The Cauldron: A Pagan Forum

I've been researching the origins of Christianity for some time now, and I was interested when I came on a site detailing how much Christianity stole from Pagan traditions. Obviously a lot of the symbolism was stolen from Pagan traditions and then altered, but I was shocked to find out how much.
Anyone else have any good sources on this sort of thing? The best site I found for this was http://see_the_truth.webs.com/. But I'm interested if anyone else has good sites, books, etc.

 
This link: Holidays, history, and calendars contains lots of good information on this issue and also contains some excelent links.

I've been researching the origins of Christianity for some time now, and I was interested when I came on a site detailing how much Christianity stole from Pagan traditions. Obviously a lot of the symbolism was stolen from Pagan traditions and then altered, but I was shocked to find out how much.
Anyone else have any good sources on this sort of thing? The best site I found for this was http://see_the_truth.webs.com/. But I'm interested if anyone else has good sites, books, etc.

Christianity stole nothing from Paganism. Stealing is a zero-sum act: if I steal something from you, you don't have it any more.

Similarities in praxis are common between religions, especially those developing at the same time. Religions don't develop in a vacuum, and customs cannot be copyrighted.

I've been researching the origins of Christianity for some time now, and I was interested when I came on a site detailing how much Christianity stole from Pagan traditions.

Every December...I can't even play World of Warcraft without encountering players who debate this, it's as bad as hearing the same Christmas song in every store.

Let me put my peeve into perspective: many Native Americans convert to Christianity, bringing their cultural traditions, like burning sage, with them. Are they stealing from their pagan neighbors? No, they're preserving their heritage and adapting it to their spiritual needs.

But when European pagans convert to Christianity, bringing their cultural traditions, like observing a festival around the winter solstice, with them, they are nasty thieves engaging in the most heinous cultural appropriation of...their own culture. Riiight...

A people cannot steal their own culture. Either a tradition loses meaning and is discarded or adapts to new needs.

I've been researching the origins of Christianity for some time now, and I was interested when I came on a site detailing how much Christianity stole from Pagan traditions. Obviously a lot of the symbolism was stolen from Pagan traditions and then altered, but I was shocked to find out how much.
Anyone else have any good sources on this sort of thing? The best site I found for this was http://see_the_truth.webs.com/. But I'm interested if anyone else has good sites, books, etc.

1. Was the triad consisting of 'Father, Son and Holy Spirit' borrowed from Paganism?

No. The designation 'Holy Spirit' occur at several places in the Hebrew Bible, and the divine title 'Father' occur in Jewish prayers approximately contemporary to early Christianity, such as the Kaddhish. The designation 'Son' seem to be typical for Christianity itself.

2. Was the Christian systematisation of trinitarian doctrine influenced by Paganism?

Yes, somewhat. Although Jesus is called 'God' or 'divine', in an undefined and unsystematic fashion, in such rather early Christian scriptures as Hebrews 1.3, John 1.1 and Titus 2.13, and early preparatory stages of systematic trinitarian doctrine emerged by the contributions of Tertullian, Origen and Novatian in the early 3d century, it wasn't until the second oecumenical council in Constantinople 381 CE the Nicaeno-Constantinopolitan creed was adopted, and the divinity of the Holy Spirit was defended against the Macedonians.

The influential Christian theologian Marius Victorinus was familiar with Pherecydes of Syros, but even more important was the high regard he held Numenius of Apamea and Julian's The Chaldaean Oracles. The Christian Trinity is not a borrowing from these philosophers, but their thought helped in systematising the very vague triad Father-Son-Spirit mentioned in the Christian sacred scriptures.

3. Is the Blessed Virgin Mary Isis in disguise?

Sometimes, but not initially, and not intentionally. When the author of The Gospel according to Luke mentioned Mary, he didn't have Isis in mind, since there are no similarities between Mary and Isis. The conventional way to depict Horus and Isis during late Antiquity is almost identical to the way of depicting Jesus and Mary called Seat of Wisdom or Chora tou Achouretou, although this Christian style of art might be considerably later. The influence – if it is an influence – is an artistic one, but it wasn't the artists who invented Mary to begin with.

