so "pregnant with light"; and from "ohra," "to conceive" or be "pregnant," we have in Greek, the word for a wife. As Orion, according to Persian accounts, was Nimrod; and Nimrod, under the name of Ninus, was worshipped as the son of his wife, when he came to be deified as the sun-god, that name Aurora, as applied to his wife, is evidently intended to convey the very same idea as prevails in Tartary and India. These myths of the Tartars and Hindoos clearly prove that the Pagan idea of the miraculous conception had not come from any intermixture of Christianity with that superstition, but directly from the promise of "the seed of the woman."
But how, it may be asked, could the idea of being pregnant with a sunbeam arise? There is reason to believe that it came from one of the natural names of the sun. From the Chaldean zhr, "to shine," comes, in the participle active, zuhro or zuhre, "the Shiner"; and hence, no doubt, from zuhro, "the Shiner," under the prompting of a designing priesthood, men would slide into the idea of zuro, "the seed,"--"the Shiner" and "the seed," according to the genius of Paganism, being thus identified. This was manifestly the case in Persia, where the sun as the great divinity; for the "Persians," says Maurice, "called God Sure" (Antiquities).
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[Back] The Goddess Mother as a Habitation
What could ever have induced mankind to think of calling the great Goddess-mother, or mother of gods and men, a House or Habitation? The answer is evidently to be found in a statement made in Genesis 2:21, in regard to the formation of the mother of mankind: "And the Lord caused a deep sleep to fall upon Adam, and he slept, and he took one of his ribs, and closed up the flesh instead thereof. And the ribwhich the Lord God had taken from man, made (margin, literally BUILDED) he into a woman."
That this history of the rib was well known to the Babylonians, is manifest from one of the names given to their primeval goddess, as found in Berosus. That name is Thalatth. But Thalatth is just the Chaldean form of the Hebrew Tzalaa, in the feminine,--the very word used in Genesis for the rib, of which Eve was formed; and the other name which Berosus couples with Thalatth, does much to confirm this; for that name, which is Omorka, * just signifies "The Mother of the world."
* From "Am," "mother," and "arka," "earth." The first letter aleph in both of these words is often pronounced as o. Thus the pronunciation of a in Am, "mother," is seen in the Greek a "shoulder." Am, "mother," comes from am, "to support," and from am, pronounced om, comes the shoulder that bearsburdens. Hence also the name Oma, as one of the names of Bona Des. Oma is evidently the "Mother."
When we have thus deciphered the meaning of the name Thalatth, as applied to the "mother of the world," that leads us at once to the understanding, of the name Thalasius, applied by the Romans to the god of marriage, the origin of which name has hitherto been sought in vain. Thalatthi signifies "belonging to the rib," and, with the Roman termination, becomes Thalatthius or "Thalasius, the man of the rib." And what name more appropriate than this for Adam, as the god of marriage, who, when the rib was brought to him, said, "This is now bone of my bones, and flesh of my flesh: she shall be called Woman, because she was taken out of man."
At first, when Thalatth, the rib, was builded into a woman, that "woman" was, in a very important sense, the "Habitation" or "Temple of God"; and had not the Fall intervened, all her children would, in consequence of mere natural generation, have been the children of God. The entrance of sin into the world subverted the original constitution of things. Still, when the promise of a Saviour was given and embraced, the renewed indwelling of the Holy Spirit was given too, not that she might thereby have any power in herself to bring forth children unto God, but only that she might duly act the part of a mother to a spiritually living offspring--to those whom God of his free grace should quicken, and bring from death unto life.
Now, Paganism willingly overlooked all this; and taught, as soon as its votaries were prepared for receiving it, that this renewed indwelling of the spirit of God in the woman, was identification, and so it deified her. Then Rhea, "the gazer," the mother of mankind, was identified with Cybele "the binder with cords," or Juno, "the Dove," that is, the Holy Spirit. Then, in the blasphemous Pagan sense, she became Athor, "the Habitation of God," or Sacca, or Sacta, "the tabernacle" or "temple," in whom dwelt "all the fulness of the Godhead bodily."
Thus she became Heva, "The Living One"; not in the sense in which Adam gave that name to his wife after the Fall, when the hope of life out of the midst of death was so unexpectedly presented to her as well as to himself; but in the sense of the communicator of spiritual and eternal life to men; for Rhea was called the "fountain of the blessed ones." The agency, then, of this deified woman was held to be indispensable for the begetting of spiritual children to God, in this, as it was admitted, fallen world.
Looked at from this point of view, the meaning of the name given to the Babylonian goddess in 2 Kings 17:30, will be at once apparent. The name Succoth-benoth has very frequently been supposed to be a plural word, and to refer to booths or tabernacles used in Babylon for infamous purposes. But, as observed by Clericus (De Chaldoeis), who refers to the Rabbins as being of the same opinion, the context clearly shows that the name must be the name of an idol: (vv 29,30), "Howbeit every nation made gods of their own, and put them in the houses of the high places which the Samaritans had made, every nation in their cities wherein they dwelt. And the men of Babylon made Succoth-benoth." It is here evidently an idol that is spoken of; and as the name is feminine, that idol must have been the image of a goddess. Taken in this sense, then, and in the light of the Chaldean system as now unfolded, the meaning of "Succoth-benoth," as applied to the Babylonian goddess, is just "The tabernacle of child-bearing." *
* That is, the Habitation in which the Spirit of God dwelt, for the purpose of begetting spiritual children.
When the Babylonian system was developed, Eve was represented as the first that occupied this place, and the very name Benoth, that signifies "child-bearing," explains also how it came about that the Woman, who, as Hestia or Vesta, was herself called the "Habitation," got the credit of "having invented the art of building houses" (SMITH, "Hestia"). Benah, the verb, from which Benoth comes, signifies at once to "bring forth children" and "to build houses"; the bringing forth of children being metaphorically regarded as the "building up of the house," that is, of the family.
While the Pagan system, so far as a Goddess-mother was concerned, was founded on this identification of the Celestial and Terrestrial mothers of the "blessed" immortals, each of these two divinities was still celebrated as having, in some sense, a distinct individuality; and, in consequence, all the different incarnations of the Saviour-seed were represented as born of two mothers. It is well known that Bimater, or Two-mothered, is one of the distinguishing epithets applied to Bacchus. Ovid makes the reason of the application of this epithet to him to have arisen from the myth, that when in embryo, he was rescued from the flames in which is mother died, was sewed up in Jupiter's thigh, and then brought forth at the due time.
Without inquiring into the secret meaning of this, it is sufficient to state that Bacchus had two goddess-mothers; for, not only was he conceived by Semele, but he was brought into the world by the goddess Ippa (PROCLUS in Timoeum). This is the very same thing, no doubt, that is referred to, when it is said that after his mother Semele's death, his aunt Ino acted the part of a mother and nurse unto him. The same thing appears in the mythology of Egypt, for there we read that Osiris, under the form of Anubis, having been brought forth by Nepthys, was adopted and brought up by the goddess Isis as her own son.
In consequence of this, the favourite Triad came everywhere to be the two mothers and the son. In WILKINSON, the reader will find a divine Triad, consisting of Isis and Nepthys, and the child of Horus between them. In Babylon, the statement of Diodorus shows that the Triad there at one period was two goddesses and the son--Hera, Rhea, and Zeus; and in the Capitol at Rome, in like manner, the Triad was Juno, Minerva, and Jupiter; while, when Jupiter was worshipped by the Roman matrons as "Jupiter puer," or "Jupiter the child," it was in company with Juno and the goddess Fortuna (CICERO, De Divinatione). This kind of divine Triad seems to be traced up to very ancient times among the Romans; for it is stated both by Dionysius Halicarnassius and by Livy, that soon after the expulsion of the Tarquins, there was at Rome a temple in which were worshipped Ceres, Liber, and Libera (DION. HALICARN and LIVY).
Christ’s Last Word to His Church SERIES. Pergamum, Balaam & How Romanism Entered the Church
Rev. 2:12-17
As we open to Revelation 2:14-15, and see the next section of Christ’s message to the saints at Pergamum, the story behind these words actually starts way back in the book of Genesis with the life of Abraham.
Revelation 2:14-15 (NKJV) But I have a few things against you, because you have there those who hold the doctrine of Balaam, who taught Balak to put a stumbling block before the children of Israel, to eat things sacrificed to idols, and to commit sexual immorality. 15 Thus you also have those who hold the doctrine of the Nicolaitans, which thing I hate.
The saints at Pergamum had gotten too close to the wickedness of the idol worship around them. They had slowly gotten comfortable going back to the old haunts of those idols they had been saved out of and away from. Then, overcome by the temptations and lusts of the flesh, they gave in to sinful practices. Idolatry is very hard to resist.
Beware of Idols
Turn back a few pages with me to the last chapter of 1 John. Always remember that the very last warning the Apostle John gave to the Church was in v. 21:
1 John 5:21 (NKJV) Little children, keep yourselves from idols. Amen.
Abraham was Saved from Idolatry
About 2000 B.C. God called Abraham away from all the idolatry of Babylon. Abram lived in Ur of the Chaldees. Babylon was also known as the realm of the Chaldeans. Abram was an idolater, he worshipped the images of the gods of his land. God saved him out of that idol worship. Listen to Joshua:
Joshua 24:2-3 (NKJV) And Joshua said to all the people, “Thus says the Lord God of Israel: ‘Your fathers, including Terah, the father of Abraham and the father of Nahor, dwelt on the other side of the river in old times; and they served other gods. 3 Then I took your father Abraham from the other side of the river, led him throughout all the land of Canaan, and multiplied his descendants and gave him Isaac.
God saved Abram from idols, and then God led him into the Promised Land, and gave him the nation of Israel as his descendants. But a thousand years later, in the ninth century B. C., Israel had returned to the same idol worship Abraham had been saved from, under the influence of wicked Jezebel (see 1 Kings 16:30-33). At this time the cult was worshiped under the name of Baal.
By the time of the prophet Jeremiah, the idolatrous worship of Babylon’s religion, Abraham was saved from, permeated the nation of Israel. Please turn with me to Jeremiah 44.
Jeremiah 44: The Queen of Heaven’s Idolatrous Religion
The words “queen of heaven” are found in five verses in the Bible (Jeremiah 7:18; 44:17-19, 25).
In Jeremiah, we are introduced to this whole idolatrous form of worship.
Jeremiah 44:17-25 (NKJV) But we will certainly do whatever has gone out of our own mouth, to burn incense to the queen of heavenand pour out drink offerings to her, as we have done, we and our fathers, our kings and our princes, in the cities of Judah and in the streets of Jerusalem. For then we had plenty of food, were well-off, and saw no trouble. 18 But since we stopped burning incense to the queen of heaven and pouring out drink offerings to her, we have lacked everything and have been consumed by the sword and by famine.”19 The women also said, “And when we burned incense to the queen of heaven and poured out drink offerings to her, did we make cakes for her, to worship her, and pour out drink offerings to her without our husbands’ permission?”
22 So the LORD could no longer bear it, because of the evil of your doings and because of the abominations which you committed. Therefore your land is a desolation, an astonishment, a curse, and without an inhabitant, as it is this day.
Do you know where the queen of Heaven came from? It came right out of Egyptian idolatry, Isis and Osiris. It has nothing to do with the New Testament at all. And if you have ever heard that Roman Catholics say the Queen of Heaven is Mary, and wondered where that came from-look at these words in Ezekiel 8:12-16.
The prophet Ezekiel is taken by God into the temple, the house of God; and he sees that there are idols there and God is very unhappy. And just to see what is offending God so greatly, he’s shown this scene:
Ezekiel 8:13-14, 16 (NKJV) And He said to me, “Turn again, and you will see greater abominations that they are doing.” 14 So He brought me to the door of the north gate of the LORD’s house; and to my dismay, women were sitting there weeping for Tammuz. 16 So He brought me into the inner court of the LORD’s house; and there, at the door of the temple of the LORD, between the porch and the altar, were about twenty-five men with their backs toward the temple of the LORD and their faces toward the east, and they were worshiping the sun toward the east.
There it is, the idolatry of Babel exported to Israel: the worship of the virgin goddess in Jeremiah 44, the worship of her son as they were weeping the 40 days awaiting his resurrection in Ezekiel 8.
Semiramis, Lent & Romanism
Let me just give you some interesting details from a book entitled, “The Two Babylons” by Alexander Hislop. The worship of Semiramis throughout history has often had these elements:
- Semiramis was called the Queen of Heaven;
- Semiramis was worshipped by the offering of a wafer, or cake;
- Semiramis began the practice of 40 days of weeping over Tammuz before the feast of celebrating his resurrection.
- These mystery cults around Semiramis also had purgatory, which they taught and believed and adhered to. [1]
The worship of Mary as the Queen of Heaven and the 40 days of Lent for her Son, has no basis in Scripture, but rather developed from the pagan celebration of Semiramis’ mourning for forty days over the death of Tammuz before his alleged resurrection-another of Satan’s mythical counterfeits.
The majority of those who call themselves Christians in our world today follow a way of worship that would have offended the apostles and early saints. What do I mean?
The statues of Mary, calling her the Queen of Heaven, the images of Christ and saints; and all of them being revered with candles and incense burning before them are idolatrous. God through His Word calls each of us to always be on guard and to:
Beware of the New Paganism in the Church
What are some of the pagan rites that have crept into the Church? To name a few would be:
The incense burning before images, the orders of priests and monks that are so contradictory to Christ-like humility, the calendar of observances that each originate with pagan events that have only been renamed with Christian events, the titles of pagan priests like: Pontifex Maximus, pontiff, vicar, and most excellent.
Then there are also all the pagan originated and never recorded in the Bible practices like: holy water, purgatory, prayers for the dead, indulgences, and so much more.
All of these names, observances, and practices came directly from the pagans; the very pagans that the early saints tried to convert! Now look back at our text in Revelation 2:12-17 where we find:
Christ’s ADMONITION (v. 14-15)
Revelation 2:14-15 (NKJV) But I have a few things against you, because you have there those who hold the doctrine of Balaam, who taught Balak to put a stumbling block before the children of Israel, to eat things sacrificed to idols, and to commit sexual immorality. 15 Thus you also have those who hold the doctrine of the Nicolaitans, which thing I hate.
The saints at Pergamum had gotten too close to the wickedness around them. They had slowly gotten comfortable going back to the old haunts they had been saved out of and away from. Then, overcome by the lusts of the flesh, they gave in to sinful practices.
They were not being obedient to the clear commands Christ had already given them, thus they were not pleasing Him. What had Jesus already asked for them to do, and taught them through their pastor’s ministry of the Word to them?
2 Corinthians 6:16-17 (NKJV) And what agreement has the temple of God with idols? For you are the temple of the living God. As God has said: “I will dwell in them And walk among them. I will be their God, And they shall be My people.” 17 Therefore “Come out from among them And be separate, says the Lord. Do not touch what is unclean, And I will receive you.”
Christ said you are in sin “I have few things against you!”
First, you have Balaam’s doctrine = what is that?
- “Put stumbling block…” Numbers 22-25 records how Moabites contacted Balaam a prophet for hire, he prophesied 4x promising Israel’ s conquest of Moab and Christ’s coming, they angrily fired him and God killed 24,000 of Israel with a plague.
- What? 24,000 Israelites killed by God? Yes, that’s the doctrine of Balaam, “If you can’t defeat it, join it and defile it and God will judge it”. Balaam said get them involved in sexual sin and God will judge them and did…
- Balaam’s doctrine is still here, such as people who actually say they are Christians and yet continue to live in sexual sin. Others say they belong to Christ yet support false doctrine that is completely opposed to Christ.
- Today if you are living in such sin and drawing in others, to you Christ says, “I am coming to war against you”.
Second, Nicolaitans, what’s that? Nicolas supposedly started a cult but any record in church history is sketchy. Many Bible teachers through the centuries take this to be nike-laios, which translated means one who “conquered people.” How can that be seen in the history of the Church?
- This would cover the many who over the centuries have arisen as self-made prophets ruling with rods of iron, building ecclesiastical kingdoms of wealth and power. This type of disobedience is still with us today, sadly.
- Just quickly a side note- How did it happen? How did the pure, simple gospel get in purple robes with gold rings and set in paganism, idols and adopt false “work your way to heaven” doctrines?
Balaam’s doctrine is when sinful and false practices are brought into the Church and the Nicolatians are those who lord over Christ’s Church instead of humbly leading and serving it.
So how did the Church inherit this wickedness? Hold on to your seats, here is an overview of world history in 3 minutes:
The Pagan Origins of Romanism
By the time of Christ, this cult had so influenced Roman life that the Caesars were not only crowned as emperors of Rome but also bore the title Pontifex Maximus, meaning, “high priest.” They were high priests of the Babylonian idol worship.
When Christ came into this world the mystery of iniquity was everywhere holding sway, save where the truth of God as revealed in the Old Testament was known. Thus, when the early Christians set out upon the great task of carrying the gospel to the ends of the earth, they found themselves everywhere confronted by this system, in one form or another; for though Babylon as a city had long been but a mystery, her mysteries had not died with her. [2]
Babylon to Pergamos
When Medes and Persians moved in and took the city and temples of Babylon in 539 BC, the high-priest fled with a company of initiates and their sacred vessels and images to Pergamos, where the Symbol of the serpent was set up as the emblem of the hidden wisdom.[3]
The chief priests wore mitres shaped like the head of a fish, in honor of Dagon, the fish-god, the lord of life – another form of the Tammuz mystery, as developed among Israel’s old enemies, the Philistines. The chief priest took the title Pontifex Maximus, and this was imprinted in on his mitre. [4]
Pergamos to Rome
Three hundred years later, Rome moved into power, Julius Caesar had all the priestesses and priests of Semiramis moved from Pergamos to Rome. That’s history. You can read that yourself. Julius Caesar had a great idea about having more power if he could combine a false religion with his system. You see, he knew what every good conqueror knows; you’ve got to get the people religiously. [5]
When the worship of Semiramis arrived in Rome, the chief priest of the Mystery Religions in Rome took the title Pontifex Maximum and it was imprinted on his miter. The title had to do with the worship of a god called Dagon the Fish-god. From then on, every emperor in Rome wore the title Pontifex Maximum. It had nothing to do with Christianity; it meant you were the chief priest of the worship of Semiramis. [6]
Constantine & Christianity
During the year A. D. 306 a Roman emperor named Constantine was threatened by a very powerful enemy army. Realizing that his uneasy troops needed confidence, Constantine claimed to have seen a vision on the eve of the battle. He saw a large blue flag with a red cross on it and heard a mighty voice that said In hoc signo vinces – “in this sign conquer.”
