| Author | Message | ||
| Maggie_b Registered user Username: Maggie_b Post Number: 22 Registered: 5-2016 |
Anyway, I'm probably wrong about Pagels, but how can the Gospel be received in any way other than gnostically, I wonder, without our "loving truth so lewdly" that we become violent? (Message edited by Maggie_b on May 21, 2016) | ||
| Resjudicata Registered user Username: Resjudicata Post Number: 713 Registered: 4-2014 |
The Miracle at the Areopagus:Viva la revolución!! Fittingly, Paul’s most revolutionary speech was delivered on a rocky hill in Athens-- not on one of the Seven Hills of Rome. If you want to outrage a Greek, slur it with its Roman name: “Mars Hill.” Since the Greeks are madly in love with their rhetoric, it took a fire-eating stemwinder of a speech to light the fuse that blew the ancient world to smithereens. Paul did exactly that on a smooth round rock mound in the center of Athens. Greece was the original target of Christianity, not Rome.You can stand right there in one spot at “Ground Zero” where the hydrogen bomb of Christianity was ignited, and see the catastrophic result of the shock waves uphill (the ruins of the Parthenon) and downhill (the ruins of Temple of Zeus and at least three other lesser-known pagan Temples). ... Hot Aegean sea winds whistled through the Parthenon on the Acropolis, and blew over the scoured-smooth rounded Areopagus and the assembled stunned and awestruck crowds, and terminated at the Temple of Zeus in the valley below. It ended at the Old Heart of "Greekness." The Saint's soaring rhetoric electrified the milling and restless crowds that swelled to 70,000 and more at times. This spectacle was the equivalent of a Super Bowl combined with a resurrected JFK repeating his inaugural speech, combined with a Rolling Stones concert. And yet there was more. More strangeness. The dumbstruck Greeks rubbed their eyes with disbelief. This was no Hebrew lawyer. Hebrew Lawyers do not mesmerize a skeptical crowd for hours without speaking a single word of the Hebrew Law. The Hebrew Law does not create Sainthood. Hebrew lawyers can not speak in the flawless, clipped idiom of urban Athens. Jewish Lawyers cannot learn classical Greek rhetoric, according to Apollonius Molon of Rhodes. The Sabbath and circumcision had never severed the evil chains of misery of one single Temple Prostitute. This newly-minted Greek Saint stood there, hoarse and the hot winds mussing up his hair, wet with sweat from the supreme exertion. All of his prior trappings of Jewishness had been abandoned. His pride in his distinguished career as an expert on the Mishnah Torah and the Talmud had been punctured on the Road to Damascus. He was blinded by the Son. He described a heroic half man/half god creature that killed itself, went into the bowels of hell to destroy death, and then resurrected itself in front of 500 people. Many of the jaded Athenian Greeks sunk to their knees involuntarily upon hearing this. The Greeks knew real heroes when they saw them. They had them in abundance at Thermopylae and Marathon. This strange Jewish deity was the Real Deal. There was the anticipated usual glow of charisma ("touched by the gods") that always emanated from an emotion-choked, head-held-back, standout rhetorical performance. The Greeks were used to that. There was more. There was no ending with the usual tidy flourish and elaborate self-congratulatory courtesies. They looked again in shock, stunned into silence. There were no rounds of standing and escalating applause and calls for an encore performance. This was the ending of all endings. Thousands of desperate Temple prostitutes were soon liberated from their brutal captivity, no longer pleading with the deaf and incompetent gods of diseased paganism for mercy. They were given hope, and then freedom. You can still see their desperate blood-stained fingernail scratches on the fallen columns of the Temple of Aphrodite in Corinth. The Greek Saint’s revolutionary sermon obeyed Isaiah's Divine command to rise up and free the oppressed: “Shout it aloud, do not hold back. Raise your voice like a trumpet.” ….. ...to loose the chains of injustice and untie the cords of the yoke, to set the oppressed free and break every yoke... …. If you do away with the yoke of oppression, with the pointing finger and malicious talk, and if you spend yourselves in behalf of the hungry and satisfy the needs of the oppressed, then your light will rise in the darkness, and your night will become like the noonday. It was the death knell of decrepit and diseased paganism: the greatest continuous assault against the human spirit the world had ever seen. The metastasized and unholy union of empty philosophy and pagan fairy tales had a life expectancy of days, maybe weeks. The morning light of the Son illumined, and the proud Greeks were embarrassed and appalled by the foul, dank corner of their rotten world. Homoousian was the noon battle cry of the Greek rebellion. It was the sudden END of the Ancient World. It was the end of human history. It was noon. It was the First Day of the brand-new Greece. The Greek Saint had transcended the earthly bonds of law and rhetoric. He had achieved the pinnacle, the wedding of the Divine with sublime Attic Oratory. He called down the thunder of revolution, and the eternal liberation of the soul. He has defined “Greekness” for 2,000 years. He is one of the Immortal Ones. | ||
