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Love, Eros and Sex Life

Introduction

 

This webpage is written in relation to Rule 3 of the Ten Rules of EthoPlasìn Discipline.  

After this introduction, it includes Part 1, Part 2 and an optional Addendum.

 

Eros trSwansHeartivially means 'erotic' in our modern world, as it has a direct, and quite exclusive, connotation to physical sex life. ThLantaneis was also in part the case in Ancient-Greece, but it did not have at all this exclusive sexual connotation. Eros, or the 'erotic drive', was conceived and felt as a much more general divine Force making people pursue in an 'erotic way' all the beautiful things of life, including eminently the ones not related to the body or to only sex specifically, but pertaining also to the mental sphere of the human being. Ancient Greeks even had a special salutation form used between cultivated people that literally meant: 'Pursue Wisdom Erotically and Flourish' (Έρρωσθε και ευδαιμονείτε!). Wisdom is intended here as the pursuit of the higher archetype values well defined by Plato, and dear to the heart of most Greeks: Beauty in particular but also Goodness, Fairness (Justice) etc. Pursuing them 'erotically' was correctly interpreted as it involved the same kind of pursuit, or drive, with which a lover would pursue his beloved, that is with care, constant attention, joy and Love. This same kind of erotic drive was also applied by the philosophical elite to the pursuit of their 4 deeply cherished cardinal virtues: Temperance, Fortitude, Prudence and Justice. From this point of view, Eros was, for Ancient-Greece, a major creative power, and a joyful force conditioning positively and beautifully, not to say 'erotically', all aspects of their lives. We will be more explicit on this subject at the end of this page.

  Eros also meant 'erotic' however, in its modern sexual connotation, and for an institution like the EthoPlasìn, devoted to holistic education, the subject of Love and Sex is an essential one for ensuring a harmonious formation of its students, soldiers and members. On tLovershe other hand, trying to talk about an ideal of 'Love Life', and an ideal of a related 'Sex Life', with regards to education based on the philosophy of Ancient-Greece, is not an easy task. On the basis of the current erroneous political correctness, it brings up immediately, in the mind of most people, many misconceptions about love in Ancient-Greece that surreptitiously come to disturb the exposition of the subject matter. These misconceptions refer to realities that have been grossly exaggerated or misinterpreted by many superficial historians, or highly distorted by writers with vested interests to defend when writing about sexuality, and homosexuality in particular. Two of these most well-known misconceptions are about "Platonic Love" and "Greek Love". In Part - 1 of this page, we will try to clarify these misconceptions, among others, and hopefully put them out of the way as distorting arguments. In Part - 2 we will then try to give a better idea of what EthoPlasìn 'Love Life' and 'Sex Life' are, or ideally what the 'EthoPlasìn Eros Life' should be, in the context of the holistic formation provided by the Academy to its members on the basis of Rule 3 of its discipline. To achieve our final objective however, in Part 2, we need first to go through a number of preliminary comments and clarifications on the same subjects, in Part 1, in relation to Ancient-Greece in which the EthoPlasìn philosophy and discipline are deeply rooted. 

Pregnancy

From our page on Family Issues, where we make an important distinction between a Wedding, a Marriage and a Parriage, and as an introduction to this page, you should maybe read first, in particular, the important paragraph on the Marriage or Sacred Unions. Keep it in mind while reading the two parts of this page, as a KEY for better understanding the concepts exposed here. Keep also in mind that, according to the philosophy of Ancient-Greece, sex in human beings, contrary to what happens with lower level animals, is not only a function of reproduction, but first and foremost a function of evolution of the soul, in a chain reaction of many levels, towards its objective of eventual final union with the 'Good', the archetypal divine value of the 'Good': if sex in humans is mainly an attraction to Beauty, Beauty in turn is an attraction to Virtue, and Virtue in turn, in its various expressions, is an attraction to 'Good', the metaphysical Good, to which we aspire to be reunited, during all our current life, in a state of 'Erotic Search' (the Έρρωσθε και ευδαιμονείτε! mentioned above) that, at its best, as documented in our page on Platonic Ethics, Aesthetics and Politics, can manifest itself in a state of Mystical Ecstasy.

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Part - 1

Love, Eros and Sex in Ancient-Greece

  1. In Ancient-Greece, the 3 distinctive elements of Love, Eros and Sex were not at all the 'melting pot' that they are today. They were not at the time the 'one-and-the-same-thing' that they tend to be today. They defined three distinct levels of a beautiful hierarchical Philosophy of Pleasure but intended essentially in terms of Joy, in the sense of the 'erotic search', or joyful pursuit of the highest metaphysical values of  the 'Beautiful', the 'True' and the 'Good'. There are many drastic distinctions between the Ancient World and the Modern World regarding these three related subjects. Unfortunately, what stands in between the two worlds, or periods, is religion. At the time of Classical Greece (around ~BC 450) the dominant concept of Love  was certainly the Greek one in most of the civilized world of that historical period. With the development and expansion of the 3 monotheistic religions (Judaic, Christian and Islamic), which happened few centuries after Classical Greece, this dominant Greek concept of Love was gradually completely dismantled, quite intentionally so, by the 3 new religions concerned, in order to make themselves look 'original and better' than the still dominant Greek culture, attract in this way the attention of new adepts and make them pass from the still dominant 'ancient' philosophy to their more 'modern' philosophical and theological dogma. The original Greek concept was thus quickly and heavily distorted or, to say the least, completely transfigured to the point of being unrecognizable today. This transfiguration has not taken place  at all for the good of the modern world, and our society today would take great advantage in returning, to a greater degree, in many respects, to the essence of the original concepts of Love, Eros and Sex as known and lived in the Ancient Greek world. However, the systematic distortion made by the three religions, in particular by the Christian church from the third century AD to the end of the black period of the inquisition, makes it quite difficult for our modern culture to understand the real nature and value of these concepts as they were in the historical classical period that expressed just about the highest level of civilization of all times so far: the Ancient-Greece that invented Philosophy, Democracy, Education, Freedom of mental research, the Meritocratic Olympic Spirit, and overall Civilization at its best from the point of view of the Western World. 

  2. Ancient Greeks were very refined and sophisticated people, much more so than people today, in particular in the field of clear thinking (thus the birth of Philosophy in their country), but also in the field of sentiments, and in the ways to best express and live positively their emotions (thus the special Realm of Eros that they had, as we will see, in between sex and Love). They were capable of distinguishing clearly, for example, between their 'Love Life', their 'Erotic Life' and their 'Sexual Life'. Of course, for them, these 3 realms could very well combine themselves in various ways and, when united, in one person, in exceptional situations, all 3 of them together at the same time, they would constitute the apotheosis of what could be considered human happiness. On the other hand, these three realms could very much be enjoyed separately, that is fully enjoyed separately, each at their own level, each with gratefulness, and each for their own full value, that is each for their own kind of beautiful and divine joy and pleasure. These 3 realms however existed in Ancient-Greece in a hierarchical way. The most basic level was Sex, at the animal level. The second level was Eros, at the emotional human level. The third level, and most noble one, was Love, at the 'spiritual' (mental) level of the human being. All this was based on their beautiful concept of the human Tetractys. The important point to understand however is that, in that hierarchy, Eros was the 'in-between' level that was used, or seen, as the element of equilibrium between the two other levels. For them, sex at the first level was not tied directly to the third level of Love. Sex was first and foremost tied essentially to the second level, Eros, and through that middle element of equilibrium, was then tied to Love. There was no direct linking, or bypass, from the first to the third levels. Unfortunately this is what is happening today and why we are in the ugly 'melting pot' mentioned above. This is precisely why in the Greek language (both Ancient and modern Greek), an expression like "making love", meaning 'having sex', just does not exist. It is even untranslatable literally still in the modern Greek language. This is quite exceptional, if not unique, as that expression does exist in English, but also in Spanish, Italian, French and most other modern languages. But these other languages were precisely developed much after the Greek language (that has had a continuous superiority over all other languages for at least some 5000 years), after Classical Greece, that is developed mainly under the major influence of the parallel development of the 3 main monotheistic religions that have systematically destroyed or diminished the vital role of the middle level of the Greek Eros between sex and love. In Greek, the only possible translation of 'making love' is clearly related to the middle level: "making erotic play" ('Erotas'). This is clearly referring, at most, to the second level of Eros.LoveMermaid There is no such expression as "making love". For "Love", and for 'love' meaning 'having sex', they have entirely different words with completely different roots and semantic meanings: "Aghapi" and "Erotas". This is not just semantic however but rather the reflection of a major difference of philosophical perception that is essential to understand their culture and thus what follows.

