Jesus: Proclaimer of the Now and Future Kingdom

When I first created this blog my purpose was to discuss politics. But it appears that religion has come to dominate more and more of my posts. Things change of course and I will, no doubt, return to politics as a primary focus eventually. For now, however, I shall continue to post on the matters most in my thoughts, and presently those matters pertain to religion.

I want to write briefly about the central message of the Historical Jesus.* But first some necessary preliminaries:

1) By the term "Historical Jesus" I refer to the actual flesh and blood person who walked the dusty roads of ancient Israel, insofar as that individual can be reconstructed by means of historical-critical scholarship. This Jesus is not to be confused with the "Jesus of Faith." The latter is Jesus as he is experienced in the religious life of Christian believers. The difference between these two is crucial to solid scholarship.

2) The four New Testament gospels are not straightforward historical accounts. This is a fact that no serious Bible scholar or historian doubts and it has been well known for around 200 years now. The gospels contain myths and legends (e.g. the birth stories, the temptation by the devil, walking on the sea) exaggeration, theological musings projected into narratives about Jesus, propaganda, and so forth.

3) Despite (2) the gospels are not useless as historical documents. Two centuries of painstaking historical research has established beyond reasonable doubt that the synoptic gospels (Matthew, Mark, and Luke) have a solid historical foundation. The gospel of John is not close to history and is not accorded the same status as the synoptics by historians.

4) The narrative spine of Mark (and thus Matthew and Luke who used Mark as a primary source) is broadly historical: Jesus came from Nazareth, briefly followed and was baptized by John the Baptist, shortly after John's arrest went out on his own mission, chose disciples to follow him and do what he was doing, taught in parables, gathered people together around a common meal, worked as an itinerant healer and exorcist, and, at Passover in the year 30, journeyed to Jerusalem, confronted the leaders there with the judgment of God by word and deed (the demonstration in the temple) and was crucified by Rome for his troubles.

5) Scholars also generally agree that much of the teaching in a hypothetical document called "Q" is authentic to the Jesus of history. Q is a source that was used by Matthew and Luke (they also used Mark). We have no copy of this source as it is lost. But it is clearly visible in the passages that Matthew and Luke have in common but that are not in their other source, Mark. It is also fairly clear that the majority of the parables (though not the interpretive gloss gospel writers sometimes give them) go back to the Jesus of history as well.

6) But, even in "Q" and Mark we do not have unbiased plain history. And scholars are careful to point out that in those two early sources some material is still suspect. In particular, passages that too obviously reflect the theology of the later Jesus movement (as evidenced in, say, Paul's letters) is unlikely to go back to Jesus. Passages in which Jesus speaks to the conditions of his followers in the 50s and 60s (see Mark 13) are clearly not from the Jesus of history, nor are passages in which Jesus speaks of himself as a heavenly judge and one who will come again - this rules out all future "son of man" passages, which has very important ramifications, as will be seen below.

With these preliminaries in place we can now ask who Jesus was? Or better, what picture of Jesus emerges from our earliest sources (Q and Mark - excluding the obviously unhistorical passages)?

I will here restrict myself to the core image in the teaching of the historical Jesus: The Kingdom of God. Better translated as the "ruling activity of God" this phrase refers to the concrete activity of God in the world whereby He establishes that He is in charge. The phrase does not indicate a place or nation in which God is actually the king.

Though the phrase "Kingdom of God" could mean many things, by the time of Jesus it serves as an eschatological image. Eschatology is that branch of theology dealing with "end-times," death, judgement, eternal life, Heaven and Hell. But used in reference to the period in which Jesus lived it refers rather to the expectation and hope, shared by many of the Jewish people at the time, that God would soon act decisively in human history to once and for all end injustice, oppression, and evil and usher in an age of prosperity, peace, and harmony.

Some scholars misleadingly speak of the time that God would do this as "the end of the world." But that is not what most of these Jewish people expected (Crossan The Greatest Prayer, 79). What they expected, rather, was that God would transform this world, not end it. Many did expect that only a supernatural act could accomplish this and thought also that events like the raising of the righteous dead to new life would accompany the eschaton. Indeed, most early Christians thought that the kingdom would be decidedly established by a return of Jesus to earth, to end evil and usher in an age of everlasting peace.

