Showing posts with label testimony. Show all posts
Showing posts with label testimony. Show all posts

Sunday, January 12, 2020

Rise

1.19.20


Rika Ishikawa

Rise
Above 
升起
Shēng qǐ
上に上昇
Ue ni jōshō
ps44
Supergreditur

We have heard the story of salvation with our ears.
The lesson has been drawn from the instruction of the years.

Our parents told us of the work You did in their days.
They spoke of how You cultivated the investigation of good ways.

You planted our ancestors with knowledge of the land.
You granted protection with the promise of Your providential hand.

When tribes were appointed the role in instruction
family taught their children as students of function.

Instructors are now trained in fields of investigation.
Students are praised for research on stations for the nation. 

Ignorance is used as the motivation to acquire knowledge.
Procedures are written so policy will be acknowledged. 

Possession came by responsible ownership.
Responsibility was grown with statecraft in sponsorship.

A posteriori thought was the basis for the metaphysical.
It was not so mysterious as statistically inferential.

A whole was left in the soul of philosophy 
with the removal of conceptual virtuosity.

Theory provides a context for factuality.
No theory results in too much detachment from reality.

When I had no theory I felt like I had been sold for nought.
The facts did not sit with what had been drawn as taught.

Reproach from the crazy neighbor was not dismissed.
Derision was entertained like truth with a twist.

Theism became a byword among the atheists.
Haters shook their heads like we were extraneous.

Confusion moved like a cloud before me.
Shame from disgrace disfigured my facial esprit.

The voice of him that reproached me for blasphemy 
was leveled by the 'avenger' for the sake of the enemy.

When all this had fallen on me,
faith was not rejected as a fatality.

The faithful heart was not turned back
though my steps had been placed under attack.

We had been taken to the place of dragons
where the smoke from the artillery cannons 
had darkened the blackened 
after the fire had blasted.



My soul was bowed down to the dust.
Like the serpent my belly met the earth's crust.

We counted ourselves as sheep for the slaughter.
The micropest rode the flea on the rat that threatened the altar.  

If we had forgotten the One that had risen from the many
or lifted our hands to a strange god for the promise offered by the enemy,
would the knowledge of God not find out what we had done out of envy?

Would the Author of the covenant not know the secrets of the heart?
Would that not be the place where the trouble would start?

Awake my soul. How is it you have fallen?
You need to rise up to defeat the problem.

It is time to meet the destiny of your name.
Falling to fate would be such a shame.

Belief in the covenant has to be preserved
for the sake of the love that has been deserved.

You are our Leader, the Christ.
Deliver Your truth seekers from blight.

The consideration of the mystical experience of awe
has to be tempered by caution toward the ascetic fever drawn.

What is the name for the first month of the year?
January is the English word that we hear.

The time for review has past.
Resolve for improvement has been cast.

Rise above habit to find the better way.
The right change will improve how you behave.  

We will rise to defeat the challenge from our adversaries.
We will leave behind the error from the centuries.

We will deflect the attacks from our attackers
to focus on policy that really matters.

Administration with faith in service to the public
is a model that admits that defense is an element in justice.

God help our enemies feel shame for their hatred.
The promise of salvation is an encounter with the sacred. 

We welcome your love throughout the day
and praise your name for the economy of Your way.

Negotiation has been favored over invasion 
as fated predestination.

The art of the deal 
preceded the invention of the wheel.

We turned back
from making an attack.

The system of voting for election 
was better than the force of enacted malediction.

Employment from the spoils of victory in the vote
did not reward merit by experience with education to note.  

The children of Israel had been scattered among the polymorphs
with the unstable as the staple for the drones enforced.

We felt like sheep designated as the meal
for the wolves of appetite unfettered and real.

I was called to rise above this before I was born. 
This witness is for heaven as a robe that is worn.

My mouth was prepared to deliver the symbolic word.
I was hidden until a time when the message could take flight like a bird.

I was polished by instruction in history, poetry and politics.
I was taught in a group that prepared to present the promise fixed.

I was told you are Israel reborn.
I felt like my performance was torn with the forlorn.

I had labored in vain.
My work had ended in pain. 

My loss in battle had resulted in resignation to the higher call.
The promise of reward was foretold by the Father of all.

This person was formed within my mother's womb
to bring Jacob to Israel as one who transcended the tomb.

The kingdom of heaven is a light for all the nations
to the ends of the earth for the promise of salvation.

The Redeemer of Israel was seen as the cause of pain.
They didn't see that he became incarnate for the Name. 

The Lamb of God takes away the sin of the world.
He ranks ahead of me because before me he was as barley pearled.

I baptized with water that he might be revealed.
The Light descended like a dove that he might the Spirit wield.

He upon whom the dove descended
baptized with the Holy Spirit so love will be apprehended.  

I have seen his wonderful work and have testified 
that Jesus is the divine person whose body was crucified.

Grace to you who believe with peace from our Father
by whom you were called in love with the Son as author.

You have been enriched in him by speech and knowledge of every kind
but the way to avoid particular sins by his gospel is a gift that some have yet to find.

The testimony of Christ has been strengthened among you
as a spiritual gift to wait until the revelation of Jesus as Lord has rung true.

Statistics are the modern form for augury.
Categorical counts provide terms for the prediction glossary.


Flock of Birds

Flights of birds through a field of vision
had provided a visual example of group indecision.

The entrails of an animal sacrificed for expiation
had demonstrated striations in the functional station.

The collection of data for a categorical description
has to be organized for display to form a position on subscription.

Let God arise for our help
to redeem us all for our higher self. 

-----------------------

Psalm 44

1 We have heard with our ears, O God, our fathers have told us, what work thou didst in their days, in the times of old.
2 How thou didst drive out the heathen with thy hand, and plantedst them; how thou didst afflict the people, and cast them out.
3 For they got not the land in possession by their own sword, neither did their own arm save them: but thy right hand, and thine arm, and the light of thy countenance, because thou hadst a favour unto them.
4 Thou art my King, O God: command deliverances for Jacob.
5 Through thee will we push down our enemies: through thy name will we tread them under that rise up against us.
6 For I will not trust in my bow, neither shall my sword save me.
7 But thou hast saved us from our enemies, and hast put them to shame that hated us.
8 In God we boast all the day long, and praise thy name for ever. Selah.
9 But thou hast cast off, and put us to shame; and goest not forth with our armies.
10 Thou makest us to turn back from the enemy: and they which hate us spoil for themselves.
11 Thou hast given us like sheep appointed for meat; and hast scattered us among the heathen.
12 Thou sellest thy people for nought, and dost not increase thy wealth by their price.
13 Thou makest us a reproach to our neighbours, a scorn and a derision to them that are round about us.
14 Thou makest us a byword among the heathen, a shaking of the head among the people.
15 My confusion is continually before me, and the shame of my face hath covered me,
16 For the voice of him that reproacheth and blasphemeth; by reason of the enemy and avenger.
17 All this is come upon us; yet have we not forgotten thee, neither have we dealt falsely in thy covenant.
18 Our heart is not turned back, neither have our steps declined from thy way;
19 Though thou hast sore broken us in the place of dragons, and covered us with the shadow of death.
20 If we have forgotten the name of our God, or stretched out our hands to a strange god;
21 Shall not God search this out? for he knoweth the secrets of the heart.
22 Yea, for thy sake are we killed all the day long; we are counted as sheep for the slaughter.
23 Awake, why sleepest thou, O Lord? arise, cast us not off for ever.
24 Wherefore hidest thou thy face, and forgettest our affliction and our oppression?
25 For our soul is bowed down to the dust: our belly cleaveth unto the earth.
26 Arise for our help, and redeem us for thy mercies' sake.

--------------------
===============
---------------------

What is the name for the first month of the year?
January is the English word.

Chn.  今年第一个月的名字是什么?
            Jīnnián dì yī gè yuè de míngzì shì shénme?
            一月是中国字
             Yī yuè shì zhōngguó zì.
Jpn.    年の最初の月の名前は何ですか?
             Toshi no saisho no tsuki no namae wa nanidesu ka?
              1月は日本語です
              Ich tsuki wa nihongodesu.     
Krn.    연도의 첫 달의 이름은 무엇입니까? 
             yeondoui cheos dal-ui ileum-eun mueos-ibnikka?
             1 월은 한국어입니다.
             I wol-eun hangug-eoibnida.
Ltn.     Quod nomen est primus mensis anni?
             January sit habitantibus terram.
Itln.    Qual è il nome per il primo mese dell'anno?
             Gennaio è la parola italiana.
Spn.    ¿Cómo se llama el primer mes del año?
             Enero es la palabra española.
Frn.     Quel est le nom du premier mois de l'année?
              Janvier est le mot français.
Gmn.  Wie heißt der erste Monat des Jahres?
              Januar ist das deutsche Wort.
Dtch.   Wat is de naam voor de eerste maand van het jaar?
               Januari is het Nederlandse woord.
Czch.    Jak se jmenuje první měsíc v roce?
               Leden je české slovo.
Hng.     Mi a neve az év első hónapjának?
               Január a magyar szó.
Grk.      Ποιο είναι το όνομα για τον πρώτο μήνα του έτους;
               Poio eínai to ónoma gia ton próto mína tou étous?
               Ο Ιανουάριος είναι η ελληνική λέξη.
               O Ianouários eínai i ellinikí léxi.
Trk.      Yılın ilk ayının adı nedir?
              Ocak Türkçe kelime.

What is the name for the first month of the year?
January is the English word we hear.

-------------------------

Psalm 44

The 44th psalm was composed by the sons of Korah. It is classified in the series of lamentations of the people.

The first verse is an empirical acknowledgement that lessons were drawn from what was heard from the experience of the parents in the discernment of ancestral wisdom. Instruction by family participation in a tribal service to the kingdom had been the means for education.

Instruction in fields of service is a modern extraction with development.

Verses 2 to 9 qualify as a historical review of success with faith. Verses 10-23 described the disaster that gave cause for the lament.  The last 3 verses (24-26) request help in rescue from the crisis.

------------------------

My Palms


"Deutero-Isaiah" dates from the time of the Israelites' exile in Babylon. Chapter 49 includes the second of the songs of the "Suffering Servant".

The servant songs are four poems within the Book of Isaiah written about a certain "servant of YHWH". God calls the servant to lead the nations, but the servant is horribly repressed. He is rewarded in the end.

The second poem was written from the Servant's point of view. It is an account of his pre-natal calling to lead both Israel and the nations. The call was probably drawn from the description made by Jeremiah. (Jer.1:5)

The Servant is now portrayed as the prophet equipped and called to restore the nation to God. This was a development in the history of Judah. Israel had identified with Elohim. This was standard for the Middle Eastern movement toward monotheism.

The self-identification with the independent tribalism however led to the alliance with Syria that attempted to force Judah to fight against the Assyrians.

Judah favored the One with the unspoken Name. It stood as a symbol that the larger victory would be won by identification with the one deity. The work of this kingdom was to persuade people that this faith could be true.

The second anticipated the fourth song. The Servant was without success. Taken with the picture in the first song, his success will come not by political or military action, but by becoming a light to the Gentiles. This victory was ultimately in God's hands.

Much of the imagery of what Christians call the Old Testament was drawn from the weapons of an army, but it represented a movement within the New Covenant. The new is simply a development away from savage primitivism as an emblem of independent leadership in the individuality of defiance toward unity.

The new promise is grounded in conservative reform toward reasonable preparation for defense with the lessons drawn from the history of faith for personal participation in responsible ownership. The prenatal calling is an expression of the inheritance of the promise.

Isaiah 49:1-7

Listen to me, O coastlands,
pay attention, you people from far away!

The LORD called me before I was born,
while I was in my mother's womb he named me.
He made my mouth like a sharp sword,
in the shadow of his hand he hid me;
he made be a polished arrow
in his quiver he hid me away.
He said to me, 'You are my servant,
Israel, in whom I will be glorified.'

I said, 'I have labored in vain.
I have spent my strength for nothing and vanity;
yet surely my cause is with the LORD.

My reward is with my God.'
The LORD who formed me in the womb to be his servant,
to bring Jacob back to him
that Israel might be gathered to him
has honored me in his sight.
My God has become my strength.

He said,
"It is too light a thing that you should be my servant
to raise up the tribes of Jacob
and to restore the survivors of Israel.
I will give you as a light to the nations
that my salvation may reach to the end of the earth.'
The Redeemer of Israel and his Holy One
to one deeply despised, abhorred by the nations
the slave of rulers said,
'Kings shall see and stand up.
Princes shall prostrate themselves
because the LORD, who is faithful,
the Holy One of Israel, has chosen you.'

---------------------

I was called before I was born.
This kingdom is for heaven as a robe that is worn.

My mouth was prepared to deliver the prophetic word.
I was hidden until a time when the message could take flight like a bird.

I was polished by instruction in history, poetry and politics.
I was taught in a group that prepared to present the promise fixed.

I was told you are Israel reborn.
I felt like my performance was torn with the forlorn.

I had labored in vain.
My work had ended in pain.