| Maggie_b Registered user Username: Maggie_b Post Number: 23 Registered: 5-2016 |
Very inspiring writing, Res. The account in Acts comes across as more prosaic, to my ears. 70,000 people? Really? Res said: "...the wedding of the Divine with sublime Attic Oratory." Did Augustine just need to study his Greek harder? _______________ Saint Augustine: One of the decisive developments in the western philosophical tradition was the eventually widespread merging of the Greek philosophical tradition and the Judeo-Christian religious and scriptural traditions. Augustine is one of the main figures through and by whom this merging was accomplished. He is, as well, one of the towering figures of medieval philosophy whose authority and thought came to exert a pervasive and enduring influence well into the modern period (e.g. Descartes and especially Malebranche), and even up to the present day.... http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/augustine/ _______________ Anyway, it was the Gnostics who first used homoosian, if I understand correctly. Clearly I need to read up on Appolonius of Rhodes....and lots of other things....  | ||
| Maggie_b Registered user Username: Maggie_b Post Number: 24 Registered: 5-2016 |
https://www.reddit.com/r/AskHistorians/comments/1q3sbk/when_did_greek_mythology_as_a_religion_die_off/ | ||
| Resjudicata Registered user Username: Resjudicata Post Number: 714 Registered: 4-2014 |
The Greeks have kept alive a lot of oral tradition about Paul. You hear a lot of it in Athens, but especially in Thessaloniki. The Mars Hill speech is simply unparalleled among Attic Orations. The Temple of Poseidon south of Athens is estimated to have been destroyed around the time of Paul's Mars Hills Speech. The Temples of Aphrodite in Athens and Corinth shared a similar fate. Those Temples were the worst example of sexual slavery in the ancient world. The opinions of the experts on Ancient Greece that I studied under indicated that the destruction of the Greek Temple system happened a LOT faster than was previously recognized. It predated the destruction of the Jerusalem Temple. | ||
| Maggie_b Registered user Username: Maggie_b Post Number: 25 Registered: 5-2016 |
Res said: "Is this a holistic and tight analysis with a few tidy exceptions, or was it a monument on a darkling plain, where ignorant armies clashed by night? Ask yourself that question. The answer will fascinate you." ____________________ You are absolutely right. I'm starting to get fascinated. It was definitely the monument on the darkling plain of the Areopagus, home of the Furies, where Ares was tried, and ignorant armies clashed by night. I'm not willing to negate the power of oral tradition, powerfully told. It was not just Paul and the Stoics and Epicureans there, was it? Perhaps that Monument on Areopagus towers o'er the ruins of time, whenever they may have taken place. And that Labyrinth/Library in Eco's book. Now *that's* getting fascinating too. (Message edited by Maggie_b on May 21, 2016) | ||
| Resjudicata Registered user Username: Resjudicata Post Number: 715 Registered: 4-2014 |
Acts 17:28 quotes the Greek poets Epimenides and Aratus. Verse 18 quotes the Stoic philosophers and their views on Zeuss. Epimenides fell asleep for fifty-seven years in a Cretan cave sacred to Zeus, after which he reportedly awoke with the gift of prophecy. When he died, he was found to have tattooed his body with his poems: "They fashioned a tomb for you, holy and high one, Cretans, always liars, evil beasts, idle bellies. But you are not dead: you live and abide forever, For in you we live and move and have our being. For even a tomb, King, of you They made, who never died, but ever shall be." Paul also borrowed from the "Phaenomena," a hexameter poem of Aratus, a Greek didactic poet: "From Zeus let us begin; him do we mortals never leave unnamed; full of Zeus are all the streets and all the market-places of men; full is the sea and the havens thereof; always we all have need of Zeus. For we are also his offspring; and he in his kindness unto men giveth favourable signs and wakeneth the people to work, reminding them of livelihood." The setting of the Mars Hill oration is instructive. There is a dispute over which Pagan god the Areopagus hill was named after. Most scholars believe it was named after the god Ares, who was put on trial there for killing his mother, another Greek deity. Others insist that there was a Temple built in honor of Erinyes at the foot of the hill. "Erinyes," also known as the "Furies," were female chthonic deities of vengeance; they were sometimes referred to as "infernal goddesses." Under Roman occupation (when Paul gave his speech) this dispute was temporarily-resolved when the Romans renamed it in honor of Mars, the pagan Roman god of War. Paul's most epic