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The Spada Pantalica

Spada means 'Great Army' in Persian. The Spada Pantalica is the overall global movement that promotes the pantothalia or common flourishing of life on Earth.

The Spada is made up of many distinct Kara ('People's Army')- or organised movements . Each Kara would likely have its own noia (consciousness/identity) with a specific 'daena' (world-view or religion). Some of these may be explicitly Mithraic in character, but people of other religious identities can also be part of the Spada Pantalica within their own kara.

Mithraists imagine King Cyrus the Great (or 'his son') returning back to this world as the leader of the modern Spada Pantalica.

How can we play our part in the Spada Pantalica?

1. Build up the internal strength of a specific kara (organised unit of the spada) by advancing its:
i) Metaphysics/Ideology/Religion
ii) Technical understanding of the world and cause and effect.
iii) Wisdom about living well and creating a good-functioning society
iii) Solidarity within a corpus and between corpores
iv) Practical skills and capabilities
v) Set up our own systems of living and communication etc

2. Attract new people to your kara
i) By providing an attractive story that inspires
ii) By showing up the evil of the tyrants
iii) By getting our message out to people - especially those who are already dissatisfied but can't make sense of their dissatisfaction.

3. Attend to the need for defence including 'offensive defence' - where we degrade the operational effectiveness of the tyrant's army (the Azorda) - so that its attacks on us are weakened.
This requires detailed and accurate knowledge of how the Azorda operates, plus the motivation and ability to make the necessary interventions.

NB1 A Social Agathist should be careful to distinguish between an army as a process and the people whose actions support the army - who are 'in' the army. A Social Agathist should try to respect the dignity of all people including those who are doing evil whether unknowingly (which is the most common case) or knowingly. It is very tempting to think that 'we' are the good people in the Spada Pantalica (the life-furthering army) and 'they' are the bad people in the Azorda (tyrant horde) , however the 'they' could be our friends and relatives and the same person might be supporting both the Spada and the Azorda in different ways at the same time.

NB2 When Mithraists say Cyrus is returning to lead the Spada Pantalica they are not saying that he will act in exactly the same way this time as he did in his first coming. Rather we are saying that he has the right spirit to take on what is a new task today. Indeed we may even consider that he made mistakes in his first coming, but that he has learned from experience and will do better this time. Mithraists may in any case talk of the 'Son of Cyrus' - meaning someone in the lineage of Cyrus who is taking on the character of Cyrus, but who will act with the same instincts and motivation as Cyrus, but not necessarily in an identical fashion. A Mithraist might imagine Cyrus (or 'Son of Cyrus') as filled with the spirit of Mithras and being an incarnation or avatar of Mithras. However Cyrus has an appeal beyond any single religion - both as evidenced by his toleration and promotion of the different religions of his empire - and his continuing good name among Christians and Jews. As far as I know he is not objectionable to other main religions such as Islam or Buddhism.

November 2021, Amended November 2024 and Mar25