The Crucifixion in History (page 3)

BluesBrother

I dont know whether this will work, but with a bit of luck , and crossed fingers, this may be the picture referred to in my previous post

I noticed the picture too. It is worth saying tho that they don't deny the practice of crucifixion (as technically differentiated from impalement), they just insist Jesus was not killed this way.

Hooberus, it's nice to see conviction. I have benefitted from your relentless demand for proof. I agree that too great a dependence upon Kersy Graves has spoiled the subject. He seems to have exaggerated perhaps even lied about details of parallels between pagan savior stories and the Jesus legend. He has done a disservce to the study of religious history, even set back work on the question of Christian origins a hundred years. It is good to find sites like the Infidels site that has honestly protrayed his work as unreliable. Why he felt the need to fudge the facts who can say. Sensationalism seems a likely motive. Any honest review of the known and confirmed facts however leads to the same conclusion. Dying/raising or disappearing/reappearing godmen/women with miraculous conceptions have been a standard of religion for millenium. Sages/godmen have always demonstrated their divinity thru miracles and prophecy. As i have said before the issue is not simple "copycatting" is is religious evolution. The Jesus story as a Jewish rendition of solar worship is as unique as any cult forms before it.

Anyway I have to thank you for your defence of your beliefs as this has improved my understanding of the study and provided me with a clearer vision of the past.

Black Sheep

Detail from "How can blood save Your life?", page 7

peacefulpete

Along with some real silliness like microscopic inspection of True Cross relics, the Catholic Encyclopedia on line has some interesting comments about the cross in antiquity and during Christian period.

Leolaia

I noticed the picture too. It is worth saying tho that they don't deny the practice of crucifixion (as technically differentiated from impalement), they just insist Jesus was not killed this way.

Except they also insist that neither the words crux or stauros meant "cross" until way into the fourth century A.D. So the Romans used crosses but just didn't have a word for it? You see the problem? That is what I focused in paper as the central problem with the Society's argument -- it makes no semantic sense. If the technology has already changed, and if the word was already used to refer to the earlier incarnation of the technology, existing words apply to the new technology if no other new words get coined. Otherwise, how else would the people refer to the new whachamacallit contraption? And so, the Society has had to deny that two-beamed crosses were in use by the first century (despite its clear attestation in the second century B.C. in the works of Plautus), and thus when they quoted from Tacitus in the Revelation Climax referring to the Neronian persection book they had to replace the words "crosses" with "[stakes]".

Leolaia

peacefulpete

I didn't remember that, thanks. On another site this has recently come up as well. There are others that insist that the Romans did not use the cross around 30CE (Vine for example,tho he also had his religious reasons for asserting so). Church Fathers debated the shape, whether an X shape, T shape or 5 armed contraption. All this offers credence to the fact that the whole thing is myth. As to whether the x or t shaped thingys were called "stauros" is however quite certainly yes as you said. Usually the arguers against the cross quote reference works that define stauros as originally an upright pole and only later a cross or ... This is deceptive as the references works typically go on and assert that the NT was referring to a cross as the word had by then come to mean many things. Secondary evidence and NT implication make the matter fairly clear. The NT writers intended to say that Jesus died on a cross shaped device.

hooberus

peacefulpete said: The practice of crucifixion popularised by the Romans doubtless influenced the cults of the time. Perhaps this is why Mithraists, Dionysian cults, and Christians incorporated it into their stories.

I have not yet seen a Mithras "crucifixion" account. The crucuifixion depections of Dionysus post-date Christianity and were probably borrowed from Christianity rather than from Roman crucifixion per se (Roman crucifixion was not a religion but a method of execution.)

Then again perhaps someone named Jesus was in fact killed in this way for sedition as the Bible says. Either way the serendipty was undeniable. Crosses having centuries before been used as religious icons. Stories like Innana's crucifixion, Attis being worshipped as an effigy upon a tree,Prometheus nailed to a pole, Ixion's punishment by being affixed to a solar cross, all must have played a part in framing the Christian theology and symbolism.