Many scholars have claimed that Jesus' own eschatology was close to that of the early Christians. He too, so they argue, expected a supernatural event in the very near future that would transform the world forever. On this view, Jesus' message was simply "the kingdom is coming soon, so you better repent and get ready for it."

I don't think this position is particularly well supported for several reasons. First the only gospel passages in which Jesus speaks of an imminent and spectacular arrival of God's kingdom are in the passages in which he speaks of the coming of the son of man (himself) from heaven. But the work of such scholars as Geza Vermes and Norman Perrin (as well as many others) demonstrate clearly that such passages do not go back to the historical Jesus, but are products of the early Jesus movement and depend upon the belief that the executed Jesus is raised up to God's right hand and that he will return from there to establish everlasting justice and peace. These passages reflect the view of Jesus' followers after his death, not the view of Jesus himself.

Second, Jesus' message in Q and Mark is simply not "repent, pray and wait for God to act." On the contrary his message reads more like "This is what the kingdom is, you are called to live out and participate in that kingdom, so get to work!" (Crossan The Greatest Prayer, 90)

So the overtly apocalyptic or end-of-the-world Jesus is not the Jesus of history. Nevertheless, I cannot quite agree with those scholars who claim that for Jesus the Kingdom of God is only a present reality made known to those who realize it in themselves. Even without the son of man passages there are enough texts that show that Jesus did teach that the kingdom, though clearly a present reality to enter now, in its full glory lies in the future (Matthew 5: 3-11, Mark 14: 25, etc.).

Did Jesus then believe that the great eschaton was soon to come? That God would indeed radically act so as to transform the world forever?

It seems to me that a careful reading of the earliest sources does not support the claim that Jesus spoke of a Kingdom of God about to burst upon the world in the future, either immediately or at some unspecified time. Nor do those teachings support that Jesus denied this in favor of a mystical present kingdom. Geza Vermes has expressed the position I am reaching for well:

[Q]ueries concerned with whether the kingdom had come, was on the way, or would come later, must be irrelevant. At issue in New Testament eschatology is the actual movement itself of turning back, of entering into the kingdom. It is in the surrender of the self to God's will that his sovereignty is realized on earth (Jesus in his Jewish Context, 35).

And Norman Perrin expressed it similarly:

In the teaching of Jesus the emphasis is not upon a future for which men must prepare, even with the help of God; the emphasis is upon a present which carries with it the guarantee of the future (Rediscovering the Teaching of Jesus, 205).

In short if we are to understand the eschatological mindset of the historical Jesus we must look to what he actually says about the kingdom. Jesus speaks of the kingdom as a reality that people can enter now (Luke 16.16), that is among us (Luke 17:20), but that will be our destiny in the future as well (Mathew 8:11). The kingdom is known in acts of healing (Luke 11:20) in the embracing of social outcasts, forgiving each other, in peace, non-violence, love for others, and the fight for justice (Matthew 5-7). In short, it is in healing each other, forgiving each other, battling injustice, and ending oppression that the kingdom is entered into by all who choose it here and now.

For Jesus, it appears, the full fruits of the kingdom do lie in the future, but it does not seem that his message is about waiting for that future. Rather than seeing the kingdom as imminent - as about to burst forth on the earth - it seems that Jesus saw the kingdom as ultimate. The Hebrew God of justice and compassion would, in the end, perfect the world, would eliminate injustice and usher in a time of everlasting peace and plenty for all. This is the heart of prophetic Judaism, and the core of the vision of the historical Jesus. Where Jesus takes his faith in God's kingdom a step further is in his clear conviction that the coming kingdom is even now already present. Like the leaven in the dough that has not yet risen, or the mustard seed that has not yet grown into a great tree, the kingdom is here, now and we may enter it, confident that the tree will grow and the bread will rise, and we must work with it.

