Read the News...in Ancient Greek!

Juan Coderch is a Spaniard who recently set up a website dedicated to presenting world news in the ancient Greek language. As a professor of Greek and Latin in the University of Saint Andrews in the U.K., Dr. Coderch got his idea from viewing two websites that exist which present world news in the sister dead language of ancient Greek - Latin. His goal is to inspire his students to develope a deeper knowledge of the language from which western society emerged and breathe into it a new life. Previous attempts to do this was his translation of a Sherlock Holmes story in ancient Greek as well. For an interview (in Greek), read here. To read the news in ancient Greek and find out more about this project, visit here.

This seems to be a growing trend, especially since Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone was translated by Andrew Wilson into ancient Greek about five years ago.

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Fires Approach Athens, Residents Flee

Embedded video from CNN Video

By DEMETRIS NELLAS, AP

ATHENS, Greece (Aug. 23) - A raging fire bore down on Athens' northern suburbs Sunday, prompting panicked residents to battle the flames with tree limbs and buckets, and police to order 10,000 people to evacuate one town immediately.

Frightened inhabitants of Agios Stefanos gathered in the town's main square in early afternoon as flames closed in on the town center and police with loudspeakers directed everyone to leave immediately on the main highway to Athens, 14 miles to the southwest.

Other residents tried desperately to save their homes with hoses, buckets and branches. Planes swooped low over the town to pour water on the flaming houses.

"I call on all residents to follow the instructions of the police as to where they will go," an emotional Agios Stefanos deputy mayor Panayiotis Bitakos told Skai TV. "We had been begging the authorities since early in the morning to send forces ... It is too late now. Too late."

By mid-afternoon, the town was empty save for a few volunteers who were aiding firefighters. Houses smoldered and burned-out cars littered the streets.

Planes and helicopters, which had suspended operations overnight, attacked the blaze again at dawn. But with gale-force winds propelling the flames, the fire spread unchecked. TV showed airplanes and helicopters dumping water on a forest outside Agios Stefanos — and the fire re-igniting moments after they left.

“The situation is tragic,” said Yiannis Sgouros, governor of the greater Athens area. “Fires are out of control on many fronts.”

The forests around Athens' northern suburbs have helped the fire leap to new areas.

"The pine cones are like projectiles — they cover long distances, too, and spread the fire around," said Avraam Pasipoularidis, mayor of the northern suburb of Drossia. "Everything around me is burning."

The fires ignited late Friday; by Sunday they were reported across an area more than 25 miles (40 kilometers) wide. They started in the mountains near the town of Marathon, from which the modern long-distance foot race takes its name. The army removed anti-aircraft missiles from a nearby military base as the flames approached.

Municipal officials said the fire was threatening the archaeological site of Rhamnus, home to two 2,500-year-old temples.

A state of emergency was declared Saturday in greater Athens: These are the most destructive fires in Greece since blazes killed more than 70 people in 2007.

Residents fled on foot, by motorbike and in cars, amid blackouts and cuts in the water supply. No casualties had been reported as of early Sunday afternoon.

TV stations broadcast frantic calls for help from people of different areas, with many complaining that no firefighting equipment had reached them.

A resident of Drossia pleaded with TV station Mega for help, saying far was within 45 yards (40 meters) of his home and he had no water with which to fight it.

Authorities evacuated two large children's hospitals, as well as campsites and homes in villages and outlying suburbs threatened by blazes that scattered ash across Athens. The flames also approached a large monastery on Mt. Penteli.

Officials said help was on the way.

"There are 14 planes — with two of these coming from Italy — and nine helicopters fighting the fire, alongside hundreds of firefighters, volunteers and soldiers," fire brigade spokesman Yiannis Kapakis told reporters.

"These will soon be joined by two planes from France and a helicopter from Cyprus. Cyprus will also send four fire engines and 60 firefighters," he added.

Elsewhere in Greece, serious fires were reported on the islands of Evia and Skyros in the Aegean Sea and Zakynthos in the west. Another large fire that started Saturday in the town of Plataea, 40 miles northwest of Athens, was spreading unchecked in western Attica.

A total of 83 fires have broken out across Greece since 6 a.m. Saturday, fire brigade spokesman Kapakis said.

Associated Press Writer Derek Gatopoulos contributed to this report.

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Dissecting the Caveman Theory of Psychology

Denyse O'Leary
Monday, 10 August 2009

Is human behaviour really based on the survival strategies of our Pleistocene ancestors?

Well, the stone hatchet is certainly poised over our iconic cavemen. A recent Scientific American podcast admits as much, and without the narrator throwing a panic attack either.

Why this? Why now? And why such equinamity?

Secular materialist thinkers have as deep a desire as anyone to understand the wellsprings of human nature. But they are much more restricted in where they can look. From the very beginning of the organized "human evolution" movement, starting with Darwin's publication of The Descent of Man, they have mined random findings from evolution for deep truths about human nature.

The first try was Social Darwinism. It is best remembered as an attempt to co-opt science to justify existing policies such as colonialism and ruthless exploitation of labour - policies earlier developed for reasons unrelated to evolution. Such policies fell by the wayside during the 20th century, of course, but sociobiology blossomed in the 1970s. Sociobiologists tried to show, using insect colonies as the key model, that the human behaviour that puzzled them - such as altruism toward strangers - was governed in reality by "selfish genes" that seek to replicate themselves. Sociobiology never came up with convincing explanations of puzzling human behaviour and soon became embroiled in controversies over alleged racism.

Later a broader movement emerged - Evolutionary Psychology (EP) - which scours the waterfront for human behaviours that can be traced to the survival strategies of our Pleistocene ancestors (1.8 million to about 10,000 years ago), that are now assumed to be encoded in our genes through natural selection. Thus our brains enact programs whose true nature we do not understand. But the evolutionary psychologist does.

This encoded behaviour can be shopping, voting, or tipping at restaurants.

It can also be: Why children don't like vegetables (nothing to do with young 'uns preference for sweet things); why hungry men prefer plump women (not just because they probably know where the kitchen is); why we have color vision (mainly to detect blushing); why we are sexually jealous (not fear of abandonment, but "sperm competition"); why toddlers are Neanderthals (not just immature); why we don't stick to our goals (evolution gave us a kludge brain); why women prefer men with stubble (except for those who don't); why gossip is good for you (despite wrecked relationships); why moral behaviour is based on primitive disgust (not rational evaluation); why music exists (to "spot the savannah with little Pavarottis"); why art exists (to recapture that lost savannah); why art exists (to spread selfish genes); why altruism is really a form of sexual display; why altruism is really just selfishness; why a child must have a selfish motive for saving her sister's life; why right and wrong don't really make sense; why we don't eat grandma (because she might babysit the kids); why we don't (usually) hurt ourselves to hurt others; why we can't help behaving badly (it is programmed into our genes); oh, and religion is a sort of replicator or "meme" in our brains; and we believe in God because he is a supernatural cheat detector; or else we believe in God because belief is and is not adaptive at the same time; also, we believe in God because we have a genetic predisposition to communicate unverifiable information.

There is a dark side too. Our Stone Age ancestors are deputized to explain, as Sharon Begley observes in Newsweek, why we rape, kill and sleep around.

Now, if this all sounds like the kvetching and venting in the "Relationships" section of your local newspaper - shallow truths, at best, never deep ones - that point was certainly not lost on thoughtful scientists and philosophers. But they were not sure what to do. Some, like neuroscientist Vilayanur Ramachandran, tried parody, as in "Why Do Gentlemen Prefer Blondes?". But when a discipline is grounded in a speculative assumption (that behaviour that might have helped our Pleistocene ancestors survive is now embedded in our genes and therefore expressed unconsciously in our brains), the pace of speculation is hard to control, and the discipline becomes difficult to parody.

Some, like agnostic, common-sense philosophers David Stove and Jerry Fodor assailed EP's simplistic and counterintuitive assertions about human nature. Social scientists such as Steven and Hilary Rose, editors of the anthology Alas, Poor Darwin, weighed in on its counterfactual assumptions about human behavior. But most such efforts sank without a trace under the tide of popular delight in explanations that absolve bad or foolish behaviour with no need for repentance or amendment of life. And common sense objections were always met by the triumphant declaration that the current speculation was "based on the science of evolution." So, as Sharon Begley points out in Newsweek,

"From its inception, evolutionary psychology had warned that behaviors that were evolutionarily advantageous 100,000 years ago (a sweet tooth, say) might be bad for survival today (causing obesity and thence infertility), so there was no point in measuring whether that trait makes people more evolutionarily fit today. Even if it doesn't, evolutionary psychologists argue, the trait might have been adaptive long ago and therefore still be our genetic legacy. An unfortunate one, perhaps, but still our legacy. Short of a time machine, the hypothesis was impossible to disprove. Game, set and match to evo psych."

But scientists and scholars were also troubled by evolutionary psychology's lack of science-based economy of explanation, conventionally called Occam's Razor: One thinks, for example, of the big bazooms theory of human evolution, according to which men prefer women with big breasts because their ample bosoms make their fertility easier to ascertain. That is, not for the same reasons as those same men prefer big cars, big steaks, or full mugs of beer.

No doubt there is an evolutionary explanation for why creatures with any mental capacity, whether it is pre-programmed or self-directed, prefer "more" rather than "less." However, one must look vastly deeper into evolution than the story of our own human race, to discover the origin of so very general a preference among life forms. Too often, as in this case, EP appeared to be searching for something to explain rather than shedding light on human behaviour.

But the key problem with EP only became apparent after neuroscientists and other thinkers had digested a key lesson from the Decade of the Brain in the 1990s. The brain does not consist of a series of linked modules; it is a restless sea in a semisolid state, constantly reorganizing itself, according to the focus of attention provided by the mind. Adaptation to one's environment is constant and normal. Echoes from the past are just that, dimly heard echoes, not prophecies of behavior.

A new discipline, that looks much more promising for interpreting human behavior, is Behavioral Ecology. Behavioral ecology does not assume that a given behavior is - or ever has been - always adaptive or not adaptive. It makes predictions only for specific ecologies. For example, is it better for a girl to marry very young or wait? To marry a wealthy old man or a vigorous, young one? To marry a cousin or an outsider to the clan? Obviously, knowledge of a specific human ecology is needed before one can attempt to answer such a question. And the only thing encoded in our genes is a general capacity to apprehend and adapt to our circumstances.

As to why we rape, kill, and sleep around? Sharon Begley insists that, "The fault, dear Darwin, lies not in our ancestors, but in ourselves." Or, put another way, if we create ecologies that reward a given behavior, we must deal with a lot more of it, whether we like it or not.

