Sunday, December 22, 2019
The Tanakh and Warfare
In contrast to many recent so called churches and synagogues who declare that G-d is a deity of love only, and so love anyone irregardless of their sin and their open advocacy of such sin, I must ask:
Have you read the Tanakh (the Old Testament for Christians) AT ALL?
I mean, clearly you haven't.
For many "modern" Christians, this pesky little problem (the fact that the Old Testament or Tanakh absolutely and clearly repudiates their moral laxity) is resolved by asserting not only the supremacy of the New Testament but a rather selective reading of the same. This is the fundamental problem of the New Testament and further evidence that it is not scripture, but it is certainly not all the New Testament's fault. Jesus and the New Testament writers were renegades against the Tanakh in their time, in the context of Judaism, but the apostles never contemplated the sort of things that are routinely contemplated in modern Christianity. Gay churches. Abortion churches. Divorce churches. How the bibles in gay churches do not burn into their lecterns I don't know, but it is a fundamental intellectual dishonesty for a gay preacher in a gay church to hold up a Bible as something they are supposed to be following.
They. Are. Not. Following. It.
That this kind of habitual lying is accepted as normal is a phenomenon of the modern world. It would be like me holding up a Quran, reading from it, praising it, and then cursing Mohammed and encouraging people to eat pork. Now, human religion gaining supremacy over divine religion is nothing new. The Jews did it in Jesus' time. Jesus and his followers upheld his human religion over divine religion. It has happened continually since the beginning of the world. It just has reached a new low where people absolutely pay no mind to the book they are pretending to follow.
"All hail the leather-bound wood pulp! We praise the leather bound wood pulp, you need not know what is written on it. What it means is what we tell you! What you want to believe!"
Gaaa.
Which gets us to my main point today. Warfare. Contra Jesus (love your enemies, turn the other cheek,) the Tanakh is full of warfare and courage and faith in the context of warfare. From beginning to end, it is saturated with war. Contra Jesus, if you are following G-d and your enemies are enemies of G-d, it is immoral and weak to turn the other cheek, not virtuous. It is condemned.
There are circumstances, such as in the book of Jeremiah, where surrender is advocated. This has absolutely nothing to do with love of enemies. The Kingdom of Judah had been run by evil and idolatrous kings basically since Solomon, with occasional exceptions. It's destruction was decreed by G-d. It would have been futile to resist. Jeremiah did not advocate LOVING the Babylonians, he advocating SURRENDERING to them because Judah's decline was commanded by G-d. In the case where the Israelites in Sinai were frightened by the reports of the scouts who were scouting Canaan, when they gathered their courage again and decided to fight, Moses said no. They did not have G-d's blessing and would not win. And that is what happened.
Far more common is something like the following: we are vastly outnumbered. G-d tells us to fight and we will win. Despite the evidence of our senses, we fight and win.
The man of G-d as warrior is something alien to modern sensibilities, but definitely not alien to the Tanakh. The Native American warrior Tecumseh typified the attitude of a holy warrior. His words were something to this effect:
"We are determined to defend our lands. If it is His (the Great Spirit's) will, we will be victorious, and if it is His will, we will plant our bones on this land defending it."
Either one was okay by him. What mattered is acting from principle. Freedom vs. slavery. You die free rather than live a slave.
In other words, a holy warrior is not concerned with outcomes. Outcomes are in the hands of G-d. Changing your behavior because of your evaluation of its likely outcome is a godless conception. The godless play at predicting the future: a man of G-d knows better. A holy warrior is concerned with principle. Death or life do not matter nearly as much as acting from right principle. There are worse things than death.
This conception is alien to our weak effeminized culture. It is however crucial to understanding the warrior mindset in the Tanakh. If G-d tells you it is GO time, you go, even if it is one against a thousand. Because the thousand will not have what you have: you are traveling in the will of G-d. You may indeed die, but you will die in G-d's hands doing His will.
How distant this is from any modern faith! How distant from modernity period! Yet this is the truth of the Tanakh. This is the test of many a warrior in the Tanakh: will you trust G-d and fight, or will you shrink from a battle that TO YOUR MIND looks unwinnable? The test of a true godly warrior is whether he is willing to act from principle, in this case divine principle, despite fear. Some warriors, as late as 150 years ago, understood this. Stonewall Jackson was the archetypal holy warrior, whatever you think of his cause.
