The essence of JW condemnation for a cross comes from their
distaste for all things pagan. They reveal their own early Christ-cult notion
of separating themselves from things unholy, worldly or contaminated by religious
practice they consider false. Catholic Christianity chose the cross as its
symbol, a stylised torture instrument, and the WT as part of affirming its own
identity chose to disassociate itself from this emblem. As a fundamental
selling point, their rhetoric is always to make themselves appear pure and separate
from the world, an impulse borrowed from much of the OT writings, especially in
connection with the setting up of the henotheistic (one god among many) identity
of worship of the pagan Yahweh.
Their attempts are in vain! What the JW org can never
achieve is freedom from pagan beliefs. Christianity is sourced almost entirely from pagan folk myth,
just condemning the cross for being pagan is to not see the wood for the trees.
They are fixated on making the distinction between a cross and stake but miss
the fact that “crucifixion” at the saviour hero’s death was a key element of
the pagan story, the death at a specific time.
If you are still interested in my theme; around two centuries
before the beginning of the calendar it was observed that the equinox occurred at
the time when the path of the sun crossed the line of the equator as seen on a
primitive armillary sphere. The overlapping lines formed a “cross” as in a saltire
or St Andrew’s cross (like an X but on its side). At the spring equinox, (day
of equal daylight and night) the northern hemisphere sees a marked increase in
the intensity of light as the sun favours the north and correspondingly moves
away from the southern hemisphere. Events had always been explained by the
heavenly movements and this early technical discovery was incorporated into the
prevailing worship of the sun god Mithras. From then on he was often depicted
standing on a plinth with the equinoctial cross engraved on its sides. This was
to reinforce his lofty role as a Sun God... and when was he crucified? As were
all the christs, they were Sun-Gods: born annually at the mid-winter solstice
and sacrificially died annually at the spring equinox in other words “at the
cross” of the spring equinox. The Catholic Church had great interest in persuading
its many Mithras worshippers to embrace its fusion “catholic” faith. In the
fourth century it finally absorbed and fused together, or syncretised important
pagan beliefs establishing Roman Catholic orthodoxy, thereby gaining mass political
allegiance from the believers. This called for incorporating much of the Mithraic
dogma... including its need for the Lamb of God to die on a cross at Easter.
NT religion uses double
entendre to speak its catholic message.
