Pagan Parallels: Achilles Heel of Christianity

Discussion about the New Testament, apocrypha, gnostics, church fathers, Christian origins, historical Jesus or otherwise, etc.
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stephan happy huller
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Re: Pagan Parallels: Achilles Heel of Christianity

Post by stephan happy huller »

But what do they care about what the evidence actually says. Indeed if they want to pursue an astrological link better to look at the four creatures of Ezekiel:

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Maximos
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Re: Pagan Parallels: Achilles Heel of Christianity

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"The zodiac is mentioned in the Bible at Job 38:32, where the author refers to the "Mazzaroth." "

- The Twelve in the Bible and Ancient Mythology
The Book of Job is one of the oldest books in the bible.
Maximos
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Re: Pagan Parallels: Achilles Heel of Christianity

Post by Maximos »

Bernard Muller wrote:"twelve" appears more than one hundred times in the Old Testament. Is each occurrence inspired by the Zodiac?

Cordially, Bernard
"Here we discuss the evidence for the motif of "the Twelve" in antiquity, including as concerns the Bible as well as in other artifacts and myths in numerous other cultures. As we can see, the ancients in many places around the world have been very focused on this sacred number, which signifies the 12 hours of day and night, the 12 months of the year and the 12 signs of the zodiac. The Twelve is, in fact, a motif found ubiquitously, dating back centuries to millennia. "

"The 12 Disciples of Jesus and the Signs of the Zodiac

Moreover, the comparison of Jesus's 12 disciples with both the 12 signs of the zodiac and the 12 hours of the day began in antiquity, in the second century with the Gnostics, and continued throughout the ages. As Michael Ladwein relates:

"The relationship of the apostles to the signs of the Zodiac in general was first mooted in a remark by Clement of Alexandria about the Gnostic Theodotus... An early Christian pottery lamp in Geneva has the heads of the twelve apostles arranged around the central opening for the flame (=Christ as the sun). The sides of a medieval ivory reliquary in the abbey church of Quedlinburg shows the (unspecified) apostles with the Zodiac signs above. An ivory reliquary in the Bavarian National Museum in Munich is similar. On the front we see Christ between Cancer and Leo, i.e. as the sun in its most powerful at the summer solstice. There are specific associations in medieval literature, e.g. in the Rota ecclesiastica, a manuscript dating from the first half of the twelfth century, in the writings of the Catalan scholar Arnold of Villanova in the thirteenth century, in those of Agrippa of Nettesheim around 1500, and those of the Augsburg jurist Julius Schiller in the seventeenth century. In each case the combinations were different as was also the composition of the circle of twelve... In contrast to these arbitrary medieval combinations, E. Lenz has ventured a new and considerably more convincing "attempt based on natural sensitivity to link Thomas with the constellation of Gemini (he is after all called the 'twin' in the Gospels) and Judas with Scorpio."

(Ladwein, 127) "

- The Twelve in the Bible and Ancient Mythology
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neilgodfrey
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Re: Pagan Parallels: Achilles Heel of Christianity

Post by neilgodfrey »

Maximos wrote:
Bernard Muller wrote:"twelve" appears more than one hundred times in the Old Testament. Is each occurrence inspired by the Zodiac?

Cordially, Bernard
"Here we discuss the evidence for the motif of "the Twelve" in antiquity, . . . .

"The 12 Disciples of Jesus and the Signs of the Zodiac

Moreover, the comparison of Jesus's 12 disciples with both the 12 signs of the zodiac and the 12 hours of the day began in antiquity, in the second century with the Gnostics, and continued throughout the ages. As Michael Ladwein relates:. . . .

- The Twelve in the Bible and Ancient Mythology
This does not answer Bernard's question. I don't know what any of this tells us except that Clement of Alexandria and others took some interest in astrology and noticed obvious correspondences with twelve this and twelve that around them and in the Bible. That tells us nothing about the origins of the biblical narratives. Only how subsequent people interpreted them.

I don't see the point of any of this. It certainly does not present any case for the Biblical narrative or the Twelve Tribes originating as some product of an astrological exercise.
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Roger Pearse
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Re: Pagan Parallels: Achilles Heel of Christianity

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I don't notice any sign that "Maximos" is engaging with anything anyone says...
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neilgodfrey
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Re: Pagan Parallels: Achilles Heel of Christianity

Post by neilgodfrey »

Roger Pearse wrote:I don't notice any sign that "Maximos" is engaging with anything anyone says...
I have noticed large chunks of text from Acharya's website or forum being pasted here, though.
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neilgodfrey
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Re: Pagan Parallels: Achilles Heel of Christianity

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Roger Pearse wrote:I don't notice any sign that "Maximos" is engaging with anything anyone says...
On the contrary, it appears that the large chunks are being posted on several threads by Maximos and he/she is picking and choosing which ones to engage with. Seems he/she prefers to have a hostile all-out-fight with outhouse on Zeitgesit1 rather than pick up anything we might say by reasoned dissection here.
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Roger Pearse
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Re: Pagan Parallels: Achilles Heel of Christianity

Post by Roger Pearse »

<sigh>
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