Bonkers parallels between Jesus and Mithras - examples?

[Roger Pearse]

Higgins doesn't appear to give any citation for the above information.

Thank you.

Is it possible that this is really the root of the tree? That the sentence originally ran "the Christians had their twelve apostles" and was then clumsily edited to insert "(followers of Mithra)" or something of the kind?

I suspect that this might really be the origin point!

I'm not sure what Higgins means by "Christian followers of Mithra had their twelve apostles". I scanned through several pages of his book in Google books, but I wasn't able to connect it to any of his other ideas on Mithraism or Christianity.

I did the same, but took from it that his general point was to assert the identity of Christ and Mithra (and all the other deities). So I parsed it as "Christians - followers of Mithra - had their twelve apostles". The point being not to assert that Mithra had 12 apostles, but that Christians did, and that Christians were the same as followers of Mithra.

Just guessing, of course.

[Roger Pearse]

According to Martin Larson, The Story of Christian Origins (1977), page 678 (chapter XII, endnote 15), the source for many of the claims is Texts et Monuments figures relatifs aux Mysteries de Mithra, by Franz Cumont (2 vols, 1896-99). I think there was a 2nd edition entitled Die Mysterien des Mithra ein Beitrag zur Religionsgeschichte der römischen Kaiserzeit (1900, I think). As far as I can tell, the 2nd revised edition of the French translation was entitled Les mystères de Mithra (about 1902). There was an English translation by Thomas J. McCormack entitled The mysteries of Mithra, by Franz Cumont. Tr. from the second revised French edition (1903).

Maybe Die Mysterien des Mithra ein Beitrag zur Religionsgeschichte der römischen Kaiserzeit has nothing to do with Die Mysterien des Mithra ein Beitrag zur Religionsgeschichte der römischen Kaiserzeit. I have to return to work, but I have to assume that the ET is available as an OCR scanned PDF through archive.org.

The book The mysteries of Mithra, by Franz Cumont. Tr. from the second revised French edition says:

The following pages reproduce the "Conclusions" printed at the end of the first volume of my large work, Texts et Monuments figures relatifs aux Mysteries de Mithra (Brussels: H. Lamertin).* Stripped of the notes and references which there served to establish them, they are confined to epitomizing and co-ordinating the sum-total of the knowledge we possess concerning the origin and the characteristic features of the Mithraic religion. They will furnish, in fact, all the material necessary for readers desirous of general information on this subject.

*Large octavo, 931 pages, 507 illustrations and 9 photo gravure plates. This work, which is a monument of scholarship
and industry, is a complete descriptive and critical collection of all the Mithraic texts, inscriptions, references, and monuments that have been recovered from antiquity. T. J. McC.

So, probably ALL English authors who cite Mithra parallels get it from this ET. I guess we're out of luck on specifics unless we all agree to learn French. or at least pretend to.
DCH

Well I know enough French to read Cumont, and Google Translate is pretty decent on French.

As I understand it, Cumont first issued his 2 volume "Texts et Monuments". Then he also circulated the conclusions section separately as the "Mysteries of Mithra" (in French) which was then translated into English, German, etc, and also revised in French (there is a revised 1913 ed). But the English translation does not include all the footnotes of the base French version, never mind the material in "Texts et Monuments".

All the best,

Roger Pearse

[Roger Pearse]

So, probably ALL English authors who cite Mithra parallels get it from this ET.... I can't believe the no one seems to have summarized this evidence in English, but I strongly suspect that it is because it is COMPLETE HOOEY! We common people call these parallels, how you say, "highly imaginative."

I think Cumont's carelessness breathed new life into the idea, but the general idea of parallels = connection = identity itself is certainly as old as 1794 and Dupuis. Not had any time to look more into this.