My loss in battle had resulted in resignation to the higher call.
The promise of reward was foretold by the Father of all.

This servant was formed within my mother's womb
to bring Jacob to Israel as one who transcended the tomb.

The kingdom of heaven is a light for all the nations
to the ends of the earth for the promise of salvation.

The Redeemer of Israel was seen as the cause of pain.
They didn't see that he became incarnate for the Name.

================

Corinth


Horace (65-8 BCE)

Poseidon was the patron god for Corinth. He was one of the Twelve Olympians in ancient Greek religion and myth. He was the god of the sea, storms, earthquakes and horses.

Poseidon supported the Greeks against the Trojans during the Trojan War in Homer's Iliad.

The Greek hero Odysseus provoked Poseidon's fury by blinding his son, the Cyclops Polyphemus, in the sea voyage from Troy back to Ithaca in the Odyssey. Poseidon punished him with storms, the complete loss of his ship and companions and a ten-year delay.

The island of Atlantis was Poseidon's domain in Plato's Timaeus and Critias.

He was venerated as a chief deity at Pylos and Thebes before he was chosen as the patron for Corinth.

The city is is located in south-central Greece. It is about 78 kilometres (48 mi) west of Athens. The Oneia Mountains and the monolithic rock of Acrocorinth where the medieval acropolis was built are natural features that surround the area.

The leadership was able to control the only land access to the Peloponnese. The control of the location dominated the trade in both the Saronic gulf (to the east) and the gulf of Corinth (to the west).

The city was known as "Wealthy Corinth." The control of the location was the reason for the wealth.
An oligarchical government seized power around 550 BCE. This government allied with Sparta within the Peloponnesian League.

Corinth participated in the Persian Wars and the Peloponnesian War as an ally of Sparta. The two allies fell out with one another after Sparta's victory in the Peloponnesian war.

Corinth pursued an independent policy in the various wars of the early 4th century BCE. The Acrocorinth was the seat of a Macedonian garrison after the Macedonian conquest of Greece until 243 BCE. The city was liberated and joined the Achaean League.

The strategic port was captured and completely destroyed by the Roman army in 146 BCE nearly a century later.

Corinth flourished as a newly rebuilt Roman colony in 44 BCE and became the administrative capital of the Roman province of Achaea. The official name for Poseidon became Neptune.

First Letter

The apostle Paul traveled from Athens to Corinth about 50 CE during his second missionary journey. The trip took him from the seclusion of an ancient university in a provincial town to the seat of government and trade.

There had been a time when Athens had been politically greater than Corinth. Athens had only the memory of its preeminence. Corinth held the keys of commerce and swarmed with a crowded population. Paul founded the Church there.

Chapter 18 of the Acts of the Apostles records the final part of the second missionary journey of Paul together with Silas and Timothy. The beginning of the third journey starts before the end of the chapter.

Gallio was proconsul of Achaia from 50-52 CE. Paul first met with Aquila and Priscilla (Acts 18:2). They were to become his important associates. They were well known to the Corinthian church (1 Corinth. 16:19; cf. Romans 16:3-4).

References to the command of Roman Emperor Claudius (r. 41-54) for "all the Jews to depart from Rome" appeared in the writings of Roman historians Suetonius (c.69 – c.122) and Cassius Dio (c.150 – c. 235) as well as Acts 18:2.

Paul waited until Silas and Timothy had come from Macedonia before he testified to the Jews that Jesus was the Christ. (Acts 18:5)

Lucius Junius Gallio Annaeanus or Gallio was a Roman senator and brother of famous writer Seneca. The Jews had taken Paul to the judgment seat and accused him of persuasion to worship contrary to the law. Gallio judged that the accusation was concerned with words and names in Jewish law. He refused to judge Paul for wicked crimes.

Sosthenes was the chief ruler of the synagogue. He was seized and beaten by the mob in the presence of Gallio according to the Acts of the Apostles. Some manuscripts added that the mob was composed of Greeks, others of Jews.

Sosthenes is identified as a co-author to the first letter to the Corinthians. (1Corinth.1:1)

The apostle had spent eighteen months in Corinth, so he was intimately familiar with the church and many of its congregants 4 years prior to writing the letter now known as the first. The letter refers to another that preceded it. (1 Corinth.5:10-11)

Paul had been in Ephesus for more than two years on his third missionary journey when he received a disturbing report of quarreling within the Corinthian church. He received the report from people associated with one of its members, Chloe (1 Corinth. 1:11).

The church he had founded so recently (Acts 18:1–17) had already developed deep divisions. The situation required immediate action. Paul wrote his letter in  c.55, just as he was planning to leave Ephesus for Macedonia (1 Corinth. 16:5–8).

First Corinthians contains a frank discussion of the church and the issues that impacted the people in the first century. The Corinthian church was corrupted by a variety of sins.  Paul provided an important model for how the church should handle the problem of sin.

The letter challenged believers to examine every area of life through the lens of the gospel.

1 Corinth.1:9


--------------------

1 Corinth. 1:3-6,9

Grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ.

I give thanks for you because of the grace of God that has been given you in Christ Jesus. You have been enriched in him in speech and knowledge of every kind just as the testimony of Christ has been strengthened among you so you are not lacking in any spiritual gift as you wait for the revelation of our Lord Jesus Christ.

God is faithful. You were called into fellowship with his Son, Jesus Christ.

---------------------

Grace to you and peace from our Father
by whom you were called into fellowship with the Son as author.

You have been enriched in him by speech and knowledge of every kind
but the way to avoid particular sins by his gospel is a gift that some have yet to find.

The testimony of Christ has been strengthened among you
as a spiritual gift to wait until the revelation of Jesus as Lord has rung true.

================

Testimony


The opening to the gospel of John echoed that to the book of Genesis (Gen 1:1), but whereas Genesis refered to God's activity at the beginning of creation, here the reader was told of a being who existed before creation took place.

The Word already was before the beginning of everything. This association had literary associations with Greeks and Jews. The Greeks held that the cosmos was the order of the universe that is ordered by reason.

Reason is this sense is more concerned with knowledge of order outside the experience of human nature though. Our nature is defined by the search to see truth outside of our own existence.

The Jews believed that  creation took place by God's speech (Gen 1; Ps 33:6). The concept of incarnation however seemed like a product of polytheism in the deification of the emperor. It was not accepted as a theological tenet.

The divine nature was not only outside of the human, he was outside of nature as that which was totally other.

Christianity would assert that the nature which was believed to be totally other was somehow united in the divine person of the Son.

The Romans were practical in their anthropomorphism. They used the deification of the emperor as the central derivative of polytheism, but the office of the emperor and his line of succession was viewed as something that was contrary to the rule of law in the republic.

The belief in Saturn was a symbol of time's consumption of the experience of itself in the cursus honorum and the imperial line of succession. The emperor had to reconcile the will of the plebians with that of the patricians for the benefit of the republic in the competition with other governments.

The emperor usually had a building project which in general supported the construction of roads as needed, an aquaduct, a theater and a public bath. The office sponsored public games in the form of gladitorial contests. Chariot racing was added.

Polythesim as a religious form was only one step beyond the superstition of totemism.

People organized their community social lives around the belief in the main deity. Fear and prejudice were divined as that which drove the formation of a mob. The mob had to be appeased by the judgment of a magistrate.

Stories about the cruelty of the emperor seemed to act as a deterrent to the expectation of reasonable judgment. This deterrence was supported by the stories of immoral behavior on the part of the gods.

The republic was a system of election which could somehow plumb the will of the people in terms of practical administration with stories and festivals that favored the consideration of the calendar with respect for harvest and special components of time in the year.

The festivals were ordered with respect for the movement of constellations in the night sky.

Leading patricians and at least some emperors must have looked at the monotheism of the Jews as an advancement that their system wasn't ready to accept at the time. It may have looked like it was too well ordered by comparison.

There were those in the first century however who must have seen that the future for the official religion of Rome would have to adopt faith in one God eventually.

John the Baptist had been described as a witness to the Light of the world. He did not claim to be the light for the world from which he had withdrawn.

The statement that the Word became flesh and dwelt among us was a summary of the major themes for the other gospels. There were grounds for agreement from Greeks, Jews and Romans in the appeal to the Logos or the Word as the means to order social reality.

Mark traced the origin of Jesus to Nazareth to show that he was the Servant for mankind. Matthew drew the lineage back to Abraham to state that he was the promised Messiah for the nations. Luke illustrated that he was the Son of Adam and fulfillment of the Perfect Man.

John declared that Jesus had come from heaven as the Son of the Father. He described 7 miracles to show the glory of his divine person. Six of the miracles did not appear in the other gospels.

His theology was dedicated to the reconciliation of different worlds. Jesus was the author of this reconciliation with the atonement made by his sacrifice on the cross.

---------------------------

John 1:29-34

The next day he saw Jesus coming towards him and declared, 'Here is the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world! This is he of whom I said, "After me comes a man who ranks ahead of me because he was before me." I myself did not know him, but I am baptizing with water for this reason that he might be revealed to Israel.'  John testified, 'I saw the Spirit descending from heaven like a dove and it remained on him. I myself did not know him, but the one who sent me to baptize with water said to me, "He on whom you see the Spirit descend and remain is the one who baptizes with the Holy Spirit." I myself have seen and have testified that this is the Son of God.'

---------------------

The Lamb of God takes away the sin of the world.
He ranks ahead of me because before me he was as barley pearled.

I baptized with water that he might be revealed.
The Light descended like a dove that he might the Spirit wield.

He upon whom the dove descended
will baptize with the Holy Spirit so love will be apprehended.

I have seen and have testified
that Jesus is the divine person whose body was crucified.

================

Statistics


Statistics is the modern form of augury. The analysis of data is used to predict future outcomes. Instead of looking at the flight of birds through a field of vision or evaluating the entrails of an animal that had been sacrificed for expatiation, numbers that represent categorical counts are examined to assess behavioral or physical trends.

------------------------

Statistics is the modern form for augury.
Categorical counts provide terms for the prediction glossary.

Flights of birds through a field of vision
had provided a visual example of group indecision.

The entrails of an animal sacrificed for expiation
had demonstrated striations in station.

The collection of data for a categorical description
is organized for display to form a position on subscription.

=================

The study of the subject  concerns the collection, organization, analysis, interpretation and presentation of data.

Mathematical analysis uses quantified models to represent synopses for a given set of experimental data or real-life study.

The evolution of statistics has been intimately connected with the development of sovereign states by imitation of what had been practiced by the office of the Roman censor.

European states that followed the peace of Westphalia (1648) employed statistical data to describe sovereignty and to predict costs for the future.

Probability theory put statistics in a firm theoretical base.

The capacity for modern technology to process large amounts of data have made statistical concepts a key concern for application in computer science.

A number of statistical concepts have an important impact on a wide range of sciences. These include the design of experiments and approaches to statistical interpretation such as Bayesian inference.

Experimental design is the organization for any task that aims to describe and explain the variation of information under conditions that are hypothesized to reflect the variation.

Bayes’s theorem describes the probability of an event based on prior knowledge of conditions that might be related to the occurence or incidence of the event. If the probability that someone has cancer is related to their age for example, the theorem provides that the age can be used to more accurately infer the probability of cancer than can be done without knowledge of the age.

Experiment and the inference of probability can be considered to have their own sequence in the development of the ideas underlying modern statistics.

Statistics
wiki History of Statistics

Literacy and Censorship


The word censor has an unfortunate affiliation with the act of censorship.  The more practical application is concerned with the act of compiling statistics as a descriptive anaylsis of how people are.

Inferences on what to do to improve the state of things can be drawn, but the inference is drawn from observed phenomena as opposed to an unreal ideal.

Roman Censor

The censor was a magistrate in ancient Rome who was responsible for maintaining the census and overseeing certain aspects of the government's finances.

A census is taken to make a count about the members of a given population. The procedure of taking the count systematically acquired and records information about the population. Categorical qualities were enumerated to describe the size of particular characteristics.

This term is used mostly in connection with national population and residency for each household.  Other common types include traditional culture, business, supplies and traffic censuses.

The word had a Latin origin during the Roman Republic. The census was a list that kept track of all adult males fit for military service. It was first instituted by Servius Tullius, sixth king of Rome, c. 575–535 BCE.

The consuls had responsibility for the census after the Republic was founded in 509. No consuls were elected in 442. The plebeians wanted to attain higher magistracies. Only patricians could be elected consuls. Some military tribunes were plebeians.

Tribunes with consular power were appointed to take the census in 443. The patricians removed the right to take the census from the consuls and tribunes. Two magistrates called censores were elected by the Patricians in Rome.

Patrician consulars of the early republic interspersed public office with agricultural labor. Cicero remarked in the first century BCE "in agris erant tum senatores, id est senes."

Senators were in the fields. It was the custom for the senior officials. Senior senators would live on their farms in those days. The custom would become obsolete by the 2d century.

