Christianity on Trial; Final Hearing

“Religions persist because most people prefer to be told what to believe.”

– Xenocrates

Most of the world’s religions, including Christianity, can be traced back to the same sources, causes and primary elements that were passed down from generation to generation – each adding their own twist to a growing mythology. This, the final chapter of Christianity on Trial will attempt to critically examine almost everything you’ve come to believe in with merciless, academic precision. I will clinically reduce it’s core concepts to elementary causation and systematically expose it for what it really is. When I’m done, I dare you to continue believing what you believe. This post will succinctly reaffirm every ounce of doubt you ever had and cause you here on after, to think like I do – never taking anything you hear for granted ever again. Can you handle the truth? Are you ready to see what I want to show you? 

WARNING: This particular entry doesn’t respect any sacred lines. It doesn’t pull any punches and it is not aimed at being politically correct. If you’re not a critical thinker, then this information may either shock or offend your sensibilities if you haven’t heard it all before. All of the information presented here can be researched and verified on your own. In fact, I encourage you to not accept anything you read here. I am very confident that if you did your own research, you will come to very similar if not exactly the same conclusions. Read on if you dare.

Sky Religion 101  

Mankind has long recognised things in the world that were considered greater than himself. In fact, whatever he feared or didn’t understand, he worshipped. This is a natural psychological phenomenon that is a part of our hard coded survival instinct. A wimp cowers before a bully for the same reason that your dog whimpers at your feet when you come home. Paying humbled respect to that which is considered superior to yourself is perceived to warrant continued survival. So whatever was considered the cause of life, death and everything in between, was worshipped and anthropomorphised (i.e., made human-like) as a god.

One of the most worshipped of these objects was the Sun. The Sun is a life giving force at the centre of our solar system. Every culture on earth since the dawn of man recognises this reality and, as expected, has long worshipped it. In virtually every ancient culture, the sun is worshipped with great fondness. As time advanced, mankind recognised the need for the recognition of a God – a great and singular creator. Some referred to the Sun as God, giving light to the world, a saviour of mankind, etc.

Not only did men worship the Sun, but they also worshipped the stars. They soon began to differentiate patterns among the stars, and realised that these patterns repeated themselves every 365 days. They used the stars to guide their travel, and to predict future events. They even anthropomorphized each star pattern (aka Constellation) as mythical creatures & people. Of the constellations, twelve became most popular. They became known as the Zodiac, which is a word which refers to the anthropomorphication of the constellations. Each Zodiac constellation was associated with elemental occurrences during the year, like Aquarius, bringer of Spring Rain. The days on which each Zodiac occurrence was noted eventually became the 12 months of the year.

Of all the ancient cultures, the Egyptians are recognized as the most religious. They deified not only the light, but also the darkness. The Sun was represented by their god ‘Horus‘ and the darkness by their god ‘Set‘. Horus is the Sun god of light and Set the moon god of Night. Thus each day, it is said that Horus and Set were in constant battle. In the morning, Horus would defeat Set and send him into the underworld. In the evening, Set triumphs over Horus, and the battle began anew. This classic battle between good and evil, darkness and light is still the most popular concept expressed on innumerable levels in stories and mythology to this very day. You can find this kind of reference in every ancient culture all over the world, and consequently, in every religion in the world.  These are the fundamental bases upon which all other systems of belief are constructed. However, it was the Egyptian system which became the most sophisticated of these, and as such, spawned several thousand years of pagan tradition…

Jesus Horus Christ

We need to examine the Egyptians’ mythology surrounding their Sun God “Horus” (also referred to as ‘Ra’ in other incarnations) as you will see why this god is of particular interest. Please note that this mythology has been dated at roughly 3000 B.C. This is significant to note as it has bearings on what we think we believe today. Through the anthropomorphication of the elements, the Egyptians weaved a complex tale about each element in the Zodiac and other heavenly bodies, including the Sun. Consequently, here is the story of Horus:

• Horus was born on the Winter Solstice (around December 25th). 
• His birth was one of a fatherless conception from the womb of Isis-Meri.
• His birth was accompanied by a star in the east which led 3 kings to adorn him as a child.
• He became recognized in a temple rite around the age of 12.
• There is no record of his life for the next 18 years.
• Then, he was baptised at the age of 30 by a figure known as Anup (also, Anubis) who was later beheaded.
• After his baptism, he began his ministry healing the sick and raising the dead, including Osiris.
• He dies and is resurrected after 3 days.
• Horus is referred to by many names, including “The Truth, The Light, Sun of God” and several others.

