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Note: if you read intellectual books on The Bible from a certain
period, you may find them claiming to be "scientific". While
scienctific disciplines (such as carbon dating and linguistic history)
are used, by "scientific" this mostly mean "not credulously
religious". If the books are old enough, they may even claim to be "objective", just as science itself was claiming to be at the time.
On Sat, 20 Sep 2025 16:27:16 -0400, William Hyde
<wthyde1953@gmail.com> wrote:
Paul S Person wrote:
On Fri, 19 Sep 2025 18:57:37 -0400, William Hyde
<wthyde1953@gmail.com> wrote:
Paul S Person wrote:
On Thu, 18 Sep 2025 18:33:46 -0400, William Hyde
<wthyde1953@gmail.com> wrote:
Paul S Person wrote:
<snippo>
Thanks for confirming that "other churches" has no meaning when
applied to other religions and, indeed, may be insulting.
I see that I missed the point of your objection. "Christian Church could >>>>>> be considered redundant. I should have said simply "in churches". >>>>>>
But there are non-christian churches. Unitarian Universalist and
Scientologist, for example. In the past some trinitarian Christians have >>>>>> claimed that even old line Unitarians are not Christians, in particular >>>>>> the branch that denies any divine status to "The man, Christ".
One of the interesting aspects of Christianity is that there are
Christians who are orthodox (small "o") and Christians who are
heretical.
The the Arians were Christians. Heretical Christians,
As the Arian doctrine is certainly older than the Orthodox, the
declaration of who is heretical simply depends on who has the support of >>>> the secular state.
Not to imply anything here, but the /last/ person who made that point
to a post I had made turned out to belong to a group that is decidedly
heterodox, regarding the Nicene Creed as imposed from above and
impervious to the minor detail that Jesus himself is addressed as
"Lord" (which, in Judaism, is the same as "God")
That might well have been me. Not that I belong to any group.
Newton and Spinoza, after all, were heretics.
Although it is clear that Newton claimed to be and and probably was an
Arian, I do recall reading a theory that he said "Arian" because, had
he said "Atheist", he would have had even more problems than he did as
an Arian.
His papers leave no doubt. He wrote millions of words on Christianity
and none of them tend to atheism. But to a large degree they are an
argument for Arianism. He regarded the worship of Jesus as a sin.
Otherwise, there is textural criticism which was advanced for its time,
and studies of church fathers. He approached this work with the same
passion that he worked in physics, mathematics, or alchemy.
He had a circle of Arian acquaintances, not an easy thing to amass when
he had to conceal his beliefs (if he wanted to keep his professorship,
that is). When meeting a potential fellow Arian one had to drop subtle
hints into the conversation, all deniable if the person turned out not
to be Arian, but enough for those who were Arian to understand that you
also held those views.
A set of behaviours which has been followed by number of people over the
ages.
Spinoza was a Jewish heretic.
Correct. Excommunicated, I believe.
Well, tossed out for asking too many questions/proposing too many
strange things, anyway.
Paul S Person wrote:
On Sat, 20 Sep 2025 16:27:16 -0400, William Hyde
<wthyde1953@gmail.com> wrote:
Paul S Person wrote:
On Fri, 19 Sep 2025 18:57:37 -0400, William Hyde
<wthyde1953@gmail.com> wrote:
Paul S Person wrote:
On Thu, 18 Sep 2025 18:33:46 -0400, William Hyde
<wthyde1953@gmail.com> wrote:
Paul S Person wrote:
<snippo>
Thanks for confirming that "other churches" has no meaning when >>>>>>>> applied to other religions and, indeed, may be insulting.
I see that I missed the point of your objection. "Christian
Church could
be considered redundant.-a I should have said simply "in churches". >>>>>>>
But there are non-christian churches.-a Unitarian Universalist and >>>>>>> Scientologist, for example. In the past some trinitarian
Christians have
claimed that even old line Unitarians are not Christians, in
particular
the branch that denies any divine status to "The man, Christ".
One of the interesting aspects of Christianity is that there are
Christians who are orthodox (small "o") and Christians who are
heretical.
The the Arians were Christians. Heretical Christians,
As the Arian doctrine is certainly older than the Orthodox, the
declaration of who is heretical simply depends on who has the
support of
the secular state.
Not to imply anything here, but the /last/ person who made that point
to a post I had made turned out to belong to a group that is decidedly >>>> heterodox, regarding the Nicene Creed as imposed from above and
impervious to the minor detail that Jesus himself is addressed as
"Lord" (which, in Judaism, is the same as "God")
That might well have been me.-a Not that I belong to any group.
Newton and Spinoza, after all, were heretics.
Although it is clear that Newton claimed to be and and probably was an >>>> Arian, I do recall reading a theory that he said "Arian" because, had
he said "Atheist", he would have had even more problems than he did as >>>> an Arian.
His papers leave no doubt.-a He wrote millions of words on Christianity
and none of them tend to atheism.-a But to a large degree they are an
argument for Arianism. He regarded the worship of Jesus as a sin.
Otherwise, there is textural criticism which was advanced for its time,
and studies of church fathers.-a He approached this work with the same
passion that he worked in physics, mathematics, or alchemy.
He had a circle of Arian acquaintances, not an easy thing to amass when
he had to conceal his beliefs (if he wanted to keep his professorship,
that is).-a When meeting a potential fellow Arian one had to drop subtle >>> hints into the conversation, all deniable if the person turned out not
to be Arian, but enough for those who were Arian to understand that you
also held those views.
A set of behaviours which has been followed by number of people over the >>> ages.
Spinoza was a Jewish heretic.
Correct.-a Excommunicated, I believe.
Well, tossed out for asking too many questions/proposing too many
strange things, anyway.
Apparently he had yet to write anything by that time, so the "crimes"
must have been verbal.-a A text of the excommunication is online:
"The Senhores of the marCOamad [the congregationrCOs lay governing board] having long known of the evil opinions and acts of Baruch de Spinoza,
have endeavored by various means and promises to turn him from his evil ways. However, having failed to make him mend his wicked ways, and, on
the contrary, daily receiving more and more serious information about
the abominable heresies which he practiced and taught and about his monstrous deeds, and having for this numerous trustworthy witnesses who
have deposed and borne witness to this effect in the presence of the
said Espinoza, they became convinced of the truth of this matter. After
all of this has been investigated in the presence of the honorable
hakhamim [rCLwise men,rCY or rabbis], they have decided, with the [rabbisrCO]
consent, that the said Espinoza should be excommunicated and expelled
from the people of Israel. By decree of the angels and by the command of
the holy men, we excommunicate, expel, curse and damn Baruch de
Espinoza, with the consent of God, Blessed be He, and with the consent
of the entire holy congregation, and in front of these holy scrolls with
the 613 precepts which are written therein; cursing him with the excommunication with which Joshua banned Jericho and with the curse
which Elisha cursed the boys and with all the castigations which are
written in the Book of the Law. Cursed be he by day and cursed be he by night; cursed be he when he lies down and cursed be he when he rises up. Cursed be he when he goes out and cursed be he when he comes in. The
Lord will not spare him, but the anger of the Lord and his jealousy
shall smoke against that man, and all the curses that are written in
this book shall lie upon him, and the Lord shall blot out his name from under heaven. And the Lord shall separate him unto evil out of all the tribes of Israel, according to all the curses of the covenant that are written in this book of the law. But you that cleave unto the Lord your
God are alive every one of you this day."
The first part sounds familiar.-a Nowadays the style is "Everybody knows he's a bad guy.-a Everybody, everybody knows.-a I'm going to get him fired from his job as a lens maker.-a His lenses only show lies."
William Hyde
V. S. Naipaul says that on his trip to Iran circa 1980, some street
doctors were still advertising that they were familiar with the medical >secrets of Galen.
Paul S Person wrote:There is one work by Galen in the collection known as /The Great Books
.
Note: if you read intellectual books on The Bible from a certain
period, you may find them claiming to be "scientific". While
scienctific disciplines (such as carbon dating and linguistic history)
are used, by "scientific" this mostly mean "not credulously
religious". If the books are old enough, they may even claim to be
"objective", just as science itself was claiming to be at the time.
Galen, though, did acknowledge that he was likely to be wrong on some >things, and encouraged those who came after to correct him.
This was the only part of Galen's work that they didn't dogmatically
cling to.
V. S. Naipaul says that on his trip to Iran circa 1980, some street
doctors were still advertising that they were familiar with the medical >secrets of Galen.
Paul S Person wrote:Huh. And "excommunication" is explicitly used.
On Sat, 20 Sep 2025 16:27:16 -0400, William Hyde
<wthyde1953@gmail.com> wrote:
Paul S Person wrote:
On Fri, 19 Sep 2025 18:57:37 -0400, William Hyde
<wthyde1953@gmail.com> wrote:
Paul S Person wrote:
On Thu, 18 Sep 2025 18:33:46 -0400, William Hyde
<wthyde1953@gmail.com> wrote:
Paul S Person wrote:
<snippo>
Thanks for confirming that "other churches" has no meaning when >>>>>>>> applied to other religions and, indeed, may be insulting.
I see that I missed the point of your objection. "Christian Church could
be considered redundant. I should have said simply "in churches". >>>>>>>
But there are non-christian churches. Unitarian Universalist and >>>>>>> Scientologist, for example. In the past some trinitarian Christians have
claimed that even old line Unitarians are not Christians, in particular >>>>>>> the branch that denies any divine status to "The man, Christ".
One of the interesting aspects of Christianity is that there are
Christians who are orthodox (small "o") and Christians who are
heretical.
The the Arians were Christians. Heretical Christians,
As the Arian doctrine is certainly older than the Orthodox, the
declaration of who is heretical simply depends on who has the support of >>>>> the secular state.
Not to imply anything here, but the /last/ person who made that point
to a post I had made turned out to belong to a group that is decidedly >>>> heterodox, regarding the Nicene Creed as imposed from above and
impervious to the minor detail that Jesus himself is addressed as
"Lord" (which, in Judaism, is the same as "God")
That might well have been me. Not that I belong to any group.
Newton and Spinoza, after all, were heretics.
Although it is clear that Newton claimed to be and and probably was an >>>> Arian, I do recall reading a theory that he said "Arian" because, had
he said "Atheist", he would have had even more problems than he did as >>>> an Arian.
His papers leave no doubt. He wrote millions of words on Christianity
and none of them tend to atheism. But to a large degree they are an
argument for Arianism. He regarded the worship of Jesus as a sin.
Otherwise, there is textural criticism which was advanced for its time,
and studies of church fathers. He approached this work with the same
passion that he worked in physics, mathematics, or alchemy.
He had a circle of Arian acquaintances, not an easy thing to amass when
he had to conceal his beliefs (if he wanted to keep his professorship,
that is). When meeting a potential fellow Arian one had to drop subtle
hints into the conversation, all deniable if the person turned out not
to be Arian, but enough for those who were Arian to understand that you
also held those views.
A set of behaviours which has been followed by number of people over the >>> ages.
Spinoza was a Jewish heretic.
Correct. Excommunicated, I believe.
Well, tossed out for asking too many questions/proposing too many
strange things, anyway.
Apparently he had yet to write anything by that time, so the "crimes"
must have been verbal. A text of the excommunication is online:
"The Senhores of the maAamad [the congregationAs lay governing board]
having long known of the evil opinions and acts of Baruch de Spinoza,
have endeavored by various means and promises to turn him from his evil >ways. However, having failed to make him mend his wicked ways, and, on
the contrary, daily receiving more and more serious information about
the abominable heresies which he practiced and taught and about his >monstrous deeds, and having for this numerous trustworthy witnesses who
have deposed and borne witness to this effect in the presence of the
said Espinoza, they became convinced of the truth of this matter. After
all of this has been investigated in the presence of the honorable
hakhamim [owise men,o or rabbis], they have decided, with the [rabbisA] >consent, that the said Espinoza should be excommunicated and expelled
from the people of Israel. By decree of the angels and by the command of
the holy men, we excommunicate, expel, curse and damn Baruch de
Espinoza, with the consent of God, Blessed be He, and with the consent
of the entire holy congregation, and in front of these holy scrolls with
the 613 precepts which are written therein; cursing him with the >excommunication with which Joshua banned Jericho and with the curse
which Elisha cursed the boys and with all the castigations which are
written in the Book of the Law. Cursed be he by day and cursed be he by >night; cursed be he when he lies down and cursed be he when he rises up. >Cursed be he when he goes out and cursed be he when he comes in. The
Lord will not spare him, but the anger of the Lord and his jealousy
shall smoke against that man, and all the curses that are written in
this book shall lie upon him, and the Lord shall blot out his name from >under heaven. And the Lord shall separate him unto evil out of all the >tribes of Israel, according to all the curses of the covenant that are >written in this book of the law. But you that cleave unto the Lord your
God are alive every one of you this day."
The first part sounds familiar. Nowadays the style is "Everybody knowsThey were were a /lot/ nastier back then. Luther included, BTW. It
he's a bad guy. Everybody, everybody knows. I'm going to get him fired >from his job as a lens maker. His lenses only show lies."
On 9/21/25 14:54, William Hyde wrote:<snippo typical very early modern condemnation of Spinoza>
I'm not sure he had a job. IIRC, after that he withdrew into being a philosopher and is remembered because he did, in fact, eventuallyThe first part sounds familiar.a Nowadays the style is "Everybody knows
he's a bad guy.a Everybody, everybody knows.a I'm going to get him fired
from his job as a lens maker.a His lenses only show lies."
