Pagan Roots of Easter

wkmac

Well-Known Member
Easter is a pagan festival. If Easter isn't really about Jesus, then what is it about? Today, we see a secular culture celebrating the spring equinox, whilst religious culture celebrates the resurrection. However, early Christianity made a pragmatic acceptance of ancient pagan practises, most of which we enjoy today at Easter. The general symbolic story of the death of the son (sun) on a cross (the constellation of the Southern Cross) and his rebirth, overcoming the powers of darkness, was a well worn story in the ancient world. There were plenty of parallel, rival resurrected saviours too.
The Sumerian goddess Inanna, or Ishtar, was hung naked on a stake, and was subsequently resurrected and ascended from the underworld. One of the oldest resurrection myths is Egyptian Horus. Born on 25 December, Horus and his damaged eye became symbols of life and rebirth. Mithras was born on what we now call Christmas day, and his followers celebrated the spring equinox. Even as late as the 4th century AD, the sol invictus, associated with Mithras, was the last great pagan cult the church had to overcome. Dionysus was a divine child, resurrected by his grandmother. Dionysus also brought his mum, Semele, back to life.
In an ironic twist, the Cybele cult flourished on today's Vatican Hill. Cybele's lover Attis, was born of a virgin, died and was reborn annually. This spring festival began as a day of blood on Black Friday, rising to a crescendo after three days, in rejoicing over the resurrection. There was violent conflict on Vatican Hill in the early days of Christianity between the Jesus worshippers and pagans who quarrelled over whose God was the true, and whose the imitation. What is interesting to note here is that in the ancient world, wherever you had popular resurrected god myths, Christianity found lots of converts. So, eventually Christianity came to an accommodation with the pagan Spring festival. Although we see no celebration of Easter in the New Testament, early church fathers celebrated it, and today many churches are offering "sunrise services" at Easter – an obvious pagan solar celebration. The date of Easter is not fixed, but instead is governed by the phases of the moon – how pagan is that?

continued at: The Pagan Roots of Easter
 

soberups

Pees in the brown Koolaid
Virtually all modern holidays are pagan in origin. Many of the original pagan holidays were co-opted by early Christianity, which changed the name and date of the holiday by a day or two in order to entice new believers into the fold. Christmas Eve occurs a day or two after the Winter Solstice which was a major pagan holiday. St Patricks day occurs 2 or 3 days before the Spring Equinox. Groundhog Day is a "cross-quarter" day, halfway between the Winter Solstice and Spring Equinox. May Day is also a "cross quarter" day, occuring halfway between the Spring Equinox and the Summer Solstice. Halloween is yet another "cross quarter" day which occurs halfway between the Autumn Equinox and the Winter Solstice.

In no way do I mean to offend anybodys beliefs here, I think one can still celebrate the true meaning of Christian holidays such as Christmas and Easter while at the same time acknowledging the fact that the Gregorian calendar that we currently use did not even exist during the lifetime of Jesus, rendering the exact dates of His birth, death and Resurrection as matters of historical guesswork.
 

Jones

fILE A GRIEVE!
Staff member
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Catatonic

Nine Lives
Horus, Mithra and Jesus

As sober stated, previous religion's mythologies, icons and rituals are assumed and used by later religions.

From my studies, I was well aware that Mithra was the primary reason that Jesus's birthday and the celebration thereof was on December 25th.

I was aware that Egyptian mythology heavily influenced Jewish mythology and thus Christian mythology.
I was also aware that Greek mythology heavily influenced the Christian mythology.
I was aware that the Greek mythology influence was a major reason for Jewish non-acceptance of Christian mythologies.

I have read a couple books on the similarities of Eastern figures (Krishna and Buddha) on the Jesus persona but I found them lacking.

Attis would most likely have been influenced by Christianity than vice-verse.

Although I was aware of many similarities in Egyptian mythology to the Jesus mythology, I was not aware of how closely Horus lined up with Jesus ... Thanks for this new area to explore.
 

Just_another_day_at_work

Well-Known Member
What I see there is a war on Jesus, Catholic church, Muslims(or previous pagan gods) before even the USA was founded till today(we just happened to see it how the religions will be killed and we probably all be enlightened, when all this will make sense hopefully)
The Rothschild banking system don't exist in countries like: Cuba, Iran, supposedly North Korea, previously Sudan, Libya, Venezuela, Syria didn't have these banking institution all which are/were enemies of the USA(or at least for all the administrations now and before). The Rothschilds don't control the world or the USA they just happen to know the game I guess.
Some Catholic news in the previous week:
Pope holds Easter candle at basilica vigil - Yahoo! News
Tearful Hugo Chávez prays for God to spare him from cancer | World news | guardian.co.uk
Hugo Chavez Arrives in Cuba for Another Round of Cancer Treatment | Fox News Latino
Pope’s visit to Cuba leaves little reason for hope - Fabiola Santiago - MiamiHerald.com
 
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