Amos's River of Justice

Our Season of Creation

  • Reading Time: 6 minutes

    Lately I’ve been thinking about the temptations of Jesus in the wilderness.  He fasted for 40 days and was hungry, and during this time in the wilderness the devil tempted him three times.  The first temptation had to do with Jesus’s hunger. The second temptation, as I understand it, was connected with the human need for validation in the eyes of other people.  But the third temptation was something else altogether.  Verses 8 and 9 imply that the ‘devil’ has the power to bestow ‘the kingdoms of the world, and the glory of them,’ if we will only worship him.  Jesus’s resistance to these temptations represents the justice of the rupture.

    And when the tempter came to him, he said, If thou be the Son of God, command that these stones be made bread.

    But he answered and said, It is written, Man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word that proceedeth out of the mouth of God.

    Then the devil taketh him up into the holy city, and setteth him on a pinnacle of the temple,

    And saith unto him, If thou be the Son of God, cast thyself down: for it is written, He shall give his angels charge concerning thee: and in their hands they shall bear thee up, lest at any time thou dash thy foot against a stone.

    Jesus said unto him, It is written again, Thou shalt not tempt the Lord thy God.

    Again, the devil taketh him up into an exceeding high mountain, and sheweth him all the kingdoms of the world, and the glory of them:

    And saith unto him, All these things will I give thee, if thou wilt fall down and worship me.

    Then saith Jesus unto him, Get thee hence, Satan: for it is written Thou shalt worship the Lord thy God, and him only shalt thou serve. (Matthew 4: 1-10) 

    The Prince of This World

    In recent years I’ve begun to think of the earth as surrounded by a closed system and ruled by a sort of cosmic tyranny.  I imagine at the head of this cosmic order sits the ‘prince of this world.’  You can call him whatever you want–Matthew called him ‘the devil’.  It follows that when Jesus resisted the devil’s temptations, he was waging a cosmic resistance.  According to an article by J. Leavitt Pearl, this cosmic resistance represents the justice of the rupture.  If I understand it correctly, this resistance remains the central drama of mortal life.  It is the fundamental necessity of the entire human race–the only path to freedom.

    Who is the God Worshipped by Both Christians and Jews?

    I believe that this is what the Christians mean when they say they worship the same god that the Jews worship.  There is a cosmic order that wields power over the Earth and her inhabitants, and there is another power directly opposed to the cosmic order.  (I am not talking about Jewish or Christian esotericism and the loosely related secret societies that capitulate to the cosmic order.)

    The Boundaries Between These Figures Don’t Seem Clear Enough

    Unfortunately, the major religions of our day have taken on much of the lore of the cosmic order.  This happened quite early in Christianity’s journey through history.  Also unfortunate is the fact that the so-called Christian ‘reformers’ failed to recognize this problem.  This is doubly unfortunate because it is not only the central problem of religion.  It is the central problem of mortal existence.  The failure to recognize this fact taints everything, including the current political environment.

    Cosmic Resistance and the Baptism of Jesus

    J. Leavitt Pearl sees this cosmic resistance in the scripture that tells about Jesus’s baptism.

    John the baptizer appeared in the wilderness, proclaiming a baptism of repentance for the forgiveness of sins.  And people from the whole Judean countryside and all the people of Jerusalem were going out to him, and were baptized by him in the river Jordan, confessing their sins.  Now John was clothed with camel’s hair, with a leather belt around his waist, and he ate locusts and wild honey.  He proclaimed, “The one who is more powerful than I is coming after me; I am not worthy to stoop down and untie the thong of his sandals.  I have baptized you with water; but he will baptize you with the Holy spirit.”  In those days Jesus came from Nazareth of Galilee and was baptized by John in the Jordan.  And just as he was coming up out of the water, he saw the heavens torn apart and the Spirit descending like a dove on him.  And a voice came from heaven, “You are my Son, the Beloved; with you I am well pleased.” (Mark 1:4-11, as quoted by J. Leavitt Pearl)

    For Pearl the key phrase is, “He saw the heavens torn apart.”  It is too easy for most of us to pass over this phrase. Perhaps we overlook it because it comes with the dramatic description of the Spirit descending like a dove. And this was accompanied by a voice coming from heaven and saying to Jesus, “You are my Son, the Beloved; with you I am well pleased.”  According to Pearl, “The tearing open of the cosmic order is the descent of the True Justice of God. The empires of this world rule under the banner of ‘order and justice,’ but this type of ‘justice’ is always only violence and oppression.”

    The Gospel of Mark is an Apocalyptic Text

    Pearl calls the gospel of Mark an apocalyptic text and describes John as an apocalyptic figure. But his focus is on what happened in the heavens.  “…the tearing apart of the heavens is a locus classicus of apocalyptic imagery, found in both…Isaiah 64:1, and…Revelation 6:14.”  (The heavens of the cosmic order are not exactly friendly to this tearing apart.)

    The heavens of the Biblical world were not only a spiritual domain and the home of God and other spiritual beings. “They were equally the heavens above–the skies, the vault across which the stars moved in their predictable patterns.  In other words, the heavens were the domain of order and regularity. Despite their extreme complexity, their interpretation could be mastered by a skilled astrologist.”

    When this domain is torn open with Jesus’s baptism, it indicates a “rupture, a radical inbreaking of something genuinely new.  But, this arrival of the new necessarily takes the form of a disruption of the delicate harmony of the cosmos, epitomized by the heavens.”

