1.
Occitan cross
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The cross was first used as such, probably, in the coat of arms of the counts of Forcalquier in Provence and then by the counts of Toulouse in the traditional territory of Languedoc. It later spread to the provinces of lo país, namely Provence, Guyenne, Gascony, Dauphiné, Auvergne. A yellow Occitan cross on a background with the seven-armed golden star of the Felibritge makes up the flag of modern-day Occitania. It can also be found in the emblems of Midi-Pyrénées, Languedoc-Roussillon and Hautes-Alpes, among others, as well as in cemeteries. The Occitan cross is technically described as mouthed and hollowed out, with keys, in La Cançon de la crosada, it goes by the name of Raymondine cross. It is still disputed among experts as to whether its first appearance in Occitania was in Provence or Languedoc and it soon spreads across the whole south-western part of todays France and is even spotted in various towns up north throughout the 12th century. Several interpretations have been proposed for the cross, often stressing the symbolic side of it and leaving aside the fact that heraldry is not a science of symbols, but one of emblems. In 1950, Henri Rolland suggested that the origin of the Occitan cross be traced back to the marquisate of Provence, north of the Durance, more precisely the town of Venasque. In 1966, in the LAuta review, Roger Camboulives voices his idea that the Occitan cross derives from a sun cross and it would have arrived in Toulouse via northern Italy and Provence, probably sometime in the 10th century. In 1980, Camboulives again emphasizes the role played by the Wisigoths in the presence of small spheres at the end of the arms of the cross and this hypothesis would definitely locate the birth of the Occitan cross in or around Toulouse. In 1986, Jean-Yves Royer claims that the cross was originally from Provence but admits that Henri Rollands theory was flawed, Royer concludes that Rolland possibly mistook the Occitan cross with that of Forcalquier. He draws evidence most notably from two crosses carved in the lid of a found in the small Alpes-de-Haute-Provence commune of Ganagobie. Two years after, in LAuta, Jean Rocacher confirms that the Occitan cross is first the own emblem of the old county of Venasque, in 2000, Laurent Macé claims that the Occitan cross became the counts emblem after Raymond IV took part in the First Crusade. Macé indicates that its pattern was first found in the Byzantine area and spread across Western Europe through Italy, the crosses of Venasque and Forcalquier would thus share the same origin, though one was not inspired by the other. Later in the year, Bertran de la Farge locates the original Occitan cross somewhere in the marquisate of Provence. He argues it could be a mixture of the Constantinople cross and the Coptic cross, as for now, there is no undeniable evidence as to which side is right. The Occitan cross can be found on a number of flags, coats of arms, emblems and logos
2.
Greek language
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Greek is an independent branch of the Indo-European family of languages, native to Greece and other parts of the Eastern Mediterranean. It has the longest documented history of any living language, spanning 34 centuries of written records and its writing system has been the Greek alphabet for the major part of its history, other systems, such as Linear B and the Cypriot syllabary, were used previously. The alphabet arose from the Phoenician script and was in turn the basis of the Latin, Cyrillic, Armenian, Coptic, Gothic and many other writing systems. Together with the Latin texts and traditions of the Roman world, during antiquity, Greek was a widely spoken lingua franca in the Mediterranean world and many places beyond. It would eventually become the official parlance of the Byzantine Empire, the language is spoken by at least 13.2 million people today in Greece, Cyprus, Italy, Albania, Turkey, and the Greek diaspora. Greek roots are used to coin new words for other languages, Greek. Greek has been spoken in the Balkan peninsula since around the 3rd millennium BC, the earliest written evidence is a Linear B clay tablet found in Messenia that dates to between 1450 and 1350 BC, making Greek the worlds oldest recorded living language. Among the Indo-European languages, its date of earliest written attestation is matched only by the now extinct Anatolian languages, the Greek language is conventionally divided into the following periods, Proto-Greek, the unrecorded but assumed last ancestor of all known varieties of Greek. The unity of Proto-Greek would have ended as Hellenic migrants entered the Greek peninsula sometime in the Neolithic era or the Bronze Age, Mycenaean Greek, the language of the Mycenaean civilisation. It is recorded in the Linear B script on tablets dating from the 15th century BC onwards, Ancient Greek, in its various dialects, the language of the Archaic and Classical periods of the ancient Greek civilisation. It was widely known throughout the Roman Empire, after the Roman conquest of Greece, an unofficial bilingualism of Greek and Latin was established in the city of Rome and Koine Greek became a first or second language in the Roman Empire. The origin of Christianity can also be traced through Koine Greek, Medieval Greek, also known as Byzantine Greek, the continuation of Koine Greek in Byzantine Greece, up to the demise of the Byzantine Empire in the 15th century. Much of the written Greek that was used as the language of the Byzantine Empire was an eclectic middle-ground variety based on the tradition of written Koine. Modern Greek, Stemming from Medieval Greek, Modern Greek usages can be traced in the Byzantine period and it is the language used by the modern Greeks, and, apart from Standard Modern Greek, there are several dialects of it. In the modern era, the Greek language entered a state of diglossia, the historical unity and continuing identity between the various stages of the Greek language is often emphasised. Greek speakers today still tend to regard literary works of ancient Greek as part of their own rather than a foreign language and it is also often stated that the historical changes have been relatively slight compared with some other languages. According to one estimation, Homeric Greek is probably closer to demotic than 12-century Middle English is to modern spoken English, Greek is spoken by about 13 million people, mainly in Greece, Albania and Cyprus, but also worldwide by the large Greek diaspora. Greek is the language of Greece, where it is spoken by almost the entire population
3.
Christianity
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Christianity is a Abrahamic monotheistic religion based on the life and teachings of Jesus Christ, who serves as the focal point for the religion. It is the worlds largest religion, with over 2.4 billion followers, or 33% of the global population, Christians believe that Jesus is the Son of God and the savior of humanity whose coming as the Messiah was prophesied in the Old Testament. Christian theology is summarized in creeds such as the Apostles Creed and his incarnation, earthly ministry, crucifixion, and resurrection are often referred to as the gospel, meaning good news. The term gospel also refers to accounts of Jesuss life and teaching, four of which—Matthew, Mark, Luke. Christianity is an Abrahamic religion that began as a Second Temple Judaic sect in the mid-1st century, following the Age of Discovery, Christianity spread to the Americas, Australasia, sub-Saharan Africa, and the rest of the world through missionary work and colonization. Christianity has played a prominent role in the shaping of Western civilization, throughout its history, Christianity has weathered schisms and theological disputes that have resulted in many distinct churches and denominations. Worldwide, the three largest branches of Christianity are the Catholic Church, the Eastern Orthodox Church, and the denominations of Protestantism. There are many important differences of interpretation and opinion of the Bible, concise doctrinal statements or confessions of religious beliefs are known as creeds. They began as baptismal formulae and were expanded during the Christological controversies of the 4th and 5th centuries to become statements of faith. Many evangelical Protestants reject creeds as definitive statements of faith, even agreeing with some or all of the substance of the creeds. The Baptists have been non-creedal in that they have not sought to establish binding authoritative confessions of faith on one another. Also rejecting creeds are groups with roots in the Restoration Movement, such as the Christian Church, the Evangelical Christian Church in Canada, the Apostles Creed is the most widely accepted statement of the articles of Christian faith. It is also used by Presbyterians, Methodists, and Congregationalists and this particular creed was developed between the 2nd and 9th centuries. Its central doctrines are those of the Trinity and God the Creator, each of the doctrines found in this creed can be traced to statements current in the apostolic period. The creed was used as a summary of Christian doctrine for baptismal candidates in the churches of Rome. Most Christians accept the use of creeds, and subscribe to at least one of the mentioned above. The central tenet of Christianity is the belief in Jesus as the Son of God, Christians believe that Jesus, as the Messiah, was anointed by God as savior of humanity, and hold that Jesus coming was the fulfillment of messianic prophecies of the Old Testament. The Christian concept of the Messiah differs significantly from the contemporary Jewish concept, Jesus, having become fully human, suffered the pains and temptations of a mortal man, but did not sin
4.
Gnosticism
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Gnosticism is a modern name for a variety of ancient religious ideas and systems, originating in Jewish milieus in the first and second century CE. This Divine spark could be liberated by gnosis of this Divine spark, the Gnostic ideas and systems flourished in Mediterranean in the second century CE, in conjunction with and influenced by the early Christian movements and Middle Platonism. In the Persian Empire Gnosticism spread as far as China with Manicheism, a major question in scholarly research is the qualification of Gnosticism, based on the study of its texts, as either an interreligious phenomenon or as an independent religion. The word Gnosticism is a construction, from the Greek word gnosis. Gnosis refers to knowledge based on experience or perception. In a religious context, gnosis is mystical or esoteric knowledge based on direct participation with the divine, in most Gnostic systems the sufficient cause of salvation is this knowledge of the divine. It is a knowing, comparable to that encouraged by Plotinus. With gnosis comes a fuller insight, and gives an understanding of the deeper meanings of doctrines, scriptures. The usual meaning of gnostikos in Classical Greek texts is learned or intellectual, platos use of learned is fairly typical of Classical texts. By the Hellenistic period, it began to also be associated with Greco-Roman mysteries, the adjective is not used in the New Testament, but Clement of Alexandria speaks of the learned Christian in complimentary terms. The use of gnostikos in relation to heresy originates with interpreters of Irenaeus, some scholars consider that Irenaeus sometimes uses gnostikos to simply mean intellectual, whereas his mention of the intellectual sect is a specific designation. The term Gnosticism was derived from the use of the Greek adjective gnostikos by St. Irenaeus to describe the school of Valentinus as he legomene gnostike haeresis the heresy called Learned, the Syrian-Egyptian traditions postulate a remote, supreme Godhead, the Monad. From this highest divinity emanate lower divine beings, known as Aeons, the Demiurg, one of those Aeons, creates the physical world. Divine elements fall into the realm, and are locked within human beings. This divine element returns to the realm when Gnosis, esoteric or intuitive knowledge of the divine element within is obtained. Gnostic systems postulate a dualism between God and the world, varying from the radical dualist systems of Manicheanism to the dualism of classic gnostic movements. Radical dualism, or absolute dualism, posits two co-equal divine forces, while in mitigated dualism one of the two principles is in some way inferior to the other, in qualified monism the second entity may be divine or semi-divine. Valentinian Gnosticism is a form of monism, expressed in terms previously used in a dualistic manner, Gnostics tended toward asceticism, especially in their sexual and dietary practice
5.
Southern Europe
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Southern Europe is the southern region of the European continent. Most definitions of Southern Europe, also known as Mediterranean Europe, include the countries of the Iberian peninsula, different methods can be used to define Southern Europe, including its political, economic, and cultural attributes. Southern Europe can also be defined by its natural features — its geography, climate, geographically, Southern Europe is the southern half of the landmass of Europe. This definition is relative, with no clear limits and those areas of Mediterranean climate present similar vegetations and landscapes throughout, including dry hills, small plains, pine forests and olive trees. Cooler climates can be found in parts of Southern European countries, for example within the mountain ranges of Spain. Additionally, the north coast of Spain experiences a wetter Atlantic climate, Southern Europes flora is that of the Mediterranean Region, one of the phytochoria recognized by Armen Takhtajan. The period known as classical antiquity began with the rise of the city-states of Ancient Greece, Greek influence reached its zenith under the expansive empire of Alexander the Great, spreading throughout Asia. The Roman Empire came to dominate the entire Mediterranean basin in a vast empire based on Roman law and it promoted trade, tolerance, and Greek culture. By 300 AD the Roman Empire was divided into the Western Roman Empire based in Rome, during the Middle Ages, the Eastern Roman Empire survived, though modern historians refer to this state as the Byzantine Empire. In Western Europe, Germanic peoples moved into positions of power in the remnants of the former Western Roman Empire and established kingdoms, the period known as the Crusades, a series of religiously motivated military expeditions originally intended to bring the Levant back into Christian rule, began. Several Crusader states were founded in the eastern Mediterranean, the Crusaders would have a profound impact on many parts of Europe. Their Sack of Constantinople in 1204 brought an end to the Byzantine Empire. Though it would later be re-established, it would never recover its former glory, the Crusaders would establish trade routes that would develop into the Silk Road and open the way for the merchant republics of Genoa and Venice to become major economic powers. The Reconquista, a movement, worked to reconquer Iberia for Christendom. The Late Middle Ages represented a period of upheaval in Europe, the epidemic known as the Black Death and an associated famine caused demographic catastrophe in Europe as the population plummeted. Dynastic struggles and wars of conquest kept many of the states of Europe at war for much of the period, in the Balkans, the Ottoman Empire, a Turkish state originating in Anatolia, encroached steadily on former Byzantine lands, culminating in the Fall of Constantinople in 1453. An unprecedented series of wars and political revolutions took place around Europe. Observers at the time, and many historians since, have argued that wars caused the revolutions, galileo Galilei, invented the telescope and the thermometer which allowed him to observe and describe the solar system
6.
