Ishtar”, which is pronounced “Easter” was a day that commemorated the resurrection of one of their gods that they called “Tammuz”, who was believed to be the only begotten son of the moon-goddess and the sun-god.
Ishtar (DIŠTAR; Akkadian; Sumerian) is the East Semitic Akkadian, Assyrian and Babylonian goddess of fertility, love, war, and sex. She is the counterpart to the Sumerian Inanna, and is the cognate for the Northwest Semitic Aramean goddess Astarte. Her symbols were the lion, the gate and the eight-pointed star
Latin name for Easter, Pascha, which is derived from the Hebrew Pesach, meaning Passover. Greek translation, is ‘pascha’.
Easter Sunday generally falls on the Sunday following the Paschal Full Moon – the first full moon of Spring in the northern hemisphere, or the first full moon occurring after the date of the vernal equinox, and as such, can fall on any day between March 22 and April 25.
Every year, on the first Sunday after the first full moon of Spring, or after the spring equinox, a celebration was made. It was Ishtar’s Sunday and was celebrated with rabbits and eggs.
Nimrod – Sun god
Marduk, ENKI/APSU, ASTALLUHI, NEBO/BEL, BAAL
Semiramis – Moon god
Astarte
Greece: APHRODITE
Egypt: ISIS
Canaan: ISHTAR
Ephesus: DIANA
Israel: ASHTORETH
Phrygians: CYBELE
Phoenecia: EUROPA
Rome: VENUS
Thelema: NUIT or ANUIT
India: KALI
Genesis 11:1-4 (KJV) 11 And the whole earth was of one language, and of one speech. 2 And it came to pass, as they journeyed from the east, that they found a plain in the land of Shinar; and they dwelt there. 3 And they said one to another, Go to, let us make brick, and burn them thoroughly. And they had brick for stone, and slime had they for morter. 4 And they said, Go to, let us build us a city and a tower, whose top may reach unto heaven; and let us make us a name, lest we be scattered abroad upon the face of the whole earth.
The name Shinar occurs eight times in the Hebrew Bible, in which it refers to Babylonia. This location of Shinar is evident from its description as encompassing both Babel (Babylon) (in northern Babylonia) and Erech (Uruk) (in southern Babylonia). In the Book of Genesis 10:10, the beginning of Nimrod’s kingdom is said to have been “Babel [Babylon], and Erech [Uruk], and Akkad, and Calneh, in the land of Shinar.” Verse 11:2 states that Shinar enclosed the plain that became the site of the Tower of Babel after the Great Flood. After the Flood, the sons of Shem, Ham, and Japheth, had stayed first in the highlands of Armenia, and then repaired to Shinar.
Any effort to trace the origins of the myth, legend, and lore of goddess-worship will eventually lead one back to a single historical figure—Semiramis, wife of Nimrod and queen of Babylon, and this is especially true when considering the goddess/planet Venus.
For ancient Greeks Semiramis (Greek: Σεμίραμις, Armenian: ՇամիրամShamiram) was the legendary queen of king Ninus, succeeding him to the throne of Assyria. Nearly every stupendous work of antiquity by the Euphrates or in Iran seems to have ultimately been ascribed to her
Various places in Assyria and throughout Mesopotamia as a whole, Media, Persia, the Levant, Asia Minor, Arabia and the Caucasus bore the name of Semiramis, but slightly changed, even in the Middle Ages, and an old name of the city of Van was Shamiramagerd (in Armenian it means created by Semiramis).
She restored ancient Babylon and protected it with a high brick wall that completely surrounded the city. Then she built several palaces in Persia, including Ecbatana. Diodorus also attributes the Behistun inscription to her, now known to have been done under Darius I of Persia. She not only reigned Asia effectively but also added Libya and Aethiopia to the empire. She then went to war with king Stabrobates of India, having her artisans create an army of false elephants to deceive the Indians into thinking she had acquired real elephants. This succeeded at first, but then she was wounded in the counterattack and her army again retreated west of the Indus.
According to the Armenian legend, Semiramis had heard about the fame of the handsome Armenian king Ara, and she lusted after his image. She asked Ara to marry her, but he refused; upon hearing this, she gathered the armies of Assyria and marched against Armenia.
During the battle, which may have taken place in the Ararat valley, Ara was slain. To avoid continuous warfare with the Armenians, Semiramis, reputed to be a sorceress, took his body and prayed to the gods to raise Ara from the dead. When the Armenians advanced to avenge their leader, she disguised one of her lovers as Ara and spread the rumor that the gods had brought Ara back to life, ending the war.
Semiramis (Shammuramat) would have thus been briefly in control of the vast Neo Assyrian Empire, which 150 years later stretched from the Caucasus Mountains in the north to the Arabian Peninsula in the south, and western Iran in the east to Cyprus in the west.
The earliest Babylonian legends tell of a conquering people who came up out of the Persian Gulf and established an empire from these cities. This seems to fit well with what we know of the movements of Nimrod in his early career. He was a native of Ethiopia and was widely traveled among the few populated areas of those days. When he set out to build himself an army of conquest, he recruited from his “cousins” the descendants of Sheba and Dedan who had come up through Arabia to settle on the Asian mainland at the Straight of Hormuz and on the Indus river in what is now Afghanistan (these people were the Dravidians who were driven southward into India by the later Aryan invasion). After raising his army, Nimrod ferried them up the gulf in the world’s first naval armada, and conquered his empire. The best estimates place the time of the conquest as about 4000 to 3500 BC, and about 1000 years after the flood of Noah.
