History: Fiction or Science? (Chronology, No. 1)

Book Description

Recorded history is a finely-woven magic fabric of intricate lies about events predating the sixteenth century. There is not a single piece of evidence that can be reliably and independently traced back earlier than the eleventh century. This book details events that are substantiated by hard facts and logic, and validated by new astronomical research and statistical analysis of ancient sources.

Customer Reviews:

Calculations are only as good as your numbers.......2007-08-03

Yes, we can all agree that mainstream history is nearly 100% BS due to politics, economics, ego, problems with dating techniques, and various conspiracies. Agreed. But, I've been researching the distinct possibility that human history (in terms of civilizations) are much more ancient than we've been told, so coming across this book was very interesting to me. I wondered how Fomenko could be wrong (if at all) because he is very persuasive in his presentations. Then it dawned on me. If at previous times in prehistory, due to the various catastrophies that are well documented (comets, asteroids, planetary disruptions, plasma discharge, pole reversals, etc) the Earth was in a different position in relation to the sun, different tilt on its axis, different orbit, different rotation (in terms of velocity and DIRECTION), and the continents were in different positions, then would this not cause the ancients to see the sky (constellations) differently? In other words, is Fomenko making erronious assumptions about the physics of the Earth in pre-history, which then corrupt his data with regards to dating the relevant astrology? The last event to seriously disrupt our planet occured roughly 3500 years ago, according to other good researchers, so is it possible Fomenko has been confused by this? The vastly different physics of our planet in the not so distant past may explain this confusion, which is not to say the "mainstream" version of history is correct; on the contrary. I am not an expert in these fields, but wanted to see if this idea could spark discussion.

Pants on fire?.......2007-07-19

Will people ever read before spamming? Yes, Jesuits could not rewrite world history alone, they had help. Anyway, Dr Prof Acad A.Fomenko does not point to jesuits as the driving force of world wide history manipulation in published volumes 1,2,3;, actually he barely mentions the poor devils. Check it with 'Search inside' feature, please. China is rarely mentioned either, in fact, Dr Fomenko is completely eurocentric. Right, his theory contradicts all mainstream schools of history, because in their actual state they are all built on blatantly erroneus chronology. You don't need a mysterious cabal (conspiracy) to falsify history, the falsification is its modus operandi. It is inherent to history(ians) to falsify (distort) events, as it is inherent to humans to boast as it is inherent to power (authority) to legimize itself by referrring to glorious past made to its own order. Dr Prof Fomenko and team have identified scores of instances of such manipulation in Russian, European, etc.. history, and delivered valid statistical proof thereof. His own 'reconstruction' is completely another story. Forget c14 as a valid method of dating. W.Libby has initially discovered a brilliant method of INDEPENDENT dating. Too bad, c14 method has become a joke after a forced marrige with dendrochronology with consensual chronological scale inbuilt. Radiocarbon method can't stand blind tests, but is so very productive as a rubberstamp.

Accepted History & Chronology Must Be Changed. .......2007-04-09

There is no doubt that history as most know it is a sham, & institution's version of History both University & Church is fradulent & inaccurate. Everything was established with an agenda, The real "Dark Ages" are now when we have access to incredible amounts of information past authorities & more important 'common folk' didn't have but our institutions & educators are slow to evolve because of what has ignorantly & arrogantly been taught for too long. This is on many subjects not just Chronology.

For anyone to question "Why would a Mathematician have anything credible to say of History?" The answer is from Dr. Fomenko's preface in the book: "It would be worthwhile to remind the reader that in the XVI-XVII century Chronology was considered to be a subdivision of Mathematics." These volumes could possibly be some of the most important works to date & should be read by everyone with an interest in History, especially professors & educators who have a duty to the public. I have read both books & must say that 'Chronology 1' has some very eye opening & revolutionary information. Even if these volumes are part true the implications are profound & opens the doors to further investigations & questions which must be done. I speak several different lanquages & must say the logic Dr. Fomenko uses with "inflection" of words & words being read from left to right in one region & right to left in another then written backwards, the removal of vowels & get down to basics of words, or different cities & locations having the same name etc. is correct. Vowel usage has always been optional & varied, actually complicating linquistics & study. The first thing one has to understand is that words never had a fixed spelling in history like we do now, the spelling of words was mutable & regional, as well as names & titles of people were vast, varied & changed, NOTHING WAS FIXED or understood linear. Matters of Life & Death as well as financial profiteering yesterday & today were & are made with ignorant, illogical & conspiratorial views of history & reality, it's time people get closer to the Truth & society collectively grow up.

Very Interesting.......2007-03-07

It is a good proposal and I believe it will mature into something even better in the future. I think it deserves to be read.

History as Science Fiction.......2007-01-10

Anatoly Fomenko has written a very intriguing book, full of pictures, charts, and computer 'proof' of his thesis: backwards of AD900 we don't really know what happened or when. Between AD900 and AD1600 there is more certainty, but there is still a lot of fuzzy ground, and things don't get reliable until we get past the 1600's where the printing press made it very difficult for the perpetrators of this timeline manipulation to change anything that had been committed to print. The Dark Ages did not happen. Books were burned for a reason. One organization has doubled the actual length of its existence by expanding the real chronology. Read why.

I had always wondered why Christ died about AD33 and yet men waited until the 11th century to form the Knights Templar, the Cathars, etc and go after the Holy Land by force. Why the 1000 year gap? Turns out there wasn't more than a 10-12 year gap and he proves it using astronomy. This also implies that the planet is not as old as we have been told, and current Christian and other creationist scientists are already championing that idea without being aware of Fomenko's book. The two groups, creationist scientists and the Russian mathematical analysts corroborate each other. Fascinating.

