Perhaps it seems that way because N's assessment was Dionysian and not as Apollionian as S's assessment.
6 hours ago — 180 Proof

There's very little of the mad god Dionysus in Stoicism, it's true.

Schopenhauer's assessment of Stoicism was more profound than that of Nietzsche.

Does life have any potential to be anything beyond suffering, — Arnie

Nope. It's suffering, alright. All of it. Every last bit. Suffer, suffer suffer. Sufferin' succotash, as Sylvester the cat would say. In saecula saeculorum..

Or you might agree with Epictetus and conclude that we're not disturbed by things, but by the view we take of them, and act accordingly.

The dreams coming true happens only in the movies and fictions. Waking up from the dreams into the cold reality is what happens in real world. — Corvus

If you'd like to see a movie which might wake you up from the American Dream, I think There Will Be Blood should do the trick.

Well, I like to take advantage of any excuse to quote Warren Zevon:

"You can dream the American Dream,
But you sleep with the lights on
And wake up with a scream,
You can hope against hope
That nothing will change,
Grab ahold of that fistful of rain."

Well, it may sound ridiculous, but who's to say that a god wouldn't punish the theists? — Scarecow

Hardly ridiculous. You must know that gods of all sorts routinely punish those who believe in them. It's part of the job.

It strikes me that your metaphor doesn't work, perhaps because those you mention in your post don't seem to be "idols" as usually defined, except perhaps Pythagoras, who was revered by his followers in ancient times much as Epicurus was by those who followed him. But Pythagoras wasn't revered for his theorem, which is what you seem to focus on in his case.

Regardless, where idols are concerned, if they are being considered, why have them at at all?

Nonetheless, if sin is in fact some act (or thought) contrary to the will of God, then it’s impossible for me (and for most people, I’d argue) to KNOWINGLY sin. — Art48

Stop boasting. You've just committed the sin of pride, one of the seven deadly sins. Besides, you'll sin regardless of whether you do so knowingly.

You don't have to knowingly sin to be sinful. You're tainted with the proclivity to sin by virtue of being born. You're going to sin whether you know it or not; just as you'll die whether you want to or not.

What makes you think God must reveal his will to you, by the way, before you can sin? Are you Moses, to be favored with a divine revelation? Might not God's will be made manifest without the need for a visitation?

Just limit it to critical thinking. Even that will cause problems with parents in our Great Republic. As for the rest, critical thinking will serve them better than a historical survey of philosophy. They can do that kind of reading on their own, if they want.

I read it, but elaborate justifications of totalitarianism don't appeal to me.

I must admit this isn't something that I've had the opportunity to consider.

Consider the words of H.L. Mencken "The Sage of Baltimore":

The whole aim of practical politics is to keep the populace alarmed (and hence clamorous to be led to safety) by menacing it with an endless series of hobgoblins, all of them imaginary.

Mencken was a great critic of American democracy, such as it was in his time, and still is. He was a prescient man, who also wrote:

As democracy is perfected, the office of president represents, more and more closely, the inner soul of the people. On some great and glorious day the plain folks of the land will reach their heart’s desire at last and the White House will be adorned by a downright moron.

Abrahamic religions are essentially exclusive and intolerant. It's not possible to reason with those who believe they already know
— Ciceronianus

I am not disagreeing. However, doesn't this apply, even if to varying degrees to: Communists, Capitalists, Racial Supremacists, Certain groups of Academics and Scholars, etc. Note also that while historically, the same might not have applied to "Hinduism," but the Hinduism of Modi? — ENOAH

It would depend, I suppose, on whether they maintain that what they believe or know was revealed to them by something equivalent by to the one, true, all-knowing God who created the universe.

Ah well. I'm just a lawyer who reads a lot, but I have a blog as well.

Ironically, this is an image of God that is often criticized by the Patristics, some of the big Medieval Latin theologians, and many contemporary Catholic philosophers. The Catholic philosophy space is quite vibrant, and so it's always surprising to me how this doesn't seem to trickle down into the lower levels of religious education. — Count Timothy von Icarus

I know little of the Patristics, though they seem interesting. Christianity, I think, has always had difficulty trying to incorporate pagan philosophy into its doctrine. The effort to do so began, I believe, when the early Christians tried to answer the criticisms of such as Porphyry and Celsus. I think a great part of the difficulty was due to the insistence that Jesus was not only divine, but "one in being with the Father." The more that one claims that God is "the god of the philosophers" the less it's possible to accept Jesus as God, and also that he is the God of the Old Testament.

I was raised Catholic. My experience of the One Holy Catholic and Apostolic Church is similar to that of 180 Proof, though my time in Catholic schools was limited to 10 years. I feel rather nostalgic about the Church of my youth. It's an aesthetic fondness related to the ritual and appearance of its ceremony and the physical churches themselves. That was before the Church became bland, at least here in the U.S.

