Gaslighting your own son

From The New York Times, January 24, 1999, here:

The bare-bones account of Nietzsche's life begins not so much with his birth in 1844 as with the death of his father five years later. Carl Nietzsche was a Lutheran pastor who died of ''softening of the brain,'' which sounds very like a dementia caused by the syphilitic infection that killed his son. Responding to his mother's urgings, Nietzsche became a child prodigy, and he also began to suffer from the nightmares and headaches that plagued him all his life.

What brought him to the state of ardent discipleship in which he met Wagner in 1868 is obscure. He had known about Wagner from his teens, but had disliked the music even while he admired the mythic themes of operas like ''Tristan und Isolde'' and tried himself to write an opera based on Nordic legends. It is clearer what he admired once he had become intoxicated: Wagner promised to re-create for the Germans the cultural climate in which the classical Greek world had created the tragedies of Aeschylus. It was this that ''The Birth of Tragedy'' spelled out in 1872 to its astonished readers.

The origin of "The Greatest Gaslighting Story Ever Told"

The priests the Levites, and all the tribe of Levi, shall have no part nor inheritance with Israel: they shall eat the offerings of the LORD made by fire, and his inheritance. Therefore shall they have no inheritance among their brethren: the LORD is their inheritance, as he hath said unto them. And this shall be the priest's due from the people, from them that offer a sacrifice, whether it be ox or sheep; and they shall give unto the priest the shoulder, and the two cheeks, and the maw. The firstfruit also of thy corn, of thy wine, and of thine oil, and the first of the fleece of thy sheep, shalt thou give him. For the LORD thy God hath chosen him out of all thy tribes, to stand to minister in the name of the LORD, him and his sons for ever.

-- Deuteronomy 18:1ff.

And the priests the sons of Levi shall come near; for them the LORD thy God hath chosen to minister unto him, and to bless in the name of the LORD; and by their word shall every controversy and every stroke be tried:

-- Deuteronomy 21:5

Neither a ram, a lamb, or a man: If there is no sacrifice, there will be nothing for the parasites to eat at dinner

And the priest shall make an atonement for him with the ram of the trespass offering before the LORD for his sin which he hath done: and the sin which he hath done shall be forgiven him. -- Leviticus 19:22

And he shall bring his trespass offering unto the LORD for his sin which he hath sinned, a female from the flock, a lamb or a kid of the goats, for a sin offering; and the priest shall make an atonement for him concerning his sin. And if he be not able to bring a lamb, then he shall bring for his trespass, which he hath committed, two turtledoves, or two young pigeons, unto the LORD; one for a sin offering, and the other for a burnt offering. -- Leviticus 5:6f.

The next day John seeth Jesus coming unto him, and saith, Behold the Lamb of God, which taketh away the sin of the world. -- John 1:29

But this man, after he had offered one sacrifice for sins for ever, sat down on the right hand of God; -- Hebrews 10:12

Deliver me from bloodguiltiness, O God, thou God of my salvation: and my tongue shall sing aloud of thy righteousness. O Lord, open thou my lips; and my mouth shall shew forth thy praise. For thou desirest not sacrifice; else would I give it: thou delightest not in burnt offering. The sacrifices of God are a broken spirit: a broken and a contrite heart, O God, thou wilt not despise. -- Psalm 51:14ff.

For I desired mercy, and not sacrifice; and the knowledge of God more than burnt offerings. -- Hosea 6:6

But go ye and learn what that meaneth, I will have mercy, and not sacrifice: for I am not come to call the righteous, but sinners to repentance. -- Matthew 9:13

But if ye had known what this meaneth, I will have mercy, and not sacrifice, ye would not have condemned the guiltless. -- Matthew 12:7

News reports about allegorical interpretation notwithstanding, the importance of Fortunatianus of Aquileia's commentary lies elsewhere

Fortunatianus' formerly lost commentary on the Gospels, discussed here by a translator in the project, will be important not primarily for its contributions to allegorical interpretation, but more for its witness to the so-called Western text of the Gospels.

The allegorical stuff is just all headline BS, designed to raise the profile for an audience no longer educated enough to appreciate the real significance.

The so-called "Vetus Latina" represents the Latin of the New Testament before Jerome got a hold of it, and Fortunatianus' commentary's "Old Latin" readings, as distinct from other text types which have been associated with Alexandria in Egypt and Antioch in Syria, should do much to improve our understanding of the Western text heretofore typically associated with the Greek and Latin Codex Bezae.