Of course, all this flies in the face of what we have been told traditionally is the 'proper' chronology of western civilization, and most readers will experience 'cognitive dissonance' in reading this book. It means that our history going backwards from AD1600 becomes progressively more incorrect and unreliable until it cannot be trusted at all... in the space of 700-800 years.

Naturally, the curious, open-minded reader will want to know WHO did this, WHY, and did any of the events we think of as really ancient ever happen?
Dr. Fomenko is a respected scientist/mathematician at Moscow State University who has already answered these questions to the satisfaction of his initially skeptical colleagues. Most of them are now believers, a few still refuse to believe (the usual diehards), and of course the western press has ignored Fomenko's work -- for obvious reasons when you read the book. The ones who perpetrated this chronology ruse have a lot to answer for. They are still with us. That's why this book is a well-kept secret.

I gave the book a 4-star rating because I was unable to check out some of his claims; those I checked were as he said. But if even 1/3 of his claims are true, this punches a big hole in what we think is our history, the meaning of western civilization, our educational process (for repeating the ruse as gospel), and the trustworthiness of the organization that perpetrated this ruse, well-intentioned or not.

This book relates to current research into a Young Earth paradigm, to John Keel's discoveries about our planet, and Fr Malachi Martin's insights (in his now out-of-print books). We are indeed sheep who are manipulated and kept ignorant -- for a reason. While knowing what these men have to say may be the "booby prize" (as in: 'what can you do with this knowledge?'), it will provide interesting reading. Didn't someone say: "...and the Truth will set you free."?? For you to judge if this book contains the truth.

The Last Days of Henry VIII: Conspiracies, Treason and Heresy at the Court of the Dying Tyrant

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Misleading Title - Worst book ever on Henry VIII
Henry's illness has a name ,but is it necessary?
Henry the Horrible
Not your average 16th century monarch.
Tyranny and terror

The Last Days of Henry VIII: Conspiracies, Treason and Heresy at the Court of the Dying Tyrant
Robert Hutchinson
Manufacturer: William Morrow
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover

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ASIN: 0060837330
Release Date: 2005-09-20

Book Description

A blazing narrative history that boldly captures the end of England's most despotic ruler and his court -- a time of murderous conspiracies, terrifying betrayals, and sordid intrigue

Henry VIII's crimes against his wives are well documented and have become historical lore. But much less attention has been paid to his monarchy, especially the closing years of his reign.

Rich with information including details from new archival material and written with the nail-biting suspense of a modern thriller, The Last Days of Henry VIII offers a superb fresh look at this fascinating figure and new insight into an intriguing chapter in history.

Robert Hutchinson paints a brilliant portrait of this egotistical tyrant who governed with a ruthlessness that rivals that of modern dictators; a monarch who had "no respect or fear of anyone in this world," according to the Spanish ambassador to his court. Henry VIII pioneered the modern "show trial": cynical propaganda exercises in which the victims were condemned before the proceedings even opened, proving the most powerful men in the land could be brought down overnight.

After thirty-five years in power, Henry was a bloated, hideously obese, black-humored old recluse. And despite his having had six wives, the Tudor dynasty rested on the slight shoulders of his only male heir, the nine-year-old Prince Edward -- a situation that spurred rival factions into a deadly conflict to control the throne.

The Last Days of Henry VIII is a gripping and compelling history as fascinating and remarkable as its subject.

Customer Reviews:

Misleading Title - Worst book ever on Henry VIII.......2007-02-08

This book was extremely disappointing, especially for a person well read in Tudor History. The title is very misleading. I thought this book would examine in depth the final years of Henry's reign. Theses final years were full of scandal, intrigue and death but the book read like a summary of his whole reign. There are plenty of other books that do this and do it better (Alison Weir for example). It's pages and pages of he said, she said quotes followed by summaries of crucial events that surely deserve more description. If you are looking for a thorough historical analysis of the final years of Henry, save your money.

Henry's illness has a name ,but is it necessary?.......2006-11-17

at last someone has ventured to give Henry's insanity a medical label,Cushings Syndrome,which encompasses alot of pathologies,from alcoholism to an uncontrollable desire to kill your advisors,even one's wife,not to mention obesity and including that overstuffed gassy feeling.This is not to mention the numerous diseases and frequent out break of plaque that Henry would be susceptible to,although he had a place to flee to get some fresh air.Hutchinson proclaims Henry,the English Nero,(maybe even Caligula),that's why British actors play degenerated Romans and Greeks so well in the movies.The history of the British Monarchy is so loaded with these sociopaths,that you can be a lunatic on the stage,and seeing as you're wearing a toga or centurian outfit,noone suspects that you're actually playing an English Monarch.The scholarship for this book is so thorough i well deserve a lashing for even attempting to review it.With the wars of the roses over and nothing left to war over but a few acres of land in Europe here and there,it's was time for henry to tackle the final frontier that being correct religious and political thought as seen through the eyes of Cushings Syndrome,(and alot of other mysterious symptoms).shakespeare sums it up well in Richard the third."our arms and battlements hung up" replaced by the lovers couch and the lute.Better hope that the you didn't design the couch when Henry's bulk and constipated flatulence renders it in pieces.You won't be able to put this book down.If henry had caught you reading this book in 1540,"no comment"!!!What a shame that Henry's unrivalled military skills and courage are sometimes overshadowed by the bad treatment he gave his wives.

