#yes I use the greek version of his name not the latin one that they had in the cartoon I like it better

[ophelialoveshandsomemen]

Got to thinking today, about some cartoons I watched when I was a kid, called the Saints and Heroes collection( great stuff), and how it's all, y'know, saints! St. Bernadette! St. Francis Xavier! St. Nicholas! The Fatima story! Yeay! They're great 30 min. episodes for kids to learn a bit about catholicism's greatest saints! And in the heroes sections, they got Columbus: which is fine, they mainly focus on navigation and how he worked hard to achieve that level of education, lots of catholic stuff floating around in that one. They got Ben-Hur; classic jewish/early christian story, though not real, per se. Really good stuff. Great for christian kids.

Then we got the bloody ODYSSEY?!?!? Like, Greek pagan Odysseus running around the seas, killing monsters and suitors and tricking his way across the Mediterranean, all narrated by a Grandpa Owl?!? telling the story to his grandson owlet?!?! Very princess bride style... super weird in this context. None of the other films are narrated by animals. I'm not saying that kids shouldn't know the story of Odysseus, I'm just saying you can get serious whiplash watching chill saint movies for kids and then coming across The Odyssey, with no catholic connections, ( at least that's easily grasped by a child), getting thrown in the middle of the list and once you're done, brother you feel like you been in a fever dream. It's so bizarrely disconcertingly different in style to the rest of the films, too.

But at least they keep the fact that Odysseus 'slept around'( for lack of a better term), during those years at sea completely absent from the story. So it does have that in it's favour.

Still lots of fun to watch!

[blogquantumreality]

FMA, Slayers, and Alphabets, Oh My!

So I've been watching Slayers along with @ayalaatreides (Using Syncplay!) and I've started noticing some interesting elements that ring a bell from when I watched FMA: Brotherhood.

Now, since FMA came out as a manga in 2001 and the anime for Brotherhood in 2009, while Slayers came out in 1989, it's clear that FMA was inspired by elements of Slayers.

For example, this stylized symbol (upon which Saillune/Seyruun is based in its design) shows clear similarities to FMA's famous transmutation circles, and while I'll discuss this more fully later, you can see both Hebrew and other alphabets used here; I can spot the Latin and what looks like either a runic-inspired or Greek-inspired alphabet (or a mixture of the two) outside the Star of David and in between the concentric circles.

Furthermore, the large door that Edward Elric possesses was clearly inspired by these elements in Slayers, as it also has Hebrew letters carved into it. See below:

In these disparate elements of the Demon's Blood, Ruby Eye, Dark Star, Chaotic Blue, and Death Fog contain lettering with a clearly Hebrew-inspired alphabet as well as what are unquestionably runic-derived letters.

I won't transliterate the runes in this post, but what's really intriguing is that in terms of worldbuilding and canon, there is evidence that writing systems were different in the past compared to the present-day of the 'verse we see in the anime. In particular, a couple of things stood out to me when I found out that Shabranigdo/Shabranigdu had a canonically spelled runic name: ᛋᚼᚾᛒᛦᛅᛁᚷᛞᚢ

If you parse this version of his name very carefully, first of all it appears that the actual alphabet may be drawn from either the Anglo-Saxon futhorc or a mixture of the futhorc with the Elder futhark. Further, the letter that expresses the /r/ sound in Shabranigdo's name is written using ᛦ which originally meant the /z/ sound in proto-Norse (arguably the very earliest runes could be a form of proto-Germanic, but the sparsness of such early rune finds makes it hard to decide firmly one way or the other, so I'll go with proto-Norse) and which turned into an /r/ sound later on, which is why words like *gastiz became gestr.

It is very tempting to hypothesize that a very early stage of the language spoken by the people who now inhabit Saillune/Seyruun and other neighboring countries had a /z/ sound which underwent rhotacism to /r/ (which happened in English as well, incidentally - this explains the origin of "was" vs "were") but for which the early runic writing system didn't adjust (analogously to the proto-Norse runes and later younger futhark and the futhorc) to reflect the sound change.

(Alternatively, in-verse, it could simply be that ᛦ always meant /r/ and was never a /z/, and by Occam's razor this does fit the known facts a bit better, but meta wouldn't be fun without all the extra meanderings, yes? :P )

Also, a fascinating final note is that the last picture shows two circles in which are clearly perpendicular wave-patterns, which to any student of physics is evocative of electromagnetism in the electric (traditionally drawn as a sine wave in the same plane as the page, shown on the left) and magnetic (traditionally drawn as a sine wave perpendicular to the page, shown on the right) fields propagating each other to transmit electromagnetic radiation.

[theromaboo]

The Second Day of Julius Caesar

Everyone knows what Julius Caesar's last words were. It's pretty much the most iconic line of all time! Et tu, Brute? (which means "And you, Brutus?") That is just pure poetry. Julius Caesar really is so cool. His last words were probably the best and most amazing last words anyone ever had ever.

Look, it's even one of The Best Latin Lines Ever according to the cover of this book.

But did Caesar really say it? (Nope!)

It's a Shakespearean invention! (that's going to be a common theme in this series) However, the idea that these were his last words actually isn't entirely Shakespearean. "Et tu, Brute?" weren't Julius Caesar's last words in the play! His true last words before dying were "Then fall Caesar."

Good golly that is old. But as you can see, Julius Caesar's last words here are "Et tu Brute?—Then fall Caesar." (forgive me, I mean Cæſar).

Aww look at him talking about himself in the third person. Adorable. Maybe my last words should be "Then fall @theromaboo."

While we're still on the topic of "Et tu, Brute?" I just want to fix a few of my pet peeves when people quote this. It is not "Et tu, Brutus?" Latin has cases. Brutus here is in the vocative because Caesar is calling Brutus by his name. The vocative of Brutus is Brute. It has to be Brute.

Neither is it "Et tu, Bruté." What is that accent doing? In modern Latin, acute accents are most commonly used to show that a syllable is stressed. And in ancient Roman Latin inscriptions, a mark that looks very similar to an acute accent (called an apex) is sometimes used to show that a vowel is long. Neither usage makes sense here with Bruté. I think what happened is that people are getting confused with French (a very common mistake!) and because Brute is pronounced with two syllables, people add an accent at the end to make it have two syllables, because without the accent, it would just be Brute, with one syllable, because that's how it works in French. But Latin doesn't care about that!

Anyway, there is no ancient source that says Julius Caesar's last words were "Et tu, Brute?" or "Then fall Caesar."

I can already hear an Italian saying "Those weren't Giulio Cesare's last words; he actually said tu quoque—" You're also wrong! (sorry italians)

There is no ancient source that says that Julius Caesar's last words were "Tu quoque, Brute, fili mi?" or "Tu quoque, mi fili?" or any other similar version (they all mean "You too, (Brutus), my son?" I find that the first one is generally used by Italians and the second is generally used by French people, and almost the entire continental Europe seems to use some sort of version of "Tu quoque. . ." However, there might be even more versions of Julius Caesar's last words in other languages. I only really interact with English, Italian, and French, so if you know any other versions from different languages, do tell me!)

Okay, now we know a lot of stuff Caesar didn't say, but what were Julius Caesar's real last words?

We don't know! (yipee!)

Shakespeare's main source was a translation of a translation of Plutarch's Parallel Lives, but nothing similar to the Shakespearean last words can be found there.

Plutarch tells us that after Caesar got a teeny little stab from Casca, he said in Latin, "Foulest Casca, what are you doing?" I'm assuming he said this in the exact same way the stepsister says to the stepbrother—but the annoying thing is that Plutarch doesn't give us the Latin, he just gives us the Greek translation of the Latin (classic Plutarch) (if you want to know the Greek, it's "Μιαρώτατε Κάσκα, τί ποιεῖς?")

Suetonius, meanwhile, gives us a different story. He says that right before the stabbing started, this dude called Cimber grabbed Caesar by the shoulders. Caesar said "Why, this is violence!" and then immediately got stabbed by Casca. Then he didn't say anything else throughout the stabbing; he just groaned at the first stab. So that means that his last words would've been, yes, "Why, this is violence!" ("Ista quidem vis est!" in Latin). Biggest understatement of 44 BC!

There is yet another common version of Caesar's last words, and they are "What is this? Such violence against Caesar!" which is bit of a poor interpretation of this.

Anyway, Suetonius says that "Some have written that when Caesar saw Brutus rushing at him, he said 'Καὶ σύ τέκνον?'" (which means "You too, child?") This is definitely most similar to the most common ideas of Julius Caesar's last words ("Et tu, Brute?" and "Tu quoque. . ."). Pretty much the only difference is that "Καὶ σύ τέκνον" is Greek. In fact, people often claim that Caesar's last words were "Tu quoque, Brute, fili mi?" by citing Suetonius, even though Suetonius doesn't say that.

I would treat this with a bit of caution though, because Suetonius is distancing himself from this claim, saying that "Oh, other people have written. . ." Clearly Suetonius doesn't really believe it himself. And, no offense to Suetonius, but if Suetonius is unsure of this, I would be too. Suetonius notoriously treats official government documents and rumors his nonna heard on the streets as equally valid sources.

Besides, would you be able to speak after being stabbed? I know Caesar isn't the average person, but Caesar is still a person. I'd imagine that one would be a bit too shocked to speak in such a high stress situation. And saying something deep about Brutus, no less! But, as always, I don't know for sure. Maybe Caesar did say something after getting stabbed, but I'm with Suetonius on this one and my best guess is that he did not.

Cassius Dio also writes about this. He pretty much says the exact same thing as Suetonius, except that he does not mention Caesar saying "Why, this is violence!" Dio also believes that Caesar didn't speak after he got stabbed, but he does mention "some writers" who say that Julius Caesar's said to Brutus "Καὶ σύ τέκνον?" (sound familiar?)

So yeah, moral of the story, no one can agree on Caesar's last words! Good gods, I spent the better half of my Saturday researching and writing this. I am so sorry for you poor souls who had to read all this. If you want to read the relevant parts of the ancient sources themselves, here they are:

Plutarch Parallel Lives, Julius Caesar, 66.7–8

Suetonius, Life of Julius Caesar, 82.1–2

Cassius Dio, Roman History, Book XLIV, 19.4–5

[nysus-temple]

Dionysus' lesser-known myths [or perhaps you do know them, but i will tell you about them anyway]

Some of these myths have already been shown in my blog, but i decided to bring some of them up again in a more elaborated way, plus some new too. Perhaps you've heard of them, perhaps you haven't, but i can tell you i haven't seen them much around here.

And my job isn't reading your minds, it's about writting essays, so here we go.