Well nearly everyone concerned with knowlege knows of Baruch de Spinoza
but who can name one of the Senhores who excommunicated him. Curses don't >seem to affect the righteous heretic except to lose him his job.
On Sun, 21 Sep 2025 15:41:10 -0700, Bobbie Sellers <bliss-sf4ever@dslextreme.com> wrote:
On 9/21/25 14:54, William Hyde wrote:
<snippo typical very early modern condemnation of Spinoza>
The first part sounds familiar.-a Nowadays the style is "Everybody knows >>> he's a bad guy.-a Everybody, everybody knows.-a I'm going to get him fired >>> from his job as a lens maker.-a His lenses only show lies."
Well nearly everyone concerned with knowlege knows of Baruch de Spinoza >> but who can name one of the Senhores who excommunicated him. Curses don't >> seem to affect the righteous heretic except to lose him his job.
I'm not sure he had a job. IIRC, after that he withdrew into being a philosopher and is remembered because he did, in fact, eventually
write stuff down.
My view is that Paul changed a Jewish heresy into something else.
Robert Woodward <robertaw@drizzle.com> wrote:
My view is that Paul changed a Jewish heresy into something else.
I think that anyone with a fair religious and historical education would agree with that.
Where people differ is in what they think he changed it into.
In article <10au53q$mi5$1@panix2.panix.com>,
kludge@panix.com (Scott Dorsey) wrote:
Robert Woodward <robertaw@drizzle.com> wrote:
My view is that Paul changed a Jewish heresy into something else.
I think that anyone with a fair religious and historical education would
agree with that.
Where people differ is in what they think he changed it into.
? He changed it into Christianity as we know it. What else would it be?
Robert Woodward <robertaw@drizzle.com> wrote:In the USA, whatever it claims to be. This is called "freedom of
In article <10au53q$mi5$1@panix2.panix.com>,
kludge@panix.com (Scott Dorsey) wrote:
Robert Woodward <robertaw@drizzle.com> wrote:
My view is that Paul changed a Jewish heresy into something else.
I think that anyone with a fair religious and historical education would >>> agree with that.
Where people differ is in what they think he changed it into.
? He changed it into Christianity as we know it. What else would it be?
What the hell IS Christianity as we know it? THAT is the question.
In article <10au53q$mi5$1@panix2.panix.com>,Or, given the record (in Acts) of the experiences of Peter with a
kludge@panix.com (Scott Dorsey) wrote:
Robert Woodward <robertaw@drizzle.com> wrote:
My view is that Paul changed a Jewish heresy into something else.
I think that anyone with a fair religious and historical education would
agree with that.
Where people differ is in what they think he changed it into.
? He changed it into Christianity as we know it. What else would it be?
The Horny Goat wrote:
On Tue, 16 Sep 2025 16:32:32 -0400, William Hyde
<wthyde1953@gmail.com> wrote:
Idiot as he was in many ways, Rob understood retail politics as well as
LBJ. During his decade as a Councillor, it became known that anyone in
the city, not just those from his ward, could call him about a problem
they were having and get help. My brother in law called him on the
Sunday of a summer long weekend and Rob was there in twenty minutes, the >>> problem resolved in the morning of the next business day. This gained
him a lot of dedicated followers - and campaigners - around the city who >>> didn't know or care that he never read the city budget before voting
against it.
Let's face it Doug Ford (now premier of Ontario) didn't have to work
too hard to improve on his brother. When you're mayor of a large city
you have no business being photographed with cocaine the way Rob was
Doug doesn't drink, doesn't do drugs, doesn't help people.
Totally different guy.
On Sat, 20 Sep 2025 16:17:55 -0000 (UTC), jdnicoll@panix.com (JamesIf James is referring to St. Paul then he needs
Nicoll) wrote:
<snippo>
Don't reasonable people agree Xtianity ended as soon as Paul got
his hands on it?
This theory, that Paul is at odds with the Gospels, was used by
Kazantzakis in /The Last Temptation of Christ/. And it made its way
into the movie as well.
On Sun, 21 Sep 2025 17:54:12 -0400, William Hyde
<wthyde1953@gmail.com> wrote:
Paul S Person wrote:
On Sat, 20 Sep 2025 16:27:16 -0400, William Hyde
<wthyde1953@gmail.com> wrote:
Spinoza was a Jewish heretic.
Correct. Excommunicated, I believe.
Well, tossed out for asking too many questions/proposing too many
strange things, anyway.
Apparently he had yet to write anything by that time, so the "crimes"
must have been verbal. A text of the excommunication is online:
"The Senhores of the marCOamad [the congregationrCOs lay governing board]
having long known of the evil opinions and acts of Baruch de Spinoza,
have endeavored by various means and promises to turn him from his evil
ways. However, having failed to make him mend his wicked ways, and, on
the contrary, daily receiving more and more serious information about
the abominable heresies which he practiced and taught and about his
monstrous deeds, and having for this numerous trustworthy witnesses who
have deposed and borne witness to this effect in the presence of the
said Espinoza, they became convinced of the truth of this matter. After
all of this has been investigated in the presence of the honorable
hakhamim [rCLwise men,rCY or rabbis], they have decided, with the [rabbisrCO]
consent, that the said Espinoza should be excommunicated and expelled
from the people of Israel. By decree of the angels and by the command of
the holy men, we excommunicate, expel, curse and damn Baruch de
Espinoza, with the consent of God, Blessed be He, and with the consent
of the entire holy congregation, and in front of these holy scrolls with
the 613 precepts which are written therein; cursing him with the
excommunication with which Joshua banned Jericho and with the curse
which Elisha cursed the boys and with all the castigations which are
written in the Book of the Law. Cursed be he by day and cursed be he by
night; cursed be he when he lies down and cursed be he when he rises up.
Cursed be he when he goes out and cursed be he when he comes in. The
Lord will not spare him, but the anger of the Lord and his jealousy
shall smoke against that man, and all the curses that are written in
this book shall lie upon him, and the Lord shall blot out his name from
under heaven. And the Lord shall separate him unto evil out of all the
tribes of Israel, according to all the curses of the covenant that are
written in this book of the law. But you that cleave unto the Lord your
God are alive every one of you this day."
Huh. And "excommunication" is explicitly used.
Thanks for the information!
Robert Carnegie wrote:
On 17/09/2025 16:39, Paul S Person wrote:
On Tue, 16 Sep 2025 16:32:32 -0400, William Hyde
<wthyde1953@gmail.com> wrote:
<snippo>
I regret to say that my area in particular is less accepting of gays
than it was forty years ago.-a We've had a serious influx of-a devout
people from several religions which are not terribly enlightened on
this
matter.-a Or other matters.-a Sermons against evolution are not uncommon >>>> hereabouts, mostly in Christian churches, but not entirely.
That's a tough nut to crack. Religious opinions tend to have a strong
emotional content, so attacking the opinion and attacking the
opinion-holder tend to be seen as the same thing. I sometimes
fantasize that an effective argument exists, but it appears to me that
\the real problems are much deeper. From my perspective, a large
percentage of what we now call "Evangelical" groups have wandered far
from the narrow path that leads upward.
Not that people aren't already working on the
religious prejudice problem, but I suppose that
offering a catalogue which shows that the other,
erroneous religions mostly have just the same
set of prejudices that yours has, may influence
a believer.
In a Texas A&M university newsgroup I watched as an atheist and a
christian argued about religion, in particular about sources, texts,
late additions and/or fakery, and so on.
Then I saw the same christian argue against a muslim, using the very
same arguments the atheist used.
And without irony.
William Hyde
On 21/09/2025 16:37, Paul S Person wrote:
On Sat, 20 Sep 2025 16:17:55 -0000 (UTC), jdnicoll@panix.com (James
Nicoll) wrote:
Don't reasonable people agree Xtianity ended as soon as Paul got
his hands on it?
This theory, that Paul is at odds with the Gospels, was used by
Kazantzakis in /The Last Temptation of Christ/. And it made its way
into the movie as well.
If James is referring to St. Paul then he needs
to offer an explanation of how so many churches
got built.
And if you are, then I think it's accepted by
most scholars that the portions of the bible
that we call "the gospels", the stories about
Jesus, were written after the essays (epistles)
by Paul, and by other people, some of whom
were mistaken for Paul. Although they probably
aren't the first attempt at gospels, and not the
last. So if there's disagreement, it is that the
gospels are at odds with Paul.
On 21/09/2025 16:37, Paul S Person wrote:A nice reversal of the position of the person I was responding to.
On Sat, 20 Sep 2025 16:17:55 -0000 (UTC), jdnicoll@panix.com (JamesIf James is referring to St. Paul then he needs
Nicoll) wrote:
<snippo>
Don't reasonable people agree Xtianity ended as soon as Paul got
his hands on it?
This theory, that Paul is at odds with the Gospels, was used by
Kazantzakis in /The Last Temptation of Christ/. And it made its way
into the movie as well.
to offer an explanation of how so many churches
got built.
And if you are, then I think it's accepted by
most scholars that the portions of the bible
that we call "the gospels", the stories about
Jesus, were written after the essays (epistles)
by Paul, and by other people, some of whom
were mistaken for Paul. Although they probably
aren't the first attempt at gospels, and not the
last. So if there's disagreement, it is that the
gospels are at odds with Paul.
Robert Carnegie <rja.carnegie@gmail.com> wrote:That was the basis on which they were chosen.
On 21/09/2025 16:37, Paul S Person wrote:
On Sat, 20 Sep 2025 16:17:55 -0000 (UTC), jdnicoll@panix.com (James
Nicoll) wrote:
Don't reasonable people agree Xtianity ended as soon as Paul got
his hands on it?
This theory, that Paul is at odds with the Gospels, was used by
Kazantzakis in /The Last Temptation of Christ/. And it made its way
into the movie as well.
If James is referring to St. Paul then he needs
to offer an explanation of how so many churches
got built.
If one is to take James' argument, then the answer would be "So many
churches got built because St. Paul was a marketing genius who took
Christ's philosophy and changed it to make it more palatable for mass >consumption." Jesus wasn't around by then to object, other than in
the sense that Jesus will always be around.
And if you are, then I think it's accepted by
most scholars that the portions of the bible
that we call "the gospels", the stories about
Jesus, were written after the essays (epistles)
by Paul, and by other people, some of whom
were mistaken for Paul. Although they probably
aren't the first attempt at gospels, and not the
last. So if there's disagreement, it is that the
gospels are at odds with Paul.
Some of those. But we talk about the four synoptic gospels that
were initially written by people who actually knew and spoke with
Jesus as being different than the other gospel texts.
On 22/09/2025 16:37, Paul S Person wrote:<snippo>
Even the fact that it was used in the translation is enough toHuh. And "excommunication" is explicitly used.
Thanks for the information!
Remember (as with anything said by for instance
Vladimir Putin) that this wasn't in English
originally.
That was the basis on which they were chosen.
Matthew and John, anyway.
This theory, that Paul is at odds with the Gospels, was used by
Kazantzakis in /The Last Temptation of Christ/. And it made its way
into the movie as well.
Robert Carnegie <rja.carnegie@gmail.com> wrote:
On 21/09/2025 16:37, Paul S Person wrote:
On Sat, 20 Sep 2025 16:17:55 -0000 (UTC), jdnicoll@panix.com (James
Nicoll) wrote:
Don't reasonable people agree Xtianity ended as soon as Paul got
his hands on it?
This theory, that Paul is at odds with the Gospels, was used by
Kazantzakis in /The Last Temptation of Christ/. And it made its way
into the movie as well.
If James is referring to St. Paul then he needs
to offer an explanation of how so many churches
got built.
If one is to take James' argument, then the answer would be "So many
churches got built because St. Paul was a marketing genius who took
Christ's philosophy and changed it to make it more palatable for mass consumption."
On 20/09/2025 21:32, William Hyde wrote:
Robert Carnegie wrote:
On 17/09/2025 16:39, Paul S Person wrote:
On Tue, 16 Sep 2025 16:32:32 -0400, William Hyde
<wthyde1953@gmail.com> wrote:
<snippo>
I regret to say that my area in particular is less accepting of gays >>>>> than it was forty years ago.-a We've had a serious influx of-a devout >>>>> people from several religions which are not terribly enlightened on >>>>> this
matter.-a Or other matters.-a Sermons against evolution are not uncommon >>>>> hereabouts, mostly in Christian churches, but not entirely.
That's a tough nut to crack. Religious opinions tend to have a strong
emotional content, so attacking the opinion and attacking the
opinion-holder tend to be seen as the same thing. I sometimes
fantasize that an effective argument exists, but it appears to me that >>>> \the real problems are much deeper. From my perspective, a large
percentage of what we now call "Evangelical" groups have wandered far
from the narrow path that leads upward.
Not that people aren't already working on the
religious prejudice problem, but I suppose that
offering a catalogue which shows that the other,
erroneous religions mostly have just the same
set of prejudices that yours has, may influence
a believer.
In a Texas A&M university newsgroup I watched as an atheist and a
christian argued about religion, in particular about sources, texts,
late additions and/or fakery, and so on.
Then I saw the same christian argue against a muslim, using the very
same arguments the atheist used.
