Toto

Campbell talks about the creation of the myth. He never says that since the story has mythic elements, that there is no underlying history, and no historical person at the center of the myth.

That's the point - Campbell confines himself to myth, preferably universal mythic themes.

Wow. That's all one sentence. Think about diagramming that sentence.

Are you saying that the legends around Jesus' birth are modern constructs? That the ancients did not worship gods who died and rose in some sense?

In fact, from my observation of my contemporaries, Campbell's theories do seem to undermine a certain type of fundamentalist thinking about the Bible.

We are discussing her theories. The "well researched" part is your concern. I think that some of her theories elicit an overreaction because of the way they are framed. You can find some problems in her research, but her response seems to be "picky, picky, picky," and I think that at least some of the problems you and others have with her could have been avoided with more adroit editing.

Malachi151

Campbell is way over rated as well. His scholarship is certainly better, but his musing are really just as bad as Acharya S'. They both try to make everything fit some perceived "universal" mythic template, and the facts of the matter are that myths and religions simply are not universal. There are different stories, different ideas, and different beliefs in different cultures that arise for different reasons.

Even when you look at things like flood mythology, once you get past the superficial element of various myths being about floods, you see that many of them are based on completely different concepts, facts, observations, ideas, etc.

Campbell and his ilk try to make all flood mythology about some kind of deep seeded universal human psychological issue, like the "need for cleansing", etc., but in fact if you look at the Native American Zuni mythology it is based on their observations of fossils of sea life forms in the desert.

If you look at Northern European flood stories they appear to tie to an actual flood event that was experienced by people.

If you look at the story of Noah it appears to be based on an existing Mesopotamian flood story, also found in the Epic of Gilgamesh, which may also be tied to a real localized flood event, for which there is some geological support.

When you look at the flood stories in Metamorphosis they appear to be inspired also by Greek fossil finds of sea life in the mountains.

While I trust the information presented by Campbell more, I don't trust his reading or analysis any more than Acharya S'.

Toto

Malachi151 - are there any scholars who meet your standards? I think you reject the entire field of NT studies, as I recall.

Iasion

Greetings all,

Continuing to check how well-supported, and how accurate, are Achayra S' claims - as found on her web site.

I see Acharya S says of Mithra :

(from http://www.truthbeknown.com/origins4.htm)

Acharya S has a more detailed essay on Mithra :
http://www.truthbeknown.com/mithra.htm


Let's check how well Acharya S supports her claims, and how accurate they are...


Born on December 25th

This claim is often made, but I have never seen anyone produce sources for this which pre-date Christianity.

The only source Acharya S gives for this is Swami Prajnanananda, no details given, no primary source mentioned.

Score: D

He was considered a great traveling teacher and master.

So what?
All religious followers would say the same of their god/leader.

Score: F


He had 12 companions or disciples.

This claim could conceivably be true, although I can't find any early support for it. Acharya S gives no source, and does not even discuss the subject in her page on Mithra. Some sources give 7 as a venerated number, not 12.

Score: D


He performed miracles.

So what?
All Gods did miracles.

Score: D


He was buried in a tomb.

Really? Says who?
Apart from endless web-sites with no sources?
I can't find any early sources which support this claim. Acharya S gives none in her essay, she doesn't even mention him being buried in a tomb.

Score: D


After three days he rose again.

Again, says who?
I can find no early support for such a claim, and Acharya S does not mention this in her essay on Mithra.

Score: D


His resurrection was celebrated every year.

Really?
Maybe he was, not an uncommon practice. But Achayra S gives no source, and does not mention resurrection in her Mithra essay.

Score: D


Mithra was called "the Good Shepherd."

Oh?
Acharya S gives no source, her essay has no mention of "Good Shepherd"

Score: D


He was considered "the Way, the Truth and the Light, the Redeemer, the Savior, the Messiah."

Well, some of these terms may have indeed been applied to Mithra, especially "Light" as Mithra was often seen as a solar deity. Other terms here could easily have been applied to Mithra, like many other gods.

As to whether this exact phrase was applied to Mithra, I can't find any source for it, other than the hundreds of web-sites which repeat this exact claim word for word.

Acharya S' essay makes no mention of this phrase.

Score: C


He was identified with both the Lion and the Lamb.

Lion? Says who?
Late Mithra is shown with a bull.
Is Jesus identified with a Lion?

Acharya S DOES give a source for Mithra's symbol being the lamb : Swami Prajnanananda - no cite, no primary source.

