Obviously, if this ass-headed god is not Christ, it is another god, centuries before Christ himself was ever portrayed pictorially as crucified. Regarding this image purported to be of an ass-headed Christ crucified, Lundy claims that it is in reality the Egyptian god Anubis, although the original head of that Egyptian god was a jackal. It is true that Anubis is depicted in cruciform; yet, as Tertullian is forced to refute, the Christians were accused of worshipping an ass-headed god, which is likely Seth or Set, the Egyptian god of night and darkness, the “twin” of the sun god Horus. In reality, both sides of the twin-faced god are depicted as crucified. Indeed, Doane remarks that the Romans’ “man on a cross” referred to by Tertullian is the “crucified Sol, whose birthday they annually celebrated on the 25th of December…” Moreover, it is interesting to note that the sun god Sol is depicted with a crown of seven rays, the same number found on the Parthian coronet of the Indian god “crucified in space.” It is apparent that this latter image is, in fact, a depiction of the sun god, the solar logos. Evans also asserts that the Roman crucifix portrayed the sun god:
Just as the Brahmans represented their god Krishna as a crucified man with a wreath of sunbeams around his head, just as the ancient Assyrians represented their sun god Baal as a man surrounded by an aureole, and with outstretched arms, thus forming a perfect cross, so the Romans reverenced a crucified incarnation of the god Sol, and many ancient Italian pictures of Jesus as a crucified Savior bear the inscription, “Deo Soli,” which may mean “To the only God,” or “To the God Sol.”
Indeed, as we have seen, the sign of the cross and crucifix were sacred motifs relating mainly to the sun or the solar deity. The sun, as a symbol or proxy of the divine, was deemed to sacrifice “himself” and to bestow eternal life; hence, the cross and crucifix became symbols of these concepts. In this regard, after discussing ancient depictions of a god within the circle of the zodiac, Lundy remarks:
So too, are the Pagan crucifixes on pp. 157, 159, 160, and notably the Hindu one, fig. 72, p. 175…doubtless intended to convey the idea of the sacrifice of this central Zodiacal figure for the life of the universe–his going out in space to give life to all others, or the great sacrifice continually going on in nature and in human society whereby crucifixion and death minister to the general welfare and higher life.
Lundy readily acknowledges the pre-Christian reverence of the cross, attempting to trace it to the Hebrew religion, from which, he claims, so many of the “perverted” and “corrupt” Pagan “mythologies” borrowed their ideas. We know through historical studies and archaeology that the assertion that Paganism was plagiarized from the Bible is false; so, any borrowing must have been in the opposite direction. In any case, like others, Lundy observes that when Moses lifted up the serpent of brass, the latter’s image was affixed upon a cross, which, as Lundy says, is a “sign of symbol, expressed by the author of the book of Wisdom, according to the Septuagint, as sumboulon swthriaV, the symbol of salvation. (Num. 21:8-9, and Wisdom, 16:6).”
The cross and crucified god were symbols of salvation, which is essentially immortality of the soul. Regarding the Egyptian religion, Rev. Cox says:
To the Egyptian the cross…became the symbol of immortality, and the god himself was crucified to the tree which denoted his fructifying power.
“The god himself was crucified to the tree”–the Egyptian god, asserts this pious Christian authority. This fructifying god, of course, is the solar deity, i.e., Osiris/Horus. Indeed, it has been likewise evinced that the sun god Horus himself is shown in cruciform, between two thieves, no less.
In describing an Egyptian image of the sun reaching down to his worshippers with hands at the ends of his rays holding the crux ansata/ankh, Lundy relates:
The sun’s disc is sending forth rays of light, each ending with a hand; and some are bestowing life’s hopes and blessings in the symbol of immortality, the cross. All that was dear in this life, and the life to come, is here intended by these hands holding forth the very sign of eternal life, and coming forth from the one source of all life and blessing.
As is evident, the concept of a divine incarnation who bestows eternal life, salvation, and redemption from sins by his suffering, often on a cross, is old and widespread, anterior to the Christian era.
In reality, the list of crucified gods and godmen does not end with the Indian, Egyptian and Roman deities. Kuhn relates that Zoroaster, who was born of an immaculate conception, was “called a splendid light from the tree of knowledge” whose soul in the end “was suspended a ligno (from the wood), or from the tree, the tree of knowledge.” Kuhn them remarks, “Here again we find the cross or tree of Calvary, the tree of the Christ, identified with the tree of knowledge of Genesis.”
Another god said to have been crucified was Prometheus, the Greek titan of fire and foresight. It has been claimed by a number of writers that the version of the Prometheus story passed down to us through Christian censors has been mutilated so as to hide its similarities to the Christ myth. As Graves says:
In the account of the crucifixion of Prometheus of Caucasus, as furnished by Seneca, Hesiod, and other writers, it is stated that he was nailed to an upright beam of timber, to which were affixed extended arms of wood, and that this cross was situated near the Caspian Straits. The modern story of this crucified God, which represents him as having been bound to a rock for thirty years, while vultures preyed upon his vitals, Mr. Higgins pronounces as an impious Christian fraud. “For,” says this learned historical writer, “I have seen the account which declares he was nailed to a cross with hammer and nails.”
Graves further relates that the “New American Cyclopedia” (i. 157) states that Prometheus was “crucified.” Lundy apparently concurs with this perspective that the Prometheus story was censored. In his remarks concerning the widely used solar symbol, the swastika, he says:
Dr. Schliemann found it on terracotta disks at Troy, in the fourth or lowest stratum of his excavations, indicating an Aryan civilization long anterior to the Greeks, say from two to three thousand years before Christ. Burnouf agrees with other archaeologists in saying that this is the oldest form of the cross known; and affirms that it is found personified in the ancient religion of the Greeks under the figure of Prometheus, the bearer of fire; the god is extended on the cross on Caucasus, while the celestial bird, which is the Cyena of the Vedic hymns, every day devours his immortal breast. The modification of this Vedic symbol became the instrument of torture and death to other nations, and was that on which Jesus Christ suffered death at the hands of the Jews and Romans.
