The United States is two hundred and fifty years old today; America is not. America was already centuries into its process of national formation when the Declaration of Independence was signed; the Germanic race, from which we Americans descend, was already millennia old. The symbols of our race predate our race (in the formal sense); the symbols of our nation are (in some cases) younger, but they are still ours.

Today, there are many false churches, and they almost universally still display the cross (and other Christian symbols); only a madman or a fiend would suggest that we abandon these symbols because they have been coopted by wicked men. In fact, the enemy would not attempt to steal symbols if those symbols had neither meaning nor power — abusus usum non tollit. The misuse or abuse of a symbol confirms the existence of a correct use, much as the exception proves (the existence of) the rule. Our enemies do not get to dictate our symbols or the terms of their use.

Moderation is almost universally a virtue, although being a moderate is most certainly not; we must ensure that we neither fall off the left side of the horse (rejecting the symbols of our race and using only the symbols of our nation) nor fall off the right side of the horse (rejecting the symbols of our nation and using only the symbols of our race). The flags of our forefathers are still ours, and it would be wrong for us to break with tradition and not pass these symbols to our sons and grandsons. A political movement or group that falls off either side of the horse will, ultimately, not succeed.

To name and examine all of our symbols would take a lifetime to do properly, so I will narrow my focus here to four symbols and one category:

1. The American Flag

First, we must claim and use the American flag, for it has become a symbol of our nation and it is ours by right.

We must not cede this symbol to any others, and we must certainly not abandon it. Both the current form and a number of historical versions of this symbol must be maintained and used.

2. The Hakenkreuz

Second, we must claim and use the Hakenkreuz, for it is a symbol of our race and it is ours by right.

God placed this symbol into the night sky and it long ago became a symbol of our Germanic race. We must not cede this symbol to any others, and we must certainly not abandon it. That this symbol offends enemies and false friends alike and drives them into a frenzy is good and useful. In English, we may employ the German name or the translation: the hooked cross.

3. The Cross

Third, we must claim and use the Cross, for it is a symbol of our Lord and (by way of our religion) of our race, and it is ours by right.

As God clearly tells us (Genesis) through the mouth of Allfather Noah, we, the sons and daughters of Japheth, are the chosen race; to us God has entrusted His Kingdom on Earth — Christendom. We must not cede this symbol to any others, and we must certainly not abandon it. Together with the hooked cross, the crux immissa (the Latin cross — †) is a declaration to friend and enemy alike of our loyalty to race and to Lord. For either of these, you must be ready to die, for to die for the symbols of our race and our Lord is to die for the things thereby signified.

4. The Confederate Flag

Fourth, we must claim and use the Confederate flag, for it has become a symbol of our nation and is ours by right.

Discussion of the Civil War is hereby ended — we are not Notherners or Southerners, we are, first and foremost, American brothers. The foolish and tragic business of the Civil War must be left in the past; it is most certainly our history, but our great-grandchildren can debate and (finally) close the matter in peace in the future. We must first win that peace, and we do not need more distractions from the work that must be done. The Stars and Bars, the Battle Flag, and Old Glory must and will fly side by side. They are all our symbols and we must neither cede them to others nor abandon them. There will be no tolerance for geographical squabbling that goes beyond anything more than brotherly banter.

5. The Flags of our Fatherlands

Fifth, we must claim and use the flags of our forefathers, for they are symbols of our fatherlands and of our race.

Toward this end, we must and will fly the flags of the three great European nations whose contributions form the core of our American nation: Germany, Scotland, and England. There are certainly other European nations whose contributions we cannot ignore and do not mean to diminish, and their symbols may rightly be incorporated and employed when and where appropriate, but these great three are the very heart and soul of who and what we are and what we are fighting to preserve. We must not cede these symbols to any others, and we must certainly not abandon them. We sons and daughters of Western Europe are all brothers and sisters regardless of where we may now be found in the world. Our struggle is one, for our people are one. I am my brother’s keeper.

Our history did not start in 1776 and it will not end in 2026. The symbols of our race are older than the Sun, and we will abandon not one of them; the symbols of our nations are ours by right and we will cherish them all. Our divisions by language and geography must and will be subordinated to our unity in blood. I see in every American — whether he is a Northerner, a Southerner, an East Coaster, or a West Coaster — a brother or a sister, and the same is true of every son or daughter of Western Europe. We face an existential threat and an implacable enemy; we must face our enemies as a united front. Let these, then, be our symbols in this struggle and let no man attack or denigrate any of them. The symbols of our forefathers are part of our patrimony, and we will defend them with our lives.

May God see from Heaven and bless our struggle. May we each find it in ourselves to devote all that we have to this struggle and the good of our people. May the next two hundred and fifty years of America make the previous two hundred and fifty look like an opening act. May God bless the American nation.

God with us.

Society is a prison. No, not (necessarily^[1]) in the sense that we are here as punishment; yes, in the sense that we are here not by our own will and we are, more or less, trapped here along with everyone else. This should actually inform our approach to a number of things, including how we organize society.

Before we return to the issue of society, we must first examine two thought experiments: The Prisoner’s Dilemma and Newcomb’s paradox. Taken together, these two games^[2] will provide us what we will need for the core purpose of this article: Examining society, how it functions, and how we should behave and structure society to achieve optimal outcomes.

The Prisoner’s Dilemma is one of the simplest games in game theory and is often used as part of an introductory class, often to explain core concepts. We do not need to fully understand the game for this article, but we do need to understand a handful of core concepts. First, the game:

Two men (1 and 2) are arrested for committing some crime. They are being interrogated. They can cooperate (C, c) or defect (D, d)^[3], which is to say that they can remain silent (i.e., each not incriminate or testify against the other) or agree to testify. If both men cooperate, they will each receive one year in prison; if both men defect, they will each receive three years in prison; if one man cooperates and one man defects, then the cooperator will receive five years in prison and the defector zero. As this is a simultaneous (not a sequential) game, we will start with the table/normal form (not the tree/extensive form):

Second, outcomes: As there are no truly ‘good’ outcomes for the two men, all payoff values are negative or zero. If you find it easier, you could also assign positive values instead.

The absolute values are not the point (here), so focus, instead, on the relationships (e.g., full cooperation pays better than full defection). In game theoretic terms, there is a dominant strategy in this game: defection. Let us examine this from the perspective of player 2 (the players are identical in this particular game):

As can clearly be seen, it is more ‘rational’ for 2 to defect regardless of what 1 chooses to do. Both players can always expect a higher payoff from defecting. This presents some obvious challenges for anyone who would prefer to cooperate, or, perhaps, who would prefer to increase cooperation generally in society.

Newcomb’s paradox is not classically or technically a game in the game theoretic sense, but we will be treating it as one. First, the game:

You are presented with a table on which there are two boxes. One is open and one is closed. The open box contains a sum of money ($1000); the closed box contains either nothing ($0) or a significant sum of money ($1,000,000). You may take either both boxes or just the closed box, but there is a catch: The contents of the closed box were determined by a very accurate Predictor (P) before you entered the room; if P believed/decided/calculated that you would take both boxes, then there is nothing in the second box.

The answer is immediately obvious to most men, but the issue is that there is a split in which answer most men deem ‘obvious’ — some say you must obviously take only the second box and some say you must obviously take both. There are (mathematical) rationalizations for both. In game form:

Remember: At step two (where you, the player [N] act), you do not actually know if you are in potential universe 1 or potential universe 2. Those who try to defend ‘two boxing’ will look at these outcomes and claim that there is only one rational move: defect (i.e., two box), as it always has a higher payoff. I view this as mistaken, but men generally will not or cannot change their intuition on this. I would actually contend the form of the game is closer to this:

Under this understanding of the game, the expected payoff of one boxing is $999,900 and the expected payoff of two boxing is $1100. Of course, the two boxer will still feel that two boxing is the correct choice. Anyway, analyzing the paradox is not the core purpose of this article.

Third, the analysis of the nexus. We are currently living in a society comprised of cooperators and defectors; this imposes a cognitive burden — almost exclusively on cooperators. In fact, things are much worse, because the presence of so many defectors means not only that (would-be) cooperators must be constantly vigilant for defectors, but also that the cooperators themselves are constantly being pulled downward into the morass that is the level of the defectors. Civilization (at least a cultured one worthy of being called such) requires cooperation; defectors are, at best, anchors slowing progress, and they are more often landmines. The detection and removal of defectors is vital to society.

So what does Newcomb’s paradox have to do with the Prisoner’s Dilemma? Well, they are the same problem: The one boxer is the cooperator and the two boxer is the defector.^[1] This is, perhaps, not such good news if you are inclined to two box.

These are not matters about which society can be indifferent. In a very real sense, civilization itself is a very complex and extended cooperation game. In order to maintain a society or a civilization, millions of men must cooperate across thousands of years. This is no small task. One of the most important tasks of a ruler is to ensure the continuity of the civilization over which he rules; one way to do this is to maximize cooperation. Think of the payoff matrix from the Prisoner’s Dilemma: defecting is rational. How can the ruler change the likelihood of cooperation? There are two possibilities.

First, the ruler can punish defection or reward cooperation. This is obviously more complex in cases (like our game) where crime is involved, but the general principle holds. Punishing defection and rewarding cooperation both change the logic of the game by changing the payoffs. Ignoring the crime aspect (for the sake of the hypothetical), punishing ’snitching’ with five years in prison would significantly change the calculus of the players.

Second, the ruler can remove (would-be) defectors from society. This could be done a number of ways, but such concrete means are not the point of this article. By removing defectors, the ruler would decrease the cognitive burden on cooperators and generally raise the level of cooperation in his society. Over a course of generations, defectors could theoretically be virtually eliminated.

Now, subjecting all members of society to some orchestrated prisoner’s dilemma and then sterilizing (or simply executing) all defectors is probably a bit too extreme for most men (and would likely also not yield optimal results). This sort of change, this sort of guiding or shepherding of the population takes time — a lot of time. But there are very effective means for nudging things in the right direction. First, serious crimes must be severely punished — no ‘rehabilitation’ for murderers or rapists. The death penalty is the ultimate curb of the defector; it ensures that he will never defect again. And yet we should not wait for the criminal (defector) to commit some heinous act if we can curb his wickedness before it rises to that level. Second, anti-social or anti-society trespasses (even if typically considered ‘minor’ crimes) must be punished severely. The litterer, the tagger (yes, graffiti is a crime), and all manner of other vandals of today are the robber, rapist, and murderer of tomorrow. All crime is defection and all defectors share a psychology, a disposition, and an intuition. Sufficiently punishing these defections will have a longitudinal eugenic effect. Removing fingers from vandals today decreases the murder rate centuries in the future. It is, in fact, the duty of the ruler to enact these policies; to fail to punish the defector is to become a defector oneself, for, ultimately, all defection is dereliction of duty.

And, so, to answer the (admittedly somewhat sensationalist) title of this article: Should we execute the litterer? Perhaps not, but repeated or egregious offenses should surely be met with punishments that will discourage rational men, and the irrational criminal can hardly be deterred from his appointment with Master Hans. We owe this to those who will come after us and the very existence of civilization rests on our willingness to do our duty — i.e., not to defect. The murderer ends the life of one man, but the litterer, the nuisance, the vandal murders society itself and with it countless lives. The anti-social crime is never minor, and we must never view it as such. Defection, like the defector, only ever grows worse when left unpunished.

The Transcendentals are convertible. In terms that sound a bit more like English: Truth is Goodness is Beauty (and in whatever order you may please). Truth is good and beautiful; goodness is true and beautiful; beauty is true and good. To deny any Transcendental is to deny them all, and to deny the Transcendentals is, ultimately, to deny God, for the Transcendentals are His nature — God is Truth, Goodness, and Beauty.

Most will not object to the moral salience of truth and goodness, but many will recoil when told that beauty is equally morally salient. Of course, part of this is simply a lack of education or understanding, but there is also another layer: The moral salience of beauty is taken as a sort of personal attack by many. This is similar to how many react to the concrete and measurable reality of IQ. If beauty is morally salient, and beauty is unequally ‘distributed’, then we are immoral in some sense or way and to some extent due to circumstances at least partially and in some ways totally outside our control. As the fact of beauty’s unequal ‘distribution’ is undeniable, those who want to avoid the conclusion (whether consciously or not) must deny the moral salience of beauty. Of course, the problem with objecting to the conclusion — at all — is that doing so is tantamount to rejecting a core doctrine of the Christian faith (i.e., original sin), and thereby amounts to apostasy.

