It is common knowledge among historians and theologians alike that celebrations on December 25th of a Christmas-like nature were taking place all over the world centuries before the birth of Jesus Christ. This date has always been astronomically and spiritually understood as the birth date of all great saviors and redeemers.

In India, for example, this period was one of great rejoicing, at which time the people decorated their homes with garlands and gave freely of gifts. In China too, the Winter Solstice was a holy time during which shops and courts were closed, and all business activity was suspended.

The birth date of the great Persian sun god Mithras was December 25th. The early Christian church – in a very direct fashion – borrowed this date as the birth date of its own savior, Jesus the Christ, as a genuine result of the contact between the two religions (Mithraism and Christianity), at a time when both were growing in popular appeal throughout the Roman Empire.

This adoption of the date December 25th was accepted by the church for strategic reasons, despite having no traditional or scriptural precedent to associate even this time of the year with the actual birth date of Jesus. Yet this was not an unusual pattern, nor was the choice an arbitrary one.

The great Egyptian god Osiris, the son of the Holy Virgin, was also said to have been born on December 25. And the Greeks celebrated this day as the birth of Hercules. Still in more acceptance was the tradition that Dionysus, the Greek god of wine, and Adonis, the youthful savior, were to celebrate their birthdays on December 25.

Historically, Adonis was called “Tammuz” by the ancient Israelites of Abysinnia (present-day Ethiopia). His celebration took place ceremonially in a cave dwelling in the town of Bethlehem, which was regarded as his birthplace! Tammuz was esteemed as “good bread” for the soul. The word “Bethlehem” means “house of bread,” or "house of Tammuz," and his name still designates the 4th month of the Jewish calendar.

(Tammuz is astronomically attuned to the time of the Summer Solstice, when the Sun reaches its greatest northern declination, and is astrologically attuned to the sign Cancer, which rules the African continent.)

The Egyptians also worshipped Tammuz as the setting sun. His name means literally “our Lord,” as does the Greek “Adonis,” and the ancient Israelites wrote many Psalms for Tammuz, as part of their liturgical services were offered in his name. One such example remains in the Old Testament as the 110th Psalm...

Meanwhile, Dionysus was later to become a big favorite with the Romans as Bacchus, their god of wine. Thus the term “bacchanalia,” used to describe a celebration feast even more frenzied than the week-long “Feast of Saturnalia,” which always began on December 17th.

All of the above may come as a surprising revelation to the modern-day Christian, but it has been common knowledge among historians and theologians for centuries. It is also common knowledge among learned religionists that nearly all other dates for Christian holidays are set based upon those of previous religions. Even in England and Ireland, the Druids had for centuries been celebrating the great day of December 25th. In other words, there has always been a Christmas, regardless of whether or not it was known as "Christmas." (The word is a shortened form of "Christ’s Mass," i.e., the Mass of Christ.)

The astronomical event and inspiration for all these diverse (yet similar) religious celebrations is the Sun’s transit across the Winter Solstice on Dec. 21st. This time is symbolically the world’s “darkest hour” – the longest night of the year. To the peoples of the Northern Hemisphere (where all our present-day religions originated) the Sun is directly below the Earth at midnight on December 25th. Concurrently the constellation Virgo - the celestial Virgin - stands upon the horizon in the Eastern Hemisphere of the Heavens...

From this point the Sun of the New Year is "born," and begins its journey back to the Northern Hemisphere to save that part of humanity from the dark and famine which would certainly be inevitable were the Sun not to return from south of the equator in time to banish the cold of winter. Thus December 25th becomes traditionally the birthplace of all saviors – all suns of God. The Sun is so-sent as a gift to mankind and for his salvation. What greater event, as cause for celebration, occurs in the Heavens?