Genesis 10:1-12
10 This is the account of the families of Shem, Ham, and Japheth, the three sons of Noah. Many children were born to them after the great flood.
Descendants of Japheth
2 The descendants of Japheth were Gomer, Magog, Madai, Javan, Tubal, Meshech, and Tiras.
3 The descendants of Gomer were Ashkenaz, Riphath, and Togarmah.
4 The descendants of Javan were Elishah, Tarshish, Kittim, and Rodanim.5 Their descendants became the seafaring peoples that spread out to various lands, each identified by its own language, clan, and national identity.
Descendants of Ham
6 The descendants of Ham were Cush, Mizraim, Put, and Canaan.
7 The descendants of Cush were Seba, Havilah, Sabtah, Raamah, and Sabteca. The descendants of Raamah were Sheba and Dedan.
8 Cush was also the ancestor of Nimrod, who was the first heroic warrior on earth. 9 Since he was the greatest hunter in the world, his name became proverbial. People would say, “This man is like Nimrod, the greatest hunter in the world.” 10 He built his kingdom in the land of Babylonia, with the cities of Babylon, Erech, Akkad, and Calneh. 11 From there he expanded his territory to Assyria, building the cities of Nineveh, Rehoboth-ir, Calah, 12 and Resen (the great city located between Nineveh and Calah).
In the midst of the tumult of war Nimrod and Semiramis met–and in none too savory circumstances, for tradition states that she was an inn/brothel keeper in the city of Erech—leading one to speculate upon the nature of their initial acquaintance. Semiramis was a native of Erech, which as evidenced by it’s name seems to have been built by a Hamitic family (Ham’s wife was said to have been descended from Cain who built the first Erech in honor of his son). The name Semiramis is a later, Hellenized form of the Sumerian name “Sammur-amat”, or “gift of the sea.”
The initial element “sammur” when translated into Hebrew becomes “Shinar” (the biblical name for lower Mesopotamia), and is the word from which we derive “Sumeria”. This one tarnished woman then, had such a lasting impact upon world history that not only do we call by her name the land from which civilization flowed, but God himself through the sacred writer has let us know that its distinguishing characteristic was that it was “the Land of Shinar,” or Semiramis.
Semiramis was the instigator in forming the religion based primarily upon a corruption of the primeval astronomy formulated by Noah’s righteous ancestors before the flood. In the original this system depicted by means of constellations the story of Satan’s rebellion and the war in the heavens, his subversion of mankind, the fall of Adam and Eve, the promise of One to come who would suffer and die to relieve man from the curse of sin then be installed as Lord of Creation, and the final re-subjugation of the cosmos to God through Him.
These eternal truths were corrupted by her (rather, quite obviously, by the evil one controlling her) into a mythic cycle wherein the great dragon is depicted as the rightful lord of the universe whose throne has been temporarily usurped by One whom we can recognize as the God of the Bible. The serpent creates man in his present miserable state, but promises that a child would one day born of a divine mother—which child would supplant God, become a god himself, and return rulership of the Earth to the serpent. These fables were based upon the then widely-known story of the constellations, and were introduced under the guise of revealing the hidden esoteric knowledge concealed in them (regardless of the fact that the original was quite straightforward).
Although this esotericism was the second element in Semiramis’ cult, it only masked the actual goal which was the worship of the “heavenly host,” which the Bible equates with Satan’s army of fallen angels. Satan was quite willing to receive worship “by proxy”, hence the third major element of the mystery religion was emperor-worship. This religion was propagated by a hierarchy of priests and priestesses, to whom were assigned the task of initiating the populace at large into it’s ascending degrees of revelation, culminating at the highest level in both direct worship of Satan and demon-possession.
During the course of the New Year’s festivities at which the advent of Nimrod’s rule was celebrated, there was a certain feast exclusively for the royal family and the upper echelons of the priesthood. During this feast, which included “courses” of psychedelic and hallucinogenic drugs, a year-old ram was traditionally sacrificed by being torn limb-from-limb while still alive, and it’s flesh eaten raw. This ram symbolized the old year passing into the heavens to allow room for the new year. A new-born lamb was then presented which, symbolizing the new year, would be kept and fattened for the next year’s ceremonies. This year Semiramis directed the ritual according to the formula, with the exception that when the time came for the ram to be slaughtered, it was the king who was torn to pieces at the hands of the drug-crazed priesthood and Semiramis’ bastard son was installed as king. Thus Nimrod, the mighty hunter, died a horrible death as a trapped beast himself.
Semiramis named her son Damu (from the Sumerian “dam,” or blood), which in the later Babylonian language became Dammuzi, in Hebrew Tammuz, and in Greek Adonis. Of course, Semiramis assumed the regency for her infant son, and ruled as absolute monarch for 42 more years. In order to avoid having to kill her son on the next New Year’s Day, she instituted an annual nation-wide sports competition, the winner of which would have the “honor” of taking Damu’s place and ascending into heaven to become a god.
To oppose the accusations of “mere” womanhood laid against her, she had herself deified as the mother of the god Damu (since only a god can beget a god) , and installed as “The Queen of Heaven” pictured in the constellation Cassiopeia, which the ancients had intended as a corporate representation of those people faithful to God who will be enthroned by Him after the end of the age.
Semiramis died after reigning as queen over Babylon for 102 years.
