06-30-2006, 01:44 AM
Thad,
You are correct that these dualistic trends influenced Judaism in the post exile period, where the Jews had been exposed to Zoroastrian theology for a very long time, and I said as much in a previous post. But mainstream Judaism dismissed these blasphemous ideas later, along with the bulk of apocryphal writings, which curiously, were embraced by some early Christian sects and can still be seen in Catholic Bibles.
However, in the Christian book of Revelation we see an almost word for word plagiarism of Zoroastrian texts written hundreds of years earlier. Quite literally, in some cases, only the new names of Michael and Satan replace Ahura and Ahriman. In other places we see only slightly more subtle changes. For example, in the Zoroastrian mythos "dragons" will destroy one third of the human population. In the Revelation version the exact same one third of the human population are destroyed, but this time by fire breathing "horses" with sharp teeth like lions, and tails like serpents....hmmmmm. :oops:
Of course, we can hardly blame Jesus for "stuff" written by others after his departure from this world. The amazing thing is why, when so many early Christian writings were dismissed, this one remained "canon" despite how closely it imitated Zoroastrian mythology, and clearly contradicted the Old Testament scriptures Jesus endorsed.
Dan
You are correct that these dualistic trends influenced Judaism in the post exile period, where the Jews had been exposed to Zoroastrian theology for a very long time, and I said as much in a previous post. But mainstream Judaism dismissed these blasphemous ideas later, along with the bulk of apocryphal writings, which curiously, were embraced by some early Christian sects and can still be seen in Catholic Bibles.
However, in the Christian book of Revelation we see an almost word for word plagiarism of Zoroastrian texts written hundreds of years earlier. Quite literally, in some cases, only the new names of Michael and Satan replace Ahura and Ahriman. In other places we see only slightly more subtle changes. For example, in the Zoroastrian mythos "dragons" will destroy one third of the human population. In the Revelation version the exact same one third of the human population are destroyed, but this time by fire breathing "horses" with sharp teeth like lions, and tails like serpents....hmmmmm. :oops:
Of course, we can hardly blame Jesus for "stuff" written by others after his departure from this world. The amazing thing is why, when so many early Christian writings were dismissed, this one remained "canon" despite how closely it imitated Zoroastrian mythology, and clearly contradicted the Old Testament scriptures Jesus endorsed.
Dan
