PAGAN ORIGIN OF THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION
The similarity between the Jesus story and earlier stories about mythological
heroes and pagan Gods and legends concerning Old Testament prophets has given
rise to the view that the gospels were made up by people who plagiarised these
tales.
THE OTHER GOD-MAN OF THE BIBLE
Antiochus IV Epiphanes of Book of Daniel fame claimed to be the image of God. Jesus was about being the image of the invisible God. This title Epiphanes means The Revelation of God. Jesus being the essential and complete image of God is what his being Son of God, Lord and divine are all about. The true origin of the incarnation, where God becomes man in Jesus, is in Antiochus.
GNOSTICS
The New Testament says that Simon carried the cross for Jesus for Jesus could do no more. It does not say that Jesus was nailed to the cross through his feet. This omission in gospels intended to show Jesus rose from the dead and gave us hope speaks loudly. Mark like Pilate wonders how Jesus died so quickly. No wonder if he were not nailed through the feet though it could be said it does not matter a lot. In some crucifixions, not all, the victim had to push up on his tied or nailed feet to take a breath and soon through pain and exhaustion was not able to any more. The victim dies by asphysia.
Oddly enough the notion that somebody, perhaps Simon pretending to be Jesus, was nailed by the feet comes from Gnostics who were essentially pagans with Christian veneers. We find such statements in the Nag Hammadi literature.
For Christians, Jesus was nailed through the feet.
THE FATHERS SPEAK
The Fathers of the Church sometimes admitted that Christianity existed before
Christ. St Augustine one of the most brilliant albeit nevertheless twisted minds
the Church ever produced wrote, “Among the ancients, this thing called the
Christian religion existed. It was not absent from the start of the human race
even before Christ came in the flesh. When he came the true religion then became
known as Christianity” (Retractiones).
The Second Book of Esdras expresses ideas that must have been stolen by the
Christians later.
“For my son the Messiah shall be revealed with those who are with him, and
those who remain shall rejoice four hundred years. After those years my son the
Messiah shall die, and all who draw human breath.”
“And as for the lion whom you saw rousing up out of the forest and roaring and
speaking to the eagle and reproving him for his unrighteousness, and as for all
his words that you have heard, this is the Messiah whom the Most High has kept
until the end of days, who will arise from the offspring of David".
“When these things take place and the signs occur that I showed you before, then
my Son will be revealed, whom you saw as a man coming up from the sea.”
“Then he, my Son, will reprove the assembled nations for their ungodliness.”
“The Most High shall be revealed on the seat of judgment, and compassion shall
pass away, and patience shall be withdrawn. Only judgment shall remain, truth
shall stand, and faithfulness shall grow strong.”
“And I will raise up the dead from their places, and bring them out from their
tombs, because I recognize my name in them.”
“Remember your children that sleep, because I will bring them out of the hiding
places of the earth, and will show mercy to them; for I am merciful, says the
Lord Almighty.”
“After seven days the world that is not yet awake shall be roused, and that
which is corruptible shall perish. The earth shall give up those who are asleep
in it, and the dust those who rest there in silence; and the chambers shall give
up the souls that have been committed to them.”
“The pit of torment shall appear, and opposite it shall be the place of rest;
and the furnace of hell shall be disclosed, and opposite it the paradise of
delight. Then the Most High will say to the nations that have been raised from
the dead, ‘Look now, and understand whom you have denied, whom you have not
served, whose commandments you have despised. Look on this side and on that;
here are delight and rest, and there are fire and torments.’ Thus he will speak
to them on the day of judgment.”
St Justin Martyr in the second century stated that in relation to the virgin
birth of Jesus and his crucifixion and death and his resurrection and ascension
the Christians said nothing that the sons of the pagan divinity Jove were not
saying.
Mary conceived by the Holy Spirit. So Matthew says. It does indicate that a miracle was involved but what exactly? Did it refer to her being too young to get pregnant, barren or getting pregnant at the wrong time of the month? It may indicate some kind of creation was involved. That is all it says. It tells us nothing about whether God found a way to simulate sex with her pagan style and leave her a virgin.
