In the King James Bible only 5 verses, 3 Old Testament and 2 New Testament. Job 11:8, Psalm 139:8, Amos 9:2, Matthew 11:23 and Luke 10:15, the last two are the same saying of Jesus being recorded twice.
NONE of these are about either of these words relationship to any human being's Eternal Destiny. They're all idioms of Heaven as up above us and Hell as being down below.
If our Eternal Destiny was supposed to be understood as a simple Heaven or Hell dichotomy I would expect these words to appear together more often.
Friday, August 30, 2019
Christian Communism
One common objection to my modern political application of the Early Church's Communism in Acts 2-4 is to say that's merely describing Voluntary Communism and would not imply support for State Enforced Communism or of Abolishing the State in the name of Communism.
If you're also teaching that Christians shouldn't get involved in secular politics at all, that we should be separatists like many of the old Anabaptists, then you can make that argument while remaining intellectually consistent. But if you're a Dominionist, or an Amillennial/Post-Millennial teaching that the Church is supposed to be ruling the world right now, or that America was founded to be a Christian Nation and should be governed by Christian Values. you can't then ignore the clear evidence that Communism is a Christian Value.
Another objection is to claim this was peculiar to just the Jerusalem Church and we should actually view the Jerusalem Church as a failure. This is very silly on many levels, there is no Biblical Evidence that other Churches didn't follow the example of the Jerusalem on this. Roman A. Montero in his book All Things in Common: The Economic Practices of The Early Christians demonstrated from the the historical records that the Early Church continued this practice all through the Pre-Constantine era, it wasn't just the first generation.
The Protestant Reformation did not begin with Martin Luther, many came before him.
The problem with beginning it with Luther is that starting then makes it a very Top-Down Reformation, not just in England, Luther befriended many Princes and Dukes of northern/eastern Germany, and the movement also won over William of Orange and Christina III of Denmark. Meanwhile in Switzerland Calvin took over Geneva and Zwignly took over Zurich, and the French Hugenots were lead by the Bourbons and the house of Navarre. What separated Luther from his predecessors was he had the shrewd Political acumen to make his message appealing to the Nobility, and that's why modern Capitalism was largely born out of this Top-Down Reformation.
Luther's Predecessors on the other hand were all Socialist to some degree, all at least teaching that the hoarding of Wealth was incompatible with a Christian Life. From the Waldensians to the Lollards (like John Ball) to the Hussite movement where Petr Chelčický and the Taborites both taught Communism in different forms.
After Luther came more Communist Protestants like Thomas Muntzer, but Luther was firmly against them, he was in the pocket of the Rich. And during the English Revolution came Gerrard Winstanly and the Diggers.
It wasn't till the 1700s that Atheists and Deists started forming a Secular version of Communism.
If you're also teaching that Christians shouldn't get involved in secular politics at all, that we should be separatists like many of the old Anabaptists, then you can make that argument while remaining intellectually consistent. But if you're a Dominionist, or an Amillennial/Post-Millennial teaching that the Church is supposed to be ruling the world right now, or that America was founded to be a Christian Nation and should be governed by Christian Values. you can't then ignore the clear evidence that Communism is a Christian Value.
Another objection is to claim this was peculiar to just the Jerusalem Church and we should actually view the Jerusalem Church as a failure. This is very silly on many levels, there is no Biblical Evidence that other Churches didn't follow the example of the Jerusalem on this. Roman A. Montero in his book All Things in Common: The Economic Practices of The Early Christians demonstrated from the the historical records that the Early Church continued this practice all through the Pre-Constantine era, it wasn't just the first generation.
The Protestant Reformation did not begin with Martin Luther, many came before him.
The problem with beginning it with Luther is that starting then makes it a very Top-Down Reformation, not just in England, Luther befriended many Princes and Dukes of northern/eastern Germany, and the movement also won over William of Orange and Christina III of Denmark. Meanwhile in Switzerland Calvin took over Geneva and Zwignly took over Zurich, and the French Hugenots were lead by the Bourbons and the house of Navarre. What separated Luther from his predecessors was he had the shrewd Political acumen to make his message appealing to the Nobility, and that's why modern Capitalism was largely born out of this Top-Down Reformation.