Devotion to Mary is older than that artistic expression. The Greek-Coptic precursor to the famous Christian antiphon Sub tuum praesidium goes back to the 3d century CE, long before the Isis-influenced icons began to circulate. In a hymn from the 8th century, Ave Maris Stella, Mary is designated 'Star of the Sea', a title similar to those held by some Pagan goddesses (The Roman form of Isis was the protector of mariners, and Freya was known as Mardöll). None of those borrowings imply that Christians considered Mary a goddess, since she was clearly described as a human being in the Gospel of St. Luke.

4. Is the Christian baptism a Pagan rite?

No. The influence from, and re-interpretation of, the Jewish Mikveh-rite is more obvious. Before 70 CE Judaism was much more diverse than it is now. In some Jewish circles during the last centuries BCE and first century CE there existed Jewish ritual baths interpreted in a slightly different way than the mikveh-rites retained within Orthodox Judaism. The Qumran Community (famous for the Dead Sea Scrolls) was one such, later defunct, Jewish community which performed baptisms. The community around John the Baptist was another one. The Essenes probably a thrid one. The two still living religions of Jewish roots that perform ritual baths slightly different than mikveh-rituals are Christianity and Mandaeism. While Christians perform their rite only once per life, Orthodox Jewish mikveh-rites and Mandaean masbuta-rites are repeated several times.

5. Is the Christian Eucharist a Pagan rite?

No. Again, the roots are Jewish. The first Christian eucharist was allegedly celebrated at the Jewish festival Passover (Pesach), and there are obvious parallels between the description of the last supper in 1Cor. 11.25 and the Jewish Seder meal. K. Hruby ('La Birkat ha-Mazon', in Mélanges B. Botte, Louvain 1972), J. Heinemann (Prayer in Talmud, 1977) and T.J. Talley ('De la 'Berakah' à l'eucharistie. Une question á réexaminer.' LMD no. 125 1976) have also brought scholars' attention to the Shabat meal held each week. The prayer Attah konanta recited at Yom Kippur may have influenced the later development of the eucharistic prayers.

It is sometimes claimed in unreliable overviews, that the Christian eucharist should be a borrowing from the Roman mystery religion of Mithraism, but the timeline doesn't work: The Christian eucharist is first attested in St. Paul's First Letter to Corinth (written at some point between 50 and 60 CE), while the Roman mystery religion of Mithraism isn't attested until 80 or 90 CE. The Mithraic meals seem to have consisted of many other foodstuff than just bread and wine. For a good, scholarly overview of Mithraism, please read Manfred Clauss: The Roman cult of Mithras.

6. Was Mithras born of a virgin, and the myth in the Gospel of Luke a borrowing from that?

No. Mithras is depicted as being born from a rock, not a virgin.

7. Did Mithras die and rise from the dead, and the Christian gospels borrowing from that?

No. There are no depictions or descriptions of such a myth. Mithraic myths are:

• Mithra's birth from a rock
• Mithras slaughtering or sacrificing a cosmic bull in order to create the world
• Mithras riding in the chariot of his friend, the Sun-god
• Mithras and the Sun-god sharing a meal together. They are assisted by two torchbearers.

Sometimes a lion-headed deity is depicted at Mithraic buildings, mithreae, but its meaning is contended. It might be a depiction of the Persian god of evil: Ahriman – Areimanios in Greek, since that name is inscribed in one mithreum.

8. Did Horus have twelve disciples, and the myth about the twelve apostles of Jesus borrowed from that?

No. That is an innovation by Gerald Massey in the 19th century, possibly by misrepresenting the myth about Horus' four sons. Four doesn't equal twelve. If you really wish to look for a connection between the four sons of Horus and Abrahamitic religions, I would suggest to compare with the four beings in Ezechiel 1.5-10 and Revelation 4.7 instead.