The Church and Christianity in general was and I think still is a remarkable and fascinating hodgepodge of certain ancient pagan philosophical and religious beliefs and Judaism, but I stopped being a believer long ago. I find it hard to believe in any transcendent, creator God, and especially the personal, hectoring, demanding and strangely needy sky-gods of the kind that are worshipped in the West. I find the ancient Stoic view of God compelling--an immanent God which is immersed in Nature, and the active, creative essence of the universe.

I do think you might endear yourself to an Orthodox Jew though with your insistence that the laws are immutable and unchanged since the day Moses walked off the mountain, as historically inaccurate as that might be. I — Hanover

I wasn't aware the Ten Commandments had changed. What do they say now? Or have they added more, to make up for the five which were lost when Moses dropped the third tablet, according to Mel Brooks?

It is no coincidence that our own modern system has similarities to that. We have a document (i.e. the Constitution) that we hold out as holy, we appoint special priests to interpret it, and we alter and form its meaning around daily disputes. You don't need to change the text of the Constitution to change the meaning and religions do the same with their documents. I suppose in most secular systems you have a mechanism to change the text of the law and perhaps you have the same in certain religious systems (for example the Mormon President's ability to decree law) or you have workarounds (like Papal infallibility allowing the text to mean whatever he says by definition). — Hanover

I think we agree on many things, but I don't think this analogy works. I know next to nothing about Mormon doctrine, and know enough about Catholic doctrine to understand that papal authority to state or make infallible pronouncements is limited and has been very rarely exercised, but the Constitution itself provides it can be amended and describes how that may be done. It would be as if the Ten Commandments stated that they may be altered provided appropriate steps were followed.

It is strange to note the execution of Christians, and then claim that the Christians were executed because they were intolerant, not being willing to venerate pagan gods. "We had to kill them because they intolerantly refused to worship our god and/or emperor." This argument will always fail for a modern mind. It would be like saying, "We had to burn the heretic at the stake because they intolerantly refused to accept Christian dogma." This is backwards. — Leontiskos

.

The followers of pagan gods didn't take the position taken by Jews and Christians regarding God or religion. A pagan didn't claim that the god they were worshipping at any particular time was the only god, nor did they believe that all must worship that god and no other. That wouldn't occur to a pagan, nor was it the position of the Empire in pagan times.

Christians wouldn't tolerate any god but their own. That's the intolerance I refer to, and is what led the Christian Roman Empire to forbid all pagan worship, and led Christians to kill Hypatia and others, destroy pagan temples, etc.

Thank you. That's a significant point.

Where does your virtue of tolerance come from? The American Revolution? The French? Romanticism? The Enlightenment? The humanist revival? Christendom? The Roman Empire? Greek philosophy? The Hebrew scriptures? — Leontiskos

Specifically as to a comparison with the Abrahamic religions, I refer to the tolerance of other religious traditions in the ancient Mediterranean before and while Christians began stamping them out. Members of the Mithras cult, or that of Isis or Cybele, for example, weren't prohibited from worshipping other gods or becoming initiates of other mysteries. Rome was generally tolerant of all forms of worship provided they weren't believed to be a danger to its rule. It didn't require that all people within its empire worship Jupiter Optimus Maximus. Jews were considered peculiar, but were allowed to worship their peevish god and avoid the homage demanded by the Roman state as they wished until they revolted against Roman rule and were ruthlessly repressed or exterminated.

The so-called persecutions of Christians have been wildly exaggerated, and were in response to actions, or we might say omissions, of believers deemed to be threats and a rejection of the Roman state, e.g. the refusal of military service or refusal to make an offering generally in form of incense to the well-being of Rome or the reigning Emperor, a problem pagan believers didn't have as they weren't intolerant

Religious debate doesn't lead to absolute rules. Much is debated and remains debated. Rules are also subject to change.

But you know this, so I don't know why you say otherwise. — Hanover

What about the rule you shall have no other god before God, or, for that matter, the other rules described, significantly, as "The Ten Commandments"? Are all of those subject to change? There may be varying interpretations of some of them (that "graven images" bit may have made some uncomfortable, and be considered to apply only to certain images, for example). Some may be ignored to suit our purposes, as in the case of the ones that say we shall not kill, or commit adultery. But the rules remain, don't they? It's one of the "rules" of the Abrahamic religions, I think, that the rules they impose may merely be given lip service when they become inconvenient, but they don't change.

That is, of course most religions consider themselves correct, but so do you. — Hanover

Well, it's not quite the same thing. What religions consider correct are different from what I consider correct. Religions may maintain it's correct, e.g., that God exists, that God has certain characteristics, that God should be worshipped in a particular way, that other Gods don't exist, that God wants us to believe in him, that God wants us to behave in a particular way, that if we don't do so we sin and are subject to punishment.

What I consider correct is somewhat less imposing and absolute. And even subject to change.

