Posts by Matt

Things are good, just taking a couple of classes. Things are fairly quiet at the moment.

Yes, I'll need to do some refresher training. I wan't sure who Polyaenus was so I got dinged on that a couple of times. Then I blanked on who preceded who Zeno or Epicurus.

I figured I'd swing by and change things up!

Yeeesh...I've been away from here for awhile. I'm rusty!

I will say that some of the metrics and visual products that have been produced lately in this forum have been exceptionally detailed. The quality of work is awesome.

I’ve only taken a cursory glance at the article, I’d love to take more time to look at it and dust off my Epicurean discussion skills. ?

Clearly the copy and pasting needs to cease if there is going to be any real dialogue. Also, the picture quotes too. Otherwise it’s just anti-intellectual bullying.

Some ground rules need to laid out and there need to be rules about using peripheral sources that are not Epicurean that are irrelevant like Liantinis.

There can be no further dialogue if these simple expectations are not met.

Thank you Cassius .

For the record I’m out. Cassius

Elli, I’m all set with responses from sources other than your own brain. Either just have a dialogue with me in your own voice or we are finished with this discussion.

I don’t want to hear any more about Liantinis or Cavafy in response to the Notre Dame fire. Please.

I’m not sure how you can misinterpret the pejorative “Jew Greek” but I guess it’s whatever you want to see.

He was assuredly an anti-Semite Obviously others pointed it out because there was a Q&A about whether or not he was an “anti-Semite.”

Liantinis, a sad martyr with a messianic complex. Judging from what little is available to English speakers is that he was an ugly anti-Semite academic that hated the “New Greeks” or “Jew Greeks” of modern times. Wrote volumes to the superiority of Greek culture.

Then he unceremoniously marched off into the mountains to kill himself after writing a melodramatic suicide note:

“My last act has the meaning of protest for the evil that we, the adults, prepare for the innocent new generations that are coming. We live our life eating their flesh. A very bad evil. My unhappiness for this crime kills me."

I see now how you replace the Christ for the melodramatic self proclaimed martyr of Liantinis. One for one.

Such a disgrace and dishonor to leave behind his family for his own vanity.

elli

It’s very clear to me where you stand hence we will never see eye to eye. There is absolutely no benefit in me trying to rebut any of your remarks since your personal philosophy is one of ethnic nationalism and anti-theism hitched to Epicurean philosophy. Why bother? Right? I will expect a long paragraph Liantinis in response. Not your words...his.

It’s pretty difficult to know where you end and Lianitinis begins. So I’m not going to argue with a disgraced dead man or you.

elli

I would respond to your comments in regard to New Testament studies and the eschatological implications of the destruction of the second temple and the coming of the spiritual kingdom of heaven and that your superficial reading of the subject does not form any relatable conclusions to the subject at hand. But really I see no point. Nor does it give me pleasure.

Thank you Elli for your usual style of dissertation on this subject. I would expect nothing less.

I got a chance to see the main highlights of the UK and Ireland when I went there 2 years ago. Cathedrals, castles and museums. Not to mention the Celtic and Paleolithic sites like Stonehenge and Newgrange. Romania was the same last year. Stunning architecture and amazing sights.

The Islamic State recently destroyed Mesopotamian artifacts and cities that had survived not only the constant internal upheaval of political power in ancient times, but also the occupation and wars of Alexander the Great and the Rome. They survived the Islamic expansion and the Crusades. They also survived the 20th century wars to include WW1 and 2 and the Gulf War.

Only to be destroyed by a few goons with sledgehammers and dynamite. Fortunately the British among other nations had many more objects and copies of objects in their possession in their respective countries. Thankfully many of the objects destroyed were well documented and photographed.

Go and see the world heritage sites while they are still here. They can at any moment be destroyed by nature or by man.

I am sad and frustrated that I never got a chance to see Notre Dame. It was a beautiful structure with significant meaning to both secular and religious people.

As far as religious implications go, the building was just that...a building. Made from wood and stone. The church is not a building. The religion of Christ is not dependent on stone structures.

Obviously if a person can’t see that it was built with reverence for something “greater” then it’s clear that such a person sees only what they wish to see.

Notre Dame like the Great Hassan II Mosque in Casablanca or the Taj Mahal in India are painstakingly beautiful artistic emanations of the human spirit. Anyone who would take pleasure in their destruction or be dismissive of them clearly have no grasp of the artistic spirit of humanity...regardless of religion and philosophy.

Porphyry is somewhat of an enigma due to the lack of complete extant writings.

We know everything that we can possibly know about Plotinus from Porphyry. Most importantly we know who and what influenced Plotinus from Porphyry. Specifically, we learn that the teacher of Plotinus was Ammonius Saccus.

We know he hated the Christians, but revered Jesus as a holy man.

His writing and philosophy, like most of the Neoplatonists, is very technical and based in Platonic and Pythagorean principles.

I’m not terribly familiar with Porphyry’s works, many that survive are fragmentary or quoted by secondary sources.

It seems that the specific section of the letter does support a knowledge of Epicurean principles .

Porphyry is of course best known for his biography of his master Plotinus and the his arrangement of the Enneads. He wrote some anti-Christian polemical works that did not survive except in secondary sources.

He and his pupil Iamblichus did not see eye to eye on the interpretation of Neoplatonic doctrine.

Porphyry also suffered from a depressive nature. He says that he even considered suicide at one point in his biography.

Yep! The Theogony is a pretty solid ancient resource for the Greek deities.

Cassius , that’s the beauty of avatara, I remain the same, yet each incarnation is different. ?

Good luck with your interview Oscar!