1. Ampelos (Αμπελος):

According to Nonnus of Panopolis, Ampelos was a satyr (tho not many art represents him as such) who loved Dionysus, and was loved by him as well. Not much of a surprise, since we do know many gods had male lovers.

The problem is that, we're still talking about a satyr, we know how those guys are and act. According to Nonnus, Ampelos was riding a bull while mocking Selene, angrily, she sent a gadfly to sting the bull. The bull ran and threw Ampelos all over the place. Nonnus describes it as a very gore-like death.

Dionysus, upset, ended up turning Ampelos' corpse into a grape vine, and from there, he created wine with his blood... THANKFULY, it was the blood.

Roman mosaic with Ampelos and Bacchus.

2. Midas (Μίδας):

"But Nysus, everybody knows Midas" yes yes, but do you KNOW the actual Greek myths? Or do you know the later, VERY later-on version that appears in Wikipedia? Midas never turned his daughter into gold in the folklore, for example.

Midas was a foreign king who married a greek woman, he was the king of Phrygia, and according to Pausanias, he had a daughter named Zoe. I have absolutely nothing about her except this.

Anyways, going to the important part: Silenus, a companion of Dionysus who used to be one of his foster fathers, got lost while he was... Kind of drunk ( come on, Dionysus can't keep an eye on everyone 24/7 ). Some peasants found him and took him to King Midas, who, as a very loyal follower of Dionysus, recognized Silenus and took care of him. When Dionysus arrived in order to take him back, he thanked Midas and said he would give him in return anything that he wished for... And here it comes: Midas wished to be able to turn everything that he touched to gold, and Dionysus agreed, even though he felt sorry he hadn't thought of it twice.

Midas was happy turning stuff into gold, obviously. But when he touched food and it turned into gold as well and he was unable to eat, he returned to Dionysus asking him to turn it back to normal.

Surprisingly, Dionysus didn't say "no" or "live with the consequences"; he told him to wash himself in the river Pactolus, and, good enough, the gold thingy dissappeared.

I don't have this myth fully narrated by a Greek, instead, from a latin author. The good thing tho, thanks to Herodotus and Pausanias, i know it's realiable.

Monument dedicated to Midas, in the old Prhygia ( now part of Turkey )

3. The Minyades (Μινυάδες):

According to Plutarch, king Minyas had three daughters ( whose names i honestly don't know, they appear in Ovid's Metamorphosis ). He tells that Dionysus appeared in the form of a maiden to invite them to the Dionysian Mysteries, since the rest of the women had already gone there. And they declined, politely, but still declined. This is one of those moments in which we see Dionysus' weak points, no justified anger. They neglected the cult, but had nothing against it anyways.

Still, for him, that wasn't enough.

He drove them mad, like very. Something that for Plutarch was even worse than death, apparently. They even killed their own children and ate them (yikes) dismembering them like Dionysus was once dismembered. The sisters were wandering around the mountains, without Dionysus caring at all.

Until finally, Hermes took pity on them, and turned them into bats, freeing them from the madness.

One of the Minyades showing the dismembered body of her son - Étienne-Barthélémy Garnier

4. Zeus' lighting bolts

This one is short, so i'll get to the point.

We all know what Nonnus' was up to when writing about Dionysus. He said in his work that Zeus recognized him (when being Zagreus) as his heir. Since when he was still a little kid, he was able to climb to his throne and to hold Zeus' lightning bolts. Of course, then the very well-known myth of Hera calling the titants to dismember Dionysus arrives here, since she wanted no heir to the throne.

Things happen, you know.

5. Lykurgos (Λυκοῦργος):

Remember when i talked about this guy in the anger essay? Wellp, here he is again, it's the same, but i'll elaborate on him a bit more.

He was a thracian king, and when he heard that Dionysus was going to Thracia, he ordered to trap all of his female followers in a prison.

Yes, only the women. I guess no men followed Dionysus in Thracia during his reign, not like i can ask him about it.

OF COURSE Pentheus 2.0 would imprison the FOLLOWERS of the god of MADNESS. Of course...

Dionysus got angry ( what a surprise ) and sent a drought towards Thracia + making Lykurgos go mad. It's not Dionysus if he doesn't punish you by making you go mad.

He then proceed to tell the people that the only way to stop that punishment was by killing Lykurgos, and, well, they did. They all killed him, and were freed from the punishment.

Dionysus then stopped the drought, he kept his word, indeed.

Lykurgos attacking his own wife after being induced into madness

6. The punishment of the titans

You think they got away? No, the fuck, of course they didn't.

After Zeus' found out what had happened to Dionysus (Zagreus), he imprisoned them in Tartatus, which caused Gaia to be all sad again, since many of her children had already been imprisoned there. What she did was, as scary as Gaia has always been, burning down everything she could.

The only way Zeus could take pity on her in order to stop that, was by sending a flood.

7. Coresus (Κόρησος):

Callirhoe was a Calydonian woman who scorned Coresus, a priest of Dionysus, who threatened to afflict all the women of Calydon with insanity as the good Dionysus priest he was.

The way to stop this was with a sacrifice, to kill the woman who scorned him. Coresus was ordered to sacrifice her, but he killed himself instead since apparently, he was in love with her and couldn't do it.

Callirhoe was overcome with remorse, and cut her throat at a spring that later received her name.

As always.

Coresus sacrificing himself to save Callirhoe - Jean-Honoré Fragonard

8. The Frogs (Βάτραχοι):

At this point, this isn't lesser-known anymore, and i'm not the biggest fan of Aristophanes' work (i love Euripides way too much, oops) but i'll still summarize what Dionysus has to do with this play.

Dionysus, as the god of theatre he is, wanted to bring back to life one of the great tragedy authors. And he descends to Hades for that, it's a way to mock his connection with it, this is still a comedy.

And after a poetry slam, Aeschylus is chosen in preference to Euripides. Smh, fucking Aristophanes, way to put your preferences.

9. Orpheus' death:

I'm not gonna elaborate on this one THAT much, since i wanna save it for the Apollo & Dionysus essay i have unfinished, which was the second most voted one and it might take more time to finish it.

In any case, do you know all these modern retellings in which they paint Dionysus as the "chill, calm, who only wants to party" dude? And Apollo as the "feral, envious, angry" dude? Well, ya'll are wrong...

Dionysus killed Orpheus due to his jealousy of Apollo's worship. I'm leaving you with this sentence, wait for the other essay to know why Dionysus and Apollo are so complex in terms of feelings. Or, at least, i will try to elaborate on it.

Apollo welcoming Dionysus to the sanctuary of Delphi, which they shared.

10. Dionysus IS physically incapable of getting drunk, live with it:

SHOCK i know. So if i see any of ya'll saying he's drunk 24/7, you better have your testament written.

NONNUS OF PANOPOLIS. DIONYSIACA. LITERAL TEXT: "Only to Dionysus gave Rhea the amethyst that saves the drinker from the chains of madness."

Yes, obviously going for scientifict facts, this doesn't work. It was believed in this world that the amethyst would prevent people from getting drunk. But this is mythology, Dionysus is a god, he can't get drunk even if he wanted to. And it's not like he should, he needs to keep an eye on his followers 24/7. Or do we want to remember what happened to Silenus?

Dude, how the hell do i have to tell you all, that in all text in which people were drinking for honoring Dionysus, they always stopped saying "he wouldn't like to see us this way" HE DOESN'T WANT YA'LL DO GET DRUNK. THAT'S NOT HOW HIS MADNESS WORKED

No. The women in the Bacchae are not ✨girlboss slaaaaay✨ they were feral women. The madness Dionysus used to punish Pentheus and the Theban women is NOT something you should idealize. Euripides didn't want ya'll to call him an icon because "omg the Bacchae is so progresive" GUYS... NO. IT'S NOT ABOUT THAT. It's about showing Dionysus' wrath. Of showing why like with any other god, he's feared.

The Greek gods are not your free playground OC's. You can't invent their sexualities or gender identities just for yourself. They're important figures of a culture and country that still lives. If you want an icon to feel identify with, create one. But don't go around there saying Dionysus is genderfluid JUST because you like seeing him young. No.

I know, personally, genderfluid people, and all of them agree THIS is wrong. I already had the whole pronouns drama with Dionysus, don't start over again with this. Please.

* AHEM * In any case... Hope you enjoyed !

I needed to work A LOT for this essay, since most of these myths weren't listed with sources. Whenever you wanna write a guide about folkore or anything similar, please, list your sources ! i don't want anyone else to go through the pain of needing to research though the catacombs of information JUST to confirm one sentence. Because i went trhough that, there's a reason why i've been researching about Dionysus for more than three years already and i still don't have everything. Thanks for your support and essay requests as always, it makes me INCREDIBLY happy to see so many of you willing to learn about a figure that has been so underappreciated and reduced into nothing like Dionysus, and who is still being misinterpreted to this day.

As always, reblogs would be very appreciated, it's the way people can find my blog for something else than copypaste incorrect quotes, and i always appreciate that kind of support. Of course i do this "por amor al arte" as i would say in Spanish, but still takes time and effort and i'm just a university student. I still will need A LOT of time to be able to work into something more accesible to everyone for the Greek folklore.

