So now you are saying that Jesus' death by crucifixion is original and not borrowed from ancient myths?
...some of the other gods were crucified after they died, or weren't explicitly killed by the act of crucifixion itself. Crucifixion isn't original... McWay simply thinks Jesus is special because he died on the cross. Attis for example dies under the cross and was nailed to it after he died... po
tatoe...
potatoe.
Not a dig at you Loco, but you need to read more closely if English is not your native language.
Did you say earlier that whatever is found in the gospels of Matthew, John and Luke that is not found in the gospel of Mark is original?
No... again, reading comprehension is important here.
Linguists believe there was a source document which they have named "Q" from which Mark's gospel was taken (the earliest copy of any canonical gospel is a copy of Mark dated to about 155 AD), sort of a summary or synopsis.
Matthew, Luke and John are most likely poor translations/copies of Mark with some instructional material added (from the "Q" document). Not surprising really, there were 80 gospels by the time Constantine convened the Council of Nicea in 325 AD.
I would hazard a guess that the original "Q" document from which all the canonical gospels are derived is probably the "Secret Gospel of Mark" alluded to by some early Church Fathers.
It was traditional among solar-deity Mystery Religions to have two versions of the dying/resurrecting godman story...
-an unenlightened abridged "Beginners" gospel filled with simple moral fables (canonical gospels);
-and an expanded "Hidden" gospel which contains passages missing from the fables which explain/highlight the astrological/mathematical allegories (Mark's Secret Gospel).
Most water baptised followers would only be privy to the basic miracle/redemption story, those initiated into the higher levels would be clued-in to the secret meanings. Centres of pagan pilgrimage such as Ephesus (home of the Ephesian Mystery Cult) would offer the more intelligent and educated followers baptism by earth, wind and fire (four elements).
Details are sketchy but the hierarchy was probably something like this:
-water baptism: any old pleb who is told the written miracle/redemption dying/resurrecting godman story
-earth baptism: access to the hidden gospel writings explaining that the religion is solar in origin
-wind baptism: orally conferred secret teachings explaining the cycles of the planets
-fire baptism: super-secret mathematical teachings regarding geodesy and secret histories
I could give an example if you'd like.
All of these higher levels and secret teachings are missing from Christian teachings because Christianity was started as a tell-them-nothing-except-everyone-gets-redeemed version of the Mystery Religion merely to raise money for the Quumran Essenes impending war effort against the Romans.
Kinda like Scientology was nothing more than a fundraiser for Hubbard. Miscavige just ran with it when the founding charlatan died. Saul of Tarsus is the Christian Miscavige... successor to the L Ron Hubbard of Christianity: James the Just, supposedly Jesus' brother (Jesus is fictitious).
The Luke