Thursday in Rome

Having done the Vatican on Wednesday, I thought I'd make Thursday the day for antiquities: the Ara Pacis, the Pantheon, the Colosseum, the Forum, Trajan's Market, and the Palatine. By the time I woke up and realized that it was raining and that it was already almost ten, I decided I would switch the outdoor sites for indoor ones. That, by the way, leaves the Palatine, the Forum, and the Colosseum as my grand finale tomorrow night. What a way to end it.

Fortunately, the Ara Pacis is indoors. Haven't heard of it? Ara Pacis means the Altar of Peace, and it is the altar erected by Caesar Augustus after his victories in the civil wars and over barbarians knocking at the gates of Rome. The inaugural sacrifice took place in 9 B.C., and that meant the beginning of the Pax Romana. More than Augustus' Pantheon or his Forum, more than roads or aqueducts, this little-known altar tells us exactly, precisely what Imperial Rome was all about: the gospel of peace through victory under the father of the fatherland, Caesar Augustus, Lord and Savior, the Son of God. And on the side, the Ara Pacis tells his gospel, The Acts of the Divine Augustus.

I got to Priene in Turkey, where the word euangelion (gospel) is first found used for the message of Caesar and Rome, but I have no idea where the inscription is; Aphrodisias, where the great shrine to the Julio-Claudian family, the Sebastion, is located, has a copy of Acts of the Divine Augustus on it, but because I had to hurry through Turkey to make the tour, I never got there; and at Pergamon the Altar to Zeus, upon which the Ara Pacis was likely based, is no longer there, but at the Pergamon Museum in Berlin.

Walking into the museum where the altar is now located, I had to catch my breath at the site of it. No, nothing visually stunning. But there it was, something I've been waiting to see for months now, the pinnacle of Rome's self-understanding. It was here that Caesar Augustus, as Pontifex Maximus (high priest) of Rome and Princeps (First Citizen), brought those two roles together to confirm Rome's place in the world- and his place in Rome.

It's shaped like an empty box with an altar in the center, with one side open to allow access. On either side are reliefs depicting Augustus, his friends, his family, his supporters and clients (patronage again). Aside the entrance way are two particularly interesting reliefs. The Ara Pacis, you see, collects the myths of Romulus and Remus and of the exiled Trojan Aeneas into a history of the Julian clan in the same way Virgil's does. So on the left side of the rear face is a relief of Romulus and Remus suckling from the She-Wolf; on the other is Aeneas. And note that Aeneas is the son of Venus, while Romulus and Remus are the sons of Mars, thus showing the godly lineage of Augustus and the Julio-Claudian dynasty.

The rear contains parallel reliefs of the goddess Roma, symbolizing (or ensuring) Augustan victory, and a pastoral scene, displaying the prosperity of the Pax Romana. There it is, the gospel of Caesar in stone. It was reassembled, by the way, by Mussolini.

From there I went to the rather uninspiring Castel Sant'Angelo, just up the Tiber from the Vatican. The two tiers of the structure are ancient and medieval; the first was the grand mausoleum of Hadrian, and the second structure built atop it was a fortress for the popes. I spent most of my time wishing I'd brought my coat, since the rain had brought in a chill for the day.

Then I headed to the Pantheon. I'd seen the Pantheon Wednesday night when I took a nighttime stroll from Campo d'Fiori, through Plaza Navona, by the Pantheon, past the Trevi Fountain, and ended at the Spanish Steps. But now I got to go in it.

The dome is an engineering marvel. Look it up for yourselves, because I'm just not competent enough to really explain it. But standing in there I had an appreciation for the genius of Rome. It is, after all, one of the few structures built by the Romans that isn't in ruins (even if the right side is currently covered in scaffolding).

One thing I didn't know about the Pantheon is that three very important people are buried there: Victor Emmanuel II (more on him in a second), his son Umberto I, and, wow, who knew?, Raphael. That was a pleasant surprise I hadn't seen coming.

The guidebook I had (Rick Steves, of course) pointed me to a number of local churches with impressive histories or architectures. I got to three out of four of the recommendations. The two that I was most impressed by were Santa Maria sopra Minerva and the Gesu Church.

Santa Maria sopra Minerva is Rome's only Gothic church (left/above). The interior is blissfully devoid of stucco overstatement and rococo absurdities. It has the sort of vaulted ceiling that is far more common in northern Europe than Italy, which is my favorite sort of ceiling (St. George's Cathedral in Israel had a vaulted ceiling).

The church also has a great history around it. 'Sopra Minerva' means that it is built atop a temple to the mother goddess Minerva, although no evidence of that is extant. This church's monastery is where Galileo was tried as a heretic by the Inquisition. On his way to his trial he knelt before the altar here. And the altar? It contains the body of St. Catherine of Sienna.

Note, by the way, 'the body.' Her head is in Sienna (more on that in the next post).

The church also has a Michelangelo sculpture in it of a strong, muscular Christ clinging to the cross. His privates are comfortably private thanks to that characteristically Counter-Reformation swoosh of bronze loincloth; Michelangelo originally sculpted him buck naked. You know, I don't have a problem with nudity in art, and we probably need to be less hung up about it since in classical art it represents innocence, not eroticism; but I draw the line at Christ (oh, and Mary, definitely Mary). Anyways, fantastic sculpture; the muscles are so the muscles of a stone cutter (or 'carpenter')

The other church I was particularly impressed with was the Gesu Church, or Jesuit Church. This church is the headquarters of the Jesuit Order, and as much as I loved it, it was downright scary.

In the left transept is the tomb of St. Ignatius of Loyola, the soldier-turned-saint and founder of the Society of Jesus (the Jesuits). An altar rises up to the ceiling above him, but the most interesting feature is the statue scene just to the right of the altar: Religion Overthrowing Heresy.
In this picture, Religion is symbolized by an angry freaking nun, the kind you've never experienced personally but always hear horror stories about. She's holding a whip and beating Heresy, a man scampering, or toppling over, on the ground. Around Heresy is the Snake, our good pal Martin Luther (or Lutheranism in general), pulling him in. Off to the side, a mean-looking cherub (the way only fat babies with wings can look mean) is tearing the pages out of a heretical book. Yeah, it was scary.

Happily, the right transept is more ecumenically friendly. Here lies the grave of St. Francis Xavier, a Catholic missionary who attempted to spread Christianity to the east. He got as far as Japan. Now that's better.

After these and other churches I walked past Trajan's Market, which really isn't anything special, and checked out the Victor Emmanuel monument. Vitorio Emmanuel II was the king of Piedmont (northwestern Italy) and Sardinia (the island) before uniting Italy under his Savoy dynasty. He is called 'the second' because he kept the numbering system of Piedmont-Sardinia, much to the chagrin of the united Italian provinces. The House of Savoy ruled Italy until their position was compromised by support for Mussolini; they were voted out of power by popular referendum in 1946, and live (and say stupid things) in Switzerland.
The monument itself is cool, though. It's a bit... big... but the central statue of Victor Emmanuel on horseback is the largest equestrian statue in the world. The Italian Tomb of the Unknown Soldier is here, too, watched over by the goddess Roma.

From here I circled around to the Capitoline Museums. This collection is one of the four great ones of Rome (with the Vatican, the Borghese, and the National Museum), and it was nice to get a good amount of time there.

Here's a rundown of their best pieces:

Bits of the colossus of Constantine, from the Basilica of Constantine that once stood in the Forum:

Commodus, the bad guy from Gladiator, dressed as Hercules:


The Capitoline She-Wolf, with Romulus and Remus:

Marcus Aurelius, extending a hand of clemency to foes and mounted on horseback (this statue was thought to be Constantine because of the hand of blessing and thus saved from the Christian purge of pagan statues; it was placed in the center of the Capitoline Square by Michelangelo):


The Dying Gaul, from Pergamon:


The Capitoline Venus, the only cute Venus I've ever seen:


And that was my Thursday.

