... on Golding's Famous Novel and on Youth

... on Golding's Famous Novel and on Youth · Two Subjects : Ireland and a certain "social conservatism" of Sensus Fidelium

I have commented on first half, minute by minute (see time signatures as denoting where comments are to), not yet heard second half. I have also after making the comments prayed 3 Hail Mary's for that poor priest.

Video commented on:

Error of Juvenilism
Sensus Fidelium | Added 19.IV.2018
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rHvp9Uz51KI

I

1:28 The boys become superstitious?

Come on!

They WERE superstitious before, and Piggy held to the modern superstition of scientism as a "remedy" against the emerging superstition.

None of them, neither Ralph, nor the ruffian (I forgot his name), neither Piggy nor anyone else has had catechism.

MUCH of the savagery of the ruffian is simply an attempt to "replace" what was not needed in the first place, the control of the boarding school.

From your description:

"we are now told that the young should lead, guide, and teach the old."

Er, no, "we" were told that in 1968. My ma was not among the culprits.

Now that the generation of 1968 is getting old, we are hearing complaints about Juvenilism.

The generation born around WW-II was often rebelling against their grandfathers (their fathers often absent in war) and now they can't stand their grandchildren rebelling (if that is the word) against them.

Young people spend YEARS more than before 1968 to get married and to get a position (independent losing to jobs), partly because those young in 1968 want to make sure about more and more factors in their grandchildren's lives before allowing a marriage.

I think it was yourself who said that Antichrist cannot come (according to Bellarmine and other saints) before the East regains control over the West. But these complaints about Juvenilism, about Immaturity (some people in France think you are immature if you read Narnia or LotR beyond your teens), they ARE Eastern control over the West.

Western culture has some degree of Juvenilism since Héloïse and Abélard got their marriage destroyed by older family members and since Sts Francis and Clare of Assisi did not get their "monastic" vocations destroyed by older family members, nor did St Thomas Aquinas.

Some old people in Paris feel ill at ease if their young ones can read on a blog arguments they never thought of that disprove evolution and prove Heliocentrism at least moot (which considering its prima facie should be enough to disprove it).

Some old people in St Nicolas du Chardonnet did not wish their young ones to be starting any carreers as editors of the paper versions of my by now 6000 + articles on the blogs. And the youth obeyed, as if they were Confucians or Muslims or Jews or Hindoos or Freemasons or Protestants or similar Oriental to Overparenting stuff.

1:28 "they form hostile factions"

Sure, they were put first in a boarding school and then landed on an island with each other they would not have chosen as company and their parents would not have chosen as company.

The outcome is as obvious at Columbine High School as in a novel. The roots can be seen in the fact that none of the school shooters has been homeschooled, at least for long.

People who can't get along, they should not be forced together. And their forcing together and power play at the school was a preparation for their power play on the island.

Because, if they had been from different schools, say, one Catholic and one Protestant, they would have separated on the island and tried to stay good neighbours at a distance.

Harmful violence to others is due to parents and teachers being absent?

Look away from that novel and back to Columbine.

Sure, Klebold and many others (perhaps all) had absent fathers. But there were other adults "in control." The problem is, the school leaves youth less and less freedom as it eats more and more of the lives of those who would willingly try sth totally different while their presence is anything from a menace to a burden of reproach "oh, it's ok for you, you somehow like the stuff" - and as a result, the control is resented as a slavery.

One good point for Madame Pénicaud, the present minister of education in France, she sets out to valorise apprenticeship ... but après le lycée, you know.

With a class of eager interested intellectuals and intellectual wannabes and a lot of smaller groups clustering in mid school age or earlier around someone able to teach them to cook, fix a bike, slaughter a pig and make it edible for human consumption, bake oven loads of bread and sth they can start living off soon enough, that would restore quite a lot of authority - and not destroy the freedom.

Authority and control are not the same thing.

1:57 Please.

We are not Pelagians, but neither do we believe in Total corruption. While I love tea, I don't take "TULIP T".

The boys having been together at a school is an evil societal background, their lacking Catechism (and having Piggy full of scientist ... I'd nearly have made a bad pun ... as nearest substitute for reminders of civilised thought), this is an evil societal background.

Within the boys, there is definitely in any case the consequences of original sin. In case some are not baptised, original sin itself is still damning as well as festering, unless someone in such a position made the relevant acts. But there is also an absence of certain qualities which are better preserved elsewhere than in English boarding schools.

Also, unlike sacraments and unlike acts for which God gives their graces, age per se is not an antidote to original sin. More sophisticated does not automatically mean more innocent.

Age of a culture means it has survived several generations and provided an antidote to some very heinous faults, prompted by the curse of Adam.

Age of an individual does not necessarily mean so, especially not in a culture which has so many collective means for keeping its members alive, despite stupidities, both for rich and poor.

II

2:55 Youth may indeed require some authority, but not the degree which stops them from marrying year after year - if authority is even a word for that.

Youth very certainly is a time for marrying:

"Let thy vein be blessed, and rejoice with the wife of thy youth:"
[Proverbs 5:18]

In Polish the bride and bridegroom are called "mloda panna" and "mlody kawaler", mlody, mloda, mlodo meaning young, and panna meaning young lady. I don't think you need a translation for "kawaler". (Niestetny, Poles, I had no barred l's to spell it correctly ...)

Today we have parents and grandparents saying "no, she can't marry at 26, she still behaves like 15" ... guess what age was very typical at least among people who could afford it, for a bride in the Middle Ages?

And you cannot reply that young marriages require the couple to be subject to parental authority of grandparents, since the Church clearly taught that while marrying against the will of the parents is usually a mortal sin (Trent), it nevertheless does not make the marriage invalid (St Thomas Aquinas).

The generation which went wild against their parents and grandparents in 1968 is again going wild against normal freedoms of their grandchildren.

3:18 Only when youth is replaced by maturity good things begin to be realised, you said?

If marriage is a good, you just contradicted Proverbs 5:18!

Who laid his hands on you without checking you know and believe the entire Bible?

You are also contradicting experience:

New blog on the kid : Highly Recommended Reading : OSN
http://nov9blogg9.blogspot.fr/2016/04/highly-recommended-reading-osn.html

Orange Street News is not made by a mature reporter, but by the young daughter of one.

That alone should put to shame the youth in St Nicolas du Chardonnet which has not felt mature enough to read my blogs and edit paper editions of them ... while the curés have in their turn not felt mature enough to either approve or condemn their contents.

If they are approved, they deserve to be a gain as well as an occupation, to others as well as of me. If they are condemned, they rather deserve to give their author some opportunity for debate or for accepting a correction, if I deem it a Catholic one.

Landing them in a longstanding limbo, scandalising those who among Atheists here wish me well, who would gladly edit if I made a good defense of Evolution, pushing me to a choice between abandoning my good work or getting physically burdened to degraded - I choose the latter, but partly in blindness, believing in more goodwill than there was over there - just because it is awkward to some that an "obviously immature" or "idiotic" work cannot be exposed as un-Catholic, and pretending to help me to "mature" into abandoning my positions myself - that is the work of a synagogue of Satan. NOT a worthy work of the Church. NOT a worthy work of tradition (even if there are shades between you and SSPX).

III

3:53 "as King David states in one of the Psalms, dearest Lord, do not remember the sins of my youth and my rebellious ways"

Again, who laid hands on you when you do not know the Bible!

"The sins of my youth and my ignorances do not remember. According to thy mercy remember thou me: for thy goodness' sake, O Lord."
[Psalms 24:7]

An "ignorance" and a "rebellious way" are two different things.

What "rebellious ways" would King David have had to repent of?

Rebellion against a Rabbi in Schul, when bored with Square Letters? Er, no. School for all Hebrews is not a Mosaic law and is about one millennium after him, after they had already rejected his Son. He spent his youth tending to sheep. A bear and a lion cannot be considered authorities.

Rebellious ways against his brother?

"And David said: What have I done? is there not cause to speak?"
[1 Kings (1 Samuel) 17:29]

No .... God rewarded that "rebellious way".

Or against the King, Saul .... when obeying him would have been suicide, supposing Saul had even explicitly ordered him to give himself over ... and when in fact in God's eyes he had more authority than Saul, since God had replaced Saul with him?

No, do not think so ...

I do NOT know what exact ignorance King David was reproaching himself, but it makes no sense to pretend it was "rebellious ways".

How can you stay a curate rather than get to a monastery and serve Mass only at side altars, if you misscite the word of God, the first thing the serpent is known to have done, in order to make a point against your pet peeve?

I have myself conflated two passages, but it was bad memory, and I am not a clergyman!

IV

5:03 I am somewhat relieved you do not quite approve of the "enough is enough" demo ...

That actual banner is per se not wrong.

But the problem is, they are blaming guns instead of blaiming school compulsion and even more practical compulsion than legal one. AND in so doing, they ARE listening to ... their teachers, their parents in the block, most of whom are easily influenced by teachers who have an exorbitant power today.

And the school which produced Columbine High school shooting (arguably Columbine High school) and the one which produced latest shooting are telling younger people, for longer and longer, to listen, about subjects they did not always choose totally freely, listen to more and more old people while there are fewer and fewer young ones to do that listening, for longer and longer years.

The teachers are one of the factions (more Piggy's than Ralph's, if Piggy had had the power to make one) on the Island of Golding's Novel, at least they are behaving so.

V

6:59 I consider I could read Lord of the Rings until I was 100 years old, and still learn something new, but very dishonourable people have risen up against me, considering that as Peter Pan syndrome.

I consider, I had the right to try to be a writer, and with 6000 + articles, I have shown the capacity to feed readers with texts, therefore potentially printers and myself with buyers (though as of late, some networks of older people have strangled my afflux of readers among the young).

Some very dishonourable people rise up against me on that account too, considering it a Peter Pan syndrome that I hope to accomplish a childhood dream.

If you are a believer in the diagnosis Peter Pan syndrome, you are as superstitious as Piggy or worse ... perhaps as superstitious as the idolater and brute in Golding's novel. Again : what are YOU doing as a curate? Who laid hands on you? Why don't you get to a side altar in a monastery instead of abusing your position to spout novelties of a blasphemous nature, blaspheming the Creator by maligning His Creature?

I am certainly not intending to be irresponsible and unserious. I have so far been kept so against my will, by people with your ideas on "Peter Pan syndrome".

7:34 While I don't share Kofi Anan's taste in revolutions, start up businesses are a very good deal for young people. I have provided an occasion and been denied the ones who could have profited from it.

Note very well, a farm per se does not need to be a start up, farms should last for centuries ... but today too few are farmers.

Too many need some substitute for farming. One farm visited by Elisabeth and Prince Philip gave jobs to a small family - but bread to 1000. Most of whom need to earn it in other ways than farming.

Were Byzantines Better, Continued

Continued

from part I, and italics denote citation of opponents previous (usually immediately so) comment.

Panos A

+Hans-Georg Lundahl
Not to mention that you just insulted how your fellow Greeks eat the gyros

LOL! You are the evidence of how pathetic villagers try to over-do it when trying "going to Rome and be like Romans". In Greece we call it "becoming more royal than royalty". The excess that divides the civilized and the pseudo-civilized. Shits like British manners and Savoir Vivre are the evidence of that. Idiot : gyros is the meat and gets its name from the rotating barbeque and of course it is eaten like all other types of meat, with fork and knife. By extension gyros can also be the sandwich eaten in bread or more popularly in pitta. And bread is eaten with hands, not with spoon an fork

Having clarified this point let us go to your other key, but failed, points.

