Reviewing Rushdoony’s “The American Indian” — Power

“The Indians originally venerated Cortes as a god. They respected strength, they were ruled by very powerful gods, and a man who could overthrow those who would be acknowledged.”

Patrick Marnham
So Far From God: A Journey to Central America — pg. 93

So, starts Rushdoony in his chapter on Power in his book “The American Indian.” The burden of this chapter is to reveal that in terms of worship what the Indian worshiped was “power.” In this context Rush insists the converse was true also in his experience. Because the Indians worshiped power, they likewise despised powerlessness. Along the way Rushdoony labors also to show that this worship of power is something that is now characteristic of American culture.

Rushdoony states the obvious in this chapter that men who will not Worship the God of the Bible, will inevitably worship naked power instead.

“If the omnipotent and all-gracious God of Scripture is not worshipped, men will pursue their adoration of power in other ways.”

Rushdoony notes that the disrespect for powerlessness that the Indians had was exhibited by their disrespect for blacks.

“Owing to this respect for power, there was a corresponding disrespect for powerlessness. The clearest expression of this was their attitude towards blacks…. to them, blacks were inferior and their feelings did not count.”

One wonders if this attitude was really about power so much as it is a mindless ethnocentrism that can be so typical among different people groups.

It is interesting though that RJR contrasts this with the attitude of the white man towards blacks as in telling a story about interaction between Indians and a particular black man RJR concludes,

“He (the black man upon whom a prank had been pulled) soon came to realize that no Indian would regard him as an equal, whereas some white men would and most white men would be reasonably fair to him.”

However after making these kinds of blanket statements Rushdoony turns around and admits that Indians could respect the black man if he was a warrior type,

“In some areas, blacks intermarried with Indians. I am of the opinion that this usually occurred where blacks fought back against enslavement and escaped. Such defiance would have earned Indians’ respect. The Indian attitude was not earned in terms of race or color but of warrior standards….What mattered was a man’s exhibition of the traits of the fighter and the hunter.”

Of course this refers back to the worship of power. According to RJR if any individual revealed power then they might be accepted on some level by the Indian. The best way that I can harmonize RJR here is to say as a general rule the Indian did not respect blacks but exceptions might occur if individuals blacks were to show a warrior spirit that bespoke power.

Rush even connected the peyote cult with the pursuit of power. He notes that the peyote drug creates “gives illusions of power.” At the same time Rush noted that many of the other Tribal members looked down upon the peyote users as being weak, thus showing again the power esteem.

As a brief side-note it is interesting that RJR reports that many of the Indians claimed that the use of peyote was a modern phenomena that was introduced by the country of Mexico.

Getting back to the power theme RJR spends time examining how modern American culture has likewise turned to the cult of power.

“This veneration of power was very notable to me, especially because I saw the characteristic becomem very prominent in the white American culture by the 1960’s. One aspect of it was the rise of ‘groupies,’ girls who eagerly sumbitted sexually to power figures in the popular culture. Popular musicians, athletes, film and television stars have since then been pursued with intensity by women, young and not so young, who feel it is an honor to be used sexually by them. Frankly, nothing I saw among the Indians matched in intensity this power worship that became so prevalent in the United States…. White American culture has far outstripped that of the Indians in its worship of power, with deadly results.”

Clearly, if man will not worship God he will worship that which he believes will give him power. As bad as this is it may be even worse when Christians worship God because of how they think they can bend God’s power to their own selfish use. Too often in the Church today God is worshiped, not because of who He is, but for what He can offer to the worshiper. If it is bad to worship naked power apart from God, how much worse to worship God for how His power can be channeled to serve our own selfish purposes? To often, in the words of Bob Dylan, we think of God as ” just an errand boy to satisfy our wandering desires.”

When are we going to wake up and strengthen the things that remain?

Perhaps a clear sign of Christian maturity is the willingness to worship God when He has determined to be God hidden. There are times in life when God’s providence comes as a severe mercy announcing a seeming powerlessness in some life event. When all seems without the necessary power we would summon will we still be a people who worship God?

In such times we need to remember with Rush,

“God’s being is more than simply power. He is justice, love, grace, law and more.”

May God be pleased to reveal to us the lie that the temptation to worship naked power is.