Henry the Horrible.......2006-09-25

If you're a Tudor buff, you'll love this book even though it portrays Henry VIII as a monster. Hutchinson believes that Henry was responsible for some 150,000 deaths. Towards the end of his life he was so viciously unpredictable his courtiers must have been in constant fear that they would go next to the block. His severe illness pushed him over the brink of any sense of fair play or decency. He was always a tyrant, however.

What was Henry's illness? There's been 400 years of speculation.
Hutchinson believes along with others including the surgeon Clifford Brewer's "The Death of Kings" (available at Amazon)that Henry did not have syphilis, but varicose ulcers on his legs. Both legs. Syphilis was treated in those days with mercury, and since hundreds of potions Henry was given by his doctors are recorded, mercury would most certainly have been administered. Also, none of Henry's wives or children showed any sign of congenital syphilis. Anyway, when the ulcers healed over,infections resulted underneath the skin, and very likely spread into the bones. The king's physical sufferings played a large role in shaping his behavior towards the end of his life.

Here is one Hutchinson's descriptions of Henry's awful disease: "He is the personification of geriatric decay. One can almost smell the the putrid stench of the rank pus oozing from his ulcers, staining the bandages on his swollen legs. Chapuys [the Spanish ambassador] labelled them 'the worst legs in the world.'"

Henry weighed, according to Hutchinson, 28 stone or 392 pounds. His waist was 54 inches around. Many suits of Henry's armor survive, so his physical proportions are easy to calculate. His gluttony contributed to his health problems, so his obesity and his ulcers did him in at age 55, and just before his death he lost the power of speech, finally sinking into a uremic coma.

"The Last Days of Henry VIII" goes into great detail about the state of England towards the end of Henry's life, but my interests lie in character portrayal. Edward VI, Henry's only son, is described as a boy of unattractive "prissiness". The stupidity of Kathryn Howard, Henry's fifth wife, in cuckolding the king right under his nose, is discussed. Anne of Cleves emerges as "no fool, behind her pock-marked face". Interestingly, Anne and Henry's daughter, Mary, became fast friends. They died at the same age, 42, one year apart. The Duke of Norfolk emerges as a coward and hypocrite. The power behind the throne towards the end of Henry's life was Sir Anthony Denny, a man I had never heard of. Sir Anthony was Chief Gentleman of the Privy Chamber and controlled all access to the monarch and managed all of Henry's finances.The power behind the throne.All of these character studies, along with many more, are what interest me the most in the book.

There's an especiially interesting plate in the book, in black and white, of Mary, painted in 1536 by Holbein when Mary was twenty years old. Mary looks like a woman of forty, her face shadowed with fatigue, her thin lips rigid and uncompromising. Facing the page of Mary is the superb portait of Elizabeth when she was 13. It's very odd, but Mary and ELizabeth facing eachother, look astoundingly alike even though Elizabeth is fresh-faced and young.In real life, the sisters did not resemble eachother and yet these two portraits, side by side, are food for thought. It's a bit eerie!

The tangled web of conspiracies and heresies and treason are brought forth in the book to great effect, including character studies and influence of the clergymen Cranmer and Gardiner. Henry VIII was responsible for many burnings at the stake of people from all walks of life. As his illness became more incapacitating, the more ruthless Henry became so that in the end, he died a lonely old man with no friends. And horribly, it was rumored that Henry's immense coffin burst a seam and issued forth a stream of corrupted matter. A dog was caught trying to lap up the blood, like the dogs who lapped up the blood of Ahab. The story may be apocryphal, of course, but maybe not.

To get a real gut feeling for the times of Henry VIII "The Last Days" is recommended.

Not your average 16th century monarch. .......2006-02-03

I commenced this book with the view that perhaps Henry VIII was no worse than your average black-hearted monarch of the Middle Ages; that view went up in smoke in the first 50 pages of this fascinating book. Hutchinson has researched well for this book and the bibliography is full of reference to primary documents and quotes at length from them.

In some ways Henry was no worse than some of his scheming, ruthless and murderous Councilors and Government officials, but he bested them all with his acutely developed sense of low cunning, deviousness and intelligence. The book offers a brilliant cross section of the personalities and the dynamics of the rulers and some of the would-be rulers during the last years of Henry's reign.

Henry was a very sick man for the last few years of his life and in great pain and this made him a very dangerous person to be around with his power of life and death over his subjects. His natural qualities of selfishness, ruthlessness and cruelty became even more pronounced as he sunk deeper into pain and ill health and edged towards death.

Hutchinson gives a very good analysis of the effects in England of Henry VIII's break with the Roman Catholic Church and the consequences, some fatal, for his subjects as they tried to deal with the aftermath. The author gives a sad and heart breaking account of some of his executed victims, some are in their teens, some are poor and they all have no hope of a fair trial or hearing under Henry's despotic rule. This book is well worth reading, if only to see how far human rights have advanced; in some countries anyway!

Tyranny and terror.......2006-01-31

Henry VIII ruled his kingdom, at least towrd the end of his reign, with low political cunning, and a mixture of tyranny and terror. Even those closest to him at court could never be sure about the long-term stability of their positions. His mind was mercurial, and often changed by the last person with whom he spoke, but the final decision, good or bad, was always his. This is an extremely readable work that takes us through the last years of his life, when life around him became extremely bad, not only because of his natural inclination to incite terror, but the very real physical pain he sufered from various problems with his often abused body. This is a cautionary tale of how absolute power corrupts absolutely, and a fine addition to the lengthy volumes on the Tudors.

