The issue date of the Mark to those who are worshipping the beast today
WAS THE CROSS A EARLY CHRISTIAN SYMBOL
OR AN ANCIENT PAGAN SYMBOL
The Sign of the Cross – by Alexander Hislop-The cross, is the ultimate stolen sign of the temporary triumph-over of the One True God by the universal but end-time Babylonian form of worship which will flood the world (Revelation 18).
Bishop Alexander Hislop notes that the cross as an idol is the ultimate confession of loss of faith in the Savior who triumphed over the cross.Chapter V, Section VI There is yet one more symbol of the Romish worship to be noticed, and that is the sign of the cross. In the Papal system as is well known,
……..the sign of the cross and the image [idol] of the cross are all in all.
No prayer can be said, no worship engaged in, no step almost can be taken, without the frequent use of the sign of the cross.
The cross is looked upon as the grand charm, as the great refuge in every season of danger, in every hour of temptation as the infallible preservative from all the powers of darkness.
The cross is adored with all the homage due only to the Most High; and for any one to call it, in the hearing of a genuine Romanist, by the Scriptural term, “the accursed tree,” is a mortal offence.
Asherah: Also a sacred wooden pole or image standing close to the massebah and altar in early Shemitic sanctuaries, part of the equipment of the temple of Jehovah in Jerusalem till the reformation of Josiah (2 Kings 23:6). The plural, ‘asherim, denotes statues, images, columns, or pillars; translated in the Bible by “groves.” Maachah, the grandmother of Asa, King of Jerusalem, is accused of having made for herself such an idol, which was a phallus. Called the Assyrian Tree of Life, “the original Asherah was a pillar with seven branches on each side surmounted by a globular flower with three projecting rays, and no phallic stone, as the Jews made of it, but a metaphysical symbol. ‘Merciful One, who dead to life raises!’ was the prayer uttered before the Asherah, on the banks of the Euphrates. See Ezekiel 31. Assyria is the “tallest tree in Eden.”
To say that such superstitious feeling for the sign of the cross, such worship as Rome pays to a wooden or a metal cross, ever grew out of the saying of Paul, “God forbid that I should glory, save in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ”–that is, in the doctrine of Christ crucified–is a mere absurdity, a shallow subterfuge and pretence. The magic virtues attributed to the so-called sign of the cross, the worship bestowed on it, never came from such a source.
NOTE: You'll find the cross highly promoted amongst lots of Christians that partake in the thing that God did not command us to observe: Dec 25th Christmas, Easter Sunday Resurrection and Sunday worship all lies told in Jesus name. The same Jesus will tell in Judgment day:
Many will say to me in that day, Lord, Lord, have we not prophesied in thy name? and in thy name have cast out devils? and in thy name done many wonderful works?23 And then will I profess unto them, I never knew you: depart from me, ye that work iniquity.(Mat 7:22-23)
And even after Jesus death and resurrection he was seen by The Apostle Joh in the midst of CANDEL STICKS no cross was seen near him
And in the midst of the seven candlesticks one like unto the Son of man, clothed with a garment down to the foot, and girt about the paps with a golden girdle. (Rev 1:13)
When Paul choose to “know only Christ and Him crucified” he did not say “preach only Christ and Him crucified.” His message was that a believer should submit as Christ (God) submitted Himself to the cruel cross. However, Paul did not glory in the execution of Christ to promote a cross.
The same sign of the cross that Rome now worships was used in the Babylonian Mysteries, was applied by Paganism to the same magic purposes, was honored with the same honors.
That which is now called the Christian cross was originally no Christian emblem at all, but was the mystic Tau of the Chaldean’s and Egyptians–the true original form of the letter T–the initial of the name of Tammuz–which, in Hebrew, radically the same as ancient Chaldee, was found on coins, was formed as in No. 1 of the accompanying woodcut (Fig. 43); and in Etrurian and Coptic, as in Nos. 2 and 3. That mystic Tau was marked in baptism on the foreheads of those initiated in the Mysteries, * and was used in every variety of way as a most sacred symbol. See the worship of Tammuz in the temple in Jerusalem.