  3. The 3 monotheistic religions have tried to tie sex directly to love, in a completely forced way, certainly unnatural for ancient Greek philosophy, eliminating the natural middle level, or the second realm, that is the realm of Eros. In Ancient-Greece, Eros was a God, and sex was considered essentially of positive, even divine, nature and to be enjoyed freely, joyfully, hopefully virtuously, and always gratefully. The three religions got afraid of this freedom of joyful expression of sex as it was reflecting just too well, and too dangerously from their point of view, the other type of freedom of the Ancient Greeks, the one that made them express freely their philosophical, political and democratic ideas in front of anyone, including their authorities. This trait of freedom, which still characterizes modern Greeks today, and the consequent difficulty in controlling them, or in dominating them, from a political or religious point of view, would certainly have impeded, at that time, the aspirations of the three new churches to become dominant 'religions', and thus dominant world 'powers'. In their quest to harness that Greek trait of freedom, the 3 monotheistic religions started tarnishing sex with a rather negative devilish nature, turning it into a major cause of 'mortal sin' in most circumstances, and something to be experienced with unnatural restraint and fear of punishment, let alone fear of hell, that for the Greeks did not even exist as intended today. The churches brought the fear element and the guilt element into the picture, in order to best favor their growing aspirations for domination and power worldwide. These 3 churches quickly restricted sex much too closely to its reproductive function, pretty much like it is the case with animals, mainly through the blacking-out of the intermediate level of Eros, and tying sex directly to a 'legitimate reproductive' function. The 3 churches could not easily prevent people to freely aspire to Love, but could certainly make the road bumpy by putting  fear and guilt on the way, and playing these cards to the advantage of their aspirations of world domination and power. These elements of guilt and fear would also put good grips on the general spirit of freedom of the Greek culture that had dominated so far at the time. One cannot control easily, or dominate politically or religiously, people with a philosophy of freedom like the one prevailing in Ancient-Greece. It was through the use of that fear element, exploited to their best advantage, that the three growing churches would  quickly become predominant new world 'powers'. And so they used it! To the contrary, Ancient-Greece, when tying sex to love, always tied sex more closely to the 'Spiritual Love' in its philosophical sense, and only through the mediation of its natural and essential middle level, the realm of Eros who was the 'God' animating and embellishing joyfully, not to say freely and erotically, the whole life of human beings caught in the difficulties of their daily routine, in pursuing their most important objectives, and in searching for happiness. In reuniting the higher and lower levels, as the factor of equilibrium in the middle, Eros was also a very powerful force embellishing all aspects of life, and not only sex. We will see this more clearly in the next section talking about the 'Love' attribute of the CoPHLE energy. Eros was a global power of attraction, not only between persons from a sexual point of view, but between individuals and their pursuit of all beautiful cardinal virtues, let alone Love and an eventual reunification to the spiritual Good. Eros was a force that pursued Kallos Beauty in all its forms, not at all only in the form of the beauty of the human body like it is so wrongly 'intended' today, but mainly in the form of the holistic Beauty of a harmonious combination of body/soul Beauty. 

  4. In reaction to what religions did, their followers, especially in the last generations, tried to react and to gradually detach their 'making love' from its primitive sexual reproductive function, but did it erratically and chaotically, just for its plain physical pleasure, without any new leading philosophy, while still being persecuted by fear and guilt for experiencing sex for non-reproductive purposes, and attempting detachment while being unconscious of the Eros middle level. With this erratic reaction, sex did become less of a reproductive function all right but nevertheless still basically a kind of animal, or even bestial, attribute to be experienced as such, without the interference of any higher levels of the human psyche like Eros and Aghapi ('spiritual' Love). This is the 'melting pot' referred to above, and the hellish stress and mess people are in today, from a sexual point of view. The three religions are gradually loosing their grips on people and things are slowly changing, but they are changing without the compass of a new leading philosophy. Ancient-Greece might be again the light post we need, for the right direction and philosophy, in reevaluating these vital concepts for modern education purposes.

  5. Because of their clear distinction between the 3 realms of Love, Eros and Sex, falling in love for example, for Ancient Greeks, could very well happen completely independently from sex. This is nearly inconceivable for a modern person. For this reason, a man could very much fall in love with another man, and a woman fall in love with another woman, independently of sex, and still be perfectly 'normal' heterosexual individuals, even if sex, or some erotic play, were to accidentally take place occasionally in their relationship. In such cases of same-sex persons in love, when actual forms of active sex came accidentally into the picture, it was usually as a kind of 'minor road incident' that normally never involved full sexual intercourse and, most of the time, was probably only the source of a good laugh, of a passing additional moment of passion and pleasure to be grateful for to the Greek God of Eros. Such incidents rarely happened and certainly did not change at all the conception the partners had of themselves as normal heterosexual persons. 

  6. This kind of falling in love between persons of the same sex, or rather independently of their sex, is fundamentally a natural trait of most human beings even if our current modern culture does not recognize it. Consequently, it still happens sometimes spontaneously and involuntarily today, but because of the influence of the culture brought in by the 3 dominant religions, it is most of the time immediately discarded when it has to do with same-sex persons, discarded as only a passing foolish thought, and readily rejected, as an inadmissible fact or a sin on a religious basis. On the other hand, when it actually happens today, the few ones who will have the courage to admit it, accept it, let alone go for it, will most of the time make the mistake of thinking they have to use active sex to better live that reality. This is the modern 'mortal embrace' of the 'melting pot' referred to above between love and sex without the mediating middle level of Eros. Ancient Greeks would not react this way. Rather the opposite. They would live their same-sex love openly and proudly, most of the time not even thinking about any active sexual dimension being attached to it, and, again, if one came up accidentally, they would go through it with pleasure and gratitude for a good passing and unusual moment of pleasure brought in to their routine lives. They would certainly not be afraid to show affection, even with mild erotic forms of touching or vague erotic playing occasionally, probably laughing a lot when doing it, but in most cases without any real sex intercourse. This playing, in any case, would not disturb in any way their good and perfectly normal relations with the opposite sex, and probably even increased their erotic desire of the opposite sex for full sexual intercourse purposes at the next good occasion.         

  7. Another essential trait to understand what was going on in Ancient-Greece is their unique Love for Beauty, real Beauty as Kallos, as expressed in their beautiful sculptured statues. We hinted at it earlier as it is closely related to the force of Eros animating all aspects of their daily lives, the realm that the 3 monotheist religions dismantled practically completely. Ancient Greeks were fascinated and deeply drawn in by the pure higher philosophical concept of Beauty in particular, but also all the higher metaphysical concepts of Neatness, Truth, Good, Just etc. Most people today are not even aware of their existence. For Ancient Greeks these higher values were a constant preoccupation or rather a cause of continuous fascination. This is precisely why they were the inventors of Philosophy. Greeks conceived their lives as a path, and a constant exercise, to return to a state of reunification with these higher values, in particular the Good they originally came from. Of course, the easiest and most accessible of these higher values, at least for common people, was Beauty, or Kallos which is the holistic Beauty of a harmonious combination of body/soul Beauty. By the same token, loving the beauty of a beautiful body was the symbol of loving the higher concept of Beauty and a hint of the infinite harmonious beauty of all the other higher values to be pursued, all life long, through an appropriate science of being or philosophy of live. 

  8. ZeusLaurelCrownThis second trait of their unique Love for holistic Beauty (and for all the other higher archetypal values of Good, True, Just etc., as expressed by Plato) inevitably made Ancient Greeks the Inventors of Philosophy to start with. Their Love for Merit and Excellence also made them the Inventors of the Olympic Games. Their particular trait of Love for Freedom mentioned previously, made them also the Inventors of Democracy, albeit intended at the time mostly as a Meritocracy, which is no more the case of the meaning of the word democracy today. These three traits were in fact horse backing another even more fundamental trait: their Love for Virtue, which also made them the Inventors of Education ('Paideia', as the holistic education intended as the inculcation of love for good behavior and the virtues we talked about in our page on Science of Being and Platonic Ethics, Aesthetics and Politics). Before Ancient-Greece, real holistic Education in terms of a formation of the 4 levels of the Pythagorean Tetractys of the soul of the young human being did not exist anywhere in the world. These traits combined reflect a uniquely beautiful moment in the history of humanity, with the kind of civic impulse that probably deserves them also the title of Inventors of Civilization. (The crown of laurels on Zeus's head symbolizes this unique period of excellence)  - The cumulative effects of these traits are fundamental for understanding what was going on at the time, in particular with regards to their love for beauty, and their love and sex life in general.  That sex live could include an occasional variety of same sex Platonic Love with or without sex. What should we call this variety that does not appear to be homosexuality nor regular heterosexuality -

    Shall We Call It Mainly KalloSexuality?

  9. It is worth repeating that Kallos basically means beauty, but in fact it is rather a holistic type of beauty that is a harmonious combination of both body and soul, not just body beauty affecting equally people of same or opposite sex. As for the Love of ancient Greeks for this kind of holistic Beauty and the related sex life, we are talking about something special, something that does not seem to exist today anymore, But what type of person are we talking about in terms of sexuality? The usual modern qualifiers, like heterosexual, homosexual or bisexual, do not seem to apply in the best of these cases. In these cases, involving two men most of the time, we seem to be talking about a type of sexuality that deserves a new name representing a beautiful ancient sexual reality that is rarely present in our modern world because it was nearly entirely lost through centuries of Judeo-Christian indoctrination, fear and dogma. To start with, their additional unique form of sexuality based on holistic beauty, hardly inexistent today, was always accompanied by a normal heterosexuality. It was delimited by the 4 following parameters.

