mountainman

Not yet, but I remain hopeful. I have stated five reasons for thinking this verse is an example of Arian satire.

Aquila Pacis

The darkness (like the whole "crucifixion" account) is diegetically transposed from the sources on Caesar's death and funeral, incl. the sixth hour, the earthquake, the moon of blood (in Acts), the rent stones, the temple entrance rent in two, and even the dead resurrecting and walking through the holy city. The parallels continue even in Arius and (especially) Orosius etc.

http://divusjulius.wordpress.com/201...darknesshour6/

mountainman

Nice article ! In particular the following extract is very interesting:

And in the case of Arius ???????????????
Is this to be left as a rhetorical question?

The concept of "The Holy Trinity" at the time of Arius had been recently defined in the Roman Empire by the publisher of Plotinus, Porphyry.


The original Greek idea (which the 4th century Christians "stole") as expressed by Plotinus (ca. CE 204–270) is outlined in History of Western Philosophy - by Bertrand Russell

HINT: This is related to the notion of Nondualism

mountainman

In the case of Arius attested by his antagonism against Constantine's new "Son of God". One has to admire how resourceful (and widely read) was this Arius as an author.

Chili

Huh, "human kind?"

The guy who wrote that obviously does not know the difference between human and man if he thinks that they are two of one kind.

mountainman

The translation of this is by Cardinal Newman, published in 1844. Since I have not yet seen any other translation I dont know whether this might be a variation in the translation of the Greek. The authorship is attributed to the "Christian Father of Orthodoxy" Athanasius. Athanasius may indeed not have known the difference between human and man, but he knew the difference between a heretic and an orthodox Christian, and he is busily engaged here giving us a wrap on the heretic Arius.

In response to whatever it was that Arius was saying in "Thalia", Athanasius was struck speechless, stopped his ears, and shut his eyes. It must have been some Arian mega-blasphemy for such a knee jerk reaction from the "Father of Christian Orthodoxy".

But wait a minute, we are told what Arius was saying because Athanasius reluctantly cited the verse from Arius. Arius draws a comparison between the execution and death of JC and JC. That is between Julius Caeasar and our Jesus Henry. As far as I can determine, thanks to a recent post above, Arius does this by mimicking the text of Josephus, who is citing a letter written by Mark Anthony.

It may have been Arius's comparison between the execution style deaths of Julius Caesar and Jesus Henry that got the goat of the Orthodox Athanasius, or the fact that Helios, the Invincible Sun, throws his own impatient fit of passion and simply withdraws his own sunshine from both events, as if they were not worthy of His (the Sun's) light.

A social and political study on the relationship between the imperial "orthodox" state christian church and the populace in general in the epoch of Athanasius reveals that it was characterised by intolerance and persecution of the indigenous Greek religious milieu, and that the imperially appointed "Bishops" were constantly fighting amongst themselves for more and more slices of the absolute power that Constantine had invested in his creation. During this epoch Ammianus tells us that "the highways were covered with galloping bishops".

Constantine was probably quite accurate when he summarised the impact of Arius as follows:

He brought state orthodoxy into the light;
He hurled his wretched self into darkness.
He ended his labors with this.

Jerome was probably also quite accurate when he summarised the situation a generation afterwards:

The whole world groaned to find itself Arian

The reality seems to be that everyone naturally found themselves somewhat aligned with Arius against the orthodox christian state church. Perhaps the entire populace were all well aware that the fabrication of the orthodox state christians was a wicked fiction and a monstrous tale constructed by Constantine so he could legitimitise the robbery of the most amount of gold and treasures in the smallest amount of time from the now redundant, but exceedingly rich and ancient Graeco-Roman temple networks of the early 4th century. While the populace (particularly the eastern empire which Constantine openly plundered) were aware of this travesty against the old traditions what could they do? Supreme power was with the emperor and his now-established network - not of Graeco-Roman priests - but of tax exempt "Christian Bishops". The world had changed during the epoch of Arius, Constantine and Eusebius. And the orthodox state church strove to eliminate all forms of non conformist opinions - ie: heresies. You know, like "Before He was born He was not".

arnoldo

You raise an interesting point. Perhaps this writer was copying the earlier non-jewish satirist who was attempting to "illustrate" the difference between the jewish god and the pagan gods in Bel and the Dragon.