With regard to the inquiry about Cumont's scholarly contributions, I found this article quite useful:
http://www.iranicaonline.org/articles/c ... ry-marie-b

Cumont was a great man. He went about the task of creating Mithraic studies in precisely the right way - first gather all the data, of all kinds, and then try to synthesise some kind of narrative to include it all. Where he went wrong - where any of us would have gone wrong - was in assuming that the ancient statement that "Mithras is the Persian god" means that Mithras and Mithra are the same. It wasn't obvious he was wrong for another 50 years. The other thing he did, which looks wrong now, was to try to interpret Mithraic materials by using Christian ideas. He did so, as it's an obvious way to try to understand a long dead and fragmentary cult; by analogy with living religious cult. But it's mistaken to do so, and his speculations lent authority to older and more rubbish claims. However, considering that he was trying to create the whole discipline, we may forgive him. It was his task to try to create a narrative somehow, and he did. We stand on his shoulders.

In view of the common denominator for most known Mithraic remains, I found this article on a Persian cave quite fascinating:

I am curious now... on studying Plutarch, to learn whether or not he addresses, in the late first century CE, or first decades of second century CE, some of these "Christian" features, (twelve disciples!) which have been elaborated above, and which have been identified as parameters ostensibly Christian, borrowed by subsequent authors and attributed, falsely one imagines, to a Mithraic belief system.

He does not. It's online, tho, so go and have a look.

All the best,

Roger Pearse

[Roger Pearse]

richard carrier and harry mcall seem to agree that their is something pagan about christianity.

Christian apologists strongly deny Greco-Roman pagan religious influence on the Jewish development of Jesus Christ, so any Christian apologist should have no trouble explaining the following paragraph from The Cambridge History of Judaism: Volume 3 The Early Roman Period.

“If the contribution of epigraphy is disappointing in the sphere of synagogal management, in other areas it has much to offer. For a start, it adds to our knowledge of the impact of Graeco-Roman culture upon Palestine Judaism. Among the Beth Shearim inscriptions, for instance, there is one extended metrical epitaph that makes clear use of both Homeric language and concepts – e.g. Moira krataie (Powerful Fate). And in the naves of several Galilean synagogues, most notably that at Hammath Tiberias, we find complex mosaic pavements, the iconography of which is purely pagan in origin. In the center of each pavement is depicted a male radiate figure looking suspiciously like the Greek sun-god, Apollo, around whom circle the Signs of the Zodiac and the Four Seasons, personified, in the normal Graeco-Roman fashion, as a young women. For each figure, except the Apollo-lookalike, a neat label in Hebrew is supplied, the assumption being, presumably, that not everyone in the congregation would be able to identify these alien figures. While these compositions must surely have been regarded as entirely compatible with Judaism, their presence in these synagogues is astonishing. That figural representation was tolerated by Diasporan Jews is shown by, inter alia, the reference to zographia in one of the donor inscriptions in the Sardis synagogue and the Roman epitah, mentioned above, of the zographos, Eudoxios. Nothing, however, in the literary sources of Palestinian Judaism prepares us for the appearance in the homeland’s ‘holy places’ of these rich arrays of captioned pagan figures.” (1)

Margaret Williams, “The Contribution of Jewish Inscriptions to the Study of Judaism” Pages 75 - 93 inThe Cambridge History of Judaism: Volume 3 The Early Roman Period. Editied by William Horbury, W.D. Davies and John Sturdy Cambridge University Press, 1999. Part II: Inscriptions from Judea / Palestine Relating to Judaism, p. 87 – 88.



It's truly odd (for Keith's apologetic point of view) that while the authors of the Gospels - who were very interested in religion and who could read and write in Greek - had strangely totally no knowledge, nor ever read of any Classical Greek religious literature (even though Jesus is called the Logos in the Gospel of John and the Early Church Fathers were heavily Neo-Platonism to from theology).


Inanna Wasn’t Crucified, She Was Just Nailed Up Dead

Casey only addresses one thing I have ever written relating to mythicism, ever. Seriously. In this entire book, he never mentions a single argument, claim, or passage in Proving History, or in any other book, article, or blog post I’ve ever written, pertaining to the topic of this book. Except one single small passage in Not the Impossible Faith: my discussion of the Innana death-and-resurrection narrative (NIF, pp. 18-19; Casey, 7-5983ff.). This is most strange, because in NIF there are a lot of refutations of assumptions he relies on in his book (such as that Luke is “an outstanding historian by ancient standards,” so true he had to say it twice, verbatim: 3-2619; 3-2683; see NIF, ch. 7, for a gut-check on that; OHJ, ch. 9, for a groin-check). Yet he never responds to those refutations or even seems to be aware of them. Likewise all my preemptive refutations of his arguments in PH, which I’ve noted already.

