Onasander

Do you have any sources for that info? Its been a while since I've read about Mark Anthony not being qualified to be a priest in Caesar's cult (and I recall seeing lists of said priests, four if I recall, Anthony being the first) and Augustus had one or two before they merged the two cults together. Anthony was essentially blocked because the marriage to the first wife (I presume first wife) had the wrong kind of marriage ritual. When he remarried, he did it right and so got to fulfill Caesar's wish as the priest in his cult. I really hope he wasn't in the habit of dispensing spiritual wisdom. I guarantee you any religious manual he used likely had penis' scribbled in the margins, and stick figures LOL'in the hijinks of one another. I however wasn't even aware he married four times, I only knew of two wives and then Cleopatra. Can't say all your facts are wrong, but I can't imagine I got the role of priest wrong, he definitely seems to of been one, no matter how absurd that idea of him occupying a priestly role in seriousness is. It be like making Pauly Shore the US Secretary of State, staring down Iran and Russia and ISIS.... nobody would take him seriously, but that is apparently what Caesar wanted. Lupus.... digging back even farther into my memory, touching memories with lacunas in them, I believe it was Romulas who established the Roman marriage laws. Apparently no one even divorced for 40 or 140 years after he established them, or a ruler very shortly after Romulas. The Greeks could only legally marry one woman at a time, and this was for legal offspring that could inherit, but the wife usually had to have a qualified status too for full civic inheritance (citizenship, voting rights). Celts had marriage, but it was a sexual free for all, all the men in the small house could bang the wife, but the husband legally was father whatever the result.... I saw that in a documentary, not a book. Was a long time ago.... but this isn't too different from the Romans just prior and even after Augustus. We know the upper class women were sluts, to borrow the feminist diction, and loved their orgies. Yet you also have the contrast with The Rape of Lucretia, of the chaste and 'good' husband wife relationship. I wouldn't be too thrilled if my wife killed herself for me or some sense of virtue if she nor I was at fault. Greek men could only have one wife, but the could have female concubines, slaves, household massuses, etc. There was of course some oddities happening in Africa, certain sex cults that could fit your bill. I don't know about Egyptian practices, they SEEM monogamous if their religion is any insight.... marriages seem stable enough.... though the guts liked to cum on one another's head, which can suggest outside hanky panky with the guys could happen outside marriage (if they had nob royal marriage, I really don't know). Jews had stable polygamy. I don't know about mesopotamia at all. I don't know about the Germans. Asia Minor.... dunno. Its allowed in Islam 4 wives. A free for all in India. China could have more than one wife if emperor, but general trend was monogamy. The Stoics and Atristotlians did knock off their religious homosexuality and child rape practices later on. I don't have much evidence Diogenes carried it far, not even certain if he met Crates, sources are mixed, and Crates seemed to of been in a stable relationship, and looked down on certain sexual excesses (such as a female murderer who got off in court because she was so beautiful that her defendant ripped her top off.... the male jury refused to execute her, Crates found this upsetting, it be like Jodi Arias showing her breasts off to get out of her murder charge). I think Coptic Christians do have monogamous relations. The Christians living in the maghrib until the 15th century would of been, as well as the many Jewish tribes there till near modern times. Most Muslims have only one. I don't know about the Etruscans or Spanish tribes. I don't know about Carthage. I don't think I can say it was just Europeans or just Romans. Seems other groups have this claim too, but the data I read over the years haven't filled in all my gaps. All those houses of prostitutes in Pompeii signify a less than monogamous paradise. Heck, Hoover's stintbin the FBI suggests the US at the height of its religious emphasis on monogamy and stable cultural living was prone to affairs, he had dirt on every politician, a lot undoubtedly sexual links and affairs. He was a closet gay and cross dresser, so he knew the power such information could gave when held over others head. Monogamy admittedly isn't in full accord with our desires or impulses, and a overemphasis can backfire, as Augustus found with his own slutty daughter.

http://www.hurriyetdailynews.com/necropolis-unearthed-beneath-istanbuls-pera.aspx?pageID=238&nID=81095&NewsCatID=375

There was an actual law against Lynch Mobs in the Roman Empire?

I've been reading Bishop Nemesius of Apamea, his "On the Nature of Man", and in the beginning of the book he is engaged in a discussion of evolution, from the intelligent design perspective! Our current model of evolution that is generally accepted has some painful gaps in it, as a result of ideology in building science from science (new science can carry prejudices, maleformed ideas, and metaphysical assptions in it without much question.... on the basis of faith alone, so long as the previous generation of self appointed scientist accept it, and no acceptable theory overturned it, or seriously questioned it's authority). He seems to very cleverly get around the current gaps in evolutionary theory, such as Cellular Autonamata series (the patterns of that create chaotic patterns from very simple rules, these patterns can be grouped together in comparative series, some survive, some neutralize themselves) by exploring Greek and Neoplatonist thought and assumptions. Its a very welcomed discovery, as were at the embarrassing point in science that new ideas as to what evolution is, or how it came about in the first place, more or less died off in our age. It was a dynamic force between our grandfather's and great-great grandfathers era, but became dogmatic and hollow very fast with no further insights about the universal aspects of what evolution really is. If I was to approach, say a Mathematician and ask if he could explain all phenomenal change inherent in evolution as a expression of pure mathematics, and not just a few proteins (such as the double helix, which would be but a aspect of a overall much larger explanation), I think the vast majority would tremble. Genetic mutation doesn't for example, explain, mechanical or numerical mutations as the later uses not DNA. Its a mutation, but what is a mutation when the object of study isn't cellular? we've never consistently categorized mathematical formulae to systematically list these aspects and how the interrelate with matter (or any unit of reality). Expect of course, biological systems on earth, a few dispersed systems in cellular autonomata, and rogue theories like Samuel Butler's Terminator like ideas about the rise of artificial intelligences. Hi-Five to the Romans for having a farther glance to the horizons of thought. They certainly outpaced Richard Dawkings here.