The magistracy continued to be controlled by patricians until Gaius Marcius Rutilus was appointed the first plebeian censor in 351 BCE. One of the Publilian laws required that one censor had to be a plebeian 12 years later (339). No plebeian censor performed the solemn purification of the people despite this until 280 BCE.

The celebration of purification was known as the "lustrum". The lustration was originally a sacrifice for expiation and purification offered by one of the censors in the name of the Roman people at the close of the taking of the census.

The expiatory offering was often made in the form of an animal sacrifice, known as a suovetaurilia. Lustratio was an ancient Greek and ancient Roman purification ceremony. It included a procession and in some circumstances the sacrifice of a pig (sus), a ram (ovis) and a bull (taurus) (suovetaurilia).

Certain records documented the sacrifice of dogs to indicate that the dog days were over. Predation by hunting was being turned on the wolves who took livestock from their owners. Armies witnessed this kind of sacrifice as a symbolic association intended to end the human 'predation' defended by an opposing army.

Lupercalia


Instructions on the Lustratio performed for the Roman town of Iguvium illustrate that the ceremony consisted of a procession of priests, sacrificial victims and people around the town's citadel.

The procession stopped at the three gates to the citadel where the sacrifices were made. The gates were considered to be weak points which required strength.

Lustratio ceremonies were also used to bless crops, farm animals, new colonies and armies before going into battle or passing into review. It is likely that the purification element in the public ceremony included the sharing of incense with a censor and the sprinkling of water with a straw whisk.

These censuses were taken at five-year intervals. A lustrum came to refer to the five-year inter-census period.

Both censors were plebeians for the first time in 131 BCE.

The purification of the Roman people was performed by one of the censors in the Campus Martius (Field of Mars) after the taking of the census was over. The Campo Marzio was a publicly owned area of ancient Rome about 2 square kilometres (0.8 sq. miles/ 490 acres) in extent.

Mars was an agricultural guardian as well as the god of war. He was a part of the Archaic Triad along with Jupiter and Quirinus.

Quirinus had no Greek equivalent. He was the guardian of the Roman people. His name may be derived from the Sabine word quiris "spear". He was  the oak-god (quercus). The quirites were the men of the oaken spear.

The Aeneid of Virgil was written under Augustus. He claimed ancestry through Julius Caesar and his mother Venus. The survivors from the fallen city of Troy banded together under Aeneas according to the Aeneid.

They underwent a series of adventures around the Mediterranean Sea. They journey included a stop at newly founded Carthage under the rule of Queen Dido. They eventually reached the Italian coast.

Aeneas married Lavinia, the daughter of King Latinus. Turnus had been betrothed to Lavinia. He started a war after the marriage to Aeneas. Aeneas won the war.  He won the right to assimilate with the local people.

The area that would become Rome was covered with forest at the time. The Aeneid said that the race of men came from the tree trunks. They were as hard as oak. They had no settled life, no arts, no skill at yoking oxen. They gathered their provisions or from the hunt. It said that they got their food from oaken bough spears and the wild game that was hunted.

Satre was known as the one who hurled lightning bolts (the spear chucker). This ability was put with Satus (sowing) to represent the leadership of the Latins.

Sterculius derived from stercus, "dung" or "manure". It referred to the odor of re-emergence from death to life associated with the fertilization of the field was manure. It was Saturn who had given the people laws and bestowed the name Latium upon them.

The agricultural aspect of Saturn was secondary to his primary relation with time and seasons. Time consumes all things. The name Saturn comes from the Latin word satis which means to fill or to satisfy.

Saturn was an anthropomorphic representation of Time as filled or satiated by all things or generations. This would become an argument against the royal line of succession for the Romans.

Octavian Augustus revived the argument for it for the value of the inheritance preserved by the family line of succession with the addition of the option of adoption for the selection of an heir.

The young son of Aeneas, Ascanius, also known as Iulus, went on to found Alba Longa and the line of Alban kings. This line filled the chronological gap between the Trojan saga and the traditional founding of Rome in the 8th century BCE.

King Procas was the father of Numitor and Amulius toward the end of this line. Numitor became king of Alba Longa at the death of Procas, but Amulius captured him and sent him to prison. He also forced Numitor's daughter Rhea Silvia to become a virgin priestess among the Vestals.

Rhea Silva gave birth to the twins, Romulus and Remus. The Italian myth identified the twins as the sons of the vestal virgin and Mars, the god of war. They were abandoned at birth, because of a prophecy that they would overthrow their great-uncle Amulius.

He had overthrown Rhea Silvia's father Numitor. The twins were abandoned on the river Tiber by servants who took pity on the infants despite their orders to let them die of exposure.

The twins were nurtured by a she-wolf until a shepherd named Faustulus found them and took them as his sons. Faustulus and his wife Acca Larentia raised the boys. When Remus and Romulus became adults, they killed Amulius and restored Numitor.

They decided to establish a city but, they quarreled over the location. Romulus was on Palatine Hill. Remus wanted to found the city on Aventine Hill. Remus attacked. He was killed by Romulus. The fratricide was later taken to represent the city's history of internecine political strife and bloodshed.

The Roman Empire deposed Herod Archelaus from his rule of Judea as a Roman client king in 6 CE. His territory was converted into the Roman province of Judea.

Publius Sulpicius Quirinius, the newly-appointed Imperial Legate (governor) of the province of Roman Syria, was assigned to carry out a tax census of the new province. The Census of Quirinius was as symbolic as it was practical.

The Gospel of Luke placed the birth of Jesus during the reign of Herod the Great (Luke 1:5) as the first registration and was taken while Quirinius was governor of Syria. Herod had died nine years before the earliest possible date of the census.

Luke's gospel was written after that of Matthew. The element regarding the census was a symbolic addition that had been made to appeal to the knowledge of a Greco-Roman audience.

The Roman Censore had the practical task to count the people in the Republic. The task was given a festival to celebrate the documentation of numbers by the event. The descriptive task was given a moral connotation that has since been associated with the censorship of media expression.

The liberal media has taken the president's criticism of fake news as an offense to their 'freedom', but they have gone so far to the political left that they seek to censor the criticism by their support for impeachment.

----------------------

Prosody of Poetry

Al-Khalil
b. 718  Oman
d. 791  Basra

Oman is an Arab country on the southeastern coast of the Arabian Peninsula in Western Asia. Its official religion is Islam.

It holds a strategically important position at the mouth of the Persian Gulf, The country shares land borders with the United Arab Emirates to the northwest, Saudi Arabia to the west and Yemen to the southwest. Marine borders are held in common with Iran and Pakistan.

The coast is formed by the Arabian Sea on the southeast and the Gulf of Oman on the northeast. The Madha and Musandam exclaves are surrounded by the UAE on their land borders with the Strait of Hormuz and Gulf of Oman forming Musandam's coastal boundaries.

Al Khalil was born in Oman in 718 CE.

Al-Khalīl was given the name Aḫmad al-Farāhīdī at birth. He was the first scholar to subject the prosody of Classical Arabic poetry to a detailed phonological analysis. Prosody is the observation of the patterns of rhythm and sound used in poetry.

The primary data he listed and categorized in meticulous detail was extremely complex to master and utilize. Later theorists have developed simpler formulations with greater coherence and general utility.

He was also a pioneer in the field of cryptography who influenced the work of Al-Kindi.
Al-Farahidi's "Book of Cryptographic Messages", was the first book on cryptography for the analysis of the codification of text written by a linguist.

The lost work contains many "firsts". The use of permutations and combinations to list all possible Arabic words with and without vowels is one of them.

Permutations and combinations are the various ways in which objects from a set may be selected to form subsets generally without replacement.

This selection of subsets is called a permutation when the order of selection is a factor. It is a combination when order is not a factor.

The calculation of permutations or combinations is used in probability theory to enumerate possibilities in expression. The determination of probability is essential in the limitation of what is possible in cryptography. Further limitation to what is probable is a refinement.

Elementary exercises in this type of calculation can be introduced at the grade level. It is generally investigated as a Middle Grade introduction to probability.

Later Arab cryptographers explicitly resorted to al-Farahidi's phonological analysis for calculating letter frequency in their own works. His work on cryptography influenced Al-Kindi (c. 801–873). He discovered the method of frequency analysis for the decryption of code..

Truth


Al-Kindi
b. 801 Kufa, Abbasid Caliphate
d. 873  Baghdad, Abbasid Caliphate

Kufa is a city in Iraq about 170 kilometres (110 mi) south of Baghdad. It is 10 kilometres (6.2 mi) northeast of Najaf. It is located on the banks of the Euphrates River. It is one of five Iraqi cities that are of great importance to Shi'ite Muslims.

The Abbasids under al-Hasan ibn Qahtaba took Kufa and made it their capital in 749. They moved their seat to Baghdad in 762. Kufa's importance gradually shifted from caliphal politics to Islamic theory and practice under the Umayyad and early Abbasid decades.

There was no unbroken Muslim or Ishmaelite population dating back to the prophet Muhammad's time in Iraq.

Al-Kindi was born in Kufa and educated in Baghdad. He became a prominent figure in the House of Wisdom. A number of Abbasid Caliphs appointed him to oversee the translation of Greek scientific and philosophical texts into the Arabic language.

Hellenistic wisdom was often called the "philosophy of the ancients" by Muslim scholars. It had a profound effect on al-Kindi. He synthesized, adapted and promoted Hellenistic and Peripatetic philosophy in the Muslim world.

He subsequently wrote hundreds of original treatises of his own on a range of subjects ranging from metaphysics, ethics, logic and psychology, to medicine, pharmacology, mathematics, astronomy, astrology and optics.

His study extended further afield to more practical topics like perfumes, swords, jewels, glass, dyes, zoology, tides, mirrors, meteorology and earthquakes.

Al-Kindi played an important role in introducing Indian numerals to the Islamic world in the field of mathematics. Arabic numerals were subsequently introduced to the Christian world along with Al-Khwarizmi.

Al-Kindi was one of the fathers of cryptography. He built on the work of Al-Khalil (717–786). Al-Kindi's book entitled Manuscript on Deciphering Cryptographic Messages gave rise to the birth of cryptanalysis. It was the earliest known use of statistical inference.

Several new methods for breaking ciphers were presented. Frequency analysis was notably among them.

Frequency analysis is also known as counting letters. It is the study of the frequency of letters or groups of letters in a ciphertext.

A ciphertext is the product of  encryption performed on plaintext using an algorithm called a cipher.

The text is known as encrypted or encoded information because it contains a form of the original plaintext that is unreadable by a human or computer without the proper cipher to decrypt it.

Decryption is the inverse of encryption. It is the process of turning ciphertext into readable plaintext.

There is a characteristic distribution of letters that is roughly the same for almost all samples of that language. E, T, A and O are the most common given a section of English language for instance. Z, Q and X are rare. TH, ER, ON and AN are the most common pairs of letters. These pairs are called bigrams or digraphs. SS, EE, TT, and FF are the most common repeats.

The nonsense phrase "ETAOIN SHRDLU" represents the 12 most frequent letters in typical English language text.

Al-Kindi's mathematical and medical expertise developed a scale that would allow doctors to quantify the potency of their medication.

Bills of Mortality


John Graunt
b. 4.24.1620  London, England
d. 4.18.1674  London

Stuart London

The house of Stuart faced the difficulty of managing the British Reformation with monarchs from the kingdom of Scotland. The Scots were mainly Presbyterians, but the royal house maintained alliance with the Catholic Church. The Irish maintained the same alliance.

The King of England had become the head of the Church according to the Royal Act of Supremacy. Henry VIII's basic observation was that a house divided in loyalties resulted  in a house divided against itself.

The papal office  had claimed papal supremacy and authority for investiture presumably with the support of the college of cardinals. The claim to supremacy was used to call for the Crusades and to institute the Inquisition.

The movement toward republican government and global colonialism threatened to institute slavery and the exploitation of natural resources on countries that lacked centralized government due to tribal organization in primitive society.

The beginning of the 17th century in the kingdom of England  was characterized by the Guy Fawkes incident, the plague and the Great Fire of London. 

This was a period that saw the beginnings of the press (newspapers), the first stirrings of scientific discourse and the city’s great chroniclers such as Pepys, Evelyn and, latterly, Defoe.

The preparations for the coronation of King James I were interrupted by a severe plague epidemic.
James VI of Scotland ascended to the English throne as the first Stuart monarch when Queen Elizabeth I died on March 24, 1603. He traveled to London from Scotland and was crowned king as James I of England on July 25, 1603.

His ceremonial procession through the city of London was postponed until March 15, 1604 due to the report of the plague.

James's reign in Scotland was the longest of any Scottish monarch (~58 yrs.). He achieved most of his aims in Scotland but faced great difficulties in England, including the Gunpowder Plot in 1605 and repeated conflicts with the English Parliament.

The plot was reported as a  failed assassination attempt against King James I by a group of provincial English Catholics led by Robert Catesby.

The plan was to blow up the House of Lords during the State Opening of Parliament on 5 November 1605. This event was to be the prelude to a popular revolt in the Midlands during which James's nine-year-old daughter, Elizabeth, was to be installed as the Catholic head of state.

