The Two Babylons, Alexander Hislop, Chapter V, Section VI, The Sign of the Cross
There
is yet one more symbol of the Romish worship to be noticed, and that is
the sign of the cross. In the Papal system as is well known, the sign
of the cross and the image of the cross are all in all. No prayer can be
said, no worship engaged in, no step almost can be taken, without the
frequent use of the sign of the cross. The cross is looked upon as the
grand charm, as the great refuge in every season of danger, in every
hour of temptation as the infallible preservative from all the powers of
darkness. The cross is adored with all the homage due only to the Most
High; and for any one to call it, in the hearing of a genuine Romanist,
by the Scriptural term, "the accursed tree," is a mortal offence. To say
that such superstitious feeling for the sign of the cross, such worship
as Rome pays to a wooden or a metal cross, ever grew out of the saying
of Paul, "God forbid that I should glory, save in the cross of our Lord
Jesus Christ"--that is, in the doctrine of Christ crucified--is a mere
absurdity, a shallow subterfuge and pretence. The magic virtues
attributed to the so-called sign of the cross, the worship bestowed on
it, never came from such a source. The same sign of the cross that Rome
now worships was used in the Babylonian Mysteries, was applied by
Paganism to the same magic purposes, was honoured with the same honours.
That which is now called the Christian cross was originally no
Christian emblem at all, but was the mystic Tau of the Chaldeans and
Egyptians--the true original form of the letter T--the initial of the
name of Tammuz--which, in Hebrew, radically the same as ancient Chaldee,
was found on coins. That mystic Tau was marked in baptism on the
foreheads of those initiated in the Mysteries, * and was used in every
variety of way as a most sacred symbol.
*
TERTULLIAN, De Proescript. Hoeret. The language of Tertullian implies
that those who were initiated by baptism in the Mysteries were marked on
the forehead in the same way, as his Christian countrymen in Africa,
who had begun by this time to be marked in baptism with the sign of the
cross.
To
identify Tammuz with the sun it was joined sometimes to the circle of
the sun; sometimes it was inserted in the circle. Whether the Maltese
cross, which the Romish bishops append to their names as a symbol of
their episcopal dignity, is the letter T, may be doubtful; but there
seems no reason to doubt that that Maltese cross is an express symbol of
the sun; for Layard found it as a sacred symbol in Nineveh in such a
connection as led him to identify it with the sun. The mystic Tau, as
the symbol of the great divinity, was called "the sign of life"; it was
used as an amulet over the heart; it was marked on the official garments
of the priests, as on the official garments of the priests of Rome; it
was borne by kings in their hand, as a token of their dignity or
divinely-conferred authority. The Vestal virgins of Pagan Rome wore it
suspended from their necklaces, as the nuns do now. The Egyptians did
the same, and many of the barbarous nations with whom they had
intercourse, as the Egyptian monuments bear witness. In reference to the
adorning of some of these tribes, Wilkinson thus writes: "The girdle
was sometimes highly ornamented; men as well as women wore earrings; and
they frequently had a small cross suspended to a necklace, or to the
collar of their dress. The adoption of this last was not peculiar to
them; it was also appended to, or figured upon, the robes of the
Rot-n-no; and traces of it may be seen in the fancy ornaments of the
Rebo, showing that it was already in use as early as the fifteenth
century before the Christian era." There is hardly a Pagan tribe where
the cross has not been found. The cross was worshipped by the Pagan
Celts long before the incarnation and death of Christ. "It is a fact,"
says Maurice, "not less remarkable than well-attested, that the Druids
in their groves were accustomed to select the most stately and beautiful
tree as an emblem of the Deity they adored, and having cut the side
branches, they affixed two of the largest of them to the highest part of
the trunk, in such a manner that those branches extended on each side
like the arms of a man, and, together with the body, presented the
appearance of a HUGE CROSS, and on the bark, in several places, was also
inscribed the letter Thau." It was worshipped in Mexico for ages before
the Roman Catholic missionaries set foot there, large stone crosses
being erected, probably to the "god of rain." The cross thus widely
worshipped, or regarded as a sacred emblem, was the unequivocal symbol
of Bacchus, the Babylonian Messiah, for he was represented with a
head-band covered with crosses. This symbol of the Babylonian god is
reverenced at this day in all the wide wastes of Tartary, where Buddhism
prevails, and the way in which it is represented among them forms a
striking commentary on the language applied by Rome to the Cross. "The
cross," says Colonel Wilford, in the Asiatic Researches, "though not an
object of worship among the Baud'has or Buddhists, is a favourite emblem
and device among them. It is exactly the cross of the Manicheans, with
leaves and flowers springing from it. This cross, putting forth leaves
and flowers (and fruit also, as I am told), is called the divine tree,
the tree of the gods, the tree of life and knowledge, and productive of
whatever is good and desirable, and is placed in the terrestrial
paradise." Compare this with the language of Rome applied to the cross,
and it will be seen how exact is the coincidence. In the Office of the
Cross, it is called the "Tree of life," and the worshippers are taught
thus to address it: "Hail, O Cross, triumphal wood, true salvation of
the world, among trees there is none like thee in leaf, flower, and
bud...O Cross, our only hope, increase righteousness to the godly and
pardon the offences of the guilty." *
*
The above was actually versified by the Romanisers in the Church of
England, and published along with much besides from the same source,
some years ago, in a volume entitled Devotions on the Passion. The
London Record, of April, 1842, gave the following as a specimen of the
"Devotions" provided by these "wolves in sheep's clothing" for members
of the Church of England:--
"O faithful cross, thou peerless tree,
No forest yields the like of thee,
Leaf, flower, and bud;
Sweet is the wood, and sweet the weight,
And sweet the nails that penetrate
Thee, thou sweet wood."
