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This looks interesting! (Painting by Charles Williams Mitchell.)
[link] A historical drama set in early Egypt, it concerns a slave who turns to the rising tide of Christianity in the hopes of pursuing freedom while also falling in love with his master, a female philosophy professor and atheist.
Actress Rachel Weisz will be playing Hypatia of Alexandria, Oscar Isaac will be playing Orestes who falls in love with her, and Ashraf Barhom will be portraying a Christian monk named Ammonius - who doesn't seem to match up to any truly historical "Ammonius", but that's OK I suppose. They would have taken artistic liberties with the story in any case.
Hypatia's story below the fold...
For those of you who do not know the story, Hypatia was an atheist scientist and philosopher living in Roman Egypt during the 3rd century CE. She is notable because of the fact that she is one of the first recorded instances of a woman atheist, who was also a respected scientist, philosopher, and teacher. She was eventually killed and her body was burned by a Christian mob who blamed her for some political/religious fallout having to do with the archbishop and the prefect. Here's one of the earliest known accounts of Hypatia, from the 439CE history text written by Socrates Scholasticus called "The Historia Ecclesiastica":
[From the English translation] Chapter XV.--Of Hypatia the Female Philosopher.
There was a woman at Alexandria named Hypatia, daughter of the philosopher Theon, who made such attainments in literature and science, as to far surpass all the philosophers of her own time. Having succeeded to the school of Plato and Plotinus, she explained the principles of philosophy to her auditors, many of whom came from a distance to receive her instructions. On account of the self-possession and ease of manner, which she had acquired in consequence of the cultivation of her mind, she not unfrequently appeared in public in presence of the magistrates. Neither did she feel abashed in coming to an assembly of men. For all men on account of her extraordinary dignity and virtue admired her the more. Yet even she fell a victim to the political jealousy which at that time prevailed. For as she had frequent interviews with Orestes, it was calumniously reported among the Christian populace, that it was she who prevented Orestes from being reconciled to the bishop. Some of them therefore, hurried away by a fierce and bigoted zeal, whose ringleader was a reader named Peter, waylaid her returning home, and dragging her from her carriage, they took her to the church called Caesareum, where they completely stripped her, and then murdered her with tiles. After tearing her body in pieces, they took her mangled limbs to a place called Cinaron, and there burnt them. This affair brought not the least opprobrium, not only upon Cyril, but also upon the whole Alexandrian church. And surely nothing can be farther from the spirit of Christianity than the allowance of massacres, fights, and transactions of that sort. This happened in the month of March during Lent, in the fourth year of Cyril's episcopate, under the tenth consulate of Honorius, and the sixth of Theodosius.
I hope the movie is not a complete waste of film! ;)