Saturday, December 05, 2009

The Christian Myth of Jesus's Birth

By the Rev. Howard Bess
December 5, 2009

The Advent season is a fun time. For many Christians, it is the happiest season of the year. The joy comes from the anticipation: “Joy to the world, the Lord has come. Let earth receive her king.”

Read on.

5 comments:

Unknown said...

How can you say that you are a christian and at the same time deny the truths from the Word of God? Does it mean that you accept as true only certain parts of the Bible?

Anonymous said...

Same old crap from supposedly "hard hitting" investigative journalism. For future reference "consortiumnews" = same crap, different url.

rightly said...

Belief is a natural function of the cortex. Belief permits mindfulness, the ability to concentrate on the moment without the distractions of preconceived ideas or emotional commitments while it performs a necessary duty. The belief process offers the illusion of certainty, continuity, and the comfort of permanence, even when we really have no idea how things work.
Belief is dependent on habituated learned behavior, a form of self hypnosis. We could nor survive without it. We would be incapable of objective reasoning is we were constantly aware of our environment and all the impinging ideas of real and imagined problems.
But the facts of Christianity begin with the advent of
Mithraic cults throughout the Roman world. Christianity, adapted the beliefs and rituals of the Persian God Mithra (600BC) to the Jewish teachings of the prophets.
This holiday was incorporated into the Catholic Church by transmuting the beliefs and rituals of the Mithras cult into Catholic doxology. The Vatican was built on the grounds dedicated to Mithras, (The God of Love and The Good Shepherd). It adopted the miter, the wafer, the altar, and baptism by water, of the earlier religion. The birth date of Mythras was December 25, His mysteries included the celebration of the solstice, Easter at the spring rebirth of nature, and of the God at the return of the sun. Constantine dedicated his coins to Mithras who became the popular cult of the Roman Soldiers as "Sol Deus Mithras Invincible" and "Sol Invictus", making the inclusion of this cult into any universal religion a political necessity.
The reason for the season is our choice to feel good.It has nothing to to with the good of others.

ChMoore said...

I'm with you Howard, and would add...

The Bible has never been a encyclopedic chronical of literal history; and its stories were never told as such. Reading it as literal history is missing the point, and leads to the idolatry and self-righteousness that is discouraged within it.

The facts may be in dispute, but the story is nonetheless true.

Lisa said...

You claim to know what was in the minds of the earliest Xn followers - not a sound idea...

Later you say it doesn't matter whether Jesus was born in Bethlehem. Yes, it does, if He is to fulfill the prophecies of Isaiah...

Perhaps you go into more detail elsewhere? I'd be interested as I was a Judaic Studies major. Thanks for the good read.