Over 10 years ago I had a dream about the Poplar Lounge, a bar that I had passed a million times, but it always seemed to have an older crowd and I never went in. I dreamt the outdoor courtyard area, in detail, with the white wall of the neighboring building running along the east side. In the dream I found a carving and inscription on this wall. It was quite my surprise years later when I first came to the Lounge and found the courtyard to look the same as my dream, minus the carving of course.
The carving itself consisted of a man driving a sword down into a bull. The man had light shining from his head and the inscription beneath the carving read: "Blessed is the Bull who is sacrificed for he shall live forever in flame". Years later, while getting a tattoo I was reading a book on Mythology. I saw a picture of the ancient god Mithras, usually shown driving a sword into a bull. Now, I never took a Mythology class and there is a chance that at some point in my life I had seen a picture of Mithras, but my conscious mind does not remember it. Here's some things I leaned about Mithras:
Worship of this god began some 4000 years ago in Persia, where it was soon imbedded with Babylonian doctrines. The faith spread east through India to China, and reached west throughout the entire length of the Roman frontier; from Scotland to the Sahara Desert, and from Spain to the Black Sea. Sites of Mithraic worship have been found in Britain, Italy, Romania, Germany, Hungary, Bulgaria, Turkey, Persia, Armenia, Syria, Israel, and North Africa.
The faithful referred to Mithras (REMEMBER, 4000 years ago!) as "the Light of the World", symbol of truth, justice, and loyalty. He was mediator between heaven and earth and was a member of a Holy Trinity. According to Persian mythology, Mithras was born of a virgin given the title 'Mother of God'. The god remained celibate throughout his life, and valued self-control, renunciation and resistance to sensuality among his worshippers. Mithras represented a system of ethics in which brotherhood was encouraged in order to unify against the forces of evil.
The worshippers of Mithras held strong beliefs in a celestial heaven and an infernal hell. They believed that the benevolent powers of the god would sympathize with their suffering and grant them the final justice of immortality and eternal salvation in the world to come. They looked forward to a final day of judgement in which the dead would resurrect, and to a final conflict that would destroy the existing order of all things to bring about the triumph of light over darkness.
Purification through a ritualistic baptism was required of the faithful, who also took part in a ceremony in which they drank wine and ate bread to symbolize the body and blood of the god. Sundays were held sacred, and the birth of the god was celebrated annually on December the 25th. After the earthly mission of this god had been accomplished, he took part in a Last Supper with his companions before ascending to heaven, to forever protect the faithful from above.
Mithra was born from a rock, as shown in Mithraic sculptures, being sometimes termed ''the god out of the rock'. It's interesting that the image in my dream was carved into the wall.
The chief incident of Mithra's life was his struggle with a symbolical bull, which he overpowered and sacrificed, and from the blood of the sacrifice came the world's peace and plenty, typified by ears of corn. The bull appears to signify the earth or mankind, and the implication is that Mithra, like Jesus, overcame the world; but in the early Persian writings Mithra is himself the bull, the god thus sacrificing himself, which is a close approximation to the Christian idea.
All that sound familiar?
Now, I have never heard a voice from god like in the bible. I have never seen a lick of proof of the existence of the Christian god. Yet, I have this crazy dream about this god that has too many connections to jesus to just be coincidental. If I was a fanatic, I would take this as a sign and become a follower of mithras. Instead I can only ponder and find it interesting. I still haven't been able to find anything about the inscription, but i think it speaks for itself. I always thought the basic ideas of christianity were cool (although spiritually elementary), it was just the details that I couldn't get behind. You know, the miracles, rising from the dead, jesus being the only way to salvation, bla bla bla.
And why the Poplar Lounge? I now live a block away from there and spend a good amount of time there.
thoughts?
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