http://www.bbc.com/news/uk-england-coventry-warwickshire-32264914 Why you intentionally put a thatched roof boathouse along the lane of fire of a flaming shot from a trebuchet I will never know, unless this was intentional. We burnt down a boat house at FOB ISKAN accidentally in 2007. It was on the eastern side of the Euphrates, a few dozen feet from the base wall that was curving almost to reach the river on the southeast corner of our base. Some idiot thought to build a 25 foot firing line for marksmanship practice just north of it. Weeds had been growing all around the boathouse, and given snipers, nobody weedwacked it.... so when a bullet richocheted and went into the weeds, it caught fire. Our CSM was happy, because it was burning the weeds, but then it also burned out boathouse down too, then the flames started leaping up the wall and nearly caught the two story building our A company, Apache, on fire. His bright ideas often worked out like that. Its kinda ironic that buildings designed to be right up on the water torch so easily.

http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Longinus_(literature) I haven't read this work yet, its interesting as its from Caesar or Augustus' reign, quotes Genesis, and eyes the slippage into the stupid era on the principate. I'm guessing this obviously would fall prior to building the libraries under Augustus in Rome, but experiencing a retardation in actual classical roman political oratory skills for the more showy and polished rhetoric or the Greek philosophical schools. Lupus... early stoics would be opposed to the concept of marriage that we have. There is a book "The Stoic Idea of the City". I strongly recommend reading it, as I doubt I can better phrase his explanations of the debates between the early stoa and the skeptics.... and bit a Christian philosopher in site to upset any prejudiced sensibilities. I also recommend looking over the Arius Dudymys link. It may horrify you to know were merely transitioning between two Roman philosophical systems in the modern era, in what in America is the conservative vs liberal battle. I'm sure it looks purely christian vs enlightened everyone else to you. I am of course stereotyping you unfairly, but I fill the void with the general pagan attitudes I encounter on philosophy boards. The two systems aren't very compatible, and Zeno's System of universal love was modeled off the Spartan state. He was also quite twisted in that all vices in his Vice/Unworthy scheme seem to be based off the psychological disorder ADHD, and he nails the behaviorism down rather well. Christianity inherited his system of Vices and Virtues as our deadly sins (via Chryssipus, and many modifications by church fathers, was originally 8). You probably know as well Jews were polygamists. They had a system of "household management", which is the very topic we are dealing with here, which was what Aristotle dealt with too. He built his system up from bottom to top, from the unity if man and woman making a household. Zeno didn't use a fully alienated system, there are points of compatibilities. But the ultimate systems do not end exactly the same. I know very well from experience. I'm not just a Christian, but also a Cynic, though I've been becoming more and more of a Stoic as time goes by. I've seen how chaotic and twisted mentalities can be in these 'communities if love'. Yeast infections are quite common, as well as drug use and getting bitten by dogs. I can give you travel directions to study it first hand if you wish. One thing I noticed though was how juvenile and fast groups were to erect bias and engadge in hatred. The upper class attraction to epicurian philosophy in Rome is easy to understand, as it happened in closed villas. You could get away with it. However, Augustus (via likely Arius Didymus, who was a expert on both Zeno and Aristotle) seemed rather obsessed with this. Marriage did become the basis of his state. Though Feudalism didn't exist then, he did lay the basic framework for its political cohesion of house built upon house. But his system was still more than it. The idea from that Korean link on Kim Jung In and "Court Economies", its a rather new phrase, but a very old and discernable behavior among monarchies. I could fill a book with parallels between monarchies using variations on that theme (so will from now on use Court Economy as a concept on this forum, unless someone knows a better name.) Augustus had certain advantages over the DPRK, in that it was a actual empire with a robust internal economy. He could make or break "political careers", whatever that was worth. In the case if consuls, not worth diddly squat if viewed from a traditional morale of the dignity and importance of the office, but in terms of showing how loyal and badassed you were, and open to overt political bribery in buying the office and fleecing entire provinces, then yeah, it was worth it. Most of the executive powers of any worth got stripped from the senate, and I wouldn't even say it was piecemeal. It went through the rituals of consigning offices, etc.... but the obvious powers, Caesar and Augustus, were in charge all along. Certain conservative points however, they could successfully protest, such as Marc Anthony becoming a priest to Caesar's cult. He wasn't yet a proper member of the senatorial class due to his marriage ceremony which disqualified him for priestly office. When he remarried, he made certain to qualify. This sorta crap wasn't a roadblock for Augustus as he understood it, and took control of it. Hence, why Christians use the Roman system of Roman marriage. Augustus was quite successful, and Christians generally were Roman, and recognized non-christian marriages of converts. You head to Africa, the One-Man One-Woman rule isn't as solidly enforced, as the Christianity which developed there hadnt the string roman influence. Charlegmange had several wives too. Polygamy lasted a long while, and we couldn't even get the Roman incest rules enforced till the 11-12th century. These were quite pagan ideas originally, and the very cream of roman political philosophy of its highest era. History can be a rather sloppy thing, doesn't always abide to our ideological expectations of it.

