OT The Roots of Christmas

[Rick Walker <looppool@cruzio.com>]

from a scholar I know:

"Don't forget the root of Christmas too!  December 25 is actually 
the birthday of the Persian Sun God, Mithras, not Jesus. Constantine, 
basically fabricated Christmas as part of his political strategy 
to unite the Roman Republic, because it was comprised of so many mystery 
cults, Roman gods, diverse beliefs, etc, and he needed to bring the 
people together under a common state religion.  Since Constantine 
worshiped  the Sun God (Sol Invictus or Mithras), he basically swapped 
birthdays, giving that birthday to Jesus, and also making the Solar 
calendar week start on Sunday (Sun = Sun God = Sol Invictus, Mithras, 
etc).  People go to church today on Sunday, because of Constantine, 
though the original Christians likely worshiped on Saturday. But back to 
Christmas, people lit candles in worship of the Sun God, brought in 
trees as a part of Mithras workshop, and gave gifts as part of the 
festival in honor of the agriculture god, Saturn.  Even the story of 
Jesus, the resurrection, the  whole bit, is all a clone of the story of 
Mithras, which precedes  Christianity by over 600 years....and it goes 
deeper into  Zoroasterism, with an almost duplicate story of a man who 
was born a  god-child, was sought to be destroyed by dark forces, birth 
was  marked by miracles, was religiously active in his 20/30's, 
professed  a belief of resurrection, judgment day, heaven and hell, 
etc....all  600-1000 years (and debatably longer) before the dawn of 
Christianity. Mithraism, the official religion of the Roman empire in 
274 CE was actually the main rival of Christianity during this time 
(4th century AD), because they were identical in many respects.  
Christianity won out because of Constantine's political campaign to unit 
the republic under one monotheistic state religion.  So, Christmas is 
basically a past-together holiday of Saturn and Mithras celebrations, 
along with the Sol Invictus mystery cult"


I had also heard that the Solstice celebration amongst many of the 
Northern shamanic tribes involved the ritual burning
of the largest felled tree in the forest (the Yule Log) and that the 
Solstice celebration was the biggest party of
the year.       I had heard (and I don't know if this is verifiable)   
that Constantine moved the official celebration of
Jesus of Nazareth's birth to the 25th in order to allow for these 
celebrations to continue but in a Christian way
without upsetting all of his subjects.    

Fascinating stuff.    I think that the cooption of myth and ritual 
happens continually with
conquering and conquered peoples.

This is highly evidenced in the African rituals that were coopted by the 
slave owners in the Caribbean and North and
South America.............

..................all a part of our sometimes violent heritage as human 
beings.................let's just hope that
some alien race doesn't come along (ala 'Day the Earth Stood Still') and 
take us to task for
our heritage.

Peace to all of you, whatever you believe.

Rick