The Church across the street is the grist of a decent illustration.
The Free Methodist Church across the street has had somewhere around 7 pastors since I’ve been here. Finally, the denomination decided to close the church because it could not meet budget. Well, they kind of decided to close the doors. The denomination came upon a brainstorm that I’ve read about other denominations pursuing with struggling churches. What the denomination decided to do is to close the church for 6 – 9 months with the intent to reopening the church once the community was convinced that the old church no longer existed. The present congregants of said church were dispersed in favor of a hoped for new and vibrant congregation.
So, in pursuit of that the denomination put a large sign in front saying, “THIS CHURCH IS CLOSED.” This sign lasted a few months and just recently a different sign replaced that sign saying “Future Home of DISCOVERY FELLOWSHIP.” The denomination refurbished the inside in anticipation of opening this “new” church. They removed the stodgy old pews and doubtless will make the interior architecture look more “hip.” I would bet my bank account that “Discovery Fellowship” was poll tested in terms of how receptive strangers would be to attending a church named “Discovery Fellowship.” I would also wager large amounts of money that phone surveys have been done or door to door polling asking the question, “If you were to attend a church what would you want to see in the church service.” All of this is right out of church growth management text books.
Now, I see this as a somewhat apt illustration for what is happening in this country. There are those in leadership in this country who think that this country can’t make it with the people we have and so they are willing to chase the original people off so that they can open up the country for a new people who they think will be more desirous than the people that they finally turned out. These new people will be more willing to support the Governing authorities than the previous inhabitants were. They will be more manageable and malleable, so the thinking goes. Also, just as the old notions of worship were ended with the ending of the old church in favor of the new pizzazz worship that will be in favor in “Discovery Fellowship” so in this country the old notions of morality are being ended in favor of the new morality of no morality.
In the end though even if “Discovery Fellowship,” is a “success” given the theology under-girding the new endeavor it will not be a Church regardless of what it might be called. Just so, whatever attains in this “new country” that results in a multiculturalism where the current majority is minoritized will not be a nation regardless of what it might be called.
The leadership of the Free Methodists with their attempt to remake their church in Charlotte and the “leadership” of this country with their attempt to remake this country have this in common; even if they succeed they will have failed.
It is not a perfect parallel. I can find holes in this illustration myself but it illustrates what I’ve given.
I was listening to an interview with Nebraska Senator Ben Sasse, in which he lamented the current state of visionlessness among most Congressman. The interview was refreshing in several ways, but your comment about leadership wanting to abandon “the people” resonated with some of what Sasse was saying about waning confidence in the American experiment.
Here is the link to the interview: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xzp710B1qHA&feature=youtu.be
Hello Joshua
Good to hear from you. Trust all is well.
Beware Sasse … he is thoroughly R2K.
Bret,
Sorry to have been silent for so long. We’re expecting our fifth child; first girl, who should arrive in mid-July! That’s too bad about Sasse. It is hard to find someone who is wholly acceptable in these times.
Though I am silent, I keep listening. I’m thankful for your kingdom work, brother!
Ben Carmack wrote,
“Can the dispositions be corrected or changed? Apparently not, since they are innate and hereditary. ”
Mark responds,
Regeneration will bring moral dispositions into conformity with god’s law. But it doesn’t raise the IQ of the Pygmy or the Watusi from 70 to 110 anymore than it changes the color of skin or the texture of one’s hair. One wonders if Carmack is categorically confused or gnostic?
“The current attempt to deny that there is any connection between the status of a culture and the quality of its citizens does not afford convincing proof that 6000 years of the historical record has – since 1950 – suddenly become invalidated, but rather that the United States is in the throes of an intellectual decline. We have reached our depth in an understanding of cultural dynamics when what is historically and scientifically valid in the area of race relations is also the most inexpedient. For the sake of temporary favors, meager political gains and a heightening of their image, even some of the most self-avowed conservatives will defy time-worn laws of cultural cause and effect in support of the Communist’s own disguised doctrine, a policy which can only defeat them at their own purpose. Americans are asked to adopt the posture of the faceless international man; to reduce themselves to their lowest cultural integer to please a generation of limp-wristed liberals and moral and intellectual elves who have momentarily seized control of their fad and opinion-molding agencies. Instead, they should reject this decadent ideology now, while anti-white propaganda has half the population afraid to come out of doors. If there is a voice that will tell all Americans within the United States to embrace their own ethnic heritage with greater pride and work to improve its integrity, quality and potential, let them follow this voice and tell other voices to take a long walk off a short pier.” ~ Kent H. Steffgen, “The Bondage of the Free”, 1965
Mr Carmack will NOT grasp the obvious until it’s too late.
https://cambriawillnotyield.wordpress.com/2016/06/04/among-us-but-not-of-us/
Hello again Ben,
First I would like to note that you essentially ignored most of what I said in my original comment about the meaning of the word nation/ethnos and the Biblical basis for my definition of nationhood. Instead you decided to focus in on the minutiae of a nation as defined by patrilineal descent vs. the relatedness of tribes. My guess is that you have no good response to the overall argument that I’ve made (as well as others) so you focus on more remote details.