Along similar astrological principles there occurs yet another planetary influence whose effect and presence is felt during this time of the year; another emissary of what has become familiar as “the Christmas spirit.” This influence emanates from the planet Jupiter, the “Great Benefic,” the largest planet in the Solar System...and ruler of the zodiacal sign Sagittarius, whose month is December and whose symbol at Christmas time has traditionally been “Santa Claus.” Just as with so many other mythological figures from the past, "Santa Claus" nonetheless possesses his own more mundane history.

It seems that Santa’s earthly evolution begins with one St. Nicholas, the Bishop of Myra during the mid-4th century AD. St. Nicholas was born, appropriately enough, on December 6th, year unknown, in what was then Patara, Lycia (now part of the country of Turkey). Evidently from wealthy parentage, young Nicholas was later orphaned however, a fact that proved to have great impact upon his legend.

From the time of his birth to the occasion of his election as the Bishop of Myra, St. Nicholas’s story gradually departs from the documented into saintly symbolism, a great deal of which proves to be astrological in origin and significance.

The word “Santa” means, of course, “saint.” Ironically, the word has shared etymology with the name “Satan”; that common source being the name “Saturn,” given first to the god, then later to the planet. Obviously this ancient and misunderstood Saturn harbors a devout nature for which he is seldom given credit – neither by astrologers nor by religionists. Instead, Saturn remains better known for his more malefic contributions to mankind.

Nonetheless, St. Nicholas (or “Sint Klaes” as he was known in Europe) was included in the Roman martyrology of saints as “Sanctus Nicolaus.” They eventually included St. Nicholas’s observance in the "Feast of Saturnalia." Yet Santa Claus’s more prominent stellar affiliation has always been with Jupiter, whose beneficial influence dominates the month of December by its rulership of the sign Sagittarius, under which St. Nicholas was born. He died in 342 AD, on December 6th, the date of his birth, with the 11th Psalm on his lips...

The astronomical event and inspiration for all these diverse (yet similar) religious celebrations is the Sun’s transit across the Winter Solstice on Dec. 21st. This time is symbolically the world’s “darkest hour” – the longest night of the year. To the peoples of the Northern Hemisphere (where all our present-day religions originated) the Sun in Capricorn is directly below the Earth at midnight on December 25th. Concurrently, the sign Libra ("peace on Earth") ascends on the eastern horizon of the Heavens, and the constellation Virgo - the celestial Virgin - stands upon the horizon in the Eastern Hemisphere of the Heavens...thus the origin of the Biblical phrase, "he was born of a virgin"...

I have some very personal questions for you: Are you a christian who stopped celebrating christmas because of this or are you not a christian because of yoy finding out about this?:confused:

I am Muslim.

Oh sorry...

Interesting information that correlates to the historical facts discussed in other threads recently.

Aqil,

Your absolutely correct about Christmas [and the Christmas tree] being related to a Pagan holiday long before Jesus.

Did you get that post from a Christian site? Because many protestants are trying to break away from this Catholic church tradition.

Christ + Mass

It was the Catholics who brought all this junk in to control the Pagans, they ruled over.

Jeremiah Chapter 10 tells us why we do not bring Christmas trees into our house. Thank God a lot of these pagan traditions are now being broken off of Christianity. As we all become more aware of what was added by European Culture and has nothing to do with the Bible.

Jesus was born most probably on September 29. Or within the week, we know from the Bible that the Holiday being talked about among the Jews, comes at this time and not in December.

Mithra was one of the competeing religions that those sly dogs of the Holy Roman Empire [Catholic political power] were able to erase from the face of the earth by adopting their pagan holiday [December 25, and Easter] and dedicating them to Jesus birth and his ressurection.

Romans did not even know about Mithraism or adopt it until after Jesus was dead and all the books of the New Testament had been written already. So there is no way that Christianity came from Mithraism.

Originally posted by Aqil
The birth date of the great Persian sun god Mithras was December 25th. The early Christian church – in a very direct fashion – borrowed this date as the birth date of its own savior, Jesus the Christ, as a genuine result of the contact between the two religions (Mithraism and Christianity), at a time when both were growing in popular appeal throughout the Roman Empire...

