Evangelos M. Rallis, 1990.
Christians and Moslems
Evangelos M. Rallis, 1990.
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No valid grounds exist within the international arena to support relationships and contractual agreements involving a feigned appellative identity of a participating state vis-à-vis the International Court of Justice presumed jurisdiction: The creation of the so-called “State of Macedonia” begs the question of a political ploy bent on divisiveness in the Balkans, the obstruction of Hellenism, and the debilitation of Eastern Orthodoxy.
[It is noted with deep regret that President George W. Bush opted to ignore the learned counsel of Pope John Paul II by recognizing the wrong name for that created state in contradiction to historical continuity and thus resulting in perpetuation of the fragmentation of the area. NEW BYZANTIUM.]
The correct reference in regard to the created state in question is:
FYROM
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The premise of current thinking is based on the assumption that there is a state of Macedonia. WRONG: There is no state of Macedonia, but only a region by that name. A state may exist there, but it is not Macedonia. This is an ancient reality and none of the three contenders could exclusively claim a Macedonian state, since such in fact is a region that touches on Greece, Bulgaria, and what was called Yugoslavia. Each of those Macedonian sectors in the overall region constitutes a province geographically in each locality. We cannot change history by turning facts into myths and modern day myths into facts. That Macedonia is Hellenic there is no doubt. Historical data presented in this writing attest to this fact.
However, we must first pay due attention to certain ludicrous pronouncements that have appeared in the press. Namely, "The American people especially must be enlightened [our emphasis] that Philip of Macedonia and his son Alexander the Great never considered themselves Greek at all; in fact they conquered Athens; and Macedonia, historically, never was part of Greece. . . ." And with untried logic, the self-embarrassing article further implies that there is a state of Macedonia (referring to the area in former Yugoslavia) that is not Greek because no Greeks are living there but some Orthodox Christians (whatever that means!), some Turks, some Vlachs, some Roumis, some Bulgars, some Serbs and some Albanians. We must now conclude from this that all the requisite elements are in place to qualify for the existence of a state of Macedonia. Just as amusing is the admonishment that the American people especially must be enlightened (. . . to complete their education) that Philip and his son Alexander did not consider themselves Greek because they conquered Athens. One's tolerance begs to be stressed to the limit in order to accommodate the said positions: The Spartans too conquered Athens and at the end of the Peloponnesian War played ruthless havoc on that City. Did they as well consider themselves outside of the Hellenic stock?
Beyond all this, however, some authors rush to inform us that the people listed for candidacy as Macedonians desperately prefer to join the cause of a Greater Albania. We wonder why such staunch Macedonians are so desperate to join a "Greater Albania" cause.
Instead, let us focus on the historical realities about Macedonia and weigh them against these frivolous attempts that emanate from a variety of sources, as they attempt to steal what is not theirs for benefit and profit. Heritage is a precious possession that cannot be given away under any circumstances. To establish the caliber of the persons professing the existence of a Macedonian state (and at that, as a non- Hellenic entity), consider that the Scopians in 1986 defrauded the Vatican by presenting Greek Byzantine icons as "Macedonian" art. The Vatican acknowledged to have been so defrauded. Eight more such frauds by the Scopians were reported to Prime Minister John Major of Great Britain by Mr. Nikolaos Martes, former Minister of Northern Greece. President Bill Clinton has been requested to prevail upon the Scopians for them not to use the Sun of Vergina (a sacred symbol for the Hellenes) as their assumed symbol. The response of Mr. Clinton is that he is unable to do so, but neither has he criticized the theft, which inevitably compromises his position. The situation is not surprising, in view of the fact that the State Department having been assigned by the President, has instructed this writer that no help can be rendered to Orthodox Christians around the world to prevent Russia's Mr. Yeltsin from offering license for the commercialization of the Bicephalous Eagle (two-headed eagle—Byzantine): universally adopted symbol of the Eastern Orthodox Church. The conclusion is that thievery of Hellenistic sacred symbols and territorial integrity moves unabated throughout the world by omission and/or positive action from some of the most unexpected sources. Something is eminently wrong.