You complain that I didn’t define what a closely related tribe is supposed to mean. I believe that this concept is rather self-explanatory and that it should be obvious that some tribes of people are far more closely related to each other than other tribes. For example, the Celts and Scandinavians are far more closely related to each other than the Scandinavians are to the Zulus of Africa. This concept is presupposed by Moses when he calls the Edomites the brothers of the Israelites (Num. 20:14; Deut. 23:7). How can Moses say this on your view that nations are not hereditary? If the Israelites are simply a non-related group of people who share a language and culture, then how can they speak to their collective relatedness to the nation of Edom? Obviously the answer is that Israel and Edom both descended from the common patriarch Isaac. The Israelites were the brothers to the Edomites in a way that they were not brothers to all nations and tribes of the world. Likewise, the Israelites accept David as their King on account of their close hereditary relationship to him, proclaiming that they were his bone and flesh (2 Sam. 5:1, 1 Chr. 11:1). The Israelites were closely related to David in a way that other nations were not. Your view simply cannot accommodate this fact.
While I do believe that national identity is essentially determined by patrilineal descent, there is no reason why this has to be limited to one father, although one particularly prominent patriarch is typically singled out, and this is the Biblical pattern as I mentioned before. This is something that you simply ignore in crafting your view that national identity can somehow be decoupled from heredity. You mention the conquest of England by successive invasions from the Angles, Saxons, and ultimately from the Normans as though I somehow approved of this. I don’t, and I never suggested that I did. I simply said that this did not destroy their national identity. You then inquire about skin color and why it is so important. The reason that people use skin color as an identifier for race is that while racial differences are far deeper than a mere difference in melanin content, skin color is a convenient descriptor. The prophet Jeremiah assumed that a nation like Cush/Ethiopia would have a different skin appearance than the Israelites (Jer. 13:23), otherwise his rhetorical question (can the Ethiopian change his skin?) is meaningless. People who share the same skin color are typically closely related, and outliers such as African albinos are easily distinguishable from whites.
You ask about the correlation of these external identifiers such as skin color with intelligence. The correlation is very strong, and there are very real racial differences in intelligence. You should consult the work of J.P. Rushton, Arthur Jensen, Charles Murray, and Richard Hernstein on this if you want more information. The reality is that people of the same race and ethnic group share a wide variety of traits, because many traits such as intelligence are indeed heritable.
You ask about eugenics. I indeed support the concept of good breeding, and I don’t think that anyone should reproduce with just anyone else. I do believe that compatibility has a good deal to do with having traits that are largely heritable in common. This doesn’t mean that I advocate forced sterilization (in most cases) or killing people, but I do think that these factors should be recognized by a healthy society. There is no Biblical reason to believe that such considerations are wrong, especially when you consider that we could make a case against excessive inbreeding along the same lines. I prefer to call myself a Kinist, but I have no problem saying that I am a nationalist for whites in our own homelands and countries. I also believe that other races and nations can and should advocate for their own people within their own homelands. Why is this wrong? Where does the Bible condemn this? Where does the Bible say that national identity is not coupled to heredity that can be recognized by common traits? Where does the Bible say that we ought to allow foreigners to rule over us? You have a lot of questions to answer, and it is clear so far that you haven’t dealt with the substantive points raised against your own position that have been offered here.
BC wrote,
Supposing this is the Biblical definition of race, nearly all states in the world where more than one tribe or ethnic group living within their borders are un-Biblical, and we are duty-bound, as a matter of orthodoxy, to oppose them. True or false?
Merle Davidson replies,
I see what you did there. You jumped from race to “tribe or ethnic group.” Of course, we understand Race to be an umbrella term under which one might find several distinct ethnicity. The White race thus would include Germans, Scots, Scandinavians, Brits, etc. As such your “duty bound” in no way follows. Naturally, it is the conviction of Kinists that nations comprised of people of a shared race, religion, culture, history, language, etc. are most likely to have the least amount of friction among the citizenry. The more commonalities the better. Robert Putnam’s “Bowling Alone,” confirms the observation that multicultural cultures do not do well.
BC
You say “patrilineal descent” but you beg an important question. Which father? How far back? If back to Noah, then all humans are brothers. If Noah’s sons, this means I have a sacred familial bond with the Queen of England and the Italian Popes. French Catholics and Swedish Lutherans. At some point, defining family so large becomes practically impossible. What do these people have in common? Why am I bound to them? This is universalizing obligations.
