Posted on 01/31/2008 5:45:17 PM PST by Manfred the Wonder Dawg
In Rome in that day, Jews had their own cemeteries and Christians were buried outside the city -- not on Vatican Hill.
This sort of thing is common today. Both the fundamentalists and the skeptics contended that the writings of the Church are lies, all lies, by the winning side in the religious war.
There is an entire 1st century necropolis under the Basilica. Almost all the tombs are from the era of Peter. Sol Invictus was a late cult...it wasn’t started until the mid-200s. Most of the tombs down there have nothing to do with Sol Invictus...except that tomb M has a mosaic which has been interpreted as such, even though it could just be Christ as the sun.
Ya know for the winners of a religious war we sure let the losers get a lot of bad press in about us. We just sure as hell must suck at suppressing anti-Church writings.
Actually all joking aside thanks be to God that both Catholics and Protestants now know that the persecution of those who do not share our beliefs is a sin. It was a dark day in our history when heresy was a crime both against God and the State.
No one threw bodies into ditches unless they wanted diseases to run rampant.
But you didn’t answer my question: why did Constantine bulldoze the hill to build a HUGE basilica if he didn’t think that he was building over Peter’s grave?
Because he was building it over someone else's grave who also went by the name "Peter" -- Simon Magus.
Constantine was a worshipper of the Sol Invictus until his death, and the mausoleum under the Vatican has the emblems of the Sol Invictus on it, emblems also linked to Simon Magus.
Vatican Hill was outside the city in St. Peter's day.
They returned after Claudius' death. Peter was executed well into the reign of Nero.
What emblems of Sol Invictus? Are you talking about Tomb M? Here’s a map of the Excavations. The putative grave of St. Peter is at “P”—that’s the location over which Constantine centered the Basilica. Tomb M with the mosaic of Christ/Helios is farther down as you can see....and he did *not* put the altar over tomb M:
http://www.saintpetersbasilica.org/Necropolis/Scavi-map.htm
Tomb M is traditionally date to the middle 200s, but Sol Invictus officially dates from the time of Aurelian, ca. 274. This tomb may be too early for it to be Sol Invictus. Plus, the other walls of this tomb have classically Christian imagery (good shepherd, fisherman, Jonah), which is why this mosaic is typically identified as Christ, *not* Sol Invictus or any other pagan divinity.
And well known as the burial place for sorcerers and seers -- thus the name "Vatican".
Hate to burst your bubble, but many reformed folks dislike the cultural traditions called Christmas and Easter. For the life of me, I don’t know why Christians think asking for and receiving worldly stuff glorifies the Lord - nor do I think it reflective of the Magi bringing gifts to Jesus. We would send Bibles to China or something along those lines if we were trying to emulate that. The time of year and various decorations most all come from pagan religions, co-opted by a church along the way.
Easter shouldn’t be called as such by Christians and we should shun the cultural masks and traditions typically put on this day we should honor above all others. The setting of the day is another recognition of man rather than Truth, as the Christians did not want to have “Easter” on the same day as the Jewish Passover, rather than stand firm on the date most likely to be accurate.
sigh
They didn't all return. Many settled elsewhere -- never to return.
As far as Simon Magus goes, where is your evidence that Simon Magus was ever even in Rome? It's not in the Bible, that's for sure. The only thing I've found are a few hints from the church fathers, or Catholic pious tradition, which you don't trust in any other context (like, say, when it says that Peter died in Rome).
In fact, there's a Catholic church in Rome that claims to be built on the spot where Simon Magus died. (In fact, they claim to have the stone where Peter and Paul knelt to pray imprecations against Simon; hardly a complementary reference to Mr. Magus.)
The idea that Constantine somehow hoodwinked the Roman Christians into venerating the tomb of Simon Magus is just silly. The tomb was clearly venerated by Christians long before Constantine was hatched.
A few???? Justin Martur, Irenaeus, Hippolytus, Eusebius, et al -- they all have more to say about Simon Magus's Roman ecclesiastical bishopric than anything about Simon Peter's mythical existence there.
In fact, there's a Catholic church in Rome that claims to be built on the spot where Simon Magus died.
St Peter's Basilica???
(In fact, they claim to have the stone where Peter and Paul knelt to pray imprecations against Simon; hardly a complementary reference to Mr. Magus.)
There are a lot of "claims" that come from Rome. The wise man sifts through them to separate fact from fiction.
The idea that Constantine somehow hoodwinked the Roman Christians into venerating the tomb of Simon Magus is just silly. The tomb was clearly venerated by Christians long before Constantine was hatched.
Venerating a tomb on a hill known to be the burial site of sorcerers and mystics. What does that say about those supposed "Christians" who have such little discernment???
You make assumptions about me and then declare a problem I “must” face. Nice try. One thing I am sure of - God’s Word is True and was discovered as such before any pope drew a breath. No church fathers wrote the Bible nor searched it out - God revealed what He had authored as Scripture, the Gnostic so-called Gospels were rejected from the beginning because they did not comport with what was known as Scripture from the Apostles appointed by God to write it.
To wit, an excerpt from the work of Gaius preserved in Eusebius, Book 2, Chap. 25:
It is confirmed likewise by Caius, a member of the Church, who arose under Zephyrinus, bishop of Rome. He, in a published disputation with Proclus, the leader of the Phrygian heresy, speaks as follows concerning the places where the sacred corpses of the aforesaid apostles are laid:Zephyrinus reigned from ca. A.D. 199-217.7. "But I can show the trophies of the apostles. For if you will go to the Vatican or to the Ostian way, you will find the trophies of those who laid the foundations of this church."
This structure--the "tropaion" or trophy of Gaius has been found beneath St. Peter's. Seals on the bricks date it to the time of Marcus Aurelius (161-180).
There is a note in the Liber Pontificalis that Pope Anencletus "built and adorned the sepulchral monument of blessed Peter". The author of the LP screwed the names and dates up (Anencletus is just another name for Cletus, not a separate person), but he may well have preserved a kernel of truth about the fact of it, as there was a Pope Anicetus who reigned from about 157-168, thus within the time period that archaeology tells us the monument was built.
meant to ping you to 117.
Magus doesn’t translate as “Peter.” Sure your name isn’t Brown? Adios!
So which is it? the Vatican or the Ostian Way? I think that it is Eusebius who records that even after the construction of St Peter's Basilica, the people in Constantine's day were still visiting the graves of St Peter elsewhere in Rome. So how many sets of bones did this Peter have???
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