"Captain, my religious belief teaches me to feel as safe in battle as in bed. God has fixed the time for my death. I do not concern myself about that, but to be always ready, no matter when it may overtake me. Captain, that is the way all men should live, and then all would be equally brave."
~General Stonewall Jackson
True, easier said than acted upon. Most things that are good and right are hard. They are meant to be. This is a test.
Friday, December 20, 2019
Is Christmas Pagan?
I want to go to some pains to explain that I mean no offense to Christians. I am indebted to Christians and Christianity in many ways.
I am indebted to Christianity because without it, I would likely know nothing of the Tanakh. I am indebted to Christians because they are the last bastion of divine ethics in a country and world rapidly heading the way of Molech. Were it not for Christians, we would certainly be further gone down the path of destruction than we are. Indeed, I firmly believe that G-d has blessed the Christians, despite what I would perceive to be the shortcomings of their creed. I am personally indebted to Christians and Christianity.
This will be an unpopular viewpoint, but I firmly believe that the reason America had so much success from Plymouth Rock onwards is because of the blessing of G-d. The story of the founding of America is a very Biblical story. A cruel people who worshiped false gods and could not even come together in unity in the face of extinction, were supplanted by a people of the Book, however imperfectly they understood it, and however cruel they themselves were. That is a viewpoint that would likely generate a lot of hate in my direction, but I happen to believe it is true. That blessing is now in danger, if it is not gone altogether.
Thus having established that I think having Christians in this country is a very GOOD thing, I now have to explain the ugly truth.
Christmas is pagan because Christianity is pagan.
(Or shall we say, strongly tainted with paganism.)
The idea of a man being god is absolutely alien to the ancient Hebraic understanding of G-d. To say that G-d was EVER a created being, would utterly be blasphemous beyond description. One of the most fundamental of the Ten Commandments is this:
You will not make an image OR ANY MANNER OF LIKENESS of anything that is in the sky above or the Earth below or the waters below the Earth: you must not worship them.
It is repeated multiple times, even in the New Testament, that to worship a created being or G-d in the image of a created being is ultimate anathema. N E V E R do it.
Well, a man is a created being. Jesus was a man.
Just to recap, G-D ALONE delivered the Israelites from the power of a man who claimed to be a god. Pharaoh claimed to be a god. The idea that G-d would deliver them from one man to deliver them to another man is ludicrous on its face. G-D alone, YHWH alone, is our salvation and our King.
No man ever was or could be.
The Israelites were delivered from the subjugation of Man altogether, into covenant with G-d's laws not human laws. We have no other king. We need no other king. When the Israelites decide to choose a king in the books of Samuel, G-d denounces that choice but allows them to have their way. Allows them to sin, basically, because that is what they choose. And what sin are they committing? Believing that a man is fit to rule, which overturns the entire salvation of the Hebrew people in Exodus.
They have gone back to Pharaoh, in other words. They have chosen Pharaoh over G-d. David, Jesus, Pharaoh, Solomon, makes no difference. The choice of ANY HUMAN KING over G-d's law and G-d's kingship is sin.
So the idea that Jesus as a Davidic king would be a GOOD thing is wrong-headed. Davidic kings, kings in general, are something that G-d allowed but not something that G-d condoned. He blessed David for Israel's sake, and blessed other kings, but that does not mean that G-d blesses the IDEA of human kings. The books of Samuel makes that clear.
***
One of the highest commandments in the Tanakh is to know and respect this simple statement:
HEAR O ISRAEL: THE LORD OUR G-D, THE LORD IS ONE
(or, THE LORD ALONE. Both readings are correct. The Lord is One, The Lord Alone, The Lord is Unity, are all technically correct readings of the original Hebrew.)
Simple logic should tell Christians that Jesus was not G-d. Just answer this question: did Jesus die on the cross?
If the answer is yes, Jesus was not G-d because the idea of G-d dying is ultimate blasphemy. G-d CANNOT DIE. To think He could is a stupid, blasphemous and unreal conception.
If the answer is no, that Jesus' death was mere appearance only, then his death was useless because it was nonexistent. An illusory sacrifice is not a sacrifice.
