The preceding four sentences are similar to a passage in A Study of Mithraism, p. 224 in this volume. The first Christian communities resembled the mystery communities in big cities and seaports by providing social security and the feeling of brotherhood. For an instance, the sacraments of baptism and the eucharist have been mentioned as rites, which were preactice {practiced} by both Christians and pagans. Willoughby, Pagan Regeneration, pp. There seems little doubt that this custom was identical with the Egyptian festival. Knowledge condemns. purchase. Weigall, Paganism in Our Christianity, p. 123: There can be no doubt that these ceremonies and beliefs deeply coloured the interpretation placed by the first Christians upon the historic facts of the Crucifixion, burial, and coming again to life of Jesus., 15. Christianity was subject to the same influences from the environment as were the other cults, and it sometimes produced the same reaction. In the first century of the Christian era the Eleusinian mystery cult was more favorable known than any of the cults of Greece.24 Its fame and popularity was largely due to the connexion of Eleusis with Athens. This sacramental use of the term did not become established until the fourth century, when the mystery religions were no longer serious competitors of Christianity. CULT OF CYBELE. Church leaders talked about "initiations, passwords, and mysteries" using exactly the same . Frickel, J. Hellenistische Erl sung in christlicher Deutung. (2) December 25 came to be considered as the anniversary of the birth of Mithra and Christ also. The coffin, meanwhile, was washed up on the Syrian coast, and became miraculously lodged in the trunk of a tree, This tree afterwards chanced to be cut down and made into a pillar in the palace at Byblos, and there Isis at length found it. Afterwards, however, he returned to the other world to reign for ever as King of the Dead; and meanwhile Horus, having grown to manhood, reigned on Earth, later becoming the third person of this great Egyptian trinity., 20. (4) All promised a happy future life for the faithful.\[Footnote:] Enslin, Christian Beginnings, pp. Clayborne Carson, Ralph Luker, and Penny A. Russell, eds. or 404 526-8968. This is, of course, a loaded question. The god of death himself stole the beloved daughter away from the life-giver; but the divine mother would not give up her loved one, and in the end she accomplished her daughters resurrection. Pluto, (also called Hades) therefore, at the request of Zeus released her but not before he had caused her to eat a pomegranate seed which magically required her return after a period of time. . Each following {year} there was a great festival in commemoration of his resurrection, and the very words, The Lord is risen, were probable used. Christianity's recently launched He Gets US campaignmillions of people got a dose during the Superbowltells us two things: 1. 5. This was by no means an accident. It is an interpretation of human history that breeds Eastern Roman Empire is considered among the most influential empires of the . In the spring, those who had shared Demeters grief for the loss of her daughter welcomed the return of Persephone with all the joy that the returning life of vegetation might kindle. It is at this point that we are able to see why knowledge of the Mystery religions is important for any serious study of the history of Christianity. The cult of Isis originated in Egypt and went through two major stages. 2d ed. 1. "Concerning the relationship between the mystery cults and Christianity, scholarly opinion has varied. Please c, ontact Intellectual Properties Management (IPM), the exclusive licensor of the Estate of Martin Luther King, Jr., Inc. at. 2. It was a nature myth, a vivid depiction of the action of life in the vegetable world with the changing of the seasons. The religious art of the Christians continued the pagan art of the preceding generations. Still others felt that, after the death of Jesus, the disciples saw in their common meal an opportunity to hold a kind of memorial service for him. But when we observe a little further we find that as a solar festival, Sunday was the sacred day of Mithra; it is also interesting to notice that since Mithra was addressed as Lord, Sunday must have been the Lords Day long before Christian use.\[Footnote:] Ibid., p. 137.\ It is also to be noticed that our Christmas, December 25th, was the birthday of Mithra, and was only taken over in the Fourth Century as the date, actually unknown, of the birth of Jesus.36, To make the picture a little more clear, we may list a few of the similarities between these two religions: (1) Both regard Sunday as a holy day. Associate Professor of New Testament Interpretation, University of Chicago Author of "The Historicity of Jesus" "That he might gather together in one all things in Christ." That is Paul's inter-pretation of God's cosmic plan. The doctrine of the soul taught in Gnostic communities was almost identical to that taught in the mysteries: the soul emanated from the Father, fell into the body, and had to return to its former home. The more crusading a religion is, the more it absorbs. Certainly Christianity has been a crusading religion from the beginning. There are no parallels in Christianity to the sexual rites in the Dionysiac and Isiac religion, with the exception of a few aberrant Gnostic communities. The mystery religions and Christianity had many similar featurese.g., a time of preparation before initiation and periods of fasting; baptism and banquets; vigils and early-morning ceremonies; pilgrimages and new names for the initiates. The words of St. Paul, They drank of that spiritual rock and that rock was Christ are borrowed from the Mithraic scriptures., 36. From the early days of Babylon and the legends surrounding Nimrod, Semiramis, and Tammuz, certain rites and rituals are traced in their various developments, thus providing clues whereby the "mystery . #516 in History of Religions. 