Read transcript of Ep 5: Flesh & Spirit
Alternatively, follow this link to hear Ep 5: Flesh & Spirit and read the show notes. Transcription by Amy Carpenter.
[Sound effects: carts and crowd noises. The city of Rome. Ancient music from a stringed instrument.]
Seneca [actor reading]:
I shall not be ashamed to tell you what ardent zeal Pythagoras inspired in me.
VegHist Ep 5: Flesh and Spirit. On Egyptian monasticism, Early Christianity, Plutarch, Neoplatonism, and Manicheansim; with David Grummet, Nicholas Baker-Brian, Michael Beer, and Fr. Abouna Yostas St. Athanasius
In the eastern Roman Empire, several faiths and philosophies agree on one thing; that you need to eschew flesh to live a life of the spirit.
Episode 5: Flesh & Spirit
Not all Romans celebrated pagan sacrifices or the bloodthirsty arena. Some Romans followed the semi-mythical vegetarian Pythagoras, or neoplatonist philosophers who preached a vegetarian contemplative life.
In the melting pot of Jewish mythology, Greek philosophy, and the worship of Jesus many forms of Christianity emerge. Some of them advocate vegetarianism. The lost world religion of Manichaeanism took ideas from India and was led by a plant based priesthood that would last a thousand years.
Alexandria in Egypt is the epicentre of many of these contemplative movements. Ian visits a valley in Yorkshire that still echoes with the traditions of the ancient Egyptian desert – the Coptic Christian monastery of St. Athanasius. He discovers why the monks pursue that life, what it means to them, and how they maintain some of the original vegetarian traditions of the Egyptian desert fathers.
Play or download (43MB MP3) (via iTunes) or read transcript.