And without irony.
William Hyde
Well...-a the lesson went in, I suppose??
Robert Carnegie <rja.carnegie@gmail.com> wrote:
On 21/09/2025 16:37, Paul S Person wrote:
On Sat, 20 Sep 2025 16:17:55 -0000 (UTC), jdnicoll@panix.com (James
Nicoll) wrote:
Don't reasonable people agree Xtianity ended as soon as Paul got
his hands on it?
This theory, that Paul is at odds with the Gospels, was used by
Kazantzakis in /The Last Temptation of Christ/. And it made its way
into the movie as well.
If James is referring to St. Paul then he needs
to offer an explanation of how so many churches
got built.
If one is to take James' argument, then the answer would be "So many
churches got built because St. Paul was a marketing genius who took
Christ's philosophy and changed it to make it more palatable for mass consumption." Jesus wasn't around by then to object, other than in
the sense that Jesus will always be around.
And if you are, then I think it's accepted by
most scholars that the portions of the bible
that we call "the gospels", the stories about
Jesus, were written after the essays (epistles)
by Paul, and by other people, some of whom
were mistaken for Paul. Although they probably
aren't the first attempt at gospels, and not the
last. So if there's disagreement, it is that the
gospels are at odds with Paul.
Some of those. But we talk about the four synoptic gospels that
were initially written by people who actually knew and spoke with
Jesus as being different than the other gospel texts. (Is this
valid, seeing as how many changes may have been made to them since
their initial writing? That's an important question that nobody
can answer yet.)
--scott
So, instead of Paul vs The Gospels, we have -- Paul vs. Paul.
And a clear illustration of the nonsense modern scholarship can
produce.
Paul S Person wrote:
This theory, that Paul is at odds with the Gospels, was used by
Kazantzakis in /The Last Temptation of Christ/. And it made its way
into the movie as well.
When I saw that movie in Texas, protesters showed up handing out
leaflets telling us not to watch this diabolic film.
But they only showed up after the day's last showing.-a I got my leaflet
on the way out.
A few chapters short of a testament, these lads.
On 9/28/25 09:14, Paul S Person wrote:In this context, "modern scholarship" refers to the Higher Criticism
[snip]
So, instead of Paul vs The Gospels, we have -- Paul vs. Paul.
And a clear illustration of the nonsense modern scholarship can
produce.
Or rather the illustration of what nonsense modern scholarship can
dispense with.
Scott Dorsey wrote:<snippo>
<snippo "ploys">If one is to take James' argument, then the answer would be "So many
churches got built because St. Paul was a marketing genius who took
Christ's philosophy and changed it to make it more palatable for mass
consumption."
Prior to Christianity there were a number of gentiles with a deep
interest in Judaism. Some of these even followed the dietary laws. I
cannot now recall what they were called by the Jews, but it was
something complimentary like "wisdom seekers".
I suspect these formed a natural core audience for Paul, once he had
come up with his two brilliant marketing ploys:
Paul S Person wrote:We had a guy standing in the back of the theater quoting various Bible
This theory, that Paul is at odds with the Gospels, was used by
Kazantzakis in /The Last Temptation of Christ/. And it made its way
into the movie as well.
When I saw that movie in Texas, protesters showed up handing out
leaflets telling us not to watch this diabolic film.
But they only showed up after the day's last showing. I got my leaflet
on the way out.
A few chapters short of a testament, these lads.
When I saw that movie in Texas, protesters showed up handing out
leaflets telling us not to watch this diabolic film.
But they only showed up after the day's last showing. I got my leaflet
on the way out.
A few chapters short of a testament, these lads.
No evidence that the Gospels were written by anyone contemporaneous
with Jesus aka Reb Jesuhua but are accounts from verbal stories at least a >generation old when written down.
On Sun, 28 Sep 2025 17:11:30 -0400, William HydeMy feeling is that the proper response to Hebdo's idiocies (why
<wthyde1953@gmail.com> wrote:
When I saw that movie in Texas, protesters showed up handing out
leaflets telling us not to watch this diabolic film.
But they only showed up after the day's last showing. I got my leaflet
on the way out.
A few chapters short of a testament, these lads.
Haven't seen the movie, have read the book and I can somewhat
understand how that the offensive portion of the Last Temptation of
Christ might have been judged offensive.
That said it's probably MORE offensive than the Charlie Hebdo cartoons
- but then Christians are not in the habit of killing people over
offensive images.
On Sun, 28 Sep 2025 14:33:39 -0700, Bobbie Sellers ><bliss-sf4ever@dslextreme.com> wrote:
No evidence that the Gospels were written by anyone contemporaneous >>with Jesus aka Reb Jesuhua but are accounts from verbal stories at least a >>generation old when written down.
Generally Mark is thought to be an assistant to St Paul but rather
younger which would suggest he had been a small child at the time of
the crucifixion of Jesus. And no question he was thought to be the
youngest of the New Testament authors.
The Horny Goat <lcraver@home.ca> wrote:
On Sun, 28 Sep 2025 14:33:39 -0700, Bobbie Sellers
<bliss-sf4ever@dslextreme.com> wrote:
No evidence that the Gospels were written by anyone contemporaneous
with Jesus aka Reb Jesuhua but are accounts from verbal stories at least a >>> generation old when written down.
Generally Mark is thought to be an assistant to St Paul but rather
younger which would suggest he had been a small child at the time of
the crucifixion of Jesus. And no question he was thought to be the
youngest of the New Testament authors.
Yes. And Bliss is correct that the synoptic gospels were not written directly by their authors, who were likely illiterate. They almost
certainly were ghostwritten by someone for them later in life. There
is no reason not to believe that they might even have been thirdhand
rather than secondhand, but there's no reason to believe that either.
There's actually an interesting discussion of this in Asimov's Guide to
The Bible, which I highly recommend to any SF fans interested in biblical scholarship. It's a bit out of date because some interesting manuscripts have been discovered since it was written but it's still a great book.
Hmmm. I had cataract surgery 3 weeks ago. Does that "prove" Canada is
equally blessed by God? Uh...
Which lenses did you get ?
The Horny Goat <lcraver@home.ca> wrote:1. Luke was a physician. He was educated. So much for the "ignorant
On Sun, 28 Sep 2025 14:33:39 -0700, Bobbie Sellers >><bliss-sf4ever@dslextreme.com> wrote:
No evidence that the Gospels were written by anyone contemporaneous >>>with Jesus aka Reb Jesuhua but are accounts from verbal stories at least a >>>generation old when written down.
Generally Mark is thought to be an assistant to St Paul but rather
younger which would suggest he had been a small child at the time of
the crucifixion of Jesus. And no question he was thought to be the
youngest of the New Testament authors.
Yes. And Bliss is correct that the synoptic gospels were not written >directly by their authors, who were likely illiterate. They almost
certainly were ghostwritten by someone for them later in life. There
is no reason not to believe that they might even have been thirdhand
rather than secondhand, but there's no reason to believe that either.
Maricon valued Luke as the only (to him) valid gospel, and included it, >along with most of the letters attributed to Paul, in his new testament<snippo>
- the first ever created. Though one of the above theories places
Marcion first. How that could work I don't understand. I don't see
Marcion writing an early version of Luke and attributing it to Paul's >companion.
Marcion's Luke is short, and scholars used to think he edited itI thought there was evidence that contemporaries of Marcion recognized
heavily, rejecting what he thought of as later contamination. But if so
his edits were surprisingly deft. The contrary view is gaining ground,
that Marcion gave Luke as he found it, and that the current version is
much later, longer with a century of accretion.
On Tue, 16 Sep 2025 02:03:44 -0500, Lynn McGuireI have two cards in my wallet, one for each eye, identifying the lens
<lynnmcguire5@gmail.com> wrote:
Hmmm. I had cataract surgery 3 weeks ago. Does that "prove" Canada is
equally blessed by God? Uh...
Which lenses did you get ?
Can't remember - would have to go back to my paperwork.
Wasn't free though it WAS done at the local general hospital.
On Wed, 1 Oct 2025 18:16:26 -0400, William Hyde <wthyde1953@gmail.com>
wrote:
<snippo>
Maricon valued Luke as the only (to him) valid gospel, and included it,
along with most of the letters attributed to Paul, in his new testament
- the first ever created. Though one of the above theories places
Marcion first. How that could work I don't understand. I don't see
Marcion writing an early version of Luke and attributing it to Paul's
companion.
<snippo>
Marcion's Luke is short, and scholars used to think he edited it
heavily, rejecting what he thought of as later contamination. But if so
his edits were surprisingly deft. The contrary view is gaining ground,
that Marcion gave Luke as he found it, and that the current version is
much later, longer with a century of accretion.
I thought there was evidence that contemporaries of Marcion recognized
the heavily redacted version as such, presumably because the had the
(well, a more) complete version in their library.
But that would have been from scholars who adopted that theory. And,
as I know full well, modernist scholars are prone to making stuff up
to support their case.
Is it still undisputed that Marcion's collection spurred others to
consider just what books should be gathered together as especially
important and reliable -- thus initiating the creation of the New
Testament?
I recommend, when investigating this stuff, always keeping in mind
that Biblical Scholarship is not a Science but rather a Liberal Art,
which means that no theory can be falsified, and the current opinion
is exactly that -- an opinion, nothing more.
Those opinions can be pretty amusing, however. And some of these
people (at least in translation) produce well-written books that are a
joy to read because the ideas are so interesting.
On Wed, 1 Oct 2025 12:45:38 -0400 (EDT), kludge@panix.com (Scott
Dorsey) wrote:
Yes. And Bliss is correct that the synoptic gospels were not written >>directly by their authors, who were likely illiterate. They almost >>certainly were ghostwritten by someone for them later in life. There
is no reason not to believe that they might even have been thirdhand=20 >>rather than secondhand, but there's no reason to believe that either.
1. Luke was a physician. He was educated. So much for the "ignorant
peasant" theory.
2. Most people back then were illiterate. This is why scribes existed:
to read letters to their recipients, and to write letters for those
wishing to send them. "Illiterate" did not mean "stupid" back then.
Paul S Person wrote:<snippo>
IOW, /none/ of his opponents claimed to have a longer, uncut version?I thought there was evidence that contemporaries of Marcion recognized
the heavily redacted version as such, presumably because the had the
(well, a more) complete version in their library.
That is how I understood it. But it seems that there is no earlier,
longer version of Luke, just a hypothesized one. With some lines of >reasoning supporting it, of course.
Marcion removed some doubful Pauline epistles from his bible, but he<snippo>
left Paul largely alone - he was very much a follower of Paul. I don't
see a motive for taking the scissors to Paul's disciple and, as I say,
if he did so he did so skillfully.
I thought the motivation was more to preserve those books/lettersIs it still undisputed that Marcion's collection spurred others to
consider just what books should be gathered together as especially
important and reliable -- thus initiating the creation of the New
Testament?
As far as I know, yes. It didn't seem right that the easiest way for >orthodox Christians to read Paul or Luke was via a heretical bible.
Of course it can be made. But the result, either way, is only anI recommend, when investigating this stuff, always keeping in mind
that Biblical Scholarship is not a Science but rather a Liberal Art,
which means that no theory can be falsified, and the current opinion
is exactly that -- an opinion, nothing more.
I think that balance of probability arguments can be made. And in some >cases the textural succession is clear.
But absent a time machine I will never be able to say for sure whether >Marcion sliced Luke or not. But as we know that biblical books growExactly. As with so many things, some of them undeniably part of
with time, I tend to think he didn't.
Yes. And Bliss is correct that the synoptic gospels were not written >directly by their authors, who were likely illiterate. They almost
certainly were ghostwritten by someone for them later in life. There
is no reason not to believe that they might even have been thirdhand
rather than secondhand, but there's no reason to believe that either.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Synoptic_Gospels#Theories
Maricon valued Luke as the only (to him) valid gospel, and included it, >along with most of the letters attributed to Paul, in his new testament
- the first ever created. Though one of the above theories places
Marcion first. How that could work I don't understand. I don't see
Marcion writing an early version of Luke and attributing it to Paul's >companion.
I recommend, when investigating this stuff, always keeping in mind
that Biblical Scholarship is not a Science but rather a Liberal Art,
which means that no theory can be falsified, and the current opinion
is exactly that -- an opinion, nothing more.
Which lenses did you get ?
Can't remember - would have to go back to my paperwork.
Wasn't free though it WAS done at the local general hospital.
I have two cards in my wallet, one for each eye, identifying the lens
and lensmaker, in the information is ever needed.
Which, I suppose, is the only way to do it when a country doesn't
actually have a medical system, which might keep centralized records
of such things, but merely a medical industry.
On Thu, 2 Oct 2025 19:18:08 -0400, William Hyde <wthyde1953@gmail.com>
wrote:
Paul S Person wrote:<snippo>
I thought there was evidence that contemporaries of Marcion recognized
the heavily redacted version as such, presumably because the had the
(well, a more) complete version in their library.
That is how I understood it. But it seems that there is no earlier,
longer version of Luke, just a hypothesized one. With some lines of
reasoning supporting it, of course.
IOW, /none/ of his opponents claimed to have a longer, uncut version?
We don't have to have the longer version; there are many, many books
we know existed only because they are referred to/quoted from in books
we do have.