Joel Osteen in Houston is having quite the little PR problem

From the story here:

“Do you think Joel Osteen realizes he is basically the innkeeper in the Christmas story right now,” one Twitter user quipped. “Joel Osteen doesn’t want all those wet, homeless Houstonians destroying the upholstery in his fake Christian grift church scheme,” chimed in another.

Pensacola Christian College terminates General Lee statue sentry

The hysteria spreads.

I guess this means no date either, huh?

The atheist Revilo P. Oliver, one of the formative ideologues of modern white nationalism

Author of "Marxmanship in Dallas"

If he were only here to hear that. I think he would have replied that the ideology was all the Christians', the Jews', etc.

From the discussion, here:

There are some white nationalist groups that specifically speak out against religion, especially Christianity, as being harmful to the white race. Each of these groups articulates that position differently. Revilo Oliver, one of the formative ideologues of modern white nationalism, was deeply atheist in his views, as is Tom Metzger of White Aryan Resistance. William Pierce, the founder of the National Alliance (a white nationalist group), felt Christianity was an alien ideology and he wanted to promote “cosmotheism” — the idea that the races are “evolving” and the white race will eventually become like gods. Ben Klassen, founder of the Church of the Creator, was doing the same. He determined his ideology — called “Creativity,” a pantheistic religion with the white race at the center — should be the white man’s religion. And Richard Spencer (president of the National Policy Institute, a white nationalist think tank) is anti-religious. But it is difficult to give a straight answer to what anti-religious white nationalists believe because what I see is a very fluid, changing dynamic.

The New Abstinence: Wait Until 8th Grade

"Parents Sign Pledge To Wait Until 8th Grade To Give Kids Smartphones"

If God had meant us to be united as the ideal way of living, he would not have confounded our language

And Jehovah came down to see the city and the tower, which the children of men builded. And Jehovah said, Behold, they are one people, and they have all one language; and this is what they begin to do: and now nothing will be withholden from them, which they purpose to do. Come, let us go down, and there confound their language, that they may not understand one another's speech. So Jehovah scattered them abroad from thence upon the face of all the earth: and they left off building the city.

-- Genesis 11:5ff.

The ideal of unity in John and Paul is of a different inspiration entirely.

Peace through violence: Christianity has made the ground fertile for the ideas of antifa

CNN has since deleted "peace through violence" after discovering its "mistake"

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

For Christ himself has brought peace to us. He united Jews and Gentiles into one people when, in his own body on the cross, he broke down the wall of hostility that separated us. He did this by ending the system of law with its commandments and regulations. He made peace between Jews and Gentiles by creating in himself one new people from the two groups. Together as one body, Christ reconciled both groups to God by means of his death on the cross, and our hostility toward each other was put to death.

-- Ephesians 2:14ff.

I guess HuffPo thinks the Jewish cabal running Trump can get down to business now

Racism angers Jesus Racist, Ethnic Nationalist God-King of the Jews?

Ideologue Russell Moore thinks so, puttin' on his blinders, in WaPo predictably:

"[T]he picture we get of Jesus in the Gospels is how relatively calm he is. ... Jesus spoke gently with those on the outside of the people of God. ... The religious leaders and those keeping the worship of God from the nations had something in common: Both were seeking to keep people away from the kingdom of God, people they didn’t feel were worthy of it. ... [E]thnic nationalism is not just a deviant social movement. It is the same old idolatry of the flesh, the human being seeking to deify his own flesh and blood as God." 

If only it were that simple.

These twelve Jesus sent out, instructing them, Go nowhere among the Gentiles and enter no town of the Samaritans, but go rather to the lost sheep of the house of Israel. And proclaim as you go, saying, The kingdom of heaven is at hand.

-- Matthew 10:5ff.

But he answered and said, I am not sent but unto the lost sheep of the house of Israel.

-- Matthew 15:24

Don't give what is sacred to dogs. Don't throw your pearls to pigs! They will trample the pearls, then turn and attack you.

-- Matthew 7:6

But he answered and said [to the woman of Canaan], It is not meet to take the children's bread, and to cast it to dogs.

-- Matthew 15:26

And when you pray, do not heap up empty phrases as the Gentiles do, for they think that they will be heard for their many words. Do not be like them . . ..

-- Matthew 6:7f.

The Jews answered him, saying, For a good work we stone thee not; but for blasphemy; and because that thou, being a man, makest thyself God.

