Why do large groups of Christians always seem to fall for such frauds?

Helen again
For starters I'm IFB not Roman Catholic.
I carefully did not include Hislop in my list.
I only mentioned him in passing as being somewhat different from the one's I listed, in a response.
I wanted the fraudulent nature of those I listed not to be controversial in this thread.


As for Hislop and his impeccable research.
Yeah right.
If you truly want to find out specific reasons for why Hislop isn't being taken serious by any reputable churchhistorian nowadays you can dig a couple of arguments out of the following links. There are lots more. I for one am not going to mention the man or his work in this thread again.
http://www.geocities.com/jayce8565/babylon.html
http://www.equip.org/free/DC187.htm
http://www.tektonics.org/guest/hislop01.html

 

Mike
Dave Hunt, T.A. McMahon, Mary Ann Collins all weren't mentioned by me in this thread.
Why do you bring them up in a thread about those who are recognized by all around here as mentally unstable frauds?
You know about exposé's on them in Cornerstone magazine I haven't heard about?

 

"The reason why I brought them up is that I was adding some additional fine works whos authors are slammed by Catholics"
"
The Catholics aren't always alone or without good reason when they start slamming.


Ralph Wood row has spoken to many different churches, groups, and conferences over the past 42 years, sharing the glad news of Jesus Christ. He is the author of 13 books with over 500,000 copies in print. Ralph and his wife, Arlene, Live in Palm Springs, California

In my earlier Christian experience, certain literature fell into my hands that claimed a considerable amount of Babylonian paganism had been mixed into Christianity. While the Roman Catholic Church was the primary target of this criticism, it seemed the customs and beliefs with which pagan parallels could be found had also contaminated other churches. Much of what I encountered was based on a book called The Two Babylons by Alexander Hislop (1807-1862)

Over the years The Two Babylons has impacted the thinking of many people, ranging all the way from those in radical cults (e.g., the Jehovah’s Witnesses) to very dedicated Christians who hunger for a move by God but are concerned about anything that might quench His Spirit. Its basic premise is that the pagan religion of ancient Babylon has continued to our day disguised as the Roman Catholic Church, prophesied in the Book of Revelation as "Mystery Babylon the Great" (thus, the idea of two Babylons---one ancient and one modern). Because this book is detailed and has a multitude of notes and references, I assumed, as did many others, it was factual. We quoted "Hislop" as an authority on paganism just as "Webster" might be quoted on word definitions.

As a young evangelist, I began to preach on the mixture of paganism with Christianity, and eventually I wrote a book based on Hislop, titled Babylon Mystery Religion (Ralph Woodrow Evangelistic Assn., 1966). In time, my book became quite popular, went through many printings, and was translated into Korean, German, Spanish, Portuguese, and several other languages. Hundreds quoted from it. Some regarded me as an authority on the subject of "pagan mixture." Evan the noted Roman Catholic writer Karl Keating said, "Its best-known proponent is Ralph Woodrow, author of Babylon Mystery Religion". 1

Many preferred my book over The Two Babylons because it was easier to read and understand. Sometimes the two books were confused with each other, and once I even had the experience of being greeted as "Reverend Hislop"! As time went on, however, I began to hear rumblings that Hislop was not a reliable historian, I heard this from a history teacher and in letters from people who heard this perspective expressed on the Bible Answer Man radio program. Even the Worldwide Church of God began to take a second look at the subject. As a result, I realized I needed to go back through Hislop’s work, my basic source, and prayerfully check it out.

As I did this, it became clear: Hislop’s "history" was often only an arbitrary piecing together of ancient myths. He claimed Nimrod was a big, ugly, deformed black man. His wife, Semiramis, was a beautiful white woman with blond hair and blue eyes. But she was a backslider known for her immoral lifestyle, the inventor of soprano singing and the originator of priestly celibacy. He said that the Babylonians baptized in water, believing it had virtue because Nimrod and Semiramis suffered for them in water; that Noah’s son Shem killed Nimrod; that Semiramis was killed when one of her sons cut off her head, and so on. I realized that no recognized history book substantiated these and many other claims.

The subtitle for Hislop’s book is "The Papal Worship Proved to Be the Worship of Nimrod and His Wife." Yet when I went to reference works such as the Encyclopedia Britannica, The Americana, The Jewish Encyclopedia, The Catholic Encyclopedia, The Worldbook Encyclopedia – carefully reading their articles on "Nimrod" and "Semiramis" – not one said anything about Nimrod and Semiramis being husband and wife. They did not even live in the same century. Nor is there any basis for Semiramis being the mother of Tammuz. I realized these ideas were all Hislop’s inventions.

If we sought to base an argument about George Washington and his wife, we should at least start out with facts. We could show who George Washington was, that he had a wife named Martha, when they lived, and continue from there. But if no historian was certain who George Washington was, or if he even had a wife, or when they lived, this would not be a sound basis on which to prove anything. Such is the inherent weakness of Hislop's thesis that papal worship is the worship of Nimrod and his wife.

I saw that a more direct and valid argument against errors in the Roman Catholic Church (or any other group) is the Bible itself, not ancient mythology. For example, the Bible speaks of a minister being "the husband of but one wife" and that "forbidding people to marry" is a doctrine of devils (1 Tim. 3:2; 4:3). This provides a stronger argument against priestly celibacy than trying to show that ancient priests of Semiramis castrated themselves.