I see some secondary sources apparently connecting Mithra with a lamb, sometimes the ram was interchangeable with the bull : [Bundahish, ii. 2.], [Garucci, /Les Myste`res du Syn. Phrygien/, p. 34.]. No idea who they are.

Score: D for Lion, C for Lamb


His sacred day was Sunday, "the Lord's Day," hundreds of years before the appearance of Christ.

This may indeed be true. A Sun god whose day is Sunday - so what? Christians chose or copied their holy day - so what? A point in common, but not very significant.

Acharya S gives no source for this claim.

Score: C


Mithra had his principal festival on what was later to become Easter, at which time he was resurrected.

Says who?
Acharya S gives no source for these claims. Tertullian does hint at the resurrection of Mithra (Presc. ch.40)

Score: C



His religion had a Eucharist or "Lord's Supper."52

Wow, a cite! What does it say ?
(52)The Eucharist, or the sharing of the god's blood and body, has been a sacred ritual within many ancient mystery religions and is part of the Mythos and Ritual. In a standard ritual that was practiced around the world, and which continues in some places, participants in the ritual actually ate and drank the "god's" body and blood, which was in reality that of a sacrificed human (king) or animal. The Christian form of the Eucharist is very similar to the ritual that was practiced as part of the Greek Eleusinian Mysteries, in detail, as is outlined by Taylor. The Eleusinian Eucharist honored both Ceres, goddess of wheat, and Bacchus/Dionysus, god of the vine. The Christians also adopted the Bacchanal symbol IHS (Greek) or IES - Iesu/Jesus. These letters stood for the sun. (See below.) "Mr. Higgins observes, 'The whole paschal supper (the Lord's supper with the Christians) was in fact a festival of joy to celebrate the passage of the sun across the equinox of spring.'" (Graves)

Hmm, a passage about eucharists, and how common they are - no mention of Mithra's eucharist. Acharya S gives no sources for this claim, even though Tertullian and Justin could be cited.

And finally Godfrey Higgins makes an appearance!
Good ol' Godfrey - I knew his name would pop up eventually :-) The Anacalypsis is the exemplar of this 19th century religious 'research'. ;-)


Conclusion

Acharya S fails to provide any early sources to back up her various claims about Mithra.

Many of her claims appear to be wrong, or at least un-supportable.

Her list of items about Mithra seems to have been lifted from Massey or Wheless or similar (I have not found this exact list anywhere yet.)

Her essay on Mithra does not actually support this list of claims, she barely mentions them.

Acharya S is not a careful or thorough researcher and often fails to source, or check, her claims, which are often lifted from unreliable sources.


Iasion

Loomis

I’m having trouble finding fault with anything Malachi151 has said so far.

How about you?

His comments and observations in this post seem spot-on to me.

Is there anything he's overlooking?

Malachi151

Good summary, but its actually a little worse on some points than your scores.

Score: F. The December 25th date is meaningless anyway. Its obvious that this isn't an original part of the Jesus story. That later Romans blended their worship of Jesus with an existing holiday tells us nothing about the origins of the Jesus story.

So, #1) The claim isn't proved for Mirthas. #2) Even if it were it wouldn't matter.

Score: F. #1) No evidence of this. #2) Even if so, correlation doesn't prove causation. There is plenty of Jewish basis for having twelve "disciples", like the fact that Joshua (a.k.a Jesus) in the Old Testament appointed 12 followers to aid him as well.

Score: F. Nothing in the earliest sources mentions a yearly celebration of the resurrection of Jesus, so again this wouldn't have anything to do with origins. Yearly veneration by later generations has nothing to do with describing how a cult originated.

Score: F. The term "good shepherd" is only found once in the New Testament, and that's in the Gospel of John, again one of the latest works and one that is also the most pro-"Gentile" and anti-Jewish, as well as the one that injects the most "gnostic" theology. The Gospel of John again does not reflect origins, it reflects later developments and may indeed incorporate some ideas from outside Judaism, but this is only an example of later integration, not origins.

Score: F. First of all, Jesus is never called "the Way, the Truth and the Light," he is called "the way, the truth and the life," so they didn't even get the quote right. (obviously looking for a "solar deity" tie-in.

Secondly, this phrase is only found in the Gospel of John, see points made above.

Thirdly, obviously the terms Savior and Messiah are found throughout the Jewish scritpures.

