Amos's River of Justice

Our Season of Creation

  • The birth control debate has focused on single women. However married couples depend on birth control more consistently than single people. I’d like to invite the legislators to include married women in the discussion.

    There is a disconnect in our understanding of sexual relations in marriage. We laugh about old television shows that depict married couples sleeping in twin beds because we think we know better. The implications of twin beds are lost to us because the control of fertility no longer depends on the control of sex.

    Many people are not aware that married couples once slept in separate bedrooms. They also may not be aware that there used to be biological and seasonal prohibitions on marital sex. Apparently, ancient people understood the importance of population control. Or was it that they still saw women as people?

    A decrease in marital sex is not what our legislators have in mind when they limit access to birth control. Their goal is a higher birthrate. These men may pose as defenders of tradition, but there is nothing traditional about what they are doing.

  • Neoclassical ideology is capitalist mind control. It was created to support the aims of dominant capital.  Capitalist mind control is a smokescreen for the abuses of capitalist economics.

    Dominant Capital and Tax Money Financed Neoclassical Economics

    This development was financed by two sources, dominant capital and tax money. It is shored up by countless apologists and repairmen and implemented by state organs. And finally, the media sells it to the public.

    Most outsiders have trouble understanding it. This is because it’s deliberately made to look difficult. This is only one of the reasons the public doesn’t discuss it.  There is also the problem of treating the economy like a natural phenomenon subject to scientific study. It’s either above our heads, or it’s an inevitable phenomenon unaffected by humans, and therefore discussion is not necessary.  Laws of nature can be discovered but they can’t be changed. Capitalist mind control is one of its greatest powers.

    Denial of the Problem

    The most troubling thing about the current crisis of capitalism is the large number of people who deny that a problem exists. One example is Catholics who object to Pope Francis’s condemnation of the economy. We should question who they represent. This kind of objection is standard practice for those whose job it is to head off criticism about the economy.

    The phenomenon of murky, inexplicable economic manipulation is explained by Jonathan Nitzan and Shimshon Bichler in The Global Political Economy of Israel, published in 2002 . 1

    What the Ruling class must hide

    The book deals mainly with Israel, but the critique of economic theory isn’t specific to Israel. The United States has a similar economic story. 2

    Between 1865 and 1920, in order for the U.S. to become the world’s leading industrial capitalist nation, dominant capitalists had to find a way to overcome two major factors: the demands of the working class; and competition among existing firms. They accomplished this through monopoly in manufacturing, and this produced a system of corporate capitalism.

    The process was driven by a ruling class with designs on power. Control of the financial system was the basic mechanism and the merger movement was the result. The process was managed by financial experts who commanded either capital itself or the avenues for gathering it.

    The Bankers’ Master Plan

    During the first years of the 20th century, ‘higher financial circles’ decided that the banking system should be the headquarters of an investment system based on cooperation among large firms. According to Thorstein Veblen, the essentials of the system were as follows: ‘The banking community took over the strategic regulation of the key industries, and…also the control of the industrial system at large.’ Key industries were controlled by the investment bankers who made up a sort of General Staff of financial strategy and who commanded the country’s credit resources.

    Their relation with insurance companies is one example.

    “In the years 1885 and 1905, the annual income of life insurance companies in the United States was $525 million and 2.9 billion, respectively. These funds were derived from premiums paid by holders of the insurance policies, and needed to be invested promptly so as to yield in income for the companies to pay for the deaths of their insured persons. Five firms owned two-thirds of the assets of all life insurance companies: Metropolitan, Prudential, Mutual, Equitable, and New York Life. The last three owned fully one-half the assets of all life insurance companies.

    In 1870 less than three percent of these assets were stocks and bonds; by 1900, that figure had risen to nearly 38 percent. Five years later, securities held by New York Life constituted 74 percent of its total assets; of Equitable 57 percent; and of Mutual, 54 percent. Which securities did the insurance companies buy? Primarily, those sold (i.e., underwritten) by six dominant New York investment banks, led by J.P. Morgan and Company. Such securities were issued by industrial corporations and others which had close relations with the dominant investment banks. According to Douglass North, ‘It was clearly a one-sided arrangement in which the great bulk of the advantages accrued to the investment banker rather than to the insurance company.’

    “Crucial to this entire arrangement was the requirement that the insurance companies control their own back yard. This was accomplished by deep company involvement in political and governmental affairs. ‘The three big insurance companies occupied key positions in financing the [New York State] Republican machine (and to some extent the Democratic one also) and guaranteed not only friendly legislators but cooperative [state] insurance departments as well.’ Between 1895 and 1905, a New York Life lobbyist was paid at least $1,312,197.18 to guard against passage of hostile legislation. The New York State Department of Insurance functioned as a subdivision of the industry…”

    The New York Department of Insurance Ruled Their Industry Like US Steel

    The New York Department of Insurance was a creature of the dominant capital machine. Its ‘regulations’ enabled the large companies to evade regulations when necessary, and to insure continuous dominance by the large companies. The Big Three insurance companies ruled their industry very much like US Steel, a Morgan firm.

    Neoclassical Ideology: the Organic Super-Government of Mankind

    Historians refer to the late 19th and early 20th centuries are frequently referred to as the age of Big Business. But according to W.E.B. Du Bois, this is misleading. It wasn’t so much about the size of the firms as it was about an ‘organic super-government of mankind in matters of work and wages. This super-government was directed with science and skill for the private profit of individuals.’

    “When Woodrow Wilson first ran for president in 1912, he declared that ‘the masters of the government of the United States are the combined capitalists and manufacturers of the United States.’ At the center of this process lay control of the principal political parties and the political machines, organized under the direction of party bosses. ‘Living to a great extent on the corporations, bossism burst into full bloom in the States where big capitalist interests were concentrated, where [railroad] companies were most numerous, such as New York, New Jersey, Pennsylvania…’”

    The bosses didn’t run everything however. Often company officials sat in on important party committees and pulled the strings for them, equipped and kept up political organization for their own use, and ran them as they pleased.

