resurrection 3 days later...



ALL COPIED FROM EGYPTIAN, GREEK, PERSIAN MYTHOLOGY AND LORE.

For the past 2000 years the Christian church has gone through great, often murderous pains to stifle and hide these facts.

They never prepared for the information age or the internet.

Why don't our public schools teach our children this information?

It's high time they start teaching it.

Google "Horus and Isis" "Mithra" "Krishna" "Dyonisis"

Here's a pretty good resource to get your search started..
http://www.religioustolerance.org/chr_jcpa5b.htm

"Atheists, it's time to end our timidity and come out of the closet." -Bill Mahr "Religulous"

I highly recommend that everyone watch "Religulous".

[malaise]

1. Is the pope Catholic?

:evilgrin:

[Union Yes]

14. LOL, nice.

:hi:

[malaise]

Nice thread

:hi:

[Ikonoklast]

45. Maybe not.

The curved staff a bishop carries is actually derived from the curled wand of an Etruscan haruspex; a seer, wizard or fortune teller.

It is not a sheperd's crook, as is popularly thought.
http://wpcontent.answers.com/wikipedia/commons/thumb/e/ee/Augur,_Nordisk_familjebok.png/150px-Augur,_Nordisk_familjebok.png




Much of the RCC earliest symbology is pagan in origin, or derived from other religious practices. Even the Romans used Etruscan soothsayers in official capacities, although the Etruscans were in Italy before the arrival of the earliest Romans.

[malaise]

74. LOL

You see :D

[Go2Peace]

131. It appears the OP claims are actually the Myth here. Read on

http://hnn.us/articles/6641.html

I had an open mind about it having seen the video's floating around and was actually kind of surprised to find out this is an internet myth. But if you do a little searching you will find out this is just false info, more attempt to use false info to propagate a particular viewpoint (the internet videos etc, not the OP).

[ZombieHorde]

174. I am not convinced by the link. No evidence has been provided. nt

[Crunchy Frog]

180. Problem is that there's no evidence for the claims in the OP.

I'm not saying this as some kind of defense of Christianity, far from it. It's just that if you examine the mythology in question through reliable sources, you just won't find most of the claims that are listed.

[roguevalley]

132. considering the cross pollination of cultures, the captivity periods and the like,

it would be a miracle if there wasn't this happening. There are about half a dozen man-god stories like the one Paul turned Jesus into. Eisenmann and Tabor have great books on this sort of thing.

[datasuspect]

2. you can google "zoroaster" too

plus christianity copped lots of graeco-roman philosophy as well.

none of this is a big secret though.

[Union Yes]

15. Will do, thanks.

:hi:

[bettyellen]

109. Freddie Mercury was a zoroasterian Parsi... he did not however choose to be eaten by vultures

darn it, that would have been cool.

[ProudDad]

3. Heard one silly god myth

heard them all...

They're primarily designed as an opiate for the masses -- keep them asleep and docile while they get fleeced...

[Arugula Latte]

9. A huge chunk of Americans swallow these myths as truth, yet evolution? Wow, that's too far fetched.

Even though evolution has been OBSERVED over and over again. The pepper moth in industrial revolution England is the classic example.

[Union Yes]

19. It's frustrating that so many shut their minds to any dissenting views to their own beliefs.

:grr:

Hopefully education, the internet, the age we are in will start changing this rut that we have been stuck in for 1000's of years.

[Arugula Latte]

27. It does seem that the Internet has helped in bring more of us non-believers out into the open.

The numbers of people saying they are not religious or un-churched or don't believe in god keeps rising. I'm sure it's a combination of people actually realizing "faith" is crap and also people being more willing to admit that they don't buy it. That encourages me.

[Union Yes]

33. It does give one at least a bit of hope.

Peace

[imdjh]

44. Those aren't the ones who amaze me. It's the ones who swap one oppressive religion for another.

Take Americans, black or white, raised under Christianity an Asian religion exotic both to Africa and Europe. But OK, they were raised since birth as Christians. To then discard Christianity and take on Islam, which is not only another oppressive Asian religion but a branch of the same family as the one they are dumping- it's stupid. There is no other word for it.

Now I might think that Druidism or Wicca is silly, but it's not stupid in the same way that adopting Christianity, Islam, or Judaism is stupid. Wicca and Druidism as they exist are basically made up as we go along philosophies based in loosely stitched together metaphysics. Quite different from three racist, sexist, homophobic, etc... religions with their history of oppression, hate, and war.

Ditto converts to Christianity.

[thereismore]

158. The moths are axample of natural selection, not evolution. Both forms pre-existed and continue

to exist. If one had evolved from the other, now that would be evolution, but no, unfortunately, the moth story does not demonstrate evolution of species. Just population changes in response to environment.

[Union Yes]

16. Agree 100%

[aquart]

34. No, that isn't why they're "designed," you silly cynic.

And why you'd believe that particular line of dismissive, propagandistic, grandiose malarkey over all the others beats me. Why doesn't this demand as much cynical scrutiny as anything else?

[CTyankee]

96. I had a brilliant friend, a grad of Yale Divinity School, who I questioned on this very subject.

She is a devout Episcopalian. She professes a belief in the Biblical version of the birth of Jesus. She is, of course, aware of the fact that there were lots of virgin birth type religions going around at the time of Christianity. But she shrugged and said that it didn't prove that Jesus wasn't the REAL savior.

There are places where you just can't go with religious people like her. As I said, she is quite brilliant and probably one of the most creative people I have ever known. But her reasoning on this one is, to me, just unfathomable. So I chalk it up to "faith."

[Union Yes]

112. Believe it or not, you may have gotten through to her...

It's just that even if you did get through she'd probably have a hard time admitting it.

What I mean is that it can take time for info like this to sink in to a devout follower. Keep working on her.

Just my 1 cent.

Peace

:hi:

[eShirl]

4. as Christianity was imposed on countries and peoples, it was grafted on to already-existing

local religious practices and folk traditions

[Swamp Rat]

5. Yes. Christianity is the latest and worst of the bunch.

[Union Yes]

39. Perfect Palin Pic!

Thanks for posting! So eerily true too.

Peace

[Arugula Latte]

6. Yes -- The Bible is just a collection of myths and stories. The Epic of Gilgamesh influenced it. too

Here is just one similarity between the two ... There are many. Gilgamesh pre-dates the Old Testament by many hundreds of years.


* * *

from: http://www.magickalshadow.com/gilgamesh.html

The Great Flood

Perhaps one of the foundations in the Old Testament is the story of Noah's Ark : “And God said unto Noah, The end of all flesh is come before me; for the earth is filled with violence through them; and, behold, I will destroy them with the earth.” Genesis 6:13.(6)

So it seems that Gilgamesh also had an adventure concerning a great flood: “Utanapishtim spoke to Gilgamesh, saying: "I will reveal to you, Gilgamesh, a thing that is hidden, a secret of the gods I will tell you Shuruppak, a city that you surely know, situated on the banks of the Euphrates, that city was very old, and there were gods inside it. The hearts of the Great Gods moved them to inflict the Flood.” Tablet XI 9-14. So it appears in both stories that the “sins” of man have angered their gods and so the gods are going to punish the human race. In both stories there is a warning of forthcoming disaster given to someone who is seen as worthy of being spared during the destruction of mankind. Both were given specific instructions on how to spare themselves and carry out certain wishes of the gods. Noah was instructed to: “Make thee an ark of gopher wood; rooms shalt thou make in the ark, and shalt pitch it within and without with pitch. And this is the fashion which thou shalt make it of: The length of the ark shall be three hundred cubits, the breadth of it fifty cubits, and the height of it thirty cubits. A window shalt thou make to the ark, and in a cubit shalt thou finish it above; and the door of the ark shalt thou set in the side thereof; with lower, second, and third stories shalt thou make it.” Genesis 14-16. (6)

Gilgamesh was instructed: “O man of Shuruppak, son of Ubartutu: Tear down the house and build a boat! The boat which you are to build, its dimensions must measure equal to each other: its length must correspond to its width. Roof it over like the Apsu.” Tablet XI 24 and 28-30.