Also compare this analysis of Kim Jung Un's "Court Economy" to this Dynasty, especially Augustus' rule: http://www.nkeconwatch.com/2010/04/28/more-on-kim-jong-ils-court-economy/

Augustus didn't just create a pattern of hierarchial support like the Medici did via favors, he actively cultivated the senatorial classes' youth, actively giving out rewards and acknowlesgement, and provided for a higher degree of culture and learning accessible to said youth. Hence the libraries and importation of philosophers, as well as the active encouragement of local poets. He was making Rome the new Alexandria and Athens, accessible locally. He also went through substantial efforts to stabilize marriage and hereditary lines. Orgies or elicit sex with roman women was discouraged (unless your name was Augustus, so exceptions were made). Its obvious he didn't just set himself above and over as a monarch, but also took very active interest in the lineage of the Roman nobility, trying to better stritify it on a political framework akin to Aristotle's outlook. He was planning longterm, in no way was this a short term dictatorship. However, even though he did inherit a philosophical framework (likely from Arius Didymus), his actual going about it was rather disappointing. He was, after all, a roman of the old roman system of sexual-political morals. Its laughable to say the roman senate could still flex its muscles when Augustus systemmatically atrophied its chief muscles, the Consulship, mocking it a way those a few generations easiler would of been sickened and dismayed at the site of. I wouldn't begin to claim his dynasty built a constitutional monarchy either. All Romans knew what a monarchy was, Rome was surrounded by societies that had been monarchies, and had them in its own history. Fairly simple system. Just they never could outright admit to it it seems as long as Rome was the capital. They did eventually abandon this farce however once the capitals began to move. Any long lasting civilization switches its capital on occasion, for whatever reasons. The most obvious thing I see with the Roman Senate after it switched away was how Emperor conscious the Senate in Rome remained, until the very end when the only emperor lived in the east in Constantinople and they had little reason to be attached at that point. During Sulla to Augustus, they had to face down more conservative, Republic minded generals who fought the tin pot dictators tooth and nail. Yet, at the far end of Roman History, what seems to of made a population Roman was its adherence under a Emperial Despot or Emperor. Holding Rome, or Constantinople didn't much matter in the sense it did for Marius or Sulla, Octavian or Anthony. That Urb was essential, as was the control of A SENATE (they made a 300 member senate in Spain as a replacement of sorts). Hence Augustus wasting away in mockery the actual power of the senate. Didn't much matter to him, but he found the bloodlines and achievements of said members as crucial. He even preserved Marc Anthony's offspring. He had a conscious outlook as to what Roman Nobility was, and his state was built around this. This of course, went to hell in the end, but left its mark on future systems heavily. Its only now that its falling apart by the left in the west. We extended the idea morally to everyone under Christianity via marriage as the cornerstone to society. Ancient political theorists, all pagan (save for a few Jews in Alexandria who also would of) political philosophers would of recognized this and applauded us. Its very, very questionable where we will go ultimately however now. Augustus embraced Aristotle that the Family was the root all society was built from, as the smallest institution all other institions were firmly built on. Now we are swinging morally to an early Stoic model that the political body is bounded together (and thus groomed and discriminated via hate against) by universal love. Its hard to say which is more painful and discriminatory objectively, but this latter is obviously more prone to fascism, rape, pedophilua, and brutality. The Spartans were built upon such a system, and its prone just as much, if not more, to illogic and demogaguery via rhetorical pronouncements. We think we live in a modern age, but we don't. We are merely switching from Augustus' Aristotelian system to a wild and unstable Stoic Zenonian System. A monarchy, as well as a republic, can exist in both, and in a sense, inevitably incorporate elements of the other into it for its preferred classes, but the transition can be hell, and its only a portion of the world's population and territory doing this switch. Africa, via Christianity is pursuing the Aristotelian model, while China remains Confucian (not too dissimilar). However, most modern intellectual ideas and technology the west uses favors the older, more stable system and mindset. We have Augustus to thank for that stability. He was a tyrant, but did earn his reputation for ending the civil wars. The entirety of his system fell apart, but did manage to survive to the near present, and we can see it dying all around us. For Caldrail, how long do you link a stable concept of nobility and monarchy, based on family values can possibly last as the population of England increasingly swings away into unabashed atheism and socialism, where father and mother are antagonistic, love is free and property is held in suspicion when amassed and put to good works? Right down the drain, huh? You can see Augustus' system a bit now more clearly. There is a PDF on the net, Google this: [PDF]aristotle and arius didymus on household and polis www.rhm.uni-koeln.de › Nagle