    The Sherman Anti-Trust Act Was Ignored by Dominant Capital

    When the Sherman Anti-Trust Act was finally passed in 1890, an amendment was offered to assure it would not be applied against the unions. Senator Sherman led a successful fight against the amendment arguing it was not necessary. Within 5 years it was indeed used against the unions. The entire Anti-Trust Act was soon judged to be a charade because so much of it was ignored whenever it suited dominant capital.

  • If we limit the conversation to what we can realistically do, our choices are limited. But if we’re talking theory, anything is possible. Since I’m in charge of my own theoretical world, I’ll offer some solutions. I’ll start with solutions to environmental problems. Any changes in politics and economics will be limited to what is necessary to the particular environmental goal. Finally, everything will be done with an eye to social effects.

    It’s been said we have 50 years to do something about the oceans. Every continent contributes to the problem of pollution, much of it from industrial farming, so ideally every country would have to participate. I propose dividing industrial farms, which also contribute to global warming, into smaller, sustainable operations. Start with the farms that drain into major river systems. This would decrease the amount of chemical fertilizers flowing into the ocean and begin to address the problem of dead zones.

    It would also create the potential for using these sustainable farms as the nucleus of a different kind of community. Such communities would have to develop over time as the underlying political theory is discovered, but they should be conceived as centers of a vibrant life—not oppressive sloughs of despair that the youth can’t wait to escape. They would have to offer opportunity; they would have to inspire and challenge all members.

    In the United States, we could consider creating another governing center in the middle of the country, specifically to serve this new type of grassroots community organization. This is not as a replacement for Washington—it could interact with Washington D.C. For example, it could facilitate the development of candidates for national office, as well as local delegates.

    The critics might say that if one country breaks up commercial farms it would cease to be competitive with other countries. Or if everyone does, we couldn’t feed the world. First, we don’t feed the world now. Second, this isn’t necessarily true. However, the first objection is important as an example of something that might work, but that can’t be tried because of outside pressure. The same thing happened in pre-war France. In a time of political and military turmoil, the French suddenly discovered that their birth rate was much lower than Germany and Great Britain. Then a series of European furniture exhibitions made them realize they were falling behind their neighbors in the decorative arts by limiting themselves to traditional French designs and methods.

    I think this illustrates that we have to develop criteria for healthy versus unhealthy competition. For example, it may have been healthy for the furniture makers to be challenged, while the manipulation of the birth rate for ideological, political, economic, or military reasons is unethical, undemocratic, and hazardous to the environment.

    What if we put limits on unhealthy competition? I’m not talking isolationism. I’m talking about the kind of limits that make it possible to solve domestic problems like dead zones in the ocean. Because of its social and environmental implications, we could start by eliminating the pro-natalist nonsense, followed by trade agreements—at least the worst aspects of them. The medieval guilds limited competition among their own members and it was effective until some hotshot broke the rules and ruined it for everyone else. This is the same idea only on a global scale.

    If you are screaming ‘Nooo!’ then maybe you don’t understand the seriousness of the world’s problems, or maybe you sense that your own privilege is being threatened. On the contrary, what we’re doing now is stupid and it threatens all of us. We are on a precipice and those responsible for it—ideologues who tell other people what to do and who have no intention of doing it themselves—look down their noses and demand to be told where all these needy people came from. In this way they prove they are unfit to wield authority of any kind, and yet there they remain.

    Iran has drained its lakes through climate change, dams, drought, and inefficient irrigation. ((Iran in Race to Save Largest Lake From Drying Up, Ali Akbar Dareini, Feb 20, 2014. The National World. Avaliable: http://www.thenational.ae/world/middle-east/iran-in-a-race-to-save-largest-lake-from-drying-up)) In parts of India, half the population is homeless. Half of India’s population defecates on the ground. Worse, even the feces that ends up in the sewage system is untreated. India is awash in antibiotic-resistant bacteria. Babies are born with these germs and they often can’t be cured. Further, the crowded conditions make it more likely they’ll pass on their infections. It should be no surprise that some of those germs are coming here. ((Harris Gardiner, Superbugs Kill India’s Babies and Pose Overseas threat, Dec. 3, 2014, New York Times. Available: http://www.nytimes.com/2014/12/04/world/asia/superbugs-kill-indias-babies-and-pose-an-overseas-threat.html?src=me&module=Ribbon&version=origin&region=Header&action=click&contentCollection=Most%20Emailed&pgtype=article&_r=0)) And of course, there is evidence of America’s contribution to the problem, both from oil spills and farming, in the Gulf of Mexico.

    Women should be able to control their own fertility. In fact, the relationship between mother and child should be understood as the essential human relationship, and therefore as the basis of all other relationships. This would guard against artificiality and indifference in a community’s social relations.

    I’m aware that my solutions are radical but in my opinion, they don’t have much competition at this time. First, we have the Democrats who can’t seem to come to terms with the demise of Marxism. It’s not clear what they’re doing in this election cycle—maybe pretending to be different from the Republicans for the sake of appearances. As for the Republicans, they are becoming famous for serving shady interest rather than the interests of their own people. Incredibly, they don’t even try to hide it any more. But it’s probably remarkable that either party can still come up with a coherent platform at all. Both are operating on old ideas that were never established on firm ground in the first place so it shouldn’t be surprising that they function more like political religions than rational approaches to the world’s problems.

  • A recent article about the Pope’s address to the European parliament poses questions that I think many of us have been asking ourselves. For example, secularists might be asking why it is important for them to move toward dialogue with the Church.