The Egyptians are the earliest known culture to record such a mythology around 3,000 B.C., but they are not necessarily to first to ever have done so as it was the Egyptians that pioneered the concept of written communication. Therefore, it is very possible that they too inherited the mythology from an even more ancient culture. However, what is most notable is the fact that this mythology surrounding a Sun God with all the elements mentioned above is not indigenous to the Egyptians. In fact the following deities have more or less very similar stories:

• 1,200 B.C. – Attis (Greece)
• 1,200 B.C. – Mithra (Persia)
• 900 B.C. – Krishna (India)
• 500 B.C. – Dionysus (Greece)
• 400 B.C. – Zeus (Greece)
• …and many more.

In fact, the image depicted above clearly shows the story of the nativity, Egyptian style. Reading the hieroglyph from left to right, we have Isis-Meri being notified of the miracle birth of Horus, followed by visitation by spiritual beings (denoted in Egyptian hieroglyphics as humans with animal heads), then following the birth, visitation by shepherds and kings who came to adorn the newborn with gifts. Does this sound even remotely familiar? If so, then you haven’t seen anything yet.

Do you remember Superman and where he came from and how he got his powers? It’s probably irrelevant that he came in a rocket ship from Krypton since like all the other Sun Gods, Superman came from the stars – literally from space. He, like Zeus, Krishna, Mithra and Jesus, was a God among men, a demigod as it were, who identified himself with the lowliest of mankind. He was borne to an earthly mother (Martha Kent) through a non-sexual production, just like his religious peers. Superman had followers and even shared his ideology. He was regarded as the Saviour of mankind, walked on water, saved people’s lives, brought Lois Lane back from the dead and all that Jazz. What I really wanted to note here however, is that Superman gets his powers from the Sun – while these other guys are seen as the equivalent of the Sun. I wonder if Superman creators Jerry Siegel and Joe Schuster knew about these parallels when they conceptualized Superman? How interesting! But I really want to get into why these beings have very similar backgrounds. The uncanny parallels between them cannot be ignored.

The Superman Mythology

All Sun Gods came from the stars; Horus, Krishna, Zeus, Jesus and even Kal-El – are all from off world. The fact that the comic book Superman derives his powers from the sun, the same object in the sky from which these other deities are derived, makes Superman fit just as snug in the same shoes as they. More importantly however, all of these Sun gods, like many others that came before them, share the same birth and death story because they’re all based on an astronomical phenomenon that occurs every single year. In fact, you will note after this section that the core story of the Biblical Jesus, like many of his fore runners, is based on astrological mythology:

1. For the last six months in the year, the Sun edges further and further south until on December 22nd, at which point Sun appears to stop moving south.
2. At this time, the Sun perceptually “resides” below the Southern Cross constellation, aka Crux, in the night sky and remains at that position for the next three days.  
3. Then, the brightest star in the eastern sky known as Sirius goes into alignment with the three stars in the belt of the constellation Orion. 
4. This alignment points to the general location on the horizon where the Sun will rise on the third day (December 25th). 

Thus, because of these astrological movements during this time of year, we have the story that:

1. The Son (Sun) dies on the Cross (Crux)
2. Is buried for three days (December 22nd – 24th)
3. Resurrected (re-birthed) on the third day (December 25th)
4. The star in the east (Sirius) leads the three wise men (the three stars in Orion were known as the “3 kings”) to the birth of the Son (Sun).

On December 25th, the Sun rises one degree north, signaling the end of winter, foreshadowing warmer times ahead. In ancient cultures, this becomes cause for much celebration and gift giving and thus, this is how the pagan festival came to be, which was rebranded as “Christmas” by the Romans some 3,000 years later. That’s why to this very day there are so many Christians that still believe that Jesus was born on December 25th, and why so many religious Christian circles still observe the decor and celebrations. Do you notice that this is a circular event? Well you should have, because the zodiac is depicted as such. But that’s not the only thing in the bible that appears to have been influenced from elsewhere.