For now, this small Tumblr pieces is what i can give. But as always, thank you and χαίρε Διόνυσον 🍇

[sailorspica]

oooh now i’m curious: do you prefer krista spelt as krista or christa? i’ve seen both ways and i’m not sure which is the more common one

i am so glad you ask because i can expand on all of these for paragraphs, short answer: krista. it's the spelling used in the kodansha USA manga, and i like the regional diversity of hopping up to northern europe among mostly german and anglo names. since ymir is in the norse edda, they get to be strange (gay) together

but i think my preference is more strongly anti-christa, because any additional degree of separation from its origin helps AoT obfuscate its intentions with the royal family for a bit longer. now i don't think iseyama is versed in abrahamic religions at all, but using the references he does for eldia brings with it way more connotations than he probably imagined, which i think ultimately work out in his and historia's favor. christian theology under the cut

"christ" comes from the greek translation of the hebrew bible that predates jesus by like, two centuries: messiah (hebrew) -> khristos (greek) -> christus (latin) -> christ (anglicized). so if not a semitic word itself, it is a semantic stand-in for the jewish concept of an anointed one whose earliest mention is in exodus. pair that with historia's uncle Uri, the most hebraic name in all of AoT from the archangel Uriel, and we're courting christian antisemitism as old as the church itself, specifically replacement theology that claims christians are god's new + better chosen people

this reading casts jesus and mary as the new adam and eve (yes, disgusting), which condemns eve to elevate mary, but in the most rational, atheistic reading of christ's conception? mary was, like founder ymir, a teenage rape victim, and the claim that she was descended from david made this traumatic birth everybody's business since the anointed one was supposed to be ben david. personally i see no fucking way for mary's circumstances to be an improvement on eve's, and many a happy satanist will say eve saved rather than damned humanity

consider the last fritz king's will, and the whole premise of "eldian atonement" echoes this eve-mary binary where eve = ymir fritz and mary = a succession of royal founder shifters, but particularly the reisses. this gets extra gross in the manga because we hear the purest, bloodiest version of the fritz king's intentions from frieda's mouth (mostly to grisha but briefly in historia's memories), wholly condemning her ancestor as sinful and evil when she, too, is a young woman subordinated to a man's will

historia is a bit of the anti-mary (anti-christ) because the whole scene in the chapel caverns where rod reiss is the only person in all of AoT to use extremely theistic language is a kind of twist on the annunciation to mary, where historia says "fuck no," and that's beautiful. the implication is if mary of nazareth had a girlfriend who told her to live her life with pride we would not have christianity/most of the world's evils

so anyway: krista. as fun and ironic and obvious CHRISTa is with this interpretation, i like krista for being slightly off the mark

[voluptuarian]

Who the fuck is Heracles?: Greek myths, Roman names, and American media in the Heracles vs. Hercules dilemma

So I regularly see people complaining about and/or ridiculing media (tv, movies, books, usually American) where Heracles, despite being represented in the Greek stories and with the Greek pantheon, is referred to by Hercules, his Roman name. The biggest target I see getting flack for this is the Disney movie and frequently people assume a story using the Roman name implies the creator's ignorance about mythology in general. I wish I could tell you all that it was that simple... sadly I can't. What I can tell you is that somehow, the name-form Hercules has predominated so entirely in the English-speaking world that that is pretty much the only version used in America, period. I would hazard that the majority of Americans, despite knowing who Hercules is, would be confused if asked about Heracles. People who recognize Heracles know something about Greek history or mythology-- if you don't know Hercules however, you live under a rock. Even I, a devoted mythology, history, and etymology fan generally refer to him as Hercules.

(I would assume this is also common outside of the US but I have nowhere near the knowledge base to confirm that one way or another-- feel free to chime in if you do.)

Now none of this has been academically researched-- I frankly do not have the energy to do an entire bottom-up deep dive on this, even if I might have the time-- but from the myriad threads of random knowledge I do have, I think I've been able to figure out HOW this situation started and WHY it's persisted so stubbornly.

To start out, after the re-popularizing of classical culture and myth in the Renaissance and on through the 18th and early 19th centuries, Europeans seem to have overwhelmingly referred to the Greek and Roman mythological figures by their Latin names, even if they were referring to Greek stories or a combination of the two. I see references to Jove, Jupiter, and Juno much more frequently than to Zeus and Hera, and Minerva more often than Athena; Diane de Portiers of course was literally named for a Roman goddess, and it was Diana who she was repeatedly painted as. Even before the Renaissance and neo-platonism, when gods appear, Latin names seem to be the standard-- Venus and Mars are not infrequently brought up in medieval literature, but I have yet to see Aphrodite and Ares (I assume the preference for Latin names is from Catholicism helping make Latin the scholarly language, not Greek? Or maybe it's tied to the planetary/scientific names? idk). The figures who I see getting called by Greek names seem to be more minor ones (I see Hebe much more often than I do Juventas), are being referred to by an epithet (Cynthia or Phoebus, for instance) or did not have a corresponding Roman figure, like Apollo, who the Romans just adopted whole cloth. (Hermes seems to be used at least as often as Mercury, which I can only assume is due to the popularity of Hermeticism.) Hercules, who for some reason appears to have been one of, if not the most popular Greek hero in the early modern period and on (why?? again, I don't know; maybe because the labors made for good art concepts? Maybe because Roman emperors had play-acted as him and so many figures were supposed to be his descendants?) is similarly mostly called by his Roman name. The continuing popularity of using classical figures in literature and allegory, especially in political image-making, helped keep those trends going for centuries, and the Roman terms seem to continue to be the most popular into the 1800s.

At some point however, that switched. Across the board I think westerners now and at least Americans are much more familiar with the Greek gods and myths. (Or at least Greek myths as funneled through fucking Ovid. Does he deserve my hate? Unsure. Do I hate him regardless? Yes.) Odysseus is more recognizable here than Ulysses, and Jupiter, Neptune, Juno, and Pluto have lost out against Zeus, Poseidon, Hera, and Hades. Many Americans mistakenly believe the Roman gods were just entirely copied from the Greeks and know next to nothing about original Roman deities or the differences between Roman and Greek analogs. Now-- when exactly did this shift happen? 🤷‍♀️ Why did it happen? 🤷‍♀️ Above my pay grade. What I DO know is that somehow Hercules doesn't get picked up in this changeover when pretty much everybody else does.

So WHAT was going on to keep the Latin name stuck in the public mind? Strongmen.

For those not in the know, strongmen (and women) were part-athlete, part-bodybuilder entertainers who became popular stars in the Victorian period. They combined the emphasis on physical strength focused on by modern weightlifters with a gradually increasing emphasis on physique that became bodybuilding later. These strongwomen and men frequently used Greco-Roman-inspired professional names-- Cyclops, Vulcana, Charmion, Atlas, etc. Annnnd a bunch of them used the name Hercules. There was Katie Sandwina, the "Lady Hercules," William Bankier, known as "Apollo, the Scottish Hercules," the McCann brothers "Hercules" and "Samson," and John "Herkul" Grün. Even when they weren't going by the name Hercules, they were often billed as "a Hercules," as if Hercules was a byword for strongman. (Pretty sure Samsons and Goliaths got thrown around that way too, but Hercules seems to have been the most popular.) These stars also frequently performed and/or did promotional work inspired by or imitating Hercules (Maurice Dériaz and Eugen Sandow even modeled for artists as Hercules.)

(And here's Dériaz in the aforementioned role of Hercules. Obviously I know who he is because of strictly scholarly reasons and not because I saw this painting once and was intrigued by those incredibly lush pectorals. Banish the thought.)

By the 30s the "strongmen" were gradually beginning to split into athlete vs. entertainer categories and these theatrical professional names were phasing out.

But bodybuilders were still big, and were only going to get more deeply entrenched in the Hercules business thanks to the sword and sandals boom. That gets started roughly in the late 40s and goes on for the better part of 2 decades (getting increasingly less historical and more fantastical as it goes along.) It also includes a slew of movies starring bodybuilders. Hercules (along with Samson and Goliath and other original "muscleman characters") is regularly represented and always with his Roman name. By the 60s "Hercules" movies are a dime a dozen, almost entirely starring bodybuilders, including Steve Reeves in Hercules and its sequel; Mark Forest and Alan Steel in the seemingly endless Hercules And... or Hercules Against... movies, and Mickey Hargitay in The Loves of Hercules, all from the late 50s and 60s. (Meanwhile even though 1963's Jason and the Argonauts has Nigel Green in the role, he's still called Hercules, not Heracles.) An entire subgenre of (mostly Italian) sword and sandals movies centering on burly, physically powerful heroes (usually played by athletes or bodybuilders) develops directly out of the success of the first Hercules series.

Looking at the connection between "Hercules" and bodybuilders, the ties between bodybuilding and sword and sandals movies, and the later universality of "Hercules" in the genre, I can't help but assume the dominance of Hercules over Heracles has to be directly indebted to strongmen, and their unintentional preservation of the Roman name, which has persisted despite the switch to Greek for literally every other character. While the rest of the mythological names remained overwhelming tied to mythological context, Hercules had become attached to other spheres, which were unaffected by changes in academic language and remained culturally prominent. Through their eventual turn to film, later "strongmen" then helped Hercules, rather than Heracles, not only remain in use but become the standard.

So. Now we're at a point where the name is stuck beyond all reason, but enough people out there versed in mythology are going, "wtf why is his name wrong?" So why doesn't that get changed?

Well, I've seen one adaptation so far go for it. The Hades games already dug out the Minotaur's personal name and got everybody using it, so it's not surprising they would be willing to give Heracles a go. (They also apparently use Heracles in the Record of Ragnarok series, but that's an anime and I have no idea what the Hercules/Heracles situation is outside the English speaking world, so I'm not sure how common that is.)

Neither of the two equally forgettable Hercules films that came out in 2014 (still don't know how or why that happened) feels like the sort of project anyone involved in would have even considered floating Heracles for. Neither of them was, let's say, well made? or overly committed to accuracy to the source material, and both banked on "well everybody knows who Hercules is!" (Interestingly, since he was a world wrestler, the Dwayne Johnson project could be considered a continuation of the strongman Hercules tradition...)

Meanwhile if Disney even did consider giving their hero his appropriately Greek name, they were releasing it in 1997, right in the middle of the run of the Hercules tv show which had been airing for 2 years already and was hugely popular. Like every project that hinges on people being familiar with Hercules' story already, if it had gone with Heracles I think the public a. would not have known that was Hercules and b. would have been like "Who the fuck is Heracles? That sounds like Hercules lol." 😑 With that kind of project, at that particular time, I think anybody would have had a snowball's chance in hell of making a name change work. Even the Percy Jackson series, which did not come out in the direct shadow of the tv show and seems to pride itself on it's perceived accuracy (hmmmmm) also has Hercules rather than Heracles. I give Rick Riordan enough benefit of the doubt to assume he would have liked to use the authentic Greek name in his series if he could have-- publishers believing children could handle Heracles in a world of Herculeses however, seems less plausible. (I mean HBO didn't think an audience of grown adults could handle Asha and Osha, so...)

So there you have it, my personal theory on why we're still out here saying shit like "Hercules was the son of Zeus" in the year of our lord 2024, how we ended up here, and why it's more complex than just "the guy who wrote this doesn't know what he's talking about."

[nyoheadcannonsaph]

Axis Powers [expanded] Human Names ( + my reasons for them)

Here we go with the Axis countries' human names! I did some reseach, but again, as before, I believe we can agree to disagree, if you don't like my takes. Also, I'm using the last names from their male counterparts for the sake of integrity (like, if we had two Italies and the male had not-so-Italian last name that Hima invented for him, and then a female version with a more appropriate name, it would get a bit confusing, right?). I don't see them as family, but hey, they are one and the same country, we can't go too crazy with that.

Still, feel free to use any names you prefer. In this particular post there will be a lot of defense of Hima's choices, so brace yourselves. I really think he worked over the Axis characters long and thoroughly enough to make up his mind and some of his impressions were more correct than you could see it at face value.

So let's look at the names, shall we?