There is an interesting parallel between the virgin conception and the resurrection of Jesus. Life appears in the womb where there is no life and life appears in the tomb where there is no life. This hints that to reject the virgin conception is to open the door for doubting the resurrection as well.
Early Church Father Origen said nothing in reply to Celsus who said that
Christianity brought absolutely nothing new in philosophy or doctrine or stories
about crucified and rising saviours for he couldn’t say anything.
St Gregory of Nazianen wrote to St Jerome that the Fathers or theologians who
helped form the Churchs doctrine were often guilty of saying what they had to
say not what they thought (page 55, 56, The Pagan Christ). So truth was of
secondary importance to them.
Origen complained about the considerable alterations of the scriptures by
Christians (page 59, The Pagan Christ).
There can be no doubt then that when the Fathers admitted that their faith was
nothing new it was the truth. It didn’t help their cause for them to confess
that. There can be no doubt that when they defended orthodox Christianity they
may have been twisting facts and lying to do so.
Conclusion
There is no evidence that Jesus lived when the Jesus story was anything but
original. The story was copied from other sources and you don’t need to copy
stories about a man who really lived.
WORKS CONSULTED
A Concise History of the Catholic Church, Thomas Bokenkotter, Image Books, New
York, 1979
Alleged Discrepancies of the Bible, John W Haley, Whitaker House, Pennsylvania,
undated
Asking them Questions, Various, Oxford University Press, London, 1936
Belief and Make-Believe, GA Wells, Open Court, La Salle, Illinois, 1991
Concise Guide to Today’s Religions, Josh McDowell and Don Stewart, Scripture
Press, Bucks, 1983
Conspiracies and the Cross, Timothy Paul Jones, Front Line, A Strang Company,
Florida, 2008
Did Jesus Exist? GA Wells, Pemberton, London, 1988
Did Jesus Exist? John Redford, Catholic Truth Society, London, 1986
Documents of the Christian Church, edited by Henry Bettenson, Oxford University
Press, Oxford, 1979
Early Christian Writings, Maxwell Staniforth Editor, Penguin, London, 1988
Encyclopaedia of Heresies and Heretics, Leonard George, Robson Books, London,
1995
Encyclopaedia of Unbelief, Volume 1, Ed Gordon Stein, (Ed) Prometheus Books, New
York, 1985
Evidence that Demands a Verdict, Vol 1, Josh McDowell, Alpha, Scripture Press
Foundation, Bucks, 1995
Fundamentalism and the Word of God, JI Packer, Inter Varsity Press, Leicester,
1996
Handbook to the Controversy With Rome, Volume 1, Karl Von Hase, The Religious
Tract Society, London, 1906
He Walked Among Us, Josh McDowell and Bill Wilson, Alpha Cumbria, 2000
In Defence of the Faith, Dave Hunt, Harvest House, Eugene, Oregon, 1996
Introduction to the New Testament, Roderick A F MacKenzie, SJ, Liturgical Press,
Minnesota, 1965
Jesus, AN Wilson, Flamingo, London, 1993
Jesus and the Goddess, The Secret Teachings of the Original Christians, Timothy
Freke and Peter Gandy, Thorsons, London, 2001
Jesus – God the Son or Son of God? Fred Pearce Christadelphian Publishing
Office, Birmingham, undated
Jesus – One Hundred Years Before Christ, Professor Alvar Ellegard Century,
London, 1999
Jesus and the Four Gospels, John Drane, Lion, Herts, 1984
Jesus Hypotheses, V Messori, St Paul Publications, Slough, 1977
Jesus Lived in India by Holger Kersten, Element, Dorset, 1994
Jesus, Qumran and the Vatican, Otto Betz and Rainer Riesner, SCM Press Ltd,