He thereupon marched his troops into a shallow river
, claimed them to be officially baptized, and ordered the sign of the cross painted on all his weapons. Thus inspired, he led his troops to victory and subsequently made Christianity the state religion of Rome.
Thus, for nearly 300 years the Devil had desperately attempted to destroy the church from outside by his terrible persecutions. But with the advent of Constantine he changed his tactics, walking the aisle, applying for membership, and joining the church!
The Roman Empire’s official priests of Tammuz soon discovered that they could easily make the transition into Christianity (with certain changes) and thereupon carried their traditions forward without interruption by promoting the Mother-Child worship concept, the holy-water sacrament, and many other practices imported from the pagan mystery religions.
Up until the Roman emperor Constantine Christianity in the early 4th century A.D., were both head of the Roman empire and also Pontifex Maximus–head of the pagan church. Constantine’s proclamation of Christianity led to the merger of Christianity and paganism in the Roman empire. As head of the pagan church, Constantine wore the garb and paraphernalia of Babylon’s idolatry which had been passed down through the Babylonian empire, preserved in Pergamum, willed to Rome, and was worn by Julius Caesar and the subsequent Roman emperors. The Roman emperor Constantine had the fish hat, the crosier, and the keys of Janus and Cybele. [7]
Babylonianism to the Church
In 381 A.D., the Roman emperor Gratian refused to wear the paraphernalia of Babylonianism, but he passed it to the Roman Pope Damasus. Since Damasus, every Pope of Rome has worn the garb of Babylon–the fish hat, the crosier, and the keys of Janus and Cybele. In our days, Pope John Paul II and his most recent successor, Pope Benedict XVI, wears the garb of Babylonian idolatry. As the pagans had worshipped their gods (icons of their deceased pontiffs) in their pantheons and temples, they now worshipped their patron saints and their icons in cathedrals and churches. [8]
Semiramis: who was Ashtoreth in Canaan, Aphrodite in Greece, Venus in Rome, known also as Astarte, Ishtar, Aurora, Diana, Rhea, Urania, and Isis: was worshipped now as Jesus’ mother Mary. [9]
Historian Will Durant[10] states that paganism conquered Christianity, saying that paganism continued “in the form of ancient rites and customs condoned or accepted and transformed by an often indulgent Church.”
Durant goes on to explain: “An intimate and trustful worship of saints replaced the cult of the pagan gods, and satisfied the polytheism of simple or poetic minds. Statues of Isis and Horus were renamed Mary and Jesus.”
Many years ago as a professor of Church History at the Masters Seminary and College, I used to give a lecture series for 14 hours, from Church History and the History of Doctrine called:
Seven Reasons I am not a Roman Catholic
- The first reason why the Roman Catholic church is wrong is because of the doctrine of Christ’s being offered over and over in the Mass.
- The second reason is because of the inordinate place that Mary has been given.
- Thirdly, because they have elevated tradition over the Scripture. Mass, with their doctrine of Mary. They put it, their teachings which have become traditions, over the holy scriptures.
- Fourthly, because of the veneration or worship of images. The scriptures tell us that God is not to be reduced into a physical form. He is not to be worshipped by anything we can make with our hands.
- Because of the false teachings about the sacraments. The Roman church, teaches that grace is infused through the operation of these sacraments; and that grace can be earned instead of being imputed by God.
- Sixthly, the teaching of the Roman Catholic church about purgatory is a falsehood.
- Finally, many practices of Roman Catholicism are tied to ancient paganism’s rites.
There are some people in the Catholic Church who have met Jesus Christ and I praise God for that, but they had to do it circumventing their own theology, if they even knew their own theology.
Christ’s message for them and to us today is: Stay separated from false doctrine and evil practices.
[1] John MacArthur preached this in a Mother’s Day message on 5/14/72
[2] Henry Allen “Harry” Ironside (October 14, 1876-January 15, 1951) was a Canadian-American Bible teacher, preacher, theologian, pastor, and author. Found also on Lambert Dolphin’s site at:http://ldolphin.org/semir.html This article copied from:http://www.biblelineministries.org/articles/basearch.php3?action=full&mainkey=BABYLONIAN+RELIGION+%28By+Harry+A.+Ironside%29
[3] Henry Allen “Harry” Ironside (October 14, 1876-January 15, 1951) was a Canadian-American Bible teacher, preacher, theologian, pastor, and author. Found also on Lambert Dolphin’s site at:http://ldolphin.org/semir.html This article copied from:http://www.biblelineministries.org/articles/basearch.php3?action=full&mainkey=BABYLONIAN+RELIGION+%28By+Harry+A.+Ironside%29
[4] Henry Allen “Harry” Ironside (October 14, 1876-January 15, 1951) was a Canadian-American Bible teacher, preacher, theologian, pastor, and author. Found also on Lambert Dolphin’s site at:http://ldolphin.org/semir.html This article copied from:http://www.biblelineministries.org/articles/basearch.php3?action=full&mainkey=BABYLONIAN+RELIGION+%28By+Harry+A.+Ironside%29
[5] John MacArthur speaking at a Q&A 10/7/1973 said these things. http://www.gty.org/Resources/Sermons/1332_The-Destruction-of-the-Nations-Part-3?q=lent
[6] John MacArthur speaking at a Q&A 10/7/1973 said these things. http://www.gty.org/Resources/Sermons/1332_The-Destruction-of-the-Nations-Part-3?q=lent
[7] Hislop, The Two Babylon’s, page 241.http://philologos.org/__eb-ttb/default.htm
[8] Hislop, The Two Babylon’s, page 241.http://philologos.org/__eb-ttb/default.htm
[9] Hislop, The Two Babylon’s, page 241.http://philologos.org/__eb-ttb/default.htm
[10] William James Durant (November 5, 1885 – November 7, 1981) was a prolific American writer, historian, and philosopher. He is best known for The Story of Civilization, 11 volumes written in collaboration with his wife Ariel Durant and published between 1935 and 1975. The Story of Civilization, Vol. IV, page 73.
Two key figures in the origin of Christmas are Nimrod, a great grandson of Noah, and his mother and wife, Semiramis, also known as Ishtar and Isis. Nimrod, known in Egypt as Osiris, was the founder of the first world empire at Babel, later known as Babylon (Genesis 10:8-12; 11:1-9). From ancient sources such as the "Epic of Gilgamesh" and records unearthed by archeologists from long-ruined Mesopotamian and Egyptian cities, we can reconstruct subsequent events.
After Nimrod's death (c. 2167 BC), Semiramis promoted the belief that he was a god. She claimed that she saw a full-grown evergreen tree spring out of the roots of a dead tree stump, symbolizing the springing forth of new life for Nimrod. On the anniversary of his birth, she said, Nimrod would visit the evergreen tree and leave gifts under it. His birthday fell on the winter solstice at the end of December.
A few years later, Semiramis bore a son, Horus or Gilgamesh. She declared that she had been visited by the spirit of Nimrod, who left her pregnant with the boy. Horus, she maintained, was Nimrod reincarnated. With a father, mother and son deified, a deceptive, perverted trinity was formed.
Semiramis and Horus were worshipped as "Madonna and child." As the generations passed, they were worshipped under other names in different countries and languages. Many of these are recognizable: Fortuna and Jupiter in Rome; Aphrodite and Adonis in Greece and Ashtoreth/Astarte and Molech/Baal in Canaan.
During the time between Babel and Christ, pagans developed the belief that the days grew shorter in early winter because their sun-god was leaving them. When they saw the length of the day increasing, they celebrated by riotous, unrestrained feasting and orgies. This celebration, known as Saturnalia, was named after Saturn, another name for Nimrod.
Blended into "Christianity"
Many historical sources show that Christmas was not observed by Christians from Christ's time to about AD 300. Saturnalia (December 17-24) and Brumalia (December 25) continued as a pagan celebration by the Romans well into the fourth century. The Catholic Encyclopedia, 1911 edition, in the article "Natal Day," records that the early Catholic church father, Origen, acknowledged:
In the Scriptures, no one is recorded to have kept a feast or held a great banquet on his birthday. It is only sinners like Pharaoh and Herod who make great rejoicings over the day in which they were born into this world.
During the fourth century, the emperor Constantine "converted" to "Christianity" and changed Sabbathkeeping from the seventh to the first day of the week. Sunday was the day he had worshipped the sun as his god. This made it easier for the Romans to call their pagan December 25th winter solstice festival, in which they had celebrated the birth of the sun god, the birthday of the "Son of God."
The New Catholic Encyclopedia, 1967, says:
According to the hypothesis . . . accepted by most scholars today, the birth of Christ was assigned the date of the winter solstice (December 25 in the Julian calendar, January 6 in the Egyptian), because on this day, as the sun began its return to northern skies, the pagan devotees of Mithra celebrated the dies natalis Solis Invicti (birthday of the Invincible Sun). On Dec. 25, 274, Aurelian had proclaimed the sun-god principal patron of the empire and dedicated a temple to him in the Campus Martius. Christmas originated at a time when the cult of the sun was particularly strong at Rome.
Only in the fifth century did the Roman Catholic Church order that the birth of Christ be observed on December 25, the day of the old Roman feast of the birth of Sol, the sun god. They renamed this day "Christmas."
Christmas in England
In AD 596, Pope Gregory I dispatched the monk Augustine to England as a missionary. The Pope had decreed that whatever pagan practices were not of themselves "evil" should be blended with Christianity. According to the 11th edition of the Encyclopedia Britannica, "Christmas":
In Britain, the 25th of December was a festival long before the conversion to Christianity, for Bede relates that "the ancient peoples of the Angli began the year on the 25th of December . . . ; and [Christmas eve] they called in their tongue "modranecht" (môdra niht), that is, the mother night, by reason we suspect of the ceremony which in that night-long vigil they performed."
When the Normans invaded England in 1066, they introduced other pagan ceremonies into the English celebration of Christmas. During the Reformation, the undisguised pagan elements in Christmas had often provoked criticism from conservative Protestants, but the festival was not really affected by their beliefs until the Puritans came to power in the early 1600's. Christmas was attacked as "the old heathens' feasting day to Saturn their god" and singing carols was forbidden.
In 1644, in protest against Christmas, the Church of England proclaimed December 25th as a fast day, and Parliament banned celebrating the festival. The new rule was enforced by the English army, which spent much of its time pulling down the greenery that festive "pagans" had attached to their doors. In Scotland, the prohibition was enforced with great rigor as well.
By the early nineteenth century, however, its popularity increased. Queen Caroline erected a tree at a royal Christmas celebration in 1821, and twenty years later, Albert, prince consort of Queen Victoria, provided one for a children's party at Windsor.
Christmas in America
In the seventeenth century, the English anti-Christmas attitude spread to her Puritan territories in America. In defiance of the Puritan attitude, the Catholic church established special Christmas services in Boston, Massachusetts, in the 1690s, but many civil authorities strongly opposed them.
By the early 1700s, German and Dutch settlers had brought the pagan custom of the gift-bringing St. Nicholas and the Christmas tree with them. Christmas was primarily celebrated in their settlements. German mercenaries, fighting on the British side in the War of Independence, raised Christmas trees in their camps.
In 1823 Santa Claus acquired national fame in the United States as a result of a poem. According to Man, Myth and Magic Encyclopedia:
St. Nicholas had become famous as a result of Clarke Moore's poem "The Night Before Christmas," published in 1823. By the 1890s the English Father Christmas, originally a minor character in a mummer's play, had been absorbed into the personality of his American counterpart, and become the jovial figure that he is today.
In 1836, Christmas first became an American legal holiday in the state of Alabama. Soon, one state after another legalized this pagan festival. Today, the U.S. celebrates this 4000-year-old festival as a national holiday with gift-giving and riotous, unrestrained feasting and drinking, in a manner similar to the celebrations in the ancient world.
Not of God
This general history of Christmas should be enough to send shivers of revulsion down our spine. The origin of Christmas and the traditional perversions surrounding this holiday should be an obvious reason to avoid this epitome of paganism. However, there is much more to it than origin and history.
What human being has the right to decide what God wants? If we were to celebrate Christ's birth, the Bible, God's instruction book to mankind, would command us to do so. Yet nowhere in the Bible are we told to celebrate the birth of Christ! It does not even tell us when it was! (For further information on the birth of Christ, see our article, "When Was Jesus Born?")
In John 13:15, Christ Himself gives us an important principle, "For I have given you an example, that you should do as I have done to you." We have no example of Christ celebrating birthdays in connection with holy days or feasts—or at all. In fact, He says, "In vain they worship Me, teaching as doctrines the commandments of men" (Matthew 15:9).
The Christmas holiday is spiritually misleading. The emphasis on the "mother and child" distracts from the Father-Son relationship that God's Word focuses on (John 10:30). Christ is reduced to a helpless baby, while Mary is deified and revered. Even Joseph is given more attention than Christ's real Father, the great God of heaven and earth!
Christmas keepers claim that they give gifts on that day because Christ received gifts. The truth is that the wise men brought gifts to the King of the Jews—not when he was born, or when He was an infant, but later when He was a young child (Matthew 2:1-2, 7-11). The gifts were not given to honor His birth, but to show esteem to a king as was the custom in the Middle East.
Further, the wise men did not exchange gifts with each other. So why do people today exchange gifts? Because the origins of these customs are based in paganism! It is interesting to note that offerings to churches decline at this time of year because people are spending their money on each other. How hypocritical!
The worst part of this holiday is that it turns people's hearts away from God. By receiving gifts and by drunkenness and gluttony, individuals are self-gratified, which inevitably leads to sinand crime. Police forces work rigorously to cope with the increased murders, suicides, robberies and domestic disturbances.
The fruit of this revelry should of itself show us that this holiday is in no way related to the Father and Son of Righteousness. Their holy days lead to peace, joy, hope and spiritual growth. That is why God instructed the Israelites not to follow pagan customs or worship Him as the heathen do. He says in Deuteronomy 12:31-32, "You shall not worship the Lord your God in that way. . . . Whatever I command you, be careful to observe it; you shall not add to it nor take away from it."
God knows that ungodly practices like these will not produce the purity of character He desires to see in each of us. James writes, expounding how something pure cannot originate from what is impure: "Does a spring send forth fresh water and bitter from the same opening? Can a fig tree, my brethren, bear olives, or a grapevine bear figs? Thus no spring can yield both salt water and fresh" (James 3:11-12).
Why meddle with the paganisms in Christmas when we can enjoy the purity of God's real holy days revealed in His Word? In following God's instruction, we will grow in developing the true and godly character that God expects in us.
Nimrod married his own mother.
After declaring himself to be a god,
then his mother declared herself to be
“the Mother of god”. Her name was
Semiramis. After Nimrod’s death, she
attempted to cover over her incenstuous
relationship with her son – by declaring
that he was both the Father and the Son.
This concept was difficult for her followers
to understand, so she told them that it was a
“Divine Mystery” – that was not comprehendable.
And thus, “god the father” and “god the son”
was invented way back then – in Ancient Babylon.
And yet, Semiramis insisted that there were not
2 gods, but rather one. Just two aspects of the
same god. On earth, while still alive, Nimrod
was the man-god of Babylon – represented by
the Sun (as a solar god). All the sun-gods that
were formed around the pagan world after him,
were all fashioned in his likeness. They maintained
different names – but were still recognized as
carbon copies of the original sun-god of Babylon,
known as Nimrod.
Nimrod’s wife declared herself to be a moon-goddess.
She gave herself glorious titles such as “queen of heaven” –
“ever virgin” – “Mediatrix” and “mother of god”.
She thus made herself into the perfect female image –
by which all future goddesses were copied or molded
after.
Since the entire family of Nimrod was involved in this
rebellion against Jehovah God, it became a trinity affair
of sorts. Nimrod became “god-the-father”, Tammuz
became “god-the-son”, and Semramis became the “dove”
or “spirit” that held this holy union together. Hence
the first trinity was born – there in Babylon – and has
spread its tentacles around the world – when the
Babylonians were scattered abroad.
The trinity of god, son, and holy spirit (semiramis) has
invaded almost every pagan religion around the world.
Their gods and goddesses have different names, but
the principals remain the same.
Even Kildare, Ireland, has their triple goddess named
“Brigid” that has been absorbed by the Apostate Christian
Church – in the form of a saint.
If you look up under ‘images’ on the internet – using the
words “trinity gods” – or “triple gods” – you will uncover
a slew of them that were invented long before Christ was
even born. When you read the attributes of the pagan
sun-gods and pagan goddesses, the resemblance to Nimrod
and his family becomes even more clear.
No, “God-The-Father” and “God-The-Son” is not a Divine
Mystery that is incomprehensible, but rather it is a Lie
that started in Ancient Babylon with Nimrod, Tammuz,
and Semiramis. Do research for yourself, and stop being
the victims of Apostate Compromise with Heathens.
………………………
“If there was one who was more deeply
concerned in the tragic death of Nimrod
than another, it was Semiramis, who had
been raised to share with him the throne
of Babylon. In life her husband had been
honored as a hero, in death she will have
him worshipped as a god…”
— (The Two Babylons,
Alexander Hislop; page 58 )
“Long ago – right after the Flood,
a man named Nimrod emerged on
the scene of history. When he died,
his wife, Semiramis,recognized that
without him she might loose power,
so she devised a clever plan.