The Midlands was the central part of England. It was the cultural and geographical area located between Northern and Southern England.

Catesby embarked on the scheme after hopes of securing greater religious tolerance under King James had faded. A number of English Catholics were disappointed. There were 12 fellow plotters.

Fawkes had 10 years of military experience fighting in the Spanish Netherlands in the failed suppression of the Dutch Revolt. He was given charge of the explosives according to the report about the plot.

Many have made life-size effigies of the Catholic Yorkshireman every year since, then set it on fire for the delight of anti-Catholic sentiment.

This was the man who plotted not just to bring down the system, but to blow up the king and his government. His actions were branded as treachery and treason in 1605. He was heralded as the first terrorist in British society.

The Lord Mayor's Show was revived by order of the king in 1609 after it had been discontinued for years. The dissolved monastery of the Charterhouse was purchased by Thomas Sutton for £13,000 in 1611. The new hospital, chapel and schoolhouse were begun in the same year.

Charterhouse School was to be one of the principal public schools in London until it moved to Surrey in the Victorian era. The site is still used as a medical school.

Charles I ascended to the throne in 1625. Aristocrats began to inhabit the West End in large numbers during his reign. Increasing numbers of country landowners and their families lived in London for part of the year simply for the social life in addition to those who had specific business at court.

King Charles I raised his banner at Nottingham in 1642. London took the side of the parliament during the English Civil War. The king had the upper hand in military terms initially. He won the Battle of Brentford a few miles to the west of London in November.

The City organised a makeshift army and Charles hesitated and retreated. An extensive system of fortifications was built subsequently to protect London from a renewed attack by the Royalists.

This comprised a strong earthen rampart, enhanced with bastions and redoubts. It was well beyond the City walls and encompassed the whole urban area, including Westminster and Southwark.

London was not seriously threatened by the royalists again, and the financial resources of the City made an important contribution to the parliamentarians victory in the war.

The civil war ended in defeat for the Royalists. The execution of King Charles on 30 January 1649, heralded Oliver Cromwell's short lived Commonwealth.

Cromwell allowed Jews to return to London in 1655. This ended a 365-year banishment. They built their first Synagogue in 1657 at Creechurch Lane.

The Commonwealth quickly collapsed after Cromwell's death in 1658 and in 1660 the monarchy was restored under Charles II.

The unsanitary and overcrowded City of London had suffered from numerous outbreaks of the plague many times over the centuries, but in Britain it is the eighth and last outbreak of plague in the 17th century which is remembered as the "Great Plague".

The plague first raged in the Netherlands in 1663. English authorities imposed a quarantine on Dutch shipping to prevent the spread of the disease to Britain. Illicit shipping continued despite this.

Cases of plague were reported in the port of Yarmouth by November. The severely cold winter of 1664-65 curtailed the flea population from reproduction. Cases of plague did not occur to any noticeable extent until the spring of 1665.

The outbreak flared up dramatically around London in June as the flea population exploded in warm weather. The plague moved into the City itself and casualties peaked in August.

Hygiene was not maintained in the overcrowded tenements and garrets in the poorer parts of the city. There was inadequate sanitation. Pen drains flowed along the center of winding streets.

The cobbles were slippery with animal dung, rubbish and the slops thrown out of the houses. The streets were muddy and buzzing with flies in summer and awash with sewage in winter.

The City Corporation employed "rakers" to remove the worst of the filth and it was transported to mounds outside the walls where it accumulated and continued to decompose.

The stench was so bad people walked around with handkerchiefs or nosegays pressed against their nostrils.

It is first necessary to know how big the population was in which it occurred in order to judge the severity of an epidemic. There was no official census of the population to provide this figure.

The best contemporary count comes from the work of John Graunt (1620–1674). He was one of the earliest Fellows of the Royal Society and one of the first demographers to bring a scientific approach to the collection of statistics.

Graunt became interested in mortality statistics despite his lack of formal education.

He got the idea to write the book that was to make him famous from having thought a great deal about the Bills of Mortality (lists of the dead) that had been published in England beginning in the late sixteenth century.

The full title for his book was Natural and Political Observations mentioned in a following index, and made upon the Bills of Mortality With reference to the Government, Religion, Trade, Growth, Ayre, diseases, and the several Changes of the said City.

The Bills of Mortality were the vital statistics about the citizens of London collected over a 70-year period. Graunt explained in his book hereafter referred to as Observations that the accounts were kept as the number of deaths rose from the plague.

The plague was a catastrophic illness whose germs were carried by fleas that lived as parasites on rats.  The number of deaths from the illness led it to be categorized as an epidemic. One-fourth of England's population died in 1625 alone, many from the plague.

The recording of the London statistics first began in the year 1592 according to Graunt. It was a time of great Mortality. Documentation was resumed again in the year 1603 after the great Plague happened.

His Observations used analysis of the bills of mortality in early modern London. Charles II and other officials attempted to create a system to warn of the onset and spread of bubonic plague in the city.

He estimated that 384,000 people lived in the City of London, the Liberties, Westminster and the out-parishes in 1662. The estimate was based on figures taken from the bills of mortality published each week in the capital.

These different districts with different administrations constituted the officially recognized extent of London as a whole. He revised his estimate in 1665 to 'not above 460,000'. Other contemporaries put the figure higher, but with no mathematical basis to support their estimates. The French Ambassador, for example, suggested 600,000.

The erudition of the Observations led Graunt to the Royal Society, where he presented his work and was subsequently elected a fellow in 1662 with the endorsement of the King.

Graunt founded the science of demography, the statistical study of human populations. This was also the start for the measure of epidemiology based on statistics for the incidence for disease.

The institution of demographics in Britain in the 17th century was a movement to improve on the statistics that had been kept by the office of the Censor in the Roman Republic.

The emphasis on the mortality lists served as a catch for public attention with respect for constructing the means to count the population.

The mortality angle was reported with the publication of Graunt's Observations. A summary of the information was of interest for the public through the newspapers as well.

The count of deaths that resulted from the plague pointed the poor among the population to the importance of public and private sanitation. Hygiene was also recommended as an avenue to prolong the quality of life.

The estimate of the population for the previous year was adjusted with respect for the number of deaths. The incidence of the plague was seen as a motivation to keep more accurate records.

The difficulty with the emphasis on mortality was that it didn't include a report about births or naturalized citizens.

An accurate account would have to add new members and subtract the deceased to the estimate of the population from the previous year.

----------------------

The incidence of the plague was motivation to keep accurate records.
The estimate of the population was adjusted with afferent wards.

================


Statistics don't lie. Mathematicians do? Oh! That is so wrong.


Sir John Sinclair
b. 5.10.1754   Thurso Castle, Caithness, Scotland
d. 12.21.1835 Edinburgh, Scotland

John Sinclair was a proponent of parliamentary reform. He wrote several tracts on the matter.  The anonymous Lucubrations published in 1782 was a notable contribution. He was not for annual elections even to the lower house.

His experience with education in law and in parliament was such that he knew that more time was needed to represent the constituency.

He went on a tour of Europe after his first wife died in 1785. He started in Paris and traveled through northern Europe as far as Moscow.

He set about managing and implementing improvements on his Scottish estates upon his return in 1787.

Sinclair had gotten particularly engaged in the improvement of sheep-breeding and wool production. He wrote several tracts on the matter and in 1791 founded an society in Edinburgh for the purpose.

He received a baronetcy from Pitt the Younger in 1786 and a doctorate in law from the University of Glasgow in 1788.

He devised a plan to conduct an extensive empirical survey of Scotland.  He prevailed on the General Assembly of the Kirk of Scotland to provide the means and information to compile his massive, twenty-one volume Statistical Account of Scotland in 1791.

This was the most extensive use of the the term "statistics" in English for the time.  It was an anglicized form of the German word "statistik". Gottingen professor Gottfried Achenwall had used it to denote the "science of the State" in 1749.

Sinclair's use of the term went beyond the narrow State-centric political definition.
There were those who were surprised that he adopted the terms Statistics and Statistical. They thought that some term in English might have expressed the same intent.

Sinclair explained that  his tour through the northern parts of Europe led him to place in Germany where he found that they were engaged in a species of political inquiry to which the name Statistics had been given.

His use of the term was different. Statistics meant a statistical inquiry for the purpose of ascertaining the political strength of a country or questions respecting matters of state in Germany.

The idea he annexed to the term was an inquiry into the state of the country for the purpose of ascertaining the quantum of happiness enjoyed by its inhabitants or the means of its future improvement.

He thought that a new word might attract more public attention, so he resolved to adopt it. He expressed the hope would completely become naturalized and incorporated within the English language.

The distinction between the strength of the political state and the quantum happiness of the inhabitants could be argued as different ways to describe the same thing, but the explicit expression of concern for the inhabitants could result in the difference between winning and losing an election.

Sinclair collected his data by sending out original questionnaires to parish ministers. This method of collection was followed by visits from his army of "statistical missionaries". It was unlike older "political arithmeticians" who relied on existing records.

Sinclair's results were published in 21 large volumes between 1791 and 1799.  His census was sometimes called the "Old Statistical Account". It was the most comprehensive census to date and continued to serve until a new account was done in the mid-19th C.

While he was still in Parliament, he persuaded the Pitt government to establish a Board of Agriculture and Internal Improvement in 1793. He was appointed its first director.  He encouraged the dissemination of "scientific agriculture" and new husbandry techniques throughout Britain.

He essentially made himself into the modern form of a Roman patrician with his application of his legal education to the administrative reform of his position in Parliament.

-------------------------

Statistics was used to measure the quantum of happiness
for people in the realm of sovereign champions.

===================

wiki Sir John Sinclair 1st Baronet
wiki Statistical Accounts of Scotland
Sinclair biography

John Sinclair went on a tour of Europe before he returned to Great Britain to write an extensive statistical account of Scotland.

The print at the time lacked frequency in production for the letter 's' as a typeset. The letter 'f' was inserted where an 's' was intended with some exception. It was also used where 'f' was appropriate to the communication.

The following statement becomes intelligible in the light of this condition.

Lucubrations
Text

"If any alteration might be wifhed or fuggefted in the prefent frame of Parliaments, it fhould be in favour of a more complete Reprefentation of the people."

-----------------------

Theory


Auguste Comte
b. 1.19.1798 Montpelier, France
d. 9.5.1857  Paris, France

Auguste Comte was a French philosopher and writer who formulated the doctrine of positivism.  This theory posited that certain or "positive" knowledge was based on natural phenomena, their properties and relations.

Information derived from sensory experience and interpreted through reason and logic formed the exclusive source of all certainty in knowledge. Positivism held that valid knowledge (certitude or truth) was found only in this a posteriori knowledge.

Verified data (positive facts) received from the senses was known as empirical evidence. The theory was a development of empiricism.

Positivism also held that society, like the physical world, operates according to general laws. Introspective and intuitive knowledge was rejected, as was metaphysics and theology. Metaphysical and theological claims could not be verified by sense experience.

Comte is often regarded as the first philosopher of science in the modern sense of the term and the founder of the academic discipline of sociology. He was influenced by the utopian socialist Henri Saint-Simon.

Comte developed the positive philosophy in an attempt to remedy the social malaise of the French Revolution. He called for a new social doctrine based on the sciences.

He was a major influence on 19th-century thought through his influence on the work of social thinkers such as Karl Marx, John Stuart Mill and George Eliot.

His concept of sociologie and social evolutionism set the tone for early social theorists and anthropologists such as Harriet Martineau and Herbert Spencer. This evolved into the modern academic sociology presented by Émile Durkheim in practical and objective social research.

Comte's social theories culminated in his "Religion of Humanity". This presaged the development of non-theistic religious humanist and secular humanist organization.

The emphasis on objectivity was so strong that it negated the value of human values. It was like Nietzsche's claim to a perspective that was 'beyond good and evil.'

The negation of goodness however resulted in an environment that was rife for anti-Christian, anti-religious and atheistic humanism that supported the destruction of old forms to make way for those new forms that were 'revolutionary.'

Unethical ventures into scientific experiment would be entertained for the benefit of 'humanity.' It was an antecedent to the Nazi experiments on Jews as 'lab rats' in concentration camps for the field of 'positive' investigation.

Auguste Comte
S. 奥古斯特·孔戴
T. 奧古斯特·孔戴         

奥 Ao     mysterious        奧  oku     heart             O      お-     オ-         O    오   five                     
古 gu      ancient              古  ko        old               gyu  ぎゅ  ギュ       gwi  귀   ear                     
斯 si        this                   斯  shi       this               su     す       ス          seu   스  s                         
特 te       special               特  toku    special           to     と         ト        teu    트  t                     
孔 Kong  hole                  孔   ko       cavity           Kon  こん   コン     Kong  콩  bean             
戴 dai      support             戴   tai       crowned       to     と         ト         te       테  rim                                               
---------------------

A posteriori thought is metaphysical.
It's not so mysterious as it is statistically inferential.

A whole is left in the soul of philosophy
with the removal of conceptual virtuosity.