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Aftershocks
A Vital Piece of History
Insightful and Prophetical
Spans the centuries with truth we need to hear.
THE WAY, THE TRUTH, AND THE ERRORS THAT ASSAIL IT

Great Heresies
Hilaire Belloc
Manufacturer: T A N Books & Publishers
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

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ASIN: 0895554755

Customer Reviews:

Aftershocks.......2007-10-01

Mr. Belloc never leaves one doubting his opinion. His direct and authoritative style might anger those who disagree or thrill the faithful. Either way you will be led through the reasoning Mr. Belloc took to draw his conclusions which will drive you to think the same matters through to your own. In this work, Mr. Belloc does not provide an in-depth theological background on the heresies cited but instead gives a rough sketch of each and categorizes each as a type. Then, using this typology approach he carries each to their logical conclusions to convey their affect on the societies they infected. Mr. Belloc provides the superstructure for understanding other heresies by giving us the essential root of Arianism, Islam, Albigensianism, Protestantism, and Modernism. Through each description he also draws some interesting parallels to the various heresies. Of course, as a Roman Catholic, Mr. Belloc will step on some Protestant toes in particular since they will be the most likely to read his book outside other Catholics.

Mr. Belloc's approach is opinionated and he writes as an expert without always providing the evidence for his opinions. At the same time, there is enough evidence in the form of his logical approach to give one the opportunity to explore his opinions more themselves. Mr. Belloc was one of the great philosopher-historians of the early 20th century and his thoughts will always be valuable to the seeker or any one wishing to improve their critical thinking skills through practice. In this key work, he reminds us how ideas, and particularly, theology has consequences to society. It is not a topic to ignore or think only the realm of the theological hair-splitters. Our culture today has the marks of the theology that created it and upholds it. Mr. Belloc helps us focus on those aftershocks in theology that have shaped our culture.

A Vital Piece of History.......2007-02-10

Hilaire Belloc begins his book by justifying its existence. Modern education and thought largely ignore religion, particularly the parts that unfolded in what we label "The Middle Ages". But Belloc has some inconvenient facts for us. The history of civilization is the history of religion. A society rises or falls by the strength of its individuals; those individuals rise and fall by the strength of their religion. To understand the past, grasp the present, and know the future, we must know religion. The one religion that has stood at the center of human history is the Catholic Church. And to take the measure of that religion, we must look at the challenges it has faced and overcome.

Belloc's spare, straightforward prose takes us through a whirlwind tour of five heresies that the Church defeated. The Arian Heresy denied the full divinity of Jesus. It was rejected by Church leaders, but survived in the Roman Army for much longer. The Albigsenean attack came later, during the High Middle Ages. It was an attack not just on theology but on the fundamental nature of reality. The end product of denying reality was an obsession with intense experience, such as bizarre rituals involving fire-worship. Fortunately for us, both of these notions passed into the dustbin of history.

The chapter on Islam is the longest and the most illuminating. Belloc begins it by unerlining the fact that Islam was a heresy. It was not a brand new religion, but a corruption and oversimplification of the Christian doctrine that the Prophet Mohammed learned in Syria. But more importantly, Belloc focuses on the social environment where Islam first rose. A massive underclass in the decaying Persian and Byzantine Empires toiled under the restrictions of the upper class. Among these oppressed, the nascent Islamic movement found willing support for its doctrine of total equality and total submission to God.

We all view Islam as decaying, stagnant, and backwards-looking. We rarely remember that until about three centuries ago, Islam dominated the world with the most advanced technology, thought, and political systems. Belloc does. He enjoins us to remember that almost into the 18th century, the Muslim hordes were knocking on the doors of Central Europe, and that Vienna was only saved by a last-minute intervention by the Poles. (It happened, in a delightful historical twist, on September 11.) In 1938 Belloc saw an Islam that was down but not out; he predicted that it would soon be knocking impolitely on Europe's door again. A far-fetched prediction at the time, this has now come true, and Belloc knows why. Islam thrives on social injustice; when westerners decided to prop up oil-wealthy shieks throughout the Arab world, they created the exact conditions in which the Muslim message can rally the masses.

Thr fourth and probably least popular chapter is "What was the Reformation?" Belloc acknowledgeed that by the 16th century, the Catholic Church was badly in need of a correction. Yet the cure, as so often happens, may be worse than the disease. He emphasized that Martin Luther aimed to fix the Church from within. It was only John Calvin who insisted on breaking away and forming a new church with a radically different theological basis. Belloc predicted that the Protestant world would lose its vitality and join the secular world. Again, time has proved him right; Protestantism remains strong in the USA but throughout northern Europe the churches are disintegrating.

And that leads us to the final chapter, "The Modern Attack". Secularism is the first heresy to try overthrowing all the building blocks of Christianity. In denies not only the supremacy of God but also the need for justice, equality, joy, and love. It replaces morality with self-interest, education with job-training, freedom with tyranny. And yet, awesome as this final attack may have seemed, Belloc saw the seeds of the Church's victory already sprouting. Time has proved him right yet again. Pope Jonh Paul II stood up to lead the defense against communism. Now Christianity regains it strength in the former Soviet block and also throughout the third world, and there are tantalizing signs that Western Europe will soon be Christian again. And so Belloc finishes the book with tempered optimism. Christianity will survive; we have Jesus's word on that. How it will look in the future remains to be seen. But in any case this book gives a spirited look at parts of world history which our schools now ignore totally, and for that alone it's more than worth reading.

Insightful and Prophetical.......2007-01-07

As Belloc argues in his other book Europe and the Faith, Europe is the Faith and the Faith is Europe, referring of course to Christianism. The development of Western Civilization is inseparable from the Christian religion and its ideology.

