Pagan Parallels With Christianity?

I'm publishing this next piece from a spirit of love and truth, and a desire to see my fellow brothers and sisters mature in the faith like I firmly believe the Lord is helping me to (Ephesians 4:15).

Well, it's that time of year again. Christmas is in the rear view mirror, but Easter is dead ahead. Invariably, that means another round of debates with fellow believers over the merits of celebrating Jesus' death and resurrection let alone over whether a Christian should even call such a time of the year 'Easter' or 'Resurrection Day' instead.

To reiterate, I believe that the Word of God makes it clear that how a Christian decides to respond to this time of year is entirely up to them, as a matter of conscience, and entirely between them and the Lord (Romans 14:5).

At the same time, this is my humble attempt to share what I've learned through my own pursuit of the truth through prayer and careful study of His Word these past several months. As always, please never take my word for it. Instead, apply Acts 17:11 and test everything! Then, take it all to the Lord in prayer yourself.

Ok, let's cut to the chase. Are their pagan parallels with Christianity? Should Christians celebrate holidays like Christmas and Easter if such perceived pagan parallels exist? I suppose we should thank a guy like Alexander Hislop for his major contribution to such thoughts.

Hislop, of course, penned The Two Babylons in the 1800s, which is where we find views so similar to those of the anti-Christmas/anti-Easter crowd who attacks their own each year under the guise of 'righteous anger' as if that means that Ephesians 4:15 and Galatians 5:22-23 no longer applies to them. Of course, Hislop was way off (see Comments Section for specifics).

Without breaking into an academic treatise on Hislop's writings, I want to simply share a short documentary that will set the stage for our grand conclusion.

Why We Should Not Passover Easter

Thank you Nick Sayers for sharing that with us. Sure, his presentation has some obvious flaws, which I'm not about to dispute, but I think he hit the nail on the head when he said, "If you are a Bible believer, you believe the Bible; if you are superstitious, you will believe Hislop." Plain and simple enough, and, I'll admit, that one comment has convicted me mightily over the past few months, and it's even contributed to a lot of the 'radical' changes here at LUF in recent weeks. Please read 'Treating Easterphobia' for additional commentary.

There's no escaping the fact that celebrating Christmas and Easter has certainly reached 'phobia' status, especially for Bible-believing, God-fearing, well-meaning genuine Christians who celebrate by worshipping Him and Him alone for all the right reasons.

I suppose reading and listening to thinkers such as Joseph Campbell has only reinforced for many people the possibility that Christianity is just another version of the ancient Roman, Greek, Persian, Egyptian, and Babylonian myths, a set of awesome stories that tell us a lot about the human condition, but still mythical for all that.

It hasn't helped young people much to have George Lucas come on the scene with his brilliant Stars Wars series, claiming that he thinks all religions are true, and that he is providing a new myth that will be of help in a modern technological age. Lucas is a great filmmaker, but a bad philosopher.

Are there pagan parallels with Christianity? The short answer? No. At least, not in the same sense that so many anti-Christmas/Easter Christians and the non-believers would have us believe.

I've reached that conclusion thanks to something I stumbled upon several months ago that was written by Dr. Bruce M. Metzger back in 1955. In fact, I actually came across it quite unexpectedly a few days after Christmas 2010 and our last debate on this subject.

However, because I had absolutely no intention of revisiting it at the time, I just decided to hang on to this in anticipation of this holy day.

Before we continue though, let's make sure we all recall that we've already established the truth of the matter...

Romans 14:5 (ESV) One person esteems one day as better than another, while another esteems all days alike. Each one should be fully convinced in his own mind.

Romans 14:14 (ESV) I know and am persuaded in the Lord Jesus that nothing is unclean in itself, but it is unclean for anyone who thinks it unclean.

Colossians 2:16 (ESV) Therefore let no one pass judgment on you in questions of food and drink, or with regard to a festival or a new moon or a Sabbath.

In other words, each one of us is free to decide what we believe the Lord is leading us to do, and that most certainly applies to what we believe we should do about celebrating or not celebrating certain holidays.

Once we identify the direction we believe we're being led, then we have a responsibility to follow obediently. However, none of us can criticize the other for such a decision for a number of aforementioned Biblical reasons.