My Day At the Vatican

Wednesday was Vatican day for me. Each Wednesday the pope has a scheduled appearance, which he sometimes attends and sometimes doesn't. This draws the crowds away from the horrendous line at the Vatican Museum; I had heard he wasn't going to make an appearance this week (he did, oh well), so I decided this was my quick way in (since without a printer I couldn't print off an online ticket). It worked like a charm. Twenty minute wait. It's usually two hours.

The Vatican Museum is one of the greatest museums in the world, on par with the British Museum, the Louvre, and the Smithsonian. In fact, throwing the Smithsonian in there probably does us a little more credit than we deserve, but I couldn't help myself (I'm looking forward to getting back to the Land of the Free, after all). Its collection goes on for five miles of hallways, and includes the Sistine Chapel as a finale. But Michelangelo's chapel is only the pinnacle of the experience; all the art and archaeology throughout the collection leads up to his work. The museum subtly, but unmistakably, tells that story.

There's no way for me to write up a full description of what I saw in the museum; whole treasures, like the Map Room, I'll have to skip. I'll just tell the story that leads up to Raphael and Michelangelo.

Guided by Rick Steves' Rome guide, I went around the painting galleries and Egyptian rooms for awhile until coming to Apollo Belvedere, in the courtyard (in the painting galleries, by the way, I saw Raphael's The Transfiguration, above). The original Apollo Belvedere was sculpted by the Greek Leochares, and the one on display that I saw is a Roman copy of the original. It was discovered during the Renaissance and delicate artists like Raphael took it as an example. It is the epitome of balance.

Nearby is a lounging Greek river god. Can you see how Michelangelo took it as his inspiration for God in The Creation of Adam?

But Michelangelo's real inspiration was Laocoon. Laocoon is the character in the Iliad who, as high priest of Troy, warns the Trojans not to accept the Greek's Horse. The famous "Beware of Greeks bearing gifts" is his statement. However, the gods were on the side of the Greeks, so they sent two huge snakes to crush him and his sons. This sculpture captures that horrific moment. It isn't just the death of himself, or his family; it captures the death of a civilization.
It was known to have existed since antiquity, but had been lost for a thousand years until rediscovery (in Rome) in 1506. It was a watershed in aesthetics and took Renaissance art in a new direction; one early viewer was the young Michelangelo. It was only two years later that he began on the Sistine Chapel, with its horrifying picture of The Last Judgment: the ultimate end of civilization.
A side note: Laocoon's right arm was long detached above the elbow, missing. It was popularly thought that the arm stuck straight out, in order to balance with the diagonal left arm; this was the culture bred on Apollo Belvedere. Michelangelo, however, insisted that it must have bent backwards, behind Lacoon's head. He instinctively saw the importance of tipping balance in order to confound the viewer. Sure enough, when the elbow was discovered in a farmhouse in the early twentieth century, Michelangelo proved to be right.

Back inside the halls I was directed to the Belvedere Torso. This hunk of unfinished and broken rock just shows how much effort goes into sculpture. And even if it were finished, it's not beautiful; the Hercules once depicted is chunky and knotty. And yet this torso turned out to be Michelangelo's inspiration for the torso and inner joints of Christ in The Last Judgment. This is not the effeminate Christ of western medieval artwork, nor the Christ of Raphael, but the hulking Christ of Revelation.
Skipping way, way ahead in my day (there was just far too much to even scratch the surface), I came to the penultimate exhibits: the Raphael rooms. The last one them contains one of my favorite pieces of art, ever: The School of Athens. I'm contrasting Raphael unfavorably with Michelangelo in so much of this post, but don't be misled; Raphael was a genius of the first order, and this painting shows you why (click on it for the full effect). It is the epitome of symmetry; philosophers on the viewer's left, scientists on the right, with Plato pointing up to the sky and Aristotle signaling to the earth below as their crux. Two archways above Plato and Aristotle form secular halos over them. Those gathered around them include Euclid, Socrates, and many others. Such a school never existed, and they lived at varying times and places; but it captures the spirit of the Renaissance, to bring them all together.
And yet, the Renaissance was above moving forward, too. Raphael worked this in by modeling the likenesses of the ancients on contemporary Renaissance men. Plato is Leonardo Da Vinci. Euclid is the architect Donato Bramante. Raphael himself stares out at the viewer, almost winking in playfulness, from the bottom right. Yet when Raphael finished he walked down the hall to see Michelangelo, at work in the Sistine Chapel. He gasped; he was astonished; he had never seen anything like it. He ran back to The School of Athens and added one more figure, in the foreground, leaning on a hunk of marble: Michelangelo.
Being in the Sistine Chapel was a deeply moving experience. No pictures; enforced rule of silence, with just a murmur from tour guides. It is so much bigger than I'd imagined (a contrast to St. Peter's; read on). The Creation of Adam is incredible, though one wishes it were a little larger. Yet The Last Judgment....

The Last Judgment may be the most sublime artwork ever created. And I use sublime the way the philosopher Immanuel Kant used the term, not in the frilly way that the term has come to be used. He contrasted the beautiful and the sublime; Raphael is beautiful. The beautiful is balanced. The sublime is a thunderclap. It challenges us. It deeply moves us by disturbing us rather than drawing us in. Michelangelo is sublime.

No one smiles in The Last Judgment. The righteous dead, resurrected to new life, wake to find themselves still corpses, and must scamper up to the divine embrace. How much more terrifying, then, for the damned. They are shot down to hell, to the welcome of the boatman, Charon, looking all too excited to ferry them across the River Styx. The terror on their faces terrifies the viewer. In the center, Christ raises his right hand, preparing to smite the damned to his left; his left hand holds up a sign of peace to those on his right, but his attention is focused on the smiting to come. Just by Christ, Mary huddles, curled submissively, looking away from the damned, unable to watch. Her days interceding for sinners are over indeed.

When the painting was unveiled to the public in 1541 the pope dropped to his knees and said, "Lord, charge me not with my sins when thou shalt come on Judgment Day."

And Catholics say the Reformers overemphasized wrath!

Awestuck and not a little introspective of my own sins, I headed out the secret back door directly into St. Peter's.

Since I took the right door, reserved for tour groups, out from the Sistine Chapel rather than the left door, which leads back to the Vatican Museum entrance, I got dropped right on the colonnaded porch of the basilica. So I didn't get to walk up through St. Peter's Square, with its famous obelisk and Bernini columns. Instead, my first view of the church was passing through the doors into the nave.

Did my jaw drop? No. Actually, I was confused. I was in the Hagia Sophia two weeks ago, after all. That felt far, far larger; far more open, with its wide dome. This was grand, to be sure, but it seemed like it was on a far smaller scale. Was this the right church?

Then I looked down the nave, and saw the size of the people at the far end.

And then my jaw dropped.

The church was actively designed to appear- and feel- smaller than it is. The canopy over the altar is a full seven stories high, but it is more than a football field away, so it looks smaller; the height of the altar canopy also cuts the distance between the floor and the dome, in order to reduce one's feeling of isolation (which is exactly what I felt in the Hagia Sophia). For instance, the twin statues of St. Teresa, on the right pillar when one enters the nave, look the same size. However, the one at the top of the pillar is a full six feet taller than the one at the base, in order to create the illusion that the church is not nearly lofty as it appears. The end result is something grand with an immense capacity for congregants that still retains a cozy, intimate feel.

The other significant thing about St. Peter's is its Counter-Reformation thrust. The whole church is designed to make absolutely clear where the church is, and where it ain't. Around the frieze of the building runs a gold band with seven-foot tall letters (it looks like it can't be more than two feet tall from ground level) that contains every phrase spoken to Peter by Christ in the New Testament. The lettering around the base of the dome reads: "You are Peter, and upon this rock I will built my church." The basilica is built on the supposed location of Peter's tomb, directly beneath the altar. To the right of the altar is a bronze statue of Peter, holding keys in his left hand and extending his right hand in blessing, and clad in Roman toga. He is wearing the toga of a Roman senator, and pious pilgrims touch or kiss his foot.

