Monday, December 21, 2009

ROME


Eternal City, Perpetual Fire


Fig.6a. Map of Rome, the city on seven hills.

And now we arrive in Rome, both the empire, the fourth and final beast of world history according to the prophet Daniel, and also the city at its center. This is the source of the myth of Romulus and Remus, twin sons of Mars (Nimrod), who both founded the city on seven hills. The hills are real, and the city is named in Scripture as the heart of the all-consuming harlot system called Babylon. (Revelation 17:9) This is the world power that remains until the Son of God descends from heaven with a shout and trumpet blast to put an end to all the substitutes and counterfeits. Romulus and Remus are merely distant echoes of Nimrod, the city founder of Mesopotamia, and also of Osiris and Seth of Egypt, one brother killing the other in a bid for supremacy. But Romulus and Remus are not important as Roman deities.

It is the temples on the seven hills that tell us who the people worshipped. Here we find the Sumerian father, mother and virgin intact, the son and seed at his most subtle, and the child in his mother’s arms. This umbilical cord leads all the way from Mesopotamia via Egypt, Canaan, Persia and especially Greece…to Rome. This is the city called "the eternal city." And so it is; a city of perpetual fire, at the center of a system reserved for everlasting flames. Let us start with her in popular worship, at the public forum and in every house.




Fig.6b. 1. Vesta-Hestia, Roman copy of a Greek original, Torlonia Museum, Rome, c.470 BC. 2. Vestal virgin (damaged), Rome. 3. Juno of the Capitoline trinity, without child, Rome.

"Vesta, Roman religion, goddess of the hearth, identified with the Greek Hestia…Her worship was observed in every household…and her image was sometimes encountered in the household shrine. The Temple of Vesta in the Roman Forum was of great antiquity…There burned the perpetual fire of the public hearth attended by the Vestal Virgins…In addition to the shrine itself and between it and the Velia stood the magnificent Atrium Vestae. This name was originally given to the whole sacred area comprising the Temple of Vesta, a sacred grove, the Regia (headquarters of the pontifex maximus, or chief priest), and the House of the Vestal." (Encyclopedia Britannica, Vesta, Hestia, Std.Ver.1999)

Hestia-Vesta is the third daughter of Cronus-Saturn, her sisters being Demeter (Rhea-Cybele) and Hera (Juno). Like her temple at the Acropolis in Athens, Vesta’s fire burned at the highest place in Rome, right next to the sacred trees and the seat of the Pontifex Maximus. Yes reader, that is the name now given to the Popes, the most devout worshippers of the Virgin Mary. The celibate nuns are none other than the continuance of the vestal virgins, and Rome is virtually grand central station for the great mother, woman, birthing goddess and virgin arriving from Greece, Babylon and Egypt in her every guise. Here she is as saviouress and a member of the capital city’s trinity.

"Juno, in Roman religion, chief goddess and female counterpart of Jupiter, closely resembling the Greek Hera, with whom she was universally identified…she was a member of the Capitoline triad of deities…traditionally introduced by the Etruscan kings. Juno was connected with all aspects of the life of women, most particularly married life. As Juno Lucina, goddess of childbirth, she had a temple on the Esquiline from the 4th century BC. In her role as female comforter she assumed various descriptive names. Individualized, she became a female guardian angel…As her cult expanded she assumed wider functions and became, like Hera, the principal female divinity of the state…originally as a saviour of women but eventually as saviour of the state." (Encyclopedia Britannica, Juno, Std.Ver.1999)

This wife of Jupiter (Zeus, Cush) is the ever-popular female comforter now blended into Mother Mary. Juno-Hera was “traditionally” brought to Rome by early Etruscan kings. According to the historian Herodotus, the Etruscans came from Asia Minor (Anatolia - literally “land of many mothers” - now modern Turkey) around 800 BC, but others say their origin is obscure. What is not obscure is that the gods of Asia Minor, especially those of Pergamon and Ephesus, are found on every one of the Seven Hills of Rome. Here is the Great Mother of Greece, Rhea, transformed into the Great Mother, Cybele, whose official title in Rome was Mater Deum Magna (Great Mother of the Gods).