Semiramis was pregnant. She told
everyone that the child in her womb
was none other than Nimrod being reborn.
This was the beginning of the greatest
perversion…the concept of a ‘father/son’
deity.”
– Resurrection Sunday and
the Babylonian Connection;
By Errol Hale
“Semiramis became pregnant after Nimcrod’s
death. And to cover up her indiscretion
she claimed that her baby was Nimrod
reincarnated. So now she claimed that
he was both the Father and the son.
The divine mother who gave birth to
this divine son was Isis, the Egyptian
name for Semiramis. Thus there were now
three gods to whom worship was due–
a father god, a son god, and a holy
mother goddess–yet all of these were
to be considered equal, because they
were all to be considered equal parts
of a triune god.”
-(Exploring Ancient History—
The First 2500 Years, Schulz, ch. 11, 24).
“After Nimrod’s death,
Semiramis claimed his son Horus
to have been Nimrod reincarnated.
These three—Osiris (Nimrod),
Isis (Semiramis) and Horus (the son)-
came to be exalted as a triad of deities
-(Exploring Ancient History—
The First 2500 Years, Schulz, ch. 11, 24).
“All Pagan religions from the time of
Babylon have adopted in one form or
another – a Trinity doctrine or a triad
or trinity of gods. In Babylon it was Nimrod,
Semiramas, and Tammuz. In Egypt it was Osiris,
Isis, and Horus. In Plato’s philosophy it was
the Unknown Father, Nous/Logos, and the world
soul. The Greek triad was composed of Zeus,
Athena and Apollo. Romans had their Trinity
of Jupiter, Mercury and Venus. The Hindus
had their trinity of Brahma, Vishnu, and Shiva.”
–The Lost Doctrines of Christianity
The Doctrine of the Trinity
is Not Based upon Scripture
by Herbert W. Armstrong (1892-1986)
“Many ancient pagan nations had
three headed gods and a Trinity doctrine.
All these have existed from ancient times,
and originated with Nimrod and Babylon.”
–THE TWO BABYLON’S,
by Rev. Alexander Hishop,
1916, Page 17-18.
“Semiramis was initially included
in the pagan Babylonian trinity
as the holy spirit and her symbol
was that of the dove.
Deified as Ishtar, she was raised
far above the level of all creatures,
and was worshipped as the third
member of the trinitarian godhead.
It’s interesting that the ancient
Babylonians pronounced the name
Ishtar in exactly the same way as
we pronounce the word Easter.”
-THE REASON FOR THE SEASON
by Rod England
The concept of a trinity godhead system
goes back to the first city nation called
Babylon. This took place during the time
of Nimrod and Semiramis. In this first pagan
trinity – Nimrod the king was the first person,
Semiramis his Queen was the second person,
and Tammuz their son was the third person,
of this godhead system.”
–Trinity, Fact or Fiction?
Section A – Rev. John D. Sims
SCRIPTURAL HARMONY PROCESS
“After the flood and then the scattering
from the tower of Babel, the earth was in
a repopulation process by pagan trinity
believers initially from Babylon. As the
original Babylonians scattered across the
face of the earth from the tower occurrence,
they took their religious system with them
even though they expressed their religious
system in their new languages. Even in their
new languages the general characteristics
of the trinity system remained the same.
This system eventually infected the
Christian religious world and is spoken
of in hidden detail in Revelation chapters
seventeen and eighteen.”
–Trinity, Fact or Fiction?
Section A – Rev. John D. Sims
SCRIPTURAL HARMONY PROCESS
“So utterly idolatrous was the Babylonian
recognition of the Divine Unity, that Jehovah,
the Living God, severely condemned His
own people for giving any countenance to it.
In the unity of that one and only god of the
Babylonians, there were three persons, and
to symbolize that doctrine of the Trinity, they
employed the equilateral triangle just as it is well
known, that the Church of Rome does to this
day. In both cases such a comparison is most
degrading to the King Eternal.”
-“The Two Babylons”
by Alexander HISLOP -pgs. 16,17
“The trinity originated with Babylon,
and was passed on to most of the world’s
religions. The idea of “God the Son” is
Babylonian paganism and mythology that
was grafted into Christianity.
–Historical Background of the Trinity
By Jeff Rath
………………….
Now while the mother derived her glory in the first instance from the divine character attributed to the child in her arms, the mother in the long-run practically eclipsed the son. At first, in all likelihood, there would be no thought whatever of ascribing divinity to the mother. There was an express promise that necessarily led mankind to expect that, at some time or other, the Son of God, in amazing condescension, should appear in this world as the Son of man. But there was no promise whatever, or the least shadow of a promise, to lead any one to anticipate that a woman should ever be invested with attributes that should raise her to a level with Divinity. It is in the last degree improbably, therefore, that when the mother was first exhibited with the child in her arms, it should be intended to give divine honours to her. She was doubtless used chiefly as a pedestal for the upholding of the divine Son, and holding him forth to the adoration of mankind; and glory enough it would be counted for her, alone of all the daughters of Eve, to have given birth to the promised seed, the world's only hope. But while this, no doubt, was the design, it is a plain principle in all idolatries that that which most appeals to the senses must make the most powerful impression. Now the Son, even in his new incarnation, when Nimrod was believed to have reappeared in a fairer form, was exhibited merely as a child, without any very particular attraction; while the mother in whose arms he was, was set off with all the art of painting and sculpture, as invested with much of that extraordinary beauty which in reality belonged to her. The beauty of Semiramis is said on one occasion to have quelled a rising rebellion among her subjects on her sudden appearance among them; and it is recorded that the memory of the admiration excited in their minds by her appearance on that occasion was perpetuated by a statue erected in Babylon, representing her in the guise in which she had fascinated them so much. * This Babylonian queen was not merely in character coincident with the Aphrodite of Greece and the Venus of Rome, but was, in point of fact, the historical original of that goddess that by the ancient world was regarded as the very embodiment of everything attractive in female form, and the perfection of female beauty; for Sanchuniathon assures us that Aphrodite or Venus was identical with Astarte, * and Astarte being interpreted, * is none other than "The woman that made towers or encompassing walls"--i.e., Semiramis. The Roman Venus, as is well known, was the Cyprian Venus, and the Venus of Cyprus is historically proved to have been derived from Babylon. (See Chap. IV. Sect. III.) Now, what in these circumstances might have been expected actually took place. If the child was to be adored, much more the mother. The mother, in point of fact, became the favourite object of worship. * To justify this worship, the mother was raised to divinity as well as her son, and she was looked upon as destined to complete that bruising of the serpent's head, which it was easy, if such a thing was needed, to find abundant and plausible reasons for alleging that Ninus or Nimrod, the great Son, in his mortal life had only begun.
The Roman Church maintains that it was not so much the seed of the woman, as the woman herself, that was to bruise the head of the serpent. In defiance of all grammar, she renders the Divine denunciation against the serpent thus: "She shall bruise thy head, and thou shalt bruise her heel." The same was held by the ancient Babylonians, and symbolically represented in their temples. In the uppermost storey of the tower of Babel, or temple of Belus, Diodorus Siculus tells us there stood three images of the great divinities of Babylon; and one of these was of a woman grasping a serpent's head. * Among the Greeks the same thing was symbolised; for Diana, whose real character was originally the same as that of the great Babylonian goddess, * was represented as bearing in one of her hands a serpent deprived of its head. * As time wore away, and the facts of Simiramis's history became obscured, her son's birth was boldly declared to be miraculous: and therefore she was called "Alma Mater," * "the Virgin Mother." That the birth of the Great Deliverer was to be miraculous, was widely known long before the Christian era. For centuries, some say for thousands of years before that event, the Buddhist priests had a tradition that a Virgin was to bring forth a child to bless the world. * That this tradition came from no Popish or Christian source, is evident from the surprise felt and expressed by the Jesuit missionaries, when they first entered Thibet and China, and not only found a mother and a child worshipped as at home, but that mother worshipped under a character exactly corresponding with that of their own Madonna, "Virgo Deipara," "the Virgin mother of God," * and that, too, in regions where they could not find the least trace of either the name or history of our Lord Jesus Christ having ever been known. * The primeval promise that the "seed of the woman should bruise the serpent's head," naturally suggested the idea of a miraculous birth. Priestcraft and human presumption set themselves wickedly to anticipate the fulfilment of that promise; and the Babylonian queen seems to have been the first to whom that honour was given. The highest titles were accordingly bestowed upon her. She was called the "queen of heaven." (Jeremiah xliv. 17, 18, 19, 25.) * In Egypt she was styled Athor--i.e., "the Habitation of God," * to signify that in her dwelt all the "fulness of the Godhead." To point out the great goddess-mother, in a Pantheistic sense, as at once the Infinite and Almighty one, and the Virgin mother, this inscription was engraven upon one of her temples in Egypt: "I am all that has been, or that is, or that shall be. No mortal has removed my veil. The fruit which I have brought forth is the Sun." * In Greece she had the name of Hestia, and amongst the Romans, Vesta, which is just a modification of the same name--a name which, though it has been commonly understood in a different sense, really meant "The Dwelling-place." * As the Dwelling-place of Deity, thus is Hestia or Vesta addressed in the Orphic Hymns:-
"Daughter of Saturn, venerable dame,
Who dwell'st amid great fire's eternal flame,
In thee the gods have fix'd their DWELLING-PLACE,
Strong stable basis of the mortal race." *
Even when Vesta is identified with fire, this same character of Vesta as "The Dwelling-place" still distinctly appears. Thus Philolaus, speaking of a fire in the middle of the centre of the world, calls it "The Vesta of the universe, The HOUSE of Jupiter, The mother of the gods." * In Babylon, the title of the goddess-mother as the Dwelling-place of God was Sacca, * or in the emphatic form, Sacta, that is, "The Tabernacle." * Hence, at this day, the great goddesses in India, as wielding all the power of the god whom they represent, are called "Sacti," or the "Tabernacle." Now in her, as the Tabernacle or Temple of God, not only all power, but all grace and goodness were believed to dwell. Every quality of gentleness and mercy was regarded as centered in her; and when death had closed her career, while she was fabled to have been deified and changed into a pigeon, * to express the celestial benignity of her nature, she was called by the name of "D'Iune," * or "The Dove," or without the article, "Juno,"--the name of the Roman "queen of heaven," which has the very same meaning; and under the form of a dove as well as her own, she was worshipped by the Babylonians. The dove, the chosen symbol of this deified queen, is commonly represented with an olive branch in her mouth , as she herself in her human form also is seen bearing the olive branch in her hand; * and from this form of representing her, it is highly probably that she has derived the name by which she is commonly known, for "Z'emir-amit" means "The branch-bearer." * When the goddess was thus represented as the Dove with the olive branch, there can be no doubt that the symbol had partly reference to the story of the flood; but there was much more in the symbol than a mere memorial of that great event. "A branch," as had been already proved, was the symbol of the deified son, and when the deified mother was represented as a Dove, what could the meaning of this representation be but just to identify her with the Spirit of all grace, that brooded, dove-like, over the deep at the creation; for in the sculptures at Nineveh, as we have seen, the wings and tail of the dove represented the third member of the idolatrous Assyrian trinity. * In confirmation of this view, it must be stated that the Assyrian "Juno," or "The Virgin Venus," * as she was called, was identified with the air. Thus Julius Firmicus says:--"The Assyrians and part of the Africans wish the air to have the supremacy of the elements, for they have consecrated this same [element] under the name of Juno, or the Virgin Venus." Why was air thus identified with Juno, whose symbol was that of the third person of the Assyrian trinity? Why, but because in Chaldee the same word which signifies the air signifies also the "Holy Ghost." The knowledge of this entirely accounts for the statement of Proclus, that "Juno imports the generation of soul." * Whence could the soul--the spirit of man--be supposed to have its origin, but from the Spirit of God. In accordance with this character of Juno as the incarnation of the Divine Spirit, the source of life, and also as the goddess of the air, thus is she invoked in the "Orphic Hymns":-
"O royal Juno, of majestic mien,
Aerial formed, divine, Jove's blessed queen,
Throned in the bosom of cerulean air,
The race of mortals is thy constant care;
The cooling gales, thy power alone inspires,
Which nourish life, which every life desires;
Mother of showers and winds, from thee alone
Producing all things, mortal life is known;
All natures show thy temperament divine,
And universal sway alone is thine,
With sounding blasts of wind, the swelling sea
And rolling rivers roar when shook by thee." *
Thus, then, the deified queen, when in all respects regarded as a veritable woman, was at the same time adored as the incarnation of the Holy Ghost, the Spirit of peace and love. In the temple of Hierapolis in Syria, there was a famous statue of the goddess Juno, to which crowds from all quarters flocked to worship. The image of the goddess was richly habited, on her head was a golden dove, and she was called by a name peculiar to the country, "Semeion." * What is the meaning of Semeion? It is evidently "The Habitation;" * and the "golden dove" on her head shows plainly who it was that was supposed to dwell in her-even the Spirit of God. When such transcendent dignity was bestowed on her, when such winning characters were attributed to her, and when, over and above all, her images presented her to the eyes of men as Venus Urania, "the heavenly Venus," the queen of beauty, who assured her worshippers of salvation, while giving loose reins to every unholy passion, and every depraved and sensual appetite--no wonder that everywhere she was enthusiastically adored. Under the name of the "Mother of the gods," the goddess queen of Babylon became an object of almost universal worship. "The Mother of the gods," says Clericus," was worshipped by the Persians, the Syrians, and all the kings of Europe and Asia, with the most profound religious veneration." * Tacitus gives evidence that the Babylonian goddess was worshipped in the heart of Germany, * and Caesar, when he invaded Britain, found that the priests of this same goddess, known by the name of Druids, had been there before him. * Herodotus, from personal knowledge, testifies, that in Egypt this "queen of heaven" was "the greatest and most worshipped of all the divinities." * Wherever her worship was introduced, it is amazing what fascinating power it exerted. Truly, the nations might be said to be "made drunk" with the wine of her fornications. So deeply, in particular, did the Jews in the days of Jeremiah drink of her wine cup, so bewitched were they with her idolatrous worship, that even after Jerusalem had been burnt, and the land desolated for this very thing, they could not be prevailed on to give it up. While dwelling in Egypt as forlorn exiles, instead of being witnesses for God against the heathenism around them, they were as much devoted to this form of idolatry as the Egyptians themselves. Jeremiah was sent of God to denounce wrath against them, if they continued to worship the queen of heaven; but his warnings were in vain. "Then," saith the prophet, "all the men which knew that their wives had burnt incense unto other gods, and all the women that stood by, a great multitude, even all the people that dwelt in the land of Egypt, in Pathros, answered Jeremiah, saying, As for the word that thou hast spoken unto us in the name of the Lord, we will not hearken unto thee; but we will certainly do whatsoever thing goeth forth out of our own mouth, to burn incense unto the queen of heaven, and to pour out drink-offerings unto her, as we have done, we, and our fathers, our kings, and our princes, in the cities of Judah, and in the streets of Jerusalem: for then had we plenty of victuals, and were well, and saw no evil" (Jer. xliv. 15-17). Thus did the Jews, God's own peculiar people, emulate the Egyptians in their devotion to the queen of heaven.
The worship of the goddess-mother with the child in her arms continued to be observed in Egypt till Christianity entered. If the Gospel had come in power among the mass of the people, the worship of this goddess-queen would have been overthrown. With the generality it came only in name. Instead, therefore, of the Babylonian goddess being cast out, in too many cases her name only was changed. She was called the Virgin Mary, and, with her child, was worshipped with the same idolatrous feeling by professing Christians, as formerly by open and avowed Pagans. The consequence was, that when, in A.D. 325, the Nicene Council was summoned to condemn the heresy of Arius, who denied the true divinity of Christ, that heresy indeed was condemned, but not without the help of men who gave distinct indications of a desire to put the creature on a level with the Creator, to set the Virgin-mother wide by side with her Son. At the Council of Nice, says the author of "Nimrod," "The Melchite section"--that is, the representatives of the so-called Christianity of Egypt--"held that there were three persons in the Trinity--the Father, the Virgin Mary, and Messiah their Son." * In reference to this astounding fact, elicited by the Nicene Council, Father Newman speaks exultingly of these discussions as tending to the glorification of Mary. "Thus," says he, "the controversy opened a question which it did not settle. It discovered a new sphere, if we may so speak, in the realms of light, to which the Church had not yet assigned its inhabitant. Thus, there was a wonder in Heaven; a throne was seen far above all created powers, mediatorial, intercessory, a title archetypal, a crown bright as the morning star, a glory issuing from the eternal throne, robes pure as the heavens, and a sceptre over all. And who was the predestined heir of that majesty? Who was that wisdom, and what was her name, the mother of fair love, and fear, and holy hope, exalted like a palm-tree in Engaddi, and a rose-plant in Jericho, created from the beginning before the world, in God's counsels, and in Jerusalem was her power? The vision is found in the Apocalypse 'a Woman clothed with the sun, and the moon under her feet, and upon her head a crown of twelve stars.'" * "The votaries of Mary," adds he, "do not exceed the true faith, unless the blasphemers of her Son came up to it. The Church of Rome is not idolatrous, unless Arianism is orthodoxy." * This is the very poetry of blasphemy.