    The Justice of the Whole and the Justice of the Rupture

    Pearl goes on to explain that these two opposing forces–the cosmic order and the order represented by Jesus–represent two kinds of justice. One is the Justice of the whole. The other is the Justice of the rupture.  To further explain his argument, he cites Slavoj Zizek’s book, The Fragile Absolute, and Zizek’s description of the cosmic order represented by paganism:

    Against the ‘pagan notions of cosmic Justice and Balance,’ wherein ‘an individual is ‘good’ when he acts in accordance with his special place in the social edifice…and Evil occurs when some particular strata or individuals are no longer satisfied with this place, ‘Zizek contrasts Christianity, which ‘asserts as the highest act precisely what pagan wisdom condemns as the source of evil: the gesture of separation, of drawing the line, of clinging to an element that disturbs the balance of the All’ (118-121, as quoted by Pearl)

    One Kind of Justice is Pagan

    Pearl tells us that the pagan as described by Zizek is no different from Edmund Burke in his Reflection on the Revolution in France, or white moderates who condemned Martin Luther King Jr.’s tactics as ‘extremist,’ or Fox News pundits who bemoaned the ‘disruption’ of Black Lives Matter protests.  They call these revolutionary tactics ‘evil’ because they disrupt a stable order.

    Martin Heidegger’s Definition of Justice Contrasted with Jacques Derrida

    Pearl admits that the rupture represents a risk but, alternatively, the path of supposed safety leads to the Justice of the whole. This is exemplified by the philosopher Martin Heidegger who interprets ‘justice’ as ‘Compliance–that is harmonization.’  In fact, Heidegger elevates compliance and harmony to ontological principles.  The writings of Heidegger were influential in the rise of Nazism.

    Pearl contrasts Heidegger’s justice with an alternative account of justice, a justice of the rupture.  For this he cites Jacques Derrida, for whom justice is the domain of the future.

    Justice emerges as a call or a demand for responsibility to the Other.  It cannot be calculated or anticipated, because justice, if there is such a thing, is always a risk, as Derrida notes in, “The Force of Law.” (947)

    Justice in Isaiah and the Book of Revelation

    The prophet Isaiah, (64:1-2), and the Book of Revelation (6:12-15) each describe a similar view of justice as that of Derrida.  It is a justice that casts down the powerful, the oppressors.  It is a justice that destroys the class and caste boundaries that order our world, so that ‘everyone, slave and free’ find themselves on an equal footing.  For John, any social, political, or economic order that is built on oppression, built on the backs of ‘slaves–and human lives’ (Revelation 18:13) is an order that must be torn open.

    My Conclusion and a Warning

    I don’t want to end this article without mentioning Pearl’s examples of the risks involved in the justice of the rupture.  These include the Terror of the French Revolution and the Stalinism that resulted from the October Revolution.  I don’t think any of us are willing to risk such things if we can avoid them, and there are things that must be understood if we want to make these kinds of failure less likely.  But they might occur in spite of our best efforts. The challenge to the cosmic order represented by Jesus’s response to his temptations in the wilderness are central to this understanding.  We must know which order we serve and which order we fight.  Otherwise, failure is almost certain.  The cosmic order stands ever ready to creep in and take over from those who remain unaware.

    In addition, I have learned since publishing this article that Derrida was a Heideggerian. Also there is an older book with the title of Political Theology. It was originally written by Carl Schmitt. Perhaps the website that inspired this article is reworking this concept. Again, caution is advised.

  • Reading Time: 4 minutes

    Please see the update at the end of the article

    Considering the pressures that weigh down the inhabitants of Planet Earth this Christmas season, I think it is important to state the good news first rather than at the end of the article.  (My recommendations for a Russian movie, Stalker, and the Grace Cathedral version of Handel’s Messiah can be found at the end of this article.) The following may not be the good news you were hoping for, but it bodes well for the future: It has recently become apparent that our conversation is developing a recognizable character, substance and direction.  In these times when foundations seems to be crumbling, a new foundation has been forming itself right under our feet.

    I came to this realization after a disturbing conversation with a member of my local Democratic Party in which I discovered that she was completely unaware of the term ‘option for the poor’.  Participants in our conversation will have learned this term from Pope Francis–it is a term used in Catholic social teaching, and it means that “God invites us to care in a special way for those who need the most help.”

    As followers of Christ, we are challenged to make a preferential option for the poor, namely, to create conditions for marginalized voices to be heard, to defend the defenseless, and to assess lifestyles, policies and social institutions in terms of their impact on the poor.  The option for the poor does not mean pitting one group against another, but rather, it calls us to strengthen the whole community by assisting those who are most vulnerable.

    Her obliviousness to this key concept of the conversation was doubly disturbing considering that President-elect Joe Biden, a member of her own party, has been using this term in his speeches.  (Biden would have learned this term directly from Catholic social teaching.)

    In addition to his mention of a preferential option for the poor, President-elect Biden has appointed cabinet members that we can at least hope will be willing and able to manage our land and resources for the support of every American.

    For example, he has appointed Xavier Becerra as Secretary of Health and Human Services; Congresswoman Marcia Fudge as Secretary of Housing and Urban Development; Deb Haaland as Interior Secretary; and Michael Regan as EPA Administrator.  Biden has also created a new cabinet role of Special Presidential Envoy for Climate Change, appointing John Kerry to this role.  We can discuss these nominees later, as well as others that are not as much to our liking, but in this season we can choose to focus on good news and that is what I want to do.

    Biden’s pick for Chair of Council of Economic Advisers, Cecilia Rouse, spoke in the language of the conversation when she said, “We need to be positioned for the economy of the future so that everyone is able to partake in the growth we hope to have.”  Biden’s pick for US Trade Representative, Katherine Tai, also spoke in the language of the conversation when she said, “[Trade] is a means to create more hope and opportunity for people…And it only succeeds when the humanity and dignity of every American–and of all people–lie at the heart of our approach.”

    In addition to the influence of Catholic social teaching, other crucial influences round out the conversation and give it life.  We have welcomed the wisdom of indigenous people in the fight to protect our resources.  Biden’s nomination of Deb Haaland as Interior Secretary is a clear nod to the importance of the Native American contribution to this effort.