9. Did Horus die and rise from the dead, and the myth abouth the resurrection of Jesus borrowed from that?

No. That is an innovation of Gerald Massey in the 19th century, possibly by misrepresenting the myth about Horus falling ill and being cured from his illness by the help of Thoth. Ill doesn't equal dead.
 
10. But Horus' father, Osiris, is a dying and rising god, isn't he?

He dies alright: His brother Set murders him and cut him up. But he doesn't rise again from the dead: He stays in the Afterlife and officiates as a judge of the dead. If you are looking for similarities between Jesus and Osiris, I suggest to compare their offices as judges of the dead instead. Osiris stays dead.

11. But some deities died and rose again, didn't they?

Yes. Some of them entered the Kingdom of Death, and, after negotiations and some haggling between the deities, they were scheduled to annually be transferred to more pleasant supra-mundane realms or afterlives, before returning to the Underworld. Inanna, Ishtar, Astarte, Persephone and Adonis belongs to this category, but none of them seem to return to the level of reality of the Alive. Balder is murdered, but he doesn't return until the world-as-the-Norsemen-knew-it was destroyed at Ragnarok and reborn. The myth of Adonis was later re-arranged, and from the 150s CE (or thereabout) we know – thanks to Lucianus – about a myth according to which he actually returns to life, but, since the rearrangement of the Adonis myth occurred more than a century after the emergence of Christianity, that doesn't serve to explain the Christian resurrection myth.

The deities that most closely resembles the Christian Jesus, are probably Baal, Melqart and Attis. Baal is taken prisoner by the god of Death, Mot, but defeats Mot (with the assistance of the goddess Anat) and return to life. Melqart dies, but return from the dead at the scent of a roasted bird. Attis dies from his wounds of self-inflicted castration, but is brought back by the goddess Cybele, at least is that hinted at in the Roman festival calendar the last week in March.

12. The Romans celebrated the birth of the Sun-god on 25th of December since time immemorial, and the pesky Christians nicked it, didn't they?

No. The Roman festival calendar was continually changing, newer festivals added by time. Some of the Roman festivals could go back as far as the 8th century BCE and beyond (before Rome was a city), but the festival of the Unconquered Sun, Sol Invictus was not one of them. It was a latecomer.

A small linguistic detail is important here: Nativitas in religious technical Latin terminology designates the day a certain temple was dedicated. That day was then onward celebrated annually in honour of the deity to whom the temple was dedicated. When the ancient Roman calendar mention a nativitas, it doesn't mean the birth of the deity itself, but the birth of the deity's temple. Emperor Aurelian dedicated a (fourth) temple to the Sun-god on 25th of December 274 CE, and that dedication festival was celebrated annually until 390 CE or 393 CE (The battle of Frigidus happened in September 394 CE).

Christian authors didn't know at which part of the year Jesus was born, but the Christian author Sextus Julius Africanus speculated already in the 220s CE, that Jesus ought to have been concipiated on 25th of March and born on 25th of December. Since Julius Africanus was writing about fifty years before Emperor Aurelian built his temple to the Unconquered Sun, the Christian author and the Roman emperor must have arrived to the same date independently of each other. It is pure coincidence.

Then, of course, the presence of a Pagan religious festival at the same date as the speculated birthday of Jesus, might have helped to ease the conversion to Christianity after the Edict of Tolerance in 313 CE. The first attestation of a Christian celebration of the birth of Jesus on 25th of December in Rome comes from the 350s, but its celebration in other parts of northern Italy, such as Milan, might be older.

Julius Africanus was not the only Christian author to guess about the birth of Christ. Already in the 120s CE, the non-mainstream Christian theologian Basilides celebrated the combined birth and baptism of Christ on 6th of January, and, as time went by, even mainstream Christians borrowed this festival from the followers of Basilides, despite any theological quarrels they had between each other. In Greek this festval was known as Theophania, but when it arrived to the West, at a time when the Italian Christmas festival already had become widespread, it became known as Epiphany, in English perhaps bettwer known as Twelfth Night and its following day. It is a funny fact that an originally  'Gnostic' festival is still upheld withing the most Orthodox churches.