Theory provides a context for factuality.
No theory results in too much detachment from reality.

================

William James (1842-1910)
The Varieties of Religious Experience (1902)
Text

The Varieties of Religious Experience was written to promote healthy minded religion. This healthiness of mind was contrasted with the sick soul.

James was psychological about medicine and religion. The Principles of Psychology was twice the length of the Varieties.

His study was directed to that part of human nature that was related to the religious experience.  Healthy-mindedness was informed by reverence for goodness in life. Walt Whitman was cited as an example.

His openness to the varieties of religious experience wasn't as focused on the value of loyalty as Royce. If you consider the expansiveness of constitutional experiment in freedom of religion there is no legislated recognition of an official religion.

The first Chief Justice of the US, John Jay, had expressed his opinion that elected officials should be Christian, but the opinion was dependent upon the will of the people in the context of election.  He had defined unity with respect for national security, but the classical view was contrasted with the biblical for the negotiation of trade in international relations.

James did recommend the consideration of the value of truth in the context of logical coherence from the perspective of the experience selected by the cultural context. The value of other religious traditions was meant to qualify agreement with what is true and beneficial in Christianity.

Countries with an official religion have a similar difficulty from a different angle. How is a nation to trade with other nations if agreement in religion is taken as the basis for trust?

National trends and cultural context were tabled as a consideration in religious life for the sake of the mystical experience of the 'trend-setters.' This brought the consideration to the ascetics insofar as the mystical experience was considered to be the objective for the ascetic practice.

James brushed aside the conventional observances of the religious believer in his country. This religion had been made by others, communicated by tradition, determined by imitation in custom and retained by the habit of practice.

James said,

 
---------------------

The consideration of the mystical experience of awe
has to be tempered by caution towards the ascetic fever drawn.

================

While the onus for this choice contradicted the greatest happiness principle for morals and legislation as advocated by Jeremy Bentham, it provided the logical designation for not harming self or others as a defining characteristic for mental health in the observance of the law. It was a pragmatic distinction in judgment regarding free speech.

If someone were to say that human rights are women's rights, it could qualify as an overstatement that wasn't representative of the whole constituency, but offered a complaint toward the public perception of male domination in society.

If the statement were made by a leading official prior to a series of media stories about men being accused of sexual assault by unsubstantiated allegations, the opinion was not offered as a criticism. It was the basis for a national policy supported by covert agency and media reports.

The perception of male domination became more pronounced in republic than it was in kingdoms. The British kingdom has had a number of female monarchs as a testimony to the substance of women's leadership in western society.

Another might make the statement that "White people are the cause of all the problems in the world" with reference to the institution of the slave trade in the European expansion of global influence.

This would ascribe the action of a limited portion of the particular population to the whole group, when a considerable effort to outlaw the trade and the institution was organized in Great Britain with a majority white population.

British officials then negotiated an impressive array of treaties to persuade other governments to adopt legislation against the trade and the institution.

The statement against white people could also be taken as an overstatement to express frustration with the mechanisms of change in a democratic republic. When it is supported by government policy under the advisement of Rawls theory of justice, it is aimed at the institution of minority prejudice against the majority.

The policy is guided by the judgment that the majority is always at fault with respect for institutional prejudice while a minority group can never be held accountable for such. This policy is harmful in terms of social and political institutions.

While these statements were related to public policy issues as opposed to specifically religious concerns, religion plays a role in the moral decisions made by political leadership.

Slavery was more a matter of republican government seeking to use it as a tool to compete with monarchies that had adopted the practice. Monarchies probably allowed the practice to compete with the rise of republican government, but it reduces to a limitation of the right to own private property in any case.

When the controversy was active however, there were those that claimed that the Apostle Paul approved of the institution. There were also those who cited Plato or Aristotle as having authorized it with their opinions. It has been outlawed on moral grounds whatever was used to justify it in the past.

The right for women to vote is also a movement in the direction of correcting errors with respect for the perception of male domination, but the reproductive and nurturing roles of women doesn't dictate that they have to have a majority in all branches of the national government to 'correct' the problem.   
The Rights of the American People



The constitution was not written for rich white men.

Spinoza proposed a constitutional monarchy to support law that didn't concede to partiality in judgment. His family had been forced from Portugal by the Inquisition. They found refuge in the Dutch Republic.

The Inquisition was only part of the increased demand to accept papal supremacy as the authority for Europe and quite possibly, the world.

The claim came first, then the authority to invest bishops as papal representatives in civil authority for all the kingdoms throughout the Roman Empire.

The Crusades and the Inquisition were proximate. Indulgences and the threat to legislate the subordination of royal authority to papal decrees were part of the picture.

Spinoza saw the need to document the principles for law for the public in order to increase literacy in law for national unity in security with impartial judgment..People had to be able to participate in government according to the rules for the action.

He was the one who proposed a Constitution for the sovereignty of national law.

Sunday, November 3, 2019

Discern

11.10.19
Radha Mitchell

Discern
Reality
辨别现实
Biànbié xiànshí
現実を識別する 
Genjitsu o shikibetsu suru
ps17
In rebus exerceant

Help me to discern the truth of statements about reality.
Listen to the innocence of objectivity as the augur for actuality.

Let vindication come from your presence
that my eyes may see justice in relation to essence. 

Summon me to weigh my heart even at night.
Let false conceptions be melted down to form assertibles as right.

Marriage is not the sole consideration in the determination of leadership seen.
The children of the resurrection are like angels in political dealership preened. 

I don't make insulting statements to attack others for their existence.
I am working to shape my thought to discourage violent resistance.

Logic points to truth.
Science is the sleuth.

Number is a concept
that describes size inside the content.

Truth defines morality
with respect for health in reality.

My footsteps hold fast to the order of design as law.
My feet will not stumble in the avoidance of flaw.

I call upon you who will answer me.
Incline your ear to consider what is or is not to be.

Show me the wonder of kindness
as deliverance from misconception as blindness.

Keep me as an object for your affection
and an emblem of your resurrection.

I would that my words were engraved in stone
to serve as testimony for those who wish to atone.


Chrysanthemums

I know my Redeemer lives though I have been gravely afflicted.
Love is the reward that is given for faith for which thought is restricted.

The second coming of Christ will not occur until after the rebellion. 
The lawless one will be revealed when Mars is in the carnelian aphelion.

Protect me from those who would attack 
with the aggression to make me break or crack.

Their mouths speak proud things.
They have closed their heart to what the heart sings. 

They press me hard to cast me to the ground
with a roar of sound that bounces all around.



They acted like a young lion greedy for prey
lurking until leaping forth to cast stealth away. 

Arise to defend and bring them down.
Turn their smile of attack into a frown.

Let deliverance from those who add strife
be rendered to those with reverence for life.

Let those who compete to provide a service
be rewarded with surplus for the observance.

I will see the face of my vindication. 
I will be satisfied with your incorporation.

-------------------------

Psalm 17
Exaudi, Domine
Hear, Dominated

1 Hear my plea of innocence, O Lord;
give heed to my cry;
listen to my prayer, which does not come from lying lips.
2 Let my vindication come forth from your presence;
let your eyes be fixed on justice.
3 Weigh my heart, summon me by night,
melt me down; you will find no impurity in me.
4 I give no offense with my mouth as others do;
I have heeded the words of your lips.
5 My footsteps hold fast to the ways of your law;
in your paths my feet shall not stumble.
6 I call upon you, O God, for you will answer me;
incline your ear to me and hear my words.
7 Show me your marvelous loving-kindness,
O Savior of those who take refuge at your right hand
from those who rise up against them.
8 Keep me as the apple of your eye;
hide me under the shadow of your wings,
9 From the wicked who assault me,
from my deadly enemies who surround me.
10 They have closed their heart to pity,
and their mouth speaks proud things.
11 They press me hard,
now they surround me,
watching how they may cast me to the ground,
12 Like a lion, greedy for its prey,
and like a young lion lurking in secret places.
13 Arise, O Lord; confront them and bring them down;
deliver me from the wicked by your sword.
14 Deliver me, O Lord, by your hand
from those whose portion in life is this world;
15 Whose bellies you fill with your treasure,
who are well supplied with children
and leave their wealth to their little ones.
16 But at my vindication I shall see your face;
when I awake, I shall be satisfied, beholding
your likeness.
------------------------
=================
------------------------

My Redeemer Lives


The book of Job is set in the land of Uz (Job 1:1). Lamentations 4:21 places Edom in the land of Uz. Edom was southeast of the Dead Sea, toward the upper reaches of the Sinai Peninsula, east of Egypt and just north of the Red Sea.

Uz would most likely fall inside the current state of Jordan.

One of Job’s false comforters was named Eliphaz (Job 4:1). He was a Temanite. Teman was a city in Edom not far from the city of Petra.

Job appears in the 6th-century BCE book of Ezekiel as a man of antiquity renowned for his righteousness.

The books of Job, Ecclesiastes and Proverbs belong to the genre of wisdom literature. The genre was common in the ancient Near East. This included ancient Iran, Egypt, Asia Minor and the territory in-between. The Babylonian empire accounted for a large amount of the in-between area.

Map 6th c. Near East


The kingdom of Judah had been conquered by the Babylonians in the 6th century. The Siege of Jerusalem had been carried out by Nebuchadnezzar II, king of Babylon in 597 BCE.

Wisdom referred to a way of thinking about the knowledge gained by the thought expressed in literature. Wisdom literature from Sumeria and Babylonia can be dated to the second millennium BCE. Several texts from ancient Mesopotamia and Egypt offer parallels to Job.

The author of Job was the recipient of a long tradition of reflection on the existence of inexplicable suffering. The author was almost certainly an Israelite. He set his story outside Israel in southern Edom or northern Arabia. He made allusion to places as far apart as Mesopotamia and Egypt.

The language of Job stands out for the large number of words and forms not found elsewhere in the Bible.

Job is an investigation of divine justice. This problem is known in theology as the problem of evil. Why does God allow evil to harm the righteous? Human choices and actions have been found to be morally significant, but experience has demonstrated that suffering can be unmerited as retributive.

The Adversary raised the question of whether there is such a thing as disinterested righteousness. If righteousness is rewarded with prosperity, will people not act righteously from selfish motives? He asked God to test this by removing the prosperity of the most righteous of all, Job.

The book begins with the frame narrative. The reader is given a panopticon view that depicts Job as exemplary in piety and faith.

The 'fear of God' was a term used as a movement from the cause of piety as respect for any one of the gods and goddesses in the parthenon to the singularity of the divine nature. Faith had to reflect benefit for the world from the citizen's perspective in the state. Prosperity was viewed as a measure of success in piety in the imperial state.

Job's affliction was a description of the transition from polytheism. His piety would be rewarded by success in either the polytheistic or monotheistic cultural setting, but it was not motivated by selfishness or greed for the reward. He did not agree with the opinions expressed by his accusers. He carefully selected the best reasons for his faith to find his way back to prosperity. 

Satan took Job's family, possessions and health. Job praised God, yet lamented his suffering. His dialog with 3 associates demonstrates a shift from the objective view of consequence as accident to anger over the cruelty of the affliction as a punishment.

His associates were unyielding in the expression of the opinion that his suffering must have been retribution for offense. They berated him further for his refusal to agree with their judgement.

Job's argument against the presumption of divine retribution was expressed in angry opposition to the statements made by the associates who had become his accusers. Baldath made the statement that present adversities always arise because of past sins.

Job responded by saying that their punishment was much worse than any offense made by him. He felt that his accusers were assuming divine authority with their judgment. He wanted his words to be recorded as testimony against the ease with which his accusers shifted their perceptions to justify the cruelty of the affliction as though it were divine punishment.

Job 19:23-25

'O that my words were written down!
O that they were inscribed in a book!
O that with an iron pen and with lead
they were engraved on a rock for ever!
I know that my Redeemer lives.
At the last he will stand upon the earth.'

------------------------

I would that my words were engraved in stone
to serve as testimony for those who wish to atone.

I know my Redeemer lives though I have been gravely afflicted.
Love is the reward that is given for faith for which thought is restricted.

==================

Roman Influence in Thessalonica

Thessalonican Amphitheater


Cicero (106-43 BCE) was a Roman statesman, orator, lawyer and philosopher. He had never been friendly towards the first triumvirate. He was specifically against Julius Caesar and his social reform. Caesar had always been fairly cordial to Cicero despite this.

Cicero’s political views became more conservative in contrast to the social reforms being proposed by Julius Caesar, Gaius Antonius and Catiline between 66 and 63 BCE.

Cicero received the consulship of 63-62 BCE at the minimum age (42).  He was consul prior, the consul who had won by the most votes. He was also a novus homo or the first man in his family to be elected to the office.

A consul held the highest elected political office of the Roman Republic (509 to 27 BCE). Ancient Romans considered the consulship the highest level of the 'cursus honorum.' The 'course of honor' was an ascending sequence of public offices to which politicians aspired.