speech was thus made on a spot where three-different Pagan gods (two Greek, one Roman) jostled for attention and superiority. The Acropolis is a big rock named after the Greek demigod Cecropia, who was a half-man half-god legendary serpent-man. The Parthenon itself is a Temple dedicated to the Greek god Apollo. Paul may have gazed at it occasionally during his speech, since it is a striking icon that dominates the Athenian skyline. The Temple of Zeus is located straight downhill from Mars Hill. Zeus was the King of all Greek gods. As Paul made his argument in front of the Athenian elders, he may well have occasionally-caught a glimpse of this magnificent temple. According to classical rhetoricians that have closely studied Paul's speech, he would have constantly-turned in a 360 arc during his speech. The plaque on Mars Hill commemorating his speech lists him as one of Ancient Greece's "Attic Orators." The Temple of Hephaestus, is located at the base of Mars Hill. Hephaestus was the Greek patron god of metal working, craftsmanship, and fire. The Thoros is located near the Hephaestus, where all of the Temple Priests lived, who served at the several pagan temples that crowd around the base of Mars Hill. Near there is the ancient Greek temple dedicated to the mother goddesses of all of the aforementioned Greek gods. The smaller Temple of Apollo Patroos is barely visible from Mars Hill. Apollo was the only Greek god who had TWO Temples in in honor in Athens. The Temple of Aphrodite Urania, the Greek god of sex and love is located not far from the Temple of Apollo. Approximately 500 Temple prostitutes served there when Paul gave his speech. Visible around the base of Mars Hill are several holy pagan gardens and reliquaries named in honor of various Greek gods, including the Stoa of Zeus; Altar of the Twelve Gods; the Royal Stoa featuring a prominent statue of Themis, the Greek god of Justice; the Stoa of Hermes (the son of Zeus); and the Stoa Poikile (honoring the Greek god Theseus' victory over the mythical Amazonians. His speech reflected his surroundings and was drenched with their poets and gods. Greek oral tradition insists that the commotion on top of Mars Hill that day would have drawn all of the Temple-goers, Priests and Temple Prostitutes from the Temples and Holy groves around the base of the rock. People came from all over Ancient Greece to immerse themselves in the Pagan rites conducted around the base of the Areopagus. Maybe its just me, but this doesn't sound like something a Hebrew Lawyer would have done. | ||
| Resjudicata Registered user Username: Resjudicata Post Number: 716 Registered: 4-2014 |
The Resurrection was preached above one of the holiest reliquaries in Athens, honoring the bones of the heroes from the Battle of Marathon: "As the battle fought upon that immortal field was distinguished from all others in Grecian history for its influence over the fortunes of Hellas,--as it depended upon the event of that day whether Greece should live, a glory and a light to all coming time, or should expire like the meteor of a moment; so the honors awarded to its martyr-heroes were such as were bestowed by Athens on no other occasion. They alone of all her sons were entombed upon the spot which they had forever rendered famous. Their names were inscribed upon ten pillars, erected upon the monumental tumulus which covered their ashes, (where after six hundred years, they were read by the traveler Pausanias,) and although the columns beneath the hand of time and barbaric violence, have long since disappeared, the venerable mound still marks the spot where they fought and fell,-- That battle-field where Persias victim horde First bowed beneath the brunt of Hellas sword." from Edward Everett's Oration at Gettysburg. Adventists insist that the Apostles "kept the Sabbath" when they preached in the Synagogues to the observant Jews and God-fearing Gentiles. What was Paul "keeping" on Mars Hill? Another plaque near the base of Mars Hill commemorates his liberation of Greece: "the olive Grove of Academe, Plato's retirement, where the Attic bird Trilled his thick-warbled note the summer long." The reverberating shock waves from the Resurrection hit that sun-drenched rock with a nuclear blast. In one fell swoop, he finished the Greek philosophical project, which had been veering ineluctably towards monotheism for over 500 years. The Resurrection was the encapsulating sine qua non of the rational Greek's hopes and aspirations. It was a project that started with the mighty Septuagint, which is observed with a day of mourning in the Talmud. The Septuagint sounded the funerary song of ancient Jewish civilization. Mars Hill was the Greek one. The glory of Marathon was magnified "where the Attic bird ....Trilled his thick-warbled note the summer long." At Marathon, the Hellenes won their most smashing victory. At Mars Hill, the Greeks surrendered. Ten minutes after that speech on Mars Hill, Ancient Greece was no more. The glories of Ancient Greece had been surpassed by the glories of the Resurrection. (Message edited by Resjudicata on May 22, 2016) (Message edited by Resjudicata on May 22, 2016) | ||