Denyse O'Leary is co-author of The Spiritual Brain.


Other Resources

Sharon Begley offers a valuable summary of the issues. Also, an article on evolutionary psychologists' recent backpedalling.

David Brooks sums it up in the New York Times.

David Buller, once an advocate of evolutionary psychlogy, now offers serious critiques at Scientific American.

Greg Downey at Neuroanthropology weighs in against "memes" as the supposed replicators of our "selfish genes" in evolutionary psychology.

Early critic University of Chicago philosophy Professor Jerry Fodor of the "common sense" school explains his misgivings here, and also here.

Robert C. Richardson, Evolutionary Psychology as Maladapted Psychology (MIT Press, 2007).

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In Cults: A Darker Side of 1960s Rebellion

By Jayanti Tamm
Special to The Washington Post
August 10, 2009

At my local bookstore on the eve of the 40th anniversary of Woodstock, 1960s nostalgia is in high gear. A display table is stacked high with pricey coffee table books, each with its own variation on psychedelic rainbow lettering, each claiming to reveal the untold story of the "peace and music" festival. I understand the lucrative business of selling those hazy memories — the Woodstock museum, Cherry Garcia ice cream, even the new movie "Taking Woodstock." I just can't buy into it.

It's not because, as a Gen-Xer, I feel slighted that I missed out on all the fun. It's because for me and many other children of the flower children, our rose-colored glasses are not just slightly tinted, but darkly tainted.

Along with the iconic music and fashion came myriad new religions and a foolish rush to embrace peddlers of spiritual snake oil. A flood of swamis, yogis and self-proclaimed enlightened beings preyed on hippies who were disillusioned by mainstream religion and in search of an alternative path.

By the time the mud had dried at Woodstock, Swami Prabhupada had created the Hare Krishnas and the Rev. Sun Myung Moon had founded the Unification Church — the Moonies. Communes and ashrams sprouted across America. In the 1960s, the decade now mythic for its anti-conformity, flocks of people conformed to the dictates of self-proclaimed prophets.

In 1968, the Beatles sat at the feet of the Maharishi. Consciousness-raising went mainstream. Reciting Sanskrit chants, wearing japa beads and finding a guru became chic. Everyone who was anyone read "I Am That" and "Autobiography of a Yogi." Many free spirits obediently changed their names, dropped out of college and abandoned their families. Ironically, their wild-child rebellion landed them in rigidly structured cults that controlled their lives — and those of their children. For many, that life eventually grew old. They retired their mantras and moved on. But for others, my parents included, the intrigue never faded.

Like the Beatles, my hippie parents met their guru in 1968. Sri Chinmoy, based in New York, promised them enlightenment — if they obeyed his dictates. All they had to do was surrender their lives to him. To my trusting and vulnerable mother, and to my eccentric and contemplative father, the offer sounded like a bargain.

Arriving in the United States in 1964, Sri Chinmoy had vast ambitions. He aimed to infiltrate the United Nations, win a Nobel Prize and gain a worldwide following. His disciples were to lead austere, celibate lives, devoting themselves and their financial resources entirely to his mission. In 1970 when my mother became pregnant — a clear breach of the rules — the guru saved face by divining me as his chosen soul.

I was raised in the ashram of this man who declared himself an incarnation of God. Before I could walk, my parents dressed me in a sari and took me on their recruiting trips. Instead of acting in school plays and playing soccer, I distributed leaflets proclaiming the guru's divinity from parade floats that wound through city streets. I spent summers scrubbing the cages of the zoo housed in the basement of the guru's Queens home.

When Chinmoy wanted to attract more media attention, he staged elaborate weightlifting feats, hoisting elephants, helicopters and even Nelson Mandela and Mikhail Gorbachev — a smoke-and-mirrors spectacle I never understood. How could lifting elephants illuminate and ultimately transform the world? When I was a teenager, the guru's strict rules banning all contact and relationships with the "outside" world provoked questions and longings for everything he forbade — college, career and family. When he told me to neglect the mind and forever remain in the heart "like a 7-year-old," I finally realized that he was a narcissistic charlatan, shamelessly exploiting the faithful.

At 25, older than my parents had been when they renounced the world to serve the guru, I was formally banished, losing all my connections to the community I'd known since birth. Fortunately, I was young enough to forge a life on my own terms.

For years, I have struggled with the reckless decision of some in my parents' generation to entrust their present and future to those who claimed to be spiritually enlightened. Cultural historians today portray the '60s as a unique time. I hope they are right. That is, I hope that the cast of corrupt opportunists — gurus, prophets and messiahs — who profited from others' naive belief is indeed a unique '60s phenomenon, safely encapsulated in those glossy anniversary books.

Tamm, an English professor at Ocean County (N.J.) College, is the author of "Cartwheels in a Sari: A Memoir of Growing Up Cult."

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The New Atheists and the Age Old Problem of Evil

13 August 2009
Donald M.
http://www.uncommondescent.com/

In The God Delusion Richard Dawkins writes that God is “the most unpleasant character in all fiction … a misogynist, homophobic, racist, infanticidal, genocidal, filicidal, pestilential, megalomaniacal, sadomasochistic, capriciously malevolent bully.” The last time a literary character was described in such despicable terms was probably Charles Dickens’s description of Ebeneezer Scrooge in A Christmas Carol. “Oh! But he was a tight-fisted hand at the grindstone, Scrooge!” writes Dickens, “a squeezing, wrenching, grasping, scraping, clutching, covetous old sinner! Hard and sharp as flint, from which no steel had ever struck out generous fire; secret, and self-contained, and solitary as an oyster.” I’ll let you decide which character is worse.

Let’s lay aside for the moment that Dawkins considers God fictional, that is to say (in Dawkins’s words) “almost certainly does not exist.” (even that betrays some slight doubt on Dawkins’s part). The real issue for Dawkins and many of his fellow ‘New Atheists’ (NA’s) such as Sam Harris, Daniel Dennett, Christopher Hitchens and the like, is that humans have had a nasty tendancy to commit many acts of evil over the centuries in the name of this fictional God. As the NA’s see it, if we could only rid the world of this fiction called God and its handmaiden, Religion, then the the Golden Age of Atheism will lead the world to a Scientific Utopia, where Science and Reason rule the Mind and all humanity is rid of these childhood fantasies about God, Church, Religion and the like. In short we’ll grow up. At least, that is the upshot of most of the lectures, books, articles and blog posts coming from the NA’s and their ilk.

Unfortunately for the NA’s, there’s a huge hitch in their thinking, and it just isn’t going to go away no matter how much clever rhetoric they toss at it. That hitch is the age old Problem of Evil (PoE). According to the NA’s, if only we could rid humans of the false beliefs in this or that god or gods and/or this or that religion, then all the evils committed by humans in the name of those gods and/or religions would go away, too. Thus, Dawkins, Harris and the other NA’s mince no words in describing their disdain for anything that smacks of the supernatural. What the NA’s don’t seem to realize is that they are admitting that real evil exists, even if the God or gods in whose name(s) the evil is committed does not.

The upshot of taking evil to be real, even if the God(s) behind aren’t, is that evil still needs to be explained. For the NA’s, the only possible explanation for any behavior, evil or otherwise is evolution. Thus, for all their ranting against religion(s) and god(s), they really ought to be ranting against evolution itself. But appealing to evolution doesn’t help their case much.

On the NA’s worldview, all events in time and space are the end result of the blind, purposeless forces of matter and energy evolving over eons of time through chance and/or necessity. That’s it. There simply are no other causal forces at work. That means that all human behaviors, good or evil, are also the end result of this same chain of evolution. We might claim we were motivated to do good or evil by our belief in some diety or religion, but the truth of the matter (on the NA’s worldview), is that evolution made us do it.

For all their complaints against religion(s) and dieties, the NA’s have no basis, rooted in evolution, to judge any act as good or evil, simply because evolution has not produced any objective standard by which to measure such things. Sure, humans might do things that NA’s (or others) don’t like, may even hate, but that doesn’t really make them evil (or good…depending on your point of view). Dawkins judgement that if the God of the Old Testament Scripture were real He’d be evil is thus not based on any objective standard, but is itself the result of the same evolutionary processes. For all the caterwauling from the NA’s against religion, they really ought to be complaining about evolution itself!

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In Russia They Build and in Greece They Demolish

by Monk Moses the Athonite

August 3, 2009
Romfea.org

Through the internet I was sent some news which made an impression on me which I am making available to you with some short comments. Are we [Greeks] more progressive and free than the Russians?

Because in today's Russia the following occurred: Patriarch Kiril of Moscow met with Prime Minister Vladimir Putin.

In this meeting the Patriarch declared that the work of the Church is a continuous offering that is positive and good for the people and the community, which eventually benefits both the Church and the State.

The Prime Minister said that the relationship between the Church and the State are very good these past few years.

The Russian Patriarch continued that the relationship between Church and State and civil community is indeed very well developed, but harder work is needed for greater development.

Very good work is being done among the chaplains of the Russian army. There are Divine Liturgies, lectures and Confessions being done.

There are currently 650 priests in 530 army churches. All the chaplains receive support from those in command.

The Minister of Culture in Russia, Mr. Aleksandr Sokolov, declared to reporters that he thinks the time has come to teach "an introduction to Orthodox Culture" in schools as a part of training, saying that in many vicinities of Russia there is little accumulated experience on this subject.

In the past a Greek bishop visited Moscow and was asked by the agonized Minister of Education in Russia if it is true that the Greek government prefers to abolish religious lessons in the schools.

Now we hear that our Greek schools will offer classes in sexual education and Yoga. What else are we going to hear?

During a recent visit to Moscow by an Athonite abbot there was a meeting with the President of Russia, Mr. Dmitri Medvedev, and he was assured of the deep respect the president has towards the Church.

When meeting with the students of the Theological Academy of Petersburg, he spoke of this, saying: "I must confess that your president astonished me. We spoke for a while. And I saw a man who loves his nation, and loves the Church and clergy."

During my visits to Russia for two gatherings, twenty and thirty years ago, I noticed a religious rebirth, the rebuilding of new churches, the restoration of old monasteries and churches, a conscious reception by the young in the Mysteries of the Church, and so forth.

I'm not saying that all in Russia is roses and perfect. I'm not saying that problems don't exist.

We do not agree with the profane view and beyond inappropriate idea of a Third Rome. Constantinople is not a Second Rome, but the New Rome. But in Russia there is respect and there is sincere discussion on the true light of Orthodoxy.

