Amantes Humanitatis, Spring 2024

AMANTES HUMANITATIS

2ndIssue- ‘LoversofHumanity’ SpringTerm2024

Oxford High School Student-Led Humanities Magazine Club

SpringTerm 2024

“Humanitywithoutscienceisfragile,sciencewithouthumanityislethal.”

“Manaspires, Togood, Tolove Sighs;”

“Beaten,corrupted,dying Inhisownblood lying Yet heavesupaneyeabove Cries,Love,love. Itishisvirtueneedsexplaining, Nothisfailing. “AwayMelancholy”-StevieSmith

Symbols of a eroic women?

A Discussion of Ideas Related to Trinity

Have you ever considered the idea that God is the Father, the Son and Spirit all in one? Have you ever heardsomeonesayingthattheGodisallinonebutatthesametime, is inthreeforms?

Iftheworldisruled by agodwithout distinctions,willwe havenovariation fromeachother? Willwebe justlike clones?

Iftheworldisruled bymanydifferent gods,willcommon senseandcommon moralstandardeven exist?

Can you imagine what difference it might make if the world was created by this kind of God, compared to a world made by a godwithoutthesedistinctions,orbymanydifferentgods?

JR Tolkien said that ‘If you do not believe in a personal God, the question: “What is the purpose of life?” is unaskable and unanswerable.

However, Stephen Hawking opposed Tolkien’s argument. In his book “The Grand Design” he stated that ‘Because there is a law such as gravity, the Universe can and will create itself from nothing. Spontaneouscreation is the reason there is something ratherthannothing,whytheUniverseexists,whyweexist.ItisnotnecessarytoinvokeGodto…settheUniversegoing.’

Now let's look at C.S Lewis’s argument. He said that ‘Unless the origin of all other things were itself concrete and individual, nothing else could be so; for there is no conceivable means whereby what is abstract or general could itself produce concrete reality. Bookkeeping( i.e. accounting), continued to all eternity, could never produce one farthing.I.ecoins.’

What C.S Lewis means is that ‘Bookkeeping needs something else (namely, real money put into the account)... before any income can exist. If anything is to exist at all, then the Original Thing must be, not a principle nor a generality,muchlessan‘ideal’ora‘value,’butanutterlyconcretefact.1.

Dutch-American theologian Cornelius Van Til said in his book “An Introduction to Systematic Theology” that “The wholeproblemofknowledgehasconstantlybeenthatofbringingtheoneandthemanytogether.”2.

What he meant is that if ultimate reality is many, that is many deities, many elements, principles or independent forces,howcanwemeaningfullygroupindividualthingsundercommoncategories?

And if ultimate reality is one, that is one all-encompassing deity, one element, or one unified principle of force), how canweaccountfordifferenceandtheseemingpluralityofthings?

Itisacomplexquestion,butifweusethe ChristiantheoryofTrinitytotrytotackleit, thingscanactuallymakemoresense:

ColinE.Guntontellsusthat:

“If we let the Trinity provide us with a blueprint for reality, we find that we are living in a universe where everything may be what it is and not other things, but it is also what is uniquely is by virtue of its relation to everythingelse.“

What do you think of this? You are welcome to leave your thoughts about the idea of ‘Trinity’ and write yourresponsetothequestion:Howcanweaccountfordifferenceandtheseemingpluralityofthings?

Allsnowflakesarethesame,andall snowflakesaredifferent.Allinsectsare insects,yettherearearound900,000 speciesofinsects.

Footnote

1.Miracles:APreliminaryStudy(NY:HarperOne,2001),138-39

2.AnIntroductiontoSystematicTheology(Phillipsburg,NJ:P&R,1979),10

Ruoying

The Mystery of the Hanging Gardens of Babylon

TheMysteryoftheHangingGardensofBabylon

The legendary Hanging Gardens of Babylon were one of the Seven Wonders of the Ancient World, generally thought to have been built in Babylonia. Babylonia was a region in Southern Mesopotamia, first settled in around 4000 BCE. Only five classical textshavebeenwrittenaboutthegardens,soitisdifficulttoknowmuchaboutthem or their location. Since all of these texts were written after the gardens were supposedly destroyed in an earthquake, they are the most elusive of the Seven WondersoftheAncientworld,andtheirexistenceisstilldisputedtoday.

There are multiple theories about who built the gardens, but the most popular belief is thattheywerebuiltinaround600BCEbyKingNebuchadnezzarII,whoruledfrom605562 BCE, for his wife Amytis. Amytis was homesick for the luscious, verdant scenery of Media, where she grew up, which was unlike the dry, arid landscape of Babylonia. It is thought that the gardens may have been built on a sloping construct to resemble the mountainsofMedia.

Anotherbeliefisthattheywerebuiltinthe9thcenturyBCEbythesemi-legendaryqueen Semiramis,sotheyaresometimesreferredtoastheHangingGardensofSemiramis. However, recent evidence found by an Oxford historian suggests that the gardens were never built in Babylon but in Nineveh, the capital of the Assyrian empire. In this case, they would have been built by King Sennacherib in the 7th century BCE. Archaeological excavations in Nineveh have found evidence of an irrigation system that was described in many classical texts. In 689 BCE, Babylon was conquered by Assyria and Nineveh becameknownas‘NewBabylon’,whichcouldbethereasonfortheconfusion.