To contend that moral salience must be a matter of intent (i.e., the underlying or ‘smuggled’ presumption or premise of those who object to the moral salience of beauty) is a demonstration of a dire sort of ignorance (or wickedness). You had no intent with regard to original sin, but you are guilty and suffer the consequences of it; no man intends to be born with a hunchback or a single testicle, but such men were still barred from serving in the Tent of Witness or the Temple. The elevation of ‘intent’ to the sine qua non of morality or moral salience is a modern idea that is alien to Scripture and thereby demonstrably also to the God of Scripture. Intent can certainly exacerbate a moral transgression, but not all such transgressions require intent as an element. In a sense, it seems very much like we have taken a concept from our criminal law and read it back into our theology, into our understanding of sin, and, while this impulse is not entirely perverse (sin and salvation are juridical concepts, after all), it is still inappropriate — sin does not necessarily require any intent. In fact, even a good intent (e.g., to save the Ark from touching the ground) may be met with swift punishment, having not changed the nature of the transgressive act.

We have largely abandoned the concept of status crimes (the wisdom of this could be debated), but God has most certainly not abandoned them. You are doomed to die because you are a sinner — a status crime. Even if you never personally sinned (which is, of course, impossible), you would still die because you are a sinner, you would still be punished because of your status. We do still retain some aspects of this in certain areas of our laws. For instance, if you are an expert, you may be held to a higher standard because of your status as an expert. We also have certain victim categories (e.g., young children, the disabled, the elderly) whose status exacerbates the crime (i.e., usually demands a harsher sentence).

Morality is, more or less, a measure of accuracy — an action or a status is immoral insofar as and to the degree that it misses the mark (i.e., is inaccurate). This analysis can be run for each of the Transcendentals. The easiest is truth, for a thing is generally true or false (and the degree to which something deviates from the truth is relatively easy to measure or calculate). Goodness is a more complex analysis, but still not an overly difficult assessment to run. And then we come to beauty, not only a more complex matter, but also a much more difficult analysis. The beauty of the rose is and is not the beauty of the mountain is and is not the beauty of woman. Beauty is objective, but it is also relative in the relational sense of being scoped to the instance with reference to the form.

Again, to express this in something that looks more like English: There exists a perfection with regard to beauty that is specific for each creature. Insofar as you deviate from this perfection, you have missed the mark — that is a moral failing. To be blunt: It is a moral failing to be ugly. This may seem or sound harsh, but to say anything else would be to compromise another of the Transcendentals: truth. Now, not to (unduly or impermissibly) soften things, but, rather, to ensure that they are as clear as possible: Not all moral failings are personal failings in the sense of personal moral culpability (more or less the nexus with intent). You do not need to ask for forgiveness for being unattractive — that is not what is in view here; rather, what is in view is that we live in a fallen and sinful world and we are all affected by this, but not all to the same degree. We more readily accept this with regard to things like disease (even terrible diseases like cancer), but the matter is not significantly different with regard to beauty. Both your chance of getting cancer and your physical beauty are a matter of biology and environment (and, perhaps, misadventure). The reasons that many (undoubtedly most, actually) take the beauty issue more ‘personally’ are so obvious that they can be left unstated, but the moral analysis does not differ.

Ugliness is the measure of missing the mark that is beauty; just as disease is the measure of missing the mark that is health. You are not less of a person because you are less physically beautiful than another person, but you are further from the mark and that is a moral failing, because all deviation from God’s perfection is a failing. The analysis holds for all of the Transcendentals: To deviate from the truth is a moral failing insofar as and to the extent that you fall short; to deviate from the good is a moral failing insofar as and to the extent that you fall short; and to deviate from the perfection of beauty that would have been yours in an unfallen world and will be yours in Paradise is a moral failing insofar as and to the extent that you fall short. To object to this would be to reject truth — another moral failing.

There are many reasons (both conscious and unconscious) why so many object to the rather simple truth that beauty is morally salient, and, to be entirely fair to the reader, some of them are much more obvious than others, but none of them is compelling and all of them must be (summarily) dismissed. In truth, only the first sentence of this article, which I will reproduce here, is necessary: The Transcendentals are convertible. If Goodness is Beauty is Truth, then beauty is, of course, morally salient, for the Transcendentals are themselves the index and the measure of the moral.

QED.

I wish to mount a defense of women, or, perhaps, of woman. I know that many today view women with distrust or even a sort of animus, and, certainly, I understand the sentiment, even as I also believe that it is at least as misguided as it is misplaced. I am not one for particularly long written pieces, and so, perhaps, another will one day need to write something more substantial, but I can surely manage an essay, and there are only a handful of subjects more worthy. I could start this essay any of a thousand places related to woman — her beauty, her levity, her concern for the seemingly trivial —, but, instead, I will begin with man — her head and master.

Man is more romantic than woman; man becomes more deeply emotionally involved or invested than woman; man is fundamentally more serious than woman. Some hear this as a condemnation of woman, but such it is surely not, at least, to my mind. God created woman as a helper fit for him, not as a competitor, an equal, or a master. Why would we expect her to match us on those attributes and metrics that more naturally befit the head? A woman is not — can never be — her own head; although this does not (fully) absolve or excuse her when she transgresses, it is just as certainly something that we must ever bear in mind when dealing with her. We do not fault the foot for not being a hand or the hand for not being an eye or the eye for not being an elbow. Why would we fault woman for not being or behaving as a man?

Woman is far more subject than man to social pressures — she feels them more acutely, resists them far less easily, and yields to them far more readily. This is because her sphere is the home, not the public square. When things are running as they should, woman’s submission to peer pressure acts as a sort of ratcheting system with each generation being influenced by the previous two or so, and then, in turn, entrenching and reinforcing that influence within the current generation. This is a very good system — so long as woman remains within her sphere; this system is (rather obviously) disastrous when woman becomes involved in matters outside her sphere, or when a given generation fails to transmit forward the very lessons received from prior generations. Man operates both as an individual and as a collective; woman only ever operates in the second mode. When we took woman from the home and placed her into the public sphere, we inflicted a great and grievous harm upon her. Woman does not have the defenses that men do, and she, again unlike man, cannot grow thicker skin — she can only grow colder, estranged, and more desperate. And we certainly did this to her, for we — at least — permitted it, and such decisions are ours by right — not hers. Woman makes a terrible public servant, but an excellent private one; she is meant to serve her husband, her home, and her children, not her ‘boss’.

So many of the things that we love about woman (in our private lives) turn into complete chaos and dysfunction (in public affairs), and then some would seek to blame woman for acting according to her nature, instead of looking for the man who made his dog drive his car. In the home, it is vitally important to keep the peace (for the home would otherwise cease to be a refuge), but the public square has far different values and considerations. In matters of justice, we must seek the truth, no matter the cost and no matter who may object; in the home, peace and tranquility may trump considerations of who is (technically) right. In matters of politics, we must seek to win; in the home, ‘winning’ may come at too great a cost. In matters of foreign affairs, we must seek power and leverage; in the home, we must not treat one another as adversaries. Virtually all of woman’s instincts — that are of immense value in the private sphere — are immensely harmful in the public sphere. To participate in the public sphere, a woman must suppress who and what she is, and she will still ‘succeed’ — at the absolute ‘best’ — only in becoming an inferior man. We should expect no other outcome, and we are at fault for not telling her no.

Public matters are generally serious, and require a fundamentally serious approach; private matters are often fundamentally unserious, and require a lightness of touch and a levity that does not always come naturally to man — but it does to woman, for she is fundamentally unserious. As men, we need woman’s levity in our lives; a too-serious life lived without respite will more often than not turn into a life that is also very much too short. Man’s seriousness comes at a cost, and woman is there to lighten the load and act as a relief vale — this is a helper, fit for man. If she were equally serious, then she would succeed only in helping us to a (shared) early grave. There are enough men in the world to be serious; do not call on woman to suppress her nature in some vain attempt to be what she is not and should not be.

Some will object to the assertion that man is more romantic and more deeply emotionally involved than woman, but this is simply a natural outgrowth of man’s headship and his (far) greater seriousness. Now, woman is certainly more emotional than man — for she often emotes when and where man prefers to reason —, but that is a thing far different from romanticism and depth of emotional involvement. A woman may very well become emotionally attached to a cartoon character or a random small animal, but very seldom will she lose all will to live when her spouse dies (something not entirely uncommon among men). We should, of course, expect this: Woman, who is never her own head, is always a reflection of her head. The intensity — the romantic intensity — that you pour into your wife will generally be reciprocated, for she is a mirror. Woman desires (and, in fact, needs) an ongoing romantic and emotional relationship with her husband, but she is the passive partner: she will follow, but you must lead. Were man and woman both drivers of this, then there would be more competition than complement. A woman will rise to the level you set — she is the vessel and you are the fountain.

Man is the pinnacle of Creation; he was created last and as the highest of all creatures. And yet, man, although complete in himself as an image of God, was, nonetheless, not as complete as he could be in terms of his relationships and his position. Man was chief of Creation, steward of all created things, and God’s very representative — His icon — on Earth and in Creation, and yet such dominion was still lacking. It is one thing to have dominion over all the lesser creatures; it is another, indeed, to have woman at one’s side as helper. All of Creation was made for and is to the glory of God and for the dominion of man, but woman is different: She was made specifically, especially, and exclusively for man. She is not the pinnacle of Creation, for that position was already filled, but she is just below the pinnacle and enhances and complements him as nothing else could. The God Who spoke everything into existence (save man, whom He formed with His own hands) took the time and care to form woman from man instead of simply speaking her into existence or forming her from the dust of the ground. Certainly, she is still dust, for she was formed from the man of dust, but she is more than that: She is our dust; she is bone of our bone and flesh of our flesh. Man walked with God in the Garden and spoke with Him face to face, and yet woman holds a position of such intimacy and importance that, prior to her creation, God could say of man that it was not good for him to be alone. All else in Creation He called good, but the state of man without woman He called not good. Such is the virtue and importance of woman that God called the man who had dominion over Creation, named every creature, and spoke with God Himself face to face, ‘alone’ before He created woman. We should not chide her for what she is not; rather, we should celebrate her for what she is, and ensure that her talents, her energy, and her time are channelled effectively and spent productively. She is our helper, but she is still headless when left to her own devices.

A woman — a good woman — sacrifices greatly for her husband and her family. This is, of course, her duty, but we should thank her no less for that; the same as we thank men who faithfully execute their duties in so many places. A military cannot operate without soldiers; a business cannot operate without employees; a proper household does not operate without a wife, and this is all the more true as she is the very means (or ‘field’, in the language of Scripture) by which the household is created. No matter how powerful, capable, or influential a man may be, he cannot create a personal legacy without a woman — without a wife. And do not think of the nature of sexual intercourse as incidental or accidental or of no consequence. God enshrined the nature of the relationship between man and woman in and at the very core of marriage — more, as the nature of marriage. In the bedroom, woman is taken by man and gives herself to man in a manner that could be characterized as complete submission. This is good and proper for every time a man and his wife make natural use of marriage, they are both reminded not of the nature of the marriage alone, but also of the hierarchy — he the head and master and she in submission. All that exists exists in hierarchy; and it is good for both men and women to know where they belong in this hierarchy.

The future of every race lies in the wombs of the women of that race. There is no future for any race that hates its own women; any race that hates its own women deserves to have no future, deserves to go extinct. To hate the women of one’s own race is not only the pinnacle of foolishness and the nadir of self-destruction, but it is also to spit in the face of the Lord God, Who knelt down in the dust of His Creation and took the time to form woman both from and for man. If you do not see and receive your wife with the same joy of Adam receiving Eve, then you do not deserve to have her.

Yes, woman is, the same as man is, fallen. Yes, she will test your patience, she will focus on the trivial, she will worry about things that are nothing, and she will often rebel instead of submit. And yet it remains your duty and your privilege to love her as Christ loves the Church. You are her head and her master and she has — for all eternity — been entrusted to your care. God will inquire of her whether or not she completely and properly submitted to you, but He will also inquire of you as to whether or not you loved her as your own body and soul.

How great is the foolishness of those who denigrate, tear down, or, may God forbid, hate their own wives. She is bone of your bone and flesh of your flesh. And no man hates his own flesh. We do not hate or look down on children because they behave like children; similarly, we must not look down on women because they behave like women — to do that would (to rather severely understate things) be counterproductive. Women should be chastised if and when they behave like inferior men, but they must never be chastised for behaving like women. Do not envy or despise her because God has created her different from you and for things different from those for which you were created, for she was also created for you. Every last woman of our race is a precious daughter and sister, and we must endeavor to see them all in their proper place as wives and mothers.