    The conversation has also welcomed the influence of socialists and Marxists in our midst (although with some trepidation on my part, mostly due to the fear that it invites extremism in American politics.)   The socialists have patiently explained the necessity of economic theory going forward as well as the importance of the creation of wealth if we’re going to care for everyone in times of crisis.  For my part, I recognize the need for these knowledgable people who can think outside of the economic box.

    We are also grateful for the voices and activism of Black Lives Matter, and the attention that protesters around the world have brought to the problem of racism and police brutality.

    Of course, Bernie Sanders has been a huge influence in the conversation.  Although Sanders was considered a left-leaning candidate for the presidency this is only true by American standards.  All of his policy proposals have a solid place in American politics.

    We are also aware in this conversation of the importance of agricultural policy and the way it affects food and water security.  This has been a concern of Marcia Fudge, who lobbied for the position of Secretary of Agriculture.  She would have shifted the agency’s focus from farming toward hunger.  Agricultural policy is central to climate policy and job security as well as food security, so it is sure to be of interest to progressives in the years to come.

    For me, the realization of the centrality of agricultural policy in global conflicts was the most exhilarating realization of this conversation.  It is so important that it should have at least been acknowledged by the Democratic establishment in the 2016 election, but Biden may be making up for that omission.  It should motivate an immediate change, not only in domestic policy but in foreign policy as well.  It makes the Empire’s foreign adventures seem futile and ridiculous, and for that reason it inspires the imagination and the confidence to envision a new world.

    But this good news is only a beginning.  Americans who face hunger and eviction continue to suffer this Christmas season, so we ask the incoming Biden administration to make them a priority.

    I’ll finish by sharing a movie and Christmas music that I think you will enjoy.  Speaking of our strange times, there is a 1979 movie called Stalker.  Admittedly, you have to pay $3.99 to rent it and also have an Amazon Prime account.  (It may also be on Netflix, but I don’t have a Netflix account so I can’t say for sure.)  The movie is based on a novel by the Strugatsky brothers, Roadside Picnic, and directed by Andrei Tarkovsy.   According to Adam Curtis it was inspired by a sense of unreality in Soviet Russia.

    Those who are not interested in the movie might like this performance of Handel’s Messiah in Grace Cathedral.

    Or, the Hallelujah Chorus from Handel’s Messiah.

    Merry Christmas everyone.

    Update December 25: I believe that the following articles and videos have some bearing on the movie, Stalker, that I recommended at the end of this article, or some bearing on my article in general.

    The Infirmity of Jesus is a Teaching of Christmas

    The Light of Hope Shines Brightest in Darkness

    Twenty-five of the best films on Amazon Prime

    Reading the Hindu and Christian Classics: Why and How Deep Learning Still Matters

    Aruna Chetana

     

     

  • Reading Time: 5 minutes

    America’s political system has been described by Loren Goldner ((Goldner, Herman Melville: Between Charlemagne and the Antemosaic Cosmic Man, Queequeg Publications, New York, NY, 2006)) and others as a Tudor Polity.  The jury is still out on whether this was a positive or negative development.

    The United States’ System Compared to Great Britain and Europe

    Samuel Huntington explains the meaning of America’s Tudor polity in more detail. ((Huntington, Samuel P. “The Change to Change: Modernization, Development, and Politics.” Comparative Politics, vol. 3, no. 3, 1971, pp. 283–322. JSTOR, www.jstor.org/stable/421470. Accessed 20 Oct. 2020.))  Writing in 1966, Huntington praises the American system.  But perhaps he would have a different opinion of it today.  In fact, it’s possible he had reservations in 1966.  On page 412 he says:

    Mass participation goes hand-in-hand with authoritarian control.

    But Huntington is not referring to the United States in the previous quote.

    As in Guinea and Ghana, [authoritarian control] is the twentieth-century weapon of modernizing centralizers against traditional pluralism.

    Instead, Huntington’s article contrasts the evolution of British and European systems, which represent two patterns of modernization, with that of the United States.  He seems to think the United States is the superior system.

    There was a process of political modernization in Europe and Great Britain that involved “rationalized authority, differentiated structure, and mass participation…”  But the American system did not undergo any revolutionary changes; it kept the main elements of the English sixteenth-century constitution.

    The Americans did take the step of increasing participation in politics by social groups throughout society.  They also developed new political institutions–such as political parties and interest associations–to organize this participation.  Unfortunately, mass participation doesn’t necessarily result in equality of political power.  According to Huntington,

    Broadened participation in politics may increase control of the people by the government, as in totalitarian states, or it may increase control of the government by the people, as in some democratic ones. (p. 378)

    Mass Participation Versus Direct Democracy

    Huntington doesn’t explain what he means by ‘mass politics’ but an article by Yoram Gat argues the United States’ system is one of mass politics.  I cite this article because he elaborates on one possible meaning of mass politics.

    Due to the symmetry of its decision making process, mass politics has superficial similarity to democracy – a political system in which political power is distributed equally among the members – since both terms describe situations of equality.  The difference is that mass politics is defined in terms of formal equality while democracy is defined in terms of equality of actual political power.

    This seems to describe our present system more accurately, however Huntington’s approach is important because it focuses on the historical process of modernization.

    The American Colonies Fought Modernization

    According to Huntington,  late medieval and Tudor political ideas, practices, and institutions arrived in the New World with English colonists in the first half of the seventeenth century.  The conflict between the colonists and the British government in the middle of the eighteenth century only reinforced the colonists’ adherence to these ‘traditional’ patterns.

    The breach between colonists and mother country was largely a mutual misunderstanding based, in great part, on the fact of this retention of older ideas in the colonies after parliamentary sovereignty had driven them out in the mother country ((Charles Howard McIlwain, The High Court of Parliament and Its Supremacy, New Haven 1910, p. 386. As quoted by Huntington, p. 382)).