The climax of any tour of the basilica is Michelangelo's Pieta, with the life size sculpture of Christ's corpse being held by a larger-than-life Mary. Her size, and yet her youth, capture in the abstract of non-realism her maternal love for our savior. Unfortunately, it is behind bulletproof glass because a crazy man came into a church a few years ago and began chipping it with a hammer.
After a stroll through the crypt (where I located the tomb of John Paul II) and the treasury (uninteresting except for a single pillar from the Constantinian basilica), I headed out for the National Museum of Rome. Once in the square, I turned around for my first look at the Basilica of St. Peter from the outside.

Wow.

My evening in the National Museum of Rome didn't quite compare to either experience, but it is definitely worth a trip. It is one of the four great museums in Rome (with the Vatican, the Capitoline Museum, and the Borghese Gallery which I won't be getting to) and contains a collection of Roman sculpture that chronicles the rise and fall of the Roman Empire. Neato.

And that was my Wednesday at the Vatican.

Tivoli and Cassino

After a nearly sleepless midnight bus ride from Bari, I arrived in Rome shortly before 7am. Naturally, it wasn't yet check in time (the real disadvantage of saving money on accommodations and time on travel by taking night transport), but the people at Alessandro Palace and Bar (great name for a hostel) let me leave my stuff in luggage storage while I went out for the day. I thought I might take in Subiaco as a day trip from Rome in order to see the monasteries of Sts. Benedict and Scolastica, but I hung around the hostel too long chatting with the early risers. Instead, I went to Tivoli.

Tivoli is a nearby medieval hill town containing two of the most impressive villas: Villa D'Este and Villa Adriana. Villa D'Este is a palace built for the sixteenth century Cardinal Ippolito D'Este, grandson of Pope Alexander VI and son of Lucrezia Borgia. He plowed over a Benedictine monastery in order to catch this piece of prime real estate, where he built a a winding series of gardens and fountains. The palace is fairly standard and boring, but the villa's estate is a wonderful place to wander. He had a political falling out in Rome and was exiled from the city's boundaries, and fortunately for him, he already had this place to retire. Honestly, it was an interesting stroll, but nothing terribly exciting.

The Villa Adriana, on the other hand, was great. This was the private estate of the Roman Emperor Hadrian, who ruled over the Roman Empire at its greatest extent and built a palace to show for it. The ruins stretch out over the grounds, which are kept green by the water system set up over 1800 years ago. It contains a bath house in true Roman style, so I finally got to see what all these bathhouses scattered around Israel, Turkey, and Greece were attempting to imitate. Hadrian's villa also included a dual-language Latin and Greek library, which seems to have been a particular interest of his (a man after my own heart).

That afternoon I returned to Alessandro's, checked in, and relaxed. The hostel scene is a lot of fun; one of 'Europe's Famous Hostels' (an association of hostels across Europe), Alessandro's offers beds as low as 19 euro a night with hot water, breakfast, free pizza every night, and a great lounge and bar. It's also located right by Termini, the central metro, bus, and train station of Rome, making it extraordinarily convenient. Sounds like an advertisement? Yeah, probably, but this is the sort of budget-traveling I can really get into. I probably should have stayed in more dorms, anyway.

The next day I slept in and went to Cassino. I'd thought about going to Subiaco to see the Benedictine monasteries named after the eponymous St. Benedict and his sister, St. Scholastica, but that's best done first thing in the morning; instead, I went to the town of Cassino, the site of the World War II battle of Monte Cassino named after the Abbey of Monte Cassino. This is the first monastery in the western world, founded by St. Benedict of Nursia; it was reduced to rubble by Allied bombing during the battle, but a new structure has been built that captures the glory of its former incarnation.

It was an hour train ride to Cassino, and a hefty price for a cab up the mount (monte) to the abbey. However, it was totally worth it. The monastery contains the relics (that is, bodies) of Sts. Benedict and Scholastica as well as a truly excellent sacristy/museum/treasury (like the ones at St. Catherine's in Sinai and St. John the Theologian on Patmos). Nothing was nearly so ancient as the manuscripts contained in those two, but I got to see quite a few items saved from the rubble of the old Monte Cassino.

I probably could have spent my first days in Rome more efficiently, but I was exhausted after two sleepless nights on a ferry and on a bus. Now it's a race to the finish, and I'm seizing every minute.

As they used to say here, carpe diem.

Jesus Is Lord (and Caesar is not)

I've been hinting at this post and openly promising it for a few weeks now. Now that I'm in Rome, the Eternal City, it's time.

"Jesus is Lord." It is the central confession of faith for St. Paul in its simplest form. Better: "Jesus is Lord and Savior." We're implicit. We're the ones who require saving. But the focus is on the Lord, Jesus of Nazareth, the Messiah, Son of God.

In fact, "Jesus is Lord and Savior" is a sentence that unpacks Paul's most formal way of speaking of the crucified man from Nazareth: Lord Jesus Christ. As the Messiah (Gr. = Christos), Jesus of Nazareth has banished the great enemy, the unholy triad of sin, death, and the devil, and is thus our savior and our lord. Jesus is Lord and Savior is the way of stating who he is, such that 'Lord' and 'Christ' have become so attached to 'Jesus' that for Paul (and hopefully for us), they're just as much a part of his name as the one given to him by his parents.

'Lord and Savior.' What does it conjure in your mind? Prayer partner? A friend in time of need? Someone who has saved your soul? It should. But what did 'Lord and Savior' mean in the first century? Why this phrase, Paul?

Who is Lord and Savior in the first century? You probably already know the answer if you've been reading this blog: Caesar is Lord and Savior. And this isn't a later comparison drawn up by theologians; no, 'Lord and Savior' is a phrase found in the archaeological record, from the tiniest coins to the grandest inscriptions on imperial cult temples, referring to Caesar.

The same goes for 'Son of God.' Caesar is the son of a god, for when each emperor dies, he becomes a god and takes his place among the pantheon of gods. This isn't a metaphor; the deceased Caesars were literally worshiped as gods, and the living Caesars were worshipped as sons of gods. Eventually, some of them dispensed with the niceties and had themselves divinized while still alive.

So when Paul says 'Jesus Christ is Lord and Savior, the Son of God,' lets be clear: he is committing high treason against the state. If you've ever wondered why the Romans persecuted Christians, make no mistake: the Christianity preached by Paul and his fellow apostles was (and is?) deeply subversive. 'Jesus is President and Commander-in-Chief' doesn't really capture it. But imagine saying in Germany in 1938, 'Jesus Christ is the Fuhrer,' or Italy in 1934 'Jesus Christ is Il Duce,' and you might have an idea.

So whenever Paul says 'Jesus is Lord,' there's this eerie echo of the subject: 'And Caesar is not.'

That isn't to say that the Roman emperors were totalitarian despots. First off, much laud heaped upon the Caesars came freely from their subjects throughout the empire. The Sebasteon (Greek for 'Augustan') of Aphrodisias, a temple to Rome's first imperial dynasty, the Julio-Claudians, was constructed by the local population in order to celebrate the Caesars and the good they brought to the empire. The empire, after all, was borne in the crucible of a series of terrible civil wars: the first between the survivors of the First Triumvirate (Julius Caesar and Pompey Magnus), the second between the survivors of the second (Octavian, adopted son and natural nephew of Julius Caesar, and Mark Antony). When Octavian defeated Mark Antony and consolidated power as the 'first citizen' of the empire, we was proclaimed 'august' by the senate, and thus took the name Augustus; august, by the way, means venerable, and venerable means worthy of worship, and worthy of worship, of course, means divine. The ascension of Augustus meant peace, and his divine triumph was celebrated throughout all the world.

Second, and following, the site of Priene (where I visited shortly before the Seven Churches tour) contains an astonishing reference. The word euangelion, 'gospel,' is used specifically of the word that goes out from Caesar proclaiming the good news that Rome is triumphant, civilization is restored, a new Caesar as ascended to the throne, or some such. "The gospel of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ, Son of God" stands over-against "the gospel of our Lord and Savior, Caesar Augustus, the son of a god."

