Freethought & Rationalism Archive

Roger Pearse · 04-30-2009, 02:01 AM

Is now a good moment to mention that "tauroboliate" might be a word of wide use? "I'm feeling rather tauroboliate today" "How do you mean?" "Well I'm stood in the dark and being showered with bloody bull!"

Roger Pearse · 04-30-2009, 02:10 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by God Fearing Atheist

How the hell did I miss this one?

Vita Heliogabali 7.1: Matris etiam deum sacra accepit et tauroboliatus est, ut typum eriperet et alia euae penitus habentur condita.

Quote:

7.1. He also adopted the worship of the Great Mother and celebrated the rite of the taurobolium; and he carried off her image and the sacred objects which are kept hidden in a secret place. 2. He would toss his head to and fro among the castrated devotees of the goddess, and he infibulated himself, and did all that the eunuch-priests are wont to do; and the image of the goddess which he carried off he placed in the sanctuary of his god.

http://penelope.uchicago.edu/Thayer/...abalus/1*.html

God Fearing Atheist · 05-05-2009, 11:32 AM

When I was looking into the question of a Mithraeum on Vatican Hill some time ago, I mentioned this page which cites Furneaux's "The Other Side of the Story" as a source. I've now been able to track down a copy. He writes (pg. 175-76):

Quote:

By infiltration, Christianity conquered the Roman Empire which its progenitor, Jewish Messianism, had failed to overcome by force. In its progress to victory, Christianity absored many aspects of the religions vanquished and of the civilization that succumbed to it. The Bishop of Rome became the head of the State religion, the Pontifex Maximus. He succeeded the High Priest of Mithra on the Vatican Hill.

No source, no nothin'. Indeed, there is not a single footnote or citation in the entire book!

God Fearing Atheist · 05-05-2009, 11:35 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Roger Pearse

Is now a good moment to mention that "tauroboliate" might be a word of wide use? "I'm feeling rather tauroboliate today" "How do you mean?" "Well I'm stood in the dark and being showered with bloody bull!"

When it comes to being showered with bull, my term of choice is feeling "mountainmanish."

Roger Pearse · 05-05-2009, 11:28 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by God Fearing Atheist

When I was looking into the question of a Mithraeum on Vatican Hill some time ago, I mentioned this page which cites Furneaux's "The Other Side of the Story" as a source. I've now been able to track down a copy. He writes (pg. 175-76):

Quote:

By infiltration, Christianity conquered the Roman Empire which its progenitor, Jewish Messianism, had failed to overcome by force. In its progress to victory, Christianity absored many aspects of the religions vanquished and of the civilization that succumbed to it. The Bishop of Rome became the head of the State religion, the Pontifex Maximus. He succeeded the High Priest of Mithra on the Vatican Hill.

No source, no nothin'. Indeed, there is not a single footnote or citation in the entire book!

No footnotes? We can be sure, I suspect, that half-remembered hearsay is the primary "source".

The truly amusing bit is the idea that the Pope was based on the Vatican in antiquity, presumably because they see on the TV that that is where he is now. The Vatican state was only created in 1929. The pope only stayed there from 1870, when Rome was captured by the army of what would become the new Italian state. Prior to that he lived in the Quirinal palace. In antiquity he was based at the Lateran, the palace that Constantine gave them.

According to Vermaseren Cybele and Attis there was a temple of the Magna Mater somewhere on the Vatican hill. They show it as under the piazza of St. Peter's, and apparently altars have been excavated from it. The main temple was on the Palatine, tho.

It is listed as the "Phyrgianum" in section XIV of the Chronography of 354. No precise location is given, tho.

All the best,

Roger Pearse

Roger Pearse · 05-05-2009, 11:30 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by God Fearing Atheist

Quote:

Originally Posted by Roger Pearse

Is now a good moment to mention that "tauroboliate" might be a word of wide use? "I'm feeling rather tauroboliate today" "How do you mean?" "Well I'm stood in the dark and being showered with bloody bull!"

When it comes to being showered with bull, my term of choice is feeling "mountainmanish."

I reserve the latter term for stepping over something that looks as if it came out of the back end of a bull; a bull, moreover, infected with chronic dysentry.

mountainman · 05-05-2009, 11:58 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by God Fearing Atheist

Quote:

Originally Posted by Roger Pearse

Is now a good moment to mention that "tauroboliate" might be a word of wide use? "I'm feeling rather tauroboliate today" "How do you mean?" "Well I'm stood in the dark and being showered with bloody bull!"

When it comes to being showered with bull, my term of choice is feeling "mountainmanish."

Surely the academic Emperor Julian should be respected
as the quintessence of "tauroboliation" since his nickname
was "Bull-Burner" and he blew the whistle on that
hot and still steaming pile of "Bullneck's" bullshit.

God Fearing Atheist · 05-07-2009, 03:13 PM

Over on the BibleGeek website, Price has admitted he was in error. Good on him.

Casper · 05-08-2009, 05:39 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Roger Pearse

Quote:

Originally Posted by ripley

This link should download the unlocked file. The link will only work once.

Many thanks indeed - got it. This is a new site to me -- what's the deal? How does this work? And... how did you unlock the PDF? (By all means send me a private message or email).

Roger, if you can download and save the pdf there are numerous free utilities available for unlocking them. I have had to use them before internally in my company just because people aren't satisfied with a simple word document. I don't have one that I particularly recommend, and many are limited to certain versions, but it really is a timesaver when you have something that you cannot easily digest due to glitches in machine translation of documents.

Standard disclaimers apply for copyrights, but I don't think that is your intention at all. Interpreting text that you have a right to peruse so that it is usable is something at the presentation layer. At least that's my position.

God Fearing Atheist · 05-12-2009, 05:12 PM

On page 68, Seeley (The Noble Death, Sheffield Academic: 1990) cites Catullus 63, Julian Orations 5.167C-169D, Lucian De Dea Syria 50-51, Minicus Felix Octavius 22.4, and Sallustius De diis et mundo 4 as having to do with Attis.

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04-30-2009, 02:01 AM	#41
Roger Pearse Veteran Member Join Date: Apr 2002 Location: N/A Posts: 4,370	Is now a good moment to mention that "tauroboliate" might be a word of wide use? "I'm feeling rather tauroboliate today" "How do you mean?" "Well I'm stood in the dark and being showered with bloody bull!"

05-07-2009, 03:13 PM	#48
God Fearing Atheist Veteran Member Join Date: Sep 2000 Location: Massachusetts, USA -- Let's Go Red Sox! Posts: 1,500	Over on the BibleGeek website, Price has admitted he was in error. Good on him.

05-12-2009, 05:12 PM	#50
God Fearing Atheist Veteran Member Join Date: Sep 2000 Location: Massachusetts, USA -- Let's Go Red Sox! Posts: 1,500	On page 68, Seeley (The Noble Death, Sheffield Academic: 1990) cites Catullus 63, Julian Orations 5.167C-169D, Lucian De Dea Syria 50-51, Minicus Felix Octavius 22.4, and Sallustius De diis et mundo 4 as having to do with Attis.

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