When one sincerely
begins to search the Scriptures, it is discovered
that many things practiced by churches today are not
commanded in the Bible. It is imparative that we
humble ourselves to the Word, or we will not be the
truly obedient children of the Most High. Ironically,
when we research the texts to uncover the origin of
these beliefs, we discover that they are derived
ultimately from paganism. The Roman Catholic Church
absorbed these pagan observances into their sacred
calendar in order to gain adherents to the church.
What is Easter? It
is a pagan observance of Rome, transplanted from
Babylon, in the pretense of remembering Christ's
resurrection. What does the word "Easter"
mean? Easter is a translation of the names
"Astarte" or "Ishtar", one of the
many names of the Babylonian goddess, Semeramis.
These names mean "godess of fertility and erotic
love" and "earth-mother goddess of love and
reproductive forces". In Babylonian religion,
she was the sister and wife of the god Tammuz, who
was said to have died and rose annually with the
dying and reviving vegetation. Tammuz was weeped for
at dying, but Ishatar was whom they rejoiced for at
the resurrection. Easter is the resurrection festival
dedicated to Ishtar, just as it was in Babylon nearly
4,000 years ago.
The Encyclopedia
Britannica states, "there is no indication of
the observance of the Easter festival in the New
Testament, or in any writings of the apostolic
fathers." Volume 7, page 858. It was not until
Constantine called the council of Nicaea in A.D. 325
that the festival of Easter was commanded to be kept
on the day dedicated to the sun in all nations under
his reign. It was decided that Easter must be
celebrated everywhere on the same day, and that day
was to be Sunday. The church elevates the Easter
holiday to a prominent position on its sacred
calendar, even though its never been mentioned in the
Bible, yet the holy season of Passover and the Feast
of Unleavened Bread that were commanded by our LORD
are never observed generally in Christianity.
What about the many
customs of Easter? Have you ever thought or wondered
about Easter eggs or Easter bunnies? The use of
rabbits and eggs is part of pagan sex fertility
worship. We use it in honoring the LORD JESUS CHRIST
and teach our children that the resurrection, bunnies
and eggs all go together -- a mixture of pagan
worship attributed unto GOD -- an abomination in HIS
sight. The rabbit is a symbol of Semeramis, the
goddess of fertility, because of its rapid
reproduction. Eggs have been used in many religious
rites, including the Egyptians and Greeks. Asarte
herself is said to hatched from a wonderous egg that
fell from heaven into the river Euphrates, which was
rolled ashore by the fish and hatched by doves. Even
hot cross buns were used in the worship of the
"queen of heaven". The history of the hot
cross buns began in Babylon, and were made in honor
of Semiramis. In Jeremiah 7:16-20 it tells us,
"Therefore pray not thou for this people,
neither lift up cry nor prayer for them, neither make
intercession to Me: for I will not hear thee. Seest
thou not what they do in the cities of Judah and in
the streets of Jerusalem? 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. Do they provoke Me to
anger? saith the Lord: do they not provoke themselves
to the confusion of their own faces? Therefore thus
saith the Lord God; Behold, mine anger and My fury
shall be poured out upon this place, upon man, and
upon beast, and upon the trees of the field, and upon
the fruit of the ground; and it shall burn, and shall
not be quenched."
Let us consider
another tradition of our elders, the Easter sunrise
service. Honoring Christ? Telling the world of His
resurrection? Wearing of new hats? Sunday is the
first day of the week. Have you ever considered what
the word even stands for? Sunday - sun day - is the
day of heathen sun worship and honors the sun god
Baal that God forbade the children of Israel to
worship. It comes from the sun worshippers of
Babylon. The word "Easter" also even
implies their worship. They rose early and faced the
East. Let us turn to the book of Ezekiel and read
what God showed Ezekiel was taking place in His
house, the temple itself. Ezekiel 8, starting with
verse 5, and reading through verse 16: "and they
worshipped the sun towards the East." We say,
"but we don't worship the sun, we are honoring
Christ." So was Jesus Christ then resurrected at
the same time as the "rising sun" of the
pagan "Easter-Sun worship"? Does God give
His glory to another? Isaiah 42:8 says, "I am
the LORD: that is My name: and My glory will I not
give to another, neither my praise to graven
images." No, Jesus Christ was not resurrected in
the morning, and the rising sun does not depict the
resurrection of Christ.