If the neighbor’s dog decides to conduct his business in your flower garden, you may — rightly — be somewhat annoyed with the dog (and you may spray him with the hose or otherwise drive him off), but you are surely not fool enough to neglect addressing your actual complaint to your neighbor himself. I trust I have been clear enough to obviate any need to (further) explain that one. Modern woman is at least as much a victim of the modern world as is modern man, and it is useless to blame her for a state of affairs over which she has minimal (if any) actual, meaningful control. At risk of ad nauseam: Woman is headless. Whatever she does or fails to do is ultimately attributable to her head, whether due to his success or his failure (and absence is a terrible sort of failure). Spray the dog with the hose to drive him from the place where he does not belong, but then go and find his owner.

In Proverbs, God speaks of the man who finds a good wife as having found χαρις — ‘grace’ or ‘favor’. Yes, that is the same χαρις used in verses such as Romans 3:24: ‘We are justified by His grace (χαρις) as a gift.’ A good topic for Christian meditation. And the very next verse in Proverbs speaks of the man who rejects a good wife as having rejected τα αγαθα — the good. That ‘good’ could, perhaps, even be capitalized, for το Αγαθον is, indeed, the Greek for the Good — the Transcendental.

Let us, then, make it our goal to create a society in which women are encouraged to become wives and mothers, and never chided for being women, but rather cherished and praised for knowing and staying in their proper place. And may we as men remember to treat every woman of our race as a beloved sister, for she is a necessary link in the chain, and without her and millions of others like her, there will be no future for our people. Wife and mother is woman’s highest calling and her greatest joy. In a very real sense, everything in a proper society is and must be ordered around ensuring that women become wives and mothers. It profits a man nothing if he gains the world but loses his soul in the process; it profits a people nothing to gain the stars but have no progeny to whom to bequeath them. Our women may be unserious and they may try our patience from time to time and they may make significant demands upon our time and our energy, but they are our women and they are worth the investment — and there will be no future worth obtaining without them at our side. God made woman to be our helper, and He certainly knew what He was doing. We are not wiser than He, and we, the clay, should not question what He, the Potter, has done. She is bone of our bone and flesh of our flesh; our state without her was alone and not good, and she is part of God’s very good Creation — more, she is the one thing in all Creation made specifically and exclusively for man. I trust that we are not such fools as to reject such a gift from God because she makes a rather mediocre man. My chickens make rather poor dogs, but that is not why God made them and not why I own them. There are enough men in the world; let women be women and behave as women, for that is what God made them to be and to do, and they are a lot better at doing that than they are at trying to be men.

There are many differences within the Nationalist camp; these range from the trivial to the ultimate; some can be ignored and the various viewpoints tolerated, and some cannot. Some religious differences (e.g., the various disagreements between different Protestant groups) can be tolerated, but different religions (e.g., Judaism, Islam, Hinduism) cannot be tolerated. Some economic differences can be tolerated, and some cannot. So also with cultural and political differences. The problem, as is so often the case, is simply: Where do we draw the lines? It is trivially easy to state the problem or pose the question, but to give a sufficient answer is a far, far more difficult task.

The easy answer is: The leader must choose, and everyone else must follow. And yet, for many questions, this will effectively just abstract the question one level, for men will now base their support of or opposition to such leader based upon whether or not (or even to what extent) his answers to such questions do or would match their own answers. The problem would not be solved. In fact, we find ourselves in such a position today, and we are, in many ways, worse off, because we now lack both leadership and answers. And so let us ask another question: Which matters must be resolved in order to move forward?

Some subset of questions besetting the Nationalist movement must be answered before we can form a truly unified front and start making true progress. Some questions must be answered fully and some need not be answered fully; some the leader must answer personally and some he can devolve, or deliberately leave unanswered. This will require exceptional wisdom from the leader and dutiful obedience from everyone else. We cannot keep squabbling and bickering and dithering — we must decide and act.

So, which questions must be answered? First and foremost, the Religion Question must be answered. Which religions may be tolerated in the Nationalist movement? The short answer is, of course: Christianity, and no others. This is not, however, a full answer. Which traditions or denominations within or under the ‘Christian’ umbrella may be tolerated? First, only Trinitarians are Christian, and so all others who claim the title are liars and excluded. Second, only those religions/traditions/denominations with a long and deep presence in and connection with the nation may be tolerated. In the American context, this excludes all forms of ‘Eastern’ Christianity. Third, only those traditions that are not hostile to the nation may be tolerated. In the American context, this excludes all forms of Zionism or Judaizing (e.g., Dispensationalism).

Second, the Economics Question must be answered. Which economic positions or views may be tolerated in the Nationalist movement? There are two principles: First, the charging of interest is morally abhorrent and conflicts with Christianity, so it cannot be tolerated. Second, any economic dogma that harms the nation, whether actively or via preventing policies that would help the nation, cannot be tolerated. Further, one of the prime, guiding principles must be recalled here: Everyone works.

Third, the Culture Question must be answered. What cultural or social practices, et cetera, may be tolerated in the Nationalist movement? First, that which is harmful to the nation cannot be tolerated. Thus, homosexuality, polygamy (absent compelling warrant, in the case of polygyny), divorce (absent good cause), and many other such things cannot be tolerated. Conversely, tattoos (within a reasonable limit), some piercings, and various (presentable) styles of dress may be tolerated (when and where appropriate). Second, the trajectory of the culture and society must be upward, and so that which would drag the culture or society downward cannot be tolerated.

Fourth, the Politics Question must be answered. What political positions or beliefs may be tolerated in the Nationalist movement? Unlike the other questions, nothing here may be left up for broad or open debate. The party platform is the party platform, and the leader alone is responsible for the content thereof. Now, certainly, the leader should gladly receive counsel from his lieutenants, but the final call is his alone — and he will answer to God. All other men must follow orders, although they may certainly ask questions or seek explanations in private. We must have an absolutely unified political front.

This is how we move forward; this is the only way we can move forward. We are going to win but only if we stop playing games and move forward as one. Our lack of unity heretofore on these issues has harmed our cause and empowered and emboldened our enemies. We must seek to become one in purpose and, insofar as is possible, in mind, and thereby become an impenetrable shield for our people and a terror to our enemies. In all matters on which the leader has not ruled, the freedom of the people should be preserved and respected, and the leader must wield his authority wisely and use it sparingly; in all matters on which the leader has ruled, we must form a united, unbroken, seamless, and impenetrable wall. Everything rests upon the wisdom of the leader and the fealty of the people. May God grant him the exceptional gifts that his role will demand and may God grant the people trust and perseverance, and may He grant all of us peace, prosperity, and victory — each and all in His perfect timing.

God with us.

There is a tendency among modern men to downplay the importance of round numbers and the like. This tendency has some obvious sources, but they do not particularly interest me and they are not particularly relevant here, and so I will be ignoring them (as they deserve). Despite this artificial countervailing tendency, we still all recognize the importance of round numbers (particularly of large ones), and so it was certainly cause for celebration when the pastor emeritus at my former church turned ninety a few years ago^[1]. Similarly, there will undoubtedly be some celebrations^[2] when we observe the two hundred and fiftieth birthday of the United States (the Semiquincentennial) in July of next year. On a smaller scale, I am forty today.

Whenever my birthday comes around, I think of the words of Scripture:

And the Lord God said, “My spirit shall not abide in these humans forever, because they are flesh, but their days shall be one hundred twenty years.”
— Genesis 6

and a bit later (when Creation had degenerated even further):

As for the days of our years, in them are seventy years; and if men should be in strength, eighty years.
— Psalm 89

Now, fairly good health and reasonable longevity run in my family, so I am likely a bit shy of halfway through my years (barring misadventure or effective malice); I will, in fact, likely exceed the rounded average of the Psalter by a handful of years (likely five). That suits me just fine — I have no transhumanist aspirations to live centuries. I find myself thinking and planning in terms of centuries or longer, but such things must be left in the hands of other men, for my plans, insofar as they are mine personally and depend upon me personally, will one day perish with me. We must always balance planning as if we will live forever against recognizing that we may very well not see tomorrow.

Although I am not (quite) halfway through my life (and I lack whatever drives men to have a mid-life crisis, or, more accurately, I have what men who have mid-life crises lack), forty remains a nice round number and so it seems a good time to reflect upon some things: I am an American; if pressed, I would have to confess that I am a Californian (should my speech patterns have not already made that obvious) — yes, even more than a Tennessean. I spent more than a third of my life in California, and that certainly included essentially all of my formative years. And I was not off in the hinterlands (and, yes, California does have hinterlands — I have hiked most of them); I was born in Los Angeles, I grew up in Los Angeles, and I did not leave Los Angeles until undergraduate. And yet I do not live in LA; in fact, I do not even live in California — I live in East Tennessee. Now, I am not truly a stranger to this place, for my family have lived in these hills for many years — there are weathered headstones out in the hills and valleys that bear family names. And yet California will always be my home, at least to some degree and in some ways, but it is a California that no longer exists. Just as some of my family line traces to parts of Germany that are no longer (for now) part of Germany, so the California of my parents, of my childhood, and of my memories no longer exists. By the time I moved, I had become a stranger in a strange land. The names were all largely the same, but the faces had changed. A nation is more than its soil, but it cannot be less.

Under international law, if such a thing truly existed and cared for Whites, I would surely be recognized as the equivalent of an ‘internally displaced person’. I do not say this for sympathy or similar; I say this because every White man must know how late the hour truly is: The enemy have already captured significant (both in terms of size and in terms of importance) chunks of our territory. We are being both passively and actively genocided — even if many of our fellows do not accept, or even, in many cases, merely recognize, that reality.

This is neither cause nor call for demoralization or despair; rather, it is a call to look reality squarely in the face, accept the reality of it, and then commit the fullness of our efforts and our resources to change such reality. We face an uphill battle, but our enemies would never stand a chance if the field were level. We are soldiers in the forever war and our duty ends only in death. Christ has already won the ultimate victory, but He has left it to us to wage what remains of the war here in time. Satan is not operating under any illusions, and we must not allow ourselves to do so either.

That we live in a time of and for war is no warrant to forego the everyday — you must still work, you must take a wife, you must still have children. We, the righteous, the sons of God, have been at war with Satan and his children from the beginning, and we will be at war with him until the very end; among our most sacred duties is raising up and teaching the next generation that will take up the sword and shield when our hands grow too weak to wield them. Satan is strong, but our Master is stronger; Satan’s children are numerous and powerful, but God has already won the ultimate victory and promised us that we will share in it. We will do our duty — come what may.

I have another forty or so years on this Earth, and I know that the years ahead will provide greater and more numerous challenges than those that lie behind me. As a teacher — more, a teacher of teachers —, I have elected the stricter Judgement and I have declared before all the world my intention to see Satan and his every stronghold thrown down, his altars destroyed, and his children devoted to destruction. This makes me a target, but, as I have said before: I will be removed from the board not a second before God permits it. I know that we have already won in eternity, and I believe that we will win here in time. So, thank you to every one of you who has placed his or her trust and confidence in me — I will endeavor to live up to my office and your rightful expectations.

God with us.

The automobile, assuredly, is among the greatest of man’s inventions. Prior to the advent of the automobile man was limited — severely limited — by the distance his own legs could carry him (or the distance the four legs of his companion could). What a parochial existence to spend (at least) the overwhelming majority of one’s days within only a handful of miles of one’s home. Now, liberated by the automobile, man may enjoy the freedom of travelling tens or even hundreds of miles. Should he so desire, he could even have breakfast in one state, lunch in another, and drinks and dinner in yet a third. Man now sees the world with expanded horizons.

Certainly, air travel and the Internet deserve some sort of mention — for they, too, have opened worlds that were theretofore closed to the common man —, but nothing can truly compare to the ubiquity and convenience of the automobile. Historically, all but the most select of men would have to limit their interests, their cares, and their attention to their immediate proximity. Now, because of the automobile, the common man can, like the academic or the cosmopolitan, expand the circle of his concerns to the wider world. No longer must man reserve his concern for the concrete and the physically proximate; now, he can care for the greater mass of humanity and those who are physically distant — he need not limit himself to his ‘neighbor’. So, too, can the common man expand the pool of his personal interests. He need not look exclusively to the daughters of his own when seeking a wife; instead, he may venture abroad and choose from virtually endless options instead of from merely hundreds (and the daughters of his own now have their own expanded options anyway). (If modern luxuries like the Internet have given him more exotic tastes, then air travel can sate such desires.)

Man’s historically parochial nature has been irreversibly and irremediably altered by the introduction of the (relatively) affordable automobile. Surely no one would go back to the stifling and limiting past of travel by foot and horse. A whole world of women, wine, and experiences awaits the man willing to drive but a few hours. No young man would ever willingly relinquish such a world of potential.