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First, there was a people and then a name was applied to them. Mythology has it that Deukalion survived the impact of a great flood (sounds familiar?). Pyrra was his wife and his son was Hellene whose brother was Amphiktyon, and they both had a sister, Protogeneia (meaning first-birth—reminiscent perhaps of a symbol by personifying a momentous event). It was alleged that Hellene was the father of Aeolos, Doros, and Xouthos, and his grandsons were Achaeos and Ion who in turn brought forth the Aeolians and Dorians, the Achaeans and the Ionians and so forth. Hellene thus acquires the status of the progenitor of a people who came to be known by a great variety of names among which more encompassing were the names, Graekoi (whence derive the words, Greek, Graecus, Griego, Griechisch, Grecque etc., unlike some anxious and unprepared Latinist enthusiasts would have us believe) and/or Hellenes.
It was believed that Amphiktyon advocated a cooperative spirit among all the people comprising the great family. This principle known as Amphiktyonia (in English, Amphictyony) eventually was manifested in terms of a political coherence and was galvanized by means of the Olympic games. The name of the Hellenes comes into use as early as 1000 B.C., and Homer mentions the kingdom of Hellas that appears to have been situated in the vicinity of the Pindhos mountain range and Mount Olympus. The kingdom was headed by Achilles the most honored of heroes: Homer describes it as the land of beautiful women. The land is justly claimed as the beginning place of a people who take pride in the nobleness of their past and their descent from the most honored of heroes and from beautiful women. From Hellas, and evidently on account of what was just mentioned, the name Hellene began to encompass more groups of the same people, beginning first in Thessaly and Macedonia and on to Epirus and extending southward to the rest of the peninsula and beyond. Therefore, Macedonians were integral to the substance of the people whose stock sprang from Pindhos. The variety of names they carried did not alter the essence of their consanguinity or their common idiosyncrasy. They were known as Macedonians, Hellenes, Graekoi, Dorians, Aeolians, Danaoi, lonians, Achaeans, Argeioi, and so on, taking on names often by reason of the father or the son or the grandson. Some of these names would describe specific sectors of the spreading family or the family as whole.
Eventually the name of the Hellenes prevailed to mean in general those who pertained to the affiliation of the Amfiktyonia; yet, it was not meant that those who did not participate were not in essence Hellenes. The admixture of Illyrians and Thracians with some of the Macedonians, did not in some manner subtract from their essential Hellenism. The elements that best define the sameness of their identity were the uniformity of their language, their Gods, their religion, their customs, their artistic expression, their mythology, their athletic events, their names of both people and places, their burial habits, their inscriptions, their ethos, and also their deportment toward one another in peace and in war in the face of common danger. The Hellenic Gods resided in Olympus the mountain of Macedonia. How is it possible that their chosen Gods could have resided in a foreign mountain?
Macedonians were of the same Pelasgian stock as the rest of the Hellenes, with delay in their rate of evolution, as compared to those branches that had previously migrated south and who opted to call themselves Hellenes; yet, the people were one people. The mythological account is that Macedon was the son of Pandora whom Hephaestus had created out of clay at the bidding of Zeus. He was also the grandson of Deukalion of the flood, the first man of the Pelasgians and predecessor of the Hellenes. It is an account that establishes the consanguinity of the Pelasgians, the Macedonians, the Hellenes, which is a happening that is confirmed by Herodotus and praised by Aeschylus. Macedonians were the Hellenes. They are the people who migrated south and then back north again.
