"The Pagan Roots of Easter"

by Heather McDowell
"The Guardian"
3 April 2010

"Easter is a pagan festival.

"If Easter isn't really about Jesus, then what is it about?

"Today, we see a secular culture celebrating the spring equinox, whilst religious culture celebrates the resurrection.

"However, early Christianity made a pragmatic acceptance of ancient pagan practises, most of which we enjoy today at Easter. The general symbolic story of the death of the son (sun) on a cross (the constellation of the Southern Cross) and his rebirth, overcoming the powers of darkness, was a well worn story in the ancient world.

"There were plenty of parallel, rival resurrected saviors, too.

"The Sumerian goddess Inanna, or Ishtar, was hung naked on a stake, and was subsequently resurrected and ascended from the underworld.

"One of the oldest resurrection myths is Egyptian Horus. Born on 25 December, Horus and his damaged eye became symbols of life and rebirth.

"Mithras was born on what we now call Christmas day, and his followers celebrated the spring equinox. Even as late as the 4th century AD, the sol invictus, associated with Mithras, was the last great pagan cult the church had to overcome.

"Dionysus was a divine child, resurrected by his grandmother. Dionysus also brought his mum, Semele, back to life.

"In an ironic twist, the Cybele cult flourished on today's Vatican Hill. Cybele's lover Attis, was born of a virgin, died and was reborn annually.

"This spring festival began as a day of blood on Black Friday, rising to a crescendo after three days, in rejoicing over the resurrection. T

"here was violent conflict on Vatican Hill in the early days of Christianity between the Jesus worshippers and pagans who quarrelled over whose God was the true, and whose the imitation.

"What is interesting to note here is that in the ancient world, wherever you had popular resurrected god myths, Christianity found lots of converts. So, eventually Christianity came to an accommodation with the pagan Spring festival.

"Although we see no celebration of Easter in the New Testament, early church fathers celebrated it, and today many churches are offering 'sunrise services' at Easter--an obvious pagan solar celebration.

"The date of Easter is not fixed, but instead is governed by the phases of the moon--how pagan is that?

"All the fun things about Easter are pagan.

"Bunnies are a leftover from the pagan festival of Eostre, a great northern goddess whose symbol was a rabbit or hare.

"Exchange of eggs is an ancient custom, celebrated by many cultures.

"Hot cross buns are very ancient too. In the Old Testament we see the Israelites baking sweet buns for an idol, and religious leaders trying to put a stop to it. The early church clergy also tried to put a stop to sacred cakes being baked at Easter. In the end, in the face of defiant cake-baking pagan women, they gave up and blessed the cake instead.

"Easter is essentially a pagan festival which is celebrated with cards, gifts and novelty Easter products, because it's fun and the ancient symbolism still works.

"It's always struck me that the power of nature and the longer days are often most felt in modern towns and cities, where we set off to work without putting on our car headlights and when our alarm clock goes off in the mornings, the streetlights outside are not still on because of the darkness.

"What better way to celebrate, than to bite the head off the bunny goddess, go to a 'sunrise service', get yourself a sticky-footed fluffy chick and stick it on your TV, whilst helping yourself to a hefty slice of pagan simnel cake? Happy Easter everyone!"
_____



Hell, even some Christian sects openly admit that Easter rituals have nothing to do with Jesus's resurrection, but are actually pagan in their creation--and not pm;u that--are devilish and Anti--Christ in their inspiration! This ain't funny-bunny, honey.

Time to reject this Rabbit from the Lower Realms and come to your Redeemer!

"The Pagan Origin Of Easter"

by David J. Meyer
"Last Trumpet Ministries International"
PO Box 806
Beaver Dam, WI 53916


"Easter is a day that is honored by nearly all of contemporary Christianity and is used to celebrate the resurrection of Jesus Christ.

"The holiday often involves a church service at sunrise, a feast which includes an 'Easter Ham,' decorated eggs and stories about rabbits.

"Those who love truth learn to ask questions, and many questions must be asked regarding the holiday of Easter.

"Is it truly the day when Jesus arose from the dead? Where did all of the strange customs come from, which have nothing to do with the resurrection of our Savior?

"The purpose of this tract is to help answer those questions, and to help those who seek truth to draw their own conclusions.

"The first thing we must understand is that professing Christians were not the only ones who celebrated a festival called 'Easter.'

