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In our culture, Easter means one of two things. It means the celebration of the resurrection of Christ or it means celebrating egg-laying bunnies and chocolate eggs. Most people don't give a second thought into why we have these traditions.
Easter is actually the celebration of the Babylonian sex goddess Ishtar. The eggs and bunnies are a symbol of fertility or sex. Two aspects of our traditions come from the fact that the son of Ishtar was supposedly obsessed with rabbits. The easter eggs come from the tradition of human sacrifice and dipping the eggs in blood after the sacrifice to Ishtar.
Out of all the holidays we celebrate, this has to be the one that makes me the most uneasy. Yes, I know that the contemporary meaning is celebrating the resurrection of Christ as well as candy for kids, but the Bible lays out its own feast, the Passover, which is punctuated by the feast of the First Fruits (egg-laying bunnies need not apply).
First of all, the fact that we have a holiday honoring Ishtar and egg-laying bunnies should make anybody pause in the first place. Second of all, if the Bible lays out the correct way to celebrate the resurrection of Christ, why does Christian culture and broader society ignore that and instead celebrate the lunacy of Ishtar? From a Christian or secular perspective, I see no reason this holiday should be a part of our culture.
In our culture, Easter means one of two things. It means the celebration of the resurrection of Christ or it means celebrating egg-laying bunnies and chocolate eggs. Most people don't give a second thought into why we have these traditions.
Easter is actually the celebration of the Babylonian sex goddess Ishtar. The eggs and bunnies are a symbol of fertility or sex. Two aspects of our traditions come from the fact that the son of Ishtar was supposedly obsessed with rabbits. The easter eggs come from the tradition of human sacrifice and dipping the eggs in blood after the sacrifice to Ishtar.
Out of all the holidays we celebrate, this has to be the one that makes me the most uneasy. Yes, I know that the contemporary meaning is celebrating the resurrection of Christ as well as candy for kids, but the Bible lays out its own feast, the Passover, which is punctuated by the feast of the First Fruits (egg-laying bunnies need not apply).
First of all, the fact that we have a holiday honoring Ishtar and egg-laying bunnies should make anybody pause in the first place. Second of all, if the Bible lays out the correct way to celebrate the resurrection of Christ, why does Christian culture and broader society ignore that and instead celebrate the lunacy of Ishtar? From a Christian or secular perspective, I see no reason this holiday should be a part of our culture.
Oh for God's sake.
Why does this happen every year that somebody feels obligated to come prancing in here as if no one has EVER posted this same stupid crap 100 times before?
The Pagan goddess Eostar was the Goddess of Dawn and New Beginnings.
One day Eostar found a bird with a broken wing. The bird was dying. Eostar could not repair the broken wing, but she could save the bird's life by changing it into a bunny.
So the bird lived its life as a bunny.
But because the bunny had once been a bird, the bunny continued to lay eggs.
Eostar's Bunny........... The Easter Bunny
Many parts of Christianity are taken from Paganism. The blend was made in 325 at the Council of Nicea and was an attempt by Roman Emperor Constantine to find a peaceful solution to the two warring factions, Paganism and Christianity.
Why does this happen every year that somebody feels obligated to come prancing in here as if no one has EVER posted this same stupid crap 100 times before?
F for originality.
If we are looking for originality we don't find it is the ever repeated claims of Christian apologetics. Why shouldn't the same obtain for Atheist apolgetics? Personally I find easter is a very appropriate time for pointing out that the actual events (and there were actual events, or the Christians would not have needed to whitewash over them) occurred at the feast of Sukkhot, not Passover, just as I find Christmas a satisfying time to post a nativity debunker.
Don't let yourself get steamed up over it dear lady, because you are going to get a lot more of it.
If we are looking for originality we don't find it is the ever repeated claims of Christian apologetics. Why shouldn't the same obtain for Atheist apolgetics? Personally I find easter is a very appropriate time for pointing out that the actual events (and there were actual events, or the Christians would not have needed to whitewash over them) occurred at the feast of Sukkhot, not Passover, just as I find Christmas a satisfying time to post a nativity debunker.
Don't let yourself get steamed up over it dear lady, because you are going to get a lot more of it.
Well, you can't MAKE me read it, so there.
I think what annoys me most is that they come dashing in here, arms waving wildly, as if they're the first to come up with the pagan connections and no one's ever heard it before...probably because they themselves just learned it.
In our culture, Easter means one of two things. It means the celebration of the resurrection of Christ or it means celebrating egg-laying bunnies and chocolate eggs. Most people don't give a second thought into why we have these traditions.
Easter is actually the celebration of the Babylonian sex goddess Ishtar. The eggs and bunnies are a symbol of fertility or sex. Two aspects of our traditions come from the fact that the son of Ishtar was supposedly obsessed with rabbits. The easter eggs come from the tradition of human sacrifice and dipping the eggs in blood after the sacrifice to Ishtar.