MD writes,
This isn’t that hard. If Israel’s 12 tribes could all identify Abraham as their Father and live as such, through the generations, it is not that difficult to identify a patrilineal descent. Clearly, Frenchmen know what it means to be of French extraction, and Kenyans know what it means to be of Kenyan extraction. No Japanese says to themself, “Well, Noah is my great great great Grandaddy therefore I will fit in, among the Inuits in Alaska. I suspect you’re trying to make this difficult in order to gain some kind of point.
And it is not universalizing obligations because we have already suggested that there are factors as well as Race and ethnicity that are involved though Race and ethnicity are certainly key. Kinists repeatedly speak of concentric circles of responsibility. First to my immediate faith and family, then to my faith and clan, then to my extended clan, etc. That this is biblical is seen in what St. Paul says,
“Anyone who does not provide for their relatives, and especially for their own household, has denied the faith and is worse than an unbeliever.”
Clearly St. Paul has an idea of what Patrilineal descent means and does not universalize obligations.
BC offered,
I share more in common with an American Hispanic than with a Swede. I have more in common with a Hispanic from Kentucky than a white guy from New York.
MD replies,
Well, you can only speak for yourself. Have you ever lived among the Mestizo to know you have more in common with them?
BC offers,
If you define family smaller, you run into the problem of multiple bloodlines. Indians marrying Whites. Irish marrying English. Germans marrying Spaniards. How big a percentage does one’s ancestry need to be to be determinitive? What if the family records are incomplete? What about adoption? Most importantly, who decides all of this and codifies it into law? Why do we need to completely overthrow our social conventions and existing national boundaries to accomodate these changes? Sounds revolutionary and Marxist to me…
MD replies,
Actually, you are the one advocating Marxist categories here. Consider a couple quotes,
“The aim of socialism is not only to abolish the present division of mankind into small states and end all national isolation; not only to bring the nations closer together, but to merge them….”
Vladimir Lenin
The Rights of Nations to Self Determination — pg. 76
”What will be the attitude of communism to existing nationalities?
The nationalities of the peoples associating themselves in accordance with the principle of community will be compelled to mingle with each other as a result of this association and hereby to dissolve themselves, just as the various estate and class distinctions must disappear through the abolition of their basis, private property.”
~ Frederick Engels in “The Principles of Communism”, 1847
“The equality of races and nations is one of the most important elements of the moral strength and might of the Soviet state. Soviet anthropology develops the one correct concept, that all the races of mankind are biologically equal. The genuinely materialist conception of the origin of man and of races serves the struggle against racism, against all idealist, mystic conceptions of man, his past, present and future.”
—Mikhail Nesturkh, Soviet anthropologist, 1959
“The Origin of Man” (Moscow)Mikhail Nesturkh, Soviet anthropologist, 1959:
Are you a Marxist Ben?
BC penned,
If nations should be extended families, this would seem to require that we marry those closest to us in relation without also violating the laws of consanguinity in Leviticus. Ideal societies are close-knit, somewhat like the Amish or Hasidic Jews.
Suppose a white girl fornicates with a black man and conceives a child. By Biblical law, the two are to be wed. The child grows up and marries one of his white cousins to “keep it in the family.” Is this allowed? Which concern predominates? Race or family ties? Who decides, and by what standard?
MD rebuts,
Keep in mind that this is not a matter of “if the word Nation means.” This is a matter of recognizing that the Word Nation according to its etymology originally denoted a family or race of men descended from a common progenitor. That is the meaning of the word “nation.” Now that, the idea of “nation” may have been watered down by conquest and creeping multiculturalism (much the same as conquest) does not deny the words original meaning.
Now, that a nation or people group can certainly suffer both from too much inbreeding as well as too much out-breeding all Kinists affirm.
You are wrong that Biblical law required marriage in your scenario. Marriage was one option but not the only option. Kinists generally advice that the child of miscegenation choose which race they feel a closer bond with and then marry within that race and so stay within that race.
BC wrote,
Suppose that a daughter commits incest with her father and the elders of the Church order this daughter to leave her home and go live with a new family. Does she marry within the new family or the old one? Who decides, and by what standard?
MD offer
Difficult and comparatively rare scenarios do not overturn general principles. The standard here would be sanguinity laws. Since she is bearing the son of her Father it would be best if that child did not marry a first cousin.
BC offers,
Agree with you on native missionaries. See Steve Saint’s book The Great Omission. First time missions, however, by definition must be foreign. Since not all people groups have been reached, this will continue to be necessary in some cases.