Indeed, the idea of Jesus dying for sins appears to be based on some crazy idea that G-d never forgave anyone their sins before that. In the Tanakh G-d forgave sins many times! Psalmists looked forward to their redemption from death, from Sheol, and no carpenter from Galilee was mentioned. G-d alone would save them. Only G-d could.
So based on every part of the Tanakh (including Isaiah which is a straw desperately grabbed,) the idea that a man could be G-d or that G-d would ever Himself appear as a man was beyond wrong, it is ludicrious. It's madness.
It is idolatry.
Sorry to say it, but I am bound to tell the truth. Christianity is idolatrous. It is a measure of how bad off the world is now that an idolatrous religion is much to be preferred to the available alternatives. Christianity was founded by pagans, influenced by pagans, and introduced the idea of Jesus as himself G-d (which is never clearly stated in the oldest documents.) All this was the later interpretation of the pagan Roman Catholic Church in the early centuries A.D.
Now, is modern Judaism also an idolatrous religion? As it currently exists, not as it was stated in the Tanakh, YES it is. I'll tell you why.
Rabbinical Judaism regards the opinions of rabbis to be equal to direct statements from G-d in the Torah. That is blasphemy. Rabbinical Judaism reveres the idea of a Messiah, which as I already stated is completely wrong-headed (no human would ever, ever be fit to be king - no king but G-D ALONE.)
So there is plenty to go around for everyone, but in short Christmas is pagan because CHRISTIANITY is pagan.
I am indebted to Christianity because without it, I would likely know nothing of the Tanakh. I am indebted to Christians because they are the last bastion of divine ethics in a country and world rapidly heading the way of Molech. Were it not for Christians, we would certainly be further gone down the path of destruction than we are. Indeed, I firmly believe that G-d has blessed the Christians, despite what I would perceive to be the shortcomings of their creed. I am personally indebted to Christians and Christianity.
This will be an unpopular viewpoint, but I firmly believe that the reason America had so much success from Plymouth Rock onwards is because of the blessing of G-d. The story of the founding of America is a very Biblical story. A cruel people who worshiped false gods and could not even come together in unity in the face of extinction, were supplanted by a people of the Book, however imperfectly they understood it, and however cruel they themselves were. That is a viewpoint that would likely generate a lot of hate in my direction, but I happen to believe it is true. That blessing is now in danger, if it is not gone altogether.
Thus having established that I think having Christians in this country is a very GOOD thing, I now have to explain the ugly truth.
Christmas is pagan because Christianity is pagan.
(Or shall we say, strongly tainted with paganism.)
The idea of a man being god is absolutely alien to the ancient Hebraic understanding of G-d. To say that G-d was EVER a created being, would utterly be blasphemous beyond description. One of the most fundamental of the Ten Commandments is this:
You will not make an image OR ANY MANNER OF LIKENESS of anything that is in the sky above or the Earth below or the waters below the Earth: you must not worship them.
It is repeated multiple times, even in the New Testament, that to worship a created being or G-d in the image of a created being is ultimate anathema. N E V E R do it.
Well, a man is a created being. Jesus was a man.
Just to recap, G-D ALONE delivered the Israelites from the power of a man who claimed to be a god. Pharaoh claimed to be a god. The idea that G-d would deliver them from one man to deliver them to another man is ludicrous on its face. G-D alone, YHWH alone, is our salvation and our King.
No man ever was or could be.
The Israelites were delivered from the subjugation of Man altogether, into covenant with G-d's laws not human laws. We have no other king. We need no other king. When the Israelites decide to choose a king in the books of Samuel, G-d denounces that choice but allows them to have their way. Allows them to sin, basically, because that is what they choose. And what sin are they committing? Believing that a man is fit to rule, which overturns the entire salvation of the Hebrew people in Exodus.
They have gone back to Pharaoh, in other words. They have chosen Pharaoh over G-d. David, Jesus, Pharaoh, Solomon, makes no difference. The choice of ANY HUMAN KING over G-d's law and G-d's kingship is sin.
So the idea that Jesus as a Davidic king would be a GOOD thing is wrong-headed. Davidic kings, kings in general, are something that G-d allowed but not something that G-d condoned. He blessed David for Israel's sake, and blessed other kings, but that does not mean that G-d blesses the IDEA of human kings. The books of Samuel makes that clear.