Aqil,

Did you notice that this post says that Christianity and Mithra were COMPETING religions, running side by side.

That kinda of conflicts with others view that Christianity came from Mithra worship doesn't it?

Look what your post says here:

as a genuine result of the contact between the two religions (Mithraism and Christianity), at a time when both were growing in popular appeal throughout the Roman Empire...

Two separate religions, growing separately. NOT one religion [Mithra] out of which came the cult of Christianity.

I wish others who think that Christianity came from Mitharaism could see your post here.

Thanks.

There's a book I used to have before someone lifted it that explained a lot of this....Someone may be able to help me out. I think it was called "European Holidays: A mental genocide"

Jesus was born most probably on September 29. Or within the week, we know from the Bible that the Holiday being talked about among the Jews, comes at this time and not in December.The “immaculate conception” myth was the result of some immaculate deception on the part of some of the Biblical translators, who developed the “virgin birth” idea by misinterpreting a prophecy made by the prophet Isaiah, who lived some 700 years before Jesus was born. The prophecy is found in Isaiah 7:14, which reads: “Therefore the Lord himself shall give you a sign; Behold, a virgin shall conceive and bear a son, and shall call his name “Immanuel.” The name “Immanuel” means “God be with us.” As the Bible abounds with occult knowledge, this verse is interpreted esoterically as follows:

The only virgin that can bear a son and still remain a virgin is VIRGO, the sign that gives birth to a sun every year between August 23rd and September 23rd...

Jesus was born on September 8, in the year 7 BC, having been conceived around the time of the Winter Solstice in 8 BC. He was born under the astrological sign Virgo, which is another cosmic verification of the Biblical expression, “born of a virgin.”

Read (THE BOOK YOUR CHURCH DOESN'T WANT YOU TO READ-ED Tim C. Leedom Editor).Some of things that are being discussed are covered in the book.

some historians say that tammuz is nimrod from the bible...

Some historians say that Tammuz is Nimrod from the Bible...If so, I think that this was a case of mistransliteration by the Bible translators.Tammuz is the 10th month of the ecclesiastical year and the 4th month of the civil year on the Hebrew calendar. It is a summer month of 29 days.

Originally, Tammuz was the Babylonian god of vegetation, and the month was established in honor of the eponymous god, which is a corrupt form of the Akkadian farming-god Dumuzi, the consort of Ishtar and the parallel of Adonis in the Greek pantheon. Beginning with the summer solstice, it was a time of mourning in ancient times: the Babylonians marked the decline in daylight hours with a six-day "funeral" for the god (see Ezekiel 8:14).

Tammuz was an ancient nature deity worshipped in Babylonia. A god of agriculture and flocks, he personified the creative powers of spring. He was loved by the fertility goddess Ishtar, who, according to one legend, was so grief-stricken at his death that she contrived to enter the underworld to get him back. According to another legend, she killed him and later restored him to life. These legends and his festival, which took place in the early Spring, commemorating the yearly death and rebirth of vegetation, corresponded to the festivals of the Phoenician and Greek Adonis and of the Phrygian Attis...

Historically, the Greek god Adonis was called “Tammuz” by the ancient Israelites of Abyssinia (present-day Ethiopia). His celebration took place ceremonially in a cave-dwelling in the town of Bethlehem, which was regarded as his birthplace! Tammuz was esteemed as “good bread” for the soul. The word “Bethlehem” means “house of bread,” or "house of Tammuz," and his name still designates the 4th month of the Hebraic calendar...

Tammuz is astronomically attuned to the time of the Summer Solstice, when the Sun reaches its greatest northern declination, and is astrologically attuned to the sign Cancer, which rules the African continent. The "sign" of the month was called "Sartan," "Cancer" or "The Crab," because this constellation - which is observed at this time of year - has the appearance of a crab. Also, the season is summer, and the hot weather of summer causes crabs to multiply in the water. Crabs pinch and hurt, and this month was basically a time in which the Jewish people were hurt (which is why it was referred to as the "month of mourning")...

