History Western Civilization Essay 13

Based on what you read in Acts, discuss Paul’s missionary journeys.

So even before Paul was an apostle and a follower of Jesus Christ he was a Jew and had a different name (Saul) and he thought that the Christians were horrible people he thought that he was doing it for God and that he had to take some sort of action to get rid of these people. So he decided to start persecuting these people, and he killed many people and many Christians were scared of Saul and one day on his way to Damascus he saw a bright light and a voice that said, “Why do you persecute me Saul?”. Saul was blind and for three days he walked in the desert and would not eat or drink, in Damascus there was a disciple of Jesus, Ananias and God said to him to heal this man Saul. Saul came to his door Ananias healed him and Saul was renamed Paul, and he went out to go preach the news of Jesus Christ.

Starting from Antioch Paul was with some of his fellow Christians and friends and they would accompany Paul on his journey’s even though most times they would split up, Paul went with Barnabas and Mark to Cyprus and from there they went to Salamis and Paphos they then sail to Perga (where Mark returns to Jerusalem) and Paul and Barnabas preach to the Gentiles, the two head back to Antioch where they preach for a while.

The second journey begins when Paul takes Silas to go to Syria and Cilicia then went to Derbe and Lystra where they meet Timothy and he joins them and goes with them to Phrygia and Galatia, to Mysia to Troas, and then into Neapolis in Macedonia going into Philippi. They go through Amphipolis and Appolonia, and Thessalonica where they preach for 3 weeks. After being in Berea for some time Paul goes on to Achaia and Athens for the winter. Then after about a year and a half of being in Cornith Paul reunites with Timothy and Silas and after a while Paul leaves to go to Cenchrea and then continue to go to the Aegean Sea to Ephesus from there Paul sails to Caesarea and then goes up to Antioch in Syria where the second journey ends.

I used the Chronology of Apostle Paul’s Journeys and Epistles by Matthew McGee to help me map out where Paul was going and here is the article if anyone wants to read it. http://www.matthewmcgee.org/paultime.html

 

 

Western Literature Essay 13

“How Important was the rhetorical Context of Cicero’s orations: his listeners’ fear of Catiline’s conspiracy and army?”

So before all of this we saw that Cicero was accusing Catiline very cunningly, he was accusing Catiline but was doing it in a way that did not make it look like he was just pointing a finger at him. Catiline left Rome because as Cicero so very kindly reminded him most rebel leaders got the penalty death so Catiline left the city in fear.

Now Cicero wants to gain the favor of the people and He is depicting himself as a savior of Rome and he said that Jupiter is along side him. He is telling the people about how treacherous Catiline is and how he will destroy Rome, including all of Catiline’s friends and followers. Cicero tells the crowd that Catiline could be coming back to Rome with an army that includes drunkards, people in debt, gladiators, adulterers, and other criminals that will destroy Rome and create havoc disturbing the lives of many. If they choose to vote to execute these five followers then Catiline would be to scared to return. He does tell them to not worry and that if they protect their families and are ready to defend themselves they would be alright. The people were swayed by Cicero and voted that the five should be executed and that is exactly what happened.

So onto the question how important was the need for fear? Well fear was the main component that was driving the people to take action, some people probably felt a lot of anger towards Catiline as well because he was part of the Roman government and was supposed to protect people. Fear was just the main emotion that Cicero stirred up among the crowd, because if you are scared you are more likely to act out on just trying to get rid of the thing that scares you. Rather if Cicero went with trying to anger the crowd he would have had a lot of angry people that would just want to go out defend themselves and go start a fight between the two groups and potentially there would be a war which would be sourced back to Cicero, and he probably did not want the responsibility and the blame for beginning a war.

Biology Essay 6

Most prairies in their natural state will have a fire every 2-3 years or so. These disturbances are relatively modest. What might happen to the community of there were no fires for 100 years? How would the changes affect the community?

There are fires every two to three years because the fire will burn any unwanted shrubs or weeds or trees that are growing on the prairie. Mostly thing that live in the prairies are cows, buffalo, other herbivores that feed off of grass. When these animals die they attract buzzards and eat the carcass of the dead animal.

If there were no fires than all of these shrubs and thorns and trees would start to grow and take over and the grass would not have as much space to keep on living, the other plants would be taking the nutrients from the grass and it would keep surviving but the animals would have to go somewhere else after a while because they would have eaten all the grass in that area.

After 100 years of no fires I would imagine that trees would be everywhere and it would be a forest where a lot more animals would be living. Like deer, and squirrels, and skunks, and rabbits. It would have changed completely and the other herbivores would have had to find a different spot and never come back.