The King James Xerox™

The story of Horus and all similar theologies that followed in the thousands of years thereafter are not the only ones to appear in the bible. In fact, the story of Moses, the great flood, the pairing of animals and what not, is not unique to Judeo-Christianity. In fact, the deluge story is rather ubiquitous and can be found in ancient cultures from all over the world. I’m talking about everyone from middle eastern cultures like the Babylonians (the Epic of Gilgamesh) to cultures found thousands of miles away in what is now central America, such as the Mayans. For a full break down of all of these historical writings, click here. In fact, many historians are inclined to believe that because this story is so ubiquitous, it is very possible that an event such as this actually occurred. However, the story remains relatively consistent right throughout:

• Mankind becomes corrupt and wicked 
• God(s) is/are angered.
• There is a large boat or similar floatation device involved that saves the only living righteous.
• Animals are paired and horded into this vessel.
• The whole world is destroyed by a flood after many days of rain.
• There are only 8 survivors; four men and four women.
• A bird is sent out to verify that the floods have ended.
• The leader of the survivors makes a pact with the God(s) or makes amends.
• The survivors repopulate the world.
• There is a Tower involved later on that causes a language split among the population.

Again, does any of this sound familiar? But wait! There’s moar!

An ancient Sumerian king by the name of Sargon of Akaad rose to power in a foreign kingdom after a sequence of unfortunate events. His mother, a high priestess of the city of Azupiranu, conceived him in secret then placed him in a basket, sealed it with tar, placed the tiny vessel on the river of the Euphrates and set him adrift. The river flooded, and took the baby in basket to the shore of the residence of then ruler, Akki, the water drawer. Akki took the babe in as his own son. He raised him as his gardener and then later, Sargon became king of that land. Now tell me, which Bible story does this very closely resemble? Unless God is in the habit of repeating history for the sheer fun of it, somebody is going to get sued for plagiarism.

Not even Justin Martyr, who was one of the earliest Christian defenders, could clarify why there were so many similarities between mythologies which predated Christianity. In fact, he may have done more damage by identifying the faith as a hoax more than anything else. In his first apology, Martyr actually says “And when we say also that the Word, who is the first-birth of God, was produced without sexual union, and that He, Jesus Christ, our Teacher, was crucified and died, and rose again, and ascended into heaven, we propound nothing different from what you believe regarding those whom you esteem sons of Jupiter“. When I first read this, I thought to myself, what the hell? 

In fact, for a rather detailed breakdown of the similarities between Christianity and Egyptian mythology, click here.

Missing History

After decades of descendant plagiarism at the behest of the rise and fall of several successive empires, the Roman Empire conquered much of the known world, and thus assimilated much of the world’s cultures, practices and yes indeed, religions. When Christ supposedly appeared, several documents were written about him, but curiously enough, only by those who wished to further the ideology of Christianity. In fact, there is no other written verification other than that which exists in the Bible of Christ’s appearance on earth. One would think that if such an epic event such as those which happened around Christ’s life actually occurred, then at least, like the flood story, there should be many other highly detailed non-Christian written accounts – right? Nope. Not one.

There were only four references to ‘Christ’ in this time – all of which have been proven to be forgeries. The references made by Pliny the younger, Tacitus and Suetonius were only discovered in the 15th century – a time when the Roman Catholic church was found to be fabricating many such things when under burden to provide proof. The fact that the references were only ‘discovered’ in the 15th century, even though they were written over 1300 years earlier, especially after all those works were scoured many times is one such glaring proof. The second is that they only refer to the word “Christ”, but not the name to which the title appears. The word “Christ” is a Greek title for “anointed”. It is not a name and it doesn’t refer to anybody in particular, just like ‘Mr.’ by itself doesn’t refer to anyone in particular. In fact, at that time, many people who had good character were referred to as “Christians” – including people who worshipped the pagan God Serapis.

The fourth reference to Christ comes from the work of known Jewish Historian, Flavius Josephus – which is also a forgery. This was proven by the fact that there was a common tradition in the 11th – 15th Century for the early Christians to make copies of original writings for distribution and other purposes. The two passages which make such reference are conspicuously out of style with the rest of the document and no other earlier copy of the document contains these two modifications. This obvious forgery again was used by the Catholic Church as a means by which to perpetuate and mobilize their ideology of a hybrid helio-astrological superman mythology.