It contains an argument too; but what does that argument amount to? It just amounts to this, that if Christ be admitted to be truly and properly God, and worthy of Divine honours, His mother, from whom He derived merely His humanity, must be admitted to be the same, must be raised far above the level of all creatures, and be worshipped as a partaker of the Godhead. The divinity of Christ is made to stand or fall with the divinity of His mother. Such is Popery in the nineteenth century; yea, such is Popery in England. It was known already that Popery abroad was bold and unblushing in its blasphemies; that in Lisbon a church was to be seen with these words engraven on its front, "To the virgin goddess of Loretto, the Italian race, devoted to her DIVINITY, have dedicated this temple." * But when till now was such language ever heard in Britain before? This, however, is just the exact reproduction of the doctrine of ancient Babylon in regard to the great goddess-mother. The Madonna of Rome, then, is just the Madonna of Babylon. The "Queen of Heaven" in the one system is the same as the "Queen of Heaven" in the other. The goddess worshipped in Babylon and Egypt as the Tabernacle or Habitation of God, is identical with her who, under the name of Mary, is called by Rome "the HOUSE consecrated to God," "the awful Dwelling-place," * "the Mansion of God," * the "Tabernacle of the Holy Ghost," * the "Temple of the Trinity." * Some may possibly be inclined to defend such language, by saying that the Scripture makes every believer to be a temple of the Holy Ghost, and, therefore, what harm can there be in speaking of the Virgin Mary, who was unquestionably a saint of God, under that name, or names of a similar import? Now, no doubt it is true that Paul says (1 Cor. iii. 16), "Know ye not that ye are the temple of God, and that the Spirit of God dwelleth in you?" It is not only true, but it is a great truth, and a blessed one--a truth that enhances every comfort when enjoyed, and takes the sting out of every trouble when it comes, that every genuine Christian has less or more experience of what is contained in these words of the same apostle (2 Cor. vi. 16), "Ye are the temple of the living God; as God hath said, I will dwell in them and walk in them, and I will be their God, and they shall be my people." It must also be admitted, and gladly admitted, that this implies the indwelling of all the Persons of the glorious Godhead; for the Lord Jesus hath said (John xiv. 23), "If a man love me, he will keep my words; and my Father will love him, and WE will come unto him, and make our abode with him." But while admitting all this, on examination it will be found that the Popish and the Scriptural ideas conveyed by these expressions, however apparently similar, are essentially different. When it is said that a believer is "a temple of God," or a temple of the Holy Ghost, the meaning is (Eph. iii. 17) that "Christ dwells in the heart by faith." But when Rome says that Mary is "The Temple" or "Tabernacle of God," the meaning is the exact Pagan meaning of the term--viz., that the union between her and the Godhead is a union akin to the hypostatical union between the divine and human nature of Christ. The human nature of Christ is the "Tabernacle of God," inasmuch as the Divine nature has veiled its glory in such a way, by assuming our nature, that we can come near without overwhelming dread to the Holy God. To this glorious truth John refers when he says (John i. 14), "The Word was made flesh, and dwelt (literally tabernacled) among us, and we beheld Hid glory, the glory as of the only begotten of the Father, full of grace and truth." In this sense, Christ, the God-man, is the only "Tabernacle of God." Now, it is precisely in this sense that Rome calls Mary the "Tabernacle of God," or of the "Holy Ghost." Thus speaks the author of a Popish work devoted to the exaltation of the Virgin, in which all the peculiar titles and prerogatives of Christ are given to Mary: "Behold the tabernacle of God, the mansion of God, the habitation, the city of God is with men, and in men and for men, for their salvation, and exaltation, and eternal glorification.... Is it most clear that this is true of the holy church? and in like manner also equally true of the most holy sacrament of the Lord's body? Is it (true) of every one of us in as far as we are truly Christians? Undoubtedly; but we have to contemplate this mystery (as existing) in a peculiar manner in the most holy Mother of our Lord." * Then the author, after endeavouring to show that "Mary is rightly considered as the Tabernacle of God with men," and that in a peculiar sense, a sense different from that in which all Christians are the "temple of God," thus proceeds with express reference to her in this character of the Tabernacle: "Great truly is the benefit, singular is the privilege, that the Tabernacle of God should be with men, IN WHICH men may safely come near to God become man." * Here the whole mediatorial glory of Christ, as the God-man in whom dwelleth all the fullness of the Godhead bodily, is given to Mary, or at least is shared with her. The above extracts are taken from a work published upwards of two hundred years ago. Has the Papacy improved wince then? Has it repented of its blasphemies? No, the very reverse. The quotation already given from Father Newman proves this; but there is still stronger proof. In a recently published work, the same blasphemous idea is even more clearly unfolded. While Mary is called "The HOUSE consecrated to God," and the "TEMPLE of the Trinity," the following versicle and response will show in what sense she is regarded as the temple of the Holy Ghost: "V. Ipse [deus] creavit illam in Spiritu Sancto. R. Et EFFUDIT ILLAM inter omnia opera sua. V. Domina, exaudi." etc., which is thus translated: "V. The Lord himself created HER in the Holy Ghost, and POURED HER out among all his works. V.O Lady, hear," etc. * This astounding language manifestly implies that Mary is identified with the Holy Ghost, when it speaks of her "being poured out" on "all the works of God;" and that, as we have seen, was just the very way in which the Woman, regarded as the "Tabernacle" or House of God by the Pagans, was looked upon. Where is such language used in regard to the Virgin? Not in Spain; not in Austria; not in the dark places of Continental Europe; but in London, the seat and centre of the world's enlightenment.
The names of blasphemy bestowed by the Papacy on Mary have not one shadow of foundation in the Bible, but are all to be found in the Babylonian idolatry. Yea, the very features and complexions of the Roman and Babylonian Madonnas are the same. Till recent times, when Raphael somewhat departed from the beaten track, there was nothing either Jewish or even Italian in the Romish Madonnas. Had these pictures or images of the Virgin Mother been intended to represent the mother of our Lord, naturally then would have been cast either in the one would or the other. But it was not so. In a land of dark-eyed beauties, with raven locks, the Madonna was always represented with blue eyes and golden hair, a complexion entirely different from the Jewish complexion, which naturally would have been supposed to belong to the mother of our Lord, but which precisely agrees with that which all antiquity attributes to the goddess queen of Babylon. In almost all lands the great goddess has been described with golden or yellow hair, showing that there must have been one grand prototype, to which they were all made to correspond. "Flava ceres," the "yellow-haired Ceres," might not have been accounted of any weight in this argument if she had stood alone, for it might have been supposed in that case that the epithet "yellow-haired" was borrowed from the corn that was supposed to be under her guardian care. But many other goddesses have the very same epithet applied to them. Europa, whom Jupiter carried away in the form of a bull, is called "The yellow-haired Europa." * Minerva is called by Homer "the blue-eyed Minerva," * and by Ovid "the yellow-haired;" * the huntress Diana, who is commonly identified with the moon, is addressed by Anacreon as "the yellow-haired daughter of Jupiter," * a title which the pale face of the silver moon could surely never have suggested. Dione, the mother of Venus, is described by Theocritus as "yellow-haired." * Venus herself is frequently called "Aurea Venus," the "golden Venus." * The Indian goddess Lakshmi, the "Mother of the Universe," is described as of "a golden complexion." * Ariadne, the wife of Bacchus, was called "the yellow-haired Ariadne." * Thus does Dryden refer to her golden or yellow hair:-
"Where the rude waves in Dian's harbour play,
The fair forsaken Ariadne lay;
There, sick with grief and frantic with despair,
Her dress she rent, and tore her golden hair." *
The Gorgon Medusa before her transformation, while celebrated for her beauty, was equally celebrated for her golden hair:--
"Medusa once had charms: to gain her love
A rival crowd of anxious lovers strove.
They who have seen her, own they ne'er did trace
More moving features in a sweeter face;
But above all, her length of hair they own
In golden ringlets waved, and graceful shone." *
The mermaid that figured so much in the romantic tales of the north, which was evidently borrowed from the story of Atergatis, the fish goddess of Syria, who was called the mother of Semiramis, and was sometimes identified with Semiramis herself, * was described with hair of the same kind. "The Ellewoman," such is the Scandinavian name for the mermaid, "is fair," says the introduction to the "Danish Tales" of Hans Andersen, "and gold-haired, and plays most sweetly on a stringed instrument." * "She is frequently seen sitting on the surface of the waters, and combing her long golden hair with a golden comb." * Even when Athor, the Venus of Egypt, was represented as a cow, doubtless to indicate the complexion of the goddess that cow represented, the cow's head and neck were gilded. * When, therefore, it is known that the most famed pictures of the Virgin Mother in Italy represented her as of a fair complexion and with golden hair, and when over all Ireland the Virgin is almost invariably represented at this day in the very same manner, who can resist the conclusion that she must have been thus represented, only because she had been copied from the same prototype as the Pagan divinities?
Nor is this agreement in complexion only, but also in features. Jewish features are everywhere marked, and have a character peculiarly their own. But the original Madonna's have nothing at all of Jewish form or feature; but are declared by those who have personally compared both, * entirely to agree in this respect, as well as in complexion, with the Babylonian Madonnas found by Sir Robert Ker Porter among the ruins of Babylon.
There is yet another remarkable characteristic of these pictures worthy of notice, and that is the nimbus or peculiar circle of light that frequently encompasses the head of the Roman Madonna. With this circle the heads of the so-called figures of Christ are also frequently surrounded. Whence could such a device have originated? In the case of our Lord, if His head had been merely surrounded with rays, there might have been some pretence for saying that that was borrowed from the Evangelic narrative, where it is stated, that on the holy mount His face became resplendent with light. But where, in the whole compass of Scripture, do we ever read that His head was surrounded with a disk, or a circle of light? But what will be searched for in vain in the Word of God, is found in the artistic representations of the great gods and goddesses of Babylon. The disk, and particularly the circle, where the will-known symbols of the Sun-divinity, and figured largely in the symbolism of the East. With the circle or the disk the head of the Sun-divinity was encompassed. The same was the case in Pagan Rome. Apollo, as the child of the Sun, was often thus represented. The goddesses that claimed kindred with the Sun were equally entitled to be adorned with the nimbus or luminous circle. We give from Pompeii a representation of Circe, "the daughter of the Sun" , with her head surrounded with a circle, in the very same way as the head of the Roman Madonna is at this day surrounded. Let any one compare the nimbus around the head of Circe, with that around the head of the Popish Virgin, and he will see how exactly they correspond. *
Now, could any one possible believe that all this coincidence could be accidental. Of course, if the Madonna had ever so exactly resembled the Virgin Mary, that would never have excused idolatry. But when it is evident that the goddess enshrined in the Papal Church for the supreme worship of its votaries, is the very Babylonian queen who set up Nimrod, or Ninus "the Son," as the rival of Christ, and who in her own person was the incarnation of every kind of licentiousness, how dark a character does that stamp on the Roman idolatry. What will it avail to mitigate the heinous character of that idolatry, to say that the child she holds forth to adoration is called by the name of Jesus? When she was worshipped with her child in Babylon of old, that child was called by a name as peculiar to Christ, as distinctive of His glorious character, as the name of Jesus. He was called "Zoro-ashta," "the seed of the woman." But that did not hinder the hot anger of God from being directed against those in the days of old who worshipped that "image of jealousy, provoking to jealousy." * Neither can the giving of the name of Christ to the infant in the arms of the Romish Madonna, make it less the "image of Jealousy," less offensive to the Most High, less fitted to provoke His high displeasure, when it is evident that that infant is worshipped as the child of her who was adored as Queen of Heaven, with all the attributes of divinity, and was at the same time the "Mother of harlots and abominations of the earth." Image-worship in every case the Lord abhors; but image-worship of such a kind as this must be peculiarly abhorrent to His holy soul. Now, if the facts I have adduced be true, is it wonderful that such dreadful threatenings should be directed in the Word of God against the Romish apostacy, and that the vials of this tremendous wrath are destined to be outpoured upon its guilty head? If these things be true (and gainsay them who can), who will venture now to plead for Papal Rome, or to call her a Christian Church? Is there one, who fears God, and who reads these lines, who would not admit that Paganism alone could ever have inspired such a doctrine as that avowed by the Melchites at the Nicene Council, that the Holy Trinity consisted of "the Father, the Virgin Mary, and the Messiah their Son"? * Is there one who would not shrink with horror from such a thought? What, then, would the reader say of a Church that teaches its children to adore such a Trinity as that contained in the following lines?--
"Heart of Jesus I adore thee;
Heart of Mary, I implore thee;
Heart of Joseph, pure and just;
IN THESE THREE HEARTS I PUT MY TRUST." *
If this is not Paganism, what is there that can be called by such a name? Yet this is the Trinity which now the Roman Catholics of Ireland from tender infancy are taught to adore. This is the Trinity which, in the latest books of catechetical instruction is presented as the grand object of devotion to the adherents of the Papacy. The manual that contains this blasphemy comes forth with the express "Imprimatur" of "Paulus Cullen," Popish Archbishop of Dublin. Will any one after this say that the Roman Catholic Church must still be called Christian, because it holds the doctrine of the Trinity? So did the Pagan Babylonians, so did the Egyptians, so do the Hindoos at this hour, in the very same sense in which Rome does. They all admitted A trinity, but did they worship THE Triune Jehovah, the King Eternal, Immortal, and Invisible? And will any one say with such evidence before him, that Rome does so? Away then, with the deadly delusion that Rome is Christian! There might once have been some palliation for entertaining such a supposition; but every day the "Grand Mystery" is revealing itself more and more in its true character. There is not, and there cannot be, any safety for the souls of men in "Babylon." "Come out of her, my people," is the loud and express command of God. Those who disobey that command, do it at their peril.
The Pagans called her by many names. She was known as Aphrodite, Cybele, or Sybyl, Diana, Electra, Europa, Isis, Venus, Semiramis, Ashtoreth and Astarte, — Ishtar Feast days honoring the mother goddesses were known from antiquity. The fact that Americans only began doing so for a little over 100 years facilitates the cognitive divorce between the hoary practice of the ancients and contemporary Americans, many of whom claim to practice the Christian faith.
600 years before Christ, the ancient Greek Pagans honored Rhea, wife of Cronus (or Saturn-Satan if you prefer) who was worshipped as the mother of the gods and goddesses. Likewise, in Pagan Rome, there was a similar festival dedicated to the worship of Juno, called “Matronalia.”
In England, “Mothering Sunday” began to be observed in the 13th century, honoring their mothers with Simnel cakes or “Mothering Day” cakes. This practice is tied to the heathen practice of women baking cakes to the “Queen of Heaven.”
This celebration was adopted by the Roman Catholic “Mother” Church. This is the same Roman church which absorbed the Pagan practices dedicated to celebrating goddess worship (Easter) and the heathen celebration of Saturnalia, renamed Christmas.
There is little doubt in this authors mind that most professing Christians will say that Mother’s Day has nothing to do with the Pagan practices of the ancient world. Despite the fact that the origins of this holiday are well known, most Christians simply cover their ears and refuse to acknowledge the truth.
After all, the American observance of Mother’s Day first began in 1907 and was made a national celebration by Woodrow Wilson in 1914. What’s wrong with paying tribute our (their) mothers? The Bible says “honor thy father and thy mother” doesn’t it? Such legalistic sophistry ignores that fact that no such day of honor was recognized by early Christians nor even mentioned in the Bible. Be it Christmas, Easter or Mother’s Day, you CANNOTtake something that was started and observed by the Pagans and ‘Christianize’ it!
To take that which is an outright and obvious abomination to God (and ALLPagan festivals, celebrations and observances ARE an abomination to Him) and use it in His service is presumptuous, a species of self-will, laying us open to the charge of “WHOhath required this at your hand?” [Isaiah 1:12]; and for us to ask God’s blessing upon the same is only seeking to make Him of OUR MIND. Let us not forget the solemn warning pointed by the death of Uzzah, when the Lord God made a breach in Israel because they “sought Him not after the DUE ORDER” [1Chronicles 15:13). We must keep closely to God’s “DUE ORDER” if we are to have His approbation in anything we use to glorify Him!
He that loveth father or mother more than Me is not worthy of me: and he that loveth son or daughter more than Me is not worthy of Me! [Matthew 10:37]
It is no coincidence that the annual Rites of Spring Pagan Celebration in New England, began during Mother’s Day weekend in May of 1979, near Boston where Julia Ward Howe, held the first organized Mother’s Day meetings of America. A similar event was held last year, Mothers Day weekend in Berkeley, California. In Brighton – United Kingdom, and elsewhere, there were comparable celebrations dedicated to the Mother goddess.
Think about it, as other holidays having roots in Pagan sun worship, Mothers Day is always held on the day named in honor of the Sun.
“Thou shalt not follow a multitude to do evil!” [Exodus 23:2] WHO is it that celebrates “Mother’s Day”? Why the whole heathen world who know not Christ! If you’re a Christian you need to know that these ‘customs of the people are vain’ [Jer 10:3] Dare to differ! You want to be nice to your mother and make her feel special . . . then do it many times during the year and not just on ONE PARTICULAR DAY . . . especially a day that has pagan implications and is observed and commemorated by the ungodly!
“Ye adulterers and adulteresses, know ye not that the friendship of the world is enmity with God? whosoever therefore will be a friend of the world is the enemy of God!” [James 4:4]
feasts that were ushered in by the Roman Catholic Church during the rule of emperor Constantine. Constantine was a pagan sun-worshipper who had a "Christian experience" that wanted to unite his empire, both Christian and pagan together. He achieved this by re-writing history and re-naming pagan feasts with Christian names.
VALENTINE'S DAY
Pagans in Rome celebrated the evening of February 14th and February 15th and as an idolatrous festival in honor of Lupercus "the hunter of wolves". It was not until the reign of Pope Gelasius that the holiday became a "Christian" custom. "As far back as 496, Pope Gelasius changed Lupercalia on February 15th to St. Valentine's Day on February 14th." The original Saint Valentine was Nimrod, on this day in February, Semiramis, the mother of Tammuz, was said to have been purified and to have appeared for the first time in public with her son as the original "mother and child."
MOTHER'S & FATHER'S DAY
Mother's Day dates back to ancient cultures in Greece and Rome. In both cultures, mother goddesses (Queen of Heaven). were worshipped during the springtime with religious festivals. The ancient Greeks paid tribute to the powerful goddess Rhea, the wife of Cronus, known as the Mother of the Gods (Queen of Heaven). Similarly, evidence of a three-day Roman festival in Mid-March called Hilaria, to honor the Roman goddess Magna Mater, or Great Mother, dates back to 250 BCE.