    WELL-KNOWN PARAMETERS OF PLATONIC LOVE
    When some limited sex activity took place between two men in platonic love, practically all experts will agree that it would take place within the limits of the following 4 parameters.
    > First, it spontaneously and naturally excluded pedophilia as it usually took place only between fully blossomed youths, thus between young adults, or maybe between one younger adult and one fully mature adult.
    > Second, in the same way, it always exclude violence as it was based on love rather than exclusively on pure physical sexual plerasure, or rather based on a mutual fascination for an unusual degree of harmonious beauty combining both body and soul. 
    > Third, it always excluded anal sex, be it with a man or a woman, as male sperm was considered a divine substance that cannot be mixed with excrements or treated as dirty garbage without committing a kind of profanation or sacrilege. For the same reason, with sperm being considered a divine nutrient, oral sex was never excluded and took place in many cases. 
    > Four, it would not disturb in any way the continued existence or the creation of an accompanying normal heterosexual parallel activity of the men concerned with a woman or a regular married spouse.

    In other words, we are talking about something special and beautiful, between two adult men that, in light of parameter 4 in particular, is not at all homosexuality as we intend it today, and that should be given a proper new name.

  10. In addition, ancient Greeks were also erotically attracted by all forms of natural pure beauty in their best representation of pure neatness and divine gracefulness. As seen in another page, on the basis of the Platonic Ethics and Aesthetics, they even had a scale of 5 levels of Beauty in their philosophy, that started with, and included, in particular for the common people, the most immediate and accessible form of beauty in their daily lives: the beauty of the human body but, in the case of our candidate in search of a proper name, ideally with a harmonious combination of soul beauty. For them this unique love for Kallos Beauty, as a combination of body-soul beauty, was not an occasional and passing pleasure, but a 'preoccupation', in terms of their constant search for achieving beauty and 'possessing' beauty. Very few modern people probably feel relatively the same today but, because of their current cultural or religious backgrounds, these few exceptions will not say so, nor certainly show it openly, in particular between two men. Ancient Greeks did. This is why they created so many beautiful works of art, in particular in their sculpture and architecture. This is why a man could also love another man without shame. In such cases, the so-called "Greek Love", or rather Platonic Love, when well understood, in its most essential sense, was just an expression of that love for a harmonious combination of body-soul beauty, except for the fact that these names do not seem right, in particular in the modern interpretation of these names. For a greater number of persons of Ancient Greece than today, their whole life was in terms of love for beauty, love of pure neatness, love for harmonious proportions. When perceived between same-sex persons, it had no automatic meaning of any "homosexual" attraction like most people interpret it so simplistically and wrongly today. For them, this was the kind of attraction that would probably be best qualified today, for lack of a better comparison, as a  strong desire to possess and enjoy beautiful works of art, like it is still the case nowadays with spiritually sophisticated art collectors. There were probably only more 'art collectors' in those days or certainly more free-minded 'art collectors'. Because of their 'superior' more natural culture, there were also probably more people than today capable of responding freely and openly with a kind of positive 'Stendhal Syndrome', or 'Florence Syndrome' in front of pure Kallos Beauty. From this point of view for example, the admiration, or even the love, of a man for the body-soul beauty of another man had absolutely no necessary or automatic connotation of homosexuality. It was just what it was: Love of Beauty, as a symbol, or a means of approach to the Love of the absolute archetype of Good. It is unfortunate that because of strong religious or social prejudices of our contemporary environment, many will misinterpret this natural attribute of a normal human being, and be even sometimes led to homosexuality because of this mistake, thinking wrongly that they 'are' homosexuals because of this trait and thus attempting to behave accordingly. In the culture of Ancient-Greece, this kind of mistake would not likely have happen as this kind of natural attraction would have been taken for exactly what it is, love of Beauty, and thus as something to be enjoyed freely and openly, let alone be grateful for. This is the real meaning and dimension of the so-called "Greek Love", or rather Platonic Love, the meaning of which was completely distorted by most modern writers, or immensely exaggerated and misinterpreted in its occasional active sex component. This distortion forces us to give it a better name. Some literature might have given it a better name, but we are not aware of it. Consequently, we are forced to attempt ourselves to give it a better name, and we could find no better name than Kallosexuality on the basis of its exact characteristics.

  11. The basic meaning of Kallos is Beauty but, again, a special form of holistic beauty involving a harmonious combination of body beauty and soul beauty. It is not usually sufficient to have a beautiful body to generate that best form of Platonic Love based on Beauty. The combined beauty of body and soul is required. This means that it can be generated only by a person with not only a beautiful body, but also a well evolved soul that bases it current terrestrial existence on a philosophical way of living that is in the pursuit of the Good in all aspects of its life through the mastering of a set of cardinal virtues applying to the 4 various levels of its Pythagorean soul Tetractys. As such, Kallosexuality will nearly always take place only between two young adults usually in their full blossoming years. On the basis of Pythagorean theory of life septennials, this is usually the case of women in their 3rd or 4th septennials (age15 to 28) and of men a septennial later, in their 4th and 5th septennials (age 22 to 35), Inside these ranges, Kallosexuality can easily take place. Above these ranges, kallosexuality is not usually possible except in a pure form of Platonic Love that excludes automatically any form of sexual activity. Within these ranges, any other form of sex is however possible, including oral sex, albeit normally in a limited manner in terms of quantity as the sexual activity it not based only on physical beauty but rather mainly on harmonious combination of body and soul beauty.   

  12. In other words, 'Greek Love', better defined as kallosexuality in its best cases, often included same-sex persons, mostly between two men, but it was in fact a phenomenon involving little active sex and was mostly related to the dominant cult of Beauty typical of the more soul-educated class (more often found in the aristocratic or 'richer' class) who, pretty much like today, was the only one who could better appreciate "Beauty", Kallos Beauty, from a cultural (philosophical) point of view, and could more easily afford 'owning' the most beautiful 'works of art' as sophisticated 'art collectors'. Greek Love, like the collection of precious works of art today, was, quite naturally, much less of a trait of the lowest uneducated classes of their society. In turn, in the upper class, who was able to afford it, and also had the necessary culture to do so, it was mainly consisting in a desire to possess and cherish Beauty, Divine Beauty and Neatness as a harmonious combination of body-soul beauty. If sex came into the picture, it was usually again only incidentally, certainly not routinely in most cases, practically never involving full intercourse, and practically never any form of particularly untidy sex, like anal sodomy (homosexual or heterosexual). In fact, in most of the famous such relationships, any recurring form of active routine sex practically ever took place. Socrates and Plato, who both refused explicitly even occasional sexual involvement in their love for handsome young adult men, are the best and most famous examples of this, as documented in our page on Platonic Ethics, Aesthetics and Politics. Such involvement would have precisely defeated their fundamental trait of free expression of love for pure divine body-soul Beauty and Neatness. The cultivated or richer aristocrat was the 'art collector'. The young adult man was typically the 'work of art' to be admired, cherished and protected openly, without most of the time any sex taking place between the two. That young adult man was not ever a child but precisely a young adult man in his full blossoming years, usually between 18 and 28 years of age. The same thing was no-doubt happening also with young women, the Venuses, but in a more discrete way that was typical of the society of those days where men were dominating the public life. In such situations of men-to-men love, the beautiful youth, called the "Eromenos" (beloved), was very much conscious of his beauty and the attraction he provoked in many people, with or without a sexual dimension but, in any case, he would rarely concede to open and active sex approaches. In turn, the 'art collector', called "Erastis" (lover) could admire, cherish and protect freely his beautiful 'work of art', without shame, openly, even in front of his spouse, family and friends, with pride and satisfaction for having been able to help its best blossoming, and expose its beauty proudly to all who wanted to see it and enjoy it. He would also ensure he helped the full maturity success of his protected youth, including in his formation of a new family and in his normal heterosexual active sex life with women and, eventually, with his own wife. The children of the protected youth would eventually become like additional 'adopted' grand-children of the benevolent protector. The rare active sex between the two certainly did not disturb the basic heterosexual orientation, and related current sex life, of neither the Erastis 'art collector' nor the Eromenos 'work of art'. Again, in the few cases that it did involve active sex, it was most of the time in mild forms of pleasant erotic play, practically never leading to full intercourse, as that would have tarnished the concepts of Neatness and Beauty that were so dear to the hearts of Ancient Greeks, and would have sort of destroyed the beautiful work of art of the art collector. For Ancient Greeks, if a youth was 'that beautiful' , in body and soul, he or she deserved assistance for full realization and success. Protecting such youths was an honor, a pleasure and a form of collaboration in order to bring to full blossoming the beauty that God had provided the exceptional youth in the first place. Was it something in that sense that a great 'soul master' named Jesus meant when he said: "It will be given to those who have and taken away from those who don't' have"?  Overall this phenomenon of enjoying and protecting body-soul Beauty was also very similar to what we do today for exceptional talent in sports, giving practically unlimited attention and assistance to the best performers, albeit most of the time unfortunately mainly, if not only, in the form of exaggerated monetary retributions. In Ancient-Greece, this kind of phenomenon was more related to pure harmonious body-soul Beauty but also, to a lesser degree, to other kinds of youths with unusual talents, including the champions in sport performance for the Olympic games.

