Origins of Christianity

[Short1]

Hey guys..

I'm wondering about where Christianity came from. Why are there stories in the Bible that resemble stories that predate it? Why were the first documents of religion polytheistic?

Basically, I'm wondering what a response to this video is:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MlnnWbkMlbg

I know you may frown upon posting a video and asking why it's right/wrong, but I don't have much background in this historical stuff. Are these assertions legitimate?

Thanks for the help guys.

[B. W.]

Hey guys..

I'm wondering about where Christianity came from. Why are there stories in the Bible that resemble stories that predate it? Why were the first documents of religion polytheistic?

Basically, I'm wondering what a response to this video is:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MlnnWbkMlbg

I know you may frown upon posting a video and asking why it's right/wrong, but I don't have much background in this historical stuff. Are these assertions legitimate?

Thanks for the help guys.

I have not watched the video but familuar with this topic - here is a good response concerning Mithra Connection

http://www.tektonics.org/copycat/mithra.html

[spartanII]

Hey guys..

I'm wondering about where Christianity came from. Why are there stories in the Bible that resemble stories that predate it? Why were the first documents of religion polytheistic?

Basically, I'm wondering what a response to this video is:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MlnnWbkMlbg

I know you may frown upon posting a video and asking why it's right/wrong, but I don't have much background in this historical stuff. Are these assertions legitimate?

Thanks for the help guys.

Once I first got into apologetics I was big into this... The origins of Christianity, or at least the Genesis accounts are radically different from their Sumerian counterparts... only one has One God (although it seems to reference the Trinity) and not multiple gods, and dragons and so forth..also where the documents came from... Ugarit (i think that's the name)... a lot of times atheists will use the Genesis account as a "copy" of other documents but once you look deep enough you'll see that it isn't. And about Christianity and everything that is closely tied to it...that's apparent in the Bible...the Pharisees ask Christ if He is the Messiah. They know who Mithras is, they know who Osiris is, etc. etc. They didn't believe they were... and they were looking for hope in Christ. After Christ died we see a big movement across the globe.

[PaulSacramento]

While some stories may SEEM to share similarities ( for those with just a passing knowledge of them), further research shows far more differences than similarities.

[spartanII]

While some stories may SEEM to share similarities ( for those with just a passing knowledge of them), further research shows far more differences than similarities.

Well it would make sense for things like these to have similarities. We are made in the image of God and around that time a lot of people wanted to be that archetype figure to deliver people from evil... Buddha, Krishna, Osiris, Mithra. It's always good to look at about 5 sources for each question you have. I've found a lot of atheists bring up faulty links so keep looking deep to find the true answers.

[kls]

One line or reasoning that is rarely explored, is the fact that demons had free access to earth and more importantly earthly bodies at the time. Many lead tribes as Gods and took their women to breed the nephilim. So if we take that into account, it seems logical to assume, given the bibles confirmation that they did take to the earth, that they borrowed upon the true story of creation, they where after all there when it happened, so they would be intricately familiar with the story of creation, why concoct your own story when you can just modify one that exists. Sometimes using the truth with slight variation is the greatest way to deceive.

[PaulSacramento]

One line or reasoning that is rarely explored, is the fact that demons had free access to earth and more importantly earthly bodies at the time. Many lead tribes as Gods and took their women to breed the nephilim. So if we take that into account, it seems logical to assume, given the bibles confirmation that they did take to the earth, that they borrowed upon the true story of creation, they where after all there when it happened, so they would be intricately familiar with the story of creation, why concoct your own story when you can just modify one that exists. Sometimes using the truth with slight variation is the greatest way to deceive.

It is my view that the God the demanded sacrifices ( human) like those of the aztecs for example, were "fallen angels" (demons if you prefer) or even perhaps THE fallen angel ( Satan).

[PaulSacramento]

One line or reasoning that is rarely explored, is the fact that demons had free access to earth and more importantly earthly bodies at the time. Many lead tribes as Gods and took their women to breed the nephilim. So if we take that into account, it seems logical to assume, given the bibles confirmation that they did take to the earth, that they borrowed upon the true story of creation, they where after all there when it happened, so they would be intricately familiar with the story of creation, why concoct your own story when you can just modify one that exists. Sometimes using the truth with slight variation is the greatest way to deceive.

It is my view that the God(s) that demanded sacrifices ( human) like those of the aztecs for example, were "fallen angels" (demons if you prefer) or even perhaps THE fallen angel ( Satan).

[Short1]

That mithraism page is interesting! Strange to see how people would try to portray Christianity as a copycat with half truths and AFTER Christianity 'happened.'
Are those rebuttals well documented? Any other sources of info about this?

Does anyone have information about the assertion that the Caananites were polytheistic and then 'morphed' into monotheism?

I'll have to review the video again and see what I'm wondering, but that was the topic of the video towards the beginning, essentially saying the Bible was plagiarized and copied the Epic of Gilgamesh etc.

Any thoughts on that? Other 'copied' stories?

Thanks a lot guys!

[Proinsias]

The History of God is an interesting book but Karen Armstrong is a student of comparative religion, she's on a mission to unite different religious traditions. I appreciate her efforts but they are not in the direction of proving one religion to be the true one, to Karen the particular creed seems rather unimportant, the extent to which it is interpreted to encourage compassion is all important to her, she has little good to say about fundamentalist interpretations of almost any religion.

Why were the first documents of religion polytheistic?

Her narrative, which the video doesn't seem to mention, is that the first religious documents were polytheists as by that time humanity had drifted away from its monotheistic roots. From what I recall the start of the book traced monotheism back to early humanity in Africa, something which she claims is still recognised but has been all but abandoned in favour of more practical religion. She pretty much claims that monotheism was the earliest form of religion and first appeared in Africa but as one would expect there's not a huge deal of evidence of theological beliefs in Africa tens of thousands of years ago to support this.

I do like Karen Armstrong, she like a next generation Alan Watts.

ps, the book is far better than that video