And now for the mythical Christ. Here we can tread on firmer
ground.
The mythical Messiah was always born of a Virgin Mother--a factor unknown in natural phenomena, and one that cannot be historical, one that can only be explained by means of the Mythos, and those
conditions of primitive sociology which are mirrored in mythology and preserved in theology. The virgin mother has been represented in Egypt by the maiden Queen, Mut-em-ua, the future mother of Amenhept III.
some 16 centuries B.C., who impersonated the eternal virgin that produced the eternal child.
Four consecutive scenes reproduced in my book are found pourtrayed upon the innermost walls of the Holy of Holies in the Temple of Luxor, which was built by Amenhept III., a Pharaoh of the 17th
dynasty. The first scene on the left hand shows the God Taht, the Lunar Mercury, the Annunciator of the Gods, in the act of hailing the Virgin Queen, and announcing to her that she is to give birth to the
coming Son. In the next scene the God Kneph (in conjunction with Hathor) gives the new life. This is the Holy Ghost or Spirit that causes the Immaculate Conception, Kneph being the spirit by name in
Egyptian. The natural effects are made apparent in the virgin's swelling form.
Next the mother is seated on the mid-wife's stool, and the newborn child is supported in the hands of one of the nurses. The fourth scene is that of the Adoration. Here the child is enthroned, receiving
homage from the Gods and gifts from men. Behind the deity Kneph, on the right, three spirits--the Three Magi, or Kings of the Legend, are kneeling and offering presents with their right hand, and life
with their left. The child thus announced, incarnated, born, and worshipped, was the Pharaonic representative of the Aten Sun in Egypt, the God Adon of Syria, and Hebrew Adonai; the child-Christ of the Aten Cult; the miraculous conception of the ever-virgin mother, personated by Mut-em-ua, as mother of the "only one," and representative of the divine mother of the youthful Sun-God.
These scenes, which were mythical in Egypt, have been copied or reproduced as historical in the Canonical Gospels, where they stand like four corner-stones to the Historic Structure, and prove
that the foundations are mythical. Jesus was not only born of the mythical motherhood; his descent on the maternal side is traced in
accordance with this origin of the mythical Christ. The virgin was also called the harlot, because she represented the pre-monogamic stage of intercourse; and Jesus descends from four forms of the
harlot--Thamar, Rahab, Ruth and Bathsheba--each of whom is a form of the "stranger in Israel," and is not a Hebrew woman. Such history, however, does not show that illicit intercourse was the natural
mode of the divine descent; nor does it imply unparalleled human profligacy. It only proves the Mythos.
In human sociology the son of the mother preceded the father, as son of the woman who was a mother, but not a wife. This character is likewise claimed for Jesus, who is made to declare that he
was earlier than Abraham, who was the typical Great Father of the Jews; whether considered to be mythical or historical. Jesus states emphatically that he existed before Abraham was. This is only
possible to the mythical Christ, who preceded the father as son of the virgin mother; and we shall find it so throughout. All that is non-natural and impossible as human history, is possible, natural and
explicable as Mythos.
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It can be explained by the Mythos, because it originated in that which alone accounts for it. For it comes to this at last: the more hidden the meaning in the Gospel history, the more satisfactorily is it
explained by the Mythos; and the more mystical the Christian doctrine, the more easily can it be proved to be mythical.
The birth of Christ is astronomical. The birthday is determined by the full moon of Easter. This can only occur once every 19 years, as we have it illustrated by the Epact or Golden Number of the Prayer Book. Understand me! Jesus, the Christ, can only have a birthday, or resurrection, once in 19 years, in accordance with the Metonic Cycle, because his parents are the sun and moon; and those appear in the earliest known representation of the Man upon the Cross! This proves the astronomical and non-human nature of the birth itself, which is identical with that of the full moon of Easter in Egypt.
