Originally posted by mr cryptoman
im sorry i was a bit harsh and i used offensive language and i know that people have different beleifs and theories but i just find religion as a lazy way of explaining things

Thanks

And take note of the Fine example offered by Harte. He was once rash and apt to respond without consideration for others.

Now he excells at demostrating disproval of the thought, through misreading and twisting what was offered and being cheeky in his responces.

But at least, this is far better than previous replies, and shows he is truely working hard on his people skills.

Now I would like to forward the following, as further consideration of what was offered, although not fully appreciated, previously.

We can perhaps best understand Poseidon and other Greek sea deities, whose roots Burkert says reach back to the Early Neolithic of 7000 B.C., as palimpsests: one thing set over another over another. In the known material, some gods and goddesses have only a nominal relationship to the sea, yet the sheer number of these underlines the Greeks' deep connection to ocean. A name connected to or familial relationship with the sea may denote sea-related worship at some unknown time or place.

For some goddesses and gods, an impressive list, their whole being and purpose was the sea. The sons of Tethys and Oceanus included the sea-deities Phorkys, Nereus and Thaumas, "Sea Wonder." Like Proteus, whose parents were not named in myth, Phorkys and Nereus had the power to change shape, which Nereus used in wrestling the hero Hercules. Proteus similarly fought the hero Menelaos, who changed to a lion, a serpent, a leopard, a pig, water and a tree. Kerényi and Burkert both theorize that Phorkys, Nereus and Proteus all referred to the same shape-changing sea god, who co-ruled the waves before Poseidon's advent.

Of Tethys and Oceanus's daughters the Oceanids, Callirhoe and Amphiro were goddesses of the sea's flux; Plexaura and Galaxaura, of wind and calm; Thoe and Okyrhoe, of speed and mobility; Petraia of the rocks, Calypso of the sheltering cave, Prymno of the ship's stern. The rest of the Oceanids were also sea-goddesses. Oceanid Doris, Nereus's wife, is mother by him of the 50 Nereids.

As part of their reverie on the ocean, Greek poets named each Nereid: names such as Glauke, "the sea-green"; Cymothoe "the wave-swift"; Lysianassa, "the redeeming mistress"; Menippe, "the courageous mare." Amphitrite, whose hand in marriage conferred sea-sovereignty on Poseidon, is called both a Nereid and an Oceanid.

Another Nereid was Thetis, also called Tethys, a mermaid and clearly an avatar of her grandmother. She had an oracular shrine among the Etruscans, and as Robert Graves notes in The Greek Myths she comforted the smith-god Hephaistos when his mother Hera threw him off Olympus. Zeus considered marrying Thetis, but an oracle said she would bear a son greater than his father. So Thetis married the mortal Peleus and gave birth to Achilles, hero of the Trojan war, but not before showing her sea-nature. When Peleus captured her, she went through a metamorphosis like those of her father and uncle. The Thessalians worshiped her son Achilles as "Ruler of the Black Sea," according to Burkert.

Kerényi calls Amphitrite and Thetis two names or aspects of the original mistress of the foaming, storming waves. By Poseidon, Amphitrite had many children, the most visible in myth the island-goddess Rhodos, of Rhodes, and horn-bearing Triton, described by Kerényi as a satyr of the sea, rapist of young women and men.

Phorkys, Amphitrite's uncle, likewise had a brood of sea-children by his wife Keto, "Sea Monster," including the half-woman, half-serpent Echidne. Echidne married the half-serpent Typhon; Graves notes Typhon was also named as husband of Delphyne, the dragon Apollo conquered at Delphi.

Sea-ruling, however, did not fall all in one family. Rhea's consorts the Telchines, who had their own oceanic aspects, had a sea-goddess sister Halia. Her sons by Poseidon, driven mad, raped her. In response, she threw herself into the sea, becoming Leukothea, the white mermaid goddess who lent the sailor Odysseus her veil to avoid shipwreck. Boetians worshiped a sea-god Glaukos, son of Cretan Minos and Pasiphae.