Amaleq13

You know that it is. Why pretend otherwise?

The answer to all of these is "Not always and apparently not in this story."

Correct. It was and is not unique asceticism.

Sometimes.

The phrase "partical ascetic master" is incoherent and fabricated. It also has no apparent connection to the story.

Just "ascetic". Your fabrication of sub-categories is transparent nonsense.

Yes, they knew some history.

Not apparently relevant to the story.

He doesn't as "spurn" requires some evidence to support it beyond speculative implications.

mountainman

It is not uniquely Jewish. In the chronology
of things it was probably shipped in from India.

But why should you make claim to the only
explication of the story? You appear to be
rejecting all other influences on the basis of
your conjectural hypothesis that we are dealing
exclusively with a Jewish story.

If we knew that the authors were Jewish, and were
named Rabbi Matt, Rabbi Mark, Rabbi Luke and Rabbi
John, and that they wrote in Hebrew in the first
century from the Roman state of Judaea, then
you might have a point.

But the fact is, the authors are unknown.
They wrote in an unknown century 1,2,3 or 4.
They wrote in the Greek language with a
specific Roman imperial polemic.

So on the basis on this, whatever point you
may have had, is severely diminished.

It is an integral component of a fractal thing
which is called asceticism, a practice which is
conducted independent of religion or nation.


It is always present in all definitions and outlines
of the ascetic path. Sooner of later the issue of
what, and how much to eat, or not, arises.


The story itself is not renown for its
coherence and authenticity. Whoever
wrote the story wrote a fabrication of
some form -- and not history as such.



If someone is depicted as gnawing on the bones
of dead animals then the depiction is not at all
conducive to the depiction of a vegetarian.

I mean really. Imagine that you were a practicing
vegetarian and then you read the gospels. What
sort of opinion do you think you would form about
the central figure of Jesus, eating meat and getting
pissed every night after work?

We do not get the principles of vegetarianism from
the authors of the gospels. Neither do we get the
principles of zero-alcohol from these authors.

The gospel authors appear to legitimate the drinking
of alcohol and the eating of meat. Vegetarianism
and abstinence from alcohol just went out the door.

The ancient ascetic traditions (of the Hellenes)
were being given a literary hiding. They were no
longer relevant to human life.




Best wishes,


Pete Brown

Amaleq13

That was neither the question nor my answer.

I'm not. I'm just accepting one based on what the story actually says. You've tried to convice me not to but not with anything that seems credible.

I'm rejecting the specific influence you suggest because there does not appear to be any evidence to imply, let alone support, it.

Not so as you have been able to establish by coherent argument or evidence.

And it would still go beyond the depiction to claim that the individual was "spurning" vegetarianism.

mountainman

Taking things at face value is a bit like "buyer beware".
My argument counsels against this activity. All stories
have their face value, but all stories have their own
backgrounds of composition, the backgrounds of
the authors, the town or towns where they did the
composition, the year of writings, or years, and any
of the associated historical settings by which any one
story may be possibly related to other stories, in their
mention or reference to historical sources - texts,
people, events, places, etc.


The Hellenic influence is ubiquitous
in the Roman empire during the period
in question 000-400.

You ignore it at your peril. The NT
was written in the language and the
scripts of the Hellenes.

Biblical "scholars" are running with the
great red herring of Constantine, towards
the Jewish Origins of the Holy Book.

This schooling of centuries endeavour has
yielded nothing but integrity issues for the
Historical Jesus, and the authors of the G's.
But it has done nothing to resolve what is
yet a completely clouded issue.

My argument is to explore a number of options.
Not just the obvious one - at face value.


When the code of vegetarianism is not embraced,
then the principles of vegetarianism are spurned.
You are either a vegetarian or you are not.
The story at face value does not exhort the
principles of vegetarianism.

It has a unique history that should perhaps be
briefly outlined, but I dont have the time here
and now. Sufficient to say, that is was one of
the distinctive marks of the ascetic community.

Knowledge of the ascetic communities of antiquity
is scattered but fragments survive, and none of it
was in any way dissimilar to the standard Indian
asceticism IMO. The network of the Healing temple
cult of Asclepius has been mentioned earlier, and
is a classic example of the role of asceticism.

The entire custodial Asclepius temple structure in
its function of healing was analogous in some ways
to the modern public hopspital system.