A predecessor of Alexander the Great, also named Alexander, was the father of Perdiccas who in 428 B.C. during the Peloponnesian War was leading the Macedonian troops in battle against the "barbarians" in Macedonia. Their ancestry was originally from the Temenids from Argos! The Macedonian dialect notwithstanding, all of the cities raised under their influence had the Hellenic tongue as their official language. When 30,000 Persian troops were drafted under his army, Alexander the Great ordered that they should learn the Hellenic language and that they should be trained in the use of Macedonian arms. Minister Martes of Northern Greece has explained in writing to President Clinton that at the Athens National Research Center there exist five thousand inscriptions in the Hellenic language. He challenges anyone that even if one such inscription were produced in the Macedonian tongue (dialect), the name Macedonia would be gifted to the Scopians [of course, . . . no frauds accepted]. Two references historically deny Philip of Macedonia his Hellenic identity. Both are references by the historian Thucydides. In one of these he remarks about the Spartan general Brasidas who made the denial in order to incite his troops against the Macedonians just before battle. In the other, he refers to the speech of Demosthenes against Philip, which was clearly motivated by political interest and anti-Philippic passion in his famous Philippics against the Macedonian king. In contrast to these two references, all other authors, historians and orators regarded the Macedonians as members of the Hellenic people. This latter opinion included the Athenian orator and rhetorician, Isocrates who acclaimed Philip to be a "man Hellene."
One fact must be understood by the reader, that the great family of that people were known by many names, until they decided to identify themselves by one common name. The initial appellation was Panhellene, and from that was derived the final Hellene. However, to be considered acceptable to the confraternity, strict conditions were attached [witness the European Union and entry denial to what today is known as Turkey on purely Hellenic-Byzantine lands]. An acceptable cultural standard had to be reached. Whether the Macedonians were of the same family stock was not the determining factor as to their Hellenistic worth. Entry was finally achieved, but the Macedonians were among the last to match the level of development that had already been reached by their forebears. For example, in the last great battle at Plataeae outside of Thebes, a soldier who alone killed the Persian commander in chief, Mardonius, was not honored by the Hellenes. The reason was that he killed Mardonius with a rock. That was not an acceptable standard of battleground behavior. In another case, at the same battle, one of the survivors of Thermopylae the previous year was shamed for not fighting to the death in that engagement as did a fellow-warrior of the same fate. He then requested to be present to fight at Plataeae. He was killed there. When the Hellenes were asked why he was not honored, they responded, no, it is because he wanted to die and, therefore, did not merit a special honor.
The mother of Alexander III the Great was Myrtale who later was named Olympias in honor of Alexander's father, Philip who had distinguished himself in athletic competition at the Olympic games. She was Molossian, which is to say, a Hellene of the Pindhos range in the vicinity of Homer's land of the beautiful women and Achilles' brave blood. Given to mysticism, as it was the practice of that people, she asserted that Alexander's birth was of the Gods. There existed the spiritual center of Zeus of Dodone and it is where Aristotle said the holy men lived and were called Graekoi and now Hellenes. Then came to exist the subsequent centers of Delphi and of Hellanios Zeus in Sparta [see also Jerusalem—Solyma], all of which originate from the Doric Macedonians who had pervaded the Hellenic space and had developed their individual characteristic identities in various degrees. The Macedonians of Alexander were about the last to enter the stage of refinement retaining their dialect based on their Doric origin and, therefore, are Hellenes.
There is nothing new about the warning for Moslems and Christians to exert every effort in order to be able to live peacefully in each other's presence. And much less is it necessary for Americans to be involved in any sort of confrontation in the Balkans. We should be directing our sights to the most desirable existence concerning the people of Greece, Albania of Northern Epirus, and the region of Macedonia, which is the Pan-Hellenic union wherein they must all have a stake. Alexander set out to Hellenize the world (he did not Macedonize), as he was aware of his identity to the Hellenic continuum. He was schooled by the Greek masters and was fondly attached to the practice of the Olympic games and was conscious of his inseparability with the Hellenic world. When the last waves of Dorians descended southward upon the evolved and entrenched civilizations of their predecessors, the Dorians were considered harsh and unrefined. Yet, their influence of the old demeanor delivered a powerful infusion of severity and frankness to the extent that the final aspect of classical Greek civilization was established. They were viewed as barbarous by the finer inhabitants they confronted, but just the same they were of one stock. The word "varvaros" (the basis for barbarian) is not so merciful as simply to mean "foreigner." Its origin is in the sound "var-var," which is what the returning Greek traveler recounted that people in other lands sounded like when they spoke. And the meaning that the word conveyed was that of an uncouth, harsh, uncivilized person or people. The Dorians were regarded in that category and when it was used to describe them or the Macedonians, it had cultural rather than racial implications. It was no surprise that Alexander received the same treatment by some quarters, particularly when he arrived with the political advantage of the conqueror.