London, 1994
Jesus the Evidence, Ian Wilson, Pan, London, 1985
Jesus the Magician, Morton Smith, Harper & Row, San Francisco, 1978
Jesus under Fire, Edited by Michael F Wilkins and JP Moreland, Zondervan
Publishing House, Michigan, 1995
Lectures and Replies, Thomas Carr, Archbishop of Melbourne, Melbourne, 1907
Let’s Weigh the Evidence, Barry Burton, Chick Publications, Chino, CA, 1983
Miracles in Dispute, Ernst and Marie-Luise Keller, SCM Press Ltd, London, 1969
On the True Doctrine, Celsus, Translated by R Joseph Hoffmann, Oxford University
Press, Oxford 1987
Putting Away Childish Things, Uta Ranke-Heinemann, HarperCollins, San Francisco,
1994
Runaway World, Michael Green, IVP, London, 1974
St Paul versus St Peter, A Tale of Two Missions, Michael Goulder, Westminster
John Knox Press, Louisville, Kentucky, 1994
St Peter and Rome, JBS, Irish Church Missions, Dublin, undated
Saint Saul, Donald Harman Akenson, Oxford University Press, New York, 2000
The Bible Fact or Fantasy, John Drane, Lion, Oxford, 1989
The Bible Unearthed, Israel Finkelstein and Neil Asher Silberman, Touchstone
Books, New York, 2002.
The Call to Heresy, Robert Van Weyer, Lamp Books, London, 1989
The Case For Christ, Lee Strobel, HarperCollins and Zondervan, Michigan, 1998
The Case for Jesus the Messiah, John Ankerberg Harvest House, Eugene, Oregon,
1989
The Early Church, Henry Chadwick, Pelican, Middlesex, 1967
The Encyclopedia of Heresies and Heretics, Leonard George, Robson Books, London,
1995
The First Christian, Karen Armstrong, Pan, London, 1983
The Gnostic Gospels, Elaine Pagels, Penguin, London, 1990
The Gnostic Paul, Elaine Pagels, Fortress Press, Philadelphia, 1975
The History of Christianity, Lion, Herts 1982
The History of the Church, Eusebius, Penguin, London, 1989
The House of the Messiah, Ahmed Osman, Grafton, London, 1993
The Jesus Event and Our Response, Martin R Tripole SJ, Alba House, New York,
1980
The Jesus Hoax, Phyllis Graham, Leslie Frewin, London, 1974
The Jesus Inquest, Charles Foster, Monarch Books, Oxford, 2006
The Jesus Mysteries, Timothy Freke and Peter Gandy, Thorsons, London, 1999
The MythMaker, St Paul and the Invention of Christianity, Hyam Maccoby,
Weidenfeld and Nicholson, London, 1986
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1990
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1905
The Unauthorised Version, Robin Lane Fox, Penguin, Middlesex, 1992
The Virginal Conception and Bodily Resurrection of Jesus, Raymond E Brown,
Paulist Press, New York, 1973
Theodore Parker’s Discourses, Theodore Parker, Longmans, Green, Reader and Dyer,
London, 1876
Theological Dictionary of the New Testament. Kittel Gerhard and Friedrich
Gerhard, Eerdman’s Publishing Co, Grand Rapids, MI, 1976
Those Incredible Christians, Hugh Schonfield, Hutchinson, London, 1968
Who Was Jesus? A Conspiracy in Jerusalem, by Kamal Salabi, I.B. Taurus and Co
Ltd., London, 1992
Who Was Jesus? NT Wright, SPCK, London, 1993
Why I Believe Jesus Lived, C G Colly Caldwell, Guardian of Truth, Kentucky
The WWW
Who is GA Wells? Rev Dr Gregory S. Neal
www.errantskeptics.org/G_A_Wells.htm
The Silent Jesus
www.askwhy.co.uk/awcnotes/cn4/0325SilentJesus.html#Justin
Apollonius the Nazarene, The Historical Apollonius versus the Historical Jesus
www.apollonius.net/bernard1e.html
Why Did the Apostles Die? Dave Matson,
www.infidels.org/library/magazines/tsr/1997/4Why97.html
The “Historical” Jesus by Acharya S
www.truthbeknown.com/historicaljc.htm
How Did the Apostles Die?
