Christian/Pagan Holidays (Formerly: Happy Valentine's Day!)

Tennessee R

New member
I'm back!!!!!

Caitlin said:
(Acutally, taking into account the celestial findings of astronimers(sp?), isn't Christmas on the wrong day according to Christian religion?) Its all about fertility! Also called Candlemas..fire..the fire of love + life! Be it Pagan christian it's about new crops....new life on earth.

Basically its Spring...but paganism being one of the oldest religions it is no wonder that it festivals and dieties have been twisted around by those in power to suit them best...names...dates...whatever..We all know what this time of year means to us,the earth,and those we care about...Just another marker for the year and the changes within it.

December 25, birthday of Sol-Invictus Mithra.
Mithra was a pagan sun-god worshipped on Dec 25th.

Colliers Encyclopedia ?The choice of December 25 was probably influenced by the fact that on this day the Romans celebrated the Mithraic feast of the Sun god ?Natalis Solis Invicti??

Encyclopedia Britannica ?In the Roman world the Saturnalia (December 17) was a time of merrymaking and exchange of gifts. December 25th was also regarded as the birth of the Iranian mystery god Mithra, ?The Sun of Righteousness??

Christmas was:
Illegal in England
Outlawed in New England from 1649-1658
Condemned by the Puritans, Methodists, Quakers, Amish, Presbyterians, and Babtists.
Finally, it was made a legal holiday in Massachusetts in 1856. Everyone realized that Christmas had nothing to do with Jesus? birthday, and had everything to do with the sun-god?s (Mithra) birthday, and only in 1856 did they finally give in, and mix sun-worship with Christian events.
 

Doc Savage

New member
Caitlin said:
Isn't it kinda punny?! The Sun God's birth and the Son of God's birth!?! Ha! Ha!

Not to incite conflagration, but don't get Christianity and the Church mixed up. Two completely different critters, those.
 

Aaron H

Moderator Emeritus
The reason why Christmas is celebrated during Saturnalia is simply because early Christians (and even modern-day) had no clue as to when exactly Jesus was born. So they took a pagan* holiday and made it their own. This was because it was hard to make new converts break from their old traditions, so by creating a holiday on the same day (or time period) of the old holiday life was made a lot simpler.
As for Easter, it is NOT associated with pagan holidays, rather it is associated with Passover...a Jewish holiday that is older than any pagan holiday.




<small>*Pagan:
1. follower of a less popular religion: somebody who does not follow one of the world?s main religions, especially somebody who is not a Christian, Muslim, or Jew, and whose religion is regarded as questionable (sometimes considered offensive)
2. polytheist or pantheist: a follower of an ancient polytheistic or pantheistic religion
3. heathen: somebody who has no religion (disapproving)</small>
 

Caitlin

New member
This is a great thread! Interesting to hear everyone's input from different backgrounds and studies.
I think you can associate just about anything(of course not everything!) in religions. As Aaron and I have said (in our own ways), that is how traditions/holidays came to be..by being moved, changed, adopted, and mixed with others in an effort to control the masses. Let's hear more on this!
Can we do this every holiday? (Is it allowed? being not quite Indy-related?)
 

Strider

New member
There are alot of former pagen holiday's, Holloween for instance. Christmas has pagen influence as well, the idea of a Christmas tree comes from a pagen ritual.
 