"Rhea, in Greek religion, ancient goddess, probably pre-Hellenic in origin, who was worshipped sporadically throughout the Greek world. She was associated with fruitfulness and had affinities with Gaea (Earth) and the Great Mother of the Gods. A daughter of Uranus (Heaven) and Gaea, she married her brother Cronus…" (Encyclopedia Britannica, Rhea, Std.Ver.1999) "Great Mother of the Gods, ancient Oriental-Greek-Roman deity commonly known as Cybele...under the empire it became one of the most important cults in the Roman world. In all of her aspects, Roman, Greek, and Oriental, the Great Mother was characterized by essentially the same qualities. Most prominent among them was her universal motherhood. Her priests castrated themselves on entering her service." (Encyclopaedia Britannica, Great Mother, 1974, IV: 700)

These are all prototypes of the Mother of God found in the Christian Church, whose celibate priests will be examined further as we focus on the counterfeit son. But first, to the father, Rhea’s brother and husband, the horned one, Cronus-Saturn who was thrown out of heaven.

Satan’s Birthday

"Saturn, in Roman religion, the god of sowing or seed. The Romans equated him with the Greek agricultural deity Cronus. Saturn's great festival, the Saturnalia, became the most popular of Roman festivals, and its influence is still felt in the celebration of Christmas and the Western world's New Year…It was the merriest festival of the year: all work and business were suspended…certain moral restrictions were eased; and presents were freely exchanged. The weekday Saturday was named for Saturn." (Encyclopedia Britannica, Saturn, Std.Ver.1999) "The Romans often cut down evergreens and decorated them to pay homage to Saturn, the god of farming." (Wikipedia, The Saturnalia)

Of course this is not literally Satan’s birthday, because he was not created on earth, but it is the closest thing that men have invented to a birthday party for Lucifer. Make no mistake, reader, this is not the time of year that Christ was born. Shepherds did not sit in the fields in December, and no Roman census to count the population (which is why Jesus was born in Bethlehem; Luke 2:1-7) was ever held in winter when so much of the empire was under snow and roads impassable. If you need more detailed information on this then read Chapter 13, Christian Festivals, The Truth Which Sets Free.

This great festival comes from Mesopotamia, from the festivities of the original horned god-kings of Babel. Almost every aspect of the Cronus-Saturn celebration is intact in Christianity, the exchange of presents, the hanging of golden suns of Adonis-Osiris and silver stars of Ishtar-Venus on the sacred tree, the chopped yule logs of Osiris-Horus, and the wreaths and drinking cups of Bacchus. Add to this the rest of the general "easing of moral restrictions" such as sexual antics under mistletoes and other vegetation sprigs of the satyrs (mini woodland horned ones) and various fertility goddesses. The disciples of Christ never took part in this massive pagan-fest. But the early Christians certainly did, and today most churchmen who are equally aware of the dark origins of these rites remain unperturbed. Like the goats who were “willfully ignorant” of impending doom before the Flood (2 Peter 3:5) they remain adamant in keeping these satanic traditions.

Like the Israelites who made a golden calf of Osiris-Apis and called it YHWH (Exodus 32), Christians say they are now keeping customs from the Saturnalia in honour of the Lord. That complete lack of integrity makes it worse, not better. Ignorance might be grounds to plead mercy, but knowledge seals the death penalty in this matter. "You shall not go after other gods, the gods of the peoples who are round about you...lest the anger of the Lord be kindled against you, and he destroy you off the face of the earth." (Deuteronomy 6:14) "In vain do you worship me," says the real Son of God, "teaching as truth the traditions of men." (Mark 7:6-8; Matthew 15:8,9)

The Magi of Persia gave gifts to Christ, not to each other, several days after his birth. The disciples of Christ never exchanged gifts on a birth date for Jesus, nor did they celebrate a birthday for him at all. They were instructed to give freely all the time. (Matthew 10:8) They were commanded to remember not his birth but his death, and this not at Easter (Ishtar) but at all times, as often as they drank wine and broke bread in their own homes. (Luke 22:19,20; 1 Corinthians 11:23-26)

But the Church did not want a simple breaking of bread or Christ’s "royal priesthood" of believers. They wanted a "house of god" made with hands and a clergy to perform the sacraments of Mithra and other sungods of Asia and Egypt. They wanted everything Babel had to offer, and God gave them it all, in full measure, from the Pontifex Maximus to his college of cardinals and priests, along with the most offensive sacrament ever devised by these sons of disobedience, an abomination far greater than the offerings baked for the Queen of Heaven by the wicked Israelites in Egypt (Jeremiah 44). And for this they created a church calendar called the Ordo (Latin: series, sequence) to specify the days on which the abomination should be celebrated, as well as all the renamed pagan feasts and events to be kept in the “service” of God.