Chili

Thanks for the elaboration Pete but I would say that from an orthodox point of view Catholics are Catholic and not Christian and as such are they cold and not lukewarm or hot. Then let me add that having the mind of Christ is the end of religion and therefore hot, where we now have Arius given them some pretty 'hot speeches' which in itself is not so bad for as long as it does not make cold Catholics lukewarm and that is probably what this 'galloping' was all about . . . in both directions, mind you, with the clergy knowing full well that those lukewarm heretics were galloping in the wrong direction and probably leaving their gold behind so they could get to heaven faster, which then is one more reason for the Catholic bisshops to go in the other direction.

It is not a secret that earthly richess are a liability to get to heaven and must be left behind to make that 'tall horse' they are riding go faster so they will get there sooner, failing all along to realize from such a lofty position that the very horse they are riding is the antichrist wherein they claim to have salvation (Jn.5:39-40), but are acually 'the forgeries' in hot pursuit of something they see 'across the great divide' for which they have to die first to get there as [born again] Christian instead of Catholic.

But I like Arius' verses and agree with them but will agree with Constantine that it is wrong to bring orthodoxy into the light and so make them lukewarm. To me, Arius was 'super enriched' sinner who was beyond mystic even in comprehension but was without the contemplative restrain to be classified as saint by the Holy Church that called itself Catholic for that reason = saved sinners are not welcome if all they can do is scatter the flock wherein, then, the "the whole world groaned to find itself Arian," and I specifically like the word 'groan' here to affirm Rev.14:10 and 11, where the stench of burning sulpher is the 'visible' emission of the torment endured by those who keep the commandments and have faith in Jesus = the saved sinners identified in verse 12, or once again, to those who Arius bought some light.

This whole sun issue is rather simple to explain if you consider that the light was before the sun in Gen.1 so that the abilty to convert sun rays into light is prior to man for whom light is life and the transformation of sun rays into light is the quality pertaining to the human only . . . wherefore then Magdalene was a candle short when she arrived at the tomb alone while Mary radiates with light for also Magdalene to see even in the dark (Gen3:15) where she would be the light but not the candle.

Chili

Yes, the common Lord always was second cause formed in Gen.2 after the intelligent desing of Gen.1 where the seventh day culminates to remain without darkness to return. A good translation here will say that "evening came and morning followed" to set the stage for the seventh day to arrive on which evening did not follow and for this the enduring Lord must be replaced . . . or the bible would not have a story to tell wherein religion is not for religion's sake but God's sake wherein we are the one and only because the entire event takes place inside the mind of man and thus is where also the end if to be found.

There is enough written in this tread to show that the left brain must be placed subservient to the right brain for which a termination of our left brain faculties are necessary before this can come about. I am certainly not sure how this happens but if both the earth and the heavens exist inside the human skull it is easy to see that the [old] earth and the [old] heavens need to pass away before the new one can emerge for the 'being' now fully man to exist without the prior human condition leading the way to wherever pleasure can be found as it was first shown in Gen. 2:10-14. 'That' the Law shuddered just means that it has been effective as the heart of the mythology itself which really is a third party to the event, but actually is the embodyment of human life on earth to which 'life' itself belongs and we as humans are just along for the ride no matter how good or bad we are.

mountainman

Arius of Alexandria is a most interesting historical figure.


Arius's involvement was with the New Testament, and it is reasonable to think he had access to various books related to the Septuagint "Apocypha". Arius must have also had access to the books of Josephus, or the letter of Mark Anthony which Josephus cites, in order to copy it, and quite mischieviously transpose the roles of Julius Caesar and Jesus Chrestus.

The unwholesome and blatant disregard evident in Arius for Jesus
indicates that Arius may not have believed that an Historical Jesus
had ever appeared on the planet Earth in the flesh.