Marcion removed some doubful Pauline epistles from his bible, but he
left Paul largely alone - he was very much a follower of Paul. I don't
see a motive for taking the scissors to Paul's disciple and, as I say,
if he did so he did so skillfully.
<snippo>
Is it still undisputed that Marcion's collection spurred others to
consider just what books should be gathered together as especially
important and reliable -- thus initiating the creation of the New
Testament?
As far as I know, yes. It didn't seem right that the easiest way for
orthodox Christians to read Paul or Luke was via a heretical bible.
I thought the motivation was more to preserve those books/letters
circulating about that satisfied their criteria as opposed to all the
others.
Which is why the New Testament has more than Luke and Paul in it.
But, yes, having /only/ a heretical collection available would have
been undesirable.
On Wed, 1 Oct 2025 18:16:26 -0400, William Hyde <wthyde1953@gmail.com>
wrote:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Synoptic_Gospels#Theories
Maricon valued Luke as the only (to him) valid gospel, and included it,
along with most of the letters attributed to Paul, in his new testament
- the first ever created. Though one of the above theories places
Marcion first. How that could work I don't understand. I don't see
Marcion writing an early version of Luke and attributing it to Paul's
companion.
In fairness Marcion was considered by many an early heretic so might
not be considered a great source.
(Most of those considered heretics were about 90% 'orthodox' in their theologies except on their main point of difference - some of the
early heresies were minor, some quite extreme)
Paul S Person wrote:You do realize that none of this is fact, only opinion, right?
On Thu, 2 Oct 2025 19:18:08 -0400, William Hyde <wthyde1953@gmail.com>
wrote:
Paul S Person wrote:<snippo>
I thought there was evidence that contemporaries of Marcion recognized >>>> the heavily redacted version as such, presumably because the had the
(well, a more) complete version in their library.
That is how I understood it. But it seems that there is no earlier,
longer version of Luke, just a hypothesized one. With some lines of
reasoning supporting it, of course.
IOW, /none/ of his opponents claimed to have a longer, uncut version?
Perhaps they did, but I've heard no evidence of this.
I don't think it would have been an important point. There was no
standard Luke, and there were possibly versions which differ more from >today's even than Marcion's. Quite probably few of Marcion's critics
would even have seen a copy of his Luke. How many would there have been
in Marcion's lifetime? How many available to outsiders?
Marcion's theology was so far from acceptable to people like TertullianYes, /I, Claudius/ is very persuasive on this theory, isn't it.
that criticizing his version of Luke would be like criticizing Hitler
for the Beer Hall Putsch. Sure, that is done from time to time, but it
gets lost in his other crimes.
(Tetrtullian, of course, was also accused of heresy by the end of his
life though it doesn't seem to have resulted in excommunication).
We don't have to have the longer version; there are many, many books
we know existed only because they are referred to/quoted from in books
we do have.
Yes. Even authors of secular literature, prolific writers, are
sometimes only known through quotes, sometimes quotes of their enemies.
I hope I live long enough to see some real discoveries from Pompeii and >Herculaneum. Claudius had only recently been emperor. It is not too
much to hope that somebody had a copy of his history of the Etruscans in >their collection. Just the sort of thing to add a bit of culture to a
noveau riche type, of which Pompeii had many. The book might also have a >guide to the language.
Sir Thomas More published a line by line "refutation" of Luther, thereby >incorporating all of Luther's writing, which was banned in England atI found a link that addrsses this, but the website is not secured, so
the time. He was most pleased by the high sales numbers, unaware that
the buyers were Protestants, who read Luther and ignored More. I
suspect Marcionites came to read the orthodox bible in the same way.
Church politics has zero to do with truth, as two thousand years haveProject much?
fully demonstrated. I would never regard someone as more reliable
simply because he was orthodox.
Marcion was the first person to gather together the works of Paul, and
the first person to make a new testament. What the "orthodox" were doing
at the time I do not know. Attacking one another and fabricating
scripture in furtherance of those disputes, I would guess.
Marcion was at the extreme end. But his religion survived in the Roman >Empire, despite persecution both from the pagan empire (Marcionites tooAnd perhaps even longer: <https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Catharism>
were crucified) and the Christian, into the sixth century. And it seems
to have survived outside the empire until the tenth. Not bad for a
religion where the worshipers cannot give birth to new members.
On Thu, 02 Oct 2025 09:21:03 -0700, Paul S Person ><psperson@old.netcom.invalid> wrote:In my case, both intra-ocular lenses produced astigmatism, so going
Which lenses did you get ?
Can't remember - would have to go back to my paperwork.
Wasn't free though it WAS done at the local general hospital.
I have two cards in my wallet, one for each eye, identifying the lens
and lensmaker, in the information is ever needed.
Which, I suppose, is the only way to do it when a country doesn't
actually have a medical system, which might keep centralized records
of such things, but merely a medical industry.
Hmmm. I had my one month check up earlier this week and while the doc
says I'm making good progress he doesn't feel I'm stabilized enough to
give me a new prescription - though he did say at the two week
check-up that I was unlikely to get to full 20-20 (even though I'm
typing this right now without glasses and mostly wear the glasses when
I know I will be driving)
My father had that kind of surgery some 20-25 years ago and wasn't
happy with the results but no question I'm already much happier than
he was which doesn't surprise me given the evolution of surgical
techniques. For me the big win is dramatically reducing the risks of >cataracts and only secondarily improvement in vision.
Yes, /I, Claudius/ is very persuasive on this theory, isn't it.
You do realize that it is a work of /fiction/. The second volume
includes translations of three (IIRC) accounts by contempories with
how the god Claudius was received by the other gods. Those, despite
being ancient and contemporaneous with events, are also fiction.
On Fri, 3 Oct 2025 18:19:47 -0400, William Hyde <wthyde1953@gmail.com>
wrote:
Paul S Person wrote:
On Thu, 2 Oct 2025 19:18:08 -0400, William Hyde <wthyde1953@gmail.com>
wrote:
I hope I live long enough to see some real discoveries from Pompeii and
Herculaneum. Claudius had only recently been emperor. It is not too
much to hope that somebody had a copy of his history of the Etruscans in
their collection. Just the sort of thing to add a bit of culture to a
noveau riche type, of which Pompeii had many. The book might also have a
guide to the language.
Yes, /I, Claudius/ is very persuasive on this theory, isn't it.
Sir Thomas More published a line by line "refutation" of Luther, thereby
incorporating all of Luther's writing, which was banned in England at
the time. He was most pleased by the high sales numbers, unaware that
the buyers were Protestants, who read Luther and ignored More. I
suspect Marcionites came to read the orthodox bible in the same way.
I found a link that addrsses this, but the website is not secured, so
I instead give <https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thomas_More> as probably including similar information.
The attack was on /sola scriptura/. As always (Luther applies this to
Erasmus in /On the Bondage of the Will/), this is based on how various
Bible verses are to be interpreted. In this case, whether or not there
was a "secret traditiion" that was not written down but passed down by
word of mouth only. IOW, an opponent of /sola scriptura/ used Bible
verses to argue against it.
The point was, of course, that the "secret tradition" is the /Roman/ tradition, and so whatever the Pope says trumps the Bible. Every time.
The account mentions Henry VIII's animosity. I don't know if this was
a factor at the time, but at one point Luther refused to sanction
Henry's "discard the current wife and marry someone else" policy.
in the long run, England ended up with the Church of England (which
imbibed rather a lot of Calvinism, depending on whether a member was
"high church" or "low church") rather than a Lutheran church.
Paul S Person <psperson@old.netcom.invalid> schrieb:
Yes, /I, Claudius/ is very persuasive on this theory, isn't it.
You do realize that it is a work of /fiction/. The second volume
includes translations of three (IIRC) accounts by contempories with
how the god Claudius was received by the other gods. Those, despite
being ancient and contemporaneous with events, are also fiction.
Is the Apocolocyntosis included? That is really funny.
On Fri, 3 Oct 2025 18:52:31 -0400, William Hyde <wthyde1953@gmail.com>
Marcion was at the extreme end. But his religion survived in the Roman
Empire, despite persecution both from the pagan empire (Marcionites too
were crucified) and the Christian, into the sixth century. And it seems
to have survived outside the empire until the tenth. Not bad for a
religion where the worshipers cannot give birth to new members.
And perhaps even longer: <https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Catharism>
suggests that the Cathari, who apparently made it to the 14th century,
were influenced by Marcionism and Paulinism.
The Donatists, OTOH, were mostly in North Africa and the Muslims took
them out when they overran North Africa and then Spain.
Spanish teacher,
that we pronounce "s" and "th" because that's what Castilians did,
read us (so we could write it down and gain experience writing
Spanish) a series of essays on Spanish History, in which the failure
of Western Christendom to defeat the Muslims in Spain (Charles Martel
stopped them in France) was because the Spanish were Visigoths -- and
the Visigoths were Arians, and so not to be helped.
The Christians doing the Reconquista were not Arians. Not any more,
anyway.
Paul S Person wrote:The theory that Claudius wrote a detailed and unexpurgated history of
On Fri, 3 Oct 2025 18:19:47 -0400, William Hyde <wthyde1953@gmail.com>
wrote:
Paul S Person wrote:
On Thu, 2 Oct 2025 19:18:08 -0400, William Hyde <wthyde1953@gmail.com> >>>> wrote:
I hope I live long enough to see some real discoveries from Pompeii and
Herculaneum. Claudius had only recently been emperor. It is not too
much to hope that somebody had a copy of his history of the Etruscans in >>> their collection. Just the sort of thing to add a bit of culture to a
noveau riche type, of which Pompeii had many. The book might also have a >>> guide to the language.
Yes, /I, Claudius/ is very persuasive on this theory, isn't it.
What theory?
You may be confusing this with another thread. This has nothing to doClaudius is a historian in the novel, and you are hoping his
with the novel.
Claudius did, in fact, write histories. None have survived but they are >referenced in surviving books and inscriptions. I am sure that while heSo you are hoping for more ... mundane ... works than what Graves
was emperor, sycophants would have fallen over themselves to get plenty
of copies made, even if Claudius himself did not order it.
Among his works were an Etruscan history and an Etruscan dictionary.
There may be charred copies still buried, and if so new techniques may
allow us to read them. Even half a page of the dictionary could be a >breakthrough.
Sir Thomas More published a line by line "refutation" of Luther, thereby >>> incorporating all of Luther's writing, which was banned in England at
the time. He was most pleased by the high sales numbers, unaware that
the buyers were Protestants, who read Luther and ignored More. I
suspect Marcionites came to read the orthodox bible in the same way.
I found a link that addrsses this, but the website is not secured, so
I instead give <https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thomas_More> as probably
including similar information.
The issue is discussed in full in Richard Marius' biography of More.
Thanks for confirming my point.The attack was on /sola scriptura/. As always (Luther applies this to
Erasmus in /On the Bondage of the Will/), this is based on how various
Bible verses are to be interpreted. In this case, whether or not there
was a "secret traditiion" that was not written down but passed down by
word of mouth only. IOW, an opponent of /sola scriptura/ used Bible
verses to argue against it.
The point was, of course, that the "secret tradition" is the /Roman/
tradition, and so whatever the Pope says trumps the Bible. Every time.
While More was a staunch defender of Erasmus, he is also on record as
saying that if every copy of the bible in every language was lost, >Christianity would carry on very well, just by carrying on the past >practices of the church.
The account mentions Henry VIII's animosity. I don't know if this was
a factor at the time, but at one point Luther refused to sanction
Henry's "discard the current wife and marry someone else" policy.
In 1522, when Henry was still married to Catherine, Luther published a >response to Henry (and Wolsey')s defense of Catholicism called "Against >Henry, King of the English". In this he called Henry a "Wretched >scribbler", and "Pig, dolt and liar", which pretty much burned thatAs has been noted elsewhere (Spinoza?), this was the style in these
bridge. Whatever he said about the marriages wouldn't change much.
More was even more scabrous in his writings on Luther. Usnet did notNo, it did not.
invent flame wars.
So,--
in the long run, England ended up with the Church of England (which
imbibed rather a lot of Calvinism, depending on whether a member was
"high church" or "low church") rather than a Lutheran church.
High vs Low church is more a matter of ritual. Extreme high Church
services are hard for the layman to distinguish from Catholicism, and >various high church types have indeed converted (Cardinals Newman and >Manning, for example). Low church services are more austere, sometimes >converting to Methodism, and the word "priest" is never used to describe
the local vicar.
The University of Toronto has two Anglican colleges. Trinity (dark
stone, decorated, and high church) and Wycliffe (red stone, plain and
low church). They face each other across the street.
Henry didn't care much whether England was Catholic or Protestant, as
long as he got what he wanted. Popes had granted at least two divorces
to French kings, on weaker grounds than Henry had. He wasn't going to
put up with that kind of disrespect, but he kept the openly Catholic
Gardner as bishop of London as a way of keeping a foot in both camps
(and an allied future Archbishop of Canterbury, if the pope came to his >senses).
But if protestant, he certainly was going to make it his protestant
church. Why concede to Luther or Calvin any fraction of the power he
had taken from the pope?
In any event Henry had native protestants to work with, followers of >Wycliffe, without which he could have done little. This population
might read and approve Calvin or Luther, but didn't necessarily want to
join the these Johnny come lately faiths. They had their own
traditions, their own heroes, their own martyrs.
