The Historical Fallacy of Atonement
The Historical Fallacy of Atonement (part 1
of 2): Paul of Tarsus and the Concept of Salvation in Christianity
Description: The affects Paul of Tarsus and
Pagan beliefs had on the forming of the idea of salvation in Christianity;
while in reality Christ’s mentioning of salvation was different from what is
widely believed today.
[By Aisha Brown]
[By Aisha Brown]
Salvation can be defined as the deliverance
from sin and its penalties; the path to salvation, however, varies from one
religion to another. In Christianity, salvation is found through the Doctrine
of Vicarious Atonement. Since human nature is considered in Christianity to be
wayward and sinful, this doctrine states that Jesus “rendered full
satisfaction” to God for the sins of man through his death and resurrection. In
a nutshell, Jesus took our place, and his death absolves us of our sins.
This is contrary to what is found in the
Torah where God says: “ ...every man shall be put to death for his own sin”
(Deut. 24:16)
The matter of Jesus, as savior of mankind, is
refuted in the Quran, wherein God says that He
“... has stamped them with their disbelief... for their saying
‘We killed God’s Messenger, Christ Jesus, the son of Mary’ They neither killed
nor crucified him, even though it seemed so to them...” (Quran 4:155-157)
Salvation According to Jesus
Nowhere in the four gospels did Jesus
explicitly state that he would die to save mankind from sin. When approached by
a man who asked what he could do to gain eternal life, Jesus told him to keep
the Commandments (Mat. 19: 16,17); in other words, to obey God’s Law. To a
similar question put to him by a lawyer, as recorded in the gospel of Luke,
Jesus told him to love God and his fellow man (Luke 10:25-28).
The role of Jesus is made clear in the Quran
where God says:
“Christ, the son of Mary, was no more than a Messenger; many
were the Messengers that passed away before him...see how God doth make His
Signs clear to them, yet see in what ways they are deluded away from the truth”
(Quran 5:75)
The mission of Jesus was not, therefore, to
set up a new method of achieving salvation, much less the founding of a new
system of belief; as even the Bible points out, Jesus sought only to take the
Jews from their emphasis on ritual back to that of righteousness (Mat. 6:1-8).
Paul of Tarsus
For the origin of the doctrine of atonement,
one does not go to the teachings of Jesus, but instead to the words of Paul,
the true founder of Christianity; in teachings of present Christian terms and
practices.
Like many Jews, Paul had no use for the teachings
of Jesus, and he himself persecuted the followers of Jesus for their unorthodox
beliefs. This zealous persecutor was turned into an ardent preacher, however,
through a sudden conversion around 35 CE. Paul claimed that a resurrected Jesus
appeared to him in a vision, thereby, choosing Paul as his instrument for
carrying his teachings to the Gentiles (Gal. 1:11; 12:15,16).
Paul’s credibility in any capacity is
questionable, however, when considering that: (1) there are four contradictory
versions of his so-called “conversion” (Acts 9:3-8; 22:6-10; 26:13-18; Gal.
1:15-17); (2) God says, in passages such as Num. 12:6, Deut. 18:20 and Ez.
13:8-9, that revelations come ONLY from Him, and (3) accounts of numerous
disagreements between the other disciples and Paul regarding his teachings are
recorded in Acts.
Experience and observation had taught Paul
that preaching among the Jews was not feasible; he, therefore, chose to go to
the non-Jews. By doing so, however, Paul disregarded a direct command from Jesus
against preaching to other than a Jew (Mat. 10:5-6). In short, Paul set aside
the actual teachings of Jesus in his desire to be a success.
The Pagan Influence
Among the pagans of Paul’s time, a wide
variety of gods existed. Although these gods had different names and were
embraced by people from different areas of the world – Adonis from Syria,
Dionysus from Thrace, Attis from Phrygia, for instance – the basic concept in
each cult was the same: these sons of gods died violent deaths and then rose again
to save their people.
Since the pagans had tangible savior-gods in
their old religions, they wanted nothing less from the new; they were not able
to accept any sort of an invisible Deity. Paul was quite accommodating,
preaching therefore of a savior named Jesus Christ, the son of God, who died
and then rose again to save mankind from sin (Rom. 5:8-11; 6:8-9).
The Bible itself points out the error of
Paul’s thinking. While each of the four gospels contain an account of the
crucifixion of Jesus, these accounts are strictly hearsay; none of the
disciples of Jesus were witness to such, having fled his side in the Garden
(Mark 14:50).
In the Torah, God says that one who is
“hanged upon a tree” – crucified – is “accursed” (Deut. 21:23). Paul
side-stepped this by saying that Jesus became accursed in order to take on the
sins of man (Gal. 3:13); in so doing, however, Paul set aside the very Law of
God.
The resurrection, wherein Paul says that
Jesus “conquered” death and sin for mankind (Rom. 6:9,10), plays such an
important part that one who does not believe in it is not considered a good
Christian (1 Cor. 15:14).
Here, too, the Bible lends little support to
Paul’s notions; first of all, not only was there no eyewitness to the actual
resurrection, but all post-resurrection accounts are in contradiction with each
other as to who went to the gravesite, what happened there, and even where and
to whom Jesus appeared (Mat. 28; Mark 16; Luke 24; John 20).
