''The Jesus Mysteries: Was the "Original Jesus" a Pagan God?'' is a 1999 book by British authors Timothy Freke and Peter Gandy, which advances the argument that
early Christianity
Early Christianity (up to the First Council of Nicaea in 325) spread from the Levant, across the Roman Empire, and beyond. Originally, this progression was closely connected to already established Jewish centers in the Holy Land and the Jewis ...
originated as a
Greco-Roman mystery cult and that
Jesus
Jesus, likely from he, יֵשׁוּעַ, translit=Yēšūaʿ, label= Hebrew/ Aramaic ( AD 30 or 33), also referred to as Jesus Christ or Jesus of Nazareth (among other names and titles), was a first-century Jewish preacher and religiou ...
was
invented by early Christians based on an alleged pagan cult of a
dying and rising "godman" known as Osiris-Dionysus, whose worship the authors claim was manifested in the cults of
Osiris
Osiris (, from Egyptian ''wsjr'', cop, ⲟⲩⲥⲓⲣⲉ , ; Phoenician: 𐤀𐤎𐤓, romanized: ʾsr) is the god of fertility, agriculture, the afterlife, the dead, resurrection, life, and vegetation in ancient Egyptian religion. He wa ...
,
Dionysus
In ancient Greek religion and myth, Dionysus (; grc, Διόνυσος ) is the god of the grape-harvest, winemaking, orchards and fruit, vegetation, fertility, insanity, ritual madness, religious ecstasy, festivity, and theatre. The Roma ...
,
Attis
Attis (; grc-gre, Ἄττις, also , , ) was the consort of Cybele, in Phrygian and Greek mythology.
His priests were eunuchs, the ''Galli'', as explained by origin myths pertaining to Attis castrating himself. Attis was also a Phrygian v ...
, and
Mithras
Mithraism, also known as the Mithraic mysteries or the Cult of Mithras, was a Roman mystery religion centered on the god Mithras. Although inspired by Iranian worship of the Zoroastrian divinity (''yazata'') Mithra, the Roman Mithras is link ...
.
The authors propose that Jesus did not literally exist as an historically identifiable individual, but was instead a
syncretic
Syncretism () is the practice of combining different beliefs and various schools of thought. Syncretism involves the merging or assimilation of several originally discrete traditions, especially in the theology and mythology of religion, thu ...
re-interpretation of the fundamental pagan "godman" by the
Gnostic
Gnosticism (from grc, γνωστικός, gnōstikós, , 'having knowledge') is a collection of religious ideas and systems which coalesced in the late 1st century AD among Jewish and early Christian sects. These various groups emphasized pe ...
s, who the authors assert were the original sect of Christianity. Freke and Gandy argue that
orthodox
Orthodox, Orthodoxy, or Orthodoxism may refer to:
Religion
* Orthodoxy, adherence to accepted norms, more specifically adherence to creeds, especially within Christianity and Judaism, but also less commonly in non-Abrahamic religions like Neo-pa ...
Christianity was not the predecessor to Gnosticism, but a later outgrowth that rewrote history in order to make literal Christianity appear to predate the Gnostics. They describe their theory as the "Jesus Mysteries thesis".
Thesis
Freke and Gandy base ''The Jesus Mysteries'' thesis partly on a series of parallels between their suggested biography of
Osiris-Dionysus
Dionysus-Osiris, or alternatively, Osiris-Dionysus, is a deity that arises from the syncretism of the Egyptian god Osiris and the Greek god Dionysus. As early as the 5th century BC, the two deities had been identified with each other, seen most not ...
and the biography of Jesus drawn from the four
canonical gospels
Gospel originally meant the Christian message (" the gospel"), but in the 2nd century it came to be used also for the books in which the message was set out. In this sense a gospel can be defined as a loose-knit, episodic narrative of the words a ...
. Their suggested reconstruction of the myth of Osiris-Dionysus, compiled from the myths of ancient dying and resurrected "godmen," bears a striking resemblance to the gospel accounts. The authors give a short list of parallels:
* Osiris-Dionysus is God made flesh, the savior and "
Son of God."
* His
father is God and his mother is a
mortal virgin, 7 month pregnancy.
*
He is born in a cave or humble cowshed on 25 December before three shepherds.
* He offers his followers the chance to be
born again through the rites of
baptism
Baptism (from grc-x-koine, βάπτισμα, váptisma) is a form of ritual purification—a characteristic of many religions throughout time and geography. In Christianity, it is a Christian sacrament of initiation and adoption, almost ...
.
* He miraculously turns water into wine at a
marriage ceremony.
* He rides triumphantly into town on a donkey while people
wave palm leaves to honor him.
* He dies at
Easter
Easter,Traditional names for the feast in English are "Easter Day", as in the '' Book of Common Prayer''; "Easter Sunday", used by James Ussher''The Whole Works of the Most Rev. James Ussher, Volume 4'') and Samuel Pepys''The Diary of Samuel ...
time as a
sacrifice for the sins of the world.
* After his death he
descends to hell, then on the third day he
rises from the dead and ascends to heaven in glory.
* His followers await
his return as the judge during the Last Days.
* His death and resurrection are celebrated by a
ritual meal of bread and wine, which symbolize his body and blood.