The Egyptians also worshiped Tammuz as the setting sun. His name means literally “our Lord,” as does the Greek “Adonis,” and the ancient Israelites wrote many Psalms for Tammuz, as part of their liturgical services were offered in his name. One such example remains in the Old Testament as the 110th Psalm...

Ezek:8:14: Then he brought me to the door of the gate of the LORD's house which was toward the north; and, behold, there sat women weeping for Tammuz.


This verse is expressed in a setting of when GOD was showing Ezekiel abominable images that were being committed by Israel in worshipping other gods.

Ezekiel 8:14 - Then he brought me to the door of the gate of the LORD's house which was toward the north; and, behold, there sat women weeping for Tammuz.

This verse is expressed in a setting of when GOD was showing Ezekiel abominable images that were being committed by Israel in worshipping other gods.From the secret abominations of the chambers of imagery, the prophet's eye is turned to the outer court at the north door; within the outer court women were not admitted, but only to the door.

The yearly lamenting for Tammuz was attended with infamous practices; and the worshippers of the Sun here described, are supposed to have been priests. The Lord appeals to the prophet concerning the heinousness of the crime; "and lo, they put the branch to their nose," denoting some custom used by idolaters in honor of the idols they served. The more we examine human nature and our own hearts, the more abominations we shall discover; and the longer the believer searches himself, the more he will humble himself before God, and the more will he value the fountain open for sin, and seek to wash therein.

The Hebrew word "Tammuz" means, "to melt down." Instead of weeping for the national sins, they wept for the idol. Tammuz (Syrian for "Adonis"), the paramour of Venus, and of the same name as the river flowing from Lebanon; killed by a wild boar, and, according to the fable, permitted to spend half the year on Earth, and obliged to spend the other half in the lower world. An annual feast was celebrated to him in June (hence called "Tammuz" in the Jewish calendar) at Byblos, when the Syrian women, in wild grief, tore off their hair and yielded their persons to prostitution, consecrating the hire of their infamy to Venus; next followed days of rejoicing for his return to the Earth; the former feast being called "the disappearance of Adonis," the latter, "the finding of Adonis."

This Phœnician feast answered to the similar Egyptian one in honor of Osiris. The idea thus fabled was that of the waters of the river and the beauties of spring destroyed by the summer heat. Or else the Earth being clothed with beauty during the six months the Sun is in the upper hemisphere, and losing it when he departs to the lower. The name "Adonis" is not used here, as "Adon" is the appropriated title of Jehovah...

It is common knowledge among learned religionists that nearly all other dates for Christian holidays are set based upon those of previous religions. Even in England and Ireland, the Druids had for centuries been celebrating the great day of December 25th. In other words, there has always been a Christmas, regardless of whether or not it was known as "Christmas."

(The word "Christmas" is a shortened form of "Christ’s Mass," i.e., "the Mass of Christ.")

The astronomical event and inspiration for all these diverse (yet similar) religious celebrations is the Sun’s transit across the Winter Solstice on Dec. 21st. This time is symbolically the world’s “darkest hour” – the longest night of the year. To the peoples of the Northern Hemisphere (where all present-day religions originated) the Sun is directly below the Earth at midnight on December 25th. Concurrently, the constellation Virgo - the celestial Virgin - stands upon the horizon in the Eastern Hemisphere of the Heavens...as Libra, the sign of peace, rises along the ecliptic.

Translation: Peace on Earth, goodwill towards men...

It is no secret to those with an open-mind (Christian or otherwise), that Christianity incorporated practices, doctrine and belief systems from other religions.

Such knowledge may allow an open-minded Christian to further see that: 1) their religion is still a religion created based on the historical and cultural context of that time period, 2) has flaws because while influenced by God it was ultimately 'translated' by man and 3) that other religious paths have merit.

Christians who are close-minded may not be able to come to such a conclusion and further believe their religion is the only path to God. This spiritual approach while common among many (not all Christians), is what limits people both individually and how one subconsciously perceives another. So people who are like this might reject the information all together.