    “The Pontiff wasn’t the most obvious person to deliver hard truths to elected politicians about the rising threats to the democracies they serve, or, as head of the Catholic Church, to convey a blast against global corporations that undermine the democratic process by co-opting institutions, as he resonantly expressed it, to ‘the service of unseen empires.’ Yet standing at the lectern at the center of the plenary chamber, peering through wire-rimmed reading glasses at his script, he did these things and more. The leader of a religion that has created its share of fractures made an eloquent plea for the European Union to rediscover its founding principles of “bridging divisions and fostering peace and fellowship.’” 3

    This attempt is important because questions can’t be answered until they are asked. Some might wonder what is required of them as a participant in this dialogue. I think I’ve answered some of these questions for myself, although there’s much I don’t know about the church, so any errors are unintentional. We each need to find an answer by paying attention to what the Pope is saying.

    Why is the Church Defending Democracy?

    First, the church’s defense of democracy is not a new innovation. The supporting theology has been developed over the last century. The Compendium of the Social Doctrine of the Church was published fairly recently but it was preceded by documents dealing with similar issues. The first was Rerum Novarum, the Papal Encyclical of Leo XIII on Capital and Labor, published in 1891.4.

    What Level of Commitment is Required From Us?

    Next you might be wondering about the level of religious commitment required for participation in this dialogue. The Evangelii Gaudium clarifies the part the church is willing to play in the conversation and it also deals with what it requires of other participants. If you are concerned about what is required of you, you would have to read it for yourself, but for what it’s worth I have a few thoughts.

    It’s possible that the requirements are different for the dominant class than for bloggers like me. With the doctrine of solidarity, the Pope addresses society’s leaders. Solidarity urges justice for the working classes in the service of social peace. It’s true that in the past it’s also been a defense against socialist solutions, but in past times of turmoil the political left, which is part of the dominant class, has participated in solidarity. So, from the Church’s point of view this is not a cynical maneuver:

    “The precepts of the sabbatical and jubilee years constitute a kind of social doctrine in miniature[28]. They show how the principles of justice and social solidarity are inspired by the gratuitousness of the salvific event wrought by God, and that they do not have a merely corrective value for practices dominated by selfish interests and objectives, but must rather become, as a prophecy of the future, the normative points of reference to which every generation in Israel must conform if it wishes to be faithful to its God.”((Apostolic Exhortation Evangelii Gaudium)).

    Being Realistic About Working Class Alternatives

    There are fewer alternatives available to the working class today, and immediate dangers threaten our ability to agree on them.  So in the short-term I think it’s important to at least understand what is being offered by the other participants in the conversation. This brings me to another set of questions unique to women.

    Being Realistic About the Place of Women in Dialogue with the Church

    In view of the importance to women of the reproductive rights issue, I think it’s necessary to offer a rationale for those who are otherwise inclined to consider the church’s proposals as a way forward. (I don’t think it’s likely that the church will change its position on abortion, but more on that later.) The rationale for female participation begins with the Pope’s statement that women should have a greater voice in the church. Critics have said the place of women in the church will not change all that much, but I don’t think this opening should be taken lightly. From what I can tell, the church continues to build on the statements of previous encyclicals. According to Catholic writer and historian Hilaire Belloc, change happens slowly with actual practice following a change in attitude.

    “First comes in every great revolution of European affairs, a spiritual change; next, bred by this, a change in social philosophy and therefore in political arrangement; lastly, the economic change which political rearrangement has rendered possible.”((Belloc, Hilaire. The Crisis of Civilization. New York: Fordham University Press, 1937))

    The Church is Honoring Its Social Responsibilities

    Claims to religious and political authority are always predicated on the ability to fulfill social responsibilities. The church is honoring its responsibilities at this time, while our politicians are doing their best to prove themselves illegitimate.

    I’ve based many of my previous articles on the assumption that the system is not working. I’ve even considered the possibility that it’s unworkable. There’s one way to prove me wrong and that is to make it work. If politicians can’t immediately solve the problems, they can at least begin to move in that direction.

  • A recent article tells of a woman in Uganda whose husband beat her regularly until she finally left him and went back to her parents’ house. It is assumed that her husband’s behavior was caused by the custom of ‘bride price or dowry’ supposedly enshrined in Ugandan law. The article refers to a survey done by Mifumi (a Ugandan NGO) which found that 84% of Ugandans believe there is a connection between bride price and domestic violence, and ends by calling for the abolition of this custom. ((Wives not cows: Uganda Dowry fuels domestic violence. Fallon, Amy, Yahoo News. Oct. 24, 2014. Available: http://news.yahoo.com/wives-not-cows-uganda-dowry-fuels-domestic-violence-041333421.html))

    “A 2007 Constitutional Court petition launched by the charity (Mifumi) and 12 individuals argued that the dowry portrayed women “as an article in a market for sale” amounting to ‘degrading treatment’…In 2010, the court upheld the payment, ruling while the bride price played a role in some domestic abuse cases and women being treated as “inferiors”, this was no justification for a “blanket prohibition”…But the petitioners then appealed in the Supreme Court, and say if it does not rule in their favour, they will explore other legal avenues. The court is currently considering its judgement.”

    I’ve suggested [intlink id=”1113″ type=”post”]here[/intlink] that bride wealth implies status and relative independence for women. The situation in Uganda seems to contradict my view, doesn’t it? I don’t think so. I’ll begin with the article’s confusion of terms. In the second paragraph we read:

    “But the dowry she would bring — cows, goats and cash — soured the marriage and brought dark clouds over the partnership, a story repeated by many others in Uganda.”

    After reading this, one wonders if the court was amused by the petition. We are told the ‘dowry’ refers to the gifts of goats, cows and cash the bride’s family received from the groom. First, this is not the definition of a dowry; second, dowry is not the same thing as bride price; third, bride price is not the same thing as bride wealth, which is not even mentioned in this article.