The citizens of Rome elected two consuls to serve jointly for a one-year term each year. The consuls alternated in holding imperium each day. A consul's imperium extended over Rome and all its provinces.

The consuls were not the highest office in Rome's republican heritage after the establishment of the Empire (27 BCE). The emperor was necessarily consul prior when elected to the office.

When the first triumvirate between Caesar, Pompey and Crassus was originally founded Caesar had made suggestions to Cicero with the possible view to include him in the alliance. It was Cicero’s principles regarding the constitution for the republic that averted any such eventuality.

Cicero stayed in Thessalonica during 58 BCE when he was exiled from Rome.

Thessaloniki's acropolis was built in 55 BCE for security reasons. It was situated in the northern hills following Thracian raids in the city's outskirts at the time. The 'high city' was a settlement in ancient Greece.

It was a citadel built upon an area of elevated ground. The elevation was frequently a hill with precipitous sides that was chosen for purposes of defense. An acropolis also had a function of a religious sanctuary. Sacred springs highlighted its religious significance.

The city contained a amphitheater where entertainment in the form of gladiatorial shows were held for the local citizens. A circus was also exhibited in the amphitheater for the amusement of the citizens. The games were held at the same time as the circus.

Cicero was under duty to govern the province of Cilicia from 51-50 BCE. When he arrived back at Rome the city was on the edge of civil war. When it finally toppled into that abyss Cicero left the city once more.

The Roman general Pompey the Great used Thessalonica as one of his chief bases during his civil war with Julius Caesar from 49-47 BCE. This put the city on the senatorial side of the war.

It was only in 47 BCE when Caesar and Pompey had finally settled their differences that he thought it safe to return to the city. Things did not exactly get better for him. This time it was for private, rather than public, reasons.

Cicero divorced his wife Terentia in 46 BCE. He had been married to her for almost thirty years. He married Publilia, who had been his ward, shortly afterwards.

The next year grief struck Cicero when his daughter Tullia died. The lack of sympathy that his second wife showed led to her also being divorced. Matters were made worse for Cicero by the fact that it was becoming ever more apparent that Caesar was not going to reinstitute the republican constitution.

Thessalonica proved loyal to the second triumvirate between Antony, Octavian and Lepidus after Caesar was murdered in 44 BCE. It was rewarded by receiving the status and privileges of a "civitas liberas" (Pliny, NH, iv.36).

The free city was granted certain tax exemptions.  It was a self-governed city during the Hellenistic and Roman Imperial eras. The status was given by the king or emperor, who supervised the city's affairs through his epistates or curator. The prosperity of Thessalonica in this period is attested by a prolific production of coinage.

Thessalonica was important, not only as a harbor with a large import and export trade, but also as the principal station on the great Via Egnatia, the highway from the Adriatic to the Hellespont.

The Roman province of Macedonia was controlled by the empire during the time of Paul's visit to Thessalonica. Each province was ruled by a Roman who was appointed as governor. Provinces were generally governed by politicians of senatorial rank, usually former consuls or former praetors.

The Latin word provincia originally meant any task or set of responsibilities assigned by the Roman Senate to an individual who held 'imperium.' The 'right of command' was often a military authority within a specified theater of operations.

Magistrates were elected to office for a period of one year under the Roman republic. Those serving outside the city of Rome such as consuls acting as generals on a military campaign, were assigned a particular provincia, the scope of authority within which they exercised their command.

The territory of a people who were defeated in war might be brought under various forms of treaty. Complete subjection (deditio) was applied in certain cases.

The formal annexation of a territory created a province in the modern sense of an administrative unit that is geographically defined. Republican-period provinces were administered in one-year terms by the consuls and praetors who had held office the previous year and who were invested with imperium.

The terms of provincial governors often had to be extended for multiple years (prorogatio), and on occasion the senate awarded imperium even to private citizens (privati). Pompey the Great was an example.

Prorogation undermined the republican constitutional principle of annual elected magistracies. The amassing of disproportionate wealth and military power by a few men through their provincial commands was a major factor in the transition from a republic to imperial autocracy.

Thessalonica was a free city which had a cosmopolitan population with a large Jewish community that was visited by the apostle Paul about 52 CE.

Paul's Second Missionary Journey


When Paul visited Thessalonica for the first time he had recently come from Philippi. He reported that he had “already suffered and been shamefully mistreated” (1 Thess. 2:2; Philppns. 1:30). It may reasonably be assumed that he had reached Macedonia by way of a journey through Galatia during which he would have founded the churches there.

Paul’s companions were Silas and Timothy. Paul’s preaching appears to have met with good success (1 Thess. 1:6-10; 2:1, 13). His message was received in spite of persecution (1 Thess. 1:6). The gentile makeup of the congregation is made evident by Paul’s recollection that they had turned from idols to serve the living and true God (1 Thess. 1:9).

Paul’s original preaching emphasized monotheism, the death and resurrection of Christ and his imminent Parousia [or coming again]. Paul presupposed in the letter their knowledge that salvation will come “through our Lord Jesus Christ, who died for us . . . ” (1 Thess. 5:9-10). Paul had probably informed them not only of the imminence of the Parousia but also of its unexpectedness (1 Thess. 5:2).

Paul probably discussed the resurrection of believers during his first visit, but neglected to explain the connection between resurrection and Parousia. He had stated the importance of the observance of moral standards and warned of persecution. He made it clear that he had delivered their moral instruction in no fewer than four places (1 Thess. 4:1, 2, 6, 11).

Paul had instructed them to be monogamous, monotheistic and to abstain from sexual immorality (1 Thess. 4:1-6). He had also charged them to be diligent in their work and to be a model of conduct to outsiders (1 Thess. 4:11-12).

Paul became removed from Thessalonica, but Silas and Timothy stayed nearby in Berea. He tried to re-visit but was stopped (1 Thes 2:18). He sent Timothy to Thessalonica (1 Thes 3:1). Timothy reported back regarding Thessalonica church health.

He wrote 1 Thessalonians shortly after his arrival in Corinth. It was not long after he left Thessalonica.

This portion of the second letter to the Thessalonians makes a reference to the rebellion as an antecedent to the parousia.

Parousia is an ancient Greek word meaning presence, arrival, or official visit. The term was used in the East as a technical expression to denote the arrival or visit of a king or emperor from the Ptolemaic period to the second century of the Common Era.

The word is mainly used in Christian theology to refer to the second coming of Christ. It is found in the New Testament 24 times. The word held a special signficance for the Thessalonians with respect for the use of the city by Pompey to rebel against the rule of Caesar.

2 Thess. 2:1-5

As to the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ and our being gathered together to him, we beg you, brothers and sisters, not to be quickly shaken in mind or alarmed, either by spirit or by word or by letter as though from us, to the effect that the day of the Lord is already here. Let no one deceive you in any way; for the day will not come unless the rebellion comes first and the lawless one is revealed, the one destined for destruction. He opposes and exalts himself above every so-called god or object of worship, that he takes his seat in the temple of God, declaring himself to be God. Do you not remember that I told you these things when I was still with you?

------------------------

The second coming of Christ will not occur until after the rebellion.
The lawless one will be revealed when Mars is in the carnelian aphelion.

==================

The Imperial Pontifex
of Constantine
Pontifex Maximus
The Highest Priest

The 'Pontifex Maximus' was the 'greatest priest' of the College of Pontiffs (Colleguim Pontificum) in Ancient Rome. The term in office for the priest was not for a fixed period. It was for life.

The College of Pontiffs was a body whose members were the highest-ranking priests of the state religion. The Romans thought of themselves as highly religious. They attributed their success as a world power to their collective piety (pietas) in maintaining good relations with the gods.

The presence of Greeks on the Italian peninsula from the beginning of the historical period influenced Roman culture. Some religious practices were introduced that became as fundamental as the cult of Apollo.

The Romans looked for common ground between their major gods and those of the Greeks (interpretatio graeca). They adapted Greek myths and iconography for Latin literature and Roman art.

The Etruscan religion was also a major influence, particularly on the practice of augury. Most of Rome's religious institutions could be traced to its founders according to legends. Numa Pompilius was the Sabine second king of Rome who negotiated directly with the gods.

This archaic religion was the foundation of the mos maiorum, "the way of the ancestors" or simply "tradition", viewed as central to Roman identity.

Roman religion was practical and contractual, based on the principle of do ut des, "I give that you might give". Religion depended on knowledge and the correct practice of prayer, ritual and sacrifice.

Latin literature preserves learned speculation on the nature of the divine and its relation to human affairs, but theology was limited to the explanation of natural phenomena. The rites did not entertain a place for a sermon.

The College of Pontiffs consisted of the Pontifex Maximus and the other pontifices, the Rex Sacrorum, the fifteen flamens, and the Vestals. The Rex Sacorum was a senatorial priesthood reserved for Patricians.

A flamen was a priest of the ancient Roman religion who was assigned to one of fifteen deities with official cults during the Roman Republic. The most important three were the flamines maiores (or "major priests"), who served the important Roman gods Jupiter, Mars and Quirinus.

Jupiter was the god of sky and administration. Mars was the god of war and the guardian of agriculture. He was the deity for the military.

The name Quirinus is derived from the Sabine word for 'spear.' He was most likely a Sabine god of war.

The Sabines had a settlement near the eventual site of Rome, and erected an altar to Quirinus on the Collis Quirinalis Quirinal Hill, one of the Seven hills of Rome. When the Romans settled in the area, the cult of Quirinus became part of their early belief system.

The Quirites were known as the men of the oaken spear. It is conceivable that they acted as a local militia or police force.

The Vestals were priestesses of Vesta, goddess of the hearth. The College of the Vestals and its well-being were regarded as fundamental to the continuance and security of Rome. They cultivated the sacred fire that was not allowed to go out.

The Vestals were freed of the usual social obligations to marry and bear children and took a 30-year vow of chastity in order to devote themselves to the study and correct observance of state rituals that were forbidden to the colleges of male priests

The College of Pontiffs was one of the four major priestly colleges; originally their responsibility was limited to supervising both public and private sacrifices, but as time passed their responsibilities increased.

The other colleges were the augurs (who read omens), the quindecimviri sacris faciundis ("fifteen men who carry out the rites"), and the Epulones (who set up feasts at festivals).

The title pontifex comes from the Latin for "bridge builder", a possible allusion to a very early role in placating the gods and spirits associated with the Tiber River, for instance.

The pontifex maximus was the most important member of the college. The pontifex maximus held the sole power in appointing members to the other priesthoods in the college until 104 BCE.

Religion was a part of daily life for ordinary Romans. Each home had a household shrine at which prayers and libations to the family's domestic deities were offered. Neighborhood shrines and sacred places such as springs and groves dotted the city.

The Roman calendar was structured around religious observances. Women, slaves, and children all participated in a range of religious activities. Some public rituals could be conducted only by the Vestals.

The main task of the pontifices was to maintain the pax deorum, the 'peace with the gods'. They gave advice to the magistrates, interpreted the omens, controlled the calendar and oversaw funerals for this goal.

The pontifex maximus was responsible for a large collection of omens (annales maximi). He wrote down the celestial and other signs each year and added the events that had followed the omens, so future generation would be able to better understand the divine will.

The pontifex maximus was elected by the comitia tributa or election tribute. The people were divided into voting districts. The taxes collected determined the vote. The ordinary pontifices were also elected after 104 BCE. They had been coopted until then.

Julius Caesar was elected pontifex maximus in 63 BCE. He kept the office until his death. The house where he spent the night before he was killed was the domus publica. Marcus Aemilius Lepidus became pontifex maximus (44-12 BCE) after his death.

When he died, the emperor Augustus became responsible for the state cult. He also put an end to the election of the pontifices. A position in the college of pontifices was a sign of special imperial favor from that point.

The pontifex maximus was recognized in public affairs by the iron knife (secespita). He killed the animal that was offered in sacrifice.

The  derivative "pontiff" later became terms used for Catholic bishops including the bishop or Rome.

Kohen Gadol
The High Priest

The High Priest or Kohen Gadol in Judaism was the religious leader for the Jewish people. He stood at the top of the chain of command tasked with running the Temple’s operations.

His role extended from Aaron in ancient times until the destruction of the Second Temple in 70 CE.
The Torah gives a detailed account of the inauguration of the first-ever High Priest. The Israelites were gathered at the Tabernacle.

Moses acted as interim Kohen Gadol. He brought a series of sacrifices, dressed Aaron and his sons in the priestly garments, anointed them with oil and smeared blood on their ears, fingers and toes. This represented the blood that the offering of animal sacrifice included.

Aaron and his sons also brought an inaugural flour offering that was to be boiled, baked and fried before being burnt on the altar.

The only parts of the ceremony that were included in subsequent High Priest inaugurations were the anointment with special oil (shemen hamishchah), being dressed with the eight garments of the High Priest and the inaugural flour offering (minchat chinuch).

The High Priest belonged to the Jewish priestly familes that traced their paternal line back to Aaron through Zadok, a leading priest in the time of David and Solomon. This tradition came to an end in the 2nd century BCE during the rule of the Hasmoneans. The position was then occupied by priestly families unrelated to Zadok.

