You feel exactly like a Roman Pagan did 1700 years ago
Christianity was the woke movement of Rome
And this is it’s bizarre story
Christianity was an urban bureaucrat movement
It seized control of the late empires bloated institutions and used them to impose their ideology
This is just like the Woke activists in your government
And just like you – the wholesome rural Roman people did NOT want this
[This is a good thread but the images do not unroll well. I added one editorial comment in the text near the end. This tale is stated simply but the analogy is highly appropriate. ABN]
We know this because people who lived at the time, like Tellurian, boasted about it
He gleefully wrote that “the urban centres are turning Christian” and that the “backwards rural pagans” will be forced to comply
The word pagan is a slander word for “country bumpkin”
These urban Christians called their native rivals pagans in the same way your snotty urban intellectuals call you “rednecks” in “flyover states”
You find it even in modern French: “paganni” which means “rustic”
This opens up a more frightening reality
Christianity was a religion of the confused minorities
Roman greed led to huge slave populations in the urban centres
Christianity was their “BLM” movement to tackle “Roman Privilege”
It was a religion of superstitious foreigners
An expression of their urge for vengeance on mighty Rome
A true “slave revolt” as Nietzsche articulated
For example, Tellurian who I mentioned earlier was a Carthaginian
Like a Hispanic guy denouncing “white privilege”
The native Romans who loved Jupiter and loved Rome (Simple as)
Saw Christianity as a bizarre slave superstition that got out of hand
Near the end, it was only the native farmers, high class aristocrats, and the army that were anti-Christian
They even had a MAGA movement in Julian the Apostate
He was from Constantines lineage, and he saw Christianity as dangerous nonsense that was subverting Rome
He tried to revive Hellenism, but died in a war out East, and never got to conclude his project
First Christians begged for mere equal representation and tolerance
Many scholars believe they weren’t even treated so bad
“They’re persecuting us” and we’re being “fed to the lions”
Does this whining remind you of anything?
And again… Tellurian was often beating this drum
Of course, when they got their “tolerance”
The mask came off…
“So much for the tolerant left”
They began to crack down – using their bureaucratic power to ban “paganism” outright
Of course, Rome’s steep decline was because of these pagans hanging on to their evil old ways
They began their famous book burnings
They tore down statues
Anything “Roman” and representative of Roman high culture (which had conquered their ancestors) was attacked
They all sang of the coming Utopia when the kingdom of God arrives on earth
Of course, the Utopia never came
It was like the Communist Purges or the French Revolution’s reign of terror
Big promises that became nothing more than a mess
19 years after Rome banned the old Gods it was sacked for the first time in 800 years by the Goths
This is Christianity’s most bizarre, profound, and uncomfortable truth
It’s not some reservoir of “basedness”… it looks like Rome’s woke movement
As Nietzsche called it: the triumph of Judea’s slave worldview over the Roman Life religion of excellence
This is shocking for many people to consider – even very hard to digest
But search the facts for yourself
Don’t trust me
Let your imagination take you back…
Try to see that era through the eyes of the people who lived at the time
Not your biases and concerns
As we Westerners confront the problems of our age…
Which Nietzsche called our confrontation with Nihilism
We will clutch for something stable… some sort of meaning… anything to stabilise our emotions in this chaos
This doesn’t mean what we clutch to is real
Perhaps this moment of nihilism [Buddhism] is the most incredible opportunity to truly understand who we are and what our history is
Perhaps it’s a chance to throw off things that were too monumental to even confront in recent history
What if Christianity is a shackle we need to unchain
Videos coming out soon on all this over on Youtube
Video on this coming out Wednesday:
Originally tweeted by Uberboyo (@uberboyo) on March 12, 2023.
For more on this topic see: Jews and pagans in the ancient world — the roots of Christianity; Persecution and Christianization of Mithraism; and JUDAISM, CHRISTIANITY, AND THE DEATH OF NATIONS | LAURENT GUYÉNOT. I added Buddhism next to the author’s nihilism. IMO, a religion is fundamentally a vocabulary that helps us talk about stuff. Buddhism provides an enormous vocabulary of words and concepts that allows atheists, scientists, nihilists, Christians, ex-Christians, Jews, ex-Jews, anyone at all to participate in wholesome, ethical communication that offers both a basis and a means for continuing exploration. Buddhism properly understood is a subjective science that can be shared and also has deep roots in the ancient past. Like science, Buddhism is not in any way a dead tradition; it is a method of personal exploration and a sound foundation for its community of the like-minded. ABN
American Buddhist Net 