In Russia they are building and in Greece they are demolishing. Greece is more progressive and modern. They want to abolish lessons in religion, prayer in schools, and the separation of Church and State. To de-sanctify everything. For freedom to not respect or honor anything. To shame all the clergy and monks. To bring down the Holy Mountain. To disrespect the Church. It's a shame that for the mistakes of a select few, that laws, authorities, personages, traditions, and ancient values will be levelled.

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The Nature and Polemical Character of Theology

It must be emphasized that a theology that is not the result of purification, that is, of ‘praxis’, is demonic. According to St. Maximus, “knowledge without praxis is the demons' theology”.

St. Thalassios, who had the same perspective, wrote that when man’s nous begins with simple faith, it “will eventually attain a theology that transcends the nous and that is characterized by unremitting faith of the highest type and the vision of the invisible”. Theology is beyond logic, it is a revelation of God to man, and the Fathers define it as theoria. Here too theology is chiefly vision of God. In another place the same Saint wrote that genuine love gives birth to spiritual knowledge, and “this is succeeded by the desire of all desires: the grace of theology”.

St. Diadochos of Photiki [teaches that] theology is the greatest gift offered to man by the Holy Spirit…. Therefore knowledge of God “comes through prayer, deep stillness and complete detachment, while wisdom comes through humble meditation on Holy Scripture and, above all, through grace given by God”. The gift of theology is a work of the Holy Spirit but in cooperation with man, since the Holy Spirit does not actualize in man a spiritual knowledge of the mysteries “apart from that faculty in him which naturally searches out such knowledge”.

…All these things show that theology is properly the fruit of man’s healing and not a rational discipline. Therefore in the Orthodox Patristic tradition theology is linked and identified with the spiritual father, and the spiritual father is the theologian par excellence – that is to say, the one who experiences the things of God and so can lead his spiritual children unerringly.

Father John Romanides writes: “The true Orthodox theologian is the one who has direct knowledge of some of God’s energies through illumination or knows them more through vision. Or he knows them indirectly through the prophets, apostles and saints or through scripture, the writings of the Fathers and the decisions and acts of their Ecumenical and Local Councils.

"Theology is not abstract knowedge or practice, like logic, mathematics, astronomy and chemistry, but on the contrary, it has a polemical character like logistics and medicine. The former is concerned with matters of defense and attack through bodily drill and strategies for the deployment of weapons, fortifications and defensive and offensive schemes, while the latter is fighting against mental and physical illnesses for the sake of health and the means of restoring health."

Metropolitan Hierotheos of Nafpaktos, Theology as a Therapeutic Science, pp. 33-36.

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The 99: An Islamic Take on the Comic Book Franchise

Superman Meets Jabbar the Powerful in New Comic Series

July 19 2009
CTV.ca News Staff

Superman and Wonder Woman will soon be fighting injustice alongside the likes of Jabbar the Powerful and Noora the Light in a new comic series, which combines the superhero powers of the Justice League of America with The 99, a group of Islamic crime fighters.

The 99 was created in 2003 by psychologist Naif Al-Mutawa during what he calls a time of heightened mistrust of Islam in the post-9-11 world.

The comic series made its debut in 2006 to widespread acclaim for the 99 heroes, who are based on the 99 attributes of Allah in the Qur'an, such as generosity, wisdom and mercy.

"Comic books have historically been used to go after injustices that exist in the world," Al-Mutawa told CTV's Canada AM this week.

"I don't think it's a coincidence that Superman and Batman were created by Jewish teenagers and young adults during the height of anti-Semitism and that The 99 was created at the height of Islamophobia. A lot of times, culture speaks for the impossible situations that people exist in, and I think The 99's creation in '03 coming out of 9-11 is not a coincidence."

According to Al-Mutawa, while the characters are based on the Islamic faith, they do not openly practice their religion in the storylines, much like superheroes Spiderman and Batman, who themselves evoke Judeo-Christian traditions.

Superman, for example, is sent to Earth in a pod, just as Moses travelled the Nile in a pod-like basket, Al-Mutawa said.

"Just like the prophets in the Bible, the superheroes have parents missing. Superman's parents die in Krypton, Batman's die when he's six, Spiderman is raised by his aunt and uncle," Al-Mutawa said.

"And also, like the prophets who get their message from above by a messenger -- from God through Gabriel -- Peter Parker is taking a photograph of Manhattan when the spider comes in from above, not below, but above, and gives him his message through a bite."

Details of the new series are scarce -- DC Comics only issued a brief announcement about the collaboration in a July 2 entry on one of its official blogs.

But it will likely spark widespread interest, as The 99 is immensely popular across the Islamic world.

The superheroes hail from 99 different countries, including Canada, and are almost evenly split between males and females.

The backstory begins with 99 gemstones that embody each of Allah's 99 characteristics, which have been scattered around the world.

As each gem is found by a "worthy" recipient, he or she gains special powers.

While the series is steeped in Islamic tradition, Al-Mutawa told the magazine Egypt Today in 2007 that its appeal lies in the fact that it embraces values that are important to all human beings, regardless of religion.

"(The 99) is Islamic only because it's not Judeo-Christian," he said. "It's about basic human values; it doesn't matter if you're Muslim or not."

Dr. Naif Al-Mutawa, creator of 'The 99'

World’s First Muslim Superheroes, "The 99", Out to Conquer the West

By Rhys Blakely
The Times
August 20, 2009

Mumbai, India - They are fighting for truth, justice and the Islamic way and are heading for your living room — prepare to say salaam to the world’s first Muslim superheroes.

Despite the ample wrongs waiting to be righted across the Middle East, Superman, Spider-Man and Batman mainly fight evil in America. When the East has featured as a setting for superhero antics — as in the recent film Iron Man — it has tended to be as a source of villainy.

That is about to change, courtesy of The 99, a Sharia-compliant version of the X-Men that has taken the Arab world by storm and has its sights set on the West.

The franchise, which was created as a cartoon strip three years ago to counter the effects of jihadist agitprop on Muslim minds, is poised to make its debut on British television this year. An animated series is being produced by Endemol, the Dutch company that made Big Brother internationally ubiquitous. Its mission: to instil old-fashioned Islamic values in Christian, Jewish and atheist children.

The story follows a group of preternaturally gifted Muslims: The 99, each with a superpower that mirrors one of the 99 attributes of Allah.

The cast includes Jabbar, a Saudi Arabian Hulk-type figure with an improbable physique, and Darr the Afflicter, a paraplegic American who can manipulate nerve endings with his mind to trigger pain. There is also a character in a burka — Batina the Hidden.

The resulting franchise — a blend of fact, classic “kapow”-style action and Dan Brown-esque hokum — has proved a hit from Morocco to Indonesia and was branded recently one of the top 20 trends sweeping the world by Forbes magazine.

Beneath the rollicking storylines, however, there is a serious subtext. The man behind The 99 is Dr Naif al-Mutawa, a Kuwaiti who was a clinical psychologist previously.

Dr al-Mutawa said that the idea came to him while he was riding in a black cab in London from Edgware Road to Harrods, but its seed was sown years before when he worked at the survivors of political torture unit in Bellevue Hospital, New York. Many of the young men he treated were Iraqis who had fled after being tortured under Saddam Hussein’s regime.

“It hit me that the stories I was hearing were from men who grew up believing that their leader, Saddam, was a hero, a role model — only to one day be tortured by him,” Dr al-Mutawa said. “I decided the Arab world needed better role models.”

The conviction was reinforced by children’s literature that was circulating in the Middle East. When Dr al-Mutawa visited potential financial backers he took a newspaper article that described the popularity in Nablus, a city under the rule of the Palestinian National Authority, of a sticker book known as the Intifada Album.

It depicted weeping Palestinian mothers, Israeli tanks and wounded children. Captions included: “Let me die a martyr, my glorious homeland is calling.”

The book’s creator, a Hamas supporter who had sold 40,000 albums and 12 million stickers in four months, brushed off accusations that he was inciting hatred, saying: “There is no escaping the everyday reality of the intifada.”

Dr al-Mutawa, a father of five boys, disagreed. “This is not what I envisage for my children,” he said.

The 99 has faced resistance in the Middle East, particularly in Saudi Arabia, where it was only passed by the country’s censors when it gained financing from an Islamic bank with a Sharia board. There will never be 99 characters because it is forbidden to depict all of Allah’s attributes.

Despite its Islamic basis Dr al-Mutawa said that The 99 has universal appeal. He said: “It is based on attributes such as generosity and mercy. These are not things that Islam has a monopoly over.”

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A Guide to Russian Sects and Fringe Beliefs - Part 5 of 6

Russian Sects and Fringe Beliefs - Part Five: Grigory Grabovoi - Resurrection Man

August 17, 2009
Ria Novosti
Marc Bennetts
Moscow, Russia

RIA Novosti continues its six part investigation into Russian sects and fringe beliefs with a look at self-proclaimed messiah Grigory Grabovoi, jailed on fraud charges in 2008.

Dressed in an anonymous dark suit and tie of the type favoured by harassed office workers the world over, the slightly nervous middle-aged man frowns and turns on his computer's camera.

He clears his throat, wipes an expression that could be interpreted as anything from nerves to boredom off his face and begins to speak.

"I, Grigory Grabovoi, born on November 14, 1963 in the Bogara village of the Kirov District in the Chimkent Region of Kazakhstan announce that, er, I, Grigory Grabovoi, am the second coming of Jesus Christ."

The clip, easy to find on the Internet, is comical and in some ways a little sad. For anyone who is unfamiliar with the name, Grabovoi seems like a most unsuccessful and unlikely would-be messiah, severely lacking in charisma and guru-appeal.

However, this self-proclaimed leader of men is at the centre of one of the most bizarre stories to have come out of modern Russia.

Although he had been in the resurrection business for some time, Grabovoi made the headlines all over Russia in 2005 after allegedly promising to bring back to life, for some $1,500 a corpse, the 186 children killed when Chechen separatists seized school number one in Beslan, an incident often referred to as Russia's 9/11.

Media reports claimed that the "Second Coming" and his political organization - the very Clockwork Orange sounding "Drugg" - regularly held "healing sessions" in Moscow with members of the Mothers of Beslan, a group formed by bereaved parents from the tragic North Caucasus town.

"I believe in this miracle and I know that it will come about," one of the group's founding members, Susanna Dudiyeva, told a gathering of Grabovoi's followers in the Cosmos hotel in north Moscow. "My maternal instinct tells me this, my maternal faith."

"I want my child back, and I will believe in anything to get him," Zalina Guburova, who lost her 9-year-old son in the attack, told Russia's NTV.

Public outrage, whipped up by both the broadsheets and the tabloids, grew and Grabovoi was eventually arrested in 2006 after a sting operation carried out by Moscow journalist Vladimir Vorsobin, from the Komsomolskaya Pravda daily.

