Bismika Alllahuma

Es wird unwarrantably durch Christian Verfasser, daß die verkörperten Götter und die crucified Retter der heidnischen Religionen alle entweder bloßen fabelhaften Buchstaben waren, oder die gewöhnlichen Menschen, die mit göttlichen Titeln investiert werden, angenommen und Attribute erahnt; während einerseits die Annahme weiter mit gleichem boldness gesetzt wird, daß Jesus Christ eine reale göttliche Persönlichkeit war, „gesehen und geglaubt an an die Welt und schließlich crucified auf Einfassung Kalvarienberg.“

Aber wir finden nicht die Tatsachen in der Geschichte, um irgend solche Annahmen oder irgend solche Unterscheidungen zu gewährleisten. Sie aller Standplatz in diesem Respekt nach dem gleichen Boden und auf gleicher Fußnote.

Und ihre jeweiligen Schüler zeigen auf die gleiche Art des Beweises, um ihr reales Bestehen und ihren göttlichen Buchstaben zu prüfen, und zu prüfen, daß sie einmal unter Männern gingen und sprachen, sowie sitzen jetzt auf dem ewigen Thron im Himmel „an der rechten Hand des Vaters.“ Und wir finden sogar christliche Verfasser, das einmal ehrliche oder persönliche Bestehen auf Masse der meisten heidnischen Retter zuzulassen.¹

Hinsichtlich des Leiters zwei ist verkörperte Götter von Indien - von Chrishna und von Sakia - dort kaum „ein Stöpsel verließ, um einen Zweifel nach zu hängen“ hinsichtlich der Tatsache von ihrem absteigend zur Masse, nach selbst die Gestalt der Männer angenommen und als wirkliche Götter anbetend.

In der Tat glauben wir aber wenige der Missionare, die diese Landfrage die Aussage und der allgemeine Glaube besucht haben, die dort von ihrer einmal persönlichen Wirklichkeit überwiegend sind. Spalte Todd, in seinem Geschichte des Rajahs (P. 44), sagt:

„Wir müssen die Idee wegwerfen, daß das Mahabaret, die Geschichte von Rama, von Chrishna und die fünf Padua Brüder bloße Allegorien sind; colossal Abbildungen, alte Bügel und die Höhlen, die mit Buchstaben dennoch Unbekanntes eingeschrieben werden, bestätigen die Wirklichkeit und ihr Rennen, ihre Städte und ihre Münzen dennoch bestehen.“

Die persönliche Wirklichkeit dieses crucified Gottes weiter zu argumentieren würde eine Vergeudung von Wörtern sein, wie es im Allgemeinen, von den historischen Verfassern und von den Missionaren zugelassen wird.

Herr. Higgins erklärt, „Chrishna lebte an der Zusammenfassung des unverschämten Alters, das errechnet wird, elf hundert oder zwölf hundert Jahre vor Christ gewesen zu sein.“ Ist hier eine sehr positive und spezifische Erklärung hinsichtlich seiner fühlbaren Wirklichkeit. Spalte Dow, Mr, Robinson, and others use similar language.

Relative to Bacchus, of whose history many writers have spoken as being wholly fabulous or fictitious, Diodorus Siculus says (lib. iii. p. 137), “the Libyans claim Bacchus, and say that he was the son of Ammon, a king of Libya; that he built a temple to his father, Amraon.” And that world-wide famous historian (Mr. Goodrich) is still more explicit, if possible, as to his material entity. After giving it directly as his opinion that there was such a being, he says, “He planted vine-yards and fig-trees, and erected many noble cities.” He moreover tells us, “His skill in legislation and agriculture is much praised” (p. 499).

With respect to Osiris of Egypt, another God-Savior, Mr. Hittle declares unqualifiedly that “Herodotus saw the tomb of Osiris, at Sais nearly five centuries before Christ” (vol. i.p. 246). Rather a strong evidence of his previous personality certainly, but not more so than that furnished by the New York, Journal of Commerce a few years since, relative to the Egyptian Apis or Thulis, whose theophany was annually celebrated, at the rising of the Nile, with great festivities and devotion, several thousand years ago. The Paris correspondent of that journal, after speaking of Mr. Auguste Marietta’s travels, “a distinguished scientific gentleman who for four years past had been employed by the French Government in making Egyptian researches,” having returned home, says, “The most important of Mr. Marietta’s discoveries was the tomb of Apis (Thulis), a monument excavated entirely in lime-rock. “There are (he says in conclusion) epitaphs, forming a chronological record of each of the Apis buried in the common tomb. The sculpture is of the date of the Pyramids, and the statues are in the best state of preservation; the colors are perfectly bright. The execution is admirable, and they convey an exact idea of the physical character of the primitive population.”