  13. In a nutshell, the above is is called Platonic Love and, in its best cases, it was what we can legitimately call kallosexuality. Because it is so much centered on the philosophical archetype concept of harmonious body-soul holistic Beauty, it is appropriate to coin a new word and call the related form of mild sexual appeal as kallosexuality. It is certainly not a form of homosexuality as we intend it today. It does not either correspond to a common situation of heterosexuality. It is rather something in between, or a trait that can apply to both homosexuals and heterosexuals. "Kallos" means Beauty in its purest sense, as explained in our page on Kallos Beauty. This form of Platonic Love, and/or Kallosexuality, is basically a beautiful form of love expression, centered on a harmonious combination of body-soul Beauty that would probably help many modern people, youths in particular, if it still existed and could still be expressed freely today, as it was in Ancient Greece. This basic kind of Platonic Love existed a lot for example between teachers and their best students. A special version often existed between soldiers preparing to go to fight, helping each other in washing themselves and grooming beautifully their hair as mutual hairdressers before a potentially deadly battle, like it happened at the battle of Marathon, in -490BC. If they were to die, they had to die like they liked to live, that is neatly, and proud of each other, loving each other, with as much beauty as possible immersing their daily lives, let alone their passing to the after-life. Platonic Love was however mostly in terms of a relationship between an educated aristocrat and the son of a friend of that aristocrat, from the same or from a poorer class, who was particularly handsome, usually both in body and soul, let alone mentally, not to say spiritually, and thus needed extra help to expose the beauty the gods had given him to the eyes of as many people as possible, and consequently help to assist the full realization of his divinely deserved success. The above was not only what we call Platonic Love, but also what we can call "Greek Love" in its right interpretation, with a perfectly legitimately related Kallosexuality, in as much as we understand its true nature, as described earlier, and exclude the heavy homosexual connotation that is usually and wrongly attached to this qualification today. From this point of view, Greek Love well interpreted, and Platonic Love, are pretty much the same, and their related form of Kallosexuality is of a divine and creative nature to be wished to all, and enjoyed gratefully by those granted with its grace. This is typically the kind of love that existed between Alexander the Great and his junior official Hepaestion, not to mention the roman emperor Hadrian and Antinous, as a kind of creative force that they used for the spreading of the best civic and meritocratic values of their philosophy, and of a more human type of Civilization to the rest of the less evolved souls of the barbarian or undemocratic world. The often alleged 'homosexual' relation of Hadrian with Antinous is probably the most famous mistake made by ignorant historians influenced by today's simplistic and erroneous interpretation of the above normal marvel of the most elevated part of the human psyche. Antinous was so beautiful in body and soul that he was something above human, similar to God. Such Kallos Beauty can only be loved. Nobody, not even Hadrian, could think of exploiting it through a regular active sexual relation: one just cannot think of having sex with God. Thinking of having sex with God is plainly inconceivable and impossible to any normal person. God, or the best image of his representations on Earth, through a youth like Antinous, can only be loved (or maybe hated) but not involved in a common human homosexual relationship. Those talking about a homosexual relationship between Hadrian and Antinous are just ignorant of Ancient-Philosophy and of the high concepts of Platonic Love and Kallos Beauty, and infer wrongly a type of active sex relationship that is based on no specific historical evidence of relevance. Platonic Love as kallosexuality is immensely beautiful, perfectly normal, highly desirable for the elevation of the soul, and has absolutely nothing to do with common modern homosexual debauchery involving anal sex. This does not mean it may not include a kind of excitement that is very similar to a sexual arousal, but from a more spiritual level, related more to the soul than to the body, something we called kallosexuality for lack of a better word. From this point of view, Antinous, because of his godly beauty, was probably condemned to a life with no or very little sex, or possibly having rare sex with only another exceptional person at his divine level of body-soul beauty, man or woman. This is why Hadrian, who was very found of the culture of the philosophy of Ancient-Greece, and imbued into it, made Antinous a kind of God to be worshiped purely for his infinite and divine Kallos Beauty. If he fully succeeded, and if we can still admire it today with immense pleasure, in his Villa Adriana near Rome, and in many world museums, it is because it was that kind of pure Kallos Beauty relationship. Otherwise it would have long been forgottLovePlatonicen.

  14. In other words, Platonic Love, and in particular "Greek Love", as described above, are not at all any form of homosexuality, certainly not what we call homosexuality today. This is why we have coined the word kallosexuality to describe its related form of mild sexuality or erotic arousal. This does not mean however that homosexuality in its modern form did not also exist in Ancient-Greece. It certainly did! However, even in this case, it existed so differently than today, and in so many nuances, mainly because of the intervening realm of Eros, that one can definitely say that homosexuality in its modern version existed much less in those days than it exists today. The difference is one of both essence and cultural perspective. In Ancient-Greece, when real homosexuality happened, it was mostly smiled at, usually in a no derogatory way on the part of most people, and readily accepted as a special way to be for a minority of people. It was not however accepted within the best philosophical schools. In our modern world it is still, most of the time, even if more and more accepted, a reason for heavy gossip, let alone small scandals or occasional derision. In Ancient-Greece, you could be freely a homosexual without much derision on the part of common people, readily accepted as you were. After all, real homosexuality was mostly an 'overdoing' of what most Greek men or women could to easily, in enjoying openly the beauty of another man or woman independently of their sex. The most beautiful young men would also often play the card of their beauty openly in their social contacts, in order to help their full success in life, thanking the gods for the useful asset, gift, and attribute they had been granted. The few that do the same today, mainly women, usually readily pass on to active sex to achieve their objectives. In Ancient-Greece very few conceded themselves to active sex and it is a well recognized historical fact that those who did, did not do it routinely at all. Again, the gift of their beauty was most of the time sufficient in itself to attract the attention and help of the Erastis protectors needed for their full success. Offering their beauty to be admired was so gracefully and gratefully received, and cherished by the 'art collectors', that it did not require most of the time the provision of any additional return payment in the form of active sex involvement. When it did, it was usually again 'a minor road incident' and conceded with freewill in a rare moment of additional passing passion or extreme joy to be remembered with pleasure and gratefulness.  

  15. Sex by itself, without Love involvement, in Ancient-Greece, was also more simply looked at, and accepted, as just a pleasant way to break a boring daily routine and sanely enjoy oneself. Ancient Greeks felt that, contrary to animals, Gods had given sex to human beings to be enjoyed with the reproductive function, but also independently of, the reproductive function. In those days, with the absence of contraceptive means available today, to enjoy sex serenely, that is 'without consequences', or any back thought of responsibility restricting its pleasure, like without the risk of pregnancy, was only possible easily between same-sex persons and in fact, although it was not the predominant way, it often happened between both women together and men together. It happened more between men, but only because men used to marry, and form a family, and have children, much later in age than women. Most ancient Greeks certainly did not suffer from anhedonia and, with their mentality for example, a boy or young man waking-up at night with a persistent erection would easily and lovingly take care of himself, manually, without fear of committing any kind of sin, and get back to sleep profoundly and happily for the rest of the night. Being caught in action by a mother or a father would probably only provoke a smile on their part, and be no cause for shame or punishment. This was acceptable as a good palliative, in waiting for a chance for a better expression of sexuality in the form of complete heterosexual intercourse. Even for the same boy to resolve his situation joyfully with the collaboration of a friend of his same age would not have been seen much differently. With the 'help' of a friend of the same age, it could probably be done quite freely, if not even quite openly. With the help of an adult man, it could also be done but at certain conditions, like being an exceptional incident as opposed to a routine one, and based on a well established relationship of mutual admiration, respect and profit, let alone the loving guidance of the older partner towards a better and fuller expression of sexuality on the part of the younger partner. The main difference with today is that, within these parameters, none of this would have been marked as homosexuality; real homosexuality and prostitution also existed at the time, in a small proportion of the population, pretty much like today. Most Greek men used to marry quite late, in their early thirties (usually with much younger women) but sex was eminently and openly part of their daily lives all along before marriage. Men also had to live often together, without woHeartInHandsmen, because of regular periods of many months in their frequent and long-last marching military campaigns (afoot, without fast transportation means). Men were also seen most easily in the nude in many places, be it a military tent, a public bath or the gyms, in particular in Sparta. In such circumstances, even if mostly only for the lack of a better alternative, they often enjoyed freely and gratefully various forms of occasional same-sex activity when an appropriate occasion came up. As shown also by the abundance of their beautiful statues, nudity was always very much appreciated when reflecting their highly-considered philosophical concept of Kallos Beauty and the related 'Kallosexuality', and nudity was thus regularly practiced in many public sport competitions and in their private gyms. In fact "gym" comes from the Greek word 'gymnos' which means "naked". Handsome boys or young men were also often seen serving food and wine naked at their 'Symposiums' (dinner-discussion-party-receptions) and their beauty was enjoyed serenely through the open comments of the invited guests, men or women, doing so quite respectfully and without any active erotic reaction most of the time. In turn, beautiful Courtesans (women providing easy heterosexual intercourse) and charming Flute Girls were also most common at these same symposiums, the latter often playing 'flute' both 'musically', for all guests, and sometimes 'physically', for some of them discretely in the background. Sacred mistresses were also present and quite active in or around most of their 'religious' temples. In other words, sex was simple, easy and enjoyed with gratitude to the Gods who created it, just like enjoying a good meal with good company. In fact, with their glorious civilization, capable of rendering anything more human than in any other society, those before or after them, including their political leaders and their wars of conquest, not to mention their own Gods, enjoying sex with company, any company, of any gender, albeit always chosen lovingly in a moment of total freewill, was certainly seen as much better than sex alone and in the shame of hiding. With this mentality, sex in company was probably not only a way to augment the quantity and the quality of their pleasure, but probably also seen as a good way to attempt to build lasting friendship between the partners involved, and to reinforce their mutual pursuit of their high archetype values, of Kallos Beauty in particular. All this is difficult to understand today after 2000 years of systematic destruction of this beautiful philosophy of sex life on the part of the institutions of the three main monotheistic religions. 