    Huntington concludes that America’s political modernization has been ineffectual and incomplete.

           European and English Monarchs of the Sixteenth Century

    The absolute monarchs of sixteenth century Europe were not reactionaries.  They were actually modernizers who oversaw the transition between medieval and modern politics.  (p. 385)  There were many political theorists at that time who tried to provide more ‘rational’ justifications of absolute sovereignty based on the nature of man and the nature of society.  Thomas Hobbes’s Leviathan, 1651, was a more extreme doctrine of sovereignty than that of Bodin and the Politiques on the Continent.  Bodin and the Politiques looked to the creation of a supreme royal power which would maintain order and constitute a centralized public authority above parties, sects, and groups.

    Hobbes and Filmer represent both the secular and religious versions of the doctrine of sovereignty.  They argued that it was the subject’s absolute duty to obey his king.  Both of them helped political modernization by giving permission for the concentration of authority and the breakdown of the medieval pluralistic political orders.

    Mass participation came much later.  Since the twentieth century authority has been concentrated in either a political party or a popular charismatic leader.  Either one is capable of arousing the masses and challenging traditional sources of authority.

    In terms of modernization, the seventeenth century’s absolute monarch was the functional equivalent of the twentieth century’s monolithic party. (p. 386)

         Parliamentary Sovereignty

    This process also occurred in England with an important difference.  James I tried to follow the Continental pattern of the absolutist monarch but  Conservatives disagreed.  They argued against James I in terms of fundamental law and the traditional diffusion of authority.  However their ideas were already out of date in England.  Their claims for royal absolutism generated counterclaims for parliamentary supremacy.  For example, Hobbes’s and Filmer’s theories of sovereignty provoked Milton’s argument that parliament is above all positive law, whether civil or common.  In short, fundamental law suffered the same fate in England as it had on the Continent but it was replaced by an omnipotent legislature rather than by an absolute monarchy.

         America

    Meanwhile America clung to the old patterns of fundamental law and diffused authority.  Huntington makes a statement here that might seem contradictory given our current political situation.

    The persistence of fundamental-law doctrines went hand in hand with the rejection of sovereignty.  The older ideas of the interplay of society and government and the harmonious balance of the elements of the constitution continued to dominate American political thought.   In England, the ideas of the great Tudor political writers, Smith, Hooker, Coke, ‘were on the way to becoming anachronisms even as they were set down.’  In America, on the other hand, their doctrines prospered, and Hobbes remained irrelevant…The eighteenth-century argument of the colonists with the home country was essentially an argument against the legislative sovereignty of Parliament.

    American Popular Sovereignty is Latent and Passive

    After stating that in America sovereignty was to be lodged in the people, Huntington admits that popular sovereignty is a vague concept. “The voice of the people is as readily identified as is the voice of God.  It is thus a latent, passive, and ultimate authority, not a positive and active one.”

         The Courts

    America’s continuation of the belief in the supremacy of law, as well as its rejection of legislative sovereignty, explains the power of the judicial branch of government in the United States.  In England, the supremacy of the law ended in the civil wars of the seventeenth century.  The result was that English judges could not oppose any points of sovereignty.  However in America, the mixture of judicial and political function remained.

    The judicial power to declare what the law is became the mixed judicial-legislative power to tell the legislature what the law cannot be…The legislative functions of courts in America, as McIlwain argues, are far greater than those in England, ‘because the like tendency was there checked by the growth in the seventeenth century of a new doctrine of parliamentary supremacy.’

    By contrast, American courts are still ‘guided by questions of policy and expediency.’  (p. 394)  This explains the prominent role of lawyers in American politics.

    Conclusion

    Perhaps the most interesting idea brought up by Huntington is that political modernization in Europe and England was driven by the need for change.  Modernization began when the needs of the time met the simultaneous impossibility of change.   It can be argued that today in the United States there is an urgent need for change, including the need to combat climate change and preserve arable land and clean water.  Yet reactionary forces are cooperating with each other to make change impossible.  This is a strong argument for modernization.

     

  • Reading Time: 3 minutes

    I criticized some of Loren Goldner’s statements in a previous post, but now I want to praise his ideas for other reasons.  I appreciate his explanation for why American radicalism differs from European radicalism.

    America’s Unique Connection to the Old Testament

    Americans have a different historical perspective than Europeans.  In Goldner’s words,  we have a different “mythical-historical self-understanding.”  ((Herman Melville: Between Charlemagne and the Antemosaic Cosmic Man, Queequeg Publications, New York, New York, 2006)) This has led to misinterpretations of American politics and political figures.

    Analysts have assumed that both American conservatives and radical socialists lack a “pre-capitalist frame of reference.”  This implies that they don’t have an imagined feudal idyll to look back to or a post-capitalist future to look forward to.  According to this interpretation, it is impossible to see the present as a mere transition from one state to another as Marx did.  But Goldner thinks this “misses something fundamental about America’s mytho-historical self-understanding.  Americans do have a pre-capitalist frame of reference, but it’s not feudal. It’s “in the imagery of Old Testament prophecy, in the fundamental myth of the New Covenant in the wilderness.  It’s in the relationship between Egypt and Israel and Babylon, in the perception of the peoples encountered in the New World as Adamic man in Paradise.”

    In other words, America’s founders didn’t recognize the past of the Holy Roman Empire or Greco-Roman antiquity as being relevant to their experience.  Their model was drawn from the Old Testament.  It comes from a deep identification between early American experience and that of the Jews ‘going out of Egypt’.

    This has had both positive and negative consequences.  The most negative consequence has been the tendency to identify peoples of color as representatives of fallen man. The Europeans also projected the Adamic myth on other peoples, but they had no direct dealings with the ‘primitive’ element as the Americans did.