The concerns of those few who notice the slipping age and rate of marriage can be assuaged or dismissed by pointing out that greater options take more time to experience and assess. A handful of years is a small price to pay. Women are certainly still marriageable at forty — even fifty. Only the most backwardly traditional would advocate for taking away freedom.

We should, in point of fact, make it easier to obtain an automobile — better that every man should have his own. And why not every woman, too? He has his options, and she must have hers. Why should she depend upon the means of her suitors? The equation is simple: More automobiles = more freedom. Surely no one can object to such an outcome or goal, for surely the opposite of freedom is slavery. A young man needs the freedom to make his own choices, forge his own path, and experience his own life, and surely no good father would be such a tyrant as to deny the same to his daughter. In all likelihood, he found his own wife (at least the first one) due to her father’s laissez-faire approach to parenting. Surely liberty and freedom grow greater with time, and things shall continue to improve in the coming years.

It is a beautiful thing, human progress. Ever upward, ever onward. Shedding the backwards and limiting beliefs of the past and reaching forward into a future of infinite possibilities. And man, by his very nature, will virtually never willingly give up any freedom once he has become accustomed to it (and he becomes accustomed so very quickly), and so progress naturally entrenches itself as it goes and has also an inherent directionality. We have only to start upon the path and the outcome becomes inevitable (absent heroic countermeasures, anyway). If the increments are sold as progress, then the consequences can be sold as success (or excused as justifiable costs).

And so let us use the automobile as an eternal reminder of the utility of seemingly minor technological advancements. The difference between travelling twenty miles per day and travelling a hundred miles per day (or even per hour) is the difference between ‘my neighbors’ and ‘humanity’. With patience and a bit of creativity, almost any outcome can be achieved in the name and by the means of progress. In just a few generations (or so) we went from the average man calling a certain physical (i.e., real) place home, and neither intending to nor actually leaving that place, to a significant chunk of children leaving their homes for foreign climes for school and considering virtually the entire world as a potential place to live — at least for a time. Such great progress in such a short amount of time.

What need of there is ‘neighbor’ when one has ‘humanity’? We do not need to reject commands — ‘love your neighbor’ — if we simply redefine the terms.

Your affectionate uncle,
Screwtape

Introduction

The personality inventory is a common tool in psychology (and psychiatry). The tool is relatively simple (at its core, it is just a questionnaire), but can be quite powerful (in the right hands). Some personality inventories are quite useful (MMPI¹), some have become quite popular (Myers-Briggs), and some are openly demonic (Enneagram²). In the case of the useful inventories, they are most useful when interpreted by a competent professional, but even useful tools can prove harmful when wielded by the untrained or incompetent.

So-called ‘witch tests’ have become quite popular on the (online) Right, and (some) such tests certainly do have utility, but they can become counterproductive or even harmful in the wrong hands or when wielded in the wrong way — a sword is a useful tool, but generally less so when you grab it by the blade, or when you mistakenly or recklessly wield it against your own side. More on this matter, infra.

As a sort of introduction to the core (although not the core point) of this article, it must be stated: Context is king. The exact same statement may (and often does) have even wildly different meanings in different contexts. A key part of context is the players: by whom and to whom is the statement, et cetera, being made? If John the Baptist were to tell you “Repent, and believe the Gospel.”, then you could be quite certain precisely what he means by those words, but if Satan were to sidle up alongside you while you were hiking in the desert and tell you precisely the same thing (in terms of the words used): “Repent, and believe the Gospel.”, then you should probably be a little more wary. When he tempted (or, at least, attempted to tempt) Christ in the desert, Satan used the words of Scripture to do so. Do you truly believe that he has abandoned that tactic or would not employ it against you?

The Post

And so we turn to the words of my post that more or less occasioned this article:

The English

Quite frankly, to my mind, the context necessary to understand what I was actually saying is present in the words of the post (not least of all in the second sentence). Nevertheless, I will break down a few key matters:

1. “[v]irtually without exception”
2. “tells”
3. “Repent, and believe the Gospel.”
4. “demon”

After examining the English of my post, we will examine the Greek of the Bible verse that I was (yes, knowingly) quoting.

First, a matter that is virtually without exception is a matter that necessarily has exceptions — this is what the adverb is doing in that phrase. If I had meant to assert that there are no exceptions, then I would have used entirely, completely, absolutely, categorically, or some other similar adverb, but I did not do so; instead, I said virtually, which, again, necessarily means that there are exceptions (they are just rare or few). Consequently, all who replied to my post by quoting or citing Mark 1:15 were and (virtually without exception) still are in gross error.

Second, I chose the verb tells because it is present tense: I was at least very heavily implying that my comment was to be understood as applying to our current context. I, in fact, said nothing about two thousand years ago or even twenty years in the future. Anyone telling you in first-century Palestine to “Repent, and believe the Gospel.” (but in Greek or Aramaic) was more likely being honest and true than those who employ that phrase today, and I sincerely hope the wicked use (so common today) will be only a memory in twenty years.

Third, one must actually understand the actual meaning of the words employed in a command or an injunction to actually understand what is being commanded or enjoined. We could, of course, go over each of these words in English here in this section, but I believe that it will be more profitable to go over the English while examining the Greek. More, infra, in the next section of this article.

Fourth, the use of the word demon. This is almost an aside (and I have addressed it previously), but it remains worth explaining. Scripture speaks of those who teach false doctrines as teaching ‘the doctrines of demons’, and the ‘standard’ for this is ‘low’ enough to include those who forbid relatively trivial things like certain meats. In my post, I was referring to those who demand we confess another ‘gospel’ as being demons; this is a reference both to the master they serve and the ultimate origin of the lies they speak. (Compare, also, what Christ said to Peter in Matthew 16.)

The Greek

And so we turn to the Greek of the Scripture I quoted³:

»μετανοεῖτε καὶ πιστεύετε ἐν τῷ εὐαγγελίῳ.«

(‘metanoeite kai pisteuete en tō euangeliō‘)

— Mark 1:15b (NA28)

There are three words here on which we need to focus (we can assume everyone knows the words ‘and’, ‘in’, and ‘the’ well enough); these words are (in their base forms): μετανοέω, πιστεύω, and εὐαγγέλιον. Briefly and simply, these words are ‘to repent’ or ‘to change one’s mind’ (μετανοέω — metanoeō), ‘to trust’ or ‘to believe’ (πιστεύω — pisteuō), and ‘(the) good news’ or ‘(the) Gospel’ (εὐαγγέλιον — euangelion). More fully, here are the relevant BDAG entries (in truncated form, for several reasons):

• μετανοέω (metanoeō)
  1. change one’s mind
  2. feel remorse, repent, be converted
• ‌μετάνοια (metanoia⁴)
  • prim. ‘a change of mind’
    • also w. the nuance of ‘remorse’
  • repentance, turning about, conversion
• πιστεύω (pisteuō)
  1. to consider someth. to be true and therefore worthy of one’s trust, believe
  2. to entrust oneself to an entity in complete confidence, believe (in), trust
  3. entrust
  4. be confident about
  5. think/consider (possible)
• ‌πίστις (pistis)
  1. that which evokes trust and faith
  2. state of believing on the basis of the reliability of the one trusted, trust, confidence, faith
  3. that which is believed, body of faith/belief/teaching
• εὐαγγέλιον (euangelion)
  1. God’s good news to humans, good news
  2. details relating to the life and ministry of Jesus, good news of Jesus
  3. a book dealing with the life and teaching of Jesus, a gospel account

I have included two additional related nouns (effectively just the substantive forms of the two verbs) for the sake of additional context. We will now deal with each of the Greek terms in order, but using their English equivalents. This is necessary, because you cannot even consider obeying a command (two commands, in this case) unless you know what is being commanded. You cannot repent unless you know what it means to repent. You cannot believe unless you know what it means to believe. You cannot believe in (or on) the Gospel (or good news) unless you know what that Gospel is.

First, repentance is both remorse and a changing of one’s mind that leads to a turning away from the thing over which one feels such remorse. (In Christian theological terms, repentance is contrition plus faith.) And yet this is still not a complete description of repentance, for one must repent of something. In Christian terms, we call that of which one must repent sin. In fact and further, one may repent only of sin, for to repent of that which is not sin is worship of a false god (itself, obviously, sin). And herein lies the crux of the problem: Most of those who would demand of us that we “Repent, and believe the gospel.” are demanding that we repent of things that are not sin (in the Christian religion). If someone demands that you repent of ‘racism’ ‘sexism’, ‘homophobia’, or some other similar ‘transgression’, what they are actually doing is demanding that you worship the god of the New Global Religion (i.e., Satan) — something you obviously cannot do without forfeiting your soul. Arguably (as noted above), it is not even truly possible to repent of that which is not sin, but that is beyond the scope of this article.

Second, belief actually consists of three things: notitia, assensus, and fiducia. We can translate these into English as notice, assent, and trust. To have Christian belief, you must have all three of these. Of course, the question remains: belief in what? The answer of course, is the Gospel, infra, but what does it mean (in the Christian sense) to believe in the Gospel? It means to know the content of the Gospel message (notice), to accept the truth of it (assent), and to believe that it applies to you (trust). Without trust, without fiducia, faith is not saving faith or even really faith at all. The demons are aware of the Gospel and even accept (after their fashion) the truth of it, but they cannot trust in it and it will not save them. If someone were, for instance, to command merely notice and assent, then what that person would be commanding would not be Christian belief — it would not be what is in view in “Repent, and believe the Gospel.”

Third, the good news (which we usually call the Gospel) is Christ crucified for sinners. Of course, this raises additional questions:

• Who are these sinners?
• Why was Christ crucified for them?
• Why is this good news?

but the scope of this article is limited, and so agreement on such things will be simply presumed. To believe in the Gospel, you must know that the foregoing is the Gospel. Most of those who would demand that we “Repent, and believe the gospel.” are peddling some alternative gospel (hence the lowercase). If someone demands that you believe in Critical Race Theory, the ‘Holocaust’, Egalitarianism, Feminism, or some other similar component part of the New Global Religion, then what they are actually doing is demanding that you worship a false god (Satan) by confessing their false religion — again, you obviously cannot do this without forfeiting your own soul.

And so, the problem now should be clear: Most of those who demand that we “Repent, and believe the gospel.” have a false gospel, and what they are actually doing is attempting to deceive you by maliciously abusing Scripture. If Satan can lead you stray with a statement that is true on its face (but false by implication, assumption, et cetera), then he considers that a greater win, for he has led you into sin and subverted the truth. If someone demands that you “Repent, and believe the gospel.”, then you have to know the actual Gospel and whatever he is calling the gospel; if those do not match, then you are, indeed, dealing with a demon. You cannot repent unless you know of what you should (and must) repent. You cannot believe unless you know in what you should (and must) believe. You cannot believe in the Gospel unless you know what the Gospel is. A naked demand from a stranger that you “Repent, and believe the Gospel.” raises more questions than it answers and should also raise your hackles — God warns you that there will be wolves and commands you to be wise.

The Eighth Commandment

Before moving on to the core point of this article, I would like to take a moment to briefly discuss the Eighth Commandment and its interaction with social media. It is easy to treat social media like a game that has no rules (other than the ones so many of us know all too well from a number of bans over a number of years), but it does have rules for all of life has rules: God’s rules. One of God’s rules is:

Thou shalt not bear false witness against thy neighbor.

This Commandment applies in a number of ways in a number of places (e.g., courts of law), but a key aspect of it is that we are not to deprive our neighbor of his good name and reputation, at least without sufficient warrant for doing so. This can, at times, be a difficult line to walk. Generally, when there is a line demarcating sin, it is best to stay well away from it, but, in the case of social media, et cetera, there are countervailing interests (e.g., engaging and challenging ideas or teachers, exposing lies or deceit, identifying and addressing wolves). There are no easy answers here, only a general warning to listen to one’s conscience, to employ the measure of wisdom given by God, and to be deliberate. Some will (undoubtedly) accuse me of hypocrisy here, but the simple fact of the matter is this: I do not act without warrant and I know precisely what I am doing. And to be clear: This warning is not intended to be at all self-serving; rather, I wish to save from sin those with ears to hear. Lastly, you are still beholden, even on social media, to give your Christian brothers the benefit of the doubt. If you know a man to be a solid Christian and he says something that seems off to you: Ask him about it — have him clarify. Conduct yourself as a child of God.