"'Ishtar,' which is pronounced 'Easter,' was a day that commemorated the resurrection of one of their gods that they called 'Tammuz,' who was believed to be the only begotten son of the moon-goddess and the sun-god.

"In those ancient times, there was a man named Nimrod, who was the grandson of one of Noah's son named Ham.

"Ham had a son named Cush who married a woman named Semiramis.Cush and Semiramis then had a son named him 'Nimrod.'

"After the death of his father, Nimrod married his own mother and became a powerful King.

"The Bible tells of of this man, Nimrod, in Genesis 10:8-10 as follows: 'And Cush begat Nimrod: he began to be a mighty one in the earth. He was a mighty hunter before the Lord: wherefore it is said, even as Nimrod the mighty hunter before the Lord. And the beginning of his kingdom was Babel, and Erech, and Accad,and Calneh, in the land of Shinar.'

"Nimrod became a god-man to the people and Semiramis, his wife and mother, became the powerful Queen of ancient Babylon.

"Nimrod was eventually killed by an enemy, and his body was cut in pieces and sent to various parts of his kingdom.

"Semiramis had all of the parts gathered, except for one part that could not be found.

"That missing part was his reproductive organ. Semiramis claimed that Nimrod could not come back to life without it and told the people of Babylon that Nimrod had ascended to the sun and was now to be called 'Baal,' the sun god.

"Queen Semiramis also proclaimed that Baal would be present on earth in the form of a flame, whether candle or lamp, when used in worship.

"Semiramis was creating a mystery religion, and with the help of Satan, she set herself up as a goddess.

"Semiramis claimed that she was immaculately conceived.

"She taught that the moon was a goddess that went through a 28 day cycle and ovulated when full.

"She further claimed that she came down from the moon in a giant moon egg that fell into the Euphrates River.

"This was to have happened at the time of the first full moon after the spring equinox.

"Semiramis became known as 'Ishtar,' which is pronounced 'Easter'' and her moon egg became known as 'Ishtar's' egg."

"Ishtar soon became pregnant and claimed that it was the rays of the sun-god Baal that caused her to conceive.

"The son that she brought forth was named Tammuz.

"Tammuz was noted to be especially fond of rabbits, and they became sacred in the ancient religion, because Tammuz was believed to be the son of the sun-god, Baal. Tammuz, like his supposed father, became a hunter.

"The day came when Tammuz was killed by a wild pig.

"Queen Ishtar told the people that Tammuz was now ascended to his father, Baal, and that the two of them would be with the worshippers in the sacred candle or lamp flame as Father, Son and Spirit.

"Ishtar, who was now worshipped as the 'Mother of God and Queen of Heaven,' continued to build her mystery religion.

"The queen told the worshippers that when Tammuz was killed by the wild pig, some of his blood fell on the stump of an evergreen tree, and the stump grew into a full new tree overnight. This made the evergreen tree sacred by the blood of Tammuz.

"She also proclaimed a 40-day period of time of sorrow each year prior to the anniversary of the death of Tammuz.

"During this time, no meat was to be eaten.

"Worshippers were to meditate upon the sacred mysteries of Baal and Tammuz, and to make the sign of the "T" in front of their hearts as they worshipped.

"They also ate sacred cakes with the marking of a 'T' or cross on the top.

"Every year, on the first Sunday after the first full moon after the spring equinox, a celebration was made.

"It was Ishtar's Sunday and was celebrated with rabbits and eggs.

"Ishtar also proclaimed that because Tammuz was killed by a pig, that a pig must be eaten on that Sunday.

"By now, the readers of this tract should have made the connection that paganism has infiltrated the contemporary 'Christian' churches, and further study indicates that this paganism came in by way of the Roman Catholic System.

"The truth is that Easter has nothing whatsoever to do with the resurrection of our Lord Jesus Christ.

"We also know that Easter can be as much as three weeks away from the Passover, because the pagan holiday is always set as the first Sunday after the first full moon after the spring equinox.

"Some have wondered why the word 'Easter' is in the the King James Bible.

"It is because Acts, chapter 12, tells us that it was the evil King Herod, who was planning to celebrate Easter, and not the Christians.

"The true Passover and pagan Easter sometimes coincide, but in some years, they are a great distance apart.

"So much more could be said, and we have much more information for you, if you are a seeker of the truth.

