<HTML><HEAD></HEAD>
<BODY dir=ltr>
<DIV dir=ltr>
<DIV style="FONT-FAMILY: 'Calibri'; COLOR: #000000; FONT-SIZE: 12pt">
<DIV> </DIV>
<DIV
style="FONT-STYLE: normal; DISPLAY: inline; FONT-FAMILY: 'Calibri'; COLOR: #000000; FONT-SIZE: small; FONT-WEIGHT: normal; TEXT-DECORATION: none">
<DIV style="FONT: 10pt tahoma">
<DIV> </DIV>
<DIV style="BACKGROUND: #f5f5f5">
<DIV style="font-color: black"><B>From:</B> <A title=starwaterstrain@gmail.com
href="mailto:starwaterstrain@gmail.com">Nick Lee</A> </DIV>
<DIV><FONT size=3 face=Calibri></FONT> </DIV></DIV></DIV>
<DIV> </DIV></DIV>
<DIV
style="FONT-STYLE: normal; DISPLAY: inline; FONT-FAMILY: 'Calibri'; COLOR: #000000; FONT-SIZE: small; FONT-WEIGHT: normal; TEXT-DECORATION: none">
<DIV class=gmail_quote>
<BLOCKQUOTE
style="BORDER-LEFT: #ccc 1px solid; MARGIN: 0px 0px 0px 0.8ex; PADDING-LEFT: 1ex"
class=gmail_quote>Gerry Quinn wrote:<BR></BLOCKQUOTE>
<DIV>> > Clear references to Jesus of Nazareth are not ?quasi-Christian
symbols and concepts?. And did</DIV>
<DIV>> > those societies have the Sign of the Cross? Did they have rosary
beads?<BR></DIV>
<DIV> </DIV>
<DIV>> The cross dates back to the stone age. </DIV>
<DIV> </DIV>
<DIV>I didn’t refer to the cross. I referred to the *Sign* of the
Cross.</DIV>
<DIV> </DIV>
<DIV>> Rosary beads are not native to Christianity. They were</DIV>
<DIV>> borrowed from the East. Most symbolism in Christianity can be traced
directly to Mithraism.</DIV>
<DIV> </DIV>
<DIV>Prayer beads and knotted cords etc. existed before Christianity.
Silk’s beads, however, have a cross and the beads come in decades. Do
Mithraic beads have the same characteristics?</DIV>
<DIV> </DIV>
<DIV><BR>> > Allah is referred to in the character name lists as ?A
forgotten god. (Perhaps an alternative</DIV>
<DIV>> > name for the Outsider.)? How direct do you want Wolfe to
be?\</DIV>
<DIV> </DIV>
<DIV>> As for Allah, that was not originally a reference to the god of the
Israelites, as I'm sure you know.</DIV>
<DIV> </DIV>
<DIV>Certainly. But do you accept that Islam at least must have existed in
Urth’s past? If so, it is hard to imagine a history that would have
produced Islam but not Christianity.</DIV>
<DIV> </DIV>
<BLOCKQUOTE
style="BORDER-LEFT: #ccc 1px solid; MARGIN: 0px 0px 0px 0.8ex; PADDING-LEFT: 1ex"
class=gmail_quote>It may be pagan, but it is set in the future of a universe
resembling our own. Nor is it a matter of a few random symbols, but a
lot of very specific ones. And Jesus is very clearly referenced.
Allah is even mentioned by name, and Quetzal gives us a mutated version of
Genesis.<BR>Ignoring all this stuff won?t make it go
away.<BR></BLOCKQUOTE></DIV>
<DIV>> Genesis also predated Christianity, as I am also sure you know. </DIV>
<DIV> </DIV>
<DIV>And Islam came after it. And everything before and after seems to be
the same. Except you and others claim Christianity didn’t exist. And
there seems to be no evidence for it whatsoever except vague speculations on
what Wolfe would find theologically acceptable.</DIV>
<DIV> </DIV>
<DIV>> When Silk glimpses Christ, could it be he is seeing a vision of the
future, </DIV>
<DIV>> of a universe following his own?</DIV>
<DIV> </DIV>
<DIV>Why should it be so? Are we given any indications whatsoever Besides,
if such visions can come from the future, clearly the Incarnation has some
potency in Silk’s universe anyway. </DIV>
<DIV> </DIV>
<DIV>Furthermore, that is only one reference to Jesus Christ. Consider the
following (a pretty clear reference to the scourging of the moneylenders):</DIV>
<DIV>“Remind them that the Outsider was known to esteem them last among men
already, that according to the Writings he had once (having possessed and
enlightened a fortunate man) beaten them severely in person.”</DIV>
<DIV> </DIV>
<DIV>That doesn’t come from Silk’s enlightenment. It comes straight from
the Chrasmological Writings. It comes, therefore, from Urth’s past.</DIV>
<DIV> </DIV>
<DIV>- Gerry Quinn</DIV>
<DIV> </DIV>
<DIV> </DIV>
<DIV> </DIV>
<DIV> </DIV></DIV></DIV></DIV></BODY></HTML>