She was worshiped throughout the world by each of the titles associated with Nimrod’s worship, in addition to many titles unique to herself (see table below). For instance, the respective Greek and Roman names applied to the worship of Semiramis include: Aphrodite and Venus, the goddess of love; Artemis and Diana, the goddess of hunting and childbirth; Athena and Minerva, the goddess of crafts, war and wisdom; Demeter and Ceres, the goddess of growing things; Gaea and Terra, symbol of the fertile earth; Hera and Juno, the protector of marriage and women, who was the sister and wife of Zeus in Greek mythology, and the wife of Jupiter in Roman mythology; Hestia and Vesta, the goddess of the hearth; plus Rhea or Ops, who was wife and sister of the Greek horned-god Kronos.
In fact, in Tibet, China, and Japan, Jesuit missionaries were astonished to find the counterpart of the madonna and child as devoutly worshiped as they were in Rome. Shing Moo, the holy mother in China was portrayed with a child in her arms and a glory around her, exactly as if she had been fashioned by Roman Catholic artisans.
In Egypt, the mother was styled Athor, the “habitation of god” to signify that all the “fullness of the godhead” dwelt in her womb. She was named Hestia in Greece and Vesta, which is just a Roman variation of the same name, meaning the “dwelling-place of deity.”
Under her title, “mother of the gods,” the goddess queen of Babylon became an object of universal worship. The mother of the gods was worshiped by the Persians, the Syrians, and with the most profound religious veneration by all the kings of Europe and Asia. When Caesar invaded Britain, he discovered the Druid priests worshiping the “mother of god” as Virgo-Patitura.
In Egypt, as the “queen of heaven” she was the greatest and most worshiped of all the divinities. During Egyptian bondage, the Israelites repeatedly departed from the one true invisible Elohim and worshiped the pagan mother. When the Israelites fell into apostasy under King Solomon, they worshiped this mother goddess as Ashtaroth (Asherah), a name by which the pagan Babylonian goddess was known to the Israelites:
And the people of Israel again did what was evil in the sight of YHWH, and served the Baals [various lord gods depicting Nimrod] and the Ashtaroth [Semiramis], the gods of Syria, the gods of Sidon, the gods of Moab, the gods of the Ammonites, and the gods of the Philistines; and they forsook YHWH, and did not serve him.
Worship of mother and child spread from Babylon to the ends of the earth, but were called different names in the languages of the various counties where their worship appeared. The ancient Germans worshipped the virgin HERTHA with the child in the arms of his mother. TheScandinavians called herDISA pictured with her child. In Egypt, the mother and her child were worshiped as ISIS with the infant OSIRIS orHORUS seated on his mother’s lap. In India, the mother and child were called DEVAKIand KRISHNA, and also ISI and ISWARA as they are worshiped to this day. In Asia, they were known as CYBELE and DEOIUS; in pagan Rome, as FORTUNA and JUPITER-PUER, or the boy JUPITER; in Greece, as CERES, the great mother with babe at her breast, or as IRENE, the goddess of peace, with the boy PLUTUSin her arms. Even in Tibet, China, and Japan, Jesuit missionaries were astonished to find the Roman counterpart of MADONNA and child. SHING MOO, the holy mother in China was portrayed with a child in her arms and a glory around her.
Semiramis was worshiped in Ephesus as the pagan fertility goddess DIANA who represented the generative powers of nature. She was referred to as a fertility goddess. Diana was pictured with numerous teats so that she could nurse all the pagan gods, and she wore a tower-shaped crown symbolizing the Babylonian tower of Babel.
Another sign or symbol found throughout Babylonia is the obelisk, a phallic symbol. These can also be seen in Egypt, Rome and Washington DC. The obelisk in St. Peter’s Square at the Vatican was dragged up to Rome from Egypt. The Washington Monument is a sign that Babylon is alive.
The Battle of the Milvian Bridge took place between the Roman Emperors Constantine I and Maxentius on 28 October 312. It takes its name from the Milvian Bridge, an important route over the Tiber. Constantine won the battle and started on the path that led him to end the Tetrarchy and become the sole ruler of the Roman Empire. Maxentius drowned in the Tiber during the battle.
According to chroniclers such as Eusebius of Caesarea and Lactantius, the battle marked the beginning of Constantine’s conversion to Christianity. Eusebius of Caesarea recounts that Constantine and his soldiers had a vision of the Christian God promising victory if they daubed the sign of the Chi-Rho, the first two letters of Christ’s name in Greek, on their shields. The Arch of Constantine, erected in celebration of the victory, certainly attributes Constantine’s success to divine intervention; however, the monument does not display any overtly Christian symbolism.
Protestant minister Alexander Hislop in The Two Babylons (1853) claimed that Semiramis was an actual person in ancient Mesopotamia who invented polytheism and, with it, goddess worship. Hislop believed that Semiramis was a consort of Nimrod, builder of the Bible’s Tower of Babel, though Biblical mention of consorts to Nimrod is lacking. According to Hislop, Semiramis invented polytheism in an effort to corrupt her subjects’ original faith in the God of Genesis. She deified herself as Ishtar and her son as Gilgamesh, as well as various members of her court and her then deceased husband. He maintained that all divine pairings in religions e.g. Isis/Osiris, Aphrodite/Cupid, and others, are retellings of the tale of Semiramis and Tammuz, and that this was then applied to Mary/Jesus in Catholicism, even though Christianity does not support a special divinity of Mary rather the Father, Son and Holy Ghost. The figure of Semiramis was later developed into the Blessed Virgin Mary, according to Hislop’s book. Hislop used this in support of his claim that Roman Catholicism is in fact paganism.