Vorsobin appealed to Grabovoi to resurrect his fictional step-brother, whose "photograph" was complied from different images by the paper's art department.

After Vorsobin had handed over the cash, he was informed that his "step-brother" had been resurrected and was leading a happy life somewhere near St. Petersburg.

Grabovoi was subsequently detained and, after the paper appealed for other people who had been conned to come forward, eventually charged and jailed on 11 charges of fraud in July 2008. His 11-year sentence was later cut to eight on appeal.

*

I met Vladimir Vorsobin this summer in central Moscow. It was over three years since he had become involved in the Grabovoi case, yet the details were still fresh in his mind.

"Before I started, I spoke to lawyers who told me that it was impossible to convict Grabovoi. He had, they said, everything covered legally so that nothing could be traced back to him. On top of this, he was guarded by some guys who used to work in the ninth."

The ninth?

"The KGB unit responsible for protecting the Soviet leadership."

Undeterred by Grabovoi's impressive defenses, Vladimir set about laying a trap.

"I went to see them, and asked them to resurrect my non-existent brother. They told me it was possible and would cost 1000 euros. They had an office in the centre, a secretary, a bookkeeping department, as well as stamps, documents, the lot. They even gave me a receipt! I went to pay the money at a branch of Sberbank [a Russian state-run bank]."

"After that, they gave me a plan of action. I had to go to the Cosmos hotel in north Moscow one evening, around 11 pm. There were around 40-50 people there, including some of the Mothers of Beslan. You can imagine the turnover - 50 people at 1000 euros, once or twice a week. They had minimal expenses as well. They just took a room, and saw everyone there."

"Anyway," Vladimir went on, "I had to sit there until morning. I was like, 'look, maybe I can go home and come home later.' 'No' they told me, 'you are being helped even as you sit here.'"

Vladimir stayed on until the crack of dawn, and, as the sun came up over the nearby rocket-shaped monument to Soviet cosmonauts, he was finally ushered in to see Grabovoi. The guru, the journalist recalled, looked shattered, "but then again, he had been resurrecting people all night."

"I switched on my Dictaphone and said "I want someone resurrected.'" 'Ok, it's done,' Grabovoi replied, without even glancing at me. 'He's living to the south of St. Petersburg.'"

Even though Vladimir had gone to the hotel with the intention of setting Grabovoi up, he still felt cheated ("1000 euros for two minutes!") and asked the Second Coming if he could have a chat as well.

"How can you do all this? Are you God?" he asked, getting in the big question first.

"Yes, I am Lord God."

"Do you know everything?"

"Yes, I see everything."

"Nice one," Vladimir said, and left.

Had he perhaps been worried that Grabovoi's followers might take revenge?

"At first, yes, I was freaked out," he confessed. "But then, you know, I realised that the rank and file who follow Grabovoi's teachings, they are basically kind at heart. They are all very educated, but like a lot of people in Russia they are looking for something. You know, we banished God in the Soviet era and now people need something more."

*

During my research into why some of the Mothers of Beslan trusted so completely in Grabovoi, I came across a book published by Drugg for the use of its members at seminars. Modestly titled, Resurrection And Eternal Life Is Our Reality From Henceforth!, the bible-sized tome contains pages and pages of documents confirming Grabovoi's "powers".

Given the Russians' Soviet-inherited respect for paperwork and official stamps, an examination of some of the documents made it slightly easier to understand exactly why so many people were taken in. Flicking through the pages, the names of the organisations and officials willing to testify caused me to do a double-take.

Some of the more impressive highlights were the Russian Space Flight centre officials who stated that Grabovoi's performances in tests designed to evaluate his powers proved that "psychics should be used to prevent and correct errors in aviation and space systems" and a contract with Uzbek National airlines to protect flights carrying the Uzbek president. Professors at Rostov State University (in Russia's south) also had no qualms about verifying Grabovoi's paranormal abilities.

"You have to remember when these documents were signed and stamped. We are talking about the late 1990s," Roman Shleinov, head of the investigation department at the Novaya Gazeta paper, told me. "Things were extremely tough financially back then in Russia. It wouldn't have cost much to buy this kind of proof."

"The Russian Space flight centre stuff doesn't really surprise me," Roman went on. "But when you see a professor at a state university testify that Grabovoi could influence events at a sub-molecular level..." He shook his head.

But what about their professional reputations? Did they not care that by lending some official credence to Grabovoi's bizarre claims they risked destroying their professional standing?

"They didn't give a damn about that!" Roman said. "Who knew what tomorrow would bring? Better to get paid today."

*

While the Grabovoi affair may seem like a one-off aberration, the meeting of the complex nature of Russian politics and the country's fondness for the supernatural, the concept of the physical resurrection of the dead through science has strong roots in Russian 19th and 20th century history.

Nikolai Fedorov, 1828-1903, was a Moscow-based ascetic philosopher who, despite not publishing anything in his lifetime, was cited by both Leo Tolstoy and Fyodor Dostoyevsky as a major influence. Fedorov, who preferred to disseminate his ideas orally, was convinced that the resurrection of the dead was scientifically possible, and that it was also humanity's moral duty to undertake this task. Mankind, the celibate thinker maintained, was the tool nature had chosen to resolve its greatest flaw, i.e. death.

Nikolai Fedorov

In order to do this, Fedorov suggested, scientists would have to search for the atoms of all the world's dead and then reassemble them. The final day of this resurrection "project" would see Adam and Eve reborn in the Pamirs, the central Asian mountain range that he considered the site of the biblical Garden of Eden.

While it would be easy to dismiss Fedorov as at best a well-meaning eccentric, his ideas continued to thrive after his death, and were taken up by a number of respected figures in Soviet society. One of the most notable people to take an interest in the philosopher's work was Maxim Gorky, the Order of Lenin-winning writer who reportedly had the ear of Stalin.

"We shall all rise from the dead," Gorky stated in his "On Knowledge." In a state where God had been exiled, it goes without saying that Gorky was not speaking of the Christian promise of eternal life.

Fedorov was also the inspiration for the 1920's Biocosmists-Immortalists, a pro-Bolshevik group that aimed to extend the October 1917 Revolution into the realms of time and space, and who claimed that humanity had two basic rights - the right to immortality and to unimpeded movement throughout the universe. "Dead of all countries, unite!" proclaimed a 1920 manifesto released by the group, whose members included high-up Soviet scientists and philosophers.

An official Soviet manifesto released the year before Lenin's death in 1924 had declared with typical revolutionary fervor that, "Mankind will be eternal!" After Lenin's death, the Biocosmists-Immortalists also published a statement in the state-run Izvestiya newspaper that consoled the bereaved nation with the thought that the workers of the world "would not be reconciled" with the passing away of the father of the Revolution and would not rest until he was resurrected in all his glory.

The Soviet-era slogan "Lenin lived, Lenin Lives, Lenin Will Live!" suddenly takes on quite a different meaning.

Representatives of Grabovoi's Drugg organization declined to be interviewed for this article.

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Polyamory - the Next Sexual Revolution?

Polyamory, reports Newsweek, is having a "coming-out-party." Polyamory is the current "term of art" applied to "families" or "clusters" comprised of multiple sexual partners. As Newsweek explains, this is not exactly polygamy, because marriage is not the issue. Advocates of polyamory argue that their lifestyle is not "open marriage." Indeed, they define their movement in terms of the moral principle of "ethical nonmonogamy," defined as "engaging in loving, intimate relationships with more than one person - based upon the knowledge and consent of everyone involved."

Legal theorists and opponents of same-sex marriage routinely (and rightly) make the argument that the legalization of homosexual marriage will, inevitably, lead to the legalization of polygamy. Once marriage is redefined to allow for same-sex unions, any determination to maintain legal prohibitions against polygamy will be seen as merely arbitrary. At the same time, once strictures against adultery were eliminated in the culture and in the wall, something essentially like polygamy was inevitable.

The article in Newsweek, written by Jessica Bennett, presents polyamory as a growing movement that now involves persons in the cultural mainstream. As the magazine reports: "Researchers are just beginning to study the phenomenon, but the few who do estimate that openly polyamorous families in the United States number more than half a million, with thriving contingents in nearly every major city."

The movement now claims a number of recognized books, logs, podcasts, and even an online magazine titled Loving More. According to Newsweek, actress Tilda Swinton and Carla Bruni, the First Lady of France, have emerged as prominent spokespersons for non-monogamy. As should be expected, the Kinsey Institute for Research in Sex, Gender and Reproduction at Indiana University now features a "polyamory library."


Jessica Bennett suggests that the contemporary polyamory movement has roots in utopian movements of the 19th century:

"The notion of multiple-partner relationships is as old as the human race itself. But polyamorists trace the foundation of their movement to the utopian Oneida commune of upstate New York, founded in 1848 by Yale theologian John Humphrey Noyes. Noyes believed in a kind of communalism he hoped would fix relations between men and women; both genders had equal voice in community governance, and every man was considered to be married to every woman. But it wasn't until the late-1960s and 1970's "free love" movement that polyamory truly came into vogue; when books like Open Marriage topped best-seller lists and groups like the North American Swingers Club began experimenting with the concept. The term "polyamory," coined in the 1990s, popped up in both the Merriam-Webster and Oxford English dictionaries in 2006."

In one sense, the polyamorous defy easy categorization. The movement includes couples who openly and with full knowledge of each other engage in sexual relationships with others. Some are involved in group sex and others experimented with bisexuality. The Newsweek article introduces readers to a new vocabulary. The most revealing word is "polyfidelitous" - which means that the multiple partners keep sexual activity within their own self-identified cluster.

Interestingly, Bennett observes that the movement "has a decidedly feminist bent." If men can have multiple wives or female partners, then, the logic goes, women must have the same in order to achieve "gender equality." Bennett quotes Allena Gabosch, director of an organization known as the "Center for Sex Positive Culture," suggesting that polyamory sounds scary to people because "it shakes up their worldview." But, she insists, polyamory might well be "more natural than we think."

Perhaps the best way to understand this new movement is to understand it as a natural consequence of subverting marriage. We have largely normalized adultery, serialized marriage, separated marriage from reproduction and childbearing, and accepted divorce as a mechanism for liberation. Once this happens, boundary after boundary falls as sexual regulation virtually disappears among those defined as "consenting adults."

The ultimate sign of our moral confusion becomes evident when virtually no one appears ready to condemn polyamory as immoral. The only arguments mustered against this new movement focus on matters of practicality. Polyamory is certainly not new, but this new movement is yet another reminder that virtually all the fences are now down when it comes to sex and sexual relationships. What comes next?

