Followers

Wednesday, October 6, 2010

The Mythological Core of Christianity

Alice C. Linsley

Christianity isn't a religion for people who seek innovation or who prefer a belief system that is open to modification and personal preferences. Unlike synthetic religions which cobble together beliefs and ideas, Christianity is an organic religion that emerges out of a belief that God made a promise in Eden and that He has been busy fulfilling it in the God-Man Jesus Christ.

Most people think of Christianity as an off-shoot of Judaism. However,  the core of Christianity can be traced back to Abraham and his Kushite ancestors, long before there were Jews and Judaism.  In this sense, Christianity isn't original. What it lacks in originality, it makes up for in antiquity and herein rests its authority.

The origins of the Faith of Christ, the Son of God, came to Abraham, not as special revelation, but as a tradition received from his forefathers. The distinctive traits of this tradition align remarkable well with the key features of catholic faith and practice:
  1. All-male ruler-priests
  2. Blood sacrifice at altars
  3. Expectation of the appearing of God
  4. As in heaven, so on earth - interpreted by morehs (prophets)
  5. Belief in an eternal and undivided Kingdom
Because of God's promise in Eden (Gen. 3:15) Abraham and his ancestors lived in expectation of the Son of God and taught their children to do so.  Their priestly lines intermarried exclsuively in expectation that the Seed of the Woman would come of their priestly lines. In other words, the Edenic tradition is a family-tribal tradition. This is evident when one studies the genealogies and discovers that the ruler-priests of Abraham's people were allied by intermarriage and shared common beliefs and practices, such as circumcision, animal sacrifice by priests, and divine guidance through prophets.

Abraham and his people were Horites, a caste of ruler-priests who were devotees of the mythical Horus who was called the "Son of God."  Many have noted the correspondance between the myth of Horus and the story of Jesus.  The correspondance is uncanny and can be explained in two ways.  Either Christians borrowed the Horus myth or Christianity emerges in an organic way from the belief system of Abraham and his Horite people.  If we decide that Christians borrowed the Horus myth, we must explain why they should have selected this one in particular. There are other great world myths that could have served as the pattern for the story of Jesus.

Christians believe that Jesus is the Son of God and that He will receive an eternal kingdom from the Father.  The citizens of this eternal kingdom must themselves be eternal beings and that is why Jesus alone offers eternal life to all who believe that He is the Son of God, the fulfillment of the Edenic Promise of Genesis 3:15.  He is able to do this because He alone has conquered death and can deliver sinners from the curse of death. This is the core of Christian belief.  Surrounding this core are attendant beliefs which logically follow. One is that to recieve eternal life, we must acknowledge our need for mercy, forgiveness and salvation. Another is that God does this for us out of His boundless love.  John wrote, "This is the revelation of God's love for us, that God sent his only Son into the world that we might have life through him." (1 John 4:9)

There are Christians who eschew Easter eggs as a pagan practice, though Abraham's people painted ostrich eggs as symbol of life after death.

There are Christians who ignore the Virgin Mother of God, though she is is central to the fulfillment of the Edenic Promise of Genesis 3:15. The Virgin Mary was a descendent of the ruler-priest lines of Abraham's people. She is the Woman to whom God makes the promise that her Seed shall crush the head of the serpent and restore Paradise. The whole of the Bible is about this promise. When we lose the core of Christianity we have to put something into the hole left by our prejudices, ignorance and fears. We introduce praise bands, revivals, campaigns to keep the Ten Commandments in public buildings, church marketing to grow our memberships, and activities to pump us up emotionally. These have nothing to do with what God is doing. They are distractions.

If Christians are to have a positive impact on the world, they must return to the mythological core of the Faith. They must believe and proclaim the singular truth that Jesus Christ is the Son of God who came into the world to save sinners because of God's great love.

2 comments:

  1. The five criteria you mentioned are also Jewish. Do you know of any tradition that is uniquely Christian?

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  2. Christianity is not original. It develops organically from the faith of Abraham and the Horite priestly lines. That is why these features are found in both Judaism and Christianity. It is what those 2 faiths disagree on that shows which faith remains closest to the faith of Abraham's Horite people.

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