According to ''The Jesus Mysteries'', Christianity originated as a Judaized version of the pagan mystery religions.
Hellenized Jews wrote a version of the godman myth incorporating Jewish elements. Initiates learned the myth and its
allegorical
As a literary device or artistic form, an allegory is a narrative or visual representation in which a character, place, or event can be interpreted to represent a hidden meaning with moral or political significance. Authors have used allegory t ...
meanings through the Outer and Inner Mysteries. A similar pattern of "Lesser" and "Greater" Mysteries was part of the pagan
Eleusinian Mysteries
The Eleusinian Mysteries ( el, Ἐλευσίνια Μυστήρια, Eleusínia Mystḗria) were initiations held every year for the cult of Demeter and Persephone based at the Panhellenic Sanctuary of Elefsina in ancient Greece. They are th ...
.
Mithraism was structured around seven serial initiations.
Freke and Gandy suggest that, at some point, groups of Christians who had only experienced the ''Outer'' Mysteries were split off from the elders of the religion and forgot that there had ever ''been'' a second initiation, and that, later, when they encountered groups who had retained the Inner Mysteries, these "Literalist Christians"
s Freke and Gandy call themattacked the "Gnostics" for claiming that what the Literalists considered false knowledge and false initiations, was, in fact, the original second initiation of primal (Gnostic) Christianity. Freke and Gandy claim that the Literalists won out when
the emperor Constantine saw the political merit of 'one empire, one emperor, one god', practically exterminated the Gnostics, and saw to it that 'Literalist Christianity' became the officially-approved
Roman Catholic Church
The Catholic Church, also known as the Roman Catholic Church, is the largest Christian church, with 1.3 billion baptized Catholics worldwide . It is among the world's oldest and largest international institutions, and has played a ...
and its modern descendants.
Reception
Chris Forbes, an ancient historian and senior lecturer at
Macquarie University in
Sydney has criticised the work, noting that Freke and Gandy are "not real scholars, they are popularisers." He calls their arguments about Jesus "grossly misconceived, and their attempt to draw links between Jesus and various pagan god-men is completely muddled. It looks impressive because of the sheer mass of the material, but when you break it down and look at it point by point, it really comes to pieces."
[The Jesus Mysteries - a critique](_blank)
Paul Barnett, a bishop and New Testament scholar who has authored several books on the
historical Jesus
The term "historical Jesus" refers to the reconstruction of the life and teachings of Jesus by critical historical methods, in contrast to religious interpretations. It also considers the historical and cultural contexts in which Jesus lived. ...
, argues that a good proportion of the citations are out of date. "Like the Gnostics, Freke and Gandy have a mystical mindset and therefore oppose Christianity as grounded in history," he wrote. "They hate the idea that the incarnation of the Son of God and his resurrection could have been a matter of actual flesh and blood and time and place."
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, asking him to debate Freke and Gandy concerning their thesis in ''The Jesus Mysteries'', Wright replied that "this was like asking a professional astronomer to debate with the authors of a book claiming the moon was made of green cheese."
New Testament scholar and secular
'', was similarly asked for his views on the work of Freke and Gandy. Not having read their work, he responded by commenting on the thesis, "This is an old argument, even though it shows up every 10 years or so. This current craze that Christianity was a mystery religion like these other mystery religions-the people who are saying this are almost always people who know nothing about the mystery religions; they've read a few popular books, but they're not scholars of mystery religions. The reality is, we know very little about mystery religions-the whole point of mystery religions is that they're secret! So I think it's crazy to build on ignorance in order to make a claim like this." In his 2012 book ''
'', Ehrman, now having actually read the book, addresses many of Freke and Gandy's assertions, demonstrating why they do not hold up to scholarly criticism.
According to Ehrman's analysis, most of Freke and Gandy's alleged evidence is either fabricated, the result of gross misinterpretation, or mere
based on the claims of other writers rather than actual historical evidence.
Ehrman concludes, "This is not serious scholarship. It is sensationalist writing driven by a desire to sell books."
He also remarks that "In both its detail and its overarching thesis, the book often reads like an undergraduate thesis, filled with patently false information and inconsistencies."
He then provides a long list of examples of serious historical errors in the book,
as well as places where Freke and Gandy's own arguments contradict each other.
James Hannam has noted that one of the artifacts that the authors rely on, a depiction of
has stated that ''The Jesus Mysteries'' "will disease" a reader's "mind with rampant unsourced falsehoods and completely miseducate". Although Carrier himself supports the view that Jesus was not a real person, he has condemned the viewpoints on "ancient world and ancient religion" presented in ''The Jesus Mysteries'' as ludicrous and without merit.
;Notes
;Books by Freke and Gandy on the Jesus Mysteries theme
* ''The Jesus Mysteries: Was the "Original Jesus" a Pagan God?'' (1999)
* ''Jesus and the Lost Goddess: The Secret Teachings of the Original Christians'' (2002)
* ''The Laughing Jesus: Religious Lies and Gnostic Wisdom'' (2005)
* ''The Gospel of the Second Coming'' (2007)
;Critique
* ''Reinventing Jesus'', Komoszewski et al., Kregel, , (2006)
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