    Europe’s Myth of the Cosmic King

    [The European myth was] first the myth of the ‘cosmic king’ of the feudal and later absolutist state, culminating in the ‘Sun King’ Louis XIV, and then the pseudo-mythical resurrection of the shattered cosmic king, victim of regicide: the Napoleonic myth.  In Europe, the centralist state haunted the ‘poetry of the past’ of the conservative right, but also, through the phenomenon of Bonapartism with its ambiguous legacy, an important part of the left, far more indeed than Marxists at the time or later cared to concede, particularly when, in the twentieth century, Bonapartism fused with the myth of the ‘Third Rome’ and appeared to many American and Western ‘Ishmaels’ to preside over the first ‘socialist’ state in history.  (pp24)

    This focus on the cosmic king is unique to Goldner and will be examined later.  My focus here is the importance of the Old Testament in America’s mytho-historical ideal.

    The Indo-European Myth

    Goldner mentions additional sources and thinkers that I have used in this blog, for example he cites Melville’s mention of Sir William Jones.  Jones is important to Goldner because in 1780 he demonstrated that Sanskrit was an Indo-European language. (pp 49)  Indian scholars have objected to this claim.  In fact they have objected to the entire Marxist view of India.  But Goldner is trying to situate Melville in a broader historical movement of ideas with which he was obviously acquainted.  To accomplish this Goldner sketches the history of what he calls the myth. 

    This is probably a good place to mention my use of Edward Moor’s book, The Hindu Pantheon.  In previous articles I have discussed Hindu deities as described by Moor without providing his controversial background.  Moor is controversial today because he worked with Sir William Jones in India when India was still a colony of the East India Company.  On the other hand America’s understanding of Hinduism has had a Western bias from the beginning.  Hindu symbolism, or an American interpretation of it, influenced American culture in a negative way when the medical profession adopted of the caduceus of Hermes.  Now back to Goldner.

         Georges Dumezil and the Source of Western Literature

    Since the 1930s, figures such as Georges Dumezil have uncovered a remarkable coherence of myth within the Indo-European cultural sphere, and in world mythology generally.  Dumezil’s work on Indo-Iranian, Greek, Roman and Scandinavian mythology have amply confirmed the quip that ‘the first half of the nineteenth century discovered that all of modern English and French literature derived from German and Scandinavian folktales.  The second half of the nineteenth century discovered that all German and Scandinavian folk tales were derived from Indian mythology.

    For Goldner this illustrates the importance of India and Egypt–not just Athens or Jerusalem–for the origins of science, religion and art, (pp 87,88).  For me it represents another source that I have in common with Goldner–Georges Dumezil.

    All things considered, it was probably natural for Marxism to be part of the progressive conversation after all.  Hopefully we can develop the ability to acknowledge our diversity, discover our similarities, and use this knowledge to build something better–something uniquely American.

     

  • Reading Time: 4 minutes

    The foundation of the ancient Greeks’ project for civilization was their determination to turn the female sex into a subject population.  But there were unintended consequences. Plato’s war on women helped bring about the end of monarchy.

    Philo

    There is evidence that the Greeks were toying with the idea of subjecting women before Plato. But it was Plato who influenced Philo, the Hellenistic Jewish philosopher born in 25 BC. Philo used allegory to harmonize Jewish scripture, mainly the Torah, with Greek philosophy.

    If we were to judge Plato by today’s standards for hate speech we would conclude that he was a hater of women.  However we don’t judge Plato or any other misogynist by that standard.  The world accepts Plato’s animosity toward women because Philo enshrined it in the Bible’s creation story.

    Aristotle

    This story led some religious leaders to conclude that nothing is due women for their role in reproduction. They are merely repaying their debt to God.  This seems to have been the goal of Plato’s student Aristotle who denied women credit for their part in the creation of life.  (This points to the importance of childbearing in the status of women.)

    The suspicion that certain influential people claimed God as a partisan gendered being with the sole aim of ruling will disturb many readers. But for those who merely want to defend biblical religion there is a solution.

    The Bible

    There are three ways to read the story of the Fall of Man: It’s a model for the way society should work; it’s a description of the way things are; or it’s warning or a prediction about a human tendency.  The second and third possibilities are more revealing than Plato could have imagined. In practice, this myth reveals  patriarchal intention.

    Unfortunately, these last two possibilities are never used to interpret the Fall of Man. They are, however, used to interpret other biblical stories.  The Tower of Babel for example is interpreted as an explanation for different languages and a warning against hubris.

    We are told the Fall of Man is a lesson in how things should be. But a literal reading of the story perfectly describes human behavior as it is.

    Customs that Guard Against the Subjection of Women

    It’s likely that human societies have always had some degree of patriarchal authority.  However ancient cultures purposely remedied the disadvantages of women.  For example, according to the biblical creation story, equality between men and women is established in marriage. (I recently discovered that this sentence said ‘inequality between men and women is established in marriage’, which is the opposite of my meaning. Sometimes I suspect my wording is changed without my knowledge.) In ancient times, equality was accomplished through customs honored by the extended family.

    Bride Wealth

    The fundamental understanding of ancient cultures was the value of children (and their mother) to the marriage and to the extended family.  Society acknowledged this in various ways.  One was the custom of bride wealth.   Another was the dowry. (Hardship can lead to a breakdown in this custom. In some parts of the world today the dowry justifies the abuse of women).

    Matrilineal Kinship

    Another custom that has been shown to benefit women and their children is matrilineal kinship.  This is a system in which lineage and inheritance are traced through women.

    The structure of matrilineal kinship systems implies that, relative to patrilineal kinship systems, women have greater support from their own kin groups and husbands have less authority over their wives. 1

    Sara Lowes tested the hypothesis that matrilineal kinship systems reduce spousal cooperation. She found that men and women from matrilineal ethnic groups cooperate less with their spouses in a lab experiment.  However she also found that matrilineal kinship has important benefits for the well-being of women and children.