May the united powers of pasta, sake and wurst be with you!

Germany (West) - Nyoitsu/Doiko

Monika Beilschmidt

I don't think it's a perfect name, but it's not bad either. I originally thought of leaving Nyo!Germany as Louise/Luise, but since I don't like copying male names for female characters, even in genderbend, I opted for Monika and found some good grounds for it. It is after all a name of the mother of St Augustine, a woman mostly known for patience and determination in her prayers, which are somewhat related to Nyo!Germany's character. Furthermore, the actual meaning of the name is lost to history, but it was associated with Latin word "moneo", which translates to "advisor; I advise" and Greek "monos", meaning "one". "One advise", is kind of reflective of a line in "I am German-made" about reading each word of the manual (yes, songs are part of canon too, and I will take it as such). So ethymology-wise, it makes sense for Nyo!Germany. Weird fun fact: in 1937 there was a premiere in Stuttgart of an operetta under the title "Monika", composed by an Austrian composer. Not sure if that is related to Hima's choice, but I thought it's worth mentioning.

I also believe that in her youth (*cough* as HRE *cough*) she used other names, probably "Luise", or "Greta/Gretchen" in order not to clash with Nyo!Prussia at the time. She certainly used different aliases, as she's usually seen with her earpiece on, suggesting she works in intelligence during wartime. I can imagine her as a spy, but more of a communicator than actual secret agent. They still use aliases, don't they?

Italy (North) - Veneziano - Itako

Alice Vargas

I can hear some Italian purists coming over to say this is by no means Italian name, only italianised one. Well, yes, but let me tell you what: North Italy shares more culturally with Switzerland and Austria than it does with Southern Italy. If you happened to watch Hetafacts, you probably know some theory behind it, but if you don't, then let me put it like this: Northern Italian kingdoms were much mostly founded by barbarians "from the North"... Yeah, kind of like Papa Germania got busy with supposedly Grandpa Rome's daughter and "dot dot dot" (forgive that "Mamma mia" reference, I just had to). I mean, North Italy is still very Italian, she interited Grandpa's (or Grandma's?) Rome talent for arts and most of his (hers?) architectural wonders. But it would make sense to have a more Germanic name by origins.

Ethymology: it comes from Proto-Germanic roots, "aþala-", meaning "noble" and "haidu-", meaning "appearance; kind", and it was originally "Adeleide" - a name that young Nyo!Italy could be using, especially when living with Nyo!Austria and Nyo!HRE (I mean, you know who that actually was, but shh). Likely, during the renaissance and later times, she used different names, as I imagine she was very involved with the trade of antique sculptures and so she needed to use various aliases; she also was known to meddle in political affairs, much more than her male counterpart (especially between Turkey and Venice matters), so she used names like "Caterina", "Felicità" or "Margherita", among others. Still, around the end of 19th century, she came back to her original name, using the italianised, shorter version of it, as "Alice" ("Ah-lee-che", for all English natives, who read it as "Ah-lys"; I see you in your sleep and I'm not even Italian myself).

Italy (South) - Romana/Lovina

Chiara Vargas

First of all, that's the name Hima gave and for one of the few times I can wholeheartedly agree with his choices here. Secondly, it's the Italian form of the name "Clara", which derives from "clarus" in Latin, which in turn means "clear, bright", but also "famous, well-known". Well, that's ironic, if that's the name of Southern Italy and not the Northern one, isn't it? After all, South Italy often complains about being in the shade of her Northern sister - I think she would choose a wishful name, honestly, hoping to highlight her individuality even more. Finally, she's described by Hima as having a "strong image", which can be interpreted as "appearing to have a strong personality" - a very clear one, if I may say so.

I just love everything about this name, it suits her character and makes sense. If she ever used any other name than this one, I believe it could be "Marìa", "Giuvanna" or "Càrmina", all of which are Sicilian-Neapolitan forms of other popular Italian names (the last one is from Spanish one, "Carmen", obviously). By the way, "Ciara" is also correct spelling in the South, as far as I know, but correct me if I'm wrong.

Japan - Nichiko/Nihoko

Honda Sakura --- 本田 桜

Here I must say I can imagine "Sakura" being Nyo!Japan's human name since forever. The fact that the country takes pride in everything related to cherry blossom and the Hanami season pretty much kicks off the school year over there speaks for itself. Interestingly, Himaruya was thinking of names like "Mameko" (豆子) , meaning something like "bean" and "child" combined together, and "Ponko" (I'm not sure, how to write it in kanji, I only know a bit katakana and hiragana, so there goes what I came up with: ぽん子), which common feature is that they are both ending with "-ko" syllable, which in Japanese is associated with more feminine names (and I put the Japanese names for Nyo!Country names here, you can see the pattern there too.) So I suppose the only thing he thought about Nyo!Japan is that she's like regular Japan, but a girl. I can't come up with anything more Japanese and more iconic feminine name in this language than Sakura, so I stick with that.

If I were to comd with other names, I would go for something like "Akira" (明), which means "bright", or "Haruka" (遥), meaning "remote, distant", anything that describes more of Nyo!Japan's character.

Prussia - Germany (East) - Puroiko (?)

Maria/Luisa/Julia Beilschmidt

Okay, I know some people like to use "Maria" for 2p!Nyo!Prussia, and some of you will be confused why I didn't put "Julchen" instead of "Julia". Well, there's a good reason for both. "Maria" would likely be the name Nyo!Prussia would use as part of the Teutonic Order, and while 2p!Nyo!Prussia seems to embody that peried of Prussian history, I think it is more likely that during that time, Nyo!Prussia was acting more "feminine", you know, emobodying the more diplomatic side of the order compared to her male counterpart. Also, one of the names the Teutonic Knights used was "Marienritter", meaning literally "(St) Mary's Knights".

Upon the conversion of the order's Grand Master, Albert of Brandenburg, to Luteranism in 1525, Maria changed name to "Luisa", which was a common name in Northern and Central Germany at the time. There's a famous character she shared that name, Queen Luise of Prussia, of whom Napoleon spoke in high regards ever since meeting her in person (just so you know, she was pretty smart and badass). Finally, as she was separated from her sister, Nyo!Germany, she started to use "Julia", with the diminutive of "Julchen" ("-chen" is a form of endearment, like "small Julia" in this context) to differentiate it from more typically Slavic-sounding "Julia". It's still very popular name in Germany now, so I imagine it being the final version as for now (not like Prussia exists XD Sorry, I had to, I got Polish-Prussian heritage, so I can make that joke).

[facts-about-myths]

Pop culture VS folklore : Elementals

Elementals are a popular type of fantasy creature related, as their name suggests, to the elements. But how does their modern depiction compare to their centuries-old version ?

Elementals, made from the elements

Ah, elementals, a timeless classic... They're these big creatures whose body is made of some element like water, fire, air or earth, right ?

Well, in DnD, yes. In folklore... Not so much (the Jain Ekendriya might be close, but it's still not quite the same thing...).

So, where did that idea come from ? The DnD creators took some inspiration from the works of Michael Moorcock in the 70s, like Elric of Melniboné. Moorcock, one of the biggest names in fantasy at the time, probably got it in turn from the writings of Paracelsus, an important 16th century alchemist — or at least something derived from the Paracelsian tradition.

Elementals, from Paracelsus (or are they...?)

The four Paracelsian elementals are also a fairly popular theme in fantasy or esoteric circles now, so you might be familiar with them already. You know, the Gnomes and their silly red hats for earth, the winged Sylphs for air, the liquid Undines for water, and the reptilian Salamanders for fire... Feels familiar ?

...Except everything I just listed about them, apart from the names, is 100% wrong.

These descriptions, while popular, are erroneous and do not match what Paracelsus wrote at all. In fact, you shouldn't trust any book or source genuinely claiming that elementals like that are what Paracelsus was talking about, because it shows that they just... Never double-checked.

Then again, to be fair, the Paracelsian concept of elementals has been reused and distorted by people for centuries now, so it's not exactly a modern pop culture issue. But still, let's set the record straight : what did the man actually write about these creatures back in the 1500s ?

Elementals, from Paracelsus (for real this time)

Their names

First, elementals aren't even called "elementals" by Paracelsus. At some point, he calls them the Saganae (sometimes rendered as "Sagani", and maybe coming from the Latin saga or sagana, meaning "witch") but that word never really caught on.

He otherwise mostly describes them in vague terms like "the water-people", "the mountain-people", and so on. Over the years, he gave the elementals various names, sometimes even randomly switching in the same text (Undines being however consistently referred to as "Nymphs"). The terms we now use for them come from the two alternative sets of names Paracelsus lists in his Liber de nymphis :

One based on what folk were apparently calling them, which he personally found inaccurate (Nymphs, Sylphs, Pygmies, Salamanders)

Another, which he found more fitting (Undines, Sylvestres, Gnomes, Vulcans)

Some of these come from previous legends or mythology (Ancient Greek Pygmies and nymphs, Roman god Vulcan, legends about the mythical salamander...). It does not necessarily mean that the elementals are the very same creatures featured in these legends (the Salamanders are very different from the magic lizard, but since both are said to live inside fire, a parallel between the two is made).

Others names, like "gnome", "undine" or "sylph", seem to have been coined by Paracelsus specifically for the elementals.

Those poor Sylphs...

The Sylphs might be the most mischaracterized of the four elementals. In fact, you can directly tell if someone has done any research on the subject by what they say about them : just searching the meaning of the word "sylph" would raise questions, as one would find that it comes from sylvestris, directly referring to the forest. Which doesn't make any sense, right ? Why the forest reference, if they are air elementals ?

Because they're not actually made of air or living in the sky. They're wild-men from the forest. If you hear anything about wings, clouds, abodes in the sky, or anything... You have left Paracelsian Sylph territory.

(But that's not even all : the words "sylph" and "sylphid" have now come to mean something ethereal, lithe and graceful... While the actual Sylphs are described are the total opposite...)

The 4 elemental chaos

To understand why air elementals would be forest people, you first need to understand the concept of chaos. The elementals aren't made of one of the 4 elements. They're creatures whose chaos is one of the 4 elements.

"Chaos" is, etymology-wise, the root of the word "gas". In this context, it's somewhat similar : as humans, our chaos is air, because we breathe air, and we move in air. The chaos of a fish is water, because it breathes and moves in water.

Elementals live inside their respective element, which is their chaos. They are able to move through it (gnomes can pass through stone for example), and aren't fit to survive in other chaos. Sylphs are, like humans, beings who breathe air and live in the air element.

(And in a way, it still makes sense, as forests do produce a big chunk of our oxygen...)