It makes a hollow showing of "the political".... I know to many politics is just heads butting between factions, and this extends to issues of defense and war, but as a commonwealth, of shared borders and commonly held threats, there needs to be a more scientific understanding of how we stratify risk and project ideas of "enemy". Its a bit like agriculture, you have very advanced modern farms, then you have historically very backwards farms in the farthest reachest of civilized antiquity. They needed food, and they planted. You can plant many ways, prepare for it differently, but despite the nebulous fashion of the initial selections, and the many different ways such endeavors could progressively unfold, any advanced system coming out of such an endeavor would have considerable knowledge and expertise behind it... it could and would be systematic to a logical set of principles, and the folly of foolishly following ones impulses and wishes that have been seen through history to lead to ruin would be seen as vices, bad psychology, warned and protected against. We live in an era built upon former eras. We have very advanced militaries, and international alliances, and a shared destiny. Yet in terms of politics were blindly throwing out our seeds, pissing against a wind we don't understand for short term gains in a theater unresponsive to the needs of the latter.... political advancement against long term survival. We don't train our children to think strategically. Best we can find is WASPs who send their kids to study economics, or guys who want their kids to be proud and honorable, marching around in youth military schools with a stick up their butt like proud little Prussians, so they know something of discipline. That stuff is silly.... I will give an iota of credit in the pursuit of economics or of defense, but neither are the whole of what a society needs. It leads to in the former an ugly and brutal Capitalism, or brainwashed socialism sure to fail in the long term, or a stupid fascism that at its most benign and tolerable exhibits itself as excessive flag waving rituals that EVERYONE must be a part of.... both claiming hidden principles to the masses they can't see or directly benefit from. However, if students at a early age are taught to study the great masters of statecraft, the pioneers of Tactics and the historic priorities that brought such necessities foreword, of economic systems, with their divergences and failures respective of one another, in how such critical thinking developed, and how to identify within each students mind those very mechanistic elements, I think the nature of "politics" would be much healthier. We wouldn't have to blindly bash and thrash against "enemies", but could indulge in the paradox of their perceptions and motivations, and find much quicker and consistent paths to alliviate such situations, using the various tools of our commonwealth. I had thought about the early British policing of Arab tribes in the middle east, but it was just that.... a very sick form of policing, of subjects. I'm certain they were viewed as enemies, but enemies under the same crown as the bombing force. The British also used a divide and control strategy to hold the middle eastern mandates together. Its not unrelated, but is a bit more advanced in its thinking (under a imperialistic mindset) that say, the US or Kenya bombing, as neither is approaching it using an classical imperialistic model (only Marxist or the extreme left would assume this, due to a lack of differenation in their logic to label violence. If you were a physicist, and only could label with the word "gravity" for any invisible force, all data pertaining to the weak or strong nuclear forces would be "gravity", your statistical analysis, however rightly empirically collected, essentially wasted). Its a nebulous set of ideas, but one universally structured as all humans share similar minds, and due to the similarity of our minds neurologically, share a higher commonwealth. Any conflict therefore should be limited and seek straight after the point this recognition. We shouldn't blindly thrash out and alienate one another, just because we got used to it and get in our collective groups a positive pleasurable feeling that we've accomplished something. We really haven't.

http://www.iranicaonline.org/articles/mehr-narseh An Armenian Christian source, according to which an Zurvanite proselytizer, Mihr-Narseh, spoke of the words openly: “ 'We do not worship, like you, the elements, the sun, the moon, the winds and the fire.'[4] http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zoroastrianism_in_Armenia I'm actually having a bit of difficulty figuring out who said this to who, was it Narsis saying it to the "Christian", as it makes absolutely no sense, or the reverse? It fits a Platonic oriented cult of Mithras exactly however, and would make a lot of sense in that context.

Hmmm.... This shoots the modern "Roman Origins" theory down for the Mithraic cult. Porphyr lists in Fr. 60 (page 101 of Robert Petty's 'Fragments of Numenius of Apamea") that Eubulus, an Athenian poet, talked of the Mithraic cult and from what I've just seen poking around, wrote a book on it, mentioning he was in a cave. Easy to dismiss? Perhaps, till you look at the meaning of Eubulus' name. http://www.theoi.com/Georgikos/EleusiniosEubouleus.html Several aspects of the Mithraic iconography pops up. I know gotta figure out how to say Eubulus in Old/Middle Persian to identify place names.

Boethius "Theological Tractates": Let us now consider the category of relation, to which all the foregoing remarks have been preliminary; for qualities which obviously arise from the association of another term do not appear to predicate anything concerning the substance of a subject. For instance, master and slave are relative terms; let us see whether either of them are predicates of substance. If you suppress the term slave, you simultaneously suppress the term master. On the other hand, though you suppress the term whiteness, you do not suppress some white thing, though, of course, if the particular whiteness inhere as an accident in the thing, the thing disappears as soon as you suppress the accidental quality whiteness. But in the case of master, if you suppress the term slave, the term master disappears. But slave is not an accidental quality of master, as whiteness is of a white thing; it denotes the power which the master has over the slave. Now since the power goes when the slave is removed, it is plain that power is no accident to the substance of master, but is an adventitious augmentation arising from the possession of slaves. From my experience, most modern pagans use a formula of Nietzsche's Slave-Master arguments, though it predates him (general Hegelian idea, though obviously he didn't invent it either, its quite classical in the true sense). Its a rather sad nuisance, I know one Dutch Nietzschean who went so far to avoid Christianity that he used a "Hermetic Cabalah" over a Jewish-Christian Kaballah, in the belief one spelling meant a pagan system (which in his mind was superior) while the other was clearly inferior. I personally love philosophy, especially psychology and history, and jump into studying anything. I still laugh at him for this silliness in nomenclature, as they are quite obviously nearly identicle and easily interchangeable, and both Jews, Christians, and Pagans had a hand in building it up until the 11th century.... but in his mind, this is life and death a crucial matter. I couldn't begin to care what a Muslim calls Christianity for example. Why, because they aren't in a position to inform or guide my outlook. I study their philosophers of course, recommend to every historian to read Ibn Khaldun.... but they haven't a say in anything, and if they tried to force a belief on me there is the dialectic of reasoning, or if by force, counterstrike. I can't see why a pagan would care what a Christian would call them any more than a Christian cares that a Muslim calls us a Infidel. They have no position of authority to do so, and in the end expose their backward ignorance.