Languedoc
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Languedoc is a former province of France. Its territory is now contained in the region of Occitanie in the south of France. It had an area of approximately 27,376 square kilometers, the traditional provinces of the kingdom of France were not formally defined. A province was simply a territory of common traditions and customs, today, when people refer to the old provinces of France, they actually refer to the gouvernements as they existed in 1789. Gouvernements were military regions established in the middle of the 16th century, however, in some cases, small provinces had been merged with a large one into a single gouvernement, so gouvernements are not exactly the same as the traditional provinces. Historically, the region was called the county of Toulouse, a county independent from the kings of France. The county of Toulouse was made up of what would later be called Languedoc, but it included the province of Quercy. After the French conquest the entire county was dismantled, the part of it being now called Languedoc. The gouvernement of Languedoc was created in the middle of the 16th century, in addition to Languedoc proper, it also included the three small provinces of Gévaudan, Velay, and Vivarais, these three provinces being to the northeast of Languedoc. Some people also consider that the region around Albi was a province, called Albigeois. This decision was intentional, to avoid reviving the independently spirited county of Toulouse. In the rest of the article, Languedoc refers to the territory of this gouvernement of Languedoc, the governors of Languedoc resided in Pézenas, on the Mediterranean coast, away from Toulouse but close to Montpellier. The kings of France became fearful of the power of the governors, thus the gouvernements became hollow structures, but they still carried a sense of the old provinces, and so their names and limits have remained popular until today. The generality of Toulouse is also referred to as Upper Languedoc, while the generality of Montpellier, the intendants of Languedoc resided in Montpellier, and they had a sub-delegate in Toulouse. Montpellier was chosen on purpose to diminish the power of Toulouse, whose parlement was very influential, the intendants replaced the governors as administrators of Languedoc, but appointed and dismissed at will by the king, they were no threat to the central state in Versailles. By 1789 they were the most important element of the administration of the kingdom. For judicial and legislative matters, Languedoc was overseen by the Parlement of Toulouse and it was the first parlement created outside of Paris by the kings of France in order to be the equivalent of the Parlement of Paris in the far-away southern territories of the kingdom. The Parlement of Toulouse was the court of justice for this vast area of France
7.
Albi
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Albi is a commune in southern France. It is the prefecture of the Tarn department and it is located on the River Tarn, c.85 km northeast of Toulouse. It was the seat of the Archbishop of Albi and is the seat of the Diocese of Albi, the episcopal city, situated in the center of the actual city, around the cathedral Sainte-Cécile, was added to the UNESCO list of World Heritage Sites in 2010. Albi is the seat of 6 cantons, covering 18 communes, the first human settlement in Albi was in the Bronze Age. After the Roman conquest of Gaul in 51 BC, the town became Civitas Albigensium, archaeological digs have not revealed any traces of Roman buildings, which seems to indicate that Albi was a modest Roman settlement. In 1040, Albi expanded and constructed the Pont Vieux, new quarters were built, indicative of considerable urban growth. The city grew rich at this time, thanks to trade and commercial exchanges, in 1208, the Pope and the French king joined forces to combat the Cathars, who had developed their own version of Christianity, and so a heresy considered dangerous by the dominant Catholic Church. Repression was severe, and many Cathars were burnt at the stake throughout the region, the area, until then virtually independent, was reduced to such a condition that it was subsequently annexed by the French Crown. He ordered the building of the cathedral of Sainte-Cécile starting in 1282, the town enjoyed a period of commercial prosperity largely due to the cultivation of Isatis Tinctoria, commonly known as woad. The fine houses built during the Renaissance bear witness to the vast fortunes amassed by the pastel merchants, Albi had a small Jewish community during medieval times, until it was annihilated in the 1320s shepherds Crusade. Ever since, Jews were only allowed to transit the town by payment, in 1967, approximately 70 Jews lived in Albi, most of them of North-African origin. Albi has conserved its rich heritage which encapsulates the various brilliant periods of its history. Considerable improvement and restoration work has been done, to embellish the old quarters and to them a new look. Albi was built around the cathedral and episcopal group of buildings. This historic area covers 63 hectares, red brick and tiles are the main feature of most of the edifices. Along with Toulouse and Montauban, Albi is one of the cities built in Languedoc-style red brick. Among the buildings of the town is the Sainte Cécile cathedral and it is characterised by a strong contrast between its austere, defensive exterior and its sumptuous interior decoration. The rood screen is a work in stone in the Flamboyant Gothic style
8.
Iran
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Iran, also known as Persia, officially the Islamic Republic of Iran, is a sovereign state in Western Asia. Comprising a land area of 1,648,195 km2, it is the second-largest country in the Middle East, with 82.8 million inhabitants, Iran is the worlds 17th-most-populous country. It is the country with both a Caspian Sea and an Indian Ocean coastline. The countrys central location in Eurasia and Western Asia, and its proximity to the Strait of Hormuz, Tehran is the countrys capital and largest city, as well as its leading economic and cultural center. Iran is the site of to one of the worlds oldest civilizations, the area was first unified by the Iranian Medes in 625 BC, who became the dominant cultural and political power in the region. The empire collapsed in 330 BC following the conquests of Alexander the Great, under the Sassanid Dynasty, Iran again became one of the leading powers in the world for the next four centuries. Beginning in 633 AD, Arabs conquered Iran and largely displaced the indigenous faiths of Manichaeism and Zoroastrianism by Islam, Iran became a major contributor to the Islamic Golden Age that followed, producing many influential scientists, scholars, artists, and thinkers. During the 18th century, Iran reached its greatest territorial extent since the Sassanid Empire, through the late 18th and 19th centuries, a series of conflicts with Russia led to significant territorial losses and the erosion of sovereignty. Popular unrest culminated in the Persian Constitutional Revolution of 1906, which established a monarchy and the countrys first legislative body. Following a coup instigated by the U. K. Growing dissent against foreign influence and political repression led to the 1979 Revolution, Irans rich cultural legacy is reflected in part by its 21 UNESCO World Heritage Sites, the third-largest number in Asia and 11th-largest in the world. Iran is a member of the UN, ECO, NAM, OIC. Its political system is based on the 1979 Constitution which combines elements of a democracy with a theocracy governed by Islamic jurists under the concept of a Supreme Leadership. A multicultural country comprising numerous ethnic and linguistic groups, most inhabitants are Shia Muslims, the largest ethnic groups in Iran are the Persians, Azeris, Kurds and Lurs. Historically, Iran has been referred to as Persia by the West, due mainly to the writings of Greek historians who called Iran Persis, meaning land of the Persians. As the most extensive interactions the Ancient Greeks had with any outsider was with the Persians, however, Persis was originally referred to a region settled by Persians in the west shore of Lake Urmia, in the 9th century BC. The settlement was then shifted to the end of the Zagros Mountains. In 1935, Reza Shah requested the international community to refer to the country by its native name, opposition to the name change led to the reversal of the decision, and Professor Ehsan Yarshater, editor of Encyclopædia Iranica, propagated a move to use Persia and Iran interchangeably
9.
Byzantine Empire
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It survived the fragmentation and fall of the Western Roman Empire in the 5th century AD and continued to exist for an additional thousand years until it fell to the Ottoman Turks in 1453. During most of its existence, the empire was the most powerful economic, cultural, several signal events from the 4th to 6th centuries mark the period of transition during which the Roman Empires Greek East and Latin West divided. Constantine I reorganised the empire, made Constantinople the new capital, under Theodosius I, Christianity became the Empires official state religion and other religious practices were proscribed. Finally, under the reign of Heraclius, the Empires military, the borders of the Empire evolved significantly over its existence, as it went through several cycles of decline and recovery. During the reign of Maurice, the Empires eastern frontier was expanded, in a matter of years the Empire lost its richest provinces, Egypt and Syria, to the Arabs. This battle opened the way for the Turks to settle in Anatolia, the Empire recovered again during the Komnenian restoration, such that by the 12th century Constantinople was the largest and wealthiest European city. Despite the eventual recovery of Constantinople in 1261, the Byzantine Empire remained only one of several small states in the area for the final two centuries of its existence. Its remaining territories were annexed by the Ottomans over the 15th century. The Fall of Constantinople to the Ottoman Empire in 1453 finally ended the Byzantine Empire, the term comes from Byzantium, the name of the city of Constantinople before it became Constantines capital. This older name of the city would rarely be used from this point onward except in historical or poetic contexts. The publication in 1648 of the Byzantine du Louvre, and in 1680 of Du Canges Historia Byzantina further popularised the use of Byzantine among French authors, however, it was not until the mid-19th century that the term came into general use in the Western world. The Byzantine Empire was known to its inhabitants as the Roman Empire, the Empire of the Romans, Romania, the Roman Republic, Graikia, and also as Rhōmais. The inhabitants called themselves Romaioi and Graikoi, and even as late as the 19th century Greeks typically referred to modern Greek as Romaika and Graikika. The authority of the Byzantine emperor as the legitimate Roman emperor was challenged by the coronation of Charlemagne as Imperator Augustus by Pope Leo III in the year 800. No such distinction existed in the Islamic and Slavic worlds, where the Empire was more seen as the continuation of the Roman Empire. In the Islamic world, the Roman Empire was known primarily as Rûm, the Roman army succeeded in conquering many territories covering the entire Mediterranean region and coastal regions in southwestern Europe and north Africa. These territories were home to different cultural groups, both urban populations and rural populations. The West also suffered heavily from the instability of the 3rd century AD
10.