  16. In spite of the above, it should be stated clearly that for most Ancient Greeks, their sex ideal was certainly overall mostly to go for full heterosexual intercourse whenever possible. However, in lack of such opportunity other forms were quite acceptable occasionally. Even at times when their best form of full heterosexual intercourse was readily available, an 'incidental detour' to another form could also be considered a pleasant occasional diversion, probably reinforcing their desire to quickly return to their best alternative. Kallosexuality itself was certainly always welcome and useful. Certainly no 'big deal', no scandal! In particular, no guilt, no shame, no sin, and no bad stigma of homosexuality! Certainly no fear to go to a non-existent hell for any 'sin' committed. All this was part of growing and living sanely and happily and, in particular, 'normally'. And precisely because of this freedom of sexual expression, without any integrated guilt or shame, all these free forms of sexuality in young age would usually evolve more smoothly and more quickly to the 'best' alternative, that is to the mastering of full heterosexual intercourse at a younger age than today, during or after adolescence, leading to more durable  marriages and more stable families than today.

  17. The above being said, and well considered, one should not make the mistake of thinking Ancient-Greece was devoted to, or somehow favoring, homosexuality, like many superficial historians and writers want us to believe. This is not true at all. The reality is rather the opposite. In fact, overall in their society, as agreed by most serious historians and researchers, there was definitely no more real homosexuality in Ancient-Greece than there is in our society today, and most probably even much less. Ancient-Greece was essentially overall, in absolute great majority, a happy heterosexual society, probably even more so than today. Although it is true that certain forms of homosexual sex were readily accepted and practiced in Ancient-Greece life, more easily so than today, it is equally true that, because of the concurrent existence of Platonic Love, and the realm of Eros in their philosophy of life, let alone the role of what we have coined 'Kallosexuality', there was less real hard-core homosexuality in Ancient-Greece than there is today in our modern world; the corollary statement is also true: it is precisely because this gentle trait of Platonic Love, or 'Kallosexuality', has been lost in the course of the last centuries, mainly because of religion, that we find ourselves with more real hard-core homosexuality today than we would otherwise have in our modern society if that equilibrium factor and safety valve still existed, let alone the whole realm of Eros. Certain forms of Platonic Love, or 'Kallosexuality', even with mild erotic play, to show affection, is still allowed in part, and more easily, between two women today, even between two men of certain cultures like typically the Indian one, where you can still see today two young men, even not so young, hold each other by the hand affectionately while having a walk on a city street without any homosexual connotation whatsoever. If showing affection were allowed more easily today between men of our western world, like it was eminently so between two men of Ancient-Greece, much less hard-core male homosexuality would most probably also exist today. Platonic Love in the form of kallosexuality is a beautiful equilibrium factor and safety valve. It is fundamentally a natural trait of human nature that in Ancient-Greece was expressing itself openly through the realm of Eros and that, in our modern world, was completely frustrated by the faulty intervention of religions spreading fear and guilt, let alone fright of sin and a non-existing hell after death. Even from this point of view Ancient-Greece can still teach us a good lesson today.

    Or Could We Call Some of It DesmoSexuality?

  18. But what about another name for another type of relation of platonic love between two young adult men? What should it be called? And is it normal? What about calling such special divine love as a “Pythagorean Desmos”? The situation was the following. To be admitted to the highest level of education, the 4th level, at the Omakoion [Ομακοειον] school of Pythagoras, one had to come in with a “Desmos”. This is what some historians and authors have called the “Pythagorean Desmos” [Πυθαγόρειος Δεσμος ]. Many books about Pythagoras talk about this, but only briefly, probably only because of modern political correctness. This means you had to come in at that highest and final level of Pythagorean formation with a beloved companion. The two companions were in a stat of platonic love, and consequently would offer mutual help in their last 2 years of Tetractys training, and hopefully for the rest of their life. There is no clear indication that any sex activity happened in the relationship, and in most cases it most probably did not happen. However, the logical implication is that occasional sexual activity could not be excluded between the two, be it only as route incidents during moments of particular joy. If so, most certainly it happened well in the limits of the four parameters of Platonic Love mentioned above. Could not this form of limited sexual activity be called desmosexuality?

    > We have seen that two young adult men caught in limited sex activity because of platonic love and a strong mutual attraction due to a harmonious combination of body-soul beauty were not homosexuals in the way we intend it today. As such, they could be called kallosexuals.
    > In the same way, two young adult men caught in a similar situation of platonic love, due this time to a desmos (commitment to help and care for each other for life in the best possible way) could possibly be called desmosexuals.

    Calling the men concerned with these two new acronyms (Kallosexual and Desmosexual) is much more appropriate than calling them homosexuals, as this last generic name, homosexual, has a lot of conflictive connotations that do not apply to these two categories on the basis of what they really are, that is on the basis of the above parameters, number four in particular. 

    What about TransitOsexuality?

  19. There is definitely a transition between a boy and a man from a sexual point of view. This transition is much more marked and much longer than between a girl and a woman. A boy becoming an adolescent in his 3rd septennial of life (age 15 to 21), is clearly in a transition between self-sexuality discovery and heterosexuality. He first discovers himself with his strange, constant and pleasant erections often leading to his first orgasms. He then gets curious of finding out if his companions are in a similar situation. When he first discovers this is the case, he cannot avoid to start laughing and joking about it, and possibly exploring it occasionally along with his best intimate companions. At that early point, he still does not know the real purpose of his erections and their eventual use for procreation purposes with a woman. Only when he will have discovered it, will he start to gradually getting interested in girls and women. In the meantime, he acts pleasantly and naturally on his own and/or with some of his companions who are in the exact same situation. This is when he can most easily be seriously sexually attracted to some of them, through kallosexuality, when in presence of the most handsome and most well sexually-mounted of his companions. With few of them he will most likely eventually be brought into a situation of desmosexuality, swearing help and mutual love for the rest of their lives. With both his best kallosexual and desmosexual companions, he is inevitably most likely to soon get into forms of what could be considered homosexuality by some persons ignorant of male human nature, be it only for fun-playing, and most likely with limited forms of sex. All of this is normal for a young man and legitimately most enjoyable. It will not normally lead to homosexuality as, in the meantime, his heterosexuality with regards to women is waking up and being developed, making him discover a much better form of sexuality, the best one, invented by nature or our God creator. During that period, this young man is normally in transition between being a boy and being a man. He is consequently in a state of what we can legitimately call TransitOsexuality. That transition is likely in the end to lead to situations of Platonic Love, at a later age, involving love of another man, with or without active sexual activity, and not disturbing at all, in most cases, the beautiful heterosexuality that he has developed fully along his transitional path to manhood. In the meantime, on his way there, the beautiful young man is a transitosexual, a normal transitosexual, insisting on "normal". Calling him this way should be done and taken as a nice compliment, indicating a beautiful normal development to be enjoyed with gratitude by the young man himself and by all those who are part of his happy life, while thanking God Apollo every day for this beautiful and joyful evolving normality. 

    What about PhilotimoSexuality?

  20. This subject means love of honorability in sexuality. We have seen the concept of "Philotimo" in the Greek ELL culture. Why should the Greeks not have also invented some new approach to sexuality when they have been so inventive in all sectors of human life to the point of being considered those who gave us civilization, through their "Philotimo", some 2500 years ago, when at that time the western world was still a primitive and barbarian environment.
     
    We will explore this aspect in more details in another subsequent webpage.      

