thought of the day.54

Prior to Genesis Babylonians had their own account of creation called “Enuma Elish,” which tells of the god Marduk forming man out of clay.

Before hymns were written to the biblical god they were written to the Egyptian god Ra: “Thou art the one god who came into being at the beginning of time. Thou didst create the earth. Thou didst fashion man, thou didst make the watery abyss of the sky, thou didst form the Nile, thou didst create the great deep, and thou dost give life to all that therein.”

The story of Noah and the Flood was borrowed from The “Epic of Gilgamesh.”

The story of the birth and rise to power of Moses was borrowed from The legend of “Sargon of Agade.”

Before the biblical god gave his laws to Moses, Shamash, the god of Babylonia gave his laws to Hammurabi and before either Moses or Hammurabi received their laws, the Sumerian King Ur-Nammu was given laws from the sky god An and the wind/storm god Enlil.

Much of the wisdom teachings or proverbs found in the Bible were drawn from an Egyptian collection by Amen-em-ope and the infamous admonishments to use a “rod” to strike children were taken from the Wisdom of Ahikar, a 7th century B.C.E. Assyrian folk tale.

Being born of a virgin was a common theme in pre-Christian religions as were the ideas of divine births in a stable or cave. Jesus was not the first to have his birth heralded by a star, attended by shepherds or be visited by gift-bearing magi. December 25th (an approximation of the Winter Solstice) was celebrated as the birthdate of other gods before the Church essentially stole the holiday from the pagans, making it Jesus’ birthday. Easter (an approximation of the Vernal Equinox) is also of pagan origin and was the time of year that the death and resurrection of pre-Christian Gods were celebrated.

Other saviors had 12 disciples (for the 12 zodiac signs) before Jesus did.

Before Jesus turned water into wine, Dionysus did it. Others were said to teach spiritual truths, walk on water, control the wind and rain, foretell the future, cast out demons, heal the blind and lame and raise the dead before Jesus supposedly worked these same miracles.

The Good Shepherd, the Word, the Light of the World, Son of Man, Son of God, God made flesh, the True Vine, and the Savior of the World described other deities before being attributed to Jesus.

The Dove, Fish and Lamb were symbols for pagan gods before becoming symbols for Jesus.

The taking away of sins, Holy Spirit, Trinity, descent into hell and return to life after three days, baptism and being born again were all pre-Christian concepts.

Speaking in tongues and eating the body and drinking the blood of a god (eucharist or holy communion) preceded Christianity.

Before Jesus' lifeless body was wrapped in linen and anointed with myrrh and aloe, Osiris’ was.

Myths that promised the return of a god in the last days and his subsequent reign of a thousand years circulated for centuries before such a story was written for Jesus.

The story of Jesus driving demons from a man into a herd of 2,000 pigs who rush over a cliff and drown seems to have been drawn from accounts of initiates in Eleusis, (numbering about 2,000) who would bathe in the sea with a pig to which their sins would be transferred upon which the pigs were chased over a chasm and killed.

The story of Jesus (Jn 21:11) performing a miracle enabling Simon Peter to catch exactly 153 fish seems to have come from Pythagoras who considered 153 a sacred number. The ratio of 153 to 265 was referred to by the Pagan Archimedes as "the measure of the fish." That ratio is used to generate a fish-like shape using two circles. The sign of the fish was used by the early Christians as their main symbol.

In Euripides’ play, The Bacchae, Dionysus is described as bringing a new religion to the people, being plotted against by the leaders, being arrested and appearing before the political ruler. Long before Jesus is made to utter nearly identical words, Dionysus said to his captors “You know not what you are doing...”

In fact, the story of Jesus consists of material borrowed from other myths to such an extent that J.M. Robertson writes, "There is not a conception associated with Christ that is not common to some or all of the Savior cults of antiquity.”

Not a single historian alive at the time that Jesus is said to have lived records his existence. In his work, On The True Doctrine, c 178 AD, Celsus writes,“Clearly the Christians have used ... myths ... in fabricating the story of Jesus' birth'...It is clear to me that the writings of the Christians are a lie and that your fables are not well-enough constructed to conceal this monstrous fiction."

Jesus, as conveyed in the bible, is simply a myth built upon myths.