Volume I of Minnesotum Mare ClarumThe American Dream of Freedom and Justice

"In the beauty of the lilies Christ was born across the sea, With a glory in His bosom that transfigures you and me: As He died to make men holy, let us die to make men free" - Julia Ward Howe

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Book I - Minnesota on the Map

“Stephanus! Wake up!”

“Wh-what?,” stammered Stephanus coming out of a dream.

“Awaken!”

“Who are you?” he asked.

“I am a spirit. And I am here to show you your future,” came the answer.

“But why? And how can you show me my future?

“It is my will,” answered the Spirit.

“Alright. What do you want to show me?”

“I want to show you a distant land on a distant shore.”

“Shore? You mean our Mare Nostrum or some inland lake?”

Stephanus knew that the Mediterranean (which in Latin is Mare Nostrum meaning 'our sea') was very big, and he had heard talk of ancient stories of places far from his city.

“I don't mean Mare Nostrum.”

“But then what?” Stephanus was confused.

“Don't you remember your dream when I woke you?”

The dream was still in his memory and Stephanus ventured to recall.

“I remember a far, far place as if in another world, with many lakes. The name was in a strange tongue. And it sounded like an echo, or a poem. I think the name was Minnesotum…Minnesotum, Mare Clarum.”

“Does that make sense? It's, it's not clear to me right now.”

“That's right!” said the Spirit. “Your Mare Nostrum is not clear, but the distant bodies of water will be clear. They will be fresh water.”

“Fresh water? You mean from springs and rivers?”

“No, this fresh water will come from gigantic pieces of ice from the top of the world.”

Now Stephanus’s head was spinning like a giant planet. “Gigantic pieces of ice? I-I can't imagine!"

“That’s alright,” came the answer. “You don't need to. I will make it so.”

Life in Athens

Stephanus lived in Athens in the early years of our Lord in 5 A.D. The Greek youth Stephanus was speaking Latin because Athens had now been part of the Roman Republic—and Empire--for 150 years.

And now even the Spirit was speaking Latin! The world was indeed changing rapidly. Stephanus lives in an Athenian oikos built by his father, whose name Nikias in Greek means “Victory.”

The Fall and Rise of a Republic

But sadly the Athenians had lost their government to the Romans and were now governed by another republic—the Roman Republic which had in turn been overthrown by powerful generals who--unopposed by any civilians--proclaimed Rome was now an Empire. Dreams of freedom had been lost.

The Romans defeated an exhausted Athens at the Battle of Corinth in 150 B.C. ("Before Christ", who had just been born five short years ago and was now walking the earth, attracting a lot of attention). Yet in this time the family has a slave, Greek, named Theron, sold to them as a slave by the victor ruler Romans.

The Nikias family lives near the Aegean Sea, and mother Theano manages the small family’s household, including securing all the water they need.

Nikias isn’t a soldier, he’s a teacher. He’s teaching the new math in a Greek private school. His city-state Athens, the leader of all Greece, had decided to make war to drive off the Romans. Although it turned out badly for them, the idea of a republic was taken by the Romans themselves so there’s that.

Actually, Theron, the family’s slave had been teaching Stephanus since he was a child. Theron taught Stephanus the basics of reading and writing—in both Latin and Greek—and arithmetic (the three R’s) and discussed with him moral and ethical questions. Theron’s a trusted member of the family.

And so it was that Stephanus told his dream about Minnesotum, Mare Clarum to Theron and they both sat for a moment, wondering….

The Other Side

Novus Orbis

Far away and unknown to Stephanus or his father—or seemingly to anybody—there were distant shores, and a special place. A magical place in the center of what would become North America. A placed called Minnesotum, Mare Clarum--full of clear, fresh water, as American Indians would describe it.

And what a story it was.

Minnesotum

The beginning was the end.

Not only the world of men, but ALL LIFE, was mercilessly wiped out, ground down and pushed along, and into bodies of water.

Over the course of many centuries huge mile-high masses of ice and snow visited major population centers of what is today Minnesota and eradicated everything—scouring out rivers and streams, and giving the area Hennepin/Anoka Counties, home of Minneapolis; Ramsey/Dakota Counties, home of St. Paul (the famous Mississippi river boat city); Washington County, home of what would be Stillwater on the St. Croix, birthplace of Minnesota Territory; Stearns County of St. Cloud; and St. Louis County, home of an inland seafaring city of Duluth. Into this fertile region the giant ice scoured a tabula rasa, a clean slate onto which the history of the new world would be etched.

Duluth would be set upon the Great Lake Superior (a body of water so monstrously huge and endless it exudes a foreboding, silent presence if you happen upon it at night if you happen to be a landlubber.) Somehow, magically, all the major cities in Minnesotum Mare Clarum had to be crafted by glaciers. But first, all people and all life had to be ended--by a giant polar reach from the top of the world.