-- John 10:33

The ideology of a terrible simplifier, the Editor in Chief of Christianity Today, would have meant tens of millions more dead in World War Two

Here in "The Use of Nuclear Weapons Is Inherently Evil":

[W]e stand in that stream of Christians who find no justification for the use of nuclear weapons. Under no circumstances would the use of nuclear arms be justified. Our reasons hinge on the sixth commandment, “You shall not murder,” and the indiscriminate nature of nuclear weapons. Simply put, they end up killing a great many more civilians than combatants, and therefore, their use violates one cardinal principle of just war: proportionality. Sadly, every war will entail the death of civilians, but as one summary of just war theory put it, “The violence in a just war must be proportional to the casualties suffered.” Thus, “innocent civilians must never be the target of war; soldiers always avoid killing civilians.” ...

This is not the place to argue the fine points, but it is the place to reiterate that we stand in that stream of Christians who find no justification for the use of nuclear weapons. This is not a politically radical view. Some of the most conservative of Christians and politicians, including evangelist Billy Graham, have also concluded that nuclear weapons are inherently evil or, to not put too fine a point on it, “totally irrational, totally inhumane, good for nothing but killing, possibly destructive of life on earth and civilization” (Ronald Reagan).


This is, as the kids say these days, a hot mess.

It begs the question of innocence for one thing, which God has found little of in the world, and cares as little for. Just last week a famous anti-nuclear weapons advocate, a survivor of Hiroshima, admitted she and her classmates were being trained as decoders for the Japanese army, in preparation for the expected American invasion.

The Bible is full of instances of the indiscriminate killing of innocents, civilian populations targeted for destruction by none other than Yahweh himself. The possession of the promised land was predicated on this very idea:

And thou shalt consume all the people which the LORD thy God shall deliver thee; thine eye shall have no pity upon them: neither shalt thou serve their gods; for that will be a snare unto thee. -- Deuteronomy 7:16.

It was murder on a grand scale, mass murder.

Perhaps the most famous of these stories is about how Saul was actually removed from being king, to be replaced by David the ancestor of Jesus, precisely because he disobeyed God by NOT destroying the Amalekites utterly: 

Now go and smite Amalek, and utterly destroy all that they have, and spare them not; but slay both man and woman, infant and suckling, ox and sheep, camel and ass. ... And he took Agag the king of the Amalekites alive, and utterly destroyed all the people with the edge of the sword. But Saul and the people spared Agag, and the best of the sheep, and of the oxen, and of the fatlings, and the lambs, and all that was good, and would not utterly destroy them: but every thing that was vile and refuse, that they destroyed utterly. -- 1 Samuel 15:3, 8f.

Evangelicals often explain away such evidence by appealing to dispensational theology, which provides a convenient way of making self-contradictory evidence from the Bible of null effect. That was a different dispensation they will say, this is now. There is bad relativism, and then there is divine relativism. And yet they insist "He changeth not".

Well, things mundane haven't changed much, either. American Evangelicals are content to imagine God still blesses America despite a slaughter of over 60 million innocents through abortion since 1973, right under their noses. But somehow we're supposed to get exercised over the possibility that Donald Trump might fry up millions of North Koreans. If proportionality mattered, the death of every man, woman and child in North Korea today wouldn't add up to 45% of the slaughter that's occurred right here in the land of the free, the home of the brave.

Many Evangelicals being Democrats over the years voted for this abortion status quo. Are we supposed to believe that was not politically radical, just because that's the way it was? Ronald Reagan said something sweeping about nuclear weapons, so just because he said it it's not radical? The is-is-ought fallacy never had it so good.

Citing Ronald Reagan as an authority for your position isn't always a good idea, but it is telling.

Ronald Reagan couldn't imagine that signing abortion legislation in California when he was governor would lead to an explosion of abortions from the hundreds to an average of over 100,000 by the time he left office. Just as he couldn't imagine that his defense build up to defeat Soviet communism wouldn't be paid for after all by spending cuts. Instead it was paid for by borrowing, becoming part of the national debt of $20 trillion which we cannot repay. Just as he couldn't imagine his immigration amnesty would act like a magnet for an explosion of illegal immigration into the United States. Just as he couldn't imagine that signing EMTALA requiring hospitals to treat all comers would eventually lead to Obamacare.

Ronald Reagan couldn't imagine a lot of things.