As every Civilization is built upon a certain ideology, in order to understand our Civilization, its history and the challenges it faces today, one must understand its ideology. And in this, it is important to know also the views that have arisen within or in the fringes of Western Civilization, that go against the Christian ideology. On this, The Great Heresies by Belloc does a very good job.

And on the issue of Islam as a threat to our civilization, in the 1930s Belloc asked himself if Islam would again present that threat. He believed it would. And in that, we now know that he was, as in much everything else, extraordinarily clear and correct.

This book is a must-read.

Spans the centuries with truth we need to hear........2006-08-20

Fantastic book! An amazing summary that rings so true you can feel it in your bones. Particularly stark and foreboding is his warning that Mohammedism will be back to try again to destroy us - and here they are now! Anyone who thinks if we only ignore Islamofascism it will go away needs to read this book. Belloc understands the threat and categorizes it within the broad expanse of human history. Ignore him at our peril!

THE WAY, THE TRUTH, AND THE ERRORS THAT ASSAIL IT.......2006-07-24

Published in 1938, this book has great merit and deserves five stars, but has its shortcomings. This edition is a re-typeset version of the original and is littered with anoying errors which snuck threw the spellchecker softwear. But the merits outweigh the demerits, and return us to great truths by way of the great heresies.

CONTENTS
1. Heresy (to oversimplify any existing system, eg scientific, nationalist, theological heresy)
2. Scheme of the book
3. The Arian Heresy (AD300: denied the Incarnation, was supported by the Roman army - good psychological analysis of the Roman Empire and military)
4. The Great and Enduring Heresy of Mohammed (AD630: Islam as over-simple theology. Predicts Islam Resurgam.)
5. The Albigensian Attack (1163: matter and the body is evil: the Manichean-Dualist-Jansenist-Calvinist-Puritan response to the problem of evil. Caused upsurge in devil worship, magic, destruction of marriage, vegetarianism, teetotalism)
6. What was the Reformation? (1517: a protest and attempt to reform RC worldliness, allied with secular powers to divest church of its land and political power)
7. The Modern Phase (now called `postmodernism', itself a dying term, not surprisingly. The secular inadvertent attack on Reason itself and deliberate attack on the Church universal, disregard of fatal intellectual mistake of self-contradiction; relativism and subjectivism, AntiChrist)

STYLE
Hilarie Belloc is closely linked with G.K. Chesterton, and his name with that of C. S. Lewis. There is merit in this linkage as Belloc and Chesterton were friends and both Catholic. But where Chesterton has subtlety and humour, smooth style and flow, Belloc has a two fists of iron style and pounds his opponents. He is normally fair, according to Queensbury rules. He is irritating to a Protestant, but (so I say) worth every effort required to adapt to as he has his compensations. He says what most are now too scared to say in the twenty-first century, for political correctness is but a hypocrite and coward mood and will pass in time.

WEAKNESSES
Belloc was as staunch a Roman Catholic as is possible to be, and every chapter of this book shouts this fact, over and above the argument and analysis he presents from the viewpoint of what C.S. Lewis called `Mere Christianity'. The irony here is that he pointedly denies that there is such a thing as a doctrinal `Mere Christianity' to be detected in all the branches of Christendom's historic churches. But he effectively contradicts himself in fact by repeatedly commenting on Greek Orthodoxy; pointedly ignores the early church; ignores the Anglican communion; and plainly allows that Protestant societies had superior `vitality' to the old RC societies but are (in 1938) dying out because they are generically `auto-toxic'. But then by this mere analogy, all societies are `auto-toxic' in this sense: he notes that the RC communion of 1500 with its bought bishops and indulgences needed radical reform but resisted it; and Islam split Shia-Sunni very early on, etc. Belloc covers a vast acreage of history but does it with seven-league boots, missing out swathes of connecting facts and ideas hasteing to a conclusion. It seems to me that he is aware of the mind of the reader, but not the person. He appeals to the male way of thinking, not the female. He too often gives generalizations unsupported by even one example. His theoretical Trinitarianism lacks consideration of the Holy Spirit.

He is very cold-blooded. Glib recitals of European civil wars, Islamic invasions, the Reconquista, the Crusades, the Inquisition, and other deadly episodes unnerve me. He skates over some critical events such as the victory of Charles Martel against Islam at the battle of Tours-Poitiers AD732. In such a short book this is probably inevitable, and he is a take-no-prisoners, no regrets type such as is not seen today. He is a dinosaur of the Rex genus and I am glad we on the same side but not side-by-side.

His knowledge of practical live Islam is weak. He notes the pure doctrines, but lacks the feel of its chimeric nature and inability to see the world as anything other than Umma-Kuffaar. The mindset of instinctive systemic counter-verisimilitude towards the jahiliya he knows not. He does not do much with his accurate perception of its inherent societal inefficiency and the consequent constant need to co-opt and tax, as opposed to create and generate. The Janissaries and Mamelukes elude him. Dhimmitude he seems not to know of, nor of the honour-shame nature of the culture, constantly operating at the level of conformity as opposed to internalization (or holiness as our jargon has it - revivals are holiness movements). This is probably due to the RC weakness towards this tendency itself.

His notion of all charging of interest as `usury' is woefully naïve economics. Interest is the cost of a loan, a charge on use of money which could be put to alternate uses, and the insurance cost of bearing the risk of loan default. But then even Aquinas did not understand this, and Belloc just failed to get up to date.

STRENGTHS
He summarises well, and says what badly needs saying in our day, without jargon-munching touchy-feely death-by-qualification. It is quite possible to get a working idea of any of the heresies he tackles, purely by reading that chapter alone. It is excellent for beginners in this respect. The sheer speed of progress over the facts and the ideas is very exhilarating.