While far away from the terrific intruders life carried on, all that was left behind by the abominable snow and ice was defaced land—and the great Great Lakes (Lake Superior, and to the east, Lake Michigan, Lake Huron, Lake Erie—stretching all the way to New York and Lake Ontario.)

These great new waters were not lakes so much as a collection of new oceans joining the North Atlantic with this new gigantic waterway. And ending way down in Minnesotum Mare Clarum. New plains had been graded by a fantastically huge grader never seen in North America before, a plane which created vast new lands for new forests and new farms. But not before more richness was dropped by the abominable ice.

For Minnesota Mare Clarum, the snowy visitors left lakes and rivers.

Life of a Dream and a New Fellowship

Stephanus’s ancient dream, born long before he was conceived, lasts forever. The cauldron into which Rome fell was followed by a contest for the West and dreams of what lay beyond as men would come to venture across the endless sea.

The spirit had spoken of a land of the mighty Mississippi River, left behind by the Minnesota glaciers. And, through a long and winding road after those cataclysmic snows and glaciers, men at last did return to the land envisioned, Minnesotum Mare Clarum. The heart of this storied land was a river, called the Mississippi, known to generations as the four-eyed river.

And so it was that a glorious expedition in 1832 A.D., a fellowship of seekers of the source, made an arduous voyage to the very origin of that vast glacial flow that--gathering water and power along the way-- fills the Gulf of America (which Columbus's leader Amerigo Vespucci would discover and whom that immense body of water--over half the size Mare Nostrum itself--would be named after, in 2025). To that vast gulf, future voyages from the Old World of Stephanus would evenually come, even to the fabled Minnesota Mare Clarum and men from a place called Europe would actually visit the New World Stephanus had been shown in his dream.

The Indian School

Schoolcraft was the teacher’s name. Today we might call him Indiana Jones. A leader, and a teacher like Stephanus’s father Nikia, and a true explorer. Accompanying him were native American Indians, for after many centuries, they came to possess a deep knowledge of the landscape, life systems, and natural resources of the Mississippi Region. They were key to the Minnesota Fellowship including the American explorers like Schoolcraft and Joseph Nicollet.

This included the guide for the Schoolcraft’s quest, Ozawindib, the Ojibway (Chippewa) guide, who spoke Ojibway. Along the way Schoolcraft and his explorers interacted with all the other American Indian tribes they met, including Dakota in Minnesota and Ho-Chunk in Wisconsin (Winnebago).

In 1832 A.D. Schoolcraft’s Itasca Fellowship located and discovered the sources of this storied work of nature, the Four-Eyed River. He identified Minnesota’s Lake Itasca as the River's true source. Schoolcraft had a background in classical studies—including the very Latin and Greek the slave Theron had taught to Stephanus and his family. The clever scholar even invented a brand-new name for the Great River Source, ‘Itasca.’ The source of the Mississippi is named after "veritas" (truth) and "caput" (head)--meaning "true head" of the Great River. It announced Minnesota to the world before we were even a territory or could vote in Congress.

This invention of Schoolcraft’s School preserved the knowledge of the ancient lost dream of Minnesotum Mare Clarum hope—the freedom Stephanus and Theron sought.

Through it all Latin--considered a universal language--was still being used in the 19th century! In fact an Italian man called Columbus, from another center of trade on the Mare Nostrum like Stephanus, was still speaking Latin while chasing down a way to get to India in the 15th Century. In 1477, before he set sail for Central America in 1492, he visited the farm Ingjaldshvöll in the island land of Iceland. Still in Stephanus’s new language of Latin. Fifteen hundred years after Stephanus, Columbus stayed the winter at that farm before he made his famous voyage to meet the Indians of North America.

Book II – The Voice of God

Και άκουσα φωνή από τον ουρανό, σαν τον ήχο πολλών υδάτων και σαν τον ήχο μιας δυνατής βροντής». Αποκάλυψη 14:2

"And I heard a voice from heaven, like the sound of many waters and like the sound of loud thunder." Revelation 14:2.

Stephanus and Theron began their class one sunny Greek day under Roman rule. The sun glinted off the surface of the Aegean Sea out the window. The sea air seemed free if a little salty.

Theron the family slave asked his student Stephanus if there were any moral topics the student wanted to discuss today.

“I keep remembering that dream I had where the spirit showed me Minnesotum, Mare Clarum,” Stephanus answered thoughtfully.

“Is that a moral topic?” asked Theron.

“Well, the spirit talked about the clear waters, not the salty waters, but a rush of clear waters left behind by huge sheets of ice, sky high. And I’m wondering if he could have meant a world free of slavery, and of these Romans everywhere,” he answered Theron, looking about and out the windows.

Theron was silent for a moment. Slavery was something he rarely talked about, or thought about. Romans prided themselves in seeking an enlightened, civilized and free world for humankind. And he knew they engaged in a more enlightened slavery, because it was needed. They relied on slavery to run their empire, including their military and police operations and to produce their wealth.

