Freethought & Rationalism Archive

Anunnaki · 01-29-2002, 07:27 PM

Take a look at the following pictures.....

Temple of Apollo the sun god

The Pope with his monstrance

Discuss.

[ January 29, 2002: Message edited by: Anunnaki ]

Toto · 01-29-2002, 11:42 PM

Christianity was entwined with the cult of Sol Invictus in the Roman Empire under Constantine. The Papacy got its start under the Roman Empire.

<a href="http://www.crosscircle.com/CH_2f.htm" target="_blank">Mithras and Constantine</a>

Quote:

. . .In the first place Constantine�s "conversion" does not seem to have been Christian at all but absolutely pagan. He appears to have had some sort of vision in the precincts of a pagan temple to Apollo, either in the Vosges or near Autun. According to a witness accompanying Constantine�s army at the time, the vision was of the sun god�the deity worshiped by certain cults under the name of "Sol Invictus," "the Invincible Sun." There is evidence that Constantine, just before his vision, had been initiated into a Sol Invictus cult.

In any case the Roman Senate, after the Battle of Milvian Bridge, erected a triumphal arch in the Coliseum. According to the inscription on this arch Constantine�s victory was won "through the prompting of the Deity." But the deity in question was not Jesus. It was Sol Invictus, the pagan sun god.

Contrary to tradition, Constantine did not make Christianity the official state religion of Rome. The state religion of Rome under Constantine was, in fact, pagan sun worship; and Constantine, all his life, acted as its chief priest. Indeed, his reign was called a "sun emperor-ship," and Sol Invictus appeared everywhere�including on the imperial banners and the coinage of the realm.

The image of Constantine as a fervent convert to Christianity is clearly wrong. He himself was not even baptized until 337�when he lay on his deathbed and was apparently too weakened or too apathetic to protest. Nor can he be credited with the Chi Rho monogram. An inscription bearing this monogram was found on a tomb at Pompeii dating from two and a half centuries before.

The cult of Sol Invictus was Syrian in origin and imposed by Roman emperors on their subjects a century before Constantine. Although it contained elements of Baal and Astarte worship, it was essentially monotheistic. In effect, it pronounced the sun god as the sum of all attributes of all other gods and thus potential rivals. Moreover, it conveniently harmonized with the cult of Mithras�which was also prevalent in Rome and the empire at the time and which also involved solar worship.

For Constantine the cult of Sol Invictus was, quite simply, expedient. His primary, indeed obsessive, objective was unity�unity in politics, in religion, and in territory. A cult or state religion that included all other cults within it obviously helped to achieve this objective. And it was under the auspices of the Sol Invictus cult that Christianity consolidated its position.

Christian orthodoxy had much in common with the cult of Sol Invictus, and thus the former was able to flourish unmolested under the latter�s umbrella of tolerance. The cult of Sol Invictus, being essentially monotheistic, paved the way for the monotheism of Christianity. And the cult of Sol Invictus was convenient in other respects as well�which both modified and facilitated the spread of Christianity. By an edict promulgated in AD. 321, for example, Constantine ordered the law courts closed on "the venerable day of the sun" and decreed that this day be a day of rest. Christianity had hitherto held the Jewish Sabbath�Saturday�as sacred. Now, in accordance with Constantine�s edict, it transferred its sacred day to Sunday. This not only brought it into harmony with the existing regime but also permitted it to further dissociate itself from its Judaic origins.

Until the fourth century, moreover, Jesus� birthday had been celebrated on January 6th. For the cult of Sol Invictus, however, the crucial day of the year was December 25�the festival of Natalis Invictus, the birth (or rebirth) of the sun, when the days began to grow longer. In this respect, too, Christianity brought itself into alignment with the regime and the established state religion.

The cult of Sol Invictus meshed happily with that of Mithras�so much so, indeed, that the two are often confused. Both emphasized the status of the sun. Both held Sunday as sacred. Both celebrated a major birth festival on December 25. As a result Christianity could also find points of convergence with Mithraism�the more so as Mithraism stressed the immortality of the soul, a future judgment, and the resurrection of the dead.

In the interests of unity Constantine deliberately chose to blur the distinctions among Christianity, Mithraism and Sol Invictus�deliberately chose not to see any contradictions among them. Thus, he tolerated the deified Jesus as the earthly manifestation of Sol Invictus. Thus he would build a Christian church and, at the same time, statues of the mother goddess Cybele and of Sol Invictus, the sun god

CX · 01-30-2002, 05:36 AM

Quote:

Originally posted by Toto:
Christianity was entwined with the cult of Sol Invictus in the Roman Empire under Constantine. The Papacy got its start under the Roman Empire.