The reason for this is because Ronald Reagan was an ideologue, specifically a libertarian ideologue. Not a dangerous ideologue like Lenin, but an ideologue nonetheless. That's what made Reagan the enemy of communism, because communism is a rival ideology. That was a good thing, because we all agree it's better to have a produce department brimming with variety instead of one which sells everything in theory but has only cucumbers.

But ideologues often get carried away by the primacy of their principles, which come to act like blinders on their eyes, rendering them incapable of seeing things they might need to see. The ideologue becomes like a pack horse which goes down the road, undistracted from pursuing its single, certain purpose. It can see nothing but what lies ahead, forgetting what lies behind, pressing onward toward its simple calling. This is fine, until the driver falls asleep, or the cargo comes loose and falls away.

It shouldn't surprise us that Ronald Reagan's views on nuclear weapons became ideological, or that Christians of a certain sort would be attracted to those views, but those views are blind. The use of the atomic bomb in World War Two not only ended the war, but dramatically lowered the number of expected casualties from a conventional assault on Japan, on both sides. Tens of millions did not die who would have. Not only that, the fact that America developed the bomb before the Germans could meant the US homeland was spared the fate we inflicted on Japan.

Not developing the bomb in order to save America from moral culpability for killing millions might well have destroyed millions in America. We will never know for sure.

But not using the bomb in order to save America from moral culpability definitely would have destroyed much more of America, and all of Japan.

Those millions who did not die would insist that things weren't so simple. And they still aren't.

Some say life is good, some say the fundamental problem

Such we find they are, as can controul

The servile actions of our wav'ring soul,

Can fright, can alter, or can chain the will;

Their ills all built on life, that fundamental ill.

-- Matthew Prior

ABC News "Analyst" Matthew Dowd has obviously risen to the level of his incompetence

Pace Kurt Andersen in The Atlantic, Democrats believe in loopy 2:1 over Republicans, and "independents" aren't far behind

Kurt Andersen in "How America Lost its Mind" contends that only one third of Americans are solidly reality-based and come mostly from the Democrat left, not the "loopy" GOP:

By my reckoning, the solidly reality-based are a minority, maybe a third of us but almost certainly fewer than half. ... Only a third strongly disbelieve in telepathy and ghosts. Two-thirds of Americans believe that “angels and demons are active in the world.” ... A quarter of Americans believe in witches. Remarkably, the same fraction, or maybe less, believes that the Bible consists mainly of legends and fables—the same proportion that believes U.S. officials were complicit in the 9/11 attacks. ... In the late 1960s and ’70s, the reality-based left more or less won: retreat from Vietnam, civil-rights and environmental-protection laws, increasing legal and cultural equality for women, legal abortion, Keynesian economics triumphant. ... [W]e’re splitting into two different cultures, we in reality-based America—whether the blue part or the smaller red part . . ..


Kurt has it exactly backwards (I'm shocked, shocked I tell you). It's your average Democrat or independent who is more likely to believe in loopy, not Republicans.

Democrats believe in reincarnation, yoga, astrology, spiritual energy and the evil eye 176 to 87 for Republicans in a Pew Research study from 2009, a ratio of 2:1. So-called independents aren't far behind at 163 to 87, for a ratio of 1.87:1.

And when it comes to being in touch with the dead, ghosts and fortune tellers, the story is similar. Democrats outstrip Republicans 163 to 81, also a ratio of 2:1. Independents beat Republicans 143 to 81, for a ratio of 1.76:1.

Apart from the greater prevalence of wacky beliefs among Democrats and independents generally, the results indicate that the much-vaunted independents are much more like the Democrats than they care to admit.

If someone really wanted to understand what accounts for America's turn toward the insane, go there.

I compiled the data above from the Pew findings, found here.

Naive American charismatics fantasize about taking over the Seven Mountains while China plans to dominate everything by 2025

"Plans like Made in China 2025 and their implementation are putting the two economies on a path of separation rather than integration in critical commercial areas."

-- The normally somnolent US Chamber of Commerce, here

Today's must-reading comes from the pen of Robert P. Seawright: "The Apocalypse is (Always) Nigh"

Here.

It's too long to do justice to here, so I'll simply say he's a keen observer of human nature and you won't want to miss his observations on apocalyptic religion and stock market crash prognostication.

Oh the times they are decayin'

 

 

Time sensibly all things impairs;

Our fathers have been worse than theirs,

And we than ours; next age will see

A race more profligate than we,

With all the pains we take,

have skill enough to be.