Innana was I believe turned into a corpse /a piece of rotting meat on a hook. Attis being worshipped in conjunction with a tree was discussed earlier on this thread. Prometheus was in all written accounts that I have read bound by chains to a rock. There does exist some pre-christian pictures showing him bound to an engraved pillar. I believe that the pillar may be symbolic of Mt Caucasus, rather than a tree. An online encyclopedia says: "In Greek mythology, the Caucasus was one of the pillars supporting the world. Prometheus was chained there by Zeus." http://www.nationmaster.com/encyclopedia/Caucasus I don't think that any of the above three (I am still researching Ixion) are in reality very parallel to the crucifixon account of Jesus Christ. The death account of Jesus Christ is that of death by Roman crucifixion which is attested as occuring by both biblical writers as well as secular writers.

peacefulpete

From your Tektonics site......she was hung on a stake after being killed (via "the death stare" by the judges of the underworld, whom she had tricked the gatekeeper to get in to see), and also brought back to life -- vindicated!

Mithra was killed and returned to life in late versions of the story. This is likely because the popularity of the motif was cresting in the early centuries CE. Some have chosen to call this a crucifixion, as in the comon vernacular 'you crucified him!" when describing a total defeat. Whether there exists art that depicts him on a cross or pole i do not know.

peacefulpete

Solar Cross (Odin's cross, wheel of Taranis)

Back to Last Page Full Glossary

Related Terms :

? Swastika
? Faravahar
? Cross
? Winged disk

Related Resources:

? Asatru
? Kemet
? Neopagan ? Zoroastrianism

Glossaries :

? Symbol Glossary
? Alternative Religions Glossary
? Glossary of Magick and the Occult

Alternative Religion/ features/ Alternative Religions Glossary / Dictionary of Symbols

Definition: The Solar cross is probably the oldest religious symbol in the world, appearing in Asian, American, European, and Indian religious art from the dawn of history. Composed of a equal armed cross within a circle, it represents the solar calendar- the movements of the sun, marked by the solstices. Sometimes the equinoxes are marked as well, giving an eight armed wheel. (The swastika is also a form of Solar cross.)

The cross in its most simplified form (shown above) is known in Northern Europe as Odin's cross, after the Chief God of the Norse pantheon. It is often used as an emblem by Asatruar, followers of the Norse religion.

The Celtic cross is a symbol of the Celtic Christian Church, borrowed from the pre-Christian Celtic Pagan emblem of the God Taranis: Another similar symbol is the symbol of the ancient Assyrian God Shamash: The Lauburu (four heads), a traditional Basque emblem, is also a form of solar cross: The Etruscan God Ixion was often depicted crucified on a solar wheel (note the similarity to the Chi-Ro cross):
The Aztec solar deity Quetzalcoatl, depicted crucified on an equal armed cross:

peacefulpete

Iananna, the Sumerian Queen of Heaven, decides to descend to the underworld. This ancient Sumerian myth (1750 BCE) contains several precedants to the Christ myth.
Before beginning her journey, she gathers the seven divine decrees and puts oinment on her face, by which she could arguably be called a "christ".
As Iananna descends, she must pass through seven gates. (One will note the similarity the archonic gates the Gnostic Redeemer has to this earlier myth). In order to pass through, at each gate she is obliged to give up one of her seven divine decrees. When she finally passes through the seventh gate, she is left bowed and naked, even her garments have been removed. (one will note the similarity of Phillipians 2 humbling of Christ).
Naked and bowed low, Inanna entered the throne room of the underworld ruler, Ereshkigal. There she is executed and hung upon a stake to rot. (one will note similarities of crucifiction). Outside the last gate, Heb. 13:12).
But Iananna has left instructions with her servant Ninshubur that if she does not return from the nether world in _Three Days and Three Nights_ the god Enki is to be entreated for help. Just so, Iananna is resurrected from the dead by the powers of the Bread of Life and the Water of Life.
"Upon the corpse hung from a stake they directed the fear of the rays of fire,
Sixty times the food of life, sixty times the water of life, the sprinkled upon it,
Inanna arose."
Even so, she ascends! The dead accompany her ascent. The under world rulers flee. The demons throw themselves in the dirt at her feet.
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The Crucifixion in History

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