busy busy busy
This first week of school has me busier than a one-legged man at some type of contest that involves kicking the posteriors of other people. My Latin TA has gone insane and given us 3 tests for this week alone. He needs to slow it down. At least I’ve remembered the vast majority of what I learned last year. When I came back in the fall to take German 104 a few years ago, I was so lost that I never really caught up until the end of the quarter.
The graduate class is pretty demanding too. When I went in last week, Professor Millett said that almost everyone in there was a graduate student and the underclassmen were only there because they’re exceptionally bright. I silently said “sweeeeeet.” It’s just me and one other underclassman in there. The grad students are all from fancy universities on the east coast, so if I do well in there, it’ll make me look really good for grad school.
My Vietnam War class also has a lot of reading that comes with it. It’s all pretty straightforward, but it still keeps me away from my oft-neglected blog.
Add in a meeting for Phi Alpha Theta, running the rifle club, the always late UV busses, and my time for the week is almost nonexistent. I’ll try to do better soon. I have a story to tell about alcohol and a chance meeting with an old TA at the OSU-Iowa game.
Frantic Upload!
While the router is cooperating, I’ll try and upload this entry that I wrote earlier.
Let’s deal with Origen for a while. I mainly read Contra Celsus, which means “Against Celsus”. That Latin 101 class really paid off!
Anyways, in Contra Celsus, Origen is refuting the claims of Celsus that Christians are bad and rebellious because they will not serve in the Emperor’s army.
Firstly he argues against the belief that Christians are a rebellious people because they were founded in rebellion. Origen points out a few flaws in the argument. First, he says that Celsus is wrongly thinking that the Jews were Egyptian. They were not, and their exodus was not a rebellion. Origen instead says:
“The ancient Egyptians, after inflicting many cruelties upon the Hebrew race, who had settled in Egypt owing to a famine which had broken out in Judea, suffered, in consequence of their injustice to strangers and suppliants, that punishment which divine Providence had decreed was to fall on the whole nation for having combined against an entire people, who had been their guests, and who had done them no harm; and after being smitten by plagues from God, they allowed them, with difficulty, and after a brief period, to go wherever they liked, as being unjustly detained in slavery.”
Origen then says that if Christians were a rebellious people, then “the Christian Lawgiver would not have altogether forbidden the putting of men to death” While the Jews rose up against the Romans time and time again, the Christians did not. They were directed merely not to murder, but to love and be merciful to their enemies. Finally, Origen says “Nor would the Christians, had they owed their origin to a rebellion, have adopted laws of so exceedingly mild a character as not to allow them, when it was their fate to be slain as sheep, on any occasion to resist their persecutors.”
Later on in Contra Celsus, Origen focuses on how Christians can help the Emperor by prayer and have a duty not to fight while wearing Roman armor, but while wearing the armor of God. Origen says that “the more any one excels in piety, the more effective help does he render to kings, even more than is given by soldiers, who go forth to fight and slay as many of the enemy as they can.” Christians, Origen argues, do their part to help Rome by praying and joining “self-denying exercises and meditations.” He finishes by saying “None fight better for the king than we do. We do not indeed fight under him, although he require it; but we fight on his behalf, forming a special army--an army of piety--by offering our prayers to God.”
Also, Origen points out that there is already a precedent for avoiding military service for religious reasons.
“Do not those who are priests at certain shrines, and those who attend on certain gods, as you account them, keep their hands free from blood, that they may with hands unstained and free from human blood offer the appointed sacrifices to your gods; and even when war is upon you, you never enlist the priests in the army. If that, then, is a laudable custom, how much more so, that while others are engaged in battle, these too should engage as the priests and ministers of God, keeping their hands pure, and wrestling in prayers to God on behalf of those who are fighting in a righteous cause, and for the king who reigns righteously, that whatever is opposed to those who act righteously may be destroyed!”
Finally, Origen says that Christians should not lead armies because, in addition to the killing, there is a great deal of glory and honor heaped on generals. Christians should avoid doing things just to be seen and praised by others. “For "in secret," and in our own hearts, there are prayers which ascend as from priests in behalf of our fellow-citizens.”
I'm kinda back
I technically have cable internet, but the router isn’t really letting me do much. I gotta fix it, but there will be entries soon. This I guarantee.
In the meantime, discuss.
Damnable Time Warner!
Damnable Time Warner! They cannot hook the internet and cable up into my apartment until the 14th at the earliest. This inconveniences me to no end…
On the plus side, with no tv to bother me, I can get a lot done on my thesis.
Schweet.
