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Most students come to the University of Maine to learn and can at least appreciate the efforts of those who strive to correct our wrong ideas. I have no respect for people who don’t understand what they are teaching.
Changing minds has to be taken seriously and based on legitimate thought and research because falsifying information is a way of blindfolding people to the truth. Unfortunately, Matthew Campbell’s previous article in The Maine Campus (“Religion a blindfold for the faithful and a prime source of evil in humanity,” Oct. 21) contained a lot of information that was not even remotely accurate.
In his article, Campbell alleged a lot of similarities between Jesus Christ and the ancient Egyptian deity Horus, his intention being to discredit Christianity and religion in general. One would assume he knows a lot about Horus in order to discredit the story of Jesus, but he gets even basic information wrong. Horus was the Egyptian god of the sky and war, not the god of the sun. Also, the earliest records of Horus date back to about 2350 B.C., not before 3000 B.C., as he claims.
He was not born on Dec. 25, but on the last day of the Egyptian month Khoiak, which for us would be around the middle of November. Anyway, this is irrelevant since despite tradition, Jesus wasn’t born on Dec. 25 either, but probably in the middle of spring. In addition, Isis, the mother of Horus, was definitely not a virgin; he had an older, jackal-headed brother named Anubis.
There is no legend of a star shining at his birth, or of any wise men coming to give gifts, though in one tradition, the young Horus was attended to by a giant scorpion. Does that count?
There is also no basis to support the idea that Horus was baptized, an explicitly Judeo-Christian practice, nor was he crucified; this form of Roman execution wouldn’t be invented for another 1500 years. In fact, Horus never even died, and therefore was never buried nor resurrected.
He did not have 12 disciples or students. He had four helpers; minor deities known as Heru-Shemsu. I can’t see any relation between Jesus’ 12 disciples, the Heru-Shemsu and the signs of the zodiac. The zodiac was a Babylonian invention, carried on by the Greeks and Romans, and had no relation to Egyptian mythology. There’s absolutely no evidence that the story of Horus came from early astrology.
While we’re on the subject of evidence, I want to point out that there is not a single legitimate scholar of any relevant field who believes Jesus of Nazareth is not a legitimate historical figure, as Campbell claims. University of Durham Professor Emeritus James Dunn has called this a “thoroughly dead thesis.” In actuality, there is more evidence supporting the historical life of Jesus Christ then there are accounts verifying the events of Julius Caesar’s Gallic Wars. Using an unbiased eye and the same criteria used to evaluate all other antique documents, the evidence of Jesus being a real person is completely overwhelming.
In addition, the biblical accounts of Jesus Christ were written with information given by eyewitnesses only a few decades after his death. Luke, one of the gospel writers, explicitly states that fact. Since these are eyewitness accounts, the story of Jesus cannot be legend.
Unfortunately for Campbell, the existence of Horus is decidedly mythological. You can’t compare historical figures with mythological ones. It’s like comparing John F. Kennedy and Spider-Man. What can you do with that?
In Campbell’s article, he said he finds it sad when he encounters a “devout” who knows nothing about the origin of their faith. Yet this is exactly what I saw in last week’s issue; a devout who knew nothing about what he believes. His article was nothing but a series of claims pulled out of thin air, formulated into “truth” and used to condemn those who dare to think contrary to how he does. Campbell opens by saying, “I have no hope for humanity when flushing the toilet is such a difficult task for many.”
Fellow students, I have hope for this world if you seek the truth and flush misinformation like his down the drain.
Samuel Kiyanitsa is a third-year civil engineering student.
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