And then the one single thing of mine he does address, he gets wrong in almost every way.

First, I never argued in NIF that “Jesus cannot have been crucified” because Inanna was; in fact I there explicitly say I am not saying the crucifixion of Jesus was inspired by that. Yet Casey imputes to me the other argument. That’s worse than a straw man, because it actually misleads his readers, who will now think I made a ridiculous argument, which in fact I didn’t. Indeed, nowhere in NIF do I even argue that Jesus didn’t exist (to the contrary, NIF consistently assumes he did). He even tries to admit this, but characterizes it as “going back” on myself (7-5994), when in fact it was simply my position, not a retreat from some “other” position (which again basically makes him a liar).
In the passage in question I am explicitly responding to the argument that “no one would worship a crucified deity, therefore Jesus must have actually risen from the dead.” Casey surely rejects such fundamentalist balderdash as I do, yet he does not tell his readers that this is the only context in which I brought up the Inanna narrative. Inanna is an example of a humiliated, killed and crucified deity, who was nevertheless widely worshipped. I seriously doubt Casey can honestly have a problem with that. Because it being true has no bearing on whether Jesus existed–unless you argue that “no one would worship a crucified deity, therefore Jesus must have actually been crucified.” Fortunately Casey doesn’t appear to make that argument. (Because my argument in that case would be correct.) So why my treatment of Inanna concerns him in this book is hard to discern. And he never explains any of this to his readers, who are thus mislead into thinking I argue that Inanna’s tale is an argument against the historicity of Jesus. It’s not. I think it can bear on the subject, but not like that. And I didn’t even discuss that possibility in NIF.

Second, Casey suffers from concrete thinking (see next section), so badly that he thinks Inanna can’t be a crucified deity because she was a vegetation goddess (7-5994). That is a non sequitur. That’s like saying she can’t be a crucified deity because she’s a woman. Or not Jewish. The differences are irrelevant. We unmistakably have a god descending from heaven, into another supernatural realm below (the underworld), being tried, executed, humiliated, and crucified (her naked corpse nailed up), and then rising from the dead three days later and ascending back to heaven (it also has this whole thing being her plan from the start). Scholars therefore cannot claim such narratives did not predate Christianity. They most certainly did. Whether they had any influence on Christianity is a separate question. But it should certainly be relevant that this narrative was part of a major cult in the Middle East still practiced in Christian times and known to the Jews of Judea (as I show in NIF, a fact Casey does not mention).

Third, Casey is such a concrete thinker he cannot fathom that killing someone and nailing them up was ideologically comparable to Roman crucifixion. Thus he declares, absurdly, “It should be obvious that this has nothing to do with the Roman penalty of crucifixion” (7-5994). Not that it should have to (no one argues that Inanna was crucified by Romans). But even so, Casey does not cite or even seem to be aware of any of the scholarship establishing that in fact all the words for “crucifixion” were so variable as to definitely include exactly this sequence of events, that the Romans even highly varied their practice of crucifixion enough to include it, and that Jews also crucified their dead in exactly this way (execution, then hanging on a post). I document this from primary sources and cite the peer reviewed scholarship that agrees with me in my chapter on the burial of Jesus in The Empty Tomb. I add even more in OHJ.

And Inanna is not alone. Romulus, Zalmoxis, and Osiris provide similar narratives of deaths and resurrections (Casey never once mentions these, even though I survey them extensively in NIF), and we know there were many more. Casey’s treatment of the dying-and-rising gods mytheme as a whole is muddled and confused and doesn’t really go anywhere (Ehrman tried harder, though fell harder in result). Compare it with what I have already written here and here and here, and you’ll see why it’s wholly inadequate. My treatment in OHJ just makes that all the clearer.

comment: so what do you think Roger?

I'd rather keep this thread to talk about modern Mithras legends. This is a divert into the general question of pagan parallels; whereas I am interested in specifics about particular claims for Mithras.

The author of that stuff you repeat - who is he? - is more ignorant than I am of iconography (which is quite a statement).