Asceticism
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Asceticism is a lifestyle characterized by abstinence from worldly pleasures, often for the purpose of pursuing spiritual goals. Asceticism is classified into two types, Asceticism has been historically observed in many religious traditions, including Buddhism, Christianity, Hinduism, Jainism and Judaism. Mainstream Islam has lacked asceticism, except for its minority Sufi sect whose long tradition has included strict asceticism, the practitioners of these religions eschewed worldly pleasures and led an abstinent lifestyle, in the pursuit of redemption, salvation or spirituality. Asceticism is seen in the ancient theologies as a journey towards spiritual transformation, where the simple is sufficient, the bliss is within, the adjective ascetic derives from the ancient Greek term askēsis, which means training or exercise. The original usage did not refer to self-denial, but to the training required for athletic events. Its usage later extended to rigorous practices that are used in all religious traditions, in varying degrees to attain redemption. Asceticism has been classified into natural and unnatural forms of asceticism, natural asceticism is defined as a lifestyle where material aspects of life are reduced to utmost simplicity and minimum. This may include minimal, simple clothing, sleeping on floor or caves, natural asceticism, state Wimbush and Valantasis, does not include maiming the body or harsher austerities that make the body suffer. Self-discipline and abstinence in some form and degree are parts of religious practice within many religious, ascetic lifestyle is associated particularly with monks, nuns, fakirs in Abrahamic religions, and bhikkhus, munis, sannyasis, yogis in Indian religions. Christian authors of antiquity such as Origen, St. Jerome, St. Ignatius, John Chrysostom. Scriptural examples of asceticism could be found in the lives of John the Baptist, Jesus, the twelve apostles, the Dead Sea Scrolls revealed ascetic practices of the ancient Jewish sect of Essenes who took vows of abstinence to prepare for a holy war. An emphasis on a religious life was evident in both early Christian writings and practices. Other Christian practitioners of asceticism include individuals such as Simeon Stylites, Saint David of Wales, according to Richard Finn, much of early Christian asceticism has been traced to Judaism, but not to traditions within Greek asceticism. Some of the thoughts in Christianity nevertheless, Finn states, have roots in Greek moral thought. Virtuous living is not possible when an individual is craving bodily pleasures with desire, the deserts of the Middle East were at one time inhabited by thousands of Christian hermits including St. Anthony the Great, St. Mary of Egypt, and St. Simeon Stylites. In 963 CE, an association of monasteries called Lavra was formed on Mount Athos and this became the most important center of orthodox Christian ascetic groups in the centuries that followed. In the modern era, Mount Athos and Meteora have remained a significant center, sexual abstinence such as those of the Encratites sect of Christians was only one aspect of ascetic renunciation, and both natural and unnatural asceticism have been part of Christian asceticism. The natural ascetic practices have included simple living, begging, fasting and ethical practices such as humility, compassion, patience, such ascetic practices were linked to the Christian concepts of sin and redemption
11.
Cathar Perfect
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Perfect was the name given by Bernard of Clairvaux to a monk of the medieval Christian religious movement of southern France and northern Italy commonly referred to as the Cathars. The term reflects that such a person was seen by the Catholic Church as the perfect heretic, as bonhommes Perfecti were expected to follow a lifestyle of extreme austerity and renunciation of the world which included abstaining from eating meat and avoiding all sexual contact. By that virtue they were recognized as trans-material angels by their followers, Perfecti were drawn from all walks of life and counted aristocrats, merchants and peasants among their number. Women could also become Perfects, Female Perfects were known as Parfaites or Perfectae, Catharism itself was a Christian religious movement with dualistic and Gnostic elements that appeared in the Languedoc region of France around the middle of the 12th century. The movement was branded by the Roman Catholic Church as heretical with some authorities denouncing them as not being Christian at all and it existed throughout much of Western Europe, but its focus was in the Languedoc and surrounding areas of what is now southern France. In addition it had links with the similar Christian movement the Bogomils from the Balkans, the Cathars were ruthlessly suppressed and finally exterminated by the Catholic Church in the 14th century. The Cathars believed that there were two powers in the Universe. This dualism they drew from a reading of the Gospels, for example That which is born of the flesh is flesh. For the Cathars, Christ was an emissary of the Light sent into this world to lead humanity back to God, each individual contained within them a shard of the Divine Light, the Angelic Soul which was trapped in a garment of flesh by Lucifer. While confined in this garment of matter the Soul would forget its origin with God, many Perfects chose to become so late in their lives, choosing to abjure their previous existences for their spiritual beliefs. The famous female Perfect Esclarmonde of Foix, for instance, became a Bonne Femme after having reared eight children with her husband, thus the decision to achieve this state was one reached after some experience in the world. Their ministry among the Credentes was to them in their journey through this life. As Perfects they were seen to be equal unto the angels, a Cathar Perfect had to undergo a rigorous training of three years before being inducted as a member of the spiritual elite of the religious movement. This took place during a ceremony in which various Scriptural extracts were quoted, including, most particularly, the ceremony was completed by a ritual laying on of hands, or Manisola, as the candidate vowed to abjure the world and accept the Holy Spirit. At this point, the Perfecti believed, the Holy Spirit was able to descend, Cathar Perfects travelled the Languedoc in twos, in imitation of Christs instructions to the Apostles in the Gospels. Male and female Perfects always travelled with partners of the sex to avoid sexual temptation. To their enemies this drew accusations of homosexuality, on their travels Perfects administered to the Credentes, the rank and file of Catharism who were not expected to follow the austere lifestyle of the Perfects. They were healers and worked with the sick, sometimes with medicinal remedies, sometimes with laying on of hands, following the instructions described in the Bible, they walked from place to place and stayed in the houses of Credentes
12.
Paulicianism
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Paulicians were a Christian sect, also accused by medieval sources of being Adoptionist, Gnostic, and quasi-Manichaean Christian. They flourished between 650 and 872 in Armenia and the eastern themata of the Byzantine Empire, according to medieval Byzantine sources, the groups name was derived from the 3rd century Bishop of Antioch, Paul of Samosata. The sources show that most Paulician leaders were Armenians, the founder of the sect is said to have been an Armenian by the name of Constantine, who hailed from Mananalis, a community near Samosata. He studied the Gospels and Epistles, combined dualistic and Christian doctrines and, upon the basis of the former, vigorously opposed the formalism of the church. Upon reading the same, he came to know about salvation in Christ, upon sharing said good news with others, he formed a group of sincere believers that became known as Paulicians. Regarding himself as called to restore the pure Christianity of Paul, he adopted the name Silvanus, twenty-seven years later, he was arrested by the Imperial authorities, tried for heresy and stoned to death. Simeon, the official who executed the order, was himself converted. He was burned to death in 690, the adherents of the sect fled, with Paul at their head, to Episparis. He died in 715, leaving two sons, Gegnaesius and Theodore, the latter, giving out that he had received the Holy Ghost, rose against Gegnaesius but was unsuccessful. Gegnaesius was taken to Constantinople, appeared before Leo the Isaurian, was declared innocent of heresy, returned to Episparis and his death was the occasion of a division in the sect, Zacharias and Joseph being the leaders of the two parties. The latter had the following and was succeeded by Baanies in 775. The sect grew in spite of persecution, receiving additions from some of the iconoclasts, the Paulicians were now divided into the Baanites and the Sergites. Sergius, as the leader, was a zealous and effective converter for his sect, he boasted that he had spread his Gospel from East to West. At the same time the Sergites fought against their rivals and nearly exterminated them, baanes was supplanted by Sergius-Tychicus in 801, who was very active for thirty-four years. His activity was the occasion of renewed persecutions on the part of Leo the Armenian, obliged to flee, Sergius and his followers settled at Argaun, in that part of Armenia which was under the control of the Saracens. At the death of Sergius, the control of the sect was divided between several leaders, Paulicians under their new leader, Karbeas, fled to new areas. They built two cities, Amara and Tephrike, by 844, at the height of its power, the Paulicians established a State of the Paulicians at Tephrike. In 856, Karbeas and his people took refuge with the Arabs in the territory around Tephrike and joined forces with Umar al-Aqta, Karbeas was killed in 863 in Michael IIIs campaign against the Paulicians and was possibly with Umar at Malakopea before the battle of Lalakaon
13.
Armenia
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Armenia, officially the Republic of Armenia, is a sovereign state in the South Caucasus region of Eurasia. The Republic of Armenia constitutes only one-tenth of historical Armenia, Armenia is a unitary, multi-party, democratic nation-state with an ancient cultural heritage. Urartu was established in 860 BC and by the 6th century BC it was replaced by the Satrapy of Armenia, in the 1st century BC the Kingdom of Armenia reached its height under Tigranes the Great. Armenia became the first state in the world to adopt Christianity as its official religion, in between the late 3rd century to early years of the 4th century, the state became the first Christian nation. The official date of adoption of Christianity is 301 AD. The ancient Armenian kingdom was split between the Byzantine and Sasanian Empires around the early 5th century, under the Bagratuni dynasty, the Bagratid Kingdom of Armenia was restored in the 9th century. Declining due to the wars against the Byzantines, the fell in 1045. An Armenian principality and later a kingdom Cilician Armenia was located on the coast of the Mediterranean Sea between the 11th and 14th centuries. By the 19th century, Eastern Armenia had been conquered by the Russian Empire, during World War I, Armenians living in their ancestral lands in the Ottoman Empire were systematically exterminated in the Armenian Genocide. By 1920, the state was incorporated into the Transcaucasian Socialist Federative Soviet Republic, in 1936, the Transcaucasian state was dissolved, transforming its constituent states, including the Armenian Soviet Socialist Republic, into full Union republics. The modern Republic of Armenia became independent in 1991 during the dissolution of the Soviet Union, the Republic of Armenia recognises the Armenian Apostolic Church, the worlds oldest national church, as the countrys primary religious establishment. The unique Armenian alphabet was invented by Mesrop Mashtots in 405 AD, Armenia is a member of the Eurasian Economic Union, the Council of Europe and the Collective Security Treaty Organization. Armenia supports the de facto independent Nagorno-Karabakh Republic, which was proclaimed in 1991, the native Armenian name for the country is Հայք. The name in the Middle Ages was extended to Հայաստան, by addition of the Persian suffix -stan, the further origin of the name is uncertain. It is also postulated that the name Hay comes from one of the two confederated, Hittite vassal states—the Ḫayaša-Azzi. The exonym Armenia is attested in the Old Persian Behistun Inscription as Armina, the ancient Greek terms Ἀρμενία and Ἀρμένιοι are first mentioned by Hecataeus of Miletus. Xenophon, a Greek general serving in some of the Persian expeditions, describes many aspects of Armenian village life and he relates that the people spoke a language that to his ear sounded like the language of the Persians. According to the histories of both Moses of Chorene and Michael Chamchian, Armenia derives from the name of Aram, a descendant of Hayk
14.
Bogomilism
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Bogomilism was a Christian neo-Gnostic or dualist religiopolitical sect founded in the First Bulgarian Empire by the priest Bogomil during the reign of Tsar Peter I in the 10th century. This helped the movement spread quickly in the Balkans, gradually expanding throughout the Byzantine Empire and later reaching Kievan Rus, Bosnia, Dalmatia, Rascia, Italy, and France-. The Bogomils were dualists or Gnostics in that they believed in a world within the body and they did not use the Christian cross, nor build churches, as they revered their gifted form and considered their body to be the temple. This gave rise to forms of practice to cleanse oneself through purging, fasting, celebrating and dancing. The term Bogomil in free translation means dear to God, and is a compound of the Slavic words for god and dear. It may be also a translation of the Greek name Theophilos, literally dear to God, loved by the gods, from theos god + philos loved, beloved. It is difficult to ascertain whether the name was taken from the founder of that movement. The word is an Old Church Slavonic calque of Massaliani, the Syriac name of the corresponding to the Greek Euchites. The Bogomils are identified with the Messalians in Slavonic documents from the 13th century, the members are referred to as Babuni in Church Slavonic documents, which originally meant superstition, superstitious person. Much of their literature has been lost or destroyed by the contemporary Christian Churches, concerning the Bogomils, something can be gathered from the polemic Against the Newly-Appeared Heresy of the Bogomils written in Slavonic by Cosmas the Priest, a 10th-century Bulgarian official. Much may also be learned from the doctrines of the variations of Bogomilism which spread in Medieval Kievan Rus after the 11th century. One of the earliest Christian dualist heresies, Marcionism, originated in eastern Anatolia, in 970 the Byzantine emperor John I Tzimiskes transplanted 200,000 Armenian Paulicians to Europe and settled them in the neighbourhood of Philippopolis. Under Byzantine and then later Ottoman rule, the Armenian Paulicians lived in safety in their ancient stronghold near Philippopolis. Linguistically, they were assimilated into the Bulgarians, by whom they were called pavlikiani, in 1650, the Roman Catholic Church gathered them into its fold. Fourteen villages near Nicopolis, in Moesia, embraced Catholicism, as well as the villages around Philippopolis, a colony of Paulicians in the Wallachian village of Cioplea near Bucharest also followed the example of their brethren across the Danube. In spite of all measures of repression, it remained strong, Bogomilism was an outcome of many factors that had arisen in the beginning of 10th century, most probably in the region of Macedonia. It was also influenced by the Paulicians who had been driven out of Armenia. The Slavonic sources are unanimous on the point that Bogomils teaching was Manichaean, a Synodikon from the year 1210 adds the names of his pupils or apostles, Mihail, Todur, Dobri, Stefan, Vasilie and Peter
15.