The elemental body

Although often mistaken for demons or ghosts, the elementals are regular beings of flesh and blood, not some kind of spirit, demon or mindless artificial being. They're born, they marry, have offspring and die, they eat, drink, sleep, poop, get sick. Each individual has their own personality, they are fully sentient and not particularly prone to evil.

However, unlike humans, their kind are not descendants of Adam (whose flesh was made from tangible earth), so their body is more subtle than ours. They're somewhat halfway between spirit and human, yet despite how humanlike they look, they lack an immortal soul (as opposed to humans).

The thicker the chaos, the more subtle the body of the species, and vice versa (so gnomes living in stone have a very subtle body, unlike humans who live in air and have a gross, tangible body).

How the elementals live

The elementals really aren't that different from us. They have their cultures, societies and rulers inside their own chaos. They have their own clothing and modesty taboos, although it doesn't necessarily line up with human ones.

They also have their own food and drink, which, while being their chaos' equivalent to our human foods and drinks, look different (except for Sylphs, who eat the plants of the forest like humans in the wilderness would). These foods and drinks are made of a special matter from the chaos that we can't see or comprehend. Each chaos has its own "soil" (usually earth, except for Gnomes, since to them, earth is like the air : instead, their soil is water), and the elementals grow their food from that soil and their element. They also have domestic animals, adapted to live in their chaos.

Since they can see through their chaos like we do in air, the elementals can all see the sun, the moon and the stars above them, just like us. They have days and nights, summers and winters like us, but their weather is slightly different, as it doesn't rain or snow inside the other chaos the same way as here.

Marriage and children

Elementals don't generally interact with the other three elemental peoples, but some of them can marry and have children with humans (which usually happens with female Undines). The children will be human, inheriting a soul from Adam through their human father. The Undine mother will also gain a soul in the process, and with it, access to the afterlife.

Paracelsus mentions that — not clarifying whether it's about the Undines only or about all elementals, but we can assume that it's about the water-people — they have a lot more females than males, which are very rare, and that this is why they actively seek human males. He mentions groups of Nymphs gathering together and constructing a place in the chaos of humans, the Venusberg, a cave where they wait for men. Their leader, the most beautiful, is the "Venus". While eternally young and very long-lived, that Venus will eventually die and be replaced by another Venus.

Each elemental kind has both males and females, so they can reproduce among themselves. However, it will produce monstrous offspring from a new race, bearing no resemblance to the parents, and also devoid of a soul. Among these monsters are sirens, giants and dwarves.

How could elementals still exist, then, if they're mortal and create other races when they attempt to reproduce ?

In his Astronomia Magna, Paracelsus writes that the elementals are actually born from nature itself : their father is the firmament — the sky and the stars within it, and their mother is their own element — fire, water, earth or air.

Undines / Nymphs 💧

Not literally made of water or a mermaid.

Look exactly like humans, and dress and behave like them

Live in rivers, they can interact with humans when they come near the water

Can speak the human language

Their unions produce different creatures, like mermaids or sea monks

Females often marry humans and have children with them, gaining a soul. If their human husband offends them near water, they disappear in it. But if the husband marries another wife, the Undine comes back and kills him

Sylphs / Sylvestres 🍃

Actually woodland beings living in forests and not any type of winged creature or spirit made of air or living in the clouds.

Humanoid. Taller, stronger and coarser than humans, but more shy

Live in forests, eat the plants of the forest

Cannot speak the human language but can understand it

Their unions produce different creatures, like giants

Sometimes marry humans, but this is way rarer than Undine/human marriages

Gnomes / Pygmies 🪨

Not the same as the garden gnomes with red hats despite sharing a name.

Humanoid, smaller than humans (about half their height)

Live in mountains, in caves and in mines

Can speak human languages, like Undines

Can see through stone and pass through it

Have a lot of money, since they have the ability to create money as they wish

Their unions produce different creatures, like dwarves

Very rarely marry humans, but often agree to serve them (as long as the human keeps their word and treats them well). Give humans money. If their human master offends them, they vanish.

Salamanders / Vulcans 🔥

Not the same as the mythical reptile living in fire despite sharing a name.

Humanoid, very thin and slender. They look all fiery, and are often mistaken for ghosts

Live inside volcanoes (they're sometimes called Aetnici, which would translate as "the Etnaeans", from Mt Etna), and we can sometimes hear them yelling, hammering and working inside

Very rarely speak, but technically able to

Create all treasures with the fire under mountains (these treasures are then kept by Undines in water, Gnomes in the earth, and Sylvestres on the surface, waiting to be discovered by humans)

Their unions create different creatures, like will-o'-the-wisps

Never marry humans, but can serve them. A lot of them get possessed by the devil (as can be any elemental or human) and seek the company of witches. Because of this, they're seen as dangerous for humans, despite not being inherently "evil" as a species.

Sources :

It's Elementary, James MALISZEWSKI

La question des êtres élémentaires chez Paracelse, Didier KAHN

Four Treaties of Theophrastus von Hohenheim, called Paracelsus, translated from the original German by C. Lilian TEMKIN, George ROSEN, Gregory ZILBOORG, Henry E. SIGERIST

[aprillikesthings]

There are a lot of things that suck ass about living in 2024, but the fact that I can look at literally any page of the Book of Kells and get a better, more zoomed-in look at it, than I could if I were standing in front of the fucking thing, is not one of them

That part is pretty god damn great

It's a lavishly illuminated book of the Gospels (in Latin), made in the 800's in Ireland.

It's one of those things that I can't think about too much or I just start crying. It's so beautiful and human.

THE LEVEL OF DETAIL IS FUCKING WILD. This is the "chi ro" page. (from the first two Greek letters of the word "Christ" (Greek: ΧΡΙΣΤΟΣ, or Χριστός) – Chi (χ) and Rho (ρ).)

Each page is 330 mm by 250 mm (13 inches by 9.8 inches). It's all on calfskin vellum. All 680 pages of it. (340 "leaves"). There are places where there's patches in the calfskin and holes that weren't patched. Some of the colors were made from things imported from as far away as the Mediterranean.

We're missing a few pages, but it's a fucking miracle we have it at ALL. It's up there with the Bayeux Tapestry (among other things! those are just ones I personally know about!) in terms of "I can't believe humans made this spectacular thing that long ago and WE STILL HAVE IT." Things like fabric and writing are just so notoriously easy to lose/destroy!

I think one of my favorite things is that it isn't perfect! Not just the patches and holes--there are visible mistakes where one of the scribes ran out of room on a line, for instance:

"ah shit I forgot I needed to write 'maria' there."

(that says "et ait Maria," or "and Mary said")

Anyway. Yes I am considering getting a tattoo of part of it.

Specifically the opening lines of the Magnificat.

It's from the first chapter of Luke, and it's the song Mary sings when the angel tells her she's going to give birth to Jesus. The translation the Episcopal church uses for evening prayer goes:

My soul proclaims the greatness of the Lord, my spirit rejoices in God my Savior

The Latin version:

Magnificat anima mea Dominum et exultavit spiritus meus in Deo salutari meo

And here's what it looks like in the Book of Kells (and a link to the whole page if you're curious)

(...plus some of the next line, "quia respexit humilitatem," "he has looked upon his humble/lowly servant")

("but a whole bunch of letters are missing" yeah there was a whole Thing with writing out Latin, back when all writing was done by hand on vellum, where you could skip letters if you knew the reader would know which word you meant. That little line above the text is fancy writing for "I skipped some letters on that one.")

ANYWAY the PROBLEM is that I'm not a huge fan of the opening "Ma" of the word Magnificat. There are other examples of illuminated "Ma" in the Book that I might swap out, but they all look like that rounded shape, just the decoration varies.

I also have to decide whether to write out the Latin words or keep the abbreviations they used. Keeping the abbreviations might be easier lol.

Also I fucking love the Magnificat.

My soul proclaims the greatness of the Lord, my spirit rejoices in God my Savior; *     for he has looked with favor on his lowly servant. From this day all generations will call me blessed: *     the Almighty has done great things for me,     and holy is his Name. He has mercy on those who fear him *     in every generation. He has shown the strength of his arm, *     he has scattered the proud in their conceit. He has cast down the mighty from their thrones, *     and has lifted up the lowly. He has filled the hungry with good things, *     and the rich he has sent away empty. He has come to the help of his servant Israel, *     for he has remembered his promise of mercy, The promise he made to our fathers, *     to Abraham and his children for ever.

The artist Ben Wildflower has a great woodcut print/sticker/t-shirt of a couple of lines from it:

[mask131]

The Zeus Case: Why such a messy love life? (1)

Short answer: Because people are parrots who repeat blindly everything they hear without doing their research. :)

Long answer: get ready for a class.

So I expressed several times my strong dislike of TV Tropes’ descriptions of the Greek gods, and they notably use to describe Zeus one quotation from the Youtube channel known as “Overtly Sarcastic Productions”. This is the quote:

From a modern perspective, when we look back at the original tellings, it’s very difficult to see Zeus doing his thing and conclude anything other than that the king of the gods is an omnipotent serial rapist who leaves a trail of shattered lives and bastard children in his wake and this pantheon is a fucking nightmare.

This quote is a perfect summary of how modern Internet perceives Greek mythology... and this point of view is wrong. I am sorry to say that, but it is wrong. I do enjoy the OSP videos, I do follow faithfully their Journey to the West videos and the like - but they also simplify some stuff to fit a small-video format and, of course, ARE OVERTLY SARCASTIC. That’s in their very name. Their videos are fun to watch, but I wouldn’t use them as a scholarly work about Greek mythology.

And so studying Zeus’ love life reveals a much more complicated history and evolution than just “In truth he was a serial rapist but nobody wanted to say it”.

 1) If you want it Roman, sprinkle some rape

Let’s tackle already the very concept of “Zeus as a serial rapist”. The answer is: no. I already talked about it previously (see my post about rape in mythology) but the whole reputation of Greek mythology as being all about rape is a huge misunderstanding caused by the Romans. Most of the stories of mythological rape came from the mind of Roman authors and writers. Ovid is a particulary bad offender, because thanks to his rape fetish he either invented lots of rapes or reinvented consensual relationships into rapes - and the problem is that Ovid’s Metamorphoses, despite being a Roman text that built a Romanize mythology, was used for a long time as a source of info about “Greek mythology”. When it was as Greek as Disney’s Hercules. And with Zeus you can actually see that: if you look at the texts in which most of his “rapes” are recorded... They are either Roman texts, or texts written far after the age of Ancient Greece, texts written in a Romanize Greece or by authors who tried to “reconstruct” the lost Greek myths by taking the preserved Roman versions as a source. So while yes Jupiter was a rapist, Zeus wasn’t a “serial rapist”. I haven’t checked EVERY story mind you, so there might some true “ancient rape”, but most of the time there is no rape - at most there is deceiving as for example Zeus will disguise himself under another shape, but this calls for more subtle, case-by-case analysis, as the transformations were done as much to not frighten/kill the often mortal lovers, as to protect said lovers from the wrath of Hera. 