     Concluding

  21. The main point to keep in mind regarding Ancient-Greece and their sexuality is their strong ideal of self-control and balance that they tried to achieve in all aspects of their lives, in order to achieve Kallos beauty, interior and exterior, in soul and body, and then wisdom at the top level of their Tetractys. Contrary to our contemporary society today, this trait was very widely spread as a strongly diffused desire of most of the population at various degrees. As seen in our page on the Pythagorean Man Emulation, this cultural trait dates back to Pythagoras who lived in the 7th century BC. All natural pleasures, including sex, were not considered diabolic but rather divine in nature and thus considered "good" if and when kept under good control and perfect balance, without abuse or misuse. Sex was eminently divine because of its co-creative or procreative attribute, which is part of our Mission of Co-Creation, through its reproductive function. All this was related to the Pythagorean philosophy of the harmonious development of the Human Tetractys where all 4 levels of the human being had to be developed in perfect balance, as the only way to reach philosophical wisdom. The first three levels of the Sacred Tetractys were the Body, the Soul, and the Spirit with their respective emotions and passions to be submitted to the famous Apollonian "Know Thyself" and kept under good balance and self-control. The fourth level was Wisdom. Man as a whole was considered a divine creature, at the top level of creation, and reaching wisdom meant reaching the top level of self-realization as a man, and the only form of happiness possible to a human being on this beautiful planet Earth. Reaching Tetractys Wisdom was thus marking man's chances of returning to God after the completion of his present life, instead of having to come back into a new one, through reincarnation, for achieving more perfection, through a better use of his freewill, and through better meritocratic efforts.

 

 

Part - 2

EthoPlasìn Love, Eros and Sex Life

  1. EthoPlasìn certainly does not want to plainly and blindly return to what society was 2500 years ago. The previous section should not either imply that EthoPlasìn wants to promote any form of homosexuality. Rather the opposite. EthoPlasìn will always pursue in priority, even promote openly, and subliminally when possible, the development of a happy sexual life expressing itself mainly in natural heterosexual relations, albeit without opposing explicitly homosexuality when it meets certain conditions, as expressed further down. Love and Sex are one of the most fundamental aspects of life, in fact as essential tools to create new beautiful life. EthoPlasìn certainly believes, like in Ancient-Greece, that Sex is 'Divine' in nature, just like the Love it is often meant to express. To have a healthy and equilibrated sex-love life is absolutely essential to achieve the holistic education the EthoPlasìn Academy is promoting, and what we can call human happiness. It is also a vital prerequisite for all the other aspects of one's life to be harmonious. It is therefore an early rule of the EthoPlasìn discipline, as Rule 3 in the scale of 10 grades into its holistic formation. Consequently, EthoPlasìn must approach frontally and openly this important trait of the human nature in the holistic formation of its students, based again on a proper interpretation of the Ancient-Greece philosophy. AdonisVenus_Canova

  2. EthoPlasìn does not encourage, but does not either condemn homosexuality, and considers homosexuals citizens equal to heterosexual citizens in terms of all fundamental human rights. EthoPlasìn does however condemn some forms of homosexual sex that are also equally prohibited to heterosexuals, like anal sex, violent sex and pedophile sex. This being admitted, homosexuals are equal to heterosexuals. No less, and but no more! Certainly with no additional special rights! For example, EthoPlasìn will not encourage the expansion of homosexuality, nor certainly demand the opposite, let alone its extinction, but will not give it more rights of ugly civic decorum like in current 'gay pride' demonstrations that correspond to  no similar demonstration rights for heterosexuals. EthoPlasìn will not either encourage men to become effeminate or women to become masculine, and prohibit all transsexual education, or operations before people are of age at least 21. EthoPlasìn believes homosexuality does exist, and should be fully respected as it is, but without the need to promote it in any way. If EthoPlasìn had  get into any form of 'promotion', its position would be the following: if homosexuality must exist in our society, and it will certainly always exist in a natural proportion of the population, then instead of proactively promoting or encouraging hard-core homosexuality, EthoPlasìn will rather encourage the readmission of Platonic Love, in its good interpretation, as explained above in our section on Kallosexuality, and in our page on Platonic Ethics, Aesthetics and Politics, even if this means in fact the admission of certain forms of sexual pleasure that may appear, but only wrongly, as mild forms of homosexuality, within the general parameters of their existence within the Platonic philosophy of Ancient-Greece. With the expansion of homosexuality in the modern world, along with a growing number of bisexuals and heterosexual men with occasional pseudo-homosexual attractions, EthoPlasìn will give all these categories interesting safety valves to their proper expression in the most possible harmonious way and perfect civic decorum. We will do so in a different webpage called TONFASUS (Transitosexuality Old-New Figures And Services Used Sagely) through an available link at the end of this page.  The page however has nothing to do with what we usually call common homosexuality and/or prostitution, nor any bad side of eugenics. By the same token, it also develops concepts that give women a better chance to be fertilized to produce the best possible offspring. Within the above mentioned parameters, and excluding cases of extreme effeminizing for good decorum purposes, EthoPlasìn will be happy to accept as members and students a natural proportion of homosexuals reflecting the proportion that exists in our society today.

  3. Even from this point of view Ancient-Greece can teach us a lesson today and, if we learn that lesson correctly, we will most likely find ourselves quickly with less hard-core homosexuality in our society than what we have today. We are not saying this is good or bad, but simply that it is our conviction that this is what will factually happen. Because of the readmission of the realm of Eros, and the natural human equilibrium factor and safety valve of the Platonic Love allowing people to express their gentle love freely to anyone, even to people of the same sex, including occasionally with expressions of mild sex or erotic play, without fear, without shame, without prejudice or any restrictive influence of any church, this natural trait of the human being will not be forced to evolve into hard-core homosexuality to express itself, like it is too often the case today. The safety valve of Platonic Love will gently allow the emission of the extra steam and play its beautiful role as a factor of equilibrium through the readmission of the realm of Eros as intended in Ancient-Greece philosophy.

  4. Following its firm policy of full transparency in providing its holistic education, including in the field of sexuality, here is the Academy's line of thinking, openly and inevitably a bit bluntly. The only things EthoPlasìn will always condemn and firmly prohibit to its members, from a sexual point of view, are few, and 4 only: pedophilia, rape and anal sex to start with, both in their homosexual and heterosexual forms, along with any kind of sexual violence not expressing love with the free will of partners; This is basically what EthoPlasìn calls "nasexual" (No Anal SEXUAL) relations as exposed briefly in its page on Family Issues. For its members, EthoPlasìn also does not accept same-sex formal marriage (but will accept a parriage), nor in particular the adoption of children by homosexual 'couples', married or not. However, EthoPlasìn will not proactively condemn non-members for doing it. More than "prohibit" however, following its philosophy of proposing and taking action instead of prohibiting, EthoPlasìn will plainly cancel inscriptions when asserting such situations in any particular case of registered membership (in line with the explicit terms of the Admission Contract signed by all members). While, as mentioned implicitly above, anal sex is always prohibited, oral sex is always allowed in nasexual relations if and when it is the expression of the freewill and desire of the partners involved. EthoPlasìn students usually join the Academy at age 18, maybe 17 or 16 in exceptional cases, and the Academy prohibits them any sex with any person younger than 16, in or out of the Arium. The same rule applies to members not living at the Arium. This is well in line with the position of the EthoPlasìn regarding 'sex discovering' and experimenting on the part children under 16: it should be let go quite freely, but only between children themselves, of the same age, that is with an age difference of maximum two years, and normally without any prohibiting involvement of any adult except maybe a firmly gentle mother or father, in no traumatic way, in obviously unusual and excessive cases. As for the Platonic Love of the realm of Eros, as intended in previous paragraphs, and in our section on Kallosexuality, it is always welcome in any of its forms, with or without any mild forms of occasional sex or erotic play.

  5. The priority of EthoPlasìn isLoversInForest and will remain the development of joyful and harmonious heterosexual relations in the life of its members (Leaving non-members full freedom to do otherwise). This will not prevent however the admission of a normal proportion of homosexuals within its ranks, reflecting the proportion of what exists in our society today, as long as they stay nasexuals. As for the form of mild sexuality, called Kallosexuality, as explained above in the previous section, not only will it not be prohibited, but it will always be encouraged, as it is a beautiful form of creative force to always be grateful for, when it appears in one's life, centered on the enjoyment of Kallos Beauty, and in line with the fundamental role of the Academy in its objective of Education to Beauty. The campus is also well equipped to protect the privacy and the joyful positive expression of all legitimate forms of sexual relations when they form within the Arium or between Arium students and partners from outside the campus. For members of the PythArmy at large, not studying at the Arium, this is not possible except when invited in, but they should also respect the above parameters, subject to the cancellation of their membership. We are sorry if some of the above comments may seem too blunt to some people, but again EthoPlasìn has a firm policy of full transparency in providing its holistic education, including in the important field of sexuality.