<a href="http://www.crosscircle.com/CH_2f.htm" target="_blank">Mithras and Constantine</a>

Do you have any other references on this. I'm not sure I trust this source given the obvious theological motive of the author who goes on throughout the site to promote some kind of newage "cosmic spirituality" WooWoo. I concur that Constantine's conversion was out of expediency more likely than genuine religious expression, but I'd like to see confirming evidence from additional sources.

CX · 01-30-2002, 05:40 AM

Quote:

Originally posted by CowboyX:


Do you have any other references on this. I'm not sure I trust this source given the obvious theological motive of the author who goes on throughout the site to promote some kind of newage "cosmic spirituality" WooWoo. I concur that Constantine's conversion was out of expediency more likely than genuine religious expression, but I'd like to see confirming evidence from additional sources.

Additional proof this guy is off his nut:

The irreconcilable barrier between Christian and Jew has been the firm conviction it was the Jew, Pontius Pilate, who knowingly sent the Messiah to the Cross.

Pilate was a Jew?!?!?! I think this guy is just making up what suits him.

RyanS2 · 01-30-2002, 06:11 AM

Quote:

Originally posted by CowboyX:


Additional proof this guy is off his nut:

The irreconcilable barrier between Christian and Jew has been the firm conviction it was the Jew, Pontius Pilate, who knowingly sent the Messiah to the Cross.

Pilate was a Jew?!?!?! I think this guy is just making up what suits him.

The original author was right about Constantine, at least in the major senses. I remember someone asking about Pilate in another thread, (don't remember which one). I found a pretty good link on the history of Pilate. <a href="http://cedar.evansville.edu/~ecoleweb/articles/pilate.html" target="_blank">http://cedar.evansville.edu/~ecoleweb/articles/pilate.html</a>

Another one:

<a href="http://www.livius.org/pi-pm/pilate/pilate01.htm" target="_blank">http://www.livius.org/pi-pm/pilate/pilate01.htm</a>

No mention of him being a Jew though, and both are pretty thorough. Some of the spurious documents that the sources talk about, (read that as "legends"), say that he was a Spaniard, or a German, however, almost everyone puts him as a Roman.

Anunnaki · 01-30-2002, 08:33 AM

Toto`s page is probably a lot more reliable than these two pages I found lastnight......

<a href="http://www.aloha.net/~mikesch/monstr.htm" target="_blank">Here`s</a> what the Seventh-Day Adventists have to say on the subject. (much of it coincides with Toto`s link)

<a href="http://www.cathinsight.com/apologetics/adventism/monstr.htm" target="_blank">Here`s</a> the Catholic response to the SDA`s page listed above. Their rebuttle sounds like pure BS and it`s capped off by their ending paragraph....

Quote:

I am saddened that SDA's do not realize that Satan is using them to mislead others, so that they may not see the REAL Whore and the REAL Anti-Christ coming when the appointed time comes.�

So it`s either Toto`s "WooWoo" link or the wacko links above that we must take our info from. Perhaps CowboyX would care to let us in on some sources he trusts on this issue or maybe we`ll just have a new age bashing fest and this thread will go the way of my Jesus Mysteries thread.

[ January 30, 2002: Message edited by: Anunnaki ]

RyanS2 · 01-30-2002, 08:56 AM

Dunno, but looking for more credible resources, I think I found one that Lpetrich may like. He has the mythic-hero profile, and this website agrees with that:

<a href="http://members.tripod.com/cryskernan/mythic_christ.htm" target="_blank">http://members.tripod.com/cryskernan/mythic_christ.htm</a>

Doesn't talk about the sun icon thing though. I wasn't able to find any decent websites with information on it.

Toto · 01-30-2002, 09:07 AM

Quote:

Originally posted by CowboyX:


Additional proof this guy is off his nut:

The irreconcilable barrier between Christian and Jew has been the firm conviction it was the Jew, Pontius Pilate, who knowingly sent the Messiah to the Cross.

Pilate was a Jew?!?!?! I think this guy is just making up what suits him.

Where did you find this quote? It looks a lot like a typo, since it doesn't make sense. It looks like the words and not were left out, and it should have read

The irreconcilable barrier between Christian and Jew has been the firm conviction it was the Jew, and not Pontius Pilate, who knowingly sent the Messiah to the Cross.

---

I originally found this page when I was looking for something else. I see now that the site is new-age and pagan, but I thought that this page was pretty straight history. It agreed with other things I had read, and summarized them well.

Fortuna · 01-30-2002, 09:24 AM

Quote:

Originally posted by Anunnaki:
Toto`s page is probably a lot more reliable than these two pages I found lastnight......