The sign of a powerful intellect, he draws accurate connections between apparently entirely different things. Eg, the indissoluble `Trinity' of Plato and Aristotle (Truth, Beauty, and Goodness) and its complete consonance with Theism, revealing why atheist Communism has contempt for both these abstract things and the physical dignity of the person (ch.7). Also, the whole chapter on Albigensianism and its forms. In life Mr. Belloc must have been as formidable a foe as a friend, I will read more of him.

Regions of the Great Heresy: Bruno Schulz, a Biographical Portrait

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Europe's most dedicated biographer

Regions of the Great Heresy: Bruno Schulz, a Biographical Portrait
Jerzy Ficowski
Manufacturer: W. W. Norton & Company
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover

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ASIN: 0393051471

Book Description

"Bruno Schulz was one of the great writers....[His] verbal art strikes us—stuns, even—with its overload of beauty."—John Updike

Exactly sixty years after his death, Bruno Schulz (1892-1942) remains one of the twentieth century's greatest and most enigmatic writers—still the subject of front-page controversy. Here the renowned Polish poet Jerzy Ficowski presents the first biography of the man who, in the words of Isaac Bashevis Singer, "wrote sometimes like Kafka, sometimes like Proust, and at times succeeded in reaching depths that neither of them reached." In his novels and stories—The Street of Crocodiles, Sanatorium Under the Sign of the Hourglass, and his missing masterpiece, The Messiah—Schulz employed a baroque, poetic style with a stunning surrealist edge. Including many of Schulz's paintings and personal letters as well as new information on the Mossad's theft of Schulz's murals from Poland in 2001, Regions of the Great Heresy is a cause for international celebration—a long-awaited work that will spark a renaissance of interest in Schulz's life. Published on the 60th anniversary of Schulz's death. 16 pages of color, 16 pages of black-and-white illustrations.

Customer Reviews:

Europe's most dedicated biographer.......2007-06-08

Jerzy Ficowski's decades-long dedication to preserving the memory of Bruno Schulz has become legendary. This book is testament to his labors. It will long be the standard biography.

Heresy in the Later Middle Ages : The Relation of Heterodoxy to Dissent C.1250-C.1450

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The Years Have Been Kind

Heresy in the Later Middle Ages : The Relation of Heterodoxy to Dissent C.1250-C.1450
Gordon Leff
Manufacturer: Manchester University Press
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover

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Customer Reviews:

The Years Have Been Kind.......2003-07-28

I first came across this work in 1972 while researching the apocalyptic vision of the Spiritual Franciscans. Now, thirty some years later, I have had the leisure to digest this magnificent and epic historical analysis of late medieval heresy, which has stood the test of time as a detailed and thoughtful unfolding of dissent against orthodox Catholic thought and practice. Leff takes the reader from the divisions within the Franciscan Order through the various spiritualist movements and on to the eras of Wycliffe and Hus. This work stops at the gates of Luther's revolt, but to his credit Leff restrains himself from the temptation to depict the Reformation as an inevitable organic outcropping of two centuries of Church dissent. His heresies are related, but only to a point. Wycliffe is not Hus, Peter Olivi is not Waldo, the Beguins are not Taborites.

It would appear that the unifying factor in the author's mind is the use and misuse of the vow and/or practice of poverty. Prior to the arrival of Francis and Dominic to the ecclesiastical scene, heresy, while not exactly a private matter, was usually debated and condemned away from the glare of public scrutiny. Certainly one of the more notorious controversies of the early Middle Ages, Berengarius of Tours' treatises on the Eucharist, was contested rather exclusively at the university and episcopal levels. In the demographics of the day, who among the countless Catholic peasants truly grasped the subtleties of a suspect Berengarius, or a mainstream Peter Lombard, for that matter?

The appearance of the mendicant orders, with emphasis upon consecrated poverty, introduced what in the language of late twentieth century social sciences would be termed "measurable outcomes." It was hard, and still is, to measure a man's conscience or his innermost beliefs. Poverty, with its attendant hardship of life and absence of worldly goods, allowed the medieval world-bishop and peasant alike-to assess the holiness and commitment of a professed believer. It did not take a university professor to discern a disparity between the power, arrogance, and material wealth of many church leaders, and the life of deprivation practiced by certain of the mendicant monks and their followers.

Leff begins his work with a study of Franciscan Peter John Olivi, an extremist on the primacy of poverty, to be sure, but not to the degree of his contemporary and future followers. Olivi's sin, it seems, was his implication that poverty and ecclesiastical legitimacy were connected, so that the authority of a corrupt [worldly] pope could be superceded. Moreover, Olivi connected the preeminence of poverty and the ideals of Francis of Assisi with the apocalypticism of Joachim of Flora, adding a certain content of excitement and inevitability to a reform of institutional Catholicism along the lines of material divestiture.

To varying degrees, the devotion to poverty and the inevitable reforms it bred are intertwined with the multifarious heretical movements that would dot the ecclesiastical landscape till the sixteenth century. Most of the movements held in common a desire for simplicity and piety; the more extreme denied the need for a church altogether, and the very fringe movements were outright Manichean in their condemnation of the non-spiritual. In one sense the variety in this work is the effort of various heretical reformers to arrive at a form of ecclesiatical life most suitable for the restructuring of church life. The Englishman John Wyclif popularized the role of national identity and the "secular arm" in the reform of the church, a thrust continued a century later in Eastern Europe and with different emphases by Jan Hus. Leff attends to the philosophical influences of William of Ockham and Marsilius of Padua upon the political thinking about the place of the Church in civil society, and the social unrest of reformers turned millitants, such as the Lollards and the Hussites. .