Both Noah and Gilgamesh spared their families and animals from the wrath that mankind faced: “But with thee will I establish my covenant; and thou shalt come into the ark, thou, and thy sons, and thy wife, and thy sons' wives with thee. And of every living thing of all flesh, two of every sort shalt thou bring into the ark, to keep them alive with thee; they shall be male and female.” Genesis 18-19. (6)

And from the Epic: “All the living beings that I had I loaded on it, I had all my kith and kin go up into the boat, all the beasts and animals of the field…” Tablet XI 84-85. They both also seemed to have the same idea to determine when it was safe to leave the safety of their boats and return to land: “And he sent forth a raven, which went forth to and fro, until the waters were dried up from off the earth. Also he sent forth a dove from him, to see if the waters were abated from off the face of the ground; But the dove found no rest for the sole of her foot, and she returned unto him into the ark, for the waters were on the face of the whole earth: then he put forth his hand, and took her, and pulled her in unto him into the ark. And he stayed yet other seven days; and again he sent forth the dove out of the ark; And the dove came in to him in the evening; and, lo, in her mouth was an olive leaf pluckt off: so Noah knew that the waters were abated from off the earth.” Genesis 7-11.(6) Gilgamesh seemed to also use doves and ravens: “When a seventh day arrived I sent forth a dove and released it. The dove went off, but came back to me; no perch was visible so it circled back to me. I sent forth a swallow and released it. The swallow went off, but came back to me; no perch was visible so it circled back to me. I sent forth a raven and released it. The raven went off, and saw the waters slither back. It eats, it scratches, it bobs, but does not circle back to me.” Tablet XI 145-154.

[NotThisTime]

43. Completely agree... It's a bunch of myths and stories told to indoctrinate people into submission

[aquart]

58. How uneducated and unlived do you have to be to be this dismissive?

What supercilious, unexamined nonsense. Murder, torture, and the threat of starvation have always worked brilliantly to keep people subdued. Religion is about something else altogether. Why don't you THINK instead of regurgitating somebody else's thoughts without a moment's fact checking.

[darkstar3]

99. "Religion is about something else altogether."

And what, pray tell, is that?

[Prophet 451]

143. No, faith is about something else entirely

Faith is about how one lives one's life, the need to reconcile the spiritual and the physical. When people of faith band together and become a religion, they hand an awful lot of power to the person leading that religion. Power which tends to end up being used for bad ends. Faith and people of faith (including myself) are not the problem; it is religion, in the form of the organised church, which is the problem because, almost inevitibly, they end up worshipping the church itself rather than the chosen deity.

Jesus kept his church small. He preached to many hundreds but those he led directly were limited to a few dozen, the better to stay focused on the teachings rather than temporal power.

[roguevalley]

133. it was the history as believed and retold about a

people both inside and outside of captivity over a very long period of time. It is the story of people attempting to understand the world, its creation and function and their place inside of it. It is also an attempt to give people hope where none existed (babylonian captivity) and an identity that would help them survive war, famine and slavery. You dismiss this too easily and with as much cynical closed mindedness as anyone who tells you Jesus is the only path.

By the way, he would have been astounded by that sort of statement, that he was a god. He never said it, ever believed it and would have considered it blasphemy if said to him.

(This is for a comment up thread. I have no luck posting to the proper response.)

[tavalon]

148. You had it until about the eleventh word

Humans are storytellers. We reference that which is too big for us to reference through mythical tales that speak to that deep truth. Myth is the highest form of truth in storytelling.

[Cleita]

7. Yes.

All those mythologies replaced the prehistoric religion worship of Mother Earth and probably some belief like Dreamtime that the Australian Abos believe in. The new mythologies were invented to give the then rising kings god-like powers. Christianity made Jesus the King of his Kingdom of Heaven, divesting the kings of those god-like powers. I think we should go back to the Mother Earth and Dreamtime religions myself. They actually make more sense.

[tanyev]

8. I recently read an interesting book about this.

The Jesus Mysteries, by Tim Freke and Peter Grandy. They compare Christianity to the various mystery religions prevalent at the time. Also goes into the influence of Platonism.

[DevonRex]

29. That book is excellent. They question whether Jesus even existed

as a person on earth and provide some pretty convincing arguments against it.

[aquart]

60. See Jane run.

I guess we all have to start with the baby books.

[tanyev]

72. Huh?

[tavalon]

149. Tee hee, I know

Before you know it, they'll be consuming Joseph Campbell and well, it get's pretty interesting from that point.

[tanyev]

161. Well, excuse the hell out of me.

I will try not to bother any of you again with my ignorance.

[tavalon]

163. I was in a very good mood when I wrote that

I like that people are talking about this. It takes some of the mystery and weirdness out of religion to talk about the common roots. Some of us know a lot about this, some less. I love that it's being talked about. I'm sorry it hit you in a mean way. It wasn't meant that way.

[tanyev]

166. Thank you. I did take your comments the wrong way.

Campbell is on my reading list. The book I mentioned was merely a starting point for me and I am fascinated by what I am learning. I'm also a little ticked off that I didn't run into this in college somewhere.

[tavalon]

167. Yeah, I know. I started out at a fancy liberal arts college and you would have thought

I would be introduced to it there but it took my high Priest to bring him to my attention.

[roguevalley]

134. google Tabor and Jesus. You will love his books.

[tanyev]

141. Thanks, I'll check on that.

My reading list is now longer than I'll ever be able to finish in my lifetime, but hey, what a way to go. :)

[Rex]

10. It was just another mystery cult, like all the rage at the time.

Fads, meh.

[aquart]

64. And what was a "mystery cult," dear?

[RadiationTherapy]

71. What's a "dear", mystery cult?

Insincere.

[aquart]

75. Oh, the question is quite sincere. What's a "mystery cult"?

You spout it, you be prepared to define it.

[Rex]

138. Spout?

How juvenile. Dear.

[eShirl]

81. Google is your friend, sweetheart. n/t

[laconicsax]

105. Since it looks like you don't want to look it up on your own, here you go:

Mystery cults were Roman-era religions with secret rites. The cult of Mithras was such a religion.

On edit: Correction, they went back as far as the ancient Greek civilization and get 'mystery' from mysterium/musterion which refered to the secret rites

[Rex]

118. Sorry, out and about.

it basically deals with the appeal of early Christianity (salvation, resurrection, eternal life) the fad at the time. All promises that sounded just the same. Just a different messiah or soothsayer or what not. I'm surprised one stuck.

[laconicsax]

123. What?

Who are you responding to?

[Prophet 451]

144. Would you like a serious answer?

The mystery cults were a group of Greek and Roman cults. They're called "mystery" cults because the rituals and ceremonies were largely secret and because we know very little about them. Christianity wasn't a mystery cult, it's doctrine and rituals being freely accessable (at least, until the persecutions started) but did use some of the same terminology.

[tavalon]

150. But, it didn't exclude the slave and lower working class

That's how it spread so far and wide and has lasted so long. All the others restricted their mysteries to the educated and there just weren't that many of them. Much the same as today, come to think of it.

[HughMoran]

11. This is common knowledge to those who care to be educated

Lots of copying and "coincidental" dates has occurred with Christianity as with other religions. Besides, all religion stems from the same thing really - fear of the unknown.

[tavalon]

151. Or, as I tend to look at it, a desire to describe the indescribable.

In my world, myths are the stories we use to describe that which we know but cannot directly express.

[Taverner]

12. Yep - read the book (not the movie) "The God Who Wasn't There"

[laughingliberal]

13. The New Testament's view of Satan

was largely taken from Babylonian mythology while the Hebrew people were enslaved in the years between the Old and New Testaments.

[Union Yes]

25. Satan gave us Heavy Metal. How can he be so demonized?

:rofl:


All jokes aside, I agree with your reply! Thanks for adding.

:hi:

[Ikonoklast]

49. As were all of the mythology of 'angels'.

Before the Babylonian captivity, there was no angel mythology in the early Jewish canon.

But the Babylonians had them, as well as the story of 'Lucifer'.

[dgibby]

17. Yes.

Zeitgeist The Movie

Are the stories from the bible real?

Christianity, along with all other theistic belief systems, is the fraud of the age. It serves to detach the species from the natural world, and likewise, each other. It supports blind submission to authority.

Part 1 Of 3

Part 1 - Part 2 - Part 3

"The Greatest Story Ever Told"

This section explores the little known foundations of the Cult of Equinoctial Christolatry (Christianity) which, unannounced to most, rests in the astrotheological belief systems of the ancient world.

http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article19507.htm

[greyl]

18. This is not LBN!

;)

[Union Yes]

20. Hah!

You had me for a moment!:hi:

:rofl:

[yurbud]

21. Does a duck fart underwater?

[greyl]

23. Not every time. nt

[yurbud]

46. You witnessed dry land duck fart?! You've got to report this to the Avian Flatulence Institute!

[Union Yes]

51. Hilarious!

:rofl:

[scarletwoman]

22. As a student of world mythololgy I knew all of this (& more) decades before there was an internet.

Knowledge such as this comes from reading books, you see.

[Rebubula]

41. So...

...I guess you will telling us to get off your lawn now....

;)

[Ikonoklast]

88. Back then they didn't have lawns.

Recent invention, doncha know.

Before the intrawebs, or so I've heard.