So the message is not to wait for God to fix things. The message of the historical Jesus is rather, embrace the outcasts, combat injustice, forgive those who have wronged you, heal the sick. Do all this and you have entered the kingdom. As John Dominic Crossan puts it:

[Jesus called others] to do exactly what he himself was doing: heal the sick, eat with the healed, and demonstrate the kingdom's presence in that reciprocity and mutuality. It is not, he said, about intervention by God, but about participation with God. God's Great Cleanup of the World does not begin, cannot continue, and will not conclude without our divinely empowered participation and transcendentally driven collaboration (The Greatest Prayer, 90).

*My understanding of the Historical Jesus is most indebted to the work of John Dominic Crossan and Marcus Borg. But I also draw considerably on Geza Vermes and Norman Perrin. To a lesser but non-trivial extent I am indebted to the work of N. T. Wright and Richard Horsley. I find the Jesus of such scholars as Paula Frederickson, Ed Sanders, and Bart Erhman to be historically problematic (given its rejection of politics and its reliance on "the son of man" style eschatology), and the very non-jewish wondering sage (who seems to have no relation to Jewish politics or eschatology!) of Robert Funk and Burton Mack even more so.

Note: The Picture accompanying this post is from a BBC documentary which attempts to construct a face for Jesus that actually looks like a 1st century Galilean.

Touching the Eternal

Is there life after death?

I have briefly raised this question in an earlier post. Since life after death was the topic of my philosophy of religion class tonight, I thought I should sum up that discussion as a continuation of this topic.

Let us first consider the concept of an immortal soul. On this view we are essentially non-physical souls that inhabit bodies during this life only to "go to the spirit realm"- or something like that - upon the death of the body.

There are a few problems with this view. Most importantly, our consciousness and thinking processes are so intimately connected with our brains that is strains credulity to think that there is some non-physical substance that accounts for our minds. Furthermore, since I can explain mental processes in terms of bodily processes, it would seem that Occam's razor obliges us to reject any explanatory need for the soul in the first place. Indeed, it is a very good principle of critical thinking to avoid positing entities - particularly entities we cannot explain or understand - unless very compelling evidence forces us to do so.

On the other hand, should strong evidence for an immortal soul exist, we should embrace it. But there is no such evidence. The most commonly sighted evidence are the following:

1) Near Death Experiences

2) Ghosts

3) Accounts of past lives

4) Visits from recently deceased loved ones

5) Mediums

This evidence is simply not compelling. Near Death Experiences can be replicated in the laboratory, there is no hard evidence of any merit for ghosts, accounts of past lives are not confirmably accurate often enough to overcome skepticism, visits from the recently deceased could very well be grief hallucinations - they are impossible to confirm or deny - and mediums have far too often been exposed as frauds and never passed the rigors of controlled experiments (The case against all these varieties of evidence is nicely summed up by Paul Kurtz).

When all is said and done, given the strong physical evidence that our minds are, if not identical with our brains, at least strongly interconnected with our neural processes, and the very inconclusive - at best - nature of the above pieces of evidence, it seems that we must say the existence of an immortal soul is rather unlikely. I personally do not entirely rule it out, as I know that my knowledge and reasoning skills are limited, but I'm strongly inclined to disbelieve it.

Another possible belief in immortality rejects the immortal soul idea in favor of "bodily resurrection." On this traditional Christian view God will, at the end of time, raise up the dead to live again and forever in transformed bodies. The only evidence of this view is an appeal to divine revelation. But it is clear to me that human beings have never received any specifically articulated divine revelation. All holy books, creeds, etc, are clearly human inventions. We cannot argue from such sources.

Does this mean then that death is the end of us?

Not necessarily.

As I have often written on this blog, I ascribe to a theology known as panentheism. To sum up this position briefly: I understand panentheism as the view that the term "God" does not refer to a separately existing supernatural and person-like being "out there" beyond us. The term "God" refers rather to reality at its ultimate level, "Being itself," "The ground of being," the all-inclusive whole. The best way to understand what these abstractions signify is through an analogy: We know from physics that reality has levels of being which require ever deeper descriptions of the same object. Take, for example, a table. At the level of human interaction the table is a solid object of such-and-such size, weight, height and so on. But at a deeper level of physical description the table is properly described as a certain relationship of interaction between fundamental particles. Both descriptions are correct, the latter simply describes the realty of the table at a "deeper" level.

