Christianity Exposed

Let's look behind the marketing of Christianity:

"Those earliest Christians agreed about precisely nothing. Some of them bickered about just how divine Jesus was–or if he existed in the flesh at all. Others bickered about how much Judaism to retain (as Peter and Paul had). They argued about how important Jesus’ death and resurrection were (and what they even meant)."

No such thing as an "Original" Christianity

"Although it is highly unlikely that the authors of the Synoptic Gospels directly based any of their stories on pagan mythology,^[12] it is possible that they may have subtly shaped their accounts of Jesus's healing miracles to resemble familiar Greek stories about miracles associated with Asclepius, the god of healing and medicine.^[13][14] The birth narratives of Matthew and Luke are usually seen by secular historians as legends designed to fulfill Jewish expectations about the Messiah.^[15]

"The Gospel of John bears indirect influences from Platonism, via earlier Jewish deuterocanonical texts, and may also have been influenced in less obvious ways by the cult of Dionysus, the Greek god of wine, though this possibility is still disputed.^[16] Later Christian traditions about Jesus were probably influenced by Greco-Roman religion and mythology. Much of Jesus's traditional iconography is apparently derived from Mediterranean deities such as Hermes, Asclepius, Serapis, and Zeus and his traditional birthdate on 25 December, which was not declared as such until the fifth century, was at one point named a holiday in honor of the Roman sun god Sol Invictus. At around the same time Christianity was expanding in the second and third centuries, the Mithraic Cult was also flourishing. Though the relationship between the two religions is still under dispute, Christian apologists at the time noted similarities between them, which some scholars have taken as evidence of borrowing, but which are more likely a result of shared cultural environment. More general comparisons have also been made between the stories about Jesus's birth and resurrection and stories of other divine or heroic figures from across the Mediterranean world, including supposed "dying-and-rising gods" such as Tammuz, Adonis, Attis, and Osiris, while the concept of "dying-and-rising gods" has received criticism."

Jesus in comparative mythology 

"Neither biographies nor objective historical accounts, the gospels resembled religious advertisements."

What are the Gospels?

Why do you think Christianity is special?