Peace soulsearcher, and thank you for your enlightening comments. Here is more re: the pagan origins of Christmas in detail:

Roman pagans first introduced the holiday of Saturnalia, a week-long period of lawlessness celebrated between December 17-25. During this period, Roman courts were closed, and Roman law dictated that no one could be punished for damaging property or injuring people during the weeklong celebration. The festival began when Roman authorities chose “an enemy of the Roman people” to represent the “Lord of Misrule.” Each Roman community selected a victim whom they forced to indulge in food and other physical pleasures throughout the week. At the festival’s conclusion on December 25th, Roman authorities believed they were destroying the forces of darkness by brutally murdering this innocent man or woman.

The ancient Greek writer and historian Lucian (in his dialogue entitled Saturnalia) describes the festival’s observance in his time. In addition to human sacrifice, he mentions these customs: widespread intoxication; going from house to house while singing naked; rape and other sexual license; and consuming human-shaped biscuits (still produced in some English and most German bakeries during the Christmas season).

In the 4th century AD, Christianity imported the Saturnalia festival, hoping to take the pagan masses in with it. Christian leaders succeeded in converting to Christianity large numbers of pagans by promising them that they could continue to celebrate the Saturnalia festival as Christians. The problem was that there was nothing intrinsically Christian about Saturnalia. To remedy this, the Christian leaders named Saturnalia’s concluding day, December 25th, to be Jesus’ birthday.

Christians had little success, however, refining the practices of Saturnalia. As Stephen Nissenbaum, professor history at the University of Massachussetts, Amherst, writes: “In return for ensuring massive observance of the anniversary of the Savior’s birth by assigning it to this resonant date, the Church for its part tacitly agreed to allow the holiday to be celebrated more or less the way it had always been.” The earliest Christmas holidays were celebrated by drinking, sexual indulgence, singing naked in the streets (a precursor of modern caroling), etc.

The Rev. I. Mather of Boston observed in 1687 that “the early Christians who first observed the Nativity on December 25th did not do so thinking that Christ was born in that month, but because the heathens’ Saturnalia was at that time kept in Rome, and they were willing to have those pagan holidays metamorphosed into Christian ones.” Because of its known pagan origin, Christmas was banned by the Puritans, and its observance was illegal in Massachusetts between 1659 and 1681. However, Christmas was and still is celebrated by most Christians.

Some of the most depraved customs of the Saturnalia carnival were intentionally revived by the Catholic Church in 1466, when Pope Paul II - for the amusement of his Roman citizens - forced Jews to race naked through the streets of the city. An eyewitness account reports: “Before they were to run, the Jews were richly fed, so as to make the race more difficult for them...and at the same time more amusing for spectators. They ran...amid Rome’s taunting shrieks and peals of laughter, while the Holy Father stood upon a richly ornamented balcony and laughed heartily.”

As part of the Saturnalia carnival throughout the 18th and 19th centuries, rabbis of the ghetto in Rome were forced to wear clownish outfits and march through the city streets to the jeers of the crowd, pelted by a variety of missiles. When the Jewish community of Rome sent a petition in 1836 to Pope Gregory XVI, begging him to stop the annual Saturnalia abuse of the Jewish community, he responded: “It is not opportune to make any innovation.” On December 25, 1881, Christian leaders whipped the Polish masses into anti-Semitic frenzies that led to riots across the country. In Warsaw, 12 Jews were brutally murdered, huge numbers maimed, and many Jewish women were raped...and two million rubles worth of property was destroyed...

http://www.simpletoremember.com/vitals/Christmas_TheRealStory.htm

Astronomers and historians, – both secular and ecclesiastical, unanimously agree that December 25th of the year 1 AD was not the authentic date of the birth of Jesus Christ. As a matter of fact, December 25, 1 AD is incorrect in regards to both the day and the year. The responsibility for this error lies at the door of the Scythian monk Dionysius Exiguus, who made several mistakes and miscalculations. He lived in Rome, and in the year 532 AD he was instructed to fix the beginning of the New Era by working back through the years. But he forgot the year 0, which should have been placed between the years 1 BC and 1 AD. He also overlooked the four years that the Roman Emperor Augustus had reigned under his own name, “Octavian.”