* TERTULLIAN, De Proescript. Hoeret. The language of Tertullian implies that those who were initiated by baptism in the Mysteries were marked on the forehead the sign of the cross. in the same way, as his Christian countrymen in Africa, who had begun by this time to be marked in baptism with[Note: the sign of the cross is in 6 steps, this is repeated three times to mark 666 on the forehead of unsinning infants. Well, that is one act actually called a sign of the cross which was the ultimate weapon of the beast which failed.The “Mark” brands the forehead or Mind when we make it into an idol.] THIS MEANS THAT IT MUST INDOCTRINATE THOSE WHO RECEIVE IT,NOT JUST MAKE THE SIGN IN IGNORANCE UPON ONE’S SELF. This is a deep seated invasion of DEMON doctrine, a BLINDNESS of spiritual sight beyond the normal blindness of mankind’s sin nature. This is RELIGIOUS BLINDNESS- HAS THE MARK OF THE WORSHIP OF TAMMUZ MARKED YOU? ONLY TIME WILL TELL!
“It is strange, yet unquestionably a fact, that in ages long before the birth of Christ, and since then in lands untouched by the teaching of the Church, the Cross has been used as a sacred symbol. . . . The Greek Bacchus, the Tyrian Tammuz, the Chaldean Bel, and the Norse Odin, were all symbolized to their votaries by a cruciform device.”The Cross in Ritual, Architecture, and Art (London, 1900), G. S. Tyack, p. 1.
The people of the ancient lands used the cross in worship, some, like the Egyptians used it in Phallus worship, or, worship of the male sex organ. It was used as a symbol of fertility. “Various figures of crosses are found everywhere on Egyptian monuments and tombs, and are considered by many authorities as symbolical either of the phallus [a representation of the male sex organ] or of coition. . . . In Egyptian tombs the crux ansata [cross with a circle or handle on top] is found side by side with the phallus.” A Short History of Sex-Worship (London, 1940), H. Cutner, pp. 16, 17; see also The Non-Christian Cross, p. 183.
W. E. Vine says on this subject: “STAUROS (staur¬V) denotes, primarily, an upright pale or stake. On such malefactors were nailed for execution. Both the noun and the verb stauroo, to fasten to a stake or pale, are originally to be distinguished from the ecclesiastical form of a two beamed cross.” Greek scholar Vine then mentions the Chaldean origin of the two-piece cross and
how it was adopted from the pagans by Christendom in the third century C.E. as a symbol of Christ’s impalement.” Vine’s Expository Dictionary of Old and New Testament Words, 1981, Vol. 1, p. 256.
Sustauroo (g4957) soos-tow-ro’-o; from 4862 and 4717; to impale in company with (lit. or fig.): – crucify with.
Stauroo (h4717) stow-ro’-o, from 4716; to impale on the cross; fig. to extinguish (subdue) passion or selfishness: – crucify.
The early Christians did not think to have a crucifix or a cross hanging on their doors or in their places of meeting. New Catholic Encyclopedia says: “The representation of Christ’s redemptive death on Golgotha does not occur in the symbolic art of the first Christian centuries. The early Christians, influenced by the Old Testament prohibition of graven images, were reluctant to depict even the instrument of the Lord’s Passion.” (1967), Vol. IV, p. 486
A History of the Christian Church says: “There was no use of the crucifix and no material representation of the cross.” (New York, 1897), J. F. Hurst, Vol. I, p. 366.
Alexander Hislop (Born at Duns, Berwickshire, 1807; died Arbroath, 13 March 1865) was a Free Church of Scotland minister famous for his outspoken criticisms of the Roman Catholic Church. He was the son of Stephen Hislop (died 1837), a mason by occupation and an elder of the Relief Church. Alexander’s brother was also named Stephen Hislop (lived 1817–1863) and became well known in his time as a missionary to India and a naturalist.
Alexander was for a time parish schoolmaster of Wick, Caithness. In 1831 he married Jane Pearson. He was for a time editor of the Scottish Guardian newspaper. As a probationer he joined the Free Church of Scotland at the Disruption of 1843. He was ordained in 1844 at the East Free Church, Arbroath, where he became senior minister in 1864. He died of a paralytic stroke the next year after being ill for about two years.
He wrote several books, his most famous being The Two Babylons: Papal worship Revealed to be the worship of Nimrod and His wife.
The cross was the unequivocal symbol of Bacchus, the Babylonian Messiah, for he was represented with a head-band covered with crosses. It has been well noted that drama works only because “the audience knows that it isn’t true.” Therefore, we sing at the foot of the old rugged cross only because we know that the blood of Jesus is not going to drip on us and we will not get jabbed with a spear.