"""""Emperor""""" Charly : a commemorative coin is no official document. Sure when Pope named him as such they would had minted such things. His state's coins were stating king, not emperor. His legal documents mentioned king. His descendants were kings not Emperors. The title """Emperor"""" is note in history in conjunction with Pope's failed effort to re-institute the long-defunct Western Roman Empire.

Holy Roman Empire : no more shit please : the full title applied on the riff-raff joke-of-a-state appears after 1200s and not in the 1000s of 1100s as often is mentioned in western historiography. The term "Empire" is a misuse of the term as it was a riff-raff collection of totally independent and often fighting with each other states (note: NOT CIVIL WARS within the same state but wars between states). The HRE term is kept in history as a practical joke summed up by Voltaire if I remember correctly : Not Holy, Not Roman and Not an Empire.

Otto I became Holy Roman Emperor on Februrary 2nd 962, succeeding Berengarius II of Italy, who had submitted to him in 961. The thing that changes is that the Germanic nation becomes the main one. If on your view Hellenic nation could do so, why not Germanic nation

First of all it is not my view, that is the historic reality. Second, claiming Germans could claim the "Roman" term is like claiming Indians could claim the term "Chinese Empire". Germans were not part of the Roman Empire and even when they - mostly ethnic Goths (Germanophone speaking an eastern germanic language but hardly any ethnic Germans) - joined in they had joined as Foederati and were banned from being Emperors, he reason why Stilicho, of Vandal father and Roman mother, could not become Emperor himself and, as a magister militum, he had to be ruled by weak western Emperor Valentinian II, then by Theodosios and then Honorius. On the contrary Greeks were part of the Roman Empire and were the first nation other than Latins who were massively given citizenship much prior to Caracalla's reforms in the 3rd century. Romans themselves acknowledged their own existence being interwoven with that of Greeks and that their Empire's civilizational base was the Greek civilization. With the transfer of capital from West to the East that happened not in 330 but in 285 and by (pagan and quite a staunch anti-christian and a latin-speaker) Emperor Diocletianus, the Greeks who already helf high offices in the regions eastern part of the Empire, not just in Greece but throughout Asia and North Africa, then they became the nation that manned the Empire's bureaucracy, the reason why already in Constantine's time all laws, typically written still in Latin, had to be instantly translated to Greek. So much this interwoving was going on that in the following centuries the terms "Greek" and "Roman" were being used interchangeably to the point that Latins were not anymore linked to the "Roman" term but rather to... Pope and the city of Rome only. "Roman" was a political term linked hence to Greeks. WHERE do the Germans fit in all that? They destroyed the western part and there was no Roman Empire there anymore. And then centuries later they jump up on the basis of occupying north Italy to claim what? Being Romans? LOL! Holy Chinese Empire... of Bollywood! Sure they used all the terms they liked to use but that has nothing to do with reality.

+Hans-Georg Lundahl

Now let us go back to gyros...

Indeed, St Peter Damian who was a trad preferred to eat

He was from Ravenna. One of the last vestiges of Eastern Roman rule in North Italy. Though he lived a couple of centuries after the end of that rule as such he only knew half the manners. LOL!

If you have ever eaten a hamburger, sausage or chicken without fork, you have been taught to eat like a Latin Frank.

I ignore how "Latin Franks" eat humburgers, sausage and chicken but I personally eat hamburgers with knife and fork, sausages with knife and fork (I eat these with hands only in a sandwich, just like the case of gyros) and chicken with knife and fork apart the leg for which I may use the hand if there is easy access to water or if I have to lift-off and go to another room to wash, I may as well use a napkin piece to hold it (but as said that is my own personal preference, it is not Savoir Vivre).

In fact, I didn't, I was of course willing to make Italy rather than Byzantium origin of the modern fork, but I checked. I did know a Western Medieval knight for centuries after 1056 was expected to use his fingers. I do not consider that as barbaric

Nor do I. I think you are losing the core issue here which is not to pinpoint the correct way to eat or which style is best, forks, sticks or hands whatever. The case is that the eating habits are one of the most basic civilizational traits and it happens that while European eating manners are derived by medieval Greeks, of the Eastern Roman Empire, popularized of course first in Italy and then in the rest of Europe not a single European knows about that. Not the slightest. And that is something extremely basic and extremely important. Not knowing something as basic as that cannot permit anyoen to claim he "knows about Byzantines". No western European knows about "Byzantines". Ask them on Roman Law and most will think Roman Law was the Law of Rome - I have seen this even in "historical documentaries" counted as the legacy of Rome, claiming to be serious! LOL!

But since you thought the issue was about cleanliness and filthyness in eating manners, there is tons of that stuff in medieval Greek literature as Greeks loved to describe how filthy were western Europeans, and in particular their aristocrats and royalties... fuck the Crusades, fuck the early Renaissance... as late as in the year 1400, i.e. well into the Renaissance, one of the last Eastern Roman Emperors, Emmanuel Paleologos did a tour reaching up to Britain to discuss the idea of another Crusade. The British - who back then were of the most progressive and fast-developing states in Europe - were not interested but were nontheless delighted in hosting an Emperor so their royalties (the king was Henry IV - raised in France in the manners of the... Franks! LOL!) outdid themselves to host him well and impress him with their feast. Needless to say it was a savegery.... Emmanuel left disgusted... dirty people, dirty hands, foods randomly on tables like a buffet on which everyone was attacking anyhow and anymeans, LOL! And lots of dogs and cats circulating around walking on tables and grabbing bits and parts. In Greece, even in the sad, destroyed Greece of 1400s not even in the lowliest of social settings would anyone see such a miserable picture. In year 1400 ... so imagine what was the case earlier! LOL!

It is fairly clear you indulge in a typical Byzantine (according to my experience) habit of overinterpretation

Over-interpretation? Exaggeration you mean?* You mean the 99,999% is an exaggeration? You may as well be right. In Europe alone (not counting European people living elsewhere) there are around 750,000,000 people. Subtract 10 million Greeks (even that I shouldn't as indeed more than half of Greeks ignore this issue too, the case of a faulty educational system designed from abroad). The 0,001% of 740,000,000 million Europeans is 740,000 souls. Which indeed is an over-exaggeration as European who know this issue are far fewer than that.

I mention this just to show how little you know on one of the most basic characteristics of your culture.

*

No, I don't mean that, overinterpretation and exaggeration are different things. Eisegesis is not hyperbole. I can't lecture him on everything.

Hans-Georg Lundahl

[answer divided on youtube into

three parts.]

First part:

"And bread is eaten with hands, not with spoon an fork"

Including if it involves gyros inside ... meaning, meat is not always eaten with fork.

"a commemorative coin is no official document."

Who says it was commemorative?

"Sure when Pope named him as such they would had minted such things."

It is not from Rome AD 800. It is from Mainz 812.

"His state's coins were stating king, not emperor."

Those minted before 800 (he acceeded the crown in 768, 1200 years before I was born), certainly.

"His legal documents mentioned king."

Dito.

"His descendants were kings"

Since he had three sons or grandsons, the two who were not emperor were kings.

"not Emperors."

True only of the ones who were NOT in the line already given, which seemingly you ignored.

"The HRE term is kept in history as a practical joke summed up by Voltaire if I remember correctly : Not Holy, Not Roman and Not an Empire."

Thanks for showing once again you are not a Christian.

After showing deplorable ignorance of history of HRE.

Christian Bohemia was as integral to HRE as Texas to US before the Civil War which had a centralising outcome. Poland and Hungary were as close to HRE as Guam and Philippines and Puerto Rico are to US.

"First of all it is not my view, that is the historic reality."

Not on the view of those who consider Byzantine as Un-Roman since ignorant of Latin.

"Second, claiming Germans could claim the "Roman" term is like claiming Indians could claim the term "Chinese Empire"."

More like saying Mongols and Manchurians could.

Vienna was a Roman Oppidum under Caesar Augustus.

"Germans were not part of the Roman Empire"

Germans were superficial newocomers in more than one part of HRE, even when imposing the language. Also, since Domitian, some Germans were part of Roman Empire. Look at Porta Nigra in Trier (if you visit or online).

"and even when they - mostly ethnic Goths (Germanophone speaking an eastern germanic language but hardly any ethnic Germans) - joined in they had joined as Foederati and were banned from being Emperors, he reason why Stilicho, of Vandal father and Roman mother, could not become Emperor himself and, as a magister militum, he had to be ruled by weak western Emperor Valentinian II, then by Theodosios and then Honorius."

You cannot equate either Austrians, of non-Germanic, ultimately Celtic, origin, or Franks with Goths or Vandals.

The status is not the same, since they are not the same historic entity.

"On the contrary Greeks were part of the Roman Empire"

Like later also Germans, before breakup. AND Celts, the origin of some parts of the Germanies.

"and were the first nation other than Latins who were massively given citizenship"

I thought non-Latin Italians were and later ... Celts, because that is how Julius Caesar got votes.

"Romans themselves acknowledged their own existence being interwoven with that of Greeks and that their Empire's civilizational base was the Greek civilization."

Not disputed. Note, it was a Greek civilisation as yet ignorant of using fork while eating. They ate meat like gyros is eaten in pita.

"With the transfer of capital from West to the East that happened not in 330 but in 285"

Rome was however restored as capital. AND if capital could be transferred to Constantinople, it could also be so to Aachen or Vienna.

"the reason why already in Constantine's time all laws, typically written still in Latin, had to be instantly translated to Greek."

As in HRE a Latin law was routinely translated to diverse dialects of German (in diverse chanceries).

"WHERE do the Germans fit in all that? They destroyed the western part and there was no Roman Empire there anymore."

That is false. You are missing the story of Syagrius and of Clovis. You are pretending Franks are Goths when Franks are NOT Goths.

"He was from Ravenna. One of the last vestiges of Eastern Roman rule in North Italy. Though he lived a couple of centuries after the end of that rule as such he only knew half the manners. LOL!"

Who says forks had been invented before Byzantium lost Ravenna?

"Nor do I. I think you are losing the core issue here which is not to pinpoint the correct way to eat or which style is best, forks, sticks or hands whatever. The case is that the eating habits are one of the most basic civilizational traits"

Laws and literature are more important, I'd say.

"and it happens that while European eating manners are derived by medieval Greeks, of the Eastern Roman Empire, popularized of course first in Italy and then in the rest of Europe not a single European knows about that. Not the slightest."

Apart from mistaking the origin as being Italian, I did.

I also happen to be European.

"Not knowing something as basic as that cannot permit anyoen to claim he "knows about Byzantines"."

Anyone can have a lacuna, no single lacuna can be made an excuse for "you know nothing".

"Ask them on Roman Law and most will think Roman Law was the Law of Rome - I have seen this even in "historical documentaries" counted as the legacy of Rome, claiming to be serious! LOL!"

I don't labour under the ignorance consider Codex Iuris Civilis by Justinian (from Constantinople) to have been in force in the times of Nero or Domitian. I do know, the original wording of "in incertum vagantes" was a warrant for making slaves out of beggars. In HRE it was reinterpreted so that a beggar was instead put in apprenticeship, unless he already knew two trades and had no chance of living off either, in which case he was allowed to beg.