Joseph A. Fitzmyer, Professor Emeritus of Biblical Studies at the Catholic University of America, member of the Pontifical Biblical Commission, and former president of the Catholic Biblical Association, writing in the Catholic Church’s official commentary on the New Testament, writes about the date of Jesus’ birth: “Though the year of Jesus birth is not reckoned with certainty, the birth did not occur in 1 AD. The Christian Era, supposed to have its starting point in the year of Jesus birth, is based on a miscalculation introduced ca. 533 by Dionysius Exiguus.”

peace,


Jermiah 10:1-10

Peace soulsearcher, and thank you for your enlightening comments. Here is more re: the pagan origins of Christmas in detail:

Roman pagans first introduced the holiday of Saturnalia, a week-long period of lawlessness celebrated between December 17-25. During this period, Roman courts were closed, and Roman law dictated that no one could be punished for damaging property or injuring people during the weeklong celebration. The festival began when Roman authorities chose “an enemy of the Roman people” to represent the “Lord of Misrule.” Each Roman community selected a victim whom they forced to indulge in food and other physical pleasures throughout the week. At the festival’s conclusion on December 25th, Roman authorities believed they were destroying the forces of darkness by brutally murdering this innocent man or woman.

The ancient Greek writer and historian Lucian (in his dialogue entitled Saturnalia) describes the festival’s observance in his time. In addition to human sacrifice, he mentions these customs: widespread intoxication; going from house to house while singing naked; rape and other sexual license; and consuming human-shaped biscuits (still produced in some English and most German bakeries during the Christmas season).

In the 4th century AD, Christianity imported the Saturnalia festival, hoping to take the pagan masses in with it. Christian leaders succeeded in converting to Christianity large numbers of pagans by promising them that they could continue to celebrate the Saturnalia festival as Christians. The problem was that there was nothing intrinsically Christian about Saturnalia. To remedy this, the Christian leaders named Saturnalia’s concluding day, December 25th, to be Jesus’ birthday.

Christians had little success, however, refining the practices of Saturnalia. As Stephen Nissenbaum, professor history at the University of Massachussetts, Amherst, writes: “In return for ensuring massive observance of the anniversary of the Savior’s birth by assigning it to this resonant date, the Church for its part tacitly agreed to allow the holiday to be celebrated more or less the way it had always been.” The earliest Christmas holidays were celebrated by drinking, sexual indulgence, singing naked in the streets (a precursor of modern caroling), etc.

The Rev. I. Mather of Boston observed in 1687 that “the early Christians who first observed the Nativity on December 25th did not do so thinking that Christ was born in that month, but because the heathens’ Saturnalia was at that time kept in Rome, and they were willing to have those pagan holidays metamorphosed into Christian ones.” Because of its known pagan origin, Christmas was banned by the Puritans, and its observance was illegal in Massachusetts between 1659 and 1681. However, Christmas was and still is celebrated by most Christians.

Some of the most depraved customs of the Saturnalia carnival were intentionally revived by the Catholic Church in 1466, when Pope Paul II - for the amusement of his Roman citizens - forced Jews to race naked through the streets of the city. An eyewitness account reports: “Before they were to run, the Jews were richly fed, so as to make the race more difficult for them...and at the same time more amusing for spectators. They ran...amid Rome’s taunting shrieks and peals of laughter, while the Holy Father stood upon a richly ornamented balcony and laughed heartily.”

