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HELEN HAD GIVEN US
their big bedroom, and we fell
asleep listening to the wind
howl.
Still
suffering from jet lag, by 7
a.m. when the others got up I
was already sitting in the
living room at my laptop, having
had a cup of coffee earlier with
George who had already left for
the farm. He promised to come
back for us at lunch time and
take us to some of the places
Jesus had visited when he was in
Corinth. George was very
familiar with the Urantia Book’s
account, and had outlined a plan
for us, half today and the other
half tomorrow.
After
breakfast, Joy and I spent the
rest of the morning walking
through modern Corinth, along
the waterfront, into some of the
streets and past the building on
Theotoki 111 where I had lived
with Pat in 1980. I videotaped
it all with my new camera, this
is one reason we have few
regular shots of this day. What
amazed me most was that
throughout the town they were
still digging up all the
streets, just as they had been
doing seventeen years before
when I lived there!
At
noon we found George waiting for
us on an agreed-upon corner.
Everyone, everywhere we went,
smoked cigarettes, and this was
annoying Joy to no end. In the
car, as I watched George’s smoke
waft straight into Joy’s
nostrils and eyes, I said,
“George, I forget to tell you
that Joy is allergic to smoke.”
“I’m sorry, Joy,” said George
sympathetically, “I didn’t know
you were allergic to smoke.” But
he continued to puff on his
cigarette anyway!
 Our
first stop the harbor near
Ancient Corinth where Jesus,
Gonod and Ganid had arrived by
boat.
From
Nicopolis they sailed [to]
Corinth, the capital of the
Roman province of Achaia.
[1471]
Ruins of
the harbor at Lechaion, when
Jesus, Gonod and Ganid arrived
by boat.
There
was little evidence of the
harbor to be seen, but George
pointed out some stones in the
ground where they used to carry
the boats across the land.
From
there we went on a tour of
Ancient Corinth. (It was a hilly
drive, and whenever the car went
down a steep incline, George
would turn off the motor and
coast in order to save
gasoline.)
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A typical visitor to the
ancient city of Corinth
would have approached it
along the paved stones
of the Lechaion Road,
which went from the port
to the agora. On the
right stood the great
Temple of Apollo, with
its massive Doric
columns, built in 550
BC. Only a few steps
away were the sacred
springs of the Pierenne,
where pilgrims had
worshipped for centuries
and from which, in
legend, Pegasus drank.
Towering over the entire
metropolis was the
Acrocorinth, an immense
outcropping that
sheltered shrines sacred
to the goddesses
Aphrodite and Demeter. [www.pbs.org]
Below is a map of
Ancient Corinth, showing
the roads leading from
the
harbor to Acrocorinth,
the ancient citadel.
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 Late
in the afternoon we stopped in
at one of the tavernas on the
town square of Old Corinth,
where the buses unload tourists
and locals. Here we had some
Greek dishes George recommended
and watched the ever-interesting
parade of Greeks passing by. We
also read to each other from the
parts of the Urantia Book that
referred to Corinth.
 George
in the taverna reading from the
Urantia Book.
* * *
Back at
Krokida 7 we sat in the kitchen
and ate the leftover food from
the night before, and everyone,
including all of the Markellos
kids, chain-smoked while we ate.
Joy, unable to bear the smoke,
escaped by taking her plate of
food into the bedroom and going
to bed early for what turned out
to be a sleeping marathon. Not
me. I stayed up drinking retsina
with Helen and George, reliving
the old days when I had been a
daily part of their lives,
living just a block away. It
seemed like another lifetime to
me now.
* * *
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PARTIAL
HISTORY OF THE GREEKS
[Around 10,000 BC] a group of the tall descendants of
Adamson made their way
over the northern
islands to Greece,
coming almost directly
from their highland home
north of Mesopotamia.
These progenitors of the
Greeks were led westward
by Sato, a direct
descendant of Adamson
and Ratta. The group
which finally settled in
Greece consisted of
three hundred and
seventy-five of the
selected and superior
people comprising the
end of the second
civilization of the
Adamsonites. These later
sons of Adamson carried
the then most valuable
strains of the emerging
white races. They were
of a high intellectual
order and, physically
regarded, the most
beautiful of men since
the days of the first
Eden. Presently Greece
and the Aegean Islands
region succeeded
Mesopotamia and Egypt as
the Occidental center of
trade, art, and culture.
. . . [P]ractically all
of the art and science
of the Aegean world was
derived from Mesopotamia
except for the culture
of the Adamsonite
forerunners of the
Greeks. All the art and
genius of these latter
people is a direct
legacy of the posterity
of Adamson, the first
son of Adam and Eve, and
his extraordinary second
wife, a daughter
descended in an unbroken
line from the pure
Nodite staff of Prince
Caligastia. No wonder
the Greeks had
mythological traditions
that they were directly
descended from gods and
superhuman beings. The
Aegean region passed
through five distinct
cultural stages, each
less spiritual than the
preceding, and erelong
the last glorious era of
art perished beneath the
weight of the rapidly
multiplying mediocre
descendants of the
Danubian slaves who had
been imported by the
later generations of
Greeks. [895]
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A view of
modern Corinth
George and Saskia
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A
SHORT HISTORY
OF CORINTH
There are four
different Corinths: New Corinth, Old Corinth,
Ancient Corinth, and
Acrocorinth.