Paul drew these terms 'Lord,' 'Savior,' 'Son of God' from two sources: they fulfilled (and filled-out) the meanings he inherited in Judaism, and they clashed like cymbals with their usage in imperial Rome. With 'gospel,' he's taking it entirely from Rome and throwing it back in the empire's face.

And yet, in Romans 13, Paul tells us to obey the authorities, for they are there to do us good and punish evildoers. In my humble opinion, Paul, recognizing the politically-charged nature of his language up until this point, which pervades the letter, wants to make absolutely clear that he is not advocating rebellion or anarchy. That is something the zealotous revolutionaries that launched the Great Jewish Revolt of AD 66 wanted, and it got the temple burned down in AD 70. Nor is he advocating radical withdrawal from society or pacifism; as a Roman citizen, Paul is glad to live under the civilization of Roman rule. And yet, and yet, he advocates submission to the authorites not because they are gods or sons of gods, but because they receive their vocation from the one true God. He is happy to live under an earthly lord and to appreciate their good news, but Caesar is not the Lord, and his good news is not the Good News.

Another word: apostle. It means emissary, or ambassador. This is not a street preacher advocating a spiritual encounter with God, or even acceptance of a truth that will save one's soul. An ambassador is a formal representative that goes around delivering proclamations in a foreign country, making known not the options or opportunities, but cold hard facts.

Can any of us imagine the Roman general (later dictator) Sulla, on his way out to Pontus and Armenia in the early first century B.C., delivering this message? "The Roman Republic is sorely displeased with your conduct. We would like to give you the opportunity to change your hearts and minds, and embrace our republic's ideals as a path to spiritual betterment." Don't be ridiculous! The message was: "Rome is on it's way. I am on my way. Pledge your loyalty to us now, be faithful to the true world power, whatever your illusions of your own self-importance, because your time is short and our wrath is bottomless. Our coming is nigh."

It gives another meaning to 'parousia,' the 'advent' or 'coming' of the Lord. For anybody in Paul's head, using politically-charged terms like Lord, Savior, Son of God, and Gospel, 'Coming' (as in, Second Coming) cannot be spoken without at least taking account of its usage in Roman imperial terminology. When an emperor or official envoy was on his was to a city, the city was forced into a state of urgent preparation for his arrival. Whether they accepted him with a parade or with barred gates determined their gate; by the time he arrived, it was already too late.

Paul's talk about salvation is thus never far from his talk about the last days. 'Getting saved' isn't about ensuring your soul goes to heaven when you die; it's about ensuring that you're marked out as a loyal subject here and now so that when the king arrives back to earth, you don't die then. After all, the end of the end times isn't eternity in heaven; it's heaven brought to earth at the hands of the king.

How then, are we marked out as part of this loyal community with this rebellious corner of God's empire? Faith (pistes) and baptism. The Greek word for faith, pistes, means belief, trust, fidelity, loyalty; it is not merely an intellectual affirmation of a truth, but deep-abiding dependence on something and tenacious loyalty to it. Roman citizens and soldiers had pistes in Caesar; Christians have pistes in Christ. We can say we are saved 'through faith alone' because faith is not dead belief, but generates works (that add nothing themselves). And baptism? Baptism is the visible sign, seal, and sacrament that incorporates us into this family of faith. It is the grace that alone generates pistes, and alone marks those with pistes.

The faithful baptized make up the church; and what is the church? In AD 135 the Roman Emperor Hadrian, after defeating the Jewish rebels of Simon bar Kokhba, turned Jerusalem into a Roman colony city, Aelia Capitolina. It was called a colony because, as in so many other places, it was a city for poorer Romans and Roman veterns to move to. It was prime real estate. And it was typical Roman strategy: pacify a rebelious area by making it properly Roman.

The church is quite the same thing. Its individual congregations are like embassies (headed by ambassadors, populated by foreign service officers and staff), or colonies. The church is the place where the true emperor of the universe- Jesus Christ, not Caesar- plants down his loyal followers. The church is the ark that the floodwaters will pass over, because these cities are already loyal.

A side note: much has been made of Paul's curious statement in 1 Thessalonians that the dead in Christ will rise first, to be followed by the living, and that the living will meet him in the clouds before he returns to earth. The latter has somewhat mangled into a justification for this brand new idea of a 'rapture' seven years before the return of Christ; so the reasoning goes, there's no reason for believers to meet Christ up in the heavenly realms only to turn right back around to come back to earth; there must be a seven year gap inbetween, the so-called tribulation period.

But in ancient Rome, both the dead rising first and the meeting the Lord 'out there' before returning make absolute sense. In the former case, one must recognize that ancient cities had sacred boundaries in which people could not be buried. The dead were buried outside the city; the graveyards of Rome are all south of the current city center, around the catacombs of the Appian Way, and the same is truth of Kerameikos Cemetery in Athens, west of the Agora and Acropolis. If Paul is envisioning a parousia (advent, coming) paralleling the coming of an emperor to a city, well, of course you meet the dead first! They're outside the city, after all.

In the second case, remember that a city loyal to the emperor didn't just wait for him to arrive. They certainly didn't wait until he arrived to unbar the gates. No, a good and proper and loyal city held festivities in which the populus ran out to greet the arriving dignitary and escorted him back into the city. Believers ('the faithful' is a better translation) show their fidelity to the Lord by running out to greet him. There's nothing odd about it that requires the insertion of some seven year tribulation.

So what about our (post-)Protestant phrase from the Pax Americana, "make Jesus the Lord of your life?"' Is this really how Paul and the early Christians thought about their relationship to Jesus of Nazareth and the nature of his reign? I very much doubt it. One does not 'make Caesar the lord of your life.' Caesar is the lord of your life and everything around it. You don't even get to accept it or not; it's just a fact. You can rebel against it all you want, and willfully fight against it, but at the end of the day, Caesar is your lord anyway. The only question is whether you will break the law and have him as the lord that condemns you to death on a cross, or you will go about your business and have him as a lord and savior.

This is one of the many, many reasons why, at the end of the day, I don't believe we can talk about 'accepting' Christ, 'choosing' Christ, or doing anything to become saved. We may choose to rebel against the Kingdom of God; we can reject his Lordship; we can frown at the good news, the Gospel; we can deny that he is Son of God; we can turn cynical at the prospect of his increasingly-delayed Parousia; but only pistes, that tenacious fidelity, that loyalty, that belief in the Lord who is unseen, can ensure that he is our Savior. We may choose our earthly lords; it is obvious whether one might choose to believe the good news of America. But choose to believe in the unseen? That sort of radically moronic move- foolish in the eyes of the world- can only come about because grace has generated that within us. No choice necessary; that is the radical confession of grace alone, and I reject theology that says otherwise.

And therein lies the difference between Emperor Caesar and King Jesus. Caesar commands loyalty and leaves it to his subjects to obey; Jesus extends grace, and adopts brothers and sisters to be the Father's sons and daughters. The gospel of Caesar is the order brought about by Roman law; the gospel of Christ is the good news grace. As Martin Luther put it in one of my favorite quotes of his (or of anyone): "The Law says 'Do this,' and it is never done; Grace says 'believe in this,' and everything is already done."

And now we strike to the heart of the difference between Caesar and Christ. Caesar wins his victories by conquering enemies on the battlefield. He rides at the head of legions and compels people to behave like civilized men rather than barbarians.

But Christ has already won the victory. And his victory, quite appropriately, was at the hands of Rome's principal instrument for the execution of those rebellious barbarians: the cross. Christ died for our sins; but however much it would have 'worked' had his innocent life ended quietly in bed in Nazareth, can we really imagine Christianity being the same if the death that saves us from death was a quiet and peaceful death in his sleep? I think not. Christ conquers Rome's good news of civilization by dying at its hands; he shows the world for what it is; he shows us for what we are. The Old Adam dies in the mutulated Image of God at the hands of those who believe themselves to be gods. He becomes the rebel- "he became sin"- in order to win the victory that Caesar never could. The idolatry of earthly goods and the pride in human accomplishment lies in ruins scattered around the Mediterranean Sea, while the ambassadors of Christ continue to subvert the principalities of this world through our tiny colonies called churches. Who is the victor?

