THE MIRACULOUS BIRTH OF CHRIST JESUS.
Project Gutenberg EPUB3 edition
Doane, T. W. (Thomas William)
Even as late as the seventeenth century of our era, do we find the myth of the virgin-born God in China.[121:4]
All these god-begotten and virgin-born men were called Tien-tse, i. e., "Sons of Heaven."
If from China we should turn to Egypt we would find that, for ages before the time of Jesus of Nazareth, the mediating deity, born of a virgin, and without a worldly father, was a portion of the Egyptian belief.[122:1]
Horus, who had the epithet of "Saviour," was born of the virgin Isis. "His birth was one of the greatest Mysteries of the Egyptian religion. Pictures representing it appear on the walls of temples."[122:2] He is "the second emanation of Amon, the son whom he begot."[122:3] Egyptian monuments represent the infant Saviour in the arms of his virgin mother, or sitting on her knee.[122:4] An inscription on a monument, translated by Champollion, reads thus:
"O thou avenger, God, son of a God; O thou avenger, Horus, manifested by Osiris, engendered of the goddess Isis."[122:5]
The Egyptian god Ra was born from the side of his mother, but was not engendered.[122:6]
The ancient Egyptians also deified kings and heroes, in the same manner as the ancient Greeks and Romans. An Egyptian king became, in a sense, "the vicar of God on earth, the infallible, and the personated deity."[122:7]
P. Le Page Renouf, in his Hibbert Lectures on the Religion of Ancient Egypt, says:
"I must not quit this part of my subject without a reference to the belief that the ruling sovereign of Egypt was the living image and vicegerent of the Sun-god (Ra). He was invested with the attributes of divinity, and that in the earliest times of which we possess monumental evidence."[122:8]
Menes, who is said to have been the first king of Egypt, was believed to be a god.[122:9]
Almost all the temples of the left bank of the Nile, at Thebes, had been constructed in view of the worship rendered to the Pharaohs, their founders, after their death.[122:10]
On the wall of one of these Theban temples is to be seen a picture representing the god Thoth—the messenger of God—telling the maiden, Queen Mautmes, that she is to give birth to a divine son, who is to be King Amunothph III.[123:1]
An inscription found in Egypt makes the god Ra say to his son Ramses III.:
"I am thy father; by me are begotten all thy members as divine; I have formed thy shape like the Mendesian god; I have begotten thee, impregnating thy venerable mother."[123:2]
Raam-ses, or Ra-mé-ses, means "Son of the Sun," and Ramses Hek An, a name of Ramses III., means "engendered by Ra (the Sun), Prince of An (Heliopolis)."[123:3]
"Thotmes III., on the tablet of Karnak, presents offerings to his predecessors; so does Ramses on the tablet of Abydos. Even during his life-time the Egyptian king was denominated 'Beneficent God.'"[123:4]
The ancient Babylonians also believed that their kings were gods upon earth. A passage from Ménaut's translation of the great inscription of Nebuchadnezzar, reads thus:
"I am Nabu-kuder-usur . . . the first-born son of Nebu-pal-usur, King of Babylon. The god Bel himself created me, the god Marduk engendered me, and deposited himself the germ of my life in the womb of my mother."[123:5]
In the life of Zoroaster, the law-giver of the Persians, the common mythos is apparent. He was born in innocence, of an immaculate conception, of a ray of the Divine Reason. As soon as he was born the glory from his body enlightened the whole room.[123:6] Plato informs us that Zoroaster was said to be "the son of Oromasdes, which was the name the Persians gave to the Supreme God"[123:7]—therefore he was the Son of God.
From the East we will turn to the West, and shall find that many of the ancient heroes of Grecian and Roman mythology were regarded as of divine origin, were represented as men, possessed of god-like form, strength and courage; were believed to have lived on earth in the remote, dim ages of the nation's history; to have been occupied in their life-time with thrilling adventures and extraordinary services in the cause of human civilization, and to have been after death in some cases translated to a life among the gods, and entitled to sacrifice and worship. In the hospitable Pantheon of the Greeks and Romans, a niche was always in readiness for every new divinity who could produce respectable credentials.