Paul S Person wrote:Didn't invading castles and cathedrals, slaughtering the
On Fri, 3 Oct 2025 18:52:31 -0400, William Hyde <wthyde1953@gmail.com>
Marcion was at the extreme end. But his religion survived in the Roman
Empire, despite persecution both from the pagan empire (Marcionites too
were crucified) and the Christian, into the sixth century. And it seems >>> to have survived outside the empire until the tenth. Not bad for a
religion where the worshipers cannot give birth to new members.
And perhaps even longer: <https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Catharism>
suggests that the Cathari, who apparently made it to the 14th century,
were influenced by Marcionism and Paulinism.
Dualist ideas keep coming up, as is quite natural. Whether the Bogomils
or the Cathars had ever heard of Marcion I do not know. Quite possibly.
I like the Cathars. To be a Perfect you must not eat meat, commit
violence, or have sex. But if you fail in this, no problem, you can try >again in the next life. You only have to succeed once. Thus Cathars, >unlike Marcionites, could have children.
And you can drink wine.
Quite civilized. No wonder they were exterminated.
Donatists believed that the validity of a ministerial act depended onThe Donatists, OTOH, were mostly in North Africa and the Muslims took
them out when they overran North Africa and then Spain.
Donatists were quite orthodox theologically. Augustine's war on them >weakened Byzantine North Africa, as the Donatists sided with the more >tolerant Vandals. After which they faded away. Possibly from lack of >someone to fight.
There was a group in Italy with much the same beliefs, though I cannot >recall the name. One of their members became bishop of Rome and I am
told is regarded (by someone, anyway) as an anti-pope.
My 8th-grade
Spanish teacher,
Envy! We had twenty minutes of French per day, taught in the most >progressive and worst way possible. Didn't really start learningIt was a description.
French until grade nine.
who claimed to be a Castilian from Spain and insisted
that we pronounce "s" and "th" because that's what Castilians did,
read us (so we could write it down and gain experience writing
Spanish) a series of essays on Spanish History, in which the failure
of Western Christendom to defeat the Muslims in Spain (Charles Martel
stopped them in France) was because the Spanish were Visigoths -- and
the Visigoths were Arians, and so not to be helped.
The Christians doing the Reconquista were not Arians. Not any more,
anyway.
Indeed. Toledo became Catholic more than a century before the Muslim >invasion.
To talk about "Western Christendom" as if it was a thing, rather than a >description, is to mistake the 700s for the 1000s. Most of the European >"powers" were weak states that had problems enough within their own
borders, and their nearest neighbors. England is still in the
heptarchy, was Wessex going to send an armada to Spain?
It was decades before northern France even helped southern France, much759 is, indeed, 26 years after 732. So "2.6 decades" is correct.
of which remained under Muslim control until 759. Charles Martel gets
far too much credit for stopping the Muslim invasion.
On Sat, 4 Oct 2025 18:21:37 -0400, William Hyde <wthyde1953@gmail.com>[...]
wrote:
who claimed to be a Castilian from Spain and insisted
that we pronounce "s" and "th" because that's what Castilians did,
read us (so we could write it down and gain experience writing
Spanish) a series of essays on Spanish History, in which the failure
of Western Christendom to defeat the Muslims in Spain (Charles Martel
stopped them in France) was because the Spanish were Visigoths -- and
the Visigoths were Arians, and so not to be helped.
The Christians doing the Reconquista were not Arians. Not any more,
anyway.
Indeed. Toledo became Catholic more than a century before the Muslim >>invasion.
On Sat, 4 Oct 2025 18:21:37 -0400, William Hyde <wthyde1953@gmail.com>
wrote:
I like the Cathars. To be a Perfect you must not eat meat, commit
violence, or have sex. But if you fail in this, no problem, you can try
again in the next life. You only have to succeed once. Thus Cathars,
unlike Marcionites, could have children.
And you can drink wine.
Quite civilized. No wonder they were exterminated.
Didn't invading castles and cathedrals, slaughtering the
nobility/bishops and carrying off the loot have an impact
Or was that some other group?
Donatists believed that the validity of a ministerial act depended on
the personal morality of the officiant.
IOW, if a bishop who ran away during the persecutions under Julian the Apostate baptized or confirmed you, those acts were invalid because
those bishops abandoned their flocks.
The other orthodox rejected this, claiming that personal morality had
no effect on the validity of the act.
It was decades before northern France even helped southern France, much
of which remained under Muslim control until 759. Charles Martel gets
far too much credit for stopping the Muslim invasion.
759 is, indeed, 26 years after 732. So "2.6 decades" is correct.
But in the 8th Century, that was pretty fast work, given all the other
stuff that needed to be done. It took Napoleon how many years to
consolidate Europe to the point that he felt ready to invade Russia?
and that was in the 19th century, not the 8th.
And who else would get /any/ credit?
who surrendered or ran away, abandoning their people.
Paul S Person wrote:I read an article in a military history magazine yesterday on the
On Sat, 4 Oct 2025 18:21:37 -0400, William Hyde <wthyde1953@gmail.com>
wrote:
I like the Cathars. To be a Perfect you must not eat meat, commit
violence, or have sex. But if you fail in this, no problem, you can try >>> again in the next life. You only have to succeed once. Thus Cathars,
unlike Marcionites, could have children.
And you can drink wine.
Quite civilized. No wonder they were exterminated.
Didn't invading castles and cathedrals, slaughtering the
nobility/bishops and carrying off the loot have an impact
Or was that some other group?
That sounds like the Catholics, except that the Cathars had no bishops
or cathedrals.
While the pope's motivation was to wipe out the Cathars, the actual >crusaders were after land. The local nobility was quite tolerant of the >Cathars, remiss in their "duty" to persecute them, and thus had to be >replaced by better Catholics. From the north of France.Count Raymond VI of Tolouse was Cathar until he joined the crusade to
The wars were thus fought mainly between Catholics, with non-Perfect
Cathars participating, especially in the defense of their strongholds.
The Donatists Augustine was dealing with were very clear: thoseDonatists believed that the validity of a ministerial act depended on
the personal morality of the officiant.
IOW, if a bishop who ran away during the persecutions under Julian the
Apostate baptized or confirmed you, those acts were invalid because
those bishops abandoned their flocks.
It dates back to the persecution of Decius in 251, the first empire-wide >persecution and somewhat different from others. Everyone in the empire >other than the Jews had to make a sacrifice to a pagan god. The
sacrificial material (a pinch of dried meat or incense, IIRC) was
provided. Those who made the sacrifice were good for another year.
The condemned were those priests and bishops who gave in and sacrificed. >Donatists considered that this act cost them their status within the
church (though not irrevocably, at least to some, if they repented), and >thus any priest consecrated by such a bishop was not really a priest,
and so on down the generations.
I think that a bishop who hid from persecution would not lose his status
in their eyes. It's hard to imagine that many Donatist bishops would
have survived Decius if they neither caved nor hid (one could also
purchase a forged certificate claiming that one had sacrificed, but this
was also a sin).
A nice summary of the details. But what does it really change? MartelThe other orthodox rejected this, claiming that personal morality had
no effect on the validity of the act.
Far too many had caved in for the Donatist view to win out. Believers
who had themselves made homage to a pagan god probably wanted to forget
the whole episode. Power wins over purity.
It was decades before northern France even helped southern France, much
of which remained under Muslim control until 759. Charles Martel gets
far too much credit for stopping the Muslim invasion.
759 is, indeed, 26 years after 732. So "2.6 decades" is correct.
The first invasion of Southern France by Muslims was in 711. It was
halted for a time by Duke Odo of Aquitaine, who won a decisive victory
at the battle of Toulouse in 721. With no help from Charles.
It was, on the contrary, Charles Martel who sacked Aquitaine, twice,
about 731. Odo had allied himself with a Muslim Berber who was himself
at odds with the Umayyad expansionists, and this was the pretext Charles >used. Probably said he was antifa, too.
Despite this rather nasty behavior on Charles' part, Odo joined him at
the battle of Tours, Odo's forces flanking the Muslims and attacking
from the rear. Odo soon retired to a monastery and I'm sure Charles had >nothing to do with it.
Contrary to high school history books, the threat was far from over
after the battle of Tours. The Umayyad forces continued to expand in >Southern France, not least because the locals feared them less than they >feared the Northern French. Martel had to ally with the Lombards to
kick them out, convincing the Lombards by the argument that if Provence >fell, they'd be next.
So yes, Charles played a major role, though he spent as much timeKeep in mind that this is a (Iberian) Spanish history of Spain. Taught
attacking the French as the Muslims. Odo also played a role, arguably
as large a one, as did Liutprand of the Lombards (who gets no credit, >doubtless for not being French).
What Charles wanted was control of southern France. His behaviour
strongly implies that whether he took it from Muslims, his fellow
French, or Goths, was of little interest to him. But he was practical >enough not to bite off more than he could chew, and left the final work
to his son, who conquered the Muslim state of Narbonne.
He also kept good relations with the Lombards. Never know when you
might need them again.
A couple of years 10 centuries later.But in the 8th Century, that was pretty fast work, given all the other
stuff that needed to be done. It took Napoleon how many years to
consolidate Europe to the point that he felt ready to invade Russia?
A couple of years at most. But I don't see the validity of this comparison.
Perhaps they did, but I've heard no evidence of this.
I don't think it would have been an important point. There was no
standard Luke, and there were possibly versions which differ more from >today's even than Marcion's. Quite probably few of Marcion's critics
would even have seen a copy of his Luke. How many would there have been
in Marcion's lifetime? How many available to outsiders?
Marcion's theology was so far from acceptable to people like Tertullian
that criticizing his version of Luke would be like criticizing Hitler
for the Beer Hall Putsch. Sure, that is done from time to time, but it
gets lost in his other crimes.
The account mentions Henry VIII's animosity. I don't know if this was
a factor at the time, but at one point Luther refused to sanction
Henry's "discard the current wife and marry someone else" policy. So,
in the long run, England ended up with the Church of England (which
imbibed rather a lot of Calvinism, depending on whether a member was
"high church" or "low church") rather than a Lutheran church.
In my case, both intra-ocular lenses produced astigmatism, so going
without glasses was never an option.
Not that I would have, having worn them since at least the 6th grade.=20
In 1522, when Henry was still married to Catherine, Luther published a >response to Henry (and Wolsey')s defense of Catholicism called "Against >Henry, King of the English". In this he called Henry a "Wretched >scribbler", and "Pig, dolt and liar", which pretty much burned that
bridge. Whatever he said about the marriages wouldn't change much.
More was even more scabrous in his writings on Luther. Usnet did not
invent flame wars.
And you can drink wine.
On Sat, 04 Oct 2025 09:24:08 -0700, Paul S Person ><psperson@old.netcom.invalid> wrote:
In my case, both intra-ocular lenses produced astigmatism, so goingIn my case it was October of my grade 1 year when my teacher called my
without glasses was never an option.
Not that I would have, having worn them since at least the 6th grade.=20
mother and advised her to get my eyes checked.
Fortunate for me since I was a tall 6 year old (and in most grade 1
classes that means "seated at the back of the classroom") who was VERY
good at verbal questions but having a tough time with the blackboard
even those a strong reader (I started reading just before my 5th
birthday) With glasses I had no problems and did well in school
thereafter.
And you can drink wine.
So what was the typical alcohol %age of wine in those days? It clearly
wasn't zero (as some have argued) since St Paul says "do not be drunk
with wine..." but I'm sure it wasn't 11-15% as is typical today.
On 2025-10-06, The Horny Goat <lcraver@home.ca> wrote:
And you can drink wine.
So what was the typical alcohol %age of wine in those days? It clearly
wasn't zero (as some have argued) since St Paul says "do not be drunk
with wine..." but I'm sure it wasn't 11-15% as is typical today.
Where does your certainty come from?
Natural fermentation results in usually dry wines with high alcohol
content, i.e., fermentation only stops once all the sugar has been
used up or the alcohol content has become toxic to the yeast.
However, mixing wine with water for consumption was also common for
this reason--and still is in Italy, or at least was some 35 years
ago, if I remember correctly from my student exchange.
There is currently some interest in "natural wines" made in the pre-Pasteur manner and they are different and extremely variable quality. I don't know how an 18th century wine is different from a first century wine but I would like to find out.
And just what IS Falernian wine?
--scott
Falernian was a strong white wine popular in the classical Roman period, produced from Aglianico grapes on > the slopes of Mount Falernus near the border of Latium and Campania. Wikipedia
-a-a-a-aMr.Dorsey don't you ever do web searches?
On Sat, 4 Oct 2025 17:32:34 -0400, William Hyde <wthyde1953@gmail.com>Luther said a lot of things, many of them well-known in some circles,
wrote:
In 1522, when Henry was still married to Catherine, Luther published a >>response to Henry (and Wolsey')s defense of Catholicism called "Against >>Henry, King of the English". In this he called Henry a "Wretched >>scribbler", and "Pig, dolt and liar", which pretty much burned that >>bridge. Whatever he said about the marriages wouldn't change much.
Didn't Luther say something to the effect that for Kings at least
polygamy was better than divorce?
--More was even more scabrous in his writings on Luther. Usnet did not >>invent flame wars.
Neither did Luther and More (and many others - I've read what Zwingli
though of Luther...)