Just a general word: these sorts of wild claims are meaningless because the devil is in the detail, which few of those making the claims seem interested in. Long ago I wrote something like this about Osiris, or Jesus as we are supposed to believe he is:

Jesus was king of Egypt and married to Isis. Jesus' brother Set murdered him and chopped his body into bits and scattered it up and down the Nile. Jesus' widow Isis then travelled around the country and gathered up all the bits, except for his willy which had been eaten by a crocodile. For this she substituted one made out of stone (iirc). That done, she worked a magic spell and resurrected Jesus, or at least enough in order to have sex with him and conceive Horus, Jesus' son. Then Osiris died again and became god of the underworld, while Horus grew up and murdered his uncle in revenge.

Yes, that's just what they teach in Sunday school ... isn't it? Ahem.

Anything can be "linked" to anything, by sufficiently loose category definition. Once done, they argue "this looks like that, therefore this is connected to that, therefore this IS that." But those of us of a sceptical turn of mind merely laugh. No valid conclusions can be reached that way. Any real parallels argument has to be made much more narrowly and with a constant eye to false positives.

All the best,

Roger Pearse

[Roger Pearse]

Apologies for brevity - a bunch of newly translated stuff has come in, and I am trying to review and comment it and get it out of the door tonight!

[Robert Tulip]

As a general comment on this thread, I should just initially say that the vilification practiced by some of the lovers of Tertullian is in my opinion offensive and unconstructive, and damaging to scholarly dialogue. I do not agree that conjecture about Mithras and the twelve can be simply dismissed as “bonkers”, and see such description as reflecting badly on those who promote it.

Acharya S simply repeats Higgins here (in the section of "The Christ Conspiracy" called "The Disciples are the Signs of the Zodiac") without further comment. Perhaps Maximos or Robert Tulip can help out with further information on what "Christian followers of Mithra had their twelve apostles" mean?... once the idea of hunting for parallels takes hold, then anything associated with "12" for any god becomes fair game. Indeed, Acharya S writes in the same section as mentioned above, before the Higgins quote: “In reality, it is no accident that there are 12 patriarchs, 12 tribes of Israel and 12 disciples, 12 being the number of the astrological signs, as well as the 12 “houses” through which the sun passes each day and the 12 hours of day and night. Indeed, like the 12 Herculean tasks, the 12 “helpers” of Horus, and the 12 “generals” of Ahura-Mazda, Jesus’s 12 “disciples” are symbolic for the zodiacal signs and do not depict any literal figures who played out a drama upon the earth circa 30 CE. The twelve disciples are thus the “sun’s librarians, the treasure-scribes.”

I have been giving further thought to why this archetype of the leader and the twelve is so pervasive. It is obvious that astrological talk of the zodiac is a big turn-off for scientifically minded people. So I think it is valuable to bracket the astrology, and just consider ancient astronomy.

Genesis 1:18 says that on the fourth day of creation, “God made the two great lights: the greater light to rule the day, and the lesser light to rule the night.” This observation of the relation between the sun and the moon as ‘the two great lights’ is at the core of all primitive cosmology, providing the natural structure of time in terms of years, months, weeks, days and nights.

The temporal relation between the observed motion of the sun and moon stands in a one to twelve relation. The moon appears to move twelve times as fast as the sun through the sky, producing the twelve months of the year (with error of about 11 days per year). This structure of time provides the rhythms of natural cycles, with each moon traditionally designated by its agrarian associated activities. We can see such a framework in the stained glass windows of Chartres Cathedral.

In terms of the conjectural speculation of astrotheology, the point of this structure of time is that the role of the sun and moon as major divinities leads directly and inevitable to this archetype of a leader with twelve followers, and of related ideas such as the structure of Jewish politics with the twelve tribes. Observation is the foundation of myth.

Assessing this conjecture, the real question is whether there are any alternative explanations that are more plausible than the twelve as universal lunisolar myth. Traditionally, the church has defended a strident literalism, with the claim that Jesus Christ had twelve disciples, despite their complete absence from disinterested records. In terms of evidence, this church claim is implausible. The one and twelve serves more to provide an allegorical mystery to initiate acolytes into a secret Gnostic cosmology than as an actual description of historical events.

