Δευτέρα 27 Μαρτίου 2017

Prison, desert island or gulag, what does the President of Greek Christian Clerics propose?

It is an article from a Christian Orthodox newspaper. Most of the article is just low level garbage, but the conclusion is frightening. The priest writes as a conclusion that since the madmen and the morons of the world are left unaccountable to think, talk and to express themselves, the sapients will suffer, if there will be no drastic measures taken for the protection of the entire society.
The morons of the world are all those, who don't believe in monotheism, so all polytheists, atheists and pantheists and their subdivisions and special cases. The sapients are those who believe the apocalyptic nature of the Bible, the Councils, the Fathers of the Church and all the priests in general. This person says that people shouldn't be allowed to think. So even if one talks or expresses himself by any other means, art probably, if everything was according to his wishes, the guilty of expressing himself would be also guilty of thinking. They never change. They cannot deal with thinking people. By their next chance, they will do exactly the same things as in the past.


 Source



Κυριακή 26 Μαρτίου 2017

Boycott the bloody islands!

Half of Greece population lives in Athens, but most of them are still registered in their hometowns. When there is election time people travel where they are registered and combine elections and holidays. So villages and islands have more representatives in the House of Commons then they should. The members of the House of Commons do not try to help their constituency develop the means for growth, but try to find a place in the public service for the voters, or get some fundings for their voters they do not deserve, or collect ones intended for investment without investing them as they should.
Typical example is that of the fishermen of the islands. They are not allowed to fish at certain areas as they are nature reserves and therefore they are recompensed either by the Greek State or the European Union. It is said that some take the money, but still keep fishing and kill the animals that eat fish. Then they bribe the local authorities with fish and consume and sell the rest. 
However when the State wants to install windmills to gain wind power, than the islanders become ardent environmentalists. They only want to take from 'Athens' and not contribute anything. 


Τρίτη 21 Μαρτίου 2017

"Yes, but there are good priests as well!"

"Yes, but there are good priests as well!". This what people say every time head priests have cursed everybody who doesn't care about their teachings and made everybody wonder, what kind of people they are.
After again the mortal remains of a Greek celebrity had to be brought to Bulgaria in order to be cremated, there was again a debate about crematoriums in Greece.
In 2006 a law was passed permitting cremation in Greece, however it is impossible to find a place to do this. Although 73 per cent are in favour of cremation and only 18 percent against it, politicians are too cowards to build a crematory. The parliament let the mayors find suitable places and they are afraid to find any, because they have been warned that they will not be reelcted. The precedent with Salonica, where a mayor has been voted twice since the local Archbishops had threatened him openly that he would never become a mayor, won't come to their minds.
There is an Archbishop of Attica, a county that has many Archbishops and the head of them, Nikolaos of Mesogaia and Lavreοtiki, who is considered the most reasonable and cultivated person of the higher clergy. The paragon of Christian clerical virtue. And that very Archbishop says that it's not up to every person to decide, what will happen to his body after his death. He says that they as a society, the Eastern Orthodox Church and its followers, they shouldn't accept cremation. They do not want to allow cremation even to atheists or people of other religions. He didn't say, as many Eastern Orthodox Christians keep repeating, that there will be no ceremony of Eastern Orthodox rite. He said that because the prevailing religion and denomination is Eastern Orthodox Christianity, all other people have to bow to the wishes of the Church. 
Many say it is not prohibited by the Bible, but even if it were, the Archbishop and the Christians must realise, that 228 years have passed since the French Revolution. Of course they will not realise it by themselves, but that is what the State is for. There are people who do not believe that the Bible is valid. However the Eastern Orthodox Church claims to be at the same time prevailing and persecuted.

