The Christian Mythology

by E. B. Leatherbee

The best known rites of the Christian church are probably those of baptism, confession and communion, with which are associated the ideas of purification, prayer and transubstantiation.

The rite of baptism, like all ideas which refer to the purification of sin by water, is a most ancient one. Rivers, as sources of purification, were at an early date invested with a sacred character, and every great river was supposed to be permeated with a divine essence and its waters were believed to cleanse from all mortal guilt and contamination. The Ganges and the Jordan are well known examples of this faith, and vases of Ganges water are to be found in almost every dwelling in India for religious purposes. In Mongolia and Thibet children are named by the priests, who immerse them in holy water while reading a prescribed prayer, after which the name is bestowed. Baptism preceded initiation into the mysteries of both the Egyptian Isis and the Persian Mithras, and was held to be the means of regeneration and of remission of sins.

Tertullian, noticing the great similarity between the Christian and pagan baptisms, naïvely remarked that the devil “baptizes some, of course, such as believe in him and are faithful to him; he promises expiation of sins from the bath, and, if my memory of Mithras serves me still, in this rite he signs his soldiers on their foreheads.”

Much akin to baptism is the general use by the Christian church of so-called holy water, which is ascribed to Pope Alexander the First, who ruled during the first century. This pontiff probably did little more than officially to condone, by his papal sanction, the very general use of lustral water, which the Romans had inherited from their pagan ancestors; for lustral water was always kept in vases at the entrance of the Roman temples, that those passing in and out might sprinkle themselves with it; and the priests used a sprinkling brush called the aspersorium with which they threw the purifying water over their congregations, in the same manner as modern priests use the hyssop. The druids gave, or sprinkled upon, the worshipers water in which mistletoe had been immersed or steeped.

Similar to the idea of purification by baptism is that of purification by confession and prayer. The idea involved in confession is that the declaration of the crime relieves the conscience of its criminality. In Iceland and among the Scandinavian and Teutonic peoples in general, murder ceased to be a crime when the slayer had declared himself guilty. Among the Jews confession was practiced, the purpose of its institution being that the priest might judge of the sacrifice required for the expiation of the sin committed, and, also, that every crime might be rehearsed over the scapegoat. The Peruvians confessed their sins to their priests with the exception of the Incas, who confessed to the sun. At the famous Samothracian mysteries a priest was especially charged with hearing the confessions of great criminals and with granting them absolution.

Among Protestant Christians confession is often made directly to the supreme deity in the form of prayer, which, like most other religious practices, is an eminently pagan custom. The Assyrians, Babylonians, Greeks, Romans, Persians, and most other ancient peoples offered sacrifices on the altars of their gods to propitiate them, and accompanied these offerings with prayers. Today, instead of presenting wines and viands to his god, the devout Christian offers verbal expressions of a contrite spirit or, more often, asks a favor. He demands, begs, or advises through this method, according to his own nature and disposition.

The expression used in modern orthodox Protestant prayers, “through our Lord, Jesus Christ,” is merely the concrete expression of the idea of mediation. The great supreme God was looked upon by most nations of antiquity as being too great, too sublime, too holy, to be addressed directly; and, in this lofty conception of the deity, they prayed for favors to mediators whom they created to request boons from the real ruler of heaven and earth.

Among the Hindus, supplications were addressed to the various apotheosized incarnations of Vishnu, rather than to the great Brahma; the Greeks made supplication to numerous lesser gods, rather than to Zeus; Persians addressed Mithras instead of Ormuzd; and the modern Romanist kneels to saints and martyrs, or Jesus or his mother, at whose shrines they place offerings which are bribes for favors; but almost never do they immediately supplicate the supreme God. In this they are certainly less blasphemous than their Protestant fellows, who do not hesitate to talk familiarly to God of the most trivial affairs.

Belief in the efficacy of prayer is an absurdity which owes its origin to a hereditary trait of humanity, descended through a long line of superstitious ancestors. Primitive man prayed to his dead fathers for their good will, believing them more powerful in their post mortem state than during life. The ancients offered prayers at the shrines of their various gods and, among all nations, from time immemorial, deities have been supplicated to bestow gifts and avert misfortunes. The overcharged mind of the superstitious has ever found relief in expressing its troubles to the imaginary beings on whom it has bestowed superhuman attributes. All over the world, in all languages, have arisen various petitions to the deities, and still do they continue to arise. Savages pray to their idols, Moslems crouch facing Mecca to pray to Allah, Hindus pray to the avatars of Vishnu, and all Christendom besieges the throne of God in constant supplication.