First Bulgarian Empire
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The First Bulgarian Empire was a medieval Bulgarian state that existed in southeastern Europe between the 7th and 11th centuries AD. It was founded circa 681 when Bulgar tribes led by Asparukh moved to the north-eastern Balkans, there they secured Byzantine recognition of their right to settle south of the Danube by defeating – possibly with the help of local South Slavic tribes – the Byzantine army led by Constantine IV. At the height of its power, Bulgaria spread from the Danube Bend to the Black Sea, as the state solidified its position in the Balkans, it entered into a centuries-long interaction, sometimes friendly and sometimes hostile, with the Byzantine Empire. Bulgaria emerged as Byzantiums chief antagonist to its north, resulting in several wars, Byzantium had a strong cultural influence on Bulgaria, which also led to the eventual adoption of Christianity in 864. After the disintegration of the Avar Khaganate, the country expanded its territory northwest to the Pannonian Plain, later the Bulgarians confronted the advance of the Pechenegs and Cumans, and achieved a decisive victory over the Magyars, forcing them to establish themselves permanently in Pannonia. During the late 9th and early 10th centuries, Simeon I achieved a string of victories over the Byzantines, thereafter, he was recognized with the title of Emperor, and proceeded to expand the state to its greatest extent. After the annihilation of the Byzantine army in the battle of Anchialus in 917, the Byzantines, however, eventually recovered, and in 1014, under Basil II, inflicted a crushing defeat on the Bulgarians at the Battle of Kleidion. By 1018, the last Bulgarian strongholds had surrendered to the Byzantine Empire, and it was succeeded by the Second Bulgarian Empire in 1185. After the adoption of Christianity, Bulgaria became the center of Slavic Europe. Old Bulgarian became the lingua franca of much of Eastern Europe, in 927, the fully independent Bulgarian Patriarchate was officially recognized. The Bulgars and other tribes in the empire gradually adopted an essentially foreign Slavic language. Since the late 9th century, the names Bulgarians and Bulgarian gained prevalence and became permanent designations for the local population, the First Bulgarian Empire became known simply as Bulgaria since its recognition by the Byzantine Empire in 681. Some historians use the terms Danube Bulgaria, First Bulgarian State, during its early existence, the country was also called the Bulgar state or Bulgar qaghanate. Between 864 and 917/927, the country was known as the Principality of Bulgaria or Knyazhestvo Bulgaria, in English language sources, the country is often known as the Bulgarian Empire. The eastern Balkan Peninsula was originally inhabited by the Thracians who were a group of Proto-Indo-European tribes, the whole region as far north as the Danube River was gradually incorporated into the Roman Empire by the 1st century AD. The decline of the Roman Empire after the 3rd century AD, nonetheless, it never relinquished the claim to the whole region up to the Danube. A series of administrative, legislative, military and economic reforms somewhat improved the situation, the group of Slavs that came to be known as the South Slavs was divided into Antes and Sclaveni who spoke the same language. The Slavic incursions in the Balkans increased during the half of Justinian Is reign and while these were initially pillaging raids
16.
Thrace
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It comprises southeastern Bulgaria, northeastern Greece, and the European part of Turkey. In antiquity, it was referred to as Europe, prior to the extension of the term to describe the whole continent. The name Thrace comes from the Thracians, an ancient Indo-European people inhabiting Southeastern Europe, the word itself was established by the Greeks for referring to the Thracian tribes, from Ancient Greek Thrake, descending from Thrāix. The name of the continent Europe first referred to Thrace proper, the region obviously took the name of the principal river there, Hebros, probably from the Indo-European arg white river, according to an alternative theory, Hebros means goat in Thracian. In Turkey, it is referred to as Rumeli, Land of the Romans. The name appears to derive from an ancient heroine and sorceress Thrace, who was the daughter of Oceanus and Parthenope, the historical boundaries of Thrace have varied. In one ancient Greek source, the very Earth is divided into Asia, Libya, Europa and this largely coincided with the Thracian Odrysian kingdom, whose borders varied over time. After the Macedonian conquest, this regions former border with Macedonia was shifted from the Struma River to the Mesta River and this usage lasted until the Roman conquest. Henceforth, Thrace referred only to the tract of land covering the same extent of space as the modern geographical region. The medieval Byzantine theme of Thrace contained only what today is Eastern Thrace, the largest cities of Thrace are, İstanbul, Plovdiv, Burgas, Stara Zagora, Haskovo, Yambol, Komotini, Alexandroupoli, Xanthi, Edirne, Çorlu and Tekirdağ. Most of the Bulgarian and Greek population are Christians, while most of the Turkish inhabitants of Thrace are Muslims, Ancient Greek mythology provides them with a mythical ancestor, named Thrax, son of the war-god Ares, who was said to reside in Thrace. The Thracians appear in Homers Iliad as Trojan allies, led by Acamas, later in the Iliad, Rhesus, another Thracian king, makes an appearance. Cisseus, father-in-law to the Trojan elder Antenor, is given as a Thracian king. Homeric Thrace was vaguely defined, and stretched from the River Axios in the west to the Hellespont, Greek mythology is replete with Thracian kings, including Diomedes, Tereus, Lycurgus, Phineus, Tegyrius, Eumolpus, Polymnestor, Poltys, and Oeagrus. In addition to the tribe that Homer calls Thracians, ancient Thrace was home to other tribes, such as the Edones, Bisaltae, Cicones. Thrace is also mentioned in Ovids Metamorphoses in the episode of Philomela, Procne, Tereus, the King of Thrace, lusts after his sister-in-law, Philomela. He kidnaps her, holds her captive, rapes her, Philomela manages to get free, however. She and her sister, Procne, plot to get revenge, by killing Itys, at the end of the myth, all three turn into birds – Procne, a swallow, Philomela, a nightingale, and Tereus, a hoopoe
17.
Plovdiv
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Plovdiv is the second-largest city in Bulgaria, with a population of 341,567 inhabitants as of 2015, while 544,628 live in its urban area. It is an important economic, transport, cultural, and educational center, Plovdiv has evidence of habitation since the 6th millennium BC when the first Neolithic settlements were established. It is said to be one of the oldest cities in the world, Plovdiv was known in the West for most of its recorded history by the name Philippopolis as Philip II of Macedon conquered it in the 4th century BC and gave his name to it. The city was originally a Thracian settlement, later being invaded by Persians, Greeks, Celts, Romans, Goths, Huns, Bulgarians, Slav-Vikings, Crusaders, on 4 January 1878, Plovdiv was liberated from Ottoman rule by the Russian army. It remained within the borders of Bulgaria until July of the same year, in 1885, Plovdiv and Eastern Rumelia joined Bulgaria. Plovdiv is situated in a region of south-central Bulgaria on the two banks of the Maritsa River. The city has developed on seven syenite hills, some of which are 250 metres high. Because of these hills, Plovdiv is often referred to in Bulgaria as The City of the Seven Hills, Plovdiv is host to cultural events such as the International Fair Plovdiv, the international theatrical festival A stage on a crossroad, and the TV festival The golden chest. There are many remains preserved from antiquity such as the ancient Plovdiv Roman theatre, Roman odeon, Roman aqueduct, Roman Stadium, the archaeological complex Eirene, and others. The oldest American educational institution outside the United States was founded in Plovdiv in 1860, on 5 September 2014, Plovdiv was selected as the Bulgarian host of the European Capital of Culture 2019. This happened with the help of the Municipal Foundation Plovdiv 2019″ - a non-government organization which was established in 2011 by Plovdivs City Council, the main objectives were to develop and to prepare Plovdivs bid book for European Capital of Culture in 2019. The organization has a board of directors, which consists of 9 members, the foundation also has a Public Council, chaired by the mayor of the city, and a Control Board supervises the organizations activities. The main objective of the foundation is strategic development and implementation of the bid book, Plovdiv was given various names throughout its long history. The Odrysian capital Odryssa is suggested to have been modern Plovdiv by numismatic research or Odrin, Philippopolis was identified later by Plutarch and Pliny as the former Poneropolis. Strabo identified Philip IIs settlement of most evil, wicked as Calybe, kendrisia was an old name of the city. An assumed name is the 1st century Tiberias in honor of the Roman emperor Tiberius, after the Romans had taken control of the area, the city was named in Latin, TRIMONTIUM, meaning The Three Hills, mentioned in the 1st century by Pliny. At times the name was Ulpia, Flavia, Julia after the Roman families, Ammianus Marcellinus wrote in the 4th century that the then city had been the old Eumolpias/Eumolpiada, i. e. the earliest name in chronological terms. In the 6th century Jordanes wrote that the name of the city was Pulpudeva
18.
Self-concept
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Ones self-concept is a collection of beliefs about oneself that includes elements such as academic performance, gender identity, sexual identity, and racial identity. Generally, self-concept embodies the answer to Who am I, self-concept is distinguishable from self-awareness, which refers to the extent to which self-knowledge is defined, consistent, and currently applicable to ones attitudes and dispositions. Self-concept also differs from self-esteem, self-concept is a cognitive or descriptive component of ones self, while self-esteem is evaluative, self-concept is made up of ones self-schemas, and interacts with self-esteem, self-knowledge, and the social self to form the self as whole. It includes the past, present, and future selves, where future selves represent individuals ideas of what they become, what they would like to become. Possible selves may function as incentives for certain behavior, the perception people have about their past or future selves is related to the perception of their current selves. In addition, people have a tendency to perceive the past self less favorably, the idea of self-concept has been around for thousands of years. It is mentioned in the Vedic philosophy as Ahamkara, a term originating approximately 3,000 years ago, psychologists Carl Rogers and Abraham Maslow were heavy influences in popularizing the idea of self-concept in the west. According to Rogers, everyone strives to reach an ideal self, Rogers also hypothesized that psychologically healthy people actively move away from roles created by others expectations, and instead look within themselves for validation. The self-categorization theory developed by John Turner states that the self-concept consists of at least two levels, an identity and a social one. In other words, ones self-evaluation relies on self-perceptions and how others perceive them, self-concept can alternate rapidly between the personal and social identity. Children and adolescents begin integrating social identity into their own self-concept in elementary school by assessing their position among peers, by age 5, acceptance from peers has a significant impact on childrens self-concept, affecting their behavior and academic success. The self-concept is a model that uses self-assessments in order to define ones self-schemas. A collection of self-schemas make up ones overall self-concept, for example, the statement I am lazy is a self-assessment that contributes to self-concept. Statements such as I am tired, however, would not be part of someones self-concept, since being tired is a temporary state, a persons self-concept may change with time as reassessment occurs, which in extreme cases can lead to identity crises. Some assert that gender stereotypes and expectations set by parents for their children impact childrens understanding of themselves by approximately age 3, academic self-concept refers to the personal beliefs about their academic abilities or skills. Some research suggests that it begins developing from ages 3 to 5 due to influence from parents, by age 10 or 11, children assess their academic abilities by comparing themselves to their peers. These social comparisons are also referred to as self-estimates, self-estimates of cognitive ability are most accurate when evaluating subjects that deal with numbers, such as math. Self-estimates were more likely to be poor in areas, such as reasoning speed
19.
