The Occult Origins of Santa

Christmas is a dual holiday. On the same day the birth of Jesus and the ideals of Christian charity are celebrated, though there is a simultaneous holiday which been foisted on us by occult forces who exercise increasing influence in our world. The other Christmas involves silly myths which include a fat man in a red suit with magical powers who lives in the North Pole.

Santa is an anagram for Satan. Santa has no Christian associations at all, but is rather the survival of the ancient worship of the god of the Underworld, in the form of Saturn.

The origin of Christmas is to be found in the 4 pagan seasonal holidays that coincide with the ancient cycles of the dying-god, symbolized by the Sun. They correspond to the two solstices and equinoxes: Christmas, Easter, St. John’s Day and Halloween.

The dying-god, as god of the Underworld, was the form Lucifer was worshipped by cultures outside of the Judeo-Christian tradition. He was found among many different peoples in ancient times, according to different names depending on the cultures. The Egyptians worshipped Osiris, the Canaanites Baal, the Babylonians Bel or Marduk, the Greeks Dionysus and the Persians Mithras.

The dying-god was equated with Venus, whose original Latin name was Lucifer. Additionally, he was also represented by the Sun, and equated with the planet Saturn, “the nocturnal Sun”, to represent his darker aspects. As god of the Underworld, he presided over the souls of the dead. And, because primitive paganism elevated this evil to the level of a god, it was regarded as necessary to also render him worship. This involved rites of apotropaic magic, meaning to avert evil. While the good god required the performance of good, the evil god demanded the performance of evil. Therefore, to prevent his evil, or to direct it, or that of his minions among the demons, against ones enemies, it was necessary to perform evil sacrifices, the most powerful of which was the slaying of a child.

Thus, the Israelites were also accused of sacrificing their own children to the Canaanite god Moloch, another title for Baal. Moloch was identified with Saturn, whom the Babylonians regarded as the “star of the Sun.” [1] The Greek myth of Kronos swallowing his children was compared to the Carthaginian worship of Moloch, or Saturn, by the ancient historian Diodorus:

Among the Carthaginians there was a brazen statue of Saturn putting forth the palms of his hands bending in such a manner toward the earth, as that the boy who was laid upon them, in order to be sacrificed, should slip off, and so fall down headlong into a deep fiery furnace. Hence it is probable that Euripides took what he fabulously relates concerning the sacrifice in Taurus, where he introduces Iphigenia asking Orestes this question: “But what sepulchre will me dead receive, shall the gulf of sacred fire me have?” The ancient fable likewise that is common among all the Grecians, that Saturn devoured his own children, seems to be confirmed by this law among the Carthaginians. [2]

The origin of Christmas is the Saturnalia, an ancient Roman festival in honor of the deity Saturn, held on the 17th of December of the Julian calendar and later expanded with festivities through to the 23rd of December. According to Porphyry, the Saturnalia occurred near the winter solstice because the sun enters Capricorn, the astrological house of Saturn, at that time.

The Saturnalia is the best-known of several festivals in the Greco-Roman world, celebrated with a sacrifice at the Temple of Saturn, in the Roman Forum, and a public banquet, followed by private gift-giving, festivities, and a carnival atmosphere that overturned Roman social norms. Slaves were treated to a banquet of the kind usually enjoyed by their masters. Saturnalian license also permitted slaves to enjoy a pretense of disrespect for their masters, and exempted them from punishment.

Imperial sources refer to a Saturnalicius princeps who ruled as master of ceremonies for the proceedings. He was appointed by lot, and has been compared to the medieval Lord of Misrule at the Feast of Fools. His inane commands, such as “Sing naked” or “Throw him into cold water,” had to be obeyed by the other guests at the convivium: he creates and (mis)rules a chaotic and absurd world.

In The Golden Bough, Jame Frazer interpreted an incident from the Acts of Saint Dasius, an early martyrological text, as indicative of human sacrifice in connection with the Saturnalia. Dasius was a Christian soldier who refused to play the part of the King of the Saturnalia when it was allotted to him, and for his refusal was killed. Frazer then surmises that the King of the Saturnalia was originally a scapegoat victim who was killed as a human sacrifice to Saturn at the end of his festival.