The right fears godless rule while the left fears godful rule. — Hanover

Which seems to make the what right wants good and what the left wants bad doesn't it? What could be bad about godful rule, and good about godless rule?

genealogy of modern tolerance — Leontiskos

I'm uncertain what you mean by this.

This is quite the broad statement, describing the essence of all Abrahamic religions, from Shia Muslims, to Mormons, to Church of Christ, to Reconstructionist Jews and so on. — Hanover

I suppose those sects, if the recognize Abraham as a prophet and believe in the Covenant, would be Abrahamic, but don't know enough about them to say whether they are or not. I suppose it's possible that they don't teach they are "the way, the truth and the life", but understand that traditional Judaism, Christianity and Islam do.

Is there a problem with God of Abraham religions that we might resolve with reason? — Athena

I doubt it. The Abrahamic religions are essentially exclusive and intolerant. It's not possible to reason with those who believe they already know what there is to know because their God has told them so (a felicitous bit of rhyming, if I don't say so myself).

Not Brazilian, no. But all too aware of the conceit of many of my countrymen in the USA.

Just a matter of time until we start seeing it here in God's Favorite Country.

Sport fencing is odd, not at all like traditional fencing is thought to be. There are some clubs, though, that teach traditional European martial arts with swords, including sabres.

I participated in some tournaments. Unfortunately, the rules are such that that the typical bout, particularly in sabre fencing, consists of two rushing each other and a single clash of swords--no swordplay, no parry and riposte, except now and then. Speed is all important; very little skill.

I tried Googling "swordswomen" and a bunch of anime characters was the result. Even so, it seems Hungary's women's team won the sabre fencing championships in 2022.

Attila was one of the great figures of the late Roman Empire in the West; Flagellum Dei (the Scourge of God). I'm not familiar with the poet.

I've heard great things about Budapest and would love to visit. When I was younger, I fenced using the sabre, recreationally. Hungarians are legendary swordsmen, especially with the sabre (swordswomen as well, no doubt).

You certainly shouldn't be mocked for being from Spain, and I didn't intend to do so. I hope to return there, as I only spent a brief time in Barcelona, and there is much I'd like to see.

The fact I think that Spain is "no better generally" than most other nations doesn't mean I think it worse than other nations. Most nations are no better generally than others.

I'm not aware of any nation which hasn't had dark periods in their history.

I'm not sure what you mean about Goya. In his time, Spain was made a battleground by France and England acting in their own interests. That "dark period" was imposed on Spain by other nations.

You shouldn't assume my aversion to the conquest and subjugation of indigenous people means I'm adverse to all nations (which includes my own) who engaged in that practice.

Oh yes! You are very fond of my country! How can I think otherwise? — javi2541997

A person can't be fond of Spain unless also fond of bullfighting and adverse to poking fun at a Genoese? You surprise me. I suppose admiration for such as El Greco, Velasquez, Goya, Picasso, Cervantes, Santayana, Las Cases, and Ortega y Gasset (sometimes)--not to mention the famous Romans born in Spain, like Seneca, Trajan (optimus princeps) and Hadrian--doesn't quite match up to enthusiastic attendance at la corrida.

Neither was I, frankly. But "Google" Rome and Iron Age and there it is.

Sorry. I had in mind the so-called Roman Iron Age, which it seems is believed to have taken place between 1-400 AD or CE.

Sidenote, if you are referring to Roman aqueducts and concrete, those were from after the Iron Age, which ended in the 7th century — Lionino

I disagree. The first aqueduct was the Aqua Appia, erected in 312 BCE. Others were built during the Roman Republic, third to first century BCE. Roman concrete was available during the Republic as well. The most impressive use of it, in my opinion, was in the construction of the Pantheon during the reign of Hadrian in the second century CE.

I suppose no answer is a kind of answer, though a poor one.

As I say, I'm a man of the West, but we shouldn't limit ourselves. Here's what another Spaniard said:

Non sum uni angulo natus, patria mea totus hic mundus est (Seneca, Epistles 28.4)

Things were in such a mess during the creation of Christianity it's hard to tell what was going on.

There was the conflict between Paul of Tarsus and James the Just; other miracle workers and holy men were wandering about, like Apollonius of Tyana, who was said to have ascended into heaven; the Gospels conflict in several respects, most problematically for traditional Christians in the case of Jesus saying the kingdom of heaven shall come within the lifetimes of those listening to him (Luke); the similarity between Christian sacraments and those of other religions. The early Church Fathers claimed that devils inspired the communion meal engaged in by members of the cult of Mithras because they knew Christianity would have the same sacrament. Then there was the dispute between the followers of Arian and Athanasius, regarding whether Jesus was of the same substance as the Father, and other early versions of Christianity like Christian Gnosticism and Montanism and Marcionism (later declared heresies). And the heresies kept coming.

It's fascinating, but a god-awful mess.