The Masters of Duplicity

"Janus, in Roman religion, the animistic spirit of doorways (januae) and archways (jani). The worship of Janus traditionally dated back to Romulus and a period even before the actual founding of the city of Rome…Some scholars regard Janus as the god of all beginnings and believe that his association with doorways is derivative. He was invoked as the first of any gods in regular liturgies. The beginning of the day, month, and year, both calendrical and agricultural, were sacred to him. The month of January is named for him…There were several important temples erected to Janus, and it is assumed that there was also an early cult on the Janiculum, which the ancients took to mean 'the city of Janus.' Janus was represented by a double-faced head, and he was represented in art either with or without a beard." (Encyclopedia Britannica, Janus, Std.Ver.1999)


Fig.6c. 1. Janus the two-faced god of the door, Roman coin, Kunsthistorisches Museum Vienna, c.220 AD. 2. Roman bishop with the staff of Tammuz-Osiris and the combined headpiece of Dagon, Baal, Tammuz and Osiris.

Janus is yet another Romanized form of Tammuz. He is one of the oldest of all the Roman gods, sometimes regarded as the very first deified god-king of Italy and given the title "god of gods." Of all the versions of Nimrod the son of Cush, Janus was one of the most significant counterfeit sons to be absorbed by the early Christian Church, playing a role as important as that of Mithra and Sol. He was the substitute for the real Door. His priests were called cardinals, from the Latin word cardinis, meaning hinge. The sacred symbols of this counterfeit and his assistants who unlocked and opened doors were, quite naturally, keys. Early Christians were quick to blend the literal image of these keys with the figurative keys that Christ conferred upon his apostle Peter, and they likewise deliberately confused Peter with the rock (recognition of the real Son and Word of God) that Jesus revealed to him. (Matthew 16:15-19, for details see Chapter 2, Wrong Name, The Truth Which Sets Free) Making the claim that the Roman pontiff was an apostle, the successor of Peter, the Christians merged both Jesus and Janus into the same entranceway so subtly that the priests of the hinge could go on serving the false door and shepherd in the name of Christ. The effect was stunning. The resulting flock was nothing like Christ’s sheep but instead a congregation of Christian goats, a vast multitude of them.

Christians had long been putting all the myths into a melting pot but it was actually Emperor Constantine that opened the floodgates for the Church when he blended Christ with the solar deity Sol Invictus (the invincible sun). Sol had long been a favourite god in Rome, a mixture of Mithra from Persia, Apollo from Greece and the Egyptian sungods Helios and Aten. It would be natural to place the "birthday" of the solar god during the shortest period of sunlight in the year, after which the days grew longer. Emperor Aurelian had already built a magnificent temple to Sol in Rome and dedicated it on December 25th. "The emperor Aurelian introduced an official religion of Sol Invictus in AD 270, making the sun-god the premier divinity of the empire, and wearing his rayed crown himself...Aurelian’s Sol borrowed many features from Mithraism, including the iconographical representation of the god as a beardless youth. Aurelian dedicated the Sol Invictus Temple on December 25, 274 (AD) in a festival called dies natalis Solis Invicti or birthday of the invincible Sun." (Wikipedia, Sol Invictus)

