CHAPTER II: Other Pagan Concepts & Practices
Cut & Paste
December 25 surprises many. For the past three centuries, no one would think that this day is of pagan origin. As the church is the one who is responsible for selecting the pagan festival, it is also responsible for many other rituals and teachings that were taken from the pagans. In this booklet we will see the most important concepts and practices which are stolen from the ancient pagan nations. You may also notice that it is very similar to what we have in the computer field the action of cut and paste. Similarly we find that the Church created Christianity in a similar fashion of cut and paste with the previous pagan cultures. I know this may be shocking to come to this understanding but this is how it is. If you are truthful with yourself you will see.
Baptism
In the gospel of Mark 1:5, John the Baptist was baptizing people in the river of Jordan because, as Mark notes, they were “
confessing their sins.†The water of baptism symbolizes a washing away of sins. One of those who came to confess their sins and to be baptized was Jesus. Mark writes:
“
And it came to pass in those days, that Jesus came from Nazareth of Galilee, and was baptized of John in Jordan.†(Mark 1:9)
How and why would John baptize and purify his God? There is no answer for this question except when we seek its origin.
The key to understanding why John baptized his God are found in the words of the mythologists (Scholars of mythologies) Timothy Freke & Peter Gandy who commented:
“Examining the stories of John the Baptist and Jesus, we do seem to be clearly in mythological territory.†The reason why they said so is explained when they had said, “Jesus is baptized, a ritual practiced for centuries in the Mysteries.â€Â
“Mysteries†are the rituals and practices of worshipping the pagan gods. If the practice of baptism is originally a Christian rite, then we must ask ourselves why was this ritual performed many thousands years before Christianity? Anciently performed by very old civilizations. One of the oldest said civilizations was that of a people who lived in Iraq and were called
SUMERIANS. Please look to an encyclopedia and read about this perished nation! The Sumerians created hundreds of gods. Every aspect of material life was idolized. One of the elements they chose as a god was water. The god of water was
EA. More than five thousands years ago, Ea’s priests and devoted worshippers performed the baptism. The Mythologist Joseph Campbell writes:
“The rite of baptism was an ancient rite coming down from old Sumerian temple city Eridu, of the water god Ea, ‘God of the House of Water.’ â€Â
In fact, Christianity did not inherit baptism directly from the Sumerians but it was a long process until finally the Church inherited it from other cultures. Among those ancient nations who practiced Baptisms were the ancient Egyptians, the Mayans of South America, the Hindus, the Persians, the Greeks, the Germans and Scandinavians. All of these nations practiced Baptism long before Christianity. The pagan heritage of the act of Baptism was passed to Christianity directly from the Romans. Baptism was chosen on the eighth day for girls and the ninth for boys, this was their practice. Timothy Freke & Peter Gandy said:
“Baptism was a central rite in the [Pagan] Mysteriesâ€Â
Eucharist (Bread & Wine)
Two days before the crucifixion, Jesus gathered with his disciples for a meal. This meal was called the Last Supper. The gospel of Mark mentions an important action made by Jesus at the Supper:
“
And as they did eat, Jesus took bread, and blessed, and broke it, and gave to them, and said, Take, eat: this is my body. And he [Jesus] took the cup, and when he had given thanks, he gave it to them: and they all drank of it. And he said unto them, This is my blood of the new testament, which is shed for many.†(Mark 14:22-24)
Since eating bread and drinking wine became synonymous with the masses in the memory of the Lord’s Supper. This ritual is called “
EUCHARIST.†The Catholics as well as Orthodoxies believe that the Eucharist literally becomes the flesh and blood of Jesus. Unlike the Protestants who believe that the bread and wine are only symbols. Whatever differences are there, we have to ask ourselves, “Why would God ask people to eat him? Is this not cannibalism?â€Â
Actually it is. It is also a ritual taken from pagans. Most old nations and pagan religions have these same ideas within them and yet they predated the Christians for thousands years. Long ago, in Persia, a child was born from a rock on the 25th of December. He was Mithra. His worshippers believed that he is omniscient with 1000 ears and 10,000 eyes. He is served by 10,000 spies. As Christians believe that Jesus offered his flesh to be eaten and his blood to be drunk, similar to Jesus’ words in Mark’s gospel, Mithra had said: “
He who will not eat of my body and drink of my blood, so that he will be made one with me and I with him, the same shall not know salvation.â€Â
Please notice that the veneration of Mithra began more than 2000 years before Jesus! So these words were spoken by Mithra before that date. 4000 years ago, the Persians had their ‘Holy Communion’ for the Savior, Mithra by eating the bread, drinking the mixture of water and wine. Part of the Mithraic communion liturgy included these words of Mithra (which are cited above).