Secondly, although Christianity states that
the body following resurrection will be in a spiritual form (1 Cor. 15:44),
Jesus had obviously not changed, for he both ate with his disciples (Luke
24:30,41-43), and allowed them to touch his wounds (John 20:27). Finally, as
the divine son of God in Christianity, Jesus is said to share in God’s
attributes; one cannot fail to wonder, however, just how it can be possible for
God to die...
In his desire to win souls among the pagans,
Paul simply reworked a number of major pagan beliefs to come up with the
Christian scheme of salvation. No prophet – including Jesus himself – taught
such concepts; they were authored entirely by Paul.
The
Historical Fallacy of Atonement (part 2 of 2): The Ultimate Sacrifice and
Original Sin
Description: A look at how old pagan beliefs crept into Christianity through Paul of Tarsus. Also included, is mention of the history of original sin and salvation from an Islamic perspective.
By Aisha Brown
The Ultimate Sacrifice
Long accustomed to making sacrifices to their
gods, the pagans easily grasped Paul’s notion that Jesus was the “ultimate
sacrifice” whose blood washed away sin. A common ceremony during this time in
various Middle Eastern cults, such as those of Attis and Mithras, was that of
the “taurobolium”: a person descended into a pit covered over with grillwork
upon which a bull (or ram), said to represent the pagan deity himself, was then
ceremoniously slain. By covering himself with the blood, the person in the pit
below was said to have been “born again” with his sins washed away.
It is worth noting that the Jews had given up
sacrifice back in 590 BCE following the destruction of their Temple. Paul’s
notions, therefore, were in direct contradiction to both Old Testament teaching
(Hosea 6:6) and even to the teaching of Jesus himself (Mat. 9:13) which
stressed how God desired good virtues, not sacrifice.
While Paul stressed that God’s “love” was
behind the sacrifice of Jesus (Rom. 5:8), the Doctrine of Atonement instead
shows a harsh Deity satisfied only by the murder of his own innocent son. Paul
was way off base here, for the Old Testament is full of references to the love
and mercy of God to man (Ps. 36:5-10; Ps. 103:8-17) revealed through His
forgiveness (Ex. 34:6,7; Ps. 86:5-7), of which even Jesus spoke (Mat. 6:12).
Pagan influence in Christianity even extends
to its sacred symbol. Although Paul calls the cross of Jesus “the power of God”
(1 Cor. 1:18), reference works, such as the Encyclopedia Britannica, Dictionary
of Symbols, The Cross in Ritual, Architecture and Art point out that the cross
was used as a religious symbol centuries before the birth of Jesus. Bacchus of
Greece, Tammuz of Tyre, Bel of Chaldea, and Odin of Norway are just a few
examples of ancient pagan gods whose sacred symbol was that of a cross.
Original Sin
Central to the Doctrine of Atonement is
Paul’s notion that mankind is a race of wrong-doers, having inherited from Adam
his sin in eating of the forbidden fruit. As a result of this Original Sin, man
cannot serve as his own redeemer; good works are to no avail, says Paul, for
even these cannot satisfy the justice of God (Gal. 2:16).
As a result of Adam’s sin, man is doomed to
die. By his death, however, Jesus took on the punishment due man; through his
resurrection, Jesus conquered death, and righteousness was restored. To earn
salvation, a Christian need only have faith in the death and resurrection of
Jesus (Rom. 6:23).
Despite its prominent place in Christianity,
the notion of an “original sin” is not found among the teachings of any
prophet, Jesus included. In the Old Testament, God says: “... the son shall not
bear the iniquity of the father, neither shall the father bear the iniquity of
the son” (Ez.18:20-22). Personal responsibility is also stressed in the Quran
where God says: “... no bearer of burdens can bear the burden of another... man
can have nothing but what he strives for” (Quran 53:38,39).
The doctrine of original sin gave Paul the
means to justify pagan influence in his scheme of salvation. Irresponsibility
became the hallmark of Christianity through this doctrine, however, for by
“transferring” sins onto Jesus, followers assume no responsibility for their
actions.
Salvation in Islam
By the seventh century, the doctrines
conceived by Paul had been embellished to the point where Christianity was not
almost entirely a man-made religion. At this time, God chose to send Muhammad
as His Final Messenger in order to set things straight once and for all for
mankind.
Since God is Almighty, He doesn’t need the
charade concocted by Christians in order to forgive man. In the Quran, God says
we are all created in a state of goodness (30:30); He has not burdened man with
any “original sin”, having forgiven Adam and Eve (2:36-38; 7:23,24) as He
forgives us (11:90; 39:53-56).
As we are all personally responsible for our
actions (2:286; 6:164) there is no need for a humanly concocted savior in
Islam; salvation comes from God alone (28:67).
Thus did Islam seek to restore the true
meaning to monotheism, for in the Quran God asks:
“Who can be better in
religion than one who submits his whole self to God, does good, and follows the
way of Abraham the true in faith?” (Quran 4:125; 41:33)
The Religion of Man
The evidence is overwhelming that the concept
of salvation in Christianity – its Doctrine of Vicarious Atonement – came not
from God but from man via pagan rituals and beliefs.
Paul effectively shifted the center of
worship away from God by saying that Jesus was the divine agent of their
salvation (Gal. 2:20). In so doing, however, Paul set aside all teachings of
God’s prophets, and even the concept of monotheism itself, since God in
Christianity needs Jesus for His divine “helper”.
Take a Closer Look
With one’s very salvation at stake here,
Christians should take a closer look at what they believe in and why. God says
in the Quran:
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