While Christianity is well known for its belief in a dying and rising god (Jesus), actually the idea went back to the days of the Egyptians, Greeks and Romans. Deities like Mi
…thra, Osiris, and Ishtar were among those said to have died, gone to the underworld and then risen and once again taken up a bodily form. In early religions, there were a number of stories (called myths today) that tried to explain natural phenomena like the changing of the seasons by saying that a deity was in the underworld for a certain amount of time (winter) and then came back to life to bring the spring (the season of rebirth). ( Full Answer )