The Greatest Hoax of All Time

The Roman Catholics are credited with the assembly, copying, manufacture, distribution and indoctrination of the masses with the known Bible. This is a well documented fact. They omitted several other “Gospels” written about the life of Christ which would have clued us into other mundane facts about his life on earth. The Catholics considered these gospels “non-canonical”, because they felt the books contributed little spiritual value. It is said that these gospels showed Christ to be more of a man than a God (let alone god’s son) by the Gnostic writers, and it wouldn’t work well with their campaign to sell their new religion (i.e. Christianity) to an unsuspecting world. As a result, we are left with books that examined the life of Christ from the limited points of view of the four known gospels. All the others which described events like his personal life, his friends, what really happened on that day of pentecost, among other events – were conveniently struck from the canon, as authorised by Constantine III of Rome. But wait, it gets better:

All of the gospels of Christ were written some 70 – 400 years after Christ donned his superman cape and flew off to Krypton. So how can a group of men (their identities are immaterial at this point) still dredge up such detailed accounts nearly a century after Christ left? Think about it: If the Gospels aren’t written based on second hand information, then the writers of Matthew and Mark had to be well over 100 years old when they wrote those gospels if they lived at the time of Christ. We know that by this time in history, men rarely exceeded the 75 year age mark. If Mark and Matthew actually lived in the time of Christ, their brains would have been too far rotted to have compiled such a detailed fabrication. One thing was for sure though: the Christian faith outsold and out-doctrinated more people in the world through sheer brute force at the time than any other – so much so that lots of spurious additions and modifications to the belief system were common place – like those described in my previous blog entries on the subject.

It was not until 362 A.D. that the churches decided to convene at the council of Nicea to agree on what they would preach as the doctrine of Christianity. They had to do this, because it was felt that there were too many churches spread across Europe and Asia preaching conflicting doctrines based on the same religion. So they met and decided to iron out once and for all, everything they could agree to believe on. Not everyone agreed with what was decided upon at the council. The many Christian denominations we currently have today are based on the various groups that descended out of the dissenting parties at the council. Many of the issues discussed at the council of Nicea became a part of Christian dogma and are perpetuated by the Nicene Creed. This creed outlined the basic tenets of Orthodox Christianity that everyone who subscribes to the faith should adhere to. The creed is not an exhaustive outlay of these beliefs. Rather, it acts as a rule of thumb such that deviations could be readily recognised as errors.

However, what if the creed is fundamentally flawed? What if the very premise of all of the tenets of the decision is likewise flawed? Here comes the final cross-examination of the core beliefs of Christianity:

1. The Divinity of Jesus – If they had to decide on whether or not Jesus was just a man (Gnostics) or a superman (orthodoxy), then it becomes plainly obvious that they’re selling everyone a cock & bull story.

2. The Sabbath – The Sabbath law, like all the other commandments were lifted from the Egyptian Principles of Maat. Even if the Sabbath law were a truly valid one, the Bible fails to note which calendar I should use. 

3. The Holy Trinity – Christianity cannot be polytheistic (God, Son, Spirit) and monotheistic (God?) all at the same time. Not only is it logically fallacious, but the Egyptian triune god head (Isis, Horus & Set) was the obvious influence for this. The kicker is that the doctrine was not formulated until some 400 years after Christ supposedly walked the earth. Talk about making stuff up as you go…

4. Sunday Worship – The holy day of Mithra is the Sun day. Mithra was a Sun God like Horus and Christ. The day on which Rome paid reverence to the emperor / pope is the same day on which Horus and Mithra were worshipped. This is a tradition lifted from Egypt where they worshipped their Pharaohs, seen as fleshly incarnates of their God Horus on the first day of the week, the SUN day. When Mithraism was fused with the cooler and newer Christ doctrines, it was really to keep up with the Joneses …er …Egyptians. That’s why Seventh Day Adventists advocate that Sunday worshipers are worshipping a man and not God. They’re right – except that they worship a Sun god too – just one day earlier. Wow. Major improvement there.