  6. In our page on Students life, we say the following: "As per rules 3 and 6, EthoPlasìn also believes sexual or orgasmic pleasure is ‘divine’ in nature, a superb expression of CoPHLE energy, and an occasion to “Lead all your thoughts by a sense of Planet Oneness Responsibility and Cosmic Life Participation Gratefulness”. Under these conditions, EthoPlasìn can only wish members to “...freely enjoy divine sexual pleasure in a holistic rejuvenating way”, hopefully under the good auspices of Eros, and do it “generatively” or in a “love-generating way”, that is producing and accumulating CoPHLE energy for their own benefit and the benefit of all the people they meet or live with. Pan-forming energy, or CoPHLE, is our creative power source. Sex is our tool to become co-creators, let alone procreators, and is thus fundamentally ‘cosmically divine’ in nature. Having an equilibrated and joyful sex life to express love and generatively enjoy life is an essential requirement for all members. Like for all good things, only abuse or misuse is to be avoided and from the EthoPlasìn point of view, even chastity would be a kind of negative abuse. Regarding the "cosmically divine nature" of sex, we also mentioned in the first part of this page the presence of Sacred Mistresses operating at, in, or around, most of the sacred places of Ancient Greece. These places were the equivalent of what we call 'churches' and 'religious sanctuaries' today. That alone shows the fundamental difference of approach and conception of sex between Ancient-Greece and today as this would be inconceivable today in relation to the modern churches of the 3 main religions. The beautiful sexual union of human beings was seen then as only a pale representation of the much more beautiful union of the human soul with God. Pursuing sexual union was fundamentally the pursuit of Beauty, of Kallos Beauty that is a combination of body-soul beauty, as an attempted union with the Beauty that is a superior value and archetype, as a human symbol of the Beauty of an eventual union with God after having gone through all the lessons our earthly life is meant to teach us in our current incarnation. This is still the case unconsciously today as opposed to the more conscious drive it was in those ancient days. This is why Beauty, and the related sense of sight, the most noble of all senses, is so much a factor in human sex appeal even today, as opposed to in the animal sexual appeal which is based on more prosaic senses at a lower level, like smell. Between humans, beauty, through the sense of sight, is the outmost important factor in activating the desire of sexual relations. Between animals, beauty as we intend it has much less to do, except in terms of expression of power, and it is typically the sense of smell that takes over and becomes the outmost important factor. Smell also links sex directly and practically exclusively to its animal reproductive function. This is not necessarily the case with human beings who, while pursuing reproduction all right, also pursue more noble objectives at the soul level in having sexual activity. In other words, in as much as sexual relations between humans were conducted with measure, and with the pureness of intention of pursuing Beauty, albeit maybe even unconsciously, they were as such considered 'cosmically divine' in nature, and there was thus no contradiction in attempting the pursuit of this divine kind of union, in, or close to, religious centers, rather the opposite. If Eros and Love came along as an additional gracious bonus, all the better but, even without them, it was still the reflection of the legitimate pursuit of a union with divine Beauty, earthly to start with, and eventually celestially. This is alsEcstasySteTheresaAvilaBerninio, in part, one of the reasons for the outmost importance attached to the concept of Beauty in the EthoPlasìn Philosophy and general Science Of Being (see also our separate page on Kallos Beauty).

  7. Another consideration is the spiritual trance, or mystical state of religious ecstasy, achieved by many saints practicing intensely their religion, in terms of contemplation or more direct union with God, in particular in the years just after the early Christian church pretended it had 'assimilated', or 'Christianized' (really: distorted), the related elements of the Ancient-Greece philosophy. Religious Ecstasy, or Mystical Ecstasy, that had already been part of the "Greek Mysteries" for centuries, was found to be so similar to a kind of superior and lasting state of sexual orgasm that the founding fathers, probably those who, jealously, could not reach that state easily themselves, decided, early on, to frown upon, and discredit it, giving it the meaning of a kind of devilish illusion, or a dangerous state of mind to be avoided, let alone to be completely banished, instead of accepting it for its divine Beauty [Bernini well represented this phenomenon in the sculpture of the Ecstasy of Holy Theresa of Avila, in the church of Santa Maria della Vittoria in Rome, as shown to the right, where the ecstatic face expression of Teresa, along with the Angel's arrow in its projected direction, are important symbols]. For these adolescent churches, encouraging such state of pure Joy was also feared as an element that could menace their full control on members, and the new supremacy of their growing power. They felt that, for their purposes, Fear (as the 'Despair' part of DDDD) was more useful than Joy, and had to be brought in to help the affirmation of their new power. This initiative and distortion was certainly an important factor in the progressive development of the sex phobia that followed for about 2000 years, phobia that still characterizes the 3 main churches today, and still disturbs very negatively the life of many people, even those who are not religious anymore but grew up in the environment of this faulty culture of subjugation. This kind of unnatural deviation of the divine cosmic nature of the human being, that Ancient Greeks had understood and lived so magnificently, was probably also, on the part of the new churches that pretended to know better, an important factor that contributed strongly in the creation of the frustrations and the aggressiveness that in turn brought-in periods of complete horror, like the 'Holy Inquisition' and the various wars of religion.

  8. Ancient Greeks definitely knew better and reacted completely differently. Sex was not conceived as a sin, but rather only a beautiful part of their life and the only thing to be careful about, like with all good things, was to prevent its abuse or misuse, and to keep its association with be pursuit of the Beauty of a much more beautiful union, at a higher level, the one of the soul slowly reuniting with God, progressively during a harmonious earthly life, and eventually fully, at the passage to the after-life. Even from this point of view Ancient-Greece can teach usThreeGracesOfCanova another incredibly important lesson today: if the control and mastering of the sexual drive was considered a virtue, chastity, contrary to Christian life, was definitely excluded as a kind of negative abuse, misuse or a destructive opposition to the beautiful expression of CoPHLE in one of its forms as a divine energy; In the same way, its use with violence, or its practice detached from the pursuit of the higher value of Beauty, was also to be excluded as much as possible. That lesson should at least be taken positively by all the religious authorities today, the same institutions that systematically destroyed that high level of culture and civilization in the first centuries of our era, and turned what was a 'cosmically divine' aspect of our life into a devilish sinful aspect to be lived with apprehension, frustration and fear of a non-existent hell. This is certainly the main lesson EthoPlasìn is trying to teach its members today from a sexual life point of view.

  9. Regarding sex, Ancient Greeks had a heavenly conception of it while the new churches, slowly gaining power over the still existing philosophical schools of Greek inspiration, replaced it, very mistakenly, with a hellish conception, and with terribly negative consequences for millions of people to this day, even for people who have now abandoned these churches. Even abandoning these churches however is not sufficient to correct this situation. It should not either be necessary to abandon these churches if they could only readjust their conception of sex to a more human and 'cosmically divine' one. At this point we are surrounded by a deeply incrusted culture which is wildly faulty regarding sex, and very difficult to redress, independently of these churches. Destroying is always a quick and easy process while constructing is always more difficult, and requires much more time, in particular re-constructing, as it requires first a difficult cleanup operation before the base of the new structure is positioned and elevated. The above destruction, or deep distortion, of the beautiful Greek civilization, comparable to the horrible destruction of other high civilizations much later on, through the Spanish conquests, was a terrible mistake of the Catholic church in particular, for which humanity has suffered too much already. EthoPlasìn hopes to provide a small contribution also from this point of view, to try to even redress a little the situation, in promoting a return to a more 'cosmically divine' conception of all the fundamental traits of the human nature, including eminently its sexual trait, contributing in this way to the improvement of all human relations, and consequently complying to its "World Civic Wellness Vocation" through the life and influence of the critical weight of its members and its PythArmy in all social environments around the world in the course of the coming generations. 

  10. Free but not Out of Control! -  Quality, not quantity! Sexual energy being divine in nature, should be expressed freely and beautifully when put into action. However, 'freely' does not mean 'out of control', that is expressed in any form, in any place or in any circumstances. Rather the opposite! "Freely" is intended in terms of beauty and form of expression: freely but under good control, that is seeking qErosControluality instead of quantity, like it is somewhat expressed in the beautiful sculpture of Adonis and Venus on the left! (Francesco Susini, around 1625). Members are strongly invited to preserve themselves, and not to make sex a daily affair unless they are madly in love at the beginning of a brand new relationship. Out of such situations, members are encouraged not to have sex more than once a week and, if possible, two to three times a month at the most. Not less than once a month however! It should certainly never be a routine affair of insignificant importance to be resolved in a few minutes. Sexual energy, and typically sperm, should be considered like the best wine of the house one owns, and should be kept preciously for only the good occasions. It should never be treated as garbage. A wine connoisseur, or any fine and reasonable person, does not spend, and spoil, the best wine of the house with routine cheap food. Having sex past adolescence should be like a sacred and joyful celebration, at a place and moment of best choice. In between good occasions, members should enjoy controlling their sexual drive, like the pleasure of controlling, or holding firmly the reins of a powerful and beautiful horse. HorseControlThis is eminently part of the EthoPlasìn discipline. Such discipline helps keep its adherents into a state of grace, charm and fullness of positive CoPHLE energy, like fully charged batteries. No exaggeration however, not one way or the other! Certainly no chastity! This would also be a blockage, or an unbalanced use, of divine and beautifully creative energy! Some members can even attempt to become experts in creating "best occasions" and, if successful, enjoy a greater number of mating occasions than the average person, but "best occasions" can never be "too many" nor certainly "routine". On the other hand, in the lack of "good occasions" for too much time, members can sometimes legitimately decide it is time to have a good glass of precious wine on their own, and fully enjoy it, proud of themselves, with their best cosmic gratitude. Members, in consultation with their chosen tutors, can also adapt the discipline to their own forces and personality characteristics. The sublimated energy that results and accumulates from the above discipline is also divine in nature and can be transmuted most positively into all sorts of new energies to be used for the good of all living beings in the overall earthly environment. Such noble transmutation in turn can attract or generate new creative force, through the beings to which the sublimated energy was granted, and result in even better sexual expressions of the donators at their next best mating occasions. The part of the energy that is sublimated returns temporarily to the realm of CoPHLE but soon bounces back to the producer in a loving give-and-take process of mutual benefit between the donators and the receivers. This is part of the Boomerang Law that we talked about in our page on Science Of Being.