Tennessee R

New member
-----------------------------------------------------
?Posted by Aaron H
The reason why Christmas is celebrated during Saturnalia is simply because early Christians (and even modern-day) had no clue as to when exactly Jesus was born. So they took a pagan* holiday and made it their own. This was because it was hard to make new converts break from their old traditions, so by creating a holiday on the same day (or time period) of the old holiday life was made a lot simpler.?
---------------------------------------------------
Christmas was not celebrated by the believers of the first century. The effort to ?Christianize? pagan holidays worked extremely well, and is still working today as we see of ?Christmas? or ?Saturnalia?.
Our Bible says, that He came and dwelt among men. The word ?Dwelt? is actually ?tabernacled?, giving the indication that Jesus might have been born around the feast described in the Bible: ?The Feast of Tabernacles?. The point is, Dec 25th was and still is the birthday of Mithra, it has nothing to do with Jesus,
Christmas trees have nothing to do with Jesus:
?For the customs of the people are vain: for one cutteth a tree out of the forest, the work of the hands of the workman, with the axe. 4They deck it with silver and with gold; they fasten it with nails and with hammers, that it move not.? Jer 10:3
A man in a hot, red costume, obviously has nothing to do with Jesus. Notice, if you see a piture of Mithra slaying the bull, he has that same Phrigian(sp) style hat.
Everything quite obviously comes from sun-worship, or something of the sort, and in my opinion, and hopefully everyone else would agree:
They should not mix sun-worship with Christianity.

-------------------------------------------------------?Posted by Aaron H
As for Easter, it is NOT associated with pagan holidays, rather it is associated with Passover...a Jewish holiday that is older than any pagan holiday.?
-------------------------------------------------------

Astarte (Easter) was worshipped in Egypt, Ugarit, among the Hittites, and in Canaan. Easter was not considered a ?Christian? festival until the fourth century. The early Christians celebrated Passover:
?in the fourteenth day of the first month at even is the LORD?s Passover? The first month began on the first visible new moon after the vernal equinox.
Easter is not another name for Passover, and is usually far from the actual date of Passover.
Easter is:
Oxford English Dictionary: ?The name of a goddess whose festival was celebrated at the vernal equinox...?
 

Caitlin

New member
(I was waiting to hear more for you TennR! From your website I knew you'd have all kinds interesting things to add!)On the Xmass tree topic...I have heard that the largest (yule)log was found, cut, brought back to the village and burned. They found the largest they could so that it would burn for many days, and each spark that came from the log was to represent the livestock that would be born that spring.
 

Tennessee R

New member
Caitlin said:
(I was waiting to hear more for you TennR! From your website I knew you'd have all kinds interesting things to add!)On the Xmass tree topic...I have heard that the largest (yule)log was found, cut, brought back to the village and burned. They found the largest they could so that it would burn for many days, and each spark that came from the log was to represent the livestock that would be born that spring.

Thanks for the kind comment, Caitlin.
I have not heard of the info on the tree. Interesting.
 

westford

Member
Aaron H said:
The reason why Christmas is celebrated during Saturnalia is simply because early Christians (and even modern-day) had no clue as to when exactly Jesus was born.
They got the year wrong as well. I'm not 100% sure how they worked that out - was it something to do with mapping the position of stars?
 

Aaron H

Moderator Emeritus
Finn said:
<small>
Aaron H said:
3. heathen: somebody who has no religion (disapproving)
Me. You loathe me now?
What do you you mean now?</small>;)

Tennessee R.
Astarte (Easter) was worshipped in Egypt, Ugarit, among the Hittites, and in Canaan. Easter was not considered a ?Christian? festival until the fourth century. The early Christians celebrated Passover:
?in the fourteenth day of the first month at even is the LORD?s Passover? The first month began on the first visible new moon after the vernal equinox.
Easter is not another name for Passover, and is usually far from the actual date of Passover.
Easter is:
Oxford English Dictionary: ?The name of a goddess whose festival was celebrated at the vernal equinox...?
Very right, Tenn; however, I would like to take you task on this a bit. You say that first century Christians didn't celebrate Easter. Again correct. However, they did celebrate Christ's Resurrection after they finished their Passover celebrations. While we wouldn't recognize it as "Easter" (and it wasn't called it then), they did celebrate the core idea behind modern Easter.
 

Tennessee R

New member
Aaron H said:
Very right, Tenn; however, I would like to take you task on this a bit. You say that first century Christians didn't celebrate Easter. Again correct.

However, they did celebrate Christ's Resurrection after they finished their Passover celebrations. [/B]

Right.

