Origen's Life

Origen was born in 185 AD and died in 254 AD at the age of 69. He originally lived in Alexandria where his father was martyred during the Christian persecutions. Origen himself nearly cut his life short by trying to become a martyr with his father. He would visit the prisons to comfort those about to be killed, and stand by the roads to the execution saluting those who passed. Indeed, it is said that at one point his mother had to hide his clothes in order to stop Origen from going to his doom. Origen eventually took over the tutelage of Clement's old school, and taught religion and secular subjects for some time. Some time later, he decided to devote himself to the teachings of Christ and sold his entire library to give himself enough to live off of. Origen supposedly wrote thousands of works during his life of which only a few survive. He traveled to Caesarea and Italy several times, and it was on one of his trips to Caesarea that he ran into trouble. Having formerly been admonished for preaching without being a priest, Origen was accepted into the priesthood while in Caesarea. However, Demetrius who was at that time bishop of Alexandria was infuriated thinking that his authority over the Alexandrian priesthood had been compromised. He managed to have Origen forbidden from preaching in Alexandria ever again, and the somewhat disappointed Origen relocated to Caesarea where he spent the rest of his life.

The Great Library

The Great Library was first envisioned and begun by Ptolemy II who lived from 309 to 246 BC. Both its creator and his successors put an enormous amount of money and effort into building up the writings of the library. Indeed, all foreigners who entered Alexandria were required to give up any articles of text they had. The texts would be copied and then returned although often when an exceptionally good copy was made, the copy was returned in the stead of the original. Many stories have been told of the great lengths that the Ptolemies went to create their library. During the reign of Ptolemy III, the Athenians were convinced to send the original works of Aeschylus, Sophocles, and Euripides to Alexandria to be copied in exchange for a hostage sum of 15 talents, an enormous sum of money. Ptolemy III paid the Athenians the money, but failed to ever return the works. Eventually, the Great Library as it came to be known accumulated almost a million works. No other library came close to that amount for a millenium, and the Great Library became known as one of the wonders of the world.

Philo

Philo of Alexandria was born in 20 BC. He was a hellenized Jew who attempted to merge and reconcile the works of the Greek poets and philosophers with the Torah. Much of his work was greeted with skepticism by other Jews, but many Christians enthusiastically accepted his works and even considered him to be Christian at heart. His works touched on platonic, stoic, Neo-Pythagorean and even Heraclitean thought. Philo was also a meticulous analyst of the Jewish Torah. He believed that there are two meanings in the Holy Book. The first is for everyday use and is the literal translation of the words into one's life. However, more important than this is the allegorical interpretation of the real meaning behind the words. In many cases, Philo would disregard words in the Torah as being meant to be ignored. He usually justified his methods by showing a that all the parts to be cut out were in fact pointing to a deeper meaner as evidenced by anomalies in the actual original language. In 40 AD Philo was chosen by the Jews in Alexandria to represent them to the emperor Caligula in a dispute with the Greek community. A decade later in 50 AD he died.

Alexandrian Fathers Timeline

331 BC - Founding of Alexandria
150-211 AD - Clement of Alexandria
185-254 AD - Origen
251-356 AD - Saint Anthony the Great
293-373 AD - Pope Athanasius I of Alexandria
378-444 AD - Pope St. Cyril of Alexandria
641 AD - Arabs conquer Alexandria

Alexandria's History

Alexandria was founded by Alexander the Great in 331 BC on his whirlwind conquest of the Middle East. When the great conqueror died not too long afterwards, one of his greatest generals Ptolemy assumed control of Egypt. Under the rule of Ptolemy and his successors Alexandria prospered. The Great Library which came to be the greatest collection of writings in the ancient world and the Great Lighthouse, a wonder of the world, were built during this time. Eventually Alexandria and all its great wealth came under the influence and eventually rule of Rome. Alexandria was the jewel of the Roman Empire second only to Rome itself and became one of the five seats of a patriarch. As Christianity grew in size and influence Alexandria became one of its intellectual hubs. Many great Church Fathers lived and taught in Alexandria, and an equal number of heresies had their origin in the Egyptian city. A few of these figures such as Origen, Athanasius, and Arius had impact on the Christian community and as a result the Roman and Byzantine Empire for centuries. The city lost much of its influence when the Arabs defeated a weakened Byzantine Egypt and then moved their capital to Cairo.

Icons to Idols

In the fourth chapter of Clement's Exhortation to the Heathen, he tries to show that the statues and idols of the pagan religions are false. However, as he does this it seems to me that if one were unaware of what he was talking about, it could easily be mistaken that he is critiquing not just idols of the pagans, but also any image of a deity which could be extended to the icons which are revered by both Catholics and Orthodox Christians to this day.

Strange Quotations

I have been reading Clement of Alexandria's Exhortation to the Heathen for my Alexandrian Christianity class. It seems to me that in several places during Clement's tirade against "heathen" religion, he contradicts himself. Throughout his arguments Clement uses quotes from renowned pagan authors, but he seems to just as often support his arguments with a quote from either the Hebrew Torah or books out of the New Testament.

...These are the slippery and hurtful deviations from the truth which draw man down from heaven, and cast him into the abyss. I wish to show thoroughly what like these gods of yours are, that now at length you may abandon your delusion, and speed your flight back to heaven. “For we also were once children of wrath, even as others; but God, being rich in mercy, for the great love wherewith He loved us, when we were now dead in trespasses, quickened us together with Christ.” Eph. ii. 3–5....