But he did not know about this dream of Minnesotum, Mare Clarum. “I don’t know,” he answered. “I don’t know if such a world can exist. Can the new world be truly free? Without slavery?” Soon in the Old World Stephanus and Theron lived in explorers would begin to look for a “new world”, which is where Minnesota lay. After the forces of Spain (the Iberian peninsula already conquered by the Romans), would be defeated by the British navy (the island land not yet conquered by Rome), English Kings would plot to develop the New World in colonies on the East Coast of America.

“I cannot see into the future of the dream,” said Stephanus after considering the question. “I have heard some astounding things coming out of Judea, in Capernaum, though. A terrible attack on children by rulers trying to suppress any ideas about any “new world.” Unbelievable barbarism by the Roman agents in crushing rebellions by the Jews, who no longer govern themselves either.” “Right, just like Greeks no longer govern in our home” thought Theron to himself.

“The Roman system of laws is one thing for Roman citizens, and another thing for us, the Greeks,” offered Theron. “And the same thing applies to the Jews in Judea. Ever since they were conquered by Alexander they have not been able to live under their own laws. And now they’re ruled by the Romans, and the Jewish Herod Antipas, as the tetrarch of Galilee installed by Rome.”

“But now there is a challenge to that arrangement and that led to the slaughter of all babies under two years old. Because Herod feared a Jewish prophecy that a peacemaker and savior would be born there in Bethlehem.”

“Your dream, Stephanus, appears to be our best hope. But how can it be”?

The Spirit said “Because it is my will.”

That night at supper, Stephanus asked his father Nikea about it.

“Why do we have slaves, father? I mean why do so many Greeks have slaves? And now, why are so many Greeks slaves? If slaves could vote would things be different?”

Normally Nikea and Theano didn’t like such subjects at the dinner table. But Stephanus had appeared troubled for the last few days and Theano had overheard some of Theron’s lessons. So finally Stephanus’s father Nikea spoke up.

“Well, son, just like you are not yet able to vote in the Ecclesiastic elections, slaves cannot vote because voting is based on a certain degree of knowledge and education, and qualifications. I myself am only allowed to vote for the Ecclesia, our principal assembly for Athens and that’s because I’m a free male and completed Athenian military training. But I can’t vote beyond that.

“Theron being a slave, he cannot vote, because the right to vote is for the well-being and good governance of our city state, big issues for the good of the whole.”

“Has Theron been talking with you about slavery?” He pressed Stephanus.

There was an uncomfortable silence. Stephanus saw his father differently somehow. Then Theano said “Theron’s father was free when he was living in Judea.”

Stephanus answered, “Well, I awakened from a dream the other night when a spirit showed me a different way of living. It was in a far-off land called Minnesotum Mare Clarum carved out by great sheets of ice and rushes of water. And I wondered what it would be like, and talked about moral and ethical issues in my class with Theron.

Turning to Theano, Nikea asked her “What did you say about Theron’s father?”

“He was captured as a slave in Judea.”

Theano didn’t know about Jesus even after he was born, but she knew about the Jews and their uprising against the Macedonians, they had a different notion of law, freedom and justice than Alexander and now different than the Roman emperors and their officials.

She recited a passage from Isaiah, that touched her. “When the poor and needy seek water, and there is none, and their tongue faileth for thirst, I the Lord will hear them, I the God Israel with not forsake them.

“I will open rivers in high places, and fountains in the midst of the valleys: I will make the wilderness a pool of water, and the dry lands springs of water. I will set in the desert the fir tree, and the pine, and the box tree together: That they may see, and know, and consider, and understand together, that the hand of the Lord hath done this, and the Holy One of Israel hath created it.”

Stephanus and Nikea both listened intently to Theano reciting, enthralled. They knew how hard Theano had to work, as all the women of Athens households, to fetch the water. Did water come from God? Greeks and Romans had not thought much of that, they had many Gods and not one God of water, or of Creation, that was a mystery to them.

Well, we are definitely the poor and needy compared to the great empire, but we have the same needs as they do of their great aqueducts that we must slave on.

Theano was also thinking, how hard it is to carry the water from the Aegean Sea when we also carry an unborn child. But God hears us. I wonder what he will create for us?

Book III - The End of Slavery

“Slavery is ended! Slavery is ended! Praise Jesus slavery is ended!”

Stephanus had a strange premonition as he drifted off to sleep. “Boy, he thought, seeing the future really messes up your sleep!” Probably indigestion from that discussion about slavery at supper time, he mused.

The voice Stephanus had heard was another youth, this one a Swedish youth named Magnus. Magnus Carlsson lived in the Swedish coastal area of Malmo in 1350 A.D. Sweden too had been tempered by massive glacial monstrosities at the same time Minnesotum Mare Clarum had been, and those monstrous visitors shaped Malmo, and also carved out the farmland of Marstrand.

