Response to Bedard’s Hellenistic Influence and the Resurrection

Stephen J. Bedard posted a blog where he linked to an article of his that was published in Journal of Greco-Roman Christianity and Judaism.

http://1peter315.wordpress.com/2008/12/11/hellenistic-influence-and-the-resurrection/

HELLENISTIC INFLUENCE ON THE IDEA OF RESURRECTION
IN JEWISH APOCALYPTIC LITERATURE

http://www.jgrchj.net/volume5/JGRChJ5-9_Bedard.pdf

I must say I was very impressed with that article. It is exactly the kind of scholarship that interests me. You did a good job of conveying the complexity of the Graeco-Roman world. You showed the subtle connections that are missed by thinking of religions as being entirley isolated from eachother.

I haven’t read as much about Judaism, and so I was glad to see you go into some detail about the Jewish beliefs about the afterlife. I knew Judaism had contact with Hellenism, but I’m not very familiar with the specifics beyond having read about Philo.

I noticed you mentioned Set and Osiris. Murdock writes about some theories of Set. Based on several quotes from scholars, she proposes that Set was originally the Samaritan god Seth, and that Seth entered Egyptian religion when the Samaritans conquered Egypt. The scholars she refers to are: James Bonwick, Dr. Samuel Sharpe, Dr. Louis Herbert Gray and Rev. Dr. Sayce
She also points out that Set originally wasn’t considered evil, but only later became the opponent of Osiris by playing a negative role in his death and resurrection story. Interestingly, Osiris and Set were considered brothers and were even combined as the dual god, Horus-Set.

Murdock doesn’t write about this, but I see a potential connection with the Coptic Gospel of Thomas attributed to Didymos Judas Thomas. I was reading elsewhere that, in later tradition, Judas “the twin” was considered the twin of Jesus. This isn’t to say that Set was a direct borrowing superimposed upon Judas. But, in the way you demonstrate in your article, Set may have been an influence on certain traditions about understanding Judas’ role.

The following quote from your article reminded me of something else that Murdock writes about.

“For a long time, the Egyptian idea of resurrection would have held little attraction for the Hebrews as it originally was a privilege only for the Pharaoh, and later for the very wealthy who could afford the elaborate burial procedures. However, the Middle Kingdom brought great theological advancements…”

Prior to the New Kingdom, love (mri) was bestowed upon a subordinate by a superior which also included by a god bestowing love to a follower, but this was strictly hierarchical except in certain situations such as a leader being beloved by his people. With the New Kingdom, love became a more common ideal where the follower could offer love to a god. There was an equality in that the person could, through love, join with their god. It was at this time that the epithet meri became extremely popular and was applied widely, in particular with Isis.

This is where Murdock points out that there is good evidence for an etymological connection not only between meri and Christian Mary but also meri and Jewish Miriam. She references a couple of sources that hypothesize that Miriam may have been an Egyptian name (the Catholic Encyclopedia and an editor’s note in Faiths of Man by Major-General James G.R. Forlong). She also references Rev. Dr. William Robertson Smith as connecting Miriam with Meri, and references Rev. Henry Tomkins as connecting Mary and Meri. Furthermore, she references both Dr. James Karl Hoffmeier and Alan H. Gardiner as connecting both Mary and Miriam with Meri.

Response to Bedard’s Laozi, Jesus and the Virgin Birth

My response to Bedard’s blog post about Laozi:

http://1peter315.wordpress.com/2009/01/06/laozi-jesus-and-the-virgin-birth/

“You are correct that most often it is a supernatural birth and not a virgin birth. But that is not how Jesus myth proponents state it. They describe pagan myths using New Testament language, even if it is not accurate in describing the myth,”

This is irrelevant. Yes, there are different words in different languages. But often meanings are similar if not the same. Words even etymologically evolve between languages as do other cultural elements such as religious motifs. For instance, Egyptian meri and Christian Mary may be etymologically linked.

Many goddesses were called virgins even after they gave birth. This is because their virginity was an inherent characteristic. When speaking about these issues, we are talking about mythology and not biology.

Another issue is that scripture says that Jesus has brothers and scripture doesn’t say that they weren’t Mary’s children. If they weren’t Mary’s children, scripture would’ve mentioned it. Anyways, Mary gave birth and still was considered a virgin. Obviously, her hymen was broken at least when Jesus came out. Also, considering that Paganism had examples of goddesses and women remaining or regaining virginity after sex, there is no reason to assume Joseph and marry never had sex.

Responding to Bedard’s Christ as Orpheus

Stephen J. Bedard had another blog I commented on: Christ as Orpheus.

http://1peter315.wordpress.com/2009/02/27/christ-as-orpheus/

And he linked to an article in the Biblical Archaeology Review, but it cost money and so I didn’t read it. The article he mentioned supposedly disproved that Christians borrowed from Pagans. However, I can’t argue against that article as I don’t know what it says. Interestingly, I did find another article at the Biblical Archaeology Review which supports borrowing.