<a href="http://www.aloha.net/~mikesch/monstr.htm" target="_blank">Here`s</a> what the Seventh-Day Adventists have to say on the subject. (much of it coincides with Toto`s link)

Sorry, but the SDA's agenda is just too anti-catholic for me to take anything they say seriously. They have major credibility problems themselves. Their prophetess (Ellen Gould White) got so many things wrong that it makes their position very weak. (she ws a Millerite, anticipating his apocalypse which never happenned, then predicted one on her own, which didn't materialize, not to mention her obsession with meat and sex). So, they just resort to catholic bashing to bolster their own position.

Summary - To bolser their own position, SDA's don't rely on their own truth, but instead begin by bashing the beliefs of others. To me that says quite a bit about their character and agenda.

Anyway, these sunburst images are in fact common. Next time you are in Rome, take a tour of the catacombs, and look at the inscriptions on the Christian graves there. You will see the chi-ro, the sunburst, the name of iouses, and all of these so-called pagan symbols, all of which look to have been used long before Constantaine and the official Roman Catholic church. I have visited the catacombs, and seen these images firsthand. Tour guides will tell you that this section is from the second century.

I think what we are really seeing here is religious syncretion. Christianity developed and progressed. Let's not forget that by the mid second century, we already see wide variations among Christian beliefs (Marcion, Valentinus, Justin Martyr). By Constantaine's time, this was all established by tradition.

Quote:

<a href="http://www.cathinsight.com/apologetics/adventism/monstr.htm" target="_blank">Here`s</a> the Catholic response to the SDA`s page listed above. Their rebuttle sounds like pure BS and it`s capped off by their ending paragraph....
[/QB]

What did you expect ? Why is this BS ? Haven;t you seen depictions of Jesus with a sunburst behind his head ? Does it represent the sun god, or is it the artists traditional way of projecting this image ?

Next time you meet an SDA, lay this one on them. Did they know that Ellen White's full name adds up to 666, the number of the beast ? Here is how ;

Ellen Gould White - extract Roman numerals (Remember that u = v in early latin, and W was represented as 2 V's. So

E L L E N G O V L D VV H I T E
L L V L D VV I

50+50+5+50+500+5+5+1 = 666 The number of the beast

LOL

Fortuna

Anunnaki · 01-30-2002, 09:56 AM

So what if these sources have a Pagan agenda? What does it matter to us if they would like to see Christianity to return to it`s gnostic origins? They`re not asking us to participate in the Mysteries,damming us to hell or trying to convince us that miracles happen and Jesus really did ascend into the sky.

The whole point of the Mysteries and gnosis was to know yourself and the tall tales of the saviors were just allegories to help the initiate on his journey in becoming his own god or christ.
Whats so wrong with that? Why do some of us feel the need to make fun of these people? I can understand the churches dire need for hating and trying to belittle them,but why should we? They`re on OUR side for crying out loud and their spiritualism that we lack seems to be their driving force for shining a light on the truth about Christianity.
These people are pissed off at the Roman Catholic church for fucking up the age old Mysteries and they`re trying to correct the hideous injustice that has been done to civilization. I think they should be applauded for this.

[ January 30, 2002: Message edited by: Anunnaki ]

01-29-2002, 07:27 PM	#1
Anunnaki Senior Member Join Date: Nov 2001 Location: I`ve left and gone away Posts: 699	The sun of God Take a look at the following pictures..... Temple of Apollo the sun god The Pope with his monstrance Discuss. [ January 29, 2002: Message edited by: Anunnaki ]</p>

01-30-2002, 09:56 AM	#10
Anunnaki Senior Member Join Date: Nov 2001 Location: I`ve left and gone away Posts: 699	So what if these sources have a Pagan agenda? What does it matter to us if they would like to see Christianity to return to it`s gnostic origins? They`re not asking us to participate in the Mysteries,damming us to hell or trying to convince us that miracles happen and Jesus really did ascend into the sky. The whole point of the Mysteries and gnosis was to know yourself and the tall tales of the saviors were just allegories to help the initiate on his journey in becoming his own god or christ. Whats so wrong with that? Why do some of us feel the need to make fun of these people? I can understand the churches dire need for hating and trying to belittle them,but why should we? They`re on OUR side for crying out loud and their spiritualism that we lack seems to be their driving force for shining a light on the truth about Christianity. These people are pissed off at the Roman Catholic church for fucking up the age old Mysteries and they`re trying to correct the hideous injustice that has been done to civilization. I think they should be applauded for this. [ January 30, 2002: Message edited by: Anunnaki ]</p>

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01-30-2002, 08:56 AM	#7
RyanS2 Regular Member Join Date: Dec 2001 Location: Louisiana Posts: 216	Dunno, but looking for more credible resources, I think I found one that Lpetrich may like. He has the mythic-hero profile, and this website agrees with that: <a href="http://members.tripod.com/cryskernan/mythic_christ.htm" target="_blank">http://members.tripod.com/cryskernan/mythic_christ.htm</a> Doesn't talk about the sun icon thing though. I wasn't able to find any decent websites with information on it.

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