in defence of astrotheology

[Leucius Charinus]

G'Don, take away your "knowledge" of the heliocentric model and try and formulate a set of beliefs from the geocentric model and tell me what you come up with apart from "astrotheological" beliefs.

Thanks. I'm serious :)

I think astrological beliefs and the cosmic allegories of the Platonists covers everything. What does astrotheology explain that can't be explained by those things? Can you give me an example where astrotheology is a better explanation?

I too happen to think that the Platonists had most of this stuff covered in the philosophical sense, but theirs was a prestigious academy. Their theology was a lot different to the public face of theologies and cults in the empire.

How did the rest of the people in the empire view things? The bulk of the people were probably highly influenced by whatever temples were nearby, and by what (astro) god (or goddess) the current Emperor wished to sponsor. Architecture might also be perceived as propaganda for "astrotheological" beliefs IMO.

And how do you see the assertions I've given above that are apparently 'astrotheological' in nature?

I'd be interested to hear mimi's response to them.

Thanks



LC

[Clive]

Another question is what is a day and what happens to define the cycle of a day? Does the sun die and resurrect, or go to sleep, or go to the underworld, or continue on a path or what? Did people know the world was round and knew without putting it in words that the sun was orbiting? They knew that from the movement of the moon and the stars, why should they not have realised the sun was also going in circles?

[neilgodfrey]

What does the evidence say about how did the Greeks and Romans viewed the setting and rising sun?

Or where did the sun go at night? What does the evidence say?

Any good book on mythology should answer that. Look for the author(s) who spoke of the sun god (Helios or Apollo?) riding the chariot through Ocean on the underside of the earth to return again in the morning.

There is nothing in Greek or Roman mythology of which I am aware that likens the sun deities to any dying and rising trope. They are always traveling though the inhabited and uninhabited (underside) regions of the earth.

The dying and rising tropes related to vegetation, including horticulture.

[Leucius Charinus]

Even from a geocentric model people understood cycles. So would they assume the stars died each morning and resurrected each night.

Well that's the question. What happens to the sun at night. Did it traverse the [sky of the] underworld?

What did these [geocentric] people assume?

They had seen ships disappear over the horizon and return.

But they had not seen ships disappear over the western horizon and reappear over the eastern horizon.
Only the sky gods - the astro gods - did this.



LC

[Clive]

There has been fascinating research about the incredible mathematical calculations we do without putting it into words, like checking a woman's health by the ratio of hips, like throwing accurately. Maybe we do know unconsciously that the sun is orbiting - the reason why - the earth spinning or the sun moving - is a secondary question that is not obvious.

Life has "known" this for 4 billion years.

[Clive]

Myths are Kiplingesque just so stories. Any particular story does not have any relationship to what we "know". These are just a story put on to life's lived experience, a veneer of story. We have become much much better at aligning reality and story, but we are not there. It might be impossible because it is a translation issue.

[neilgodfrey]

Did people know the world was round and knew without putting it in words that the sun was orbiting?

Yes they did, or at least as much as they ever thought about it on the basis of what the philosophers knew. The maps of the world only showed the inhabited regions and these were surrounded by ocean. Both writings and art inform us that the ancients of this era understood the world was round with the sun and planets orbiting it. They were not going through Hell on the other side as far as we can tell.

"The Flat Earth" by Garwood and "God's Philosophers" by Hannam are two works that explode the myth that pre-Enlightenment peoples generally believed in a flat earth.

The sun and moon orbited the round earth according to the general educated knowledge of the Greek and Roman eras.

https://www.librarything.com/work/32957 ... /115569945
https://www.librarything.com/work/8562256/book/61479420

[Clive]

https://books.google.co.uk/books?hl=en& ... in&f=false

The Mathematical brain

[neilgodfrey]

Aristotle taught the sun orbited the round earth and Ptolemy based his model of the planets on this idea. That was "the scientific" view of the day.

The mythology of the sun god was something different but again this explained the orbiting sun in personified terms. No death; just traveling a long way off and returning again.

