Jesus vs Horus
To begin I'll admit that my background on christianity is very limited. Growing up I never went to church except on two occasions, that I remember, with friends' families. Luckily for me my parents kept my siblings and I occupied with sports, music, movies, games, and family activities indoors and out rather than go to church. In fact my father admitted to me that he lost interest in religion as a child when his parents stopped going to church but sent my father and brother by themselves on their bikes. And of course, without parental supervision, my father said he and his brother immediately quit going to church but used the time away from parents to go peruse the town and keep themselves entertained in other ways - most likely mischief.
Browsing some blogs this afternoon, I ran across Jake's entry titled Revenge as a question to the authenticity of religion.
Jake's short but insightful blog recognizes the similarities between the great floods in the Bible and Ovid's Metamorphoses, which he end with an excellent last sentnece that reads, " the fact that both of these stories have stunning parallels calls to question the possibility that religions such as Christianity and other creation stories that include the idea of "the great flood" perhaps stole the idea from Greek literature."
You are indeed on the right track Jake. Last year I was introduced to an award winning, maybe slightly overdone, documentary titled Zeitgeist. However this movie revealed, for me, some stunning connections between Christianity and other world religions, past and present. Zeitgeist is defined as 'the defining spirit or mood of a particular period of history as shown by the ideas and beliefs of the time.'
What it boils down to is that much of the Christian myth is incredibly similar to ancient Egyptian religion and the common god Horus; and throughout human history there are hundreds of other religions and deities that share similar connections. It is one amazing story.
I have done some general internet research periodically on this connection and, personally, find it to be quite accurate. However, there is an incredible amount of controversy on this topic. Books have been written, websites for and against the connection, and much more. I believe it depends on the person, obviously, whether they acknowledge it as true or false.
It is very easy to believe what you are told is correct, but much harder to think about it further and repudiate it honestly and accurately.
Here are a couple links to begin at:
http://www.religioustolerance.org/chr_jcpa5.htm
http://www.adam.com.au/bstett/BJesusandHorus74.htm
I find the first link to be much better, and less biased. The Pantheon also has an interesting entry on Horus at: http://www.pantheon.org/articles/h/horus.html. At the bottom of this entry there is a quoted passage from the Coffin Texts that reads, "I am Horus, the great Falcon upon the ramparts of the house of him of the hidden name. My flight has reached the horizon. I have passed by the gods of Nut. I have gone further than the gods of old. Even the most ancient bird could not equal my very first flight. I have removed my place beyond the powers of Set, the foe of my father Osiris. No other god could do what I have done. I have brought the ways of eternity to the twilight of the morning. I am unique in my flight. My wrath will be turned against the enemy of my father Osiris and I will put him beneath my feet in my name of 'Red Cloak'."
If you read this carefully you may notice some familiar themes and ideas. What stands out the most to me is that the description of Horus is strikingly similar to a personified description of the sun, not son, but sun, the bright orange globe we see every day. The relevance of the bible's reference to sun and son is no mistake.
The coolest part: the resurrection of Jesus, and Horus, is practically an exact personification of the winter solstice. Read more about the solstices here: http://www.astrologycom.com/solstice.html.
As the days get shorter and the angle of the sun declines throughout december, it reaches its lowest point around December 22. Then the sun stops, for three days, and on December 25, Christmas, 'resurrects' and begins its journey back up, peaking-out on the summer solstice in June, usually around the 19th or 20th. And, not surprisingly, the word solstice derives from the latin phrase, 'sun stands still.'
And is it not interesting that all this is merely replicas of nature? Absolutely, because the natural world is the only thing that we can depend on, it isn't an abstract fictional world such as heaven and hell.
Well this turned into a rather obscenely long blog. It may be important for us, humans, to ground ourselves with the earth, the natural world; however it is just as important to escape from this world to one of fiction and imagination, which, for me, is where heaven and hell seem to fit quite well.
Posted by bmcycleski
at 6:14 PM MDT
Updated: Monday, 23 March 2009 7:58 PM MDT