Source 1

Τρίτη 7 Μαρτίου 2017

54% greeks think orthodoxy is essential

There was a survey from Pew Research Center, about how important is a Christian denomination to a country's ethnic identity. Only Greeks had a majority of 54% for claiming that a certain denomination is important for their ethnicity.
Well so think the 65% who are older than 50 years old, as at their time everyday life was strictly controlled by the State and 49% of people with an age between 35 and 49 years old. Greece and Cyprus were the only Eastern Orthodox Christian countries which weren't communistic, so the Greek State propaganda created the impression that only Greeks are Orthodox Christians and the other became all atheists.
Of course there are other parts in Greek History misinterpreted by the Greek State so 39% people between 18 and 34 think that to be a Greek one has to be a greek Orthodox Christian.
The greek newspaper that made an article from the survey asked two people whose jobs depend on their faith.
The professor of Theology, says that Greeks are religious without going to Church very often. They pray rather privately than publicly. How does he know what they do, do they inform him? They have, says the professor, a personal, secret faith, gained through experience and probably practice but he uses the wrong word and says twice the same thing; and this faith is far from the dogma, clergy or the Bible. Greeks were always mystical and not religious, even in the time of ancient Greece, because they had the Mysteries instead of the Olympian twelve gods, the daemon of Socrates and the"offering of Areopagus" dedicated to the unknown God. He adds that, Paul calls Athens a city full of idols. As quoted here "Mysteries thus supplement rather than compete with civil religion. An individual could easily observe the rites of the state religion, be an initiate in one or several mysteries, and at the same time adhere to a certain philosophical school." The daimonion of Socrates is self-explanatory, otherwise it would be the Hellenic daimonion. As to the offering, Christians through 'Paul' talk about an altar, which no one ever saw. A short explaining is stated here. So why this whole misinformation? The Greek Institutions controlled by the State, which is controlled by the Church, brainwash people, that they belong to the Eastern Orthodox Church, because it is on their records, because it is a tradition, meaning that the ancestors at the time of the Byzantine and Ottoman empire didn't have any other choise, or because they think they owe something to this denomination.
Than he goes on saying that the relationship of Greeks with 'Orthodoxy', meaning the denomination, is ambiguous, double and of two forms. Actually one cannot call them Greek Orthodox, if they don't follow that particular dogma and do not believe the priests or the Bible.
Then he taks about the three Philadelphias. There was one in Turkey, now called 'Alaşehir', the one in Greece is called New Philadelphia and its inhabitants are people who until 1922, lived in the town now called Alaşehir, and the one in USA, probably the one in Pennsylvania, although there are others as well. They all are supposed to be connected by Orthodoxy as they are baptised, married and buried with the same rites. Neither do the Turks, nor the majority of Philadelpheia. Than he takes advantage of the behaviour of the Communists. The Communists have a faith similar to Christianity, so there is sympathy between them, however not the majority is communistic.
Then comes the general secretary of religions, the one who served under the coalition of center-right and center-left and the coalition or right-left; a man of the Church. He actually talks about Romanity and not Hellenism, as he knows that the majority of Greeks do not know the difference. The Romioi, the Christians of the Eastern Church, had a different identity than the Catholics of the Muslims, but many Greeks speaking the greek language were Catholics or Muslims as well. However Christians did not feel they belonged to any ethnicity until the time of the French Revolution. So although the Greek War of Independence was fought to free the Hellenic nation, it ended up forming a country called Hellas, but a Greek Christian Orthodox one, as Russia wanted and England and France let it happen.
Another lie is that there would be no modern Greek language, if there was no Church. The Church uses the common language of the Greeks at the time when Jesus is supposed to have lived. Modern Greek survived in forms of dialects. Than he wants to be nice and speaks about non Christians that spilled their blood for the Christian land Greece for some reason; well as part of the government he cannot exclude Greek citizens of Jewish or Islamic faith.

Few strong links to national identity
Source in Greek



Πέμπτη 2 Μαρτίου 2017

THE NEOPLATONIC SCHOOL OF HELLENOPOLIS (CARRHAE, HARRAN)

 Source
THE NEOPLATONIC SCHOOL OF HELLENOPOLIS (CARRHAE, HARRAN), by Jean Efpraxiadis (February 2017)

It is now largely agreed that there was a high quality school of Greek philosophy in Harran (Grk. Ελληνόπολις, Κάρραι) as a result of that city being the final destination of at least one among the seven neoplatonic philosophers exiled by Justinian in 529, namely Simplicius. These refugee philosophers had first spent a few years with Sassanid king Khosrow whom they affectionately called "Plato's philosopher king". Pursuant to terms of a peace treaty negotiated between Justinian and Khosrow, the Greek philosophers were allowed to return to the Roman Empire.

The view that they might have returned back to Athens now appears implausible. It is now believed that they settled in Harran, a city on the Byzantine side of the border with the Sassanid Empire, where they could easily escape and find refuge again, if it became necessary. Harran had remained a Pagan city: Hellenism was practiced side-by-side with the indigenous Mesopotamian religion and there were also some Manichaeists/Zoroastrians. It was an ideal place to found a school of Platonism. In a way, it was a school of all Greek philosophy and science, since they were the last remaining curators of all ancient knowledge, the most erudite people then alive.

The school must have outlasted the lives of its founders as well as the Islamic conquest one century later. Harran had become a rather unique place indeed. Its population was not religiously persecuted. According to Abu Yusuf Absha al-Qadi, Caliph al-Ma'mun of Baghdad in 830 CE questioned some Harranians about what protected religion they belonged to. As they were neither Muslim, Christian, Jewish or Magian, the caliph told them they were non-believers. He said they would have to become Muslims, or adherents of one of the other religions recognized by the Qur'an by the time he returned from his campaign against the Byzantines or he would kill them. The Harranians consulted with a lawyer, who suggested that they find their answer in the Qur'an II.59, which said that Sabians were tolerated. It was unknown what the sacred text intended by "Sabian" and so they took the name.