On Sat, 04 Oct 2025 08:55:21 -0700, Paul S Person ><psperson@old.netcom.invalid> wrote:But ... would you know it if you heard it from, say, the pulpit?
The account mentions Henry VIII's animosity. I don't know if this was
a factor at the time, but at one point Luther refused to sanction
Henry's "discard the current wife and marry someone else" policy. So,
in the long run, England ended up with the Church of England (which
imbibed rather a lot of Calvinism, depending on whether a member was
"high church" or "low church") rather than a Lutheran church.
Was that in Tudor times or later under the Stuarts? I ask because
obviously the English had a lot more contact with the Scots after 1603
and pre-1603 there were of course more Calvinists in Scotland than
England.
While I am a former Anglican I never heard any discussion of Calvinism
in our congregation (though after our Anglican diocese went heavily
woke many left with some moving to Presbyterian congregations) though
after being forced to resign by our bishop our priest eventually ended
up leading a congregation in Switzerland (where his wife was from)
where presumably he's in line with their theology.
On Fri, 3 Oct 2025 18:19:47 -0400, William Hyde <wthyde1953@gmail.com>The RSV ends Mark at 16:8. It's footnotes have what I suppose is the
wrote:
Perhaps they did, but I've heard no evidence of this.
I don't think it would have been an important point. There was no >>standard Luke, and there were possibly versions which differ more from >>today's even than Marcion's. Quite probably few of Marcion's critics >>would even have seen a copy of his Luke. How many would there have been >>in Marcion's lifetime? How many available to outsiders?
Marcion's theology was so far from acceptable to people like Tertullian >>that criticizing his version of Luke would be like criticizing Hitler
for the Beer Hall Putsch. Sure, that is done from time to time, but it >>gets lost in his other crimes.
Mike Wingerl's video (which I referred to in my previous posting but >mistakenly said it was Sean McDowell's) said that there were 15-20+
early Greek manuscripts most editors were working from and that
they're inconsistent on things like the "long ending" of Mark (Mark
16:9-20) where some manuscripts include this section and others don't
and that there's no consistent pattern between age of the manuscript
and whether it appears in a particular manuscript.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WJilpQsl4vc
Given Hitler's later activities I doubt too many people bother toWell, maybe. The general memory I have of what I have read on this is
include the Beer Hall Putsch in it though several people DO emphasize
his killing of Ernst Roehm (early leader of the SA) in his list of
crimes presumably because it gives clear evidence of Hitler's view of
gays.
On Sat, 4 Oct 2025 18:21:37 -0400, William Hyde <wthyde1953@gmail.com>Whatever the fermentation process produced, as others have noted.
wrote:
And you can drink wine.
So what was the typical alcohol %age of wine in those days? It clearly
wasn't zero (as some have argued) since St Paul says "do not be drunk
with wine..." but I'm sure it wasn't 11-15% as is typical today.
In article <5j28ek9rqntltlibteell2llkmfdg5o89h@4ax.com>,My problem developed later, but when I found it necessary to stand
The Horny Goat <lcraver@home.ca> wrote:
On Sat, 04 Oct 2025 09:24:08 -0700, Paul S Person >><psperson@old.netcom.invalid> wrote:
In my case, both intra-ocular lenses produced astigmatism, so going >>>without glasses was never an option.In my case it was October of my grade 1 year when my teacher called my >>mother and advised her to get my eyes checked.
Not that I would have, having worn them since at least the 6th grade.=20
Fortunate for me since I was a tall 6 year old (and in most grade 1
classes that means "seated at the back of the classroom") who was VERY
good at verbal questions but having a tough time with the blackboard
even those a strong reader (I started reading just before my 5th
birthday) With glasses I had no problems and did well in school
thereafter.
In grade one and two, the luck of the seating draw by surname
put me at the back of a middle row. Until I got my glasses towards
the end of grade two, I had no idea there was stuff on the blackboard.
On Sat, 4 Oct 2025 17:32:34 -0400, William Hyde <wthyde1953@gmail.com>
wrote:
In 1522, when Henry was still married to Catherine, Luther published a
response to Henry (and Wolsey')s defense of Catholicism called "Against
Henry, King of the English". In this he called Henry a "Wretched
scribbler", and "Pig, dolt and liar", which pretty much burned that
bridge. Whatever he said about the marriages wouldn't change much.
Didn't Luther say something to the effect that for Kings at least
polygamy was better than divorce?
More was even more scabrous in his writings on Luther. Usnet did not
invent flame wars.
Neither did Luther and More (and many others - I've read what Zwingli
though of Luther...)
On Sun, 5 Oct 2025 17:49:43 -0400, William Hyde <wthyde1953@gmail.com>
wrote:
I read an article in a military history magazine yesterday on the
Albigensian Crusade. It may be helpful to cite a few items:
1. At this period, at least, sacking castles etc is either a slander
or something that no longer occurred, as there is no mention of this
in the article, as there surely would be when the reasons for the
crusade are discussed.
2. The first to style himself King of France (as opposed to King of
the Franks) was Phillip II in 1180. Charles Martel could not and did
not add anything to France, because France did not exist in his day.
3. "By the 1170s, the sect [Cathar] had self-organized into dioceses
with their own bishops and deacons who acted as parish priests."
Cathedrals are not mentioned. Another discussion suggests that
wherever the bishop was was also a cathedral.
4. The local nobles were vassals of King of Aragon.
5. The local nobles defended their /land/, and so their people.
Actually, one of them, in return for his excommunication being
cancelled, joined the 1209 crusade and attacked his cousin to save his
own lands. For a while.
The wars were thus fought mainly between Catholics, with non-Perfect
Cathars participating, especially in the defense of their strongholds.
Count Raymond VI of Tolouse was Cathar
protect his lands by diverting it to Trenceval. He eventually deserted
the Crusade, resumed his Cathar beliefs, and ... well, it's a typical
story of the time.
It was decades before northern France even helped southern France, much >>>> of which remained under Muslim control until 759. Charles Martel gets >>>> far too much credit for stopping the Muslim invasion.
759 is, indeed, 26 years after 732. So "2.6 decades" is correct.
The first invasion of Southern France by Muslims was in 711. It was
halted for a time by Duke Odo of Aquitaine, who won a decisive victory
at the battle of Toulouse in 721. With no help from Charles.
It was, on the contrary, Charles Martel who sacked Aquitaine, twice,
about 731. Odo had allied himself with a Muslim Berber who was himself
at odds with the Umayyad expansionists, and this was the pretext Charles
used. Probably said he was antifa, too.
Despite this rather nasty behavior on Charles' part, Odo joined him at
the battle of Tours, Odo's forces flanking the Muslims and attacking
from the rear. Odo soon retired to a monastery and I'm sure Charles had
nothing to do with it.
Contrary to high school history books, the threat was far from over
after the battle of Tours. The Umayyad forces continued to expand in
Southern France, not least because the locals feared them less than they
feared the Northern French. Martel had to ally with the Lombards to
kick them out, convincing the Lombards by the argument that if Provence
fell, they'd be next.
A nice summary of the details. But what does it really change? Martel
was in command.
So yes, Charles played a major role, though he spent as much time
attacking the French as the Muslims. Odo also played a role, arguably
as large a one, as did Liutprand of the Lombards (who gets no credit,
doubtless for not being French).
What Charles wanted was control of southern France. His behaviour
strongly implies that whether he took it from Muslims, his fellow
French, or Goths, was of little interest to him. But he was practical
enough not to bite off more than he could chew, and left the final work
to his son, who conquered the Muslim state of Narbonne.
He also kept good relations with the Lombards. Never know when you
might need them again.
Keep in mind that this is a (Iberian) Spanish history of Spain. Taught
by a Castilian Spanish speaker. It may have been a bit ... biased.
It was almost certainly something for younger students in Spain than ourselves. But that's not uncommon in learning a language: books
written for younger people are closer to the learning student's
abilities.
But in the 8th Century, that was pretty fast work, given all the other
stuff that needed to be done. It took Napoleon how many years to
consolidate Europe to the point that he felt ready to invade Russia?
A couple of years at most. But I don't see the validity of this comparison.
A couple of years 10 centuries later.
With some progress in both weaponry and in organizational ability.
Napoleon probably went into winter quarters in the Fall. But he didn't
do it so his troops could go back home and harvest the crops. Martel
(and the later crusaders discussed above) did.
As with the school year in farming regions of the USA in the last
century, so also in the long history of warfare the need to get the
food harvested took precedence and limited the time available.
Napoleon also had a unified country at his back. Martel had a feudal
system, which is less reliable.
Christian Weisgerber <naddy@mips.inka.de> wrote:
On 2025-10-06, The Horny Goat <lcraver@home.ca> wrote:
And you can drink wine.
And just what IS Falernian wine?
On 10/6/25 16:13, Scott Dorsey wrote:
There is currently some interest in "natural wines" made in the
pre-Pasteur
manner and they are different and extremely variable quality.-a I don't
know
how an 18th century wine is different from a first century wine but I
would
like to find out.
And just what IS Falernian wine?
--scott
-a-a-a-aMr.Dorsey don't you ever do web searches?
Falernian was a strong white wine popular in the classical Roman
period, produced from Aglianico grapes on > the slopes of Mount
Falernus near the border of Latium and Campania. Wikipedia
-a-a-a-aAnd it is still available in Italy today as Falerno I read
in a note adjacent to my search.
In article <5j28ek9rqntltlibteell2llkmfdg5o89h@4ax.com>,
The Horny Goat <lcraver@home.ca> wrote:
On Sat, 04 Oct 2025 09:24:08 -0700, Paul S Person
<psperson@old.netcom.invalid> wrote:
In my case, both intra-ocular lenses produced astigmatism, so goingIn my case it was October of my grade 1 year when my teacher called my
without glasses was never an option.
Not that I would have, having worn them since at least the 6th grade.=20 >>>
mother and advised her to get my eyes checked.
Fortunate for me since I was a tall 6 year old (and in most grade 1
classes that means "seated at the back of the classroom") who was VERY
good at verbal questions but having a tough time with the blackboard
even those a strong reader (I started reading just before my 5th
birthday) With glasses I had no problems and did well in school
thereafter.
In grade one and two, the luck of the seating draw by surname
put me at the back of a middle row. Until I got my glasses towards
the end of grade two, I had no idea there was stuff on the blackboard.
On Mon, 06 Oct 2025 11:18:36 -0700, The Horny Goat <lcraver@home.ca>
wrote:
On Fri, 3 Oct 2025 18:19:47 -0400, William Hyde <wthyde1953@gmail.com> >>wrote:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WJilpQsl4vc
The RSV ends Mark at 16:8. It's footnotes have what I suppose is the
"long ending" as 16:9--19. It also gives a shorter addition to 16:8.
This is old news to readers of the RSV, at least.
And, no, it doesn't justify some cockamamy theory that Mark was--- Synchronet 3.21a-Linux NewsLink 1.2
written in the 3rd century AD!
Given Hitler's later activities I doubt too many people bother to
include the Beer Hall Putsch in it though several people DO emphasize
his killing of Ernst Roehm (early leader of the SA) in his list of
crimes presumably because it gives clear evidence of Hitler's view of
gays.
Well, maybe. The general memory I have of what I have read on this is
that Hitler was concerned about Roehm's ambitions and the number of
troops he had available to pursue them with.
Hegseth might want to watch himself carefully. /He/ has a large number
of troops available as well.
I've been watching /I, Claudius/ a disk a week for the last few weeks
(I expect tol finish up this week), and it had Tiberius removing
Sejanus for much the same reason.
It has occurred to me that the only reason the Roman Empire was not a >totalitarian state is that they simply did not have the technology
required to create one. But they certainly gave it the old college
try!
My problem developed later, but when I found it necessary to stand
three feet from the blackboard and memorize it on my way out after
class ended I realized I had a problem.
The Horny Goat wrote:
On Sat, 4 Oct 2025 17:32:34 -0400, William Hyde <wthyde1953@gmail.com>
wrote:
In 1522, when Henry was still married to Catherine, Luther published a
response to Henry (and Wolsey')s defense of Catholicism called "Against
Henry, King of the English". In this he called Henry a "Wretched
scribbler", and "Pig, dolt and liar", which pretty much burned that
bridge. Whatever he said about the marriages wouldn't change much.
Didn't Luther say something to the effect that for Kings at least
polygamy was better than divorce?
I at first thought this could not possibly be true, but you are correct.
Apparently Luther granted permission for a German prince to make a >polygamous marriage. He believed that given the polygamous marriages in
the old testament, such could not be utterly forbidden.
Marcion could have set him straight (As AJP Taylor said, goak here).
As to divorce, I get the impression that he was even more reluctant to
allow it than the Catholic Church.
Alas for Henry, even with Luther's, even with the Pope's support,
neither Catheron nor Anne would have accepted a co-wife.
Pistols at dawn would have been the least of it.
More was even more scabrous in his writings on Luther. Usnet did not
invent flame wars.
Neither did Luther and More (and many others - I've read what Zwingli
though of Luther...)
That was a polite debate compared to More on Luther.
James Nicoll wrote:
In article <5j28ek9rqntltlibteell2llkmfdg5o89h@4ax.com>,
The Horny Goat-a <lcraver@home.ca> wrote:
On Sat, 04 Oct 2025 09:24:08 -0700, Paul S Person
<psperson@old.netcom.invalid> wrote:
In my case, both intra-ocular lenses produced astigmatism, so goingIn my case it was October of my grade 1 year when my teacher called my
without glasses was never an option.
