Christmas is almost here and so tis the season for New Atheist types and misinformed people to post memes about the supposed parallels between Jesus and Mithras.
"But the idea that there are many remarkable parallels between Mithraism and Christianity and that the latter is therefore derived, at least in part, from the former maintains its imaginative hold on those who don’t bother checking these things. Unfortunately, despite their regular repetition, virtually none of these parallels stand up to critical scrutiny. Most of them come directly from the – ahem – “research” of the notorious New Age nutcase who called herself “Acharya S”. This loon, whose real name was D.M. Murdock, wrote a series of books repeating the idea that Christianity was derived entirely from earlier pagan religions based on astrological themes. Her work is a case study in bad New Age nonsense, with tenuous or even totally non-existent parallels presented as evidence of derivation, and footnotes to everything from online undergraduate essays to nineteenth century Theosophy texts based on “visions” as the supposed substantiation for her claims. Why atheists who claim to be rationalists would gormlessly accept this New Age junk pseudo history without checking it is the main “Mithraic mystery” here".
From this article: https://historyforatheists.com/2016/12/the-great-myths-2-christmas-mithras-and-paganism/
"But the idea that there are many remarkable parallels between Mithraism and Christianity and that the latter is therefore derived, at least in part, from the former maintains its imaginative hold on those who don’t bother checking these things. Unfortunately, despite their regular repetition, virtually none of these parallels stand up to critical scrutiny. Most of them come directly from the – ahem – “research” of the notorious New Age nutcase who called herself “Acharya S”. This loon, whose real name was D.M. Murdock, wrote a series of books repeating the idea that Christianity was derived entirely from earlier pagan religions based on astrological themes. Her work is a case study in bad New Age nonsense, with tenuous or even totally non-existent parallels presented as evidence of derivation, and footnotes to everything from online undergraduate essays to nineteenth century Theosophy texts based on “visions” as the supposed substantiation for her claims. Why atheists who claim to be rationalists would gormlessly accept this New Age junk pseudo history without checking it is the main “Mithraic mystery” here".
From this article: https://historyforatheists.com/2016/12/the-great-myths-2-christmas-mithras-and-paganism/