New Corinth is a
modern seaport and center of trade for olives, tobacco, raisins, and
wine. New Corinth was built twice: First in 1858 after Old
Corinth, four miles southwest, was destroyed by an
earthquake, and rebuilt after another earthquake in 1928. Old
Corinth is now a village close to the ruins of Ancient Corinth,
which was one of the largest, wealthiest, most powerful, and oldest
cities of ancient Greece. Acrocorinth is the fortified citadel, or
acropolis, built high on a hill overlooking the ancient city, and
the site of the temple of Aphrodite.
First inhabited in the Neolithic period (5000-3000 B.C.), Ancient
Corinth occupied a strategic position on the only land road from
northern to southern Greece and was the site of a strong fortress.
Located in the middle of a fertile land and sitting on an isthmus
dividing the Greek mainland from the Peloponnesus, Corinth served
two harbors: Lechaion and Kenchreai.
Corinth was invaded by the Dorians (Adamsonite stock) around 1000
B.C. Under the rule of tyrants Cypselus, his son Periander, and
their successors, it became a flourishing maritime power also known
for its inventions in architecture and music. Corinth reached its
economic and artistic peak in the fifth century B.C. becoming one of
the three major powers in Greece and taking part in all the battles
against the Persians.
By
the fifth century B.C., a towpath (diolkos) across the isthmus
(about 4 miles wide at the narrowest point) made it possible to haul
ships from one harbor to the other, permitting passage from the
Adriatic to the Aegean thus avoiding the perilous trip around the
Peloponnesian cape. Heavy taxes were imposed on the passage of goods
across the isthmus, and Corinth’s warehouses were filled with wheat
from Sicily, papyrus from Egypt, ivory from Libya, leather from
Cyrenaica, incense from Arabia, dates from Phoenicia, apples and
pears from Euboia, carpets from Carthage and slaves from Phrygia.
Corinth was destroyed in 146 B.C by the Romans and rebuilt in 44
B.C. by Julius Caesar. The center of the Roman city was organized to
the south of the temple of Apollo and included shops, small shrines,
fountains, baths and other public buildings. It became the capital
of Roman Greece and was mainly populated by freedmen and
Latin-speaking Jews. Living for centuries in a major crossroad of
world trade, inhabitants of Corinth were exposed to the philosophies
and religious practices of many cultures, and paid homage to foreign
as well as civic deities.
It
was during this Roman revival time that Jesus visited the city with
Gonod and Ganid, and it was to this sophisticated metropolis that
the Apostle Paul brought his message of the “crucified Jesus Christ”
in 50-51 A.D., staying in Corinth for 18 months. The letters of 1
and 2 Corinthians are addressed to Christians in the city: Prisca
and Aquila with whom he lived and engaged in tent making, and town
notables Chloe, Stephanus, Gaius, Crispus, and Erastus.
After the invasion of the Herulians in A.D. 267, the city declined
though it remained inhabited for many centuries through successive
invasions and destructions, until it was liberated from the Turks in
1822.
Excavations in the ancient city over the last 100 years have
revealed the agora, temples, fountains, shops, porticoes, baths and
various other monuments, all dominated by the imposing ruins of the
Temple of Apollo, built in 550 A.D. Digging has also extended to the
fortress on Acrocorinthos, the prehistoric settlements, the
amphitheaters, the cemeteries, the Quarter of the Potters, and other
buildings outside the main archaeological site.
[http://www.culture.gr; Encyclopaedia Britannica]
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The Temple
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EXCERPTS FROM
"AT CORINTH" [1471]
The
three travelers enjoyed
their sojourn in Corinth
[where] they met people
of every race hailing
from three continents.
Next to Alexandria and
Rome, it was the most
cosmopolitan city of the
Mediterranean empire. .
. . Excepting Athens,
which was more renowned
as an educational
center, Corinth was the
most important city in
Greece during these
Roman times, and their
two months' stay in this
thriving commercial
center afforded
opportunity for all
three of them to gain
much valuable
experience. [T]hey held
intimate conversations
with scores of
worth-while individuals,
and as a result of all
these apparently casual
contacts more than half
of the individuals so
affected became members
of the subsequent
Christian community. . .
.
[Those who “greatly
profited by the
instruction received
from Jesus” included a
miller, a Roman
centurion, the earnest
leader of the Mithraic
cult, an Epicurean
teacher, a Greek
contractor and builder,
a Roman judge, the
mistress of the Greek
inn, a Chinese merchant,
a traveler from
Britain, a runaway lad,
and a condemned
criminal.]
. . .
[In the synagogue Jesus
and Ganid] heard a
learned rabbi discourse
on the "Destiny of
Israel," and after the
service they met one
Crispus, the chief ruler
of this synagogue. . ..
Jesus held more than
twenty sessions with
this forward-looking
Jew; and it is not
surprising, years
afterward, when Paul was
preaching in this very
synagogue. . ., that
Crispus with his entire
family embraced the new
religion, and that he
became one of the chief
supports of the
Christian church which
Paul subsequently
organized at Corinth. .
. . During the eighteen
months Paul preached in
Corinth . . . he met
many others who had been
taught by the "Jewish
tutor of the son of an
Indian merchant.”
Jesus
and Ganid were often
guests in another Jewish
home, that of Justus, a
devout merchant, who
lived alongside the
synagogue. And many
times, subsequently,
when the Apostle Paul
sojourned in this home,
did he listen to the
recounting of these
visits with the Indian
lad and his Jewish
tutor, while both Paul
and Justus wondered
whatever became of such
a wise and brilliant
Hebrew teacher.
When
Paul first went to
Corinth, he had not
intended to make a
prolonged visit. But
[because] the Jewish
tutor had prepared the
way for his labors . . .
Paul prolonged his stay
in Corinth.
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