Borrowing from the Neighbors: Pagan Imagery in Christian Art
by Sarah K. Yeomans

http://www.bib-arch.org/e-features/pagan-imagery.asp

You are correct that, for Christian apologetics, “It does not help that there seems to have been some sort of early Christian building that had a mosaic of Orpheus as a picture of Christ.” Nonetheless, it is a fact. And images like this are numerous.

Showing a pagan parallel doesn’t prove a Christian borrowing from Paganism, but the cumulative evidence is immense. Nothing is proved absolutely in that we can only speak of probabilities. Specific examples are only telling in relation to other examples. This is why scholars of comparative religion and comparative mythology tend to provide many examples to back up any hypothetical connection. To argue against the connection, you would need to argue in detail against the whole body of evidence.

Anyways, what all of this does show is that early Christians were knowledgeable of other religions and incoporated into Christianity motifs from those religions. Also, it causes one to suspect that the incorporating went further.

These Pagan images weren’t merely stylistic conventions. Within the Christianized Pagan images, there are obvious Pagan mythological motifs. Let me use some examples from another article I found at the Biblical Archaeology Review website.

The use of the image of Helios within both Judaism and Christianity is telling because it goes beyond imagery. Some of the respectable early Church fathers referred to Jesus as the “sun”. This was simply a common way in the Pagan world to refer to a savior god-man, but it also entails a complex solar theology that was pervasive throughout the Graeco-Roman world.
More relevant to this blog are the images of the Orpheus-Christ. Orpheus descends into the underworld and this same motif was used by Christians. Significantly, as far as I know, this motif isn’t supported by Christian scripture even though it was found within early Christian tradition. If it didn’t come from scripture, where did it come from? Maybe the same place the images came from. Also, the descent into the underworld was another common motif of solar mythologies in general.

The article also states outright that Christians borrowed the image of Mary nursing baby Jesus from the Egyptians. Isis was one of the most popular deities worshipped in the Roman Empire. Temples, shrines, statues, and icons of her were found all across Europe. As you know, many have theorized the Black Madonnas were originally Isis statues. Murdock spends about a hundred pages detailing the similarities between Isis and Mary. She does this by referring to Egyptian scholarship including that of Christian scholars, and she analyzes the relevant hieroglyphics of virgin birth nativities. Hieroglyphics are important to keep in mind because they’re not merely images and artistic styles but also a religious language based in religious concepts.

So, you seem to be admitting that early Christians borrowed imagery from the Pagans. Also, I think I noticed in another blog you admitted that Christians borrowed their holidays from Pagans. Are you trying to argue that all of this is mere superficial detail? If you took awasy all of the Pagan elements, what would be left?

All of the elements of Christianity can be found in prior Pagan religions: historical god-men, virgin births, slaughter of the babes, resurrection deities, salvific messages, and the list goes on and on. Some of these elements preceded Christianity by thousands of years.

No one can prove that there wasn’t a historical Jesus and no one can prove there was. Even if you could prove a historical Jesus, it doesn’t disprove that the stories of him were partly lifted from Pagan mythology. Removing the Paganism won’t prove the Good News of Christ’s coming to earth. Paganism and Christianity have become so entangled that I would argue they’re practically fused together. Considering what may be original to Christianity is important. But, ultimately, that may be more of question for faith than for scholarship.

Despite your criticisms of Harpur’s scholarship, why not embrace his vision? Wouldn’t a Christ figure that revealed himself to all cultures all over the world be more inspiring than a historical figure that no one of significance took notice of while he was alive? Anyways, plenty of reputable scholarship can be found elsewhere (such as in the Biblical Archaeology Review article).
The other article you linked, I couldn’t read because I don’t have the money to spend. If you could tell me the basic argument, I could respond.

Murdock on Justin Martyr’s Admission of Parallels

D.M. Murdock, Christ in Egypt, pp 517-19:


Regarding this matter of precedence for parallels, Witt advocated proceeding with caution, but was also certain that the Egyptian religion influenced Christianity, remarking:

“Historians, generally, and specifically those who trace the development of
religious ideas, need to avoid the trap of confusing the chronological order
with cause and effect: post hoc ergo propter hoc. On the other hand, the veneration (hyperdulia) of the Blessed
Virgin Mary was certainly introduced at about the same time Theodosius ordered
the destruction of pagan temples, including the Serapeum and other shrines of the Egyptian
gods. Here, we may think, lies a reason for the absorption of elements, ideas and
usages from the old religion into the new.”