***
One of the highest commandments in the Tanakh is to know and respect this simple statement:
HEAR O ISRAEL: THE LORD OUR G-D, THE LORD IS ONE
(or, THE LORD ALONE. Both readings are correct. The Lord is One, The Lord Alone, The Lord is Unity, are all technically correct readings of the original Hebrew.)
Simple logic should tell Christians that Jesus was not G-d. Just answer this question: did Jesus die on the cross?
If the answer is yes, Jesus was not G-d because the idea of G-d dying is ultimate blasphemy. G-d CANNOT DIE. To think He could is a stupid, blasphemous and unreal conception.
If the answer is no, that Jesus' death was mere appearance only, then his death was useless because it was nonexistent. An illusory sacrifice is not a sacrifice.
Indeed, the idea of Jesus dying for sins appears to be based on some crazy idea that G-d never forgave anyone their sins before that. In the Tanakh G-d forgave sins many times! Psalmists looked forward to their redemption from death, from Sheol, and no carpenter from Galilee was mentioned. G-d alone would save them. Only G-d could.
So based on every part of the Tanakh (including Isaiah which is a straw desperately grabbed,) the idea that a man could be G-d or that G-d would ever Himself appear as a man was beyond wrong, it is ludicrious. It's madness.
It is idolatry.
Sorry to say it, but I am bound to tell the truth. Christianity is idolatrous. It is a measure of how bad off the world is now that an idolatrous religion is much to be preferred to the available alternatives. Christianity was founded by pagans, influenced by pagans, and introduced the idea of Jesus as himself G-d (which is never clearly stated in the oldest documents.) All this was the later interpretation of the pagan Roman Catholic Church in the early centuries A.D.
Now, is modern Judaism also an idolatrous religion? As it currently exists, not as it was stated in the Tanakh, YES it is. I'll tell you why.
Rabbinical Judaism regards the opinions of rabbis to be equal to direct statements from G-d in the Torah. That is blasphemy. Rabbinical Judaism reveres the idea of a Messiah, which as I already stated is completely wrong-headed (no human would ever, ever be fit to be king - no king but G-D ALONE.)
So there is plenty to go around for everyone, but in short Christmas is pagan because CHRISTIANITY is pagan.
Tuesday, December 17, 2019
A Beautiful World
My dream is a beautiful world. A world made beautiful through obedience to G-d's law.
Think about it. A world without theft, where wives and husbands stick together through difficulties no matter what. A world without war or murder. A world where nobody follows the false gods of wealth or sex or fame. Where as long as you have enough to survive, no one covets what another has and you are content. Where parents are honored. Where everyone speaks the truth, and no one lies. Where there is no king but G-d.
While the idea that human beings could be the ruination of the Earth was not dealt with in the Torah in modern terms (pollution, extinction, climate change,) it was dealt with. Care for the Earth was emphasized in such laws as not taking all the eggs from a nest or not cutting down fruit trees even of your enemies in a time of war. Evil people and kingdoms are spoken of as actually contaminating the Earth itself, and this is depicted as a crime against G-d. The Israelites were told that they are tenants and the land is G-d's. There is no 11th Commandment to protect the Earth, but it is implicit in the Ten and in other statements in the Torah. So this beautiful world would not only be beautiful to human lives, but beautiful period.
Now the fact that this world will almost certainly never be THAT beautiful world, is completely irrelevant. Some truths are indeed irrelevant truths, many in fact. A man of G-d does not base his actions on measurements of his odds of success. He does not commit actions based on their believed outcomes. The future is known to G-d alone. Basing the morality or rightness of your actions on their likely outcomes is anathema to a man of G-d, because it is based on the arrogant idea that we can ever predict outcomes or that we are allowed to gamble with ethics. We can't play G-d with the future. G-d's Law is the rule that a righteous man follows.
The idea that the ethics of an action are determined by their outcome is called Teleological Ethics. And such a concept is hateful to G-d, and it is a black hole from which there is little chance of escape except by the grace of understanding how very wrong-minded and wrong-hearted it is.
And it is only too common. Indeed, some people would be surprised to be told there is any other kind of ethics.