http://www.bbc.com/news/world-africa-32194722 Its been erking me for a while, that "airstrikes" have become a legitimate response to armwd provacation. Bill Clinton thought this with Bin Laden.... a few missiles should teach them. It was half hearted, with no follow up. Little point, it was merely a rebuttle in a debate with Bin Laden, like one would have in a political debate club "You see that crater in your camp Bin Laden, I responded in kind!" I would like to think this started with the semi-earnest air campaign in Kosovo. It had a weird logic to it since fully embraced by the democratic party for whatever odd reasons: Airstrikes is the more acceptable method of engaging in war, as it avoids a Vietnam "quagmire". Vietnam was a country we dropped Daisy Cutters and Agent Orange on, Airstrikes do not solve a Vietnam! Precision targeting does, and in order to have that, you either need something beyond a doubt obvious from the air that its a legit enemy target.... like a tank, or eyes on the ground confirming it is. In the military, the most basic formula is a SALT report, where a ground unit will call up on radio Size, Activity, Location, Time. There are longer variations, but that's the most basic, whittled down formula you can say before the Air force goes to bomb a target by request. In cases like Kenya.... their troops aren't already in position all over Somalia, a radioguy on every hill, obviously aware of what is and is not a target. They're all bunched up in the SouthEast in Somalia doing poorly equipped peacekeeping work. They gotta rely on other, non Kenyan info, or delayed intelligence reports before they make their strikes, if their relying on info at all. It might be as stupid as some colonel informing the pilots they gotta head out and find a good target to bomb, as the government needs to show a response. This is a crappy system. First off, Missiles, bombs, and fuel cost money. Secondly, even your most precise aircraft made ordinance blows up everything around it. In Kenya's case, a few guys in jeeps, trained to special forces level training, could make a far more precise, politically painful and efficient strike against their opponents, and they could release images of a night-vision raid, capturing some idiot. If they get the target wrong, catch and release, but there are no catch and releases when you just bomb them. Aircraft diplomacy sucks. Light and rapid groups of special forces are better. A large military like the US can use both, but a small military should just focus on SF. Secondly, if you use such strikes, they should be meaningful in the larger picture. There is no just war criteria for the proper means to seek revenge. Wars of revenge are stupid, however limited. Bill Clinton shouldn't of bothered at all with those stupid strikes on Bin Laden. Dialogue would of been at the very least, just as effective (as the effect was zero). But a well crafted argument can induce reflection and perhaps change. A worthless retaliatory strike on a peripheral aspect of a belligerent power most definately won't. It doesn't harm them. So if your going to engadge in strikes, it better be either the final end game.... it will forever remove that threat to your country, or its the beginning, more to follow.... and by more I don't mean just more airstrikes. Infantry know how to spread out and move along multiple lines of advance. Air forces can't conventionally stop this, just nuisance them. You'll need ground forces. If Kenya wants the strikes to stop, it has to craft its response in a manner that will get it to stop. If the Arabs want the war in Yemen to stop, the same applies to them. Same applies to President Obama in Iraq and Syria. There is nothing more moral or ethical about airstrikes over troops on the ground, and not all troops need be a occupational, base building force bent on reconstruction. We got plenty of special forces, in and out raids focusing on systematically reducing the enemy's ability to hold it together. Even poor countries can have SF units, and most do. However, in Kenya's case more than any other, I recommend just sending a battalion or two to reinforce Mogadishu in Somalia, and train two more battalions for rotation, and send out a sixth of said force out at any given time with the Somalian government on joint strikes. Don't bother to take terrain, just find the terrorists and kill them. If the locals want to join up, let them tslj to the Somali units, if not, oh well, come back next week when the village idiot takes up the mantel of jihad. They'll run out eventually of such fools. It will be for more effective that some stupid airstrikes. They do nothing. Airstrikes are by far the worst method of communication ever devised. Try sending a letter instead if all your doing is replying. Its better to not even bother if this is all your doing. Its disturbing, either be Pacifists or do it right. There is no middle, enlightened position of randomly maiming from afar without a endgame that ends it once and for all as part of the calculus.