Author and conspiracy theorist David Icke also incorporates Hislop’s claims about Semiramis into his book The Biggest Secret, claiming that Semiramis also had a key role in the Reptilian alien conspiracy that he asserts is secretly controlling humanity.
Genesis 6:4 4 In those days, and for some time after, giant Nephilites lived on the earth, for whenever the sons of God had intercourse with women, they gave birth to children who became the heroes and famous warriors of ancient times.
Queen Semiramis also proclaimed that Baal would be present on earth in the form of a flame, whether candle or lamp, when used in worship.
Semiramis became known as “Ishtar” which is pronounced “Easter” referred to as Ashtoreth in scripture, and her moon egg became known as “Ishtar’s” egg.” One of her titles was the Queen of Heaven, and two of her fertility symbols were the rabbit and the egg. She soon became pregnant and claimed that it was the rays of the sun-god Baal (the ascended Nimrod) that caused her to conceive.
She also proclaimed a forty day period of time of sorrow for each year prior to the anniversary of the death of Tammuz. During this time, no meat was to be eaten – this is what became known as Lent” in Roman Catholic tradition. Worshipers were to meditate upon the sacred mysteries of Baal and Tammuz, and to make the sign of the “Tau” (a cross) in front of their hearts as they worshiped. They also ate sacred cakes with the marking of a “T” or a cross, on the top. Every year, on the first Sunday after the first full moon after the spring equinox, a celebration was made. It was Ishtar’s Sunday and was celebrated with rabbits and eggs. Ishtar also proclaimed that because Tammuz was killed by a pig, that a pig must be eaten on that Sunday.
Ishtar, (Semiramis, widow of Nimrod, mother of Tammuz) came to be represented as the bare breasted pagan fertility goddess of the east. The original pagan festival of “Easter” was a sex orgy that celebrated the return of life via the fertility of Ishtar’s conception of Tammuz. Worshipers of the Babylonian religion celebrated the conception of Tammuz on the first Sunday after the Full Moon that followed the Spring Equinox. They celebrated it by baking cakes to Ishtar, getting drunk, engaging in sex orgies and prostitution in the temple of Ishtar. Women were required to celebrate the conception of Tammuz by lying down in the temple and having sex with whoever entered. The man was required to leave her money. Babies were sacrificed in the honor of these pagan gods and their blood was consumed by the worshipers. The priest of Easter would sacrifice infants (human babies) and take the eggs of Easter/Ishtar, as symbols of fertility, and die them in the blood of the sacrificed infants (human babies). The Easter eggs would hatch on December 25th (nine months later), the same day her son Tammuz the reincarnate sun-god would be born.
Many babies would be born around Dec 25 from the sex orgies that began on the feast of Ishtar in the Spring and many of these babies would be sacrificed the following Easter/Ishtar feast .
It was also common for pagans to bake cakes to offer to her (the Queen of heaven) on the Friday before the Easter festival. This is where we gained the custom of ‘hot cross buns’, with the “cross” symbol indicating the female (the Babylonian symbol for the “female” was, and is, a circle with a crux/cross beneath). The cross also indicated the Equinox, when the Earth’s orbit “crossed” the celestial equator.
The celebration of Easter has a long history going back to the time after the Flood. Ham, the grandson of Noah had a son named Cush who married a woman named Semiramis. Cush and Semiramis then had a son and named him “Nimrod.” After the death of his father, Nimrod married his own mother and became a powerful King.
The Bible tells of this man, Nimrod, in Genesis 10:8-10. Nimrod became a god-man to the people and Semiramis, his wife and mother, became the powerful Queen of ancient Babylon. They developed what became the mystery religion of Babylon.
Says Alexander Hislop, “It was an essential principle of the Babylonian system, that the Sun or Baal was the one only God. When, therefore, Tammuz was worshiped as God incarnate, that implied that he was an incarnation of the Sun” (p.96). Connected with his worship was a pagan “Lent” of forty days. Hislop adds, “Among the Pagans this Lent seems to have been an indispensable preliminary to the great annual festival in commemoration of the death and resurrection of Tammuz, which was celebrated by alternate weeping and rejoicing . . . being observed in Palestine and Assyria in June, therefore called the ‘month of Tammuz;’ in Egypt, about the middle of May, and in Britain, some time in April. To conciliate the Pagans to nominal Christianity, Rome, pursuing its usual policy, took measures to get the Christian and Pagan festivals amalgamated, and, by a complicated but skillful adjustment of the calendar, it was found no difficult matter, in general, to get Paganism and Christianity — now far sunk in idolatry — in this as in so many other things, to shake hands”
Baʿal is a Semitic word signifying “The Lord, master, owner (male), keeper, husband”, which became the usual designation of the great weather-god of the Western Semites. Cognates include Standard Hebrew (Bet-Ayin-Lamed); Akkadian Bēl and Arabic. In Hebrew, the word ba’al means “husband” or “owner”, and is related to a verb meaning to take possession of, for a man, to consummate a marriage. The word “ba’al” is also used in many Hebrew phrases, denoting both concrete ownership as well as possession of different qualities in one’s personality. The feminine form is Baʿalah (Hebrew בַּעֲלָה Baʕalah, Arabic بعلـة baʿalah) signifying “lady, mistress, owner (female), wife”
1 Kings 16:31 relates that Ahab, king of Israel, married Jezebel, daughter of Ethba’al, king of the Sidonians, and then served habba’al (‘the Baʿal’.) The cult of this god was prominent in Israel until the reign of Jehu, who – according to the biblical account in 2 Kings – put an end to it: “And they brought out the pillars (massebahs) of the house of the Baʿal and burned them. And they pulled down the pillar (massebah) of the Baʿal and pulled down the house of the Baʿal and turned it into a latrine until this day.” (2 Kings 10:26-27)
Jeremiah 11:12-21 Then shall the cities of Judah and inhabitants of Jerusalem go and cry to the gods to whom they offer incense: but they shall not save them at all in the time of their trouble. For according to the number of your cities are your gods, O Judah; and according to the number of the streets of Jerusalem you have set up altars to the abominination, altars to burn incense to the Ba‘al.