Again, HRE more civilised than Byzantium. Need I get to castrate signers?

Castration was illegal in Austria, and the man who had offered Haydn to save his voice could have been put to prison by Haydn's father. Guess where it was most practised? Venice.

Again, what does "spadarius" mean?

"there is tons of that stuff in medieval Greek literature as Greeks loved to describe how filthy were western Europeans,"

It could be a topos among Pharisees and Pharisaically minded men, right?

"and in particular their aristocrats and royalties... fuck the Crusades, fuck the early Renaissance... as late as in the year 1400, i.e. well into the Renaissance, one of the last Eastern Roman Emperors, Emmanuel Paleologos did a tour reaching up to Britain to discuss the idea of another Crusade. The British - who back then were of the most progressive and fast-developing states in Europe - were not interested but were nontheless delighted in hosting an Emperor so their royalties (the king was Henry IV - raised in France in the manners of the... Franks! LOL!) outdid themselves to host him well and impress him with their feast. Needless to say it was a savegery.... Emmanuel left disgusted... dirty people, dirty hands, foods randomly on tables like a buffet on which everyone was attacking anyhow and anymeans,"

1400 was "well into the Renaissance" in Italy, not in England. (Britain is an anachronism, since England, Scotland and Ireland were three separate kingdoms).

It was also during 100 Years' War.

Any royalty had spent years in camps and on battlefields. Even in France, manners were arguably worse than earlier in the time of St Louis IX. However, I think part of what he may have reacted to was the very idea of a buffet.

"And lots of dogs and cats circulating around walking on tables and grabbing bits and parts."

Sounds Biblical. Matthew 15:27.

Walking on tables sounds like cats ...

"The 0,001% of 740,000,000 million Europeans is 740,000 souls. Which indeed is an over-exaggeration as European who know this issue are far fewer than that."

I'd definitely say there are layers of people where historical knowledge is no big thing in the first place.

Panos A

+Hans-Georg Lundahl Look idiot, you are not going to convince anyone with your blabbering talk ... Roman Law existing under Nero or Domitian... idiot you have no clue of what is Roman Law. It is NOT the legal system of Old Rome which was a patchwork that covered over the earlier borrowing of the Attic Code of Law. Roman Law does not refer to single laws idiot, it refers to the COOOODDDDEEE of Laws, it is a whole work behind to rationalize the justice system. Hand-picking laws and claiming this or that existed under Nero will get you nowhere. Sure, the law that forbids murder exists since before the code of laws of Hamurabi. So what?

Again, HRE more civilised than Byzantium. Need I get to castrate signers

Oh you found castration (a millenia old practice all over the world... ) to claim the Unholy Unroman Notempire as more civilized than the Eastern Roman Empire? Idiot, the Eastern Roman Empire had a more educated population than your country currently has. There has never been any Empire, any state, any culture that has been more admired in its days than that of Constantinople, not ancient Rome, not even ancient Athens, forget about the rest. The Holy Roman Empire was a pile of nothingness, made out of a massive illiterate mass ruled by modestly educated (you know... the basics...) oligarchs who were basically run by the Venetians.

Try better next time.

Hans-Georg Lundahl

"Look idiot, you are not going to convince anyone with your blabbering talk"

Reading is a synaesthesia ... but you push it very far into some delirium about how I sound and you seem to omit reading the actual words.

"Roman Law existing under Nero or Domitian... idiot you have no clue of what is Roman Law."

I made fairly clear it was not I who imagined that, but my adversaries in discussions - your equals in condescension, your inferiors about Roman Law knowledge.

"It is NOT the legal system of Old Rome which was a patchwork that covered over the earlier borrowing of the Attic Code of Law."

I am, as I already explained, well aware that Codex Iuris Civilis comes from Justinian who ruled in Constantinople.

"Roman Law does not refer to single laws idiot, it refers to the COOOODDDDEEE of Laws, it is a whole work behind to rationalize the justice system. Hand-picking laws and claiming this or that existed under Nero will get you nowhere."

The one law I did handpick in order to confer how it applied under Justinian and how it applied under Holy Roman Emperor had nothing to do with Nero.

My point was, it had one wording in Justinian's original, which was slave-hunting and one application in Holy Roman Empire which was not so.

"Oh you found castration (a millenia old practice all over the world... ) to claim the Unholy Unroman Notempire as more civilized than the Eastern Roman Empire? Idiot, the Eastern Roman Empire had a more educated population than your country currently has."

So, you imagine of two places and times, one has more reading skills (something you are not showing, but you could blame the non-Greek half) and the other has no legal possibility to castrate anyone, even if it is sometimes circumvented ... and your criterium for civilisation is such that the reading skills are more important?

Since, as the Classics professor we listened to said (or perhaps I only read his subtitles), the backbone of Byzantine civilisation was a transcendental view of the world, of life, in occurrence a Christian one, civilisation should be judged by how Christian it was. Lacking reading skills is far less of a blemish than castration. HRE was more Holy than Byzantine Empire.

Panos A

Since, as the Classics professor we listened to said (or perhaps I only read his subtitles), the backbone of Byzantine civilisation was a transcendental view of the world, of life, in occurrence a Christian one, civilisation should be judged by how Christian it was

Blah blah blah... meanwhile back in reality, those you call idiotically `````byzantines````` went to school at the tender age of 6 learning the alphabet and reading on the Iliad. Of course in your culture - which is merely a local culture, not a civilization - you have never produced such works so a direct comparison would not be possible but still, there has never been a single germanic school where schoolchildren learnt to read directly on Goethe or Schiller. Greek kids in the Middle Ages did it, directly on Homer. Iliad and Oddysey. Bitch (to bring it down to your semi-illiterate level).

Idiot, there has never been a civilization that matched the Eastern Roman`s citizens`average educational level. Ever. Not even ancient Greeks - speaking on average - had attained that refinement. Your 18th century baroc-oco poets and writers are caricatures - your own greatest philosopher, little Friedrich, admitted so. Above I had shown you that you pathetically ignored even where you got your own eating habits, as said, it is useless to even having this conversation with you whem you try to compare World Cup level teams with your 3rd division village teams... Holy Roman Empire - the best joke of European history. LOL!

Hans-Georg Lundahl

"Blah blah blah... meanwhile back in reality,"

Look, reality is not a nickname for your own idiosyncrasies.

"those you call idiotically `````byzantines````` went to school at the tender age of 6 learning the alphabet and reading on the Iliad."

And Homer who never learned to write would have been horrified at what Byzantines were doing at other levels. Like gouging or castration, for two.

"Of course in your culture - which is merely a local culture, not a civilization - you have never produced such works"

Virgil's Aeneid and anonymous poet's Beowulf are not such works - how?

Anonymous poet's Nibelungen is not such a work - how?

Or were you unaware these works exist? And that where they were written, you did not have any spadarius anymore than whereever Homer made the Iliad.

"so a direct comparison would not be possible but still, there has never been a single germanic school where schoolchildren learnt to read directly on Goethe or Schiller."

There have been over Frankish kingdom and Roman Empire where they went from Disticha Catonis to Phaedrus, from Phaedrus to Hexameters of some Virgil, Prudentius, Statius.

"Greek kids in the Middle Ages did it, directly on Homer. Iliad and Oddysey. Bitch (to bring it down to your semi-illiterate level)."

And Latin Franks did it on Latin ... as for your epithet abut me, I am not the one using "blah blah" or "idiot" or "back in reality" or things, you are the one doing so, and you just added one.

"Idiot, there has never been a civilization that matched the Eastern Roman`s citizens`average educational level. Ever. "

Another "idiot" and again from Mister Savoir Vivre à la Nouvelle Rome ...

You gave me that "statistic" once before, and I asked how you did statistics about how many OF the East Romans actually did go to school and actually did acquire this proficiency. You did not answer then ...

"Not even ancient Greeks - speaking on average - had attained that refinement."

And how do you get an average for Ancient Greece? It was not even one single state with one single educational system ...

"Your 18th century baroc-oco poets and writers are caricatures - your own greatest philosopher, little Friedrich, admitted so."

I actually do not know whom you call our greatest philosopher "Friedrich" ... do you mean Nietzsche?

I am NOT Prussian, I do NOT consider either Nietzsche or Schopenhauer as "my" philosophers, they are NORTH of the Danube border. I was born in Vienna, where Marcus Aurelius died, and my greatest philosophers are Sts Thomas Aquinas, Bonaventura, Albert of Saxony, as well as Bishop Étienne Tempier ...

I also do not consider either Schiller or Goethe as being as great as Aeneid or ... Tolkien. If no German schoolboy on German schools learned German directly from them, it is because:

• when German became learning language, the idea of Classics as the very basics was gone;
• Homer has a grammar simpler than that of Classic Attic, Goethe has a grammar more complex than Grimmelshausen (who, let's be fair, was NOT a Prussian either).

"Above I had shown you that you pathetically ignored even where you got your own eating habits"

One of them, with some degree of ignorance - which you show too if you imagine that eating with fork is sth which had been lost between Exarchate of Ravenna and St Peter Damien.

It is a Byzantine invention. Like eating with chop sticks is a Chinese one. It is not Ancient Greek and not Ancient Roman.

Any fork from Augustus' time was as different from a table fork as a ladle is from a spoon. It was used for serving boiled meat without giving too much liquid. It was not put into anyone's mouth. It is Medieval Franks, Latins, who better preserved Old Roman eating habits, though now we are Byzantinised.

"whem you try to compare World Cup level teams with your 3rd division village teams"

If you think of size, how about comparing the extent of Charles V of Holy Roman Empire with that of the last Palaeologus?

But I am not into size. I am into gentleness. That is why I value things like:

• no slavery
• no gouging
• no castration

and these things are earlier on in Francia than in Byzantium.

If Anyone Thinks I am or will be a Mason ...

Sorry to promote a Masonic channel, by linking to a video on it, but it is needed to clear my name.

How to Identify Freemasons
What is a Mason | Ajoutée le 11 mars 2018
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ErZsAiz4Pws

Generally : get out of that damned thing!

[more specific comments:]

So, at 4:07, if a fellow Catholic Antimason pretends to identify me as a Mason, he needs to watch this video, I haven't done any of above to get identified as a Mason, right?

5:16 Or the good person, if such, could be a Catholic.

So, if a Mason tries to identify me as a Mason by some flattery about my moral shape, he also needs to watch this video, right?

6:34 Seriously guys!

We Catholics have our modes of recognition called Symbol of the Faith.

If you recite the Apostolic Creed and don't SAY outright you are a Mason - not you, I already saw the video - I'll take you for a Catholic.

But you seem to need to learn "modes of recognition" and "being tried" in absurdum and that not from any "clergyman" but from the one you trust most or are closest to.

Reminds me of Saunière's rose on the door in Dan Brown's novel.

What a horrible culture of secrecy. Even supposing you don't have some dirty secret (I would not absolutely bet on it, but let's give you the benefit of the doubt), you can be sure such a culture of secrecy leads to others having them - and getting them protected.

7:07 So before you help a guy, you make sure he is a brother and before he accepts help from you he makes sure you are one?