:hide:

[Union Yes]

57. Totally agree, but the problem was accessability to this info was very difficult before the net.

Much of this could be researched in a Library. Only problem was few ever heard about this to begin with so they never knew to research it. I hope that makes sense.

I've spent the past couple of years researching this as a hobby. Both at a libraries and online. This post has been several months in the making. I wanted this information to be as accurate as possible. I've verified and re-verified every word of it to the best of my ability. I've learned a ton in the process.

I believe it is time to teach this to our school children so that all people learn and have access to this information.

Thanks for adding to the debate.

Peace

:hi:

[yurbud]

24. an Evangelical author figured out how to spin this to their advantage...

In a book called ETERNITY IN THEIR HEARTS he claimed it was a sort of foreshadowing God planted in their hearts to prepare them to be receptive when they heard the Gospel.

It's sort of like the way God made dinosaur fossils to test our faith.

[Union Yes]

31. I grew up in an Assembly of God (Evang) church..

their view was that Satan went back in time and "planted" these myths and dino bones etc. Back then(early 80's) our preacher was still slammin his fist on the pulpit claiming Earth was only 5000 years old.

Crazy shit.

I left that faith and all faith at the age of 14. Been atheist ever since and haven't missed a beat.

Your spot on correct with your reply!

Peace

[yurbud]

42. ironcially, their excuses fall apart when you start looking at the Bible's age, self-plagiarism,

contradictions in multiple accounts of the same events, and worse, morally repugnant behavior.

Their idea of inerrancy can't take much direct examination, even friendly examination, like asking who decided which books to put in the Bible and why, which again leads to glaring mistakes like including Revelations because they thought John of Patmos was the apostle John, not a hermit who dropped too much acid.

[aquart]

69. But why do ANY Christians accept the math of Bishop Usher?

He wasn't even a pope. He wasn't a writer of the Bible. He has NO infallibility attached to him. So why is this idiot taken as an authority? Particularly since he's claiming authority over the Old Testament which has NOTHING to do with his religion.

[Prophet 451]

142. He wasn't an idiot

Usher was actually a very bright man but like most of us, he was trapped by the time he lived in. At the time he wrote, the Bible was near-universally accepted as the actual, literal word of God.

[notadmblnd]

26. in a word, yes.

I truly believe that man created god(s) because of his inability to accept that there is nothing after life, just as there is nothing before we're born.

[Hawkowl]

28. Duh!

No kidding.

[WeDidIt]

30. The myth of the God who dies to save mankind

is fairly uni-cultural.

[aquart]

65. Why?

[WeDidIt]

107. It's clasic hero mythology

and goes back to pre-agrarian society.

In the hunt, many would work to kill the large beast.

Occasionally, a member of the hunting party would die in the effort.

This heroic quality is transferred to the god myth.

[tavalon]

152. Um, no not really

Unless you meant to write universal rather than uni-cultural. The Dying and Reborn God is almost the most universal myth around. That sucker has probably had legs since before we did.

[jemelanson]

32. There are no original stories in the Christian bible. NONE.

There are many books available at your public library or available at your local bookstore and from online seller such as amazon.com that will inform you of these stories. There were no less than 16 saviors prior to the birth of the Christian Savior Jesus. All were Virgin born, birth dates or Dec 25. Who were crucifies, buried and arisen. There are a multitude of Creation stories.

Books I would recommend would include "The Dark Side of Christian History" by Helen Ellerbe, "The First Sex" by Elizabeth Gould Davis, "When God was a Woman" by Merlin Stone and "The Woman's Encyclopedia of Myths and Secrets" by Barbara G. Walker.

IN our culture, and in our time we are encouraged no to question the stories in the bible. From the time we were children this has been stressed. So by the time we are capable of critical thinking and reason we are so accustomed to this taboo on questioning that we do not apply those skills on the religion or its holy book. I would suggest that you approach this with an open mine. These are well written books with information from the various disciplines to back up the ideas.

[exman]

35. Excellant video on this topic

Anyone who has seen the movie Zeitgeist will recognize this immediately. I also strongly recommend the movie.

http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=5547481422995115331#

About 25 minutes in, it gives the same information

[janx]

36. Of course!

And it's a beautiful thing! I had the chance once to visit a Greek Orthodox church once. It was a domed church with a painted ceiling. What I saw was absolutely amazing.

[mzteris]

37. well, duh . . .

who doesn't know that?

I mean some refuse to admit it, but everyone knows it.




You forgot Tammuz, Adonis, Dionysus, Attis, and Baal

[Mixopterus]

38. Most religions

Are a convergence of local and loan mythologies.

[Fire1]

40. I think you're trying to start shit. First of all your post is in the

wrong forum. Secondly, if you were genuinely interested in increasing your knowledge in this area you would ask an expert in the field or for something NEW, try going back to school instead of relying on "google" or a message board to be the extent of your intellectual experience.

[yurbud]

50. did you have a specific disagreement with the author's post? That's kind of a blanket slam

[Arugula Latte]

62. Are you saying the Bible did NOT draw on previous mythologies?

[Union Yes]

63. Feel free to dispute anything in my OP. Please be specific.

[tavalon]

153. Wrong forum! That's hilarious.

I'm having fun with this thread because people are coming at it with all sorts of levels of knowledge but a willingness to talk. Why do you think it got your goat?

[stray cat]

47. GD?

Your post belongs in the religion forum. Here is just looks like your fishing.

[ikri]

48. Christianity is a melding of loads of religions

In every area it appeared in where there was an established religion it picked parts of the local religion and merged it into itself. Everything from the virgin birth the to the resurrection appears in other religions first and is later adapted into Christianity.

We celebrate Christmas day at the end of December even though there's nothing to suggest he was born then (April is more likely), yet it is conveniently close to the dates of the existing midwinter equinox dates when other celebrations were already taking place.

It was politically convenient for the Roman Empire to adopt Christianity as the state religion and Rome's power and influence in the world at the time allowed Christianity to flourish where it might have otherwise fizzled out of history. Had things gone differently we might have been discussing the influence of Mithras.

[imdjh]

55. Christianity is a brilliant design. So , apparently, is Islam.

Judaism, mother of both but without the design improvements, clearly the loser in the long run.

[ikri]

59. Judaism isn't anywhere near as evangelical as the other two

Christianity spread at the head of a Roman sword, Islam spread as the Sassanid Empire fell and kept on growing.

[Ikonoklast]

97. Early Christians realized that Judaism was exclusionary.

Some wanted the numbers, some wanted to remain 'pure', and after some earlier dissension about accepting non-Jews as Christians, the numbers guys won out.

If Christianity was formed around only allowing Jews to be followers, and excluding all others, it would have maybe attained cult status, but never the numbers we have today.

[roguevalley]

135. there are some who write about the fall of Jerusalem being the turning point

in the rise of Christianity. Eisenmann has books that discuss the importance of James and how Jesus left the Messianic movement in his hands when he died. James died before the fall of Jerusalem and the church was headed by another brother of Jesus. Because they were all dispersed or killed, the Roman church was left and filled with Pauline accolytes who lead the church until it was co-opted by Constantine and turned into something very different from the communal beginnings where the poor and widows mattered and works were necessary to being a good and faithful servant of God. Too bad. Would have been a totally different world because Jewish "christians" at the time believed in the Jewish call to a life without works is no life at all, while the romanized Christians believe faith is enough.

(EDIT: the quotations of the Jewish Christians is because I am not at all clear what to call the early Messianic converts to the authentic teachings of Jesus and John the Baptist.)

[imdjh]

98. Judaism almost always gets a pass, and it shouldn't. Judaism is the core of this ritual mess.

Which isn't to say that if Judaism didn't exist that there wouldn't be something in its place, or something worse.

Those Bible stories are about Judaism being spread by the sword. Many of the references in the Bible to brother turning against brother are stories of sibling nations rather than actual siblings.

[Union Yes]

70. Agree!

I'm suprised that it's such a shocking rip off of ancient mythologies.

I mean, if one is gonna create a religion why not at least attempt to be original? They never prepared for the information age. IMO that's why. Just sayin.

Thanks for adding to the debate.

Peace

[imdjh]

52. Herod was a real person.

As documented as they get. Granted a good lie has elements of truth to make it believable, but just pointing out that "Herut" and "Herod" is not one of the points of comparison.

[Union Yes]

77. Over the course of centuries, it's quite easy to link someone like Herod into mythology.

Make sense?

Other words, those who wrote the Bible and history intertwined them. They re-wrote history to link real historical figures into the mythology of made up gods.

[madmom]

53. My family tried to tell my MIL (who is a willfully ignorant jesus freak) about all these

"coincidences". She wanted to know where we learned all this garbage, so I pulled up different internet articles. She said "well yeah anyone can put anything they want on the internet so I don't believe anything on there" How do you reason with people like that?:banghead:

[Union Yes]

114. While it may seem like your talking to a brick wall...

remember that info like this is hard for the devout to hear. What I mean is, she may have acted like a vampire exposed to garlic when you told her this. But it gets through. No matter how stubborn they may seem. It gets through.