    Dowry is a payment of cash or goods by the bride’s family. It does not refer to gifts from the groom or his family to the bride’s family. The subject of dowry can get really complicated. Its purpose differs according to the culture and time period. In some accounts it remains the bride’s property although she may use it to set up a household for her new family. At the other extreme a dowry is considered the groom’s property to use as he sees fit. Or it is considered the property of his family. In the most onerous manifestation of dowry, the bride suffers the wrath of the grooms family if the dowry is insufficient.

    On the other hand, bride wealth is cash or goods paid by the groom’s family to the bride’s family. Again, it’s complicated. Ideally bride wealth is held in trust for the bride even though her family is allowed to use the income it generates. But in current practice it might be counted as her father’s property. Today, it is often used to pay for a brother’s marriage.

    On the other hand, bride price is just that—cash or goods paid by the groom’s family for the services of the bride.
    This article also demonstrates a confusion of cause and effect. The bride’s father paid nine cows to her mother’s family when he married, and his marriage is still in tact. If this payment is the cause of domestic violence, why didn’t it lead to domestic violence in his case? In fact, the bride’s mother remains in favor of the custom.

    Furthermore, domestic violence exists in societies that don’t practice this custom. In the United States for example, the righteous indignation expressed in this article might be a little disorienting. Americans see violence against women, even though American laws support ‘community property’. They even hear violence encouraged by their own legislators who speak cavalierly of rape. Here is an important fact to keep in mind whenever you read about efforts to end payments associated with marriage—especially when they are promoted by NGOs: Usually it is to the advantage of a certain class of people to end them, and this class of people includes colonizers as well as Christians and Muslims. Why?  About some of the reasons we can only speculate. There is the matter of the family connections and the wealth the custom helps to protect. In addition, and this reason has been noted by others, because these payments have the effect of delaying marriage they have a tendency to decrease birth rates.

    But if this custom is so beneficial, how do you explain the abuse? To be fair, the cultural context can make the causes easy to misinterpret. You would have to start by looking at cultural changes wrought in these societies by turmoil and invasion. While bride wealth used to be premised on pleasing the ancestors, various factors have given it a more individual nature. For example, in one African society a colonizing ruling class levied taxes on the population to cover the costs of the colonial government. This made it necessary for the young men to work in a distant mine in order to earn enough money to marry. The result was a subtle change in the attitude of the men. Some of them began to feel that since they had paid for their wives they were entitled to rule over them.

    Meanwhile, back in the community property West, women often exit marriage financially destitute and can consider themselves fortunate if they are not deprived of their own children as well. I’m not suggesting that Americans should implement the practice of bride wealth, even if it were possible, which it isn’t, and not only because of cultural differences. Typically by the time society has been organized into states, the inhabitants don’t have enough wealth for such things. But on the level of principle this custom has much to teach us about human nature, about hidden and seemingly innocuous factors behind the world’s problems, and about how tangled these problems have become during the course of history.

    The confusion of terms in this article combined with the blanket assurance that this NGO knows what is right for this culture indicates that we haven’t even begun to talk about this custom rationally.

  • General Martin Dempsey stated recently that because the Islamic State group is motivated by an ‘apocalyptic, end of days strategic vision’ the United States and a coalition of partners must confront it ‘head on’ in Syria.5 This has helped me to focus on a subject I’ve been wanting to talk about but didn’t know where to begin. The subject of apocalpytic beliefs is probably the best illustration we will ever find for the importance of dialogue. What, if anything should the United States do about the Islamic State’s Apocalyptic Vision?

    In this article I will cite similar beliefs among Americans, Britons, and Jews and argue for the importance of dialogue.

    I think Dempsey is correct in despairing that IS will never engage in dialogue. The general’s assessment of the danger of the Islamic State’s apocalyptic vision also seems correct. I just don’t agree that this vision can be wiped out by military action. After all, Jihadism is only only one version of this phenomenon. Americans have their own ‘end of days’ beliefs, and apparently, so do Britons. The Jihadist who beheaded American Journalist, James Foley is believed to be a British born militant from London who calls himself John.6

    The Blood Moon Influence and the Christian Answer

    There are other influences that add to the concerns of believers. When I asked myself why so many Americans and Britons would be drawn to fight with the IS at this time, it led me in an interesting direction. It’s possible that at least part of the problem is an astronomical phenomenon, the ‘blood moon’. With the help of a growing industry that promotes end of days hysteria, apocalyptic beliefs in the West may be coinciding with IS’s apocalyptic jihadism.  Consider this article written in the UK in April of this year. 7.

    What is the blood moon? Sometimes during a lunar eclipse, the earth’s shadow on the moon takes on a red hue. Lunar eclipses aren’t unusual—there are about two per year. What is unusual this time is that there will be four blood moons within eighteen months. Certain parties have been whipping religious believers into a frenzy.

    Several books written for a Christian audience have been published about this event. They refer to an Old Testament verse in Joel 2:31 and its echo in Acts 2:20: “The sun shall be turned into darkness, and the moon into blood, before the great and notable day of the Lord.”

    One author who is getting a large share of the attention is Texas megachurch pastor John Hagee. The book in question is “Four Blood Moons: Something is About to Change”.

    Calming Voices Among Christians

    Lest I add to the hysteria, I’ll begin with a discussion of dissenting views in the Christian community. A pastor of Woodland Hills Church in St. Paul, Minn., Greg Boyd, has called this whole thing a waste of time—a very dangerous waste of time–and he warns that no congregation is immune to it.

