Quote: Randal_Flagg said: I don't know if anyone has mentioned this or not but the Bible and Christianity have actually borrowed a lot of stuff from pagan myth.
Yes. We did. Please review.
Quote: For instance, almost every ancient culture has a "flood story" where God or the gods punish mankind for becomming sinful, corrupt, a nuisance, etc. Mesopotamian mythology has a story similar to the "Moses in the bullrushes." There are several other overlaps in the Old Testament, but I can't remeber them all b/c it has been like seven years since I was in my religion class (at a Baptist college no-less, not a secular university).
You're going to have to provide sources if you want to argue this point. Especially since scientists have actually put forth evidence of a world-wide flood which remains in sync(sp) with Christian dogma.
Quote: Furthermore, almost every Christian tradition was incorporated by the early church to help Christianity to become more popular and spread more easily. Easter was originally the spring fertility festival to the mesopotamian goddess Ishtar. That's why we paint eggs and eat chocolate bunnies; they are all fertility symbols.
As I said before, neither Catholicsim or any other sects of Christianity adopted those traditions. They didn't start them, they've never endorsed them as actually being apart of the real meaning of the holiday. That's commercialism shelling out to Christians, not Christians shelling out to society. Easter has always been the day that Christ died, not when a rabbit broke into our houses while we slept.
This is just another case of that, except it was centuries ago:
Quote: Christmas is also an adaptation of a Roman festival. December 22nd is the shortest day of the year, but you can't actually percieve the days gettting longer until Dec 25th. On this day the Romans celebrated the "Birth of the Sun" by exchanging gifts to one another. Change the "u" to an "o" and you've got Christmas. The actual symbols for Christmas (e.g. the Tree, mistletoe, etc) are all adaptations of Germanic folklore that preserve pagan traditions within a Christian context.
As I said previously in the thread, the trees mean nothing to us. Only Christ's birth does. It's all about intent. Saying that the traditions make us pagans whilst not actually referencing the reason we celebrate the holiday is fallacious. FYI: Gift giving is a way of showing generosity for the sake of Christ's wishes.
Quote: Finally, several of the early Catholic saints and holy site in Europe were Christinization of local dieties and holy sites. So, In a very realy way Christianity itself is an amalgum of a variety of folklore throughout Europe and the Middle East.