As Christianity spread throughout Europe, the celebration of the "Mother Church" replaced the pagan tradition of honoring mythological goddesses. The fourth Sunday in Lent (Weeping for Tammuz), a 40-day fasting period before Easter, became known as Mothering Sunday. To show appreciation for their mothers, they often brought gifts or a "mothering cake" (Jeremiah 7:18) and over time, it began to coincide with the celebration of the Mother Church. Mother's Day always falls on the second Sun-day of May, and like so many other holidays rooted in pagan sun-worship including Father's Day which always falls on the third Sun-day of June, usually fall on the day named in honor of their most powerful god -- The Sun!
EASTER SUNDAY
Easter or Ishtar, also known by her biblical name Semiramis and later called the "Queen of heaven" was the widow of Nimrod and mother of Tammuz. Easter is the bare breasted pagan fertility goddess of the east. Legend has it that she came out of heaven in a giant egg, landing in the Euphrates river at sunrise on the first Sunday after the vernal equinox, busted out, and turned a bird into an egg laying rabbit.
To honor this event, pagan sun-worshippers would go out early in the morning and face to the east to watch their sun-god arise over the horizon before having a mass (sacrifice) in which the priest of Easter would sacrifice three month old human infants and take the eggs of Easter and die them in the blood of the sacrificed infants. The blood-red colored Easter eggs would later hatch on December 25th, the same day her son Tammuz the reincarnate sun-god would be born...how convenient!
Easter married her son Tammuz who was by legend the reincarnate sun-god. Tammuz went pig hunting and was gored to death by a wild boar and that is why pagans eat ham on Easter. Because Tammuz was killed when he was forty years old, pagans fast one day for each of the years that he lived leading into Easter. This practice is known as Weeping for Tammuz by pagans but called Lent by Catholics.
HALLOWEEN
All Saints' Day was followed by All-Souls' Day, November 2, unless that was a Sunday then it was November 3, this was another Catholic adaptation of pagan festivals for the dead. Prayers for the dead are an integral part of the traditional All Saint's Day services, which are scheduled in Catholic churches on November 1, and on the next Sunday. Halloween gets its name from the Catholic holiday, it is a Hallowed evening, because it precedes All Hallows' Day, thus: Hallow'en. Halloween is a pagan holiday to honor the dead and evil spirits. We are warned not to take part in customs and traditions like this in the Scripture.
take heed to yourself that you not be ensnared to follow them, after that they are destroyed from before you; and that you not inquire after their deities, saying, "How do these nations serve their dieties? I will do likewise." You shall not do so to YaHuWaH your Elohim: for every abomination to the YaHuWaH, which he hates, have they done to their deities; for even their sons and their daughters do they burn in the fire to their deities. (HIM Deuteronomy 12:30-31)
Halloween is a perfect example of what this passage is referring about. Pagans served their gods by honoring the evil spirits on Halloween. They did this by dressing up like the evil spirits and giving offerings to the evil spirits. This is why candy is given out on Halloween, as offerings for the evil spirits. The phrase trick or treat was attributed to this practice because pagans believed the evil spirits would do something bad (trick) to them if they did not leave an offering (treat) for them. I would rather honor the Most High.
THANKSGIVING
The pagans in Rome celebrated their thanksgiving in early October. The holiday was dedicated to the goddess of the harvest, Ceres, and the holiday was called Cerelia. The Catholic church took over the pagan holiday and it became well established in England, where some of the pagan customs and rituals for this day were observed long after the Roman Empire had disappeared. In England the "Harvest Home" has been observed continuously for centuries.
In our own hemisphere, among the Aztecs of Mexico, the harvest took on a grimmer aspect. Each year a young girl, a representation of Xilonen, The goddess of the new corn, was beheaded. The Pawnees also sacrificed a girl. In a more temperate mood, the Cherokees of the American Southeast danced the Green Corn Dance and began the new year at harvest's end.
No wonder Chief Massasoit and his ninety braves felt right at home with the Pilgrim Fathers on that day in 1621!! Obviously, the idea for this "first Thanksgiving" did not just "pop" into the mind of Governor Bradford as most people believe! On the contrary Thanksgiving, in the guise of the pagan harvest festivals, can be traced right back to ancient Babylon and the worship of Semiramis!
CHRISTMAS
Christmas was celebrated by pagan sun-worshippers for thousands of years before the Messiah was even born. It all started during the building of the tower of Babel. Nimrod supervised the operation and was called the sun-god and worshipped as such. To end this worship, Nimrod's uncle Shem, Noah's eldest son, killed Nimrod and cut his body into small pieces then scattered his body parts across the land.
Ishtar or Easter, also known by her biblical name Semiramis was the widow of Nimrod. She was called the "Queen of heaven" and claimed to have been impregnated by Nimrod through the rays of the sun and later had a son by the name of Tammuz who had a miraculous birth on December 25th. Pagans believed that Nimrod was reincarnated as Tammuz and so Easter married her son Tammuz. Pagan sun-worshippers celebrated the birthday of the reincarnate sun-god on December 25th. Scripture is very clear that we are not to celebrate this particular holiday.
The children gather wood, and the fathers kindle the fire, and the women knead the dough, to make cakes to the Queen of Heaven, and to pour out drink offerings to other deities, that they may provoke Me to anger. (HIM Jeremiah 7:18)
The passage above is obviously referring to making Christmas cookies and leaving those cookies and a glass of milk for Nimrod's widow Easter who was called the queen of heaven. The only difference is now those offerings are left for Santa (Satan) himself. Let's move on and read another passage from Scripture.
Thus says YaHuWaH, "Do not learn the way of the gentiles, and do not be dismayed at the signs of the heaven; for the gentiles are dismayed at them. For the customs of the peoples are vanity; for one cuts a tree out of the forest, the work of the hands of the workman with the axe. They deck it with silver and with gold; they fasten it with nails and with hammers, that it not move. (HIM Jeremiah 10:2-4)
This passage is obviously referring to cutting down the Christmas tree, putting it on some sort of tree stand, and decorating it. Once you learn why it had become customary to use an erect evergreen tree that has a pointed end decorate it with big red balls you will realize the extent of the perversion in this holiday. The erect tree symbolizes Nimrod's erect masculinity. The tree was evergreen because evergreen trees are full of life year round, like Nimrod's penis. The tree was pointed at the end just like Nimrod's pecker. The big red balls that dangle off the tree, well you get the picture. This holiday is perversion at its best.
Every sun-god was born on December 25th. Amun-Ra, Horus, Mithra, Tammuz, and Zeus were born on December 25th. If there was one day that the Messiah was not born, it was December 25th. In fact the Scripture is quite clear that Messiah was born late September or early October on the first day of the Feast of Tabernacles.
SUNDAY SERVICES
Early believers kept Saturday as the Sabbath until March 7, 321 CE when Pope Constantine passed a law requiring believers to worship on Sunday, the day the pagans worshipped the sun-god. Believers still kept Saturday as the Sabbath until another law was passed eleven years later. This law signed into decree by Pope Constantine forbid believers to worship on the Sabbath (Saturday) and it was punishable by death by the Catholic Church. Many believers were burned to death by the Catholic Church for keeping the Sabbath.
Noah’s great-grandson Nimrod is described in Genesis 10:8-12. Nimrod is the man who built the Tower of Babel and he was worshipped as the god of Babylon. He is believed to have been one of the giants as well.
After the death of his father, Ham, Nimrod married his own mother, Semiramus and became a powerful King.
The Jewish historian, Josephus, further describes Nimrod:
Now it was Nimrod who excited them to such an affront and contempt of God. He was the grandson of Ham, the son of Noah, a bold man, and of great strength of hand. He persuaded them not to ascribe it to God, as if it were through his means they were happy, but to believe that it was their own courage which procured that happiness. He also gradually changed the government into tyranny, seeing no other way of turning men from the fear of God, but to bring them into a constant dependence on his power. He also said he would be revenged on God, if he should have a mind to drown the world again; for that he would build a tower too high for the waters to reach. And that he would avenge himself on God for destroying their forefathers.
After Nimrod died, Semiramis claimed to be pregnant by the rays of the sun, (her dead sun god husband) and to be expecting the son of the sun god. The child that she gave birth to was named Tammuz.
Tammuz was also worshipped as a god and when he was 40 years old, he was gored to death by a wild boar.
This was the basis for a tradition which was begun in his honor; to fast for 40 days – a day for each year of his life – for Tammuz. Those who worshipped the son of “the sun god” then set aside 40 days of weeping for Tammuz. They celebrated “Lent” one day for each year of his incarnation – in which they would deny a worldly pleasure for his pleasure in the afterworld (see Ezekiel 8).
The pagans believed that the fasting and weeping for Tammuz must be done ahead of the Spring Equinox in order to bring the spirit of the Babylonian god back up from the underworld in time to impregnate the goddess Ishtar. If she does not receive his spirit by the Spring Equinox, she can not give birth to the son of the sun god 9 months later at the Winter Solstice.
Every year the maidens fasted and wept for Tammuz for 40 days to represent his 40 years.
Every year, on the first Sunday after the first full moon after the spring equinox, a celebration was made to honor Ishtar.
Let’s sum up the little gods and their many names. NOTE: This is by no means an exhaustive list and may vary depending on the source.
To say that the history and the legends and the religions are all mixed up is a gross understatement. We must recognize that our religious traditions are all married in with the pagan religions, unfortunately. We know that Satan is a liar and deceiver and only ever wanted to usurp the throne of the one true YHVH, and thus, he has created a close copycat version of God’s plans whenever and wherever he could.
What we have then is a distorted version of God’s plan in every pagan religion. When you see these statues and paintings of the virgin mother and child, look carefully, it may be Ishtar and Tammuz. The sun halo on the head will often give it away.
You will also notice the unholy pagan trinities that have been fabricated in the pagan religions.
Regardless of the different names and different cultures and different legends, it all comes down to this….
The Babylonian system condemned throughout the Bible, and whose end is prophesied in Revelation, is based on Nimrod’s rebellion against the Creator and the subsequent false religion his life spawned.
It is all sun worship. It is all Ba’al worship. And it is all connected to Babylon. This is the religion of the Mystery Babylon of Revelation that has never completely gone away.
Scripture tells us that Solomon also followed Ashteroth: (The Babylonian cult that started with Ishtar/Ashtarte)
For Solomon went after Ashtoreth the goddess of the Zidonians, and after Milcom the abomination of the Ammonites. And Solomon did evil in the sight of the LORD, and went not fully after the LORD, as did David his father.
(1 Kings 11:5-6)
Because of his idolatry, Israel was split into two nations after Solomon’s death, as explained later:
Because that they have forsaken me, and have worshipped Ashtoreth the goddess of the Zidonians, Chemosh the god of the Moabites, and Milcom the god of the children of Ammon, and have not walked in my ways, to do that which is right in mine eyes, and to keep my statutes and my judgments, as did David his father.
I Kings 11:33
Later, King Yosiah (Josiah) destroyed these places which Solomon had built:
And the king commanded Hilkiah the high priest, and the priests of the second order, and the keepers of the door, to bring forth out of the temple of the LORD all the vessels that were made for Baal, and for the grove, and for all the host of heaven: and he burned them without Jerusalem in the fields of Kidron, and carried the ashes of them unto Bethel. And the high places that were before Jerusalem, which were on the right hand of the mount of corruption, which Solomon the king of Israel had builded for Ashtoreth the abomination of the Zidonians, and for Chemosh the abomination of the Moabites, and for Milcom the abomination of the children of Ammon, did the king defile. 14And he brake in pieces the images, and cut down the groves, and filled their places with the bones of men.
2 Kings 23
Most of us have been observing and participating in this religion without even knowing it. The ancient rites and traditions are weaved throughout our culture and right into our churches.
Gravely, I do believe that “although God overlooked the ignorance of earlier times, He now commands all people everywhere to repent.” (Acts 17:30)
For
What agreement has the temple of God with idols? For we are the temple of the living God; as God said….Therefore “Come out from among them, and be ye separate, saith the Lord, and touch not the unclean thing and I will receive you.”
2 Corinthians 6:16-17
As YHVH commanded His first Hebrew people…
You shall tear down their altars and dash in pieces their pillars and burn their Asherim with fire. You shall chop down the carved images of their gods and destroy their name out of that place. You shall not worship the LORD your God in that way.
Deuteronomy 12:3-4
We are often told in our modern churches that we need to accept Jesus/Yeshua as our Lord, but that is not scriptural. The one true God that created us is very plain with His Words, and He will not accept just any kind of worship. We read of these traditions and dismiss it by saying, “Well that’s not what that means to me” …forgetting that it doesn’t matter what it means to us…it only matters what it means to God.
And Samuel spake unto all the house of Israel, saying, If ye do return unto the LORD with all your hearts, then put away the strange gods and Ashtarothfrom among you, and prepare your hearts unto the LORD, and serve him only: and he will deliver you out of the hand of the Philistines. Then the children of Israel did put away Baalim and Ashtaroth, and served the LORD only.
1 Samuel 7:3-4
And they cried unto the LORD, and said, We have sinned, because we have forsaken the LORD, and have served Baalim and Ashtaroth: but now deliver us out of the hand of our enemies, and we will serve thee.
1 Samuel 12:10
Whenever you see the words Ba’al and Ashera and Ashteroth in scripture, recognize this: It is the Babylonian religion that Nimrod the rebel started. It has been tweaked and distorted and handed down through thousands of generations and it has been melded right into the modern church.
Lupercalia and Valentines Day and Fat Tuesday lead into The weeping of Tammuz for 40 days, whitewashed as Ash Wednesday, this leads up to the sun rise service on Easter morning, held on the spring equinox, the fertility eggs and rabbit, the Easter ham (boar), the celebration of the immaculate conception on the Spring Equinox followed up later in the year by the celebration of the birth of the sun god at the winter Solstice.
These are all remnants of Nimrod’s worship. This is Sun worship. This is Ba’al worship. This is the Babylonian religion. Revelation speaks of the whore of Babylon and the Beast that was, and is not, and yet is. (Revelation 17:7-8) Could this possibly refer to Nimrod’s Babylonian religion and the pagan festivities that their calendar revolves around? How closely are we following this Beast and it’s ancient religion? Join me in beginning the process of disentangling our worship of the one True God, YHVH, from the anti-Christ centuries-old religion of Babylon.
Read more about this in this post: Church Passover Hunt | Berean Bible Journeys
Authors note: I have in no way done justice to this staggering subject. The history and legends and traditions are all intertwined in a tangled weave. The information is overwhelming. I have left out much of the gory details. I encourage you to research further and pray without ceasing for eyes to see and ears to hear what the Spirit says to the churches.
Should Christians use the 'E' word? What does the term Easter mean? In the Old Testament times the Bible talks about Ashtoreth and Baal worship in I Kings 11:5-6, “For Solomon went after Ashtoreth [Easter in english] the goddess of the Zidonians, and after Milcom the abomination of the Ammonites. And Solomon did evil in the sight of the LORD, and went not fully after the LORD, as did David his father.” Ashtoreth is the mother of Baal. The short form is Ashtar or Ishtar and the English form of the word is “EASTER”. Easter is nothing other than the mother of Baal and the celebration or worship of Ashtoreth is forbidden in the Old Testament Scriptures. Look at the Scriptures in Judges 2:13-14, “And they forsook the LORD, and served Baal and Ashtoroth. And the anger of the LORD was hot against Israel…” Easter is Ashtoreth! EASTER IS AN EVIL WOMAN!
In AD316 Constantine was in charge of the known world and in AD321 he declared Christianity to be the only religion. The pagan religions did not go away. They simply gave their practices new names. Ashtoreth and Baal became Mary and Jesus. Many today know Mary as the 'queen of heaven'. This pagan title belonged to Ashtoreth in the Old Testament. Ashtoreth and Baal were adored and worshipped and many today adore and worship Mary and Jesus (read Jeremiah 44). We must ask ourselves, who is the real Mary and who is the real Jesus? Unless we examine what we believe in the light of the Scriptures, we might well be deceived. According to the Scriptures, only God is to be adored and worshipped (Exodus 20). Watch out!
As Christians, we celebrate the RESURRECTION of Jesus Christ from the dead. We should use the 'R' word as in Resurrection. Certainly, we do not celebrate Easter (the mother of Baal), but we do celebrate the Resurrection of Jesus from the dead. Easter does not occur in the Bible at all. There is one appearance of the word 'Easter' in Acts 12:4 in the King James Bible, but it is a mis-translation and should be translated 'Passover'.
Have you ever wondered about the “WOMAN” of Revelation chapter 17? She represents a religious (worldwide) system that had its beginnings in ancient Babylon and will have its final headquarters in Rome during the Tribulation period. God will judge the religious system and destroy it during the Tribulation. H. A. Ironside, a past pastor of Moody Memorial Church, in his commentary of the Book of Revelation, written in 1920, gives us the following insights: “The wife of Nimroud-bar-Cush was the infamous Semiramis the First. She is reputed to have been the foundress of the Babylonian mysteries and the first high-priestess of idolatry. Thus, Babylon became the fountainhead mystery-religion that was originated there and spread in various forms throughout the whole earth; it is with us today.
Building on the primeval promise of the woman's Seed who was to come, Semiramis bore a son whom she declared was miraculously conceived! And when she presented him to the people, he was hailed as the promised deliverer. This was Tammuz, whose worship Ezekiel protested against in the days of the captivity. Thus was introduced the mystery of the mother and the child, a form of idolatry that is older than any other known to man. The rites of this worship were secret. Only the initiated were permitted to know its mysteries. It was Satan's effort to delude mankind with an imitation so like the truth of God that they would not know the true Seed of the woman when He (Jesus Christ) came in the fullness of time.
From Babylon this mystery-religion spread to all the surrounding nations. Everywhere the symbols were the same, and everywhere the cult of the mother and the child became the popular system; their worship was celebrated with the most disgusting and immoral practices. The image of the queen of heaven with the babe in her arms was seen everywhere, though the names might differ as languages differed. It became the mystery-religion of Phoenicia, and by the Phoenicians was carried to the ends of the earth. Ashtoreth and Tammuz, the mother and child of these hardy adventurers, became Isis and Horus in Egypt; Aphrodite and Eros in Greece; Venus and Cupid in Italy; and bore many other names in more distant places. Within 1,000 years Babylonianism had become the religion of the world, which had rejected the Divine revelation. In 316 AD, it became Mary and Jesus.