Whether folks like your MIL take this newfound info and try research it on their own and learn and change, thats another matter.

If you can stand it, keep workin on her.

Just my 1 cent.

Peace

[Taitertots]

54. It is fairly obvious that the bible is a work of fiction

It wasn't even written within a hundred years of Jesus being alive. I'm fairly certain the people who wrote it didn't even speak the same language as Jesus.

[aquart]

61. If you're referring to the New Testament, say so.

You clearly know nothing about the Old Testament. (Or damn all about the New, either.)

[Taitertots]

67. Yeah, the new testament

I don't care to know all that much about an obviously false mythology.

[aquart]

56. "Several mythologies"? "Pre-date by 1500 years"? Oh, sweetie.

That story was so old by the time the Egyptians took a swing at it.

It's nice that you've begun your awakening, though.

I don't want to frighten you at the very start of your journey, but you might want to look at the social organization of lions and macaques. See if anything strikes you as shockingly familiar.

Remember this tidbit: religion is extremely conservative. By that I mean ritual will persist long after anyone breathing remembers WHY it was begun in the first place. The persistence of ritual is why religion after religion contains mainly the same ritual or celebration with completely different explanations. For instance, Herodotus describes an Egyptian ritual that sounds suspiciously like Diwali in India.

Try some nice jumping off point books:

Orpheus the Fisher by Robert Eisler
Greek Myths by Robert Graves (gives you the myth and then the way it came about)
The White Goddess by Robert Graves
The Descent of Woman by Elaine Morgan

[RadiationTherapy]

76. Why do you call people "dear" and "sweetie" intermingled with obvious hostility?

I mean, I understand you are using it as a diminutive to try to imply that the person to whom you speak is naive and inexperienced, it is just so cliche and uncreative, really. It seems like a waste of energy.

[aquart]

78. Why do you go off on tangents rather than discussing the issue at hand?

[RadiationTherapy]

95. The condescending attitude from you is actually pertinant.

It is relevant in the context of the hostility that automatically arises in some people upon hearing criticisms of their chosen belief systems; Christians are particularly intolerant of criticisms.

Other than that, I think you would be a more effective communicator without the diminutive titles. It is a defensive wall on your part and it triggers the same in others thus ending another opportunity to understand one another.

[Union Yes]

110. Spoken like a student of philosophy. =)

People that champion civil debate are near and dear to my heart.

Peace.

:hi:

[cali]

66. well, yes and no. sure Christianity incorporates myths from other religions

but it's a bit more than just repackaging of older myths.

[Union Yes]

111. These are the strictest tenets used to proselytize nonbelievers..

these are not just some "repackaged myths".

These long and fiercly held beliefs, the virgin birth, 3 wise men, the star in the sky, his baptism, his preformance of miracles, casting out demons, healing the sick, raising the dead, his crucifiction between 2 criminals, his resurrection 3 days later...

are the heart and soul of Christianity.

Again, Christians use these beliefs and refer to them to proselytize the non-believer.

What you said is so far from the truth.

[Joanne98]

68. Do bears shit in the woods?

[Union Yes]

80. LOL, nice.

:hi:

[Walk away]

73. When I was a kid we had a copy of the Golden Bough and the complete..

..works of Shakespeare in the upstairs bathroom. I grew up believing everybody had great works in the john. I discovered Atheism while making tub sculptures with my dads shaving cream.

Plus, every Easter my family sits down and watches Life of Brian.

[Union Yes]

82. Cool story!

thanks for sharing.

:hi:

[Arugula Latte]

84. OMG -- That is the best tradition I've ever heard of.

Life of Brian. I'm copying that. :hi:

(Oh, and speaking about Christianity ripping off previous religions ... how 'bout those "Easter" eggs, huh?)

[aquart]

86. Did you know your copy of The Golden Bough is a tiny summary?

The real thing is shelves and shelves of books of myths and customs. Could take years to read. Most daunting thing I ever saw.

[SpookyCat]

130. HA! My in laws do that too! Life of Brian I mean. :-)

[Ezlivin]

79. Does the pope shit in the woods?

[moobu2]

100. NO

He shits on a 24 kt gold thrown in the baroque taste.

[Union Yes]

106. Your melding old analogies to create a new joke.

Like using old myths to create a new religion. :rofl:

Kidding, kidding.

I'm on to you!

:hi:

[Odin2005]

83. Christianity is a fusion of cults that were going around the Middle East at the time.

Christianity was born in an age of apocalypsist Messianic fervor in the Middle East that lasted between 100 BC and 100 AD

[Union Yes]

87. Good points.

Thanks for adding.

:hi:

[nadinbrzezinski]

85. YES.... and the point is?

All mythologies borrowed from each other.... heavily.

I particularly like the reference to Mithra.

[FarCenter]

89. Jesus was the L. Ron Hubbard of his day?

[roguevalley]

136. Jesus had nothing to do with this. Try Paul of Tarsus.

[GrilledCheeses]

90. But will any christians take notice?

Probably not. Truth can be a hard pill to swallow.

Realizing there is no hell for Dick Cheney to go to is not very comforting.

[Union Yes]

115. Agree.

I felt a need to at least try to educate or ask people to research it themselves.

We simply can no longer ignore these facts. Not in the age we live in now, the Information Age.

These topics have been stifled for too damn long.

And I do agree that Cheney deserves eternity in hell in every sense.

welcome to DU BTW.

:hi:

[GrilledCheeses]

173. Thank you! I really appreciate that.

[Crunchy Frog]

91. Is all of this actually accurate? Do you have any links to reliable sources?

Just off the top of my head I would dispute the claims made about Dionysus. As I recall the myth of his birth, he was born of his father Zeus (who was most emphatically not a virgin), after he seduced and knocked up a mortal maiden and Hera got wind of it. The jealous Hera then incinerated the maiden, and Zeus rescued the fetal dionysus and sewed him into his leg, where he gestated him to birth. Also, Dionysus is the god of wine, while wine is only really tangential to the Jesus myth, so while there may be parallels it's probably mostly coincidental.

At least that's my recollection.

I don't doubt that much of Christian mythology is drawn from other surrounding myths that were part of the cultural milieu, but it doesn't do any good to overstate things to the point of inaccuracy.

Again, I would like to see some sources.

[muriel_volestrangler]

108. Dionysus is complicated - probably the fusion of 2 myths

Dionysus, also commonly known by his Roman name Bacchus, appears to be a god who has two distinct origins. On the one hand, Dionysus was the god of wine, agriculture, and fertility of nature, who is also the patron god of the Greek stage. On the other hand, Dionysus also represents the outstanding features of mystery religions, such as those practiced at Eleusis: ecstasy, personal delivery from the daily world through physical or spiritual intoxication, and initiation into secret rites. Scholars have long suspected that the god known as Dionysus is in fact a fusion of a local Greek nature god, and another more potent god imported rather late in Greek pre-history from Phrygia (the central area of modern day Turkey) or Thrace.

According to one myth, Dionysus is the son of the god Zeus and the mortal woman, Semele (daughter of Cadmus of Thebes). Semele is killed by Zeus' lightning bolts while Dionysus is still in her womb. Dionysus is rescued and undergoes a second birth from Zeus after developing in his thigh. Zeus then gives the infant to some nymphs to be raised. In another version, one with more explicit religious overtones, Dionysus, also referred to as Zagreus in this account, is the son of Zeus and Persephone, Queen of the Underworld. Hera gets the Titans to lure the infant with toys, and then they rip him to shreds eating everything but Zagreus' heart, which is saved by either Athena, Rhea, or Demeter. Zeus remakes his son from the heart and implants him in Semele who bears a new Dionysus Zagreus. Hence, as in the earlier account, Dionysus is called "twice born." The latter account formed a part of the Orphic religion's religious mythology.

http://www.pantheon.org/articles/d/dionysus.html

[roguevalley]

137. horus is better.

[RockaFowler]

92. Thanks for this

I needed a good comeback to give to my neice who is a Baptist Brainwashed youth.

[Union Yes]

104. My pleasure!

:hi:

[tavalon]

154. I want you to know that all is not hopeless

I was a Baptist Brainwashed youth. I got better.

[BlooInBloo]

93. All mythologies borrow from previous mytholigies. Not news, except to the ahistorical.

[Joe the Liberal]

94. This movie explains it quite well......

Part 1: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BNf-P_5u_Hw&feature=related

Part 2: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qc-mrJf45Hg&feature=related

Part 3: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IjAegPhQOUg&feature=related

[Union Yes]

102. Bookmarked. Thank you for the links.

:yourock: :hi:

[anonymous171]

172. LOL Zeitgeist.

[DeSwiss]

101. Oh yeah!

Kicking it big time!!!!!

