Serapis-Christian links overlays??

[Peter Kirby]

The rule of three is a writing principle that suggests that things that come in threes are inherently funnier, more satisfying, or more effective than other numbers of things.[citation needed] The reader or audience of this form of text is also more likely to consume information if it is written in groups of threes. From slogans ("Go, fight, win!") to films, many things are structured in threes. Examples include The Three Stooges, Three Little Pigs, Three Billy Goats Gruff, Goldilocks and the Three Bears and the Three Musketeers.

A series of three often creates a progression in which the tension is created, built up, and finally released. Similarly, adjectives are often grouped in threes to emphasize an idea.

The Latin phrase, "omne trium perfectum" (everything that comes in threes is perfect, or, every set of three is complete) conveys the same idea as the rule of three.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rule_of_three_(writing)

Citation needed is hilarious in this context. Not every thing requires (or is improved) by a footnote.

[Clive]

every set of three is complete

So the trinity is a literary invention?

[Leucius Charinus]

Ephesians 4:5-6King James Version (KJV)

5 One Lord, one faith, one baptism,

6 One God and Father of all, who is above all, and through all, and in you all.

https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?s ... ersion=KJV

Isn't this a common Greek rhetorical construction? I thought similar statements were common. And Ephesians here does not look particularly xian, but does feel as if it is referencing the true gods.

For in him we live, and move, and have our being; as certain also of your own poets { Epimenides of Zeus} have said, For we are also his offspring.

The Three Stooges, Three Little Pigs, Three Billy Goats Gruff, Goldilocks and the Three Bears and the Three Musketeers.

The Four Gospels, Four Points of the Compass, Four Winds, the Tetrarchy = "Leadership of Four", and the Four Corners of a Quadrangle.

So the trinity is a literary invention?

Plotinus [Enneads] - The One, Spirit, Soul




LC

[MrMacSon]

Vespasian as Serapis

Trevor S. Luke (2010) A Healing Touch for Empire: Vespasian's Wonders in Domitianic Rome Greece and Rome (Second Series)
Greece and Rome (Second Series) Vo 57, Issue 01 (April 2010) pp 77-106

• Before Vespasian returned to Rome to take up the reins of imperial government, he reportedly had a vision in the Serapeum of Alexandria and, as the New Serapis, healed two men. These wonders came to define Vespasian's time in Egypt and yet, for modern readers, their prominence in the story of the emperor's rise to power creates an apparent inconsistency. The same man who on his deathbed joked about his impending divinization also apparently played the part of a god at the beginning of his reign. Such contradictions are to be expected in the colourful accounts of emperors' lives, but this particular one invites further investigation because of its significance to the historical development of the conception of the emperor's divinity. Through detailed consideration of the prospects for reception of these wonders both during and after the Flavian dynasty, this article seeks to demonstrate the predominance of Domitianic influence on the story of Vespasian's wonders. Domitian's reign saw a new emphasis on the living emperor's divinity, which diminished again under Trajan. Nevertheless, wonders were a means through which the charisma of the emperor was manifested in Flavian Rome and later.

“An old superstition spread over all the East that out of Judaea would come the ruler of the world. This prediction, as it later proved, referred to two Roman emperors Vespasian and his son Titus” (Suetonius, Life of Vespasian 4.5).

[MrMacSon]

Tacitus Histories Book IV (end)

"81 1 During the months while Vespasian was waiting at Alexandria for the regular season of the summer winds and a settled sea,4 many marvels continued to mark the favour of heaven and a certain partiality of the gods toward him. One of the common people of Alexandria, well known for his loss of sight, threw himself before Vespasian's knees, praying him with groans to cure his blindness, being so directed by the god Serapis, whom this most superstitious of nations worships before all others; and he besought the emperor to deign to moisten his cheeks and eyes with his spittle. Another, whose hand was useless, prompted by the same god, begged Caesar to step and trample on it. Vespasian at first ridiculed these appeals and treated them with p161 scorn; then, when the men persisted, he began at one moment to fear the discredit of failure, at another to be inspired with hopes of success by the appeals of the suppliants and the flattery of his courtiers: finally, he directed the physicians to give their opinion as to whether such blindness and infirmity could be overcome by human aid. Their reply treated the two cases differently: they said that in the first the power of sight had not been completely eaten away and it would return if the obstacles were removed; in the other, the joints had slipped and become displaced, but they could be restored if a healing pressure were applied to them. Such perhaps was the wish of the gods, and it might be that the emperor had been chosen for this divine service; in any case, if a cure were obtained, the glory would be Caesar's, but in the event of failure, ridicule would fall only on the poor suppliants. So Vespasian, believing that his good fortune was capable of anything and that nothing was any longer incredible, with a smiling countenance, and amid intense excitement on the part of the bystanders, did as he was asked to do. The hand was instantly restored to use, and the day again shone for the blind man. Both facts are told by eye-witnesses even now when falsehood brings no reward.