Have you ever
wondered, or tried to figure out, how the Scriptures
say Jesus would be three days and three nights in the
grave, yet it does not agree with the traditions of
our elders that we are taught even to this day? Read
Matthew 12:38-40, "Then certain of the scribes
and of the Pharisees answered, saying, Master, we
would see a sign from thee. But He answered and said
unto them, An evil and adulterous generation seeketh
after a sign; and there shall no sign be given to it,
but the sign of the prophet Jonas: For as Jonas was
three days and three nights in the whale's belly; so
shall the Son of man be three days and three nights
in the heart of the earth." Read Mark 8:31,
"And He began to teach them, that the Son of man
must suffer many things, and be rejected of the
elders, and of the chief priests, and scribes, and be
killed, and after three days rise again."Or in
Luke 24:7, "Saying, The Son of man must be
delivered into the hands of sinful men, and be
crucified, and the third day rise again." They
all say three days and three nights, the same as
Jonah 1:17. Leviticus 23:32 tells us that the day
ended at sunset and began at sunrise. "It shall
be unto you a sabbath of rest, and ye shall afflict
your souls: in the ninth day of the month at even,
from even unto even, shall ye celebrate your
sabbath." I wonder, is it possible that Jesus
was crucified on Wednesday? Buried at sunset, and 72
hours later (3 days), arose at sunset, the end of the
sabbath day and the beginning of the first day?
The very root of
"Good Friday" observances is based on
mistruth. Have you ever wondered what Good Friday
meant, or just where that phrase came from? If you
will look up Friday, you will find that it comes from
"Freya," who was worshipped as the goddess
of FERTILITY, and her symbol was the fish, a
well-known symbol of worship among ancient Babylon.
The symbol of the fish was worshipped because of its
high reproductive rate. A single codfish annually
spawns upwards of nine million eggs. Why is Friday
known as fish day? The ancient pagan worship of
"Freya," the goddess of fertility,
symbolized by the fish, as carried over into the
early Catholic religion in order to bring thousands
of pagan worshippers into the Catholic church.
(Source: Encyclopedia of Religions) I wonder if we
are not in some way accountable to Revelation
22:18-19 in regards to our handling of the Scriptures
given by Jesus Himself in the matter of His death and
resurrection? "For I testify unto every man that
heareth the words of the prophecy of this book, if
any man shall add unto these things, God shall add
unto him the plagues that are written in this book:
And if any man shall take away from the words of the
book of this prophecy, God shall take away his part
out of the book of life, and out of the holy city,
and from the things which are written in this
book."
Even the observance
of the forty day abstinence that immediately precedes
Easter, Lent, has its roots in worshipping the
"queen of heaven". Just as on December 25th
a great celebration and feast was held in Babylon to
honor the birth of Tammuz, so in that same country
the forty days fast was a preliminary of the great
feast held in commemoration of the death and
resurrection of the same idol. Lent is still observed
by the pagan worshippers of Koordistan who inherited
it from their early masters, the Babylonians. It was
also celebrated by pagan Egypt, and in the Jewish
calendar, the month in which this is celebrated is
called Tammuz. In the pagan rites, the abstinence was
not from food, but a sexual abstinence that
terminated in a sex orgy. The Catholic Church brought
over this forty-day abstinence also, but as a food
abstinence, a forty day fast. Yet, the fast is only
from meat, and fish is eaten as a substitute, which
as we've just seen, is a fertility symbol.
I wonder, does God
accept it or is it an abomination to Him? I wonder if
He is calling, "Come out of her, My people, that
ye be not partakers of her sins, and that ye receive
not of her plagues?" (Revelation 18:4, "And
I heard another voice from heaven, saying, come out
of her, My people, that ye be not par-takers of her
sins, and that ye receive not of her plagues."
And Luke 16:15, "And He said unto them, Ye are
they which justify yourselves before men, but God
knoweth your hearts: for that which is highly
esteemed among men is abomination in the sight of
God.")
I wonder ... Are we
carrying our sins and the sins of our elders because
of these abominations, and are we under the curse
that God Himself places on us in Deuteronomy 5:7-9?
"Thou shalt have none other gods before Me. Thou
shalt not make thee any graven image, or any likeness
of any thing that is in heaven above, or that is In
the earth beneath, or that is in the waters beneath
the earth: Thou shalt not bow down thyself unto them,
nor serve them: for I the Lord thy God am a jealous
God, visiting the Iniquity of the fathers upon the
children unto the third and fourth generation of them
that hate Me ..." A more correct translation is,
"of them that do not obey MY WORD.
If so, we all need
to repent and do as Daniel did in 9:3-11, where he
repented for his sins and the sins of his fathers and
the sins of the Nation. "And I set my face unto
the Lord God, to seek by prayer and supplications,
with fasting, and sackcloth and ashes; And I prayed
unto the Lord my God, and made my confession, and
said, 0 Lord, the great and dreadful God, keeping the
covenant and mercy to them that love Him, and to them
that keep His commandments; We have sinned, and have
committed iniquity, and have done wickedly, and have
rebelled, even by departing from thy precepts and
from thy judgments: Neither have we hearkened unto
thy servants the prophets, which spake in Thy name to
our kings, our princes, and our fathers, and to all
the people of the land.
(This article has
been compiled by Amy DuFresne from information from
the following sources: Thoughts From My Notebook -
Glen Miller, Easter - Christian or Pagan - Richard A.
Davis, Lent, Good Friday, and Easter - R.F. Becker,
and Mourn the Easter Apostasy - John Quincy Adams)
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