In this great mix of individual characteristics under the overall consciousness of a pervading identity, a political system of city states evolved that lent itself to almost constant competitive strife. A patriarchal system of family clans formed the underpinning of the society from early times and was reflected in its mythology. The great variety of names in identifying themselves attests to that fact. Rules of austerity, principles of behavior, the question of honor played a major role in such a competitive social environment. The people of all Epirus (the land that lies in both present day Greece and Albania) have shown to be an embodiment of the type of life described above. They were that body of the heroic Arvanites [see opening Illustration above]: men who together with their brave women in 1821 played the major role in the liberation of Greece from the Turk after almost four hundred years of occupation. They retained the basic traditions of their heritage and familial life. They carried with them the spirit of contention, competition, and singularity of the family clans that in ancient times became the underlying cause of the city state system. A proud people who claimed their descent from the Great Alexander, they maintained their very ancient warring traditions, including that of the men shaving their heads above the forehead as the ancient Spartans did in order not to be subdued by the enemy in the event of hand to hand combat. The rear of the head was left untouched with the mane growing to its natural length, producing and impressively formidable aspect of the individual. The art museums, encyclopedias, and history books are witnesses to this fact whenever such figures are portrayed. They would carry arms and engage seriously in the practice of taking from the rich to give to the needy. There was disgrace and shame if the activity was used for any sort of personal gain. Strict rules and family codes existed, and what prevailed was solemnity and modesty. The central theme of their existence was the recovery of their ethnic integrity and independence in a total and unconditional form. First and foremost they felt they were Hellenes. Religious intolerance was not the bane of their life. Religious belief was an individual choice and no questions were raised within the family. Many mixed marriages existed, and it was not uncommon for a home to have both pork and lamb baking at the same time in order to accommodate the religious dietary requirements of all members of the household. For political reasons that always translate into wealth and power as well as for dogmatic passion, far reaching intrigues were continually enacted not the least of which was the selective use of the words "Hellene" and "Greek." The distinction that was made ceased to be that of ancient times. It is stated that based on the etymology of the tongue of Northern Epirus, the word "Graekoi" means cliff-dwellers, and the word "Hellenes" means dwellers of high places. These words correspond accurately to the topography they intend to describe. Be that as it may, the ancient use became the appellation of a people. More so for the word "Graekoi," because "Hellenes" referred primarily, as it has been explained, to the participants in the Amphictyony.
With the advent of Christianity, a new distinction was made and widely promoted, namely, "Graekoi" meant the faithful Greeks, whereas "Hellenes" meant the ones outside the fold. The latter, however, became a derogatory reference and a stigma of accusation. This type of practice tended to polarize the people and dilute their strong ethnic cohesiveness. In a similar manner, the passion of dogmatic difference was being instilled between Christian and Moslem Greeks and more when the mood for independence rose. Yet, the steadfastness of the ethnic revolutionaries, and more specifically of the heroic Arvanites, saved the moment—Christians and Moslems, true Hellenes, fighting side by side to a final victory. Foreign interests interfered deeply into the event and at the close of the Revolution, which by official fiat was memorialized on March 25, 1821 (Feast Day of the Annunciation), a Constitution was drawn that stipulated the Nation would be ruled by a king. However, a provision was imposed by some sort of foreign beneficence that the king must not be a Hellene. Greece has at last in recent years rid herself of this foreign-interest un-Hellenic scourge. Good riddance to non-Hellenic royal attachments, when in truth authentic Byzantine-Hellenic inheritors exist to serve the general interest, identity, prosperity, and happiness of the historic Balkan people. With the success in the effort for independence, foreign interests eager to destroy the grandness of a restored Hellenistic presence, put into place a deceitful program of intrigue and manipulation designed to corrupt the joy of a better life of the majority of people for the sake of profit and power. The aura of greatness can only be stolen if it cannot be earned by virtue. The materialistic pursuit of a one-world government with the objective only for profit and control by the few at the expense of freedom and good fortune of many is the point being made here. Witness the obliqueness into which the United Nations has degenerated while upholding the pretense of equivalence to the Hellenistic Amphictyony.
