Jesus clearly tells us at John 8:32
"and you will know the truth, and the truth will set you free.”
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| The cross
You may assume that Christians were the first to use the cross.
The Encyclopedia Americana, however, speaks of "its ancient usage by
both Hindus and Buddhists in India and China, and by the Persians,
Assyrians, and Babylonians." Similarly, Chambers's Encyclopaedia,
(1969 edition) says that the cross "was an emblem to which religious
and mystical meanings were attached long before the Christian era."
Indeed, there is no evidence that early Christians used the cross in their worship.
During the early days of Christianity, it was the pagan Romans who used the cross!
Says The Companion Bible: "These crosses were used as symbols of the Babylonian sun-god
and are first seen on a coin of Julius Caesar, 100-44 B.C., and then on a
coin struck by Caesar's heir (Augustus), 20 B.C." The Roman nature-god Bacchus was
at times represented with a headband containing a number of crosses.
In 312 C.E., Constantine, ruling the area now known as France and Britain,
headed out to war against his brother-in-law, Maxentius, of Italy.
En route he reportedly saw a vision a cross on which were the words
"Hoc vince," meaning, "By this conquer." After his victory,
Constantine made the cross the standard of his armies.
When Christianity later became the state religion of the Roman Empire,
the cross became the symbol of the church.
The Truth is:
The cross is of pagan origin
also, God does not approve of the use of images.
The crucifix
We now know the pagan origin of the cross
What can we learn from the Bible about the crucifix
Lets look at the prophecy recorded for us at Genesis 3:15.
"And I(God) will put enmity between you(satan)and the woman(God's faithful angles) and
between your offspring(satan's demons & followers) and her(the woman) offspring.(God's faithful servants)
He(Jesus) will crush your(satan) head,
and you(satan) will strike him(Jesus) in the heel.
The Truth is:
The crucifix memorializes the painful heel wound that
Jesus suffered at the hands of satan and his offspring.
Also the fact is: Jesus died on a stake not a cross.
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| The trinity
In An Encyclopedia of Religion, edited by Vergilius Ferm, 1964, on pages 793 and 794,
under the word "triad," are listed the trinities of the Babylonian, Buddhist, Hindu,
Norse, Taoist, and other religions, as well as those of Christendom. As an example,
it notes that in India, "the great Triad include Brahma, the Creator, Vishnu, the
Preserver and Shiva, the Destroyer. These represent the cycle of existence,
just as the Babylonian triad of Anu, Enlil and Ea represent the materials of
existence, air, water, earth."
The New Encyclopædia Britannica, 1985, Micropædia, Volume 11, page 928,
says under the subject of Trinity: "Neither the word Trinity nor
the explicit doctrine appears in the New Testament,
nor did Jesus and his followers intend to contradict the Shema
in the Old Testament: 'Hear, O Israel: The Lord our God is one Lord.'
(Deut. 6:4)" This encyclopedia also says: "The doctrine developed
gradually over several centuries and through many controversies. . . .
The Council of Nicaea in 325 stated the crucial formula for that
doctrine in its confession that the Son is 'of the same substance . . .
as the Father,' even though it said very little about the Holy Spirit. . . .
By the end of the 4th century . . . the doctrine of the Trinity took
substantially the form it has maintained ever since."
History confirms that the Trinity was borrowed from pagans and was in existence
centuries before Jesus came to the earth. Long after his death, it was promoted
by those who had been influenced by pagan philosophies and who had apostatized
from the true worship of God as taught by Jesus and the apostles
The Truth is:
The Trinitarian dogma is a late
fourth-century invention rooted in pagan religions
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| Immortal soul
Plato believed: "The soul is immortal and imperishable, and our souls will
truly exist in another world!" The Dialogues of Plato.
The immortal-soul teaching, however, goes back much further than Plato.