Government Entitlement For the Corporate Class

“by the late 19th century the inner sanctums of Wall Street understood that the most efficient way to gain an unchallenged monopoly was to ‘go political’ and make society go to work for the monopolists — under the name of the public good and the public interest…. One barrier to mature understanding of recent history is the notion that all capitalists are the bitter and unswerving enemies of all Marxists and socialists…. In fact the idea is nonsense. There has been a continuing, albeit concealed, alliance between international political capitalists and international revolutionary socialists — to their mutual benefit…. The open minded reader should bear two clues in mind: monopoly capitalists are bitter enemies of laissez-faire entrepreneurs; and, given the weaknesses of social central planning, the totalitarian socialist state is a perfect captive market for monopoly capitalists, if an alliance can be made with socialist power brokers.”

Antony C. Sutton
Wall Street and the Bolshevik Revolution

Clearly the point above is that the idea that socialism and (finance) capitalism are arch enemies is ridiculous. In point of fact the purpose of finance capitalism (Corporatism) is to enrich itself via the means of socialism.

A couple of examples will begin to bring to light this reality.

How else, but as entitlement to the Oligarchy, does one view the FEDS lifting bad assets from private bank balance sheets? This is an entitlement for the International Money interest, is it not? This is a clear re-distribution of wealth upwards.

When we bail out mega companies from their private debt who’s money is committed to being the ‘lender of last resort’ but those of taxpayers?

In such a move we see a re-distribution of wealth upward from the have-nots to the haves.

Secondly by way of example, taxing the middle class income and using it to pay the interest on the Treasury bonds that make up the National debt is also and example of redistribution of wealth upwards where there oligarchs are enriched at the cost of the middle class. This is because the Treasury bonds that represent the National debt are held mostly by the wealthy companies, individuals, and nation states.

Socialism is NOT a boon to the lower class. Socialism is the way the Oligarchy fools the lower economic class into thinking they are trying to help them. In Socialism the Oligarchy (the International money interest) is helping and enriching themselves at the expense of the middle class. Socialism does not lower the gap between the Bourgeoisie and the proletariat. In point of fact Socialism widens the gap between the finance capitalist Corporatist class and the blue collar laboring class.

Fisking A Snippet From Obama’s “State Of The Putsch” Address

The Great Leader waxed eloquent,

“Finally, if we are serious about economic growth, it is time to heed the call of business leaders, labor leaders, faith leaders, and law enforcement —and fix our broken immigration system.”

The Peanut gallery responds,

1.) Economic Growth — If you increase the population of a country you can simultaneously grow the economy while at the same time decrease the per capita income. This is not rocket science.

2.) Heeding call of business leaders

a.) The call from business leaders is a call from the Oligarchs of mega corporations who desire cheap labor so as to increase their own profit margin. These people would replace their Mothers if they could find a South of the Border Mamacita who would be willing to be “Mom” for a lesser wage.

b.) Repeatedly, it has been demonstrated that immigration, whatever the source, causes an upward redistribution of income from labor to capital in any society, whether high or low wage. As such, of course business leaders desire amnesty.

3.) Heeding call of labor leaders

a.) The call from labor leaders is a call to grow their rank and file which will mean increased money via union dues which will mean the ability to purchase more political power by purchasing more politicians. The labor leaders care no more for their rank and file then the business leaders care about their customers. For each, amnesty means a larger constituency by which they can have a larger wallet.

b.) Further “O” cites “labor leaders” because he understands that more Union workers means not only more money but more votes. Amnesty means the Democratic single party rule for a generation and the redefining of the Republican party even further to the Left then they already are.

4.) Heeding call of Faith Leaders — This is from the “do-gooder” crowd who’s schmaltzy sentimentalism even Jesus is embarrassed by. These types tend to far outstrip God in terms of how Holy they are. Typically they are soft Marxists, full of good intentions, who have no ability whatsoever to understand the law of unintended consequences. The best thing they could do is to try and understand the broken window fallacy in all its implications. Believe me when I tell you that God is even more embarrassed by these people than I am.

5.) Heeding call of law enforcement — Border patrol officers and organizations have routinely complained about amnesty.

The Great Leader Offered,

“Republicans and Democrats in the Senate have acted.”

The Peanut Gallery,

Like the political whores they are.

His Majesty continued,

I know that members of both parties in the House want to do the same. Independent economists say immigration reform will grow our economy and shrink our deficits by almost $1 trillion in the next two decades.”

The “Emperor is Naked” kid responds,

Shrinking our deficit by 1 Trillion in two decades will be exactly how much in terms of 2014 dollars? A few billion? And yes, we will grow our economy but what will that growth look like in terms of income as our population increases so that per captia income decreases. The Congressional Budget Office insists that this treasonous Amnesty proposal will depress American wages for the next two decades.

And I’m sure members of both parties in the House want to do the same. After all, they are all political whores for the Eastern Establishment, who in turn are political whores for the International Money Interest.