Score: F. First of all, Judah is also associated with the lion and the lamb symbolizes the Passover lamb, and both of these symbols go back in Judaism far beyond the time of the Roman Mithras.

Secondly Jesus is not associated with a lion in the New Testament. See again any potential argument based on later traditions, these are meaningless.

Score: F. There is no indication of any "day of Jesus" or day for worshiping Jesus until after the time of the New Testament writings. The adoption of Sunday for this worship was done by Romans, etc. who adopted the religion, so that they blended it with their existing traditions is no surprise. Again, we are only seeing evidence of later blending, this has nothing to do with origins.

Score: F. The earliest Christians continued to celebrate Passover and to associate the resurrection of Jesus with Passover. The decision to create "Easter" and move the date to something other than Passover was made by later Romans, and once again has nothing to do with origins, it only reflects the later blending done by the Romans.

If the story of Jesus were BASED ON the story of Mithras then wouldn't we expect that Jesus would have been killed on, or come back to life on, the same day as Mithras in the Gospels? (If any of this business about Mirthas is even true)

Solitary Man

Not only that, but these were stock terms for deities and even deified humans. Caesar was called savior, for instance. Likewise, Jupiter. Conservator was a standard epithet for Jupiter.

However, Mithras, as far as I can tell, was never called "messiah", or anointed. I'd be very, very surprised if anyone ever called him that.

GakuseiDon

Yes, Dr Price points out as much in his review of her "Suns of God" (though complimentary on other points):
http://www.truthbeknown.com/price-sog-review.html

"Again and again, Acharya finds herself hemmed in by old writers who never elevated their claims above the level of hearsay (as she herself points out). Kersey Graves (The World's Sixteen Crucified Saviors) assures the reader that he has before him plenty of original documentation for his claims of crucifixion parallels, but he, er, doesn't have room to include any. And this is the rule, not the exception. Lundy, Higgins, Inman, Graves, Doane, etc., they all claim they have read or heard this or that, but none of them can site a single source document. Acharya seems generously inclined to believe them. I don't."

Acharya writes on why such evidence on crucified godmen in India seems to be only available from 19th C sources:
http://www.truthbeknown.com/kcrucified_3.htm

"Any evidence of crucified gods in India--asserted by some to be commonplace in sacred areas, but hidden by the priesthood--may today be scant. It is an intriguing coincidence that many of the scholars who unwillingly and against interest exposed this information were not only Christian but also British, and that the British took over pertinent places, possibly with the intent of destroying such evidence, among other motives."

So, it seems the trail on many of her claims end with a cite to some 19th C author. THEY saw the evidence, but either didn't have room in their books to cite the primacy source, or it was destroyed by Christians, to keep the truth hidden (you atheists out there who are critical of her are in on it too, remember!). It's not for nothing that her first book was called "The Christ Conspiracy".

(ETA) Acharya writes in the quote above about Christian scholars "who unwillingly and against interest exposed this information". She sometimes refers to them as "pious" sources -- a "pious with source", so to speak (sorry, couldn't resist!). But I've never seen her address the issue that there was a cottage industry for fantastic theories in the 19th C, and there was a real market for books promoting them. As Dr Price wrote: Acharya "seems generously inclined to believe them". That has to be a major concern for anyone using her material.

manwithdream

There are so many fringe writers, I don't understand why you all are making such a big deal about this one. If you don't like fringe writers, then just ignore them. You can't stop everyone from having unusual beliefs or from spreading them. That is just life. Every day many new religious cults are started or someone sees a UFO for the first time or whatever else happens like that to start a new fringe writer's work. I think it is better to try to spread what you believe than to try to stop what other people believe. You just drive yourself crazy if you have to read books on subjects you don't like so you can constantly argue with people who write them or believe in them.

ApostateAbe

I think it would be a mistake to think the ideology of Acharya S is something on the fringe. The Jesus-mythers like Acharya S are at the fringe of critical Biblical scholarship, but they are on the center stage of atheist and anti-religious activists. It gives Christians an intellectual leg up over atheists in debate, and this hurts all of us, because the best propaganda method that atheists have is winning the argument. The people who believe Acharya S are not people who will believe anything. They are intelligent, skeptical, well-meaning people who are sucked into her ideology because they have a bias against Christianity, and it seems like the only people who take the trouble to try to refute Acharya S on the Internet are the Christians. This has got to change. We can't just be attackers of religion. We have got to be defenders of truth.