Here's a video that accompanies the news from 2008, as I reported in my blog here:
Ancient Tablet Evidence of Jesus Myth?
An ancient Hebrew tablet is creating a stir after certain scholars identified it as containing a pre-Christian account of the awaited Jewish messiah's death and resurrection after three days. If this artifact is genuine, from the era claimed, and actually says what is asserted, the discovery clearly demonstrates that the idea of a messiah, savior or divine redeemer dying and rising after three days existed decades before the alleged advent of Jesus Christ. This dying-and-resurrecting motif is one of a number that various writers and scholars have claimed demonstrate Jesus to represent not a "historical" personage but a mythical concept found in religious ideologies and mythologies long prior to the so-called Christian era.
Comments (7)
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|2011-08-20 21:04:41 Robyn Kelley Lawson - Dr.It is common knowledge that almost EVERY culture has had the same ideology regarding a risen saviour, most considered myths today (a myth is a religion that is no longer in practice). It is also common knowledge that nobody knows of a certainty who the author(s) of the books contained in the New Testament actually were. From my own personal research, I am beginning to be inclined toward believing that the Roman Catholic church is the author.
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|2011-08-21 18:30:31 Z"It is common knowledge that almost EVERY culture has had the same ideology regarding a risen saviour, most considered myths today."
China didn't. It only received a serious injection of Christianity with the Jesuits back in the 16th century. The idea that a god could die, to the Chinese mind, is the very proof that it could not be a god, as, to them, when such an entity died, it was truly dead. There are other cultures too, but as the Chinese population were never a minority I think this is enough of a rubuttal . . .
"(A) myth is a religion that is no longer in practice."
Nope. "Religion" is a Western category that arose as a result of its unique history. Buddhism, e.g., is not a religion, it is a "yana", and China again eludes Western classification. As for "myth", your definition is nonsense. You are describing superstition if anything. A little study of the subject might help you unconfused yourself.
(Contemptuously) Z
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|2011-08-21 18:45:12 Jerry - a myth is a religion that is no longer in practiceIn reality, a myth was an explanation of events, usually containing a supernatural or beings, that was considered to be real by the teller. You will also be surprised to find that many of the religions that you think are no longer in practice, are really alive and well in the modern world. There may not be as many worshipers of Zeus, Thor, and Isis as there are members of the three largest mainstream religions, but there are enough to call these religions active.
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|2011-09-05 11:36:27 BESH - Solar Deity = Solar DeityHello,
Find the facts your self.
The metaphor - Jesus. is a solar event.
The sun travels south from the summer solstice, in the north. to the winter solstice in the south. Longest day to the shortest day of the year.
He "dies" on the cross, which means in the constellation of Orion "the southern cross" and is reborn after three days. Meaning that the sun's starts its journey northward and the days begin to get longer.
Best of luck in your understanding and seeing the truth behind the transmission.
Peace and Love
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|2011-09-05 17:36:16 AnonymousAs I have figured it out (and this is only my reasoning, but it makes sense to me), the Emperor Constantine came to the purple by winning what was in effect a civil war. He found himself having to maintain order in the Empire, but didn't want to be a sitting pigeon for the next ambitious gauleiter with an army behind him to come along. Mulling this problem over, he recalled that back in Brittania and Gaul, where he had come from, order was largely maintained by the compliant Druid priests, who of course had a presence in every community in the land. Aha! If he could cagole some established religion to go along with the idea, perhaps their priesthood could perform the same fine service for him throughout the Empire - he would assure his own security from other ambitious generals, and would save one hell of a lot of money that had hitherto been spent on maintaining the Army (whose job seems to have been to enforce the payment of taxes throughout the Empire - and why the taxes? To pay for the Army, of course...!
I expect that he tried the Mithrans first, as they were already striong in the Army, but they probably wouldn't play. He may have tried a number of the Christian sects, and finally he found one who decided that in return for "Official Religion of the Empire" status it was too good an opportunity to pass up. I expect that it was a group from Rome itself, or near by, as they had been treated pretty badly in the past, what with been thrown to the lions or being coated with pitch and set alight to illuminate the Emperor's evening garden parties. But as I see it, aside from a deathbed ritual, he never adopted Christian beliefs. He remained, as he had been all along, amember of the cult of "Sol Invictus" - the Invincible Sun. Hence he changed the Christian holy day from Saturday to Sunday, and decreed that the key figure in this new religion, Jesus, had been born on the day of the year on which the sun at last, after the Winter Solstice, began to gain strength, and the days began to lengthen.
The irony of it all was that while his new status quo lasted for several reigns (with successive emperors declaring that membership in the new state religion was compulsory, and then that all other brands of Christianity - Arianism, the Alexandrine School, the group in Jerusalem, etc - were "Heresies", and finally that Heresy would be punishable by death.) But then, some 140 years or so later a new wrinkle was added; Rome was faced not with internal revolt but by invasion by a series of Germanic tribes sweeping through Southern Europe from the eastern steppes. And where was the once-invinceable Army...?
And so fell the Western Empire - not all at once, but in dribs and drabs. However the Germanic Tribes were just that - tribes. Their leaders were good field commanders, but in no wise capable of ruling their newly conquored empires! The Roman civil service wasn't aboout to help - but there was one institution (that had already 'sold out' once, after all) who not only had the expertise to run vast areas but who already had priests and congregations set up in every sizeable community in the conquored areas! The Church! Could they help? Certainly - but this time it was the political leaders who depended on the religious leaders, who actually commanded the loyalty of their peoples! And so it was that aside for the occasional king who claimed his own supremacy - Charlemagne, taking the crown from the officiating archbishop at his coronation and placing it on his own head (yet who called his dominions the "Holy Roman Empire"!), or HenryII of England amd his squabble with his erstwhile drinking buddy,Thomas a Becket, the Papacy still claims precedence over the civil authorities within Catholic Christendom!
...or so it seems to me!
Cheers
Ian
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Maybe Simon was an inspiration behind the "Jewish Messiah" vien of the gospels.