13. But Easter must be originally Pagan, isn't it?

The word 'Easter' is pre-Christian and Germanic (not Celtic, as is sometimes claimed) in origin, but English and German are the only languages that call that Christian festival by that name (or, in the German case, the closely related Oster).

When the Christian Church arrived to the Anglo-Saxons and the Germans in the 6th, 7th and 8th centuries, Christians had already celebrated the same festival for centuries under other names.

The Christian celebration of the resurrection of Christ originally occurred at the 14th of the Jewish month Nisan – the full moon after Spring Equinox. The first Christians were also Jews, and continued to celebrate the Jewish festival Passover (Pesach) in remmebrance of the Jewish exodus out of Egypt, but added the celebration of the resurrection of Christ. In the 180s, some Christians had retained this original date, while others had moved the festival to the nearby Sunday.

Similarly, the Jewish festival of Shauvot was retained by Christians – even Christians of gentile heritage – but the original themes of spring harvest and Sinaitic covenant, were overshadowed by the celebration of the Holy Spirit, and the celebration moved to a nearby Sunday.

Neither the Hebrew name of the festival, Pesach, the Greek name of the festival, Anastasis, or the Latin name of the festival, Pascha, has anything to do with the later English or German names of the festival.

The Anglo-Saxon Christian monk Bede the Venerable wrote in the 8th century about pre-Christian Anglo-Saxon customs and beliefs, as they were dimly remembered a considerable time after the conversion era. Bede mention two goddesses: Redha (who formerly was worshipped in the month of March) and Ostara (who formerly was worshipped in the month of April). The German and English name of the Christian Pascha is derived from the name of the goddess Ostara.

I have always been puzzled by those Neo-Pagans who prefer to call Spring Equinox Ostara. The 21th of March happens in March, not April, and the goddess connected to the month of March in Bede's description is Redha, not Ostara. If Bede is worth meddling with, why don't take him at his word when it comes to months?

14. And Halloween?

Halloween is of Christian origin, but Samhain is probably pre-Christian in origin. Don't mix them up.

The word Halloween is a contraction of All Hallow's Eve, i.e. 'the Evening before All Saints' Day'. All Saints' Day is a Christian festival occurring on the 1st of November, and its Eve happens, of course, on the 31st of October.

In some Paganism 101 books, authors who are careless with historical criticism allege that All Saints' Day was instituted in order to convert the Irish. There are problems with this view on history.

The origin of the festival is in Rome, not Ireland. Italians didn't celebrate Samhain, so it would be a useless tactic to invent All Saints by that reason. The original date of the celebration (as a martyr-festival) was 13th of May, in remembrance of the dedication of the Pantheon in Rome to serve as a church in 609 or 610 CE, but, since the city didn't have enough food to sell to the many pilgrims who filled the city at the martyr-festival, it was moved to 1st of November and re-branded 'All Saints' at an unknown date. In 835 it spread to Germany and France. At that time the Irish population had been Christian for centuries (and retaining some pre-Christian folk customs, as everyone else in Europe). The Christian church in Ireland, before changing to the continental date, celebrated All Saints the 20th of April, so there is no trace of intentional assimilation of Samhain there.

In the following I re-tell what Ronald Hutton writes in his book Stations of the Sun. The pre-Christian Irish festival Samhain, when the summer rest, is mentioned in a written source from the 10th century CE, Tochmarc Emire, several centuries after the conversion. It is described as a week-long celebration with drink and food, but the source does not describe what any pre-Christian religious customs may have consisted in.

