Month: March 2013

Christians rescue snowed-in motorists in UK: story in Daily Mail

Posted on by Roger Pearse

From the Daily Mail today:

Thank Heavens for Snow Angels! How a group of Christians got through to help stranded drivers hours efore the emergency teams arrived

  • Motorists stranded on A23 towards Brighton for up to 13 hours
  • But more than 30 Plymouth Brethren turned out to lend a helping hand
  • Airports and railways also hit during traffic chaos

Pity the poor souls out there on the highway to hell.

Cars were skidding into ditches or ploughing into snowdrifts … truckers were forced to abandon jack-knifed lorries … people were wrapped in blankets and shivering against the cold.

For up to 13 hours, motorists were stranded on the A23 towards Brighton when a few miserable inches of snowfall turned the road into a skating rink.

But – praise the Lord – salvation was at hand. For the only True Grit that seemed to work was the resolve of a modest group of Christian evangelists, undaunted by the chaos.

They became ‘Angels of the A23’ by working until dawn to help desperate motorists who must have wondered if hell would freeze over before they were rescued.

More than 30 Plymouth Brethren, as they are called, turned out in a fleet of trucks and four-wheel drive vehicles to tow cars to safety, care for shivering casualties and dispense that most quintessentially English of comforts – hot tea and Bakewell tarts.

Yesterday they were hailed as ‘snow saviours’ by those stuck for hours at Handcross, a few miles below the end of the M23 in West Sussex. ‘They were absolutely brilliant,’ one driver said. ‘It would take the council a week to organise something like this. They were angels and everyone was really grateful to see them.’

The Plymouth Brethren is a 200-year-old religious fellowship group without structured hierarchy or  formal membership.

Among those on the rescue mission was Mark MacIntyre, who works in the medical supply industry.

He initially arrived around teatime to find his nephew, who was among those stranded.

Yesterday he said: ‘When I got up here I realised the severity of the situation and organised the others.

‘The road obviously hadn’t been gritted, or the snow was too much, and there were cars stuck as far as you could see. The snow was just blowing across the road and was gradually turning to ice, making it really treacherous.

‘There were about 30 of us with seven 4x4s. It was a kind of rapid response unit … we were on the scene within about 45 minutes.

‘One of the Land Rovers we have has the facilities to make tea and coffee and had plenty of supplies on board, so we were dishing those out to the police as well as people who were stuck in their cars.

‘Everyone was really grateful. A hot drink can mean a lot when you are stuck outside at night.

‘By the time we left at about 4.30am the snow ploughs seemed to be on top of the situation.’

Alas, the Brethren couldn’t reach all parts of the country yesterday.

Despite Highways Agency teams working at ‘full capacity’ through the night, dozens of stranded Sussex drivers bombarded the internet with complaints that they never saw a gritter or a snow plough. 

The chaos caused by Britain’s worst spring freeze for 27 years spread rapidly across the country. As well as the roads, airports and railways were also hit, bringing most of the south east to a standstill. All Eurostar rail services were suspended.

Although snowfall in isolated patches reached 4.7inches, the worst-hit areas of Sussex and Kent experienced only a couple of inches. But thanks to the fact that the snow did not settle but turned to ice as temperatures plummeted as low as -3C, it became unusually treacherous. The AA was expected to have attended more than 15,000 calls by the end of last night – almost double the normal rate. Guernsey and Jersey airports were closed. The Channel Tunnel shut for six hours, causing huge delays on the M20 in Kent.  …

The story is also mentioned briefly in the Guardian.  The Telegraph has a picture of another group of the Brethren shovelling snow away from the entrance to the doctor’s surgery at Stow in the Wold.

Well done, Mr MacIntyre, and the Plymouth Brethren.  I don’t know whether these are open or exclusive brethren, but the service rendered was very timely, and well done, and Christ was honoured in it.