The popularity of Saturnalia continued into the third and fourth centuries AD, and as the Roman Empire came under Christian rule, some of its customs have influenced the seasonal celebrations surrounding Christmas and the New Year. In one of the interpretations in Macrobius’ work, Saturnalia is a festival of light leading to the winter solstice, with the abundant presence of candles symbolizing the quest for knowledge and truth. The renewal of light and the coming of the new year was celebrated in the later Roman Empire at the Dies Natalis of Sol Invictus, the “Birthday of the Unconquerable Sun,” on December 25.

The cult of Sol Invictus, of Syrian in origin, was harmonized with the cult of Mithras, with which it was so similar that the two are often confused. Ultimately, reserved for the highest ranking members, and representing the ultimate mystery, the ancient Mysteries of Mithras equated Mithras with the Leontocephalus, a lion-headed and winged god who was also equated with Hades, the Greek Satan. The Leontocephalus has also been identified with Saturn. According to Ptolemy, the people of Persia and Mesopotamia “worship the star of Aphrodite [Venus], naming it Isis, and the star of Kronos [Saturn] as Mithras Helios (Sun).” [3] Saturn, known as the nocturnal Sun, and “Pluto”, Porphyry explained, “is the Sun going beneath the earth and voyaging round the invisible world…” [4]

Imposed by Roman emperors on their subjects a century before Constantine, and instead of being eliminated in the time of his reign, it seems to have to have survived by being absorbed into Christianity. In common with Jesus, Mithras was born in a cave surrounded by animals and shepherds at the Winter Solstice in December, dates that had specific astronomical significance. In the Julian calendar, the 25th of December was reckoned the winter solstice, and was regarded as the Nativity of the Sun, because from this date the length of the day began to increase, and therefore, was regarded as the day of the rebirth of the Sun-god and the rejuvenation of life.

The Gospels, however, say nothing as to the day of Christ’s birth, and accordingly the early Church did not celebrate it. In time, though, the Christians of Egypt had come to regard the 6th of January as the birth of the Saviour, and that date gradually spread until, by the 4th century AD, it was universally established in the East. Finally, however, at the end of the 3rd or the beginning of the 4th century AD, the Western Church, which had never recognized the 6th of January as the day of the Nativity, adopted the 25th of December as the true date.

Christian authors, like Justin Martyr and Tertullian, noted the similarities between Christianity and Mithraism, but claimed that the mysteries were demonically inspired imitations of the true Christianity. To Justin Martyr:

“Jesus took bread, and… said, ‘this do ye in remembrance of me, this is my body’; and, after the same manner, having taken the cup and given thanks, He said, ‘this is my blood’; and gave it to them… Which the wicked devils have imitated in the mysteries of Mithra, commanding the same thing to be done.” [5]

To Tertullian,

“washing is the channel through which they are initiated into the sacred rites of some notorious Isis or Mithras… at the Eleusinia they are baptized to achieve regeneration, and the remission of their sins. Which fact being acknowledged, we recognize here also the zeal of the devil rivaling the things of God, while we find him, too, practicing baptism.” [6]]

Tertullian states that Mithras,

“in the kingdom of Satan, sets his marks on the forehead of his soldiers; celebrates also the oblation of bread, and introduces an image of resurrection… What also must one say to Satan’s limiting his chief priest to a single marriage: He too, has his virgins; he, too, his proficients in continence… Satan has shown such emulation in… administration of Christ’s sacraments” that he “succeeded in adapting to his profane and rival creed the very documents of divine things and of the Christian saints.” [7]

Effectively, although his mission began as that of an orthodox Jewish reformer, Jesus became the dying god of the mysteries, whose death and resurrection was celebrated every spring, known as Easter. Most of the churches had decided to observe Easter replacing the Jewish Passover. The Jewish Passover festival was ostensibly celebrated to commemorate the night God slew the firstborn sons of the Egyptians, expect those houses marked with the blood of a sacrificed lamb, which He passed over. In actuality, Passover was an assimilation of the spring rites that celebrated the death and resurrection of Tammuz. The Book of Ezekiel speaks of as an abomination among the Jews, with Jewish women sitting by the gate of the Temple weeping for the foreign god. [8]

footnotes

[1] Diodorus Siculus, Book II: 30.
[2] Book XX, Chap. I.
[3] Tetrabiblos 2.2.64, quoted from Beck, Planetary Gods, p. 86.
[4] Beck, Planetary Gods, p. 89.
[5] First Apology, LXVI.
[6] On Baptism, V.
[7] Prescription Against Heresies, XL.
[8] Ezekial 8:14; Jeremiah 32:29: 44:15: Isaiah 17:10