-- Wentworth Dillon, 4th Earl of Roscommon

INC Christianity: Paulinism's Achilles' heel is disintegrating Protestantism into a Corinthian chaos of self-appointed profiteering prophets and apostles

And its locus is libertarian America, which worships at the altar of the unencumbered individual, fruitful ground for those who claim they are imitating the self-appointed apostle who was "not sent from men nor through the agency of man, but [directly] through Jesus Christ and God the Father, who raised Him from the dead" (Galatians 1:1).

From the story here:

These apostles are able to access a lot more money, because they are operating with a pay-for-service model, rather than relying on people’s donations and their goodwill. Congregations bend over backwards to keep people happy and keep the butts in the seats; people don’t have to pay unless they feel like it. But this is a completely different financial model, and it tends to generate much more money. ...

It’s all sort of self-appointed. Leaders in the [movement] would say that people are recognized as apostles because of the influence that they have—not only over your own congregation but over other leaders. But there’s definitely a good deal of self-appointing going on. Peter Wagner, a leader in the New Apostolic Reformation movement, referred to himself as a “super apostle,” because he was influential with a bunch of other apostles. ...

[T]he INC movement is explicitly post-millennial. In their minds, God’s kingdom can come to earth before Christ returns—and, by the way, it will be in America. There is this interesting combination of America first, Americans as God’s chosen people, and a romantic vision of God working it out through the people he chooses. /end

You happily put up with whatever anyone tells you, even if they preach a different Jesus than the one we preach, or a different kind of Spirit than the one you received, or a different kind of gospel than the one you believed. But I don't consider myself inferior in any way to these "super apostles" who teach such things. ... But I will continue doing what I have always done [paying my own way, not charging for the gospel]. This will undercut those who are looking for an opportunity to boast that their work is just like ours. These people are false apostles. They are deceitful workers who disguise themselves as apostles of Christ.

-- 2 Corinthians 11:4f., 12f.

The bloody Canucks have been content for 14 months not to criminalize all forms of bestiality

If the heat doesn't drive you crazy, the cold will.

Story here.

Imprudent fervour is the fault common to both belief and unbelief

 

One would fancy that infidels would be exempt from that single fault, which seems to grow out of the imprudent fervours of religion; but so it is, that infidelity is propagated with as much fierceness and contention, as if the safety of mankind depended upon it.

-- Joseph Addison's Spectator

The Arminian Roger Olson, hostile to Augustine, does not believe God is "infinite" and is therefore outside the catholic faith

Here, already from a young age, which ought to tell you something (enthusiasm dies hard):

I long ago rejected the notion that God is “infinite.” I rejected it when I first heard it articulated which was probably in some seminary class. I immediately thought that the concept itself was beyond comprehension (except perhaps in mathematics) and that attributing it to God led away from thinking of God as personal, present, involved, loving and able to be affected by us. With Brightman (who I only learned about later) I thought of that attribute of God in traditional theology as an inappropriate expansion of the concept of God brought into Christian thought through philosophy, not the Bible.

Compare the Athanasian Creed:

And the catholic faith is this: That we worship one God in Trinity, and Trinity in Unity; Neither confounding the Persons; nor dividing the Essence. For there is one Person of the Father; another of the Son; and another of the Holy Ghost. But the Godhead of the Father, of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost, is all one; the Glory equal, the Majesty coeternal. Such as the Father is; such is the Son; and such is the Holy Ghost. The Father uncreated; the Son uncreated; and the Holy Ghost uncreated. The Father unlimited; the Son unlimited; and the Holy Ghost unlimited. The Father eternal; the Son eternal; and the Holy Ghost eternal. And yet they are not three eternals; but one eternal. As also there are not three uncreated; nor three infinites, but one uncreated; and one infinite [et unus immensus]. 

Hilary of Poitiers, On the Councils (composed in 359), thought it was a mark of safety to employ expansion in theology in order to avoid error (unlike Olson), and that the profusion of definitions appropriately mimics the boundlessness of God:

The infinite and boundless [infinitus et immensus] God cannot be made comprehensible by a few words of human speech. Brevity often misleads both learner and teacher, and a concentrated discourse either causes a subject not to be understood, or spoils the meaning of an argument where a thing is hinted at, and is not proved by full demonstration. The bishops fully understood this, and therefore have used for the purpose of teaching many definitions and a profusion of words that the ordinary understanding might find no difficulty, but that their hearers might be saturated with the truth thus differently expressed, and that in treating of divine things these adequate and manifold definitions might leave no room for danger or obscurity.

The reductionism of the Reformation is a contrary tendency.