Astrid, the cousin of Magnus lived in Marstrand, about 180 miles away by horseback and boat, on a piece of land her family farmed. Their uncle had been freed from slavery. Astrid Carlssen still celebrated and when she visited Malmo to study at the university she talked with Magnus.

“It seems that in such an imperfect, wild world, that such a beautiful perfect thing can still happen,” referring to the courageous action of King Magnus IV ending slavery for all Christians in Sweden and Norway.

“Someday I think the reason for this miracle will become more clear to us all,” answered Magnus. “The King was following the word of Jesus. Maybe the only who can save us from our slavery is the Man who saved us from all our sins.” Astrid was impressed with the intelligence and seriousness of his response.

Malmo, a coastal city in eastern Sweden relied on trade for its free and prosperous lifestyle. Vikings used the port. The city engaged in a lot trade with the Hanseatic League, a loose confederation for trade and defense based out of Northern Germany. Herring was big business.

There was still slavery. But in 1335 the king, Magnus IV had declared that those born to Christian families could no longer be held as thralls. Centuries later, this would be important again, as these Christians would be allowed to emigrate to a place they called Amerika, where the fabulous Minnesotum Mare Clarum would be. In 1335 Christians abolished slavery in both Sweden and Norway, and also of Finnish slaves.

Like Moses, Good King Magnus was named as Lawgiver. However, the laws he gave were received from Jesus Christ, of the New Testament, while Moses was of the Old Testament and received law directly from Father God. Magnus was changing Sweden and Norway's laws to reflect Christianity. Both Moses and Magnus had a great impact on the world and on Minnesotum. In the end it would be Minnesotum Mare Clarum who abolished slavery in a new nation called the United States of America, driven by this same Christian impetus and rejection of the sin of slavery.

Yet after Christ many people who followed him would be persecuted, killed and yes, enslaved. But along the way his followers in Sweden, Norway and Minnesota found the way to abolish it. Unlike the ancient Athenians, this dream--of freedom from slavery, would not perish from the Earth, but would take root in Minnesotum, Mare Clarum.

“You know, Astrid, Jesus was betrayed to the Cross for 30 pieces of silver. That was the typical cost for “buying” a slave. But Jesus defeated that bargain by rising again from the grave. He saves us from our sin, including enslaving other people.” Magnus was thinking of that dream of freedom and justice. Slavery and tyranny were still out there.

The fight against slavery

"He has sounded forth the trumpet that shall never call retreat; He is sifting out the hearts of men before his judgment-seat: Oh! be swift, my soul, to answer Him! be jubilant, my feet! Our God is marching on." - Julia Ward Howe

The end of slavery was the beginning of freedom. Slavery was being attacked in different ways since at least 600 B.C. in Athens when Solon ended debtor slavery in Greece. Other forms of slavery persisted. In 873 A.D. Pope John VIII declared the enslavement of fellow Christians a sin and commanded their release. Freedom was breaking out all over.

Magnus Carlsson, like all Swedes, was Catholic. Vikings were the first Catholics to visit Minnesota, long before Columbus stumbled into the Caribbean Islands. A Viking runic site was discovered near a town that would be called Alexandria (ironically after the tyrant who ended early efforts of self-rule in the Mare Nostrum), in Minnesota reached by glaciers during the last Ice Age. There the Laurentide ice sheet advanced and retreated, leaving a drumlin field formed by glacial till, by the Wadena lobe of the glacier. The cleansing power of the glacier wiped away the sinful past and unleashed the voice of God.

From Minnesota and Wisconsin arose the Presidency of Abraham Lincoln, who would Proclaim the end of Slavery during the United States Civil War and whose victory would result in amending the U.S. Constitution to prohibit slavery. Lincoln rose to power in nearby Illinois and Wisconsin, and newly-minted Minnesotans buoyed him into office. Lincoln's proclamation of the need to abolish slavery was followed by U.S. Army troops, the Union's first regiments to defend America. And they came from the newly-admitted State of Minnesota, sent to Lincoln and resulting in the rescue of the Union and the ending of slavery.

Galatia

King Magnus was on the freedom road. Another Greek, named Titus, traveled with a follower of Christ. They went into what is today Turkey. At the time, in 50 A.D., decades after the wrenching discussion between Stephanus and Therano on the Aegean Sea coast. Paul, the Christ follower talked about slavery and freedom. So while there was widespread slavery throughout Galatia—there was also this new idea of freedom.

Titus may well have been in Athens, part of the Hellenistic environment created by Alexander as he conquered lands in the Mediterranean world. He was converted by Paul’s ministry.

Slavery was part of Mosaic Law, which was fulfilled as Christ, who by now had lived and been executed by Rome and Jewish religious leaders. But who had resurrected and converted Paul as he was on the road hunting down and killing Christ’s believers. Slavery indeed. Things looked dark for the hopes and dreams of Stephanus and Theron and for which they hoped. For Minnesota—Minnesotum Mare Clarum.

