Why does Christianity have similarites to older pagan religions?

Answer 1

I guess I'm one of those "verbally violent" Pagan weirdos. About all I have to say on this subject is that the virgin birth concept was used long before Jesus (check out Mithras) as well as many holidays and even the rising from the dead story. Nothing original in Christianity at all. That really irks the Christians, but then I find that many of them can't handle the truth. If it's not in their precious little bible, then it's not real. Oops, I guess I'm being verbally abusive. At least I don't go around telling everyone they're going to hell if they don't accept Jebus.

Answer 2

Christianity is nothing more than a knock-off brand of pagan religions and has take ALL major points of the pagans and transformed them into Christianity. If you watch the first section of this program it tells HOW they got Christianity from the pagans and even to how Christmas, the cross and the "Resurrection" are ALL from pagans. And the other deities and astrology all check out. It doesn't matter what sect you are from within the Christian church..Catholic, Lutheran or even Southern Baptist.

http://www.zeitgeistmovie.com/

Answer 3

When the Romans took over other regions, they brought their religion with them. In order to pacify the people, rather than saying "your religion is wrong and ours is right", they "melded" elements of both.

It is a lot easier to conquer a country if you don't make them give up their religion.

When the Roman empire became Christian, it still maintained this policy. This is also a major reason there is so much variety within Christianity - because elements of the local religions live on.

Many many many religions have a celebration of the Winter Solstice, for instance. The Romans had Saturnalia.

And Christians have Christmas.

That doesn't mean that Christ wasn't born ... it means that emporers in the early hundreds A.D. (Constantine for one, but the principle was the same for many others) decided that it was much easier to let the locals continue with their traditions while bringing in new religious concepts.

The Romans were NOT stupid.

Answer 4

Well, Constantine was a smart fellow. He knew that he could make Christianity the official religion of the realm, but he couldn't stop people from carrying on the traditions they were accustomed to. So... for the most part he hijacked traditional pagan festivals and made them Christian holidays.

For example Christmas was placed at the time of the traditional Yule festival. Even today there are many traditional parts of Christmas that hearken back to pre-christian paganism such as the Christmas Tree, Yule Log, and even the traditional Christmas Ham.

Answer 5

Because in the third century CE Constantine created a form of universalism that today is called christianity. Pagan ideas were intentionally incorporated to make the religion acceptable to the pagans of the day.

Answer 6

Christianity was controlled by the Romans by mixing pagan beliefs with Christs teaching to control the spreading of Christians as they where growing in numbers that scared the Romans

Answer 7

Because some of the pagan rituals are Incorporated within their religion, which were taken from Christianity. Christianity is the beginning. all the follow are what have spun off, into their own belief.. You will find that all religions have taken something from the beginning that is Christianity

Answer 8

Several reasons.

1. Christianity was in competition with pagan religions when it was developing, and naturally some pagan concepts would have been adopted when they were practical.

2. Christianity spread into areas where pagan religions were popular, and often used the pagan rituals and festival days in order to draw people toward their religion.

3. Many religious ideals are universal. If something serves your spirit for one religion, it may well serve your spirit in another. It is not unlike the fact that people in other cultures share similar secular similarities with our culture. Some things are just too practical or necessary to not share.

Another important question is this: why does it even matter?

Answer 9

Because when Christianity was devolving it took a number of pagan traditions and incorporated into its own doctrine to make it easier to get converts and make it easier for them them to accept the religion.

Answer 10

Yes. Many "Christian" traditions are just Pagan traditions that were assimilated into Christianity to make converting look more appealing.

Christmas, for instance, is Yule. Jay-sus was born in spring, not in December.