S e r i o u s l y ... Mussolini had a point in suppressing freemasonry, unfortunately somewhat mingled with making Fascism a parallel one:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Suppression_of_Freemasonry#Italy

8:26 No need to thank me for continued support. I am not a supporter.

I am obviously sharing this outside anything called lodge as best as I can ...

M 77
U 85 150 12
S 83 230 15
S 83 310 18
O 79 380 27
L 76 450 33
I 73 520 36
N 78 590 44
I 73 660 47 = 707

Hand signs and hand shakes of Freemasons That they use in Court
Raise a Little AL | Ajoutée le 25 juin 2017
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eaf6Lvn9_FU

A) 1:33 "are you travelling"

That would mean, someone who was travelling in a literal sense, because he was homeless, could answer "yes" and be taken for a freemason?

Even without the handshake (I cut connections with a man who gave me a funny handshake), if they reported this ...

Obviously, for a long time I have answered no, I am in and around Paris, which is the truth.

B) In other words, if Mark Shea likes to whisper "hail hydra", we cannot say he is a Mason, but he is in somewhat bad company? Knights of Columbus being that.

Why do anti-theists act like Young-Earth Creationism is the only valid interpretation of Genesis? (quora)

Q

Why do anti-theists act like Young-Earth Creationism is the only valid interpretation of Genesis?
https://www.quora.com/Why-do-anti-theists-act-like-Young-Earth-Creationism-is-the-only-valid-interpretation-of-Genesis/answer/Hans-Georg-Lundahl

Context link:

Where Young Earth Creationism Gets the Bible Wrong
GodAndScienceOrg | 9.XII.2013
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S2InalJfkEo

Answer requested

by Lyra Heartfold

Hans-Georg Lundahl

Studied religions as curious parallels and contrasts to Xtian faith since 9, 10?

Answered Feb 19, 2018

I cannot answer for anti-theists, but I can say that if they do, they have good reasons.

• It is prima facie good exegesis;
• It is historically the not just predominant but universal exegesis, the other one being a very recent accomodation to what Young Earth Creationists do not recognise as real discoveries.

Updates with possible comments on video will, if so, be posted here./HGL

How much of English is Indo-European? (quora)

Q

How much of English is Indo-European?
https://www.quora.com/How-much-of-English-is-Indo-European/answer/Hans-Georg-Lundahl

Hans-Georg Lundahl Self Employed at Writer and Composer

Answered Feb 21, 2018

As I said in the comment, the question used to be “What is the significance of indo-European parentage to the growth of English?” - I have translated it to “How much of English is Indo-European?” which is more comprehensible in linguistic terms.

Now, English is mainly Germanic and Romance, and both of these are Indo-European language groups, but, both Germanic and Italic / Latin / Romance have traits which are not traceable to Indo-European commonalities or possible Proto-Language.

So, the question really boils down to, how much is Germanic Indo-European in the items kept in English (vocabulary and other) and how much is Romance Indo-European in the items borrowed by English.

For Germanic, it seems vocabulary is 20 - 50 % only Indo-European.

For Romance, I confess I do not know the proportions, the article (I have forgotten where I read it) only spoke about the Germanic part.

And on top of that, how much is there of each in English.

“I will lay down my sword and shield and study war no more”

Germanic and Indo-European:

“I will … my … no more”

Germanic and not clearly Indo-European:

“lay down … sword and shield and … war”

Romance:

“… study …”

And I am not sure if there is an Indo-European cognate for that one or if it is restricted to Latin.

Was Odin a Hebrew?

The Sun, the Moon, and Stars in Norse Myth
Jackson Crawford | 29.III.2018
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=msWoMpyENGA

I

4:05 So, from Voluspá, there is a kind of presumption that Sun and Moon at least (perhaps stars too) are personal, but are servants.

Not masters. They are awaiting orders at the beginning.

Also, they will die.

This is very coherent with Jewish and Christian (not modern Evangelical, but early Christian up to Medieval and Early Modern) thoughts on celestial objects, on the "personifying" side.

They are servants of the one God. And at the end of the world, they will give up shining as they usually do. "Consensus" by the time of St Thomas Aquinas on the Western Latin Christian side was, celestial bodies are in themselves inanimate but moved by angels. Other options : inanimate and moved by God alone, animate in themselves (condemned by Tempier, but probably more accepted on the Jewish side), or, among philosophers of vaguely Averroistic bent, animate but irrational in themselves (like horses) and guided by rational angels obeying God (like Árvakr et Alsviðr in the case of Sól).

In French wiki, Skinfaxi is ridden by Dagr and Hrimfaxi by Nott.

Not by Sun and Moon ...

References are for Árvakr et Alsviðr : Gylfaginning, Grímnismál et Volsunga saga, Sigrdrifumal; for Skinfaxi and Hrimfaxi : Vafþrúðnismál, Gylfaginning.

Did some wikipedian miscite or misconstrue the meaning of them?

1) En goðin reiddust þessu ofdrambi ok tóku þau systkin ok settu upp á himin, létu Sól keyra þá hesta, er drógu kerru sólarinnar, þeirar er goðin höfðu skapat til at lýsa heimana af þeiri síu, er flaug ór Múspellsheimi. Þeir hestar heita svá, Árvakr ok Alsviðr, en undir bógum hestanna settu goðin tvá vindbelgi at kæla þá, en í sumum fræðum er þat kallat ísarnkol

2) Árvakr ok Alsvíþr,
þeir skulu upp héðan
sval svangir sól draga;
en und þeira bógum
fálu blíð regin,
æsir ísarn kol.

3) Dans la Völsunga saga, Brunehilde informe Sigurðr que des runes de l'esprit, associées à la sagesse, sont coupées sur la tête d'Alsviðr.

4) Sigrdrífumál strophe 15

_______________
1)

Skinfaxi heitir
er inn skíra dregr
dag um dróttmögu;
hesta beztr
þykkir hann með reiðgotom,
ey lýsir mön af mari.

2)

Hrímfaxi heitir,
er hverja dregr
nótt of nýt regin;
méldropa fellir hann
morgin hvern;
þaðan kemr dögg um dala.

___________________

My impression is, compatibly with the creation account in Genesis 1, day and night are prior entities to Sun and Moon, or at least independent of them.

Skinfaxi gives daylight over blue sky, Hrimfaxi gives darkness of night, Sun decorates the daylight and Moon gives some light contrasting with the darkness.

Obviously, Hrimfaxi dripping dew when drooling, that image is independent of whether there is full moon or no visible moon the night, it has to do with temperature, not moonlight, which would have been obvious to Norse pagans too.

II

4:56 If the smith wanted the sun and the moon and Freya, well, he seems to have wanted slaves?

III

5:42 Your citation of Second Merseburg Charm ...

Text:

Phol ende uuodan uuorun zi holza.
du uuart demo balderes uolon sin uuoz birenkit.
thu biguol en sinthgunt, sunna era suister;
thu biguol en friia, uolla era suister;
thu biguol en uuodan, so he uuola conda:
sose benrenki, sose bluotrenki, sose lidirenki:
ben zi bena, bluot si bluoda,
lid zi geliden, sose gelimida sin!

Translation from wiki:

Phol and Wodan were riding to the woods,
and the foot of Balder's foal was sprained
So Sinthgunt, Sunna's sister, conjured it.
and Frija, Volla's sister, conjured it.
and Wodan conjured it, as well he could:
Like bone-sprain, so blood-sprain,
so joint-sprain:
Bone to bone, blood to blood,
joints to joints, so may they be mended.

For one thing, Sunna herself is not seen as conjuring anything, and for another, nobody is directly in the charm mentioned as a god to whom sacrifice or worship is due.

In other words, Sun being a person doesn't equal Sun being worshipped - as with Hebrews and Christians.

Also, the context seems to imply a presence of Aesir on a somewhat anecdotic basis, supporting the background scenario in Gylfaginning - a man came along and actually claimed to have created the Earth some time ago, claimed - now Merseburg - this lady in his company was the sister of the Sun and so on ...

IV

8:23 Colorado, like Sweden, like Holy Land, would in Hebrew be an Eretz.

The word is also used for Earth.

My bet, Thorr was legitimate son of Odin, and the epithet "Hann er sonur Óðins og Jarðar", could be a bad translation of Ben HaEretz.

Obviously an Earth-actual-goddess is really not stated at all in Norse myth.

"Jörð er í norrænni goðafræði móðir Þórs, en hann eignaðist hún með Óðni. Ennfremur nefnd Fjörgyn."

Mother of Thor may have a name meaning Earth, but she is not associated with upkeeping or life or fertility of Earth, as far as we can see.

Earth being inanimate is also a trait Norse myth has in common with Hebrews, Christians and Ancient Near East myths of Mesopotamia, as far as I can see.

For once, ONE FOR ISRAEL Ministries are Wrong on Some Points

Inquisition, Crusades & Pogroms, really are from Jesus?
ONE FOR ISRAEL Ministry | 14.I.2018
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ITM_FCP1NrE

I

Is the blood libel a horrible deed against your people (part of my own ancestry too)?

Or are child murders a horrible deed by extreme Jews who hated Christians so much they wanted to "execute" a Christian guilty of no other thing (they could have considered that any Christian past puberty was stoneable for other offenses and so wanted as young and innocent a Christian as possible)?

Or were they done by a synagogue of Satan in the sense of Molochists, hidden by the Jews, within Jewry, but not being part of it?

We do know very well that Andrew Ochs[n]er was found killed in a way resembling kosher slaughter of lambs, we also know he was before that frequent guest in a Jewish home, before being killed, so, while he was a Christian boy, it is likely he had some Jewish ancestry and could therefore be "justiceable" by Jews.

Note, the Christian interpretation of Genesis 49:10 means that as Jews had lost the right to public execution (even kept in Babylonian captivity, see Daniel 13) by the Romans, the Messiah had to come before that.

And it could be some intrigue on part of Jews was claiming, first through Pagan Imperial executioners and then through these child murders that no, the sceptre (and sovereignty, and right to execute capital punishment) was still with Judah.

As you may know, one Ariel Toaff wrote a book with an admission of the blood libel, on his theory extreme Jews. More like hate crimes. He was more or less forced to take it back.

Oh, red matsoth were not for food consumption, I am not claiming there was a confusion involving Christian human blood to be kosher (though some might have pretended so in a tit-for-tat accusation against the Eucharist), but the perpetrators knew they could not transport the body of Andrew Ochser, and so red matsoth would have been used for documentation (before you had cameras and internet tweets).

Dear St Andrew Ochs[n]er, pray for us and for the conversion of the Jews!

I think the rabbi who fed feces to children would very probably be one argument for the existence of the kind of extreme hatemongers within Jewry I envisage as culpable for killing of Bl Andrew Ochser and Simon of Trent.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Andreas_Oxner

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Simon_of_Trent

Quoting from the latter:

"Town magistrates arrested eighteen Jewish men and five Jewish women on the charge of ritual murder — the killing of a Christian child in order to use his blood in Jewish religious rites."

Note, the part of "religious rites" may come from a false confession previously planted to give Christians a confusion about the exact nature of these proceedings. Have you read Da Vinci Code? Saunière to his killer confesses a false secret.

So, obviously, using Christian blood in a Pesach rite is not kosher. But, if someone had planted this info, this could involve an attempt to hide the real nature of the proceeding.