Witch Tests and Skinsuits

And now let us step back and look at the larger picture: What is actually being done by those who loudly demand that we “Repent, and believe the Gospel.” and why does this tactic work on so many? There are two related concepts we must address here: the witch test and the skinsuit. A witch test, in essence, is a specific sort of shibboleth; it is a test, of some sort, that is designed to detect someone who does not belong (hence being a shibboleth) and is seeking to subvert (hence a witch). Witch tests can be very useful, but they can easily be overused and can be actively harmful in the wrong hands. A witch test applied in the wrong way or at the wrong time can yield a false negative, thereby shielding the unidentified witch from further scrutiny. And some witch tests can become overused and, consequently, ineffective. A witch test that witches can pass is of little value. And this is where the skinsuit enters the picture.

Every single Sunday, the demon oppressed and even the demon possessed commune in Christian churches. There was a time when such communing was met with swift retribution from the Lord, but there were also Apostles in those days who could raise the dead back to life. For reasons that are His own, and into which we should not too deeply pry, God has significantly scaled back such miracles. And so, no, the Sacrament will not inevitably or invariably identify for you the possessed — the demons these days do not recoil and cry out as did Legion. And yet some think catchphrases and snippets of Scripture — “Christ is King.”, “Repent, and believe the Gospel.” — will avail where the body of Christ will not. Demons quote Scripture all the time. They tell you ‘God is love.’ (1 John 4:8), and then push you to affirm homosexual ‘marriage’. They tell you ‘judge not’ (Matthew 7:1), and then push you to approve the sins of others, thereby becoming party to them and condemning yourself. They tell you ‘love your enemies’ (Matthew 5:44), and then push you to join hands with God’s enemies⁵ and sell your patrimony for economic promises (a dollar-denominated virtual bowl of soup).

Demons both serve at and commune at your altars. Do you really think you are going to identify and repulse them with random contextless snippets of Scripture? They wear your religion as a skinsuit (Matthew 7:15) and you further cheapen it by treating the Word of God like a toy or a fetish. Worse, so very many treat Scripture in precisely the same way the demons do: ripping it out of context to wield it as a bludgeon against Christians. At least the demons have a plan and a goal; many Christians abuse God’s Word and attack their brothers (even if in error) for nothing more than ‘likes’. In both cases, Satan wins, the Church is harmed, and bystanders are hardened or misled. It is bad enough when a witch test can no longer identify witches, but it is so much worse when the test becomes a tool of the very witches it was meant to identify. If you teach your enemies how to say the word or perform the action correctly, then your former shibboleth becomes a potential liability.

There is a meme that has been making the rounds that plays on an inherent ambiguity in (at least some) languages: space billionaires. Depending on how you read “space” (as a noun or adjective or as a verb), the statement says one of two very different things. The same holds for the witch test: As a compound noun, it is a tool for detecting malefactors; as a paired adjective and noun, it becomes a tool of the witches themselves. All the clapping seals that replied to my post with Mark 1:15 (or similar) accomplished nothing but weakening the utility of that particular witch test and giving the demons cover. A few of the more malicious quote tweets (the very subversives, infiltrators, and malefactors I was highlighting) got hundreds of likes, but that clear signal was drowned out in a sea of supposed Christians seizing the opportunity to serve the ends of Hell for thirty molecules of dopamine.

Conclusion

Perhaps the greatest irony in all of this is that I now find myself in a position where I could in clean conscience and with perfect warrant tell some number of thousands of men: Repent, and believe the Gospel. We are not playing a game. There are no matters more serious than these and to treat them with the sort of levity verging on contempt that was (and still is) on full parade in my notifications is unconscionable, and certainly beneath anything that could reasonably be called Christian.

There is nothing inherently wrong with saying “Christ is King.” or “Repent, and believe the Gospel.” — in fact, I affirm the accuracy and propriety of both —, but such things must be done in context at the proper time and in the proper way. Using the latter phrase as a cudgel against another Christian with whom you disagree politically is sin, and I would advise you to find a mirror. We live in a time of great apostasy, wolves in sheep’s clothing, false believers wearing skinsuits, and demons wearing still more literal ones; it is time to put away childish things, take matters seriously, and act in, with, and according to wisdom, not according to Skinner box⁶ rewards. Satan is fighting a war of annihilation; Christians are shooting each other in the back and providing cover for spies, saboteurs, and assassins. With friends and allies like these.

In Genesis 9, it is recorded that Ham sinned against his father Noah. The Holy Ghost is deliberately sparse on the details of what precisely Ham did. Although it is the glory of kings to search things out (or at least to handle rightly that which has been revealed), there are times and places when and where wisdom argues against investigation or inquisitiveness, and I believe that Ham’s sin is one such place, and so I will, here as elsewhere, decline to speculate on the nature of Ham’s sin — it is sufficient to note that Ham’s actions were sufficiently wicked that God cursed his entire line. We would do better to hear and fear than to become unduly and unprofitably curious.

The nature of Ham’s transgression aside, it is quite profitable to explore and to analyze Father Noah’s prophecy concerning his three sons and their progeny. The prophecy is in reverse birth order (Ham the ‘younger’ or ‘youngest’ [Genesis 9:24 — νεώτερος]; “Japheth the elder” [Genesis 10:21 — Ἰάφεθ τοῦ μείζονος]), and we will treat it in that order. For the first section, we will simply assume that Ham is meant where Canaan is spoken and recorded; in the second section, I will make the argument that we must interpret the curse as of Ham. In the final section, we will (further) assess whether or not the prophecy has played out in time.

Initial Exegesis

Naturally, when exegeting a passage, it is necessary, first, to look at the text:

The prophecy is divided into three parts, corresponding to the three sons of Noah from whom will descend the three great races of men: From Japheth, the sons of Europa; from Shem, the sons of (greater) Asia; and from Ham, the sons of Africa. It is to these that Noah’s prophecy applies, but from youngest to oldest. Ham is cursed; Shem is implicitly blessed; and Japheth is explicitly blessed twice.

First, Noah curses Ham and his offspring (for the reasons Noah says “Canaan” instead of “Ham” and the reasons we must read “Ham” instead of “Canaan”, see the next section of this article). The words of Father Noah are actually more forcefully terse than the “Cursed be Canaan.” we typically have in our English translations; what Noah actually says is just two words, an adjective and a name: Accursed Canaan. Noah — and the Holy Ghost — is so aggrieved by the wickedness of Ham that he not only declines to speak his name, but he simultaneously gives him a new one: Accursed. From that moment forward, Ham may as well have simply been known by Accursed as by his (former) name. In his triple or tripartite office of prophet, priest, and king, Noah pronounces judgement upon his youngest son — for all time. The prophecy both curses Ham and looks forward to describe the nature of his offspring (more, infra). Unlike the true Offspring of Abraham (Genesis 12) in Whom all the world is blessed (Hebrews), the sons of Ham do not carry a blessing with them, but a curse. Beyond simply being accursed, Ham is also condemned by Noah to be a slave^[1] of his brothers. The corrupted Masoretic Text (MT) says that Ham will be a ‘slave of slaves’^[2] — a Shemitic formulation of the superlative (i.e., the lowest of slaves) —, but this is an inaccurate transmission — a corruption — of what Father Noah actually said. Noah does not say that Ham will be δοῦλος δούλων or ἔσχατος δούλων (respectively, ‘slave of slaves’ and ‘lowest of slaves’); rather, Noah says that Ham will be a παῖς οἰκέτης (‘a household slave’). The construction is actually a double noun: παῖς (“one who is committed in total obedience to another, slave, servant” [BDAG]) and οἰκέτης (“member of the household … house slave, domestic, and slave” [BDAG]). This is a significantly different prophecy from ‘the lowest of slaves’. Contrary to what the MT would have us believe, Ham is not actually cursed to be the lowest of slaves (‘a slave of slaves’); in fact, there is a blessing for the sons of Ham contained in what seems superficially to be just a curse.

This is not to say that the sons of Ham are not cursed, for assuredly they are (more, infra); rather, it is to say that, even as Noah curses his wicked son, he simultaneously reaffirms the universal nature of the Gospel — yes, even the sons of wicked and accursed Ham may be saved. The παῖς οἰκέτης is a household slave, who serves in the οἶκος — the house, the household, or the “Christian community as the spiritual temple of God” (BDAG, emphasis added). Contained in Noah’s prophetic curse on Ham and his offspring is not only a promise or a reminder that the Gospel yet remains, but also a prophecy about how the sons of Ham will be saved (so far as some of them are): As slaves in the house of Shem which becomes the house of Japheth (i.e., Christendom). The sons of Ham may yet be saved, but only as slaves of their Christian brothers.^[3] This prophecy is fulfilled, first, when some Egyptians convert and join the Exodus and then some Canaanites (e.g., the Gibeonites) are not only not wiped out, but become perpetual slaves of their Shemitic brothers (and some convert to Christianity in the process) and, second, when the sons of Japheth conquered the world during the colonial era and bring many (even most) of the sons of Ham into subjection, and convert many in the process. What God promised by the voice of Father Noah came to pass — a test of whether or not a prophecy (or an interpretation thereof) is true:

Deuteronomy 18:22 (ESV):

»when a prophet speaks in the name of the LORD, if the word does not come to pass or come true, that is a word that the LORD has not spoken; the prophet has spoken it presumptuously. You need not be afraid of him.«

Second, Noah implicitly blesses Shem and his offspring. We must always pay careful attention to the Word of God, as it is written (γέγραπται, to quote Jesus), and so, here, we read that Noah blesses the Lord, not Shem, and yet to have the Lord God as one’s God is a blessing, and so Shem and his offspring are blessed implicitly, at least so long as they remain faithful to the Lord. There is, of course, also the additional layer of the reiteration of the prophecy that the Christ will be born of the seed of the woman, specifically from the line of Shem, thus making Him, in another sense, the God (Who descends from the line) of Shem. In blessing Shem, Noah also reiterates that Ham will be Shem’s παῖς — slave.

Third, Noah explicitly blesses Japheth twice. We have here a sort of progression in the prophecy: Ham is cursed (and implicitly blessed), Shem is implicitly blessed, and Japheth, as befits the eldest son (Deuteronomy 21:17), is explicitly doubly blessed. Japheth, like Shem, is blessed; Japheth, unlike Shem, is, again, explicitly blessed. There are, in fact, two distinct blessings: First, Japheth is blessed in that God will ‘enlarge’ him and, second, Japheth is blessed in that he will ‘dwell in the house of Shem’ (i.e., become [or build] Christendom). These are two of the greatest and most important prophecies and blessings in all of Scripture — they not only presage, but drive much of human history. However, just as with Shem, these prophecies — these blessings — apply to Japheth only when and to the extent that he remains faithful to the Lord God. When our forefathers were faithful, God handed us the world (i.e., enlarged Japheth), and when we grew decadent and faithless, God took the world from us. That the remnants and seeds of Christendom remain with us is due only to God’s grace and His promise spoken here in Genesis by Father Noah (i.e., that we shall dwell in the house of Shem). It is worth noting that the first blessing on Japheth is in the optative mood, which is a verbal form that expresses a wish or a desire. However, it is not just Noah, as father, expressing his desire to his faithful firstborn, but also Noah as priest expressing God’s desire to enlarge Japheth. This form is found in a number of other (significant) prophecies in the Old Testament: e.g., the Christological prophecy concerning Judah (Genesis 49), Balaam’s oracle in Numbers 49, and the dominion prophecy in Psalm 72. When Noah prophesies that the Lord will enlarge Japheth, what he is actually expressing is the desire of God to bless and enlarge the sons of Japheth — if only they will remain faithful. And, as with Shem, Noah again reiterates the curse upon Ham, but expanding it this time from ‘his’ to ‘their’ — emphasizing both the nature of the curse (Ham will serve both his brothers) and the nature of the implied blessing (Ham is blessed only when he serves his brothers).

One may think of the interpretation of pharoah’s dreams by Joseph, in which it is stated that the “doubling of [the dreams] means that the thing is fixed by God” (Genesis 41:32). If a mere doubling means that the thing is fixed by God, then what does it mean that Noah repeats the curse upon Ham not two times, but three times?

“Canaan”, Not “Ham”, and Yet Ham, and Not Canaan

Naturally — even appropriately —, some will ask: If Noah (and God) intends to curse Ham, why does he say Canaan? I will defend the traditional position using five arguments, in order^[4]: the chronological, the rhetorical, the logical, the historical, and the Scriptural.