Not that I would have, having worn them since at least the 6th
grade.=20
mother and advised her to get my eyes checked.
Fortunate for me since I was a tall 6 year old (and in most grade 1
classes that means "seated at the back of the classroom") who was VERY
good at verbal questions but having a tough time with the blackboard
even those a strong reader (I started reading just before my 5th
birthday) With glasses I had no problems and did well in school
thereafter.
In grade one and two, the luck of the seating draw by surname
put me at the back of a middle row. Until I got my glasses towards
the end of grade two, I had no idea there was stuff on the blackboard.
I was lucky, and got glasses in grade one.-a I could see that there was something on the blackboard.-a Perhaps I mentioned that what was on the board didn't look anything like what was in my book.
The past is a strange place indeed.
William Hyde
On Tue, 07 Oct 2025 08:43:59 -0700, Paul S Person <psperson@old.netcom.invalid> wrote:
My problem developed later, but when I found it necessary to stand
three feet from the blackboard and memorize it on my way out after
class ended I realized I had a problem.
Again I consider myself VERY fortunate to have had my grade 1 teacher
phone my mother on this subject within 3-6 weeks of my beginning grade
1.
I have described this scenario to several university students training
to become elementary teachers and only about half asked if the
solution was eyesight related. It's been a long time since I was in
first grade and was sorry to hear that grade school teacher's training
didn't routinely teach that to student teachers.
My life would have been completely different had my eyesight issues
not be "caught" as early as they were.
On 10/7/25 16:19, William Hyde wrote:
James Nicoll wrote:-a-a-a-aIt certain was strange but had some very nice inhabitants.-a It also had people like Adolph Hitler, Father Coughlin, Henry Ford, Joseph Stalin Daryl Gates, Fred Trump and their various crews. Nice folks like FDR and Eleanor, Harry Truman, Dwight David Eisenhower, Earl Warren and
In article <5j28ek9rqntltlibteell2llkmfdg5o89h@4ax.com>,
The Horny Goat-a <lcraver@home.ca> wrote:
On Sat, 04 Oct 2025 09:24:08 -0700, Paul S Person
<psperson@old.netcom.invalid> wrote:
In my case, both intra-ocular lenses produced astigmatism, so goingIn my case it was October of my grade 1 year when my teacher called my >>>> mother and advised her to get my eyes checked.
without glasses was never an option.
Not that I would have, having worn them since at least the 6th
grade.=20
Fortunate for me since I was a tall 6 year old (and in most grade 1
classes that means "seated at the back of the classroom") who was VERY >>>> good at verbal questions but having a tough time with the blackboard
even those a strong reader (I started reading just before my 5th
birthday) With glasses I had no problems and did well in school
thereafter.
In grade one and two, the luck of the seating draw by surname
put me at the back of a middle row. Until I got my glasses towards
the end of grade two, I had no idea there was stuff on the blackboard.
I was lucky, and got glasses in grade one.-a I could see that there was
something on the blackboard.-a Perhaps I mentioned that what was on the
board didn't look anything like what was in my book.
The past is a strange place indeed.
William Hyde
-aPat Brown, the younger more idealistic Jerry Brown, and a host of other
-aincluding JFK, Martin Luther KIng, and more I never heard of.
-aAllan Ginsberg, Hemingway, Jack Kerouac, Robert Heinlein, Ray Bradbury,
-aCordwainer Smith, to name but a few. Oh and much younger me. James
Branch Cabell had completed his long series about Manuel before I was.
Eggar Rice Burroughs with his fantasies from Africa to Mars was pretty
well out of the picture.-a Tom Swift was not yet jUnior and flew his
Electric Airplane and other fantastic toys.
-a-a-a-aBatman has been freshly invented to take the place of Sherlock Holmes as Master Dectective as well as acroBatic crime fighter.
Kal-El was so young he could not fly nor did he yet know his
given name but was happy to work as a reporter, with a crush
on Lois Lane. for the mighty newspaper "The Daily Planet'.
During WW II they would be joined by Bullet Man and his companion
a woman, Wonder Woman herself, Hawkman and his girl friend.
Captain America and the Star-Spangled Kid, The Human Torch
who was an Android, Daredevil who was not blind then and
several troups of children all fighting the NAZI and their spies
in our sacred USA and overseas. At the same time in the
real newspapers, we had Mutt & Jeff, Terry and the Pirates,
Flash Gordon, Prince Valiant, the Katzenjammer Kids copied
as the Captain and the Kids, Our Boarding House and others.
Bring Up Father aka Maggie and Jiggs.-a Oh life was rich if
you could afford a daily paper and we could. We also read
the Saturday Evening Post, Life Magazine, Colliers' and
a few others. I think it was Colliers that printer long
articles on the forth-coming space exploration with
illustrations of orbital space station inspired by Werner
von Braun ideas.
-a-a-a-aWe had Amazing Stories, Astounding which became Analog,
Worlds of If, Galaxy and the Magazine of Fantasy and Science Fiction,
still floating around were Startling Stories, Planet Stories and more.
-a-a-a-aIt did not have White Christian Nationalism but Isolationism
and its supporters who worked on a plot to overthrow FDR. The old
John Birch Society which insisted that some Democrat had surrendered
China to the Communist Party whereas we never held any title to any
of China.
-a-a-a-aThere was no movement to change the laws regarding same sex relationships nor the idea that allowing them the same rights as other Americans would destroy society or harm other peoples sexual
relationships.-a Transgender would not arrise until teh 1960s when
a book was published called the "Transsexual Phenomena" by an endocrinologist,Harry Benjamin, then it was only a scale of gerder
from normal? thru transgender to the most extreme transsexual.
before that the term "Sex Change" was used to designate the more
public members of the gender dsyphoria crowd.
-a-a-a-aWe had the fission bomb and the fusion bomb and lived
in fear of Communist invasion.-a Movies were made about that
unpleasant possibility.
-a-a-a-aYes the past was strange and the future, if humanity persists
in its many follies, will be stranger still.-a I hope humanity itself persists somehow.
-a-a-a-abliss
The Horny Goat wrote:That wouldn't have been the Prince-Elector in whose principality he
On Sat, 4 Oct 2025 17:32:34 -0400, William Hyde <wthyde1953@gmail.com>
wrote:
In 1522, when Henry was still married to Catherine, Luther published a
response to Henry (and Wolsey')s defense of Catholicism called "Against
Henry, King of the English". In this he called Henry a "Wretched
scribbler", and "Pig, dolt and liar", which pretty much burned that
bridge. Whatever he said about the marriages wouldn't change much.
Didn't Luther say something to the effect that for Kings at least
polygamy was better than divorce?
I at first thought this could not possibly be true, but you are correct.
Apparently Luther granted permission for a German prince to make a >polygamous marriage. He believed that given the polygamous marriages in
the old testament, such could not be utterly forbidden.
Marcion could have set him straight (As AJP Taylor said, goak here).If we are still talking Henry VIII, I believe Henry was citing a
As to divorce, I get the impression that he was even more reluctant to
allow it than the Catholic Church.
Alas for Henry, even with Luther's, even with the Pope's support,
neither Catheron nor Anne would have accepted a co-wife.
Pistols at dawn would have been the least of it.
--More was even more scabrous in his writings on Luther. Usnet did not
invent flame wars.
Neither did Luther and More (and many others - I've read what Zwingli
though of Luther...)
That was a polite debate compared to More on Luther.
William Hyde
On Tue, 07 Oct 2025 08:34:54 -0700, Paul S Person ><psperson@old.netcom.invalid> wrote:Which is strange, since the ASV was available from 1901. And the RV
On Mon, 06 Oct 2025 11:18:36 -0700, The Horny Goat <lcraver@home.ca>
wrote:
On Fri, 3 Oct 2025 18:19:47 -0400, William Hyde <wthyde1953@gmail.com> >>>wrote:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WJilpQsl4vc
The RSV ends Mark at 16:8. It's footnotes have what I suppose is the
"long ending" as 16:9--19. It also gives a shorter addition to 16:8.
This is old news to readers of the RSV, at least.
Which is one of the reason I consider the RSV a rather dodgy
translation that being the only major translation of the era (1952)
was adopted by most Protestant denominations that were tired of ye old
1611 King James despite some sections that were sketchy at best.
I personally think the 2001 English Standard Version handled it betterThe footnote has a brief indication of the problem.
by inserting a paragraph explaining the situation then giving the
"long ending".
Again - there were a dozen or two Greek texts in the late 2nd centuryPart of this was a switch in how the original text was to be
through 5th century some including the "long ending" some not with no
clear trend during that period. After that the Latin texts pretty much
were the standard until the wave of Bible translations done in the
early Protestant Reformation era mostly in English and German.
--And, no, it doesn't justify some cockamamy theory that Mark was
written in the 3rd century AD!
Given Hitler's later activities I doubt too many people bother to
include the Beer Hall Putsch in it though several people DO emphasize
his killing of Ernst Roehm (early leader of the SA) in his list of
crimes presumably because it gives clear evidence of Hitler's view of >>>gays.
Well, maybe. The general memory I have of what I have read on this is
that Hitler was concerned about Roehm's ambitions and the number of
troops he had available to pursue them with.
Hegseth might want to watch himself carefully. /He/ has a large number
of troops available as well.
I've been watching /I, Claudius/ a disk a week for the last few weeks
(I expect tol finish up this week), and it had Tiberius removing
Sejanus for much the same reason.
It has occurred to me that the only reason the Roman Empire was not a >>totalitarian state is that they simply did not have the technology
required to create one. But they certainly gave it the old college
try!
Paul S Person wrote:<snippo here and there>
On Sun, 5 Oct 2025 17:49:43 -0400, William Hyde <wthyde1953@gmail.com>
wrote:
I read an article in a military history magazine yesterday on the
Albigensian Crusade. It may be helpful to cite a few items:
And his responsibility, as their liege lord, to assist/protect them.2. The first to style himself King of France (as opposed to King of
the Franks) was Phillip II in 1180. Charles Martel could not and did
not add anything to France, because France did not exist in his day.
Here is a good map that illustrates this:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Charles_Martel#/media/File:Francia_714.png
Martel of course, claimed the whole as the successor of Clovis and that
all these territories were in fact part of his kingdom (even if he
wasn't technically the king).
Charles may not have been adding these territories to France, but he was >adding them to his personal possessions, and passed on most of what is
now France to his son (who divided it among his sons, but one died early
and the other was Charlemagne).
4. The local nobles were vassals of King of Aragon.
It's complex. Raymond VI, for example was in various territories a
vassal of the King of France, Henry II of England, the ruler of Aragon
and the Holy Roman Empire. He was descended from a recent king of
France, related to the King of Aragon, and married a daughter of Henry II.
And yes, as you mentioned (and I erroneously snipped) at one point the
king of Aragon fought to restore his vassal and relative Raymond's lands
and titles. He obviously took his authority in Languedoc seriously.
He was excommunicated for being a Cathar. Per the article, anyway.The wars were thus fought mainly between Catholics, with non-Perfect
Cathars participating, especially in the defense of their strongholds.
Count Raymond VI of Tolouse was Cathar
I don't believe he was. He was sympathetic, and did not persecute, but
he kept to the Catholic faith.
It was difficult to rule and be a Cathar. Too much violence required.Not in a Cathar territory.
until he joined the crusade to
protect his lands by diverting it to Trenceval. He eventually deserted
the Crusade, resumed his Cathar beliefs, and ... well, it's a typical
story of the time.
In fact he died in the company of an Abbot, and was cared for by the
Knights of St John. He was never buried, however, and a recent attempt
at lifting his excommunication failed (according to wikipedia - none of
my other sources mention this so ...).
Think of it as an Iberian Spanish 5th-grade textbook being used withKeep in mind that this is a (Iberian) Spanish history of Spain. Taught
by a Castilian Spanish speaker. It may have been a bit ... biased.
It was almost certainly something for younger students in Spain than
ourselves. But that's not uncommon in learning a language: books
written for younger people are closer to the learning student's
abilities.
Batman has been freshly invented to take the place of Sherlock
Holmes as Master Dectective as well as acroBatic crime fighter.
Kal-El was so young he could not fly nor did he yet know his
given name but was happy to work as a reporter, with a crush
on Lois Lane. for the mighty newspaper "The Daily Planet'.
During WW II they would be joined by Bullet Man and his companion
a woman, Wonder Woman herself, Hawkman and his girl friend.
Captain America and the Star-Spangled Kid, The Human Torch
who was an Android, Daredevil who was not blind then and
several troups of children all fighting the NAZI and their spies
in our sacred USA and overseas. At the same time in the
If we are still talking Henry VIII, I believe Henry was citing aHenry certainly wouldn't have minded though while he was undoubtedly a
statement in the Bible and Luther felt he was doing so incorrectly.
Alas for Henry, even with Luther's, even with the Pope's support,=20 >>neither Catheron nor Anne would have accepted a co-wife.
On Tue, 07 Oct 2025 21:27:13 -0700, The Horny Goat <lcraver@home.ca>
wrote:
On Tue, 07 Oct 2025 08:34:54 -0700, Paul S Person >><psperson@old.netcom.invalid> wrote:
The RSV ends Mark at 16:8. It's footnotes have what I suppose is the >>>"long ending" as 16:9--19. It also gives a shorter addition to 16:8.