History Western Civilization Essay 12

How would you compare the teachings of Christianity, to the values cherished by earlier civilizations we have discussed. Conversely, can you see anything in common between Christianity and some of the great ancient thinkers we have discussed?

I am going to be using a paradigm that I use in my youth group. Basically your heart is the cockpit of your life and in your heart you have good and bad desires. You filter those desires through your values and perspectives, which leads to your thoughts which leads to your actions.

The values between the Bible and of the Greeks were not very similar at all their values and perspectives were completely focused on different things. The Greeks value was to please themselves and the Bible focuses on the joy of others. The Greeks perspective is that they were going to die so I need to have lived my life with great might and power, while the Bible focuses on where you are going after you die.

1. The number one difference is their values. Focused on themselves vs. focused on others.
2. Their perspectives. A good life means to please myself vs. I need to focus on where I am going to end up.
3. The Greeks are very hard headed and do not really think about the consequences, while wise people in the Bible are trying to see what is up ahead.
4. There are several gods in the Greek culture, while there is only one God.

There are some similarities but they are still very different.

1. They both understand that there is some greater power that controls them and the universe.
2. To some extent the Greeks understand that there are some consequences, and a lot of the Bible is focused on consequences for certain actions.

So in conclusion there are more differences than similarities and while the Greeks understand that there is something greater than themselves they really don’t want to fully commit and give themselves away to the gods. The Christians do not care if they die because they know that if they follow God and give themselves to him then they will be with him for all of eternity.

Western Literature Essay 12

“If you had been Catiline, what would you have said to undermine Cicero’s case?”

Cicero was a great politician, lawyer, speaker and a master of rhetoric. He persuaded people quite easily and could get large crowds to listen to him. He had a lot of power, which I believe is one reason that a lot of people listened to him. He was also clearly very popular among the people because many times people did not only listen to him but they really believed what he was saying was true.

Now onto the case between Cicero and Catiline. Cicero made it pretty clear that he did not like Catiline and he made some accusations against him, whether they were true or not I do not know. These accusations made against Catiline made him look like a betrayer of Rome. These accusations were not made so strongly that it looked like Cicero was pointing a finger at Catiline, but they were to the point and everyone got the idea.

If I were in Catiline’s position I would not want to get thrown out of Rome so I would defend myself by asking where these accusations had come from, where the evidence was from, and if you had any eye witnesses to prove if I were guilty. The strange thing is that Catiline did not defend himself, I don’t know why but it makes you wonder if he was actually guilty or not.

History Western Civilization Essay 11

How would you summarize the period of the Julio-Claudian and Flavian emperors? Were they consistently humane and competent, wicked and foolish, or is the pattern erratic? Was there a consistent system of succession from one emperor to another?

In the period before the four emperors there was a lot of chaos, there was also a lot of tyrants in Rome because they were absolute power and could do whatever they wanted. There was so much stress put on one person that they ended up killing themselves. Then finally they had an idea to have four emperors at one time so that the power could be shared and everyone could have different responsibilities.

Why do historians tend to look with favor on the period of the five good emperors? What differences do you observe between that period and the period from the death of Augustus through the death of Domitian?

While the period with the four emperors were much more peaceful than before they were still giving their power over to their sons and they began to become more like tyrants again, so instead the remaining emperor would pick someone from the senate that had good character, and would be a worthy successor. This went on for five emperors and in this time period there was peace.

Western Literature Essay 11

“How does the view of ethical cause and effect in history in Works and Days compare with the furies’ view in The Eumenides?”

In the Works and Days we are told all about ethics and how to live a full and nurturing life. It talks about how to work, when to get married, how to worship, how to have a life that will bring honor and joy to your future children, how to prosper, and it focuses on how to be happy, and the joys in life. Where as the Eumenides talks about the consequences, and while Works and Days does touch on this a bit the Eumenides really focuses on the outcome of certain actions.

They both talk about revenge in the same way. In the Works and Days it says that revenge is alright if you have been harmed, and in the Eumenides it focuses on the revenge of Orestes, trying to kill his mother and her lover.

Another similarity is that both books/plays have a high regard for justice. In the Works and Days he talks about how to live justly and how to give justice and he obviously thinks that revenge is a form of justice, and in the Eumenides Orestes is being tried by Athena and other judges for killing his mother. Both of these pieces of writing are focusing on what is right and what justice is, even though one talks about it in a more brutal way.