Ummm.... Christians used the term prior to becoming a state religion, and by using the term Hellinist just cause Julian the Apostate used it, hardly breaks you out of this tacit Master-Slave Nietzschean Paradox of Self-Recognition. because in the end, Julian was what the communist called a "Reactionary", more or less being lead in everything in his reforms out of studying Christianity. Hence his reforms might not even be termed Pagan, but rather a anthetical movement within the mother religion of Christianity dressed in earlier pagan anachronisms. An example of this logic: You have the Platonic religion, with its Demiurge, but you can also have Gnostics operating within the confines of said Platonism, they simply flip the Ethics that align it, by declaring the demiurge as evil. Said gnostics are a separate group from Platonist's on one hand, but are still Platonists on the other. Same goes for many Satanic groups. They still dress themselves purposefully within Christian theology. Hence they are little more than a subgroup worshiping in a scewed way, where the ethics have been reversed. The cosmology inevitably has to be adjusted too in such systems, and in the case of many modern Satanists, its a bit of a Dadaist Farce, as many are just Atheists looking for excitement. A further difficulty in your pronouncement is the problem that many Eastern Romans started revering to the old Greek Paganism a by the very term your advocating, so no, you definitely don't break out of this paradox via that route. I recommend if you follow a religion, and dislike being called a pagan, just be a politically correct prude and say "I prefer to be called a "...", using the proper name of your religion. If your just resurrecting a old Greek practice of sacrificing a goat and burning it on a altar however, especially if outside of a larger established movement, know everyone will fill in "...." with pagan when you explain it in their head, and that will be the greater truth society will for the most part accept, as burning a Goat for Poseidon so he gives you a new car isn't likely to get a large upwelling of followers, and most people will not see the beauty, greater logic, or utility of any of it as its alien and disturbing to them. And it rightfully is, hence why Paganism was supplanted by Christianity, Islam (which is only partially descended from the ideas of Christianity), Buddhism, Vedanta..... they behave in similar ways to Christianity in their rise to regional dominance. On one had, Christians view these other groups as Pagans, but are more likely to also list them as something separate too, like how we list Jewish people, or Samaritans, or Zoroastrians, or followers of Mani We have a inherent separate category for listing other more formerly established religions. This cognitive divide shouldn't be undervalued in this analysis, as it reflects where Christians put themselves in the larger scheme. Hellenes = Pagans to the Romans, remember that.

This is from "Cow Sacrifice Replinishing Fields Dods" I came up with a Roman Festival The Robigalia http://penelope.uchicago.edu/~grout/encyclopaedia_romana/calendar/robigalia.html It didn't occur to me, despite the obvious Zodiak encompassing the entire year, and sacrificial feasts, that the cultists might have festivals for every aspect of this festival. If I remember back in my memory, it wasn't usually Cattle that was sacrificed, but ..... I fell asleep. Umm... wasn't usually cattle, but chickens and such from the bones recovered. I believe dogs too. http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mithraic_mysteries#/media/File:Cautes_riding_bull,_Hermannstadt.jpg Matches that Scandinavian coin, bug headed guy riding bull. I'm going to sleep now.

Found this: http://www.ianridpath.com/startales/orion.htm Orion was blind, had two dogs, and sun restored his eyesight. Odin seems similar to this, but not necessarily to Mithras as I know him. However, Orion does face down Taurus, the bull, and I do seem to remember long ago Mithras sits largely in Orion's constellation, but I can't recall where the bull fits in under him, much less where the two dogs are in relation to the snake. I'm having difficulty imagining where everything is. I was googling moon over bull, man over bull.... doing a image search. I see occasionally a pic of Mithras with the bull over his back.... this stuff came up. This as well (doubt it is relevant, late southern Indian coin) http://www.worldofcoins.eu/forum/index.php/topic,29250.0.html?PHPSESSID=0373f4e646e2c3e5c6c5dd23b8da0617 I'll include it just incase someone sees a link to some aspect.

http://sukat.su.se/resultat.jsp?ufilter=cn-expand-permute&ofilter=ou-expand-permute&cn-expand-permute=Olof+Sundqvist I found his address, sent him an email. Waiting for confirmation I'm wrong about everything.

https://books.google.com/books?id=gjq6rvoIRpAC&pg=PT42&lpg=PT42&dq=odin+mithras&source=bl&ots=dqofkt1CDm&sig=hCkOU7c8fxLR0a1qjcMcBgJw_lk&hl=en&sa=X&ei=RcMhVePEGM62ogTz9ICoDA&ved=0CB8Q6AEwAQ I can't find the particular coin he mentions, and that image is a tad bit blury, but I found a similar one. Raven, Bull, big headed guy. http://scienceblogs.com/aardvarchaeology/wp-content/blogs.dir/417/files/2012/04/i-44350ecb459f8be36edec601dfc5c492-vadstena.jpg I'm going to look into this author, Olof Sundqvist. Hope this isn't some ancient article.