Two of the most illustrious mathematicians and astronomers of the Arab world were Sabians from Harran. Thabit ibn Qurra and al-Battani were born in Harran in 826 CE and c.858 CE respectively. Thabit had such an extensive knowledge of Neoplatonism and Greek science that can only be explained if he had grown up in it. He was so proficient in Greek as to be able to revise the translations of Hunayn ibn Ishaq, known as the "Sheik of all translators". Arab historians such as Al-Mas'udi knew more about Simplicius' biography and career than the Byzantines. Al-Nadim and al-Qifti list Simplicius as a famous mathematician, a fact that the Byzantines seemed to not know or to not remember about him. Al-Qifti actually mentions Simplicius as the author of a commentary on Euclid's Elements. This lost work of Simplicius was not known to the Byzantines. Extensive fragments of it survive in an Arabic translation used by Persian mathematician Al-Nayrizi to write his own commentary on the Elements at around 900 CE. This is a case where the Arabs had access to Greek mathematical works that the Byzantines didn't even know existed.

The Byzantines did not know of Simplicius' commentary on the Elements of Euclid but a very few of them had studied the Elements themselves, in particular Leo the Mathematician, also known as Leo the Philosopher or Leo the Hellene and his anonymous and enigmatic teacher in the island of Andros.

In a battle between the Byzantines and the Arabs a student of Leo was taken prisoner. Arab scholars were impressed with his knowledge of mathematics and astronomy but he explained that his teacher, Leo the Mathematician, was a lot brighter than himself. The Caliph was so impressed that he sent a letter to Leo promising him a comfortable life should he move to Baghdad and join his team of learned scholars. Leo refused the offer but he did send them answers to some technical questions in mathematics and astronomy that they had trouble with.

While in the 9th century the centre of Arabic scholarship was moving from Harran to Baghdad and a revolution in philosophy, mathematics, medicine, astronomy etc was in progress with Greek, Persian and even Chinese texts being translated, collected and studied, being a Hellenizing secularist in 9th century Byzantium was a dangerous occupation (even under the cover of being a clergyman). While Leo the Mathematician was allowed to call himself "Leo the Hellene" because of his celebrity status, the powers that be were suspicious of his devotion to ancient learning.

One of his students named Constantine accused him of being a pagan outright in a preserved elegiac poem and despite Leo's necessary apology in equally poetic form to the effect that he was not a worshipper of Zeus, Constantine had probably seen right. A few decades later, a Platonist disciple of Leo the Mathematician named Leo Choirosphaktes got in similar trouble.

Late in his career, he was sent as ambassador to Baghdad in 905 CE, a position which would have given him the opportunity to enter into contact with the Arabic renaissance that was happening there, an opportunity which his teacher had turned down. Upon his return in Constantinople he must have complained that the Arabs were progressing by leaps and bounds due to their study of Greek philosophy and science while the Byzantines were letting their manuscripts collect dust. Arethas of Caesarea, perhaps inspired by the advanced work of the Arabs, finally orders a copy of the Elements be made so as to preserve and understand the subject matter. He also orders copies of plenty of other ancient works including the works of Plato. Interestingly, he condemns Leo Choirosphaktes accusing him of Hellenism, not an unreasonable accusation seeing who his teacher had been and what kind of friends he may have made in Baghdad.

Joining Arethas in accusing Choirosphaktes of being a Hellene was Constantine the Rhodian who came up with fanciful epithets for Choirosphaktes:
"ψευδομυθοσαθροπλασματοπλόκος",
"ελληνοθρησκοχριστοβλασφημοτρόπος" and
"ολεθροβιβλοφαλσογραμματοφθόρος".

Coming from people who were devoted to higher learning and study of ancient knowledge themselves, in my opinion such accusations show one of three things: Either the accusers felt uncomfortable in their own Pagan closets, or they were afraid of being accused themselves of too much devotion to ancient learning (feeling that they could get in trouble, unless they were publicly seen by their peers as hating the "delirium of the Hellenes") or they were just jealous of Leo Choirosphaktes and felt inadequate in comparison to his erudition and virtue as a statesman. Whatever the reason may have been for accusing (or outing) Choirosphaktes, he was exiled for five years before he was pardoned by the next emperor.br>
The difference between attitudes of Arabs and attitudes of the Byzantine establishment towards advanced learning and Platonist scholars in the 9th century was stark. The Byzantines had a few brilliant people hiding in the closet communicating among themselves using dissimulation and read-between-the-lines hints while the Arabs were embracing Greek knowledge as if it were part of their own heritage, which, in a partial but non insignificant sense it was.