2) If you like it, don’t say it

There is an implicit consent in Ancient Greek texts that modern audience, sensibilized to sexual harassment and “the evils of patriarchy”, often does not get. When someone rapes another person, the Ancient Greek author will explicitely say it. There will be descriptions of struggle, of violence, of resistance. If there is no mentions of that, if the relationship is not called a “rape”, it won’t be a rape. This notably led to a great confusion due to several myths describing Zeus “taking away” or “ravishing” a person in animal form, snatching them away from their home or community to isolate them and have love with them. I can sound like rape - but in effect, in the text, it is just ravishing someone. The confusion notably arose in latinized languages thanks to the word “rapt”, “rape”, originally meaning “taking someone away by force - usually with romantic or lustful intents but not always”. With time “rape” became what we know today, but in old-fashioned language a man in love with a girl but refused her hand by her parents, if he took her away from her parents nonetheless, it would be a rapt/rape - even if the girl was in love with him, because it was still forcefully and brutaly stealing away from a family/from parents. There is a big confusion arising from all that.

Second point is that in Ancient Greek texts, there is no need to explicitely describe the love and the consent of two parties to say “this was a consensual relationship”. While rape is explicitely described as rape, consensual love is not glossed much about. It will often just be said as “X laid with Y and they had three kids”. Or “X came into the bed of Y” or “Y was loved by X”. Often only one side of the couple will be evoked, but not because it was a one-sided relationship - just because there is an implicit consent that is not explicitely described. The Greeks thought that by nature, if two people had children together, it meant they had to be in love. If a man was described as “entering a girl’s bed” without mentions of him enslaving her or brutalizing her, it meant that she had allowed him to climb in her bed. It was a thought-structure that has been recently lost in an effort to prevent the “romanticism of rape”, but it was a thought logic that was prevalent in Ancient texts. Rape is explicit, consent is implied. 

(This also tied with a very Greek aesthetic of “sexuality is vulgar”. The Greeks were known to be disgusted by too expressive manifestations of desire. Sexuality was a needed and fine thing - but in moderation and subtlety. If someone loudly or openly enjoyed having sex, they were seen as pervs. Poets kept their art... well, poetic, by saying as little as possible about sexuality itself. This is why Ancient Greek statues of male nudes depicted such tiny genital organs. To have a “big one” was seen as something vulgar and ugly, as a manifestation of an excessive lust or overflowing desire that repelled rather than attracted. On the contrary, to have small sexual organs was something attractive, elegant, “polite” we may say.)

3) Confusion

If Zeus’ love life seems so messy today, it is because people confuse everything and mix together stories from so many sources. 

I already pointed out that there is a confusion between the Roman sources (aka “Greek myths rape edition”) and the actual Greek sources. But people also love to throw in Orphic content, not realizing that the Orphic religion was not the “mainstream” religion of the Greeks. This is why it is called “Orphic religion”, not “Ancient Greek religion”. Orphic poetry and Orphic literature fits with an Orphic cosmogony and Orphic rites that differ MASSIVELY from what we know as “Greek mythology”. Orphic religion is WEIRD and completely reinvent the Greek gods and legends by mixing them with motifs and concepts taken from Near-East and Middle-East religions and mythologies ; and so “fusing” it with well-known Greek myths such as the Homerics or the Hesiodics necessitates a HUGE rewrite because they were NOT made to fit, they belong to two different worlds. 

For example this is where you’ll find the whole legend of Zeus raping Persephone. Which doesn’t fit because if you look at “traditional” Greek myths, Zeus never slept with any of his daughters. 

4) Love VS Lust

As I said previously, the Romans and the “late” Greek authors (understand those that wrote in a Romanize Greece or in a post-Roman Greece/Christianized Greece) took the habit of turning the love life of the gods into a series of rapes and savage hunts. This applied to Zeus’ love life.

Because if you look at the older texts, at the “original” texts, what are the words you find? You find the words “seduction” - Zeus “seducing” women, women being “seduced” by Zeus, aka a process of charming and attracting his lovers, and the lovers themselves falling in love with Zeus or allowing him to share a night with them. And you find the word “love”. Zeus explicitely describes his feelings towards his old flames and affairs as “love”, or “sweet love”, “deep love”, “tender love”. 

This is in sharp contrast to the later writers and the depictions of rapes who use more explicit words such as “desire” and “lust”. There is a sharp contrast between the “older” Zeus as an all-lover, and the “newer” Zeus as a deity overflowing with lust. Mind you, in Ancient Greece love and sex were still mixed together (virginity being seen as refusing all love, and chaste lovers being unusual couples) but the Greeks still had a clear way of dividing sexuality as driven by love, from sexuality as driven by pure physical desire.

Which does tie into...

5) My weird Greek wedding

Greeks had a different conception of marriage.

Now, I am not adding as a “solid proof” that Zeus was better than what you think, or that him cheating on Hera was a socially accepted thing in any way. One must point out that the laws and society of Ancient Greeks didn’t actually fit their own myths - such as how Greek mythology presents strong, autonomous, “feminist” goddesses when in real life being a woman in Ancient Greece sucked. The Greeks themselves recognized that the gods, due to their inhuman and superior nature, were allowed things forbidden to mankind (for example incest was perfectly allowed and normal among gods, but sternly forbidden among humans - this topic had been discussed at length by the Greeks themselves). But... to take a peek into the society and the social norms of Ancient Greece does allow one to understand better the myths, by having a different light shine onto the legends. 

And the reason Zeus’ love life became so debordant (and why in general gods are known to have what we call today “affars”) is because Greek marriage was much more... permissive than our modern-day marriage. But just for men. Women were sworn to complete and utter fidelity and were owned by their husband or consort - they had no way of sleeping with anyone else. HOWEVER... men were allowed to sleep with women other than their wives in given conditions. Don’t understand me wrong: unfaithfulness was seen as a crime by Greek law, and a husband cheating on his wife was to be punished. But the law also allowed the husband to have a legal sex with other women outside of marriage without suffering any kind of punishment. It was the “Pallakai/Hetairai/Gynaekes” system. A man had to marry to a wife, and they could only have one wife to which they were to be faithful (they were the “gynaekes”). The wife was the “guardian of the house” and the keeper of the man’s home, and she was the one supposed to bear the man’s children, as well as the “tool” through which legitimate succession took place. She was a legal and domestic element. But a man was also allowed to have a “pallake”, that is to say a “concubine”. Pallakai were female slaves (either bought through the slave commerce, or taken back as war prisoners) that their master had sex with. Concubines were allowed for sex - but nothing more. They were sex slaves, but they were not supposed to take over the position of a wife. (In the legend of Agamemnon, Cassandra was a pallake/concubine, as opposed to Clytemnestra the wife).  And third came the “hetairai”, the prostitutes, who were also legally allowed to have sex with married men in exchange for money. 

So in conclusion, married men were allowed to have sex with prostitutes and concubines - as long as they did not made them fill a roll of “wife”. For example, while men were allowed to have pallakai, it was seen as of very poor taste to have your concubine live under the same roof as your wife (no need to tell you the “concubines” were usually found in noble ranks of the Greek society, among the rich and powerful). As it was said : “We have hetairai for pleasure, pallakai for the body’s daily needs, and gynaekes for the bearing of legitimate children and for the guardianship of our houses”. Three different types of sexual relationships allowed within a marriage, with three different purposes. To be crude: a commercial pleasure ; a living sex-toy ; and a legal wife. 

Taking this into account, the many extra-marital relationships of Zeus (and other gods) can gain a bit more sense as, in the Greek mindset a married man is allowed to have sexual relationships with other women as long as 1) it is just casual, non-consequence sex and 2) the other women is of a lesser rank (prostitute or slave). If we try to transpose it to the world of the gods, it explains why the male gods are searching for pleasure among mortal women (by definition, “lesser women”, as humans are inferior to gods and would be a good equivalent of prostitutes/slaves to the “citizen”), but never marry any of them and stick to having one divine wife. But in return, applying such a view onto the myths (which again is not the “correct” one, but just another angle) also explains why Hera would become so furious and so mad at Zeus’ affairs - because 1) as said above, Zeus often deeply loved his mistresses, and seems to have treated them as more than just casual one-nights and 2) he had children with them, which is normally the “prerogative” of the wife. This all leads to a divine repetition of the “Cassandra/Clytemnestra” tragedy, when a wife becomes jealous of a concubine when the husband seems too much attached to her, to the point of almost replacing his wife with her.

Because that’s a last point I should add: wives could easily be replaced in Ancient Greece. Well “easy” might be a bit of a strong word, there were legal procedures to be undertaken and there was money to be exchanged, but the thing is that divorce was a normal and usual thing for the Ancient Greeks. And not just for the men! A man could dissolve his marriage and get rid of his wife - but the same way a wife could get rid of her husband and dissolve her marriage. It was all allowed - and in fact this is why Zeus had so many wives before Hera in such a quick succession (up to seven wives if we believe some interpretations of the poems!). This social consideration could also add another point of view on this set of myths - if you decide to have a “social reading” of them - by raising the question “Why doesn’t Zeus leave Hera?” or “Why doesn’t Hera leave Zeus?”. Of course there is an answer to be provided with the construction of the myth itself - they would have never left each other in mythology because they were a couple in religion and a myth of a separation would only have occured if suddenly religion changed and declared the two weren’t a couple anymore, which likely would have never happened... But since we talk here about interpretation of the myths, and “reinventing” the myths, this is a very legitimate question to ask, especially since people keep this very Christianized view of ancient wedding as a thing people are stuck in till death. It opens a lot of funny and fascinating reinterpretations of the Greek myths: try to imagine, why would Zeus not leave Hera when he left his two or six previous wifes, and that despite all the crap going on in their marriage? You can find a dozen of answers going in very different directions...

ADDENDUM: Gods are not characters

... but while I always encourage people to be creative with their reinterpretation of the Greek gods for FICTION, here we are talking about the ACTUAL god and mythical figure, and I have gone a bit too far. Because all these later considerations are actually treating Zeus as a character. It isn’t all wrong - especially since a good chunk of what we know about Greek mythology comes from literary works, so the gods we know are a third “fictional characters”/”literature characters”. But it is also forgetting that they are mythical figures, AND religious figures. You know, actual gods, of a religion, with rites and canons and theological debates ; and figures of myths, as in the equivalent of today’s folktales and fairytales. Archetypes. Stock figures. Metaphores. Allegories. Not entities supposed to have human-like psychology, not entities supposed to be treated as fictional characters of an author’s work ; and whose stories are not supposed to always be coherent or logical - as long as they are powerful and meaningful. 