5. The Immaculate Conception – Lots of religions make vague reference to a similar idea where a God is spawned through a miraculous birth. The idea is key to selling Superma …er …Christ as a divine being. The Gnostics were decried as heretics thereafter to suggest that Jesus was just a mortal man. I guess they didn’t like that part of the script. I wonder if we get those deleted scenes on the dvd?

6. Christmas – This is a pagan celebration of the Winter Solstice. It has existed for well over 3,500 years as the festival of Horus, long before Jesus came along and bought the copyright.

7. Easter – Again, a pagan celebration of the Spring Solstice. Even though the death/resurrection story in pagan rituals actually occurs from December 22nd to 25th, the Roman Catholics who own the copyright thought it would be cool to celebrate the birth on the Dec. 25th and the resurrection at the time when the days grew longer.

I could go on forever, but alas, I can’t live that long and I’m pretty sure you get the point. Everything else was just made up along the way or pilfered from other religious movements. The pilfering continues to this very day.

Conclusion

Even though I was raised a Christian and was one of the most well learned Biblical scholars, there were so many things that stood out to me as being obviously wrong with what I believed (or was taught to believe), that I could no longer ignore them. As I got older, the curiosity got the better of me and I had to find out the truth. That’s where the search began – and as been going on since I was about 14 years old. I will admit that deep down in my heart, I want the faith to be real. I want it to be true. It would be really nice if all those things that I was taught in Sunday School were authentic. Now I realise that for the most part, most of what we believe appears to be a hoax of epic proportions; a pseudo religion cobbled together from ancient rituals, beliefs and inherited pagan rites.

I’ve seen many Christian counter-arguments against the ideas presented here. However, all of them are based on weak, circumstantial, logically fallacious, unresearched, emotionally-driven gabber. The best they can do is to say that the comparisons are “too general”. This is a lousy argument, because it is like saying that even though all cars from countries all over the world have four tyres, it does not suggest that the idea was inherited from the first person to invent a car with four wheels. All defense arguments are clutching at straws. There simply isn’t enough unique evidence in Christianity to distinguish it from other faiths, other than to say that its ideas were forced fed to the incumbents of the Roman empire for so long, that it has now garnered the largest religious following on earth.

I want to be proven wrong and I am hoping to God that I am wrong. Most people (including Christians) are victims of a paradigm where they prefer to be told what to believe – just like the early Christians and other religious enthusiasts at the time. This is the only reason why religion persists today, in spite of this modern world where we greatly value critical thinking. We use religion today as more of a means to cause harm than to create unity. In spite of all of this, I still believe that there is a God. I’m convinced now more than ever that righteousness is from God, but man created religion. I prefer to separate the two, because they are functionally mutually exclusive. Therefore, two possibilities now exist in my mind. Either:

1. God foreshadowed Christ’s coming by creating these similarties in other cultures long before Christ, OR…
2. The whole deal is a sham of epic proportions transcending generations, used to enslave cultures and establish empires.

While I can prove unequivocally that the latter is true, I cannot prove the former in any way shape or form, save for conjecture and personal comfort.

Some people would argue that I think too much and that is going to get me into trouble. I would argue that most people think too little, and they’re in far more trouble than they already realise. Some people believe that questioning my faith is blasphemous, and that will damn my soul to hell. I would argue that most people can’t even define what they believe, and thus have already damned themselves to their own foolishness. Some people say that I’ve backslidden, and that I should repent. But how can I backslide from a fairy tale? Some people say that I’m too arrogant. I would argue that they are too gullible. They say that humility is the key to salvation. I argue that salvation doesn’t need a key, since it was provided freely for all men. Others say that I am not Christian. I would argue that neither are they, since true Christians don’t judge their fellow men. Irrespective of what they argue, I contend that while they’re entitled to their own opinions, they’re not entitled to their own facts, since that’s what created this fairytale religion in the first place.

As for me, I’m going to seek the face of the one true God, unbound by the rules, rites, rituals and other horrendous obligations imposed upon men by ancient religious sun god worshipping con-artists. All I need to do is love God, and respect my neighbour. It doesn’t need to get any more complicated than that. That’s my story, and I’m sticking to it.