Luther's Predecessors on the other hand were all Socialist to some degree, all at least teaching that the hoarding of Wealth was incompatible with a Christian Life. From the Waldensians to the Lollards (like John Ball) to the Hussite movement where Petr Chelčický and the Taborites both taught Communism in different forms.
After Luther came more Communist Protestants like Thomas Muntzer, but Luther was firmly against them, he was in the pocket of the Rich. And during the English Revolution came Gerrard Winstanly and the Diggers.
It wasn't till the 1700s that Atheists and Deists started forming a Secular version of Communism.
Tuesday, August 20, 2019
No one is actually defining the "Alt Right" correctly.
If your definition of "Alt Right" excludes Ben Shapiro and Paul Joseph Watson then you're actually excluding the core cultural center of how the "Alt Right" works. And possibly the same can be said about Stephen Molyneux and Stephen Crowder.
The Alt Right is largely defined by how undefined it is, there is no actual ideological common denominator, every one of them on at least one issue takes a position that in modern American Political Discourse is considered a very far right position. But there is no single issue that unifies them all.
One of the more common attempts to define the Alt Right based on an actual policy position is to say it requires "Advocating for a White Ethno-State". Which can be easily justified by the fact that a couple of the most prominent websites calling themselves something like "altright dot com" are indeed doing a form of that, and attacking some of the names I listed above for not being that. But the thing is that designation existed before it was an officially trademarked domain name.
The thing that all forms of the Alt Right actually have in common is that they are Trump Supporters, that is why it first entered public discourse during his Presidential Campaign. But not all Trump Supporters, not people who were gonna vote Republican no matter what because "anyone but Hilary" not even necessarily every vote he eventually got in the primaries (which was less then 50% of votes cast in the Republican 2016 Primary). But the people who were enthusiastic Trump supporters in 2015, and didn't do so just because they liked him best on one issue important to them. They are the people who considered his inflammatory style a feature rather then a bug. The people who care more about "triggering the libs" then any actual Conservative policy. And because of this the label can include people who are constantly attacking each other, just as different kinds of Fascists in the 1920s and 30s often didn't get along with each other (Mussolini and the Nazis actually had a very hostile partnership), they are united only in their support of Trump.
Trump himself I don't call Alt Right because I don't think he believes a single thing he says. But the Alt Right were those people predisposed to find him appealing the moment his campaign started. Many of them came out of GamerGate and the 4Chan /pol/ board. But that is not me agreeing with those saying all of Meme Culture is Alt Right or even all of 4Chan, I think most of 4Chan looks at /pol/ with annoyance.
You see some people want to separate the Alt Right from the Kekistani flag wavers, but the Kekistani flag wavers are specifically who the term was first coined to describe, attempts to attach it to a more specific ideology came later.
Now a lot of this desire to define the "Alt Right" to exclusively is specifically fans of Jordan Peterson and Sargon of Akkad wanting to keep the label from including them. So I will say here I don't currently have an opinion one way or the other if either of them qualifies because I don't know if they ever supported Trump, much less soon enough or strongly enough to have the proper MAGA street cred. But they certainly have been allied with people who qualify. It is only specifically the White Nationalism variety they are hostile to.
I am not making this post with any specific desire to condemn someone I don't like as being Alt Right, this is my truly unbiased observation of what the movement is.
In 2015 I was still "Paleo-Conservative" enough while also being rebellious enough that I could have easily became a founding member of the Alt Right, but I didn't, I always looked at Trump with distrust and in a way his rise helped drive me out of the Alex Jones listening community.
The Alt Right is largely defined by how undefined it is, there is no actual ideological common denominator, every one of them on at least one issue takes a position that in modern American Political Discourse is considered a very far right position. But there is no single issue that unifies them all.
One of the more common attempts to define the Alt Right based on an actual policy position is to say it requires "Advocating for a White Ethno-State". Which can be easily justified by the fact that a couple of the most prominent websites calling themselves something like "altright dot com" are indeed doing a form of that, and attacking some of the names I listed above for not being that. But the thing is that designation existed before it was an officially trademarked domain name.
