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"... manuscript was taken to an isolated Greek monastery in Palestine, possibly to protect it from occupying crusaders, who often equated Greek script with here

"... manuscript was taken to an isolated Greek monastery in Palestine, possibly to protect it from occupying crusaders, who often equated Greek script with heresy against their Latin church and either burned or looted many such texts ..." Depressingly reminiscent of Bishop Landa and the destruction of Mayan codices ("as they contained nothing in which were not to be seen as superstition and lies of the devil, we burned them all"). How much of our common cultural heritage has been destroyed by religious zealots over the centuries?

andrepd 3y ago
Immense amounts. Christian monasticism in particular was responsible for the loss of the vast majority of classical texts in the late roman and early medieval periods. It was only by the ~12th century that the image of the "wisdom-loving monk copying the classics" truly existed, in the almost a millennium prior they were almost always zealots bent on destruction of non-christian heritage.
_a_a_a_ 3y ago
Absolute fucktons. Now I've answered your as-good-as-rhetorical question, where are you going to go with this? What's your point, your proposal, your next step? (NB, I'm an atheist too)
- TeMPOraL 3y ago
  FWIW, it's not specific to religion. The exact same thing happens with political ideologies, too, and cultural differences in general. Historically, a lot of art, knowledge and people were erased in conflicts over those things - through wars and civil wars and reformations and such. My take from this is that zealotry has a long proven, insanely high base rate of being disastrously wrong. It's also sheer idiocy on a theoretical level - it's the extreme case of using confidence to hide lack of understanding. If you feel you're becoming zealous about some cause or idea, this means you most likely don't understand much of it[0]. If you're in an environment that encourages zealotry, you're being used. Something to keep in mind when evaluating your religious, political, social or technological beliefs. -- [0] - It doesn't mean the idea itself is necessarily bogus. The idea is probably wrong in some ways - all ideas are - but zealotry is just stupid, regardless of the subject. To abuse a philosophical point, regardless of whether your belief is true or not, you ought not to be zealous about it.

andrepd 3y ago

Immense amounts. Christian monasticism in particular was responsible for the loss of the vast majority of classical texts in the late roman and early medieval periods. It was only by the ~12th century that the image of the "wisdom-loving monk copying the classics" truly existed, in the almost a millennium prior they were almost always zealots bent on destruction of non-christian heritage.

_a_a_a_ 3y ago

Absolute fucktons. Now I've answered your as-good-as-rhetorical question, where are you going to go with this? What's your point, your proposal, your next step? (NB, I'm an atheist too)

TeMPOraL 3y ago
FWIW, it's not specific to religion. The exact same thing happens with political ideologies, too, and cultural differences in general. Historically, a lot of art, knowledge and people were erased in conflicts over those things - through wars and civil wars and reformations and such. My take from this is that zealotry has a long proven, insanely high base rate of being disastrously wrong. It's also sheer idiocy on a theoretical level - it's the extreme case of using confidence to hide lack of understanding. If you feel you're becoming zealous about some cause or idea, this means you most likely don't understand much of it[0]. If you're in an environment that encourages zealotry, you're being used. Something to keep in mind when evaluating your religious, political, social or technological beliefs. -- [0] - It doesn't mean the idea itself is necessarily bogus. The idea is probably wrong in some ways - all ideas are - but zealotry is just stupid, regardless of the subject. To abuse a philosophical point, regardless of whether your belief is true or not, you ought not to be zealous about it.