The usurpation of the territorial integrity of Greece is the real goal of foreign plunderers who have set their eye on Northern Greece and the Aegean on account of the natural wealth and beauty existing there.
One thing is clear: Let all predators cease in their grab for the wealth of Greece—her beauty, her climate, her physical store, her history, her art, her food, her dance and her music—and there would be no need for foreign aid to fund her imposed military readiness. But, of course, the manipulators keep funding her while what is known as Turkey lurks on the sidelines, well funded also and more so for premeditated good measure [e.g., see Cyprus]. And there are those who believe the instigators when the carrot of a "Macedonian state" or a "Greater Albania" is dangled before them while they are being used by being divided. Then, witness the obliqueness into which the Olympic games have degenerated, where valor has been traded for profit. Human worth has been stolen . . . . And, when will Hellenic art be returned to its rightful place for the ennoblement and delight of every human soul. It is the restoration of Panhellenism that should be sought not its destruction.
The compelling conclusion is that a fictitious state of Macedonia cannot be drawn out of thin air by rapacious interests in a geopolitical game of greed. The sacrificial struggle of the Hellenes, the sons and daughters of Doros and Macedon, manifests to the world what and where Macedonia is. Mount Olympus and Pindhos and all of Greece (while Northern Epirus, which is to say southern Albania today, and Cyprus, still lament) rejoice in the presence of their eternal offspring who still sing and dance the praises of their grandeur. The Hellenes, those Doric Macedonians, defenders of the Panhellenic principle will fight again to the finish for their most precious heritage. Of this there is no doubt. No credence can be given to the machinations of the internationalist communist (sounds familiar?) Tito who assigned himself prerogatives about Macedonia, which has always been, continues to be, and will always be Hellenic in origin, as already explained. Scopia was never within the geographic parameters of Macedonia. There is no historical basis that Macedonia was ever anything but Hellenic, and only modern day border delineations of Balkan states have produced such distinctions. The Roman conquest of 168 B.C. resulted in the dissolution of what was known as Macedonia. This was followed by the Byzantine Empire that emerged with the victory of Constantine the Great in 312 A.D. against Maxentius outside of Rome. In turn, the Ottoman victory against the Byzantines in 1453 A.D. caused the subjugation of the Helladic peninsula until 1821. Therefore, the successful fight of the Hellenes for independence of their own historic land, is the only specific manifestation of a de jure and a de facto Macedonia in the world. The place is there and the only people who belong there are in their place.
The message that follows was given to the Athenian troops by Alexander of Macedon forebear of Alexander the Great. It was on the eve of the battle of Plataeae in 479 B.C., when Mardonius was killed with a rock. Xerxes ostensibly satisfied that he had accomplished his objective, which was to burn Athens, was returning home and had delegated to his brother-in-law, Mardonius the duty of this fateful campaign that ended with the complete devastation of the Persian forces and with the historical end of Persian aggression in Greece. Mardonius' army included Macedonian troops that were compelled to assist him in the campaign. On the Greek side, Pausanias was the general in command. Alexander reached the Athenian troops in secret and in great fear for his safety to warn them about Mardonius' impending attack the following morning. He said to them: "Men of Athens, that which I am about to say I trust to your honour; and I charge you to keep it secret from all excepting Pausanias, if you would not bring me to destruction. Had I not greatly at heart the common welfare of Greece, I should not have come to tell you; but I am myself a Greek [link to: Pope John Paul II on Macedonia] by descent, and I would not willingly see Greece exchange freedom for slavery . . . consider the risk I have run, out of zeal for the Greek cause, to acquaint you with what Mardonius intends and to save you from being surprised by the barbarians. I am Alexander of Macedon." (Herodotus, The Persian Wars, Translation by George Rawlinson, The Modern Library, New York).
Text by: Mark Athanasios C. Karras
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