It was the job of the High Priest to oversee the Temple service.  His most prominent responsibility was entering the Holy of Holies on Yom Kippur.

The Yom Kippur service mirrored the typical holiday service with two sacrifices, daily incense burnt twice, special holiday offerings and the lighting of the menorah. Atonement offerings were brought for the High Priest, his family, the priests and the nation as a whole.

The High Priest was required to carry out all of the services himself on Yom Kippur. An additional incense offering was also brought. This was the unique service performed in the Holy of Holies.

The political authority of the Priest grew during the times of occupation by foreign powers. Messianic sovereignty was attributed to a member of the royal house, while religious affairs were reserved to the high-priesthood, represented in the Book of Zechariah by Joshua.

The high priest also became a political chief of the congregation as the Messianic hope or even the hope of autonomy under foreign (Persian, Greek, Egyptian or Syrian) suzerainty became weaker in the course of time.

The consideration shown him by the suzerain powers and their viceroys induced the effect of the increasingly thorough acceptance of the Levitical code by pious Judeans.

The assumption of the princely authority by the Maccabean high priests during the Hasmonean dynasty was merely the final link in this development. The ideals of the politico-Messianic and the religio-Levitical were combined in one office beginning with the death of Zerubbabel.

When the brief heyday of national independence had come to an inglorious close, the high-priesthood changed again in character insofar as it ceased to be a hereditary and a life office during the Herodian dynasty in the Roman occupation.

High priests were appointed and removed with great frequency. This may account for the otherwise strange use of the title in the plural (ἀρχιερεῖς) in the New Testament and in Josephus.

The high priest was looked upon as exercising authority in all things, political, legal, and sacerdotal in the post-Maccabean period.  The presidency of the Sanhedrin was almost certainly vested in the high priest.

The major distinction between the Pharisees and the Sadducees was belief in the Resurrection. The Pharisees were a social movement and a school of thought in the Holy Land during the time of Second Temple Judaism. They were associated with the development of synagogues in post-exilic Judean society. The Sadducees were aligned with temple worship.

Josephus (37 – c. 100 CE) is believed by many historians to be a Pharisee. He estimated the total Pharisee population before the fall of the Second Temple to be around 6,000.

Josephus claimed that Pharisees received the full support and goodwill of the common people in contrast to the Sadducees who were in the upper class.

Pharisees claimed Mosaic authority for their interpretation of Jewish Laws. Sadducees represented the authority of the priesthood established since the days of Solomon when Zadok, their ancestor, officiated as High Priest.

The phrase "common people" in Josephus' writings suggests that most Jews were distinguished from the main liturgical groups.

The letter to the Hebrews attributes the title of High Priest to Jesus, but there are gospel accounts that describe his activity as a judge who made statements about important religious controversies. The following account from the gospel of Luke relates how he made a statement about the resurrection to those who did not believe that such a thing existed.

Luke 20:27-35

Some Sadducees, those who say there is no resurrection, came to him and asked him a question, 'Teacher, Moses wrote for us that if a man's brother dies, leaving a wife but no children for his brother. Now there were seven brothers; the first married and died childless; then the second. The third married her. So it was in the same way all seven died childless. Finally the woman also died. Whose wife will the woman be in the resurrection? The seven had married her.'

Jesus said to them, 'Those who belong to this age marry and are given in marriage; but those who are considered worthy of a place in that age and in the resurrection from the dead neither marry nor are given in marriage. Indeed they cannot die any more, because they are like angels and are children of God, being children of the resurrection.'

------------------------

Marriage is not the sole consideration in the determination of leadership.
The children of the resurrection are like angels in political delearship.

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Early analytic philosophy tended to avoid the study of philosophy of religion. It was grouped with the study of ethics by logical positivists as metaphysical and meaningless. The demise of logical positivism renewed interest in the philosophy of religion.

Philosophers like Alvin Plantinga, Richard Swinburne and Antony Flew not only introduced new topics, but returned to classical issues such as the nature of miracles, theistic arguments, the problem of evil, the rationality of faith, concepts on the nature of God and many more.

Plantinga and Flew debated the logical validity of free will to defend the choice of good despite the problem of evil. Analytic epistemology and metaphysics has formed the basis for a number of philosophically-sophisticated theistic arguments.

The philosophy of language has established the analysis of the logic of statements about reality as the objective for the discernment of meaning in communication.

This modern form for wisdom has precedents in the concepts of the Word or Logos. Reason was viewed as the way to order thought for action. Duty was ordered as automated action for happiness.

The work of Plato shows that there was a movement in philosophy to convert religion from the stories about the immorality of the gods in polytheism to the morality of the moral code in monotheism. This concern for the monad was expressed even earlier in the Eleatic school.

Nature lies within the universe. The concept of God allows for contrast with that which is within the universe and the divine being which is posited as the Creator of it.

The paradox of Zeno removed that which was pragmatic from the logical description of reality in order to demonstrate the role that language plays in the description.

Logic is the general form for reason. It has to balance the ideal with pragmatic concern in order to describe things realistically.

Logic is the general form for reason.

Chn. 逻辑是理性的一般形式.
Luójí shì lǐxìng de yībān xíngshì.

Jpn. 論理は理性のための一般的な形式です.
Ronri wa risei no tame no ippantekina keishikidesu. 

Krn. 논리는 일반적인 이유입니다.
Nonlineun ilbanjeog-in iyuibnida.

Pre-Socratic Logic

Elea, Italy
Ruins

The pre-Socratics preceded the life of Socrates (470-399 BCE). They were the forerunners of what became natural philosophy in the West. Knowledge mined from the study of nature later developed into the natural sciences (such as physics, chemistry, geology and astronomy).

Their efforts were directed to the investigation of the ultimate basis and essential nature of the external world. They sought the material principle (archê) of things and the method of their origin or disappearance.

The study of rhetoric and logic was started.

Pythagoras of Samos (an Aegean island) arrived in Croton in southern Italy in the last quarter of the 6th century. He established a community of followers who adopted his political views, which favored rule by the “better people,” and also the way of life he recommended on what seem to have been more or less philosophical bases.

There were two traditions about Pythagoras. One meshed with the traditional view and associates Pythagoras with political tyrants. Another credited him with rejecting tyrannies for aristocracies that might not have been grounded in wealth. The latter case is more likely.

The early Pythagoreans conceived of nature as a structured system ordered by number. Post-Parmenidean Pythagoreans such as Philolaus lived more than a generation after Pythagoras' death. Archytas lived in the late 5th to early 4th century.

Either held more complicated views about the relation between mathematics and cosmology than it is reasonable to suppose Pythagoras himself could have advanced.

Aristotle (384-322 BCE) attributed the discovery of the art of dialectic to Zeno the Eleatic (495-422 BCE). Dialectic is the art of discussing the truth of opinions. Zeno was third among the leaders of the Eleatic school.

The Greek colony of Elea was in southern Italy. The colony was  south of Naples. It is now known as Velia.

The Eleatics emphasized the doctrine of the One. Xenophanes (570-470 BC) declared God to be the eternal unity. The One permeated the universe and governed it by his thought.

Parmenides (510-440 BC) affirmed the one unchanging existence to be alone true and capable of being conceived. Multitude and change were defined as appearance without reality.

His investigation explored the nature of philosophical inquiry. It concentrated less on knowledge or understanding than on what can be understood with the language.

He composed a poem in Homeric hexameters that narrated the story of a young man (kouros) who was taken to a goddess who promised to teach him all things. The goddess didn't give him knowledge of the things, she gave the kouros the tools to acquire that knowledge himself. 

The goddess showed him the paths of being or opinion. The right way of thinking was to think of what-is. The wrong way was to think of both what-is and what-is-not. 

Parmenides was the inventor of metaphysics as the inquiry into the nature of being or reality. While the tenets of his thought have their home in poetry, they are expressed with the force of logic. The Parmenidean logic of being thus sparked a long lineage of inquiry into the nature of thought.

The doctrine of the One doctrine was defended by his younger countryman Zeno of Elea (490-430 BC) in a polemic against the common opinion which sees in things multitude, becoming and change.

Zeno propounded a number of celebrated paradoxes, much debated by later philosophers, which try to show that supposing that there is any change or multiplicity leads to contradictions.

Zeno paid particular attention to the contrast between the requirements of logical argument and the evidence of the senses.

He is now and in antiquity best known for the four famous paradoxes of motion. He purported to show that despite the evidence all around us the ordinary motion of everyday experience is impossible.

The paradoxes claim that motions can never be begun (the Achilles), be completed (the Dichotomy), entail contradictions (the Moving Blocks) or are altogether impossible (the Arrow). Logical argument is explicated in the description of the paradoxes.

Socrates

Socrates was a stonemason who had served as a Hoplite in the Peloponnesian War. The conflict between Athens and Sparta stretched intermittently over a period spanning 431 to 404 BCE.

Socrates was active for Athens in the battles of Amphipolis (422), Delium (424) and Potidaea (432) according to his testimony in the Apology.

Athens was a democracy whereas Sparta had two monarchs who ruled as a military dictatorship. The more aristocratic Athenian families tended to favor the rigid and restricted hierarchy of power in Sparta instead of the more widespread democratic distribution of power with free speech for the citizens in Athens.

Plato placed praise for Sparta in the mouth of his character Socrates more than once. Such praise was expressed in Protagoras, Crito and Republic.

Sparta finally defeated Athens in 404 BCE. It was just five years before Socrates’ trial and execution. They installed as rulers a small group of Athenians who were loyal to Spartan interests.

These were called "The Thirty." It was reported that they executed a number of wealthy Athenians and confiscated their property. Others were arrested or exiled for democratic sympathies.

The Thirty were led by Critias, a known associate of Socrates and a member of his circle. The Thirty were overthrown in 403 BCE by a group of democratic exiles returning to the city. It was reported that Critias was killed. The Spartans brokered an accord and installed a different government.

Plato's Meno is set in 402 BCE. It imagines a dialog between Socrates and Anytus. Anytus argues that instruction in virtue is not limited to the elite or privileged few. Socrates argued that one should consult an expert in virtue to learn about it.

The Socrates portrayed in Apology, Crito, Phaedo and Symposium concurs with description provided in other sources. The Platonic Socrates as demonstrated in these dialogs is a representation of the actual Socrates as he lived in history.

Xenophon is more reliable as a source of historical information insofar as he wrote as a historian. Plato wrote as a dramatist. He was prone to use the character Socrates as a vehicle for his ideas.

Xenophon reports that because youths were not allowed to enter the Agora, the central open space for a Greek city state, they used to gather in workshops surrounding it. Socrates frequented these shops in order to converse with the merchants.

Socrates and his contemporaries lived in a polytheistic society. The stories of the gods recounted in Hesiod, Homer and the like describe a world that was not created by the gods. They themselves were created and intervened in the affairs of humans.

Aphrodite saving Paris from death at the hands of Menelaus in the Iliad. Zeus sent Apollo to rescue the corpse of Sarpedon after his death in battle in the same epic.

They were not defined as omniscient, omnibenevolent or eternal. They were constrained to respond to what they witnessed or reports about what had been witnessed.

The story about the experience of the oracle at Delphi is well known, but there are variants with an important distinction. Whereas in Plato’s Apology the oracle tells Chaerephon that no one is wiser than Socrates, in Xenophon’s Apology Socrates claims that the oracle stated that no one was more free, just or moderate than him.

Socrates was reputed to have said, "I know that I don't know." He used this statement to question the definitions of concepts presented by those who claimed certain knowledge about something.

Certainty in the claim to knowledge was diminished, but the essential definition of key terms was analyzed and clarified. Even when it seemed that certainty regarding a definition was destroyed, logical clarity was refined with proximity to the conception of definition.

The theology expressed by Plato's Socrates was more Eleatic than conventional. The blind acceptance of dictates from the gods was not promoted. Monotheism was posited as the basis for questioning cultural conventions regarding the perception of nature. Belief in the One was the reason for analytical philosophy.

Aristotle (384-322 BCE)

Aristotle made it evident in his Organon (343) that the demand for a regulative art of scientific discourse was created by the logic of debate as influenced by the Eleatic school. The case paralleled the rise of the art of rhetoric.

Aristotle regarded Empedocles (495-435 BCE) as the originator of that art as he had referred the beginnings of dialectic to Zeno (495-425). The essential principles of logic and rhetoric were operative and effective in practice in lawsuits before Aristotle gave them their abstract formulation. The formulation of both arts in well-rounded systems came much later.

While the Pre-Socratics did not document a formal system of logic even in the Eleatic school, it is more significant that they either received from their predecessors or themselves developed the conceptions and the presuppositions on which Aristotelian logic is founded.

Bertrand Russell called Aristotle's principles of logic laws in 1912.

The identity principle is drawn from the verb 'to be'. When something exists, it is. This is expressed symbolically as p = p. If rain is heard, seen or felt, it means that it is raining. If a person exists, he or she is alive.

