"Zeitgeist" Online Movie: Part One
Refuted©
Posted: August 23, 2007
Did Any of these Pre-Christian Deities Really Rise
from the Dead?
Free Online Video: View Part I and Part II of a video debate between Dr. Gary Habermas and skeptic Tim Callahan regarding alleged pre-Christian "dying-and-rising" pagan deities.
Academic scholars of religion acknowledge that there is no evidence for the belief that any of these deities were believed to have risen from the dead prior to the time of Jesus. The Greek religion scholar Dr. Walter Burkert, author of Greek Religion (Harvard University Press, 1985) and Ancient Mystery Cults (Harvard University Press, 1987) writes: “There is no evidence for a resurrection of Attis; even Osiris remains with the dead” 1 (bold emphasis is mine).
The New Testament scholar Everett Ferguson writes, “Neither Dionysus nor the initiates were thought of as rising from the dead. Rather, the mysteries removed anxiety about death by depicting life in the other world as a Dionysus revel.” 2
In fact, the first account of a dying and rising god that resembles the account of Jesus’ resurrection postdates the New Testament’s composition by 100 years! 3
Potential Objection: Didn’t the Osiris resurrection myth predate Christianity?
Response: The early form of the Osiris resurrection myth does not correspond to the Christian concept of bodily resurrection. In the earliest version of the myth Osiris simply became the ruler in the Underworld. 4 He did not return to life on earth.
Dr. Burkert sums up the resurrection concept in pagan religions predating the New Testament issue superbly, writing,“The Frazerian construct of a general “Oriental” vegetation god who periodically dies and rises from the dead has been discredited by more recent scholarship.” 5
Endnotes:
1. Walter Burkert, Ancient Mystery Cults (Cambridge, Massachusetts, and London: Harvard University Press, 1987), 75.
2. Everett Ferguson, Backgrounds of Early Christianity, 2nd Edition (Grand Rapids, Michigan: William B. Eerdman’s Publishing Company, 1993), 248.
3. Gary R. Habermas and Michael Licona, The Case for the Resurrection of Jesus (Grand Rapids MI : Kregel Publications, 2004), 90.
4. Gary R. Habermas and Michael Licona, The Case for the Resurrection of Jesus (Grand Rapids MI : Kregel Publications, 2004), 91.
5. Walter Burkert, Ancient Mystery Cults, (Cambridge, Massachusetts, and London: Harvard University Press, 1987), 75.
Continue to: The “Copycat” Theory Can’t Explain the Origin of the Belief in Jesus’ Bodily Resurrection