Casini, the French Astronomer, has demonstrated the fact that the date assigned for the birth of the Christ is an Astronomical epoch in which the middle conjunction of the moon with the sun happened on the 24th March, at half-past one o'clock in the morning, at the meridian of Jerusalem, the very day of the middle equinox. The following day (the 25th) was the day of the Incarnation, according to Augustine, but the date of the Birth, according to Clement Alexander. For two birth days are assigned to Jesus by the Christian Fathers, one at the Winter Solstice, the other at the Vernal Equinox. These, which cannot both be historical, are based on the two birthdays of the double Horus in Egypt. Plutarch tells us that Isis was delivered of Horus, the child, about the time of the winter Solstice, and that the festival of the second or adult Horus followed the Vernal Equinox. Hence, the
Solstice and spring Equinox were both assigned to the one birth of Jesus by the Christolators; and again, that which is impossible as human history is the natural fact in relation to the two Horuses, the dual form of the Solar God in Egypt.
And here, in passing, we may point out the astronomical nature of the Crucifixion. The Gospel according to John brings on a tradition so different from that of the Synoptics as to invalidate the human history of both. The Synoptics say that Jesus was crucified on the 15th of the month Nisan. John affirms that it was on the 14th of the month. This serious rift runs through the very foundation!
As human history it cannot be explained. But there is an explanation possible, which, if accepted,proves the Mythos. The Crucifixion (or Crossing) was, and still is, determined by the full moon of
Easter. This, in the lunar reckoning, would be on the 14th in the month of 28 days; in the solar month of 30 days it was reckoned to occur on the 15th of the month. Both unite, and the rift closes in
proving the Crucifixion to have been Astronomical, just as it was in Egypt, where the two dates can be identified.
Plutarch also tells us how the Mithraic Cult had been particularly established in Rome about the year 70 B.C. And Mithras was fabled
as having been born in a cave. Wherever Mithras was worshipped the cave was consecrated as his birthplace. The cave can be identified, and the birth of the Messiah in that cave, no matter under
what name he was born, can be definitely dated. The "Cave of Mithras" was the birthplace of the Sun in the Winter Solstice, when this occurred on the 25th of December in the sign of the Sea-Goat,
with the Vernal Equinox in the sign of the Ram. Now the Akkadian name of the tenth month, that of the Sea-Goat, which answers roughly to our December, the tenth by name, is Abba Uddu, that is, the "Cave of Light;" the cave of re-birth for the Sun in the lowest depth at the Solstice, figured as the Cave of Light. This cave was continued as the birthplace of the Christ. You will find it in all the Gospels of the Infancy, and Justin Martyr says, "Christ was born in the Stable, and afterwards took refuge in the Cave." He likewise vouches for the fact that Christ was born on the same day that the Sun was re-born in Stabulo Augiæ, or, in the Stable of Augias. Now the cleansing of this Stable was the sixth labour of Herakles, his first being in the sign of the Lion; and Justin was right; the Stable and Cave are both figured in the same Celestial Sign. But mark this! The Cave was the birthplace of the Solar Messiah from the year 2410 to the year 255 B.C.; at which latter date the Solstice passed out of the Sea-Goat into the sign of the Archer; and no Messiah, whether called Mithras, Adon, Tammuz, Horus or Christ, could have been born in the Cave of Abba Uddu or the Stable of Augias on the 25th of December after the year 255 B.C., therefore, Justin had nothing but the Mithraic
tradition of the by-gone birthday to prove the birth of the Historical Christ 255 years later!
In their mysteries the Sarraceni celebrated the Birth of the babe in the Cave or Subterranean Sanctuary, from which the Priest issued, and cried:--"The Virgin has brought forth: The Light is about to begin to grow again!"--on the Mother-night of the year. And the Sarraceni were not supporters of Historic Christianity.
The birthplace of the Egyptian Messiah at the Vernal Equinox was figured in Apt, or Apta, the corner; but Apta is also the name of the Crib and the Manger; hence the Child born in Apta, was said to be
born in a manger; and this Apta as Crib or Manger is the hieroglyphic sign of the Solar birthplace. Hence the Egyptians exhibited the Babe in the Crib or Manger in the streets of Alexandria. The birthplace was indicated by the colure of the Equinox, as it passed from sign to sign.