This is old news to readers of the RSV, at least.
Which is one of the reason I consider the RSV a rather dodgy
translation that being the only major translation of the era (1952)
was adopted by most Protestant denominations that were tired of ye old
1611 King James despite some sections that were sketchy at best.
Which is strange, since the ASV was available from 1901. And the RV
was even earlier.
The RSV was very controversial in some quarters, with little booklets
(and perhaps not so little books) published showing all the Evil
Changes to the KJV.
I personally think the 2001 English Standard Version handled it better
by inserting a paragraph explaining the situation then giving the
"long ending".
The footnote has a brief indication of the problem.
At least a footnote is not likely to be confused with the actual text.
Part of this was a switch in how the original text was to be
determined: Erasmus used "majority rule", but that was replaced by
"oldest is best" supplemented by "hardest to understand is best" (the
theory here being that the less hard to understand versions were
someone's attempt to figure out what the original was actually
saying). This affected the Greek text used, which affected the meaning
of the Greek, which was reflected in the English.
Interestingly, support for this ("textual criticism") is much more
widespread than the "higher criticism". Possibly because it is pretty
clear how manuscripts differ, relative age can be determined up to a
point, and the criteria make sense.
Well, maybe. The general memory I have of what I have read on this is >>>that Hitler was concerned about Roehm's ambitions and the number of >>>troops he had available to pursue them with.
Hegseth might want to watch himself carefully. /He/ has a large number
of troops available as well.
I've been watching /I, Claudius/ a disk a week for the last few weeks
(I expect tol finish up this week), and it had Tiberius removing
Sejanus for much the same reason.
It has occurred to me that the only reason the Roman Empire was not a >>>totalitarian state is that they simply did not have the technology >>>required to create one. But they certainly gave it the old college
try!
On Tue, 7 Oct 2025 17:30:36 -0400, William Hyde <wthyde1953@gmail.com>
wrote:
The Horny Goat wrote:
On Sat, 4 Oct 2025 17:32:34 -0400, William Hyde <wthyde1953@gmail.com>
wrote:
In 1522, when Henry was still married to Catherine, Luther published a >>>> response to Henry (and Wolsey')s defense of Catholicism called "Against >>>> Henry, King of the English". In this he called Henry a "Wretched
scribbler", and "Pig, dolt and liar", which pretty much burned that
bridge. Whatever he said about the marriages wouldn't change much.
Didn't Luther say something to the effect that for Kings at least
polygamy was better than divorce?
I at first thought this could not possibly be true, but you are correct.
Apparently Luther granted permission for a German prince to make a
polygamous marriage. He believed that given the polygamous marriages in
the old testament, such could not be utterly forbidden.
That wouldn't have been the Prince-Elector in whose principality he
lived, would it?
As to divorce, I get the impression that he was even more reluctant to
allow it than the Catholic Church.
If we are still talking Henry VIII, I believe Henry was citing a
statement in the Bible and Luther felt he was doing so incorrectly.
On Wed, 08 Oct 2025 08:59:26 -0700, Paul S Person <psperson@old.netcom.invalid> wrote:
If we are still talking Henry VIII, I believe Henry was citing aHenry certainly wouldn't have minded
statement in the Bible and Luther felt he was doing so incorrectly.
Alas for Henry, even with Luther's, even with the Pope's support,=20
neither Catheron nor Anne would have accepted a co-wife.
On Tue, 7 Oct 2025 18:32:15 -0400, William Hyde <wthyde1953@gmail.com>
wrote:
Paul S Person wrote:
And yes, as you mentioned (and I erroneously snipped) at one point the
king of Aragon fought to restore his vassal and relative Raymond's lands
and titles. He obviously took his authority in Languedoc seriously.
And his responsibility, as their liege lord, to assist/protect them.
Feudal obligations were /mutual/, not just one-way.
He did this because the man the Pope put in charge was behaving very
badly, and he did it under threat of excommunication.
Count Raymond VI of Tolouse was Cathar
I don't believe he was. He was sympathetic, and did not persecute, but
he kept to the Catholic faith.
He was excommunicated for being a Cathar. Per the article, anyway.
It was difficult to rule and be a Cathar. Too much violence required.
Not in a Cathar territory.
On Wed, 08 Oct 2025 09:11:27 -0700, Paul S Person ><psperson@old.netcom.invalid> wrote:Which is a great pity.
On Tue, 07 Oct 2025 21:27:13 -0700, The Horny Goat <lcraver@home.ca>
wrote:
On Tue, 07 Oct 2025 08:34:54 -0700, Paul S Person >>><psperson@old.netcom.invalid> wrote:
The RSV ends Mark at 16:8. It's footnotes have what I suppose is the >>>>"long ending" as 16:9--19. It also gives a shorter addition to 16:8. >>>>This is old news to readers of the RSV, at least.
Which is one of the reason I consider the RSV a rather dodgy
translation that being the only major translation of the era (1952)
was adopted by most Protestant denominations that were tired of ye old >>>1611 King James despite some sections that were sketchy at best.
Which is strange, since the ASV was available from 1901. And the RV
was even earlier.
Yup - at one point in his life my father was a seminarian who wanted
to be a US Navy chaplain (unfortunately for him he graduated right at
the end of the Korean war when their ranks were very full with almost
no new ones till the Vietnam era by which time he was working
elsewhere) and he kept his textbooks so I had access to a pretty good
library on this stuff in my teens. So yes I know both the
abbreviations and dates you cite.
The RSV was very controversial in some quarters, with little booklets
(and perhaps not so little books) published showing all the Evil
Changes to the KJV.
No question most evangelicals hated the RSV - but most weren't eager
to go on using the KJV forever.
I personally think the 2001 English Standard Version handled it better
by inserting a paragraph explaining the situation then giving the
"long ending".
The footnote has a brief indication of the problem.
At least a footnote is not likely to be confused with the actual text.
I'd rank the ESV as the best translation since the 1950s.
Part of this was a switch in how the original text was to be
determined: Erasmus used "majority rule", but that was replaced by
"oldest is best" supplemented by "hardest to understand is best" (the >>theory here being that the less hard to understand versions were
someone's attempt to figure out what the original was actually
saying). This affected the Greek text used, which affected the meaning
of the Greek, which was reflected in the English.
One of the things our generation has lost is an interest in Greek and
Latin - and being Canadian the main language taught in the western
portion of the country (where I grew up) was French so while I can
mostly read it I can't follow French language TV or speak it.
Well, good for him.Interestingly, support for this ("textual criticism") is much more >>widespread than the "higher criticism". Possibly because it is pretty
clear how manuscripts differ, relative age can be determined up to a
point, and the criteria make sense.
All of which were emphasized in the McDowell video I cited earlier.
Well, after 68AD, anyway. Augustus was the first Emperor ("Caesar").Well, maybe. The general memory I have of what I have read on this is >>>>that Hitler was concerned about Roehm's ambitions and the number of >>>>troops he had available to pursue them with.
On top of that of course Hitler wanted a German population of 200
millioni + and thus wasn't keen on encouraging those of Roehm's sexual >persuasion.
Hegseth might want to watch himself carefully. /He/ has a large number >>>>of troops available as well.
I've been watching /I, Claudius/ a disk a week for the last few weeks >>>>(I expect tol finish up this week), and it had Tiberius removing >>>>Sejanus for much the same reason.
I never really followed I Claudius but know the history of Tiberius
and Sejanus - in the Roman world a victorious general (the best way to
be a popular general) was a potential threat and there were plenty of
Caesars who were removed from 44BC onwards.
The same way it is always done: after being publicly displeased withIt has occurred to me that the only reason the Roman Empire was not a >>>>totalitarian state is that they simply did not have the technology >>>>required to create one. But they certainly gave it the old college
try!
Heh heh - good way of putting it though obviously given the technology
of that age how did a Caesar embrace the ambition of a victorious
general without endangering himself? Even Julius himself marched on
Rome.
Paul S Person wrote:It's easier to loot a town if you kill everybody than it is if you
On Tue, 7 Oct 2025 18:32:15 -0400, William Hyde <wthyde1953@gmail.com>
wrote:
Paul S Person wrote:
And yes, as you mentioned (and I erroneously snipped) at one point the
king of Aragon fought to restore his vassal and relative Raymond's lands >>> and titles. He obviously took his authority in Languedoc seriously.
And his responsibility, as their liege lord, to assist/protect them.
Feudal obligations were /mutual/, not just one-way.
He did this because the man the Pope put in charge was behaving very
badly, and he did it under threat of excommunication.
De Monfort, Earl of Leicester, was quite ruthless, and his personal
faith inclined to the Dominicans and their desire to extirpate "heresy".
But he was also very keen on grabbing land, though his son lost most of
the gains.
His second son, also Earl of Leicester, tried to become the effective
ruler of England, and to some degree the nature of Parliament is due to
his maneuverings. A better politician than his father, but not as good a >general.
Count Raymond VI of Tolouse was Cathar
I don't believe he was. He was sympathetic, and did not persecute, but
he kept to the Catholic faith.
He was excommunicated for being a Cathar. Per the article, anyway.
I'm sure that was the accusation, and when accusation equals conviction >everyone is guilty. But there is plenty of evidence that he kept to the >Catholic faith, however sympathetic he was to their beliefs, and
reluctant to persecute the peaceful, productive, tax-paying and highly >respected Cathars in his domain.
He did travel in company with a Cathar perfect, doubtless "evidence"
used against him, but he also had his Catholic priests. I used to drink
and talk theology with a professor at the Pontifical Institute for
Medieval studies, but that didn't make me a Catholic.
It was difficult to rule and be a Cathar. Too much violence required.
Not in a Cathar territory.
While crusader propaganda claimed a Cathar majority, the Cathars were a >definite minority. However respected their behavior made them, most
people were not prepared to believe in two gods, to think about giving
up meat and sex, and so on.
After the sack of Beziers, the murderers naturally claimed that the vast >majority of those killed were Cathars, and even exaggerated the death
toll to 20,000, but while Beziers had a strong Cathar community, it was >unlikely to have been even half the population, probably much less.
It was always to the benefit of the crusaders to exaggerate the number
of Cathars killed, if only because this implied that they had killed
fewer Catholics.
On Tue, 7 Oct 2025 22:04:42 -0700, Bobbie Sellers ><bliss-sf4ever@dslextreme.com> wrote:When I was in BCT in Ft Ord, the story was that draftees from LA were
Batman has been freshly invented to take the place of Sherlock
Holmes as Master Dectective as well as acroBatic crime fighter.
Kal-El was so young he could not fly nor did he yet know his
given name but was happy to work as a reporter, with a crush
on Lois Lane. for the mighty newspaper "The Daily Planet'.
During WW II they would be joined by Bullet Man and his companion
a woman, Wonder Woman herself, Hawkman and his girl friend.
Captain America and the Star-Spangled Kid, The Human Torch
who was an Android, Daredevil who was not blind then and
several troups of children all fighting the NAZI and their spies
in our sacred USA and overseas. At the same time in the
I'm skeptical of your claim that Superboy didn't understand his powers
till near adulthood since DC Comics debuted Superboy in 1945 (20
second Google search) but generally agree. Of course you're flipping
back and forth between DC and Marvel (as you likely know) and no
question the few 1941-45 reprints I've seen are all very much into
"beating the Nazis" as a front and center theme - I remember the one
were Superman got drafted and in his physical he read the "published
by" line on the eye chart which was 6 pt type at a range of 30'. (At
first they thought he had erred but then checked with a magnifying
class - the things you remember 40 years later!)
On Wed, 08 Oct 2025 10:22:14 -0700, The Horny Goat <lcraver@home.ca>
wrote:
On Tue, 7 Oct 2025 22:04:42 -0700, Bobbie Sellers
<bliss-sf4ever@dslextreme.com> wrote:
Batman has been freshly invented to take the place of Sherlock
Holmes as Master Dectective as well as acroBatic crime fighter.
Kal-El was so young he could not fly nor did he yet know his
given name but was happy to work as a reporter, with a crush
on Lois Lane. for the mighty newspaper "The Daily Planet'.
During WW II they would be joined by Bullet Man and his companion
a woman, Wonder Woman herself, Hawkman and his girl friend.
Captain America and the Star-Spangled Kid, The Human Torch
who was an Android, Daredevil who was not blind then and
several troups of children all fighting the NAZI and their spies
in our sacred USA and overseas. At the same time in the
I'm skeptical of your claim that Superboy didn't understand his powers
till near adulthood since DC Comics debuted Superboy in 1945 (20
second Google search) but generally agree. Of course you're flipping
back and forth between DC and Marvel (as you likely know) and no
question the few 1941-45 reprints I've seen are all very much into
"beating the Nazis" as a front and center theme - I remember the one
were Superman got drafted and in his physical he read the "published
by" line on the eye chart which was 6 pt type at a range of 30'. (At
first they thought he had erred but then checked with a magnifying
class - the things you remember 40 years later!)
When I was in BCT in Ft Ord, the story was that draftees from LA were
mostly washing out. Apparently, the LA eye test consisted of the
question "do you see that wall?" and nothing else.
"Look up in the sky, is it a bird? Is it a plane?" "No it is Superman, strange
visitor from another planet."