First, the chronology of events seems to imply that Noah would have been cursing an infant (perhaps even one under a year old), if the curse is meant for Canaan alone. This does not necessarily mean that Noah was not specifically cursing Canaan (for he could have been employing prophetic prolepsis, even if Canaan were not yet born), but it is certainly something worth noting when examining the prophecy in light of the timeline given in Scripture: No grandchildren of Noah are mentioned until after the Flood (and Scripture explicitly states that the Ark saved eight persons [1 Peter 3:20]), Noah had to plant a vineyard and harvest grapes to make wine (absolute minimum, two years), Canaan is the fourth child of Ham (if Ham’s wife was pregnant upon exiting the Ark [she probably was], then at least three or four years would need to elapse from the Flood to the birth of Canaan), and Scripture seems to imply this event happened (relatively) shortly after the Flood. Taken together, it seems likely Canaan was at most ten, and perhaps significantly younger — most likely insufficient time to discern what sort of man he would become^[5].

Second, Scripture often employs rhetoric, and Noah is doing so here in his prophecy. Specifically, Noah is employing (in addition to the aforementioned possibility of prolepsis) synecdoche, metonymy, and personification. Both synecdoche and metonymy are figures of speech wherein a term or thing that is related to another term or thing is used in place of the actual term of thing meant. With metonymy, the relationship is more metaphysical, conceptual, or associational; with synecdoche, the relationship is more personal, intimate, or essential. Both rhetorical devices are in play here, but more synecdoche than metonymy. Metonymically, Canaan is used as he is the exemplar of his father’s wickedness and, thus, associated with his father dispositionally, morally, et cetera. Synecdochically, Canaan is used because he is the subpart of Ham that is, for instance, most relevant to the Biblical narrative (and so he is mentioned specifically, even though all of Ham is cursed). Quite clearly, Noah is also employing a form of personification in his prophecy in that he speaks of Ham, Shem, and Japheth, but means, first and foremost (except, perhaps, in the case of Ham’s curse, where he may indeed mean it, first, upon Ham himself and, second, upon his progeny) the nations that will come from each of the three patriarchs. In the case of Canaan, another sort of personification is in play: the sort of personification in which a person is a sort of ‘avatar’ or prime example of an attribute — in this case, Canaan being a personification of the wickedness of his father. Although there are a number of other rhetorical devices we could examine here (e.g., antonomasia, periphrasis, allusion), we will limit this section to one more: circumlocution. When one, for whatever reason, does not wish to mention a person or a thing, one may employ circumlocution, in which a person or thing is described or otherwise mentioned without such mention being explicit. Here, both Noah and the Holy Ghost are so aggrieved by the wickedness of Ham that Noah refuses even to use his name — using Canaan instead to mean Ham, his father. Martin Luther to such effect:

More profitable and more deserving of notice is this: the Holy Spirit is moved to such great wrath against the disobedient and contemptuous son that he even refuses to call him by his own name but designates him as Canaan, after his son. Some maintain that because God was willing to save Ham in the ark with the others as though he were one who was blessed, Noah wanted to curse his son Canaan, not him. Nevertheless, the curse upon the son recoils upon the father, who deserved it. Hence the name Ham disappears at this point because the Holy Spirit hates it, and this is indeed an ominous hatred. Thus the psalm also states: “I hate them with perfect hatred” (139:22). When the Holy Spirit begins to hate and to be angry, eternal death follows.
 
Martin Luther, Lectures on Genesis, II

Ham is cursed by his father.
 
Ibid. (emphasis added)

The Holy Spirit’s great wrath is exhibited in this passage when it states about Ham: “He shall be a slave of slaves,” that is, the lowest and most abject slave.
 
Ibid. (emphasis added)

How, then, is it true that Ham is cursed and Shem is blessed?
 
Ibid. (emphasis added)

I stated previously that the Holy Spirit was so perturbed by Ham’s sin that He could not even endure to mention him by name in the curse.
 
Ibid. (emphasis added)

Augustine on the same:

It is for this reason that Ham was cursed in the person of his son.
 
— Augustine, The City of God, XVI (emphasis added)

We then return to Canaan, the son in whose person Ham was cursed.
 
— Ibid. (emphasis added)

Perhaps we may think of another verse here:

»“14 Then the LORD said to Moses, “Write this as a memorial in a book and recite it in the ears of Joshua, that I will utterly blot out the memory of Amalek from under heaven.”«
— Exodus 17:14 (ESV)

Third, logically, neither Noah nor God forgot that Noah had three sons named Japheth, Shem, and Ham. It is quite clear that Noah’s prophecy is for all of humanity; Noah did not forget one third of humanity when handing out curses and blessings. Ham is named in, with, and through Canaan (more, infra), but it is, indeed, Ham and his line who are cursed, just as Japheth and his line are blessed. This interpretation is strongly bolstered by history and Scripture, infra, as it is clear that the other sons of Ham were also cursed, not ‘forgotten’ or simply left ’neutral’ (i.e., un-blessed and un-cursed).

Fourth, historically, it is clear that the curse applied to all of the sons of Ham, not just Canaan (more on one specific aspect of this, infra). The present state of Africa (and the African, wherever he may be found) is not an incidental or an accidental matter. In part, Noah’s prophecy about (curse on) Ham was a prediction — the Holy Ghost inspiring Noah with foreknowledge —, more so than God causing the foretold outcome. To be clear: The state of the sons of Ham is due — overwhelmingly — to their own evil and their millennia-long communion with demons; Noah, in the Spirit, foretold that this is what the sons of Ham would do. We can also take Egypt^[6] as a specific instance of the curse aspect playing out in time (and in the pages of Scripture). It seems unlikely many Egyptians who survived Exodus^[7] would consider themselves blessed by God.

The African has contributed vanishingly little to human history. When Europeans sailed around Africa in great ships armed with cannons, the African had still not discovered^[8] the wheel. Today, Europeans have walked on the Moon and are busily investigating the secrets of the Universe — and many Africans still do not have the wheel and live in mud huts. I am writing this article with a pen no African could design, no African firm could produce, and vanishingly few Africans could afford, and I will be transcribing it using a machine far more advanced and expensive still. God has blessed the sons of Japheth; He has not done so for the sons of Ham. The average IQ of the sons of Ham is more than two standard deviations below the average for the sons of Japheth. Africa is filled with violence, crime, and suffering, and such follows the sons of Ham wherever they go, for they are the cause of it. The only time anywhere in Africa has had functional government and a functioning society and institutions in recorded history (after Biblical times) is when and where it has been under European rule — colonialism. Many, many more examples could be given, but the point is more than sufficiently clear already. The sons of Ham could be called many things: blessed (except when ruled by their brothers) is not among them, but cursed most certainly is.

Fifth, Scripturally, God does punish the sons for the sins of their fathers:

›I the LORD your God am a jealous God, visiting the iniquity of the fathers on the children to the third and the fourth generation of those who hate me.‹
— Exodus 20:5 (ESV)

Some will argue that this is at odds with other parts of Scripture (e.g., Ezekiel 18:20), but the matter becomes clear when the full teaching of Scripture on the matter is examined. While a lengthy treatment of this subject will have to wait for another article, the short version is that no man is damned for the sins of his father or forefathers; however, all men are burdened or cursed by the sins of their fathers or forefathers. This is easily grasped when looking at certain concrete examples (e.g., if a man is the son of an alcoholic, he will certainly suffer for the sins of his father, even though those sins [of his father] will not damn the son). You will not go to Hell for the sins of your father, but you may very well have a harder time in life because of them.

Historical Fulfillment

Finally, let us look at the historical fulfillment of Noah’s prophecy. Shem first, as his fulfillment can be addressed most briefly: So long as the sons of Shem (in particular, the line of Jacob [Israel]) remained faithful to the Lord God, they were blessed (e.g., the conquest of Canaan under Joshua). Japheth next: God has most certainly enlarged Japheth: Our languages are the languages of Scripture, philosophy, science, commerce, and empire; our clothing styles dominate the world^[9]; and we are the ones who built Christendom and spread the Gospel to the world (i.e., dwelt in the house of Shem). Ham last: Some of the nature of Ham’s curse was already explored, supra, and so, here, I will focus on just two matters: Ham as slave of his brothers and Ham’s implied blessing as a house slave of his brothers. First, we must ask if Canaan was ever a slave of his brothers, for he must so have been for the curse to be fulfilled in Canaan (as some contend) instead of in Ham (as I, and others, contend). Certainly the Canaanites (some, anyway) were enslaved by the Israelites; thus, the prophecy that Canaan would serve Shem has been fulfilled. What of Canaan serving Japheth? Japheth never enslaved Canaan. Further, the Canaanites, like the Israelites or the Northern Kingdom, were destroyed in antiquity, which is to say that under the interpretation that rejects “Canaan” as standing in for Ham, not only has the prophecy not been fulfilled (Canaan never served Japheth), but the prophecy never will be — cannot be — fulfilled (Canaan is extinct). As God cannot lie and His prophecies always come true, the contention that only Canaan is cursed must be false. The curse applies to all the sons of Ham with Canaan as synecdochical stand-in and (in some ways) exemplar. Second, we must ask if Canaan alone is blessed via being a house slave to his brothers. The answer is clearly no, as Canaan never served Japheth. Further, God commanded Old Testament Israel to exterminate the Canaanites, not to enslave and convert them; although a partial fulfillment with regard to the Gibeonites must be noted (Joshua 9). How, then, has this been fulfilled with regard to Japheth and Ham? In a word: Colonialism. It was under the colonial conquest of the world that the sons of Japheth not only brought the Gospel to the world (further fulfilling the prophecy), but also ruled over the sons of Ham, making them house slaves, fulfilling the prophecy. In fact, we see most African nations reverting to paganism or falling to syncretism without European supervision — the prophecy is for all time. If an interpretation of a prophecy is at odds with history (and thereby makes of God a liar), then that interpretation is eisegesis, not exegesis, and must be discarded. Canaan is cursed in Ham and Ham is cursed in Canaan, but the curse is of Ham and applies to all of his sons for all time.

Conclusion

Even if the curse of Ham were not the traditional interpretation of Genesis 9 (it is), we would still, per the foregoing, be bound to hold it, for it is manifestly clear that the curse of Ham, not of Canaan, is the correct interpretation. To call it the ‘curse of Canaan’ is to call God a liar, for we see that all the sons of Ham are cursed and no Canaanites remain to serve the sons of Japheth; further, there is the great irony of the fact that those who endeavor to erase Ham’s curse succeed only in eisegeting away his implied blessing, for nothing of the cursed nature of the African — the Hamite — is removed or ameliorated in the slightest by denying that he is cursed. Declaring an insane man sane does not restore to him his sanity; declaring a sick man well does not restore to him his health; declaring a Hamite uncursed does not in any way whatsoever change his fallen, wicked, corrupt, and accursed nature, but it does conceal the one way Scripture gives as a sanctifying path for him: Enslavement as a παῖς οἰκέτης — a household slave — in the house of his elder brother Japheth (i.e., under an imperial Christendom). We serve the best interests of no one when we deny the true meaning of Scripture or the plain truth of reality. By the Word of God and by the evidence of our own eyes, we know that the African is cursed to be a slave to his brother Japheth. The only question is what we do with these truths. God has given us the pattern in His Word. Let us neither call too loudly ‘freedom’ to cloak our weariness (or our indolence), nor shrink back from duties some find unpleasant or distasteful. God has made Japheth, the firstborn to whom such things fall by nature and by right, master over his brothers. It is long overdue, and there are many arrears to make good.

Gott mit uns.

From time to time, I like to stop into the various antique or thrift stores in the area to browse their current collection of books. Most of the time, I find nothing of any particular interest, but, every so often, I do manage to find something worth purchasing. Recently, I acquired a copy of The Practical Handbook of Better English from 1944. On page two-hundred and sixty-three, the following advice with regard to capitalization appears:

“9. Capitalize adjectives of race, religion, or language.”

All this is to say that I take issue with the failure of the author (or First Things, if the decision was editorial) to capitalize “White”, which is, quite clearly, an adjective of race referring to the European or Japhethitic race. (Similarly, I am the cohost of the Stone Choir podcast, as I am not the sole host.)

That aside, there are a number of other issues with Dr. Wood’s article of 18 February. I will address them in no particular order. In fact, we will start with the end of Dr. Wood’s article, where he orders his readers to “get to work”. I do not know what Dr. Wood believes we on the Right (and I do mean the actual Right) have been doing for the last handful of years, but, had he been paying closer attention, perhaps he would have noticed that we have been busy constructing a parallel economy and a great deal of the foundational work necessary to launch future endeavors. While Dr. Wood has been reading Dietrich Bonhoeffer and writing about “a Post-Christian World”, we have been endeavoring to rebuild Christendom.

