io, saturnalia!

[brinstar]

started on wednesday, lasts a week. origin of most of the christmas traditions!

IO, SATURNALIA!

[Tikker]

shhh, don't let the christians hear you

[Harrison]

Shhh, I don't think they give a flying fuck as much as you do.

[brinstar]

come on guys none of that happy holidays crap

let's keep Saturn in Saturnalia

[Harrison]

come on guys none of that happy holidays crap

let's keep Saturn in Saturnalia

lol

[Iccarra]

Happy Holidays!

(interesting stuff, none-the-less)

[Kramer]

tee hee hee.... though i do think that plenty of christians' heads might explode if they read that stuff....

"you mean the church ISN'T the origin of all religious tradition!!!!"

kind of the same way they plug their ears and lalalalala whenever they hear the story of buddha

[Arlos]

December 25th was also the Feast of Mithras, which was yet another old religion the early Christians wanted to stomp out by co-opting the existing holiday.

Actually, someone recently used the descriptions of the star and planetary positions in the sky from the biblical sources about the birth of Jesus, along with an astronomical program that can chart progression or regression of star placements depending on time period. (due to the wobble in the earth's movement, the positions of the stars in our sky seems to change over time). They put in the positions, then regressed the star positions back in time (based on a point of view of where Israel is on the globe), until they found a time that matched up: 2 BC, roughly mid-June.

That actually lines up reasonably well with other data, such as the mention of shepherds tending their flocks in the hills, etc. In winter, it was too cold, and the flocks were kept in paddocks, not out in the wilds.

Anyway, here's the original article:

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/3077385/

-Arlos

[Tikker]

sorry arlos, you fail

valid facts, and data are not applicable in the land of the christians

[Kramer]

ok. that was funny.

[Nusk]

there is a book called "the two babylons" and it is all about the catholic adoption of pagon rites and rituals.. even down to the hats they wear which are the same as the hats worn by the priest of Dagon

[Iccarra]

lalalala...lalalala...not listening...lalalala

[brinstar]

today's the last day of saturnalia

[Gaazy]

Why did they ever decide to put jesus' birthday on the 25th anyways? I cant remember, its been posted here god knows how many times, but i cant remember

[Arlos]

Few posts up, Gaazy.

December 25th was also the Feast of Mithras, which was yet another old religion the early Christians wanted to stomp out by co-opting the existing holiday.

Basically, all the peasants were technically converted to Christianity, but kept celebrating their old festivals, since it was traditional. (and since none of the other gods they'd worshiped cared about honoring other gods too). Christianity, on the other hand, has a serious stick up its ass about even the existence of other dieties, and so this pissed them the hell off.

When flat out telling people to stop those celebrations predictably didn't work, the Church got clever. It invented a Christian "holiday" that was dedicated to similar purposes as the existing one, and got people to at least alter the forms of their celebrations to the new one. Generation passes, and everyone has grown up celebrating Christmas instead of the Feast of Mithras, the new holiday has taken over, and the old one vanishes.

That's not the only holiday they tried that with, obviously. Take a look at a lot of Christian holidays, and marvel at how they seem to mysteriously line up with the equinoxes and solstices, which people had celebrated for millenia, because they marked important times of the year. (start of spring, beginning of winter, etc. etc. etc.) The fact that they line up so closely in so many cases is NOT an accident, I assure you.

-Arlos

[Gaazy]

Shaeaesh, I need to learn how to read ><