Ba‘al Zəbûb is variously understood to mean “lord of flies”, or “lord of the (heavenly) dwelling”. Originally the name of a Philistine god, Ba’al, meaning “Lord” in Ugaritic, was used in conjunction with a descriptive name of a specific god. Jewish scholars have interpreted the title of “Lord of Flies” as the Hebrew way of calling Ba’al a pile of dung, and comparing Ba’al followers to flies. The Septuagint renders the name as Baalzebub (βααλζεβούβ) and as Baal muian (βααλ μυιαν, “Baal of flies”), but Symmachus the Ebionite may have reflected a tradition of its offensive ancient name when he rendered it as Beelzeboul.
New Testament
Beelzebub, also Beelzebul, is also identified in the New Testament as Satan, the “prince of the demons”. In Arabic the name is retained as Ba‘al dhubaab / zubaab (بعل الذباب), literally “Lord of the Flies”. Biblical scholar Thomas Kelly Cheyne suggested that it might be a derogatory corruption of Ba‘al Zəbûl, “Lord of the High Place” (i.e., Heaven) or “High Lord”. The word Beelzebub in rabbinical texts is a mockery of the Ba’al religion, which ancient Hebrews considered to be idol (or, false god) worship.
The word “Easter” appears in the KJV translation, but in the Greek from which it is translated, it is ‘pascha’, and it means Passover, from the Hebrew word “Pesach”. All scholars admit that this is an error in translation, and it only appears ONCE, at Acts 12:4. Luke didn’t put it there as “Easter”, he wrote it as “Pesach/Passover”. The KJV is the only one with this error, since translators have since corrected it in all others!
Acts 12:4 4 And when he had apprehended him, he put him in prison, and delivered him to four quaternions of soldiers to keep him; intending after Easter to bring him forth to the people.
Gevurot 12:4
Orthodox Jewish Bible (OJB)
4 When he had Kefa seized, he put him in the beis hasohar, having handed him over to four squads of chaiyalim to guard him, intending after Pesach to bring him before the people.
Need anyone wonder why the ancient Hebrews would want to amend this legend and the Puritans to forget about it all together? They didn’t consider Babylon “the mother of harlots and abominations of the earth” for nothing.
Another theory, adopted by the Roman Catholic Church, is that Easter celebrations have their linguistic origins in the Anglo-Saxon fertility rites of the goddess, Eastre. “Since Bede the Venerable (De ratione temporum 1:5) the origin of the term for the feast of Christ’s Resurrection has been popularly considered to be from the Anglo-Saxon Eastre, a goddess of spring…the Old High German plural for dawn, eostarun; whence has come the German Ostern, and our English Easter” (The New Catholic Encyclopedia, 1967, Vol. 5, p. 6).
The Epic of Gilgamesh contains an episode involving Ishtar
She asks the hero Gilgamesh to marry her, but he refuses, citing the fate that has befallen all her many lovers:
Listen to me while I tell the tale of your lovers. There was Tammuz, the lover of your youth, for him you decreed wailing, year after year. You loved the many-coloured Lilac-breasted Roller, but still you struck and broke his wing […] You have loved the lion tremendous in strength: seven pits you dug for him, and seven. You have loved the stallion magnificent in battle, and for him you decreed the whip and spur and a thong […] You have loved the shepherd of the flock; he made meal-cake for you day after day You struck and turned him into a wolf; now his own herd-boys chase him away, his own hounds worry his flanks.”
Angered by Gilgamesh’s refusal, Ishtar goes up to heaven and complains to her father the high god Anu that Gilgamesh has insulted her. She demands that Anu give her the Bull of Heaven. Anu points out that it was her fault for provoking Gilgamesh
Acts 7:43
No, you carried your pagan gods— the shrine of Molech, the star of your god Rephan, and the images you made to worship them. So I will send you into exile as far away as Babylon.
1 Samuel 7:3
Then Samuel said to all the people of Israel, “If you are really serious about wanting to return to the Lord, get rid of your foreign gods and your images of Ashtoreth. Determine to obey only the Lord; then he will rescue you from the Philistines.”
Ephesians 5:11
King James Version (KJV)
11 And have no fellowship with the unfruitful works of darkness, but rather reprove them.
By: Tonya Parrott
INTRODUCTION
In Acts 19, the apostle Paul sets out for Ephesus on his third missionary journey and confronts the Ephesians for worshipping the goddess Diana. Diana was just a disguised version of Jezebel, the detestable ‘Queen of Heaven.’ Diana was also known as Semiramis and many other names in ancient Babylon, as was her counterpart, the sun god Baal (Nimrod, etc).
The idolatry involved was Mother and Son worship, fertility worship and the worship of the celestials. Diana represents the spirit of Jezebel from Revelation 2:20 Nevertheless, I have this against you: You tolerate that woman Jezebel, who calls herself a prophet. By her teaching she misleads my servants into sexual immorality and the eating of food sacrificed to idols.