- You've hit the nail on the head.

K&R

[Union Yes]

103. Aw Thanks! nice .gif too!

:hi:

[DeSwiss]

122. If you liked that....

...then you'll probably like this one too:

[Liberation Angel]

113. Reincarnation

great souls may reincarnate as needed to help save humanity from itself.

Note I said MAY.

But I do tend to believe that.

It makes more sense to me that this is all universal intelligence to help us reach univeral love and joy...

At least I prefer to look at it that way

and the evidence of universal intelligence or awareness surrounds us.

So if there is awareness and intelligence everywhere and infinitely in the universe (life itself) then

the fact that we exist at all is a miracle

and such possibilities surround us.

The Talmus says something like: "one who does not believe in miracles is not practical."

I say it is a miracle that we exist at all.

Thus other miracles are possible. as is reincrnation.

[Union Yes]

116. I wanna be reincarnated as a Rethug..

so I can once again re-undergo my conversion to Liberalism and later to a Marxist.

I'm 38. My 25 year journey to the far left has been a grand one. Filled with ups and downs. Good times and bad. I wouldn't trade it for anything.

Just sayin, it'd be fun to do it all over knowning what I know now. Cept it'd be impossible for me to come back as a Rethug if I knew what I know now.

Makes my head spin thinking about it. :rofl:

Peace

:hi:

[Shanti Mama]

119. I've been struggling with the concept of reincarnation for a long time.

Am reading a book that has given me some great new insights. The Joy of Living, by Yongey Mingyur Rinpoche. He compares brain science with Tibetan views and finds many similarities. Interesting stuff to ponder.

I tend to agree with you about reincarnation. Some aspect of us never dies. Still have to wrap my mind around what that aspect is.

One night I suggested my kids, who are both adopted from Nepal, have a really outrageous dessert. They looked at me like I'd lost my mind. So, I said "Hey, you only live once." The "your mind is gone" looks did not go away. So funny. I had to explain that in many cultures you live but once.

[Odin2005]

120. Wishful thinking.

[muriel_volestrangler]

117. Here's the Egyptian 'Book of the Dead'

http://en.wikisource.org/wiki/Papyrus_of_Ani (though that's not a name the Egpytians used for it).

Apart from Horus being the son of the goddess Isis, it's really hard to find any of the claims you make about Horus in it. Can you point out where they come from?

And, as an example of what is generally said about Horus in mythology, we have this entry in teh Bloomsbury Dictionary of Myth:

Horus the Sun. Horus, in Egyptian myth, was originally a Sun-god, Ra's strength made manifest. His honorary titles included Harakhty ('Horus of the horizon'), Harsamtaui ('Horus uniter of Egypt') and Horkhentiirti ('Horus of the two eyes', that is lord of the Sun and Moon). He was often shown as a small child (Herupakhret, 'Horus the child', Greek Harpocrates), suckling at his mother's breast, gazing out with one finger in his mouth, playing with tame snakes and scorpions, or riding crocodiles and lions.

Horus, son of Aset and Osiris. In later myth, from the region of the Nile Delta, Horus was said to be the child of Aset (Isis) and Osiris. He was conceived when Aset took the form of a hawk, or kite, and beat her wings to try to restore the breath of life to Osiris after his brother Set murdered him. In these accounts Horus was a hawk, or a hawk-headed warrior, and his Egyptian name Har was derived from the bird's call. Since hawks symbolize the immensity of the sky, this Horus was merged with the earlier Sun-god to become a single deity, and was regarded as Osiris' representative in the World Above after his father became ruler of the Underworld. Horus mediated between the two worlds, guiding the souls of the Dead to judgement before Osiris' throne and giving especial protection to pharaohs and their households. (Pharaohs acknowledged this relationship by taking the title 'living Horus'.)

Horus and Set. The Delta myth-cycle tells of Horus' efforts to punish Set for killing his father and usurping his power on Earth. The battle began when Horus claimed his inheritance from the divine court, and Ra refused to listen because Set made the boy-god's breath smell as foul as a crocodile's. They continued with trials of magic. When Set suggested a race in stone boats, Horus won by making his boat of plaster on a wicker framework. Then Horus suggested that they change themselves into hippos and see who could stay longest underwater. He tried to persuade Aset to spear Set underwater, but Aset refused to kill her own brother and Horus was forced to hide for his life in the desert. Set found him and gouged out his eyes; light disappeared from the world, and was returned only when Hathor dribbled gazelle's milk into the sockets and new eyes grew. In some accounts Horus ended the struggle by ripping off Set's testicles and so destroying his power. In others, Set brought about his own downfall by raping Horus, a crime which Aset used to Horus' advantage before the celestial court (see Aset).

In some accounts, perhaps a version of the story of Ra's eye (the Moon), only one of Horus' eyes was restored after Set gouged them out - and his benefactor was not Hathor but Thoth the healer. The other eye was left rolling about the darkness which was Set's domain, and became the Moon. However this myth arose, it inspired the cult of Horus' remaining eye, the udjat, which began as a good-luck charm (either worn as an amulet on the forehead, where it gave insight into the past and future as well as the present, or painted on doors, chests and above all, coffins) and ended up as a god worshipped in its own right and depicted as a heavily-made-up eye with a coiled hawk-feather hanging below it to one side and a pair of arms at the other holding a pot containing the two reeds which symbolized Upper and Lower Egypt. These rather portentous artistic representations are, however, outnumbered by the charmingly domestic portraits of Horus as a young child, and by the affectionate way he is shown as guide and protector of the Dead - the only deity in Underworld scenes to be given any glimmer of human warmth.

Again, none of the stuff you claim. Isis was Osiris' wife (and sister - you know what those Egpytian gods were like) before Osiris was killed, so describing her as a 'virgin' isn't true. Horus was born by artificial insemination:

Aset (or Eset, 'throne'; Greek Isis), in Egyptian myth, was the daughter of Nut and Geb and sister of Osiris, Set and Nebthet. She and Osiris had a dual function as fertility gods: she oversaw love and union, he was the god of growth. They ruled Egypt as wife and husband; he taught his subjects the rule of law and respect for the gods; she taught them marriage, household management and medicine.

After Osiris was drowned and dismembered by their jealous brother Set, Aset used her medical skills first to impregnate herself with the last drop of semen in her consort's penis, and then to reassemble the corpse and bring it back to life. The first magic worked, and she became pregnant with Horus. But the gods refused to let Osiris return to the world of mortals, and he went to rule in the Underworld, leaving Aset vowing revenge on Set. Instead of fighting him herself, she encouraged Horus to take every chance to try to kill him, and when this proved impossible she arranged for Horus to humiliate and disempower Set. In some accounts this happened when Horus castrated Set in a duel, fit punishment for Set's crime of cutting off Osiris' penis and throwing it into the Nile.

In other accounts, Set was defeated by a trick. Horus went to Aset, complaining that in one of their wrestling-bouts Set had raped him, and producing drops of the god's semen to prove it. Aset asked Horus to masturbate over a lettuce-bed, and when the lettuces were grown took the choicest to Set, who ate them greedily. Then she handcuffed him and took him before the court of the gods, claiming that he'd stolen what belonged to Horus. Set protested that he'd not stolen the lettuces but had been given them - at which point Horus' semen began flying out of his mouth like a flock of finches, returning to its creator.

So I'm confused. Where does your stuff about Horus come from? The Horus in the standard mythologies isn't behaving much like the stories about Jesus. :shrug:

[DeSwiss]

124. I'll let the OP respond....

..to your specific queries, because I'm not familiar with his sources. But in response to your comment: "The Horus in the standard mythologies isn't behaving much like the stories about Jesus."

I would have to say that if you think you're going to go and click a mouse, or pick up a book at Borders with the Horus story all laid-out in it, refuting Jesus and everybody after 2000 years of THE CHURCH'S propaganda -- then forget it. Stop looking now. I can only say that I've been studying religions and philosophies for almost 40 years, and in the early days at-best one might find blurbs within a book that raised an eyebrow and others bit and pieces that didn't jibed with the story we've been given. The reality was then and still is much the same way today, that publishing companies and university presses absolutely would not publish the truth about religion when it came up again THE CHURCH.

And you always come up against The Church. Especially when you say things they don't like, or that they perceive might threaten their con. I'm often surprised that after 2000 years we haven't gotten any further in people knowing the truth, but then The Church has got governments working with them, unlike "we the people." And besides, outside of the bible and the religious/church sources subsequent to the bible's "creation" -- you won't find any stories about Jesus that "behave" properly either. Because you won't find any at all.