Indeed, even the Catholic Encyclopedia admits that Prometheus was depicted in ancient times as bound to a cross:
On an ancient vase we see Prometheus bound to a beam which serves the purpose of a cross….
…Speaking of Prometheus nailed to Mount Caucasus, Lucian uses the substantive and the verbs and, [sic] the latter being derived from which also signifies a cross. In the same way the rock to which Andromeda was fastened is called crux, or cross.
CE also says:
The penalty of the cross goes back probably to the arbor infelix, or unhappy tree, spoken of by Cicero (Pro, Rabir., iii sqq.) and by Livy, apropos of the condemnation of Horatius after the murder of his sister.
Regarding the execution or, rather, expiatory sacrifice upon an “unhappy tree,” CE further comments:
This primitive form of crucifixion on trees was long in use, as Justus Lipsius notes (“De cruce”, I, ii, 5; Tert., “Apol.”, VIII, xvi; and “Martyrol. Paphnut.” 25 Sept.). Such a tree was known as a cross (crux). On an ancient vase we see Prometheus bound to a beam which serves the purpose of a cross.
Obviously, with such an admission against interest made by the world’s most powerful Christian organization, we can safely assume that Prometheus was bound to a cross, and that this information has been suppressed. We can also be assured that other gods and, possibly, humans were depicted on crosses, since, as admitted by CE, the “primitive form of crucifixion on trees was long in use.” In fact, as we shall see, this primitive crucifixion was part of ancient human sacrifice rituals in numerous parts of the world.
Another of the crucified Pagan gods was Orpheus Bakkhikos, who was depicted on a cross, although this image apparently dates to the 2nd or 3rd centuries CE. However, it may well be that the image represents an earlier tradition, one that was much more commonly portrayed. The deliberate destruction of cultural artifacts, books, sculptures, etc., for centuries by Christians makes it difficult to determine, obviously.
Yet another deity hung a tree was the Norse god Baldur, as Rev. Cox relates:
The myth of Baldur, at least in its cruder forms, must be far more ancient than any classification resembling that of the Hesiodic age [8th cent. BCE]. Such a classification we find in the relations of the Jotun or giants, who are conquered by Odin as the Titans are overthrown by Zeus; and this sequence forms part of a theogony which, like that of Hesiod, begins with chaos. From this chaos the earth emerged, made by the gods out of the blood and bones of the giant Ymir, whose name denotes the dead and barren sea. This being is sprung from the contact of the frozen with the heated waters, the former coming from Nifleim, the region of deadly cold at the northern end of the chaotic world, the latter from Muspelheim, the domain of the devouring fire. The Kosmos so called into existence is called the “Bearer of God”–a phrase which finds its explanation in the world-tree Yggdrasil, on which Odin himself hangs, like the Helene Dendritis of the Cretan legend–
I know that I hung On a wind-rocked tree
Nine whole nights With a spear-wounded,
And to Odin offered, Myself to myself,
On that tree, Of which no one knows
From what root it springs.
Concerning the Norse god Odin, Frazer says:
The human victims dedicated to Odin were regularly put to death by hanging or by a combination of hanging and stabbing, the man being strung up to a tree or a gallows and then wounded with a spear.
As we can see, the god hung on the tree and pierced in the side is a Pagan motif, likely predating Christianity by centuries, if not millennia.
Regarding the Syrian god Tammuz, who was also worshipped by Israelites/Jews (Ezek. 8:14), Graves claims he was crucified around 1160 BCE, asserting that Higgins relates this story, and that Julius Firmicus writes about Tammuz (Thammuz) “rising from the dead for the salvation of the world.” Titcomb relates the same information regarding Tammuz, as well as others, giving the solar meaning of this pervasive mythical motif:
The crucified Iao (“Divine Love” personified) is the crucified Adonis, or Tammuz (the Jewish Adonai), the Sun, who was put to death by the wild boar of Aries–one of the twelve signs of the zodiac. The crucifixion of “Divine Love” is often found among the Greeks. Hera or Juno, according to the Iliad, was bound with fetters and suspended in space, between heaven and earth. Ixion, Prometheus, and Apollo of Miletus were all crucified.
Moreover, the rites of the “crucified Adonis,” the dying and rising savior god, were celebrated in Syria at Easter time. As Frazer says:
When we reflect how often the Church has skilfully contrived to plant the seeds of the new faith on the old stock of paganism, we may surmise that the Easter celebration of the dead and risen Christ was grafted upon a similar celebration of the dead and risen Adonis, which, as we have seen reason to believe, was celebrated in Syria at the same season.
Interestingly, Tammuz was represented by a tau (T) or cross. In History of the Cross: The Pagan Origin and Idolatrous Adoption and Worship of the Image, originally published in 1871, pious Christian Henry David Ward quotes “The Illustrated History of the British Empire in India” as saying:
The mystic T, the initial of Tammuz, was variously written. It was marked on the foreheads of the worshippers when they were admitted to the mysteries.
Indeed, this mark of the cross upon the forehead was common among a number of pre-Christian peoples, including the Persians and Hebrews. Obviously, we possess traditions and images of crosses and crucified gods not only in the Pagan world at large but also in the Israelite/Jewish world, and in the very area where Christianity is purported to have been created.
Excerpted from Suns of God: Krishna, Buddha and Christ Unveiled.