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Dishonesty at Wikipedia: “they don’t like it up ’em, sir”

Posted on by Roger Pearse

An amusing story from Wikipediocracy, the Wikipedia criticism site.  A user at Wikipedia has now banned any link to Wikipediocracy from Wikipedia, by adding the site to the “spam” blacklist.  Of course Wikipediocracy is not spam; this is censorship of an external site.

Since Google privileges Wikipedia so much, this reduces traffic to Wikipediocracy and therefore reduces the number of people who are aware of the criticism site.  Which is, of course, terribly convenient to evildoers at Wikipedia, of whom there are rather a lot these days.

And why, we may ask, was it felt acceptable for Wikipedia to impose a ban on another legitimate internet site?

WO has regrettably decided to out a Wikipedia user on its pages (the link is available from its main page, and several sub-pages that link to what’s on the front page) and several en-Wikipedia users have gone on a crusade to mention this site as much as possible to push drama and in some cases to further the outing.

That’s right.  Someone in Wikipediocracy dared to mention the real name of one of the editors hiding behind a pseudonym in Wikipedia.  This is strictly forbidden in Wikipedia — where abuse is so endemic that it is unsafe to use your own name — and, apparently, Wikipedia feels that it has the right to forbid any other internet site to do it either.  Or else.

Dear me.  And I thought Wikipedia was all about sharing knowledge?

The serious point is that the people in power in Wikipedia today are unfit to hold such a role, as such impudence demonstrates.  Wikipedia is too important to the internet, and has too much power over Google ranking, to be left to the administration of fools, trolls and children.  It’s got to stop, and needs regulation now.

Yes, crowdsourcing content is a marvellous idea, and I have used it myself for translation projects.  But there is no point whatsoever in trying to “crowd-source” control of such projects.  Doing so merely allows the most determined trolls to self-select themselves as kings and lords of the project.  Rarely will such people be fit to hold such a role.  What follows will be mainly a “Lord of the Flies” experience. 

It is now time for the administrators of Wikipedia to be retired.  Instead a group of paid administrators should be introduced, with transparent, fair and adult administration. 

Until this happens, sleazy events like anonymous users banning other internet sites for daring to leak information will continue to occur.

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Finding interesting things at the Christies web-site

Posted on by Roger Pearse

Few of us will be aware that there are good quality images of past sale objects on the website of Christie’s, the fine art dealers.  But an accident took me there this evening, and I found half a dozen objects relating to Mithras, which had been sold over the last 20 years.  There were photographs of most of these.  I rather doubt that any of them appear in the catalogue of Mithraic monuments and objects, the CIMRM, although of course it is very hard to tell.

Naturally I have added these to my own modest catalogue online of monuments and objects.  I hope that Christie’s will not mind.

One item in particular caught my eye; a statuette supposedly of Mithras-Sabazios.  Sabazios is usually identified with Jupiter or Dionysus.  What I do not see, however, is why we should suppose this to be Mithras?  Merely wearing a phrygian cap is not enough … is it?

There were no such items in the CIMRM, which is telling, perhaps.  I have included it in my own catalogue, but with misgivings.

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From my diary

Posted on by Roger Pearse

I did a little more on the Mithras pages.  I was able to identify one of the images that I found online and create a CIMRM page for it.  The section in CIMRM on material from Alba Iulia is not very easy to work with, and I was reduced to looking through the limited number of illustrations in the same volume, just to find out which relief I was looking at.  There must have been several Mithraea at Alba Iulia, judging from the number of reliefs of Mithras killing the bull; yet none are mentioned in the CIMRM.  One was discovered in 2010.  There must have been others.

Still, it is impossible for a single amateur like myself to do more than scratch the surface of Mithraic archaeology.  I console myself by thinking that what I do is at least useful, as far as it goes.

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Eusebius on the Psalms – some old quotations on the sabbath

Posted on by Roger Pearse

A couple of years ago I discussed a quotation from Eusebius’ Commentary on the Psalms.  An incoming link alerts me to a discussion which gives a longer quotation, and a source for it.