Okay.... think I found the dadophoroi. This is them in Latin, see the similar yet different names? http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cautes_and_Cautopates http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Serpens_Cauda This was once a single constellation, but got chopped into two: Serpens Caput, Serpens Cauda..... Which in English kinda looks like Cates and Cadupates, in terms of how they modify one another and remain phonetically somewhat similar. I don't mean to suggest they mean the same thing, but there is a pattern. From what I've read, these two sit on the eleptic plane of the sun, which this picture describes: http://moonblink.info/File/Graphics/diagrams/Orbits.png So we have two guys leading the sun and moon from what is generally gathered from Mithraic Iconography.... one holding a torch up, another down.... one little guy for the sun, one for the moon. So.... I'm then looking for a myth where two people/creatures are leading the sun and moon. I didn't find that, but I did find a pick of two dogs CHASING the sun and the moon, Odin's two dogs, and their names coincidentally follow a somewhat similar formula: http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Geri_and_Freki So Odin, up in Scandinavia, somehow got Mithra's Raven, Sun, and the Dadophoroi with a echo of the phonetic patterns that emerged when Serpens was cut in half. Those damn Swedes stole Mithras from the Romans. I mean, you can still see Mithras cape in the Odin icon going off into the sun.... I gotta ask.... how? The route of this transmission if confusing me. It was a military and civil government religion.... died out. Vikings came later. I doubt missionary efforts to convert them in some far away land up north. Goths within the Roman empire maybe. They served in the military, went back home, or... hard to say what home would be, they went north. Or, some Viking fell his butt through a hole in a ground, landing on a statue, and saw all this scenery up on the walls, and copied it. But if so, how would he get the name pattern for the two wolves? Another is, the cult of Mithras simply held out somewhere in Northern Europe, and it fell elsewhere, and the vikings or Germans came across it. Another possibility is, there was once a text describing the cult of Mithras in detail, and they of all people inherited it. It could of been a manuscript on a shelf in some monastery, they found it and brought it home. I haven't the slightest clue. Anchorage, Alaska is at a similar latitude, and when I lived there I saw no snakes or scorpions, so doubt it make it over.

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/b/b5/Mithras_tauroctony_Louvre_Ma3441b.jpg http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/b/b3/Manuscript_Odinn.jpg/640px-Manuscript_Odinn.jpg I had been having a terribly time deciphering a 19th century text on the Fragments of Numenius, his "Cave of the Sea Nymphs" analogy, but especially the descent and rising of the soul, with the tropics of Capricorn and cancer, underworld being involved, within the larger framework of three gods. Well, I was more or less screwed working through it, as his fragments were, well, VERY fragmentary. The visual reconstruction lead to a tilted earth, with the tropic of cancer being closer to the earth than the tropic of Capricorn (say what?!). So I redoubled my efforts, hating to throw a potentially good fact away. I started looking into Ionian seamanship and exploration, tilt of the earth axis via the seasons, what portions of what constellations could be seen and when (still working on that last part). I had typed the out of copyright translation up, and was correcting its language (still am), turning manifold doubleness into Duality, etc.... but uncertain if he is pushing a real Monadic theory as I know it from the pre-einstein era in Natural Philosophy or in India, or more like Leibniz. I kept focusing on his cosmology, building up in my mind a visual map of every stage I understood. I believe (not 100%) that he was describing a Analemma and not just a simple circle for the soul's migration into matter and back. I got the only other translation I know of, hard to get, Robert Petty's PHD Thesis, and found the Tropic of Cancer-Capricorn story was much bigger than I thought, and that I was on the right track, just missing a lot of info. But I kept thinking of church domes, simulating the universe, and of the ceiling in the Library of Alexandria. And images of the ends of underground Mithra Temples. I don't know why, maybe it was the underground Neo-Pythagorean underground temple in Rome that made that unconscious connection, hard to say. So I've continued to read, unable to shake the idea of souls entering either end. I know I lack any data architecturally to suggest this, and will undoubtedly eliminate it, but it remains hovering. I none the less have been looking up images of Mithra temples the last hour. I recognize now why Mithras was looking at the Sun from Numenius' perspective.... Sun being the Monad, Mithras being the Creator God, who is only Good IF he is looking to the Monad, while slaughtering the Bull for life to thrive. Each animal is very different, unlike the other. Scorpion is a kind of bug, Snake is a legless Reptile, Ravens Fly, dog is a mammal, each can lend themselves to allegories and myth. Numenius called the Monad Apollo, and the Raven was a prophetic messenger of Apollo, according to those picture books I read as a kid. It couldn't be, could it? The damn raven is hanging out next to the sun in every other image. I saw a few with a snake, and the moon in Apollo/Sol Invictus' place. So I said to myself "You know dammit, your a philosopher, you know how to invert a logical system by systematically approaching it from a very different style of thinking." So I did. I said to myself, even IF the Mythraic religion was secretive, a fucking loudmouth like Numenius who LOVED to get initiated into mystery cults and then immediately spill their beans (feeling guilty afterwards) would of leaked this stuff all over, and even if it didn't, it likely seeped into different myths over time, be they Roman or a later barbarian state. So I googled Ravens and Sun. Guess what I found? That image of Odin. Raven in the sun, with a whisp of the cape/lopsided facial hair heading off to the sun. It also has a second raven, suggesting what the underlining "mystery" originally was, a psychological one. Each creature I'm guessing represented a hidden nature in each man. I don't know what manuscript this text comes from. Could be pure coincidence, but a lot of parallels exist. This is my state at only the beginning. Found this unexpectantly fast. Pretty cool, huh? (Mithras was a cult BIG on Serotonin Increase OVER Dopamine alone, should make it easier to predict and shuffle through ideas).

Its often assumed the Indo-Greeks reached Patiliputra, which is on the Ganges, but Cicero in his Dream of Scipio said none of his race (Scipio, I don't know to what degree Cicero was ethnically discriminating here) had made it yo the other side of the Ganges yet. I'm a bit stumped when this information flow was hitting the roman west of the continuation of Greek emploits in the region. From my hazy recollection, the Greeks had to give up upon taking Patilputra due to a coup of some type in their rear, and had to pull back, and soon collapsed afterwards.