Book IV – Galatia

Freedom Road

At the northeast corner of the Roman Empire there lay a Roman province where the early Christian Church took shape. Called “Galatia” and addressed by Paul in Galatians, it contains what is today called Ankara, in Turkey. It really contains the origin of freedom humankind understands today. The early dreams, or assumptions of the Athenians and the doomed Roman Republic were impossible. No one really knew why.

But the solution to ending slavery yearned for by Therano and dreamed of by Stephanus near the Aegean Sea lay not so much in the clear waters of Minnesota, but in the abolition of slavery throughout the world. Slavery that was, as Paul wrote, in the Mosaic Law itself. The idea of freedom was not to be found in any of man’s laws--even divinely inspired. Freedom lay only in salvation through Grace, which is in Christ Jesus. Meaning, until we are free from sin, we are slaves to sin, because we are born into it. And so it was that King Magnus IV of Sweden led his followers--through grace--down Freedom Road, even to Minnesotum Mare Clarum.

Leviticus

More than 1,000 years before Stephanus in Athens, the Jews were released from slavery in Egypt. Yet in the Mosaic Code slavery under that law was permitted and expected. Under Moses law the taking of slaves was encouraged “from the nations around you.” Male and female slaves are to come from the nations around you; from them you may buy slaves. You may also buy some of the temporary residents living among you and members of their clans born in your country, and they will become your property. You can bequeath them to your children as inherited property and can make them slaves for life. Leviticus 25:44-46.

This would not do. But predictably slavery continued in the Macedonian and Roman worlds. Perhaps it was for this reason that religious faith was a subject of great contention under Macedonian and Roman rule in Judea in the years up to the Birth of Christ.

“but you must not rule over your fellow Israelites ruthlessly...."

Just as King Magnus IV abolished slavery in Sweden and Norway for those born to Christian families, the early Mosaic laws forbade only treating ruthlessly only fellow members of the tribes of Israel but not non Jews.

Astrid asked Magnus Carlssen why the abolition of slavery only extended to those born to a Christian family.

“Because treating each other kindly and with respect is a teaching of Christianity,” he answered. "And the great teacher Jesus not only showed us the way, but came to bring us Salvation from sin to which we are by nature enslaved, blocking us from seeking the road to freedom he gave us. For we lost our way after the Fall.”

Because we are enslaved by sin, it is the law that enslaves, indeed that binds us. Even generations of judges would claim to be bound to render certain decisions because those precedents were to be found in the writing and practices of laws in emerging (and surviving) societies in the West.

Paul wrote: “If righteousness were through the law, then Christ died for no purpose.” In fact, it was Jesus Christ Himself who gave the Holy Spirit to his followers and Paul writes that the Spirit was received not by any works of the law but by hearing Jesus with faith. And indeed, it was Jesus, sold out for thirty pieces of silver--the legal price for a slave--who has led the way on Freedom Road followed into Minnesotum Mare Clarum and a new world.

Paul wrote how slavery had appeared in the world after the Fall from grace in the Garden of Eden:

“Now before faith came, we were held captive under the law, imprisoned until the coming faith would be revealed. So then, the law was our guardian until Christ came, in order that we might be justified by faith. But now that faith has come, we are no longer under a guardian, for in Christ Jesus you are all sons of God, through faith.”

And yet the world fought for slavery--a faithless world. A slave was a chattel, owned by another. But by putting on Christ through baptism:

There is neither Jew nor Greek, there is neither slave nor free, there is no male and female, for you are all one in Christ Jesus. And if you are Christ's, then you are Abraham's offspring, heirs according to promise.

Through the new Christian law, legislated by King Magnus, who was once a slave was now an heir, regardless of gender, male or female, and regardless of legal status. But that came not through an empty faith but through faith in the God of Abraham. And the newcomer Minnesota Scandinavians decided during the Presidency of Abraham Lincoln, the God of that Abraham wanted slavery gone, replaced with the “guardianship” of the secular law that sanctioned ownership of the laws.

That legal change allowed freedom, and a big change to government. But the law still supported slavery to and through the law to continue.

The Nation of Minnesota

The young nation did not wait until the formation of Minnesota to begin the task. In 1777 Vermont, an independent republic, became the first U.S. territory to abolish slavery outright in its constitution. In 1780 Pennsylvania passed a “gradual” abolition law, freeing children born to enslaved mothers after a certain date. And a series of court cases in Massachusetts in 1783 interpreted its new state constitution as incompatible with slavery.

Creation of Minnesota

The Northwest Ordinance created part of Minnesota (east of the Mississippi River), and included what are now Ohio, Indiana, Illinois (land of Lincoln), Michigan, Wisconsin. In 1803 Congress designated this area as the Northwest Territory. This federal Act forbade slavery. Six years later the western part, West of the Mississippi was added to the United States by the Louisiana Purchase.

In New York and New Jersey gradual emancipation laws, through the late 18th and early 19th centuries eventually ended slavery within those borders.