These are all also the same spirit referred to twice in the book of Jeremiah as the Queen of Heaven:
Jeremiah 7:18 The children gather wood, and the fathers kindle the fire, and the women knead their dough, to make cakes to the queen of heaven, and to pour out drink offerings unto other gods, that they may provoke me to anger.
Jeremiah 44:15-18 Then all the men which knew that their wives had burned 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, 16 As for the word that thou hast spoken unto us in the name of the LORD, we will not hearken unto thee. 17 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. 18 But since we left off to burn incense to the queen of heaven, and to pour out drink offerings unto her, we have wanted all things, and have been consumed by the sword and by the famine.
Diana was worshipped as the moon goddess and Mother of all living things, both man and nature. Every year in Ephesus, a festival was held in her honor to celebrate her birthday in which the whole city participated in drunkenness and immorality. Like the Israelites had done before them, the Ephesians also had turned their backs on the Lord to stubbornly practice these customs and follow this false goddess down a path of destruction.
WHAT IS IN A NAME?
The Encyclopedia of Wicca & Witchcraft describes Diana as “the Queen of Heaven, goddess of the moon, and the keeper of the hearts and souls of those who honor her.” 1 Pagans worship this moon goddess as the spouse of the sun god Baal, also referred to as Baalim (plural) in the Old Testament. In witchcraft, everything revolves around balancing powers; hence the female goddess is said to reign as the power opposite the male god.
Nimrod was the founder of the Tower of Babel (Genesis 10:10, 11:1-9) and his wife was named Semiramis. The ancients believed that after his death, he ascended to the sun and became known as the sun god Baal. Baal is also another name for Molech (Jeremiah 19:5, 32:35).
Ashtaroth was another name for the wife of Baal. This title also refers to many other names such as Ishtar and Astarte, the fertility goddesses of the Assyrians and Babylonians. ‘Easter’ is derived from these female goddesses’ names.
The International Standard Bible Encyclopedia defines Diana as:
A deity of Asiatic origin, the mother goddess of the earth, whose seat of worship was the temple in Ephesus, the capital of the Roman province of Asia. Diana is but the Latinized form of the Greek word Artemis, yet the Artemis of Ephesus should not be confused with the Greek goddess of that name. She may, however, be identified with the Cybele of the Phrygians whose name she also bore, and with several other deities who were worshipped under different names in various parts of the Orient.2
The Old Testament is full of examples of what God thought of the worship of Baal (Judges 6, I Kings & II Kings) as well as his counterpart, Ashtaroth (Judges 10:6). But it can be summed up in Judges 2:13, “And they forsook the LORD, and served Baal and Ashtaroth.” From this passage, it is clear to see that in order to serve the sun god Baal and/or his moon goddess bride by any name, one must first turn their back on the Lord.
MOTHER AND SON WORSHIP
The Babylonians, in their popular religion, supremely worshipped a goddess Mother and a Son, who was represented in pictures and in images as an infant or child in his mother’s arms.3 Following the death of Nimrod, Semiratis had a son whom she named Tammuz. She claimed that her son was the resurrected Nimrod, or rather, the sun god Baal. She further claimed that her son was conceived supernaturally and was the Savior promised in Genesis 3:15. In the religion that developed, not only was the child worshipped but the mother as well.4
Mother and Son worship took on various names depending on the culture. Alexander Hislop explains:
From Babylon, this worship of the Mother and Child spread to the ends of the earth. In Egypt, the Mother and the Child were worshipped under the names Isis and Osris. In India, even to this day, as Isi and Iswara; in Asia, as Cybele and Deoius, in Pagan Rome, as Fortuna and Jupiter-puer, or, Jupiter, the boy; in Greece, as Ceres the great Mother, with the babe at her breast, or as Irene, the God of Peace, with the boy Putus in her arms; and even in Thibet, in China and Japan, the Jesuit missionaries were astonished to find the counterpart of Madonna and her child as devoutly worshipped as in Papal Rome itself; Shing Moo, the Holy Mother in China being represented with a child in her arms, and a glory around her, exactly as if a Roman Catholic artist had been employed to set her up.3
Diana was the Ephesians’ version of the Babylonian Semiramis.
FERTILITY WORSHIP
The Ephesians’ goddess Artemis, sometimes called Diana, is not quite the same figure as the one that was worshiped in Greece. The Greek’s Artemis was the goddess of the hunt. The Ephesians’ Artemis was a goddess of fertility and was often pictured as draped with eggs or multiple breasts, symbols of fertility, from her waist to her shoulders.2
As stated earlier, Cybele of the Phrygians is also identified with Diana of the Ephesians. Cybele was generally regarded as the Mother of the major part of the gods. This procured her the appellation of Magna Mater, the Great Mother.5
There are many versions of the story of Cybele. One is that she was born the daughter of a king and abandoned on a mountain. She was nursed by wild animals and grew up and fell in love with a shepherd named Attis. He was unfaithful to her and was about to marry another but she appeared at the wedding banquet and filled the guests with panic. Attis fled to the mountains. Cybele killed him there and instituted a great mourning in his memory every year at the Vernal Equinox. Her priests went to the mountains marching to kettle drums and fifes and found Attis (or something like him) and out of excitement and joy cut themselves with knives in wild enchantment. 6
In the days of the Old Testament, the Israelites never completely abandoned the worship of God the Creator. What they actually did was add the worship of Baal to their worship of God. This is called syncretism. Syncretism, as defined by the American Heritage Dictionary, is “the reconciliation or fusion of differing systems of belief.” Biblical Christianity cannot be reconciled with this. 7
The Israelites would only call on God the Creator in the midst of a crisis and worship Baal for everyday life. The worship of Baal was carried out by imitative magic and sexual acts by both male and female temple prostitutes. This involved orgies as well as the offering of children for sacrifices. It was understood that these things aroused Baal. Because of this, he would cause it to rain and make the Great Mother (Earth) fertile. The myth was also represented by a female consort, Ashtaroth, Queen of Heaven.8
THE TEMPLE OF DIANA
Diana’s Temple, also called the Temple of Artemis, is one of the Seven Wonders of the World. It is located in Ephesus, which is modern day Turkey. It was built in 560 B.C. by King Croesus of Lydia and took approximately 120 years to build. It was designed by a Greek architect by the name of Chersiphron.