- Of course on the other hand, its not unusual not to find a story about someone who didn't exist. That said, here's a couple of references you might find useful.....

http://books.google.com/books?id=Iaqe9CG_s6cC&pg=PA144&lpg=PA144&dq=virgin+birth+horus&source=bl&ots=HVm0tvM-uL&sig=GXscmyXgHeLzESKgFiIo5ZFSEqs&hl=en&ei=LaetSr_WIci0tweNnJjmDA&sa=X&oi=book_result&ct=result&resnum=3&ved=0CA8Q6AEwAjgU">Christ in Egypt- The Horus-Jesus Connection By D. M. Murdock, Acharya S.

http://www.pocm.info/">Pagan Origins of the Christ Myth

on edit: spelling

[muriel_volestrangler]

139. However, the source was claimed to be 'The Book of the Dead', and all this isn't in there

The only place it appears is with people who claim there are parallels between the Horus and Jesus myths.

We've now got a few links below that say most of the Horus claims in the OP are without foundation. It's not just about the occasional detail that isn't put into the brief summaries of Horus; what about it's major claims, like was Horus resurrected?

The texts inscribed upon the Stele are as interesting as the figures of the gods, and relate to events which were believed to have taken place in the lives of Isis, Horus, etc. The first composition is called the "Chapter of the incantation of the Cat," and contains an address to Ra, who is besought to come to his daughter, for she has been bitten by a scorpion; the second composition, which is called simply "another Chapter," has contents somewhat similar to those of the first. The third text is addressed to the "Old Man who becometh young in his season, the Aged One who maketh himself a child again." The fourth and following texts contain a narrative of the troubles of Isis which were caused by the malice of Set, and of her wanderings from city to city in the Delta, in the neighborhood of the Papyrus Swamps. The principal incident is the death of her son Horus, which took place whilst she was absent in a neighboring city, and was caused by the bite of a scorpion; in spite of all the care which Isis took in hiding her son, a scorpion managed to make its way into the presence of the boy, and it stung him until he died. When Isis came back and found her child's dead body she was distraught and frantic with grief, and was inconsolable until Nephthys came and advised her to appeal to Thoth, the lord of words of power, She did so straightway, and Thoth stopped the Boat of Millions of Years in which Ra, the Sun-god, sailed, and came down to earth in answer to her cry; Thoth had already provided her with the words of power which enabled her to raise up Osiris from the dead, and he now bestowed upon her the means of restoring Horus to life, by supplying her with a series of incantations of irresistible might.

These Isis recited with due care, and in the proper tone of voice, and the poison was made to go forth from the body of Horus, and his strength was renewed, his heart once more occupied its throne, and all was well with him. Heaven and earth rejoiced at the sight of the restoration of the heir of Osiris, and the gods were filled with peace and content.

http://www.touregypt.net/HORUS.HTM

So this "Horus was crucified on a tree/cross" story doesn't appear in the Horus myth. He was stung, as a child. His mother brought him back to life.

Saying "it's been covered up - the church is all powerful" is a cop-out. It's been claimed by a few authors, and there's no reason to believe them unless they can point to myths about Horus that existed before their claims. The Book of the Dead doesn't cut it.

[DeSwiss]

140. The book I referenced above.....

http://books.google.com/books?id=Iaqe9CG_s6cC&pg=PA144&lpg=PA144&dq=virgin+birth+horus&source=bl&ots=HVm0tvM-uL&sig=GXscmyXgHeLzESKgFiIo5ZFSEqs&hl=en&ei=LaetSr_WIci0tweNnJjmDA&sa=X&oi=book_result&ct=result&resnum=3&ved=0CA8Q6AEwAjgU">Christ in Egypt- The Horus-Jesus Connection By D. M. Murdock, Acharya S., makes references to both the question of Virgin-birth and other parallels between Jesus and Horus' births (as well as citing its sources). And it likewise covers the question and sources regarding the supposed crucifixion of Horus and Osiris. Check the contents tab at the top of the page.

While I may have missed it, I also don't see an instance above where the OP states that "anything's been covered up" nor that the "church is all-powerful," because obviously if that were in fact true, then we wouldn't be having this convo. However, the fact remains that The Church is definitely responsible in its own history for the (senseless) destruction of libraries and books about pagan religions and countless other categories of knowledge that we will probably never know completely what we've missed due to their stupidity -- and this was carried out solely for the purpose of the suppression of ideas, and truth. So from that perspective, yeah The Church has tried to conspire to cover-up and cover-over anything that would seem to undermine their authority, and their power to control the dialogue.

As I said, I don't know about the OP's sources, so I'll let him contend with that issue. But as far as what I can determine from my own sources, there is more truth about similarities between the Jesus/Horus dichotomy, than conjecture.

[struggle4progress]

159. Anyone who wants to assess Murdock/Acharya's credibility should examine her comments

on the discussion page for the Wikipedia article on her writings

Her ideas receive little, if any, scholarly recognition. Instead, we find: "I have my own publishing company, Stellar House Publishing, under which I published my book Who was Jesus? Fingerprints of the Christ." So the publisher, Stellar House, of your "reference" Christ in Egypt- The Horus-Jesus Connection, is just a vanity press. Her idea of showing her own credibility involves statements like

I have appeared on the radio show of Alan Colmes, of Fox's Hannity & Colmes

and

Famous Italian atheist Luigi Cascioli, who also has a Wiki page, links to my site

Curiously, she provides no evidence that she has any appropriate training, experience, or other background in the subject area she claims to illuminate

[DeSwiss]

162. And that's it?

Those are the best aspersions you got to cast? So she's "guilty" for having her own publishing company? Even though she writes the kind of academic and scholarly books that routinely sell in the hundreds per year? I mean what "legitimate publisher" would want to give up having tens of book sales per year of scholarly and academic books? (STRIKE ONE)

And exactly how does one gauge whether one is receiving "adequate" versus "little" scholarly recognition? Tell me, are we to use the natural incestuousness of academia as our guide? Or, are we to just use the regular good 'ol boy back-patting, in-house awards, or various puff-pieces and press-filler as the supreme measure of accountability and veracity? Should she have waited to receive her Nobel before daring to publish? And exactly who is the standard-bearer of theological research and truth these days? Who cornered that market?, I forget. (STRIKE TWO)

But you saved her worst sins for last didn't you? Guilt by association because she appeared on Hannity & Colmes. Oh, and while we're at it, here's another list of "guilty" past guests appearing on H&C that we can now rightly condemn. Thanks to your vigilance:

* Bob Beckel
* Susan Estrich
* Harold Ford Jr.
* Kirsten Powers
* Robert Reich

Just terrible, I know. They're all tainted now. (STRIKE THREE)

Oh, but wait. There it is!!! It wasn't Hannity & Colmes that got you all hot and bothered, was it?!?! You saved it right at the very last. THERE'S. THAT. WORD. ------> ATHEIST. An atheist links to her website, so obviously anything she says or writes is not to be trusted!!! If we follow that logic (for lack of a better word for it), then any discussions or writings by religious folks on secular matters should then also be immediately expurgated and forgotten without any consideration whatsoever. Right? (STRIKE FOUR: just in-case)

Curiously, she provides no evidence that she has any appropriate training, experience, or other background in the subject area she claims to illuminate.

And exactly what does "appropriate" look like? Tell me, what would a Christian apologist consider appropriate experience in order to question and challenge the legitimacy of..... Christianity??? Ha ha. Forgive me but I always have to laugh when religious folks start questioning someone else's legitimacy. Why not try http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&client=firefox-a&rls=org.mozilla%3Aen-US%3Aofficial&hs=XOJ&q=d.m.+murdock&aq=2&oq=D.M.+&aqi=g10">Google, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Writings_of_D.M._Murdock">Wiki or her http://www.myspace.com/120058877">MySpace page. You will not be disappointed. Or maybe you will.

If I must say so, this was a pretty pathetic attempt at character assassination on your part. And it has been my experience that when those who disagree with a subject under discussion but have little or nothing to add to the conversation (e.g. - The Church) but do so anyway, they typically will start by refuting the reality they don't want to hear. Failing this, they go after the messenger trying to undermine and poison everyone's mind against them. Which is exactly why I consider The Church a DEADLY MENTAL HEALTH DISEASE. A disease that can't be reckoned with, bargained with, nor accommodated in any way. And yet even now I hear others http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=214x218319">crying the blues about a lack of civility in religious discussions in this forum.

But the problem is that I have found that with the religious folks, civility is always a one-way street that only goes in one direction. Their way.....