It is believed that the gardens were filled with glorious vegetation, such as fruit trees, exotic flowers and even waterfalls. The gardens would have needed an incredible irrigation system to keep the plants ‘permanently green’ as the Alexandrian philosopher Philo described them. This included balconies covered with reeds or lead so that water did not seep through, and a systemofscrewsandpumpsthatbroughtwaterfromthenearby.

Euphrates river to the gardens. The German archaeologist Koldowey discovered a series of vaults in the palace at Babylon. One of these contained a well which could have been part of the irrigationsystem,supportingthebeliefthatthegardenswerebuiltatBabylon.

‘TheHangingGardensofBabylon’isquiteaninaccuratename.Weretheyhanging?Thegardens are called ‘hanging’ gardens because Philo wrote in his book ‘De sept orbis spectaculis’ that the gardens floated in the air. This is because they are thought to have been built on a roof with terraces which gave the illusion of floating. Were they in Babylon? Evidence suggests that the gardens were in Nineveh, 300 miles from Babylon. Did the gardens exist at all? It is likely that there will never be conclusive evidence, and the mystery of the alleged Hanging Gardens will remain unsolved.

-Katherine

Bibliography:

https://www.britannica.com/place/Hanging-Gardens-of-Babylon

https://www.wonders-of-the-world.net/Seven/Description-of-the-gardens.php

https://www.history.com/news/hanging-gardens-existed-but-not-in-babylon

https://www.worldhistory.org/Hanging_Gardens_of_Babylon/

https://www.newworldencyclopedia.org/entry/Hanging_Gardens_of_Babylon

https://www.independent.co.uk/news/science/archaeology/features/the-biggest-wonder-about-the-hanging-gardensof-babylon-they-weren-t-in-babylon-8604649.html

https://www.google.com/url?sa=i&url=https%3A%2F%2Fezgrogarden.com%2Fhistory-of-hydroponics-2%2Fthegardens-of-babylon%2F&psig=AOvVaw2XIeM_Dd0bLtsTXPSCPFj&ust=1707749632788000&source=images&cd=vfe&opi=89978449&ved=0CBEQjRxqFwoTCJj mmrDdo4QDFQAAAAAdAAAAABAD

What does IMago Dei imply?

Theideathathumansaredifferentfromanimals,hasbeenabigtopicforthinkersinWesternhistory. SomephilosophersagreewithLocke’sthesis,that ‘it is the understanding that sets man above the rest of sensible beings.’ This is originated from Locke’s “An Essay concerningHumanUnderstanding(Indianapolis:Hackett,1996),4. JohnLocke(1632-1704)‘

However, some people such as Jean-Jacques Rousseau (1712-1778), thought that ‘it is not, so much the understanding that constitutes the specific difference between the man and the brute, as the human quality of freeagency’ JeanJacquesRousseau,DiscourseontheOriginsofinequality(Indianapolis:Hackett,1992),17

Adam Smith (1723-1790), true to his economic cast of mind, considered the division of labour as that which ‘is commontoallmen,andtobefoundinnootherraceofanimals,whichseemtoknowneitherthisnoranyotherspecies of contracts.’ –Adam Smith, An Enquiry into the Nature and Causes of the Wealth of Nations, ed. Edwin C annan (Chicago:UniversityofChicagoPress,1977).

For Alexis de Tocqueville (1805-1859), "though man resembles the animals in many respects one characteristic is peculiar to him alone; he improves himself and they do not.’ –Alexis de Tocqueville, Democracy in America, ed. J.P. MayerandMaxLerner,translate.GeorgeLawrence(NewYork:HarperandRow,1996),420.

John Stuaut Mill thinks that human beings differ from animals in only two respects: ‘in being capable of sympathising, not solely with their offspring, or, like some of the more noble animals, with some superior animal who is kind to them, but with all humans, and even with all sentient beings,’ and ‘in having a more developed intelligence, which gives a wider range to the whole of their sentiments, whether self-regarding or sympathetic’ –John Stuart Mill, Utilitarianism (Indianapolis:Hackett,2002),51

Inmoderntimes, therehavealsobeennotableeffortstoarguethatnothingsignificantseparateshumanity fromtheanimals....

We can notice from those arguments above that most ideas about what makes humans special focus on a certain skill wehave,likebeingabletothinklogicallyoruselanguage.JohnE.CoonsandPatrickM.Brennancallsthisthe ‘hostproperty.’It’slikeaspecialabilitythatsetsusapartfromotheranimals.

But, if we think more deeply about this so-called ‘host property’, this ‘host property 'approach faces a chilling problem: What if certain individuals do not possess the requisite capacities to get them across the line of humanity? What about the rationality of those with severe mental disabilities? What about the very young? Whatabouttheveryold?

Therefore, whenever we try to say that being human is special because of a certain quality or feature, we run intoaproblem.Thisisbecausenoteveryonemighthavethisquality,orhaveenoughofit.

If we base being human on this, it could mean some people might not be considered fully human and wouldn’tgettherespectorsafetythatcomeswithit.

Genesis 1, however, explicitly does not name what it is about human beings that makes us in the image of Godbutrepeatedlyemphasisesthattheimagodeiisafeatureofcreation,notanachievement*.

This idea thus implies that being human is special, not because of what we can do or show off, but just becausewearewhoweare.It’snotaboutbraggingorthinkingwearebetterthanotheranimals.

SeeingourselvesasmadeintheimageofGod, givesusastrongreasontobelieveineveryone’sequalworth andhumanrights.

*creationismentionedthreetimesin1:27:“SoGodcreatedhumankindinhisown image,intheimageofGodhecreatedthem;maleandfemalehecreatedthem”