Then in 1850 came the first great settlement of the sons of Magnus, Norwegians began in the Midwest, including Wisconsin, where Lincoln was nominated President. And in 1851 the Swedes themselves, were invited as settlers. As a result of this, these hardy Scandinavians launched the election of Lincoln and the Republican Party, forged to free all from slavery. When Abraham's victory threatened dissolution of the nation itself, because of opposition to that freedom, Minnesota's Scandinavians sent the first two regiments to defend freedom. Would slavery have continued in North America without Minnesota? It seems it would have and the Union would have faltered.

Not long after that, in the far west, on the Minnesota border, there lived a beautiful Norwegian lass named Mary, who was swept off her feet by a man of Welsh descent and bore a daughter named Betty. She was so taken by the bold story of the Minnesota troops who dove into the fight for American freedom that she memorized the entire short Gettysburg Address of Abraham Lincoln himself.

After two more wars, World Wars, she met another man, Douglas, from Texas by way of Mexico, who started as a professional luchador and had a career as a matador in the bullrings of Mexico and Central America. After entering and being discharged from the U.S. military for World War II, he came out and met Mary in the Midwest (previously the Northwest) and married her and they settled in the Twin Cities carved out by the Ice Age glaciers.

To the end of her life at over 100 years old, Mary could recite from memory that Lincoln Address, and in particular that new birth of freedom under God and Jesus:

“So that government of the people, by the people for the people shall not perish from the Earth.”

The ancient tale of Stephanus and Theron, the slave still had that dream—not lost—of freedom and justice, in Minnesotum Mare Clarum. The American dream in the land visited by Amerigo Vespucci.

The End of Volume I

Volume II of Minnesotum Mare Clarum The American Dream of Freedom and Justice

Book I – Moving On

“Stephanus! Wake up!”

It was Theron.

“I’ve fixed you a good breakfast,” he continued. “Ever since your father passed away you seem unsettled,” Theron observed with concern.

No matter what we do, the Ecclesia doesn’t seem to be making any headway or direction, Stephanus had been complaining.

“My father shared his concerns for years now that representative government is not doing what the great Athenian thinkers dreamed about, like the shared humanity of all people and the importance of living in harmony with nature and reason as the Stoics urged, or Cicero's works on natural law, justice, and the responsibilities of rulers that we thought were influential ideas about governance and ethics in the Roman world—before the deluge.”

“Yes, before the red flood of Roman slaves on the Mare Nostra” thought Theron quietly.

“And now the Romans are going nuts driving the development of new slave communities as far as civilization is known.” Stephanus slammed the cookie-cutter plans that installed Roman authorities all the way West to the edge of the known world. “Is this what the world will become? Self-proclaimed 'deities' served by a massive slave colony?”

The Library

“I heard some interesting things about Alexandria and their wonderful library,” offered Theron.

“Well I heard about Philo,” responded Stephanus. “He’s a Jewish philosopher from Alexandria who blends Greek philosophy with Jewish theology. Not only the ethical responsibilities of individuals within a community interest him, also the relationship between divine law and governance,” he began to come alive again. Still something about a pantheon bothered him.

“Well with some of my inheritance from my father and connections with Greek merchants I’ve made at the Ecclesia I think we can go to Alexandria and see if we can find our way back from Roman hegemony,” he decided.

Slavery Builds

As the monster of “ruthless treatment” of others outside one’s tribe--or “slavery”, in the words of Leviticus--grew and expanded dramatically throughout the Mediterranean, the family of Stephanus and their slave Theron was tossed about like a boat at sea. As Stephanus grew up—and began voting in the Athens Ecclesia and took on new roles in trade and in leadership—his faithful friend and slave Theron grew with him, carrying on the family tradition which began in Judea and drastically changed as his father lost his freedom on the other edge of Mare Nostrum on a battlefield in Judea.

Then his father Nikea passed away after a full and enjoyable career as a teacher and thinker, Stephanus and Theron decided to travel further into the Hellenistic world, crossing the Mare Nostrum into Egypt.

Book II - Mare Nostrum Sea of Slavery and Salvation

Sailing for Freedom

The Mediterranean was not clear water like the Mare Clarum in Minnesota. But Stephanus and Theron were about to launch across its salty waters to cross over on their quest for the freedom promised by some thinkers and moralists. The waters were dangerous and notoriously rough, unlike the beautiful calm rivers and lakes that literally served as the Mare Clarum transit system for Minnesota.

The ship lay in the waters of the harbor of Piraeus as the two boarded, with Theron working with the crew to load the belongings of the household for the move to North Africa. The salt-water of Mare Nostrum was calm in the Athens harbor and the loading was not dangerous. The two were part of a couple dozen passengers on the summer voyage, expected to take about seven days, but possibly longer as the Mare Nostrum could become treacherous on the long voyage to the great Alexandria harbor and the safety (safe from Mare Nostrum) of the Pharos Lighthouse (one of the Seven Wonders of the Ancient World). The Stephanus entourage would be using the commercial harbor, not the military one.

