hB

 

It was not based on a body of scripture, and hence very little written documentary evidence survives. Soldiers and the lower nobility appeared to be the most plentiful followers of Mithraism. Until recently, women were generally thought not to have been allowed to join, but it has now been suggested that "women were involved with Mithraic groups in at least some locations of the empire.

 

No Mithraic scripture or first-hand account of its highly secret rituals survives, with the possible exception of a liturgy recorded in a 4th century papyrus, thought to be an atypical representation of the cult at best. Current knowledge of the mysteries is almost entirely limited to what can be deduced from the iconography in the mithraea that have survived.

 

The tauroctony
In every Mithraic temple, the place of honor was occupied by a tauroctony, a representation of Mithras killing a sacred bull which was associated with spring. Mithras is depicted as an energetic young man, wearing a Phrygian cap, a short tunic that flares at the hem, pants and a cloak which furls out behind him. Mithras grasps the bull so as to force it into submission, with his knee on its back and one hand forcing back its head while he stabs it in the neck with a short sword. The figure of Mithras is usually shown at a diagonal angle and with the face turned forward.

In antiquity, texts refer to "the mysteries of Mithras", and to its adherents, as "the mysteries of the Persians." This latter epithet is significant, not only for whether the Mithraists considered the object of their devotion a Persian divinity (i.e. Mithra), but for whether the devotees considered their religion to have been founded by Zoroaster.

Mithraism and Christianity
Christianity was similar to Mithraism in many respects for instance the Ecclesiastical calendar retains numerous remnants of pre-Christian festivals, notably Christmas, which blends elements including both the feast of the Saturnalia and the birthday of Mithra. Evaluation of the relationship of early Christianity with Mithraism has traditionally been based on the polemical testimonies of the 2nd century Church fathers, such as Justin's accusations that the Mithraists were diabolically imitating the Christians. This led to a picture of rivalry between the two religions, which Ernest Renan set forth in his 1882 The Origins of Christianity by saying "if the growth of Christianity had been arrested by some mortal malady, the world would have been Mithraic," However, Renan's conclusions have been criticised by contemporary scholarship. Edwin M. Yamauchi comments on Renan's work which, "published nearly 150 years ago, has no value as a source. He [Renan] knew very little about Mithraism...” Little was actually known about Mithras in 1882.

Iconographical similarities with Christian art in late antiquity
Although Judaism has a rich narrative imagery from which much of biblical history painting in the history of Christian art draws its imagery, Judaism did not give a precedent for pictorial or visual representation in painting or sculpture from which the Early Christians could base the form of its visual imagery. Yet, while some early Christian scenes do make use of the figures from pagan imagery their content is based in most part on the biblical narrative.

However, according to one Franz Cumont, after the triumph of the church over paganism, artists continued to make use of stock images originally devised for Mithras in order to depict the new and unfamiliar stories of the bible. The way in which Mithras was depicted shooting arrows at rocks causing fountains to spring up was adapted to represent the biblical story of Moses striking Mount Horeb with his staff to release drinking water, according to Cumont. Likewise the Heavens, the Earth, the Ocean, the Sun, the Moon, the Planets, signs of the Zodiac, the Winds, the Seasons, and the Elements appear on sarcophagi, mosaics, and miniatures in the fourth to fifth centuries using the same sort of iconography used for Mithras earlier. The "strangehold of the workshop" meant that the first Christian artworks were heavily based on pagan art, and "a few alterations in costume and attitude transformed a pagan scene into a Christian picture".

M. J. Vermaseren claimed that the scene of Mithras ascending into the heavens was similarly incorporated into Christian art: after Mithras had accomplished a series of miraculous deeds, he ascended into the heavens in a chariot, which in various depictions is drawn by horses being controlled by Helios-Sol, the pagan sun god. In other depictions a chariot of fire belonging to Helios is led into the water, surrounded by the god Oceanus and sea nymphs. Vermaseren argues that Christian portrayals on sarcophagi of the soul’s ascension into heaven, though ostensibly referencing the biblical scene of Elijah being led into heaven by fiery chariots and horses, were in fact inspired by representations of Mithras' ascent into the heavens in Helios’ chariot. The sun god, Vermaseren claims, provided inspiration for the flames on Elijah’s chariot and the Jordan River is personified by a figure resembling the god Oceanus.

A. Deman suggests that rather than attempting to find individual references from Mithraic art in Christian iconography, as Cumont does with the sun and moon, for instance, it is better to look for larger patterns of comparison: "with this method, pure coincidences can no longer be used and so the recognition of Mithras as the privileged pagan inspirer of medieval Christian iconography is forced upon us." For example Deman compares what he calls the "creative sacrifice" of Mithras with the creative sacrifice of Christ. In representations of both iconographic scenes the vernal sacrifice is central to the image, with sun and the moon symmetrically arranged above. Beneath the sacrifice two other figures are symmetrically arranged. In mithraic scenes these are Cautes and Cautopates, and in the Christian scenes, which date from the 4th century onwards, the figures are typically Mary and John. In other Christian instances however, these two attendants are other figures, and carry a raised and lowered object reminiscent of the raised and lowered torches of Cautes and Cautopates. Such figures may be two Roman soldiers armed with lances, or Longinus holding a spear and Stephaton offering Jesus vinegar from a sponge. In some instances the clothes of these figures resemble those of Cautes and Cautopates in the earlier Mithraic depictions. Deman also compares the twelve apostles shown in Christian crucifixion scenes with the twelve signs of the zodiac common in Mithraic scenes, as well as identifying a cross-legged posture commonly found in figures in both sets of iconography.