You should make a tourism brouchure to attract roman history minded tourism to the area after that last post. Were the hillforts already abandoned then when the Romans showed up? Did the Romans leave them alone out of indifference.... walls and all and just focus all their efforts on non military concerns, such as importing mesquitos to the wetlands, and making crappy pottery? Also, does anyone make this apparently bad kind of pottery, is it sold on the internet? Can I buy the most neglected pottery in the Roman Empire?

http://www.bbc.com/news/uk-england-nottinghamshire-32117815?post_id=628006319_10153286153841320 Apparently it works. Everyone has MRSA in them, but it sometimes breaks out bad in individuals and can spread via contact, a terrible contagion. A big chunck of every US hospital regularly struggles with it, though with long, costly treatment its rarely lethal. This is a big boon. We also recently discovered a new class of antibiotics that can cure it, but that's a way out from mass production. This can be done now.

It definitely was for religious reasons. The persecutions more or less (the final push for them culturally, not the early ones like Nero) began ironically during his reign, by one of his administrators (anyone know what to call his close ministers/cabinet members? Its a default administration, how ever ad hoc). His mother was openly Christian, and he was seen as a mild manner, timid, war avoiding emperor. These are classical signatures of Turn The Other Cheek Christianity. The Pogroms from this point on took a radical shift, the pagan emperors systematically targeted Christianity on a priori ideological grounds, on the assumption that killing Christians = more stable government (or at least a more successful one). I obviously can't rule out that some of these assumptions came prior to Alexander Severus' flirtation with Christianity, but they seemed to solidly of formed. Pursuing Scapegoats make of crappy reforms, and the empire sorely needed some good ones. The question of this period arises is, why did this fixation land in the minds of the imperium in the first place. We had a disturbing amount of emperors during this period, but some came to power already with this assumption that this is exactly what was needed. In hindsight, we can see it backfired, but must of made cultural sense in certain military and civil circles throughout this period. The end of this period you had effective outsiders like Julian the Apostate holding to these circles trying to figure out just how the policy went so very wrong, ironically importing elements of Christianity while finally becoming friendly and tolerant (I really do wish it would of lasted, the tolerance too, as its what the Christians themselves sought prior, but they held grudges, eye for an eyeeye sort of mentality). Its this culture that catches my eye. Upon Alexander Severus' death, we can safely say that the Senate was largely tolerant of its own members being members of foreign religions. We see this tolerance in members of other eastern religions. The Senate however really didn't understand Christianity either, as they deified Alexander Severus after his death. To them outside of a few well informed members, was just one religion among many, who had this odd willingness to defy imperial decreed sacrifices under past emperors. A few laws on the book, admended by president in how to deal with this civil disobedience. This is about as upsetting as say, the modern Jehovah Witness refusal to be drafted in Wars. The Jehovah Witnesses are not about to collapse any government. So what really concerns me is tracking this period. I haven't hardly exhausted the sources, if anything I'm starting to see how little studied and examines the sociology of this period is. Its a bit like the transition from Buddhist hegemony into Vedanta, or the Buddhist struggling against the Taoist and Confucians. Lots and lots of texts, but the principal actors are known, but the reasons why aren't well understood. Im thinking we will have to govfurther back into the Severan Dynasty and look at the mores that flourished then. Why the military became so bitterly anti-christian in part, and so incredibly unstable to the point that every other commander thought it was a swell idea to set themselves up as emperor. It was obviously a increasingly autonomous and self minded force by this point. When we deal with Emperors who tolerated or just ignored Christianity, whereas before it was policy to persecute, we have to ask why? Whenever you institute hatred, bevit against a race or an idea, there will be constituents who become attached to that ideal of such attacks. It isn't always rational. These emperors had to deal with letting these people down. It be a bit like a successor to Hitler in the Nazis Empire (a successful one still fighting a long-term world war) saying "Were wasting time hunting for Jews, Gays, Catholics, and Surrealist painters, let's focus our resources on fighting"..... you know many in the military are going to pout, and every military setback, however poorly understood in actuality, will be attributed to NOT continuing the genocide. Its just how some people are. You see them in every political party on the planet. The Ought-Is mindset isn't really good at statistical analysis and grasping underlying logistics that form strategic thought.... its conservative and pleasure driven, and is simple minded.... pain vs utopia, and utopia is always pleasurable, and they always identify themselves individually and ideologically with that. Your basic monoamine cascade. Its important to figure this period out, as it looks rather cyclic. A lot of countries like Iran and Syria are in the deep end of this cycle right now, while countries like England and Sweden are slipping back into it with mild persecutions. Chinese are further along in the process and feel it backfiring... some Chinese history sites are aware of this and clamp down on overly antichristian, overly nationalistic tendencies in some Chinese posters, them know the long term effect and inherent "logical fallacies" it produces. In Countries like Nigeria, with Boko Harem and the recent election, you see how much farther along and self aware they are on all sides of this fundamental issue.

I don't quite understand. I read a few books on the Greek and Armenian Genocides in Turkey during the Armistice of WW1, and they held out in a Eagle's Nest, a old Roman fort, perched up on a vertical cliff, extremely hard to assault. Likewise, I recall a equally inaccessible site in Syria. Yet this Nythe farm looks depressingly flat. Nythe = Nest, and the roman camp would be there.... but I see nothing special about the inaccessibility of that location. Am I wrong about the usage of the name? It was used for high up, hard to assault forts, wasn't it?