Yet the merchant cargo vessel was armed, although the route in Mare Nostrum was patrolled by the Roman navy. This is because the vessel was carrying a cargo that included slaves. And also because a passenger could literally be carried away a slave when the vessel was attacked by pirates (who also used the name 'Mare Nostrum', 'our sea'! This boat carried armed guards hired for the voyage and they carried swords and bows.

Despite centuries of empty promises, Athens, Greece, even before defeat by Rome, was a thriving center of slavery, yes chattel slavery. A report (Atlas of the Greek World 1980) on the 5th century Before Christ tells that:

“Chattel slavery, the buying and selling of human beings like a dog or a piece of furniture, is supposed to have entered the Greek world through Chios, but the people of Chios claimed that the slaves they bought and sold were non-Greek. Neither war nor piracy nor even slave raiding could have maintained effectively the systematic slavery of the 5th C B.C. without organized trading and organized markets, and the importance of Chios may have been great.

“In Athens, slaves’ nationalities were mixed. Aristotle observes that in any area where slaves were numerous, a racial mixture among them was a useful deterrent against slave revolution.

“The greatest concentration of slaves was at Laurion in the silver mines, where there were 20,000 to 30,000, nearly the equivalent of the full population of Athens, half that of a really large city of this period like Miletos.”

Stephanus was still looking around the harbor as the ship was loaded. The wine-colored shallow waters of the placid harbor showed a few ripples as other merchants came and left. There was a deceptive breeze. Looking toward the shore Stephanus noticed Theron talking with one of the slaves loading the ship. It looked like he knew the man.

Stephanus continued with his thoughts. “We couldn’t get rid of slavery and operate this harbor or this vessel,” he noticed. “Well, maybe when get out on the open sea it will clear my mind. I’m thrilled to leave the horrific history of Athens slavery behind and head out for the distant shores the spirit promised me years ago.

Theron came over to him. “Joudaios,” he said.

"What is Joudaios?” asked Stephanus. “Joudaios,” Theron repeated matter of factly. “Joudaios is the name of my uncle! They gave him that name in Judea after he was captured in war! And he’s here, on this ship!”

“How interesting” thought Stephanus. “I wonder if he knows anything about this Jesus I keep hearing about. It’s been 20 years since he was crucified, for 30 pieces of silver, yet his followers still think he’s alive.

Shortly after Christ was killed by the Romans and rival Jews, the early Christian community in Jerusalem began to form, about 30 A.D. They were often referred to as the "Jerusalem Church."

“Joudaios confirmed what I had heard in Athens, about the Jerusalem Church and how they are spreading the Gospel of Jesus, even among the slaves!” said Theron. “One of the actual apostles of Jesus, Mark, has been in Alexandria for more than five years,” said Theron. “He is the first bishop of Alexandria and the founder of the Christian Church of Alexandria.”

“I had heard of that church from business associates said Theron. It is a bustlng Christian community,” said Stephanus.

Book II - Freedom, Slavery and the Open Sea

The ship, the Eos, broke away from the harbor and on to the open sea. It’s name referred to the Greek goddess of dawn. While the name referred to the fact that ships often set sail at first light (fortunately, Stephanus mused, this on had not), Stephanus, a kind of spiritual man, was drawn to the connection with the promise of freedom, from slavery, and also freedom from darkness. "We are setting sail for the dawn of freedom," said Stephanus to his friend Theron.

But for now, the crew put their heads down and ran up a whole set of sails, to catch the wind and set sail for the 980 miles (850 in nautical miles). Slaves (those who were crew members) and free men alike focused their efforts on getting the ship up and running on the main sea. Skill was needed not only for speed and safety in reaching their destination Alexandria harbor, but to avoid other ships—especially the pirates who would board and steal and carrying the voyagers off into slavery.

The Eos had a modest crew of ten. Six of them worked on deck to run the ship. Of these four were North African. Of these, by today’s standards in the United States two of them could classify as black people. One of these was a free, and paid member hired on the crew. He was an Egyptian. The other was a slave from Tunisia. Three other slaves worked on deck.

On the Mare Nostrum in the time of the early Jerusalem Church, the concept of race did not exist. the Roman, Greek, and North African crew members working the Eos on the Alexandria voyage were, first, crew members, and next identified by their ethnicity, culture, or place of origin.

Daybreak in Alexandria

“Stephanus wake up!” It was Joudaios, the uncle of Theron.

“Yes, get up” chimed in Theron. “Look at that lighthouse! We’re in Africa. The lighthouse, called Pharos, is one of the Seven Wonders of the Ancient World. Alexandria, Africa was a Roman outpost. It had been annexed in 30 B.C. with the defeat of Antony and Cleopatra.

Latin, which would continue to be spoken in Minnesotum Mare Clarum, was the official language, Greek was still used since the city’s founding in 331 B.C. and still served as the primary language for commerce, scholarship and everyday communication. And it was the language in which the coming of Jesus to the Earth was written in the entire New Testament.