    The children of matrilineal women are healthier and better educated, and matrilineal women experience less domestic violence and greater autonomy.

    Royal Succession in Egypt

    Matrilineal kinship is not only a remedy for the inequality of women in marriage (Lowes didn’t measure for the effect of bride wealth or bride price), I believe it was the original system for royal succession in Egypt.  Consider the tendency of pharaohs to marry their sisters.

    Marriage to sisters was not a natural part of matrilineal succession.  I believe it was a way for an ambitious pharaoh to escape the limits of matrilineal succession. Dynasties are impossible in a matrilineal system.  The only way around this obstacle would have been for the son of a pharaoh to wed an heiress.

    They obviously considered the daughter of the Pharaoh eligible to inherit royalty from her father, otherwise there would have been no motive for marriage to her brother.  However this would have gone against custom, if not law.   Traditionally, a sister’s offspring (the child of the daughter of the former pharaoh) would not be legally eligible to succeed him.

    This patriarchal strategy can be demonstrated in other countries besides Egypt.  The Achaean invader Menelaus married Helen, a kidnapped heiress, because without her he had no right to be king.  That’s why Helen’s rescue by Paris led to the Trojan War 2.

    Finally, Patrilineal systems inevitably lead to a narrowing of the gene pool for succession.  This narrowing of the gene pool has played out in the lineage of European kings.  This breakdown in the system of royal succession points to a departure from ancient custom and law.

    Plato’s Anti-Democratic Focus

    Plato did not only weaken the monarchal ideal. His writings are anti-democratic. He literally condemned democracy, but he condemned it figuratively by his hatred of women. Patriarchy weakens participation by women.

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    I’m not trying to end to our conversation with people in these categories.  I’m trying to clarify the position of progressives by comparison with competing voices in the “progressive” movement.  I put progressive in quotation marks because there are non-progressive participants in this movement. In fact, there are categories of participants that we may not be aware of. I’m thinking of socially conservative Marxists, progressive Trump supporters, and the Greeks. Everyone who differs with us is important for purposes of comparison if nothing else. But who are the progressives’ friends?

    We can learn from our exchanges with them if we have the courage to ask hard questions and disagree when necessary.  But if we keep silent about our differences the conversation can’t help but be empty and purposeless, and it will become vulnerable to special interests.  The consequences of capitulation on our part will no doubt be very unpleasant.

    Aside from enriching our debates, many of these ‘voices’ have served our causes.  One individual in particular has worked hard to advance our agenda for the environment.  We could not have accomplished the things Pope Francis has accomplished in such a short time and I plan to remember what he has done and honor him for his service to us.  However, I think the time has come to identify what is American in the progressive conversation and for that matter, what is progressive about it.

    Occupy Wall Street and Marxism

    Since Occupy Wall Street burst on the scene we’ve seen a lot of Marxist rhetoric from the alternative media.  Most people who subscribe to these channels don’t know anything about Marxism except that it claims to be a solution to our present troubles.  Likewise, they don’t know anything about Occupy Wall Street.

    Unfortunately, it is likely that the agenda some of our allies are espousing will keep everything the same.  For example Caleb Maupin, a “Marxist” on YouTube, has been insisting that Marxism has always been socially conservative.  This is a direct challenge to progressive support for Roe v Wade. Similar to right-wing pundits, he resorts to a litany of Margaret Sanger’s racism and Malthusianism to justify his position and to ‘prove’ that Roe v Wade was a misguided piece of legislation from the beginning.

    It is also important for progressives to speak frankly about Roe v Wade and how it constrains our conversation.  The right for a woman to obtain an abortion–which is a medical procedure and not technically a political issue–is a very low bar as far as women’s rights are concerned. It is sad that we are forced to continually fight for it.  Unfortunately, the fight for Roe v Wade, which is already the law of the land, is as progressive as we are allowed to be in this political climate.  I regret this situation while I acknowledge the fight as necessary.  I also regret the way we are forced to be cheerleaders for abortion in response to conservatives’ obsession with it.

    Was Occupy Wall Street Socially Conservative?

    I believe Maupin was associated with Occupy Wall Street, which also claimed to have a Marxist foundation. Was OWS proposing socially conservative policies too?  This possible association is pretty enlightening, given that OWS temporarily took over our conversation in its early days. Were they proposing their own agenda for the conversation?

    This leads me to wonder whether the mutual admiration expressed between OWS and Vatican II Catholics indicates a deeper alliance than we realize.  Again, this is not a rejection of their ideas.  It is a request for clarification.

    For progressives, social conservatism usually implies control of women. This is not a progressive position.

    Reproductive Rights Are Not Faith-based

    Some will say that women have always dealt with social control and the country has more important things to worry about at this time.  That may be true, but what if the problems we are facing are a result of our culture’s control of women?   I’ve written about this in the past and I will write more in the future.

    Marxism on Population Control

    Another Marxist, Loren Goldner, claims that humans don’t have population limits like other species do because humans continually interact with the environment to create new environments.

    The universalism of Marx rests on a notion of humanity as a species distinct from other species in its capacity to periodically revolutionize its means of extracting wealth from nature, and therefore is free from the relatively fixed laws of population which nature imposes on other species.3

    This is clearly a matter of faith and I completely disagree with it.  I also believe it is contrary to the progressive agenda which advocates slowing population growth as much as possible and finding ways to care for the population we do have.  It is my understanding that this is the reason we fight for better management of the environment.