The thing that all forms of the Alt Right actually have in common is that they are Trump Supporters, that is why it first entered public discourse during his Presidential Campaign. But not all Trump Supporters, not people who were gonna vote Republican no matter what because "anyone but Hilary" not even necessarily every vote he eventually got in the primaries (which was less then 50% of votes cast in the Republican 2016 Primary). But the people who were enthusiastic Trump supporters in 2015, and didn't do so just because they liked him best on one issue important to them. They are the people who considered his inflammatory style a feature rather then a bug. The people who care more about "triggering the libs" then any actual Conservative policy. And because of this the label can include people who are constantly attacking each other, just as different kinds of Fascists in the 1920s and 30s often didn't get along with each other (Mussolini and the Nazis actually had a very hostile partnership), they are united only in their support of Trump.
Trump himself I don't call Alt Right because I don't think he believes a single thing he says. But the Alt Right were those people predisposed to find him appealing the moment his campaign started. Many of them came out of GamerGate and the 4Chan /pol/ board. But that is not me agreeing with those saying all of Meme Culture is Alt Right or even all of 4Chan, I think most of 4Chan looks at /pol/ with annoyance.
You see some people want to separate the Alt Right from the Kekistani flag wavers, but the Kekistani flag wavers are specifically who the term was first coined to describe, attempts to attach it to a more specific ideology came later.
Now a lot of this desire to define the "Alt Right" to exclusively is specifically fans of Jordan Peterson and Sargon of Akkad wanting to keep the label from including them. So I will say here I don't currently have an opinion one way or the other if either of them qualifies because I don't know if they ever supported Trump, much less soon enough or strongly enough to have the proper MAGA street cred. But they certainly have been allied with people who qualify. It is only specifically the White Nationalism variety they are hostile to.
I am not making this post with any specific desire to condemn someone I don't like as being Alt Right, this is my truly unbiased observation of what the movement is.
In 2015 I was still "Paleo-Conservative" enough while also being rebellious enough that I could have easily became a founding member of the Alt Right, but I didn't, I always looked at Trump with distrust and in a way his rise helped drive me out of the Alex Jones listening community.
Sunday, August 4, 2019
The Myth of Mutually Assured Destruction
This post is not me saying Nuclear Weapons didn't exist or that they don't pose a serious risk of destroying all life on Earth. Just the opposite.
This is about the myth that the existence of Nuclear Weapons are the only reason the Cold War never went Hot and so therefore it's a good thing Nukes exist because they've prevented another major war.
The whole notion that post 1945 history has been some uniquely peaceful era of human history is itself an absurd western bias of human history. Europe hasn't gone to war with itself but try telling the Middle East or South East Asia that things have been peaceful.
But mostly what I'm aware of is that The Cold War was not the first Cold War in history.
Rome and Parthia glared at each other across the Euphrates for nearly two centuries before their first full on war with each other. Yet people think America and Russia needed "Mutually Assured Destruction" to go less then a third of that.
Most people today don't know this but the fact is we attempted to invade Russia right after the Bolsheviks took over during WWI, and we were utterly and decisively defeated. We were never gonna invade Russia again because we'd already learned that was a futile endeavor. And Stalinist Russia just wanted to keep to itself, Stalin rejected the World Revolution ideology of Lenin and Trotsky. So neither side was ever going to go to full scale war with the other regardless of Nukes existing or not.
So no, the real danger caused by the mere existence of Nuclear Weapons is not worth their imaginary benefit.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qBMHaM_3JhA
This is about the myth that the existence of Nuclear Weapons are the only reason the Cold War never went Hot and so therefore it's a good thing Nukes exist because they've prevented another major war.
The whole notion that post 1945 history has been some uniquely peaceful era of human history is itself an absurd western bias of human history. Europe hasn't gone to war with itself but try telling the Middle East or South East Asia that things have been peaceful.
But mostly what I'm aware of is that The Cold War was not the first Cold War in history.
Rome and Parthia glared at each other across the Euphrates for nearly two centuries before their first full on war with each other. Yet people think America and Russia needed "Mutually Assured Destruction" to go less then a third of that.
Most people today don't know this but the fact is we attempted to invade Russia right after the Bolsheviks took over during WWI, and we were utterly and decisively defeated. We were never gonna invade Russia again because we'd already learned that was a futile endeavor. And Stalinist Russia just wanted to keep to itself, Stalin rejected the World Revolution ideology of Lenin and Trotsky. So neither side was ever going to go to full scale war with the other regardless of Nukes existing or not.
So no, the real danger caused by the mere existence of Nuclear Weapons is not worth their imaginary benefit.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qBMHaM_3JhA
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