Other similarities with Christianity
Some authors have drawn parallels between the circumstances of Mithras' and Jesus' birth: Joseph Campbell described it as a virgin birth. This theory is in contradiction to the traditional understanding of Mithras' birth. In Mithraic Studies it stated that Mithras was born as an adult from solid rock, "wearing his Phrygian cap, issues forth from the rocky mass. As yet only his bare torso is visible. In each hand he raises aloft a lighted torch and, as an unusual detail, red flames shoot out all around him from the petra genetrix." David Ulansey speculates that this was a belief derived from the Perseus' myths which held he was born from an underground cavern. Martin A. Larson, as well as Franz Cumont asserted that Mithras was said to have been born on December 25, or the winter solstice.

 

First of all by reading the title - we would think in the religion of Satan there would be Devil worship.

But it is not like that.

 

As High Priest Peter H. Gilmore says:

 

There is a church The Church of Satan which is an organization dedicated to the acceptance of Man’s carnal self, as articulated in The Satanic Bible, written in 1969 by Anton LaVey.

 

Anton LaVey was a found of all this dogma.

 

Satanists within the Church of Satan adhere to these as guidelines on how to live.

 

The Nine Satanic Statements outline what "Satan" represents in the Church of Satan.

   1. Satan represents indulgence instead of abstinence
   2. Satan represents vital existence instead of spiritual pipe dreams
   3. Satan represents undefiled wisdom instead of hypocritical self-deceit
   4. Satan represents kindness to those who deserve it instead of love wasted on ingrates
   5. Satan represents vengeance instead of turning the other cheek
   6. Satan represents responsibility to the responsible instead of concern for psychic vampires
   7. Satan represents man as just another animal, sometimes better, more often worse than those that walk on all-fours, who, because of his “divine spiritual and intellectual development,” has become the most vicious animal of all
   8. Satan represents all of the so-called sins, as they all lead to physical, mental, or emotional gratification
   9. Satan has been the best friend the Church has ever had, as he has kept it in business all these years

 

   1. Stupidity
   2. Pretentiousness
   3. Solipsism
   4. Self-deceit
   5. Herd Conformity
   6. Lack of Perspective
   7. Forgetfulness of Past Orthodoxies
   8. Counterproductive Pride
   9. Lack of Aesthetics

 

   1. Do not give opinions or advice unless you are asked
   2. Do not tell your troubles to others unless you are sure they want to hear them
   3. When in another’s lair, show him respect or else do not go there
   4. If a guest in your lair annoys you, treat him cruelly and without mercy
   5. Do not make sexual advances unless you are given the mating signal
   6. Do not take that which does not belong to you unless it is a burden to the other person and he cries out to be relieved
   7. Acknowledge the power of magic if you have employed it successfully to obtain your desires. If you deny the power of magic after having called upon it with success, you will lose all you have obtained
   8. Do not complain about anything to which you need not subject yourself
   9. Do not harm little children
  10. Do not kill non-human animals unless you are attacked or for your food
  11. When walking in open territory, bother no one. If someone bothers you, ask him to stop. If he does not stop, destroy him

 

After knowing all this we can see that on this earth there are many people who are not necessarily associated to the Church Of Satan but still are Satanists.

 

A cult of personality or personality cult arises when a country's leader uses mass media to create a larger-than-life public image through unquestioning flattery and praise. Cults of personality are often found in dictatorships but some can be found in some democracies as well.
A cult of personality is similar to general hero worship except that it is specifically built around political leaders. However, the term may be applied by analogy to refer to adulation of non-political leaders.

The criticism of personality cults often focuses on the regimes of Mussolini, Hitler, Stalin, and Mao. During the peak of their reigns, these leaders appeared as god-like infallible rulers. Their portraits were hung in every home or public building, and artists and poets were legally instructed to produce only works that glorified the leader and their political movements. The term cult of personality comes from Karl Marx's critique of the "cult of the individual" - expressed in a letter to German political worker, Wilhelm Bloss.

