stephan huller

Right DCH

I think you picked the right English equivalent euphemism - 'beat.' Am I right then in supposing that the passage in Peregrinus is the equivalent to 'beat his meat'? When I was driving home today I was thinking - to Toto's point earlier - that (a) there is something that Peregrinus actually did while in Alexandria which is unknown but seemingly connected with self-abuse (see context) and then (b) there is Lucian's satirical layering on top of that. Are we safe to say that 'beat his meat' is a parody of Peregrinus's original action - a play on words or words chosen with a deliberate double entendre - or that Peregrinus figuratively 'beat his meat' in public?

stephan huller

Here's my bottom line. All the non-Greeks go with the figurative translation of the line in the Lylistrata:

"Oh my dearest! of a truth we should have suffered dreadful things, if the men could have seen us excited!" (Hickie)

"And us, too, pal. Maybe the audience could see that we was playing with ourselves."(Ruden)

"My dear fellow, we'd have suffered still worse if one of those fellows had seen us in this condition." (Sommerstein)

"... we are also having awful time, when people having seen us all erected."(Neuberg)

"Ah! my boy, what a terrible thing it would have been if these fellows had seen us just now when we were on full stand!" (wikisource original source unknown)

So much for the white people. Yet George Theodoridis - a Greek with undoubtedly a better feel for the original language - translates it more literally as:

Polycharides, my friend! We too have suffered terrible things, so let’s not allow those prick-thieves see us so well and truly flagellated.

I think the term again means both figuratively 'beat yourself' and literally 'beat yourself' but the Greek is more sensitive to the original context of 'self-flagellation'"

squiz

Is this why you repeat yourself so much?

stephan huller

Squiz

That is a very valid observation. I was actually going to start a thread at one point - something like, what would it take for mountainman to admit he's wrong? Then when I read your post I realized that something like what you are suggesting must be at work in his brain - i.e. THEY started Christianity with a lie that was repeated many times despite no evidence to prove their case THEREFORE (and here is the key) I will do the same to BRING BACK THE TRUTH (i.e. that there is no history for Christianity before Constantine). The reasoning is completely circular but it depends on meeting young impressionable minds who might not be completely familiar with all the evidence.

I think however you have answered my question - namely he feels that because there was no evidence for Christianity before Constantine HE DOESN'T NEED TO VIEW ANY EVIDENCE WHICH MIGHT SUGGEST THERE WAS A CHRISTIANITY BEFORE CONSTANTINE. It's all a big lie, perhaps the biggest lie in history and he sees himself waging a holy war of lies - repeating the same lie many times AGAIN - in order to rescue the truth.

Clearly he must be doing all of this for some reason. I think he has a romatic notion of the beauty and truth of paganism. It must be at work or something like it

Amazing