God
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In monotheism, God is conceived of as the Supreme Being and principal object of faith. The concept of God as described by most theologians includes the attributes of omniscience, omnipotence, omnipresence, divine simplicity, many theologians also describe God as being omnibenevolent and all loving. Furthermore, some religions attribute only a purely grammatical gender to God, incorporeity and corporeity of God are related to conceptions of transcendence and immanence of God, with positions of synthesis such as the immanent transcendence of Chinese theology. God has been conceived as personal or impersonal. In theism, God is the creator and sustainer of the universe, while in deism, God is the creator, in pantheism, God is the universe itself. In atheism, God is not believed to exist, while God is deemed unknown or unknowable within the context of agnosticism, God has also been conceived as the source of all moral obligation, and the greatest conceivable existent. Many notable philosophers have developed arguments for and against the existence of God, there are many names for God, and different names are attached to different cultural ideas about Gods identity and attributes. In the ancient Egyptian era of Atenism, possibly the earliest recorded monotheistic religion, this deity was called Aten, premised on being the one true Supreme Being and creator of the universe. In the Hebrew Bible and Judaism, He Who Is, I Am that I Am, in the Christian doctrine of the Trinity, God, consubstantial in three persons, is called the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit. In Judaism, it is common to refer to God by the titular names Elohim or Adonai, in Islam, the name Allah is used, while Muslims also have a multitude of titular names for God. In Hinduism, Brahman is often considered a concept of God. In Chinese religion, God is conceived as the progenitor of the universe, intrinsic to it, other religions have names for God, for instance, Baha in the Baháí Faith, Waheguru in Sikhism, and Ahura Mazda in Zoroastrianism. The earliest written form of the Germanic word God comes from the 6th-century Christian Codex Argenteus, the English word itself is derived from the Proto-Germanic * ǥuđan. The reconstructed Proto-Indo-European form * ǵhu-tó-m was likely based on the root * ǵhau-, in the English language, the capitalized form of God continues to represent a distinction between monotheistic God and gods in polytheism. The same holds for Hebrew El, but in Judaism, God is also given a proper name, in many translations of the Bible, when the word LORD is in all capitals, it signifies that the word represents the tetragrammaton. Allāh is the Arabic term with no plural used by Muslims and Arabic speaking Christians and Jews meaning The God, Ahura Mazda is the name for God used in Zoroastrianism. Mazda, or rather the Avestan stem-form Mazdā-, nominative Mazdå and it is generally taken to be the proper name of the spirit, and like its Sanskrit cognate medhā, means intelligence or wisdom. Both the Avestan and Sanskrit words reflect Proto-Indo-Iranian *mazdhā-, from Proto-Indo-European mn̩sdʰeh1, literally meaning placing ones mind, Waheguru is a term most often used in Sikhism to refer to God
20.
New Testament
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The New Testament is the second major part of the Christian biblical canon, the first part being the Old Testament, based on the Hebrew Bible. The New Testament discusses the teachings and person of Jesus, as well as events in first-century Christianity, Christians regard both the Old and New Testaments together as sacred scripture. The New Testament has frequently accompanied the spread of Christianity around the world and it reflects and serves as a source for Christian theology and morality. Both extended readings and phrases directly from the New Testament are also incorporated into the various Christian liturgies, the New Testament has influenced religious, philosophical, and political movements in Christendom and left an indelible mark on literature, art, and music. In almost all Christian traditions today, the New Testament consists of 27 books, John A. T. Robinson, Dan Wallace, and William F. Albright dated all the books of the New Testament before 70 AD. Others give a date of 80 AD, or at 96 AD. Over time, some disputed books, such as the Book of Revelation, other works earlier held to be Scripture, such as 1 Clement, the Shepherd of Hermas, and the Diatessaron, were excluded from the New Testament. However, the canon of the New Testament, at least since Late Antiquity, has been almost universally recognized within Christianity. The term new testament, or new covenant first occurs in Jeremiah 31,31, the same Greek phrase for new covenant is found elsewhere in the New Testament. Modern English, like Latin, distinguishes testament and covenant as alternative translations, John Wycliffes 1395 version is a translation of the Latin Vulgate and so follows different terms in Jeremiah and Hebrews, Lo. Days shall come, saith the Lord, and I shall make a new covenant with the house of Israel, for he reproving him saith, Lo. Days come, saith the Lord, when I shall establish a new testament on the house of Israel, use of the term New Testament to describe a collection of first and second-century Christian Greek Scriptures can be traced back to Tertullian. In Against Marcion, written circa 208 AD, he writes of the Divine Word, by the 4th century, the existence—even if not the exact contents—of both an Old and New Testament had been established. Lactantius, a 3rd–4th century Christian author wrote in his early-4th-century Latin Institutiones Divinae and that which preceded the advent and passion of Christ—that is, the law and the prophets—is called the Old, but those things which were written after His resurrection are named the New Testament. The canon of the New Testament is the collection of books that most Christians regard as divinely inspired, several of these writings sought to extend, interpret, and apply apostolic teaching to meet the needs of Christians in a given locality. The book order is the same in the Greek Orthodox, Roman Catholic, the Slavonic, Armenian and Ethiopian traditions have different New Testament book orders. Each of the four gospels in the New Testament narrates the life, death, the word gospel derives from the Old English gōd-spell, meaning good news or glad tidings. The gospel was considered the good news of the coming Kingdom of Messiah, and the redemption through the life and death of Jesus, Gospel is a calque of the Greek word εὐαγγέλιον, euangelion
21.
Old Testament
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Its counterpart is the New Testament, the second part of the Christian Bible. The books that comprise the Old Testament canon differ between Christian Churches as well as their order and names. The most common Protestant canon comprises 39 books, the Catholic canon comprises 46 books, the 39 books in common to all the Christian canons corresponds to 24 books of the Tanakh, with some differences of order, and there are some differences in text. The additional number reflects the split of texts in the Christian Bibles into separate books, for example, Kings, Samuel and Chronicles, Ezra–Nehemiah, the books which are part of a Christian Old Testament but which are not part of the Hebrew canon are sometimes described as deuterocanonical. In general, Protestant bibles do not include books in its canon. The Old Testament consists of translations of many books by various authors produced over a period of centuries. The canon formed in stages, first the Pentateuch by around 400 BC, then the Prophets during the Hasmonean dynasty, and finally the remaining books. The Old Testament contains 39 or 46 or more books, divided, very broadly, into the Pentateuch, the books, the wisdom books. For the Orthodox canon, Septuagint titles are provided in parentheses when these differ from those editions, for the Catholic canon, the Douaic titles are provided in parentheses when these differ from those editions. Likewise, the King James Version references some of these books by the spelling when referring to them in the New Testament. The Talmud in Bava Batra 14b gives a different order for the books in Neviim and Ketuvim and this order is also cited in Mishneh Torah Hilchot Sefer Torah 7,15. The order of the books of the Torah is universal through all denominations of Judaism and they are present in a few historic Protestant versions, the German Luther Bible included such books, as did the English 1611 King James Version. Empty table cells indicate that a book is absent from that canon, several of the books in the Eastern Orthodox canon are also found in the appendix to the Latin Vulgate, formerly the official Bible of the Roman Catholic Church. The books of Joshua, Judges, Samuel and Kings follow, there is a broad consensus among scholars that these originated as a single work during the Babylonian exile of the 6th century BC. The two Books of Chronicles cover much the material as the Pentateuch and Deuteronomistic history and probably date from the 4th century BC. Chronicles, and Ezra–Nehemiah, were finished during the 3rd century BC. Catholic and Orthodox Old Testaments contain two to four Books of Maccabees, written in the 2nd and 1st centuries BC and these history books make up around half the total content of the Old Testament. God is consistently depicted as the one who created or put into order the world, the Old Testament stresses the special relationship between God and his chosen people, Israel, but includes instructions for proselytes as well
22.
Sin
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In a religious context, sin is the act of violating Gods will by transgressing his commandments. Sin can also be viewed as any thought or action that endangers the ideal relationship between an individual and God, or as any diversion from the ideal order for human living. To sin has been defined as to miss the mark, the word derives from Old English syn, for original *sunjō. The stem may be related to that of Latin sons, sont-is guilty, in Old English there are examples of the original general sense, ‘offence, wrong-doing, misdeed. e. In the Baháí Faith, humans are considered good, fundamentally spiritual beings. Human beings were created because of Gods immeasurable love, however, the Baháí teachings compare the human heart to a mirror, which, if turned away from the light of the sun, is incapable of receiving Gods love. Buddhism believes in the principle of karma, whereby suffering is the consequence of greed, anger. While there is no direct Buddhist equivalent of the Abrahamic concept of sin, the concept of Buddhist ethics is consequentialist in nature and is not based upon duty towards any deity. Karma means action, and in Buddhist context, motivation is the most important aspect of an action, whether karma done with mind, body and/or speech is called good or bad, depends on whether it would bring pleasant or unpleasant results to the person who does the action. One needs to purify negative karma Four Satipatthanas to free oneself from obstacles to liberation from the circle of rebirth. The purification reduces suffering and in the end one reaches Nirvana, an enlightened being is free of all the suffering and karmas, and will not be automatically born again. In the Old Testament, some sins were punishable by death in different forms, christians consider the Old Covenant to be fulfilled by the Gospel. In the New Testament however, the forgiveness of sin is effected through repentance which involves confessing the sin, Sin is forgiven, when the sinner acknowledges, confesses, and repents for their sin. The unregenerate man is expected to confess his sins to God through repentance in order to be restored to relationship with God. The unregenerate man has never before been in a relationship with God. When, as a part of his salvation, he is forgiven, he enters into a union with God which abides forever. In the Epistle to the Romans 6,23, it is mentioned that the wages of sin is death, in Jewish Christianity, sin is believed to alienate the sinner from God even though He has extreme love for mankind. It has damaged and completely severed the relationship of humanity to God and that relationship can only be restored through acceptance of Jesus Christ and his death on the cross as a satisfactory sacrifice for the sins of humanity
23.
Spirit
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The English word spirit, from Latin spiritus breath, has many different meanings and connotations, most of them relating to a non-corporeal substance contrasted with the material body. It can also refer to a subtle as opposed to gross material substance, the word spirit is often used metaphysically to refer to the consciousness or personality. e. A manifestation of the spirit of a deceased person, the term may also refer to any incorporeal or immaterial being, such as demons or deities. In the Bible, the Spirit, specifically denotes the Holy Spirit, the English word spirit comes from the Latin spiritus, meaning breath, but also spirit, soul, courage, vigor, ultimately from a Proto-Indo-European *peis. It is distinguished from Latin anima, soul, in Greek, this distinction exists between pneuma, breath, motile air, spirit, and psykhē, soul. The word spirit came into Middle English via Old French, the distinction between soul and spirit also developed in the Abrahamic religions, Arabic nafs opposite rūħ, Hebrew neshama or nephesh נֶ֫פֶשׁ nép̄eš opposite ruach. In a lecture delivered to the literary Society of Augsburg, October 20,1926, on the theme of “Nature and Spirit, the mistrust of verbal concepts, inconvenient as it is, nevertheless seems to me to be very much in place in speaking of fundamentals. Spirit and Life are familiar enough words to us, very old acquaintances in fact, pawns that for thousands of years have pushed back. It can scarcely be an accident onomatopoeic words like ruach, ruch, roho mean ‘spirit’ no less clearly than the Greek πνεύμα and the Latin spiritus”. In spiritual and metaphysical terms, spirit has acquired a number of meanings, An incorporeal but ubiquitous, unlike the concept of souls a spirit develops and grows as an integral aspect of a living being. This concept of the individual spirit occurs commonly in animism, note the distinction between this concept of spirit and that of the pre-existing or eternal soul, belief in souls occurs specifically and far less commonly, particularly in traditional societies. One might more properly term this type/aspect of spirit life or aether rather than spirit, people usually conceive of a ghost as a wandering spirit from a being no longer living, having survived the death of the body yet maintaining at least vestiges of mind and consciousness. In religion and spirituality, the respiration of a human has for obvious reasons become seen as linked with the very occurrence of life. A similar significance has become attached to human blood, Spirit, in this sense, means the thing that separates a living body from a corpse—and usually implies intelligence, consciousness, and sentience. Latter-day Saint prophet Joseph Smith Jr. taught that the concept of spirit as incorporeal or without substance was incorrect, all spirit is matter, but it is more fine or pure, and can only be discerned by purer eyes. In some Native American spiritual traditions the Great Spirit or Wakan Tanka is a term for the Supreme Being, individual spirits envisaged as interconnected with all other spirits and with The Spirit. This concept relates to theories of a unified spirituality, to universal consciousness, the experience of such a connection can become a primary basis for spiritual belief. Christian spiritual theology can use the term Spirit to describe God, or aspects of God — as in the Holy Spirit, Spirit forms a central concept in pneumatology
24.