Linked with the central mystery were countless lesser mysteries, the hidden meaning of which was known only to the initiates, but all the people practiced the outward forms. Among these were the doctrines of:
Purgatorial purification after death
Salvation by countless sacraments, such as priestly absolution
Sprinkling with holy water
The offering of round cakes to the queen of heaven as mentioned in the book of Jeremiah
Dedication of virgins to the gods, which was literally sanctified prostitution
Weeping for Tammuz for a period of 40 days, prior to the great festival of Istar
Istar was said to have received her son back from the dead, for it was taught that Tammuz was slain by a wild boar and afterwards brought back to life. To him the egg was sacred, as depicting the mystery of his resurrection even as the evergreen tree was his chosen symbol and was set up in honor of his birth at the winter solstice. Along with many other mysterious observances, a boar's head was eaten in memory of his conflict, and a Yule log was burned. The sign of the cross was sacred to Tammuz, as symbolizing the life-giving principle and as the first letter of his name. It is represented upon vast numbers of the most ancient altars and temples, and did not, as many have supposed, originate with Christianity.
It was from this mystery-religion that the patriarch Abraham was separated by the divine call, and with this same evil cult, the nation that sprang from him was constantly in conflict. Under the leadership of Jezebel, a Phoenician princess, this cult was grafted onto what was left of the religion of Israel in the northern kingdom in the day of Ahab, and it was the cause of their captivity at the last. Judah was polluted by it, for Baal-worship was nothing more than the Canaanite form of the Babylonian mysteries, and only by being sent into captivity to Babylon itself did Judah become cured of her fondness for idolatry. Baal was the Sun-god, the life-giving one, identical with Tammuz.
When Christ came into this world the mystery of iniquity was holding sway everywhere, except where the truth of God as revealed in the Old Testament was known. Thus, when the early Christians set out upon the great task of carrying the gospel to the end of the earth, they found themselves everywhere confronted by this system in one form or another. Though Babylon as a city had long been but a memory, her mysteries had not died with her. When the city and temples were destroyed, the high priest fled with a company of initiates and their sacred vessels and images to Pergamos, where the symbol of the serpent was set up as the emblem of the hidden wisdom. From there, they crossed the sea and immigrated to Italy, where they settled in the Etruscan plain. There the ancient cult was propagated under the name of the Etruscan Mysteries, and eventually Rome became the headquarters of Babylonianism. The chief priests wore miters shaped like the head of a fish, in honor of Dagon, the fish-god and the lord of life. Here again is another form of the Tammuz mystery, as developed among Israel's old enemies, the Philistines.
The chief priest when established in Rome took the title Pontifex Maximus, and this title was held henceforth by all the Roman emperors down to Constantine the Great, who was at one and the same time, head of the church and high priest of the heathen! The title was afterwards conferred upon the bishops of Rome, and is borne by the Pope today. The Pope is thus declared to be, not the successor of the fisherman-apostle Peter, but the direct successor of the high priest of Babylonian mysteries, and the servant of the fish-god Dagon, for whom he wears, like his idolatrous predecessors, the fisherman's ring.
Ash-Wednesday, Lent, Holy Water, Purgatory, etc… These are all pagan and are not found in the Bible! All of these can be traced back to the 'mother and son' cult. For further study a book called Two Babylons by Hislop is recommended. We are in the latter days, so we expect rapid developments in the “Babylonian Mystery” church system. This false church system will aid the Anti-Christ in his rise to power! The church that keeps it's focus on 'the woman' (MARY {not the true Mary of the Bible]) and not on Jesus is the one to watch! Keep your eyes open! See Revelation chapter 17!
Pray for the many who are deceived by this system! “And Jesus answered and said unto them, Take heed that no man deceive you (Matthew 24:4).”
NIMROD
Lucas van Valckenborch: The tower of Babel (1568)
The Bible develops a very prominent and notorious character named Nimrod. He was the sixth son born of Cush. His name in Hebrew means to rebel. He was the founder of Babylon and Assyria. He is mentioned in I Chronicles 1: 10, Micah 5: 6 and in Genesis 10: 8b-9. The Hebrew text states that he was a mighty hunter before the Lord. This is indicative of his antagonism and opposition to God. He was wicked and made the whole world rebel through the building of the Tower of Babel. He was the first to establish kingdoms. This happened in two stages. The first is in Shinar, which included Babel, Erech, Accad and Calneh. The second kingdom is Assyria called the land of Nimrod in Micah 5: 6. After the language was separated and confused by God it drove him to Assyria from Babylon. The two have been intertwined since then.
Josephus says:
“Now it was Nimrod who excited them to such an affront and contempt of God. He was the grandson of Ham the son of Noah. He was a bold man, and of great strength of hand. He persuaded them not to ascribe it to God, as if it was through his means they were happy, but to believe that it was their own courage, which procured that happiness. He also gradually changed the government into tyranny, seeing no other way of turning men from the fear of God, but to bring them into a constant dependence on his power…(Josephus, Flavius Translated by William Whiston, The Works of Josephus, Hendrickson PublishersPeabody, MA 01916-3473, 1987, Pg. 35 Antiquities of the Jews Chapter 4:2)”
The Tower of Babel was in essence an attempt to have their own way apart from God. Humans were commanded to “Be fruitful and fill the earth.” Instead they attempted to settle down in one location and establish a world state to offset the divine rule. The tower was meant to be a rebellious attempt to break from divine rule. They did not wish to obey God.
The Cultic Background
Tradition suggests that Nimrod died a violent death. One tradition says that a wild animal killed him. Another says that Shem killed him because he had led the people into the worship of Baal.
According to ancient Egyptian and Babylonian traditions, his mother was Semiramis; sometimes Semiramis is referred to as the mother of Nimrod, and sometimes as his wife, leading to the belief that Nimrod married his mother. Also according to these traditions, Semiramis, who rose to greatness because of her son, was presented with a difficulty when her son died, so instead she pronounced him to be a god, so that she herself would become a goddess.
One story says that after Nimrod was killed, Semiramis claimed that an evergreen tree sprouted from a tree stump, which she said indicated the entry of new life into the deceased Nimrod; every year on the anniversary of Nimrod’s birth (December 25) they would leave gifts at this evergreen tree.
Even though Semiramis claimed to be a virgin she had another son, named Tammuz, who she said was the reincarnation of Nimrod. She became known as the “Virgin Mother”, “Holy Mother” and the “Queen of Heaven” and was symbolized by the Moon. So began the worship of Semiramis and the child-god, and the whole paraphernalia of the Babylonian religious system.
From various ancient sources, it seems that Nimrod’s wife/mother; Semiramis was high priestess of the Babel religion and the founder of all mystery religions as well as goddess. After the tower was destroyed and the multiplicity of languages developed, she was worshiped as a goddess under many different names. She became Ishtar of Syria, Astarte of Phoenicia, Isis of Egypt, Aphrodite of Greece, and Venus of Rome—in each case the deity of sexual love and fertility. Her son Tammuz also came to be deified under various names and was the consort of Ishtar and god of the underworld.
According to the cult of Ishtar, Tammuz was conceived by a sunbeam, a counterfeit version of Jesus’ virgin birth. Tammuz corresponded to Baal in Phoenicia, Osiris in Egypt, Eros in Greece, and Cupid in Rome. In every case, the worship of those gods and goddesses was associated with sexual immorality. The celebration of Lent which has no basis in Scripture, but rather developed from the pagan celebration of Semiramis’ mourning for forty days over the death of Tammuz (Ezekiel 8:14) before his alleged resurrection. This is another of Satan’s mythical counterfeits. Whether these traditions have any basis in fact or not is irrelevant. This is because they embody the occult and were followed in ancient Israel and still today
Ezekiel 8:12–15
12Then said he unto me, Son of man, hast thou seen what the elders of the house of Israel do in the dark, every man in his chambers of imagery? for they say, Jehovah seeth us not; Jehovah hath forsaken the land. 13He said also unto me, Thou shalt again see yet other great abominations which they do. 14Then he brought me to the door of the gate of Jehovah’s house which was toward the north; and behold, there sat the women weeping for Tammuz. 15Then said he unto me, Hast thou seen this, O son of man? thou shalt again see yet greater abominations than these (ASV, 1901).
Ezekiel is communing with The Lord in a vision and the Lord shows him these things. The Babylonians took Ezekiel to Babylon in the second invasion of Nebuchadnezzar in 597 B.C. Subsequent to that there was an additional invasion in 586 B.C. Sometime after the 2nd invasion and before the 3rd invasion the Lord showed Ezekiel the extent of the apostasy the Jews back in Jerusalem had fallen into.
After the decline of Babylon, their priests fled to Egypt and transported their religion with them. There the people worshipped Isis and her son Osiris (otherwise known as Horus). The same mother and child deities appeared in Greece as Ceres, the Great Mother, with the babe at her breast, or as Irene, the goddess of Peace, with the boy Plutus in her arms and in Pagan Rome as Fortuna and Jupiter. Other cultures embraced this concept such as Cyprian and Indian.
In its organized form false religion began with the tower of Babel and Nimrod, from which Babylon derives its name. Cain was the first false worshiper, and many individuals after him followed his example. But organized pagan religion began with the descendants of Ham, one of Noah’s three sons, who decided to erect a great monument that would “reach into heaven” and make themselves a great name (Genesis10: 9-10; 11:4) Under the leadership of the proud and apostate Nimrod they planned to storm heaven and unify their power and prestige in a great worldwide system of worship. That was man’s first counterfeit religion, from which every other false religion in one way or another has sprung.
God’s judgment frustrated their primary purpose of making a grand demonstration of humanistic unity. By confusing “their language, that they may not understand one another’s speech,” and scattering “them abroad from there over the face of the whole earth” (Genesis 11:7–8) the Lord halted the building of the tower and fractured their solidarity. But those people took with them the seeds of that false, idolatrous religion, seeds that they and their descendants have been planting throughout the world ever since. The ideas and forms were altered, adapted, and sometimes made more sophisticated, but the basic system remained, and remains, unchanged. That is why Babel, or Babylon, is called “the mother of harlots and of the abominations of the earth” (Revelation 17:5). She was the progenitor of all false religions.
Satan's church had its beginning at Babylon with the construction of the Tower of Babel on the plain of Shinar by the River Euphrates many generations after the deluge. At the time of the construction of Babylon at the Tower of Babel (Genesis 11:1-4), mankind had multiplied and spoken one language. Cush who was the son of Ham and grandson of Noah (Genesis 10:1, 6), helped to plan with his son Nimrod, a blueprint by which to rule the world of humanity through a wicked counterfeit religion. Nimrod was the originator of sun worship and founder of Babylon. A Bible translation called the Targum says, “Nimrod became a mighty man of sin, a murderer of innocent men, and a rebel before the Lord.”
The beginning of Nimrod's evil plan had its origin at Babel which was later known as Babylon. This city of Babylon with a tower “whose top may reach unto heaven” was built by Nimrod (Genesis 10:8-10; 11:4). They called the tower “Babel, the gate to heaven,” but God called it what it was which was, “Babel, confusion,” for there God confused the language of the people which forced them to scatter. This heaven defying group of people wanted one government to rule the world and one religion to sway the hearts of mankind. This was Satan's attempt to defy God and His authority and the ring leader of his scheme was Nimrod. But God came down and stopped this world wide rebellion at Babel, in defiance of His command for mankind to replenish the earth (Genesis 9:1) by confusing their language into many languages so they could not understand one another's speech. Mankind discontinued the building of Babel and were scattered to different parts of the world (Genesis 11:8-9).
Nimrod had a plan to weld together and strengthen this evil religious system and so he married his own mother who was Semiramis. She was the first deified queen of Babylon and Nimrod was the first deified king. Semiramis was as wicked as her son Nimrod, and as much sold out to Satan and devil worship as did he. Incest was used here as a basis to unite this newly false religious system. Nimrod and his mother/wife would be greatly used by Satan in the following centuries to send countless millions and even billions of souls to hell.
Satan's plan was to develop a counterfeit, opposition system of religion to attract worship away from the true God of Heaven. This false system had its sacrificial plan just as God had a plan of sacrifice. But Satan's pagan worship required the offering up of human beings, which was often the sons and daughters of the worshipers. A counterfeit holy day was instituted in honor of the sun god, (Sun-day) and this was designed by Satan to rob God of his peculiar authority as the Creator of the universe as designated by His Holy day the Sabbath.
Have you noticed how occult symbols are typically reversed? Example: The occult symbol for a cross is an inverted cross. Most have never noticed that God uses the 6:1 principle. That is, you have 6 of something normal and then on the 7th something special happens. Example: God created the world in 6 days and the 7th is a special day of rest and worship. Crops were grown for 6 years and the 7th year the land was rested. Slaves were kept for 6 years and were to be set free on the 7th year. There are 6 weeks from Passover to the 7th week being Pentecost. There are 6 months from Passover to the 7th month being the Day of Atonement. Bible chronologists say we are currently approaching the end of 6000 years since creation and if Christ returns at the end of 6000 years, we will then have the 7000th year being the 1000 year millennial reign. (See Revelation 20:1-15) So 6000 years + 1000 years (millennium) = 7000 years. None of this is by chance and is God's plan. Observe the days of the week below.
| Sunday Day 1 | Monday Day 2 | Tuesday Day 3 | Wednesday Day 4 | Thursday Day 5 | Friday Day 6 | Saturday 7th Day Sabbath |
The first six days are normal but the 7th day is the “Sabbath of the Lord thy God.” Remember that the occult uses the reverse symbol or is the opposite (in opposition) to God. So if Sunday was Satan's plan for a day of worship, and we have seen historically that it is, then his week would be the reverse of God's week. Instead of being the 6:1 principle it would be 1:6. As seen from the table below, this is the case and so it is not just two days side by side. It is the occult equivalent and this is not by chance but Satan's choice.
| Sunday Counterfeit Sabbath | Monday Day 2 | Tuesday Day 3 | Wednesday Day 4 | Thursday Day 5 | Friday Day 6 | Saturday Day 7 |
We are fast approaching 6000 years (last generation now) and if Jesus comes at the end of 6000 years we would then have a 1000 year Sabbath. A thousands years a day just as God said. 2 Peter 3:8 “But, beloved, be not ignorant of this one thing, that one day is with the Lord as a thousand years, and a thousand years as one day.” Six days work and the Seventh day rest. This Earth's history may end up being a mirror image of the creation week but with a thousand years to a day. That would put a whole new perspective on the meaning of the Sabbath now that is for sure. 6000 years of working and a 1000 years of rest. God does love doing things in numbers!
Nimrod's and Semiramis' followers plunged so deeply into sin and the occult that they even sacrificed babies to Satan in their worship of him. This became a common practice until Shem who was one of Noah's three sons and the great uncle of Nimrod, in his anger and wrath killed Nimrod and cut him up into small pieces as an example to others not to commit such abominable sins and not to follow such evil religious practices. (Shem was a godly man and it was through his seed the Messiah would come.)
Alexander Hislop in his book The Two Babylons said, , “the Tower of Babel was actually the worship of Satan in the form of fire, the sun and the serpent. However, Satan worship could not be done openly because of the many who still believed in the true God of Noah. So a mystery religion began at Babel where Satan could be worshipped in secret.” – Alexander Hislop, The Two Babylons, 2nd American ed.(Neptune, New Jersey: Loizeaux Brothers, 1959)
Because of Nimrod's death, the followers of Nimrod and Semiramis were stunned and experienced much grief. Their religious hero was dead. They were afraid to continue in their worship of Satan for fear that what happened to Nimrod would also happen to them, so a mystery religion developed at Babel where Satan could be worshipped in secret. This is exactly what is happening in these last days. Satan is using mysteries and deceptions to deceive people into thinking that they are worshipping God when they are actually worshipping Satan.
For a short time the practices of this counterfeit religion ceased but Semiramis, the wife of Nimrod, had a brilliant idea of how she could successfully revive her and Nimrod's pagan religion and give it a new form. It was not long after the death of her husband that Semiramis became pregnant. She said that when Nimrod died that he went up to the sun, and the sun then became a symbol of Nimrod. She told the people that a ray of the sun had come to her and impregnated her with a child and that it was actually Nimrod coming back in a reincarnation of the sun god. The child was called Tammuz and these three were worshipped as the personification of the sun god, and this is where we find the three in one trinity doctrine originated and is where the first three came into existence. This mysteryreligion was nothing more than Satan worship. Read the pagan origins of the trinity doctrine for more.
“The trinity got its start in Ancient Babylon with Nimrod - Tammuz - and Semiramis. Semiramis demanded worship for both her husband and her son as well as herself. She claimed that her son, was both the father and the son. Yes, he was “god the father” and “god the son” - The first divine incomprehensible trinity.” – The Two Babylons; Alexander Hislop, p.51
So Semiramis proclaimed that her husband Nimrod was a god, and she as the wife of Nimrod was a goddess. She then announced herself to be “The Queen of Heaven” and that she should be worshiped as such. She claimed that her spirit was the moon and when she died she would dwell in the moon, even as Nimrod was already in the sun. What a devilish brainstorm inspired by Satan!
Satan was laying the foundation for every system of falsehood and error the world has ever known. They took the truth of God and turned it into a lie and “worshipped and served the creature (on a wider application also includes Satan) more than the Creator.” Romans 1:25. This system of paganism, while professing to be the true religion, is actually devil worship. It professes and claims to be the truth of God but in reality it is Satan's masterpiece, the “mystery of iniquity.”