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Hans Holzer (1920–2009), Dean of Ghost Hunters, Goes to "the Other Side"

by Joe Nickell

During the second half of the twentieth century, “Dr.” Hans Holzer, a self-styled parapsychologist, was the dean of ghost hunters. Attracted to the supernatural in childhood, he went on to pen over a hundred books on occult subjects. He was also a Wiccan high priest and claimed to have had past lives—for instance, supposedly having been present at the 1692 “Battle” of Glencoe (“Hans Holzer” 2009a).

Dubious Background

Holzer — who was born in Vienna, Austria, on January 26, 1920 — used to enthrall his fellow kindergarten pupils with ghost tales that he pretended to read but actually only “made out of whole cloth” (Holzer 1963, 9). By age six he was guilty of “regaling my mother’s family in Moravia with tales told me, allegedly, by the wood sprites in the trees along the little river that flows through the city of Bruenn” — tales “about as far from factuality as you can go” (Holzer 1968, 10). Such antics set the stage for Holzer to become not the scientific “parapsychologist” he posed as but one of the most successful raconteurs of “true” hauntings.

After a brief career as associate editor of a “scientific” antiquities magazine, he became a freelance writer and — by about 1951 — a ghost hunter (Holzer 1963, 14, 15, 211). Of uncertain date, his alleged doctorate in parapsychology was from what The Daily Telegraph in London (May 4, 2009) called “an elusive London College of Applied Science (not, it appears, London, England).” Holzer (1963, 10) stated:

"I am a professional investigator of ghosts, haunted houses, and other 'spontaneous' phenomena, to use the scientific term—that is, anything of a supernormal nature, not fully explained by orthodox happenings, and thus falling into the realm of parapsychology or psychic research."

Holzer cranked out book after mystery-mongering book, such as Haunted House Album (1971) and America’s Haunted Houses (1991), in which he reported on his “investigations” of supposedly haunted sites.

He is credited by Wikipedia with coining the terms “The Other Side” and (for the title of his first paranormal book, published in 1963) Ghost Hunter (“Hans Holzer” 2009c). In fact, however, the first term appears in the title of at least one nineteenth-century book, “I Awoke”: Conditions of Life on the Other Side Communicated by Automatic Writing (1895), and Holzer’s antecedent, Harry Price (1881-1948), published a book in 1936 titled Confessions of a Ghost Hunter.


“Investigations”

Holzer decried today’s so-called paranormal investigators whom he portrayed as “running around with Geiger counters and cameras and instruments that can measure cold spots” — a method he noted that “really is bullshit” (2005).

His own “scientific” approach was at least as bogus. He took along an alleged “medium” who, after getting “impressions” and supposedly going into a trance, invariably claimed to substantiate the haunting, so­metimes even letting the alleged spirit speak using her vocal cords. Holzer’s most famous case was the “Amityville Horror,” in which he relied on a reputed medium named Ethel Johnson Meyers and wrote several books on the subject. Meyers asserted that the house — wherein Ronald DeFeo murdered his parents and siblings — had been built atop an ancient Shinnecock Indian burial ground and was haunted by the angry spirit of Chief “Rolling Thunder.” In fact, the Amityville Historical Society could find no connection between the site and Native Americans and pointed out that in any case it was not the Shinnecocks but the Montaukett Indians who had settled the area. Worse, the Amityville haunting tale proved to have been a hoax (Nickell 2004, 73-77).

In trying to sell Amityville spookiness, Holzer also published “photographs of bullet holes from the 1974 murders in which mysterious halos appeared” (Grimes 2009). Actually, the single bullet-strike photo appearing in Murder in Amityville (Holzer 1979, 158) is labeled a “psychic photograph,” was made under questionable (certainly not forensic) conditions, and exhibits overall blurring (apparently due to movement of the camera when the picture was snapped). What Holzer terms an “auric imprint” may be nothing more than, say, light reflecting from impact - beveling around the bullet hole — if, indeed, it is a bullet hole. (Holzer never used that term, referring to “strange haloes exactly where the bullets had struck” [Holzer 1991, 177].)

Holzer’s work was once examined in the Journal of the Society for Psychical Research (December 1970). He had taken two mediums to a reputedly haunted house, and they had made certain pronouncements:

"They identified the ghost as Nell Gwyn and gave the cause of the haunting as the murder of one of her lovers on orders from Charles II who had given the house to her. She was supposed to have acted at the adjacent Royalty Theatre. It was also stated that the house had formerly housed the Royal Stables."

Unfortunately, however,

"The JSPR article reveals that just about everything the mediums said was incorrect, the house not having been built until after Nell Gwyn’s death, the theatre not having been built until about 150 years later, and the Royal Stables never having been located anywhere near the site. 'Whatever may be the truth about the ESP investigations carried out by Mr. Holzer, his treatment of his historical sources is so unsatisfactory, on the evidence of this case, as to cast considerable doubt on the objectivity and reliability of his work as a whole.'" (quoted in Berger and Berger 1991, 183)


I reached a similar opinion of Holzer’s work, especially after I reinvestigated his claims regarding Ringwood Manor in northern New Jersey. Holzer had arrived at Ringwood with Ethel Johnson Meyers in tow. There she supposedly made contact with the spirits of two former servants but without proof that either had ever existed. One was said to be responsible for ghostly footsteps in the house, while the other, “Jeremiah,” “complained bitterly about his mistress,” Mrs. Robert Erskine. Of the latter, Holzer stated: “The ghost lady whose manor we were visiting was not too pleased with our presence. Through the mouth of the medium in trance, she told us several times to get off her property! She may still be there,” Holzer added glibly, “for all I know” (Holzer 1991, 125).

When I visited Ringwood in 1993, I found the curator, Elbertus Prol, annoyed with Holzer’s account. As a senior historic preservation specialist who had been at Ringwood for a quarter of a century, Prol discounted claims that the house was haunted. He had never seen anything of a paranormal nature about the house and insisted, “I don’t believe in ghosts.” He emphatically discounted the Meyers/Holzer claim that Mrs. Erskine mistreated a servant — whether named “Jeremiah” or not. He observed that the present house was never seen by Mrs. Erskine. In fact, he added, “the area of the house isn’t even near the location of the original house!” (quoted in Nickell 1995, 62). Thus when Holzer wrote, “The center of the hauntings seems to be what was once the area of Mrs. Erskine’s bedroom” (Holzer 1991, 126), he betrayed an utter lack of historical credibility.

From Beyond?

Holzer was a skeptic of religion, much of which he termed “man made,” although he advocated having “a spiritual concept of life” and, of course, believed in “the other side.” From there, according to one of his two daughters (possibly Alexandra, who fancies she is psychic), Holzer communicated soon after his death on April 26, 2009. He reportedly sent “his heartfelt ‘thanks’” to London’s The Daily Telegraph (“Hans Holzer” 2009a) in anticipation of his obituary. But what if that alleged communication is as bogus as those that emanated from Holzer on this side?

Acknowledgments

I am grateful to CFI Libraries director Timothy Binga and librarian Lisa Nolan for their research assistance.

References

- Berger, Arthur S., and Joyce Berger. 1991. The Encyclopedia of Parapsychology and Psychical Research. New York: Paragon House.
- Grimes, William. 2009. Hans Holzer, “Amityville” writer, dies. New York Times, May 2.
- “Hans Holzer.” 2009a. Obituary, London Daily Telegraph, May 4.
- “Hans Holzer.” 2009b. The Economist, May 7.
- “Hans Holzer.” 2009c. Available online at Wikipedia. Accessed May 6, 2009.
- Hans Holzer. 1963. Ghost Hunter. New York: Ace Books.
—. 1968. Psychic Investigator. New York: Hawthorn Books.
—. 1971. Haunted House Album: A Ghostly Register of the World’s Most Frightening Haunted Houses. New York: Dorset Press.
—. 1979. Murder in Amityville. New York: Tower Publications.
—. 1991. America’s Haunted Houses. Stamford, Connecticut: Longmeadow Press.
—. 2005. Interview by Jeff Belanger, February 7. Available online at http://www.ghostvillage.com/; accessed May 6, 2009.
- Nickell, Joe. 1995. Entities: Angels, Spirits, Demons, and Other Alien Beings. Amherst, N.Y.: Prometheus Books.
—. 2004. The Mystery Chronicles: More Real-Life X-Files. Lexington, Ky.: University Press of Kentucky

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The Relationship Between Saint John of Damascus and the Theotokos Together With a Sermon on Her Dormition

The Miracle of the Panagia Tricherousa Icon

In the ninth century during the time of the Iconoclasts, St. John of Damascus (December 4) was zealous in his veneration of holy icons. Because of this, he was slandered by the emperor and iconoclast Leo III the Isaurian (717-740), who informed the Damascus caliph that St. John was committing treasonous acts against him. The caliph gave orders to cut off the hand of the monk and take it to the marketplace. Towards evening St. John, having asked the caliph for the cut-off hand, put it to its joint and fell to the ground before the icon of the Mother of God. The monk begged Our Lady to heal the hand, which had written in defense of Orthodoxy. After long prayer he fell asleep and saw in a dream that the All-Pure Mother of God had turned to him promising him quick healing.

Before this the Mother of God bid him toil without fail with this hand. Having awakened from sleep, St. John saw that his hand was unharmed. In thankfulness for this healing St. John placed on the icon a hand fashioned of silver, from which the icon received its name "Of Three Hands." (Some iconographers, in their ignorance, have mistakenly depicted the Most Holy Theotokos with three arms and three hands.) According to Tradition, St. John wrote a hymn of thanksgiving to the Mother of God: "All of creation rejoices in You, O Full of Grace," which appears in place of the hymn "It is Truly Meet" in the Liturgy of St. Basil the Great.

St. John Damascene accepted monasticism at the monastery of St. Sava the Sanctified and there bestowed his wonderworking icon. The Lavra presented the icon "Of Three Hands" in blessing to St. Sava, Archbishop of Serbia (+ 1237, January 12). During the time of an invasion of Serbia by the Turks in the reign of King Urosh V, some Christians who wanted to protect the icon entrusted it to the safekeeping of the Mother of God Herself. They placed it upon a donkey to lead the army into battle, which instead without a driver proceeded on its own by another route to Mount Athos and stopped in front of the Hilandari Monastery which is Serbian. The monks put the icon in the monastery's cathedral church (katholikon). During a time of discord over the choice of abbot, the Mother of God deigned to head the monastery Herself and moved miraculously from the sanctuary, and from that time Her holy icon has occupied the abbot's throne in the temple. At the Hilandari Monastery there is chosen only a vicar, and from the holy icon the monks take a blessing for every obedience. Thus even though the Hilandari brotherhood is a coenobium, it has no abbot and is administreted in accordance with the system of idiorrhythmic monasteries.

