Monday, August 12, 2024

Pagan Entities Of The Bible

Unless a being is an uncaused cause [1] at least according to its own ideology, it is absolutely not a god, but a created, contingent mind, like the Olympians of Greek mythology.  The word has been exaggerated and conceptually misused by fools.  For instance, Athena springs out of the head of Zeus wearing her full armor, and Zeus himself is the child of Cronus (also spelled Kronos), who in turn has his own father and mother.  Neither is a true god or goddess despite the asinine traditional labeling.  Whether or not a given being is allegedly the uncaused cause or a contingent albeit superhuman creature according to its own related philosophies, the Bible mentions certain pagan pseudo-deities throughout multiple books.

In saying to not invoke the names of other gods, Exodus 23:13 does not at all say to not think about or mention the names of these pseudo-deities, and Deuteronomy 12:29-31 only condemns learning about various forms of paganism to imitate their beliefs and practices (one would not even be permitted to know examples of what to avoid otherwise!).  To invoke is to call upon something for aid, not the mere uttering of a word with some other intention.  Also, over and over, the Bible mentions pagan entities by name, so to read the Bible by default would expose one to such references, and to read certain passages aloud would require that one indeed says these names.  What are some of these pseudo-deities?

One can find mention of Molech in the Torah, the god associated with human sacrifice of children by burning them (reportedly inside a hollow bull-like statue), an act declared a capital sin in Leviticus 20:1-5.  Later, there is Dagon, the supposedly half-humanoid and half-fish Philistine god whose statue is found broken after it spends multiple nights next to the ark of the covenant in 1 Samuel 5:1-4.  There are also Asherah and Baal, each named more than once, the former tied to poles of worship Yahweh demanded the destruction of (Deuteronomy 7:5, 12:3) and the latter revered by priests that repeatedly interact with Yahweh's servants (1 Kings 18:16-40, 2 Kings 10:18-28).  Jeremiah 7:18 also speaks of an unspecified goddess called the Queen of Heaven among the false deities worshipped rather than Yahweh, and Isaiah calls the Babylonian deities Bel and Nebo mere idols carried by beasts (Isaiah 46:1).

The New Testament also mentions a handful of pagan beings by name.  Paul and Barnabas are confused for Hermes and Zeus respectively after Paul, through Yahweh's power, heals a lame man in Lystra (Acts 14:8-18).  Since Paul speaks to them, they assumed he is Hermes, the messenger of the Olympians, and a local priest of Zeus wanted to sacrifice animals to them because they thought their pseudo-deities had come down to them in human form.  In Acts 19:23-27, a silversmith named Demetrius objects to how Paul has preached against idolatry and thus "slandered" the divine nature (and profitable reputation) of Artemis, the goddess worshipped in Ephesus and the province of Asia.  Irate about the disrespect/disregard shown towards this pseudo-goddess, Demetrius cites his invalid concerns to workers in similar trades, his own occupation centering on making shrines of Artemis.

The Bible is very overt in specifying some of the pagan beings followed in the ancient world and the types of practices connected with them.  It neither neglects to mention them by name in many cases nor has little to say about the metaphysical errors like the assumption that a fashioned piece of wood or metal is sentient (Jeremiah 10:3-5, 14), not that literal idolatry is the only possible expression of paganism.  The likes of Isaiah 44:6, 45:18, 46:9 also make it as clear as language can that the Biblical stance on paganism is one of sheer condemnation because there is no deity besides Yahweh according to their words--something that contradicts conventional Trinitarianism as well as paganism.


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