I find it strange at least from a logical perspective that someone would use a quotation from their religion in order to convince another that their religion is false. I believe in most cases it would be a worthless attempt at conversion as a result. If I were to tell someone that their religion was evil because my holy book said so, I do believe that I would have harmed my own case. The only way I can see for a master rhetorician like Clement to extricate himself from the situation he has caused for himself, is by a change of audience.

Instead of speaking to the heathen, Clement should of said he was speaking to the philosophers. By the time Clement wrote his exhortation, most of the myths and stories behind the Greek or Roman gods were throughly unsatisfying to educated men. As a result, many of these may have been more open minded and eager to learn of another path. If his audience are these, then instead of trying to strengthen his arguments against paganism, Clement is attempting to lend credibility to the Bible. By first agreeing with the qualms of these philosophers and educated men, and then showing that the Bible also disapproves of such obvious falsehood, Clement achieves his goal.

Nuclear Pulse Propulsion

Recently, I heard of something called nuclear pulse propulsion. It began with Project Orion in the 1950s. The idea was to use nuclear explosions to propel a spacecraft. In order to channel the immense amount of power from the explosions to the ship, a large plate would shield the ship from the explosion and by means of shock absorbers protect the crew and transmit the energy to forward motion.

The main assets of the plan were its ease of enactment and effectiveness. The design allowed known materials, namely steel and nuclear technology, to be used while still being able to power a massive ship over long distances far faster than any technology we have now even 50 years later. Its specific impulse or fuel efficiency (space travel’s equivalent of “miles per gallon”) is estimated to be anywhere between 12 and 200 times that of NASA’s space shuttles, and a journey to Mars now estimated to take 12 months would take four weeks. In addition, the spaceship could weigh thousands of tons and still lift off.

Technical problems include devising an appropriate shock absorber and providing enough radiation shielding for the crew, but just as solutions for these were found in the 1960’s the project was cancelled due to two main factors. First, the Partial Test Ban Treaty between the US and Soviet Union made the Orion Project illegal, and second, the fallout effects from the nuclear pulses as a result of a launch inside the magnetosphere would kill several people. While no longer a viable option for space travel in the near future, nuclear pulse propulsion with its potential to create a constructive use for the thousands of nuclear bombs that have been made, and its effectiveness as a space design, is a technology which deserves a second look.

Neighborhood WiFi

If your neighborhood is anything like mine, every household has its own wireless network. When I search for nearby networks with my ten-dollar antenna hooked up to my PC, I can see up to 5 networks from the nearby houses. Currently each of these households pay the internet company for their own pipe to the internet. I propose that we hook our individual wireless networks together in order to make one larger network. Since not every house would use all of their internet capacity at the same time, we could get rid of several pipes thereby decreasing the amount of money necessary to give internet access to all the homes. While each house would still need a WiFi hub, the overall internet cost for the entire neighborhood would decrease. For example, if the five networks that I can see were to merge into a single network, it would be possible for the five of us to share three network connections and slash the costs of the other two.

The obvious advantage to this is the reduction in cost of internet access for our neighborhood. There are a few technical issues to work out such as the actual meshing of the individual networks into one. In addition, freeloaders also become a problem. The freeloader problem has an easy solution. A password on the network is the normal course that public WiFi hubs use. The more pressing issue is the actual consolidating of the networks and deciding how the remaining internet dues will be paid. The homeowner’s association in my neighborhood could implement such a system.

The Hand

Some time ago, when my father was barely older than I am now, he lived in Barcelona, Spain. One of his favorite pastimes was art. This painting, by him, is entitled "The Hand." It was painted in 1980. My dad's strange sense of color stems from his color blindness.

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"The Hand"

It was dark. I couldn't see anything but the stars in sky and no moon was present. I looked down at my hand. Several small figures stood there. They were as confused as I was with looks of bewilderment at this strange landscape they found themselves in. Slowly they began to realize that they were far above the ground and panic began to set in. To quell their shouts and fears I spoke softly to them telling them that they would be all right and to be unafraid. Understandably they were even more frightened when they realized that a giant far greater than any of them was holding them in the palm of his hand.

It was all right though. As time passed their cries of distress gradually subsided as I neither moved nor gave any sign of being hostile. Slowly they started to ask me questions about where they were and who I was. I smiled and told them that I had no idea, but they need not worry as I would not harm them. They began to talk amongst themselves learning each other's names.

Suddenly, I felt something was very wrong. I looked up and around me on the barren landscape that we were on. Nothing seemed out of place, so I decided to take a look around. Then I found it. As a stepped forward, I found myself unable to move my feet. I tripped. At the last moment I lifted up the hand with the Little Ones so as to shield them from the impact of my fall, but there was no impact. As I hit the ground my hand sank into it, cushioning the blow. Strange, I thought, and looked down at my knees and feet. To my horror, I realized that they had melted several inches into the ground.

The Little Ones picked themselves up and once they realized what had happened asked me if I was all right. I told them of my predicament. At first they were suspicious of me again, but when they looked and saw the truth, the suspicion gave way to fear.

Several minutes passed. Tears came to my eyes, now sunken beneath the earth. I was still sinking and soon would not have the strength to keep my hand up. The Little Ones were still safe, but I had lost my ability to breathe some time ago. In the few minutes I had known them, I had become quite fond of the Little Ones, but now it seemed our time together was over. My body began tingling like it was fading away. Suddenly the figures on my hand stopped moving for a second. I felt them begin to sink, but not into the earth as I had. Rather they were falling into my hand! The very hand that sought to save them. In a panic I tried to shake my hand, desperate to stop the process, but I found myself unable to move. They began to climb onto my fingers which thankfully remained whole and solid. But many were already stuck in the mire as I had been.

I begin to black out. I'm sorry my Little Ones, I tried my best to save you.