The Christian Father Justin Martyr, says:
"It having reached the Devil's ears that the prophets had foretold the coming of Christ (the Son of God), he set the Heathen Poets to bring forward a great many who should be called the sons of Jove. The Devil laying his scheme in this, to get men to imagine that the true history of Christ was of the same character as the prodigious fables related of the sons of Jove."
Among these "sons of Jove" may be mentioned the following: Hercules was the son of Jupiter by a mortal mother, Alcmene, Queen of Thebes.[124:1] Zeus, the god of gods, spake of Hercules, his son, and said: "This day shall a child be born of the race of Perseus, who shall be the mightiest of the sons of men."[124:2]
Bacchus was the son of Jupiter and a mortal mother, Semele, daughter of Kadmus, King of Thebes.[124:3] As Montfaucon says, "It is the son of Jupiter and Semele which the poets celebrate, and which the monuments represent."[124:4]
Bacchus is made to say:
"I, son of Deus, am come to this land of the Thebans, Bacchus, whom formerly Semele the daughter of Kadmus brings forth, being delivered by the lightning-bearing flame: and having taken a mortal form instead of a god's, I have arrived at the fountains of Dirce and the water of Ismenus."[124:5]
Amphion was the son of Jupiter and a mortal mother, Antiope, daughter of Nicetus, King of Bœotia.[124:6]
Prometheus, whose name is derived from a Greek word signifying foresight and providence, was a deity who united the divine and human nature in one person, and was confessedly both man and god.[124:7]
Perseus was the son of Jupiter by the virgin Danae, daughter of Acrisius, King of Argos.[124:8] Divine honors were paid him, and a temple was erected to him in Athens.[124:9]
Justin Martyr (A. D. 140), in his Apology to the Emperor Adrian, says:
"By declaring the Logos, the first-begotten of God, our Master, Jesus Christ, to be born of a virgin, without any human mixture, we (Christians) say no more in this than what you (Pagans) say of those whom you style the Sons of Jove. For you need not be told what a parcel of sons the writers most in vogue among you assign to Jove. . . .
"As to the Son of God, called Jesus, should we allow him to be nothing more than man, yet the title of 'the Son of God' is very justifiable, upon the account of his wisdom, considering that you (Pagans) have your Mercury in worship under the title of the Word, a messenger of God. . . .
"As to his (Jesus Christ's) being born of a virgin, you have your Perseus to balance that."[125:1]
Mercury was the son of Jupiter and a mortal mother, Maia, daughter of Atlas. Cyllene, in Arcadia, is said to have been the scene of his birth and education, and a magnificent temple was erected to him there.[125:2]
Æolus, king of the Lipari Islands, near Sicily, was the son of Jupiter and a mortal mother, Acasta.[125:3]
Apollo was the son of Jupiter and a mortal mother, Latona.[125:4] Like Buddha and Lao-Kiun, Apollo, so the Ephesians said, was born under a tree; Latona, taking shelter under an olive-tree, was delivered there.[125:5] Then there was joy among the undying gods in Olympus, and the Earth laughed beneath the smile of Heaven.[125:6]
Aethlius, who is said to have been one of the institutors of the Orphic games, was the son of Jupiter by a mortal mother, Protogenia.[125:7]
Arcas was the son of Jupiter and a mortal mother.[125:8]
Aroclus was the son of Jupiter and a mortal mother.[125:9]
We might continue and give the names of many more sons of Jove, but sufficient has been seen, we believe, to show, in the words of Justin, that Jove had a great "parcel of sons." "The images of self-restraint, of power used for the good of others, are prominent in the lives of all or almost all the Zeus-born heroes."[125:10]