jesus christmas is winter solstice for christs sakes.
That's where the Roman Catholic church decided to an official celebration and recognition of the birth of Jesus Christ. But, that does NOT mean that Christ himself was formed from pagan deities.
...ell, let's put it this way: the Vikings had a genesis/creation story in which there was a garden and a snake, a creation mythos which predates not just Christianity, but Judaism itself.
In the Viking story the tree of life in the centre of the garden is called Yggdrasil (spelling?), the world tree. Which the Vikings took as being synonymous with the axis of the Earth, it's leaves were eternally changing between glowing green and fiery orange as they died only to be replenished. Similarly the Vikings associated these burning yet not consumed leaves with the Aurora Borealis at the North Pole.
A tree of life with DYING leaves? Boy, this is going to be FUN!!! Genesis account says NOTHING of the sort!!!
So the garden is symbolic of the world; the tree is a metaphor for the worlds rotational axis; the burning yet unburnt leaves are a metaphor for the Aurora Borealis.
The Vikings associated this "tree" with knowledge; star lore and astrology, yet maintained the mystery tradition that there as another secret tree at the centre of the garden; a tree of eternal life which was unreachable by man (the southern pole and the Aurora Australis).
Let the dismemberment begin.
Surprise, surprise the Vikings even had a snake entwined about the centre of their mythical tree (or double ended trees if you understood the metaphor): the fabled Midgard Serpent.
Guess what? "Midgard" is Viking for "equator"
Doesn't any of this sound suspiciously familiar to any Christians reading?
A garden, with two trees. A tree of knowlede from which man may eat if he is willing to accept the consequences and an unreachable tree of everlasting life beyond mans grasp. A snake, and the first two people in the world. A garden paradise; and a choice between consciousness and our baser animal existence?
Can't you people comprehend metaphor?
The Luke
Can't you comprehend simple sentences? Suspicisously familiar? PLEASE!!!
The Garden of Eden has far more than two trees; so that little blurb basically gets the boot. The choice is hardly between consciousness and animal existence. It's simply eternal life for the two people and ALL LIVING BEINGS or death for Adam, Eve, and all life on the planet. If that weren't enough, the tree of life was NOT unreachable to Adam and Eve. They ate of it; however, once sin entered the world, they were banished from eating of it.
The Midgard Serpent, per the account grows big enough to encircle the planet. The serpent mentioned in Genesis? CURSED, upon its belly to eat dust. And nothing indcates that this serpent is large enough to circumvent the planet.
And, once again, per the Genesis creation account, there is NO DEATH of any kind, prior to sin, a far cry from the Norse stuff we read.
Once again, we see a flat-out comparison between the two accounts, with virtually nothing to suggest that Moses got the Creation/Garden of Eden account from a Viking legend.
Nice try, Luke. But, that doggie hunteth not!!!
The Viking account incorporate the concept of DEATH before sin, something that is not in the Genesis, whatsoever. The Viking accounts however have the universe deriving from the corpse of one of the Norse gods.
More on this place called Midgard,
Midgard, also Middel-erde, Middangeard or Middle-earth is an old Germanic name for this world, derived from the Old Norse word Midhgardhr ("middle garden").
Midgard is the realm of the humans in Norse mythology. Pictured as placed somewhere in the middle of Yggdrasil, Midgard is surrounded by a world of water or ocean, which is impassable. The ocean is inhabited by the great sea serpent Jormungand, who is so huge that he encircles the world entirely, grasping his own tail.
It is depicted as an intermediate world between heaven (Asgard) and hell (Nifelheim or Hel). Thus it is part of a triad of upper (Heaven), middle (Earth), and lower (Underworld). It was said to have been formed from the flesh and blood of the frost giant Ymir, his flesh constituting the land and his blood the oceans, and was connected to Asgard by the Bifrost Bridge, guarded by Heimdall.
According to legend, Midgard will be destroyed in Ragnarok, the battle at the end of the world. Jormungand will arise from the ocean, poisoning the land and sea with his venom and causing the sea to rear up and lash against the land. The final battle will take place on the plain of Vigrond, following which Midgard and almost all life on it will be destroyed, with the earth sinking into the sea. http://www.indopedia.org/Midgard.html