Jesus is Lord. And Caesar is not.

Corinth and Onward

To get things straight: there's the site of ancient Corinth, which includes the ancient city and the acropolis (Acrocorinth) rising beyond it; there's Corinth, the modern city that has been built up around the canal that runs through the isthmus of Corinth; and there's Ancient Corinth, the modern village which envelops the site of the ancient city like a ring.

Got that?

So from Athens I caught a bus to modern Corinth, and from there to Ancient Corinth after a lengthy wait. Modern Corinth isn't all that big, but it's got a big city feel and nothing of interest. It's sort of like Harrisburg.

Ancient Corinth on the other hand is a lovely little village with one central cobblestone square. It's got real character, even apart from the fact that it has a truly extraordinary archaeological site smack in the middle of it and the hill to the south rises up into the massive Acrocorinth (which dwarfs the Athenian Acropolis, by the way). I checked into a place I reserved from Chan HaShayarot (the Bedouin tent with internet that I stayed at during Lent) called Rooms for Rent Tasos, a little mom and pop (and daughter and grandfather) Greek place above their own Tasos taverna, where probably no Americans ever stay. It was wonderful; hot water, clean sheets, a shared balcony, shampoo and soap and towel included; really, what more could you ask for? Well, internet, but fortunately there was an internet cafe up the road that doubled as the one and only hangout for the village youth.

By the time I'd arrived it was an hour before sunset and the sites were long closed. However, I took a few minutes to walk around the town and acquaint myself with its single main street, running along the north side of ancient Corinth, and talk to some locals. It was a very relaxing evening.

I'd planned on getting up bright and early in order to hike up Acrocorinth, but I ended up sleeping in and I took a taxi up to the top instead. No worries, though; there's quite a bit of hiking to be had at the top. Acrocorinth was fortified in the archaic age of Greece long before the Dorian invasion, when those northern tribes intermingled with the native Mycenaean population and produced the ethnic Greeks of classical Athens. It proved a solid fortification for the Corinthians until the ascension of Rome, which smashed it with her legions. Byzantine, Frankish Crusader, Venetian, and Ottoman rulers have all placed their stamp on the site, and the current walls are largely Frankish and Venetian.

After hiking around the site for about an hour and a half, going from various disused fortresses and coming across an abandoned mosque (which, like all abandoned Ottoman mosques in Greece, lacks its minaret thanks to an orgy of destruction wrought by the liberated Greeks) I decided I wouldn't forgive myself if I didn't trek up to the Temple of Aphrodite. There isn't really anything there except the barest witness to its foundations, and I knew that, but this was, after all, the Corinthian Temple of Aphrodite.

In his correspondence with the Corinthians St. Paul calls them out for their sexual immorality. This conforms perfectly to the picture we have of Corinth from others in the ancient world; the Temple of Aphrodite was known to various writers as a center for sacred temple prostitution (in which women would sacrificially offer their bodies to the goddess by using them as means of financing the temple).

The best preserved temple in ancient Corinth, though, is in the ancient city remains down below. Upon returning to Ancient Corinth village and taking a break for lunch, I went into the site, which contains an archaic era Temple of Apollo. We know it's archaic because archaic-era temples were very long and narrow, unlike the classical Parthenon; the temple is pretty well preserved, too. The rest of the site, however, is largely Roman-era; thanks to this, it is one of those sites where we can really envision Paul living, working, and proclaiming on its streets.

A word, then, about Paul's troubles in Corinth. Paul stayed in Corinth for some time thanks to the patronage of Priscilla and Aquila. This pair of Jews from Rome were exiled by the Emperor Claudius when he declared Jews banned from the city (possibly due to intra-Jewish conflicts over whether to accept Christ); they turn up in Corinth, Ephesus, and then Rome once Claudius is no longer emperor and Nero is on the throne (thus ending the law of exile). Just from this, there are two things we might say about them: they were patrons to Paul, also engaged in his trade of leather-working and tent-making but in some way supporting him, with him as their client; they themselves were refugees and exiles. So how were they in a position to be patrons?

The Roman socioeconomic system was suffused with the patronage system. The gods were the patrons of various vocations with their official guilds; the highest gods were the patrons of the emperor, their client; the emperor was in turn the patron of the aristocracy and the citizens of the empire (SPQR), with the senators having own clientele of equestrians, and on down the ladder. Wealthy and aristocratic citizens, clients of higher authorities, were patrons of poorer citizens, non-citizens, freedmen, and even their own slaves. Slaves, for instance, might have once been free persons who sold themselves into slavery in order to become the client of a wealthy patron in the hopes that, once freed, they would be in a far better position in this social system of patronage than they were originally; of course slaves were just as often debtors or war captives.

The patronage system fundamentally organized life in the Roman world. So when we picture Priscilla and Aquila as Paul's patrons, there's no need to imagine them as wealthy; they might just be in the right place to offer aid, with the expected return being aid in their own project.

Where would refugee tent-makers work? Ancient neighborhoods were not divided between wealthy and poor neighborhoods; at Pompeii and Herculaneum the largest villas are surrounded on their street-side walls by storefronts on the first story and tenant housing on the second. The clients of the owners of the villa- lesser citizens, free persons, freed slaves, and their own slaves- all worked in these storefronts and lived in these rented spaces. One imagines Priscilla and Aquila latching on to these wealthy and powerful patrons as they move between Ephesus and Corinth, waiting for the day they might return to room; in order to rent a shop to ply their trade and live in the housing cluster above, they must make themselves into the clients of the villa's owners; and Paul, in order to have a place from which to base his mission, becomes their clients, working in their shop and sleeping in a corner of their home. It's beneficial to them because it relieves their workload; it's beneficial to Paul because it allows him to integrate himself into the villa's patronage network which, he hopes, will become a center of Christianity in Corinth.

And yet something goes terribly wrong.

While the problems addressed in 1 Corinthians are varied, they all trace back to a root problem: a fundamental misunderstanding of the body of Christ. This is either a misunderstanding of the relationship between male or female; or a misunderstanding of Christ's body in the Eucharist; or a misunderstanding of the relationship between members of the community on how to treat each other; or a misunderstanding of what it means to have Christ risen in his true body.

Without going into too much detail, I follow certain scholars in thinking that this misunderstanding arises because Paul's missionary strategy, which aimed at integrating himself into the patronage structure, was at first successful- the villa owners were converted and used their villa as a sacred space for the community gathering of Christians for worship- but never dissolved the patronage system. Rather, it carried over into the church.

So for instance, when discussing the Eucharist in 1 Corinthians 11, Paul rebukes the community for having a preference for the wealthy over the poor. In the common patronage system villa owners would have feasts with their clients, and these would be both opportunities for working one's way deeper into the patronage system and for visually and symbolically clarifying who was at the top of the food chain (literally). First, the seating arrangement would place the villa owner at the head place, with his (or her) clientele sitting close, and their clientele sitting farther away, until the feast spilled out into the the slave's quarters. So when he writes "there are divisions among you" (11:18), he's referring to a very recognizable system of dividing guests. Second, the villa owners would provide the food, but it would be a radically different quality depending on one's place in the system. Clearly, both of these villa patronage practices worked their way into the villa church's feasts (which came either before or after the ceremonial, solemn Eucharist). The situation seems to have gotten so bad that people were bringing their own food and eating it separately from everybody else (11:21).

As a result, Paul has to tell the villa owners that if they, the wealthy, must eat better food than everyone else, at least do it in their homes (11:22; 34), and to eat, worship, and partake together in a more formal and solemn spirit worthy of the church that treats the villa's patrons and everyone else in the system as radically and totally equal. The patronage system simply won't work within the church.

So as I walked around ancient Corinth and saw a building with a row of shops (above), but one door larger than the rest leading back to a villa back away from the street-front, I got excited. That was exactly the sort of place we might expect Paul to work, live, and preach, and I was downright giddy to view the archaeological remnant of that system which imported so many problems into the radically equal body of Christ.