A particular form of heretical life that captures Leff's attention are the mystics: Beguins, Fraticelli, Flagellants, and the Free Spirit movement, to name some. Leff notes that the mystics caused Church officials considerable worry, perhaps because implied in their practices and misshapen beliefs were the seeds of a more dangerous concept: freedom of conscience. The mystics represent the most tragic and in some ways the most shameful aspects of this work. The Inquisition was instituted to hunt them down, but Leff detects a papal ambivalent about mystics, particularly the Beguins. Thus, the most intense of persecutions by one pope would frequently be succeeded by a period of clemency and benignancy by a successor.

Book Description

Who were the Lollards? What did Lollards believe? What can the manuscript record of Lollard works teach us about the textual dissemination of Lollard beliefs and the audience for Lollard writings? What did Lollards have in common with other reformist or dissident thinkers in late medieval England, and how were their views distinctive? These questions have been fundamental to the modern study of Lollardy (also known as Wycliffism). The essays in this book reveal their broader implications for the study of English literature and history through a series of closely focused studies that demonstrate the wide-ranging influence of Lollard writings and ideas on later medieval English culture. Introductions to previous scholarship, and an extensive Bibliography of printed resources for the study of Wyclif and Wycliffites, provide an entry to scholarship for those new to the field.Contributors: DAVID AERS, MARGARET ASTON, HELEN BARR, MISHTOONI BOSE, LAWRENCE M. CLOPPER, ANDREW COLE, RALPH HANNA III, MAUREEN JURKOWSKI, ANDREW LARSEN, GEOFFREY H. MARTIN, WENDY SCASE, FIONA SOMERSET, EMILY STEINER. FIONA SOMERSET is at Duke University, Durham NC; JILL C. HAVENS is at Texas Christian University; DERRICK G. PITARD is at Slippery Rock University, PA.

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Channelling History?
More understanding of Cathar beliefs
The Cathars, Alice Bailey, Ken Carey... I see a pattern
For crackpots only

The Great Heresy
Arthur Guirdham
Manufacturer: The C.W. Daniel Company Ltd
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

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ASIN: 0852072716

Book Description

A study of the history and beliefs of Catharism.

Customer Reviews:

Channelling History?.......2005-03-11

One of the sources for this book is the author's use of channeling spirits. Thanks but no thanks.

More understanding of Cathar beliefs.......2002-01-19

I read this book hoping to learn more about Cathar beliefs. I had a smattering of knowledge and wanted more, but I was looking for real information, not comdemnation and half truths. I got what I was looking for. I got an indepth description of the facets of everday Catharism and descriptions of the more educated/trained Cathars. It was entertaining and informative reading. The second part of the book was quite eye-opening for me. It was interesting to see/read the thoughts of the returned CAthars. I found the thoughts presented there to be quite thought provoking. All in all a good read and worth the cost.

The Cathars, Alice Bailey, Ken Carey... I see a pattern.......1999-10-19

Arthur Guirdham's historic research (dates, characters, events) of the condemnation of the Cathars is consistent with research by Picknett and Prince in "The Templar Revelation..." and Starbird's "The Woman with an Alabaster Jar: Mary Magdalene...". However, where it differs significantly is that Arthur Guirdham displayed the ability to embrace the esoteric and higher consciousness. What he writes of the philosphy and beliefs of the Cathars can be compared in part to the writings of Alice A. Bailey (e.g. The Seven Rays) and Key Carey (e.g. The Third Millenium). As the souls on Earth who reach this higher level of consciousness are outnumbered by those who do not, it is not surprising to see how condemnation occurs, not only in the 13th century Crusades and Inquisition, but in the 20th century by unenlightened readers (e.g. the reviewer from Berkeley).

For crackpots only.......1998-01-18

The first part of the book has some basic facts about the Cathars with a fanciful interpretation, inspired by the second half which deals with revelations from discarnate entities about reincarnation on other planets and similar topics.

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Benn Heresy
Alan Freeman
Manufacturer: Pluto Pr
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

Blasphemy: Verbal Offense Against the Sacred, from Moses to Salman Rushdie

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schmeviticus
Great and important book, without any agenda
No one said history was pretty!
How Free the Speech?

Blasphemy: Verbal Offense Against the Sacred, from Moses to Salman Rushdie
Leonard W. Levy
Manufacturer: University of North Carolina Press
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

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God Is Not Great: How Religion Poisons Everything

ASIN: 0807845159

Customer Reviews:

schmeviticus.......2007-09-03

The interesting part of the book is the way the justification for blasphemy laws morphed smoothly over the years, even as the punishment changed very little. If you go back thousands of years, blasphemy laws made a great deal of sense -- people literally believed that gods were offended by blasphemy and that they would take revenge against communities that harbored blasphemers. So blasphemy was, from the point of view of a lawmaker, no different from arson.

However, as the centuries wore on, the purported role of the Christian God in daily life became more abstract. By the 16th century the justification for blasphemy laws had become more vague: Since the religion was part of the government (in England, the focus of the book), the blasphemer was essentially advocating the overthrow of the government. A few centuries later, following the appearance of numerous alternatives to the officially sanctioned version of Christianity, the justification switched again: Blasphemy was bad because it threatened to undermine the Church/State-sanctioned oppression of poor people! During all these centuries, the punishment was often quite brutal, ranging from imprisonment to mutilation to death.

By the 20th century blasphemy laws were, not surprisingly, being used to punish homosexuals and others who deviated from the church's views on social issues (notably birth control). In England and parts of the U.S. there are still blasphemy laws on the books, waiting for the right combination of an overzealous prosecutor and someone to pick on.