It was also pointed out by the Star in the East. When the birthplace was in the sign of the Bull, Orion as the Star that rose in the East to tell where the young Sun-God was re-born. Hence it is called
the "Star of Horus." That was then the Star of the "Three Kings" who greeted the Babe; for the "Three Kings" is still a name of the three stars in Orion's Belt. Here we learn that the legend of the
"Three Kings" is at least 6,000 years old.
In the course of Precession, about 255 B.C., the vernal birthplace passed into the sign of the Fishes,and the Messiah who had been represented for 2155 years by the Ram or Lamb, and previously for
other 2155 years by the Apis Bull, was now imaged as the Fish, or the "Fish-man," called Ichthys in Greek. The original Fish-man--the An of Egypt, and the Oan of Chaldea--probably dates from the previous cycle of precession, or 26,000 years earlier; and about 255 B.C., the Messiah, as the Fish-man, was to come up once more as the Manifestor from the celestial waters. The coming Messiah is called Dag, the Fish, in the Talmud; and the Jews at one time connected his coming with
some conjunction, or occurrence, in the sign of the Fishes! This shows the Jews were not only in possession of the astronomical allegory, but also of the tradition by which it could be interpreted. It was the Mythical and Kronian Messiah alone who was, or could be, the subject of prophecy that might be fulfilled--prophecy that was fulfilled as it is in the Book of Revelation--when the Equinox entered, the cross was re-erected, and the foundations of a new heaven were laid in the sign of the Ram, 2410 B.C.; and, again, when the Equinox entered the sign of the Fishes, 255 B.C. Prophecy that will be again fulfilled when the Equinox enters the sign of the Waterman about the end of this century, to which the Samaritans are still looking forward for the coming of their Messiah, who has not yet arrived for them. The Christians alone ate the oyster; the Jews and Samaritans only got an equal share of the empty shells! The uninstructed Jews, the idiotai, at one time thought the prophecy which was astronomical, and solely related to the cycles of time, was to have its fulfilment in human history. But they found out their error, and bequeathed it unexplained to the still more ignorant Christians. The same tradition of the Coming One is extant amongst the Millenarians and Adventists, as amongst the Moslems. It is the tradition of El-Mahdi, the prophet who is to come in the last days
of the world to conquer all the world, and who was lately descending the Soudan with the old announcement the "Day of the Lord is at hand," which shows that the astronomical allegory has left some relics of the true tradition among the Arabs, who were at one time learned in astronomical lore.
The Messiah, as the Fish-man, is foreseen by Esdras ascending out of the sea as the "same whom God the highest hath kept a great season, which by his own self shall deliver the creature." The ancient Fish-man only came up out of the sea to converse with men and teach them in the daytime. "When the sun set," says Berosus, "it was the custom of this Being to plunge again into the sea, and abide all night in the deep." So the man foreseen by Esdras is only visible by day.
As it is said, "E'en so can no man upon earth see my son, or those that be with him, but in the daytime." This is parodied or fulfilled in the account of Ichthys, the Fish, the Christ who instructs men
by day, but retires to the lake of Galilee, where he demonstrates his solar nature by walking the waters at night, or at the dawn of day.
We are told that his disciples being on board a ship, "when even was come, in the fourth watch of the night, Jesus went unto them walking upon the sea." Now the fourth watch began at three o'clock, and ended at six o'clock. Therefore, this was about the proper time for a solar God to appear walking upon the waters, or coming up out of them as the Oannes. Oannes is said to have taken no food whilst he was with men: "In the daytime he used to converse with men, but took no food at that season." So Jesus, when his disciples prayed him, saying "Master,
eat," said unto them, "I have meat to eat that you know not of. My meat is to do the will of Him that sent me."
This is the perfect likeness of the character of Oannes, who took no food, but whose time was wholly spent in teaching men. Moreover, the mythical Fish-man is made to identify himself. When the Pharisees sought a "sign from heaven," Jesus said, "There shall no sign be given but the sign of Jonas. For as Jonas became a sign unto the Ninevites, so shall also the son of man be to this generation."
The sign of Jonas is that of the Oan, or Fish-man of Nineveh, whether we take it direct from the monuments, or from the Hebrew history of Jonah, or from the Zodiac.