Out of all the holidays we celebrate, this has to be the one that makes me the most uneasy. Yes, I know that the contemporary meaning is celebrating the resurrection of Christ as well as candy for kids, but the Bible lays out its own feast, the Passover, which is punctuated by the feast of the First Fruits (egg-laying bunnies need not apply).
First of all, the fact that we have a holiday honoring Ishtar and egg-laying bunnies should make anybody pause in the first place. Second of all, if the Bible lays out the correct way to celebrate the resurrection of Christ, why does Christian culture and broader society ignore that and instead celebrate the lunacy of Ishtar? From a Christian or secular perspective, I see no reason this holiday should be a part of our culture.
From a secular perspective, you've obviously never heard of Spring before.
Do you really think any Babylonian religious person considered their beloved Ishtar "some w.e. sex goddess." No, She WAS Love (any similarities to another religion?). She provided fertility/protection contracts to individuals (any similarities to another religion?) although not for all further generations as that would be racist. She was the Lordess of Hosts/Armies (any similarities to another religion?). Heaven simply had NO SLAVES (no angels) to these anti-canonical syncretic polytheists.
Yes, the eggs and bunnies are a symbol of Spring/Dawn/Fertility, whom Romans had correlated with Ishtar when they were trying to unite the world under their syncretic polytheism. The Christians did this too, even today they color the eggs red because they found it convenient (in Orthodox circles), they even used Phoenix symbols because they found it convinient.
"Ishtar was supposedly obsessed with rabbits" really? So Jesus was obsessed with fish and sheep? Ishtar wouldn't even put a human in hell to save herself from it (her sister's domain that she was trying to bring back all people to life from); sacrifices were officially limited to animal sacrifices in Babylon [saves the King his head] even if being willing to sacrifice your children was still considered most religiously loyal by the rural people (sound familiar to another religion?)
Yes, most Bible canons, and versions of those canons, and translations of those versions, do in fact set up a good facsimile of what a Jew is supposed to do: celebrate passover for 7 or 8 days, then 50 days after the second day of passover celebrate the harvest festival (later including a celebration for the Torah). That harvest festival is called "Pentecost" in Christian circles and that is 7 weeks after Easter. The reason some few Christians celebrate Pentecost is because in that Jewish festival it is written into story that Jewish Christians had a crazy time where they felt like something Holy was with them (as Jesus had promised he would bring a comforter to them, some say that is Paul instead of the H.S.) and they spoke in tongues (that is they understood eacother while speaking "Angelese" and/or World-Languages (The opposite of the Tower of Babel)). Thus, the "resurrection" should be celebrated sometime during the end days of passover... but it isn't. It is celebrated on Easter because none of the cultures wanted to stop celebrate the wonderful happiness of Easter, and the Catholics wanted to try to slowly overshadow it.
I think what annoys me most is that they come dashing in here, arms waving wildly, as if they're the first to come up with the pagan connections and no one's ever heard it before...probably because they themselves just learned it.
Besides, the OP does not seem to be Atheist.
Anyway. Whatever blows your skirt up. Carry on.
That's your choice. Horse -water, as they say. Neither can you dissuade us from writing such things or seeing religious festivals as a very appropriate time for explaining (to any willing to listen) that what they are celebrating is a factually dubious event.
We have to be patient. Just as we are with the white -whiskered "Who made everything then?" or "Millions would not die for a lie". And in fact the pagan connection is hardly explored as yet. The implication of the Ptolemaic Isis and Horus (1) hardly seems to have penetrated as yet despite bit Isis and Mary being known as "Star of the sea".
That's your choice. Horse -water, as they say. Neither can you dissuade us from writing such things or seeing religious festivals as a very appropriate time for explaining (to any willing to listen) that what they are celebrating is a factually dubious event.
We have to be patient. Just as we are with the white -whiskered "Who made everything then?" or "Millions would not die for a lie". And in fact the pagan connection is hardly explored as yet. The implication of the Ptolemaic Isis and Horus (1) hardly seems to have penetrated as yet despite bit Isis and Mary being known as "Star of the sea".
Damn it hasn't attached.
Honey-pie, I am not trying to dissuade you from writing anything. I explained what annoyed me about it. Perhaps I'm just old and cranky and sick of seeing the same thing over and over again.
How many people really don't know this stuff? How many people do you think there are out there that REALLY think December 25 was Jesus birthday or don't know that the non-religious Easter traditions come from pagan fertility festivals?
As I've stated before, I grew up in a fairly conservative religious home in the 1960s, yet we knew those things. The people who don't are surely few and far between.
But you reminded me, there is a lovely retreat house called Stella Maris (Star of the Sea) on the beach not far from here, run by a nuns who have an organization called Waterspirit that works to preserve the oceans. They do events on the equinoxes and solstices.
Unfortunately, I think they've had to sell the property due to financial constraints. It will be a nature preserve.
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