Both Saturn and Sol are intimately associated with the Christians’ choice of December 25 as their big day. And they know it. "The well-known solar feast, however, of Natalis Invicti, celebrated on 25 December, has a strong claim on the responsibility for our December date" and "from the beginning of the third century ‘Sun of Justice’ was used as a title of Christ." (New Catholic Encyclopedia, Christmas) "According to the New Catholic Encyclopedia (1967) article on Constantine the Great: Sol Invictus had been adopted by the Church of Rome as evidenced by Christ (portrayed) as Apollo-Helios in a mausoleum discovered under St. Peter’s Basilica in Vatican City and dated to 250 (AD)...The date for Christmas may also bear a relation to sun worship…According to the scriptor Syrus, writing in the fourth century: ‘It was a custom of the Pagans to celebrate on the same 25 December the birthday of the Sun, at which they kindled lights in token of festivity. In these solemnities and revelries the Christians also took part. Accordingly when the doctors of the Church perceived that the Christians had a leaning to this festival, they took counsel and resolved that the true Nativity should be solemnized on that day.’" (Wikipedia, Sol Invictus) Christians of practically every sect still blend Christ with the sun in "sunrise services" at the second most important pagan festival of Easter (Ishtar).

This is all a continuation of the subtle mix used so successfully by Constantine, the classic Christian. Like Janus, Constantine was two-faced. He minted coins for Sol while adopting a semblance of belief in Christ, and he conferred upon himself the title of Pontifex Maximus, becoming Emperor and High Priest rolled into one, a position worthy of the Zzars of Babel. The Bishop of Rome, a spin "doctor of the Church" without equal, had a similar "leaning" and double intent when he took for himself the title Pontifex Maximus (Supreme Pontiff) as well as "Holy Father" and "Vicar (Substitute) of Christ." Far from imitating or remotely obeying the Son of God that he claims to follow, he walks instead in the garments of Tammuz-Osiris, carries the staff of Tammuz-Osiris, and wears the combined hat of Dagon, Baal, Tammuz and Osiris. His priests are the rightful successors to the priests of Zeus (Cush) in Pergamon, and his throne most definitely belongs in Rome. This "apostle" is indeed the successor of one of the disciples of Christ, but it is not Peter. And like the apostle he resembles, he is the only one in Scripture to be personally possessed by Satan to perform his inescapable destiny: selling out the real Son of God before ultimately perishing. (Luke 22:3; John 13:27, 17:12; 2 Thessalonians 2:3,9) To read about this connection in detail see Chapter 17, The Truth Which Sets Free.

Mysteries in the Dark

A priesthood is rarely successful unless it builds a church and keeps its pew-sitters in the dark. That is exactly what the ancient priests of Mesopotamia knew. First build a house for the god, then officiate over mysterious rites that only priests can truly understand and perform. In Babylon "the sense of mystery, of the divine and secret, was further strengthened by the retention of Sumerian as the religious and sacred language; Sumerian was the source of all culture for the Assyro-Babylonians, and its use was also a tribute to a people to whom they owed a great deal of their science." (Archaeologia Mundi: Mesopotamia, Margueron, p.177) Roman priests learned this lesson well, retaining ancient Latin as the language for their mumbo-jumbo, in all their incantations. The word "hocus-pocus" comes from the utterance "hoc est me corpus" (this is my body) in the most important rite that they ever perfected.

Unlike the broken pieces of ordinary bread that Christ shared with his elect, the bread of the counterfeits had to be whole and intact. In fact each of the breads was round, in the shape of the sungod, whether that was female (Isis cakes) or male (Mithra breads). These ceremonies and commonly shared meals were "constitutive features of the mystery societies, which reached their peak of popularity in the first three centuries of the Christian era." (Encyclopaedia Britannica, Mystery religions, 1974, VII: 153) The mystery bread was literally considered to be the god himself, and thus the consumer actually ate his deity, partaking of his divine nature. And only the priests could turn the grain into god and dole him out.