As can be seen, the evident borrowing by Christianity continued well into the common era, during Theodosius’s time in the fourth century. Thus, simply because borrowing occurred during the “Christian era” does not mean it was by Paganism from Christianity. Again, what is designated as the “Christian era” did not descend suddenly upon the entire world after the year 1 AD/CE but is relative, and to this day there remains places that are still pre-Christian, showing no knowledge of or influence by Christianity.

In capitulating to the fact there are indeed very serious correspondences between the Egyptian and christian religions, apologists insist that these motifs can only be found dating to the middle of the second century at the earliest. When Justin Marty discussed them in detail, thereby supposedly showing that Paganism must have borrowed from Christianity. In the first place, this present work reveals otherwise, as practically everything significant within Christianity existed in one form or another in the Egyptian religion long before the common era, much of it revolving around the characters of Osiris, Isis and Horus.


Moreover, in his First Apology (54) Justin specifically claims these parallels, including the Greek god Bacchus/Dionysus’s ascension into heaven, as well the virgin birth and ascension of Perseus, were the result of “the devil” anticipating Christ’s story:

“For having heard it proclaimed through the prophets that Christ was to come…
[the wicked demons] put forward many to be called sons of Jupiter, under the
impression that they would be able to produce in men the idea that the things
which were said
with regard to Christ were mere marvelous tales, like the things which were said
by the poets.”

(Roberts, A., ANCL, II, 53-54)

In chapter 56 of his Apology, Justin pointedly states that the “evil spirits” were making their mischief “before Christ’s appearance.” (Roberts, A., ANCL, II, 55) In other words, Justin — and others using the same “devil did it” excuse, such as Tertullian and Lactantius — did not dishonestly deny the parallels, as have many modern apologists.” Indeed, these early Church fathers happily used these correspondences in their polemics and apologies to make Christianity appear less ridiculous — and ridiculous it evidently was perceived to be by the educated Greeks and Romans of the time. To these latter groups, the gospel story could not have been any more “real” or “historical” than that of Apollo or Neptune, and surely doubted Christ’s existence as a “historical” figure in ancient times. Moreover, nowhere does Justin Martyr claim that the Pagans copied Christianity after Christ’s alleged advent, which he certainly would have done, had the copying occurred in that direction.


It is obvious from Justin’s “devil got there first” excuse that these mythical motifs existed before Christ’s purported manifestation on Earth and that there were those n his time who sensibly questioned the historical veracity of the gospel story, essentially calling it “mere marvelous tales” – in other words, a myth. In Dialogue with Trypho (69), in fact, Justin again invokes the “devil got there first” argument, specifically stating that these Pagan “counterfeits” were likewise “wrought by the Magi in Egypt.” (Roberts, A. ANCL, II, 184) Now, which “counterfeits” and “Magi” would these be? The “Magi” must be the Egyptian Priests, apparently called as such by people of Justin’s era, while the “counterfeits” must refer to at least some of the Egyptian gods. Justin also specifically names the Greek gods Dionysus, Hercules, and Asclepius as those whose “fables” were emulated by the devil in anticipating Christ. As we have seen, these gods have their counterparts in Egyptian mythology as well, in Osiris and Horus, as prime examples.

Faith of the Early Apologists

Acharya S (aka D.M. Murdock), The Christ Conspiracy

pp 24.25:

Indeed, the story of Jesus as presented in the gospels, mass of impossibilities and contradictions that it is, has been so difficult to believe that even the fanatic Christian “doctor” and saint, Augustine (384- 430), admitted, “I should not believe in the truth of the Gospels unless the authority of the Catholic Church forced me to do so.” Nevertheless, the “monumentally superstitious and credulous Child of faith” Augustine must not have been too resistant, because he already accepted “as historic truth the fabulous founding of Rome by Romulus and Remus, their virgin birth by the god Mars, and their nursing by a she-wolf…”

Apparently unable to convince himself rationally of the validity of his faith, early Church Father Tertullian (c. 160-200) made the notorious statement “Credo quia incredibilis — I believe because it is unbelievable.” An “ex-Pagan,” Tertullian vehemently and irrationally defendedhis new faith, considered fabricated by other Pagans, by acknowledging that Christianity was a “shameful thing” and “monstrously absurd”:

“… I mean that the Son of God was born; why am I not ashamed of maintaining such a thing? Why! but because it is itself a shameful thing. I maintain that the Son of God died; well, that is wholly credible because it is monstrously absurd. I maintain that after having been buried, he rose again; and that I take to be absolutely true, because it was manifestly impossible.”

Early Apologists Speaking Honestly

"The Religion proclaimed by him to All Nations was neither New nor Strange."

~ Bishop Eusebius (264-c.340 AD/CE), The History of the Church (2:4)


"For what is now called the Christian religion existed of old and was never absent from the beginning of the human race until Christ came in the flesh. Then true religion which already existed began to be called Christian."