Angel
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An angel, especially according to Abrahamic religions and Zoroastrianism, is a spiritual being superior to humans in power and intelligence. Most of them either as intermediaries between Heaven and Earth, or as guardian spirits. They are studied in the doctrine of angelology. In Christian Science, the angel is used to refer to an inspiration from God. In fine art, angels are depicted as having the shape of human beings of extraordinary beauty, they are often identified using the symbols of bird wings, halos. The word angel in English is a blend of Old English engel, both derive from Late Latin angelus messenger, which in turn was borrowed from Late Greek ἄγγελος ángelos. According to R. S. P. Beekes, ángelos itself may be an Oriental loan, the words earliest form is Mycenaean a-ke-ro attested in Linear B syllabic script. The ángelos is the default Septuagints translation of the Biblical Hebrew term mal’ākh denoting simply messenger without specifying its nature. In the Latin Vulgate, however, the meaning becomes bifurcated, if the word refers to some supernatural being, the word angelus appears. Such differentiation has been taken over by later vernacular translations of the Bible, early Christian and Jewish exegetes, in Zoroastrianism there are different angel-like figures. For example, each person has one guardian angel, called Fravashi and they patronize human beings and other creatures, and also manifest Gods energy. In the commentaries of Proclus on the Timaeus of Plato, Proclus uses the terminology of angelic, according to Aristotle, just as there is a First Mover, so, too, must there be spiritual secondary movers. The Torah uses the terms מלאך אלהים, מלאך יהוה, בני אלהים and הקודשים to refer to beings traditionally interpreted as angels, later texts use other terms, such as העליונים. The term מלאך is also used in books of the Tanakh. Depending on the context, the Hebrew word may refer to a messenger or to a supernatural messenger. Daniel is the first biblical figure to refer to individual angels by name, mentioning Gabriel in Daniel 9,21 and these angels are part of Daniels apocalyptic visions and are an important part of all apocalyptic literature. One of these is hāšāṭān, a figure depicted in the Book of Job, philo of Alexandria identifies the angel with the Logos inasmuch as the angel is the immaterial voice of God. The angel is something different from God himself, but is conceived as Gods instrument, in post-Biblical Judaism, certain angels took on particular significance and developed unique personalities and roles
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Reincarnation
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Reincarnation is the philosophical or religious concept that an aspect of a living being starts a new life in a different physical body or form after each biological death. It is also called rebirth or transmigration, and is a part of the Saṃsāra doctrine of cyclic existence and it is a central tenet of all major Indian religions, namely Buddhism, Hinduism, Jainism, and Sikhism. The idea of reincarnation is found in ancient cultures, and a belief in rebirth/metempsychosis was held by Greek historic figures, such as Pythagoras, Socrates. Unity Church and its founder Charles Fillmore teach reincarnation, in recent decades, many Europeans and North Americans have developed an interest in reincarnation, and many contemporary works mention it. The word reincarnation derives from Latin, literally meaning, entering the flesh again, the Greek equivalent metempsychosis derives from meta and empsykhoun, a term attributed to Pythagoras. An alternate term is transmigration implying migration from one life to another, the term has been used by modern philosophers such as Kurt Gödel and has entered the English language. Another Greek term sometimes used synonymously is palingenesis, being born again, Rebirth is a key concept found in major Indian religions, and discussed with various terms. These religions believe that this reincarnation is cyclic and an endless Saṃsāra and they consider the release from the cycle of reincarnations as the ultimate spiritual goal, and call the liberation by terms such as moksha, nirvana, mukti and kaivalya. Gilgul, Gilgul neshamot or Gilgulei Ha Neshamot refers to the concept of reincarnation in Kabbalistic Judaism, Gilgul means cycle and neshamot is souls. Kabbalistic reincarnation says that humans only to humans and to the same sex only. The origins of the notion of reincarnation are obscure, discussion of the subject appears in the philosophical traditions of India. The Greek Pre-Socratics discussed reincarnation, and the Celtic Druids are also reported to have taught a doctrine of reincarnation, the ideas associated with reincarnation may have arisen independently in different regions, or they might have spread as a result of cultural contact. In ancient European, Iranian and Indian agricultural cultures, the cycles of birth, death. The idea of reincarnation has early roots in the Vedic period, predating the Buddha, the concepts of the cycle of birth and death, samsara, and liberation partly derive from ascetic traditions that arose in India around the middle of the first millennium BCE. Though no direct evidence of this has found, the tribes of the Ganges valley or the Dravidian traditions of South India have been proposed as another early source of reincarnation beliefs. Hinduisms Rigveda makes references to reincarnation in the Brahmanas layer, though these early textual layers of the Vedas, from 2nd millennium BCE, mention and anticipate the doctrine of Karma and rebirth, the idea is not fully developed. It is in the early Upanishads, which are pre-Buddha and pre-Mahavira, the texts of ancient Jainism that have survived into the modern era are post-Mahavira, likely from the last centuries of the 1st millennium BCE, and extensively mention rebirth and karma doctrines. The Jaina philosophy assumes that the soul exists and is eternal, passing through cycles of transmigration, after death, reincarnation into a new body is asserted to be instantaneous in early Jaina texts
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Pope Innocent III
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Pope Innocent III reigned from 8 January 1198 to his death. His birth name was Lotario dei Conti di Segni, sometimes anglicised to Lothar of Segni, Pope Innocent was one of the most powerful and influential popes. He exerted an influence over the Christian states of Europe. Pope Innocent was central in supporting the Catholic Churchs reforms of ecclesiastical affairs through his decretals and this resulted in a considerable refinement of Western canon law. Pope Innocent is notable for using interdict and other censures to compel princes to obey his decisions, Innocent called for Christian crusades against Muslim Spain and the Holy Land, as well as the Albigensian Crusade against the Cathars in southern France. One of Pope Innocents critical decisions was organizing the Fourth Crusade, originally intended to attack Jerusalem through Egypt, a series of unforeseen circumstances led the crusaders to Constantinople, where they ultimately sacked the city in 1204. Lotario de Conti was born in Gavignano, near Anagni and his father was Count Trasimund of Segni and was a member of a famous house, Conti, which produced nine Popes, including Gregory IX, Alexander IV and Innocent XIII. Lotario was the nephew of Pope Clement III, his mother, as Pope, Lotario was to play a major role in the shaping of canon law through conciliar canons and decretal letters. He subscribed the papal bulls between 7 December 1190 and 4 November 1197, as a cardinal, Lotario wrote De miseria humanae conditionis. The work was popular for centuries, surviving in more than 700 manuscripts. Although he never returned to the work he intended to write, On the Dignity of Human Nature. Celestine III died on 8 January 1198 and he was only thirty-seven years old at the time. He took the name Innocent III, maybe as a reference to his predecessor Innocent II, as pope, Innocent III began with a very wide sense of his responsibility and of his authority. The Muslim recapture of Jerusalem in 1187 was to him a divine judgment on the moral lapses of Christian princes and he was also determined to protect what he called the liberty of the Church from inroads by secular princes. The patrimonium was routinely threatened by Hohenstaufen German kings who, as Roman emperors, the early death of Henry VI left his 4-year-old son Frederick II as king. Henry VI’s widow Constance of Sicily ruled over Sicily for her son before he reached the age of majority. She was as eager to remove German power from the kingdom of Sicily as was Innocent III, before her death in 1198, she named Innocent as guardian of the young Frederick until he reached his maturity. In exchange, Innocent was also able to recover papal rights in Sicily that had been surrendered decades earlier to King William I of Sicily by Pope Adrian IV, the Pope invested the young Frederick II as King of Sicily in November 1198
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Pierre de Castelnau
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Pierre de Castelnau, French ecclesiastic, was born in the diocese of Montpellier. He was archdeacon of Maguelonne, and in 1199 was appointed by Pope Innocent III as one of the legates for the suppression of the Cathar heresy in Languedoc. In 1202, he became a Cistercian monk at the abbey of Fontfroide, Narbonne, and was confirmed as Apostolic legate and first inquisitor, first in Toulouse, and afterwards at Viviers and Montpellier. In 1207 he was in the Rhone valley and in Provence, Castelnau was assassinated on 14 January 1208, quite possibly by an agent of Raymond. His murder was the cause of Raymonds excommunication and the start of the Albigensian Crusade. He was beatified in the year of his death by Pope Innocent III, the relics of Pierre de Castelnau are interred in the church of the ancient Abbey of St-Gilles. The Southern French Nobility and the Albigensian Crusade and this article incorporates text from a publication now in the public domain, Chisholm, Hugh, ed
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Rome
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Rome is a special comune and the capital of Italy. Rome also serves as the capital of the Lazio region, with 2,873,598 residents in 1,285 km2, it is also the countrys largest and most populated comune and fourth-most populous city in the European Union by population within city limits. It is the center of the Metropolitan City of Rome, which has a population of 4.3 million residents, the city is located in the central-western portion of the Italian Peninsula, within Lazio, along the shores of the Tiber. Romes history spans more than 2,500 years, while Roman mythology dates the founding of Rome at only around 753 BC, the site has been inhabited for much longer, making it one of the oldest continuously occupied sites in Europe. The citys early population originated from a mix of Latins, Etruscans and it was first called The Eternal City by the Roman poet Tibullus in the 1st century BC, and the expression was also taken up by Ovid, Virgil, and Livy. Rome is also called the Caput Mundi, due to that, Rome became first one of the major centres of the Italian Renaissance, and then the birthplace of both the Baroque style and Neoclassicism. Famous artists, painters, sculptors and architects made Rome the centre of their activity, in 1871 Rome became the capital of the Kingdom of Italy, and in 1946 that of the Italian Republic. Rome has the status of a global city, Rome ranked in 2014 as the 14th-most-visited city in the world, 3rd most visited in the European Union, and the most popular tourist attraction in Italy. Its historic centre is listed by UNESCO as a World Heritage Site, monuments and museums such as the Vatican Museums and the Colosseum are among the worlds most visited tourist destinations with both locations receiving millions of tourists a year. Rome hosted the 1960 Summer Olympics and is the seat of United Nations Food, however, it is a possibility that the name Romulus was actually derived from Rome itself. As early as the 4th century, there have been alternate theories proposed on the origin of the name Roma. There is archaeological evidence of occupation of the Rome area from approximately 14,000 years ago. Evidence of stone tools, pottery and stone weapons attest to about 10,000 years of human presence, several excavations support the view that Rome grew from pastoral settlements on the Palatine Hill built above the area of the future Roman Forum. Between the end of the age and the beginning of the Iron age. However, none of them had yet an urban quality, nowadays, there is a wide consensus that the city was gradually born through the aggregation of several villages around the largest one, placed above the Palatine. All these happenings, which according to the excavations took place more or less around the mid of the 8th century BC. Despite recent excavations at the Palatine hill, the view that Rome has been indeed founded with an act of will as the legend suggests in the middle of the 8th century BC remains a fringe hypothesis. Traditional stories handed down by the ancient Romans themselves explain the earliest history of their city in terms of legend and myth
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Raymond VI, Count of Toulouse