This is what the early Christians blended with the simple supper of Christ and substituted for that commemorative meal. Some still serve these sun-breads or wafers from a monstrance, a sun-shaped vessel, containing the "host" (the god). The word "monstrance" was derived from the Latin verb to "demonstrate," in this case to "show" the priests’ magic creation, but in fact they had concocted a "monstrosity," the spiritual atrocity of the ages, confusing the pagan rite with the Lord’s most intimate part of an ordinary meal that was designed for his elect. This is the "abomination" that the "little horn" of the fourth beast of Daniel instituted, replacing the household bread-breaking that Jesus entrusted to his elect with a sacrament of the sons of Babel. They replacing the finished work and end-all sacrifice of the Son of God (who rendered all temples and priests obsolete) with an ongoing sacrifice administered by a new order of priests in a new church. And they did it in the name of Jesus Christ. The Catholic Dictionary defines this ritual as, "the unbloody Sacrifice of Calvary; the Sacrifice of the Eucharist; the highest act of worship in the Catholic Church which is offered up by a priest in the place of Christ himself." Countless millions "celebrate" this rite every week, the greatest insult to the real God and Father ever perpetrated by the goats in the name of his Son.

You may think that this kind of error is merely confined to the Roman, Orthodox or "high" churches with their incense-wielding priests. Not so. Protestants and other sects of practically every persuasion have similar obsessions with how to perform their "sacraments," such as exactly how to cut the bread, which way to administer the water in baptism, and what "duly qualified minister" may do so. And in most cases their "festivals" and "gospels" are no different from those of Rome. That is why they are so easily being drawn back into the Great Mother Church. Billy-goat Graham and other popular "evangelists" have no defense against the dark lord of Babel because they are already in his domain, part of the daughter churches spawned from the original. They are as much in love with a "house of god" and a substitute Christ as any Sumerian ever was. If you doubt this then now is the time to read Chapter 10, 15, 20 (Sacraments, Gospels, Ecumenism) in The Truth Which Sets Free.

The same confusion exists throughout Christianity, whether it is in Orthodox, Coptic, Protestant or any other sectarian circles, a deep-rooted belief in churchmanship, in belonging to a church and accepting the words of the clergy. This has nothing to do with true discipleship, it is a cult concept invented in Babel, found throughout world religion, cherished by priests and swallowed by pew-sitters. And it was perfected in Jesus’ name by Mother Rome. Instead of sheep with God-given individual faith, this religion produces a mass of goats, with church-created herd faith, and deliberately confuses them with God’s elect. Here it is, perfectly defined by the founder of the "Society of Jesus" (Jesuits) a champion of churchmanship and primary agent of Satan’s ace card. "That we may be altogether of the same mind and in conformity with the Church herself, if she shall have defined anything to be black which to our eyes appears to be white, we ought in like manner to pronounce it to be black. For we must undoubtedly believe that the Spirit of our Lord Jesus Christ, and the Spirit of the Orthodox Church His Spouse, by which Spirit we are governed and directed to Salvation, is the same." (Ignatius Loyola, Spiritual Exercises, No.13)

It is no wonder that the word Jesuit is now defined in many dictionaries to mean "one who is devious or untrustworthy." But this is the spirit of the Church, and it is nothing like the Spirit of God. It is a very dark substitute. The seven-hilled city of Rome is without a doubt the resurrected neo-Babylon of Scripture, the "mystery" (in the apostle John’s time) that is no longer a mystery, specifically identified as "Babylon the great, mother of harlots and of earth’s abominations." (Revelation 17:5,9,18) From here we can follow the progress of the Mesopotamian model into the West with ease. But it also took an eastern route, through India and the Far East, and evidence of that can clearly be found all the way to the New World. And of course there is the religion of Cush in Africa and Ishmael in Arabia. But the first and most logical step now is to examine Europe, to which Rome exported many Babylonian replicas, followed by a second helping of Church clones.

Even to the farthest reaches of Northern Europe, we can find Bel or Baal’s identity in the storm god Thor and the widely worshipped Odin, revered in the great winter festival of Yuletide, also called “The Feast of the Dead,” a celebration full of “devilish spirits.” This was indeed a feast for the dead goats of the world, and still is. When the first “missionaries” began “converting the Germanic peoples to Christianity,” they found it convenient to “allow the celebrations themselves to go on largely unchanged, versus trying to confront and suppress them.” Pope Gregory I, himself one of those early messengers, advocated that “converting heathens is easier if they are allowed to retain the outward forms of their traditional pagan practices and traditions” and he justified this as permissible if it was done in God’s name and to His glory. (Wikipedia, Yuletide) This was nothing new. Christians have adhered to this religious strategy ever since they created and refined this counterfeit faith in the first few centuries AD.
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