    Sam Storms, pastor of Bridgeway Church in Oklahoma City says, “We need to stop giving into some of these sensationalist speculations. Maybe Christians are more gullible. One has to twist the data to make it appear as if these are the fulfillment of some biblical prophecy. I thought in 2011 we all said we weren’t going to fall for this again, when Harold Camping twice missed the date of the Second Coming?” 8.

    A Call for Dialogue

    Even though IS seems more determined than ever to provoke an immediate reaction, I’m going to argue that this is really the time for intensive dialogue.

    Characteristics and Tendencies of Apocalyptic Thinking

    To begin with, it’s important that we understand the general characteristics and tendencies of apocalyptic thinking. I’ll begin with a discussion of Muslim apocalyptic beliefs and end with Christian and secular beliefs in the West.

    Apocalyptic Jihadism

    Richard Landes discussed Apocalyptic jihadism in a 2004 article: Jihad, Apocalypse and Anti-Semitism. I’m aware Landes is controversial, however the value of this article is the perspective it offers on Islamic apocryphal thinking. In hindsight, we should be so lucky to be dealing with the PLO and Hamas instead of IS. However, Landes says they both used apocalyptic rhetoric. The majority of Muslims are not yet apocalyptic, but Landes worries that both Arabs and Muslims worldwide could get swept up in ‘a fever of apocalyptic hope and violence’. All things considered, it’s hard to find fault with him on that point.

    According to Landes, modern jihadism is a ‘cataclysmic, apocalyptic movement’. Its goal is Islam’s dominance over the world. Its promises have a millennial character, such as the claim that once Islam rules everywhere there will be world peace. Jihad’s millennial war operates on two major levels: The first is outright violence; the second is the invocation of civil society’s values to undermine that system from within.

    Apocalyptic Thinking

    In more general terms, apocalyptic thinking is a belief that a cosmic transformation is imminent. The transformation can take two forms. Either it will end entirely (eschatology), or the Messianic Age will begin. The second form is often called millennialism. Moderate millennialism exists everywhere in the hope that the world is going to improve.

    Passive and Active Forms

    Again, there are two alternative beliefs as to how this improvement will come to pass. The passive one says God will cause it. The activist approach says we are God’s agents. Therefore we have to bring it about. If activists believe cataclysmic destruction is necessary, it follows that they can save the world by destroying it. According to Landes, the Holocaust was an ‘apocalyptic deed’.

    Landes returns us to the West’s participation in this chain of events when he talks about ‘Philo-Judaism’. There has been a change in Anglo-Christians’ millennial scenario to a view which says that the Jews have to return to Zion in order for the apocalypse to occur. Balfour was a believer in pre-millennial dispensationalism and held views similar to today’s Protestant Zionists. According to Landes, the present degree of Christian millennial theology has never before been seen among Christians at so popular a level. (Pre-millennialists believe Christ must return before the Millennium can begin while post-millennialists believe we must create the millennium here and now.)

    The Mujaddid

    Landes cites a book by David Cook, Studies in Muslim Apocalyptic. According to Cook, there are a variety of apocalyptic traditions in Islam. One is called the Mujaddid. This tradition holds that every hundred years, a religious ‘renewer’ is expected. The Mujaddid is a Messianic figure. In 1300 of the Hajj (1881/2) the renewer was the Mahdi, who took over Khartoum and started a war against English imperialism. in 1400 (1979/80), Khomeini inspired apocalyptic thinking. That year there was a violent messianic outbreak in Muslim Nigeria, while the Shiites in Lebanon had a candidate for the renewer in the Imam Musa al Sadr of Lebanon.

    Khomeini had the support of a large number of secular, as well as religious, supporters. Both fundamentalist and progressive millennialists shared a common hope.  Unfortunately, Khomeini’s program didn’t work, but it did legitimize Islamic extremism.

    “Khomeini did for Muslims—even Sunnis—what Lenin did for Communists. No matter how bad the Sharia state, it served as a model of the possible. After Khomeini, apocalyptic Muslims could begin to imagine that Islam would eventually take over the whole world. The Taliban represented the first anti-modern Sunni millennial experiment.”

    The Apocalyptic Rhetoric of War with Israel

    The 1948 and 1967 Arab wars with Israel were accompanied by apocalyptic rhetoric. In the 1960s, the failure of Nasser’s ‘final war’ with Israel discredited secular Arab nationalism for many, leading back to religious fundamentalism and eventually to cataclysmic millennialism.”  (Of course, the Jews have millennialist beliefs as well, but Landes says these are passive.)  Islamic extremism has increased since that time.

    “In the 1980s, Muslim apocalyptic discourse took a new turn. Whereas previously it had been very conservative, only compiling traditional hadiths on the subject, it now borrowed ideas and techniques from the Western world—especially Protestant millennialism—including more sophisticated use of means of communication, such as glossy pamphlets and cassettes of sermons. It even picked up Western themes, such as flying saucers or Biblical texts, and quoted these in addition to the Koran and the hadith.

    “The approach of the end of the Christian era’s second millennium also influenced the Muslim world. It expected the classic Muslim version of the Anti-Christ, the Dajjal, to arrive in 2000. He would be a Jew and control most of the world according to the procedures outlined in the Protocols of the Elders of Zion. (According to Landes, the Protocols remain influential with Arab intellectuals and elites.)

    “The most depressing aspect of current Islamic apocalyptic thought is that all its variants of cataclysmic events will bring immense destruction and death. This is why so much apocalyptic thought in the Arab world—secular and religious—focuses on death and martyrdom that kills indiscriminately. They think that God wants them to visit the destruction on the Jews that the Hebrew prophets warned about. Current Muslim apocalyptic thinking gives no support to the notion that Islam is a religion of peace.”

    Was the year 2000 a turning point?

    Since 2000 the 12-year-old boy, Mohammed Al Dura has become a martyr and patron saint for both the intifada and global Jihad. (Unfortunately, this article is unnecessarily inflammatory when it claims the Al Dura affair was staged.) 9.