The Holy Communion of Mithra (or Mithras) was passed over to the Romans for their different gods and goddesses, where, later on, it was adopted within Christianity for Jesus. The International Encyclopedia states:
Mithras seems to have owed his prominence to the belief that he was the source of life, and could also redeem the souls of the dead into the better world ... The ceremonies included a sort of baptism to remove sins, anointing, and a sacred meal of bread and water, while a consecrated wine, believed to possess wonderful power, played a prominent part.
Prof. Franz Cumont, of the University of Ghent, writes in his, ‘The Mysteries of Mithras’, pp. 190-191:
The sectaries of the Persian god, like the Christians', purified themselves by baptism, received by a species of confirmation the power necessary to combat the spirit of evil; and expected from a Lord's supper salvation of body and soul. Like the latter, they also held Sunday sacred, and celebrated the birth of the Sun on the 25th of December.
Furthermore, there are other nations who also had Eucharist before Christianity. To name a few: The Hindus, Buddhists of Nepal and Tibet, ancient Aztecs, Chinese Confucians, old Egyptians, Greeks and Romans; all had the Eucharist.
The Romans called it
LECTESTERNIA. There were different cults of gods like: Hercules, Jupiter, Vesta, Juno, Minerva, Isis, Apollo, Venus, Diana, Neptune, Mercury and Mars. Commonly, for every god they practiced Eucharist. Thus a Roman philosopher, Cicero (106-43 BCE) mocked them by saying:
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Is anybody so mad as to believe that the food which he eats is actually a god?â€Â
The Cross
Christians use the sign of the cross, referring to the crucifixion of Jesus and his sacrifice. This sign began to be used only in the middle of the 3rd century. In prior times, in the early centuries of Christianity, the symbol used by the Christians was the fish.
Why did Christians change the sign from the fish to the cross? The Catholic Encyclopedia answers this question by stating:
The sign of the cross, represented in its simplest form by a crossing of two lines at right angles, greatly antedates, in both East and the West, the introduction of Christianity. It goes back to a very remote period of human civilization … In later times the Egyptian Christians (Copts), attracted by its form, and perhaps by its symbolism, adopted it as the emblem of the cross.
Another question is how did Christians get the cross from the pagans? This question is answered by Vine's Expository Dictionary of New Testament Words; it says:
“In order to increase the prestige of the apostate ecclesiastical system, pagans were received into the churches apart from regeneration by faith, and were permitted largely to retain their pagan signs and symbols.â€Â
The Christians took the symbol of the cross from the Romans. Thus Bishop Alexander Hislop notes:
“The Vestal virgins of Pagan Rome wore it [e.g. the Cross] suspended from their necklaces, as the nuns do now.â€Â
Again here, most of the pagan nations had already used the cross before the Christians. It seems that the first nation to use the cross would be the Babylonians for their god Thammuz. Then following them were various nations like the ancient Egyptians, Romans, Buddhists of Tibet, Celts (fathers of the Irish) and the Scandinavians. Encyclopedia Britannica stated:
From its simplicity of form, the cross has been used both as a religious symbol and as an ornament, from the dawn of man's civilization. Various objects, dating from periods long anterior to the Christian era, have been found, marked with crosses of different designs, in almost every part of the old world. India, Syria, Persia and Egypt have all yielded numberless examples, while numerous instances, dating from the later Stone Age to Christian times, have been found in nearly every part of Europe. The use of the cross as a religious symbol in pre-Christian times, and among non-Christian peoples, may probably be regarded as almost universal, and in very many cases it was connected with some form of nature worship.
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