While seeking to condemn the paganism of Roman Catholicism, Hislop produced his own myths. By so doing, he theorized that Nimrod, Adonis, Apollo, Attes, Ball-zebub, Bacchus, Cupid, Dagon, Hercules, Januis, Linus, Lucifer, Mars, Merodach, Thithra, Molock, Narcissus, Oannes, Oden, Orion, Osiris, Pluto, Saturn, Teitan, Typhon, Vulcan, Wodan, and Zoraster were all one and the same. By mixing myths, Hislop supposed that Semiramis was the wife of Nimrod and was the same as Aphrodite, Artemis, Astarte, Aurora, Bellona, Ceres, Diana, Easter, Irene, Iris, Juno, Mylitta, Proserpine, Rhea, Venus, and Vesta.

Take enough names, enough stories, and enough centuries; translate from one language to another; and a careless writer of the future might pass on all kinds of misinformation, Gerald Ford, and American president, might be confused with Henry Ford, the car manufacturer. Abraham Lincoln might end up as the inventor of the automobile, the proof being that many cars had the name "Lincoln". The maiden name of Billy Graham’s wife is Bell. She has sometimes gone by the name Ruth Bell Graham. The inventor of the telephone was Alexander Graham Bell. By mixing up names, someone might end up saying Billy Graham was the inventor of the telephone; or that he invented Graham Crackers. In fact, the inventor of Graham Crackers was Sylvester Graham. Again, similarities could be pointed out. Both men were named Graham. Both men were ministers. But the differences make a real difference: Sylvester was a Presbyterian and Billy a Baptist, and they were from different generations.

Building on similarities while ignoring differences is an unsound practice. Atheists have long used this method in an attempt to discredit Christianity altogether, citing examples of pagans who had similar beliefs about universal floods, slain and risen saviors, virgin mothers, heavenly ascensions, holy books, and so on.

As Christians, we don’t reject prayer just because pagans pray to their gods. We don’t reject water baptism just because ancient tribes plunged into water as a religious ritual. We don’t reject the Bible just because pagans believe their writings are holy or sacred.

The Bible mentions things like kneeling in prayer, raising hands, taking off shoes on holy ground, a holy mountain, a holy place in the temple, pillars in front of the temple, offering sacrifices without blemish, a sacred ark, cities of refuge, bring forth water from a rock, laws written on stone, fire appearing on a person’s head, horsed of fire, and the offering of first fruits. Yet, at one time or another, similar things were known among pagans. Does this make the Bible pagan? Of course not!

If finding a pagan parallel provides proof of paganism, the Lord Himself would be pagan. The woman called Mystery Babylon had a cup in her hand; the Lord has a cup in His hand (Ps. 78:8). Pagan kings sat on thrones and wore crowns; the Lord sits on a throne and wears a crown (Rev. 1:4; 14:14) Pagans worshipped the sun; the Lord is called the "Sun of Righteousness" (Mal. 4:2), Pagan gods were likened to stars; the Lord is called "the bright and Morning star" (Rev. 22:16). Pagan gods had temples dedicated to them; the Lord has a temple (Rev. 7:15). Pagans built a high tower in Babylon; the Lord is a high tower (2 Sam. 22:3). Pagans worshipped idolatrous pillars; the Lord appeared as a pillar of fire (Exod. 13:21-22). Pagan gods were pictured with wings; the Lord is pictured with wings (Ps. 91:4).

I realized that citing a similarity does not provide proof. There must be a legitimate connection. Lets suppose on May 10 a man was stabbed to death in Seattle. There were strong reasons for believin

 

Born Again Catholic
I'm agreeing with Pete on this.

 

music4Him
Let's assume for one second that we are not going to derail this thread into the standard denominational warfare.
But we can establish a pecking order of primary audience and primary attack target for each fraud.


Mike Warnke
attacked: Satanists
audience: Evangelicals

Rebecca Brown
attacked: Satanists (who ofcourse run a vast conspiracy)
audience: Christians who take Chick tracts seriously/ folks who believe in satanic ritual abuse.

Elaine
attacked: Satanists (who ofcourse run a vast conspiracy)
audience: Christians who take Chick tracts seriously/ folks who believe in satanic ritual abuse.

Daniel Michael Yoder
attacked: Jews (who ofcourse run a vast conspiracy)
audience: (closet) anti-semites/ folks who believe in satanic ritual abuse.

Leo Taxil
attacked: Freemasonry
audience: the Roman Catholic Church

Alberto Rivera
attacked: the Jesuits (who run a conspiracy even vaster than that of the earlier mentioned satanists)
audience: Christians who take Chick tracts seriously

John Todd
attacked: everybody not in his audience it seems all linked in one vast conspiracy.
audience: Fundamentalist Christians

Lauren Stratford
attacked: Satanism
audience: Evangelicals/Holocaust survivors supportgroups/ folks who believe in satanic ritual abuse.

William Schnoebelen
attacked: witchcraft/Satanism/Mormonism/Catholicism
audience: Christians who take Chick tracts seriously

Maria Monk
attacked: Catholicism
audience: everybody who didn't like people immigrating from mostly catholic countries to the USA.

 

Helen
"Hislop's references have been checked out -- by me, among others."
"
And by a host of 20th century archeologists and linguists 2 of whom ended up as guestlecturers in a course on 19th century Anti-Catholicism in the Englishspeaking world I followed back in the 80's. I got 2 credits out of the whole thing and among other things all the information one is ever going to need to know about The Two Babylons.

"In the meantime, if you consider black to be ugly, that's up to you. But the evidence is that Nimrod/Ninus was probably very dark skinned. "
"


"Do NOT ignore the footnotes."
"
Indeed if you look them up (much harder nowadays, but not undoable) you find out how much Hislop warped what his sources said.

 

music4Him
The Roman Catholic Church is currently by far the largest denomination in the world.

 

Indeed.