The Asclepius doctors were not "merchant doctors".
They were ascetics, who within a local administrative
structure of a temple, had specific doctrines of
asceticism. Some were not vegetarian, but many
were, and these included the lineage from Pythagoras,
who clearly espouses the merit of vegetarianism. The
lineage from Pythagoras to Porphyry, author of the
vege treatise extant, is quite discernible.



Best wishes,


Pete Brown

mountainman

Hi Klaus,

Thanks for your comments to date here and elsewhere.
I have a question relating to your assessment of the
chronology of the field. Elsewhere you wrote:

What is your personal opinion on the chronology
of the authorship of the gospels, given your
positions above, and in this thread.

When did they arise?

Best wishes,


Pete Brown

schilling.klaus

Already Philo Alexandrinus justified Middle Platonism by exegesis of the Septuagint. In the same era many other religions of the Near and Middle East got spiritualised and philosophised by the Pythagoreised Platonic school of Hellenic philosophy, as seen in the efforts of Plutarch concerning the Serapis cult. Another most important member of this way was the genius Numenius of Apamea who defined Plato as the Greek Moses.

The cleanest movement was the Hermetic circle, bringing forth in this era wonderful works like Poimandres, Asklepius, Ogdoas-and-Enneas.

Christianity started in this realms by replacing Hermes with Jesus who led Israel into the Promised Land, i.e. the soul into divinity.
This proper Christianity is characterised by a thorough disdain for the material existence.

Only after the defeat of Lukuas and bar Kohbah did Christianity start to get corrupted into a cosmophile, positivist religion, against the protest of the heretics like Marcion and Valentinus. Those political Roman, essential Stoic, communities developped their own catechisms, in refutation and by perversion of heretical ones, which culminated after a few decades in the later canonical gospels who got continually revised and updated for sociopolitical purposes. Their goal was to absorb the messianic prophesies of the Old Testament for their Roman sociopolitical purposes, proclaimimg the Roman church as God's kingdom on earth.

Klaus Schilling

mountainman

Yet we have inscriptions to
"Thrice-Great Hermes, who
stood beside our fathers" in
the late third century, and
we have the Nag Hammadi
author(s) extolling the wisdom
and discourses of Hermes,
and preserving such literature
in the mid-fouth century.

Chronology is the backbone of all forms of history.
The chronology of "early christian origins" is a very
slippery slope, with next to no salient features that
have certain and secure time-frames. Of course,
Eusebius is the author of all we will ever know about
this period, so his word must be "worth something".

Best wishes,


Pete Brown

mountainman

I have responded here because my remarks about asceticism are mainly clustered in this thread. Perhaps you are correct in pointing out that that nothing is served in communication by referering to "asceticism" and then using the term "fractal" as a description of the nature of asceticism.

I am at a loss to try and explain in text a specification of ascetic practices, in summary and detail form, since ascetic practices are capable of being identified across a broad spectrum of human activity. Additionally, in each of these aspects, there are gradations of this ascetic practice. (eg: vow of silence for one hour, or one day, or the Pythagorean 5 years, etc). Hence myriad differences of the "ascetic practice" across all types of traditions, and individuals, and of each of the senses of those individuals.

I am convinced that our understanding "asceticism" is necessarily required to understand at least some of these authors of antiquity, who are presented in the associated historical texts, as "ascetics".
This includes the entire pythagorean lineage, and some of the New Testament figures, especially the so-called (Eusebian) "gnostics", such as Tatian - the encratitic, and of course Origen -- to name only two.

Of course also, it relates to the NT literature as a whole, in the sense that ascetic related terms, such as fasting, prayer, contemplation, and even healing, are literally scattered by the NT authors throughout the NT stories. It seems clear, that asceticism was regarded as the
ancient authority, and that there were definite gradations (of finer and finer detail) of ascetic practice associated with the custodial administration of the ancient temple structures, such as Asclepius/Imhotep, and others, just like the Buddhists. Besides (temple associated) therapeutae there were the more reclusive ascetic communities, and also the more individual "hermit" like communities, which increased dramatically in the fourth century, such as those established by Pachomius. (An interesting thesis on Pachomius is available from here)


Best wishes


Pete Brown

mountainman

Is there someone here with JSTOR access (I dont have it)
who might forward the following article to
arius at mountainman.com.au ?

The Rise and Function of the Holy Man in Late Antiquity
Peter Brown
The Journal of Roman Studies, Vol. 61, 1971 (1971), pp. 80-101
doi:10.2307/300008
This article consists of 22 page(s).


Thanks, and best wishes,


Pete Brown