Well, yesterday I headed to Patra and boarded a ferry to Italy. Now I'm stuck in Bari, Italy, the port town. I was given a train ticket to Cassino (where I was supposed to stay tonight) at the billet window which wasn't a ticket at all but merely a schedule (even though I checked it and asked whether or not that was the ticket). When I tried to board the train, I was told to go back and buy a ticket; by the time I was on my way back, the train was gone.

So, I booked another night in Rome tomorrow night. I'll be taking a night bus there tonight (oh joy) and hopefully get Cassino in as an excursion. Phew. If I'd known it was going to work out like this, I would have just flew from Athens to Rome. Oh well!
In any case, welcome to Italy. Country #6, ten days from home.

The Prayer of the Heart

What in the world is the prayer of the heart?

The prayer of the heart, or the Jesus prayer, is an ancient prayer drawn from the Scriptures and expressed as the simplest petition one can offer: Lord Jesus Christ, Son of God, have mercy on me, a sinner.

Lord Jesus Christ, Son of God, have mercy on me, a sinner....

The best-known work on the prayer is the anonymously authored classic of Russian spirituality, The Way of the Pilgrim. It's definitely worth reading, but it presumes certain convictions on the part of the reader. It assumes, first of all, that the reader is acquainted with repetitive, ritual, and liturgical forms of prayer, which most Americans just aren't. It also presumes belief in the Orthodox concept of salvation, called theosis, which most Americans don't.

So I offer this as my humble introduction to the prayer of the heart which has accompanied the way of this pilgrim for these four months. I also hope it will be a useful introduction to the theory and practice of prayer ropes and prayer beads as well as the deeper meditative nature of prayer. I write this not as an exhortation to conform to a spiritual practice, but as an invitation to join with me in a prayer that has brought profound comfort to me through the stress of my travels.

Lord Jesus Christ, Son of God, have mercy on me, a sinner....

Most basically, you need to know that you don't just say the prayer once. You repeat it over, and over, and over. It's a drumming beat.

The prayer is not meant to be a one-time petition; indeed, its less a petition than a meditation. American Protestantism has almost entirely lost the art of contemplative prayer, as opposed to the petitionary prayer that dominates our worship services and daily devotions: "Lord, I just want this; Jesus, I'd like that." And I certainly don't mean selfish petitions! By no means! "Lord, I want peace of mind for this brother and sister in Christ who is in deep need; Jesus, I just pray to you for the work of this Christian orphanage in such and a such a place."

But petitionary prayer is not the sort of deep communion with God that prayer has always offered. For that, we require the flip side of the coin: contemplative, or meditative prayer. In this sort of prayer we search for an inner silence so we can hear the still small voice of the transcendent and imminent God. Most often, we look for this by the quiet reading of the Scriptures; the ancient liturgical art of Lectio Divina, or Sacred Reading, is a contemplative, very slow, out loud reading of the Scriptures. Petitions are an important facet of prayer; but prayer-as-communion requires going further.

The Jesus Prayer stands as the hinge between petitionary and meditative prayer. It's a petition for Christ to have mercy on us, whether for our sins or in the hardships we face because of the fallenness of the world; but it's equally a reflection on the essential truth of the Christian faith: that the Lord Jesus Christ, the Son of God, is boundlessly merciful to us wretched sinners.

Lord Jesus Christ, Son of God, have mercy on me, a sinner....

The repetitions of this prayer can go on silently, in the background of your mind, all day (and when you really get into it, in your dreams as well). When beginning, as advised in the The Way of the Pilgrim, one should take a significant time alone- several hours over the course of several days- in order to simply pray the prayer. Only then can it get into your subconscious in such a way that is spontaneously prayed in the midst of everyday activities, as I chat with others, as I wait in line for a bus, as I type this post.

The prayer, you see, is not meant to be something you pray in the forefront of your mind all day and night. We're not monks; we have vocations to attend to. Rather, it is meant to form a constant background to your life-experience. Repentance toward God is not a one-time event that 'gets us saved' or something we do after we've sinned; rather, it is an attitude we must actively cultivate in order to inform our everyday interaction with God, other persons, and the world.

Lord Jesus Christ, Son of God, have mercy on me, a sinner....

I say this specifically as I anticipate two objections to the practice of repetitive, nigh-subconscious prayer: one very American-Protestant, the other very Lutheran.

On the one hand, you might say, how can such a prayer be truly meaningful if it isn't prayed sincerely and in the foreground? This objection, I think, is a sad symptom of our American obsession with petitionary prayer, on the one hand, and authenticity, on the other. Yet as I said, the Jesus Prayer stands on the hinge between petitionary prayer and contemplative prayer. It is voiced in the words of a petition, yes, but contemplative prayer is as much a dialogue between us and God as it is a lone cry out to God. It is repeated over and over less because we are calling out again and again (and again!) to God than it is because in these words, from our tongue, God is crying out again and again (and again!) to us to live in the light of the answer of this prayer: Yes, I do! I shall always have mercy on you, my child!

Prayer does not begin with the presence of God, but with his absence. We cry to the Lord in our distress not because he is visibly there, but because he seems so far. The prayer is repeated because it is a seeking for the presence of God, ready to come to the foreground in the most difficult situations precisely because it is always there in the background. Many times on this journey I have found myself suddenly in a tight spot, in need of aid, and have found that rather than beginning to stumble onto words, the words were already on my lips! Lord Jesus Christ, Son of God, have mercy on me, a sinner!

But how can this been truly the authentic voice of the Spirit if its a ritual? And how can it be authentic if I'm hardly even aware of praying it? For that, I think we need to revisit our understanding of authenticity. What is truly real is not the glamorous or the spontaneous, the sudden ecstatic outburst or the words of our own mouths, but those deep things within us that inform our world and transform our lives, even when we're barely aware of them.

I think this response goes a long way toward meeting the Lutheran concern, which I myself have had to struggle with as a sincere adherent of Luther's theology. How can I pray this prayer for mercy, over and over, when I believe that God has already declared me as sinless as possible, and as righteous as Christ? And how, when that declaration came about not even by 'choosing Jesus' or saying the 'sinner's prayer' (as most evangelicals believe), but only by his unmerited grace?

In the first case, by I point to everything I said above. This is less a petition than it is a contemplation; and it is less my crying out to God than it is a lesson in the right order of things- Jesus of Nazareth is Lord, Messiah, and Son of God, and I am a sinner in need to his mercy- that shapes who I am and where I am in God's creation. So if you, like me, believe that justification is by grace alone through faith alone, and are concerned at the nature of this repetitive, ritual prayer of the heart, go back and reread what I wrote to our Protestant brothers and sisters.

But second, I would emphasize that if we, as Lutherans, are to be serious that justification is by 'double forensic imputation'- that is, our sin is legally credited to Christ crucified, and his righteousness is legally credited to us- and not by the growth in visible righteousness as Catholics believe, then we need to get serious about sanctification. For when we say that Christ is regarded as our sin, and we are regarded as Christ, the Catholic response is that we believe in a 'legal fiction' and are accusing God of willful ignorance; but if God is to be God, let us be clear that in legally regarding us as the righteousness of Christ, we have no doubt that we one day will be transformed from glory (of our legal partaking in Christ's righteousness) to glory (of our visible partaking in Christ's righteousness). For me, praying the Jesus Prayer means getting serious about sanctification.

But enough of arguments. After all, my point is not to convince anyone to pray this prayer, but merely to share my experience of it; I only counter these objections in order to defend my own actions.

Lord Jesus Christ, Son of God, have mercy on me, a sinner....

Back to the practice of the prayer itself.

One thing that helps me pray the prayer throughout the day has been timing it with my breathing, as suggested in The Way of the Pilgrim. At first this is fairly difficult, since during hours and days of practice you need to really pray it quietly, but out loud. That's how you drum it into your head. But eventually you let your voice fade away, and only your lips continue. Once I got to this point, I timed it as such:

(while breathing in): Lord Jesus Christ...
(while breathing out): ...Son of God...
(while breathing in): ...have mercy on me...
(while breathing out) ...a sinner...

And on the next breath, you start right over again, with 'Lord Jesus Christ...'

