Religion in the Heavens; Or, Mythology Unveiled in a Series of Lectures

by Logan Mitchell

* A ludicrous instance of false translation appears in Mark
x., 25, where, according to the learned, the word in the
original means a cable-rope, not a camel. In the notion of a
cable going through the eye of a needle, an association of
ideas is preserved, but the other meaning is forced and
ridiculous.

It has been remarked that, besides the evident dissonance and glaring inconsistencies of these books, they contain numerous proofs that they could not have been written at the time alleged, or by the persons whose names are affixed to them; for instance, if Paul was an apostle, or lived in or near the same age with Jesus, how could he speak as he does in the epistle to the Colossians, about the Church of Laodicea, which was not founded until the middle of the second century? Again, in the book called Revelations, ascribed to John the evangelist, who was contemporary with Jesus,* the writer not only speaks of this church of Laodicea, but mentions its sloth and great corruptions, arising from the possession of riches and power. Now, though of all human institutions whatsoever, a church** has the most uniform and natural tendency to grow corrupt and profligate, from the acquirement of riches and power, yet we may allow one hundred years to have elapsed after the foundation of the one in question, before it arrived at the shameless condition described in these revelations; and, therefore, it is no unfair inference to conclude that these allegorical rhapsodies were not written before the middle of the third century. Tertullion says it was Saturninus, and Luke says it was Cyrenius who was governor of Syria, when a certain event happened,*** and Augustus issued his decree taxing "all the world" but Roman history seems to deny both accounts, by not acknowledging any such decree of Augustus, even over the Roman empire. Numerous other discrepancies and contradictions might be adduced, which all the forcing and twisting of church chronologists have not been able to reconcile.

* Yet in Matthew xi., 12, Jesus is made to say, "And from
the days of John the Baptist, until now," etc. Again,
xviii., 17, Jesus speaks of "the church" though there was
no such thing in existence in the alleged time of his life.
** Church—the shrine of credulity, where reason is weekly
sacrificed—a patent for hypocrisy—the refuge of fraud,
sloth, ignorance and superstition—the corner stone of
tyranny.
*** The birth of Jesus.

They tell us that Matthew wrote his gospel about the year thirty-five, and in that gospel the writer, whoever he was, makes Jesus tell the Scribes and Pharisees that "all the innocent blood that has been shed on earth, from that of Abel down to that of Zaccharias, son of Baruch, whom they slew between the temple and the altar, shall be upon their heads." Here let it be remarked that, according to Josephus, book 4th (and the fact is nowhere else to be found) this event did not take place until the siege of Jerusalem by Titus. This affords proof positive that the first of our gospels could not have been written before the year seventy, but that is no proof why it might not have been written after the middle of the second century.