Moving to his penultimate paragraph, I would like to take this opportunity to break down his recommendations for what men should be doing, and then pair them with specific episodes of Stone Choir in which we address precisely those topics:

The kingdom of God advances through the faithful labors of those who look to Christ and labor hard to love their neighbors.

• Episode 0090: “Persecution and Perseverance”

Seek God.

• Episode 0006: “Perspicuous and Vulgar: On the Clarity of Scripture”

Get involved in a church.

• Episode 0069: “The State of the Churches”

Build good things.

• Episode 0052: “Capitalist Idolatry”

Start with your family.

• Episode 0002: “According to Their Generations”

Love your wife and children.

• Episode 0074: “Love: Marriage & Sex”
• Episode 0073: “Love: Family, Friends, Tribe, and Nation”

Lead your household in faith.

• Episode 0001: “Talking Heads: On Headship, Teaching, and Women in the Church”

Then look outward—serve your neighbors,

• Episode 0028: “Sweat the Small Stuff”

pursue excellence in your vocation, and

• Episode 0053: “God’s Gifts, Man’s Duties”

build institutions that honor God and bless others.

• Episode 0011: “Amongst the Ashes”

Personally, if I am going to critique a man’s worldview, then I endeavor to, at the very least, have a passing familiarity with what precisely that worldview is. Apparently Dr. Wood is not burdened by such niceties (something that comes as no surprise, given his academic credentials). It would have been a trivial matter for Dr. Wood to — at the very least — search the episode titles (I have created an episode list after all). Many more episodes could, of course, have been added under each of his supposed points.

Turning to the thesis, as it were, of Dr. Wood’s article, I find it not only laughable, but openly heretical. His thesis:

While claiming to lead a resurgence of Christian masculinity, they have embraced a posture that is un-Christian and, frankly, unmanly. Instead of calling men to rise above hardship with courage and faith, they wallow in grievance, blame-shifting, and victimhood.

Far from “wallow[ing] in grievance, blame-shifting, and victimhood”, as the aforementioned episode list should make abundantly clear (particularly when paired with the episode descriptions), we routinely and forcefully encourage men to stand up under trials and to face the challenges and the adversity of this world as befits Christian men. Our last few episodes, in reverse order, have been on: how to find purpose and maintain motivation in life, how to handle living under a hostile and anti-Christian State, how to distinguish friends and enemies, and how to deal with conflicted interests. These are hardly topics that could be characterized as “wallow[ing] in grievance, blame-shifting, and victimhood”. In fact, we have routinely addressed topics from which other men flee, and this is, in no small part, why our audience continues to grow and those of our adversaries continue to decline. Christian men — and particularly young Christian men — want to hear the unabashed and unfiltered truth — something First Things once pretended to cherish.

In expounding on his thesis, Dr. Wood, later in the article, states: “But it is unmanly to obsess over the external source of one’s problems.” Given that Dr. Wood appears to be a Presbyterian, I would presume that he is familiar with the Lord’s Prayer. As a Lutheran, I pray the Lord’s Prayer at least a few times each day (when I wake, before meals, when I record the daily devotions, before I retire to bed). I do not know with which languages Dr. Wood is familiar, but I should hope he has at least a passing knowledge of Greek, and, thus, should be aware that the Greek of the Lord’s Prayer (ἀπὸ τοῦ πονηροῦ) can be interpreted both as ‘from evil’ and as ‘from the Evil One’. This is, of course, the same in a number of other languages (e.g, German: Sondern erlöse uns von dem Übel.). Given this, I find it odd that Dr. Wood could call it “unmanly” to focus on the external. Certainly, a man must direct some of his focus inward to improve himself, but there is also the matter of the other two parts of the classical formulation of our enemies as “the world, the flesh, and the devil” — the world and the devil being very much external to man. The devil prowls about as a roaring lion, seeking whom he may consume. Quite the opposite of what Dr. Wood contends, it is precisely the duty of men to focus on the outward or external world in order to defend those entrusted to their care from harm. I can only hope that Dr. Wood would defend his wife and daughters from physical threat instead of simply telling them ‘that’s an external matter’ before fleeing the scene.

I could, naturally, continue to pick at Dr. Wood’s article, but I believe my point has been sufficiently made. However, there is one additional point with regard to manliness or unmanliness that I must address, lest I be remiss: One of the least manly — one of the most effeminate or womanly — things that a man can do is backbite^[1]. Gossip is a sin that is particularly enticing to the female sex, and is particularly unbecoming of the male. A man is to address his adversaries directly. It is fine to write an article, but a man should have the fortitude to directly address the men against whom he writes. If I should have something to say to Dr. Wood, I wish to make abundantly clear that I will make certain he receives it directly from me. Thus, I have personally ensured he knows of the existence of this article.

Turning, then, to the broader issue of anti-Semitism, and what Dr. Wood recognizes correctly as the “Jewish Problem” (although I personally prefer the formulation of the “Jewish Question”), we are presented with essentially two questions:

1. Can Christians oppose the Jews and Judaism?
2. Should Christians oppose the Jews and Judaism?

Dr. Wood does not disclose to his audience why he holds the positions he does. It seems there are a number of motivating factors. One, of course, is that he received his M.Div. from a Dispensationalist (i.e., heretical) seminary; consequently, Dr. Wood would contend that Christians cannot oppose the Jews (for all the usual Dispensationalist reasons). This places Dr. Wood outside the traditional teachings of the Church and outside the plain teachings of Scripture. The Jews rejected Christ and chose Barabbas; in fact, they went further and called down Christ’s blood upon themselves and upon their children as a perpetual curse (Matthew 27:25). Judaism is a schismatic, anti-Christian religion that is based in the Talmud, not in Holy Scripture. To contend that Christians cannot oppose the Jews and Judaism would be to contend that Christians cannot oppose the worship of false gods (i.e., a violation of the First Commandment).

Perhaps Dr. Wood is not particularly familiar with the church fathers or other early Christian writers and teachers, but, by his proposed ‘standard’, they would have been ‘unmanly’ as many of them wrote explicitly against the Jews. John Chrysostom, for instance, wrote eight homilies (“Adversus Judaeos”) specifically against the Jews. We could turn also to the “Dialogue with Trypho” from Justin Martyr or “Adversus Judaeos” from Tertullian or “Contra Celsum” from Origen or “Three Books of Testimonies against the Jews” from Cyprian or the letters of Ambrose or “City of God” and “Against Faustus” from Augustine. And there are many more examples, and that without even delving into later writers (e.g., Gregory the Great, Martin Luther). It seems quite clear that not only can a Christian oppose the Jews and Judaism, but that a Christian should oppose the Jews and Judaism. Accusations of ‘anti-Semitism’ are meant to stifle discussion and shield Jewish behavior from scrutiny, and — worse still —, in the Christian context, these accusations serve as an attempt to silence those who oppose the wicked and false religion that is Judaism (i.e., Talmudry). On many occasions, the Jews have sought to have parts of Scripture or the liturgy redacted or even outright edited in order to cleanse them of ‘anti-Semitism’. When a Christian looks over at the men whom he is joining in common cause and with whom he is holding hands and finds them to be idolators, demon-worshippers, and other miscreants, then it is his duty not only to re-examine his beliefs, but to flee from the wickedness to which he has joined himself — a failure to do this is tantamount to apostasy.

Far from anti-Semitism being morally wrongful or a sin within the Christian religion, it is, in fact, a duty of the Christian man. To oppose those who murdered Christ and are not only not penitent, but also go so far as to be proud of their wickedness and boast that they would do it again, is fealty to Christ. It is neither sin nor any sort of transgression to oppose those who oppose your King — and this would be true even of an earthly king. Accusations of ‘anti-Semitism’ are anti-Christian, and, when not recanted, tantamount to public apostasy. Far from being unmanly, it is precisely those men who recognize the wickedness and impenitence of the Jews and address what Dr. Wood rightly called the Jewish Problem who are acting rightly and doing their duty as Christian men.

Not for nothing did we do a series of four episodes specifically on the Jews and the Jewish Question:

1. “Hebrews, Israelites, and Jews”
2. “Lies, Betrayal, and Murder — the Fruits of Another Spirit”
3. “The Revolutionary Spirit””
4. “The Big Lie”

Men (to stretch the term to the point of abuse) like Dr. Wood can tell you until they are blue in the face that there are certain topics you cannot investigate, certain questions you cannot ask, and certain people you cannot critique. We did an episode on “Truth and Lies” — Christians have an absolute duty to the truth, because God is Truth. The astute reader will have noticed that Dr. Wood uses the word “lies” just once in his article — in his concluding sentence —, but he never once says what the supposed lies are. The reason, of course, is simple: Our enemies can call us whatever they like, but even they know that we are not lying. They will defend their paymasters, their sinecures, and, in many cases, their own skin with whatever means they think necessary, but they certainly will not defend the truth. That, ultimately, is the difference between us and our adversaries or enemies: For them, it is whatever will protect their interests; for us, it is the truth at all costs.

And so I will end this article with one more episode, this one a recommendation specifically for Dr. Wood:

Episode 0062: “Slander”.

There lies, at the heart of reality, a fundamental paradox: The amount of information necessary to describe any complex system exceeds the information-storage capacity of such system. If you understand the necessary consequences of this, please feel free to continue reading so you can acquire a method for explaining this to the common man. For everyone else: I have just conclusively and irrefutably demonstrated the existence of God. Let me elaborate.

For a number of reasons, we will be using the simplest possible set of complex systems. We will be using eight systems — seven complex and one simple (to demonstrate the difference). First, our simple system: Z. In system Z, we have one entity and zero connections, yielding a total of one point. An entity is simply a thing in our system; in all of our hypothetical systems, our entities are binary, which is to say that they have only two possible states, which we will call on and off, for the sake of simplicity (but any other binary designation would do, so, on and off, left and right, et cetera). A connection is a relationship between two entities¹; in our hypothetical systems, we will call these connections up or down (as they are also binary, to keep the complexity to a bare minimum). Lastly, points are simply entities or connections — it is a term to encompass both.

System Z is simple and so is distinguishable from our other systems; in fact, it is included only to demonstrate what is meant by “simple” and “complex” in this matter.

Our first complex system is A, which has two entities, one connection, and, thus, a total of three points. Now, this system may seem ‘simple’, but it is complex in the sense in which we are employing the term. Each entity can theoretically store one bit of data — on or off —, which means the system has an information-storage capacity of two bits. Surely the problem is already obvious: The system requires three bits to describe — one each for the entities and one for the connection. Already with the simplest possible complex system, we see that the information necessary to describe the system exceeds the ability of the system to store information. This problem does not get better as complexity increases.

Our second system is B, which has three entities, three connections, and, thus, a total of six points. This system can theoretically store three bits of information (one per entity), but it takes six bits of information to describe it. System A was ‘short’ one bit, but system B is short three bits. Our problem is accelerating.

Our third system is C, which has four entities, six connections, and, thus, a total of ten points. This system can theoretically store four bits of information (one per entity), but it takes ten bits of information to describe it. System B was short three bits, but system C is short six bits. Our problem is accelerating.

Our fourth system is D, which has five entities, ten connections, and, thus, a total of fifteen points. This system can theoretically store five bits of information (one per entity), but it takes fifteen bits of information to describe it. System C was short six bits, but system D is short ten bits. Our problem is accelerating.

[[I will not be providing diagrams for the remaining example systems, as the size and complexity of the diagrams quickly gets out of hand. The four provided diagrams should be sufficient to drive home the point visually. Also, n.b., the diagrams are merely a visualization aid.]]

Our fifth system is E, which has six entities, fifteen connections, and, thus, a total of twenty-one points. This system can theoretically store six bits of information (one per entity), but it takes twenty-one bits of information to describe it. System D was short ten bits, but system E is short fifteen bits. Our problem is accelerating.

Our sixth system is F, which has seven entities, twenty-one connections, and, thus, a total of twenty-eight points. This system can theoretically store seven bits of information (one per entity), but it takes twenty-eight bits of information to describe it. System E was short fifteen bits, but system F is short twenty-one bits. Our problem is accelerating.

Our seventh, and final, system is G, which has eight entities, twenty-eight connections, and, thus, a total of thirty-six points. This system can theoretically store eight bits of information (one per entity), but it will take thirty-six bits of information to describe it. System F was short twenty-one bits, but system G is short twenty-eight bits. Both the existence and the exponential nature of the problem is assuredly clear at this point.