St. Paul was by most accounts single. That’s good enough for me.
BC asks,
Will you answer my questions or will you simply quote Sacred Tradition? Do you still affirm Sola Scriptura?
MD ends,
I read your whole reply Mr. Carmack. I didn’t see any quotation of Scripture on your part.
The thing is BC, when someone asks question after question, as you have, and each is answered in turn logically, historically, and scripturally, only to find at the end your insinuating that those who disagree with you must have laid down “sola scriptura,” you are arguing in bad faith. If someone answers your questions to the extent that you can find no means to cross-examine the answers, you do not turn around and accuse him of losing the faith. Doing so only proves that you aren’t interested in the answers. I sense what is really going on here is that this is not a hearing, but a judge’s opinion at a sentencing.
As such this is my last involvement. Others can take up with you if they wish.
You guys don’t seem to understand what patrilineal descent groups and families even are. Don’t mix one KIND of concept with another KIND of concept, hehe.
To be one nationality you have to follow from yourself, to your father, to your grandfather, to your great-grandfather etc. IN A STRAIGHT UNBROKEN LINE.
Racists often get it backwards, thinking that it is possible to identify a descent group from the bottom horizontally.
Nationality based on the patrilineal descent principle MUST have genealogical records back to ONE MAN. That is why the Israelites are called “the children of Israel”. They literally could trace back (patrilineally) multiple generations to the MAN Jacob/Israel, which was a REQUIREMENT for being “of Israel” (Ezra 2:59).
Notice also, that Shaul, the son of Simeon and grandson of ISRAEL had a CANAANITISH mother (Genesis 46:10). Yet this “half-breed” Shaul is still a “child of Israel” and continues in the genealogy and forms one of the tribal clans (Numbers 26:13). His mother’s origin is merely an inserted fact that can tell us that he is influenced by Canaanite CULTURE, or to shame his father for intermarrying with peoples who have wicked cultures, but he is STILL an Israelite.
Joseph also, had two sons who are “half-breeds” with a mother from HAMITE descent, a line FAR removed from the Shemite line. The two “half-breed” became tribes of Israel.
So notice, how this system is more inclusive than the race idea or “pure-blood” nonsense and can allow or tolerate a little foreign “blood” to slowly creep into the nation-family, WITHOUT destroying the DISTINCTIVE and very CLEARLY SEPARATE national boundary identity. Albeit, allowing large-scale intermarriage would conjoin two distinct lines (that would still be distinct) into one very friendly alliance, but would TOTALLY blur CULTURAL practices, beliefs and customs through influence (Psalm 106:35).
Sorry, but French, Anglo-Saxon (sounds like the name of a “mixed breed”) and Celts are not groups named after a man, and at some point all stopped using the patrilineal tribal principle or never actually did in the first place. So it must be something else that defines a Celt or a Frenchman, and that is why you guys are fishing in the dark for a clear definition and because you rightly look at “heritage” (but you should think descent instead), all you have is common physical characteristics, but that makes it IMPOSSIBLE to define CLEARLY a Dane from a Celt.
With DNA science it makes it a little easier (you can use Y-chromosomes), but that still makes it hard to define clearly distinctive descent groups such as a “children of Israel” or “children of Moab”.
Beard fallacy much Eric?
And it is not a given that Asenath (Joseph’s wife) was from Ham. Many contend that she was descended from Shem. Joseph’s case, of course, we’re speaking of his having taken a wife from amongst the Hyksos Semites who reigned in Egypt at the time of his sojourn there.
We should note that though scripture emphasizes patrilineal descent on account of the principle of federalism, it is not to the exclusion of matrilineal descent. See Ezekiel 19 where matrilineal descent is underscored, saying that the mother of Israel is “a lioness” (vs.2) and “a vine in your bloodline.” (vs.10) And Christ’s matrilineal descent is certainly emphasized as it is His only connection to the blood of Israel and the throne.
Eric said,
“To be one nationality you have to follow from yourself, to your father, to your grandfather, to your great-grandfather etc. IN A STRAIGHT UNBROKEN LINE.”
Bret responds,
You are saying each of us alone as individuals are the only nations. At best, the biggest nation that can exist according to your definition is between immediate siblings born in the same house. That is a definition which the bible nowhere assumes.
Finally, both references to Shaul and Joseph marrying other races are subject to geographic names being used to describe them rather than racial. In Shaul’s case, to assume intermarriage was conceived as benign flies in the face of both Abraham and Isaac having insisted on their children marrying kinswomen. And to call Shaul’s wife Canaanite without specifying which nation of the Canaanites she came from also makes it sound geographic.
Oh, and Eric, if it impossible to define clearly a Dane from a Celt then why are you calling them “A Dane,” and “A Celt?”