Eventually, you can even let your lips slide and just flick your tongue in the now-familiar motion. It is also said in The Way of the Pilgrim to time the words and syllables to your heartbeat; personally, I've never found this helpful, as my heartbeat and my natural breathing rhythm are simply off, and the syllables don't line up most of the time. But if it works for you, or if the heartbeat works better than the breathing, go for the other or both.

A note on the structure of the prayer: some time, word out the fullest meanings of each word of the prayer. It's fascinating, and for those of you, like me, who enjoy a bit of biblical, theological, and historical study, it's an excellent way to incorporate your intellectual interests into your prayer life. For instance:

Lord. In Hebrew, this could be Yahweh, the personal name of the one patron deity of the Hebrews, who we know under the name Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. It could also be Adonai, the term in Hebrew used when 'Yahweh' cannot be spoken aloud with a meaning of 'master' or 'suzerain.' This is a fun place to incorporate the scholarly work of an M.G. Kline or a Michael Horton on the parallelism between the covenant at Sinai and the suzerainity treaties of the Ancient Near East (if that makes no sense, don't worry). And then there's the Greek, Kyrie, which brings me back into the central spine of this prayer: "Kyrie eleison," "Lord have mercy." And then there's the Latin Dominus, where I incorporate the parallelism between Paul's 'Jesus is Lord' and Roman imperial ideology/theology's "Caesar is Lord," which in turn contrasts the Kingdom of God with the Imperium Romanum.

And you can go on and on, with each word of the prayer. I suppose if you really want to hear my personal reflections on each one, you can email me, but I won't bore you with them here. My simple point is that the prayer is absolutely packed with meaning.

Lord Jesus Christ, Son of God, have mercy on me, a sinner....

A second note about the structure: not with every word, but with its overall trust, the prayer descends from the highest heights of Godhead (Lord, Yahweh) down to me, a sinner. Strange to think about, given the Orthodox theology of sin, but as a Lutheran what petition better expresses the total depravity of humankind in contrast to its righteous Creator?

Indeed, if this were a prayer designed for one-time petition, it's a rather depressing one. It begins with the Lord, yes, but it ends with 'a sinner.' It's designed to be repeated: the final word 'sinner' demands that we run back to the 'Lord,' beginning the prayer anew with every breath.

Lord Jesus Christ, Son of God, have mercy on me, a sinner....

So a word about the chotki, the Orthodox prayer rope. It's a series of knots tied together in a circle, with a cross usually hanging off of it. They come in a number of varieties, with varying number of knots; mine is the 100-knot variety, with three blue beads and the cross punctuating each series of twenty-five petitions. It's not as though I need to keep track of how many times I've prayed (the Orthodox do, but I feel a little uncomfortable keeping track of a supposedly ceaseless prayer). Rather, the chotki reminds me to pray, and hear Spirit calling to Spirit within me. Moving my now-calloused thumb from knot to knot pushes me to continue these repetitions when my soul becomes, my body lazy, and my mind weak, so that when true laziness, or weakness, or exhaustion come, the prayer of the heart will be right there. I find it useful; you may not. That's fine!

Certain Lutherans going straight back to the sixteenth century have incorporated this ancient prayer into a theologically-acceptable version of the rosary, as well. Unlike the Anglican version of the rosary, which is physically different from that used by Catholics, Lutherans like me (hardly in the majority) use one that is identical in organization to the Catholic version. It is a loop of five 'decades,' or ten beads, separated by four distinctive beads, with a fifth central piece containing an image of the Blessed Virgin Mary. From this Marian piece hangs another series of beads, five in all, with the two beads farthest up and farthest down on this hanging bit that are also distinctive from the inner three. At the bottom hangs a crucifix.

Yet whereas the decades on the Catholic rosary are used to recite the Hail Mary ("Hail Mary, full of grace, the Lord is with thee. Blessed art thou amongst women, and blessed is the fruit of thy womb, Jesus Christ. Holy Mary, Mother of God, pray for us sinners now and at the hour of our death), the Lutheran version employs these decades to pray the Jesus Prayer. Using the rosary, I work my way up from the crucifix, where I invoke the name of the Trinity ("In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit, Amen."), I pray the Nicene Creed on the first distinctive bead; three prayers of the heart on the next series; a Gloria Patri (Blessed be the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit. As it was in the beginning, is now, and evermore shalt be, world without end, amen.) on the chain between the uppermost of these three and the next distinctive bead; and an Our Father (i.e., the Lord's Prayer) on the second and uppermost of these distinctive beads.

Skipping the Marian image, I proceed directly to the first decade of ten Jesus prayers; at the chain between the last of the decade beads and the connecting distinctive bead, I pray the Gloria Patri, and then the Our Father on the distinctive bead. This process repeats five times until I reach the image of Mary again. Here, I pray the pre-Tridentine Hail Mary; that is, the first two sentences, taken from Luke 1:28 and 1:42, without praying the third sentence, added by the Council of Trent, which prays directly to her for intercession on our behalf. Then I just reverse the order down the last beads- the Our Father, the Gloria Patri, the Jesus Prayers, and the Nicene Creed- before finishing "In the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, amen."

Here's a very similar summary: http://www.giftsofaith.com/Files/lutheranrosary.pdf

Why this excursus into the Lutheran rosary? Well, besides the fact that I've mentioned it in my posts before without explaining, it helps illustrate the multifaceted uses of the Jesus Prayer. The prayer of the heart is there so that we can "pray without ceasing" (1 Thessalonians 5:17), and it is largely meditative and contemplating. But it's also a petition, as it is most obviously in this Lutheran rosary. That is why I pray this version of the rosary before church; for that is when I most thoroughly need to ask for God's mercy upon this sinner, when I prepare my heart and mind to receive him who comes to us in his body and blood.

And here I note that as with all great spiritual practices, there is the threat of pride. What I must strive to remind myself is that praying the prayer of the heart does not bring about God's mercy; if anything, God's mercy is bringing about this wellspring of prayer within my heart. And it is not in actually doing deeds of righteousness, whether in saying the prayer or just being a good person, that I am actually made righteous; the righteousness of Christ, legally imputed to me, is rather the foundation of why I am transformed into a better person, first inside, then out. And still better, it is not in cultivating an attitude of repentance, or asking for God's repentance, that I am prepared to receive Holy Communion, but rather I am humbled by the declaration of 'righteous' which alone allows me to partake of the glory of God incarnate.

Even so, Lord Jesus Christ, Son of God, have mercy on me, a sinner....

Athens

The night train to Athens was only a night train inasmuch as it ran at night; fortunately, my first class Eurail ticket allowed me to sit in a quieter compartment with five other people rather than in a rowdy car. So between sleeping pills, earplugs, a facemask, and three days of exhaustion from Mount Athos, I think I got a good five hours of sleep before arriving at 6am.

From the train station I worked out the metro system (boy am I glad I took a little Greek) and found my way to Monasteraki Square. Monasteraki and Syntagma Squares are the two ends of Ermou Street, the main artery through Athens' nicest neighborhood, the Plaka. My hostel was right off Monasteraki; it's run by internationals, and called Athenstyle. Like Jimmy's Place in Selcuk and Fauzi Azar in Nazareth, I highly recommend it. Their lobby is part lounge, part cafe and bar, and part tourism bureau; better yet, they have a rooftop bar and lounge with a nightly happy hour and an unbeatable view of the Acropolis.

Since it was seven in the morning by the time I got there, my room obviously wasn't ready, but they were happy to let me crash on the couch downstairs in the pool hall. So after three hours of catching up on sleep, I got up around 10:30 and began my Rick Steves walking tour of Athens.

Athens can be magnificently charming, or horrendous. You have to have a good guide, and once again, Rick Steves didn't disappoint. I hopped the metro to Syntagma Square, and the tour took a meandering four hours before getting back to Monasteraki, a mere one kilometer away from the starting point.