The source given is Moses Stuart’s Commentary on the Apocalypse (vol. 2, p.9, p.40; Andover: Allen, Morrill, Wardwell, 1845).  But a quick look at the 1850 reprint suggests that something is awry.  A better source is Harmon Kingsbury, The Sabbath, 1840, p.218 f. As Eusebius’ Commentary on the Psalms does not exist in English, it seems useful to repeat what is said:

Professor Stuart says:

“The important testimony of Eusebius, (fl. 320,) in the time of Constantine has been unaccountably overlooked by all the patristical investigators whom I have yet been able to consult. It is contained in his commentary on the Psalms which is printed in Montfaucon’s Collectio Nova Patrum and some of it is exceedingly to our purpose and withal very explicit.

“In commenting on Ps. xxi. 30 (xxii. 29 in our English version) he says ‘On each day of our Savior’s resurrection [i.e. every first day of the week] which is called Lord’s day, we may see those who partake of the consecrated food and that body [of Christ] which has a saving efficacy after the eating of it bowing down to him.’ pp. 85, 86.

“Again on Ps. xlv. 6 (xlvi. 5) he says ‘I think that he [the Psalmist] describes the morning assemblies in which we are accustomed to convene throughout the world.’ p.195

“On Psalm lviii. 17 (lix. 16) he says ‘By this is prophetically signified the service which is performed very early and every morning of the resurrection day [i.e. the first day of the week throughout the whole world].’ p.272

“But by far the most important passage of all remains to be adduced. It is in his commentary on Ps. xci (xcii) which is entitled ‘A psalm or song for the Sabbath day’. He begins his commentary by stating that the patriarchs had not the legal Jewish Sabbath but still, ‘given to the contemplation of divine things and meditating day and night upon the divine word, they spent holy Sabbaths which were acceptable to God.’

“Then observing that the Psalm before him has reference to a Sabbath he refers it to the Lord’s day and says that ‘it exhorts to those things which are to be done on resurrection day.’ He then states the precept respecting the Sabbath as addressed originally to the Jews and that they often violated it. After which he thus proceeds: ‘Wherefore as they rejected it [the sabbatical command], the Word [Christ] by the New Covenant translated and transferred the feast of the Sabbath to the morning light and gave us the symbol of true rest, viz. the saving Lord’s day, the first [day] of the light in which the Savior of the world, after all his labors among men, obtained the victory over death and passed the portals of heaven, having achieved a work superior to the six days creation.’ … ‘On this day which is the first day of light and of the true Sun, we assemble after an interval of six days and celebrate holy and spiritual Sabbaths, even all nations redeemed by him throughout the world AND do those things according to the spiritual law which were decreed for the priests to do on the Sabbath, for we make spiritual offerings and sacrifices which are called sacrifices of praise and rejoicing, we make incense of a good odor to ascend as it is said, Let my prayer come up before thee as incense. Yea we also present the shew bread, reviving the remembrance of our salvation, the blood of sprinkling, which is of the Lamb of God who taketh away the sins of the world and which purifies our souls. … Moreover we are diligent to do zealously on that day the things enjoined in this Psalm, by word and work making confession to the Lord and singing in the name of the Most High. In the morning also with the first rising of our light we proclaim the mercy of God toward us also his truth, by night exhibiting a sober and chaste demeanor; and all things whatsoever that it was duty to do on the Sabbath [Jewish seventh day], these we have transferred to the Lord’s day as more appropriately belonging to it, because it has a precedence and is first in rank and more honorable than the Jewish Sabbath. For on that day, in making the world, God said Let there be light and there was light; and on the same day the Sun of righteousness arose upon our souls. Wherefore it is delivered to us [paradedotai, it is handed down by tradition] that we should meet together on this day and it is ordered that we should do those things announced in this Psalm.’

“After some interval he speaks again of the title to the Psalm and says that it does not so much respect the Jewish Sabbath for ‘it signifies the Lord’s day and the resurrection day as we have proved in other places.’ ‘This Scripture teaches that we are to spend the Lord’s day in leisure for religious exercises (twn qeiwn a)skse)wn) and in cessation and vacation from all bodily and mortal works which the Scripture calls Sabbath and rest.’

