Biff the unclean

Classical Greek I believe. Di Onysus =Two Births. It's in reference to his mother, Semele, being turned to ash from seeing the glory of God. And Zeus took the unborn child from the pile of ash, slit His own thigh open with His finger nail and placed the fetus in His own leg until it was full term.
Followers of Dionysus cult all went through ceremonies where they had a spiritual second birth.


Father, Son and Holy Ghost/ Virgin Mother.
Dionysus descended into Hades, rescued the ghost of Semele and brought her to Mount Olympus (against Hera's wishes) where she reigned in Holiness. It isn't three persons in one God; it's a sacred family.


Well the whole plot of the persecuter meeting the God on the road and converting is from that story. Though the dialogue is lifted from Euripides so we can be sure that it is his version of the story that Luke lifted

Eazy

I'll have to do a little reading up on this. This is my first time hearing about it.

Biff the unclean

In that case also look up Apollonius of Tyana. He lived at the same time as Jesus...only he left evidence that he was actually here behind. He did all the same healing miracles that are attributed to Jesus including bring someone back from the dead. He revived the Alexandrian Greek worship of the God Christna.

Interesting point that you'll notice if you ever visit Rome and take the catacombs tour. All the art on the walls from before 325CE is of Mithra, Dionysus, Apollonius and Hercules. Only after 325 do pictures of Jesus show up. The tour guides give lame Christian apologetic excuses and claim that the early Christians really meant to paint Jesus but didn't.
One noteable picture of Apollonius, said to be Jesus, shows him clean shaven in a sporty toga, raising a dead girl to life...using a magic wand.

lpetrich

And how does "onysos" mean anything like "Birth". I checked the Liddell-Scott dictionary, and I could find no Greek word for "birth" that looks like that.

Like what other miracles besides raising a little girl from the dead?

Biff, can you cite even one primary-source reference to that alleged deity?

It was the Christian Church, not Jesus Christ himself, and it was Constantine and his successors that they had succeeded in influencing -- 300 years after when Jesus Christ had allegedly lived.

And "Mithras" is simply "Mithra" deformed to fit Greek grammar.

Biff the unclean

In the 1890's the English spelling was changed fron Christna to Krishna. You should have no trouble finding him (...just look in any airport )

At the time the spelling was changed there was a large mysticism/spiritualist movement afoot in England. One of their big "heros" was Apollonius so one must be careful that you don't only fine their nonsense about him but go to the source material. The wild claims of this Victorian "New Age" group is probably what prompted Christian scholars to "correct" Krishna's spelling

Biff the unclean

Well then perhaps it's from another middle eastern language. Every book you pick up on Dionysus says his name means "twice born".
Here's where Encyclopedia Mythica (http://www.pantheon.org/areas/mythol.../articles.html) says it



According to one myth, Dionysus is the son of the god Zeus and the mortal woman, Semele (daughter of Cadmus of Thebes). Semele is killed by Zeus' lightning bolts while Dionysus is still in her womb. Dionysus is rescued and undergoes a second birth from Zeus after developing in his thigh. Zeus then gives the infant to some nymphs to be raised. In another version, one with more explicit religious overtones, Dionysus, also referred to as Zagreus in this account, is the son of Zeus and Persephone, Queen of the Underworld. Hera gets the Titans to lure the infant with toys, and then they rip him to shreds eating everything but Zagreus' heart, which is saved by either Athena, Rhea, or Demeter. Zeus remakes his son from the heart and implants him in Semele who bears a new Dionysus Zagreus. Hence, as in the earlier account, Dionysus is called "twice born." The latter account formed a part of the Orphic religion's religious mythology.

Rick Sumner

Called "twice born" doesn't mean that Dionysus means twice born. It means that he was called Dithyrambos as well as Dionysus.

As near as I can tell, the meaning of "Dionysus" is unknown and frequently disputed.

To purport that the double-birth of Dionysus is somehow parallel to Christian concepts of being born again is unfounded. Pattern of religion is defined by how adherents thought it functioned, not by whether or not you can mix and match terminology at will.

Regards,
Rick Sumner

Rick Sumner

I believe Peter Kirby already slaughtered the misconception regarding "kicking at the goads."

Regards,
Rick Sumner

Biff the unclean

I believe that if you go to the actual trouble (pleasure) of reading Euripides' The Bacchae you'll find ...for yourself... that Kirby is only kicking at pricks himself

Rick Sumner

As amusing as this bout of ear-plugging is (and I have, in fact, read The Bacchae), there's simply no getting around the fact that "kicking at the pricks" was used widely, and even used before Euripides wrote. It is quite impossible for it to be distinct to Euripides, and thus useless in establishing dependence.

If you'd care to write a rebuttal to Kirby, I for one would certainly be interested in it. If you'd care to make presumptions about what I have or haven't read, and then follow it up with vague allusions to what I might find in Euripides' use of the phrase, I assure you you're wasting your time. I have no reason to simply take your word for it, and every reason not to.

Regards,
Rick Sumner