The extreme aggression of church leaders such as Tertullian in suppressing pagan thought, with their dark age notions that the cross has abolished the need for curiosity, means that a scientific reconstruction of questions such as the relation between Christianity and Mithraism has to start from recognition that the extant evidence is distorted by intentional early destruction of cultural trends that were seen as uncongenial to emerging dogma. So regarding what has survived as typical and representative may well lead to incorrect conclusions.

Mithras and Jesus Christ stood in mythic competition as sun gods, as representatives of the stability and order of the Roman Empire provided by the invincible sun, Sol Invictus, source of light and life. It is entirely plausible that like Christ and the Sun, Mithras as the sun also was imagined as surrounded by twelve followers. This model describes the actual observed relation between the two great lights, the sun and the moon. It appears that the lunar basis of the twelve disciples has been neglected in theology, along with the broad suppression of matrifocal imagery by rampant patriarchal hierarchs.

So in terms of intellectual coherence, it is more likely that a myth of Mithras and the twelve existed and was suppressed than that such a myth never existed. Restoring the moon to its dignity as the source of the twelve helps to imagine a more coherent picture of ancient cosmology, and how this archetypal structure of the one and the twelve should be expected to pervade the mythical frameworks of ancient culture.

[bcedaifu]

So in terms of intellectual coherence, it is more likely that a myth of Mithras and the twelve existed and was suppressed than that such a myth never existed. Restoring the moon to its dignity as the source of the twelve helps to imagine a more coherent picture of ancient cosmology, and how this archetypal structure of the one and the twelve should be expected to pervade the mythical frameworks of ancient culture.

Thank you for a well written, entertaining, and educational summary. I liked it.

My question remains, are there any observers from that time frame, ~~2000 years ago, who have commented on this lunar relationship, or any other justification, for Mithras having had 12 disciples? Why not 15, or 7, or 23? Seems odd, to me, that whatever the cosmological correlation, a famous leader of a group should have exactly the same quantity of important followers, as Jesus of Nazareth. I am asking whether there exist any pre-christian writings describing Mithraism, including its practices and personalities. Did Alexander of Macedonia also have exactly 12 important generals under his command? Did Siddharta have only 12 significant adherents? Did the camel drivers traveling from the silk route terminus in Turkey to Mecca in the Arabian peninsula, travel in groups of twelve? Did the Mongol warriors fighting under Genghis Khan function with twelve commanders, or operate with 12 horseman to a group? Is Pythagorean numerology similarly based on the zodiac? Did the Minoans (linear A) also employ 12 for some reason or other?

Is the thirteenth disciple (must have been appointed, after death of Judas), a reminder that sometimes, the lunar calendar requires an extra month?

[neilgodfrey]

I have been giving further thought to why this archetype of the leader and the twelve is so pervasive. It is obvious that astrological talk of the zodiac is a big turn-off for scientifically minded people. So I think it is valuable to bracket the astrology, and just consider ancient astronomy.

Studying and understanding both ancient astrology and ancient astronomical ideas is interesting and important given that it helps us understand ancient cultures.

Genesis 1:18 says that on the fourth day of creation, “God made the two great lights: the greater light to rule the day, and the lesser light to rule the night.” This observation of the relation between the sun and the moon as ‘the two great lights’ is at the core of all primitive cosmology, providing the natural structure of time in terms of years, months, weeks, days and nights.

This is a sweeping and vague claim. What exactly do "all" ancient cosmologies have in common that we can identify as their "core" and what is the relation of the sun and moon to this core?

Are you saying that all primitive peoples had the same way of structuring time: the same divisions of "years" (lunar or solar or both?), the same number of months? the same 7 day week? (Do you mean to say that the 7 day week is also a "natural structure of time"?)

The temporal relation between the observed motion of the sun and moon stands in a one to twelve relation. The moon appears to move twelve times as fast as the sun through the sky, producing the twelve months of the year (with error of about 11 days per year). This structure of time provides the rhythms of natural cycles, with each moon traditionally designated by its agrarian associated activities. We can see such a framework in the stained glass windows of Chartres Cathedral.