This icon is commemorated by the Church on June 28 and July 12.


There are three sermons by St. John of Damascus on the Dormition of the Theotokos. They can be read here: Sermon One, Sermon Two, Sermon Three.

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Orthodox TV and Radio Stations on the Internet

Orthodox Television

4E Orthodox Channel out of Thessalonika, Greece (Greek)
http://www.tv4e.gr/4E_ORTHODOX_CHANNEL.htm

Lihnos, Metropolis of Patras (Greek)
http://www.i-m-patron.gr/lyxnos/

Albishara Orthodox TV (Arabic)
http://www.alepporthodox.org/tv

Orthodox TV (English)
http://www.orthodox.tv

E-theology TV – Orthodox Church of Taiwan (Chinese)
http://www.etheology.tv/

-----------------------------------

Orthodox Radio

Church of Greece - 89,5 FM (Greek)
http://www.ecclesia.gr/greek/ecclesiaradio/index.htm

Apostoliki Ekklesia - 88,4 FM - Metropolis of Patras (Greek)
http://www.i-m-patron.gr/radio/index.html

"Lydia of Phillipi" - 94,5 FM - Thessalonika (Greek)
http://www.radiolydia.gr/

Monastic Diakonia - Sacred Convent of the Holy Archangels - Pelion, Greece (Greek)
http://www.impt.gr/radio.html

Peraiki Ekklesia - 91,2 FM (Greek)
http://www.pe912fm.com/

Radio Martyria - 95,5 FM - Metropolis of Hania, Crete (Greek)
http://www.imka.gr/martyria

Radio Floga (Greek)
http://radiofloga.ath.cx/

Al Orthodoxiya Radio Station (Arabic & various languages)
http://www.orthodoxiya.org/

Radio Al-Bishara (Arabic)
http://www.radioalbishara.org/index.php

Ancient Faith Radio (English and various languages)
http://ancientfaith.com

RADIO SVETIGORA (Serbian)
http://www.svetigora.com/node/5653

Radio Trinitas (Romanian)
http://radio.trinitas.ro/

Radio Lumina (Romanian)
http://www.radiolumina.ro/

Radio Reintregirea (Romanian)
http://live.reintregirea.ro:8000/live128.m3u

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Controversy in the Acropolis Museum Over the Film by Costas-Gavras by Greek Clergy

News report from Mega News concerning the controversial new film by Costa Gavras

On June 20th the magnificent new Acropolis Museum opened to the public. To commemorate this event Oscar winning and Greek-born French filmmaker Constantine Costa-Gavras directed a historical tribute to the Acropolis, a short segment of which was to be shown as an introduction to visitors in the museum. Certain clerics of the Church of Greece unofficially protested this film because the short segment depicts christian priests and faithful destroying part of the sculpture of the Parthenon frieze. According to The Associated Press dated to July 25, 2009:

"The animated segment showed figures clad in black climbing up ladders and destroying part of the Parthenon frieze; the scene referred to well-documented episodes of destruction that took place in the early Byzantine period (5th-8th centuries A.D.), when Christians often demolished monuments and temples belonging to the old pagan era. Many parts from those temples were used to build churches. The Parthenon itself suffered some damage but was spared a worse fate by being converted into a church.

"'The priests used to destroy ancient temples. Now they want to remove scenes from a film,' Costa-Gavras told Greece's Mega TV channel. 'This is the kind (of censorship) that used to happen in the former Soviet Union.'"

So what is the truth?

First of all, there is no documented evidence that Christians set out to destroy the Parthenon. Though it served as a pagan temple, it also served as a memorial for those who had fallen in the Battle of Marathon in 490 B.C. Rather than destroying it, the Christians seemed to have kept it as a memorial and converted it into a church in the sixth century dedicated to the Theotokos and was later re-named Panagia Atheniotissa (Virgin of Athens) around the eleventh century and served as the city's cathedral. The Erechtheion was dedicated to the Sotiras (Savior) or the Panagia, the temple of Athena Nike became a chapel and the Propylaia an episcopal residence. The Acropolis during this time was a major destination for pilgrimage visited by Saints and Emperors, probably within the top five in the world. Thus during Roman/Byzantine times, there is no evidence that Christians set out to destroy this historical monument of antiquity, but rather evidence points to the fact that they may have helped preserve it.

For further study on the Parthenon during this time period, I recommend The Christian Parthenon by Anthony Kaldellis. I also highly recommend the article "A Heretical (Orthodox) History of the Parthenon" by the same author. Further information is found in "The Restoration of the Athenian Acropolis".

Significant damage to the Parthenon is recorded to have began with the Ottoman occupation when it was used as the garrison headquarters of the Turkish army. The Venetians under F. Morozini besieged the Acropolis in 1687 and on September 26th bombarded and destroyed the Parthenon, which then served as a munitions store. Lord Elgin caused further serious damage in 1801-1802 by looting the sculptural decoration of the Parthenon (the so-called "Elgin Marbles"), the temple of Athena Nike and the Erechtheion. The Acropolis was handed over to the Greeks in 1822, during the Greek War of Independence, and Odysseas Androutsos became its first Greek garrison commander.

Thus, according to Alison Frantz in her still seminal and elegant article from 1965 (A. Frantz, "From Paganism to Christianity in the Temples of Athens," DOP 19 (1965), 185-205), the destruction that the Parthenon endured during the nineteenth century rendered it impossible to know whether or not and to what extent if any the Christians caused any damage to it. She writes:

"The zeal with which the classically-oriented archaeologists of the nineteenth century stripped away from Athenian temples all possible reminders of their post-classical history has rendered unduly complicated the task of dating their conversion. The nature of the required alterations made it impossible to eradicate completely all traces and these, supplemented by descriptions and drawings by the early travelers, have sometimes made it possible to reconstruct the general appearance of both exterior and interior. But the systematic removal, without recording, of wall masonry and, in many cases, even of foundations, destroyed at the same time almost all chronological evidence..." (p. 201)

Costa-Gavras, upon hearing that the scene depicting Christians destroying parts of the Parthenon was to be censored, insisted that his name be removed from the credits of his film. He insisted that because Christians were known for destroying other pagan temples, it is to be rightly assumed that they did the same to the Parthenon. Of course, he cannot prove this historically or archaeologically, but it rather seems that he is displaying his well-known anti-clerical attitude in his film. His previous films supported issues within left wing politics and directly attacked conservative based values and institutions (his father was imprisoned for being a communist and this had many repercussion on Costa-Gavras which made him eventually move to France to be able to get an education and eventually make politically based films). For example, in 2002 he made a film based on a highly controversial play titled Amen, which depicts the role of the Catholic Church and Pope Pius XII in the Holocaust and on the poster promoting the film a cross was mixed in with a swastika. This issue has continued to be hotly disputed, yet this did not prevent Gavras from making his film and continuing the controversy of the play. In regards to his film on the Parthenon, it is not surprising that his left wing anti-clerical propaganda would creep into the film.

Throughout this controversy, I find it odd how a debate rages on about whether or not Christians set out to destroy the Parthenon, while there was a controversy on whether or not the new Acropolis Museum could obtain the rights to destroy one of the finest masterpieces of art deco architecture in Europe just so it can have a better view of the "sacred rock". Its interesting how an awe-inspiring monument can empower the need to both destroy and create not only in the past but also in the present.

On August 4th Reuters reported that the Acropolis Museum reversed its decision to censure Gavras' film and will now show it uncensored. Reportedly this was done to prevent further picketing and threats of an alleged lawsuit.

If you want to see what all the fuss is about, eager web surfers have posted the controversial video on Youtube. The clip, originally posted by the site zougla.gr, features the offending scene at around the 1-minute 45-second mark.

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"The Monk" by Kostis Palamas

THE MONK

by Kostis Palamas

You allowed your skete to be on the dry cliff
and lived there
below the depths of heaven,
a monk with prayer.
On the rock you leaned. The years passed.
God shines within you.
With your sacred work you deepened even the cliff,
and it became a temple.


37 Years of Monastic Labor

Pilgrim: Father, how many years have you been in the monastery?

The Elder: 37 years my son and I still have done NOTHING!

And what do we have to say for ourselves?

(by the blessed Elder Damascene, Skete of the Resurrection in Limassol)

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The Relationship Between Saint Gregory Palamas and the Theotokos Together With a Sermon on Her Dormition

St. Gregory Palamas with his righteous family

THE PERSONAL RELATIONSHIP OF ST. GREGORY PALAMAS WITH THE THEOTOKOS

By Metropolitan Hierotheos of Nafpaktos, from his book Saint Gregory Palamas as a Hagiorite

Every Saint loves the Panagia. Sainthood is not understood without this Theotokophilia. It occurs because the Saints, after tasting the Love of God, communing of the Body and Blood of Christ, and experiencing the gifts of the incarnation of Christ, feel the need to give thanks also to that person who was the cause of this great joy. It is well known that the Saints are very sensitive and are therefore grateful for even the smallest gifts which they receive, and much more for the great gift of the deification of human nature, which came about in the Tomb of the Theotokos. She gave her flesh to the Son and Word of God for His incarnation.

This is also the case with St. Gregory Palamas. However, the Saint felt love for the Panagia also for other reasons. He was granted to see her in his life; he was her protege. We shall give more details to demonstrate this truth, as his biographer Philotheos Kokkinos, Patriarch of Constantinople, describes them.

The first indication is the fact that from an early age he was given into the protection of the Theotokos by his father. Before his father died, St. Gregory's mother asked him to ask the emperor to protect his children. That Saintly man not only did not accept her words, but rebuked her in a way and said to her. "I do not leave my children to some earthly rulers, but I leave my children to the Mistress of all, the mother of the King of heaven." And indeed at the time when he said these things he was looking at the icon of the Theotokos which was in front of him. St. Philotheos says in the biography of St. Gregory that the words of his holy father came true, because the Theotokos herself persuaded the emperor to take care of the orphan children, and also later "she was seen to be their protectress and guide, and in every way the savior of both their souls and their bodies."

The second circumstance which shows that his father's prophetic words were actually fulfilled and the Theotokos was a wonderful sponsor, governess and guide, came from the period of his studies. At the beginning of his studies the Saint had difficulty in memorizing. Then he placed a restriction on himself not to come near the books and not to begin reading without first having knelt three time before the icon of the Theotokos, saying a prayer at the same time. When he did this every day he succeeded very easily in memorizing and reciting the lessons. But if he sometimes forgot to follow this rule even the recitation failed right away. At the same time, as Philotheos says, the Panagia persuaded the emperor to be the guardian of the children and to assume all their personal expenses. Furthermore the emperor showed particular sympathy, for he invited them to come to see him and talked with them in a kind and loving way.

