Soteriology in Pagan Religions

Soteriology is the study of religious doctrines of salvation, which are a feature of various religions.

Pagan religions are numerous and diverse, but some archetypes and themes are shared, although not universally. Pagan savior figures can be seen in harvest deities who are sacrificed to become food, sustenance so that the religious community may have continuing life. This may take the form of a sacrificial animal hunted, or an agricultural deity, frequently a grain god who becomes bread and beer. In the pagan mystery religions, salvation was less worldly and communal, and more a mystical belief concerned with the continued survival of the individual soul after death. [10] Savior gods associated with this theme are often dying and resurrected gods, such as Osiris, Tammus, Adonis, and Dionysos. A complex of soteriological beliefs was also a feature of the pagan cult of Cybele and Attis. [11]

Frequently pagan soteriology involves a journey after death to the underworld realm of the dead, where eternal life is won. The similarity of themes and archetypes to later Christianity has been pointed out by many authors, including the fathers of the early Christian church. One common assumption is that early Christianity borrowed these myths and themes from the earlier pagan religions, who already possessed the idea of a dying and resurrected savior god, who was born of a human mother and a divine father; and who was associated with the sun, and various other commonalities between Christianity and its pagan precursors.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Soteriology