    Marx and Engels Use Class Analysis for Male-Female Relations

    Goldner’s praise of Marx and Engels on the importance of quality relations between men and women falls into this discussion about how humanity creates its own environment.  Basically Marxists deal with this issue under the heading of class.  This of course, diminishes the standing of women. On the contrary, I would argue that male-female relations are in a class of their own.

    Male-female relations should be decided by customs within the extended family, not by Marxist theory or work arrangements. However, Marxists don’t want to talk about this any more than capitalists do.  They would prefer to discuss same-sex marriage and gender rights. That way, they don’t have to make any changes to the fundamental position of women.

    Same-Sex Marriage and Trans Rights

    I agree that discrimination against gays and trans-people must be illegal, but the interesting thing in this development is the lack of attention to the position of women.  Why do we see this convergence of the left and right on women?

    It is clear to me that right-wing talking points, regardless of whether they come from the right or the left, cannot refute the current progressive movement.  Our agenda is the only sensible response being offered at this time to the realities of human existence.  But if the “Marxists” are successful in winning over the progressive movement, nothing will change because their policy proposals are identical to the Right and the Democratic establishment in the only ways that really matter. They negatively influence our relationship with nature and the way our culture deals with women.

    Loren Goldner on Marx and Civil Society

    Goldner envisions the following options given our current predicament:

    The fundamental question before the international left today is whether or not Marx was (as this writer believes) right to think that civil society could be abolished…on a higher level (which preserves and deepens the positive historical achievements of civil, that is, bourgeois society) and not on a lower level, as happened in Soviet-type societies. The second question, which follows hard on the first, is: if Marx was wrong about the critique of civil society, and was in fact a protototalitarian, what, if anything remains valid in his critique of political economy and its programmatic implications?…

    I haven’t yet said anything under the heading of progressive Trump supporters.  It seems to me this category overlaps with the people who supported Jill Stein in 2016 and those who are now arguing that Trump is better on foreign policy than Biden.  It also overlaps with those who have been refuting the DNC’s claim of Russian interference.

    I agree that the DNC is an embarrassment in many ways, but their opponents’ arguments verge on support for Putin, who is seen by many Christians as a champion for Christianity.  I would argue that there is one good reason to vote for Joe Biden and it can’t be rationalized in order to drum up support for Trump.

    Trump’s Covid Response

    During the covid19 pandemic Donald Trump has actually carried out policies that he knew would kill more people in blue states, and especially people of color.  In other words, he has not only admitted to homicidal tendencies, he has acted on this impulse.  Any progressive who argues that we should consider Trump as a candidate should not be trusted.  We don’t know if Joe Biden will be better, but at least he has not admitted to being homicidal!

    Unfortunately, the DNC is replaying Hillary’s 2016 choice of a vice presidential running mate.  Biden’s new running mate, Kamala Harris, is like a clone of Tim Kaine in her unpopularity with progressives.  Therefore I think it is possible that the Democrats don’t want to win in 2020 and that they didn’t want to win in 2016.  The only choice left to us is to turn out in such large numbers that Joe Biden wins in spite of himself.

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    We tried to defend the property rights of American Indians but the establishment made a point of laughing in our face.  We raised the money and the votes to put our candidate in the White House but they ran their stable of corporate stooges against us.  Now they want us to vote for their candidate even though he’s given us nothing.  We asked Joe Biden to promise to undo welfare reform and we got him spouting Rhaum Emmanuel’s talking points on income tax caps.  We refused to fall for their tricks when they tried to turn the races against each other, but they’ve killed George Floyd, Ahmaud Arbery and many others, and we’ve seen the videos.   What would you call a system like that?  Certainly not democracy.  

    We’ve tried it their way.  We did everything by the rules because this is our country and we care what happens to it.  But we flattered them by working within their system.   They didn’t deserve such a compliment.  They should be laughed at, scorned, held up to our children as an example of evil, and then ignored.  And if the mobs burn everything down, we’ll tell our children that’s what happens to people who love injustice.  

    A word to the wise for our fearless leaders.  You deserve this.  I would recommend that you don’t retaliate with more injustice.

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    I want to urge activists to use caution in the post-Bernie stage of this election cycle.  I’m a little worried about the tone the analyses have taken–not for Bernie, I’m worried for the activists.  It is crucial to the health of the movement to be able to put things in their proper perspective, especially now.  At this time the pundits are apparently just coming to terms with the fact that Bernie is out and they have to watch the smirking idiots in Washington calmly go on with their plans.  I won’t deny it is disgusting to watch–one can’t help but think they should be more afraid than they are, and yet their so-called plans lurch determinedly on.  If you think the job of government is to serve the people, it seems to go forward without rhyme or reason.

    Still, it is not time to lash out.  For one thing, it’s not over yet.  I’m not implying that our dreams still might miraculously come true, although if the world makes any kind of sense at all they should come true.  What I’m saying is that at this point we have no choice but to wait and hope.  Rather than tear everything down, we should be using this time to reconnoitre.

    We have learned some important facts during the course of these two campaigns.  For example, we’ve seen that our people in Congress have a firm grip on the mechanism of government at every level–including the press which is not even supposed to be a branch of government–and they have no fear of repercussions.

    My own analysis of Sanders’ campaign would go something like this: we could have used our time better in the interim between the two campaigns.  I would also like to suggest that some of Bernie’s million volunteers were not really Bernie supporters.  I believe that if our progressive pundits had volunteered by making calls and knocking on doors, they would have the same concern.  Who were the volunteers who sabotaged the good volunteers you ask?  Ask yourself what you would do if it was your job to keep Bernie out of the White House?  Wouldn’t you sign up to volunteer so you could sabotage the attempts by real supporters trying to do their job?  It would be so easy–you could be virtually anonymous.  Finally, I would like to ask the pundits how they thought Bernie could win by being humiliated at the polls in all of the remaining states, which I believe would certainly have happened.  If you didn’t see that coming after Iowa I’m not going to waste my time explaining it.  Anyway, I’ve already written about it here.