"82 1 These events gave Vespasian a deeper desire to visit the sanctuary of the god to consult him with regard to his imperial fortune: he ordered all to be excluded from the temple. Then after he had entered the temple and was absorbed in contemplation of the god, he saw behind him one of the leading men of Egypt, named Basilides,5 who he knew was detained by sickness in a place many p163 days' journey distant from Alexandria. He asked the priests whether Basilides had entered the temple on that day; he questioned the passers-by whether he had been seen in the city; finally, he sent some cavalry and found that at that moment he had been eighty miles away: then he concluded that this was a supernatural vision and drew a prophecy from the name Basilides.

"83 1 The origin of this god has not yet been generally treated by our authors: the Egyptian priests tell the following story, that when King Ptolemy,6 the first of the Macedonians to put the power of Egypt on a firm foundation, was giving the new city of Alexandria walls, temples, and religious rites, there appeared to him in his sleep a vision of a young man of extraordinary beauty and of more than human stature, who warned him to send his most faithful friends to Pontus and bring his statue hither; the vision said that this act would be a happy thing for the kingdom and that the city that received the god would be great and famous: after these words the youth seemed to be carried to heaven in a blaze of fire. Ptolemy, moved by this miraculous omen, disclosed this nocturnal vision to the Egyptian priests, whose business it is to interpret such things."

http://penelope.uchicago.edu/Thayer/E/R ... s/4D*.html

http://www.ourcivilisation.com/smartboa ... chap17.htm

[MrMacSon]

.
An interesting tie between the stories about Jesus and the stories about Vespasian has been provided by Neil Godfrey -

I saw a reference online to a scholarly article that was suggesting that Mark’s account of Jesus’ healing the blind man by spitting on him may have been written in response to the rumour circulating that Vespasian had,not long before, performed the same miracle by spitting. Was Mark drawing the readers’ attention to a contrast between Vespasian using the miracle to declare his universal authority and Jesus using it to lead into his message about humble service?

Eric Eve of Oxford had the article published in New Testament Studies in 2008, titled “Spit in your eye: the blind man of Bethsaida and the blind man of Alexandria".*

But to suggest a link with the similar miracle by Vespasian seems to me an obvious point to consider and I am amazed it has appeared only so recently.

Historian Suetonius’s account of Emperor Vespasian’s miracle informs us that the miracle served the propaganda purpose of certifying his claim to be emperor (that is the Roman “son of god” on earth):

• 7 2 Vespasian as yet lacked prestige and a certain divinity, so to speak, since he was an unexpected and still new-made emperor; but these also were given him. A man of the people who was blind, and another who was lame, came to him together as he sat on the tribunal, begging for the help for their disorders which Serapis had promised in a dream; for the god declared that Vespasian would restore the eyes, if he would spit upon them, and give strength to the leg, if he would deign to touch it with his heel.
  
  Suetonius: The Lives of the Caesars; The Life of Vespasian

Eric Eve in his article explains that the imperial propaganda machine circulated these stories throughout the region in order to impress subjects of the divine authority and power of the new emperor — despite his evident praise-worthy modesty. This occurred around the time of the fall of Jerusalem, the same time when many scholars think the Gospel of Mark was composed.

Interestingly EE includes a suggestion that the passage in Mark’s “Little Apocalypse” in which Jesus warns against going after false messiahs performing miracles and prophets falsely pointing to such messiahs might be a reference to Vespasian and his propaganda machine. (Josephus adds that there was a Jewish prophecy also that was interpreted in a way to support Vespasian’s new authority.) If so, the false messiah and prophets were not Jews who invited their destruction from the Romans, but the Roman power itself that turned on them.