As Satan's church gained momentum, Semiramis pushed this satanic religious order underground. The followers of this counterfeit religion had to take secret oaths. The secret societies (some unscriptural lodges of today) thus had their beginning. The confessionals and priesthood were set up. The followers of this pagan religion confessed their sins to their priests. (what church continued this unbiblical pagan tradition?) See also 1 Timothy 2:5, Luke 5:20-21. By so doing, Semiramis could control her followers and exercise lordship over them. She boldly and brazenly proclaimed that she and her priests were the only ones who understood the mysteries of God and that they were the only possible way to God. Because of dedication to and fear of this false religious system, the followers of this religion fearfully complied.
Semiramis and her priests of Satan were deep into the occult, magic and illusion. They were masters of lies and deception. Everywhere there were statues or idols of this mother/child cult. Semiramis was soon hailed as “The Queen of Heaven” (Ashtarte). Her symbol became the moon and her husband Nimrod, was called “Baal” (the “sun god”) and his symbol became the sun. The city of Babylon was the seat of Satan worship until its fall to the Medes and the Persians in 539 BC. At this time the Babylonian pagan priests left Babylon and went to Alexandria and Pergamos. See who is the beast that has the number 666 or the origin of 666 for more.
It should be noted that the majority of the Babylonian pagan priests went to Pergamos more so than Alexandria, so for many centuries after the fall of Babylon, Pergamos became the new seat of Satan (Revelation 2:12-13), but around 129 BC, opportunity arose for them to leave Pergamos and go to Rome and thus Rome became the final seat of Satan where he set up his church, and hence sun worship, which was practised on Sunday, was most prevalent in Alexandria and Rome by the time of Christ.
Church historian Socrates Scholasticus (5th century) wrote: “For although almost all churches throughout the world celebrate the sacred mysteries [of the Lord's Supper] on the Sabbath of every week, yet the Christians of Alexandria and at Rome, on account of some ancient tradition, have ceased to do this.” – Socrates Scholasticus, Ecclesiastical History, Book 5, ch. 22.
So Baal worship was in full swing. It caught on fast and spread to many parts of the world. In Egypt, Semiramis became known as “Isis”, “The Queen of Heaven.” Nimrod became known as “Osiris”, the husband/son, and frequently called “Horus” (the sun god). In Phoenicia, Semiramis and Nimrod were worshipped as or known as Ashterath and Tammuz; in Greece, Aphrodite and Eros; in Rome, Venus and Cupid, and in China, Mother Shing Moo and her child.
When the cold season began every year, they believed their sun god was leaving them. It was on December 25th that they noticed the gradual return of the sun god. So they called this day the birth of the sun. Tammuz was hailed as the son of the sun. He was idolized and even worshipped and the first letter of his name became the symbol of sun worship. Human sacrifices to the sun god were offered on this initial letter made of wood, known as the cross “T” and this “T” for Tammuz is also the true origin of Catholics crossing themselves. His birthday of December 25 was honored more and more. Satan worked many years before the conception and birth of the true Messiah to counterfeit through sun worship His miraculous conception and birth. Satan succeeded many times in leading God's people into sin and pagan sun worship.
The true date of the birth of Christ is most likely between July and September but since the exact date of Christ's birthday was unknown, it was suggested, “Why not call it the same date as the birth of Tammuz, which was December 25?” This was the time when the sun had reached its lowest point on the horizon and started back up into the heavens and so the sun god had come to life, so to speak. So gradually December 25 came to be known as the birthday of Christ. The Papal Church finally instituted a special mass on that day, “Christ's Mass,” and so December 25 became “Christmas.” The yule log burning in the fire followed by the green tree lit with candles all came from the pagan worship representing Nimrod being dead, while his spirit still lived on in the sun and was alive again in Tammuz his son.
Jesus was crucified and resurrected in the spring of the year near the time of the moon festival. The devil was at work once again to bring the idea of having a celebration at the same time as the heathen but calling it “in honor of the resurrection.” And in regards to the worship of the moon goddess Semiramis, the so called queen of heaven. The cakes to the QUEEN OF HEAVEN were round and on them was cut a cross in honor of the sun god, and they were offered to the queen of heaven and today we call them “hot cross buns.” (Read Jeremiah 7:16-18). The forty days of “weeping for Tammuz” became Lent and at the close of Lent came Easter Sunday. The prophet Ezekiel was shown even greater abominations. (Read Ezekiel 8:12-18). This goddess Ishtar (Easter) came to be known as the goddess of springtime as in “new life,” or as history records it, the “goddess of reproduction.” The pagans would go to some mountain side early Sunday morning and worship this goddess as the sun was rising in the east. They gave themselves to immorality and indecency of every description. The eggs and rabbits were used as symbols of fertility and germination and hence “new life.” It all came into the Church gradually and was all blessed by the Catholic Church and given to the world. And some people wonder why God calls the Catholic Church Babylon!
“The use of temples, and these dedicated to particular saints, and ornamented on occasions with branches of trees; incense, lamps, and candles; votive offerings on recovery from illness; holy water; asylums; holydays and seasons, use of calendars, processions, blessings on the fields; sacerdotal vestments, the tonsure, the ring in marriage, turning to the East, images at a later date, perhaps the ecclesiastical chant, and the Kyrie Eleison are all of pagan origin, and sanctified by their adoption into the Church.” — An Essay on The Development of the Christian Doctrine John Henry “Cardinal Newman” p.373.
“It has often been charged… that Catholicism is overlaid with many pagan incrustations. Catholicism is ready to accept that accusation and even to make it her boast… the great god Pan is not really dead, he is baptized” — The Story of Catholicism p 37.
As time elapsed, stories spread worldwide about Semiramis and Nimrod as Baal worship was everywhere. (The above information on the beginning of Satan's church and its unscriptural practices is found in The Two Babylons, by Rev. Alexander Hislop) In his book he has composed a list of names adopted in other parts of the world that can be traced back to Semiramis and Nimrod in one way or another. The list of names are as follows:
| SEMIRAMIS or Ashtarte | NIMROD or Baal the sun god |
| Cybele (Goddess Mother) Asia | Deoius (Asia) |
| Fortuna (Pagan Rome) | The Boy Jupiter (Pagan Rome) |
| Isis (The Queen of Heaven) Egypt | Osiris or Horus (Egypt) |
| Isi (Goddess Mother) India | Iswara (India) |
| Venus (Rome) | Cupid (Rome) |
| Ashterath (Phoenicia) | Tammuz (Phoenicia) |
| Aphrodite (Greece) | Eros (Greece) |
| Irene (Goddess of Peace) Greece | The Boy Plutus (Greece) |
| Ishtar (Babylon) | The Winged One (Babylon) |
| Rhea (Mother of Gods) | Orion (Constellation) |
| Diana (Ephesian) | Bacchus (God of Party going) of Ancient Greece |
| Shing Moo (Holy Mother of China) | The Centaur (Greece) |
Satan pulled it off well as he had the whole world trapped into some form of Baal worship. The entire world had lapsed into polytheism (worship of many gods or idols). Mankind no longer desired to serve the true and living God and to accept His scriptural plan of salvation. (Romans 1:18-32).
Around 2000 BC in Abraham's day, Baal worship and its pagan rites had so permeated the human race that God called Abraham out from it to be the progenitor of a nation of people (the Israelites or Jews) who would be instructed by God through Moses and the prophets to be a shining light and an example of godliness to the heathen nations and reveal to them God's scriptural plan of salvation (Genesis 11:26-12: 1-5; Exodus 19:5-6; Hebrews 11:8).
The Jews were greatly blessed by God as His chosen people, who were to serve as His representatives of godliness to those heathen nations who had become entrapped by paganism, to evangelize those godless nations and to show them God's love. The Jews were repeatedly told that if they were to sin by serving other gods, to depart from the Lord and fail God in their mission as His representatives to those nations trapped in Baal worship, the Jews would suffer terribly at the hand of God and be dispersed into all the nations of the earth. (See Deuteronomy 4:1-40; 6:14-18; 7:6-26; 8:6-20; 10:12-20; 11:1-28; 12:28-32; 29:16-29; 30:11-20).
Before his death, Moses foretold that after his death the Jews would disobey and turn to other “gods” to worship and serve them (Deuteronomy 31:27, 29; 32:16-29). After Moses' death, Joshua took command and led the children of Israel across the River Jordan into Palestine. The Jews were ordered to exterminate the Canaanites of the land because they were so wicked and so deeply involved in the evil practices of Baal worship, and to take the land as their dwelling to be used for the glory of God in leading the ungodly nations to God and His plan of redemption. The Jews took the land and exterminated some of the inhabitants of the land but not all. The Jews here had already begun to disobey God. They soon became weary in their conquests of Palestine and stopped fighting. Soon afterwards the Israelites departed from their worship of the Lord and started to worship and serve other gods as Moses had predicted. The Jews soon became so involved in Baal worship and its pagan practices that some of them even sacrificed their children to Satan.
Because of their disobedience to God's command to be faithful in their worship of and service to the true and living God, the Jews would have to suffer. On many occasions God allowed the children of Israel to be captured by their enemies and to be persecuted. When the Jews cried out to God in sorrow for their sins, the Lord delivered them. The Lord raised up Judges to secure their deliverances. After each time the Lord brought about the deliverance of the captured, suffering children of Israel, the Jews would plunge back into sin and Baal worship. As time passed the Jews became even more involved in pagan worship in spite of God's warnings and chastisements. God raised up prophets to warn the Israelites to repent or suffer more. Prophet after prophet was raised up for that purpose and many of them were executed by the Jews. In 722 BC the ten Northern tribes were captured by the Assyrians and scattered never to return, and in 586 BC the Babylonians captured Judah and Jerusalem. This was the third time Babylon came up against them but this time brought about their total destruction as everything was torn down. After the Babylonian captivity in 539 BC at which time Babylon had fallen to the Persians, the Persians granted the Jews in Babylon permission to return to Jerusalem.
Many Jews did return to Palestine during the years 539 BC, 457 BC and 445 BC. Others doubtless returned between those years and after 445 BC. Read also Daniel's 70 weeks prophecy. In 70 AD the Romans under General Titus captured Jerusalem and persecuted the Jews. The Jews final dispersion took place at this time. After 70 AD, the Jews had been dispersed into all the nations of the world to suffer. Nearly all nations who had received Jews eventually turned on them and persecuted them. The Jews have been the most hated and persecuted people in history and have suffered more than any other people. They disobeyed God and they had to suffer as God said they would.
When the Roman Empire was in power during the earthly life of Jesus and during the early Church period, the Roman Caesars were to be worshipped as gods. The early Christians were persecuted by the Romans because they would not bow down to the pagan Caesars. Satan directed this persecution of the early believers in an effort to stamp out Christianity. But instead of wiping out Christianity, persecution resulted in its growth! As more Christians were put to death, more and more Christians rose up to replace them. Satan saw that his directed persecution of the early believers would not obliterate Christianity so he moved to attack the Church from within instead of from without.
Satan devised a plan by which he would lay the foundation for and establish his own counterfeit church. Under Satan's direction paganism would get a new face. Satan would introduce to the world his own version of a “Christian Church.” As was indicated earlier, the Caesars were worshipped as gods. As the Roman Empire was near disintegration, the pagan Caesars did not want to lose their power in controlling the world, so they decided on a plan by which to keep their power and influence in the world. The Roman Caesars simply exchanged their Roman togas for religious costumes. Thus they could control the world's governments and their economies through religion.
After Constantine defeated Maxentius in 312 AD in a battle for the throne of Rome, Satan continued in his clever plan to build his own version of a “Christian Church.” After his ascension to the Roman Throne, Constantine issued his Edict of Toleration in 313 AD to stop the persecution of the true believers in Christ. Under Constantine the Christian Church for a time found relief from persecution. Satan had now temporarily stopped his persecution of the Christian Church from without, but he would now proceed to attack the Church from within.
Under Satan's direction, Constantine set up the “Council of Nicaea” and presided as “Summus Pontifex”, the official title of a Pope. Constantine's job was to mix paganism with a perverted form of Christianity to make his new religious organization look respectable. This mixture of paganism with some of the teaching of Christ was Satan's version of a “Christian Church.” This powerful religious institution would be later used by Satan to send millions of souls to hell and to cause the deaths of many Bible believing Christians.
Many changes took place in this Babylonian pagan church. Under Constantine, the pagans were permitted to bring their statues and idols of Semiramis, “The Queen of Heaven”, and Nimrod, “Baal”, “The Sun God', into the Church. The names were changed to the Virgin Mary, “Queen of Heaven” and little Jesus, “The Sun God.” For example: Is this Catholic image Mary and baby Jesus or is it Semiramis, “The Queen of Heaven” and son Nimrod/Tammuz? Note the pagan trident symbol from the head of what is supposedly baby Jesus and that the hand is displayed with two fingers and a thumb prominent, being another way of symbolizing the trident and is a Satanic hand sign symbolic of occult powers. This is also used by high Church officials and priests in blessings invoking the sign of the cross by motioning their right hand with two fingers and thumb casually extended. It is also found in freemasonry of which origins can be found in the Catholic Church. The Catholic Church erroneously say that Peter was the first so called Pope of this Papal system but in fact it was really Constantine. So under Constantine as its first Pope, the Roman Catholic Institution as we know it today had its beginning. See also paganism in the Catholic Church and Catholic Church error and was Peter the first Pope.
The Roman Catholic Church grew in power as the people in Rome were again under the priests and each succeeding Pope. Constantine had fifty Bibles made of perverted manuscripts composed by pagan worshippers of Baal from Alexandria. Alexandria was not only the seat of Baal worship but was also the headquarters of the most liberal philosophers. Those wicked philosophers produced their own perverted version of a Bible, and fifty such copies were made for Constantine to be given to the new “Church” over which he presided. The Latin Vulgate, authored by Jerome and based on the above fifty Bibles, later became the Roman Catholic Bible, which was kept from the people so that unscriptural traditions would have greater emphasis in the minds of the followers of the Pope.
The above information can be found in the books, The Two Babylons by Alexander Hislop and the Angel of Light by Jack Chick. Alexander Hislop in his book also traces Roman Catholic sacraments, ceremonies, doctrines, confessionals, priesthood, etc. back to ancient Babylonian Baal worship. Roman Catholicism is based on ancient Babylonian Baal worship and on the man made traditions of the Church fathers. Catholicism is not based on the teachings of God's Word or on the Scriptural plan of salvation. So we find Satan had a long term plan for his church and sun worship, which was practiced on Sunday, and was initially most prevalent in Alexandria and Rome. From this pagan sun worship came both the trinity doctrine and Sunday worship. Too many people are too quick to write off the fourth Commandment as unimportant when it obviously is. Please read who is the Antichrist for the evidence and watch The god's of Babylon for the pagan origins of the trinity doctrine.
The history of the Holy Roman Empire goes all the way back to the days that began the post-flood era. Noah and his family, which consisted of his wife, three sons, and their wives, were the only survivors of the flood. His sons were Shem, Ham, and Japheth. Ham had a son named Cush and Cush had a son named Nimrod (Gen. 10:6-8), which means rebellious and lawless in Hebrew. The passage goes on to state, regarding Nimrod, that “he began to be a mighty one in the earth.”
He built his kingdom in the land of Babylonia and built many cities, and one of the first of these cities was Babylon. Nimrod pledged to protect the people from treacherous wild animals. This protection came mainly in the form of walled cities, such as Babylon. It wasn’t long for Nimrod to establish total control over the people. Settled within his city and reliant on him for survival, the people in effect belonged to Nimrod.
As a consequence, Babylon, the capital of Mesopotamia and the seat of human civilization, proceeded to reflect Nimrod’s character and ambition—morally, politically, and religiously. As he grew his empire, he moved away from God and formed philosophies and religions with his immoral wife, Semiramis.
For a description of Nimrod’s character, the words “mighty one” in Genesis 10:8is a translation from a Hebrew word that conveys a tyrant. Verse 9 records that he was “a mighty hunter before the Lord”; the Hebrew word translated “before” should more accurately be translated as against the Lord. Nimrod was an oppressor whose primary inspiration in his life was laboring against God. Nimrod built the city of Babylon and instituted the entire Babylonian kingdom that included most of the world’s population at the time as an act of rebellion against God.
Nimrod established himself as the supreme, flawless, religious authority, putting himself above God, and to his followers, Nimrod was God!
This sacrilege condition vindicates why Babylon is generally synonymous with rebellion and lawlessness in the Bible.
Genesis 11 addresses Nimrod’s construction of the city of Babylon, and his motive for building this city is significant. Verse 4 records that it was an endeavor to “make us a name” to gain prominence and notoriety. However, neither God nor His faithful servant Noah had authorized Babylon’s construction. Since the people constructed a tower, “whose top may reach unto heaven” indicates that the people recognized that they were rebelling against God. Nimrod and his defiant cohorts had mind of the flood, that it was punishment for humanity’s rebellion, and were building a gigantic tower in an attempt to escape another flood that may come resulting from their wickedness.
Thus, Babylon’s construction of the tower represented an attempt by Nimrod and his citizens to break away from God and to void the work God was executing through Noah.
Babylon was the center of operations of Nimrod’s campaign to oppose God. This location is where Nimrod, the great organized world apostasy from God, was initiated and controlled the world until today. Together with his wife, Semiramis (also his mother), Nimrod fashioned, then imposed on his followers, his particular finance, politics, and education system.
Furthermore, Nimrod acclaimed himself as the religious head of the people.
He set himself up as the supreme spiritual power in place of God and Noah the servant of God. As the priest of Babylon and in union with Semiramis, Nimrod devised the Babylonian mystery religion, including many pagan religious doctrines and practices. Presently numerous patterns and symbols associated with Christmas and Easter, for example, can be traced back to ancient Babylon. (For proof, read Alexander Hislop’s book The Two Babylons, available online.) [paid link]
Nimrod was eventually killed while hunting. But the false and rebellious political and religious system he fashioned carried on without him. It thrived, actually, thanks to the work of Semiramis. With her husband/son dead, Semiramis persuaded her followers that Nimrod presently lived as an immortal spiritual being. Therefore, Nimrod, even in death, was worshiped as a god. He became celebrated as the messiah. The original mother and child duo, Semiramis and Nimrod, became the main objects of worship in ancient Babylon.