If Monasteraki Square is the social and cultural center of Athens, Syntagma Square is the center of its political and economic life. Coming up from the metro station the first thing I saw was the parliament building. I'd arrived at the top end of the hour, so I got to witness the changing of the evzone guards at the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier (right), which sits just in front of parliament. The evzone guards left a little something to be desired (I mean, I've seen the British and the Danish do it), but the tomb was excellent: the shallow relief is of a dead Greek soldier, depicted with his shield. Spartan! Come back with your shield... or on it!

From here took me along Ermou street, a wide, brick-paved pedestrian thoroughfare with just the occassional moped- just like Ben Yehuda St. in Jerusalem, but like the pedestrian way in Istanbul, much longer. I walked around and saw three or four beautiful Greek churches. Unfortunately, after an earthquake, the Metropolitan Church of Athens, the leading church of Greek Orthodoxy (though not of worldwide Orthodoxy; that's St. George's in Istanbul), is covered in ugly scaffolding inside and out. However, a number of smaller churches are little treasures, especially the Church of Kapnikarea and the Church of Agios Eleftherios.

In the courtyard of the Metropolitan Church, though, is a statue of Greek Archbishop Damaskinos erected by the local Jewish population. During the Nazi occupation, he risked formally speaking out against the deportation of Jews to the rumored camps. When the Nazis threatened to put him before a firing squad, he said that he should be hanged instead, in proper Orthodox tradition. He survived.

Nearby to these churches is the wonderful Agia Filotheis St., which is sort of a Greek Orthodox emporium of church supplies. Vestments, icons, censors, lamps, and whatever else you can think of can be purchased on this street. I didn't have the time or money to shop, but I managed to snag a picture of an iconographer at work.

Dipping farther south, I walked into Hadrianopolis, the area outside classical Athens that was refounded by the Emperor Hadrian (much as he refounded Jerusalem as Aelia Capitolina, but here out of love for the native culture rather than disdain). The centerpieces of this area are the Arch of Hadrian and the Temple of Olympian Zeus. The former was built to commemorate the completion of the latter; the side facing classical Athens contains an inscription "This is Athens, ancient city of Theseus;" the opposite frieze, facing Hadrianopolis, says "This is the city of Hadrian, and not of Theseus." Ouch.

The Temple of Olympian Zeus is now a series of six or so clustered columns and two outlying stragglers; it's rather difficult to get the overall impression. What I think is really significant about it is that alongside the statue of Zeus that served as the object of worship was a statue of Hadrian himself, likewise worshiped as a god on earth. Once again, the imperial cult raises its head; I promise, that post on Jesus, Paul, and Caesar will come.

After winding me past the Lysicrates Monument and Lysicrates Square, and taking me through the quaint white-and-blue streets of the Hellenic islander neighborhood Anafiotika, the guide led me out to the Roman Forum and its Tower of the Winds. The Tower of the Winds is an octagonal, domed structure that has eight reliefs of persons representing the eight winds. The tower itself served as a sundial, waterclock, and astronomical chart.

Finally, walking past Hadrian's Library, I came back to Monasteraki Square. At this point it was already 3pm, and all the archaeological sites were closing down. So I got on the internet for awhile and eventually went up to enjoy the company of other young international travelers on the roof.

The next morning it was time to take in the heavy-lifting: the Agora and the Acropolis. Note, of course, that both of those are common nouns; but they get capitalized here, because Athen's agora is the Agora, and Athen's acropolis is the Acropolis.

The Agora was the central place of political, social, economic, and intellectual activity; only in the cultural and religious fields did the center of focus shift southeast to the Acropolis. The Agora contained places for public debates on philosophy; the bouleterion, the seat of the democratic leadership of Athens; stalls and arcades for merchants; a theater (properly an odeon) for musical performances; the ceremonial parade grounds leading up to the Acropolis; and even temples to the Mother Goddess (the Matroon) and Hephaistos. The Stoa of Attalos has been meticulously reconstructed and now houses the Agora Museum; the Temple of Hephaistos, god of blacksmiths (notice the mercantile theme, as well as the Matroon's agricultural patronage), has been blessedly preserved, much like the Parthenon. All of this made for an excellent two hour stroll through the site.

From there it was a very pleasant fifteen minute walk up the Panathenaic Way up to the Acropolis. I'm not entirely sure what to say about it. The Parthenon, dedicated to Athena the Virgin (virgin = parthenos), patronness of the city, is an unbelievable combination of sheer bulk and masterful architecture. It uses a series of optical illusions to keep its bulk from appearing unbalanced, by widening the columns at the end, having them tilt inward ever so slightly, and adding a gradual curvature to the floor so that the middle sticks up about an inch from the sides. So yes, I mean, it's the Parthenon.

The other structures were just as impressive, though. The Temple of Athena Nike, just to the right as one passes through the Propylaea, is dedicated to the victory of Athena and the Athenians over the Persians, and to ensure her continued support as the Athens fought the Persians in the Peloponnesian War. Note: the Athenians lost. Unfortunately it is currently undergoing extensive renovation; the entire temple is being disassembled, transported elsewhere brick by brick, where each bit will receive a thorough cleaning, and then it will be put back together again on site. At present, it's covered in scaffolding and cranes, and half the temple just isn't there.

There's also the Erechtheion and its Porch of the Caryatids. It occupies the oldest-inhabited site on the Acropolis where the Mycenaeans originally built their palace, and it was dedicated to Athena Polias, the 'Protector of the City.' When the Persians sacked the city and burnt the original Acropolis complex to the ground, Pericles took the statue of Athena Polias- an olive-wood satue dating to 900 BC- in order to save it so that she might, in turn, save them.

Oh, and of course, there's my own personal interest: the Romans decided to plop down their own temple, fittingly to the goddess Roma. Ah, the imperial ideology/theology rears its head again.

A fun note: the Acropolis' east side contains a large Greek flag with a history of its own. When the Nazis entered Athens in April of 1941, they ordered the evzone guard (the same unit at the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier) to remove the flag. He took the flag down, wrapped it around himself, and jumped to his death. A month later two Greek teenagers scaled the Acropolis, took down the Nazi flag, and raised the Greek flag back up.

Well, my camera ran out of batteries, so I wasted a few hours recharging it, by which time most of the sites were closed. So it was another afternoon on the internet and night on the roof. The good news: 1.80 euro will buy you a delicious gyro or souvlaki pita in Monasteraki Square. Seriously, you can do Europe on a tight budget, no problem, if you stay in dorms at hostels and let the staff point you in the right direction. I wasn't in a dorm here, but I've since switched my plans for Rome.

Anyways, this morning I went to the National Archaeological Museum of Greece, the greatest collection of Greek art and finds anywhere in the world. It was just jaw-dropping; and like the museums in Istanbul, they let you take pictures.

The highlights:

The Archaic-era Kouros figures (note the Egyptian influence), young nude men with a creepy smile:

The classical-era bronze Zeus/Poseidon, in mid-throw of a missing lightning-bolt or trident:

The ancient replica of the Parthenon's statue of Athena, holding Nike in her palm; for reference, the original Nike was six feet tall:

The Hellenistic-era bronze Paris, handing an apple to the winner of the ill-fated beauty contest that kicks off The Iliad:

And the Roman bronze of Caesar Augustus, with its return to the stoicism of classical Athens:

I was also a fan of the creepy bird-people:

There was also this other statue of Aphrodite and a satyr (I think), but I didn't get a look at the label because of a huge crowd of artists on the floor drawing it. If anyone can tell me its significance, much appreciated:

Well, I returned to the Roman Forum and the Library of Hadrian for the afternoon since I hadn't been able to go in before, but my Acropolis ticket happily covered those two sites as well as several others (including the Agora), so I figured I'd give those priority. I never made it to the Byzantine and Christian Museum or to the Acropolis Museum, but I certainly made the best of three days in a city that inexplicably shuts down at 3pm.

This afternoon I headed off by bus for Ancient Corinth, the village ringing around the ancient city's archaeological site about three miles outside the wholly uninteresting modern Corinth. With any luck, I'll be going up the Corinthian acropolis tomorrow morning and seeing the archaeological site and its museum before the 3pm closing. Wish me luck.

Christos anesti! Alithos anesti!