It is useful to have this material.  I wonder what else in the way of patristic material lies buried in elderly English bible commentaries?

How I love these forum arguments! I have gained so much from them over the years.  How sad it is that, today, it is simply impossible for me to even find the discussions online, since it became impossible to search only for forums online.

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A Mithraic brooch in the Ashmolean in Oxford

Posted on by Roger Pearse

Last Saturday I was in the Ashmolean Museum in Oxford, browsing idly the Roman exhibits.  Suddenly I realised that I was looking at a set of small finds, all of Empire-period deities; and I started looking much more closely to see if there was a representation of Mithras.  And so there was!

Sadly I had no camera with me.  All I had was the camera in my smartphone, which is nothing special.  Anyway I had a go, and, after several attempts, produced this.

I also photographed the card in the window.  I have found, looking for images online, that the presence of such a card in the collection of photos is really good.  So here is mine:

The reverse of the brooch was harder to see, but there was a pin sticking out to one side from the back, just as with a modern brooch.

So … not a wasted day, in any sense!

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From my diary

Posted on by Roger Pearse

Last week and this I have been staying in two different hotels in neither of which it is easy to sleep.  How great the noise is, in our society!  It does make it difficult to do anything else.

Last night there were a couple of comments on the post in which I ask whether there is any actual ancient evidence that Pythagoras went to India.  I ended up looking up and posting here all the passages in which it is mentioned that Pythagoras studied under the Brahmins; but none confirm the story of actually going to India. 

The general quality of the passages is low; the whole story looks legendary.  Fragments of Alexander Polyhistor, at second and third hand in Clement of Alexandria and Eusebius’ Praeparatio Evangelica; a statement in Apuleius’ Florida; a statement in the largely legendary Life of Apollonius of Tyana by Philostratus … this is not the stuff of good history.

I’m still working on the Mithras pages.  I’ve created a page which lists all the inscriptions which mention a “pater patrum” of Mithras.  It probably refers to a senior priest in a Mithraeum, but we don’t know for sure.  Last night I also came across and read most of an article by Richard Gordon in the Blackwell Companion to Roman Religion, which gave a very nice overview of Mithraic studies.

A couple of translation projects are going forward as well. 

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Egypt and Archduke Rainer

Posted on by Roger Pearse

I wonder how many of us know the name of Archduke Rainer?  Very few, I would imagine.  Yet he played an important part in the history of Egyptology. 

Archduke Rainer (1827-1913) was an Austrian nobleman, some time Prime Minister of Austria.  He is notable for his collection of Egyptological items.  In particular his collection of papyri is supposedly the largest known.  He donated it to the national collection in Vienna in 1899.  It includes Arabic papyri, and shows the process of transition in documents in Egypt from papyrus to paper.[1]

In 1877 thousands of papyri were discovered in the Fayyum, at the site of ancient Arsinoe.  There were also substantial discoveries at Heracleopolis and Hermopolis, near by.  These items were recognised by those who found them as precious, and so worth preserving, and went on to the art market.[2]  They came into the hands of a Cairo dealer named Theodor Graf (1840-1903), who sold them in lots, first to the Louvre and the Berlin Museum and then, from 1883-4 on, to Archduke Rainer. Graf also owned some of the Fayyum portraits.[3]

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  1. [1]S. Adshead, China in World History, p.97: “The Archduke Rainer collection illustrates the change from papyrus to paper in Egypt. All thirty-six manuscripts from 719 to 815 are papyrus, between 816 and 912, there are ninety-six papyrus to twenty-four paper, one document apologising …“↩
  2. [2]John Muir, Life and Letters in the Ancient Greek World, 2008, p.25.↩
  3. [3]Georg Ebers, Theodor Graf, The Hellenic portraits from the Fayum at present in the collection of Herr Graf, 1893, p.4-5.↩