Aaron H said:
While we wouldn't recognize it as "Easter" (and it wasn't called it then), they did celebrate the core idea behind modern Easter. [/B]

Absolutely right! The celebration of Easter today, is thought by most Christians (Other than preachers that have been to seminary-sp?, They have been taught better) to be the time that Jesus was ressurected. As far as people in the occult, they know where it came from, and only those that are educated on the matter, would know that Easter is the name of a fertility goddess. (and I could quote the Oxford English Dictionary again, but it?s on the posts above.) Maybe the Christians of today ought to study the matter more detailed, because, to a Christian, it should be an insult for people to have taken a special day (Christ's ressurection), and blended paganism (goddess worship) with a Christian holiday.
 

Finn

Moderator
Staff member
westford said:
They got the year wrong as well. I'm not 100% sure how they worked that out - was it something to do with mapping the position of stars?
Or maybe it was very calculative politics?
 

Aaron H

Moderator Emeritus
Tennessee R said:
Aaron H said:
Very right, Tenn; however, I would like to take you task on this a bit. You say that first century Christians didn't celebrate Easter. Again correct.

However, they did celebrate Christ's Resurrection after they finished their Passover celebrations.

Right.

Aaron H said:
While we wouldn't recognize it as "Easter" (and it wasn't called it then), they did celebrate the core idea behind modern Easter. [/B]

Absolutely right! The celebration of Easter today, is thought by most Christians (Other than preachers that have been to seminary-sp?, They have been taught better) to be the time that Jesus was ressurected. As far as people in the occult, they know where it came from, and only those that are educated on the matter, would know that Easter is the name of a fertility goddess. (and I could quote the Oxford English Dictionary again, but it?s on the posts above.) Maybe the Christians of today ought to study the matter more detailed, because, to a Christian, it should be an insult for people to have taken a special day (Christ's ressurection), and blended paganism (goddess worship) with a Christian holiday. [/B]
I can see the logic of the "blending", however. The modern form of Easter is determined by Passover and not a set date (which makes the celebration of the Ressurection right, according to the Jewish calendar). That said, the Church has been known to take a pagan holiday and make it their own in order to keep the Faithful from sin, that said I have no issue with Christians "borrowing" a pagan holiday and making use of it for themselves...as for the carry over traditions, well, at least a bit of it is religous.:)
 

Caitlin

New member
Oh yes Tenn R, Ostara..(Easter/Eostar/Ostre/Eastre?)A "Pagan" holiday celebrated on the spring equinox... about 22 days
apart THIS year (is much closer some years ..again, given findings from the changes of star pattern the strong hand of
politics to move days around...(just look at when we celebrate most US holidays compared to their actual dates!)
(Oooo..we should talk about leap year + Ceasar sometime soon! Its one this year , ya know!)
And also just the distinct fact that earth/goddess worship is based around the rhythm of the earth + timings of the
universe, not man's perception and labeling of time.
The tradition of the easter egg...fertility...even rebirth!?? Easter is celebrated the 1st full moon after
spring equinox. 1 cycle of the moon, coincides with female cycles and egg release..

[Edited by Caitlin on 02-21-2004 at 11:39 pm]
 

Strider

New member
I've heard that Easter was accually the birth of Christ whereas Christmas was his death. Time zones have been confused so freacuently who knows, maybe Christ was really born in the summer.
 

Tennessee R

New member
Good points Caitlin.
Yes, I had noticed that this year is a leap year.
Oh, and Finn will get on to you for not spelling it 'Caesar' ;)

Interesting, Strider, never heard of that before.

Aaron H, Yes, the different organizations have slightly twisted pagan holidays, and made them 'christian', or vice versa. (Now, I know that there are rules on the bar about religion, so I will just say that I am one who believes in the Bible) But, for the people that believe in the Bible, it says:
"...Her priests have violated my law, and have profaned mine holy things: they have put no difference between the holy and profane..." Ezekiel 22:26

and just
"A little leaven leaveneth the whole lump." Galatians 5:8
 
Top