Yes there was a literary Zeus, akin to the various incarnations of Zeus we have in books today (and this is why we have different Zeus depending on the author - an Homeric Zeus, an Hesiodic Zeus...) ; but the religious and “truly mythical” Zeus of Antiquity was probably more akin to the folkloric/artistic/cultural figures we know today. The Grim Reaper, Father Time, Mother Nature, Jack Frost... Everybody knows who they are, what they look like, what they do, but nobody can give them a true “psychology” or will start saying “They’re like that because they had a bad childhood”. Books will give them backstories and personal traits and human depth - but you can’t call it the “true” incarnation of the entity. [Of course the analogy is a bit shaky because the texts of Homer and Hesiodic were heavily religious in nature, and so there is an effort to stick to an established belief and coherent canon - but we know that for later authors, religious authorities of Ancient Greece clearly considered some of their depictions of gods clear blasphemy.]

Note: I originally planned this post to be just one post, but as it turns out I have a LOT of things to say, so I better split my post into two to let you better appreciate the nuances of this debate. 

Second note: Of course I do not tell you to believe me on everything. Remember I am just one person, with a knowledge maybe big but still limited. Always double-check, triple-check, go look for other sources - and if I make any mistake don’t hesitate to tell it to me! With such vast and complex topics one can easily get lost into details and forget the big picture ; or the opposite. 

[ultramarine-spirit]

About your post about Athy's name in other languages ​​(which I loved) it reminded me that when I started reading the manhwa I always confused the name of Athanasia with Anastasia to the point that I went to find out if they were the same and found that both they have the same meaning and that they come from Greece but I did not find any page that will confirm that it is the same but different variants. I also couldn't help but notice how Athanasia's name resembles Anastacious (which is technically the male version of Anastasia) and yes, the fact that both names have the same meaning may be why these two names sound so similar but Aeternitas also means Immortality and it doesn't look alike beyond the fact that it starts with A.

I found it interesting how Athy's name and Anas are similar and it made me wonder if at some point Claude must have had a deja vu hearing Athy's name (not only does she look like the woman he loved but also her name sounds similar to of the brother who killed lol)

I also mixed up "Athanasia" with "Anastasia" the first time I read WMMAP, but now I do the opposite. I have to remind myself all the time that no, it's not Athanasia Nikolaevna-

Funny thing about Aety's name is that it's the name of a goddess, and it doesn't really have a male form. I guess finding so many different greek names that mean immortality was hard for Plutus(?

That's an interesting thought! Athy and Ana's names are really close, so indeed I think she must have reminded Claude of his brother. There's also the fact that only the current emperor can give an immortal name to their heir, which draws an immediate parallel between them. As a side note, Diana was very daring naming Athy, as Claude himself notes, not only because of the name itself but also because Athy is a girl. His wording implied women aren't usually rulers in Obelia ("and a girl at that"). This is curious to me, since Obelia's first monarch, back when it was a kingdom and not an empire, was queen Ambrose. But I digress.

Athy speculates that Claude must have some sort of complex over the immortal names. Since he wasn't the empress' son he could only take the throne by force, but "he would never be granted the name of an emperor", unlike Anastasius and Athy. And well, there's also the fact that Claude means "the one who limps", "limping" or "crippled" (from the Latin “claudus”). Which makes one wonder if Aevum hated Claude that much to name him as an insult or what. Note that this is just one of Claude's meanings, but it's explicitly the one that Plutus used, as Athy refers to this plot point in the novel. Myself and others have theorized that Plutus based Ana and Claude's characters on real Roman emperors, and emperor Claudius indeed suffered from a limp and deafness, being ostracized by his family as a child. WMMAP Claude wasn't sickly as far as we know, but the ostracized thing definitely rings a bell.

Now, as far as I remember, it was never confirmed that Claude indeed felt inferior because of his name compared to Ana's (and Athy's), but I can definitely see how he could have felt like that, at least in his youth when Ana was the crown prince and Claude was treated so badly.

One thing I find rather sweet is that Claude remembered the bond he used to have with Ana when he spent time with Athy. It's because Athy melted Claude's heart and gave him something dear to him again that he started to remember Ana and to question their turbulent relationship. I adore how Athy's love and kindness had that effect on him (even though it wasn't enough for Claude to not want to execute Ana but shhh he still saved his ass because Athy asked him to. Small steps, you know?).

[fierceawakening]

I gather that the early church distanced itself from the original Jewish core to expand as widely as possible, hence Paul scrapping kashrut and circumcision as requirements. One strategy seems to have been appealing to gentile antisemitism, like by playing up the Sanhedrin's role in Jesus's death. This MAY have entailed referring to Jesus's betrayer as Judas, but that name is a Greek/Latin version of a popular name Yehuda (see also St. Jude), so Jesus's betrayer could've easily been called that.

Thanks! Yeah, I was thinking more about this and wondering if we know it for sure. (Again, even if it IS a fake etymology, it’s understandable to me that people would be upset by it anyway.)

I recall lots of art of the Crucifixion having the label “INRI” on the cross, and while I don’t recall what each letter stands for I know it’s an acronym for “Jesus Christ King [of the] Jews” (that is, a mocking inscription making fun of his claim to the title) and if that’s so, “Jews” starts with an I in Latin, not a J.

Which may or may not mean much, lots of ancient names and words get written in different ways by different people, and different translators use different letters sometimes.

But I did wonder.

It may well just be how I was raised, but I personally was never taught that early Christians intended to portray all Jews as villainous. The intention, i was taught, was to convert both them and Gentiles. (This is ALSO not okay/shitty behavior, to be clear.)

If you’re trying to convert people, you don’t portray every member of that community as shifty. Then you’re just alienating them. Instead you portray the religious leaders of the day as out of touch and missing the point, obsessed with how well others follow the rules rather than what the rules mean and why they matter.

Which is what I was taught the tension was between Jesus and the priests. It wasn’t that they should’ve immediately converted or something. (I mean, yes, it’s implied that they should have, Christianity wants to spread. That’s a thing, and imo not a good one. But that wasn’t the primary point.)

The primary point was that, being corrupt religious leaders, they acted similarly to corrupt religious leaders of our day (who are often Christian Dominionist), shaming and judging people for failing at following the rules perfectly rather than paying attention to whether they lived well, praying in ostentatious ways to show off their wealth and power, etc.

I’m not saying there aren’t people who teach that the point is “Jews are bad.” Just saying I wasn’t taught to see it that way, so I don’t look at it and think “Oh no, rabbis.” I look at it and think “Oh no, Paula White and Creflo Dollar.”

[gigglebug]

OC Name meanings

tagged by @randomstupidchaos

okay, so I think we all know that I primarily write a bunch of fanfic. so a lot of my characters come pre-built with names. there are several that I came up with myself, but if I only listed those names, it wouldn't even look like my book anymore, so I'm gonna define all of them anyway. (except for Malroth. I have little idea what his name means or where it comes from. it's not even his name from his starting language. who knows!)

that said I do have ONE original story (I have not worked on it in so long agh) and I will do that one at the end.

Builderverse

Crea- short for Create. stole it from the tutorial lmao.

Aris- short for Arisplotle. who is a slime. dragon quest has a thing about slimes having pun names, you know? (granted in maskverse I named him Aristaeus, which he hates, and it means some variation of "best" because he's the best boy.)

of note, in Maskverse specifically, "Malroth" is a nickname he made up for himself that he could use while in hiding as the prince so no one could sus him out. his first name is Troy. this is because his mom is Hellen and I thought it would be funny. Hellen of Troy from illiad fame is now Troy of Hellen in my story. (it's really not that funny, is it?) (yes this is basically the sole reason I made Hellen from the game his mom for the sake of the story. good times!)

of the main builders cast I'm mostly interested in Rosie (self-explanatory since she's a gardener), Babs (comes from Barbara which means stranger), and Anessa. From the (weirdly few) posts I can find about this name, Anessa is short for Agnessa, which is another form of Anges. in Greek, Agnes is pure/holy/chaste/satisfaction (everyone gives a different one lol), which I find interesting given her role in the story.

of other interesting note, Warwick can mean from the settlement by the weir (which I guess is a dam), but it also can mean "strong leader who defends". personally I think they went with his name because "war" is in it and hi that's what his island is known for.

Ludovic itself means Famous war/battle, but I chose it because the Spanish version of builders named Warwick "Ludovico" and I needed another antagonist.

Damara is Greek for "gentle" which makes sense cos she was created to be a mentor character. ended up later adopting Malroth but she lended well to it XD

Griswold- english was grey forest or grey land, french it was a ruler with grey hair (which is kinda weird because in game he is VERY bright blue). that said, I think they picked it because it kinda sounds like gristle, which is related to bone, which he is a skeleton.

Floria- flower. just thought it's fun to have a hypercompetent soldier be named Flower because her parents wanted her to be a nice proper lady. (she said fuck that.)

that's all that's coming to mind on that.

Sirens

Patrick- nobleman (english)

Jonathan- God has given (hebrew)

Scotia- person from Scotland (english) (she's not Scottish tho I just liked how it sounded)

Troy- footsoldier (greek) (don't ask me how I got two of these)

Easton- from the east (he arrives to the story from far away)

Brinda- from the basil plant (india) (again I liked the sound)

Kurt- courteous (american) (it's funny because he's overtly sarcastic with everyone but Brinda and then he turns into a teddy bear. only Patrick ever sees it tbh)

Felice- fortunate/happy (latin)

Tahlia- morning dew (hebrew). also because my dad always joked about naming me Talitha so I played with the letters.

Sera- shortened from Saraphim, which is an angel (something latin related)

I have other characters that only appear in book 2, but given I haven't touched that story since 2014-2016, I don't think it's going anywhere enough to bother listing here.

[sgnblg]

Jethrault is the "elezenified" version of Jethro. In Hebrew, it means abundance, overflowing, but also excellence. It's a name I already used for an other OC (vampire, nurse in ER, caring for his mortal patients, hate vampire supremacy in a world they rule, another story). I like hidden meaning, open secret.

For both of them, I choose Jethro/Jethrault for "not what they show, but what they are". They both have an eating disorder making them really thin, almost meager, so the contrary of their name, yes? Yet, they overflow with something else. For my vampire OC, it was his kindness and his excellence in medicine. When I made Jethrault, I thought the analogy also fits him well : as a WoL he overflows of power and excels in calculus, despite his lean body and lazy mind. I don't think it's lore accurate. We know that Garlemald uses Latin and Sharlayan uses Greek, for example, but no country seems to use Hebrew for names or places.