In the book The Religion of Babylonia and Assyria, by Morris Jastrow, we read:
"The problem of immortality engaged the serious attention of the Babylonian theologians
Death was a passage to another kind of life." Also, the book Egyptian Religion,
by Siegfried Morenz, states: "The early Egyptians regarded life after death
simply as a continuation of life on earth." The Jewish Encyclopedia notes the
connection with these ancient religions and Plato when it says that Plato was
led to the immortal-soul idea "through Orphic and Eleusinian mysteries in which
Babylonian and Egyptian views were strangely blended."
“The early Christian philosophers adopted the Greek concept of the soul’s
immortality and thought of the soul as being created by God and infused
into the body at conception.” The New Encyclopædia Britannica (1988), Volume 11, page 25.
When God created the first man, Adam, He did not infuse into him an immortal soul
but the life force that is maintained by breathing. Therefore, “soul”
in the Biblical sense refers to the entire living being. If separated from the
life force originally given by God, the soul dies.
The doctrine of the immortality of the soul raised questions:
Where do souls go after death? What happens to the souls of the wicked?
When nominal Christians adopted the myth of the immortal soul,
this led them to accept another myth?—the teaching of hellfire.
The Truth is:
Satan also told Eve that she would not die
The Immortal-soul idea is rooted in pagan worship
It's not supprising that false religion promotes Satan's lie
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| Hellfire
About 2,000 years before the birth of Jesus, the Sumerians and the Babylonians believed
in an underworld that they called the Land of No Return. This ancient belief is reflected
in the Sumerian and the Akkadian poems known as "The Epic of Gilgamesh" and the "Descent
of Ishtar to the Underworld." They describe this abode of the dead as a house of darkness,
"the house which none leave who have entered it."
"The extreme care that the Etruscans took of their dead is explained by their conception of the nether regions.
Like the Babylonians, they considered these to be places of torture and despair for the manes
[spirits of the dead]. The only relief for them could come from propitiatory offerings made
by their descendants." Another reference work declares: "Etruscan tombs show scenes of
horror that inspired Christian paintings of hell."
Interestingly, it would appear that the torments of the Egyptian, Hindu, Jain, Buddhist, and Zoroastrian
versions of hell are not everlasting. According to these religions, after a period of suffering,
the souls of sinners move on to some other place or state, depending on the particular religion's
concept of human destiny. Their ideas of hell resemble Catholicism's purgatory.
"HELL," explains the New Catholic Encyclopedia, is the word "used to signify the place
of the damned." A Protestant encyclopedia defines hell as "the place of future punishment
for the wicked." But belief in such a place of punishment after death is not limited to the
main churches of Christendom. It originated many centuries before Christendom came into existence.
What crime, however horrible, could cause a God of love to torture a person endlessly?
The Truth is:
God is a God of Love
He does not punish people in hell
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| Mother of God
As a further example of the parallel between ancient Babylon and modern religion,
consider the following description taken from the same encyclopedia: "Her faithful
believers call her by the sweetest names: She is not only goddess and lady but
also merciful mother, she who listens to prayers, she who intercedes . . .
she who has given life to the universe and to humanity." Compare that to the
following prayer from El Santo Rosario (The Holy Rosary): "We give you thanks,
Sovereign Princess, for the favors we receive every day from your beneficent
hand; be so kind, Lady, as to have us now and forever under your protection and shelter."
Who is the subject of this description and the prayer? Many will immediately conclude,
"The Virgin Mary." That answer is only half right. The prayer is offered to Mary.
However, as Las Grandes Religiones Ilustradas informs us, the first quotation is
a description of Ishtar, the "Lady of Love," the Babylonian goddess of fertility,
love, and war. Sometimes she is presented in images "as a mother suckling her baby boy."*
Yet another example of how modern religion is not such a far cry from ancient Babylon!
The Truth is:
Mary was the mother of the Son of God,
not of God himself.
The "Lady of Love" worship gave birth to
the worship of Mary as the Mother of God
False religion has built upon the Babylonish ideas and doctrines
In Rev 18:1-5, your bible says
"get out of her "Babylon the Great" if you do not want to share in her sins"
We can see why at John 8:44
Jesus called Satan "the father of the lie"
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