Littlejohn

Among the various theories which include the 'fictional' nature of the 'jesuan character' (ie Jesus of Nazareth), the one according to which Christianity was an 'invention' of Constantine and his 'associates', is surely the most puzzling and the least likely also. (assuming that there is at the least a 'rag' of probability even in the theory according to which Jesus was not a historical figure!)

Frankly I'm not able to figure out to which theory was Dan Brown inspired, who also supports him that Christianity was an invention of the Emperor Constantine! ..

I have already said several times that at the basis of the creation of the catholic-christianity there was indeed the figure of an emperor: however, there is no question of Constantine, but of another emperor, because this happened long before the birth of Constantine I.

Greetings


Littlejohn
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Pyrrho

Do you seriously believe that your modern sensibilities are relevant to what sorts of things would be acceptable in the second century in some different culture? People did all sorts of things in the past that would get them in trouble if they did them today in the U.S. Whether it happened or not cannot be determined by reference to today's standards of acceptable conduct.

Chili

. . . in public even! . . . praying the HS down from heaven to put on a better show with jiggelo's planted in the crowd to get the 'spirit moving.' Hmmm, sounds like a strip-joint all right.

stephan huller

Having lived a very strange life I remember standing with a bunch of Kenyans newly arrived in America sitting in a dressing room in the backstage area at Disneyworld watching them see the Jerry Springer show for the first time. The episode that day featured an interview with a mother who claimed to have slept with her son.

I can't describe their horror when they figured out what was going on.

They literally stood up and were shaking with agitation. They kept pointing at the screen and rambled uncontrollably in Swahili to one another. When they finally calmed down they asked me why people in the audience didn't murder these people. I explained that this wasn't done in our country. But they assured me that this would never make it to TV in their country because the audience members would be compelled to kill these guests.

I guess the point is I guess that I believe that certain acts were ultimately abominable. But even that isn't the issue here. The question again it is reasonable to accept our English translation when it says that this stranger repeatedly masturbated in public to demonstrate adiaphora and more important that the Greek terminology should be interpreted this way when whatever he was doing in public, it was grouped together with acts of self-flagellation.

I just want to hear a reason why the translation 'flagellated his private parts' doesn't work.

Chili

Mud on the face makes them two-faced and public pretenders without shame and thus without spiritual integrity.

Chili

You should have told them that in America it is legal to sell out the mythology one movie at the time.

stephan huller

Chili

I agree with you on that. I think the half-shaved head and the mud, points to some sort of outward sign of penance. Perhaps it is linked with some cultural symbolism reflected in 1 Chronicles 19:

In the course of time, Nahash king of the Ammonites died, and his son succeeded him as king. David thought, "I will show kindness to Hanun son of Nahash, because his father showed kindness to me." So David sent a delegation to express his sympathy to Hanun concerning his father. When David's men came to Hanun in the land of the Ammonites to express sympathy to him, the Ammonite nobles said to Hanun, "Do you think David is honoring your father by sending men to you to express sympathy? Haven't his men come to you to explore and spy out the country and overthrow it?" So Hanun seized David's men, shaved them, cut off their garments in the middle at the buttocks, and sent them away.

For what action then was Peregrinus publicly repenting? Perhaps what immediately proceeds the description in Lucian's account provides some answers:

He left home, then, for the second time, to roam about, possessing an ample source of funds in the Christians, through whose ministrations he lived in unalloyed prosperity. For a time he battened himself thus; but then, after he had transgressed in some way even against them—he was seen, I think, eating some of the food that is forbidden them, they no longer accepted him, and so, being at a loss, he thought he must sing a palinode and demand his possessions back from his city. Submitting a petition, he expected to recover them by order of the Emperor. Then, as the city sent representatives to oppose the claim, he achieved nothing, but was directed to abide by what he had once for all determined, under no compulsion from anyone.

Thereafter he went away a third time, to Egypt, to visit Agathobulus, where he took that wonderful course of training in asceticism, shaving one half of his head, daubing his face with mud, and demonstrating what they call 'indifference' flagellating his genitals amid a thronging mob of bystanders,18 besides giving and, taking blows on the back-sides with a stalk of fennel, and playing the mountebank even more audaciously in many other ways.[Peregrinus 16,17]

Toto

Stephan Huller: if you prefer, I can split the more off topic posts from this thread.

stephan huller

Nah, I like kvetching. You know what they say - complaining is the last refuge of the impotent.

stephan huller

I actually woke up this morning giggling to myself thinking about mountainman's thought process. I mean God bless him but as we all know there are conspiracy theorists who argue that the Bush administration plunged those planes into the World Trade Center to cause the American public to support a takeover of oil fields in the Middle East. Whether or not people accept or don't accept this hypothesis it seems a million times more plausible than the same administration creating propaganda footage of George H W Bush walking around in masturbating at all sorts of public landmarks for some alleged agenda.

I guess I am saying that even conspiracy theorists have to set limits that their enemies - in this case the dreaded 'fourth century Church' and Constantine - would not cross in order to achieve their ends. In this case inventing a text attributed to Lucian which portrays a Church Father pleasuring himself in public. I am chuckling to myself again and every time I think of it. I can't even see what the agenda could be.

It's so crazy it's funny.