Apostates

         I am still reading, on the computer, Edward Gibbon's "Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire," so much so, in fact, that it's been hurting my other computer activities, including keeping up this weblog.  Much more than in the past, recently I've been going through the stress of coming up to the 22nd or 23rd hours of the day before posting something.
        So far, though doing the same thing every day isn't my thing at all, I haven't let a day go by since starting this weblog without putting up a post.    I don't know why I feel it's so necessary to keep up that "record."   I'm well aware that if I miss a day, or two days, or a week, or any other length of time, the sky won't even remotely fall in, for me or for anyone else.   Then why?
       Lots of smiles may be in order!
       I've reached Chapter 23 of the book, and that means I may be near the halfway mark.   It's in the year 363, near the end of the  short but extremely significant reign of Julian, the Apostate Emperor.   He's up to his ears in an issue that is still red hot to this very day, and that is what should be put on the man-leveled top of "Mt." Moriah in Jerusalem.   The most important Jewish temple of all, built by King Solomon, used to crown that height, but it was reduced to ruins during the reigns of the emperors Titus and Hadrian.
       Julian, in his campaign to roll back the adoption of Christianity as had been put into effect by his predecessor, Constantine, attempted to rebuild Solomon's Temple  on the same spot, but events like an earthquake and a whirlwind and fireballs from a volcano or some such supposedly interfered, and then Julian died, and some centuries later, with new proprietors on the scene, a mosque was put on that spot.    A mosque is still there,  and with the Israelis now in control, it's still a very touchy situation.   You may recall Sharon's ill-advised visit to that spot that brought on the renewal of the Intifada just a few years ago.
       I've been reading "Decline and Fall"  closely, though I have to admit that when I got to Constantine and later Julian, I skipped over quite a few paragraphs when Gibbon's interest in theological matters exceeded mine.   I expected something like this to happen, but I thought it would be economics instead.    
        I'm waiting to understand how the Roman adoption of Christianity contributed to the empire's decline and fall, to the extent that Gibbon found it so necessary to expound at such length on the tenets and the arguments of that religion's early doctrines.   Instead, it would seem, so far, that Christianity instead breathed new life into the Roman fortunes.   I am sure, though, that it will all be made clear to me.
        Gibbon, meanwhile, got some competition for my attention, after I recalled that for years I've had a copy of Gore Vidal's "Julian," a historical novel about that very emperor.   I read it in the 1960's when it was even a best-seller, but it made hardly any impression on me.   I expect that now it will mean more.   But before I get too far into it, I guess I'll see what Gibbon has to say first.   The contrast should be interesting, as I expect that Vidal was much less reverent than Gibbon. 
       Hey!  Without much effort in just a few minutes I've typed up another post, just by rapping on what is chiefly on my mind at this moment.   So  my release from the benign tyranny of this weblog will have to wait till tomorrow or another day soon.