If they wanted to make it out they publically executed Simon of Trent for being a Christian, they would consider within the Synagogue as public enough, and consider whether Christians knew it was an execution or not didn't matter.

Or would you disagree on the Talmudic attitude to Christians?

Similarily, if it was a recurring band of Molochists, they would have needed Christians to suspect normal Jews in order to keep Jewish solidarity sheltering them from Christians.

Note, it is also possible that people sent on a mission to kill a toddler were already criminals among the Jews and Jewish justice used Gentile justice to dispose of them.

II

2:02 The common people did have access to Holy Scriptures up to 800 in a Latin pronounced basically as they spoke, and when Latin pronunciation was restored to a few centuries older and became incomprehensible, the Gospel reading was each Sunday and Holiday by a decision in 813 translated in what is the origin of the compulsory sermon.

Ostendite mihi numisma census. At illi obtulerunt ei denarium. (from Matthew 22)

Pronounced before 800 (fair linguistic guess):

Ostenditz-mei nümisma tsens. At li optulayrent ey denier.

Pronounced from 800 in Gospel reading:

Ostenditay meehee noomisma tsensoos. At illee optulayroont e-ee denahrioom.

After the ritual thanking Christ for the Gospel, the priest would, from 813 on say (also, fair linguistic guess):

Ostenditay meehee noomisma tsensoos. Tso est, ostenditz-mei la moneye le tsens.
At illee optulayroont e-ee denahrioom. Tso est, meis li monstrayrent ey ün denier.

[Pikardy, like Italy would have pronounced chens, chensoos, rather than tsens, tsensoos]

Not only popular pronunciation, previously to 800 the correct one, but also replacing the less known old words with more usual ones. And adding definite articles, which aren't there in Latin (they were taken over by calque from Greek, Hebrew or Arabic later than St Jerome's translation). Perhaps even indefinite articles too.

A priest who missed this part could get imposed to fast if it was occasional, or he could be deposed from parish service, and confined in a monastery, where his reading Mass involved one server who also was too bad at Latin to give a good translation, or not. Arguably, most priests were able to and did comply.

2:06 The average Christian could not read the New Testament on his own. Technically correct.

Some have argued an average Galilaean in Our Lord's time would not have been able to read the Old Testament on his own.

Arguably, if he couldn't, he didn't have to. If he went to Synagogue on the Sabbath (not a command by Moses, by the way), after a reading in Hebrew there might be some comment in Aramaic. A Targum on the meaning of the text would be appropriate if the audience included people not able to read Hebrew.

When Our Lord had read from Isaiah, either the Gospel doesn't mention the Targum part, or, it was not needed, because everyone in that particular synagogue either knew Hebrew or the text well enough to know what Our Lord meant, when He added his explanation of what Isaiah had prophecied.

III

2:38 Jews were widely impopular for economic reasons (read up on how debtors were tied to creditors and on how much interest Jews could charge when they were allowed that business).

This means that some people had a real itch to beat Jews to death.

What religious leaders at least in Western Europe have done was try to limit this.

After a pogrom in 1300's in Germany, a monk chronicling the events and with a very large sympathy for this popular hatred and very little sympathy for the Jews was writing things like "unfortunately we simply can't kill off all Jews, God has reserved Himself to use them later on," and references to both conversion of some and their adherence to Antichrist of others were either given or omitted as already known "but let us pray that up to then, they may find a land far from good Christians where they may live on their own".

Any Jew in New York or Tel Aviv can verify New York is across the Atlantic and Tel Aviv is across the Mediterranean, as the German Antisemite had prayed for ...

Violent and evil Christians ... not sure they were more violent and evil than a synagogue who in a pogrom (I recall it was even the one recorded by the antisemite) on being given the alternative to convert or die set fire on their own synagogue, so as to prevent conversions by weakness - or [than] the killers of blessed Andreas or Simon.

I mean, punching a Jew on the nose on Good Friday is not good, but it is less bad than such acts.

3:22 I would hardly consider a Catholic delivered up to child killing or Russian Revolution and its aftermath (Jews in Cheka were killing in Ukraine some months before what is now considered breakout of WW-II, before the death of Pius XI) were less disciples or less Jewish than the ones standing before Christ in Matthew 24:9.

3:40 How binding do you consider Matthew 5:39 is to an average Christian when it is far beyond just the striking on the cheek?

Do you consider Christian civil authorities have a right or duty to defend Christians, if for instance a toddler is killed for being Christian?

3:55 Matthew 5:44 was spoken to the chosen disciples.

And seeing the multitudes, he went up into a mountain, and when he was set down, his disciples came unto him.

On another occasion (Luke 6), perhaps an hour later same day, He was speaking to a multitude:

And all the multitude sought to touch him, for virtue went out from him, and healed all. And he, lifting up his eyes on his disciples, said: Blessed are ye poor, for yours is the kingdom of God.

No going up to a mountain this time. Here he is not saying: pray for them that persecute and calumniate you as to the chosen disciples, but Bless them that curse you, and pray for them that calumniate you

Meaning, ordinary Christians are not necessarily called to put up with persecution, if there is a possibility for defense. That also seems implied in a warfare going on in Apocalypse - as where presumably both sides make use of weapons of the kind that physically hurt and kill.

4:27 As you mention Romans, how about chapter 13, where St Paul says "the magistrate beareth not his sword in vain"?

5:55 It is dubious to interpret "his brother" in [1 John 2:9] as including persecutors, including Christ-rejecting Jews who persecute Christians.

In fact, the very same John in Apocalypse received words about them that say they are Jews and are not, but are the synagogue of Satan.

And in Gospel, instead of quoting words of Jesus involving a vocative to Pharisees and Sadducees, and whoever, he instead omits what Jesus called them and starts the quote by "and Jesus spoke to the Jews and said" - implying the Christ-rejecting Jews are NOT our brothers. Especially not if persecuting Christians.

IV

8:13 Have you conferred Deuteronomy 28 with Matthew 28?

The covenant in Deuteronomy 28 is conditional, because God knows Jews will reject Him.

The covenant in Matthew 28 is not stated in conditional but in categoric terms.

Therefore, unlike the old nation of Israel, the Church that Jesus founded is indefectible. Individual members may indeed be in a state of mortal sin (sometimes involving a pogrom against a Jew), but the Apostles are always there with Christ to guide His Church and that specifically in their successors, as before 10 days had passed, Judas got a successor.

So Moses and Josue went and stood in the tabernacle of the testimony: And the Lord appeared there in the pillar of a cloud, which stood in the entry of the tabernacle. And the Lord said to Moses: Behold thou shalt sleep with thy fathers, and this people rising up will go a fornicating after strange gods in the land, to which it goeth in to dwell: there will they forsake me, and will make void the covenant, which I have made with them, And my wrath shall be kindled against them in that day: and I will forsake them, and will hide my face from them, and they shall be devoured: all evils and afflictions shall find them, so that they shall say in that day: In truth it is because God is not with me, that these evils have found me. But I will hide, and cover my face in that day, for all the evils which they have done, because they have followed strange gods.

Can the same thing happen to the Church Christ founded?

Could for instance the Catholic Church have been following strange gods in the days of the Inquisition and so on?

Well, not unless there is another Church with better claim to continue since Apostles.

See here:

And the eleven disciples went into Galilee, unto the mountain where Jesus had appointed them. And seeing him they adored: but some doubted. And Jesus coming, spoke to them, saying: All power is given to me in heaven and in earth. Going therefore, teach ye all nations; baptizing them in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost. Teaching them to observe all things whatsoever I have commanded you: and behold I am with you all days, even to the consummation of the world.

This means, the Apostolic Church, whichever it is, cannot have failed as Old Testament Judaism failed, sometimes wholesale all or nearly all of the people, and at one important point 2000 years ago, in those who rejected Christ - and His Church.

9:47 Confer the perverse generation in [Deuteronomy 32:20] which is echoed more than once by Our Lord [Matthew 17:16], [Luke 9:41] AND by St Peter [Acts Of Apostles 2:40] with [Matthew 24:34] and [Mark 13:30] and [Luke 21:32] - presumably referring to the generation of the Catholic Church, which has not passed since those words were said.

The generation that will not pass, that is.

[Matthew 23:37] would imply a hint on why Roman rather than Hierosolymite Church is the mother and teacher of all Churches. (Roman Catholics claim this for Rome, some at least Greek Orthodox for Jerusalem).

In AD 70 (or whenever Titus came), the Church obeyed Christ's words of fleeing to the mountains, so they fled to Pella.

There are more places than one that are called Pella. No, it is not to 40° 45′ 36″ N, 22° 31′ 09″ E that they fled, a place in Ancient Macedon and modern Greece. Nor 35° 25′ 00″ North, 36° 23′ 00″ East, better known as Apamaea. It is to 32° 26′ 57″ N, 35° 36′ 54″ E that they fled, to what is now Tabaqat Fahil or Tell al-Hosn in Jordan, and was in ancient times part of Edom, Moab and Ammon - fulfilling Isaiah 11:14.

As to "fly upon the shoulders of the Philistines by the sea" (same verse) that might mean Romans (culturally related to Greeks and Philistines, worshippers of Dagon / Poseidon) were chasing the Church so closely, some of them were even able to touch the shoulders of Romans - or that they sometimes behaved better to Christians fleeing Jerusalem (obeying both Christ and Titus) than to Jews (who were disobeying Titus after saying "we have no king but Caesar" when disobeying Christ).

V

12:53 I cannot agree to compare Crusades and Inquisition to Holocaust.

At all.

I cannot agree to consider people taking part in Crusades or Inquisition as automatically evil people.

Some incidental acts by the Crusades (massacre of Jerusalem which Godfrey of Bouillon tried to stop and finally did stop) or of Inquisition (like the episcopal Inquisition by a bishop Cauchon of Beavais trying St Joan of Arc or by some English bishops considering people as Lollards simply for having some Bible access or access to prayers in English), yes.

But you cannot condemn the Kingdom of Judah because Herod massacred the innocents, and you cannot condemn Aaronite priesthood because Kaiaphas perpetrated the so far most ultimate rebellion against God.

Similarily with Christians states and with the priesthood of the New Covenant, including when at war against infidels (for some other reason than them just not being believers!) in Crusades on the state side or in Inquisition on the Church side.

13:39 Indeed I do love Israel, first and foremost, in honour if not personal closeness, Christian Palestinians, who are the remnants of the earliest Jewish and Samarian part of the Church.

And next, people like you and ...

Israeli News Live
https://www.youtube.com/user/BenDeNoon

Those of Jewish or Muslim confession come after and proportionally to their peace with or love for Christians.

Were Byzantines Better?

Tunc abeuntes pharisaei, consilium inierunt ut caperent eum in sermone. Et mittunt ei discipulos suos cum Herodianis, dicentes : Magister, scimus quia verax es, et viam Dei in veritate doces, et non est tibi cura de aliquo : non enim respicis personam hominum : dic ergo nobis quid tibi videtur, licet censum dare Caesari, an non? Cognita autem Jesus nequitia eorum, ait : Quid me tentatis hypocritae? Ostendite mihi numisma census. At illi obtulerunt ei denarium. Et ait illis Jesus : Cujus est imago haec, et superscriptio? Dicunt ei : Caesaris. Tunc ait illis : Reddite ergo quae sunt Caesaris, Caesari : et quae sunt Dei, Deo.