Recurring to the miraculous parts of these books, we think it proper to observe that the natural good sense of Mahomet prevented his making any pretensions to the power of working miracles; for those laid to his charge by Christian opponents, were the inventions of his more ignorant and less judicious successors. It was no doubt in ridicule of the New Testament fables about removing mountains by faith, and such like nonsense, that he told his disciples one day: "To-morrow I will call yonder mountain to come to me." The morrow came, his hearers assembled to see the miracle. He called the mountain to come to him, but it sullenly kept its place. "Well," says he, "since the mountain will not come to Mahomet, Mahomet must go the mountain." If he gave out that he received his Koran by piecemeal from heaven, his pretensions went no farther than to be considered the humble agent of a higher power; and such it appears was the case with his brother prophet Jesus, who wrote nothing himself, but his followers, on rather the sect which assumed his name, bent upon the establishment of their new superstition on the ruins of the old, had recourse to a series of falsehoods and deceptions unexampled in all the other pages of history. They ascribed to their reputed founder a train of miracles and unsightly prodigies, so disgusting to reason and common sense, as to be sufficient of themselves to condemn any book at a single glance; and which could only be palmed upon extreme ignorance and credulity; while the inventors and propagators of these fictions agreed with each other in nothing but in the common duty of religious lying, forging and fabricating to serve the interests of the priesthood. The younger Scaliger expressly declares of these falsifying compilers, that "they put into their Gospels whatever they thought would serve their purpose." Faustus says: "We have frequently proved that these things were neither written by himself (Jesus) nor by his apostles; and that they were fabricated long after their decease, from vague stories and flying reports." As these miraculous fables are beneath criticism, the particular notice of one or two of them will suffice as a sample of the rest. It appears that the devils possessing the two demoniacs who lived among the tombs, could not be dislodged without terms of capitulation; one article of which bore, that they should be allowed to go into the swine. The treaty being concluded with the spokesman of these devils, who had announced that he was legion, or called legion (probably from being the chief of a detachment consisting of that number) the devils took possession of their new subjects accordingly; but they, finding a devilish commotion within them, committed suicide immediately. This "rash act" was not surprising when we consider that there were "about two thousand swine;" so that three devils would be crammed into each pig, reckoning a legion of devils to consist of the same number as a Roman legion. As nothing would operate so much against the interests of theology as any diminution of the number of devils, we may presume that the swine only were drowned. Mark and Luke say that one person possessed all these devils; he must have been a man of great capacity to contain that which drove two thousand swine mad. So numerous a herd of these animals in a country where swine and swine's flesh were held in abhorrence, is quite sufficient to stamp the tale as a fiction; but taking all the circumstances into consideration, it is perhaps the most ridiculous romance that ever was invented. If this exploit had been laid to the charge of Mahomet, would he not have been branded by all Christians as a most wicked and abominable wizard, independently of the robbery committed on the owners of the swine, in causing this wholesale and ruinous Hoggicide?

It is unfortunate for the foregoing miracle, that its allegorical bearings are not so apparent as to save it from being branded as a wild and vulgar romance, rather than an instructive parable. Such, however, is not the case in the fable about the resurrection of Lazarus, which is evidently a dramatic allegory of the demise of the old, and birth of the new year; the former of which is personated in Lazarus, whilst Christ is, as usual, the personification of the Sun. This unsightly miracle, as taken literally, is narrated by John only; a circumstance so suspicious that it alone ought to shake the credulity of even the swallowers of prodigy. Our false and deceitful translation of this drama, foists in; "Now a certain man was sick, named Lazarus;" but there is no man named in the original, which merely says—"Now Lazarus was sick;" that is, figuratively, the year was spent or expiring, as in December, which month is personated by Martha, as January is by Mary. These two sister months send to Christ (the Sun) to inform him of the dying state of their brother (the old year). Now mark the equivocating answers he gives them regarding the real condition of their brother; that his "sickness is not unto death;" that he was dead in reality, and he was glad of it; that he only slept, and would revive or "rise again" These enigmatical or equivocal answers, and the four days which Lazarus is said to have been dead in the sepulchre, have most pointed allusion to the four days between the twenty-first and twenty-fifth of December, during which time the Sun seems to hang, as it were, in the solstitial balance; but at the latter period he gains his first degree of altitude, and is said to "rise from the dead," or to have been born again, that is he begins to rise from the dead of winter.

For very good reasons, the drama being finished, we are not told what became of Lazarus. What was his fate afterwards? He continued to gain strength till the summer solstice; but as he again became the old year, he died the following December, in the same manner.

Thus the Sun, as personified in Christ, says Rev., i., 18, "I am he that liveth, and was dead, and behold I am alive for evermore, Amen." Again, "I am the resurrection and the life; the day star on high, that redeemeth his people; I come a light into the world." This word Amen is nothing else than the disguise in which the translators have thought it proper to put Ammon*. The Sun, in the sign Aries, was personified in Jupiter Ammon, as well as in Christ. Ammon signifies the secret or concealed one, and sacred had originally no other meaning than secret. In Isaiah lxv., 16, is not the "God Ammon" mentioned in the original, and suppressed by the English translators?

The astro-drama of the Redeemer in the book of Job** is another sublime allegory of the sun and circle of the seasons.

* The difference between the words Aman, Amen, and Ammon,
says Sir William Drummond, "is nothing."
** For fuller explanation of the dramas of Job and Lasarus,
see the works of the Rev. Mr. Taylor.