From: Bill.Carlson@p0.f18.n104.z1.FIDONET.ORG (Bill Carlson)
Newsgroups: alt.messianic
Subject: Gentile Christianityi
Date: 27 Sep 92 15:46:06 GMT
Organization: FidoNet node 1:104/18.0 - Midrash, Denver CO

To: hamilton@hydra.cs.gmr.com

 WEHC> Date: 24 Sep 92 19:10:14 GMT
 WEHC> Message-ID: <90689@rphroy.ph.gmr.com>
                  -=> Quoting William E. Hamilton <=-
 WEHC> The question I would like to have the answer to is, "Why did the
 WEHC> church time its celebration of the risen Savior to coincide with
 WEHC> the pagan fertility  Goddess' day instead of Passover?"

      Good question.  In the 4th century council, they disassociated
      themselves from anything Jewish, and replaced the Biblical Feasts
      of HaShem, with pagan feasts.  You see, once they decided to rid
      themselves of a Judaic Biblical context, it created a void that
      needed to be filled.  And when one takes anything out of their
      life that was given from El*him, they are only left with
      something that is not from El*him to replace it.  - In this case
      pagan holidays to replace Biblical Holy Days.  Here are a few
      comments from that council, (of many such around then), that I
      have on disk:
             Anti-Judaic writings, 4th Century AD/CE & on...
One finds the same concern at the council of Nicaea [A.D.325], when the
issue came up in respect to easter.  Eusebius of Caesarea informs us of
the emperor Constatine's opinion:  "It appears an unworthy thing that
in the celebration of this most holy feast we should follow the
practice of the Jews, who have impiously defiled their hands with
enormous sin, and are, therefore, deservedly afflicted with blindness
of soul....Let us have nothing in common with the detestable Jewish
crowd."  Eusebius, Life of Constantine 3.18-19 [Nicene and Post Nicene
Fathers, Second Series, 1:524-525].

Constantine's decree is clear:"The Emperor Constantine to A. Helpidius. 
All Judges, townspeople and all occupations should rest on the most
honorable day of the SUN.  Farmers indeed should be free and unhindered
in their cultivation of the fields, since it frequently occurs that
there is no more suitable day for entrusting seed of corn to the
furrows and slips of vine to the holes prepared for them, lest haply
the favorable moment sent by divine providence be lost." Code of
Justinian III.12 [de feriis].3.

Eusebius of Caesarea[ca. 330], bishop contemporaneous with Constantine,
says quite explicitly in his commentary on the Psalms, "On that day of
light, the first day of the real SUN, when we gather together at
intervals of six days...we then accomplish, following spiritual laws,
that which had to be accomplished during the Sabbath...all that which
had to be accomplished during the Sabbath we have brought over to the
Lord's Day, inasmuch as it is the most important, the dominant, the
first, and it has more value than the Sabbath."  Commentary of the
Psalms, on Psalm 91; see W. Rordorf, Sabbat et dimanche, pp.79,81.

Church historians have not failed to take note of this matter: "The
Hebrew Sabbath having been abolished by Christians, the Church made
a sacred days of Sunday, partly because it was the day of the
resurrection,but largely because it was the weekly festival of the sun;
for it was definate Christian policy to take over the pagan festivals
endeared to the people by tradition, and to give them a Christian
significance.  But as a solar festival, Sunday was the sacred day of
Mithra; and it is interesting to notice that since Mithra was addressed
as Dominus, 'Lord,' Sunday must have been 'the Lord's Day' long before
Christian times."  Arthur Weigall, The Paganism in Our Christianity
[New York, 1928], p.145.  [Also see: [J.A.W. Neander, Allgemeine
Geschichte der Christlichen Religion und Kirche, I,1,p.513.]

... 012 But, woe unto the house that the turnip enters :-) 210  
--  
Bill Carlson - via ParaNet node 1:104/422
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