More Read:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cult_of_Personality
http://www.guardian.co.uk/greatspeeches/story/0,,2061014,00.html
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stalin
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hB

A study appearing today in the journal Science reports that the hunter-gatherers seem to be the only group of humans known to have no concept of numbering and counting.
There are really only three numeric words in Pirahã - "one," "two," and "many." To add to the confusion, "one" doesn't always mean exactly one - it could mean one fish, a small fish, or only a few fish.
Not only that, but adult Piraha apparently can't learn to count or understand the concept of numbers or numerals, even when they asked anthropologists to teach them and have been given basic math lessons for months at a time.
Their lack of enumeration skills is just one of the mental and cultural traits that has led scientists who have visited the 300 members of the tribe to describe the Piraha as "something from Mars."
Daniel Everett, an American linguistic anthropologist, has been studying and living with Piraha for 27 years.
Besides living a numberless life, he reports in a separate study prepared for publication, the Piraha are the only people known to have no distinct words for colours.
They have no written language, and no collective memory going back more than two generations.
They don't sleep for more than two hours at a time during the night or day.
Even when food is available, they frequently starve themselves and their children, Prof. Everett reports.

More than 60 years ago, amateur linguist Benjamin Lee Whorf argued that learning a specific language determined the nature and content of how you think.
That theory fell into intellectual disrepute after linguist Noam Chomsky's notions of a universal human grammar and Harvard University professor Steven Pinker's idea of a universal language instinct became widely accepted.
Piraha's language has a grammar so radical that it could possibly disprove the theory that certain principles of grammar are shared by all languages– the universal grammar theory.
Of more interest to linguists is the discovery that the Pirahã language does not allow for one phrase to be embedded inside another, which means the language is not recursive.

They communicate almost as much by singing, whistling and humming as by normal speech.
They frequently change their names, because they believe spirits regularly take them over and intrinsically change who they are.
...

One might think that this unique way of life would disappear if introduced to modern life, but this is not the case. They do not live in isolation; they have been in contact with other Brazilians for over two hundred years, and they have sold goods to traders for quite a while. Rather than being absorbed by their neighbors, they resist. The reason for this is because the Pirahã see themselves as intrinsically better than the people around them, and so they do their best to avoid being like others. Maybe they resisted progress so fiercely that they have succeeded in keeping their culture different from those around them. Then again, maybe they really are superior, and we just lack the mental faculties to realize it.

 

Ref:
http://www.jcrows.com/withoutnumbers.html
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/americas/3582794.stm
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pirah%C3%A3_language
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pirah%C3%A3_people

 

In 1972, the physicist Freeman Dyson wrote an article called "Missed Opportunities." In it, he describes how relativity could have been discovered many years before Einstein announced his findings if mathematicians in places like Göttingen had spoken to physicists who were poring over Maxwell's equations describing electromagnetism. The ingredients were there in 1865 to make the breakthrough—only announced by Einstein some 40 years later.

This unexpected connection with physics has given us a glimpse of the mathematics that might, ultimately, reveal the secret of these enigmatic numbers. At first the link seemed rather tenuous. But the important role played by the number 42 has recently persuaded even the deepest skeptics that the subatomic world might hold the key to one of the greatest unsolved problems in mathematics.

In their search for patterns, mathematicians have uncovered unlikely connections between prime numbers and quantum physics. Will the subatomic world help reveal the elusive nature of the primes?

...
Ref: http://www.seedmagazine.com/news/2006/03/prime_numbers_get_hitched.php?utm_source=seedmag-main=rss

 

 

 

Cupid's algorithms

4/01/2006 12:00:00 AM

Posted by Michael Krantz, Product Manager, Google Romance

Ever been on a date and wondered "What on Earth am I doing with this person?" Or perhaps you wished there was a way that you could instantly find your perfect match, and then go on a date during which everything just went right?

Wish no more: Google Romance, a beta product currently incubating in Google Labs, uses cutting-edge personal search algorithms to help you find your soulmate, then sponsors your first Contextual Date with said soulmate-to-be in exchange for showing you highly relevant advertising that just might help Cupid's arrow find its mark. Does it really work? Ask our internal beta testers -- if you can find them, that is. Not a single one has shown up for work in days.

So why not give it a try yourself? You've got true love to gain, and only your faith in psychographic and contextual advertising software to lose.

Sun Helps Architect with J2EE Technology Standards and Instill Development Best Practices

EBAY V3 ROLLOUT STATUS
Three-Phase Roll Out

From the beginning, the V3 architecture roll-out was planned to occur in three distinct phases:

Phase One: Design Concepts. A broad set of eBay constituents, Sun consultants, and other technology vendors agreed on concepts and produced top-level design specifications. These specifications were used to convert a small part of the site to prove the viability of the architectural strategy.
Phase Two: Proof of Concepts and Initial Deployments. Working with Sun consultants, eBay teams refined concepts and made final decisions through prototyping and the actual development of initial V3 components. This included converting the most heavily trafficked part of the site to confirm that the architecture could deliver on the quality-of-service requirements that had been identified.
Phase Three: Wide-Scale Migration. Based on priority and, moreover, ease of integration, eBay will migrate all of its services and applications to the V3 architecture.

http://www.sun.com/service/about/success/ebay5.html

Take a look at:

Word 2007

 

Office 2007