    To continue with my analysis, we jumped into this torrent in the middle of the river with no preparation.  It wasn’t our fault.  When I started talking about the 2016 presidential campaign, I had in mind the responsibility of citizens to pay attention to elections and to vote.  The presidential election was on the horizon and it seemed like a good idea.  The thing is, no one knew that Bernie would take the country by storm and that we would have to stand by while those devils took it from us.  All I hoped back then is that his campaign would add a little sanity to the downward spiral of our republic.

    I still think we have the responsibility to vote, but I clearly had some unrealistic expectations.  I thought we could choose our candidates based on what we understood to be the most pressing needs of the nation.  That would be our second lesson–we can’t.  The election process, at least at the presidential level, is nothing more than a long, expensive spectacle.  Oh, we still have free speech alright, but what does that do for us?  It saves us from the punishment of cement overshoes for speaking our mind, which is a good thing, but unfortunately it lasts a lot longer than cement overshoes.  At least with cement overshoes we’d be sleeping with the fishes, whereas elections never end.  And no, this is not an invitation for Bernie’s former supporters to check out.  We’re going to find a way to go on and this is how you do that–by calmly thinking it over.  Well, maybe not so calmly in every case.

    Now let’s turn our attention to these people who claim to be Democrats, but who have been treating us like poor relations at the reading of the will.  Who exactly are these people against whom we’ve been sending our own personal gladiator, Bernie Sanders, to do battle?  Where do they fit in the overall scheme of American history and world history?  Let’s look at them first in the context of American history.

    I won’t keep you in suspense.  The explanation is too long and I’m afraid you’ll forget the question by the time I get to the answer.  Our Democratic establishment is kin to the conservatives who defeated the liberal Republicans in the 1960s and 70s.  How do I know this?  Because the main issue that divided the Republican Party at that time was the New Deal.  Of course now the Conservatives are all about social issues, while back in the sixties they used anti-Communism as a rallying point for bringing the GOP together, but they kept their animosity toward the American middle class.  The liberal Republicans were in favor of the New Deal and the conservatives were against it.  The Clintons have always been on board with this conservative focus.

    We know that Hillary Clinton was a Young Republican and that she supported the great conservative hope, Barry Goldwater.  Of course now she makes a joke of it but I’ve never heard her renounce his ideas, have you?  You might be interested to know that her father used the same tactic.  He ran for a local office as a Democrat, although he was a Republican, and then switched back to being a Republican. I only wish Hillary Clinton had the decency to switch back!

    Fast forward to the Clinton administration.  Bill Clinton did battle against the middle class on several fronts, the most egregious assault being NAFTA, but also including financial deregulation with the end of the Glass Steagall Act, and the Telecommunications Act of 1996.  Interesting isn’t it, that certain Democrats accuse others of not being Democrats when they are the ones who are not Democrats?

    You might want to read about how the conservative Republicans took over the party.  It’s explained in a book, Turning Right in the Sixties: The Conservative Capture of the GOP by Marry C. Brennan.  ((Turning Right in the Sixties: The Conservative Capture of the GOP, the University of North Carolina Press, 1995))

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

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    There are only two political rivals in the world today: organized crime and the state.  It is true that there are many seemingly valid state ideologies vying for attention, but they are mostly different versions of the same idea, none of which defend the state in the way it needs to be defended.  These versions include advocacy for shrinking the state, austerity, theocracy, xenophobia and zionism, neoliberalism and libertarianism.  Marxism also remains part of the conversation, but the Marxists are merely a convenient and irrelevant target for the conservative versions of the idea listed above.  I say irrelevant because the Marxists have mistaken notions about the state and these notions render them useless in the fight against organized crime.

    James Cockayne warns that a failure to understand how mafias work has led to the overlooking of a major force in global affairs.  What we are seeing today are the effects of a purposeful strategy for controlling the planet’s resources, and this strategy is a direct challenge to the authority of states.  It represents the imposition of an alternate form of governmentality—in other words, a mental framework or operating system.  The only entity capable of resisting organized crime is an efficient state. (James Cockayne, ”Hidden Power: The Strategic Logic of Organized Crime″, Oxford University Press, 2016)

    I think it’s obvious that  something similar to what happened in Italy after the World War Two is happening in the United States today.  Just like in Italy, the ruling class in the United States would rather prop up a criminal state than give any credence to the political left.  

    According to Cockayne’s book, the rise of organized crime was not inevitable.  The state’s silence, along with the media’s silence, has enabled it to gain power.  However, he doesn’t advocate direct confrontation, which most definitely would not work anyway.  He argues instead that states cannot simply disappear in this globalized world—they must learn to compete in the market for government.  A state must demonstrate that it is an effective, credible, rewarding system of government, and the people must understand this and choose to be governed by the state rather than the other options becoming available, from ISIS to the transnational gang model of the maras.  Otherwise, other forms of governmentality will continue to grow (309).

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    It’s disconcerting to talk about Christian grace in a blog like this.  You think about it later and worry about how you phrased it, or how others might take it. There is the fear that it will be misunderstood in the context of common assumptions about what is required to be successful in this life—that it will be interpreted as boasting.  

    And I realized after publishing the last post that I didn’t mention Jesus.  Or did I?  

    Grace is the love of God shown to the unlovely; the peace of God given to the restless; the unmerited favor of God…Grace is the opposite of karma, which is all about getting what you deserve.  Grace is getting what you don’t deserve, and not getting what you do deserve. [Grace] is Jesus Christ in redeeming action

    By the world’s standards grace is extraordinary, strange, and counterintuitive.  

    Christian Grace
    Merry Christmas

    A lot like if the incarnate deity, veiled in flesh, were born in a manger in Bethlehem. 

    Religion must guide the political moment.

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