"We know that the Bible tells us in John 4:24, 'God is a Spirit: and they that worship him must worship him in spirit and in truth.'

"The truth is that the 40 days of Lent, eggs, rabbits, hot cross buns and the Easter ham have everything to do with the ancient pagan religion of Mystery Babylon. These are all anti-christ activities!

"Satan is a master deceiver, and has filled the lives of well-meaning, professing Christians with idolatry.

"These things bring the wrath of God upon children of disobedience, who try to make pagan customs of Baal worship Christian.

"You must answer for your activities and for what you teach your children.

"These customs of Easter honor Baal, who is also Satan, and is still worshipped as the 'Rising Sun' and his house is the 'House of the Rising Sun.'

[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9FCBg3GmzQM]

"How many churches have 'sunrise services' on Ishtar's day and face the rising sun in the East?

"How many will use colored eggs and rabbit stories, as they did in ancient Babylon?

"These things are no joke, any more than Judgment Day is a joke.

"I pray to God that this tract will cause you to search for more truth.

"We will be glad to help you by providing more information and by praying for you.

"These are the Last Days, and it is time to repent, come out and be separate."



Edited 6 time(s). Last edit at 04/17/2017 02:31AM by steve benson.

How often do you hear from the Walker clan? Have they given up trying to reconvert you?

Always a breath of fresh air, Mr. Benson. However, my I take the topic one step further? Just some thoughts. According to Carl Jung/Joseph Campbell, all these items are themselves symbols and shadows of a much deeper primal imperative, which is the innate desire in all of us to achieve a transcendent awareness typified by the mystical experience. All these rituals and myths are the outward manifestations of this part of us that for various reasons tends to get buried under all the layers of consciousness that are necessary for survival- like the need to put food on the table- and at the same time distracting from what our souls desperately crave. According to this school of thought the mystical experience is the ultimate example of a rebirth into a new life.

What say you? Are they right? Is the mystical experience (or the Buddhist Nirvana, which many Buddhists insist not the same as a Western mystical event) the goal to which all souls secretly yearn? Can we all achieve that state? Should we want to?

They finally did.

One might say it was submission to my non priesthood "authority."



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 04/16/2017 05:29PM by steve benson.

I suspect that was Flora and Heather. I would get a kick out of talking to you sometime.

Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 04/16/2017 06:26PM by steve benson.

That likely came from hubby K. I didn't know her as well as the middle 3. I was in between L and R. Do you have a work email where I can send you my contact info?

she wrote me a letter expressing her extreme displeasure and engaging in typical in-denial rationalizing against the obvious that is typical of the true-believing Mormon mindset.

Her husband Karl added a short, single-sentence rah-rah at the end expressing his priesthood support for her kissin' cousin tongue-lashing.

Neither one of their declarations moved me any closer to returning to the LDS cult-de-sac. If anything, it simply reinforced my decision to leave as being the right move.

Clueless TBMs simply don't get tis central fact:

Unleashing rote, self-righteous, regurgitated-rigmarole guilt trips on folks like myself who--(through the accident of birth) happened to land smack dab in the middle of it all and came to know quite well from a unique insider vantage point how institutionalized Mormonism systematically works to deceive, grow its material wealth and maintain power--does nothing but annoy those who have operational brains that came into existence through no fake fortune-telling patriarchal blessing.

But, hey, it's Easter. Let's enjoy the paganness of it all, while mopping the floor with the mythical Mormon messiah.



Edited 5 time(s). Last edit at 04/17/2017 03:09AM by steve benson.

You are a funny dude.

Though I'm pretty hard core Baptist, I found your articles interesting.

Thanks for the information and the interesting read.

I admit, I had my kids participate in the "pagan" rituals today. regardless of their origin, I love watching my kids hunt for Easter Eggs and candy. We did it in our backyard today, and then they went into a diabetic coma (not really, figure of speech) from gorging themselves all day on sugary sweets.

I admit, for them, the holidays (Easter, Christmas, etc) probably are not so much about religion, and much more about what they can get on those days...it's all about candy, gifts, and other things that we, as parents, probably enjoy giving them far too much.

I always liked Sundays right after Halloween. The kids came stumbling into church like like little hung over adults. Primary was a little less noisy that day.

Nursery became a laboratory for testing my own version of chaos theory. "If you give these kids sugar, there's gonna be chaos."