Can
any one, reading the gospel narrative of the crucifixion, possibly
believe that that narrative of itself could ever germinate into such
extravagance of "leaf, flower, and bud," as thus appears in this Roman
Office? But when it is considered that the Buddhist, like the Babylonian
cross, was the recognised emblem of Tammuz, who was known as the
mistletoe branch, or "All-heal," then it is easy to see how the sacred
Initial should be represented as covered with leaves, and how Rome, in
adopting it, should call it the "Medicine which preserves the healthful,
heals the sick, and does what mere human power alone could never do."
Now,
this Pagan symbol seems first to have crept into the Christian Church
in Egypt, and generally into Africa. A statement of Tertullian, about
the middle of the third century, shows how much, by that time, the
Church of Carthage was infected with the old leaven. Egypt especially,
which was never thoroughly evangelised, appears to have taken the lead
in bringing in this Pagan symbol. The first form of that which is called
the Christian Cross, found on Christian monuments there, is the
unequivocal Pagan Tau, or Egyptian "Sign of life." Let the reader peruse
the following statement of Sir G. Wilkinson: "A still more curious fact
may be mentioned respecting this hieroglyphical character [the Tau],
that the early Christians of Egypt adopted it in lieu of the cross,
which was afterwards substituted for it, prefixing it to inscriptions in
the same manner as the cross in later times. For, though Dr. Young had
some scruples in believing the statement of Sir A. Edmonstone, that it
holds that position in the sepulchres of the great Oasis, I can attest
that such is the case, and that numerous inscriptions, headed by the
Tau, are preserved to the present day on early Christian monuments." The
drift of this statement is evidently this, that in Egypt the earliest
form of that which has since been called the cross, was no other than
the "Crux Ansata," or "Sign of life," borne by Osiris and all the
Egyptian gods; that the ansa or "handle" was afterwards dispensed with,
and that it became the simple Tau, or ordinary cross, as it appears at
this day, and that the design of its first employment on the sepulchres,
therefore, could have no reference to the crucifixion of the Nazarene,
but was simply the result of the attachment to old and long-cherished
Pagan symbols, which is always strong in those who, with the adoption of
the Christian name and profession, are still, to a large extent, Pagan
in heart and feeling. This, and this only, is the origin of the worship
of the "cross."
This,
no doubt, will appear all very strange and very incredible to those who
have read Church history, as most have done to a large extent, even
amongst Protestants, through Romish spectacles; and especially to those
who call to mind the famous story told of the miraculous appearance of
the cross to Constantine on the day before the decisive victory at the
Milvian bridge, that decided the fortunes of avowed Paganism and nominal
Christianity. That story, as commonly told, if true, would certainly
give a Divine sanction to the reverence for the cross. But that story,
when sifted to the bottom, according to the common version of it, will
be found to be based on a delusion--a delusion, however, into which so
good a man as Milner has allowed himself to fall. Milner's account is as
follows: "Constantine, marching from France into Italy against
Maxentius, in an expedition which was likely either to exalt or to ruin
him, was oppressed with anxiety. Some god he thought needful to protect
him; the God of the Christians he was most inclined to respect, but he
wanted some satisfactory proof of His real existence and power, and he
neither understood the means of acquiring this, nor could he be content
with the atheistic indifference in which so many generals and heroes
since his time have acquiesced. He prayed, he implored with such
vehemence and importunity, and God left him not unanswered. While he was
marching with his forces in the afternoon, the trophy of the cross
appeared very luminous in the heavens, brighter than the sun, with this
inscription, 'Conquer by this.' He and his soldiers were astonished at
the sight; but he continued pondering on the event till night. And
Christ appeared to him when asleep with the same sign of the cross, and
directed him to make use of the symbol as his military ensign." Such is
the statement of Milner. Now, in regard to the "trophy of the cross," a
few words will suffice to show that it is utterly unfounded. I do not
think it necessary to dispute the fact of some miraculous sign having
been given. There may, or there may not, have been on this occasion a
"dignus vindice nodus," a crisis worthy of a Divine interposition.