After Nimrod’s death, Semiramis declared him as the “sun god.” She continued in unbridled covetousness and depravity and raised Babylon, where she had reigned to a depraved distinction among the nations as the seat of idolatry and sacred prostitution.
She became an expectant mother, birthed a son, and declared that her late husband, now “the Sun,” fertilized her with the rays of the Sun, and her son, which she named Tammuz, was born on the Winter solstice. Tammuz was eventually worshiped as the reincarnation of the sun god “Nimrod,” his birthday became recognized until this day, on December 25th.
Does that date ring a bell? [It is an ambition to post an article on the Holidays we celebrate…stay tuned]
The immortal soul and mother-child worship doctrines can be traced directly back to Nimrod and Babylon, to name only two of Catholic principles.
When Nimrod died, his false system was profoundly rooted in humanity. It is not possible to overemphasize what Nimrod and Semiramis accomplished in Babylon.
It was from this seditious nation that all other civilizations transpired. Mesopotamia, the region that contains Babylon, is known as “the cradle of civilization.”
The Bible unequivocally records the baffling of the languages and the scattering of the diverse populous from the region of Babylon(Gen. 11:3-8).
This action occurred during the construction of the tower of Babel. God disapproved and confused their language so that they could not communicate with one another. As a consequence, they scattered all over the earth.
As the myriad of races and peoples disbanded, they carried the beliefs and practices of the Babylonian mystery religion with them, as many of which remained ingrained in them. The various races developed new religions, though often altered in the new form.
After they began building a tower to heaven, the tower of Babel, with the occurrence of this scattering, this Babylonian system of idolatrous worship spread worldwide as the inhabitants of the city itself were scattered (Genesis 11:9). As they went from Babylon, these men took their worship of mother and child and the various “mystery” symbols as well. It is noted that Babylon was the sourcefrom which all
idolatry emanated.
As time went on, the Roman Empire incorporated the gods and religions of the countries it ruled into its system. Since Babylon was the source of this paganism, it is understandable to see how Rome’s early religion was a form of Babylonian worship that had developed under different forms and names in the countries it had entered.
It was the Pagan Roman Emperor Constantine the Great who introduced Christianity to Rome. He converted to Christianity in AD 312. He was Rome’s first Christian emperor and initiated the empire to become a Christian state.
There is much debate over his conversion to Christianity as being sincere or merely a political maneuver. Nevertheless, in A.D. 313, Constantine and co-emperor Licinius, the eastern emperor, issued the Edict of Milan. The mandate granted “to the Christians and others full authority to observe that religion which each preferred.”This action put an end to the harsh persecution and initiated its spread throughout the Roman Empire.
In 330 A.D., Constantine moved his capital from Rome to Byzantium, which he renamed Constantinople, after himself, which is now modern-day Istanbul. This move consequently paved the way for the Roman Catholic Popes to be in power in Rome to succeed Constantine.
As the Papal (Catholic) Church increased in power, it was in disfavor of the practices of the Christians, particularly Saturday worship. Remember, Rome practiced the Babylonian doctrines and worship that including worshiping the Sun on Sunday. These practices were also part of Constantine’s background. Therefore, it became Constantine’s ambition to harmonize these differences to unify the empire. As a result, he imposed his own version of Christianity upon the empire and ordered Sunday worship. He presented the following proclamation in 321 AD: “Let all magistrates and people of the city… rest on the venerable day of the Sun”
(The New Schaff-Herzog Encyclopedia of Religious Knowledge, “Roman Legislation for Sunday,” vol. XI, p. 147).
Later, the Roman church additionally passed a startling decree in the Council of Laodicea, declaring, “Christians shall not Judaize and be idle on Saturday, but shall work on that day; but the Lord’s Day they shall especially honour, and, as being Christians, shall, if possible, do no work on that day. If, however, they are found Judaizing [keeping the seventh-day Sabbath], they shall be shut out from Christ” (A History of the Councils of the Church, vol. 2, p. 316).
To put it bluntly, Christian Sabbath-keepers became affirmed as heretics.
This collaboration amid church and state produced what eventually became known as the Holy Roman Empire.
This empire developed into a multi-ethnic composite of territories in Western, Central, and Southern Europe that formed during the Early Middle Ages and continued until its dissolution in 1806 during the Napoleonic Wars.
A relic of the Holy Roman Empire is the Roman Catholic Church that continues with Babylonian practices to this day.
Amen
Any questions, comments, and concerns are more than welcome below.
Blessings!
In the Bible, the Prophet Zechariah spoke a significant Prophecy concerning Sukkot/ The Feast of Tabernacles. In the end of days, and after the time of Jacob’s trouble, the Great Tribulation, Israel and all the nations will be commanded to come to Jerusalem to celebrate Sukkot/ Feast of Tabernacles.
“Then it will come about that any who are left of all the nations that went against Jerusalem will go up from year to year to worship the King, the Lord of hosts, and to celebrate the Feast of Booths.” Zechariah 14:16
Zechariah’s prophecy proves that God Almighty has not done away with this Jewish Feast, and that it still stands, no matter what manmade doctrines say about the Jewish Feasts. Sukkot is truly an anointed Feast of Great Importance to the Lord of Hosts, and evidence points to this time as the time of Jesus’s true time of birth.God inspired Moses to warn parents of the grave responsibility that they have in what and how they teach their children. Notice His instruction in Deuteronomy 6:1, 6-7, 20-21, 25: “Now these are the commandments…which the LORD your God commanded to teach you, that you might do them in the land where you go to possess it…And these words, which I command you this day, shall be in your heart: And you shall teach them diligently unto your children, and shall talk of them when you sit in your house, and when you walk by the way, and when you lie down, and when you rise up… And when your son asks you in time to come, saying, What mean the testimonies, and the statutes, and the judgments, which the LORD our God has commanded you? Then you shall say unto your son, we were Pharaoh's bondmen in Egypt; and the LORD brought us out of Egypt with a mighty hand…And it shall be our righteousness, if we observe to do all these commandments before the LORD our God, as He has commanded us.”
According to the Bible the sons of Noah started to re-populate the earth after the Flood. Noah had a great grandson called Nimrod, a great hunter and leader. He built some of the first cities and one was ‘Babel’ or Babylon in the land of Shinar (ancient Babylonia or modern day Iraq) (Gen 10:10).
But Nimrod was anti-God. Even his name (Hebrew root ‘marad’) means ‘rebel’, link. According to historian Josephus, Nimrod persuaded men not to ascribe to God and to build a tower too high for any further flood waters to reach! So, on a plain in the land of Shinar they started building a tower to heaven in order to make a name for themselves (Gen 11:1-9). This is highly significant in that Babylon came to denote man’s defiance against God; Nimrod’s high tower glorified man rather than God.
Some of today’s towers symbolize the same defiance, link, link. For example, Nimrod’s tower is mirrored in the European Union today. An official EU poster (now banned due to protests) promoting the EU Parliament clearly showed the Tower of Babel and the words ‘Many Tongues One Voice’. These words are in direct defiance of God’s condemnation of man’s arrogance in Genesis 11. Secular history and Chaldean legend fills in more of the picture.
Origin of the Whore of Babylon
Chaldean legend claims that after Nimrod’s death his evil wife Semiramis soon became pregnant, link. She told the people that a ray of the sun had come to her and impregnated her with a child and that it was actually Nimrod coming back in a reincarnation of the sun god. The child was called Tammuz. Moreover, in the Chaldean Mysteries Semiramis was worshipped as Rhea, the great ‘Mother’ of the gods, and this led to the peculiar worship of ‘Mother and Son’.
This mother/son idolatry is found in many ancient cultures, link. For instance, the historian Durant claims that the adoration of Mother and Child was found in pagan Egypt, where the Babylonian mother was known as Isis and her child as Horus.
So it was that through Chaldean legend and the claimed actions of Semiramis, the term Babylon became associated with idolatry and prostitution [Hislop, The Two Babylons, 1858] and the historian Herodotus wrote of how Babylon was the prime evil source from which all systems of idolatry flowed. As we shall see, it seems that a satanic hand, the current ‘ruler of the world’ (John 14.30) has used this Babylonian root to grow a counterfeit Christianity.
Rome’s Idolatry
Sun-god and mother-child worship come through Constantine
After his ascension to the Roman throne, Constantine set up the Council of Nicaea in 325 AD. There he invited Christian bishops to work out their theological differences. So started the path to state interference in the Christian faith, link, although Constantine continued to support both Christianity and paganism. For example, he retained the title Pontifex Maximus (greatest Pontiff and High Priest of the state cults).
The term pontiff comes from Roman pagan times where the highest priest was considered a ‘bridge builder’ between men and gods. It was a distinctly religious office under the early Roman Republic, but gradually it became politicised and eventually subsumed into the Imperial office. So the title Pontifex Maximus gave Constantine authority over both spiritual and civil affairs, link. Constantine also presided as Summus Pontifex (Highest Pontiff, Vicar of Christ, Bishop of Bishops, link). The veritable meaning of Summus Pontifex and Pontifex Maximus is simply ‘high priest’, link.
The Pope – A false High Priest and Mediator between Men and God
Under Constantine, pagans were now allowed to bring in idols of Semiramis, the Babylonian ‘Queen of Heaven’, and of Nimrod, the ‘Sun god’ into the church. Despite his accommodation of Christianity, historian Johnson claims that Constantine never abandoned sun worship.
Perhaps even more significantly, Constantine’s title ‘Pontifex’ later became a term used for Christian bishops, and the title of Pontifex Maximus (“high priest”) was applied within the Roman Catholic Church to the Pope as its chief bishop! Summus Pontifex (Highest Pontiff) is also sometimes used as a Papal title.
Today, noteworthy titles of the pope are Papa, Summus Pontifex, Pontifex Maximus and Servus servorum Dei, link, implying that the pope has both spiritual and civil authority over men. Not surprisingly, some claim that Constantine and not Peter was in fact the first pope, link, link.
So through Babylon (the Chaldean Mysteries) and Constantine’s pagan roots, the Roman Catholic Church adopted the following idolatries:
- sun god worship
- mother-god/mother-child worship
- Mary Queen of Heaven, link
- the pope’s title of Pontifex Maximus (‘high priest’ or ‘chief human bridge between God and man’)
- as with Constantine, the title Pontifex Maximus gives the pope authority over both spiritual andcivil affairs
So following on from the last point, today, the Vatican has worldwide political and financial influence, link. For example, the Holy See (aka the Roman Catholic Church) has Permanent Observer Status at the United Nations, link.
The Vatican is not only a religious institution and a centre of political power but also an economic institution with vast financial and real estate holdings
Jean-Guy Vaillancourt, professor of sociology, University of Montrealnone
Summary: the Whore of Babylon
We can now better understand the term ‘MOTHER OF HARLOTS’ in Revelation 17. First, Roman Catholicism holds the pope as a human “high priest”, whilst the true Church is symbolised as a woman who is submissive only to her husband, Christ, humanities true High Priest (Hebrews 10:21). Put another way, Catholicism prostituted herself to Roman pagan concepts and idols. So here the term “harlot” or “whore” refers to idolatry rather than to sexual transgression.
Similarly, Catholicism is a spiritual harlot in the sense that it has entered into adulterous relationships (spiritual fornication) with the leaders and kings of this world (Revelation 17:2) rather than having total allegiance to Christ. Spiritual formication is also seen in the Vatican’s embrace of Islam (Pope St. John Paul II kissed the Quran). And subsequently Roman Catholicism became the Mother of Harlots (Revelation 17:5) as other parts of Christendom (apostate protestant churches) adopted her practices e.g. worship on Sunday – the pagan “day of the sun”.
But some may still ask “what proof is there that the Vatican, the Roman Catholic church, is the harlot in Revelation 17?” Consider the following correlations with todays papacy:
- Roman Catholicism has global influence (about 1.2 billion adherents) (Revelation 17:1)
- The pope readily embraces other faiths which do not honour Christ (Revelation 17:2)
- The Vatican is political and controls (aka ‘sits on’) world government at the end of the age (Revelation 17:3)
- The Catholic Church dresses in purple and scarlet, the colours of royalty, and the golden cup is exactly what the Pope uses for the mass (Revelation 17:4)
- Papal Rome shed the blood of some fifty million Christians in Europe during the middle ages (Revelation 17:6)
- Rome itself is well known as “the city on seven hills” (Revelation 17:9)
- Roman Catholicism uses names and symbols of her Babylonian roots e.g. Pontifex Maximus, worship of mother and son (as in Semiramis and child Tammuz), and sun symbols
Roman Catholicism Today
A modern example of sun worship is seen in the Roman Catholic monstrance. This displays a round wafer of bread (called the Eucharistic Host) which is used in the Catholic Mass.
In post-medieval times the monstrance took the form of a sunburst on a stand, usually topped by a cross (as shown). The monstrance is also used in some Anglican and Lutheran Churches, link.
From about 400 AD we find images (idols) of saints and martyrs appearing in churches, together with the adoration of the Mother and Child (the Virgin Mary) and the evolution of the ‘priest’ from the early church elder. In accordance with the title Pontifex Maximus, we find the medieval western church under the papacy becoming a powerful political machine, far removed from the church of the gospels.
In fact, with much historical documentation, Hislop (The Two Babylons) maintains that the Roman Catholic Church is a continuation of the ancient Babylonish mystery system, with most of its practices drawn from the Babylonian religion and its priesthood.
Let’s list some of the idolatrous practices and pagan doctrines of today’s Catholic Church:
- The round wafers in the sacrament and in the monstrance symbolise the sun (the sun was erected above the altars in the worship of Baal, [Hislop])
- The columns of St Peter’s Cathedral in Rome have a sun-like image, and a wall has a golden sunburst image just as in the Babylonian temple
- The Church claims that the woman in Revelation 12:1 represents the Virgin Mary or ‘Mother of God’
- The Church insists that there is no salvation by faith alone, but that further works are required e.g. through the sacraments and penance. Thus, salvation can only be achieved through the Catholic Church and Rome is the only true church
- The Church insists that the pope is unable to err in any formal statement (such as a Papal Bull)
- The Church ordination of a special priesthood is contrary to New Testament teaching (1 Tim 2:5, Heb 10:19-22)
- The Church insists that the Mass is a sacrifice as Christ continues to offer Himself on the altar
- The Church insists that the wafer and wine are changed into the body and blood of Christ (transubstantiation)
- The Church is a prime player in the EU, so merging Christ’s true mission for the church with state business. Recent EU Treaty emphasis upon the ‘subsidiarity’ of nation states to the EU is a Vatican concept [Semlyn, All Roads Lead to Rome]
Pagan Christmas – Pagan Sunday
Of course, Wycliffe, Huss, Tyndale, Luther, Calvin, Knox, Whitefield, the Wesley’s, and others recognised many of these doctrines and practices as being opposed to biblical teaching, and so they opposed the Catholic Church. Even so, today’s free churches are only partially reformed from Rome in that they still retain pagan concepts. For example, December 25th was originally the heathen date used to honour the birth of the son of the Babylonian queen of heaven [Hislop]. And the Christian Sunday arose when Constantine replaced the Jewish Sabbath since he decreed no work was to be done on ‘the venerable day of the sun’ (Sunday).
The Harlot is Destroyed by Fire
Ancient Babylon was destroyed by the Medo-Persian Empire around 539 BC. This destruction was foretold in Isaiah 47, where Babylon is described as “daughter of the Chaldeans” … queen of kingdoms”. She was powerful and proud, but her destruction was coming. Isaiah 47 describes history, but the chapter also looks forward to an end time Babylon. The parallels between what happened to ancient Babylon and what will happen to the future ecclesiastical Babylon (headed by the Roman Catholic Church) are striking. Regarding ancient Babylon we read:
Yet you said, ‘I will be a queen for ever … I am, and there is no one besides me. I will not sit as a widow …’ (Isa 47:7-8)
Compare this with the prophecy of the end time Mystery Babylon:
… for she says in her heart; ‘I sit as a queen and I am not a widow …’ (Rev 18:7)
Regarding ancient Babylon we read:
But these two things will come on you suddenly in one day: loss of children and widowhood … they have become like stubble, fire burns them … (Isa 47:9,14)
Compare this with prophecy for the end time Babylon:
For this reason in one day her plagues will come,… and she will be burned up with fire … (Rev 18:8)
The prophetic picture is one of an end time apostate church suffering sudden and catastrophic destruction. How? Destruction comes from the other end time Babylon – the powerful ten-horned beast of Rev 13.1, the final commercial, political and humanistic world government (see World Government):
… and the ten horns … and the beast, these will hate the harlot and will make her desolate and naked, … and will burn her up with fire (Rev 17:16)
Why does this happen? A plausible explanation is that the political beast of Revelation 13:1-10 is godless and its leader demands that the world worship him alone (2 Thes 2:4)(Rev 13:8). The end time church, although corrupt and ‘Babylonish’, will probably still acknowledge God as supreme above all creation, and so stands in the way of the aspirations of the end time world ruler. In fact, many see the other beast of Revelation 13 (v 11-18) as the Antichrist – represented by the papacy – and this beast is notably absent in Revelation 17:16.
Summary
Nimrod’s Babylon was originally humanistic, political and commercial, but with the influence of his wife this soon developed into idolatry, pagan worship and moral corruption (the ‘Chaldean Mysteries’). These pagan mysteries subsequently developed into an ecclesiastical Babylon which many believe is characterised by Roman Catholicism today. Here we readily see the idolatry of ‘mother and child’ worship and ‘sun god’ worship, and sadly, elements of these mysteries are still retained by today’s Protestant Church.
Both Babylons, religious and political, can be seen in Rev 17 and 18 (noting that Revelation 17:14-18 is specifically the political Babylon), and prophecy indicates that the end-time apostate world church headed by Rome will be destroyed by the political Babylon. Many claim both Babylon’s can be seen within the EU, see Europe in Bible Prophecy.
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