Victor D. Hanson: The Byzantine Empire and Immigration
PhilosophyInsights | 2.IV.2018
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zWR9lGEB7Xk

I

Hans-Georg Lundahl

I wonder, is he really that sure that "the West" fell and Byzantium "survived" 1000 years between 476 and 1453?

There is a reason why Charles the Great was crowned emperor in 800, on Christmas day.

First there had been the Iconoclasts. The Papal reaction to that was to give Venice leave to pay no more taxes to Byzantine Emperors. You don't need to finance a persecutor.

THEN "Emperor" Irene (Empress means only Empress a consort, not a reigning Empress, in Byzantium, the ruler's title is masculine even if it is a woman who is ruling, unlike in the West) makes Orthodoxy triumph over Iconoclasm.

Part of that triumph is beating her son in a military way. And after he is beaten, he is punished.

Now - here is the problem, in 800 people tended to think of that punishment as fairly barbaric. It was blinding, as Assyrians had done with a King of Judah (or so I recall).

When Iconoclasts were ruling, one could say "OK, when the Emperor is Orthodox, he's an authority again". But after Iconoclasm, the barbarism of blinding someone ... "well, no, rather not, actually".

I think it was the West which was more civilised in 800, despite certain accomplishments where it was behind Byzantium as yet (like in Greek or in Medicine or in some other ways).

1:12 - 1:53
"How did Western civilisation, Christianity, survive in that hostile climate in the East for thousand years after the fall of the West to that "black Tuesday" is what we say in Greece today of May 29 1453? And I think the answer is that what kept Byzantium alive was not their material riches, but people believed in a transcendence, in this case it was Christianity, the Hellenic language and Western civilisation, they thought ... they didn't think it was perfect, but they thought it was better than the alternative outside the Byzantine Empire, whether it was the Seljuk Turks later, the Ottomans, the Huns, whoever they were, they thought they were better than the alternative, and they were willing to make enormous sacrifices, and articulate that again and again ..."

[next phrase is garbled by the subtitling]

Now, I hope that as Christians they thought Hellenic language and Byzantine Empire better than the alternative, not that as Hellenoglots and Byzantines they thought Christianity "not perfect but better than the alternative".

If it was the latter, that explains why Byzantium became less civilised than Latin West.

For in the case of the Latin West, it was a question of : as precisely Christians they thought the Latin West not perfect, but better than the alternative, whether Islamic or even after a while Byzantine.

And on the principle given, you cannot take the material accomplishments of Byzantium as proof they were more civilised.

2:08 - 2:30
"if you don't believe that you are better than the alternative, nobody else will, and there is no reason for you to continue and it has to be plenty psychologically, and so all of you in this room, we have a duty, each according to our station, each day we have to say to ourselves, the United States is better than the alternative, and what in my own way can I do to remind people of that?"

Well, I don't think one has to believe one is better than the alternative if one isn't.

One Empress or Imperial princess (brother of Emperor) condemned Florence Council.

"But we must do that to save the Empire"
"I'd rather my brother lost my brother's Empire than we all lose the faith"

I don't think she was right about [Council of] Florence losing the faith, but her attitude was no breach of duty.

However, for the time being, US actually is better than most ... thank you, Donald! In part.

(adjusting the last words of quote, where my memory was not freshly accurate)

Of course, US would be better if you banned abortion.

Panos A

+Hans-Georg Lundahl
I wonder, is he really that sure that "the West" fell and Byzantium "survived" 1000 years between 476 and 1453

The Western part of the Empire disintegrated. The Eastern part which largely coincided with the Hellenic world continued for a millenium (3 times the duration of the previous Roman Empire) and it did so in a much more dangerous world than what the previous Empire of Rome had experienced. Show a little more respect to Byzantines.

There is a reason why Charles the Great was crowned emperor in 800, on Christmas day

LOL! Try now to explain why all his successors were not Emperors? Charles was crowned as "Emperor" only after the Pope wanted to create a new enemy against his arch-rival the Patriarch of Constantinople. Reality is that Charles himself did not even want the title knowing it would drag the ire of the real Roman Emperor at Constantinople, which it did : his envoy was bitch-slapped an sent back tied inversely on a donkey for having uttered little Charles as "Roman Emperor", and little Charles NEVER used the title. It is later western European re-writing of history (particularly the French...) who re-invented Charles as a "Roman Emperor" when he never really used the title. A bit like the Holy Roman Empire which supposedly was founded around the 11th century but the title itself appears well after 1204 (i.e. the date of the real demise of the Eastern Roman (Byzantine) Empire, not 1453).

First there had been the Iconoclasts

Division between Popes and Patriarchs LONG PREDATED iconoclasm

The Papal reaction to that was to give Venice leave to pay no more taxes to Byzantine Emperors

On the contrary, Venice remained as a Byzantine protectorate well into the 1000s.

You don't need to finance a persecutor

Whom did Byzantines persecute in Italy? LOL!

THEN "Emperor" Irene (Empress means only Empress a consort, not a reigning Empress, in Byzantium, the ruler's title is masculine even if it is a woman who is ruling, unlike in the West) makes Orthodoxy triumph over Iconoclasm. Part of that triumph is beating her son in a military way. And after he is beaten, he is punished

The torture and eye-gouging was punishment for treason against the Emperor and/or the Empire. Her son had rebelled against her rule and planned to attack with rebel armies. Law was law and her son, once arrested was condemned. Corporal punishmen indeed is barbarous but - guess what : it was the inheritence of old Roman-era (i.e. Imperial Roman of Rome...Latin Rome....) laws. In fact medieval Greeks found such old laws barbaric but they were part of the fabric of the Empire for centuries and thus kept. Sounds interesting however that none among western European readers has problem with barbaric laws of the earlier Roman Empire and when a few of these survive as heritage in the Eastern Roman Empire ohhhhh the humanity, oooohhh the catastrophe! At any rate, last time I checked, the punishment for treason in Britain was hanging till near-death and then alive splitting apart (quartering!) with the torn body parts sent to the four corners of the kingdom as warning to future would-be traitors. This in 1600s-1700s, not in 700s. And Britain was of the most civilized lot in Europe at those times. Some sense of historic perspective is needed here.

Now - here is the problem, in 800 people tended to think of that punishment as fairly barbaric. It was blinding, as Assyrians had done with a King of Judah (or so I recall

No idiot, ONLY GREEKS tended to think that as fairly barbaric. The rest of Europeans tended to think of that punishment as quite light. Treason was punished with much more horrific torture in western Europe. See above Britain in the 1600s-1700s.

When Iconoclasts were ruling, one could say "OK, when the Emperor is Orthodox, he's an authority again". But after Iconoclasm, the barbarism of blinding someone ... "well, no, rather not, actually

Bliding as said was an old Roman Imperial law, remnant of the legacy of old Rome into the New Rome. It had nothing to do with Iconoclastic civil wars. Iconoclasts too enacted that law as far as I remember.

I think it was the West which was more civilised in 800, despite certain accomplishments where it was behind Byzantium as yet (like in Greek or in Medicine or in some other ways

West was more what? More civilized? Are you fucking out of your mind? When Charles rose to the throne, there were no more than 500 people (mostly Italian envoys by the Pope!!!) in the whole so-called "Empire" which had at least 20 million people!!!! That is 0,0% of the population! Writing had almost disappeared (not that it had been ever any popular there....) in the West and it was Charle's effort that rekindled interest in letters, one which passed through importing massive number of Italians but also Greeks (when intermmariage of nobilities intensified post-9th century). How does that compare with the Eastern Roman Empire which had the highest literacy rates that the world only saw again in the second half of 19th century in western Europe? Not to mention literacy rates among women (which Europe only got to reach in the first half of the 20th century...).

Look kid, you have absolutely no idea of the Eastern Roman Empire. Admit it and go back to read more on it or just stick to other chapters of human history which you may digest better.

Hans-Georg Lundahl

"The Western part of the Empire disintegrated."

Was divided.

"The Eastern part which largely coincided with the Hellenic world continued for a millenium"

Never denied.

"(3 times the duration of the previous Roman Empire)"

241 BC - 476 AD

717 years is a third of 1000? And I am only counting from end of First Punic War. Since that was first time Rome was outside Appenine Peninsula.

"and it did so in a much more dangerous world than what the previous Empire of Rome had experienced."

It was dangerous for the Latin West too ... and not sure any of them was equal to Hannibal in II Punic War.

"Show a little more respect to Byzantines."

I showed as much respect as I owe. I have said the contrast between Roman Empire "falling" in the West and "surviving" in the East is overdone. You have showed nothing to the contrary.

"LOL! Try now to explain why all his successors were not Emperors?"


Succession of Imperial dignity in the restored West:
Charlemagne, Louis the Pious, Lothair I, Louis II of Italy, Charles the Bald, Charles the Fat, Guy III of Spoleto, Lambert of Italy, Arnulf of Carinthia, Louis the Blind, Berengar I of Italy,
38 years vacancy, [or not, see below]
Otto I, Holy Roman Emperor, Otto II, Holy Roman Emperor, Otto III, Holy Roman Emperor, Henry II, Holy Roman Emperor, Conrad II, Holy Roman Emperor, Henry III, Holy Roman Emperor, Henry IV, Holy Roman Emperor, Henry V, Holy Roman Emperor, Lothair II/III, Holy Roman Emperor, Frederick I, Holy Roman Emperor (Barbarossa), Henry VI, Holy Roman Emperor, Otto IV, Holy Roman Emperor, Frederick II, Holy Roman Emperor (the bad guy, like Nero in antiquity and Kopronymus in the East), Conrad IV of Germany, Richard, 1st Earl of Cornwall, Rudolf I of Germany, Adolf of Germany, Albert I of Germany, Henry VII, Holy Roman Emperor, Louis IV, Holy Roman Emperor, Charles IV, Holy Roman Emperor, Sigismund, Holy Roman Emperor, Frederick III, Holy Roman Emperor (the first of Habsburg dynasty), Maximilian I, Holy Roman Emperor, Charles V, Holy Roman Emperor, Ferdinand I, Holy Roman Emperor, Maximilian II, Holy Roman Emperor, Rudolf II, Holy Roman Emperor, Matthias, Holy Roman Emperor, Ferdinand II, Holy Roman Emperor, Ferdinand III, Holy Roman Emperor, Leopold I, Holy Roman Emperor, Joseph I, Holy Roman Emperor, Charles VI, Holy Roman Emperor, Charles VII, Holy Roman Emperor, Francis I, Holy Roman Emperor, wife of Maria Theresia, Joseph II, Holy Roman Emperor (second bad guy, but not so bad as Frederick II), Leopold II, Holy Roman Emperor, Francis II, Holy Roman Emperor, for whom:

Gott erhalte Franz den Kaiser
Monomah1389 | 20.VII.2010
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=06643umEJZg

and he changed name to Francis I of Austria, then:
Ferdinand I of Austria, Franz Joseph I of Austria, Charles I of Austria, also called Charles the Last. Ruled a few months longer than Nicolas II of Russia.

"Charles was crowned as "Emperor" only after the Pope wanted to create a new enemy against his arch-rival the Patriarch of Constantinople."

No, after restored Orthodoxy showed manners which in the West were considered as Barbarian. Like blinding in punishment.