~ St. Augustine (354-430 AD/CE), Retractiones (1:13)

Tarnas on Agustine’s Anti-intellectualism

I own The Passion of the Western Mind by Richard Tarnas. I don’t normally read books about history except when they directly relate to religion, but this is a good book. It covers a lot of territory and sometimes I wish the author would go more deeply into certain aspects. Besides that minor complaint, the author does manage to capture some central streams of development. He spends a decent amount of time on Christianity and the Roman Empire, and that is why I was looking at it recently.

The following excerpt is about Augustine and the early Christian attitude toward science and rationality.

pp 113-14: Moreover, in the new self-awareness of the late classical and early Christian era, most acutely epitomized in Augustine, the individual soul’s concern for its spiritual destiny was far more significant than the rational intellect’s concern with conceptual thnking or empirical study. Faith alone in the miracle of Christ’s redemption was enough to bring the deepest saving truth to man. Despite his erudition and appreciation for the intellectual and scientific achievement of the Greeks, Augustine proclaimed:

“When, then, the question is asked what we are to believe in regrd to religion, it is not necessary to probe into the nature of things, as was done by those whom the Greeks call physici; nor need we be in alarm lest the Christian shoud be ignorant of the force and thenumber of the elemetns; the motion, and order, and eclipses of the heavenly bodies; the form of the heavens; the species and natures of animals, plants, stones, fountains, rivers, mountains; about chronology and distances; the signs of coming storms; and a thousand other things which those philosophers either have found out, or think they have found out…. It is enough for the christian to believe that the only cause of all created things, whether heavenly or earthly, whether visible or invisible, is the goodness of the Creator, the one true God; and that nothing exists but Himself that does not derive its existence from him.” (Enchiridion, in Augustine, Works, vol. 9, edited by M. Dods; Edinburgh (Edinburgh; Clark, 1871-77), 180-181.)

With the rise of Christianity, the already decadent state of science in the late Roman era received little encouragement for new developments. Early Christians experienced no intellectual urgency to “save the phenomena” of this world, since the phenomenal world held no significance compared with the transcendent spiritual reality. More precisely, the all-redeeming Christ had already saved the phenomena, so there was little need for mathematics or astronomy to perform the task. The study of astornomy in particular, being tied to astrology and the cosmic religion of the Hellenistic era, was discouraged. The monotheistic Hebrews had already had occasion to condemn foreign astrologers, and this attitude persisted in the Christian context. with its planetary deities, annd aura of polytheistic paganism, and with its proneness to a determinism antithetical to both divine grace and human responsibility, astrology was officially condemned by Church councils (with Augustine especially seeing the need for confuting the astrological “mathematicians”), as a result of which it gradually declined despite its occasional theological defenders. In the Christian view, the heavens were devoutly perceived as the expression of God’s glory and, more popularly, as the abode of God and his angels and saints, and the realm from which Christ would return at the Second Coming.

Even though this gives good context, I think Tarnas missed the heart of the matter. Augustine didn’t prize human responsibility above all else, and not all ancient astrology was deterministic (and certainly no more deterministic than Augustine’s theology). Early Christians were anti-intellectual (in particular towards astrology) because too much analysis would prove Christianity’s indebtedness to other religions and philosophies.

In seeming contradiction with what Augustine said in the above quote, he had also written that when the scriptures conflict with science that the believer should give authority to the latter. But I imagine that he was mostly thinking of the Old Testament when he wrote this. Augustine was fine with interpreting allegorically such scriptures as Genesis. However, his scientific education was surely rather limited and I doubt he ever considered the possibility that science might one day develop so far as to demonstrate the impossibility (i.e., reasonable doubt) of dead people resurrecting and other miracles.

What I find intriguing here is how Augustine correlated Paganism with rationality, science and basically any interest in the world whatsoever. He dismisses all of this as being irrelevant to Christianity. This is extremely significant because to this day orthodox Christianity still has a troubled relationship with rationality and science. The sad part here is that so many Christians over the centuries have perceived a non-existent conflict. Augustine says that all a Christian needs to know is that all things were created by a good Creator. Was he so clueless as to not realize that one could worship both the Creator and his Creation? Was he utterly ignorant of the fact that some Pagans (and some Gnostic Christians) did worship both the Creator and his Creation? I’m reminded of Augustine’s distinction between the sun and the Creator of the sun. He was implying that Pagans hadn’t made this distinction when, for example, the Egyptians had made this precise distinction.

And this isn’t just a theological issue. It was because Christians felt so little interest towards rationality and science that they didn’t realize the great intellectual tradition they were losing. In fact, as Augustine wrote about this subject in 420, the Catholic Church was in the process of destroying all knowledge it could get its hands on. How could a great intellectual like Augustine be so indifferent? Was he so cynical about the world that he was contented to see the Church (and the whole Roman Empire with it) commit intellectual suicide? Was he hoping this wholesale destruction would hasten the Second Coming or something?