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The Everlasting Covenant - Contents
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    Paganised Christianity

    Thus it came to pass that “nearly all those corruptions by which, in the second and subsequent centuries, Christianity was disfigured, and its pristine simplicity and innocence almost wholly effaced, had their origin in Egypt, and were thence communicated to the other churches.” “Observing that in Egypt, as well as in other countries, the heathen worshipers, in addition to their public religious ceremonies, to which everyone was admitted without distinction, had certain secret and most sacred rites, to which they gave the name of mysteries, and at the celebration of which none except persons of the most approved faith and discretion were permitted to be present; the Alexandrian Christians first, and after them others, were beguiled into a notion that they could not do better than make the Christian discipline accommodate itself to this model. The multitude professing Christianity were therefore divided by them into the profane, or those who were not as yet admitted to the mysteries, and the initiated, or faithful and perfect .... From this constitution of things it came to pass, not only that many terms and phrases made use of in the heathen mysteries were transferred and applied to different parts of the Christian worship, particularly to the sacraments of baptism and the Lord’s Supper, but that, in not a few instances, the sacred rites of the church were contaminated by the introduction of various pagan forms and ceremonies.” 1Mosheim, History of Christianity, Cent. 2, Sec. 33, Note 2, and Sec. 36.EVCO 157.1

    It is not necessary to enumerate the various false doctrines and practices that were thus introduced into the church. Suffice it to say that there was not a thing that was not corrupted, and there was scarcely a heathen dogma or ceremony that was not either adopted or to a greater or less extent copied. The light of God’s word being thus obscured, the “Dark Ages” necessarily resulted, continuing until at the time of the Reformation the Bible was once more put into the hands of the people, for them to read for themselves.EVCO 157.2

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