A lot of this sounds eerily familiar. The U.S. started a War on Drugs in the early 1970s under the reasonable premise that certain narcotics posed a health hazard. But when research showed the health risks of drugs like marijuana and LSD to be comparatively minor, the justification suddenly changed to crime prevention, and more recently, to a component of the War on Terror (which itself started as a legitimate response to a serious problem, then morphed into a way for right-wing loons to consolidate power). There's a lesson here: The Man has no use for democracy.

Minor complaints: The book is almost entirely about England and Christianity, and it's too detailed. Unless you're writing a thesis on the topic, you don't need to read about many of the minor blasphemy prosecutions mentioned in the book. It would have been more interesting to take a wider view of the subject, which is quite interesting and relevant to current politics.

Great and important book, without any agenda.......2005-07-09

Reviewers too often let their personal beliefs get in the way of their reviews, in which case they are not reviewing the book at all but merely spouting a belief. This book, written by a serious historian and First Amendment scholar, is an incredible resource for the history of blasphemy and heresy laws in Western civilization. It is not anti-Christian, unless exposing Christianity's true history is anti-Christian (which I suppose it could be, to a Christian!). It goes back to the ancient Greeks and Hebrews and gives a very objective account of the laws and attitudes. Particularly valuable are the sections about early American blasphemy laws, which prove once and for all that the U.S. was not created by or for religious freedom; each group had its own "true belief," and anything else was not only false but punishable by law.
If Christians cannot take their own history straight up, perhaps they should think about that, especially when they get to uppity about instituting their beliefs into law today. Otherwise, this is a brave and important book, full of valuable information and worth the read of anyone who is interested in religion and law--and how dangerous it is to mix the two.

No one said history was pretty!.......2002-07-25

I assume from the first reviewer of this book that he hates to admit that evil has been done in the name of Christianity. He has a hard time seeing it done today, because we have a seperation of church and state. Look, this book may come as a shock to many Christian readers, but these are facts we can't deny. For example, America is a beautiful country, but in our history there is racism (KKK), the Civil War and the brutal murder of gay student, Matt Shepard. The same goes true for any other organization/country. What ever has done good, has done bad too.

This book provides a very detailed, factual account of people being killed in the name of Christianity from it's inception up to the present. You read about mennonites (anabaptists) getting executed by Protestants and Catholics, Jews being stripped of their Civil Rights, and everyone else who didn't take Jesus as their saviour. It is truly sick and stupid that the laws in those days prosecuted someone just because of a difference of opinion, espeically religious. How gruesome and brutal were Christians to people who differed with them on an opinion? Well, picture you are a Muslim, and preaching the Koran on the streets of England. First the government burns your books, since they are not pro-Christian. Second, you get whipped over 300 times until you have no flesh on your body. Third offense, you will get your tongue cut off, a "B" burned into your skin for "blasphemer", exiled or executed. Isn't that a good reason, and why our founding fathers established a seperation between church and state?

This is a good book, though very long. But, hey it's a history book, right?

How Free the Speech?.......2000-06-15

Were it not for the digressions into post-modernist chic, I might be able to give a more resounding endorsement. Nevertheless, Levy did successfully acquaint the reader with the common court precedents for blasphemy in British law, while furnishing modern examples such as the 1976 blasphemy trial of a homosexual poet. Though the traditional branding, mutilation, and execution of blasphemers has stopped in modern-day Britain, Levy points out that the Anglican Church has argued for an extension of the outmoded blasphemy laws to other religions in the wake of the Rushdie affair. Rather than forego the Church of England's privileged status altogether, the Archbishop of Canterbury proposed the use of government coercion to protect all flights of lunatic fancy from their deserved ridicule. Needless to say, the lack of separation of Church and State in Europe, and the diluted freedom of speech provided by speech codes (e.g. laws against the expression of unpopular speech, such as Holocaust denial) surely constitute an important area of debate as far as the limitations of freedom. At present, the only US equivalent I can think of is the attempts to mold hate crimes legislation. Though certainly justice demands proper sanctions for those who violate the rights of others, this acts to punish criminals on the basis of their beliefs rather than actions. What next? Love crimes legislation that reduce a person's sentence if the jury thought they were acting for a more socially acceptable cause?

Fear, Myth and History: The Ranters and the Historians

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Fear, Myth and History: The Ranters and the Historians
J. C. Davis
Manufacturer: Cambridge University Press
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

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ASIN: 0521894190

Book Description

Flourishing briefly in the aftermath of the English Revolution (1649â€“1650), the Ranters have been seen as the ultimate counter-cultural group or movement of seventeenth-century England. Their apparent rejection of sin, hell and all moral constraints, authorities and limitations imposed from above has drawn considerable attention to them as illustrative of an irreligious popular culture and the determination of the people to have a revolution of their own making. Acting out a plebeian permissiveness in denial of the Protestant ethic at the moment of its achievement of dominance, they have drawn the attention, in particular, of those seeking to record the history of a popular tradition rejecting the hegemony of bourgeois values. This book calls in question that framework. The author argues that there was no Ranter group or movement: that the Ranters did not exist. Rather, a myth of the Ranters was projected in a press sensation and was sustained by heresiographers and sectarian leaders. The projection of this myth in the early 1650s is explained in terms of fears aroused by a revolutionary crisis and the dilemma of authority within sectarianism. In this sense the work forms a case study in the projection of deviance consequent upon a â€~moral panicâ€™. The elements out of which the mythic identity of the Ranter was composed are examined in detail, as is the projection of the myth.

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