[struggle4progress]

165. Let me say first, that I really don't care one way or the other whether someone calls

himself/herself an atheist. I grew up in the Bible Belt, and the Fundamentalists soured me on religion for a long time. Various materialistic (and often Marxist) readings of the texts brought me back to Christianity, and this return involved considerable introspection over the question Does one have any moral obligations to approach certain particular situations from an atheistic perspective?, a question which I'm naturally inclined to answer in the affirmative. Many people -- religious and irreligious alike -- simply can't stand the way I read religious texts: for example, I don't think "having faith" means "assenting intellectually to ancient or medieval world views." If you think I'm hostile towards atheists or atheism per se, I think you are battling dragons born in your own imagination

Before I spend much time thinking about Murdock/Acharya's work, I want to know whether it is likely to be based on real scholarship or whether she merely conveniently cherry-picks secondary and tertiary sources. I gave a link to her own comments on the discussion of her Wikipedia page. Surely she's free there to make the best possible case for her own competence to discuss the matters in question; anyone can go read the material at the link I provided and decide for themselves how good a case she makes. I don't think she makes much of case that she should be taken seriously

Nobody with any intellectual integrity doubts that syncretism influenced Christianity as we know it: and there are interesting things that might be said about this. Merely to triumphantly wave the bare fact of syncretism back and forth like a flag, without careful attention to details and historical context, however, is not even remotely interesting

[glitch]

121. Horus Fecking KRST!

If it's not one Son of God it's another. Still, love thy neighbor is a nice way to live... ;)

[knitter4democracy]

125. Um, so?

All you've proven is that basic archetypes existed in various religions/mythologies/belief systems before Christ. There have been other since. All those archetypes tell me is that there's something in us as humans that needs those stories.

I always giggle, though, when I read of people thinking the Church started out as a massive conspiracy theory. Read up on the early Church again--small groups of people staying in touch by infrequent letters, meeting in secret and needing to use secret codes to identify each other, and even the first councils were rather small in terms of attendance. The Church didn't have the power or the ability for the first, what, four hundred years to do what everyone accuses it of doing. Four hundred years is a long time.

I'm not saying the history of the Church or the Christian faith is perfect, but I am saying that people who latch onto the conspiracy theories ignore scads of other evidence that doesn't back up their thesis.

[kwassa]

126. your OP has many, many flaws, with almost none of it sourced.

I found this response in about two seconds:

http://www.kingdavid8.com/Copycat/JesusHorus.html

1) Horus was born of the virgin Isis-Meri on December 25th in a cave/manger with his birth being announced by a star in the East and attended by three wise men.

Let’s take this one apart and deal with each separate issue:

Horus’ mother was not a virgin. She was married to Osiris, and there is no reason to suppose she was abstinent after marriage. Horus was, per the story, miraculously conceived. Seth had killed and dismembered Osiris, then Isis put her husband's dead body back together and had intercourse with it. In some versions, she used a hand-made phallus since she wasn't able to find that part of her husband. So while it was a miraculous conception, it was not a virgin birth.

Horus was given three different birthdates in mythology, one of which does correspond to December 25th. But since Jesus wasn't, per the evidence, born on 12/25, this isn't a parallel.

"Meri" (technically "Mr-ee") is the egyptian word for "beloved" and was apparently applied to Isis prior to Jesus' time, as a title, not as part of her name. But since there were probably thousands of women between Horus' time and Jesus' with a name or title that was a variation on "Mary", there's no real reason to suppose that Jesus' mother was named after Isis in particular. Even if, hypothetically, the Gospel authors themselves fabricated Jesus' mother and decided to name her "Mary", it's far more likely that they named her after other women from around their time named "Mary" than it is that they named her after "Isis-Meri"

Horus was born in a swamp, not a cave/manger. Acharya's footnotes for this point only make the claim that Jesus was born in a cave, and say nothing about Horus being born in one.

Horus' birth was not announced by a star in the east

There were no “three wise men” at Horus’ birth, or at Jesus’ for that matter (the Bible never gives the number of wise men, and they showed up at Jesus’ home, not at the manger, probably when Jesus was a year or two old).

Acharya's source for the last two claims appears to be Massey, who says "the Star in the East that arose to announce the birth of the babe (Jesus) was Orion, which is therefore called the star of Horus. That was once the star of the three kings; for the 'three kings' is still a name of three stars in Orion's belt . . . " Massey's apparently getting mixed up, and then the critics are misinterpreting it. Orion is not a star, but a constellation, of which there are three stars in a row making up the belt of Orion. However, there is no evidence that these three stars were called the "Three Kings" prior to Jesus' time, nor even prior to the 19th century, for that matter.

And even if there is a specific star called 'the star of Horus', there's no legend stating that it announced Horus' birth (as the critics are claiming) or that the three stars in Orion's belt attended Horus' birth in any way.

2) His earthly father was named "Seb" ("Joseph").

First of all, there is no parallel between the Egyptian name “Seb” and the Hebrew name “Joseph”, other than the fact that they’re common names. Also, Seb was Osiris’ father, not Horus’.

3) He was of royal descent.

This one’s true! But it's not really a comparison to Jesus. When followers speak of Jesus being of 'royal descent', they usually mean His being a descendent of King David, an earthly king. Horus was, according to the myth, descended from heavenly royalty (as Jesus was), being the son of the main god.

4) At age 12, he was a child teacher in the Temple, and at 30, he was baptized, having disappeared for 18 years.

He never taught in any temple and was never baptized. Also, Jesus didn't 'disappear' in the years between His teaching in the temple and baptism. He worked humbly as a carpenter.

5) Horus was baptized in the river Eridanus or Iarutana (Jordan) by "Anup the Baptizer" ("John the Baptist"), who was decapitated.

Again, Horus was never baptized. There is no “Anup the Baptizer” in the story.

6) He had 12 disciples, two of whom were his "witnesses" and were named "Anup" and "Aan" (the two "Johns").

Horus had four disciples (called ‘Heru-Shemsu’). There’s another reference to sixteen followers, and a group of followers called ‘mesnui’ (blacksmiths) who join Horus in battle, but are never numbered. But there’s no reference to twelve followers or any of them being named “Anup” or “Aan”.

7) He performed miracles, exorcised demons and raised El-Azarus ("El-Osiris"), from the dead.

He did perform miracles, but he never exorcised demons or raised his father from the dead. Also, Osiris is never referred to as ‘El-Azarus’ or ‘El-Osiris’ (clearly an attempt to make his name more closely resemble the Bible’s “Lazarus”).

8) Horus walked on water.

No, he did not.

9) His personal epithet was "Iusa," the "ever-becoming son" of "Ptah," the "Father." He was thus called "Holy Child."

Horus was never referred to as “Iusa” (nor was anyone in Egyptian history - the word does not exist) or “Holy Child”.

10) He delivered a "Sermon on the Mount" and his followers recounted the "Sayings of Iusa."

Horus never delivered such a sermon, and, as pointed out above, he was never referred to as “Iusa”.

11) Horus was transfigured on the Mount.

No, he was not.

12) He was crucified between two thieves, buried for three days in a tomb, and resurrected.

Horus was never crucified. There’s an unofficial story in which he dies and is cast in pieces into the water, then later fished out by a crocodile at Isis’ request. This unofficial story is the only one in which he dies at all.

13) He was also the "Way, the Truth, the Light," "Messiah," "God’s Anointed Son," the "Son of Man," the "Good Shepherd," the "Lamb of God," the "Word made flesh," the "Word of Truth," etc.

The only titles Horus is given are “Great God”, “Chief of the Powers”, “Master of Heaven”, and “Avenger of His Father”. None of the above titles are in any Egyptian mythology.

14) He was "the Fisher" and was associated with the Fish ("Ichthys"), Lamb and Lion.

He was never referred to as “the fisher”, and there are no lamb or lion in any of the stories. Acharya S.'s footnotes on this claim only show an association with fish (which is that Horus WAS a fish, unlike Jesus), with no evidence of his being called 'the fisher' or having any association with a lamb or lion.

15) He came to fulfill the Law.

There was no “law” he was supposed to fulfill.

16) Horus was called "the KRST," or "Anointed One."

He was never referred to by either of these titles. "Krst", in Egyptian, means "burial", by the way. It wasn't a title.

17) Like Jesus, "Horus was supposed to reign one thousand years."

No mention of this in Egyptian mythology.

[Schema Thing]

155. Thanks. I'm not even sure a single "Jesus" character existed

but I hate to see the stuff in the OP passed off uncritically as fact. And that it made it into the otherwise great movie Religulous, chaps me greatly.

[Schema Thing]

157. Much (most?) of the OP is mythmaking of a sort worse than Christianity

at least the early christians didn't have google.