The Great Leader plods on,

“And for good reason: when people come here to fulfill their dreams — to study, invent, and contribute to our culture — they make our country a more attractive place for businesses to locate and create jobs for everyone. So let’s get immigration reform done this year.

The popcorn throwing guy in the cheap seats responds,

More schmaltz. One wonders if a President should be more concerned about the Dreams of the citizens of those who elected him than the dreams of illegal immigrants. Our real unemployment numbers are through the roof and our Government wants to give amnesty to non-Americans so that they can fulfill their dreams? What dreams are those? Getting on the Government tit of welfare, health-care, and free-fare?

Secondly, I suspect that the fulfilling of their dreams will mean that they will do for our country what they did for their country when they lived there. After all, polling reveals that Immigrants bring with them the mindset that created the Tyranny of the countries they fled from and that mindset followed through upon in the voting booth will inevitably re-create their hell-hole homelands here.

http://townhall.com/columnists/anncoulter/2014/01/29/gop-crafts-plan-to-wreck-the-country-lose-voters-n1786781

Look, I’ve said this repeatedly. This is not about anybody’s Dreams except the Dreams of the Treason constituency which is comprised of the Corporatist traitor class, the Mega-Union traitor class, the Faux-Religious Leader’s traitor class and Bureaucratic-Politician traitor class. This is not about doing what is good for our country. This is about the State replacing one defiant citizenry with a compliant citizenry. The Government is, in essence, electing a new people.

Bret Lee on Brian Lee

“Focusing perhaps too much on the civil laws of the old covenant, as if they were still in effect in the new covenant era, the book (Tim Keller’s “Generous Justice”) gives too little attention in my view to Jesus’ explicit “new commandment” for his followers to “love one another as he has loved them” (John 15:12-17; 1 John 2:7-10; 3:11-24). Jesus even says that it is by this special love that his followers will be known in the world. How does this command relate to Israel’s calling to manifest God’s justice societally?”

Dr. Brian Lee
Minister — URC
Article From Modern Reformation Publication

http://www.modernreformation.org/default.php?page=articledisplay&var1=ArtRead&var2=1285&var3=main&var4=Hom

1.) I don’t agree with Tim Keller. I think Keller advocates a kind of soft Marxism as Christianity. Whatever will be written here is not in defense of Keller. Instead I am defending the idea that the Old Testament law is not obsolete per Lee’s reasoning.

2.) The Westminster Confession insists that the civil law remains in effect in terms of its general equity.

“To them also, as a body politic, He gave sundry judicial laws, which expired together with the State of that people; not obliging under any now, further than the general equity thereof may require…”

The fact that the last phrase is placed in the WCF 19:4 suggests that Lee is in error about the civil laws no longer being in effect today. The civil laws as they pertained to OT Israel, as the Old Testament saints existed in their National existence, have expired, however, the general equity of those civil laws abide on and remain in force. When we attempt to just throw out God’s civil law without paying attention to the general equity that remains we eviscerate the applicational use of the Moral law as the civil law was merely the moral law as interpreted into case law. When we whimsically toss out the general equity of the civil law we make the moral law toothless. It is true that we have to do interpretive work here to find the general equity of the civil law but upon doing the interpretive work the heart of the civil law continues to live.

3.) When Lee appeals to Jesus’ new commandment and plays that off as superseding God’s eternal law as codified in the OT how is Lee not making a Dispenstional move here? Is Lee here suggesting that the amorphous idea of “love” is supposed to be the ethic by which New Testament Christians are to live? How is Lee’s approach any different than Joseph Fletcher’s approach in his book, “Situation Ethics: The New Morality?” Fletcher posited an ethic of “Loving concern” as the beacon by which all decisions are made. Is this what Lee is suggesting as well?

4.) When Jesus commanded his people to love one another, He did so in the context of upholding the law of God at every turn. The point here is that love as an ethic, cannot be defined without a transcendent law structure to inform it. When Jesus said “love one another,” they could only know what love was and looked like by referencing and accessing God’s transcendent law. Jesus Himself loved His people by fulfilling God’s law in relation to them. If they were to love one another as He had loved them then in order to do so they would have to love one another by respect to and fulfillment of God’s law word just as Jesus had loved them in respect to and fulfillment of God’s law word.

5.) So, Keller makes the OT speak soft Marxism, while Lee makes it speak antinomian Dispensationalism. Neither approaches are particularly satisfying.

Postscript,

For a good article reviewing Keller’s “Generous Justice” as soft Marxism see,

http://freedomtorch.com/blogs/3/2762/tim-keller-and-social-justice