So without the Gospels the great Alexandria would have been just a stale battleground of the ancients. As it was, the story would transform all of the Europe and reach Minnesota near Alexandria. Minnesotum Mare Clarum, and leave behind the Kensington Rune on top of the glacier-sculpted New World. And the Nordics would descend on Minnesota and extend freedom, and a government that abolished slavery.

So Theron’s lessons were very useful to Stephanus.

The city Stephanus and Theron were sailing into was a mix of Greek, Egyptian, Roman and Phoenician influences. It would serve as an intellectual battleground of sorts as Christianity and Judaism continued to clash. In the end Mark the Evangelist, the immediate Disciple of Jesus Himself, would fall, at the hands of a pagan mob, in 73 A.D. in Alexandria.

“This is where our language came from,” said Joudaios, who had traveled around Mare Nostrum for years now since his capture in Judea. He had become a world traveler of sorts in the mini-world of that sea, and was never quite sure what port he was in. But he had become aware that he was following in the sea routes of the famous Phoenicians of what is today called Lebanon, and the famous cities of Tyre and Sidon.

“Yes,” he continued, “the Phoenicians invented a whole new alphabet system, instead of pictures (which we call cuneiform writing). We Greeks took them and added a few vowels to make ellinika! Brilliant. It made language much more useful as our world expanded with such explosive growth.”

“Yes, and then the Romans came and took everything we had,” added Stephanus dourly.

“True, but our world is growing in truly glorious ways, shedding the light of the empire everywhere,” Joudaios pushed back. “Why I’ve seen things…”

“This lighthouse is truly amazing,” Stephanus broke in.

“It really is,” agreed Joudaios. “I’ve seen some bad ports I wouldn’t want to approach in broad daylight. This lighthouse not only helps us see the other boats, but actually works as a beacon for ships just passing by in the night.”

“You seem to really like sailing,” said the slave nephew Theron.

“Yes I have to say it is thrilling,” conceded Joudaios. “But to be honest there’s nothing like reaching a Mare Nostrum port and getting my feet on dry land.”

He seemed to think to himself for awhile. Then Joudaios surprised the travelers. “I tried to escape. I made my way to a small vessel and signed on. Sailing for freedom was wonderful, the open sea and the glorious morning sun. But I was captured, and put in prison by the Roman authorities.”

“I met some interesting people there.” Joudaios observed the surprised looks of the travelers. Then he explained, “Judea has been a crucible of ideas for centuries. Very close to the old Phoenician centers. But since the Macedonians arrived, the Israelites have fought them and resisted their immoral pagan ideas. And a certain figure out of rural Capernaum, a settlement called Bethlehem, came with very new ideas, and the idea of freedom. It’s h I rfr to when I said our world is growing in glorious ways. Not the slaves and their masters.”

“So you believe he is God, as his followers claimed?” asked Theron.

“I met them in the prisons and the ships and I believe they’re coming here to Alexandria. They’re bringing ideas of freedom, of equality of all peoples, and of transforming lives and the world. It’s as powerful as the God they proclaim,” Joudaios answered seriously.

“Yes, I sometimes dreamed of things like this in Athens,” answered Stephanus after hearing all this. “I wonder if there can be a new, much different world far from this Mare Nostrum,” he said vaguely, looking a bit at Theron and not venturing to talk about Minnesotum, Mare Nostrum.

“We actually came here seeking the ideas of freedom the Greek dreamers used to talk about before the brutal, “golden age” of Athens,” he concluded.

The three ended their fortunate discussion as the crew needed to prepare to sail into and dock in the Alexandria port.

###

Thank you for inviting me, and I’m glad I could make it, glad to be discussing this critical issue of Minnesota agriculture, a source of immense pride, actually, our farming, I’ve worked in several private and public companies helping to market your great work—Cargill, Pillsbury and General Mills, and you are a treasure of the entire state. And we need the farmer back on the flag, and the Indian too, and regarding that I am calling for clemency for Leonard Peltier based on the record that has come out.

I met Amy Klobuchar who has represented Minnesota on the Senate Agriculture Committee since soon after she was first elected in 2006, and in fact I was there when she walked through the precinct caucus where my friend who headed Migrants in Action sent me as a proxy for health reasons, and I had just been told I should get him off the voting delegation because he was a man, and DFL rules limit men. But I first met her as she attended a government meeting I had at the University of Minnesota with those active migrants, the Chicano activists, and talked with her about her dad, the very talented writer Jim Klobuchar (I had delivered his papers). And Amy confirmed this at the FarmFest debate where she sad right next to me.

Now Amy is very serious about her politics, and she is passionate about some things, especially abortion, which from the farmer’s point of view is bad, it hurts the families which are very important to a farm family, and it literally kills your market with 65 million souls lost since Roe. But Amy doesn’t come from a farming family, but rather an iron ore family. Very different.