    Christopher Columbus and The Western Contribution

    According to an article on the TeacherServe website, apocalyptic thinking in the Americas began with Christopher Columbus who invested the discovery of the new world with millennial meaning. He thought he had found the new heaven and the new earth that God spoke ‘through the mouth of Isaiah’ and again in the Apocalypse of St. John.

    That said, it is more common for apocalyptic views to express the expectation that history will come to a complete halt. Protestant conservatives have been susceptible to this belief, especially evangelicals, because of their literal reading of the Bible. They focus on the book of Revelation in the new Testament, as well as the book of Daniel in the Hebrew Bible.

    Evangelicals

    Throughout American history, evangelicals have vacillated between pre and postmillennialism. The Puritans were premillennial. In other words, they knew Christ’s return could take place at any moment. Jonathan Edwards believed the millennium would begin in America.

    The Shakers and John Humphrey Noyes

    The Shakers thought Christ had already returned in the person of Mother Ann Lee and they were busy establishing the millennial kingdom. They forbade all private union between the sexes. On the other hand, John Humphrey Noyes, founder of the Oneida Community in western New York, believed Christ had returned in A.D. 70. For him the millennium provided sexual license.

    The American Revolution

    Many patriots in the eighteenth century fused millennial expectations with radical Whig ideology and thought the American Revolution was ‘the sacred cause of liberty’.

    The Second Great Awakening and the Reform Movements it Inspired

    During the Second Great Awakening there was optimism in the perfectibility of humanity and society. This complemented the Enlightenment’s appraisal of human potential and inspired many reform efforts such as temperance, abolitionism, prison and educational reform, and Christian missions, in other words, postmillennialism.

    At the same time, some evangelicals had lost their optimism about human potential after the excesses of the French Revolution and they reverted to premillennialism. William Miller believed Jesus would return sometime between March 1843 and March 1844.

    Joseph Smith

    Joseph Smith thought the New Jerusalem would center in Jackson County, Missouri. His assassination interrupted the preparations, but in recent years a small band of Mormons has returned to resume the task.

    Nat Turner

    There was a conviction among antebellum blacks that God sanctioned rebellion against white slaveholders. On May 12, 1828, God appeared to Nat Turner, a slave preacher in Southampton County, Virginia. “I heard a loud noise in the Heavens,” he said, “and the Spirit instantly appeared to me and said the Serpent was loosened, and Christ had laid down the yoke he had borne for the sins of men, and that I should take it on and fight against the Serpent, for the time was fast approaching when the first should be last and the last should be first.” The rebellion he unleashed claimed the lives of fifty-five whites and two hundred blacks.

    Reform Judaism

    Even some Reform Jews caught the spirit and recognized America as the New Zion and Washington as the New Jerusalem.

    From Postmillennialism to Premillennialism

    After the Civil War, optimism about human perfectibility continued to dissipate. In addition, the evangelicals had lost their dominance due to European immigration. This caused an inward turn and eventual contempt for the culture that had spurned them. An alternative to postmillennialism was found in John Nelson Darby’s dispensational premillennialism. Believers saw a society careening toward judgment. Enter the influential Dwight Moody. Subsequently, the Scofield Bible provided a dispensational template for their reading of the scriptures.10.

    Apocalypticism, the Right Wing, and Popular Culture

    According to another article on oldpubliceye.org (cited below) Apocalypticism and millennialism have influenced a variety of right-wing political and social movements, especially in the United States. Tim LaHaye in his 1980 book, The Battle for the Mind, stated: “tribulation is predestined and will surely come to pass.” But LaHay also teaches that there will be a pre-tribulation tribulation if the liberal, secular humanists are permitted to take control of our government. He says this not predestined, but it will happen if Christians fail to assert themselves in defense of morality and decency!

    The Book of Revelation and Popular Films

    In the United States the apocalyptic worldview is influenced by religious and secular interpretations of the prophecies in the Biblical book of Revelation about the coming of a new millennium. Fundamentalist Christians believe the end of time will be preceded by a cataclysmic battle between the forces of good and the forces of evil. The period of peace and harmony begins when evil is vanquished. This period marks the return of Christ. Popular films like Rambo, Mad Max, the Terminator series, and Red Dawn reinterpret the vision without making its origins clear. The film Apocalypse Now and theTV series Millennium name the myth while secularizing and mainstreaming it as a paradigm.

    Heaven’s Gate

    The Heaven’s Gate group merged prophetic themes with the dynamic of manipulative demagoguery in the setting of a totalitarian group with a charismatic leader. Three roots of key prophetic visions in the Heaven’s Gate group came from:

    The Christian Bible
    The prophecies of Nostradamus
    Science Fiction

    Science Fiction

    The science fiction theme often proposes that more advanced life forms and beings with higher consciousness from space will visit Earth and select humans for travel or transformation. A typical example is the book Childhood’s End by Arthur C. Clarke. These ideas are also embraced by people in the UFO movement.

    The New Testament Book of Revelation has inspired a large number of myths, metaphors, images, symbols, phrases and icons for mass movements. It is the influence behind current right-wing movements such as the new Christian electoral right, Protestant and Catholic theocratic groups, survivalism, the patriot and armed militia movement, Christian patriot constitutionalists, and the Christian Identity religion. Some, but not all, Christian Identity members such as Aryan Nations, are racists.

    The Book of Revelation’s Influence on Popular Culture

    This article lists six key ways the predictions of Revelations influence popular culture: Omens and Signs of the Times; Apocalyptic Doomsday Cataclysm; Subversion and Countersubversion; Armageddon and Holy War; Reign and Rule; and Transcendent Ascension and Rapture.