6. The statement, ''A mix of Greco-Roman religions gradually replaced by Christianity'', is the one that can be used as an accurate description of religion in the Eastern Roman Empire in the first five centuries of the Common Era.Therefore, the option C holds true.. What is the significance of Eastern Roman Empire? Joining a mystery religion was a personal decision and was not connected to what family or culture one belonged to. I do not deny that there are some similarities. 1. During the first semester of his second year at Crozer, King wrote this paper for Enslin's course on Greek religion. As the religious history of the empire is studied more closely, writes M. Cumont, the triumph of the church will, in our opinion, appear more and more as the culmination of a long evolution of beliefs. familiar with a type of religion known as Mystery-Religions which changed the religious outlook of the Western world, and which are operative in European civilization and in the Christian Church to this day. Weigall, Paganism in Our Christianity, p. 145: The Hebrew Sabbath having been abolished by Christians, the Church made a sacred day of Sunday, partly because it was the day of the resurrection, but largely because it was the weekly festival of the sun; for it was a definite Christian policy to take over the pagan festivals endeared to the people by tradition, and to give them a Christian significance. This makes it sound as if they were unified, sharing common beliefs that . The theology of the mysteries was developed to a far lesser degree than the Christian theology. Never stop with the external, which may seem like borrowing, but recognize there is the perennial struggle for truth, fuller life itself. The purity demanded in the worship of Sol and in the Chaldean fire rites was similar to Christian standards. All of Lent's penitential practices and acts of spiritual renewal find their meaning in the journey of self-emptying and self-giving love that Jesus undertakes in his death and resurrection. 6 Mithraism. After telling a fictitious tale of her escape from pirates, she won the sympathy of the girls who took her home and at her own request was given a job to nurse their infant brother, Demophon. It was believed that this god suffered a cruel death, after which he descended into hell, rose again, and then ascended into Heaven. Answer (1 of 7): Over the years, Christianity has often been compared to the mystery religions of ancient Greece and Rome, both by Christians wishing to emphasize the esoteric nature of their religion and by opponents of Christianity who claim that the resemblance between Christianity and mystery. All this goes to show how important Mithraism was in ancient times. The statue of the Good Shepherd carrying his lost sheep and the pastoral themes on Christian sarcophagi were also taken over from pagan craftsmanship. mystery religion, any of various secret cults of the Greco-Roman world that offered to individuals religious experiences not provided by the official public religions. They covered an enormous range, and manifested a great diversity in character and outlook, from Orphism to Gnosticism, from the orgies of the Cabira to the fervours of the Hermetic contemplative.\[Footnote:] Angus, The Mystery Religions and Christianity, p. vii.\2 However it is to be noticed that these Mysteries possessed many fundamental likenesses; (1) All held that the initiate shared in symbolic (sacramental) fashion the experiences of the god. March 24th was the Day of Blood, whereon the High Priest, who himself impersonated Attis, drew blood from his arm and offered it up in place of the blood of a human sacrifice, thus, as it were, sacrificing himself, a fact which recalls to mind the words in the Epistle to the Hebrews: Christ being come an High Priest neither by the blood of goats and calves, but by his own blood obtained eternal redemption for us. That night the priests went to the tomb and found it illuminated from within, and it was then discovered to be empty, the god having risen on the third day from the dead; and on the 25th the resurrection was celebrated with great rejoicings, a sacramental meal of some kind being taken, and initiates being baptised with blood, whereby their sins were washed away and they were said to be born again., 14. He hears all and sees all: none can deceive him.\[Footnote:] Cumont, Mysteries of Mithra, pp. In its older Egyptian version, which was not a mystery religion, Isis was regarded as the goddess of heaven, earth, the sea, and the unseen world below. Question 10 1 out of 1 points It is likely that Christianity borrowed from the mystery religions, but when Christianity did this was hundreds of years after it began, and thus has nothing to do with the core of Christian proclamation. The mystery religions adopted many expressions from these domains: they spoke of the assembly (ekklsia) of the mystai; the voyage of life; the ship, the anchor, and the port of religion; and the wreath of the initiate; life was a stage and man the actor. Osiris and Isis, so runs the legend, were brother and sister and also husband and wife; but Osiris was murdered, his coffined body being thrown into the Nile, and shortly afterwards the widowed and exiled Isis gave birth to a son, Horus. Willoughby, Pagan Regeneration, pp. As the religious history of the empire is studied more closely, writes Cumont, the triumph of the church will, in our opinion, appear more and more as the culmination of a long evolution of beliefs. It is