Do the stained glass windows of Chartres Cathedral illustrate cycles common to all primitive or ancient human kind? (If you are Australian you will know that certain indigenous tribes with a heritage going back many thousands of years have six or five or other numbers of seasons in a year. Darwin only has two seasons. It's more "natural" to divide seasons not by the moon but by weather and changing hunting and foraging cylces.)

Did all primitive cultures settle upon a neat one in twelve relation between the sun and moon? Did they all conclude that any discrepancy was "an error"?

In terms of the conjectural speculation of astrotheology, the point of this structure of time is that the role of the sun and moon as major divinities leads directly and inevitable to this archetype of a leader with twelve followers, and of related ideas such as the structure of Jewish politics with the twelve tribes. Observation is the foundation of myth.

Can you articulate the logical steps from one to the other? Have you thought to seek out alternative explanations to test your hypothesis? Does the Chinese zodiac conform to your hypothesis if the moon, rather than the sun, is central? Certainly later Jewish writings associated 12 tribes with signs of the zodiac but they also said lots of other ignorant things, too. What evidence is there that the twelve tribes of "Jewish politics" was derived from astrology? What evidence is there that the number of tribes was anything but a literary construct? If so, what evidence do we have for the source of that literary construct?

Observation is the foundation of myth, but seeking out alternative explanations and hard evidence and the testing of hypotheses is the foundation of more accurate (if tentative) knowledge.

Assessing this conjecture, the real question is whether there are any alternative explanations that are more plausible than the twelve as universal lunisolar myth. Traditionally, the church has defended a strident literalism, with the claim that Jesus Christ had twelve disciples, despite their complete absence from disinterested records. In terms of evidence, this church claim is implausible. The one and twelve serves more to provide an allegorical mystery to initiate acolytes into a secret Gnostic cosmology than as an actual description of historical events.

No, the real question is whether there is evidence to support the conjecture. Sometimes we may have to be satisfied with a "don't know" or consider a number of theories as possibilities, and other times we may have to be satisfied that the data does not support a universal 'natural structure' of time.

The extreme aggression of church leaders such as Tertullian in suppressing pagan thought, with their dark age notions that the cross has abolished the need for curiosity, means that a scientific reconstruction of questions such as the relation between Christianity and Mithraism has to start from recognition that the extant evidence is distorted by intentional early destruction of cultural trends that were seen as uncongenial to emerging dogma. So regarding what has survived as typical and representative may well lead to incorrect conclusions.

What power did Tertullian and others like him (and who, exactly?) wield to destroy ancient records? Do many scholars really "regard what has survived as typical and representative" of what once existed? I thought they all (well the critical ones certainly) recognized the filters involved in what was preserved.

Mithras and Jesus Christ stood in mythic competition as sun gods, as representatives of the stability and order of the Roman Empire provided by the invincible sun, Sol Invictus, source of light and life. It is entirely plausible that like Christ and the Sun, Mithras as the sun also was imagined as surrounded by twelve followers. This model describes the actual observed relation between the two great lights, the sun and the moon. It appears that the lunar basis of the twelve disciples has been neglected in theology, along with the broad suppression of matrifocal imagery by rampant patriarchal hierarchs.

Odd that such representations of Jesus appear in the record after your thesis appears to suggest that such information had been suppressed, yes?

So in terms of intellectual coherence, it is more likely that a myth of Mithras and the twelve existed and was suppressed than that such a myth never existed. Restoring the moon to its dignity as the source of the twelve helps to imagine a more coherent picture of ancient cosmology, and how this archetypal structure of the one and the twelve should be expected to pervade the mythical frameworks of ancient culture.

That's not very high dignity for the moon. The Chinese made the moon the centre and demoted the sun to doing the twelve annual loops around the moon until it managed to catch up with moon back in the same place again. Isn't that a more natural structure of time? Or isn't a more natural structure of time related to where on the planet one lives and how that -- whether via weather, animal migrations, etc -- affects one's cycles of activities?

[Roger Pearse]

Thank you, Neil, for some obvious questions.

I don't know of any Mithraic monument that depicts the moon as the source of the zodiac.

[Maximos]

bcedaifu, here's an interesting discussion of the twelve: The Twelve in the Bible and Ancient Mythology