The third sign is from the period of his asceticism on Mount Athos. Immediately after he came to the Holy Mountain he gave himself over with great zeal to ascesis, fasting, vigil and unceasing prayer. It is significant, according to the information of St. Philotheos Kokkinos, that he prayed unceasingly to the Theotokos. He prayed day and night to God, projecting the Mother of God "as guide, protector and mediator, all the time bringing before his eyes her aid and her countenance, with words and prayers and noetic movements, and pondering the way of obedience with her guidance." So in the first two years the Saint was praying constantly to God, with the Panagia as his guide and mediator. The prayer which he was saying at that time was "enlighten my darkness."

During a great stillness, while his nous had turned inward and to God, John the Evangelist appeared to him, not in a dream, but in a vision, and assured him that he had been sent "as a messenger from the Queen beyond," to find out why he was constantly praying: "Enlighten my darkness, enlighten my darkness." St. Gregory replied that, since he is a passionate man, he was praying to be enlightened by God to be conformed to His saving will. Then John the Evangelist said: "Do not be afraid, do not doubt... the Queen of all is giving the order through us: 'I myself will be your help'." And when again St. Gregory asked when the Theotokos would be his help and ally, in the present or future life, then the Evangelist replied: "Both before and now, and in both the present and the future."

This appearance of St. John the Evangelist, sent by the Most Holy Theotokos, was revealed by St. Gregory himself years later to his fellow-monk Dorotheos, later Metropolitan of Thessaloniki. It is characteristic that the Theotokos heard the prayer and assured him that, just as long ago, so also now and in the future, she would be his helper and defender, and moreover, that she was filling him with divine gifts.

The fourth sign is the revelation which the Theotokos herself made to St. Gregory. It was at the time when he had returned to the Lavra, but he was staying at St. Savas frontisterion outside the Monastery of the Great Lavra. He once prayed for himself and his fellow monk to the Panagia, "the usual governor and deliverer," that both their guidance and their journey toward God might be unimpeded, but also that they might have what they needed for their nourishment, in order not to be very much occupied with collecting supplies and neglect prayer. Then the Panagia, the Queen of all, appeared in a vision, "dressed modestly and purely," just as the holy icons present her. Many saints had appeared and were following her. Then the Theotokos turned and gave them the order to serve St. Gregory and his companion: "From now on you are to be stewards and distributors of the necessities for Gregory and his companion." And St. Gregory was assured that from then on "all that was necessary for our bodily needs was offered us without effort wherever we happened to be."

From what we have said it is clear that St. Gregory Palamas had a close relationship and communion with the Theotokos. All the things that he writes about her, which we shall see further on, are obviously not dry, intellectual thoughts and reasoning conjectures, but experiences of the Panagia. This explains his great love for her. We can also see the progressive manifestation and revelation of the Theotokos. At first, through his father's prayer, she took up his protection. Then she showed him clearly that he must trust in her, for she would protect him throughout his studies. Then, through John the Evangelist, she assured him that she would be his helper and protector, and finally she herself was revealed personally. Throughout his life the Saint was convinced that he had the protection and help of the Theotokos, and therefore he struggled with strength and courage, expounded the theology of the Church in an Orthodox way and defeated the heresies of his time.

ORTHODOX HERITAGE, OCTOBER 2004, BROTHERHOOD OF ST .POIMEN

_______________________________________

A Homily on the Dormition of Our Supremely Pure Lady Theotokos and Ever-Virgin Mary

by St. Gregory Palamas

Both love and duty today fashion my homily for your charity. It is not only that I wish, because of my love for you, and because I am obliged by the sacred canons, to bring to your God-loving ears a saving word and thus to nourish your souls, but if there be any among those things that bind by obligation and love and can be narrated with praise for the Church, it is the great deed of the Ever-Virgin Mother of God. The desire is double, not single, since it induces me, entreats and persuades me, whereas the inexorable duty constrains me, though speech cannot attain to what surpasses it, just as the eye is unable to look fixedly upon the sun. One cannot utter things which surpass speech, yet it is within our power by the love for mankind of those hymned, to compose a song of praise and all at once both to leave untouched intangible things, to satisfy the debt with words and to offer up the first fruits of our love for the Mother of God in hymns composed according to our abilities.

If, then, “death of the righteous man is honorable” (cf. Ps. 115:6) and the “memory of the just man is celebrated with songs of praise” (Prov. 10:7), how much more ought we to honor with great praises the memory of the holiest of the Saints, she by whom all holiness is afforded to the Saints, I mean the Ever-Virgin Mother of God! Even so we celebrate today her holy dormition or translation to another life, whereby, while being “a little lower than angels” (Ps. 8:6), by her proximity to the God of all, and in the wondrous deeds which from the beginning of time were written down and accomplished with respect to her, she has ascended incomparably higher than the angels and the archangels and all the super-celestial hosts that are found beyond them. For her sake the God-bearing prophets pronounce prophecies, miracles are wrought to foreshadow that future marvel of the whole world, the Ever-Virgin Mother of God. The flow of generations and circumstances journeys to the destination of that new mystery wrought in her; the statutes of the Spirit provide beforehand types of the future truth. The end, or rather, the beginning and root of those divine wonders and deeds is the annunciation to the supremely virtuous Joachim and Anna of what was to be accomplished: namely, that they who were barren from youth would beget in deep old age her that would bring forth without seed Him that was timelessly begotten of God the Father before the ages. A vow was given by those who marvelously begot her to return her that was given to the Giver; so accordingly the Mother of God strangely changed her dwelling from the house of her father to the house of God while still an infant. She passed not a few years in the Holy of Holies itself, wherein under the care of an angel she enjoyed ineffable nourishment such as even Adam did not succeed in tasting; for indeed if he had, like this immaculate one, he would not have fallen away from life, even though it was because of Adam and so that she might prove to be his daughter, that she yielded a little to nature, as did her Son, Who has now ascended from earth into heaven.

But after that unutterable nourishment, a most mystical economy of courtship came to pass as regards the Virgin, a strange greeting surpassing speech which the Archangel, descended from above, addressed to her, and disclosures and salutations from God which overturn the condemnation of Eve and Adam and remedy the curse laid on them, transforming it into a blessing. The King of all “hath desired a mystic beauty” of the Ever-Virgin, as David foretold (Ps. 44:11) and, “He bowed the heavens and came down” (Ps. 17:9) and overshadowed her, or rather, the enhypostatic Power of the Most High dwelt in her. Not through darkness and fire, as with Moses the God-seer, nor through tempest and cloud, as with Elias the prophet, did He manifest His presence, but without mediation, without a veil, the Power of the Most High overshadowed the sublimely chaste and virginal womb, separated by nothing, neither air nor aether nor anything sensible, nor anything supra-sensible: this was not an overshadowing but a complete union. Since what overshadows is always wont to produce its own form and figure in whatever is overshadowed, there came to pass in the womb not a union only, but further, a formation, and that thing formed from the Power of the Most High and the all-holy virginal womb was the Word of God incarnate. Thus the Word of God took up His dwelling in the Theotokos in an inexpressible manner and proceeded from her, bearing flesh. He appeared upon the earth and lived among men, deifying our nature and granting us, after the words of the divine Apostle, “things which angels desire to look into” (1 Pet. 1:12). This is the encomium which transcends nature and the surpassingly glorious glory of the Ever-Virgin, glory for which all mind and word suffice not, though they be angelic. But who can relate those things which came to pass after His ineffable birth? For, as she co-operated and suffered with that exalting condescension (kenosis) of the Word of God, she was also rightly glorified and exalted together with Him, ever adding thereto the supernatural increase of mighty deeds. And after the ascent into the heavens of Him that was incarnate of her, she rivaled, as it were, those great works, surpassing mind and speech, which through Him were her own, with a most valiant and diverse asceticism, and with her prayers and care for the entire world, her precepts and encouragements which she gave to God’s heralds sent throughout the whole world; thus she was herself both a support and a comfort while she was both heard and seen, and while she labored with the rest in every way for the preaching of the Gospel. In such wise she led a most strenuous manner of life proclaimed in mind and speech.

Therefore, the death of the Theotokos was also life-bearing, translating her into a celestial and immortal life and its commemoration is a joyful event and festivity for the entire world. It not merely renews the memory of the wondrous deeds of the Mother of God, but also adds thereto the strange gathering at her all-sacred burial of all the sacred apostles conveyed from every nation, the God-revealing hymns of these God-possessed ones, and the solicitous presence of the angels, and their choir, and liturgy round about her, going on before, following after, assisting, opposing, defending, being defended. They labored and chanted together to their uttermost with those who venerated that life-originating and God-receiving body, the saving balsam for our race and the boast of all creation; but they strove against and opposed with a secret hand the Jews who rose up against and attacked that body with hand and will set upon theomachy. All the while the Lord Sabaoth Himself, the Son of the Ever-Virgin, was present, into Whose hands she rendered her divinely-minded spirit, through which and with which its companion, her body, was translated into the domain of celestial and endless life, even as was and is fitting. In truth, many have been allotted divine favor and glory and power, as David says, “But to me exceedingly honorable are Thy friends, O Lord, their principalities are made exceeding strong. I will count them and they shall be multiplied more than the sand” (Ps. 138:17). And according to Solomon, “many daughters have attained wealth, many have wrought valiantly; but she doth exceed, she hath surpassed all, both men and women” (cf. Prov. 31:29). For while she alone stood between God and the whole human race, God became the Son of Man and made men sons of God; she made earth heavenly, she deified the human race, and she alone of all women was shown forth to be a mother by nature and the Mother of God transcending every law of nature, and by her ineffable childbirth - the Queen of all creation, both terrestial and celestial. Thus she exalted those under her through herself, and, showing while on earth an obedience to things heavenly rather than things earthly, she partook of more excellent deserts and of superior power, and from the ordination which she received from heaven by the Divine Spirit, she became the most sublime of the sublime and the supremely blest Queen of a blessed race.