    The Branch Davidians believed the end times were approaching and were studying the meaning of the seven wax seals on a scroll mentioned in Revelation. Law enforcement abuse of power against the Branch Davidian’s in Waco, Texas and other dissidents creates cascading echoes of apocalypse throughout the society. (Italics mine)

    The survivalist movement, and in particular the Weaver family and the Montana Freemen, are influenced by a belief in apocalyptic doomsday cataclysm.

    Those who take the subversion and counter-subversion route believe that humankind will be betrayed by a world leader who will eventually be exposed as Satan’s agent. In addition to this leader there will be a false prophet and global religion that supports him. They especially mistrust those who call for world cooperation and international intervention, like the United Nations. They thought at one time that the antichrist was based in the Soviet Union. This was the evil empire of the Star Wars trilogy. It is also partly the basis for the Montana Freeman rejecting government authority. It influences some, but not all, armed militia groups.

    Believers of the Reign and Rule dogma think they must clean up secular society to prepare for the return of the Lord. Much of the violence against reproductive rights clinics and attacks on gay rights is based on this interpretation. This is called dominion theology. Its most theocratic and authoritarian version is Christian Reconstructionism.

    Dialogue is the Only Way Out

    “The millennium provides an opportunity for society to engage in a process of renewal and reconciliation, as well as an opportunity for demagogues, bigots, paranoids, and charlatans to spread messages of division and destruction.

    If a totalitarian group turns outward its members can engage in scapegoating with the most extreme outcome being homicide. If a totalitarian group turns inward its members can engage in scapegoating with the most extreme outcome being suicide. In a society where inequality and injustice is creating deep divisions and tensions, we need constructive ways to channel anger and alienation toward demands for social change rather than apocalyptic withdrawal or aggression.

    In societies suffering from economic and social stress, backlash movements take several forms: racial or ethnic nationalism; religious fundamentalism or spiritual alternative; and right-wing populism and conspiracist scapegoating. These forms can blend and interact.

    “The more we all discuss the issues of millennial expectation, apocalyptic thinking, and scapegoating, the more likely the outcome will be positive rather than negative.”

    Definitions

    Apocalypticism: the belief in an approaching confrontation, cataclysmic event, or transformation of epochal proportion, about which a select few have forewarning so they can make appropriate preparations. From a Greek root word suggesting unveiling hidden information or revealing secret knowledge about unfolding human events. The dualist or demonized version involves a final showdown struggle between absolute good and absolute evil. In Christianity there are competing apocalyptic prophetic traditions based on demonization or liberation. Central to Christianity, the tradition also exists in Judaism, Islam, and other religions and secular belief structures. Believers can be passive or active in anticipation; and optimistic or pessimistic about the outcome. Sometimes used similarly to the term millenarianism.

    Millennialism: A sense of expectation that a significant epochal transformation is imminent, marking either the end of a thousand year period, or signal its beginning, or both. Two major forms of millennialist response are passive waiting versus activist intervention. Can involve varying degrees of apocalypticism. In Christianity, the idea that the Second Coming of Christ marks a thousand year period.

    Aggressive apocalypticism: the merger of conspiracism with apocalypticism often generates aggressive forms of dualism. Apocalyptic aggression occurs when demonized scapegoats are targeted as enemies of the ‘common good’, a dynamic that can lead to discrimination and attacks.((Apocalyptic Millennialism, Political Research Associates. Available: http://www.publiceye.org/tooclose/apoc.html))

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    Responding appropriately to the Church of England’s decision to ordain female bishops is complicated. In the case of the Mormon Church, I couldn’t see how a movement to ordain women would have a good effect on female members. However, the Church of England’s case is different in several ways and there are factors that complicate the analysis. For one thing, Great Britain’s class system makes it difficult to say how this decision might affect ordinary women. On the other hand, you could say that the British government’s lack of separation between Church and state makes the decision more impressive. Female bishops will now be eligible to sit in the House of Lords.

    This vote comes at a time when the monarchy is changing its system of primogeniture, making females equal with males in eligibility for the throne. And no, I’m not forgetting that it’s still primogeniture or that it helps keep the class system in place. Still, it’s hardly a small matter. Nor is it insignificant that Church leadership has long been in favor of ordaining female bishops when they could have just as easily refused to consider it.

    I’m not sure why this wasn’t bigger news in the U.S., unless it has to do with old rivalries, what with the Church of England being part of the British government, but I was fascinated to hear the Church say ’yes’ to women. I thought it made an interesting contrast with the favorite refrain of conservatives in the United States: ’Me Tarzan, you Jane’.

  • U.S. Federal Judge Thomas Griesa called a hearing on Friday to discuss the case of Argentina and the vulture funds. In this hearing, Griesa reaffirmed his ruling of June 16 favoring the vulture funds. He also said that Daniel Pollack would continue as mediator. However, he did not clarify what would become of the frozen payments intended for Argentina’s cooperating creditors.

    Argentine lawyer, Jonathan Blackman said that while Argentina is committed to the continuing negotiations, “The republic does not trust the process under (the intervention) of special master Pollack.” This mistrust is a result of Pollack’s statement that Argentina is in default. The act of declaring Argentina in default is quite meaningful in this case; it allows those holding insurance on Argentine debt to profit in the amount of $1 billion.

    All things considered, it is difficult to see how Pollack could make this statement with a straight face. According to Argentina’s president, Cristina Fernandez,

    “The causes of default are listed for the 92.4 percent of bondholders, in the bond, in the contract itself. There is no cause where default is an impossibility to getting paid, because default is not paying. Preventing someone from paying is not default. I told them they will have to invent a new word, and they will have to invent this word.”

