Board Thread:Questions and Answers/@comment-24577079-20141203031648/@comment-5789047-20151214235408

Saturn1257 wrote:

JoshTheRoman wrote: In case, you guys are finished with discussing the historicity of Jesus,

Mithraic mysteries

It was Christianity's main competitor and arc enemy within the a hundred years of Jesus dying. I'm considering that the Mithraic mysteries would simply take the place of Christianity. Quoting straight from Wikipedia:

"The Mithraic Mysteries were a mystery religion practiced in the Roman Empire from about the 1st to 4th centuries AD. The name of the Persian god Mithra (proto-Indo-Iranian Mitra), adapted into Greek as Mithras, was linked to a new and distinctive imagery. Writers of the Roman Empire period referred to this mystery religion by phrases which can be anglicized as Mysteries of Mithras or Mysteries of the Persians;[1][2] modern historians refer to it as Mithraism,[1] or sometimes Roman Mithraism.[3][4] The mysteries were popular in the Roman military.[5]

Worshippers of Mithras had a complex system of seven grades of initiation, with ritual meals. Initiates called themselves syndexioi, those "united by the handshake".[6] They met in underground temples (called mithraea), which survive in large numbers. The cult appears to have had its centre in Rome."

Not to mention the similarities with Christianity: "liberator-saviour, hierarchy of adepts (archbishops, bishops, priests), communal meal and a hard struggle of Good and Evil (bull-killing/crucifixion)."

The only reason this religion it declined was because Christianity became more popular and was eventually suppressed and destroyed with the emergence of a Christian Roman Empire. Intresting concept. Oct brought this up to me a couple days ago, and I said I'd take a look at it. I think it would definetly be canon for the timeline. Now, would Mithraism spread as far as it would in OTL? Also, would forms of Mithraism vary from place to place? (Example, would Hispanian Mithraism vary from Anatolian Mithraism?) It wold indeed vary, as there wasn't a written code of how it worked and it varied from city to city. Also the cult was extremely predominant in the military and it was male-only.