The Temple is described by Antipater of Sidon as follows:
I have set eyes on the wall of lofty Babylon on which is a road for chariots, and the statue of Zeus by the Alpheus, and the hanging gardens, and the colossus of the Sun, and the huge labour of the high pyramids, and the vast tomb of Mausolus; but when I saw the house of Artemis that mounted to the clouds, those other marvels lost their brilliancy, and I said, ‘Lo, apart from Olympus, the Sun never looked on aught so grand. 9
On July 21, 356 B.C. in a successful attempt at fame, a man by the name of Herostratus set the Temple on fire and burned it to the ground. It was rebuilt many years later with the aid of Alexander the Great. The Temple was destroyed for the second time by the Goths in 262 A.D. By the fourth century, the majority of the population of the city of Ephesus had converted to Christianity and in 401 A.D. the Temple was destroyed for the final time by Saint John Chrysostom. Many of the ruins were used for the construction of other buildings and the Temple remains in ruins at present.10
The Apostle Paul came to preach the Good News at Ephesus around 54 A.D., which was in between the Temple’s first and second destruction. In approximately 56 A.D., Paul spoke out against the false goddess, Diana. This threatened the livelihood of the townsmen at Ephesus who made their living by manufacturing silver shrines of the goddess.
A man by the name of Demetrius called a meeting of his like businessmen and addressed the issue. The men became angered and began to shout, “Great is Diana of the Ephesians!” A crowd began to gather and soon a riot broke out and there was much confusion in the city. The townspeople rushed the amphitheater and were finally calmed and dispersed by the mayor. He feared the commotion would draw the attention of the Roman government and bring about legal charges for the city (Acts 19).
The seeds that Paul’s preaching planted there took many years to grow but in God’s timing, it bore the fruit that resulted in the destruction of Diana’s well known Temple at Ephesus. Many Ephesians received the gift of eternal life as a result of Paul’s good work among them.
DIANA WORSHIP TODAY: ISHTAR AND THE VIRGIN MARY
Unfortunately, Paul’s message did not extinguish the worship of Diana, as it only disguised itself in other forms. This idolatry is still rampant today and has even found its way into the worship services of most churches in the United States of America as well as other countries around the world by cleverly disguising itself as ‘Christian’. Although it still comes in the form of Mother and Child and fertility worship, it somehow goes unrecognized by the vast majority. Two of the most deceptive methods are the worship of Ishtar and the worship of the Virgin Mary.
Easter has been declared a Christian holiday and it is openly celebrated at the same time every year in almost every Christian church globally. Regarding Ishtar, Richard Rives states:
The English word ‘Easter’ is derived from the names ‘Eostre’ or ‘Eastre,’ ‘Astarte’ or ‘Ashtaroth’. Astarte was introduced into the British Isles by the Druids and is just another name for Beltis or Ishtar of the Chaldeans and Babylonians. The book of Judges records that ‘the children of Israel did evil in the sight of the LORD, and served Baalim, and Ashtaroth, and forsook the LORD, and served not Him.’ Easter is just another name for Ashteroth ‘The Queen of Heaven.’ Easter was not considered a ‘Christian’ festival until the fourth century. Early Christians celebrated Passover on the 14th day of the first month and a study of the dates on which Easter is celebrated will reveal that the celebration of Easter is not observed in accordance with the prescribed time for the observance of Passover. After much debate, the Nicaean council of 325 A.D. decreed that ‘Easter’ should be celebrated on the first Sunday after the vernal equinox. Why was so much debate necessary if ‘Easter’ was a tradition passed down from the Apostles? The answer is that it was not an apostolic institution, but, an invention of man! They had to make up some rules. History records that spring festivals in honor of the pagan fertility goddesses and the events associated with them were celebrated at the same time as ‘Easter’. In the year 399 A.D. the Theodosian Code attempted to remove the pagan connotation from those events and banned their observance. The pagan festival of Easter originated as the worship of the sun goddess, the Babylonian Queen of Heaven who was later worshipped under many names including Ishtar, Cybele, Idaea Mater (the Great Mother), or Astarte for whom the celebration of Easter is named. Easter is not another name for the Feast of Passover and is not celebrated at the Biblically prescribed time for Passover. This pagan festival was supposedly ‘Christianized’ several hundred years after Christ.11
The Vernal Equinox determines the timing of the celebration of Easter and not the dating of the resurrection of Christ. Vernal Equinox is the time of the year when day and night are almost equal in length. Ishtar (Easter/Ostara/Ashtaroth, etc.) is one of the eight sabbats (holidays) celebrated by pagans and neopagans on the Wiccan calendar each year. Easter is a celebration in honor of this pagan fertility goddess from the ancient world called by the same name as Diana, the ‘Queen of Heaven.’
