mythology behind christianity and islam?

**VAE VICTUS** · 09-09-2005, 21:12

just wondering about the mythology behind religions,christianity and mithras,christmas and the solstice.

allah and the moon god(dess)

if anyone had any links and information on these two things please.

**Aenlic** · 09-09-2005, 21:40

Look for works by Joseph Campbell, the leading scholar of comparative mythlogy of our time. A good one to start would probably be, for your question, The Masks of God: Occidental Mythology. There is probably a good portion of a shelf at your local library or bookstore devoted to his works.

**GoreBag** · 09-10-2005, 04:50

Christmas is one of those things adopted by the Church to help smoothe things over with the pagans, specifically the Germans. Yule (Jul), as I understand it, is still the name for Christmas time in Scandinavia, which meant "wheel" an age ago. The Christmas tree is supposed to be a German creation, but I've read that it goes farther back than the Germans today brag, citing a spear-point on top of the tree as a reference to Odin.

All Saints' Day and Hallowe'en, November 1st and October 31st, has a similar history with the Celts - this was the date of Samhain, an important date in the Celtic calendar which had very much to do with the spirits of the dead and the Otherworld. Such a tradition is obviously bastardised to reach the point that it has today.

I don't know much about the Moon Goddess, but I know that since Sumerian mythology, the moon has been regarded by cultures in that area as a masculine force.

Allah was originally the chief god in a massive pantheon of Arabic deities (250? 255? something like that). One day, according to Muhammed, Allah spoke to him and enlightened him, telling him that he was the only true god. The large stone whose name I eludes me at this point (the one in Mecca, where all Muslims face when they pray) had all the gods engraved into it, but it was defaced (improved?) and now has only the image of Allah. Of course, I'm not Muslim, so I could easily be mistaken on the details of this.

**lars573** · 09-10-2005, 05:05

Actually Neon I heard that most of the modern Christian holy days are on the dates of Roman solstices celbrations, the winter and spring ones are around like with in a few days of Christmas and Easter.

**LeftEyeNine** · 09-10-2005, 05:06

Kabe ( I guees it is called Kaaba in English) is where all Muslims turn towards while doing their regular praying ritual called Namaz.

Kabe was full of totems that the Cahiliye (English translation needed) period Arabs used to erect and worship. As soon as it was cleansed off those, it was then the Mosque Of Allah on Earth.

**GoreBag** · 09-10-2005, 06:12

Originally Posted by LeftEyeNine

Cahiliye (English translation needed)

Would the term "Pagan" do?

Thanks for filling that in.

Originally Posted by lars573

Actually Neon I heard that most of the modern Christian holy days are on the dates of Roman solstices celbrations, the winter and spring ones are around like with in a few days of Christmas and Easter.

Oh yeah, Easter. What I know of Easter is that it is named after a Germanic goddess (Eostre) of fertility. The rabbit was seen as a fertile animal (you know..."do it like rabbits"..ahem) and thus was associated with her cult often, hence the Easter bunny.

I imagine a great deal of the Roman rituals are more in alignment than the Germanic ones when compared to the Christian dates. I don't know that Jul was practiced on December 25th, for example; it may easily have been a different point throughout winter. Eostre's festival would have been sometime in the spring (fertility season), but not necessarily a certain amount of weeks after another certain ritual. Rome, after all, did have much more control over Christianity as it developed early, and setting the auspices at already auspicious dates would have made it easier for the Romans to swallow, just like the addition of other pagan traditions in other regions.

**Kraxis** · 09-10-2005, 13:33

I have heard of another god who's birthdate was 25th of December and one which christianity assimilated. Just too bad I can't remember where or what it is really is.

Besides, in Scadinavia we celebrate christmas the 24th in the evening, just like the population of old did before christianity. And yes it is called Jul to this day (wheel is called hjul and pronounced the same way).
But of course this is not taken from the paganism of Scandinavia and applied all round. That celebration is very much a common celebration among pagan religions, noone can claim to have christmas as theirs, it is most certainly all's.