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What did Muhammad look like, anyway?

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JulesMaximus

No Lifer
Jul 3, 2003
74,584
984
126
He looks like a game show host.

:confused:

3757253356_alg_resize_drew_carey_bob_barker_jpg_xlarge.jpeg
 

GagHalfrunt

Lifer
Apr 19, 2001
25,284
1,998
126
Not arguing against the rest of your post, but I never understood why some people see a connection between the "sun god" and "son of god" concepts. At least outside of son and sun being homophones in English (but not in any relevant ancient languages that I'm aware of)

Really? In an area with a couple of dozen different languages and at a time when almost nothing is written down and all stories are passed along in a five-thousand year, thousand mile long game of telephone you don't see how "sun god, died and resurrected" morphs into "son of god, died and resurrected"? Really? It doesn't matter what ancient language it is or that they're not homophones in all languages. All that's important is the concept. Person A tells person B about a sun god, B repeats it to C and when C passes it to D he says "son of" instead of sun.

There were many gods in many religions in that area who predated Jesus and had almost the exact same life story. Born of a virgin with a name similar to Mary or Meri of Meary around the winter solstice, sun god or son of god, little known about him from age 1 to age 30, then became famous, died via being nailed to a tree or a cross, resurrected after 1 day or 2 days or 3 days, fed the hungry, etc etc. That basic story is a template for Horus, Zoroaster, Attis of Phyrgia, Dionysus, Romulus, Mithra and a bunch of others with varying degrees of similarity. There's not a single aspect of Jesus that isn't a direct rip-off from another god in the same region that came first.
 

destrekor

Lifer
Nov 18, 2005
28,799
359
126
Really? In an area with a couple of dozen different languages and at a time when almost nothing is written down and all stories are passed along in a five-thousand year, thousand mile long game of telephone you don't see how "sun god, died and resurrected" morphs into "son of god, died and resurrected"? Really? It doesn't matter what ancient language it is or that they're not homophones in all languages. All that's important is the concept. Person A tells person B about a sun god, B repeats it to C and when C passes it to D he says "son of" instead of sun.

There were many gods in many religions in that area who predated Jesus and had almost the exact same life story. Born of a virgin with a name similar to Mary or Meri of Meary around the winter solstice, sun god or son of god, little known about him from age 1 to age 30, then became famous, died via being nailed to a tree or a cross, resurrected after 1 day or 2 days or 3 days, fed the hungry, etc etc. That basic story is a template for Horus, Zoroaster, Attis of Phyrgia, Dionysus, Romulus, Mithra and a bunch of others with varying degrees of similarity. There's not a single aspect of Jesus that isn't a direct rip-off from another god in the same region that came first.

You're not even going back far enough. ;)

El, Hadad (also sometimes referred to only as Baal), and Asherah, among many many others, are also all quite implicated in the trappings of later belief systems. While not necessarily invoking the concept of death/rebirth, that much is hardly the only commonality between modern religions and ancient religions. Heck, I find it fascinating more that at one time, Judaism quite strongly acknowledged that, while there are many deities, Yahweh was the most supreme of them all, and it really isn't detailed if he is in that position by way of nature, or if it was entirely because of the covenant established. Yahweh, the more ancient descriptions of him at least, heavily matched those of El (and Hadad at times, unless I am mistaken).

Many of the polytheistic religions match quite a bit to the ancient Sumerian, Akkadian, Assyrian, and Canaanite beliefs.
 

GagHalfrunt

Lifer
Apr 19, 2001
25,284
1,998
126
You're not even going back far enough. ;)

El, Hadad (also sometimes referred to only as Baal), and Asherah, among many many others, are also all quite implicated in the trappings of later belief systems. While not necessarily invoking the concept of death/rebirth, that much is hardly the only commonality between modern religions and ancient religions. Heck, I find it fascinating more that at one time, Judaism quite strongly acknowledged that, while there are many deities, Yahweh was the most supreme of them all, and it really isn't detailed if he is in that position by way of nature, or if it was entirely because of the covenant established. Yahweh, the more ancient descriptions of him at least, heavily matched those of El (and Hadad at times, unless I am mistaken).

Many of the polytheistic religions match quite a bit to the ancient Sumerian, Akkadian, Assyrian, and Canaanite beliefs.

All true. But the farther you go back the more the story changes. You can go WAY back, 10,000 years or so and pick up pieces of the myth. Some gods were born of virgins on the winter solstice, some were crucified, some were resurrected, most healed the sick and fed the hungry, etc etc. But it wasn't until the period from like 1,500BC to 200BC that the full story came together for the more modern gods like Horus, Mithra, Zoroaster and Attis. They were all influenced by various bits and pieces of the earlier pagan myths, but the whole story coalesced around them and they're who the Christians stole the story from virtually word-for-word.
 

Dari

Lifer
Oct 25, 2002
17,133
38
91
Here's a good documentary on the origin of Islam that led to death threats against the author, Tom Holland, and his family. According to an op/ed in the WSJ, there was palpable fear as he was making this documentary. But make it he did. I also posted here years ago that Islam is a bastardization of Judaism, Christianity and Hinduism. In fact, the Kaaba in Mecca used to be a Shiva temple before it was turned into the Holy of Holies of Islam.

http://vimeo.com/79051482
 

Exophase

Diamond Member
Apr 19, 2012
4,439
9
81
Really? In an area with a couple of dozen different languages and at a time when almost nothing is written down and all stories are passed along in a five-thousand year, thousand mile long game of telephone you don't see how "sun god, died and resurrected" morphs into "son of god, died and resurrected"? Really? It doesn't matter what ancient language it is or that they're not homophones in all languages. All that's important is the concept. Person A tells person B about a sun god, B repeats it to C and when C passes it to D he says "son of" instead of sun.

Where are you getting "died and resurrected" as part of "sun god"? You're putting it like one is a standard component of the other...

I can't find anything in your common narrative listed for Horus here:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Horus

Or any connection with Zoroaster, Romulus, being a sun god. I can find reference to a mistaken conflation between Attis and "Atys" son of Croesus. Connections between Dionysus and the sun seem to be along the lines of "attributes of gods were basically interchangeable."

If you think I'm arguing against common patterns in the Jesus narratives appearing in other deity narratives that predated him then you're missing the point. I'm ONLY saying that I don't understand where people connect the "sun god" and "son of god" concepts, unless it's stretched to where you basically just see "sun god" in a huge swath of ancient gods. And I've seen this connection repeated a lot, even by Christians explaining the importation of pagan holidays.