The non-contradiction principle says that logic can be used to distinguish one thing from another. Being alive is distinguished from not being alive. This is expressed as ~(p and ~p) where ~ means 'not.' It is not the case that a person is alive and not alive.

The principle of the excluded middle asserts that everything must either be or not be. This principle is particularly significant in that implies the logical abstraction of truth. To say that what is, is not, is false. It is also false to say that what is not, is. The truth then is p or ~p.

Some one or some thing is alive or it is not. These principles are logical operations of thought for a personal perspective, yet the principles propose there is a reality that is true. I think that is the reason the Russell called them laws of logic. The principles point to something larger in truth with respect for law.

Stoic Propositions

Stoic logic is the system of propositional logic developed by the Stoic philosophers in ancient Greece. The Stoic school was centered in Athens.

A stoa was a classical portico or roofed colonnade. It is conceivable that instruction was given in the public space under the protection of the roof over the corridor. The Athenian Agora had four, possibly five, stoas that lined the southern, western and northern sides of the public area.

The "Painted Stoa" was a building in Athens where Zeno of Citium met his followers and taught. Later adherents of this philosophical tradition were given the name "Stoic" from their association with this place.

Stoic logic was one of the two great systems that analyzed language in the classical world. It was largely built and shaped by Chrysippus (c.279-206 BCE), the third head of the Stoic school in the 3rd-century BCE.

Chrysippus's logic differed from Aristotle's  because it was based on the analysis of propositions rather than terms. The smallest unit in Stoic logic is an assertible. This was the Stoic equivalent for a proposition.

The assertible is the content of a statement such as "it is day". An assertible is “that which subsists in accordance with a rational impression.” Rational impressions are those alterations of the commanding faculty whose content can be exhibited in language.

The Stoics held that being (ὄντα) is material. Not all things (τινά) are. They accepted the distinction between abstract and concrete bodies, but rejected Aristotle's belief that purely incorporeal being exists as the Unmoved Mover.

The Stoics defined the Universe as a material, reasoning substance, known as God or Nature. This was divided into the active and passive classes.

They accepted the idea that if an object is hot, it is because some part of a universal heat body had entered the object.

Assertibles have a truth-value such that at any moment of time is either true or false. This looks like modern proposition theory, but propositions (axiômata) are one subspecies of Stoic assertibles.

It would be a mistake to assimilate this sub-class too closely to modern theories of propositions. Modern theories tend to treat propositions as untensed and time-indexed.

The statement “It’s warm  today” expresses the proposition that it is warm in a particular location at the time the statement is made. That’s different from the same statement with the use of those same words tomorrow.

If it is cold tomorrow and what is said by means of the words “It is warm today” is false, then the meaning of the proposition changed, not the truth content.

The sub-text that there is a temperature that indicates how warm or cold it is retains a constant relative value to the observation. The tenseless and time-indexed propositions allow variability in the measure of the truth value.

The modern proposition entertains the question, 'How warm is it?' or 'What is the temperature?' within the context of the statement.

Stoic axiômata are crucially different in this respect. The Stoic theory holds invariant the identity of the assertible corresponding to an utterance on different occasions, but allows its truth value to change.

Compound assertibles can be built up from simple ones through the use of logical connectives. The resulting syllogistic was grounded on five basic indemonstrable arguments to which all other syllogisms were claimed to be reducible.

Stoics outlined what we have control over categories of our own action, thoughts and reaction. The Enchiridion states that opinion, pursuit, desire, aversion and actions are under our control. Body, property, reputation, command and those actions that are not ours are not in our control.

The Stoics are especially known for teaching that "virtue is the only good" for human being. External things such as health, wealth and pleasure are not good or bad in themselves (adiaphora), but have value as "material for virtue to act upon".

Stoics such as Seneca and Epictetus emphasized that because "virtue is sufficient for happiness", a sage would be emotionally resilient to misfortune in a manner comparable to Job.

The belief that health and happiness were subordinate to virtue left the door open for excess in ascetic imposition. Seneca went so far as to recommend that parents cheer their children on for bravery when they were being beaten.

Seneca's position in the administration of Nero was suspect for the tolerance of the reports of assassination, violence and cruelty as something outside of our control even in terms of opinion.

Stoicism was esteemed more than the philosophy of Aristotle or Epicurus throughout the Roman world until the 3rd century CE. Emperor Marcus Aurelius was among its adherents. It experienced a decline after Christianity became the state religion in the 4th century. 

The Logic of Gottlob Frege

Gottlob Frege (1848—1925) played a crucial role in the emergence of modern logic and analytic philosophy. He was born on November 8, 1848 in the coastal city of Wismar in Northern Germany.

His father, Karl Alexander Frege, and his mother, Auguste (Bialloblotzsky) Frege, both worked at a girl's private school founded in part by Karl. Karl held the position until his death 1866, when Auguste took over until her death in 1878.

Gottlob studied at the Gymnasium in Wismar from 1864-1869.  He began studies at the University of Jena in the Spring of 1869. He studied chemistry, philosophy and mathematics. He transferred to the University of Göttingen after 4 semesters. He studied mathematics and physics, as well as philosophy of religion under Hermann Lotze.

Lotze’s main philosophical significance was as a contributor to an anti-Hegelian objectivist movement in German-speaking Europe. The publication of the first editions of his Metaphysics (1841) and Logic (1843) constituted the third wave of this movement.

Lotze advanced an objectivist philosophy that did not start from the subject-object opposition. He insisted that this opposition  is based on a metaphysical relation that is more fundamental. He promoted the “universal inner connection of all reality” by uniting all objects and terms in a comprehensive, ordered arrangement.

Humanity was the microcosm to the universe as the macrocosm. The fundamental metaphysical and logical problems of philosophy are to be discussed and answered through the lens of the microcosm. The specific perceptual and rational characteristics of human beings are the lens for wisdom.

Frege finished his doctoral dissertation, under the guidance of Ernst Schering in late 1873.  He received a lectureship at the University of Jena in 1874. He stayed there the rest of his intellectual life.

Concept Script (Begriffsschrift) was published as his first major work in logic in 1879. He presented his invention of a new method for the construction of a logical language.

The book was not well received. His contemporaries found its two-dimensional logical notation difficult to comprehend. They failed to see its advantages over previous approaches such as that of Boole.

The Foundations of Arithmetic was published in 1884. Frege refuted other theories of number and developed his own.


He wanted to show that all of the basic truths of arithmetic could be derived from purely logical axioms. He decided to describe his logicist views informally in ordinary language in argument against rival views on the advice of his colleague Carl Stumpf.

Frege objected to any account of mathematics based on psychologism. Math and numbers are not strictly relative to the subjective thoughts of the people who think of them. Psychological accounts appeal to what is subjective, while mathematics is objective.

Mathematical entities have objective properties regardless of whether or not they are recognized as such. He draws a fundamental distinction between logic and psychology. Logic explains things as they are. Psychology studies certain thought processes in individual minds.

He criticized Kant mainly on the grounds that numerical statements are not synthetic-a priori, but rather analytic. Kant claimed  that 7 + 5 = 12 is an unprovable synthetic statement. No matter how much the idea of 7 + 5 is analyzed, the idea of 12 will not be found. The idea of 12 is derived by application to objects in the intuition.

Frege argued that the truth of the equation can be derived without intuition. When 7 objects are added to 5, the total is 12. Mathematical calculation is consistent between smaller and larger numbers by way of analysis. Smaller sums are demonstrated with objects, until the pattern for addition is determined as a process that adds the numbers to obtain the sum.

The abstraction of addition moves from objects to units. A number line assists in the demonstration of the consistency between the two. Add 5 units to 7 on the number line and the addition results in 12. The capacity for mental math moves the abstraction further into the concept of numbers.

When this process is expressed in the general form, it means that any number of units added to a number of units results in the sum for the two numbers. That is to say a + b = c.

The truth of the equation 654,768 + 436,382 = 1,091,150 can be affirmed without the intuition of the numbers or the counting of objects.  Particular numerical statements such as 1 + 2 = 3 are distinct from general statements such as a + b = b + a, but the latter are as true as the former. The equation is the object for analysis in either case.

Frege criticized J. S. Mill's theory of number as too empirical. Mill's idea that numbers correspond to the various ways of splitting collections of objects into subcollections is inconsistent with confidence in calculations involving large numbers.

The operation of addition cannot be limited to physical quantities for the simple reason that large quantities won't be calculated if they can't be counted as physical objects. 

Frege agreed that geometry is synthetic a priori, but argued that arithmetic must be analytic. It is objective in between intuition and sense perception.

He argued that numbers are objects that assert something about a concept. Numbers are also the extensions of concepts. The number of F's' is defined as the extension of the concept G as a concept that is equinumerous to F. The concept in question leads to an equivalence class of all concepts that have the number F (including F).

The book can be considered the starting point in analytic philosophy, since it revolves mainly around the analysis of language with the goal of clarifying the concept of number.

Frege developed new and interesting theories regarding the nature of language, functions, concepts and philosophical logic in the late 1880's and early 1890's.  His views were published in influential articles such as "Funktion und Begriff" ("Function and Concept", 1891), "Über Sinn und Bedeutung" ("On Sense and Reference", 1892) and "Über Begriff und Gegenstand" ("On Concept and Object", 1892). 

Frege's logical ideas spread through the writings of his student Rudolf Carnap (1891–1970) and other admirers, particularly Bertrand Russell and Ludwig Wittgenstein (1889–1951).
He died on July 26, 1925 in Bad Kleinen, Germany.

Gottlob Frege
S. 哥德叶弗雷加
T. 哥德葉弗雷加

哥 Ge    older brother             哥 ka          big brother          Go   ごっ  ゴッ       Go 고 go                 
德 de    morality                     德 toku      morality                to     と      ト          teu 트 t                   
叶 xie   in harmony                葉  yo         leaf                       ro    ろ-   ロ-            lo  로 in               
弗 Fu    not                             弗  futsu     dollar                    bu    ぶ     ブ           beu브 bro       
雷 lei   terrific                        雷  rai         thunder                  Fu    ふ     フ           Peu프 f       
加 jia    add                             加  ka         add                        re     れ      レ           le  레  re
                                                                                                ga     が     ガ            ga 가   end

------------------------

Logic points to truth.
Science is the sleuth.

Number is a concept
that describes size inside the content.

Truth defines morality
with respect for health in reality.

=================


Peirce made extensive contributions to mathematical logic. He was an innovator in mathematics, statistics, philosophy, research methodology and various sciences, but he defined himself as a logician. He saw logic as the formal branch of semiotics or the study of signs.

The general study of signs that began in Latin with Augustine culminated with the 1632 Tractatus de Signis of John Poinsot. Peirce drew up a "new list of categories" in 1867. He aimed to base his list directly upon experience as constituted by the action of signs.

His list contrasted with the one in Aristotle's categories. Aristotle aimed to articulate within experience the dimension of being that is independent of experience and knowable as such through human comprehension. Peirce included animal life.

The estimative powers of animals interpret the environment as sensed to form a "meaningful world" of objects. The objects of this world are logically reduced to desirable (+), undesirable (--) or safe to ignore (0).

Peirce distinguished between the interpretant and the interpreter. The interpretant is the internal, mental representation that mediates between the object and its sign. The interpreter is the human who creates the interpretant.

The "interpretant" notion opened the way to understanding an action of signs beyond the realm of animal life. This was an advance over Latin Age semiotics.

The process of communication relies on the use of codes. A code may be the individual sounds or letters used to form words. Body movements are codified to show attitude or emotion. Clothing is also used to make a statement.

The community must agree on a simple meaning within the language. The word has to convey meaning within the grammatical structures and codes of the language. These codes regarding syntax in grammar, order in reason and the truth of opinion represent the values of the culture. They can add shades of connotation to any aspect of life.

Peirce wrote his paper "How to Make Our Ideas Clear" in 1878. The distinction between clear and obscure ideas is regarded as a property of modern logic.

"A clear idea is defined as one which is so apprehended that it will be recognized wherever it is met with, and so that no other will be mistaken for it. If it fails of this clearness, it is said to be obscure." (Text: How to Make Our Ideas Clear)

Clearness is qualifed as familiarity with an idea. A distinct idea is defined as one which contains nothing which is not clear. An idea is distinctly apprehended when a precise definition of it is applied in abstract terms.

Descartes challenged the practice of looking to established authority as the ultimate source of truth. The goddess had provided the young man with logic as the way to discern truth with the use of language in the poem of Parmenides of Elea. The young man had to explore things for himself.

Logic was a tool for investigation. The young man was given the ability to look at reality with his reason. He was not directed to form dependence upon the claims to authority in the statements that had been made by others.

Descartes made an error in the rejection of all that had been discovered by others. The test of dialectical examination allows for agreement with statements made by the authority of investigation.

He made the effort nonetheless to express agreement with the propositions made by others in terms of his personal expression.

Leibniz was more abstract in his logical reason. The clearness of his exposition lost something in general discerment of proximity to the personal perspective.

C.S. Peirce (1839-1914)
Popular Science: Logic