Movie Mayhem

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There's an online film going around called Zeitgeist.

I first heard of it at a wingnut site I sometimes visit for fun - Covenant News. They say "An online movie documenting the close ties between ancient pagan religions and today's Christianity is "antichrist" in nature, destroying the faith of believers by combining some astonishing truth with plenty of error."

But according to Wikia Filmguide, "Zeitgeist is designed to prompt the audience into questioning their own beliefs on the subjects of US involvement in the 9/11 terrorist attacks, Christian theology, the Federal Reserve System".

Ah, so it's either a (possibly flawed) historical look at the roots of Christianity...or another Loose Change.

And apparently "Antichrist" is now an adjective.

So what could I do but watch it?

It's a film in three parts. The first part makes the following main assertions:

Horus and Set were the Ancient Egyptian gods of light and dark, day and night, good and evil.

Horus was born on December 25th of a virgin. His birth was heralded by a star in the east, which was followed by three kings.

He was a teacher at twelve and was "baptised" at thirty. He had twelve disciples and performed miracles such as healing the sick and walking on water.

He was known as "The Light", "The Good Shepherd", "The Lamb of God", "God's Anointed Son" etc.

He was crucified and after three days came back to life.

Much of the same biography applies to Attis and Dionysus of Greece, Mithra of Persia, Krishna of India, and many others, all over the world.

The star in the east is Sirius in the constellation Virgo, which means virgin. On December 24th it aligns with the stars in Orion's belt, known as the three kings.

Jesus was born of the virgin Mary, Adonis of the virgin Myrra, Buddha of the virgin Maya - all names starting with "M". An altered letter "M" is the symbol of the constellation Virgo - the virgin.

Virgo was also known as the "House of Bread". Bethlehem literally means "House of Bread".

The sun "dies" when it reaches it's southmost point at the winter equinox on December 22nd, then it stays still for three days near the "Southern Cross", then begins to rise on December 25th.

However it only overpowers the darkness at the spring equinox - Easter.

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Well. What to make of all that? Bearing in mind I'm an amateur and not a specialist.

The mythology of Horus and Set or Seth - the prototype for Shatan or Satan - is well known and uncontroversial. As is the origin of Christmas in the Festival of Saturn - which the film oddly doesn't mention.

That most of the stories about Jesus are retellings of much older stories is something any first year theology student could tell you.

There's some silly stuff punning "sunrise" with "birth of the son" and "the sun dying before being resurrected after three days" but I assume the director isn't really dumb enough to think ancient languages had the same homophones as modern English.

As for the rest...I just don't know. There's a lot of anachronism like mentioning baptism and a monotheistic God three thousand years before there was such a thing, some strained making of connections like the stuff with the letter "M", and what looks a lot like cherry picking and "creative simplification" to make the facts fit the theory.

But I'm curious now, so I'll watch the rest of the film and hunt up some scholarly sources.

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But first...

There is, somewhat inevitably, a response film - called Zeitgeist Refuted. So I had a look at that.

It starts by refuting the idea that Christianity was invented for social control. Has anyone seriously suggested that it was?! Does Zeitgeist make that specific allegation? Not that I've seen, and it doesn't fit what I have seen.

It notes that Zeitgeist uses its cited sources more than once, as though this were some kind of grossly unprofessional practice.

It then attacks John M Allegro's fanciful notion that the earliest christians were a hippie cult using the codeword "Jesus" for hallucinogenic mushrooms. Fair enough, but does Zeitgeist promote the idea? Erm, no.

Zeitgeist Refuted states, on no evidence, that the Theosophy movement influences the United Nations...and founded Naziism.

Oh dear. This would be the proverbial shark jumping moment.

And we're only ten minutes in to a ninety minute film.

Moving on, we find some of Zeitgeist's sources were...Freemasons! Who worship Lucifer. Who isn't actually the devil but nevermind, let's obscure that point.

The identification of the constellation Virgo with the Virgin Mary is "refuted" using a book called "The Paranormal Seduction of Today's Kids". Obviously a scholarly tome.

Next, Bethlehem was a real place, not a metaphor named after a constellation. Indeed - and Zeitgeist didn't actually suggest otherwise.

Then after some fuzzy nitpicking of the "12 zodiac signs = 12 disciples" notion, which completely avoids the main thrust of the argument, we're at the fifteen minute mark, and I don't want to watch any more of this wank.

So far there's no mention of the promised 9/11 conspiracies, from either side.

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So all I know yet is: Zeitgeist is highly questionable, and its official refutation is a pile of cack.

It's just like being back at university. Really, quite a lot like it.

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Update: There are several versions of Zeitgeist. The final version is here.

It's two hours long, full of snazzy graphics, spends the first fifteen minutes saying absolutely nothing, and does indeed contain a 9/11 conspiracy theory. Which is a shame really, because the connections shown between biblical stories and Egyptian, Indian and Greek myths are fascinating.

I've also done a bit of reading on John M Allegro, and it looks like he wasn't the druggie nutball I was led to believe. He used philology to trace christianity back to mystery and fertility religions - I'm reminded of Martin Bernal in Black Athena.

Allegro and Bernal were excoriated and osctracised when they published, before becoming respected when the hype wore off and people read the works - which is not to say their ideas are accepted.

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