Whether, however, there was anything out of the ordinary course, I do
not inquire. But this I say, on the supposition that Constantine in this
matter acted in good faith, and that there actually was a miraculous
appearance in the heavens, that it as not the sign of the cross that was
seen, but quite a different thing, the name of Christ. That this was
the case, we have at once the testimony of Lactantius, who was the tutor
of Constantine's son Crispus--the earliest author who gives any account
of the matter, and the indisputable evidence of the standards of
Constantine themselves, as handed down to us on medals struck at the
time. The testimony of Lactantius is most decisive: "Constantine was
warned in a dream to make the celestial sign of God upon his solders'
shields, and so to join battle. He did as he was bid, and with the
transverse letter X circumflecting the head of it, he marks Christ on
their shields. Equipped with this sign, his army takes the sword." Now,
the letter X was just the initial of the name of Christ, being
equivalent in Greek to CH. If, therefore, Constantine did as he was bid,
when he made "the celestial sign of God" in the form of "the letter X,"
it was that "letter X," as the symbol of "Christ" and not the sign of
the cross, which he saw in the heavens. When the Labarum, or far-famed
standard of Constantine itself, properly so called, was made, we have
the evidence of Ambrose, the well-known Bishop of Milan, that that
standard was formed on the very principle contained in the statement of
Lactantius--viz., simply to display the Redeemer's name. He calls it
"Labarum, hoc est Christi sacratum nomine signum."--"The Labarum, that
is, the ensign consecrated by the NAME of Christ." *
*
Epistle of Ambrose to the Emperor Theodosius about the proposal to
restore the Pagan altar of Victory in the Roman Senate. The subject of
the Labarum has been much confused through ignorance of the meaning of
the word. Bryant assumes (and I was myself formerly led away by the
assumption) that it was applied to the standard bearing the crescent and
the cross, but he produces no evidence for the assumption; and I am now
satisfied that none can be produced. The name Labarum, which is
generally believed to have come from the East, treated as an Oriental
word, gives forth its meaning at once. It evidently comes from Lab, "to
vibrate," or "move to and fro," and ar "to be active." Interpreted thus,
Labarum signifies simply a banner or flag, "waving to and fro" in the
wind, and this entirely agrees with the language of Ambrose "an ensign
consecrated by the name of Christ," which implies a banner.
There
is not the slightest allusion to any cross--to anything but the simple
name of Christ. While we have these testimonies of Lactantius and
Ambrose, when we come to examine the standard of Constantine, we find
the accounts of both authors fully borne out; we find that that
standard, bearing on it these very words, "Hoc signo victor eris," "In
this sign thou shalt be a conqueror," said to have been addressed from
heaven to the emperor, has nothing at all in the shape of a cross, but
"the letter X." In the Roman Catacombs, on a Christian monument to
"Sinphonia and her sons," there is a distinct allusion to the story of
the vision; but that allusion also shows that the X, and not the cross,
was regarded as the "heavenly sign." The words at the head of the
inscription are these: "In Hoc Vinces [In this thou shalt overcome] X."
Nothing whatever but the X is here given as the "Victorious Sign." There
are some examples, no doubt, of Constantine's standard, in which there
is a cross-bar, from which the flag is suspended, that contains that
"letter X"; and Eusebius, who wrote when superstition and apostacy were
working, tries hard to make it appear that that cross-bar was the
essential element in the ensign of Constantine. But this is obviously a
mistake; that cross-bar was nothing new, nothing peculiar to
Constantine's standard. Tertullian shows that that cross-bar was found
long before on the vexillum, the Roman Pagan standard, that carried a
flag; and it was used simply for the purpose of displaying that flag.
