*sigh* I've been trying to follow our religious discussion because it IS important - but at the same time, it's one of those things that rather loses me, because it's like trying to fit yourself into one of those small amphorae from the late Republic - in a western, Christian tradition, how can we know how they felt about their religion, particularly as they never discussed it?

I've always thought that Caesar probably believed in his own luck, but whether he actually believed in the gods as being more than a force to be properly and dutifully propitiated, I cannot know.

I've been listening to a history of Byzantium, and I had the wildest idea, the other night. Close your eyes and open your mind.

You've never heard, even conceived, of a written moral code for your religion (Ten Commandments, etc.)

You've never heard of Jesus Christ (Caesar, of course, had not).

You've no concept of "heaven" or "hell" and the two being clearly linked to following a given set of moral rules - or not.

You've never heard of any great religion with specified moral rules or coda, so you have to work ethics out on your own, using a few philosophers.

Betcha can't do it?!