The question remains unanswered as to why the ‘Christian’ Council of Nicea in 325 A.D. even discussed the appropriate time to honor a pagan goddess. There is no justification for this and the Bible blatantly opposes such worship. The results of doing so are detailed in Jeremiah 44:15-18 (previously quoted).
The Virgin Mary, the object of adoration for those of the Catholic faith, is not the same Mary as the mother of Jesus because they also give her the title ‘Queen of Heaven’. Marian devotion (the worship of Mary) is thought to have been started by a group of people known as the Collyridians. Women would decorate a square chair by covering it with fine linen and on a certain day of the year, make cakes out of bread and offer them as a sacrifice to the Virgin Mary.12 The Lord rebukes this act in Jeremiah 44:15-18 as well.
Collyridiansim is still practiced by Catholics today although they deny this as fact. They believe that Mary is the Mother of God in the eternal sense because she gave birth to both the spiritual and human Jesus (theotokos). The Protestant Church teaches that Mary is not the Mother of God in the eternal sense, although she is the mother of Jesus. God has no mother in the eternal sense and believing that Mary is the Mother of God in this way leads to worshipping the creation rather than the Creator. Romans 1:25, “Who changed the truth of God into a lie, and worshipped and served the creature more than the Creator, who is blessed for ever. Amen.”
CONCLUSION
Syncretism has no place in the true Church and should be exposed and rebuked for the sin that it is. It is clear to see why Paul spoke out against the worship of the goddess Diana. She is indeed the one referred to as the Queen of Heaven in the Old Testament. The sins involved in her worship were many and included things such as idolatry, sexual perversion, child sacrifice and the worship of the sun and moon. Paul was very well aware of the dangers of these sins and wanted the people of Ephesus to see their need for repentance and be reconciled with God.
The names of the gods and goddesses may have changed throughout the cultures but the focus of worship remains the same. God the Creator changed names for His glory (like Abram to Abraham) throughout the Bible. The devil apparently changes names for his glory, too. After all, it is much easier to lead people astray if they are unaware of the true origins and reasons for their worship. It should be pointed out that changing the name does not change the object.
Many today are ignorant to the fact that they are participating in the same rituals practiced and handed down by the Babylonians.
Revelation 18:1-10:
And after these things I saw another angel come down from heaven, having great power; and the earth was lightened with his glory. 2 And he cried mightily with a strong voice, saying, Babylon the great is fallen, is fallen, and is become the habitation of devils, and the hold of every foul spirit, and a cage of every unclean and hateful bird. 3 For all nations have drunk of the wine of the wrath of her fornication, and the kings of the earth have committed fornication with her, and the merchants of the earth are waxed rich through the abundance of her delicacies. 4 And I heard another voice from heaven, saying, Come out of her, my people, that ye be not partakers of her sins, and that ye receive not of her plagues. 5 For her sins have reached unto heaven, and God hath remembered her iniquities. 6 Reward her even as she rewarded you, and double unto her double according to her works: in the cup which she hath filled fill to her double. 7 How much she hath glorified herself, and lived deliciously, so much torment and sorrow give her: for she saith in her heart, I sit a queen, and am no widow, and shall see no sorrow. 8 Therefore shall her plagues come in one day, death, and mourning, and famine; and she shall be utterly burned with fire: for strong is the Lord God who judgeth her. 9 And the kings of the earth, who have committed fornication and lived deliciously with her, shall bewail her, and lament for her, when they shall see the smoke of her burning, 10 Standing afar off for the fear of her torment, saying, Alas, alas that great city Babylon, that mighty city! for in one hour is thy judgment come.
The Bible teaches us that ignorance will be no excuse for those who do not follow the ways of God. Hosea 4:6, “My people are destroyed for lack of knowledge: because thou hast rejected knowledge, I will also reject thee, that thou shalt be no priest to me: seeing thou hast forgotten the law of thy God, I will also forget thy children.” This penalty is sure to be executed on Judgment Day upon all of those who do not come out of Babylon and its practices and be separate!
Revelation 2:7 Whoever has ears, let them hear what the Spirit says to the churches. To the one who is victorious, I will give the right to eat from the tree of life, which is in the paradise of God.
**I created One16ministries in 2015. I have never asked for donations or monies of any kind. But I would very much appreciate you checking out my invention at PaciTeether.com and telling anyone you know with a new baby or toddler! 🙂
1 Raven Grimassi, Encyclopedia of Wicca and Witchcraft. (St. Paul, MN: Llewellyn Publicaions, 2003), 120.
2 E.J. Banks, International Standard Bible Encyclopedia. (Wm. B. Eerdmans Publishing Co., 1939), Diana; Artemis.
3 Alexander Hislop, The Two Babylons. (London: Houlston & Wright, 1762), 28 & 29.
4 Ralph Woodrow, Babylon Mystery Religion (Ralph Woodrow Evangelistic Association, Inc., 1966), 8.
5 M. L’Abbe’ De Tressan, Mythology Compared with History: Or, The Fables of the Ancients Elucidated from Historical Records. (London: The Strand, 1797), 61.
6 O. Seemann, The Mythology of Greece and Rome: With Special References to its Use in Art. (New York: Harper & Brothers Publishers, 1887), 132 & 133.
7 Gotquestions.org, “What is Religious Syncretism?” Available from http://www.gotquestions.org/syncretism-religious.html; May 2012.
8 Dennis Bratcher, “Baal Worship in the Old Testament.” Available from http://www.cresourcei.o
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