    What happened to the money Argentina set aside to pay its bondholders? Judge Thomas Griesa confiscated it! The Argentine government maintains that it is not in default, as it is willing to pay and remains in negotiations with creditors.” ((Griesa: Talks between Argentina and Vultures to Continue, Telesur, August 1, 2014. Avaliable: http://telesurtv.net/english/news/Griesa-Talks-Between-Argentina-and-Vultures-To-Continue-20140801-0045.html))

    In a previous meeting on Wednesday, Argentina invited Elliot Management to join the 2005 and 2010 swaps by which the firm would profit 300 percent, but Elliot Management rejected Argentina’s offer. The enormity of this rejection can only be understood in light of Argentina’s history.

    “To understand the dispute Argentina has with the Vulture Funds, one must go as far back as 1976, when Argentina was governed by a brutal civil-military dictatorship that introduced an aggressive neoliberal economic policy that ended in the severe economic crisis of December 2001.
    In 1976, the dictatorship decided to extend the jurisdiction of foreign courts, a move that technically permitted judgments to be made abroad, thus causing Argentina to lose judicial and economic sovereignty.
    In order to attract foreign capital to Argentina, the Carlos Menem government signed investment and trade agreements with different countries that gave even more power to international tribunals.
    By 2001 Argentina’s economy was in a critical situation. Former President Fernando de la Rua and his then Economy Minister Domingo Cavallo implemented a financial operation called el Mega Canje, the Mega Swap, to ease the country’s economic strain. The proposal came from David Mulford, former Treasury Secretary of the United States. It turned out to be a scam which cost Argentina $55 billion and boosted its foreign debt even further. The scheme contributed to a tragic hike in poverty and triggered Argentina’s 2001-2002 economic, social and political outburst as well as its historic debt default.
    A court case was opened to try those responsible, which include seven major banks, Cavallo, Mulford and de la Rua. Some 69 percent of the bonds that the vulture funds hold come from the scandalous 2001 mega swap.” ((Vulture Fund Rejects Argentina’s Offer Preventing Debt Repayment. Telesure, August 1, 2014. Available: http://telesurtv.net/english/news/Vulture-Fund-Rejects-Argentinas-Offer-Preventing-Debt-Repayment-20140801-0022.html))

     

     

     

  • The Church of England’s General Synod is set to vote on Monday on whether to allow women to become bishops.  This would not necessarily compel all Anglican Churches to accept women bishops, but it would set a precedent.  Conservative Anglicans rejected a previous proposal in 2012.  However, Anglican women in the United States, Canada and Australia have already been ordained as bishops.  ((London AFP,  Church of England female bishops would be ‘seismic’, July 11, 2014. available: http://news.yahoo.com/church-england-female-bishops-seismic-032533964.html))

  • The debacle of Argentina’s blocked bond payment reminds me of Edward Moor’s description in his ‘The Hindu Pantheon’ of the Hindu deity, Kuvera. This deity seems to be the patron saint of Chief Justice Roberts, Judge Thomas Grieva, Elliot Management Corporation, and Aurelius Capital Management. Apparently, American courts are possessed by the spirit of Kuvera.

    American Courts arePossessed by the Spirit of Kuvera
    Kuvera

    Capitalist Manipulation

    Argentina will miss a bond payment today thanks to a U.S. court. Argentina had the funds set aside to make this payment. However, when Argentina transferred them to the bond trustee, a U.S. District Court judge, Thomas Griesa, ordered the payment sent back. He stated that his ruling will allow the parties to ‘negotiate’. What it will most certainly do is keep the scheduled payments from interfering with the vulture capitalists’ windfall—the windfall granted to hedge funds last week courtesy of our very own Chief Justice Roberts. Grieva’s ruling marks the first time in history a judge has prevented a country from paying a restructured bond holder.

    Edward Moor

    “Kuvera, the regent of wealth, for a moment demands our attention; and although few people seek the favor of this deity with greater avidity than the Hindus, yet I find but little mention of him in my mythological memoranda; nor have I any image or picture of him…On Kama, Lakshmi, or Saraswati, poets and historians dwell with complacency and delight; but the gloomy, selfish, and deformed Kuvera, claims not, nor deserves, so much of our attention….

    “His servants and companions are the Yakshas and Guhyakas, into those forms transmigrate the souls of those men who in this life are addicted to sordid and base passions, or absorbed in worldly prosperity. The term Guhyaka is derived from Guh (ordure), a word retained in several dialects: hence Guhya… We happily do not find that the regent of wealth is related in marriage or otherwise with Lakshmi, the goddess of riches, to whom a Hindu…would address himself for that boon, and not to Kuvera: he has, however, a Sacti, or consort, named Kauveri, whence I conjecture, the river of that name, in Myhsore, derives its appellation.”

    Rabinranath Tagore had similar things to say about Kuvera:

    “Those who are familiar with the Hindu Pantheon know that in our mythology there is a demi-god named Kuvera, similar in character to Mamon. He represents the multiplication of money whose motive force is greed. His figure is ugly and gross with its protuberant belly, comic in its vulgarity of self-exaggeration. His is the genius of property that knows no moral responsibility. But the goddess, Lakshmi, who is the Deity of Prosperity, is beautiful. For prosperity is for all. It dwells in that property which, though belonging to the individual, generously owns its obligation to the community. Lakshmi is seated on a lotus, the lotus which is the symbol of the Universal heart. It signifies that she presides over that wealth which means happiness for all men, which is hospitable.

    “By some ill-luck, Lakshmi has been deprived of her lotus throne in the present age, and Kuvera is worshipped in her place. Modern cities represent his protuberant stomach, and ugliness reigns unashamed. About one thing we have to be reminded, that there is no cause for rejoicing in the fact that this ugliness has an enormous power of growth and that it is prolific of its progeny. Its growth is not true progress; it is a disease which keeps the body swelling while it is being killed.” ((Tagore, Rabindranath, The English Writings of Rabindranath Tagore: A miscellany. Sahitya Akademi, 1996))

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