Steven Carr

One standard metaphor that Christians used for resurrection was of a seed and harvest.

Was there any similarity between Christian views on resurrection and non-Christian views on resurrection?

NT Wright writes 'Did any worshipper in these cults, from Egypt to Norway.... thank that actual human beings, having died, actually came back to life? Of course not. These multifarious and sophisticated cults enacted the gods' death and resurrection as a metaphor, whose concrete referent was the cycle of seed-time and harvest.'

And he also writes 'When the Christians spoke of resurrection of Jesus they did not suppose it was something that happened every year, with the sowing seed and harvesting of crops.'

Amazing that many early Christians (like Clement) gravitated naturally to metaphors for resurrection of seeds and harvests that had nothing to do with Christian ideas of resurrection , but were very , very suitable for non-Christian ideas of resurrection.

Almost as though they could see parallels between pagan myths and Christian stories.