Cody > Recent Status Updates

327-421 was the most difficult part of the book. Mme de Villeparisis' section seem slow and of little interest. It picks up once you meet Saint-Loup and his dandy uncle

Off to a great start! Spies, opium dealers, bandits, getting smuggled from White territory to Yunnan where we meet the Reds. Encounter fascinating people along the way like KMT Marshal Zhang, who, growing disillusioned with Chiang Kai Shek's neutral policy against Japan, kidnaps the general to force him to join a united front with the CCP. Excited to see Zhou and the Chairman himself

Had hoped to have chapter updates to document my movement through this book. But it was easier to keep reading. Hopefully I'll do a thorough review when finished

Chapter 2 covers fall of Egyptian state and religion and the rise of Christianity, hermeticism, gnosticism, and Neoplatonism & Kabbalah. MB cites writing of figures at this time, emphasizes Egyptian origins to Greek thought. Even renaissance sought origins past Greece. Ficino, Bruno, Copernicus et.al. point to Egypt. Hermes Trismegistus as euhemerization for Thoth. Ancient Model obtains to modern period. Fun reading!

So far so good! Seems like Bernal's critics focus more on volumes 2 and 3. I am not a specialist. Chapter 1 argues convincingly that from the 5th Century BCE & up many Greek writers believed in the Egyptian origin for things like religion, writing &etc. The book goes on to show how long this Ancient Model obtained and will argue how colonial modernity replaced it with the Aryan Model. Chapter 2 is bananas; I love it!