The voice of the secret wisdom here says truly that those who are looking for signs, can have no other than that of the returning Fish-man, Ichthys, Oannes, or Jonah: and assuredly, there was no
other sign or date--than those of Ichthys, the Fish who was re-born of the fish-goddess, Atergatis, in the sign of the Fishes, 255 B.C. After whom the primitive Christians were called little fishes, or
Pisciculi. This date of 255 B.C. was the true day of birth, or rather of re-birth for the celestial Christ, and there was no valid reason for changing the time of the world.
The Gospels contain a confused and confusing record of early Christian belief: things most truly believed (Luke) concerning certain mythical matters, which were ignorantly mistaken for human and historical. The Jesus of our Gospels is but little of a human reality, in spite of all attempts to naturalize the Mythical Christ, and make the story look rational.
The Christian religion was not founded on a man, but on a divinity; that is, a mythical character. So far from being derived from the model man, the typical Christ was made up from the features of
various Gods, after a fashion somewhat like those "pictorial averages" pourtrayed by Mr. Galton, in which the traits of several persons are photographed and fused in a portrait of a dozen different
persons, merged into one that is not anybody. And as fast as the composite Christ falls to pieces, each feature is claimed, each character is gathered up by the original owner, as with the grasp of
gravitation.
It is not I that deny the divinity of Jesus the Christ; I assert it! He never was, and never could be, any other than a divinity; that is, a character non-human, and entirely mythical, who had been the pagan
divinity of various pagan myths, that had been pagan during thousands of years before our Era.
Nothing is more certain, according to honest evidence, than that the Christian scheme of redemption is founded on a fable misinterpreted; that the prophecy of fulfillment was solely astronomical, and the
Coming One as the Christ who came in the end of an age, or of the world, was but a metaphorical figure, a type of time, from the first, which never could take form in historic personality, any more than Time in Person could come out of a clock-case when the hour strikes;
that no Jesus could become a Nazarene by being born at, or taken to, Nazareth; and that the history in our Gospels is from beginning to end the identifiable story of the Sun-God, and the Gnostic Christ
who never could be made flesh. When we did not know the one it was possible to believe the other; but when once we truly know, then the false belief is no longer possible.
The mythical Messiah was Horus in the Osirian Mythos; Har-Khuti in the Sut-Typhonian; Khunsu in that of Amen-Ra; Iu in the cult of Atum-Ra; and the Christ of the Gospels is an amalgam of all these characters.
The Christ is the Good Shepherd!
So was Horus.
Christ is the Lamb of God!
So was Horus.
Christ is the Bread of Life!
So was Horus.
Christ is the Truth and the Life!
So was Horus.
Christ is the Fan-bearer!
So was Horus.
Christ is the Lord!
So was Horus.
Christ is the Way and the Door of Life!
Horus was the path by which they travelled out of the Sepulchre. He is the God whose name is
written with the hieroglyphic sign of the Road or Way.
Jesus is he that should come; and Iu, the root of the name in Egyptian, means "to come." Iu-em-hept, as the Su, the Son of Atum, or of Ptah, was the "Ever-Coming One," who is always pourtrayed as
the marching youngster, in the act and attitude of coming. Horus included both sexes. The Child (or the soul) is of either sex, and potentially, of both. Hence the hermaphrodital Deity; and Jesus, in
Revelation, is the Young Man who has the female paps.
Iu-em-hept signifies he who comes with peace. This is the character in which Jesus is announced by the Angels! And when Jesus comes to his disciples after the resurrection it is as the bringer of peace.
"Learn of me and ye shall find rest," says the Christ. unsu-Nefer-Hept is the Good Rest, Peace in Person! The Egyptian Jesus, Iu-em-Hept, was the second Atum; Paul's Jesus is the second Adam. In one rendition of John's Gospel, instead of the "only-begotten Son of God," a variant reading gives the "only-begotten God," which has been declared an impossible rendering. But the "only-begotten God" was an especial type in Egyptian Mythology, and the phrase re-identifies the divinity whose
emblem is the beetle. Hor-Apollo says, "To denote the only-begotten or a father, the Egyptians delineate a scarabæus!
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