But now the Mother of God has her dwelling in Heaven where she was today translated, for this is meet, Heaven being a suitable place for her. She “stands at the right of the King of all clothed in a vesture wrought with gold and arrayed with diverse colors” (cf. Ps. 44:9), as the psalmic prophecy says concerning her. By “vesture wrought with gold” understand her divinely radiant body arrayed with diverse colors of every virtue. She alone in her body, glorified by God, now enjoys the celestial realm together with her Son. For, earth and grave and death did not hold forever her life-originating and God-receiving body - the dwelling more favored than Heaven and the Heaven of heavens. If, therefore, her soul, which was an abode of God’s grace, ascended into Heaven when bereaved of things here below, a thing which is abundantly evident, how could it be that the body which not only received in itself the pre-eternal and only-begotten Son of God, the ever-flowing Wellspring of grace, but also manifested His Body by way of birth, should not have also been taken up into Heaven? Or, if while yet three years of age and not yet possessing that super-celestial indwelling, she seemed not to bear our flesh as she abode in the Holy of Holies, and after she became supremely perfect even as regards her body by such great marvels, how indeed could that body suffer corruption and turn to earth? How could such a thing be conceivable for anyone who thinks reasonably? Hence, the body which gave birth is glorified together with what was born of it with God-befitting glory, and the “ark of holiness” (Ps. 131:8) is resurrected, after the prophetic ode, together with Christ Who formerly arose from the dead on the third day. The strips of linen and the burial clothes afford the apostles a demonstration of the Theotokos’ resurrection from the dead, since they remained alone in the tomb and at the apostles’ scrutiny they were found there, even as it had been with the Master. There was no necessity for her body to delay yet a little while in the earth, as was the case with her Son and God, and so it was taken up straightway from the tomb to a super-celestial realm, from whence she flashes forth most brilliant and divine illuminations and graces, irradiating earth’s region; thus she is devotedly venerated and marvelled at and hymned by all the faithful . Willing to set up an image of all goodness and beauty and to make clearly manifest His own therein to both angels and men, God fashioned a being supremely good and beautiful, uniting in her all good, seen and unseen, which when He made the world He distributed to each thing and thereby adorned all; or rather one might say, He showed her forth as a universal mixing bowl of all divine, angelic and human things good and beautiful and the supreme beauty which embellished both worlds. By her ascension now from the tomb, she is taken from the earth and attains to Heaven and this also she surpasses, uniting those on high with those below, and encompassing all with the wondrous deed wrought in her. In this manner she was in the beginning “a little lower than the angels” (Ps. 8:6), as it is said, referring to her mortality, yet this only served to magnify her pre-eminence as regards all creatures. Thus all things today fittingly gather and commune for the festival.

It was meet that she who contained Him that fills all things and who surpasses all should outstrip all and become by her virtue superior to them in the eminence of her dignity. Those things which sufficed the most excellent among men that have lived throughout the ages in order to reach such excellency, and that which all those graced of God have separately, both angels and men, she combines, and these she alone brings to fulfillment and surpasses. And this she now has beyond all: that she has become immortal after death and alone dwells together with her Son and God in her body. For this reason she pours forth from thence abundant grace upon those who honor her - for she is a receptacle of great graces - and she grants us even our ability to look towards her. Because of her goodness she lavishes sublime gifts upon us and never ceases to provide a profitable and abundant tribute in our behalf. If a man looks towards this concurrence and dispensing of every good, he will say that the Virgin is for virtue and those who live virtuously what the sun is for perceptible light and those who live in it. But if he raises the eye of his mind to the Sun which rose for men from this Virgin in a wondrous manner, the Sun which by nature possesses all those qualities which were added to her nature by grace, he shall straightaway call the Virgin a heaven. The excellent inheritance of every good which she has been allotted so much exceeds in holiness the portion of those who are divinely graced both under and above heaven as the heaven is greater than the sun and the sun is more radiant than heaven.

Who can describe in words thy divinely resplendent beauty, O Virgin Mother of God? Thoughts and words are inadequate to define thine attributes, since they surpass mind and speech. Yet it is meet to chant hymns of praise to thee, for thou art a vessel containing every grace, the fullness of all things good and beautiful, the tablet and living icon of every good and all uprightness, since thou alone hast been deemed worthy to receive the fulness of every gift of the Spirit. Thou alone didst bear in thy womb Him in Whom are found the treasuries of all these gifts and didst become a wondrous tabernacle for Him; hence thou didst depart by way of death to immortality and art translated from earth to Heaven, as is proper, so that thou mightest dwell with Him eternally in a super-celestial abode. From thence thou ever carest diligently for thine inheritance and by thine unsleeping intercessions with Him, and thou showest mercy to all.

To the degree that she is closer to God than all those who have drawn nigh unto Him, by so much has the Theotokos been deemed worthy of greater audience. I do not speak of men alone, but also of the angelic hierarchies themselves. Isaiah writes with regard to the supreme commanders of the heavenly hosts: “And the seraphim stood round about Him” (Isaiah 6:2); but David says concerning her, “at Thy right hand stood the queen” (Ps. 44:8). Do you see the difference in position? From this comprehend also the difference in the dignity of their station. The seraphim are round about God, but the only Queen of all is near beside Him. She is both wondered at and praised by God Himself, proclaiming her, as it were, by the mighty deeds enacted with respect to Him, and saying, as it is recorded in the Song of Songs, “How fair is my companion” (cf. Song of Songs 6:4), she is more radiant than light, more arrayed with flowers than the divine gardens, more adorned than the whole world, visible and invisible. She is not merely a companion but she also stands at God’s right hand, for where Christ sat in the heavens, that is, at the “right hand of majesty” (Heb. 1:3), there too she also takes her stand, having ascended now from earth into the heavens. Not merely does she love and is loved in return more than every other, according to the very laws of nature, but she is truly His Throne, and wherever the King sits, there His Throne is set also. And Isaiah beheld this throne amidst the choir of cherubim and called it “high” and “exalted” (Isaiah 6:1), wishing to make explicit how the station of the Mother of God far trancends that of the celestial hosts.

For this reason the Prophet introduces the angels themselves as glorifying the God come from her, saying, “Blessed be the glory of the Lord from His Place” (Ezek. 3:12). Jacob the Patriarch, beholding this throne by way of types (enigmata), said, “How dreadful is this Place! This is none other than the House of God, and this is the Gate of Heaven” (Gen. 28:17). But David, joining himself to the multitude of the saved, who are like the strings of a musical instrument or like differing voices from different generations made harmonious in one faith through the Ever-Virgin, sounds a most melodic strain in praise of her, saying: “I shall commemorate thy name in every generation to generation. Therefore shall peoples give praise unto thee for ever, and unto the ages of ages.” Do you see how the entire creation praises the Virgin Mother, and not only in times past, but “forever, and unto the ages of ages”? Thus it is evident that throughout the whole course of the ages, she shall never cease from benefacting all creation, and I mean not only created nature seen round about us, but also the very supreme commanders of the heavenly hosts, whose nature is immaterial and transcendent. Isaiah shows us clearly that it is only through her that they together with us both partake of and touch God, that Nature which defies touch, for he did not see the seraphim take the coal from the altar without mediation, but with tongs, by means of which the coal touched the prophetic lips and purified them (cf. Isaiah 6:6-7). Moses beheld the tongs of that great vision of Isaiah when he saw the bush aflame with fire, yet unconsumed. And who does not know that the Virgin Mother is that very bush and those very tongs, she who herself (though an archangel also assisted at the conception) conceived the Divine Fire without being consumed, Him that taketh away the sins of the world, Who through her touched mankind and by that ineffable touch and union cleansed us entirely. Therefore, she only is the frontier between created and uncreated nature, and there is no man that shall come to God except he be truly illumined through her, that Lamp truly radiant with divinity, even as the Prophet says, “God is in the midst of her, she shall not be shaken’(Ps. 45:5).

If recompense is bestowed according to the measure of love for God, and if the man who loves the Son is loved of Him and of His Father and becomes the dwelling place of Both, and they mystically abide and walk in him, as it is recorded in the Master’s Gospel, who, then, will love Him more than His Mother? For, He was her only-begotten Son, and moreover she alone among women gave birth knowing no spouse, so that the love of Him that had partaken of her flesh might be shared with her twofold. And who will the only-begotten Son love more than His Mother, He that came forth from Her ineffably without a father in this last age even as He came forth from the Father without a mother before the ages? How indeed could He that descended to fulfill the Law not multiply that honor due to His Mother over and above the ordinances of the Law?

Hence, as it was through the Theotokos alone that the Lord came to us, appeared upon earth and lived among men, being invisible to all before this time, so likewise in the endless age to come, without her mediation, every emanation of illuminating divine light, every revelation of the mysteries of the Godhead, every form of spiritual gift, will exceed the capacity of every created being. She alone has received the all-pervading fullness of Him that filleth all things, and through her all may now contain it, for she dispenses it according to the power of each, in proportion and to the degree of the purity of each. Hence she is the treasury and overseer of the riches of the Godhead. For it is an everlasting ordinance in the heavens that the inferior partake of what lies beyond being, by the mediation of the superior, and the Virgin Mother is incomparably superior to all. It is through her that as many as partake of God do partake, and as many as know God understand her to be the enclosure of the Uncontainable One, and as many as hymn God praise her together with Him. She is the cause of what came before her, the champion of what came after her and the agent of things eternal. She is the substance of the prophets, the principle of the apostles, the firm foundation of the martyrs and the premise of the teachers of the Church. She is the glory of those upon earth, the joy of celestial beings, the adornment of all creation. She is the beginning and the source and root of unutterable good things; she is the summit and consummation of everything holy.

O divine, and now heavenly, Virgin, how can I express all things which pertain to thee? How can I glorify the treasury of all glory? Merely thy memory sanctifies whoever keeps it, and a mere movement towards thee makes the mind more translucent, and thou dost exalt it straightway to the Divine. The eye of the intellect is through thee made limpid, and through thee the spirit of a man is illumined by the sojourning of the Spirit of God, since thou hast become the steward of the treasury of divine gifts and their vault, and this, not in order to keep them for thyself, but so that thou mightest make created nature replete with grace. Indeed, the steward of those inexhaustible treasuries watches over them so that the riches may be dispensed; and what could confine that wealth which wanes not? Richly, therefore, bestow thy mercy and thy graces upon all thy people, this thine inheritance, O Lady! Dispel the perils which menace us. See how greatly we are expended by our own and by aliens, by those without and by those within. Uplift all by thy might: mollify our fellow citizens one with another and scatter those who assault us from without like savage beasts. Measure out thy succor and healing in proportion to our passions, apportioning abundant grace to our souls and bodies, sufficient for every necessity. And although we may prove incapable of containing thy bounties, augment our capacity and in this manner bestow them upon us, so that being both saved and fortified by thy grace, we may glorify the pre-eternal Word Who was incarnate of thee for our sakes, together with His unoriginate Father and the life-creating Spirit, now and ever and unto the endless ages. Amen.

© Holy Transfiguration Monastery

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