If, therefore, that cross-bar was the "celestial sign," it needed no
voice from heaven to direct Constantine to make it; nor would the making
or displaying of it have excited any particular attention on the part
of those who saw it. We find no evidence at all that the famous legend,
"In this overcome," has any reference to this cross-bar; but we find
evidence the most decisive that that legend does refer to the X. Now,
that that X was not intended as the sign of the cross, but as the
initial of Christ's name, is manifest from this, that the Greek P,
equivalent to our R, is inserted in the middle of it, making by their
union CHR. The standard of Constantine, then, was just the name of
Christ. Whether the device came from earth or from heaven--whether it
was suggested by human wisdom or Divine, supposing that Constantine was
sincere in his Christian profession, nothing more was implied in it than
a literal embodiment of the sentiment of the Psalmist, "In the name of
the Lord will we display our banners." To display that name on the
standards of Imperial Rome was a thing absolutely new; and the sight of
that name, there can be little doubt, nerved the Christian soldiers in
Constantine's army with more than usual fire to fight and conquer at the
Milvian bridge.
In
the above remarks I have gone on the supposition that Constantine acted
in good faith as a Christian. His good faith, however, has been
questioned; and I am not without my suspicions that the X may have been
intended to have one meaning to the Christians and another to the
Pagans. It is certain that the X was the symbol of the god Ham in Egypt,
and as such was exhibited on the breast of his image. Whichever view be
taken, however, of Constantine's sincerity, the supposed Divine warrant
for reverencing the sign of the cross entirely falls to the ground. In
regard to the X, there is no doubt that, by the Christians who knew
nothing of secret plots or devices, it was generally taken, as
Lactantius declares, as equivalent to the name of "Christ." In this
view, therefore, it had no very great attractions for the Pagans, who,
even in worshipping Horus, had always been accustomed to make use of the
mystic tau or cross, as the "sign of life," or the magical charm that
secured all that was good, and warded off everything that was evil.
When, therefore, multitudes of the Pagans, on the conversion of
Constantine, flocked into the Church, like the semi-Pagans of Egypt,
they brought along with them their predilection for the old symbol. The
consequence was, that in no great length of time, as apostacy proceeded,
the X which in itself was not an unnatural symbol of Christ, the true
Messiah, and which had once been regarded as such, was allowed to go
entirely into disuse, and the Tau, the sign of the cross, the
indisputable sign of Tammuz, the false Messiah, was everywhere
substituted in its stead. Thus, by the "sign of the cross," Christ has
been crucified anew by those who profess to be His disciples. Now, if
these things be matter of historic fact, who can wonder that, in the
Romish Church, "the sign of the cross" has always and everywhere been
seen to be such an instrument of rank superstition and delusion?
There
is more, much more, in the rites and ceremonies of Rome that might be
brought to elucidate our subject. But the above may suffice. *
*
If the above remarks be well founded, surely it cannot be right that
this sign of the cross, or emblem of Tammuz, should be used in Christian
baptism. At the period of the Revolution, a Royal Commission, appointed
to inquire into the Rites and Ceremonies of the Church of England,
numbering among its members eight or ten bishops, strongly recommended
that the use of the cross, as tending to superstition, should be laid
aside. If such a recommendation was given then, and that by such
authority as members of the Church of England must respect, how much
ought that recommendation to be enforced by the new light which
Providence has cast on the subject!
_____________________________________________________________________________________
As
many have suspected, there is much more to the true, authentic history
of the Christian religion than what we had originally been told. Some
claims regarding the Church's history are accurate, some are not. The
most extreme claims against the religion come from the atheist camp and
often remain unproved. But this book is completely different. It comes
from a devout Christian, Henry Dana Ward, a believer in Christ who backs
himself up with scholarly research and facts. Why, then, was this book
written if it goes against traditional beliefs and acceptance? It is
because the traditional beliefs surrounding the cross and its worship
are wrong! It took time for us to eventually accept the cross in its
current form and to worship it and, according to Ward, this was a pagan
symbol that should never have been adopted. Idols were not to be
worshipped by the earliest of Christians, and the cross was no exception
to this rule. Not worshipping the cross is consistent with early
Christianity and is not heretical. Its lack of worship is part of
Christianity's foundational beliefs and its exclusion should be part of
the religion's current structure, according to Ward. Revering the cross
is based on lies, deception, and ignorance. Ward shows how the lies
began, who spread them, and how and why they did it.