"Reality is that Charles himself did not even want the title knowing it would drag the ire of the real Roman Emperor at Constantinople, which it did : his envoy was bitch-slapped an sent back tied inversely on a donkey for having uttered little Charles as "Roman Emperor", and little Charles NEVER used the title."

I wonder if the historian you have that from was a Byzantine who did not dare tell a truth which his emperor didn't like.

"It is later western European re-writing of history (particularly the French...) who re-invented Charles as a "Roman Emperor" when he never really used the title."

How come his son Louis the Pious used it?

"A bit like the Holy Roman Empire which supposedly was founded around the 11th century but the title itself appears well after 1204 (i.e. the date of the real demise of the Eastern Roman (Byzantine) Empire, not 1453)."

It is easy to say "appears" if you ignore all previous appearances.

"Division between Popes and Patriarchs LONG PREDATED iconoclasm"

W a i t, you look like an adulator of that archenemy of God and men, Romanides, with his heterodox disciple Metallinos ...

The final excommunication was 1054. AFTER iconoclasm.

"On the contrary, Venice remained as a Byzantine protectorate well into the 1000s."

Protectorate is not territory. It was Byzantine TERRITORY until a Pope under iconoclasm gave them sovereignty or independence.

"The traditional first doge of Venice, Paolo Lucio Anafesto (Anafestus Paulicius), was elected in 697, as written in the oldest chronicle by John, deacon of Venice in ca. 1008. Some modern historians claim Paolo Lucio Anafesto was actually Exarch Paul, and his successor, Marcello Tegalliano, was Paul's magister militum (General: literally, "Master of Soldiers"). In 726 the soldiers and citizens of the Exarchate rose in a rebellion over the iconoclastic controversy at the urging of Pope Gregory II. The Exarch, held responsible for the acts of his master Byzantine Emperor Leo III, was murdered and many officials put to flight in the chaos. At about this time, the people of the lagoon elected their own independent leader for the first time, although the relationship of this to the uprisings is not clear. Ursus was the first of 117 "doges" (doge is the Venetian dialect development of the Latin dux ("leader"); the corresponding word in English is duke, in standard Italian duce.) Whatever his original views, Ursus supported Emperor Leo III's successful military expedition to recover Ravenna, sending both men and ships. In recognition of this, Venice was "granted numerous privileges and concessions" and Ursus, who had personally taken the field, was confirmed by Leo as dux[22] and given the added title of hypatus (Greek for "Consul".)"

Venice on Wikipedia, Origins
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Venice#Origins

"Perhaps a native of Eraclea, Orso was elected Doge in 726 following the death of Marcello Tegalliano. The Venetian people had elected him against the will of the Byzantine Empire, a consequence of the Byzantines' unwelcome attempts to institute iconoclasm in the West. Virtually nothing is known of his life before his accession, though it is reasonable to assume that he was born in the latter part of the seventh century."

Orso Ipato on Wikipedia
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Orso_Ipato

Leaving out that Ursus Hypatus was first approved by the Pope at the time.

"Whom did Byzantines persecute in Italy? LOL!"

Even if iconoclasm did not extend to Italy, it was good for Venice not to pay taxes to iconoclasts in Byzantium.

"The torture and eye-gouging was punishment for treason against the Emperor and/or the Empire."

Yes, I know. And this is the precise thing where Latin Franks are MORE civilised than Byzantines. Gouging had been outlawed as punishment in Francia for centuries.

"Her son had rebelled against her rule and planned to attack with rebel armies. Law was law and her son, once arrested was condemned. Corporal punishmen indeed is barbarous but - guess what : it was the inheritence of old Roman-era (i.e. Imperial Roman of Rome...Latin Rome....) laws."

But in the Latin West, gouging had already been done away with.

"In fact medieval Greeks found such old laws barbaric but they were part of the fabric of the Empire for centuries and thus kept."

Those medieval Greeks were in fact influenced by Franks, who not only found them barbaric, but had abolished that.

"Sounds interesting however that none among western European readers has problem with barbaric laws of the earlier Roman Empire"

Oh, they had. Gouging was outlawed, enslavement of Christians was not only outlawed, but slaves already held were freed, centuries before Charlemagne.

Saint Balthild of Ascania:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Balthild

"At any rate, last time I checked, the punishment for treason in Britain was hanging till near-death and then alive splitting apart (quartering!) with the torn body parts sent to the four corners of the kingdom as warning to future would-be traitors. This in 1600s-1700s, not in 700s."

After some hour of suffering the person died. Unlike a blinded man who remained blind for years.

"And Britain was of the most civilized lot in Europe at those times."

No.

Austria was not persecuting Protestants in as barbaric a fashion as England persecuted Catholics.

"No idiot, ONLY GREEKS tended to think that as fairly barbaric. The rest of Europeans tended to think of that punishment as quite light"

No, you are wrong. A traitor was killed or graced, but not spared in such as barbaric way as to be blinded for years.

"Blinding as said was an old Roman Imperial law, remnant of the legacy of old Rome into the New Rome. It had nothing to do with Iconoclastic civil wars. Iconoclasts too enacted that law as far as I remember."

Very possible, but as long as it was just iconoclasts, Latins could say "oh, well, heresy can't last that long, there came a Theodosius after the sons of Constantine". What was shocking was when somene actually NOT a heretic did a barbaric thing.

"When Charles rose to the throne, there were no more than 500 people (mostly Italian envoys by the Pope!!!) in the whole so-called "Empire" which had at least 20 million people!!!!"

Your information sounds garbled, what are you talking about, in a bit clearer terms?

"Writing had almost disappeared (not that it had been ever any popular there....) in the West and it was Charle's effort that rekindled interest in letters,"

Not true at all. What had happened was that Latin in Francia was less and less katharevousa and had been more and more dhimotikised, THEN Charlemagne did a radical katharevousisation of Latin, aided by Alcuin of York - who also brought in an older pronunciation, closer to the letters, but less comprehensible. What happened between 800 and 813 was as if your priest had started to read LXX and NT in Erasmian pronunciation, and so, in 813, the sunday sermon was introduced to translate from the new katharevousic Latin to the Latin spoken by the people.

That is how Romance languages French and Provençal were invented.

[Note to linguists : as separate written languages, outside the standardised Latin, becoming new standards]

"one which passed through importing massive number of Italians but also Greeks (when intermmariage of nobilities intensified post-9th century)."

One of the intermarriages of course being a wife of the early Ottos ... it also passed through importation of Anglo-Saxons and Irish, since these also had changed the pronunciation of Latin less than in West Francia. If you can compare a pronunciation like in Italy to itacistic pronunciation, the one in Francia was more like a Pontic one.

"How does that compare with the Eastern Roman Empire which had the highest literacy rates that the world only saw again in the second half of 19th century in western Europe?"

Look, I was speaking of civilisation, as a moral thing. Not as a material or even cultural accomplishment.

As to "high literacy rates" it is a dubious measure of civilisation. It is used by Protestants, since they believe each faithful needs to read his Bible on his own, at least in theory, and it has led to the 20th C. which was a very Barbaric one.

"Not to mention literacy rates among women (which Europe only got to reach in the first half of the 20th century...)."

If you mean among farm women, tell me how many are known. If you mean among imperial and nobles, well, the rates of literacy are higher if you don't count the illiterate.

"Look kid,"

You are not my dad.

"you have absolutely no idea of the Eastern Roman Empire."

You are fortunately not my professor in Classics either.

"Admit it and go back to read more on it or just stick to other chapters of human history which you may digest better."

You might do well, though it is not a full request on my part, to follow similar advice about the Latin West.

Supplying information on Pope's opposition to Byzantine iconoclast rule in Italy:

"Paul was a senior Byzantine official under Leo III the Isaurian, serving as the strategos of Sicily, and then as the Exarch of Ravenna from 723 to 727."

Life

"Paul is first mentioned in 717/18. Theophanes the Confessor calls him the private chartoularios of Emperor Leo III the Isaurian, while Patriarch Nikephoros I of Constantinople calls him a loyal and close confidante (oikeios) of Leo's, and that he was experienced in military matters.[1][2] As a result, when the governor (strategos) of Sicily, Sergios, driven by a false message that Constantinople had fallen to the Arabs, declared a rival emperor in the person of Basil Onomagoulos, Leo named him as Sergios' replacement and sent him to Sicily to restore control. It was probably on this occasion that he was raised to the rank of patrikios, although Patriarch Nikephoros implies that he already held the title.[2][3]"

"He is commonly held to have been the same as the Sergios appointed as Exarch of Ravenna in c. 723, and consequently to have held the office of strategos of Sicily continuously until then. Although both suppositions are likely, neither is certain. If the identification is true, then Paul was responsible for the defeat of an Arab attack on the island in 720/21.[2][4]"

"As exarch, he had to face the resistance of the local inhabitants, led by Pope Gregory II, to the high taxation demanded by Leo. According to the Liber Pontificalis, the Emperor ordered Paul to either kill or imprison the Pope, but both failed and led to a renewed wave of rebellion against imperial authority in Italy; the Pope even anathematized Paul.[2] In 726/27, the Ravenna itself rose in revolt, denouncing both Exarch Paul and Emperor Leo III, and overthrew those officers who remained loyal. Paul rallied the loyalist forces and attempted to restore order, but was killed. The armies discussed electing their own emperor and marching on Constantinople, but when they sought the advice of the Pope, he dissuaded them from acting against the sitting emperor.[2][5]"

"According to John Julius Norwich, the person traditionally recognized as the first doge of Venice, Paolo Lucio Anafesto, was actually Exarch Paul. Moreover, Paul's magister militum had the same first name as the doge's reputed successor, Marcellus Tegallianus, casting doubt on the authenticity of that doge as well.[6]"

Paul (exarch) on Wikipedia
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paul_(exarch)

I don't think John Julius Norwich is right, but if he is, the other version would have been by people wanting to give Venice part of the credit for opposing Leo III Isaurus.

Panos A

+Hans-Georg Lundahl Look I see you insist.

Fact one : Little Charles NEVER used the term "Emperor" himself. In his coins he noted himself as king of Franks and so did in papers coming out of his office. It was the Pope who gave the title without even Charles understanding a lot, other than not wishing to have the ire of the Empire, the actual Roman Empire. An envoy of his got punished for mentioning the term "Emperor" and that was it, end of story. Just like the case of the (un)Holy (un)Roman (un)Empire which is said to have started in the 1000s when the term appears well after 1200 and even then as a practical joke, the title "Emperor" for Charlemagne and any of his succesors was placed centuries after his era by western european historiography. All the rest is just your bullshit. I have no reason to talk more on that. Charlemagne's state was never an Empire. It was just a collection of feuds and it remained so until the rise, during Renaissance, of centralized monarchies in western but not central Europe.

Fact two : Claiming that Western Europeans were more civilzed than Eastern Romans because they had - what? LOL! - banned eye gouging as """""barbaric"""" while Eastern Romans maintained that ancient Roman (Latin Roman) custom of punishing traitors is ludicrous when Western Europeans were punishing traitors with far worse corporal punishments including that charming punishment of dismembering - for fucks shake, they were dismembering people for crimes less than treason in Britain well into the 1700s, 500 years after Renaissane and the humanistic movement took off in Italy, itself singlehandedly occuring as the natural result of the Greek intellectual transplant post-1204. I guess I have to tie your 4 limbs to four horses and then spank these beasts to tear you apart alive for you to understand that eye-gouging (which was more often than not bliding by heat, not literal gouging) would be something that you would prefer over that (and any other contemporary) Western European punishment.