[struggle4progress]

127. From the link: "... Tom Harpur .. studied the works of .. Godfrey Higgins (1771-1834), Gerald Massey

(1828-1907) and Alvin Boyd Kuhn (1880-1963) ..." http://www.religioustolerance.org/chr_jcpa5b.htm

This may be an unimpressive intellectual effort; Kuhn appears to have derived most of his evidence from Higgins and Masse

The worth of Higgins as a scholar might be guessed by a quick look at his massive ANACALYPSIS (1833), which you can find here: http://pc93.tripod.com/anacalyp.htm

Let us merely quote from the Preface:

... In a very early stage of my investigation, my attention was drawn to the ancient Druidical and Cyclopæan buildings scattered over the world, in almost all nations, which I soon became convinced were the works of a great nation, of whom we had no history, who must have been the first inventors of the religious mythoses and the art of writing; and, in short, that what I sought must be found among them. My book, called the CELTIC DRUIDS, which I published in the year 1827, was the effect of this conviction, and is, in fact, the foundation on which this work is built ... I think the old synagogue Hebrew is the oldest written language ... The letters of the old Synagogue Hebrew language are nearly the same as the English, only in a different form. They are so near that they almost all of them may be read as English, as any person may see .. by a very little consideration of the table of letters, and the numbers which they denote ... No doubt, in order to prevent females from reading the following work, it will be accused of indecency ...

You can find Massey's some of Massey's works here: http://www.occult-underground.com/massey.html

Massey holds the strange view that all mythologies are one, and that the originate from the representation of animal forces. So, for example, in ANCIENT EGYPT, THE LIGHT OF THE WORLD: A Work of Reclamation and Restitution in Twelve Books, VOL. I ("I have written other books, but this I look on as the exceptional labour which has made my life worth living ... The earlier books were met in England with the truly orthodox conspiracy of silence"), you will find page after page of text like the following:

... Nor did Mythology spring from fifty or a hundred different sources, as frequently assumed. It is one as a system of representation, one as a mould of thought, one as a mode of expression, and all its great primordial types are virtually universal ... In the most primitive phase Mythology is a mode of representing certain elemental powers by means of living types that were superhuman like the natural phenomena ... It is the present writer’s contention that the Wisdom of the Ancients was the Wisdom of Egypt, and that her explanation of the Zootypes employed in Sign-Language, Totemism, and Mythology holds good wherever the zootypes survive ...

Kuhn probably likes this insistence that mythic symbols can only have one universal meaning, because he is an enthusiast of Madame Blavatsky:

The Secret Doctrine
by Alvin Boyd Kuhn
http://www.blavatskyarchives.com/kuhnthesecretdoctrine.htm

[struggle4progress]

128. The Leading Religion Writer in Canada ... Does He Know What He's Talking About?

8-09-04
The Leading Religion Writer in Canada ... Does He Know What He's Talking About?
By W. Ward Gasque

... Who is Alvin Boyd Kuhn? He is given the title ‘Egyptologist’ and is regarded by Harpur as “one of the single greatest geniuses of the twentieth century” <who> “towers above all others of recent memory in intellect and his understanding of the world’s religions.”

As it turns out, Kuhn was a high school language teacher who was an enthusiastic proponent of Theosophy, a prodigious author and lecturer, who self-published most of his books.

Not being myself an expert in Egyptian religion, I consulted those who are about their views of contribution that Kuhn, Higgins and Massey have made to Egyptology and whether they thought some of the key ideas of The Pagan Christ well grounded. So I sent an email to twenty leading Egyptologists — in Canada, USA, UK, Australia, Germany, and Austria ...

http://hnn.us/articles/6641.html

[UrbScotty]

129. ENOUGH OF THE RELIGION-BASHING!!!

If I wanted to go to a website where so many people bash religious views other than their own, I'd be on Free Republic!

[tavalon]

156. I suppose you might see this as religion bashing

but I see the similarities in myths through the different religions as pretty good proof that we're all on to something, something we can't speak to directly but that we know, with a knowing that goes beyond knowing.

[redqueen]

145. I'd think this would be common knowledge (except for the Horus stuff)...

Haven't there been shows about it on tv often enough?

I grew up hearing about this kind of history regularly so it was never a surprise. I learned about lots of religions at the same time... we were lightly Catholic but we my dad lectured to us about other religions frequently.

[satya]

146. Skeptic magazine article sorts thru this (even asserting there is evidence for a historical Jesus)

"Perhaps the worst aspect of “The Greatest Story Ever Told,” Part I of Peter Joseph’s Internet film, Zeitgeist, is that some of what it asserts is true. Unfortunately, this material is liberally — and sloppily — mixed with material that is only partially true and much that is plainly and simply bogus. Joseph’s main argument is that Jesus never existed and is in fact a mythical character based on earlier sun gods. He sees all the motifs and characters of the New Testament as coded astrological or solar references. The argument that Jesus was a mythical construct has been made before — for example by Timothy Freke and Peter Gandy in their 1999 book, The Jesus Mysteries, though Freke and Gandy made their argument with a far greater level of scholarship. In reducing Jesus to a sun god, Joseph ignores — as Freke and Gandy did before him — the powerful current of messianic apocalypticism prevalent in first century Judea. The fact that there were references back to earlier dying and rising gods in the Christ myth can lend an air of spurious scholarship to Zeitgeist, as long as one ignores the equally important messianic myth and the fact that there is a viable basis for an actual historical Jesus. Joseph totally ignores the messianic/apocalyptic aspects of the New Testament writings and erroneously asserts that there is no evidence for a historical Jesus. I will return to this issue later. For now, let us consider Joseph’s solar deity argument."

full article here: http://www.skeptic.com/eskeptic/09-02-25#feature

[HiFructosePronSyrup]

170. I'm glad I've never bought Skeptic magazine.

Author cites both Tacitus and Josephus as evidence for a historical Jesus.

Neither were contemporaries with an alleged Jesus, both were born after a cult would have formed.

[satya]

176. That's good to know; I'm in the "Jesus is a myth" camp and like to keep my facts straight. nt

[HiFructosePronSyrup]

177. He's also unwittingly supporting the OP's thesis.

He argues that Christian mythology derives from Jewish mythology, not Egyptian mythology. But he then maintains that Jewish mythology is derived from Egyptian mythology.

[tavalon]

147. Um, yeah.

All the religions copy from one another. And there are themes that encompass and overlap many. I used to hate Christianity but thanks to my Wiccan High Priest and Joseph Campbell, I see how it fits just as well with all the others. I just wish it could play well with others, or at least the people who follow it could.

[humblebum]

160. trouble is that most of the stuff from your referenced site is bunk.

http://www.conspiracyscience.com/articles/zeitgeist/part-one/#horus

This seems to be a fairly common tactic of atheists. The epistemology they use to "prove" their assertions is not used by the majority of scholars. It was designed to eliminate any opposing viewpoints.

[JustAnotherGen]

164. Yes

But I'm a Unitarian. No need to watch Religulous. :-) I have so many books on this it would make your head spin.

Glad to see another person has been enlightened that it all leads back to one entity.

[Crunchy Frog]

168. Sort of like Sarah Palin and the death panels.

Something is true because you want it to be true, and because it discredits something you don't like. The originator of the stuff in this OP has about as loose of a relationship with accuracy as the originator of the infamous healthcare email.

I'm all for criticism of Christianity, but it should be done in a manner which respects factual accuracy. :shrug:

[HiFructosePronSyrup]

169. Here's another thing Egyptian mythology has in common with Christian mythology...

It's full of contradictions.

Horus being born of a virgin is not a central part of Egyptian mythos. But then again, depending on which temple you're reading they heiroglyphics off of, Horus is also the god Ra. And Ra was born from the Goddess Nut, who was the sea, and was the product of immaculate conception. He just sprang up from the sea, sort of a combination of Jesus and Aphrodite.

Early Christian iconography of Madonna and Child is very clearly a ripoff of Isis suckling Horus.

I'm sure you can find similar examples for the rest of the items on this list.

Christian apologists really hate this shit.

[anonymous171]

171. Jesus wasn't born on December 25th though. nt

[stopbush]

175. Soory, but you're repeating a mythology that was created in the late 1800s.

Jesus didn't exist and Xianity is myth based, that's true. But Jesus is not a figure whose life story was lifted entirely from a single earlier god myth and retold with a big Jesus sticker pasted on it. In all of ancient literature on the gods, there is no event-by-event analogue of Jesus. The "Jesus-and-other-ancient-God life event similarities" you've listed are as phony as the Bible itself.

What's important to know about ancient gods is that the "meaning" of the god came first, and the "facts" about the god came second.

Here's a great website to peruse to see what I mean:

http://www.pocm.info/pagan_christs_getting_started.html

[humblebum]

178. Atheists are comical creatures. NT

[stopbush]

179. You talkin' to me?

[GrilledCheeses]

181. lol. which God do you believe in?