The bottom line is that 'celebrating' or 'not celebrating' does not make us any 'more' or 'less' spiritual. Jesus plus nothing, remember?

Ok, so now that we've reviewed the case to this point, I want to introduce you all to a Dr. Bruce M. Metzger who I just happened to come across on another blog I visited for the first time a few months back.

In the post titled 'Metzger On Pagan Parallels With Christianity', we are exposed to even more truth centered around this quote from Metzger...

"The differences between the Christian sacraments of baptism and the Eucharist and corresponding ceremonies in the Mysteries are as profound as their similarities are superficial."

Did you catch that? The similarities are "superficial", and that's coming from the greatest textual critic of the 20th Century, as found in an article written by him, published in the January, 1955 edition of the Harvard Theological Journal (p.13).



As previously stated, that quote above was written by Dr. Bruce M. Metzger, in his article, 'Considerations of Methodology in the Study of the Mystery Religions and Early Christianity', which was published in the January, 1955 edition of the Harvard Theological Journal. Pretty serious stuff, wouldn't you say?

Metzger’s conclusions from his study of the methodology of scholars who make much of the parallels between Christianity and pagan mystery religions is that the parallels are analogical, rather than genealogical. In other words, the elements of Christianity which parallel paganism were not derived from paganism, but, as above, “their similarities are superficial.”

Michael Heiser's blog by the name of PaleoBabble had the following short review of Metzger's article back on June 18th, 2009...

Readers who spend much time on the internet know there is a lot written on the popular level on this topic; namely, that Jesus / Christianity was just the newest manifestation of standard paganism. I know of only one “real” academic (Tom Harpur) who defends this idea, which should tell you how idiosyncratic it is. There are no doubt others, but that handful against thousands (again) tells you that there must be reasons why the vast majority of scholars of all persuasions don’t buy the idea.

The problem is basically a methodological one. This 1955 (and so somewhat dated) Harvard Theological Review article by Bruce Metzger would give readers some insight into the methodological problems and errors involved in the “pagan Christ” view. Some of it requires knowledge of Greek, but not much. You’ll see the logical disconnects. Metzger, for those who don’t know the name, was for many years a professor of New Testament at Princeton. His specialty was textual criticism, and his name is nearly synonymous with the field. He died a couple years ago.

Lastly, a couple of recent books deflate much of what’s written on the popular Jesus = a pagan god front. I recommend The Jesus Legend, by Boyd and Eddy, and a more dense work, written for scholars, called The Riddle of the Resurrection; Dying and Rising Gods of the Ancient Near East. This book takes on Frazer’s work (Golden Bough) on dying and rising gods in the ancient Near East and finds the thesis considerably wanting.

I also learned that the well-known Lee Strobel also tackled this issue. Here's an interview that's particularly useful to anyone looking for a Cliff Notes version of this annual debate, but one that scholarly debunks this pervasive propaganda of pagan parallelism.

Everything to this point has been purely academic.

Concerns about C.S. Lewis aside (which are warranted in some cases), I think it's equally fascinating that he turned completely upside down this argument about Christianity as a myth.

In a brilliant little essay called Myth Become Fact, Lewis opened up an entirely different possibility, based on two insights...

1. All the myths of mankind's primitive religions were expressions of a deep yearning — the deepest yearning — in mankind's consciousness, namely that the mysterious transcendent God would come into intimate contact with mankind, and do so in such a way that He would repair the damages made by mankind's sinfulness, and would grant to mankind a safety that would last forever.

2. Christianity, rather than being one myth alongside many others, is thus the fulfillment of all previous mythological religions. It is a myth, like the others, but this time a myth that is also a fact.

Here it is straight from the horse's mouth...

The heart of Christianity is a myth which is also a fact. The old myth of the Dying God, without ceasing to be myth, comes down from the heaven of legend and imagination to the earth of history. It happens — at a particular date, in a particular place, followed by definable historical consequences. We pass from a Balder or an Osiris, dying nobody knows when or where, to a historical Person crucified (it is all in order) under Pontius Pilate. By becoming fact it does not cease to be myth: that is the miracle.

