From childhood, Tom Holland loved the exciting gods and warriors of ancient Greece and Rome. They were more fun than the Christian God of the church he grew up in. Later the books he read, like Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire, confirmed for him that the values and people he admired came from the ancient classics.
Tom became a historian, looking deeply into the accounts and writings of his heroes like Julius Caesar and Leonidas. But he learned enough to discover that their values were not his values. Leonidas supported "murderous eugenics", and Caesar "killed a million Gauls and enslaved a million more."
Tom found that his own values were in sympathy with the God who came to earth to live a sacrificial life to save the people he loved. "In the ancient world, it was the role of gods [to inflict] punishment – not to suffer it themselves." Those gods would not inspire people like the Vanderpools to live sacrificially for others (yesterday's post).
He says that he was wrong about Christianity. "It took me a long time to realize my morals are not Greek or Roman, but thoroughly, and proudly, Christian."
Ditto for most of the West.
Tom became a historian, looking deeply into the accounts and writings of his heroes like Julius Caesar and Leonidas. But he learned enough to discover that their values were not his values. Leonidas supported "murderous eugenics", and Caesar "killed a million Gauls and enslaved a million more."
Tom found that his own values were in sympathy with the God who came to earth to live a sacrificial life to save the people he loved. "In the ancient world, it was the role of gods [to inflict] punishment – not to suffer it themselves." Those gods would not inspire people like the Vanderpools to live sacrificially for others (yesterday's post).
He says that he was wrong about Christianity. "It took me a long time to realize my morals are not Greek or Roman, but thoroughly, and proudly, Christian."
Ditto for most of the West.
(cont'd tomorrow)
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