Christianity: The Origins of a Pagan Religion

It is generally understood that Christianity strengthened its position early on in the popular mind by usurping and bending pagan rituals and sacred locales. In this ambitious scholarly treatise, professor of medieval French literature Walter marries the pagan and Christian calendars in great detail by examining ancient myths, saints and celebrations. He visits All Saints Day, the Twelve Days of Christmas, Candlemas, Easter, Ascension, St. John's Day of Summer, St. Peter's Chains Day and St. Michael's Day to find that these yearly rounds, roughly 40 days apart, share a mythical realm with the dates of Carnival, best understood as ""a religion-it was even the religion preceding Christianity."" Walter's sources include acts of councils, confessors' manuals, literary texts such as Arthurian romances, hagiographic works and medieval iconography. While he doesn't attack Christianity on its spiritual merits, he concludes boldly that ""Christianity would have had no chance of imposing itself in the West if, on certain points of dogma and rites, it had not responded to the religious needs of the converted pagans."" While not for general readership, this volume makes a strong scholarly contribution to understanding the evolution of belief, where ""it is important to understand that nothing has been lost or created.""