Athanasius’s Account of St. Anthony’s Life
Uploaded by mfields on Dec 28, 2004
Throughout Athanasius’s account of St. Anthony’s life, Anthony is besieged by demons sent by the Devil to destroy him. His religious devotion is unwavering and he remains in perfect shape even though he seems to be starved and prays all day. Anyone reading that today would immediately say it’s a romanticized account of someone’s life with some obviously fictional accounts.
One of the main reasons ancient peoples would be more likely to regard the story as truth was a belief in mysticism. Even when the church was much more developed in Europe in the middle ages the masses still believed in spirits and magic. Today our society has embraced logic and science and there is no room for a story like this to make it into the mainstream.
In a society where there is a strong belief in the Devil and a lack of much scientific understanding many bad events will be blamed on the Devil or some other evil force. The stories in which Anthony is attacked by demons sent by the Devil or is confronted by the Devil disguised are only credible to people living in such a society. Today many religious people still believe in the Devil or in some cosmic force of evil they don’t attribute every bad occurrence and decision to the Devil and most don’t believe the Devil comes down and tests people.
The Enlightenment brought the idea of using scientific reasoning to explain problems to the general public. In school we learn what is rational and what is not. Kids sometimes even like to trick each other into thinking things that aren’t true. By finding out the truth kids learn not to be gullible and they use their past knowledge and experiences to evaluate everything they hear and determine whether they think it’s true or not. All of these factors make questioning the story of St. Anthony a no-brainer for a modern audience.
When a movie comes out that’s based on a historical event or someone’s life it’s factualness is immediately questioned in the media. It is assumed that the filmmaker has a certain bias and is trying to market the movie to a specific audience. In the movie A Beautiful Mind the story of mathematician John Nash was watered down to make the story appeal to more moviegoers. If that was the only record of his life historians had to look at they may...