We have no written sources about folk beliefs about Halloween until the 16th century. From then on, Halloween is associated with the activity of (potentially dangerous) supernatural beings of different sorts, and it is likely that these beliefs had moved from the pre-Christian Samhain to the Christian Halloween.

Jeffrey Keating wrote in the 17th century that Druids used to lit a bonfire on Samhain, but that tells us more about what Keating and persons of his time thought about Druids, than about pre-Christian Irishpersons themselves. In the 17th and 18th centuries bonfires were lit at Halloween or on All Saints' Day in Ireland, Scotland and northern England. To dress and cause mischief at Halloween is known with certainty from the 18th century, but I would be very happy if anyone was able to show me an earlier attestation.

Christianity stole nothing from Paganism. Stealing is a zero-sum act: if I steal something from you, you don't have it any more.

Similarities in praxis are common between religions, especially those developing at the same time. Religions don't develop in a vacuum, and customs cannot be copyrighted.

I really like the way you put this. This will definitely stick with me.

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1. Was the triad consisting of 'Father, Son and Holy Spirit' borrowed from Paganism?[/B

3. Is the Blessed Virgin Mary Isis in disguise?


13. But Easter must be originally Pagan, isn't it?


14. And Halloween?


.

 
1. The triad was a long standing aspect of pagan religions and symbolic. Christians borrowed that aspect and placed Jewish terms. The triad was also debated quite a bit but the Roman Church finally had it its way.

3. The veneration of Mary would not have been important in Jewish religion and never placed near the same level as did the Roman Christian Church. Having a goddess (mary) being part of the belief associated with the God (Jesus) is a more pagan viewpoint than a Jewish one.

13. The name of the celebration of the resurrection in Germanic influenced area was from the Pagan Goddess but the reason for the celebration was central to Christianity. There are many aspects the way we celebrate it that are not so christian.

14. Halloween has become a secular over-though of the All Saints day which was devised to redirect pagans away from the celebration of Samhain. There was direct Papal directives to take pagan symbols and rename them as Christian and the shift of Samhain to All Saints day is an example.

As for December 25th we have archaeological evidence it was recognized as important in pagan cultures but I do not know of any significance to the Jewish religion which branched off to be Christianity.

1. The triad was a long standing aspect of pagan religions and symbolic. Christians borrowed that aspect and placed Jewish terms. The triad was also debated quite a bit but the Roman Church finally had it its way.

The expression 'Father, Son and Holy Spirit' is first attested in Matt. 28. 19, written at some point between 80 CE (possibly 70 CE) and 100 CE (possibly 110 CE). A similar triad is mentioned in 2Cor. 13.13, written at some point between 50 CE and 60 CE. Exactly which Pagan deities did St. Paul and the anonymous author of the Gospel of Matthew intend to signify with these titles, in your opinion?

3. The veneration of Mary would not have been important in Jewish religion and never placed near the same level as did the Roman Christian Church. Having a goddess (mary) being part of the belief associated with the God (Jesus) is a more pagan viewpoint than a Jewish one.

Mary is not a goddess in the Gospel of St. Luke and not a goddess in any official Christian dogma. The similarity in artistic depictions of Isis and Mary is as far as we can go. But it is something.

13. The name of the celebration of the resurrection in Germanic influenced area was from the Pagan Goddess but the reason for the celebration was central to Christianity.

Why do you tell me this? We agree on this do we not? It is not like you claim that Judaea, Samaria and Syria around 50 CE was mainly populated by Anglo-Saxons and other Germanic tribes?

14. Halloween has become a secular over-though of the All Saints day which was devised to redirect pagans away from the celebration of Samhain.

No. Rome was not populated by Irishmen in the decades after 609 CE, so there were no Irishmen to redirect.

As for December 25th we have archaeological evidence it was recognized as important in pagan cultures

No. Emperor Aurelian invented the festival of Sol Invictus in 274 or 275 CE, and Sextus Julius Africanus speculated that Jesus was born on 25th of December in the 220s, a half century before the festival of Sol Invictus was invented.