And so the fact that this world will likely never be that beautiful world where everyone obeys G-d's law has no bearing on my actions, heart or behavior. *I* need to do right, whether or not anyone else does. That is my task. And I fall short sometimes: this world is a difficult place for those who try to keep the Commandments. It was meant to be. This is the Enemy's turf, and I am trespassing. I do not seek to be conformed to this world. That is why I do not measure people's likely responses when I tell them what G-d's law is. I am obligated to tell them plainly. Whether they heed or not is not my department. Usually they don't.
My job is to bring that beautiful world into existence somewhere, in whatever pocket of land that the Lord sees fit to bring me to. My job is also to live that beautiful world now, in so far as I am able. I will speak truthfully, not covet what belongs to other human beings, honor the Lord my G-d and have no other gods, not steal from human beings, honor my ancestors, not do violence to anyone except to protect life, keep the Sabbath Day holy, and not commit any of the varied forms of adultery and sexual immorality. I will seek forgiveness from G-d and reform if I break any of these.
I actually do believe in the existence of this beautiful world where everyone keeps G-d's Law, and I aspire to be fit for it. It's not here, and it's not now, but it is.
I do not want to live according to THIS order of existence, I want to live according to THAT one.
Think about it. A world without theft, where wives and husbands stick together through difficulties no matter what. A world without war or murder. A world where nobody follows the false gods of wealth or sex or fame. Where as long as you have enough to survive, no one covets what another has and you are content. Where parents are honored. Where everyone speaks the truth, and no one lies. Where there is no king but G-d.
While the idea that human beings could be the ruination of the Earth was not dealt with in the Torah in modern terms (pollution, extinction, climate change,) it was dealt with. Care for the Earth was emphasized in such laws as not taking all the eggs from a nest or not cutting down fruit trees even of your enemies in a time of war. Evil people and kingdoms are spoken of as actually contaminating the Earth itself, and this is depicted as a crime against G-d. The Israelites were told that they are tenants and the land is G-d's. There is no 11th Commandment to protect the Earth, but it is implicit in the Ten and in other statements in the Torah. So this beautiful world would not only be beautiful to human lives, but beautiful period.
Now the fact that this world will almost certainly never be THAT beautiful world, is completely irrelevant. Some truths are indeed irrelevant truths, many in fact. A man of G-d does not base his actions on measurements of his odds of success. He does not commit actions based on their believed outcomes. The future is known to G-d alone. Basing the morality or rightness of your actions on their likely outcomes is anathema to a man of G-d, because it is based on the arrogant idea that we can ever predict outcomes or that we are allowed to gamble with ethics. We can't play G-d with the future. G-d's Law is the rule that a righteous man follows.
The idea that the ethics of an action are determined by their outcome is called Teleological Ethics. And such a concept is hateful to G-d, and it is a black hole from which there is little chance of escape except by the grace of understanding how very wrong-minded and wrong-hearted it is.
And it is only too common. Indeed, some people would be surprised to be told there is any other kind of ethics.
And so the fact that this world will likely never be that beautiful world where everyone obeys G-d's law has no bearing on my actions, heart or behavior. *I* need to do right, whether or not anyone else does. That is my task. And I fall short sometimes: this world is a difficult place for those who try to keep the Commandments. It was meant to be. This is the Enemy's turf, and I am trespassing. I do not seek to be conformed to this world. That is why I do not measure people's likely responses when I tell them what G-d's law is. I am obligated to tell them plainly. Whether they heed or not is not my department. Usually they don't.
My job is to bring that beautiful world into existence somewhere, in whatever pocket of land that the Lord sees fit to bring me to. My job is also to live that beautiful world now, in so far as I am able. I will speak truthfully, not covet what belongs to other human beings, honor the Lord my G-d and have no other gods, not steal from human beings, honor my ancestors, not do violence to anyone except to protect life, keep the Sabbath Day holy, and not commit any of the varied forms of adultery and sexual immorality. I will seek forgiveness from G-d and reform if I break any of these.
I actually do believe in the existence of this beautiful world where everyone keeps G-d's Law, and I aspire to be fit for it. It's not here, and it's not now, but it is.
I do not want to live according to THIS order of existence, I want to live according to THAT one.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)