Alan: Regular readers of this blog know my "curious" relationship with "The Thinking Housewife," a very smart but crackpot Catholic Traditionalist whose epistemology - to be kind - is often "untrustworthy."
In her recent post concerning the Paris terror attacks, The Thinking Housewife further indulged her fondness for conspiracy-thinking, supplying a link to an argument that "The Peace Symbol" is "satanic."
The Occult Peace Symbol For Paris
The Thinking Housewife Plunges Into The Abyss Of Conspiratorial Thinking
Compendium Of "Pax" Posts On "The Thinking Housewife," Laura Wood
Liberalism: "Satanic Rebellion Against God?" (The Thinking Housewife)
http://paxonbothhouses.
Liberalism: "Satanic Rebellion Against God?" (The Thinking Housewife)
http://paxonbothhouses.
http://paxonbothhouses.
Contrast "The Thinking Housewife's" view of the "satanic" Peace Symbol with the Jehovah's Witnesses' view that the Christian "cross" is a sacrilegious, pagan device that early Christianity forced on the New Testament's Greek word, xy'lon, which does not mean "cross" but "tree, timber, stick or club."
For conspiracists (whatever their stripe) it is an inconvenient truth that plausible explanations of "anything" can always be cobbled together.
Noam Chomsky Discusses 9/11 Conspiracy Theories
And so The Thinking Housewife argues that the carnage at Sandy Hook and the "Batman" cinema slaughter in Aurora, Colorado were orchestrated by the United States federal government to generate animus against guns as prelude to over-ruling The Second Amendment. Specifically, she sets forth the theory that photographic evidence shows that the same actors (employed by Homeland Security) were present at Sandy Hook and Aurora.
What Does the Bible Really Teach?
Why True Christians Do Not Use the Cross in Worship
THE cross is loved and respected by millions of people. The Encyclopædia Britannica calls the cross “the principal symbol of the Christian religion.” Nevertheless, true Christians do not use the cross in worship. Why not?
An important reason is that Jesus Christ did not die on a cross. The Greek word generally translated “cross” is stau·rosʹ. It basically means “an upright pale or stake.” The Companion Bible points out: “[Stau·rosʹ] never means two pieces of timber placed across one another at any angle . . . There is nothing in the Greek of the [New Testament] even to imply two pieces of timber.”
In several texts, Bible writers use another word for the instrument of Jesus’ death. It is the Greek word xyʹlon. (Acts 5:30; 10:39; 13:29;Galatians 3:13; 1 Peter 2:24) This word simply means “timber” or “a stick, club, or tree.”
Explaining why a simple stake was often used for executions, the bookDas Kreuz und die Kreuzigung (The Cross and the Crucifixion), by Hermann Fulda, states: “Trees were not everywhere available at the places chosen for public execution. So a simple beam was sunk into the ground. On this the outlaws, with hands raised upward and often also with their feet, were bound or nailed.”
The most convincing proof of all, however, comes from God’s Word. The apostle Paul says: “Christ purchased us, releasing us from the curse of the Law by becoming a curse instead of us, because it is written: ‘Accursed is every man hung upon a stake [“a tree,” King James Version].’” (Galatians 3:13) Here Paul quotes Deuteronomy 21:22, 23, which clearly refers to a stake, not a cross. Since such a means of execution made the person “a curse,” it would not be proper for Christians to decorate their homes with images of Christ on a cross.
There is no evidence that for the first 300 years after Christ’s death, those claiming to be Christians used the cross in worship. In the fourth century, however, pagan Emperor Constantine became a convert to apostate Christianity and promoted the cross as its symbol. Whatever Constantine’s motives, the cross had nothing to do with Jesus Christ. The cross is, in fact, pagan in origin. The New Catholic Encyclopedia admits: “The cross is found in both pre-Christian and non-Christian cultures.” Various other authorities have linked the cross with nature worship and pagan sex rites.
Why, then, was this pagan symbol promoted? Apparently, to make it easier for pagans to accept “Christianity.” Nevertheless, devotion to any pagan symbol is clearly condemned by the Bible. (2 Corinthians 6:14-18) The Scriptures also forbid all forms of idolatry. (Exodus 20:4, 5; 1 Corinthians 10:14) With very good reason, therefore, true Christians do not use the cross in worship. *
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