also significant to know that Roman tolerance had favoured this great syncretism of religious ideas. The Greeks interpreted the national religions of the Greek Orient chiefly in terms of Platos philosophical and religious concepts. The Christian theologian Origen wrote in the 3rd century that it was part of the divine plan that Christ was born under the emperor Augustus: the whole Mediterranean world was united by the Romans, and the conditions for missionary work were more favourable than ever before. Perhaps the most notable difference between Christianity and the mystery religions is Christianity's attitude towards proselytism. The ideas of Greek philosophy penetrated everywhere in this society. Forces have been known to delay trends but very few have stopped them. The date of Christmas was purposely fixed on December 25 to push into the background the great festival of the sun god, and Epiphany on January 6 to supplant an Egyptian festival of the same day. Les myst res pa ens et le myst re chr tiens. The essay examines how Christianity developed as a distinct religion with a set of central tenets and how it was influenced by those pagan religions it assimilated. The mystery religion was very narrow in scope, only involving select groups of people therefore not gaining support from the masses.Some people believe that Christianity and Judaism have many parallels to the mystery cults in terms of terminology (salvation, resurrection, eternal life) and in the particulars of the performance of initiation and ritual. Now it seems that the general belief of the early church that Jesus was born in a cave grows directly out of Mithraic ideas. by Bart D. Ehrman. This tree afterwards chanced to be cut down and made into a pillar in the palace at Byblos, and there Isis at length found it. In this earlier stage, Isis had a husband named Osiris. Firstly, she was pictured as the lady of sorrows, weeping for the dead Osiris, and secondly she was commended as the divine mother, nursing her infant son, Horus. . While Herodotus fails to give a date for this festival, Plutarch says that it lasted four days, giving the date as the seventeenth day of the Egyptian month Hathor, which, according to the Alexandrian claendar used by him, corresponded to November 13th.\[Footnote:] Frazer, op. The mysteries of human life and death are vividly enacted by Demeter, Persephone, and Hades. In order to understand the type of religious experience represented by this important cult, we must turn to the myth of the rape of Demeters daughter by Pluto. 40. Christianity triumphed over these mystery religions after long conflict. Christianity certainly has many important features in common with Greco-Roman mystery religions, but there are some crucial differences between Christianity and mystery religions that really set Christianity apart. It is very common to find claims that Christianity was a mystery religion, similar to the worship of Dionysus, Isis, Orpheus, etc. It seems instead to have been carried over from Jewish background and modified by the new ideas and beliefs of the Christians. However when we come to the idea of Jesus decent into hell it seems that we have a direct borrow from the Adonis religion, and in fact from other religions also. Dimensions : 5.37 x 0.73 x 8.4 inches. MLKP, MBU, Martin Luther King, Jr., Papers, 1954-1968, Howard Gotlieb Archival Research Center, Boston University, Boston, Mass. (3) Baptism and a communion meal were important parts of the ritual of both groups. P: (650) 723-2092 | F: (650) 723-2093 | kinginstitute@stanford.edu| Campus Map. The preceding three paragraphs are similar to a passage in Kings earlier paper, A Study of Mithraism, p. 211 in this volume. Weigall, Paganism in Our Christianity, pp. Willoughby, Pagan Regeneration, p. 42: The experiential basis for this story is quite clear. 131132: At about this time a story, attributed to Melito, Bishop of Sardis in the Second Century, but probably of much later origin, began to spread that Mary had been miraculously carried to Heaven by Jesus and His angels; and in the Sixth Century the festival of the Assumption, which celebrates this event, was acknowledged by the Church, and is now one of the great feasts of Roman Catholicism, It is celebrated on August 13th; but that was the date of the great festival of Diana or Artemis, with whom Isis was identified, and one can see, thus, how Mary had gradually taken the place of the goddess., 24. 124125: The popular and widespread religion of Osiris and Isis exercised considerable influence upon early Christianity, for these two great Egyptian deities, whose worship had passed into Europe, were revered in Rome and in several other centres where Christian communities were growing up. There are also great differences between Christianity and the mysteries. Mithraism, a sect of Zoroastrianism characterized by the worship of Mithra as the defender of the truth, was a monotheistic mystery religion prevalent in the Roman empire before the acceptance of Christianity in the fourth century. Interpretation in Platonic concepts was also the means by which the Judeo-Christian set of creeds was thoroughly assimilated to Greek ideas by the early Christian thinkers Clement of Alexandria and Origen. Weigall, Paganism in Our Christianity, pp. They were not self-sufficient sects . Willoughby, Pagan Regeneration, p. 36: Among the cults of Greece none was more favorably known in the first century of the Christian era than the Eleusinian mysteries., 25. In order to give a comprehensive picture of this subject, I will discuss Four {Five} of the most popular of these religions separately, rather than to view them en masse as a single great religious system. 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