| Resjudicata Registered user Username: Resjudicata Post Number: 717 Registered: 4-2014 |
Maggie_B asked "Did Augustine just need to study his Greek harder?" Yes. Had he done so, we wouldn't have had to wait another 1200 years for Descarte's ontological argument. Plato already had that one wired. | ||
| Maggie_b Registered user Username: Maggie_b Post Number: 26 Registered: 5-2016 |
Res said: "Plato already had that one wired." ____________________ So, you are suggesting that Anselm, following Augustine, reasoned inadequately around the ontological argument, while Descartes, following Plato, saw clearly? Therefore, even though Augustine is credited with blending Greek thought with Christian theology, he did so from a flawed understanding, due to inadequate mastery of Greek? And this has resulted in Christian schism, dating back to the Roman Empire, and a false view of "papal supremacy," and, of late, a false religion of Seventh-day Adventism, which is therefore completely misbegotten? ____________________ Quote: PLATO'S PROOF OF GOD'S EXISTENCE Curiously, all this overlooks the fact that we do potentially have at our disposal a much better philosophical proof of God’s existence. To call it a proof in the sense of a logical proof might be technically incorrect — it’s really more of a demonstration. Nevertheless, regardless of how we classify it, its evidential value for supporting a belief in God is, I believe, substantially stronger than that of the ontological argument. This experiential argument comes from Plato’s dialogues, most notably, the central books of the Republic and Diotima’s speeches in the Symposium. It is illustrated as follows: Consider some beautiful thing — say an incredibly beautiful sunset, the kind that totally absorbs you in a profound sense of beauty, awe, and wonder. Now, instead of pausing in that experience alone — which is our usual tendency — elevate your thoughts still higher and consider that this is not the only beautiful thing. There are many other experiences equally or more beautiful as this one. Then consider that there must be something in common amongst all these experiences — in exactly the same way that there is something in common for all triangles, all horses, or all trees. That is, each of these things has some defining principle or principles, some essence. Consider further that a defining essence has, at least in theory, some existence outside of its instantiation in actual examples. Hence we may conceive of the abstract “Form” of a triangle, which would exist even if somehow we were able to remove all physical triangles from the world. If so, we may also suppose that there is some Form of Beauty, which is the principle that all beautiful things have in common; and that this may potentially exist independently of all beautiful things. Moreover, Beauty is not the only good. There are also such noble things as Truth, Virtue, Excellence, and Justice — which we also unhesitatingly consider good, which delight or assure us, and which can bring us very deep levels of satisfaction. And, just as with Beauty, we may suppose that there is some essence or Form for each of these other things: a Form of Truth, a Form of Virtue, of Excellence, of Justice, and so on. And finally, we may contemplate the possibility of some principle or essence which all these different Forms of good things have in common. This, too, would be a Form — the Form of Goodness. God is defined as that being than which nothing can be more Good. Therefore God is the Form of Goodness. For me, this comes very close to being a fully logically persuasive argument for God’s existence. But — perhaps more importantly — it can also be approached as a contemplative or spiritual exercise. That is, as Plato himself presents this line of thought, one is not so much trying to logically convince oneself, as to elicit, by performing this exercise, an elevation of the mind to an awakening or remembrance (anamnesis) of an innate, intuitive understanding of God. We might call this an experiential proof, or an anagogical proof. https://catholicgnosis.wordpress.com/2013/11/28/platos-proof-of-gods-existence/ ____________________ (Message edited by Maggie_b on May 22, 2016) | ||
| Resjudicata Registered user Username: Resjudicata Post Number: 718 Registered: 4-2014 |
I was a naughty naughty boy. Boy oh boy, was I a naughty boy. | ||
| Resjudicata Registered user Username: Resjudicata Post Number: 719 Registered: 4-2014 |
You would agree that St. Thomas Acquinas so thoroughly-trashed Anselm's ontological argument, that it took Descarte to resurrect it several centuries later? And that Descartes - influenced heavily by neo-Platonism - had an ontological argument that was both simpler and more defensible? Wasn't Descarte committed to a species of Platonic realism? Why couldn't Augustine have done this? | ||
| Maggie_b Registered user Username: Maggie_b Post Number: 31 Registered: 5-2016 |