You have to be an absolute retard to claim that "if Greeks of the Eastern Roman Empire considered some ancient Roman military traditions like eye-gouging punishment as barbaric, that had to be the influence of Franks" ... Hahahahahaha.... ARE YOU OUT OF YOUR MIND? Do you have the slightest idea of who were the Greeks back then and who were the Franks? This is like trying to convince the world that humanism in Western Europe is fostered by ISIS fighters or something... Particularly the Franks were some of the most barbaric people in Europe at those times, far more barbaric than the kind-of-progressive Saxons of Britain and the curious Scandinavians. The Eastern Roman Empire was the most civilized Empire the world has ever seen, INCLUDING RECENT (Britain) AND MODERN (USA) ONES. The contribution of this Empire to world civilization is something that is not theoretical, nor does it concentrates on philosophical and scientific spheres but rather is something you feel each and every day when your own state is govern by Eastern Roman Law, and when you yourself it taught since a baby to mimick being an Eastern Roman, sitting on a table to eat with a fork and knife from a plate after having washed your hands first. These were not at all Western European thingies you know... and it is perfectly clear to me you learn this here, how could you know about it when 99,999% of Europeans ignore where they got their manners and eating habbits. You ignore all that, yet you pretend to be someone who knows. You know jackshit. Stick to your nations' history and quite pretending to be an expert.

If you disagree bring me here and now coins of Charlemagne with "Emperor" on them. Or something, anything, a legal tender document he personally signed as Emperor. Don't bring me your opinion or distortions written centuries after Charlemagne. And start paying some respect to the Empire that turned you from an animal into a human. Stop the insults and the comparison with... Franks. For fucks shake, this is an insult to humanity itself.

Hans-Georg Lundahl

"Little Charles NEVER used the term "Emperor" himself. In his coins he noted himself as king of Franks and so did in papers coming out of his office."

He started ruling as King of Franks in 768, so it is easy to find coins without the Imperial title.

In cabinet des médailles, Bibliothèque nationale de France, there is an imperial denarius, with the text KAROLVS IMPAVG (Imperator Augustus).

Denier impérial en argent de Charlemagne, inspiré des modèles numismatiques romains. Au droit, le profil imberbe, le front ceint de lauriers, et l'inscription « KAROLUS IMP[ERATOR] AUG[USTUS] » (Charles, empereur auguste)[1],[2].Cabinet des médailles, BnF, Paris.

PHGCOM — Own work by uploader, photographed at Cabinet des Médailles, Paris. CC BY-SA 3.0

https://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/Charlemagne#/media/File:Charlemagne_denier_Mayence_812_814.jpg

"It was the Pope who gave the title without even Charles understanding a lot, other than not wishing to have the ire of the Empire, the actual Roman Empire."

Nice story telling, but the coin says otherwise.

"An envoy of his got punished for mentioning the term "Emperor" and that was it, end of story."

Now, is that from Einhard or from a Byzantine chronicler, trying to appease a Basileus?

"Just like the case of the (un)Holy (un)Roman (un)Empire"

The Holy, Roman and also Empire.

Holy, since full imperial dignity was only available by coronation by the Pope, the lower status being King of Romans, a title born by Syagrius.

Holy, again, since some abbots and bishops replaced prefects, like bishop St Remigius had done between Syagrius and giving the keys to Clovis, like hermit and abbot St Severine had done up to the time of Odoacar entering what is now Austria.

Roman, since part of the population, including at times large parts of Italy, were under their control, and since they never lost a Latin speaking population, like in 1683 Eugene of Savoy was a vassal of the Roman Emperor and his subjects spoke Franco-Provençal, French and Provençal rather than German.

Empire, since a federation of lesser sovereignties, under a federal government, like ancient Roman Empire before and like US later (up to the Westphalian Peace, when Imperial sovereignty became a more nominal suzerainty).

And as you presumably pretend to be a Christian, it behoves you very ill to paraphrase the sentiments of the infamous Voltaire, father of modern totalitarianism.

"which is said to have started in the 1000s"

Otto I became Holy Roman Emperor on Februrary 2nd 962, succeeding Berengarius II of Italy, who had submitted to him in 961. The thing that changes is that the Germanic nation becomes the main one. If on your view Hellenic nation could do so, why not Germanic nation?

Hellenes had been part of Roman Empire since Magna Graecia was conquered, before First Punic War, but Germans at least since Domitian. Since before St John died or was translated from his grave, where he had laid himself down.

"when the term appears will after 1200, the title "Emperor" for Charlemagne and any of his succesors was placed centuries after his era by western european historiography."

Here is a seal by Otto I:

Sceau impérial d'Otton Ier (968).

This work is in the public domain in its country of origin and other countries and areas where the copyright term is the author's life plus 70 years or less.

https://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/Otton_Ier_du_Saint-Empire#/media/File:Siegel_Otto_I_968.jpg

OTTO IMP AVG

"All the rest is just your bullshit. I have no reason to talk more on that."

At least not until you get a grip ...

"Charlemagne's state was never an Empire. It was just a collection of feuds and it remained so until the rise, during Renaissance, of centralized monarchies in western but not central Europe."

An Empire was not a centralised monarchy. It was a collection of feuds. Constantine was vassal of the Emperor in Britain before he was Emperor in Constantinople.

"Fact two : Claiming that Western Europeans were more civilzed than Eastern Romans because they had - what? LOL! - banned eye gouging as """""barbaric"""" while Eastern Romans maintained that ancient Roman (Latin Roman) custom of punishing traitors is ludicrous when Western Europeans were punishing traitors with far worse corporal punishments including that charming punishment of dismembering. I guess I have to tie your 4 limbs to four horses and then spank them to tear you apart alive for you to understand that eye-gouging (which was more often than not bliding by heat, not literal gouging) would be something that you would prefer over the Western European punishment."

You still don't get the distinction between some hour of torture, supposing the dismembering of traitors was even done in 700's (I'd need to check) and supposing it was done before beheading, and full years of a life with clearly reduced quality.

"You have to be an absolute retard to claim that "if Greeks of the Eastern Roman Empire considered some ancient Roman military traditions like eye-gouging punishment as barbaric, that had to be the influence of Franks" ... Hahahahahaha.... ARE YOU OUT OF YOUR MIND? Do you have the slightest idea of who were the Greeks back then and who were the Franks? This is like trying to convince the world that humanism in Western Europe is fostered by ISIS fighters or something..."

I think your comparison of Franks to ISIS makes it clear YOU have no clue on who they were.

"Particularly the Franks were some of the most barbaric people in Europe at those times, far more barbaric than the kind-of-progressive Saxons of Britain."

I see you prefer not giving examples ... Saxons had slaves, Franks hadn't.

"The Eastern Roman Empire was the most civilized Empire the world has ever seen, INCLUDING RECENT (Britain) AND MODERN (USA) ONES."

With eye gouging, with Bulgaroktonos gouging out both eyes from nine of ten and one eye from the tenth soldier of Bulgarian army (a Frank from Italy a few centuries later wrote "de multitudine non est sumenda vindicta", you don't revenge on a crowd), and with same Bulgaroktonos becoming, according to Psellos, that way, because, like Frederick II of Prussia, he was denied being who he wanted to be, by networks trying to make him "fit" the role.

And when we speak of gouging, how about your translating the title also found in Psellos on such contexts, like "spadarius" ?? A title not found at the Frankish court.

"The contribution of this Empire to world civilization is something that is not theoretical,"

Actually, giving good texts of Plato and Aristotle to Latins was kind of theoretical.

"nor does it concentrates on philosophical and scientific spheres but rather is something you feel each and every day when your own state is govern by Eastern Roman Law,"

In fact, Latin West has at least up to recent centuries provided more, for instance absence of slaves in Europe (yes, some Western states had slaves in colonies, but that was because colonies were anyway not governed by totally European laws : abolishing slavery in Louisiana brought Louisiana in line with France, not with Byzantium).

"and when you yourself it taught since a baby to mimick an Eastern Roman, sitting on a table to eat with a fork and knife from a plate after having washed your hands first."

The one thing which could be Eastern Roman on the list, exclusively at first, is the fork, but I thought it was an Italian invention, not a Byzantine one.

Indeed, you were right on that one:

"Les fourchettes actuelles sont apparues dans l'Empire byzantin, et sont arrivées vers 1056 en Italie, quand Théodora Doukas, la fille de Constantin Doukas, a été mariée au doge de Venise Domenico Selvo, et ont été diffusées comme une mode en Italie du Nord. L'ecclésiastique Pierre Damien blâme d'ailleurs ce raffinement apporté par la princesse byzantine."

"These were not at all Western European thingies you know..."

Indeed, St Peter Damian who was a trad preferred to eat:

• taking meat in left hand, with three fingers
• cutting it with a knife held in right hand
• washing hands after meal or even after each dish (but as he was a monk, this could have been sth he renounced for monastic simplicity)

If you have ever eaten a hamburger, sausage or chicken without fork, you have been taught to eat like a Latin Frank.

"and it is perfectly clear to me you learn this here, how could you know about it when 99,999% of Europeans ignore where they got their manners and eating habits"

It is fairly clear you indulge in a typical Byzantine (according to my experience) habit of overinterpretation.

"You ignore all that, yet you pretend to be someone who knows."

In fact, I didn't, I was of course willing to make Italy rather than Byzantium origin of the modern fork, but I checked. I did know a Western Medieval knight for centuries after 1056 was expected to use his fingers. I do not consider that as barbaric.

"You know jackshit."

Nice manners of a Byzantine, aren't they ...?

"Stick to your nations' history"

Which one of them? Sweden? I have a Swedish passport. Denmark? My grandfather is from Scania, which was Denmark up to 1660, sorry, 1658 (swapped treaty of Oliva for the relevant one of Roskilde). Austria? I was born there ... oh, wait, Vindobona is where Marcus Aurelius died, so, in that sense, I am in fact sticking to "my nation's" history.

"and quite pretending to be an expert."

I did not claim to be an accredited expert at history. But I think I have shown, I know more of Byzantium than you give me credit for and more of the Latin West than I could give you credit for so far.

"If you disagree bring me here and now coins of Charlemagne with "Emperor" on them."

I just did, if you click jpg links ...

"And start paying some respect to the Empire that made you from an animal into a human."

I am sorry, but if you think eating with fingers instead of with fork is being an animal, I think that on Byzantine laws, you may merit gouging if ever you act on such convictions to treasonal detriment of Franks.

Not to mention that you just insulted how your fellow Greeks eat the gyros.

II

Own to video

"We've never had a proximate country with so long a border, 1700 miles."

I am open to being wrong, but Mexican border used to be even longer before California, Arizona, New Mexico and Texas left Mexico?

Or you mean, back then US was not that far West, so missed most of that border? (Florida was already sold by Joseph Bonaparte).

It seems you got that border by expanding.

Yes, I do think not having wages undercut is one reasonable reason to exclude immigrants.

Yes, I do think not having wages undercut is one reasonable reason to exclude immigrants.