  11. Virginity, and the loss of it in conditions of love, can be a wonderfully binding experience for a young couple, for the rest of their lives, and consequently it is a desirable experience if one can have it with the spouse he intends to marry, but it is not an essential requirement for a happy sexual life after the excitement of a loving defloration.       

  12. In that page called Science Of Being we also talked quite extensively about the energy we call CoPHLE (Cosmic Pan-Forming Holographic Loving Energy). In relation to its 'Loving' attribute, we have said the following: "This Energy is “Loving” in that Love is the particular CoPHLE attribute that attracts and maintains together all created things and beings, and all their internal components. It is the same element, or force, that attracts people in love. This attribute acts like a kind of fundamental 'Glue' or Spiritual Gravity force of attraction and expression, that gives a sense of Oneness with to the whole universe. Paraphrasing the sayings of James Jeans, one of the greatest physicists, mathematicians and astronomers of the last century, and Physics Nobel Carlo Rubbia still working at the CERN of Geneva: 'the more we dig, the more the Universe is getting to resemble a Great Spirit in Love, with clear Mental Attributes, and not anymore just a great piece of mechanic like we so far considered it'.  It is the Law of Attraction and Love reflected by Hera, the wife of Zeus, in the Greek Mythology, while Zeus himself (or Zefs, or Dios), the king, or the top level, top God of that mythology, in representing and reflecting the Law of Freedom and Wisdom. The two are united and inseparable, as the two forces that complete each other to create our beautiful universe, and as the forces that collaborate with couples for the beautiful procreation of all living beings, human beings in particular.  

  13. Sex is to Love what Weight is to Gravity. Gravity is a force of attraction and thus a force of Love. Gravity is Love. Contemporary scientists still cannot explain gravity, but the Ancient Greece philosophers already knew, 5000 years ago, that its clear and simplest explanation is Love, the kind of Love that attracts and keeps together all parts of all things, from the biological cells of a body to the stars of a Galaxy, and the galaxies of the universe. This Love is the Love attribute of the CoPHLE energy we talk about in the previous paragraph and more thoroughly in our page on Science of Being. Without gravity, there couldErosPsyche be no weight but gravity can still exist without weight being experienced. In the same manner, sex cannot, or should not, exist ideally without love, but love can still exist without sex. Sex is, or should always be, a privileged tool to express Love, be it love of oneself, love of others or love of the universe. In between Love and Sex however there is also the whole Realm of Eros. It is like the 'atmosphere' between 'weight' and 'gravity' mentioned above. Eros should accompany and embellish our daily lives as a kind of joyful force of attraction towards not only Beauty but also Good, Truth, Justice and the other virtues and values we talked about in our pages on Science Of Being and Platonic Ethics and Aesthetics.

  14. Eros is much more, we must insist, than the appeal to beautiful sex as we usually wrongly restrict it to be. Such restrictive appeal is what happens between animals. Between humans, which is the only realm where Eros operates, it is not only an appeal to beautiful sex at the lower level, but at the same time an appeal to all beautiful virtues at the higher levels of the human soul, and to their best expressions in the superior metaphysical concepts of Beauty, Truth, Good and Just. This is the '...holistic rejuvenating way' of Rule 3. It is thus the power that moves us forward in a holistic rejuvenating way in all the beautiful aspects of our lives at both the physical and the mental levels. Eros is thus also the power behind all beautiful achievements and creations, including of course procreation, pursuing essentially Beauty holistically in all its ways and forms but in a particular harmonious combination of body-soul beauty. This is the way it was serenely interpreted in Ancient-Greece. Rule 3 of the EthoPlasìn discipline says: "Host love for all as for yourself and, Eros permitting, freely enjoy divine sexual pleasure in a holistic rejuvenating way". The 'holistic' way means a special combination of body-soul beauty. In consideration of all the comments of this page, the rule should now be clearly understood in what it is meant to say. Ideally sex should always be an expression of Love but, when it is not, it should still be a privileged vehicle to carry the Eros drive we have in our souls towards the pursuit and attainment of all beautiful virtues and wisdom in an erotic way. As such, it is divine in origin, and in nature, just like the beautiful sperm in which it is reflected, and it should always be practiced with gratefulness, in an enjoyable and holistic rejuvenating way. In the Greek Philosophy tradition, Eros is related not only to body, but also to psyche, that is to the soul, as the driving force uniting body and soul, matter and spirit, for the erotic pursuit of beauty, knowledge and wisdom, making us point to the highest levels of achievements in all fields of human activity. The hands of the beautiful Eros and Psyche sculpture to the right, pointing upwards, symbolize this erotic attraction of the human being toward superior levels of realization and achievements.

  15. Children born on the campus - EthoPlasìn will provide all the expenses for the marriage of a couple of students at the Academy and the delivery of their child conceived and born on the Campus. If the parents confirm their mutual love and get legally married on the campus, in the spirit and with the kind of written commitment for at least 16 years after their first child, as it is mentioned in our page on Family Issues, EthoPlasìn will in addition commit the funds for a long term scholarship covering all expenses for the study and education of their first child in the best private schools, let alone possibly at the PythAcademia, at university level, if selected for it after age 16. While at the campus, the couple of students, if they have a child, will be given appropriate accommodation in its CivicArium (the Mini Social Recuperation Center) to allow them to live comfortably as a new family unit, and to be provided with all baby sitting or other kinds of assistance that may be required. If that child were to die early, before finishing university, and the couple of students were still married at that time, as the same family unit, EthoPlasìn would transfer this commitment to their second or third child.

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Our Decorum page talks about a related subject that we copy here as an excerpt

Mixed and Equal, but Different – The EthoPlasìn believes there is a beautiful difference between a man and a woman, like between a male andRosePink a female. This difference does not mean superiority or inferiority of any kind RoseBlueon either side. It does not prevent equality of fundamental rights on both sides, but only a differentiation in skills and specializations, just like Mother Nature has so pleasantly succeeded in doing, giving males and females quite different and visible attributes and roles. That difference is important in aspects of civic behavior, in discipline training, and for the decorum as conceived and applied by the ARIUM. The ARIUM not only will never try to hide that difference, but will rather encourage it, even promote and reinforce it, let alone trying to make it a most enjoyable one on both sides of our mixed world. This has first implications in the way to dress. It has more important and quite drastic implications for the role of PythaS in the “Combat Force” of the ARIUM, and thus the necessity to split males and females between Hoplites (PythaH) and Amazones (PythaZ) for the training of this special class of EthoPlasìn soldiers, while all other soldier categories are mixed and with identical training. See our page on PythArmy for more details.

 

This conception of the “Enjoyable Difference” between man and woman is made known to ARIUM members in their Admission Contract, and is an essential part of EthoPlasìn membership and lifestyle.  If this were not acceptable to any of them, they have no alternative but to choose serenely another university or discipline center for their studies and training, and the ARIUM will be sorry to see them go. From this point of view the ARIUM might be seen as somewhat not very ‘modern’ but, from its point of view, it is a characteristic to be proud of, one that is being promoted proactively, as the so-called “modernity” of current fashions is not at all always what is best for our civic environments. Certainly not in EthoPlasìn terms.

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P.S.

For related information on this subject, with accurate references to the various works of Plato, you can see our page on Platonic Philosophy in Ethics and Aesthetics.  and our pages on PythArmy and Kallos Beauty.

ADDENDUM:

For most people, the above webpage on sexuality, on male sexuality in particular, shall be more than sufficient and probably the most they can stand and consider acceptable without being offended on the basis of religion dogma or political correctness. Nevertheless, for those who may want to explore some more about the special 'Old-New' figures and services related to the TransitOsexuality, or the honorable PhilotimoSexuality of a young adult man in particular, please go to our additional page. Be aware however that some content of this additional page may be interpreted by some of you as offending, or crude, if you are strongly affected by current political correctness or some religious dogma regarding sexuality. If so, please avoid this additional page. If not, please go ahead reading it. To have access to the additional webpage, please click down here on:

TONFASUS

[page under review at the moment]

 (Transitosexuality Old-New Figures And Services Used Sagely).