Did you know that Ash Wednesday and Lent have roots in ancient pagan worship—specifically, the Weeping for Tammuz, which God condemns in Scripture?
The Pagan Festival of Tammuz
Long before Christianity, the Babylonians worshiped a god named Tammuz and fertility goddess named Ishtar (pronounced “Easter” in some cultures.) According to pagan mythology, Tammuz was a god of fertility who died and was mourned by weeping and fasting for 40 days—a ritual that led up to the supposed “resurrection” of Tammuz. This mourning period was deeply ingrained in Babylonian and later Roman religious practices.
Tammuz was a god of fertility and vegetation worshiped in Babylon. According to mythology:
• He was the son/consort of the goddess Ishtar (Astarte, Ashtoreth), who was associated with fertility, love, and war.
• Tammuz supposedly died and was gored to death by a pig (which is why they roast a ham on Easter) and descended into the underworld, causing the world to mourn.
• After 40 days of weeping and fasting, it was believed that Ishtar resurrected Tammuz, bringing new life to the earth. This period of time of mourning was known as the weeping for Tammuz.
This pagan mourning period for Tammuz lasted 40 days—which later became known as Lent, leading up to Easter (the feast of Ishtar).
The Bible explicitly condemns this practice:
“Then He said to me, ‘Son of man, do you see what they are doing, the great abominations that the house of Israel commits here…’ And He brought me to the door of the gate of the Lord’s house; and behold, there sat women weeping for Tammuz.”
— Ezekiel 8:13-14
God called this act an abomination, yet the pattern of a 40-day mourning period continued and was later absorbed into Roman Catholic tradition as Lent—the same timeframe observed today before Easter. In fact, the Roman Catholic Church specifically moved the festival dates of Lent and Easter to coincide with Passover and Feast of Firstfruits. The word “catholic” means universal. They were blending and adopting the pagan traditions into the church and rebranding them in an effort to create a universal one world religion. (It’s no coincidence that the word Vatican, etymologically literally means “serpent sorcery.”)
Ash Wednesday marks the beginning of Lent, where ashes are placed on the forehead—as a carbon (666) cross over the pineal gland—a ritual never commanded by God.
Rather, God told us to keep and remember the seven festivals of Messiah forever (these symbolize overcoming the seven archons of the material world). And he told us that the resurrection of the Messiah is to be honored and remembered each year on the Feast of Firstfruits, not a day celebrating the resurrection of a pagan god. He is our firstfruits from the dead, not a false deity who produces a chimeric egg laying bunny.
We are told in Jeremiah 10, Deuteronomy 12 and elsewhere not to learn the ways of the world and not to create religious systems like the world.
#AshWednesday #Lent #PaganOrigins #Tammuz #BiblicalTruth