As part of the Saturnalia carnival throughout the 18th and 19th centuries, rabbis of the ghetto in Rome were forced to wear clownish outfits and march through the city streets to the jeers of the crowd, pelted by a variety of missiles. When the Jewish community of Rome sent a petition in 1836 to Pope Gregory XVI, begging him to stop the annual Saturnalia abuse of the Jewish community, he responded: “It is not opportune to make any innovation.” On December 25, 1881, Christian leaders whipped the Polish masses into anti-Semitic frenzies that led to riots across the country. In Warsaw, 12 Jews were brutally murdered, huge numbers maimed, and many Jewish women were raped...and two million rubles worth of property was destroyed...

http://www.simpletoremember.com/vitals/Christmas_TheRealStory.htm


The Romans also used to observe a celebration on December 25th that was known as the Brumalia, which was a festival dedicated to Bacchus.

Aqil,

Your absolutely correct about Christmas [and the Christmas tree] being related to a Pagan holiday long before Jesus.

Did you get that post from a Christian site? Because many protestants are trying to break away from this Catholic church tradition.

Christ + Mass

It was the Catholics who brought all this junk in to control the Pagans, they ruled over.

Jeremiah Chapter 10 tells us why we do not bring Christmas trees into our house. Thank God a lot of these pagan traditions are now being broken off of Christianity. As we all become more aware of what was added by European Culture and has nothing to do with the Bible.

Jesus was born most probably on September 29. Or within the week, we know from the Bible that the Holiday being talked about among the Jews, comes at this time and not in December.

Mithra was one of the competeing religions that those sly dogs of the Holy Roman Empire [Catholic political power] were able to erase from the face of the earth by adopting their pagan holiday [December 25, and Easter] and dedicating them to Jesus birth and his ressurection.

Romans did not even know about Mithraism or adopt it until after Jesus was dead and all the books of the New Testament had been written already. So there is no way that Christianity came from Mithraism.
How can you put them down as "sly dogs" and still uphold the bible when it was those same sly dogs who put the bible together and decided which manuscripts out of hundreds should be in the cannon? There is very little difference between what we call the bible today and what they put together back then except they included the apocrypha and excluded Ephesians and Philippians. We accept the four Gospels they chose and reject the ones they rejected knowing full well they they were politically motivated to choose these gospels - knwoing full well that those gospels uphold the same mythology that we know is built around paganism.

That's the thing about belief and faith - one is never required to take one's belief to its logical conclusion. And so we live with all manner of contradictions and think nothing of it.

Aqil,

Did you notice that this post says that Christianity and Mithra were COMPETING religions, running side by side.

That kinda of conflicts with others view that Christianity came from Mithra worship doesn't it?

Look what your post says here:

as a genuine result of the contact between the two religions (Mithraism and Christianity), at a time when both were growing in popular appeal throughout the Roman Empire...

Two separate religions, growing separately. NOT one religion [Mithra] out of which came the cult of Christianity.

I wish others who think that Christianity came from Mitharaism could see your post here.

Thanks.
Historically Mithra was worshipped for hundreds of years before Jesus but his worship did not become popular in the Mediterranian area until about the time the christians started frmulating their Pauline theology. Therefore although Mithra was new in that area unlike with christianity he was not a new god whose theology was inchoate.

The Roman Catholics were doing everything in their power to divorce christianity from its Jewish parentage so they were borrowing from here and there to create a new religion without having to start from absolute scratch.

Jeremiah 10:1-10Jeremiah was a priest from Anathoth in the territory of the Benjamin tribe, and the world of Jeremiah's time was full of wars as new empires cconquered the old ones. The tiny kingdom of Judah was caught in the middle, and during Jeremiah's lifetime. Babylonia conquered Judah and ended its freedom as a nation. Jeremiah began bringing the Lord's message to the people of Judah when he was young, possibly less than 20 years old. He continued until 586 BC, when the Babylonians captured Jerusalem. Some of the people of Judah soon forced him to go with them to Egypt, where he continued to speak to them for the Lord.

