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From: jonw@azure.UUCP (Jonathan White)
Newsgroups: net.religion
Subject: Re: Myths similar to Christ?
Message-ID: <2688@azure.UUCP>
Date: Sun, 8-Apr-84 19:09:08 EST
Article-I.D.: azure.2688
Posted: Sun Apr  8 19:09:08 1984
Date-Received: Thu, 12-Apr-84 01:25:47 EST
Organization: Tektronix, Beaverton OR
Lines: 116

Judy has taken issue with my claim that Jesus is nothing more than a myth.  
She made some good points by calling attention some factual errors in the 
account I quoted of Hercules, but the major parallels between the Jesus myth
and the Hercules myth still stand:  

1.  They were both avatars (fathered by a god, but having a human mother).

2.  They both had a lifelong mission of service to mankind.

3.  They both willingly died (Hercules placed himself on a funeral pyre that
he had ordered built), and then ascended into heaven to join their father.

In order to give the author of the Hercules passage I quoted from the benefit
of the doubt, there may be a possibility that the factual errors pointed out by 
Judy are really only discrepancies in different accounts.

I also listed 15 other avatar myths that the author, Lloyd M. Graham, mentioned
as being similar to (and predating) the Jesus myth.  In an effort to rebut, 
Judy picked on two of the examples:

   Krishna - considered by the reference I used (Myths of All Races) as an
   incarnation of Vishnu who also appeared as a dwarf and several kinds of
   animals. 

True, but it is not clear from your sentence that Vishnu is the one who
appeared as several kinds of animals, not Krishna.

   According to this reference, he had an earthly mother and
   father. I don't think the Hindu's even THOUGHT in terms of people being
   fathered by gods. 

You are certainly wrong in that assumption.  Joseph Campbell gives this account
of Krishna's birth:

 "...[Vishnu] plucked from his giant head two hairs, one white, one black,
 while a voice--infinitely inward--could be heard by all there assembled.
 `These two hairs' they heard, `shall descend upon the goddess Earth to relieve
 her of her burden:  the white to become the seventh, and the black, the eighth
 child of Devaki, the chaste wife of the pious prince Vasudeva.'

 "And indeed, that very night, the goddess Yogenidra...descended on the
 princess Devaki.  And she conceived of the white hair her seventh child...
 And so the time came for the work of the black hair, which, rendering
 Devaki's eight conception, produced an incarnation of the world dreamer Vishnu
 himself...in the black-blue form of Krishna.  (The Mythic Image, pp. 46-47)"
 
Interestingly enough, the baby Krishna had to be hidden away from an evil king
who had heard a prophesy that Krishna would destroy him if allowed to live.

   In any case, he definitly was NOT crucified on a cross! He was shot 
   accidentally in the foot with an arrow. It was his only vu[l]nerable area.  

This appears to be the case.

   Odin - Gee, I always thought he was a Norse GOD, not the son
   of a god - and I was right. I could not even find a reference to his
   birth or death.  Of course, I COULD have missed it, but I doubt it.
   This must be another exception.

Well, you did miss it.  According to Larousse World Mythology, Odin was 
fathered by the god Bor and born to Bestla, a giant's daughter.  Although I 
could find no explicit reference to his death, Odin did undergo voluntary 
self-sacrifice by wounding himself with a lance and hanging from a tree for 
nine days.  (By the way, a tree was a mythological symbol to Germanic people.) 
He waited in vain for someone to come along and alleviate his suffering, but 
after nine days managed to "rejuvinate" himself by some spiritual means.

All this is not to say that I think the stories of Krishna or Odin offer
conclusive parallels to the Jesus myth.  I think some further research is in 
order before it can be claimed that the Jesus myth originated from any 
particular source.
 
Graham comments on the lack of historical information on Jesus:

 "Had there actually lived a man who could raise the dead, heal the sick, and
 walk on water, history would have recorded it.  Why then did it not?  For lack
 of historians?  Had this been the case, the believers would have at least a
 negative proof, but oddly enough the period was peculiarly distinguished in
 this respect.  There were many historians just then and some of them the most
 illustrious of all time... (Deceptions and Myths of the Bible, p. 290)"

Judy responded:

   Is this to say that there is no mention of Jesus AT ALL? Or that there is 
   no historical reference to him raising the dead, etc.? I could understand 
   not writing the miracles down, MOST historians want to be taken seriously.
   But NO mention of Christ at all, not even the MAN? That is perplexing. I 
   shall have to research this also, when I have time. Of cource the reference 
   will have to be from an unbiased source, probably Roman - they had no reason 
   to lie either way.

Apparently, there was no mention whatsoever of Christ the man.

 "It has always been an unfailing source of astonishment to the historical
 investigator of Christian beginnings that there is not one single word from
 the pen of any pagan writer of the first century of our era which can in any
 fashion be referred to the marvelous story recounted by the Gospel writers.
 The very existence of Jesus seems unknown (G.R.S. Mead, in Did Jesus Live
 100 B.C.?)"  (By the way, the title of the book in this quote refers to a 
 mythological Jesus of the pre-Christian Nazerites.)

 "Whether accepting or rejecting Christ, one would think that the Jewish
 historians would at least admit so great a personage was of their race.  And
 if anyone should do so, it should be Philo.  This philosopher-historian
 lived both before and after the time of Christ, yet never mentions him.  The
 only direct reference to Jesus in Jewish history of the time is found in
 Josephus, born in Jerusalem, 37 A.D., but no serious student today, not even
 the theologian, believes Josephus wrote it.  (Deceptions and Myths of
 the Bible, p. 293)"

I have not yet received any replies to my earlier challenge:  does anyone have
any valid historical evidence that Jesus ever existed?  If not, then we are all
wasting a lot of time arguing about nothing!

			Jon White
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