Now as myth transcends thought, incarnation transcends myth. The heart of Christianity is a myth which is also a fact. The old myth of the dying God without ceasing to be myth, comes down from the heaven of legend and imagination to the earth of history. It happens – at a particular date, in a particular place, followed by definable historical consequences. We pass from a Balder or an Osiris, dying nobody knows when or where, to a historical person crucified (it is all in order) under Pontius Pilate. By becoming fact it does not cease to be myth: that is the miracle. I suspect that men have sometimes derived more spiritual sustenance from myths they did not believe than from the religion they professed. To be truly Christian we must both assent to the historical fact and also receive the myth (fact though it has become) with the same imaginative embrace which we accord to all myths. The one is hardly more necessary than the other is.

[C. S. Lewis, “Myth Became Fact,” in The Grand Miracle and Other Selected Essays on Theology and Ethics from God in The Dock, ed. Walter Hooper (New York: Ballantine, 1970), pp. 38-42 (41-42).]

I've read that that J.R.R. Tolkien persuaded Lewis of theism by arguing that Jesus is the 'true myth' of which other myths are shadowy reflections. Interesting way of putting it, isn't it?

In conclusion, the blog The Misadventures of Captain Headknowledge put it best...

In short, don’t be sucked in by the claims of "pagan parallels" as an attempt to discredit the historicity, inspiration and authority of the New Testament, or to relativize it, like Rob Bell was...

Rob Bell. The fact that his name comes up in this discussion tells us a lot I think.

Pagan parallels with Christianity? Yes, but only superficially speaking, or almost as if the Lord was using Jesus Christ to simultaneously negate (or to simultaneously 'one-up') all the other false gods being worshipped in the world to that point in time, and saying, "This is my Son Jesus Christ and the only one, true Lord and Savior!"

Myth and Christianity are not, therefore, antagonistic to each other. Various myths exist either as anticipations of Christianity or as echoes of Christianity. It was sort of like a foreshadowing I guess you could say.

In the end, God had the last laugh when He trumped Satan's numerous attempts to produce various counterfeits that would pre-date Jesus Christ.

Forgive me if I haven't made my point clearly enough. There are just so many different directions that I could come at this annual discussion from. Plus, I'm trying not to repeat myself after what I wrote in the Christmas posts a few months ago.

I'll end with this point for emphasis. Someone once suggested to me that Christian worship on Sunday was pagan in origin and was a spin-off of Sun worship.

My goodness! How far do we want to take this? I mean, I suppose we should never leave our homes and do anything in service to the Lord during the course of a day because the days of the week themselves are derived from pagan gods and goddesses, aren't they?

I ran across this quote today from Tertullian, who, if memory serves me correctly, wrote in the early 3rd Century that's a good response.

This is from his "Apology" and he is writing in defense of the Christian faith. Please note that his reader would be a pagan ruler.

Others, again, certainly with more information and greater verisimilitude, believe that the sun is our god. We shall be counted Persians perhaps, though we do not worship the orb of day painted on a piece of linen cloth, having himself everywhere in his own disk. The idea no doubt has originated from our being known to turn to the east in prayer. But you, many of you, also under pretence sometimes of worshipping the heavenly bodies, move your lips in the direction of the sunrise. In the same way, if we devote Sun-day to rejoicing, from a far different reason than Sun-worship, we have some resemblance to those of you who devote the day of Saturn to ease and luxury, though they too go far away from Jewish ways, of which indeed they are ignorant.

Simply stated, Christian Sunday worship does not have pagan roots. Christianity itself does not have pagan roots.

These attacks, which continue to this day, that seek to neutralize Christians from worshipping their Lord and Savior in any kind of a formal and public way throughout the course of the year are nothing new, and they have their roots in the pit of Hell.

I'm sure this won't put an end to the ongoing debate, but that really isn't my intention here. I just wanted to share with you what I've learned through my Bible studies as of late.

The perceived pagan connections to Christianity we hear so much about this time of year are analogical and superficial -- not genealogical.

What I mean by that is that a Christian should be free to celebrate the death and resurrection of their Lord and Savior Jesus Christ this time of year without condemnation from their fellow brothers and sisters in Christ, especially when they are doing so with the right heart motives, and without the use of non-Christian symbols like the Easter Bunny and Easter Eggs.

Grace and peace unto you and yours.

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