Many of Jeremiah's messages include the date when they were originally spkoken. But when his friend Baruch helped him put the messages into writing, they did not arrange the messages by these dates. Usually the messages are grouped together because they are about similar subjects. Jeremiah acted out many of his messages , so that the people would know exactly what the Lord was saying. Time after time Jeremiah said God was going to punish Judah. But because he also said the people of Judah should surrender to the Babylonians, his enemies accused him of being a traitor. They had thrown him in prison and even tried to have him killed. Jerimiah complained to God about his problems, and these complaints are now known as his "Confessions." Jeremiah often reminded the people of Judah that they had broken their agreement to worship only the Lord. And so the Lord was going to punish them by letting the Babylonians take them away to Babylon.
But the Lord had also promised to bring his people back to their land someday, amd at that tome the Lord wold make a new agreement with them. Here is Jeremiah 10:1-10, under the heading, "The Lord Talks About Idols":

"The Lord said: Listen to me, you people of Israel. Don't follow the customs of those nations who become frightened when they see something strange happen in the sky. Their religion is worthless! They chop down a tree, carve the wood into an idol, cover it with silver and gold, and then nail it down so it won't fall over. An idol is no better than a scarecrow. It can't speak, and it has to be carried, because it can't walk. Why worship an idol that can't help or harm you?"

Jeremiah Praises the Lord

"Our Lord, great and powerful you alone are God. You are King of the nations. Everyone should worship you. No human anywhere on Earth is wiser than you. Idols are worthless, and anyone who worships them is a fool! Idols are made by humans. A carver shapes the wood; a metalworker hammers out a covering of gold from Uphaz or silver from Tarshish. Then the idol is dressed in blue and purple clothes. You, Lord, are the only true and living God. You will rule for all time. When you are angry the earth shakes, and nations are destroyed."

(Jeremiah 10:1-10, KJV, Contemporary English Version)

Jesus was born on September 8, in the year 7 BC[/B], having been conceived around the time of the Winter Solstice in 8 BC. He was born under the astrological sign Virgo, which is another cosmic verification of the Biblical expression, “born of a virgin.”
Mary was pregnant for 11 years??!! That sounds like the emaciating conception.

Jesus was born on September 8, in the year 7 BC, having been conceived around the time of the Winter Solstice in 8 BC. He was born under the astrological sign Virgo, which is another cosmic verification of the Biblical expression, “born of a virgin.”Mary was pregnant for 11 years??!!If Jesus was born on Sept. 8, 7 BC, it means that he was conceived around the time of the Winter Solstice (Dec. 21) in the year 8 BC...exactly nine months before.

If Jesus was born on Sept. 8, 7 BC, it means that he was conceived around the time of the Winter Solstice (Dec. 21) in the year 8 BC...exactly nine months before.
Gee I'm thinking September AD. Sorry.

^5 sister river..."emaciating conception"...whew!

Historically, the Greek god Adonis was called “Tammuz” by the ancient Israelites of Abyssinia (present-day Ethiopia). His celebration took place ceremonially in a cave-dwelling in the town of Bethlehem, which was regarded as his birthplace! Tammuz was esteemed as “good bread” for the soul. The word “Bethlehem” means “house of bread,” or "house of Tammuz," and his name still designates the 4th month of the Hebraic calendar...

Tammuz is astronomically attuned to the time of the Summer Solstice, when the Sun reaches its greatest northern declination, and is astrologically attuned to the sign Cancer, which rules the African continent. The sign of the month was called Sartan, Cancer or The Crab, because this constellation - which is observed at this time of year - has the appearance of a crab. Also, the season is summer, and the hot weather of summer causes crabs to multiply in the water. Crabs pinch and hurt, and this month was basically a time in which the Jewish people were hurt (which is why it was referred to as the "month of mourning")...

The Egyptians also worshiped Tammuz as the setting sun. His name means literally “our Lord,” as does the Greek “Adonis,” and the ancient Israelites wrote many Psalms for Tammuz, as part of their liturgical services were offered in his name. One such example remains in the Old Testament as the 110th Psalm...