And for his last name, he has a very common name amongst Elezen, since his family came from a farming background. This one is lore accurate. Fun fact, many of my french friends struggled to read the name at first. The last letters "ault" are just pronounced "o", really. [ʒetʁo]. So they called him Jeje, which sound like "GG" said in french. :D

WoL QotD: What made you choose your WoL's name? Does it have any important meaning or did it just sound nice?

Follow up: Is it lore accurate? If it isn't, why not?

[bookoformon]

Alma Chapter 39. "The Pillar of the Cornhole."

The commandments of Alma to his son Corianton.

Comprising chapters 39 through 42.

CHAPTER 39

Sexual sin is an abomination—Corianton’s sins kept the Zoramites from receiving the word—Christ’s redemption is retroactive in saving the faithful who preceded it. About 74 B.C. "Insolence continues."

The rubrics ahead of each section are as important as the scriptures that follow. What are sexual sins? Sex in the butt? Sex with more than one person? Blowing a popsicle stand? Doing the hole team? Bondage sex? How about wearing costumes or doing it any time you want while using contraception?

The goal of sex is insemination. Everyone either provides insemination services or gets inseminated. Of this, there is no doubt. The problem with the desire to inseminate or be inseminated as we all know is it interferes with our judgement. To make an unethical judgement involving sex is the problem, not sex itself.

Ethics are voluntary standards by which we come to trust and rely on other persons. They create the belief they will do no harm, they will not violate the Decrees, or deliberately fall short of expectations.

So long as a person is not underage and is devoted, the Torah says pretty much anything goes. The Book of Joshua suggests "a loving embrace at the end".

In terms of the Torah Tantra, to intercourse with anything requires an appropriate match. The intention and the patterns that are created when man reproduces the moments of his life must always be pure or a big sloppy dirty discharge will result.

As for Corianton= "speaks justly."

κερας

The Greek noun κερασ (keras) means horn and is cognate with the Latin cornu and probably the Hebrew קרן (qeren). The usage of these words demonstrates a strong association with words and speech. The noun κερασ (keras), horn, is related to κρανιον (kranion) meaning skull, hence the Greek version of the name Calvary.

Anton=a decent person, one who is just

1 And now, my son, I have somewhat more to say unto thee than what I said unto thy brother; for behold, have ye not observed the steadiness of thy brother, his faithfulness, and his diligence in keeping the commandments of God? Behold, has he not set a good example for thee?

2 For thou didst not give so much heed unto my words as did thy brother, among the people of the Zoramites. Now this is what I have against thee; thou didst go on unto boasting in thy strength and thy wisdom.

3 And this is not all, my son. Thou didst do that which was grievous unto me; for thou didst forsake the ministry, and did go over into the land of Siron among the borders of the Lamanites, after the harlot Isabel.

4 Yea, she did steal away the hearts of many; but this was no excuse for thee, my son. Thou shouldst have tended to the ministry wherewith thou wast entrusted.

Zoramites= leprous hornets, or apostates

Siron="the pillar of the cornhole."

סיר I

The masculine noun סיר (sir I) means pot. This word exists in Arabic as well and even in Greek, as σιρος (siros), denoting a pit or vessel to keep corn in.

Borders of Lamanites= the membrane between man and God, AKA sin.

Isabel="God save the husband!"

Isa= God saves

Bel= The name Bel is closely related to that of Baal, the patron deity of Canaan, and both names simply mean Lord (or owner, husband,

"On the border between sin and purity is the pillar of the cornhole and the woman who is the bane of her husband."

5 Know ye not, my son, that these things are an abomination in the sight of the Lord; yea, most abominable above all sins save it be the shedding of innocent blood or denying the Holy Ghost?

6 For behold, if ye deny the Holy Ghost when it once has had place in you, and ye know that ye deny it, behold, this is a sin which is unpardonable; yea, and whosoever murdereth against the light and knowledge of God, it is not easy for him to obtain forgiveness; yea, I say unto you, my son, that it is not easy for him to obtain a forgiveness.

7 And now, my son, I would to God that ye had not been guilty of so great a crime. I would not dwell upon your crimes, to harrow up your soul, if it were not for your good.

8 But behold, ye cannot hide your crimes from God; and except ye repent they will stand as a testimony against you at the last day.

9 Now my son, I would that ye should repent and forsake your sins, and go no more after the lusts of your eyes, but cross yourself in all these things; for except ye do this ye can in nowise inherit the kingdom of God. Oh, remember, and take it upon you, and cross yourself in these things.

10 And I command you to take it upon you to counsel with your elder brothers in your undertakings; for behold, thou art in thy youth, and ye stand in need to be nourished by your brothers. And give heed to their counsel.

11 Suffer not yourself to be led away by any vain or foolish thing; suffer not the devil to lead away your heart again after those wicked harlots. Behold, O my son, how great iniquity ye brought upon the Zoramites; for when they saw your conduct they would not believe in my words.

12 And now the Spirit of the Lord doth say unto me: Command thy children to do good, lest they lead away the hearts of many people to destruction; therefore I command you, my son, in the fear of God, that ye refrain from your iniquities;

13 That ye turn to the Lord with all your mind, might, and strength; that ye lead away the hearts of no more to do wickedly; but rather return unto them, and acknowledge your faults and that wrong which ye have done.

14 Seek not after riches nor the vain things of this world; for behold, you cannot carry them with you.

15 And now, my son, I would say somewhat unto you concerning the coming of Christ. Behold, I say unto you, that it is he that surely shall come to take away the sins of the world; yea, he cometh to declare glad tidings of salvation unto his people.

16 And now, my son, this was the ministry unto which ye were called, to declare these glad tidings unto this people, to prepare their minds; or rather that salvation might come unto them, that they may prepare the minds of their children to hear the word at the time of his coming.

17 And now I will ease your mind somewhat on this subject. Behold, you marvel why these things should be known so long beforehand. Behold, I say unto you, is not a soul at this time as precious unto God as a soul will be at the time of his coming?

18 Is it not as necessary that the plan of redemption should be made known unto this people as well as unto their children?

19 Is it not as easy at this time for the Lord to send his angel to declare these glad tidings unto us as unto our children, or as after the time of his coming?

So what is the plan of redepmption if you fall off the wagon and go on ahead and so something visibly improper? Will Jesus save you from your sins in the end?

So what if he does? In between you will have to bear the brunt the walk of shame, and this tells the world you don't know what you're doing, or that maybe you do.

The Commandment we want to add to the Plates is in verse 14.

Seek not after riches nor the vain things of this world; for behold, you cannot carry them with you.

Tear someone's asshole out, but leave their heart intact This is the new rule.

[at-the-end-of-days]

So let’s talk briefly about Joel 2 since I’ve just given my own run down of those versus. There are better breakdowns on the internet, found with an easy Google search, that really dive deep into each individual verse. Christianity isn’t a new religion, there have been plenty of scholars over the years who have studied it far more deeply than I have, or could ever. After all, I don’t speak Greek, Latin, or Hebrew.

Something I don’t like when talking about the end times is how readily Christians want to “skip ahead.” To the Rapture, completely ignoring everything that comes before that (and I blame Billy Graham for a good bit of that) or skipping what Jesus said.

I think that our takeaway from Joel is that he has expanded upon what Revelations has said will happen, rather than giving us a list of events that must happen before Revelations as Jesus told us. The locusts will be.. terrible, assuming that we live to see that.

But we should all take a breath, and look for what Jesus has said will come first.

Mark 13, verses 5-8, the New King James Version.

“Take heed lest any man deceive you: For many shall come in my name, saying, I am Christ; and shall deceive many. And when ye shall hear of wars and rumours of wars, be ye not troubled: for such things must needs be; but the end shall not be yet. For nation shall rise against nation, and kingdom against kingdom: and there shall be earthquakes in divers places, and there shall be famines and troubles: these are the beginnings of sorrows.”

Now, I DO NOT claim to be Jesus made flesh. I do not claim to be a messiah. I do not claim to be a savior. But I do see many claiming that our troubles can be solved if we only lose weight, only look pretty, only use this specific self help book, if we listen to this economist, if, if, if- I don’t think we’ll see people claiming to be the reembodied Christ unless we’re walking the streets of New York City. But I do think that people are claiming to be saviors of a fashion, acting as deceivers, promising to make lives better… for a price.

And if we take this verse to stretch longer than the present day.. how many religious leaders, cult leaders, have come forward and led people away from the Church to create their own rules, their own laws? Mormonism, for example, the Church of Latter Day Saints… well. That’s enough said.

Wars and rumors of wars.

We’re in the thick of this now.

Earthquakes in many places? Absolutely.

Famines and troubles.. I think we’re headed into this now. And perhaps the grasshoppers won’t be so bad this year, even with El Niño. Maybe that’s a trouble for another time.

But I do think that that’s where we’re headed. Inflation has already hit so many, so hard, and a recession is knocking at the door. What is that, if not troubles?

But all we can do now? Is to prepare for the famines.

And that will surely be a problem that will strike others more harshly than some.. so we should be patient, kind, and generous where we can afford to do so.

All of this, and Revelations hasn’t even started in full. Or, perhaps it has.

Jesus then speaks of harassment for being Christians, and speaks of what I think truly begins the end of days.

Verses 14–23

Edit

Jesus then predicts a disastrous event in Judea:

Mark 13:14-23

"When you see 'the abomination that causes desolation' standing where it does not belong — let the reader understand — then let those who are in Judea flee to the mountains. Let no one on the roof of his house go down or enter the house to take anything out. Let no one in the field go back to get his cloak. How dreadful it will be in those days for pregnant women and nursing mothers! Pray that this will not take place in winter, because those will be days of distress unequaled from the beginning, when God created the world, until now— and never to be equaled again. If the Lord had not cut short those days, no one would survive. But for the sake of the elect, whom he has chosen, he has shortened them. At that time if anyone says to you, 'Look, here is the Christ!' or, 'Look, there he is!' do not believe it. For false Christs and false prophets will appear and perform signs and miracles to deceive the elect—if that were possible. So be on your guard; I have told you everything ahead of time. (14-23 NIV)

I think a nuclear bomb hits Israel.

But will this happen concurrently with the horsemen? Is this what famines and wars and rumors of wars mean? More earthquakes and famine and then war?

Next, we’ll discuss the horsemen.

But I think the tell tale sign that we are truly in the end of days… will be something to do with the Temple.