_____________________________________________________________________________________
You
may be surprised to learn that many traditions of Roman Catholicism in
fact dont come from Christs teachings but from an ancient Babylonian
Mystery religion that was centered on Nimrod, his wife Semiramis, and a
child Tammuz. This book shows how this ancient religion transformed
itself as it incorporated Christ into its teachings. You may be
surprised that certain practices like confessions, and crossing ones
self, and even the position of the Pope come from traditions of this
mystery cult. Originally a pamphlet published in 1853, The Two Babylons
is Hislop's most famous work. In this book he argues that the Roman
Catholic Church is nothing more than pagan cult, with roots in
Babylonian mystery cults, which have a bank of secret knowledge only
available to those who have been formally accepted into the cult. Roman
Catholics, Hislop argues, are descendants from early Christians who
adopted the Roman religion descended from the worship of Semiramis, the
wife of the founder of Babylon. By discrediting the true Christianity of
Catholics, Hislop hoped to bolster the legitimacy of the Protestant and
Scottish Reformations. Students of theology and those interested in the
complex history of Christianity will find Hislop's arguments
provocative enough that they may be moved to further research of their
own. Scottish minister ALEXANDER HISLOP (1807-1865) became an ordained
clergymen in the Free Church of Scotland in 1844. As a Presbyterian
minister, Hislop was famously critical of the Roman Catholic Church. He
wrote a number of books including Christ's Crown and Covenant (1860) and
The Moral Identity of Babylon and Rome (1855).
http://philologos.org/__eb-ttb/
_____________________________________________________________________________________
The
history of the symbol of the cross has had an attraction for the author
ever since, as an enquiring youth, he found himself unable to obtain
satisfactory answers to four questions concerning the same which
presented themselves to his mind. The first of those questions was why
John the Baptist, who was beheaded before Jesus was executed, and so far
as we are told never had anything to do with a cross, is represented in
our religious pictures as holding a cross. The second question was
whether this curious but perhaps in itself easily explained practice had
in its inception any connection with the non-Mosaic initiatory rite of
baptism; which Jesus accepted as a matter of course at the hands of his
cousin John, and in which the sign of the cross has for ages been the
all-important feature. And it was the wonder whether there was or was
not some association between the facts that the New Testament writers
give no explanation whatever of the origin of baptism as an initiatory
rite, that this non-Mosaic initiatory rite was in use among Sun-God
worshippers long before our era, and that the Fathers admitted that the
followers of the Persian conception of the Sun-God marked their
initiates upon the forehead like the followers of the Christ, which
finally induced the author to start a systematic enquiry into the
history of the cross as a symbol.
The
third question was why, despite the fact that the instrument of
execution to which Jesus was affixed can have had but one shape, almost
any kind of cross is accepted as a symbol of our faith. The last of the
four questions was why many varieties of the cross of four equal arms,
which certainly was not a representation of an instrument of execution,
were accepted by Christians as symbols of the Christ before any cross
which could possibly have been a representation of an instrument of
execution was given a place among the symbols of Christianity; while
even nowadays one variety of the cross of four equal arms is the
favourite symbol of the Greek Church, and both it and the other
varieties enter into the ornamentation of our sacred properties and
dispute the supremacy with the cross which has one of its arms longer
than the other three. Pursuing these matters for himself, the author
eventually found that even before our era the cross was venerated by
many as the symbol of Life; though our works of reference seldom mention
this fact, and never do it justice. He moreover discovered that no one
has ever written a complete history of the symbol, showing the
possibility that the stauros or post to which Jesus was affixed was not
cross-shaped, and the certainty that, in any case, what eventually
became the symbol of our faith owed some of its prestige as a Christian
symbol of Victory and Life to the position it occupied in pre-Christian
days. The author has therefore, in the hope of drawing attention to the
subject, incorporated the results of his researches in the present
essay.
_____________________________________________________________________________________
This
study investigates the philological aspects of how ancient Greek, Latin
and Hebrew/Aramaic texts, including the New Testament, depict the
practice of punishment by crucifixion. A survey of the ancient text
material shows that there has been a too narrow view of the
“crucifixion” terminology. The various terms are not simply used in the
sense of “crucify” and “cross,” if by “crucifixion” one means the
punishment that Jesus was subjected to according to the main Christian
traditions. The terminology is used much more diversely. Almost none of
it can be elucidated beyond verbs referring vaguely to some form(s) of
suspension, and nouns referring to tools used in such suspension. As a
result, most of the crucifixion accounts that scholars cite in the
ancient literature have to be rejected, leaving only a few. The New
Testament is not spared from this terminological ambiguity. The accounts
of the death of Jesus are strikingly sparse. Their chief contribution
is usage of the unclear terminology in question. Over-interpretation,
and probably even pure imagination, have afflicted nearly every wordbook
and dictionary that deals with the terms related to crucifixion as well
as scholarly depictions of what happened on Calvary. The immense
knowledge of the punishment of crucifixion in general, and the execution
of Jesus in particular, cannot be supported by the studied texts.
http://www.exegetics.org/
