XBOX 360 2696

Had a hardware-related crash on the laptop I was writing this on. Now it's back running, although battery showing one percent negative charge isn't all that nice.

Oh well.

Likewise here, in my case it's Finnish Evangelic Lutheran, but the rest of that does apply - now.

Correct. But still, applying that same blanket category to all of Christianity is not factually correct.

Funny how you foreigners always start talking about separating the lovees, and Paul, and such, when someone of us mentions the sauna ;-)

Naughtiness in the sauna was supposed to make something very angry. Our kids still get told that in stories, but with less of a pagan religious overtone. (And most of the sauna elves have changed jobs as Santa Claus pays better wages, too.)

My point exactly.

But a small group's insbreastutional greed or acquisitiveness or whatever may survive for slightly longer. Those have occasionally come up, on the political side as well.

It isn't that, it's that I've found similar declarations by a lot of different groups in my history books. I don't see any overwhelmingly important differences.

Yes, the others were nasty in their times too, and needed attention. That's no difference.

Maybe they think their cattle is halfBubalus Caffer-, or something. Or maybe they want to claim on the insurance. (Where's my tinfoil hat?)

I think it's clear that in the historically objective sense, religions (as practiced) do so too.

Neither was, just to name one secular counterexample, militant Communism. That one seems to have gone out of fashion somehow. I don't think similar global-scale phenomena were quite as likely to happen in earlier times so not having many more examples doesn't indicate much anything.

We were also discussing the possible case where the lead comes from the secular side, and therefore the policy too.

That was actually done here at one time. Tends to discourage the zealots a bit, in general. At least if there's also an outside control chain (like local nobility).

Such drastic symptoms are not required for a gradual effect.

My point exactly.

Yes, and plenty of them too, starting from quite early on. Plenty of them went to non-Romans over the centuries, but I understand that in the later stages when the legions decided who'd be the Imperator, Romans still had a substantial proportion of those offices.

It may be a bit too long since I last read those books, though.

Yes, and some time after those, there were even a couple of ones with some looting. No one outside the city limits paid much attention any more.

Duh, I get the impression that Italian politics were fairly dangerous well into ... or never mind. I'm not completely sure it'd be safe now either ;-)

Well, what of those who tried to settle in Spain?

Slavery not required for that.

And besides the Ottoman Empire didn't immediately collapse due to overreaching, so someone apparently knew better than a bunch of people who (each in turn) tried to acquire Russia, did get into Moscow and ... well.

(Well, there was once an invasion of Moscow that didn't result in the invading country collapsing. It still didn't do much good either.)

I just wish such was more common, in general.

-- #Not speaking for my employer. No warranty. YMMV.