Res said: "Why couldn't Augustine have done this?" ____________________ 'Cause his Greek teacher beat him? One good reason among many to decry corporal punishment. So that naughty, naughty Greek teacher caused the whole unfortunate detour into Scholasticism? But, I seem to recall Princeton physicist Freeman Dyson suggesting that the Scientific Method germinated in the rich soil of Scholasticism. But, then, he's on the "wrong side" of Climate Change, too. And anyway, Aquinas didn't even finish the Summa. http://www.catholic.com/quickquestions/when-st-thomas-aquinas-likened-his-work-to-straw-was-that-a-retraction-of-what-he-wro | ||
| Maggie_b Registered user Username: Maggie_b Post Number: 32 Registered: 5-2016 |
Why couldn't Augustine have done this? It remained vouchsafed for the Renaissance people to rediscover Platonism, for whatever reasons, I can't pretend to understand. But was the Renaissance a detour also? Remember, Umberto Eco is a postmodern writer, they say.... | ||
| Resjudicata Registered user Username: Resjudicata Post Number: 720 Registered: 4-2014 |
You are absolutely correct that the Scientific Method germinated in the rich soil of Latin scholasticism. But Augustine didn't like Greeks. The larval stages of the schism between East and West were already obvious, by the time St. Jerome produced the Vulgate. I am not convinced this has been good for the West. | ||
| Maggie_b Registered user Username: Maggie_b Post Number: 33 Registered: 5-2016 |
Res said: "Augustine didn't like the Greeks." ____________________ This is confusing to me. ____________________ SAINT AUGUSTINE One of the decisive developments in the western philosophical tradition was the eventually widespread merging of the Greek philosophical tradition and the Judeo-Christian religious and scriptural traditions. Augustine is one of the main figures through and by whom this merging was accomplished. He is, as well, one of the towering figures of medieval philosophy whose authority and thought came to exert a pervasive and enduring influence well into the modern period (e.g. Descartes and especially Malebranche), and even up to the present day.... http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/augustine/ | ||
| Resjudicata Registered user Username: Resjudicata Post Number: 721 Registered: 4-2014 |
Most westerners have only seen the "merged" view of "Greekness." We have never given a fair hearing to why the Greeks rejected scholasticism. I spent 6 months with the Greeks, they are very charismatic. And being natural rhetoricians, they are very persuasive. They really got to me. They know how to worship. They know how to dance. Perichoresis cannot be "merged." Hesychasm cannot be "merged." I remember where I was, when it hit me: the tiny chapel at Ancient Corinth, where tradition holds that Paul wrote the Book of Romans. I was in there on a weekday, all by myself, except for about 10 monks swishing around, chanting and incensing. Something came over me. I started bawling and bawling and bawling, until I was choking sobs, gasping for air to breathe. This went on for over hour while I purged myself, I think, of all the suppressed rage and hatred that had accumulated over my 25 year old life. When I was done, I felt tired but pure. It was a moment of holiness. It was sublime. We have lost the magic in the west. We have lost worship. We have lost the dance. | ||
| Maggie_b Registered user Username: Maggie_b Post Number: 34 Registered: 5-2016 |
And yet the schism shows up in the Greek sons of Zeus. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Apollonian_and_Dionysian So is this "East versus West," "Greek versus Latin," or something more fundamental, something more organic, do you think? | ||
| Resjudicata Registered user Username: Resjudicata Post Number: 722 Registered: 4-2014 |
Its Eastern mysticism versus Latin scholasticism. I don't think it is Dionysian at all. Its the mystical awe of the unknown. Its the ineffable awe of the holy. We westerners have painted ourselves into a corner, with our obsessive need to classify and define everything. We know everything, and know nothing. We don't value charisma ("the light of the gods"). This isn't purely a question of epistemology. We have lost our way. We have lost sight of the light. | ||
| Maggie_b Registered user Username: Maggie_b Post Number: 35 Registered: 5-2016 |
Res said: "We have lost our way. We have lost sight of the light." ____________________ That seems right. But the Catholic Church has a deep vein of mysticism, it seems evident to me. ____________________ QUOTE: In the Roman Catholic Church the First Vatican Council re-affirmed the existence of mysteries as a doctrine of Catholic faith as follows: "If any one say that in Divine Revelation there are contained no mysteries properly so called (vera et proprie dicta mysteria), but that through reason rightly developed (per rationem rite excultam) all the dogmas of faith can be understood and demonstrated from natural principles: let him be anathema" (Sess. III, De fide et ratione, can. i) https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sacred_mysteries ____________________ Pehaps the Apollo versus Dionysis split bears more discussion? Back later.... |
