Significantly, Peter is not a Jewish proper name, but relates to function. It is a Semitic word denoting an interpreter of oracles. The priests of Apollo among the Gauls were denominated paterœ, as having the gift of prophecy. The residence of Balaam the prophet was called Petur, and there were oracles of Apollo at Patrai in Achaia and Patara in Asia Minor. When, therefore, it is announced that the Church would be built “upon this rock,” we may understand it to be the apostle's oracular utterance that Jesus was the Son of God. The Church that was thus established consisted solely of adepts and initiates, the clergy only, and the higher functionaries at that. The laity only belong to the Church: the others are the Church.
The Roman Catholic hierarchy have for centuries caused the fiction to be promulgated that the apostle Peter founded the universal see of Rome. This is like the mystic utterances of Jesus in speaking to the multitude in parables. The pope, cardinals, and prelates know the real truth. There never took place, so far as any historical evidence exists, any visit, and much less the martyrdom, of the apostle Peter at Rome. The pope is not the successor of any Christian apostle whatever, but only of the pagan high priest. Under the republic and emperors the pontifex maximus was the supreme religious dignitary. Julius Cæsar held that office. He presided over the worship and interpreted the sacred oracles. It was a direction in the secret religion never to change the foreign names. The Chaldaic designation of the supreme pontiff and hierophant was peter. When the ancient worship was suppressed the Roman bishop succeeded to the pontificate; and by this exaltation became vicar of the Lord and successor of the peter or pagan pontiff of Rome.
The tradition of the Magi or wise men coming from the east to worship the infant Jesus, which was prefixed to the Gospel of Matthew, is pretty well set forth by the names given them: Kaspar, the white one; Melchior, the king of light; and Balthasar, the lord of treasures. The additional legend that they travelled to Germany and were buried at Cologne grew out of the fact that the Mithraic worship was prevalent in that region.
It should be borne in mind, while considering the astrologic character of the story of Jesus, that the divis-ion of the apparent path of the sun among the stars into the constellations which form the zodiac was made and known throughout the Oriental world and employed in its religious myths at an antiquity so remote as not to be known when the plan was devised. Astrological correspondences are carefully maintained all through the gospel narrative. The apostles represent the twelve months, each of them being sent or commissioned to announce him (the sun) to the people.
The special events and their dates are commemorated by the Church so as to be coincident with astrological data. The designation “Lamb of God” comes directly from the fact that the crucifixion was placed at the time the sun crosses the equinoctial line in March, and so entered the zodiacal sign of Aries, the Lamb. He was thus “slain before the foundation of the world,” or year, and takes away the sins or evils of winter. Having descended into hell, or the winter period, he rises from the dead. He is now enthroned; the four beasts, denoting the four chief constellations in each quarter of the zodiacal circle—Taurus, Leo, Aquila, and Aquarius—adore him, and the twenty-four elders (or hours) fall down and worship him. The miracle of turning water into wine is done every year, as Addison has sung,:
“May the sun refine
The grape’s soft juice and mellow it to wine.”
The curse of the fig tree is visited on every plant that is feeble and poorly rooted when the sun’s heat comes upon it. John the Baptist says of Jesus: “He must increase, but I must decrease.” The 24th of June, St. John’s Day, is the last of the summer solstice, from which period the days shorten, as, on the contrary, from the 25th of December, the natal day of Jesus, they lengthen. “This is the sixth month with her that was called barren,” said the angel Gabriel to Mary on the 25th of March, the Annunciation, nine months before Christmas. On the 15th of August the Church celebrates the Assumption of the Blessed Virgin into the heavenly chamber of the King of kings, and accordingly the constellation Virgo (or Astræa) also disappears, being eclipsed by the light and glory of the sun. This disappearance continues seven days. Miriam, the virgin sister of Moses and Aaron, doubtless also an astral character, was secluded seven days while leprous. Three weeks later the sun has moved on in the sky, permitting the constellation again to appear; and accordingly the Church celebrates the 8th of September as the anniversary of the nativity of the Blessed Virgin.
The prominent pagan symbols which are now adopted by the Christian prelacy are generally astronomical. Astrology and religion always went hand in hand, and have not been legally divorced. At an earlier period the sun entered the zodiacal sign of Taurus at the vernal equinox. This fact led to the adoption of the bull or calf as a symbol of the Deity. We notice this fact all over the ancient world, and in some modern peoples that have not had a learned caste of priests. Every 2152 years the zodiac shifts backward one sign—i. e. one-twelfth of its whole extent. Hence, eventually, Aries, the Ram or Lamb, took the place of the Bull to represent the god of spring. The paschal lamb, the ram-headed god Amen of Egypt, and the lamb of Christian symbolism thus came into existence. Since that the constellation Pisces has become the equinoctial sign, and the Fish is the symbol of the Church. Hence the bishop of Rome employs the seal of the fisherman, and the Gospel narrative has made St. Peter a “fisher.” In this way the entire passion of Jesus from the crucifixion to the ascension is astronomic.
The Roman Catholic Church, having the superior understanding of the matter, holds Protestants in derision for making a fetish of the Bible and worshipping the sun, while not comprehending the matter intelligently. Indeed, it is known by every intelligent priest that the sun and phallic symbols characterize every world-religion. No matter what attempts are made to disguise the matter, such is the fact. That the sun is the light of the world needs but a mention; and so is Jesus as the avatâr or personification. The cross on which he is impaled was a symbol of the phallic worship thousands of years ago. The form may be an X, f, or f, but it means the same. He is buried in winter and resuscitated in the spring.
Thus, to recapitulate: The Christian religion consists of the worship of a divine being incarnated in human form in order to redeem fallen man, born of a virgin, teaching immortality, working wonders, dying through the machinations of the evil one, rising from death, re-ascending into heaven, and to be the judge of the living and dead. The Mithraic worship, its great rival and counterpart, was constituted with similar imagery. The festivals appointed in honor of Mithras were fixed in accordance with the seasons of the year, his birth being at the end of the solstice in December, his death directly after the equinox in March. Christ, being like Mithras, the personification of the sun and lord of the cosmos, enacts a career on earth corresponding in its principal parts to that of the sun in the heavens. The Holy Spirit as a wind or atmosphere is the herald of his advent. The Virgin is the moon, the mother of the sun and queen of heaven, just as she was in the pagan world under different names.