The New American Cyclopedia (art. Apis) in speaking of this Egyptian God, tells us his lifetime was twenty-five years; in harmony with one of the theologics-astronomical cycles of the Egyptians. The same work and volume (p. 132), in speaking of the real existence of Adonis of Greece, tells us, upon the authority of the poet Panyasis, that he was a veritable son of Theias, king of Syria.

But of all the characters who figured in the mythological works or lawless rhapsodies of the ancients, and worshiped by them as crucified Gods and sin-atoning Saviors, none has, perhaps, been so indubitably, so positively, and so universally set down as mythological or fabulous as that of Prometheus of Caucasus.

And yet Mr. Lempriere, D.D., tells us in his Classical Dictionary that he was the son of Japetus. Sir Isaac Newton say he was a descendant of the famous African Sesostris; while that erudite and masterly historian (Mr. Higgins) seems to have entertained no doubt of his personal esse; nor, indeed, of many, if any, of the pagan Saviors, as the following declaration will show. He says,

“Finding men in India and other countries of the same name of the inferior Gods (as it is quite common to name men for them) has led some to conclude that those deified men never existed, but are merely mythological names of the sun. True, the first supreme God of every nation (not excepting the Jews) was the sun. But more modernly the names were transferred to men.”

Again, he says,

“Inasmuch as some of them are found to have been real bona fide human beings, there is nothing unreasonable in concluding that all were.”

And if we take into consideration the true and indisputable fact that the priests had everything at their disposal, and the strongest motives for concealing and suppressing, not to say garbling and destroying evidence, it is not to be wondered at that the histories of some of these Gods should be somewhat obscure and ambiguous. Further on he declares,

“In every case the Savior was incarnate, and in nearly every case the place in which he was actually born was exhibited to the people.”

And upon the authority of the Hierophant, we will add, the memories of many of them have been consecrated and perpetuated by tombs placed beside their temples, which is perhaps the most convincing species of evidence that could be offered.

The evidence, then, is precisely of the same character as that offered in the case of Jesus Christ to prove that the pagan Saviors did really possess a substantial, earthly and bodily existence. Though it is true that it never has been universally conceded or believed by Christian themselves that Jesus Christ ever had a personal or corporeal existence on earth.

Cotilenius, in a note on Ignatius, Epistle to the Trallians, written in the third century of the Christian era, declares that “it is as absurd to deny the doctrine which taught that Jesus Christ’s body was a phantom as to deny that the sun shone at midday.” His physical body of course was meant, for it appears he believed in his eternal existence as a spirit in heaven.

And we find whole sects advocating similar views in the early ages of the Christian church. “One of the most primitive and learned sects,” says a writer, “were the Manicheans, who denied that Jesus Christ ever existed in flesh and blood, but believed him to be a God in spirit only; others denied him to be a God, but believed him to have been a prophet, or inspired character, like the Unitarians of the present day. Some denied his crucifixion, others asserted it.

It is more than probable that this was the cause of dispute between Paul and Barnabas, mentioned in the Acts of the Apostles, seeing that Paul had laid such peculiar emphasis on “Jesus Christ and him crucified.”

And this conclusion is corroborated by its being expressly stated in the Gospel of Barnabas that “Jesus Christ was not crucified, but was carried to heaven by four angels.” “There was a long list,” says the same writer, “from the earliest times, of sincere Christians who denied that Jesus Christ rose from the dead;” while, as we may remark here, there could not have been at that early date any grounds for denying these things, had he really figured in the world in the miraculous and extraordinary and public manner as that related in the Gospels.

1. Kersey Graves, The World’s Sixteen Crucified Saviors, Chapter 15, “The Saviors Were Real Personages” [back]