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Raymond VI was Count of Toulouse and Marquis of Provence from 1194 to 1222. He was also Count of Melgueil from 1173 to 1190, born at Saint-Gilles, Gard, he was a son of Raymond V and Constance of France. His maternal grandparents were Louis VI of France and his second wife Adélaide de Maurienne and his maternal uncles included Louis VII of France. In 1194 he succeeded his father as count of Toulouse and he immediately re-established peace with both Alfonso II of Aragon and with the Trencavel family. He was married five times,1 and his first wife, Ermessende, Countess of Melgueil, whom he married in 1172, died in 1176 without issue. His second wife was Beatrice of Béziers, sister of Roger II Trencavel, they divorced in 1189 and she was said to have become a Cathar parfaite after the divorce. Raymond and Beatrice had one daughter, Constance of Toulouse, who was married firstly to King Sancho VII of Navarre, in October 1196 at Rouen he married Joan Plantagenet. They had two surviving children, Raymond VII, Count of Toulouse and Joan of Toulouse, second wife of Bernard II de la Tour and his fourth wife was the daughter of Isaac Komnenos of Cyprus. They divorced probably in late 1202, January 1204, in Perpignan, he married his last wife, Eleanor of Aragon, daughter of King Alfonso II of Aragon and Sancha of Castile. Raymond VI held vast territories but his control of them was problematic, aside from theoretically owing allegiance to the King of France, Raymond held Provence as a vassal of the Emperor. Henry II of England controlled neighboring Aquitaine through his wife Eleanor, Alfonso II of Aragon was involved in the affairs of Languedoc, stimulating emigration from the north to colonize newly reconquered lands in Aragon. In Toulouse, Raymond maintained the communal freedoms, extended exemptions from taxation, a poet and a man of culture, he hated war but did not lack energy. At first Innocent III tried to deal with the Cathars by peaceful conversion, the legates sent from Rome and France received little support as they were considered foreign reformers. Papal legate Pierre de Castelnau was sent to address Raymonds tolerance for the practice of the Cathars, pierres assassination on January 15,1208 led to Raymonds excommunication. The excommunication was lifted after Raymond humbled himself before the Pope, more of a diplomat than a soldier, he was unable to stop the advance of Simon de Montfort, who conquered Toulouse. Raymond was exiled to England under his former brother-in-law John Plantagenet, in November 1215 Raymond and his son were in Rome with Raymond-Roger, Count of Foix on the occasion of the Fourth Lateran Council to vindicate themselves and dispute the loss of their territories. Raymonds son-in-law, Pierre-Bermond II of Sauve, was there to lay claim to the county of Toulouse. Raymond and his son went from Rome to Genoa and thence to Marseille in February 1216, Raymonds son set out from Marseille to regain the family territories in Provence, in May 1216 he besieged Beaucaire and captured it on August 24
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Missionary
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A missionary is a member of a religious group sent into an area to proselytize and/or perform ministries of service, such as education, literacy, social justice, health care, and economic development. The word mission originates from 1598 when the Jesuits sent members abroad, derived from the Latin missionem, meaning act of sending or mittere, meaning to send. The word was used in light of its usage, in the Latin translation of the Bible. The term is most commonly used for Christian missions, but can be used for any creed or ideology, a Christian missionary can be defined as one who is to witness across cultures. The Lausanne Congress of 1974, defined the term, related to Christian mission as, Missionaries can be found in many countries around the world. Jesus instructed the apostles to make disciples of all nations and this verse is referred to by Christian missionaries as the Great Commission and inspires missionary work. The New Testament-era missionary outreach of the Christian church from the time of St Paul expanded throughout the Roman Empire and beyond to Persia, in 596, Pope Gregory the Great sent the Gregorian Mission into England. In their turn, Christians from Ireland and from Britain became prominent in converting the inhabitants of central Europe, about the same time, missionaries such as Francis Xavier as well as other Jesuits, Augustinians, Franciscans, and Dominicans started moving into Asia and the Far East. The Portuguese sent missions into Africa and these are some of the most well-known missions in history. While some missions accompanied imperialism and oppression, others were relatively peaceful, contemporary Christian missionaries argue that working for justice forms a constitutive part of preaching the Gospel, and observe the principles of inculturation in their missionary work. Over time, the Vatican gradually established a church structure in the mission areas, often starting with special jurisdictions known as apostolic prefectures. The two 9th-century saints Cyril and Methodius had extensive success in central Europe. The Byzantines expanded their work in Ukraine after a mass baptism in Kiev in 988. The Serbian Orthodox Church had its origins in the conversion by Byzantine missionaries of the Serb tribes when they arrived in the Balkans in the 7th century, Orthodox missionaries also worked successfully among the Estonians from the 10th to the 12th centuries, founding the Estonian Orthodox Church. The Russian St. Nicholas of Japan took Eastern Orthodoxy to Japan in the 19th century, the Russian Orthodox Church also sent missionaries to Alaska beginning in the 18th century, including Saint Herman of Alaska, to minister to the Native Americans. Quaker publishers of truth visited Boston and other mid-17th century colonies, the Danish government began the first organized Protestant mission work through its College of Missions, established in 1714. This funded and directed Lutheran missionaries such as Bartholomaeus Ziegenbalg in Tranquebar, India and he also got to know a slave from the Danish colony in the West Indies. Within thirty years, Moravian missionaries had become active on every continent, and they are famous for their selfless work, living as slaves among the slaves and together with the Native Americans, the Delaware and Cherokee Indian tribes
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Jurist
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A jurist, also known as legal scholar or legal theorist, is someone who researches and studies jurisprudence. Such a person can work as an academic, legal writer or law lecturer, thus a jurist, someone who studies, analyses and comments on law, stands in contrast with a lawyer, someone who applies law on behalf of clients and thinks about it in practical terms. Many legal scholars and authors have explained that a person may be both a lawyer and a jurist, but a jurist is not necessarily a lawyer, nor a lawyer necessarily a jurist, both must possess an acquaintance with the term law. The work of the jurist is the study, analysis and arrangement of the law — work which can be wholly in the seclusion of the library. Any highly civilized society requires both lawyers and jurists, both philosophers and doers and it is important however to note the fundamental difference between the work of the lawyer and that of the jurist. The term jurist has another sense, which is wider, synonymous with legal professional, i. e. anyone professionally involved with law, in some other European languages, a word resembling jurist is used in this major sense. This is a classification of some notable jurists. History of the legal profession Law professor Legal profession List of jurists Paralegal Media related to Jurists at Wikimedia Commons
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Christian martyrs
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A Christian martyr is a person who is killed for following Jesus. In early church years, this occurred through stoning, crucifixion, burning at the stake or other forms of torture. The word martyr comes from the Greek word μάρτυς, mártys, at first, the term applied to Apostles. Once Christians started to undergo persecution, the term came to be applied to those who suffered hardships for their faith, finally, it was restricted to those who had been killed for their faith. The early Christian period before Constantine I was the Age of martyrs, Early Christians venerated martyrs as powerful intercessors, and their utterances were treasured as inspired by the Holy Spirit. The Greek word martus signifies a witness who testifies to a fact of which he has knowledge from personal observation and it is in this sense that the term first appears in Christian literature, the Apostles were witnesses of all that they had observed in the public life of Christ. The Apostles, from the beginning, faced grave dangers, until eventually almost all suffered death for their convictions. Thus, within the lifetime of the Apostles, the term came to be used in the sense of a witness who at any time might be called upon to deny what he testified to. St. John, at the end of the first century, the 2nd-century Church Father Tertullian wrote that the blood of martyrs is the seed of the Church, implying that the martyrs willing sacrifice of their lives leads to the conversion of others. Relics of the saints are still revered in the Catholic and Orthodox Churches, the lives of the martyrs became a source of inspiration for some Christians, and their relics were honored. Numerous crypts and chapels in the Roman catacombs bear witness to the veneration for those champions of freedom of conscience. Special commemoration services, at which the holy Sacrifice were offered over their tombs gave rise to the time honoured custom of consecrating altars by enclosing in them the relics of martyrs, some felt they should not, while others said they could. In the end, it was agreed to them in after a period of penance. The re-admittance of the “lapsed” became a moment in the Church because it allowed the sacrament of repentance. This issue caused the Donatist and Novatianist schisms, Martyrdom for the faith. became a central feature in the Christian experience. “Notions of persecution by the world. run deep in the Christian tradition, the doctrines of the apostles brought the Early Church into conflict with some Jewish religious leaders. This eventually led to their expulsion from the synagogues, Acts records the martyrdom of the Christian leaders, Stephen and James of Zebedee. The first known Christian martyr was St. Stephen as recorded in the Acts 6, Stephen was accused of blasphemy and denounced the Sanhedrin as stiff-necked people who, just as their ancestors had done, persecute prophets
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Albigensian Crusade
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The Albigensian Crusade or Cathar Crusade was a 20-year military campaign initiated by Pope Innocent III to eliminate Catharism in Languedoc, in the south of France. The reforms were a reaction against the scandalous and dissolute lifestyles of the Catholic clergy in southern France. They became known as the Albigensians, because there were many adherents in the city of Albi, Innocent IIIs diplomatic attempts to roll back Catharism met with little success. After the murder of his legate, Pierre de Castelnau, in 1208 and he offered the lands of the Cathar heretics to any French nobleman willing to take up arms. After initial successes, the French barons faced an uprising in Languedoc which led to the intervention of the French royal army. The Albigensian Crusade also had a role in the creation and institutionalization of both the Dominican Order and the medieval inquisition. By the 12th century, organized groups of dissidents, such as the Waldensians and Cathars, were beginning to appear in the towns and cities of newly urbanized areas. In western Mediterranean France, one of the most urbanized areas of Europe at the time, the Cathars grew to represent a mass movement. Relatively few believers took the consolamentum to become full Cathars, the theology of the Cathars was dualistic, a belief in two equal and comparable transcendental principles, God, the force of good, and Satan, or the demiurge, the force of evil. They held that the world was evil and created by this demiurge. Rex Mundi encompassed all that was corporeal, chaotic and powerful, the Cathar understanding of God was entirely disincarnate, they viewed God as a being or principle of pure spirit and completely unsullied by the taint of matter. He was the God of love, order and peace, jesus was an angel with only a phantom body, and the accounts of him in the New Testament were to be understood allegorically. As the physical world and the body were the creation of the evil principle. Civil authority had no claim on a Cathar, since this was the rule of the physical world, deriving from earlier varieties of gnosticism, Cathar theology found its greatest success in the Languedoc. The Cathars were known as Albigensians because of their association with the city of Albi, in Languedoc, political control was divided among many local lords and town councils. Before the crusade there was fighting in the area and it had a fairly sophisticated polity. Western Mediterranean France itself was at that time divided between the Crown of Aragon and the county of Toulouse, on becoming Pope in 1198, Innocent III resolved to deal with the Cathars and sent a delegation of friars to the province of Languedoc to assess the situation. One of the most powerful, Count Raymond VI, Count of Toulouse, openly supported the Cathars and he refused to assist the delegation
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Trade route