(By the way, the idea of sailing west and returning from the east doesn't 'prove' the earth is round: flat-earth belief simply holds that the ship is merely traveling the circle of a flat earth disc.)

[Leucius Charinus]

What does the evidence say about how did the Greeks and Romans viewed the setting and rising sun?

Or where did the sun go at night? What does the evidence say?

Any good book on mythology should answer that. Look for the author(s) who spoke of the sun god (Helios or Apollo?) riding the chariot through Ocean on the underside of the earth to return again in the morning.

http://www.perseus.tufts.edu/hopper/tex ... Ahymn%3D31

• [1] And now, O Muse Calliope, daughter of Zeus, begin to sing of glowing Helios whom mild-eyed Euryphaessa, the far-shining one, bare to the Son of Earth and starry Heaven. For Hyperion wedded glorious Euryphaessa, [5] his own sister, who bare him lovely children, rosy-armed Eos and rich-tressed Selene and tireless Helios who is like the deathless gods. As he rides in his chariot, he shines upon men and deathless gods, and piercingly he gazes with his eyes [10] from his golden helmet. Bright rays beam dazzlingly from him, and his bright locks streaming from the temples of his head gracefully enclose his far-seen face: a rich, fine-spun garment glows upon his body and flutters in the wind: and stallions carry him. [15] Then, when he has stayed his golden-yoked chariot and horses, [15a] he rests there upon the highest point of heaven, until he marvelously drives them down again through heaven to Ocean.
  
  Hail to you, lord! Freely bestow on me substance that cheers the heart. And now that I have begun with you, I will celebrate the race of mortal men half-divine whose deeds the Muses have showed to mankind.
  
  
  Anonymous. The Homeric Hymns and Homerica with an English Translation by Hugh G. Evelyn-White. Homeric Hymns. Cambridge, MA.,Harvard University Press; London, William Heinemann Ltd. 1914.

There is nothing in Greek or Roman mythology of which I am aware that likens the sun deities to any dying and rising trope. They are always traveling though the inhabited and uninhabited (underside) regions of the earth.

[wiki]Pluto_(deity)[/wiki]

• Pluto (Greek: Πλούτων, Ploutōn) was the ruler of the underworld in classical mythology. The earlier name for the god was Hades, which became more common as the name of the underworld itself.
  
  ///
  
  During the Roman Imperial era, the Greek geographer Strabo (1st century AD) makes a distinction between Pluto and Hades. In writing of the mineral wealth of ancient Iberia (Roman Spain), he says that among the Turdetani, it is "Pluto, and not Hades, who inhabits the region down below."[19] In the discourse On Mourning by the Greek author Lucian (2nd century AD), Pluto's "wealth" is the dead he rules over in the abyss (chasma); the name Hades is reserved for the underworld itself.

Hades

• Hades (/ˈheɪdiːz/; from Ancient Greek Ἅιδης/ᾍδης) was the ancient Greek god of the underworld. Eventually, the god's name came to designate the abode of the dead. In Greek mythology, Hades is the oldest male child of Cronus and Rhea considering the order of birth from the mother, or the youngest, considering the regurgitation by the father. The latter view is attested in Poseidon's speech in the Iliad.[1] According to myth, he and his brothers Zeus and Poseidon defeated the Titans and claimed rulership over the cosmos, ruling the underworld, air, and sea, respectively; the solid earth, long the province of Gaia, was available to all three concurrently.
  
  Later, the Greeks started referring to the god as Plouton (see below), which the Romans Latinized as Pluto.[2] The Romans would associate Hades/Pluto with their own chthonic gods, Dis Pater and Orcus. The corresponding Etruscan god was Aita. He is often pictured with the three-headed dog Cerberus. In the later mythological tradition, though not in antiquity, he is associated with the Helm of Darkness and the bident.
  
  The term "Hades" in Christian theology (and in New Testament Greek) is parallel to Hebrew sheol (שאול, "grave, dirt-pit"), and refers to the abode of the dead. The Christian concept of hell is more akin to and communicated by the Greek concept of Tartarus, a deep, gloomy part of Hades used as a dungeon of torment and suffering.

Nothing particularly specific here.




LC