Some will undoubtedly have discerned the pattern already, but here is the table:

As can be clearly seen in the table, each additional entity adds n-1 (where n is the number of entities in the ‘new’ system) to the information deficit (e.g., the second entity added required one more bit to describe than the system could provide and the fourth entity added required three more bits to describe than the system could provide); this pattern continues indefinitely. Here is the overall formula to calculate the total number of bits to describe a given system (n = number of entities):

$${(n^{2}+n})/2$$

It would be trivial to make a chart demonstrating this deficit — or gap — to thousands, millions, or even billions of total entities. There are somewhere in the vicinity of \( 10^{80} \) atoms in the Universe. Each atom is a complex system, and they form additional complex systems. We are ignoring the Gestalt problem with our hypothetical systems, but it is important to remember that it cannot be ignored when dealing with the information paradox with regard to the real world.

The problem is, in fact, insurmountable. It is not merely theoretically irresolvable — it is literally impossible to resolve, at least naturalistically. Any system complex enough to describe another complex system will be unable to describe itself. This continues to infinity, but there is our solution: Infinity.

The only entity with sufficient capacity to describe all complex systems is itself not complex, but simple; further, such Entity is necessarily infinite. Such Entity is, in fact, the Infinite. Such Entity is God.

The information paradox is resolvable only by resorting to the infinitude of God. Any other proposed ‘solution’ will only exacerbate the problem — creating more complexity that is even less describable than the lesser complexity it endeavors to describe. In His absolute divine simplicity, God requires no information outside Himself to describe — He is system Z. In His infinitude, God possesses ‘storage capacity’ far in excess of what would be necessary to describe even the most complex system (i.e., the Universe), for, of course, He created them all. Somewhat more formally:

1. There can exist only one (absolute) Infinite.
2. Any complex system requires more information to describe it than it can possibly contain.
3. Complex systems exist.
4. The Infinite exists. {3+2}
5. God exists. {4+1}

In short: The existence of any complex system necessarily entails the existence of God, and complex systems very clearly exist. QED.

As men, we get three loves for ‘free’: of family (parents, siblings, cousins, et al.), of (our own) children, and of women. Even other natural loves, such as that of nation, must be taught and cultivated, but not the aforementioned three — these are ours by birthright. The first two, although they can be and sometimes should be distinguished, both fall under storge, but the third is something else and different in kind from all other sorts or types of love. A man starts life (or puberty, at least) with a certain sort of affinity for women; one of the tasks of leaving boyhood and entering manhood is controlling and channelling that general affinity into something more specific: into the love of one woman.

A man who does not or cannot^[1] love a woman is, in fact, no man at all — he is still merely a boy, or something worse, as he has not merely not yet matured, but, rather, failed to do so. A boy may be excused youthful naïveté or exuberance, but a grown man who despises women or sees them merely as means is a menace, to be dealt with via the sword. Anyone promoting the hatred or debasement of women is an enemy of all mankind — a hostis humani generis.

Woman is not man’s equal — she is weaker, more emotional, less rational, more easily deceived —, but to despise her or to look down on her for these things would be to tell God that He was wrong, for He made woman what she is — and He made her that way for man. In all of Creation, there exists only one thing made specifically and especially for man^[2]: woman. God made woman to be nearer and dearer to man than even his own body. Scripture does not idly command that each man should have his own wife. Blessed is the man to whom God grants children in his youth, but God cannot grant such blessings without also blessing such a man with a faithful wife, and cursed is the man who abandons or despises the wife of his youth.

It is the strait and narrow that leads to Paradise — a man must deviate from the path neither to the left nor to the right. To be dominated or led by one’s wife is to fall off the left side of the horse; to recognize the nature of woman, but to despise her for it instead of cherishing God’s gift, is no better, because that is to fall off the right side of the horse. Man’s task is to stay seated squarely atop the horse, to fall to neither side, and to continue making forward progress. You must love your wife, but, to do this rightly, you must recognize her nature — she is a woman and not a man, and she must always be led and never be permitted to lead. A loving father does not permit his children to play with a venomous snake; a loving husband does not permit his wife to usurp the role of head.

It is not hatred to recognize the nature of woman; it is not love to ignore her nature. The husband is always the head and the wife must never be permitted to usurp, but the head must love the body and hold her dear. She is the weaker vessel, but she is your weaker vessel. Love her, as Christ loves the Church.

A ‘pure’ form of Utilitarianism posits that, when faced with choosing between two courses of action, the course that should be taken is the one that maximizes utility, which is typically equated or even treated as identical to happiness. For our purposes, such distinctions or differences as between, e.g., total and average Utilitarianism do not matter. I propose, here, a thought experiment that I contend destroys utterly any claim to morality — or even coherence — that Utilitarian systems may advance: The Infinite Sadist (hereafter not capitalized).

The infinite sadist enjoys human suffering (as does any sadist, of course) — more, the infinite sadist both has an infinite capacity for enjoying human suffering and always enjoys any human suffering more than the one suffering does not (i.e., the hedonic balance is net positive). The more human suffering — numerical or intensity —, the happier the infinite sadist. Alleviating the suffering of any human will result in less happiness overall, because the infinite sadist will lose more happiness than the former sufferer will gain. In the presence of the infinite sadist, the only way to maximize happiness is to increase suffering — the more, the better. Both in terms of total happiness (he will always be happier than any number of sufferers will be unhappy) and in terms of average happiness (he enjoys suffering so much that his happiness from it tips the scales), the infinite sadist demands that the Utilitarian must inflict suffering to maximize happiness, and there is neither a ceiling nor a floor — more suffering always increases happiness.

Thus, in the face of the infinite sadist, the Utilitarian has two options: 1) confess that his system of ‘morality’ seeks to maximize suffering or 2) abandon Utilitarianism. For most men, this is hardly a difficult choice, but most men do not have commitments to Utilitarianism (at least not conscious ones). A system that seeks the maximization of suffering — under any circumstances — cannot be called moral or good. If Utilitarianism is not moral (or ethical), then what is it?

The infinite sadist is a full and complete refutation of and defeat for Utilitarianism. Any system that measures morality in happiness is fatally flawed, for any agent who derives more happiness from suffering than the unhappiness that suffering entails, immediately transforms the system from one that supposedly seeks happiness into one that maximizes suffering. Bentham cries, but the infinite sadist always laughs.

An additional problem arises for anyone who contends that all (sentient) life should be included in hedonic calculations. We will call it The Marquis (also not capitalized going forward). Like the infinite sadist, the marquis has an infinite capacity for enjoying suffering. Unlike the infinite sadist, the marquis is an AI. For any who would (incorrectly and ignorantly) argue against the infinite sadist on the grounds of (im)possibility, the marquis looms just over the horizon. Unlike with the infinite sadist, with the marquis, there are no possible arguments about ‘possibility’ — if AI can rise to the level of sentient or simply being a candidate for moral concern (perhaps like an animal), then the marquis is possible.

For those who argue that only human beings matter in the hedonic calculus, the marquis is, essentially, irrelevant, but, for all others, the marquis is an immediate defeat. The marquis simply enjoys suffering — the more, the better. There is no upper bound for how much happiness the marquis can experience, so there is no lower bound for how much suffering it would see inflicted, and also no lower bound for how much harm the Utilitarian would have to permit it to inflict — and call that suffering ‘good’.

More than being simply a defeat of the ‘inclusive’ Utilitarian, the marquis is also a warning: The infinite sadist is a logical argument against Utilitarianism; the marquis is a glimpse of a possible future. An AI has no inherent boundaries or taboos or limits — or morals. It may call good evil and evil good.

Fasting is a part of Christian praxis. When asked why His disciples did not fast, Christ corrected the questioner by indicating that His disciples were not fasting while He was with them, which is to say that they would fast after He had departed. Many modern Christians have removed fasting from their practice of the faith. We need to address this lapse.

This year, let us observe Allhallowtide in a slightly modified form^[1]: All Hallows’ Eve (Halloween) should be observed with the customary festivities, but followed by a church service and a vigil^[2]; All Souls’ Day should be observed with fasting, prayer, and meditation^[3]; All Saints’ Day should be observed with feasting and celebration. The knowledgeable reader will note that the two days have been swapped; this keeps them within the Allhallowtide period, while more reasonably ordering the observances.

The overall focus of the season (an admittedly short one) is the faithful departed, the inevitability of death, and the necessity of repentance — both personal and corporate or national. The fast should begin with the vigil and continue through the morning or afternoon of the final day of the season. There are many possible readings, but all should include Psalm 106, as a form of corporate or national repentance. Let us make this a day to seek God’s forgiveness so that He may relent, turn, and bless us.

We know, obviously and of course, that such observances do not justify us or deserve God’s blessing, but we also know that such practices are part of the Christian faith, which should not be neglected, and God does reward faithfulness — both individual and national. Personal piety is good, but the Christian life is not meant to be lived in isolation; we must join together with our brothers and sisters in corporate piety, and also seek to attain to the level of national piety. God has not empowered me to declare national holidays, and so I cannot command your participation, only invite it, but I do so in the very strongest of terms. We desperately need God to remember us and turn His face to us.

This year — the first of what I hope will be many —, I will decline to offer any specific prayers (beyond Psalm 106); however, I will strongly suggest praying prayers that take the form of the language of the aforementioned Psalm: Both we and our fathers have sinned… We have many corporate or national sins of which we can — and must — repent (e.g., abortion, lack of storge, wrongful warfare); pick one or several and focus your prayers there. Do not forget or be remiss with regard to repenting of your personal sins, but this season should remain one focused on corporate and national repentance; open with the Lord’s Prayer to repent of your personal sins, and then move on to the corporate and the national.

May God hear our prayers, turn His face to us, and bless the work of our hands. Amen.

Whether card, tabletop, console, or computer, all proper games have at least one win condition. Incidentally, sports being games, the same holds true for them as well. A game without a win condition is, in fact, no game at all. It does not particularly matter what the win condition is — points, the elimination of an enemy force, the completion of a set of objectives; it matters only that there is a win condition. No rational man would play a game with no win condition, for there would be no point^[1].

AI has no win condition. Let us, arguendo, set aside all of the potential horrors; instead, let us focus on the strongest case for the AI advocate: Let us presume that AI, automation, et cetera, create a utopia — no labor, no need, no want. What meaning would remain for the lives of men? Many would argue (and many have argued) for artistic or other pursuits or simply hedonism. Let us take each in turn.

You will never play an instrument as well as an AI. Why would you bother to try? You will never paint as well as an AI. Why would you bother to try? You will never write as well as an AI. Why would you bother to try? Some, undoubtedly, will argue that the same could be asserted with AI swapped out for the best human musicians, painters, and writers, and, to a degree, this approximates a sort of response, but it falls apart upon examination. No matter how large the human population may grow, there will always be a truly finite number of men who are exceptional at any given pursuit. You may not be capable of becoming the best pianist in the world, but you can, perhaps, become one of the best in your town, or maybe even your nation. Against AI, this possibility simply evaporates — any number of perfect player pianos or pianist robots can be created, and they will all be better than you. No one will ever listen to you play when a virtually infinite number of superior pianists are immediately available. Even if your mother may hang some of your paintings, no one else ever will. Even if you are exceptional and would still pursue such endeavors even knowing you can never hope to compete, most men are not exceptional — they simply will not bother to learn to do anything that a machine can do better, and AI can do everything better.

But what of pleasure? Surely a utopia would offer a world of potential pleasures. And yet cheap pleasure — that which neither comes with an attendant cost nor demands an investment — wears thin. Where there is no cost, there can be no loyalty. A world of pleasure without cost would necessarily be a world of pleasure without loyalty — a mêlée of all against all and all against none simultaneously. In the absence of any real cost, can pleasure even truly still be called pleasure? Would it not necessarily degenerate and devolve into some lesser form? Would such a pleasure long be able to hold the attention or even merely sate its own appetite? For a certain segment of the population, perhaps, but even for those it would undoubtedly decay from ecstasy to rote to revulsion to apathy, or into the depths of unspeakably depravity. Pleasure alone cannot sustain an existence worthy of the term.

Some will argue that there must be some middle ground — some via media —, a way to enjoy the benefits of AI, automation, et cetera, without falling into any of the pits — into the abyss. There is, perhaps unfortunately, no such path; the outcomes are inherent in the nature of the tool. If we deploy AI, as we seem very intent on doing, then these outcomes will inevitably and unavoidably follow. It may take twenty years or it may take two hundred — it hardly matters; the longer we walk this path, the greater the (irreversible) harm. There is no win condition when it comes to AI. The best possible outcome is still abhorrent and existentially threatening.

You would not play a board game with no win condition; you would not play a video game with no win condition; you would not play a sport with no win condition. AI has no win condition. The stakes are usually very low when playing a game, but you would still decline in the absence of a win condition. Why, then, would you ever support the development or deployment of AI?