Eric Eve’s conclusion:

• ... the Blind Man of Alexandria is a story that served to help legitimate Vespasian’s claim to the imperial throne, a claim also supported by various prophecies including Josephus’s reinterpretation of Jewish messianic expectations. The Blind Man of Bethsaida leads into Peter’s confession of Jesus as the messiah, but a messiah apparently misconceived in emperor-like terms. Even if this were mere coincidence it seems likely that Mark’s audience would hear one story in terms of the other, but it seems even more likely that there is no coincidence and that Mark deliberately shaped the Blind Man of Bethsaida with the Blind Man of Alexandria in mind. (p.17)

http://vridar.org/2011/07/12/jesus-out- ... e-emperor/

I think the role of attributing god-like properties to the Emperor is relevant, as is the basis for attributing those god-like properties ie. the pre-existing/concurrent theology. Here we have a Serapis-Roman event translated into Christian story contemporaneously.

• *
  Eve, E (2008) Spit in Your Eye: The Blind Man of Bethsaida and the Blind Man of Alexandria

  • New Testament Studies Vol 54 (Issue 01; Jan 2008), pp 1-17. Cambridge University Press

  Abstract
  The account of Vespasian's use of spittle to heal a blind man at Alexandria has long been noted as a parallel to the use of spittle in Mark's healing of the Blind Man of Bethsaida, but little has been made of the temporal proximity of these two stories. Vespasian's healings formed part of the wider Flavian propaganda campaign to legitimate the new claimant to the imperial throne; to many Jewish ears this propaganda would have sounded like a usurpation of traditional messianic hopes. This article argues that Mark introduced spittle into his story of the Blind Man of Bethsaida to create an allusion to the Vespasian story as part of a wider concern to contrast the messiahship of Jesus with such Roman imperial ‘messianism’.
  
  http://journals.cambridge.org/action/di ... id=1683000
  .

[MrMacSon]

Coins depicting Serapis through to the early 3th C - http://www.forumancientcoins.com/catalo ... ?vpar=1899


"Caesarea in the Third and Fourth Centuries" Caesarea Under Roman Rule By Lee I. Levine (link to p57)

p 42 Chapter titled "The Second Century"

Caesarea undr Roman Rule, Levine p42.JPG (79.95 KiB) Viewed 11111 times

[MrMacSon]

Interesting assertions here tying Serapis to Gnosticism -

The universal Serapis was therefore the right God for the Gnostic movement in Egypt. This philosophico-religious movement in the first centuries AD was a combination of Eastern religious ideas from Syria, Persia and Judaism, and Greek philosophical elements from Plato and Neo-Platonism, from Pythagoras and Neo-Pythagoreanism and from Stoicism. The Gnostics believed knowledge was the only way to salvation. To them religion was thinking about the great questions of life and studying secret texts, although important mystical aspects were involved as well. Furthermore they considered everything as a struggle between good and evil.

There were several different fractions however, namely Jewish, Christian and pagan Gnostics. Because they believed the world was created by the highest God, the pagan Gnostics needed a deity superior to all the others. In the Egyptian city of Alexandria, the most important intellectual centre in the Mediterranean, and therefor an important Gnostic centre, Serapis was an obvious choice. Serapis became the object of a mystery cult with similarities to other Eastern mystery cults as Christianity and the Mithras cult, which were both strongly influenced by Gnosticism.

http://www.mindserpent.com/American_His ... rapis.html

[MrMacSon]

Interesting statements about Serapis being accompanied by a three-headed dog at his right hand, and having a role as a sun god.

• At his temple, the Sarapeum in Alexandria, he was represented as a robed and bearded figure, with a three-headed dog at his right hand, and a sceptre in his left hand. In this role he was a sun god, and a god of fertility and healing.
  
  The temple contained a gigantic statue of a throning Serapis accompanied by his three-headed dog, made of various kinds of stone, precious metals and emeralds.
  
  http://www.mindserpent.com/American_His ... rapis.html

[MrMacSon]

There are interesting assertions about sacrifice of Christians and their matyrdom during the destruction of the Serapeum Temple

Eventually the Roman emperor Theodosius ordered the destruction of the sanctuary [the Serapeum of Alexandria] in 391 AD. After the declaration of his edict, which forbade the worship of pagan Gods and made Christianity the state religion of the Roman Empire, religious riots broke out in Alexandria between pagans and Christians. The pagans took refuge in the Serapeum and fortified it against the Christians, while captured Christians were sacrificed in revenge. The emperor declared the sacrificed Christians to be martyrs and ordered the destruction of the temple; the pagans, however, were free to go.

http://www.mindserpent.com/American_His ... rapis.html