www.infidels.org/library/magazines/tsr/1997/4/4front97.html
History’s Troubling Silence About Jesus, Lee Salisbury
www.secweb.org/asset.asp?AssetID=102
Steven Carr discusses the Christian and apostolic martyrs
www.bowness.demon.co.uk/martyrs.htm
www.bowness.demon.co.uk/martyrs2.htm
Challenging the Verdict
A Cross-Examination of Lee Strobel’s The Case for Christ
http://human.st/jesuspuzzle/CTVExcerptsOne.htm
http://human.st/jesuspuzzle/CTVExcerptsTwo.htm
http://human.st/jesuspuzzle/CTVExcerptsThree.htm#Twelve
The Martyrdoms of Peter and Paul, Peter Kirby
http://home.earthlink.net/~kirby/
The Martyrdoms: A Response, Peter Kirby
www.bowness.demon.co.uk/martyrs3.htm
A Sacrifice in Heaven,
http://human.st/jesuspuzzle/supp09.htm
The Evolution of Jesus of Nazareth
http://human.st/jesuspuzzle/partthre.htm
The Jesus of History, a Reply to Josh McDowell by Gordon Stein
www.infidels.org/library/modern/gordon_stein/Jesus.html
Josh McDowell’s Evidence for Jesus – Is It Reliable?, by Jeffrey J Lowder
www.infidels.org/library/modern/jeff_lowder/jury/chap5.html
A Reply to JP Holding’s “Shattering” of My Views on Jesus
www.infidels.org/secular_web/new/2000/march.html
Robert M Price, Christ a Fiction
www.infidels.org/library/modern/robert_price/fiction.html
Earliest Christianity G A Wells
www.infidels.org/library/modern/g_a_wells/earliest.html
The Second Century Apologists
http://human.st/jesuspuzzle/century.htm
Existence of Jesus Controversy, Rae West
www.homeusers.prestel.co.uk/littleton/gm1_jesu.htm
Why I Don’t Buy the Resurrection Story by Richard Carrier
www.infidels.org/library/modern/richard_carrier/resurrection/index.shtml
Jesus Conference,
www.st-and.ac.uk/~www_sd/jconf_hall.html
Jesus Conference,
www.st-andrews.ac.uk/~www_sd/jconf_stuckenbruck.html
The Testament of Levi Concerning the Priesthood and Arrogance
www.ccel.org/fathers2/ANF-08/anf08-07.htm#P378_53868.
Sherlock Holmes Style Search for the Historical Jesus
www.fortunecity.com/greenfield/bp/890/history.html
The Ascension of Isaiah
www.earth-history.com/sacred-ascension-Isaiah.htm
Apollonius of Tyana: The Monkey of Christ? The Church Patriarchs, Robertino
Solarion www.apollonius.net/patriarchs.html
What About the Discovery of Q? Brad Bromling
www.ApologeticsPress.org
Wells without Water, Psychological Buffoonry from the Master of the Christ-Myth,
James Patrick Holding
www.tektonics.org/JPH_WW.html
Critique: Scott Bidstrp [sic] on The Case for Christ by James Patrick Holding
www.tektonics.org/bidstrup02.html
GA Wells Replies to Criticism of his Books on Jesus
www.infidels.org/library/modern/g_a_wells/errant.html
The Ossuary Scam: A Critical Analysis of the “James” Ossuary
http://www.atrueword.com/index.php/article/articleprint/15/-1/1/
The Origins of Christianity and the Quest for the Historical Jesus, Acharya S
www.truthbeknown.com/origins.htm
BIBLE VERSION USED
The Amplified Bible
The King James Version