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A trade route is a logistical network identified as a of pathways and stoppages used for the commercial transport of cargo. The term can also be used to refer to trade over bodies of water, among notable trade routes was the Amber Road, which served as a dependable network for long-distance trade. Maritime trade along the Spice Route became prominent during the Middle Ages, during the Middle Ages, organizations such as the Hanseatic League, aimed at protecting interests of the merchants, and trade became increasingly prominent. In modern times, commercial activity shifted from the trade routes of the Old World to newer routes between modern nation-states. Innovative transportation of modern times includes pipeline transport and the relatively well-known trade involving rail routes, automobiles, one of the vital instruments which facilitated long distance trade was portage and the domestication of beasts of burden. Organized caravans, visible by the 2nd millennium BCE, could carry goods across a distance as fodder was mostly available along the way. The domestication of camels allowed Arabian nomads to control the long distance trade in spices, caravans were useful in long-distance trade largely for carrying luxury goods, the transportation of cheaper goods across large distances was not profitable for caravan operators. With productive developments in iron and bronze technologies, newer trade routes—dispensing innovations of civilizations—began to rise, evidence of maritime trade between civilizations dates back at least 90 millennia. Navigation was known in Sumer between the 4th and the 3rd millennium BCE, and was known by the Indians. The Egyptians had trade routes through the Red Sea, importing spices from the Land of Punt, maritime trade began with safer coastal trade and evolved with the manipulation of the monsoon winds, soon resulting in trade crossing boundaries such as the Arabian Sea and the Bay of Bengal. South Asia had multiple maritime trade routes which connected it to Southeast Asia, Indian connections to various Southeast Asian states buffered it from blockages on other routes. By making use of the trade routes, bulk commodity trade became possible for the Romans in the 2nd century BCE. A Roman trading vessel could span the Mediterranean in a month at one-sixtieth the cost of over-land routes, the peninsula of Anatolia lay on the commercial land routes to Europe from Asia as well as the sea route from the Mediterranean to the Black Sea. Records from the 19th century BCE attest to the existence of an Assyrian merchant colony at Kanesh in Cappadocia, trading networks of the Old World included the Grand Trunk Road of India and the Incense Road of Arabia. Parts of the Mediterranean world, Roman Britain, Tigris-Euphrates river system, beyond this was a margin which included not only temperate areas such as Europe, but the dry steppe corridor of central Asia. This was truly a world system, even though it occupied only a portion of the western Old World. Whilst each civilization emphasized its ideological autonomy, all were part of a common world of interacting components. These routes - spreading religion, trade and technology - have historically been vital to the growth of urban civilization
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Bulgarians
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Bulgarians are a South Slavic ethnic group who are native to Bulgaria and its neighboring regions. Bulgarian citizenship shall further be acquirable through naturalization, the population of Bulgaria descend from peoples with different origins and numbers. They became assimilated by the Slavic settlers in the First Bulgarian Empire, from the indigenous Thracian people certain cultural and ethnic elements were taken. Other pre-Slavic Indo-European peoples, including Dacians, Celts, Goths, Romans, Greeks, the Thracian language has been described as a southern Baltic language. Some pre-Slavic linguistic and cultural traces might have preserved in modern Bulgarians. Medieval historians claimed that the Triballi are the largest tribe and that subsequently changed their name to Bulgarians or Serbs. Others claimed that the Paeonians are Bulgarians, others claimed that the Moesi, according to archeological evidence from the late periods of Roman rule, the Romans did not decrease the number of Thracians significantly in major cities. The latter gradually inflicting total linguistic replacement of Thracian if the Thracians had not already been Romanized or Hellenized and they continued coming to the Balkans in many waves, but also leaving, most notably Justinian II settled as many as 30,000 Slavs from Thrace in Asia Minor. The Byzantines grouped the numerous Slavic tribes into two groups, the Sklavenoi and Antes, some Bulgarian scholars suggest that the Antes became one of the ancestors of the modern Bulgarians. The control of the Bulgars in the west was indirect and in the hands of the Slavic chiefs, the Bulgars are first mentioned in the 4th century in the vicinity of the North Caucasian steppe. However, any connection between the Bulgars and postulated Asian counterparts rest on little more than speculative and contorted etymologies. The Bulgars are not thought to have numerous, becoming a ruling elite in the areas they controlled. Their archeological evidence is concentrated in northeast Bulgaria and in Macedonia, mixed Bulgar-Slavic settlements emerged according to archeological evidence. Omurtag was the last ruler with a Turkic name and during the reign of Boris the Slavonic language reached an official level, a substantional number of loan words of the Bulgar language remained in the Medieval Bulgarian Slavic language and fewer survived in the modern. During the Early Byzantine Era, the Roman provincials in Scythia Minor and Moesia Secunda were already engaged in economic, the major port towns in Pontic Bulgaria remained Byzantine Greek in their outlook. The establishment of a new state molded the various Slav, Bulgar, in different periods to the ethnogenesis of the local population contributed also different Indo-European and Turkic people, who settled or lived on the Balkans. The First Bulgarian Empire was founded in 681, after the adoption of Orthodox Christianity in 864 it became one of the cultural centres of Slavic Europe. Its leading cultural position was consolidated with the invention of the Cyrillic script in its capital Preslav at the eve of the 10th century
36.
Manichaeism
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Manichaeism was a major religious movement that was founded by the Iranian prophet Mani in the Sasanian Empire. Manichaeism taught a dualistic cosmology describing the struggle between a good, spiritual world of light, and an evil, material world of darkness. Through an ongoing process which takes place in history, light is gradually removed from the world of matter and returned to the world of light. Its beliefs were based on local Mesopotamian gnostic and religious movements, Manichaeism was quickly successful and spread far through the Aramaic-Syriac speaking regions. It thrived between the third and seventh centuries, and at its height was one of the most widespread religions in the world, Manichaean churches and scriptures existed as far east as China and as far west as the Roman Empire. It was briefly the main rival to Christianity in the competition to replace classical paganism, while most of Manichaeisms original writings have been lost, numerous translations and fragmentary texts have survived. An adherent of Manichaeism is called, especially in older sources, Mani, an Arsacid Persian by birth, was born 216 AD in Mesopotamia, which was ruled by Persia, then within the Sassanid Empire province of Asuristan. According to the Cologne Mani-Codex, Manis parents were members of the Jewish Christian Gnostic sect known as the Elcesaites, Mani composed seven writings, six of which were written in Syriac Aramaic. The seventh, the Shabuhragan, was written by Mani in Middle Persian and presented by him to the contemporary King of Sassanid Persia, Shapur I, in the Persian capital of Ctesiphon. Although there is no proof Shapur I was a Manichaean, he tolerated the spread of Manichaeism, while Manichaeism was spreading, existing religions such as Zoroastrianism were still popular and Christianity was gaining social and political influence. Although having fewer adherents, Manichaeism won the support of many high-ranking political figures, with the assistance of the Persian Empire, Mani began missionary expeditions. The date of his death is estimated at AD 276–277, Mani believed that the teachings of Buddha, Zoroaster, and Jesus were incomplete, and that his revelations were for the entire world, calling his teachings the Religion of Light. Manichaean writings indicate that Mani received revelations when he was 12 and again when he was 24, with the discovery of the Mani-Codex, it also became clear that he was raised in a Jewish-Christian baptism sect, the Elcesaites, and was influenced by their writings as well. It taught him truths which he developed into a religion and his divine Twin or true Self brought Mani to self-realization. He claimed to be the Paraclete of the Truth, as promised in the New Testament, Manichaeisms views on Jesus are described by historians, Jesus in Manichaeism possessed three separate identities, Jesus the Luminous, Jesus the Messiah and Jesus patibilis. Jesus the Messiah was a historical being who was the prophet of the Jews, however, the Manichaeans believed he was wholly divine. He never experienced human birth as notions of physical conception and birth filled the Manichaeans with horror, since he was the light of the world, where was this light, they asked, when he was in the womb of the Virgin. Jesus the Messiah was truly born at his baptism as it was on occasion that the Father openly acknowledged his sonship
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John of Damascus
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Saint John of Damascus, Arabic, يوحنا الدمشقي, ALA-LC, Yūḥannā ad-Dimashqī), also known as John Damascene and as Χρυσορρόας / Chrysorrhoas was a Syrian monk and priest. Born and raised in Damascus, he died at his monastery, Mar Saba and he is one of the Fathers of the Eastern Orthodox church and is best known for his strong defense of icons. The Catholic Church regards him as a Doctor of the Church, the most common source of information for the life of John of Damascus is a work attributed to one John of Jerusalem, identified therein as the Patriarch of Jerusalem. This is a translation into Greek of an earlier Arabic text. The Arabic original contains a prologue not found in most other translations, Michael explained that he decided to write his biography in 1084 because none was available in his day. However, the main Arabic text seems to have been written by an earlier author sometime between the early 9th and late 10th centuries AD, the hagiographic novel Barlaam and Josaphat, traditionally attributed to John, is in fact a work of the 10th century. John was born in Damascus in the quarter of the 7th century AD. The family was named after Johns grandfather, Mansur ibn Sarjun, Mansur seems to have played a role in the capitulation of Damascus to the troops of Khalid ibn al-Walid in 635 after securing favorable conditions of surrender. Eutychius, a 10th-century Melkite patriarch, mentions him as one high-ranking official involved in the surrender of the city to the Muslims. Moreover, the name was common among Syrian Christians of Arab origins, and Eutychius noted that the governor of Damascus. However, Sahas also asserts that the name not necessarily imply an Arab background and could have been used by non-Arab. John was raised in Damascus, and Arab Christian folklore holds that during his adolescence, John associated with the future Umayyad caliph Yazid I and the Taghlibi Christian court poet al-Akhtal. When Syria was conquered by the Muslim Arabs in the 630s, Johns father, Sarjun, went on to serve the Umayyad caliphs. According to John of Jerusalem and some versions of his life, after his fathers death. In addition, Johns own writings never refer to any experience in a Muslim court and it is believed that John became a monk at Mar Saba, and that he was ordained as a priest in 735. One of the vitae describes his fathers desire for him to not only the books of the Muslims. From this it has suggested that John may have grown up bilingual. John does indeed show some knowledge of the Quran, which he criticizes harshly, other sources describes his education in Damascus as having been conducted in accordance with the principles of Hellenic education, termed secular by one source and Classical Christian by another
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Epiphanius of Salamis
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Epiphanius of Salamis was bishop of Salamis, Cyprus, at the end of the 4th century. He is considered a saint and a Church Father by both the Eastern Orthodox and Catholic Churches and he gained a reputation as a strong defender of orthodoxy. He is best known for composing the Panarion, a large compendium of the heresies up to his own time. Regardless of this he was strongly against some contemporary uses of images in the church. He was ordained a priest, and lived and studied as superior of the monastery in Ad that he founded for thirty years and gained much skill and knowledge in that position. In that position he gained the ability to speak in tongues, including Hebrew, Syriac, Egyptian, Greek, and Latin. His reputation for learning prompted his nomination and consecration as Bishop of Salamis, Cyprus, in 365 or 367 and he was also the Metropolitan of the Church of Cyprus. He served as bishop for nearly forty years, as well as travelled widely to combat unorthodox beliefs and he was present at a synod in Antioch where the Trinitarian questions were debated against the heresy of Apollinarianism. He upheld the position of Bishop Paulinus, who had the support of Rome, over that of Meletius of Antioch, in 382 he was present at the Council of Rome, again upholding the cause of Paulinus. During a visit to Palestine in 394 or 395, while preaching in Jerusalem, he attacked Origens followers and urged the Bishop of Jerusalem, John II and he urged John to be careful of the offence of images in the churches. He noted that when travelling in Palestine he went into a church to pray and he told Bishop John that such images were opposed. This event sowed the seeds of conflict which erupted in the dispute between Rufinus and John against Jerome and Epiphanius, Epiphanius fuelled this conflict by ordaining a priest for Jeromes monastery at Bethlehem, thus trespassing on Johns jurisdiction. This dispute continued during the 390s, in particular in the works by Rufinus. In 399, the took on another dimension, when the Bishop of Alexandria, Theophilus. As a result of persecution, four of these monks, the so-called Tall Brothers, fled to Palestine. John Chrysostom, Bishop of Constantinople, gave the monks shelter, Epiphanius, by this time nearly 80, was one of those summoned, and began the journey to Constantinople. Letter LI in Jeromes letters gives Jeromes Latin translation, made at Epiphanius request, of his letter,394, From Epiphanius, Bishop of Salamis, in Cyprus, to John, Bishop of Jerusalem. The final section covers the often quoted incident of the curtain, asking what place it was, and learning it to be a church, I went in to pray, and found there a curtain hanging on the doors of the said church, dyed and embroidered
Alphandéry, Paul Daniel (1911). "Albigenses". In Chisholm, Hugh. Encyclopædia Britannica. 1 (11th ed.). Cambridge University Press. pp. 505–506.
Alphandéry, Paul Daniel (1911). "