The panentheist takes this basic claim about the table and extends it to reality as a whole. The universe at the level of physical observation is the total collection of matter and energy interacting in space and time. If we go deeper, however, we can think of the universe as being reality itself only at a less than ultimate level of description. If we think of reality at its greatest or ultimate depth, we must think of it has having no boundaries or limits of any kind (after all what could limit it?). Ultimate reality would then be infinite (no limits), eternal (no beginning or end), and self-caused. All things in our universe can be seen as simply various expressions of the one ultimate reality at a level of less depth. Panentheists call ultimate reality "God" partly because it is eternal, infinite, and self-caused, but also because reality as a whole is so awe-inspiring, mysterious, and tremendous, that we can only feel reverence, humility, and awe when we contemplate it. In other words, for the panentheist all things are parts of God, but the reality of God goes deeper than reality at the level of things, though God does not exist apart from things as another being; God is, rather, the "ground of all being."

So how does this relate back to surviving our death?

Since, according to panentheism we are all a part of God, we are, like everything else, one with God at the deepest level of reality. This means that the core of who we are, that part of us that causes us to be, to love, to think, is nothing other than the very power of being-itself and since being itself is eternal, that core part of us is eternal. In a classic analogy we are like waves in relation to the water. The waves perish, but the water remains. In like manner, it may be true that our memories, personality, and self-awareness perish at death (though I am open to the possibility that something of these remains, I am not convinced that any of it does), but something of us, something that makes us who we are is eternal and imperishable.

Many find this less than reassuring. On this non-personal understanding of immortality, there is no reunion with departed loved ones, and probably no self-conscious awareness of an everlasting life. On the other hand, I'm not so sure that living forever with a conscious awareness like we have now would be enjoyable or rewarding. I could easily imagine it as a kind of inescapable tedium.

But I find the idea that the core of my being is eternally one with reality at its ultimate level to be quite inspiring. This means that my thoughts, loves, deeds, and joys have something of eternal value and meaning to them, that something of my true being partakes of the rhythm of the eternal dance, that the relationships I've had, the things I've learned, and who I've been are taken into and indeed part of the eternal creative act of Being itself.

In short, I am inclined to agree, to an extant at least, with Paul of Tarsus, when he says that

For none of us lives unto himself,

and no one dies unto himself.

For if we live, we live unto the Lord;

and if we die, we die unto the Lord.

Therefore whether we live or die

we are the Lord's (Romans 14: 7-8).

Indeed just as "we live and move and have our being" in the reality that is God (Acts 17:28), so we die into that same reality, our deepest being taken into and included in that divine essence.

Bill Moyers on Memorial Day

The following video is from 2009 but it is still timely and relevant. Moyers' comments should help us to reflect more carefully on what memorial day is really about.

Here's the video:

Reflections of Eternal Life: Part 1

I've decided to do a few blog posts together as a series on the issue of - for lack of a better term - "life after death." I don't know how many posts this series will finish up with, although I'm sure I will write at least three. I should begin with a candid admission that I am agnostic regarding life after death. I simply do not know - and am pretty sure that none of us can know - anything about what might happen to us after death (other than the facts that our bodies will decompose).

I thought, however, that I ought to compose a few reflections on the topic, since it has of late become something of a newsworthy item.

A well known evangelical pastor has recently come out with a book questioning the existence of Hell. There is, predictably, much controversy over this. The Religious left has long embraced this universalist conclusion, and the religious right damns it as blasphemy. But in my opinion he is only half right. I think it is VERY UNLIKELY that anything like the traditional concept of a personal afterlife can be true.

The idea that after death we will hang out again with Grandma and the beloved family dog we lost at age 12 is without any support of any kind. And it requires a commitment to the view of God as a supernatural being "out there" somewhere in a equally supernatural heaven; a God who makes plans, has intentions, thoughts, feelings, and will judge our merit (or gracefully forgive us all our failings) based on our moral behavior.

Belief in such a person-like God is hard to sustain given the impersonal nature of the laws that govern the physical world, the vast age and size of the universe, and the rather obvious historical development of that concept of God over time together with its clear role as a psychological projection. This is not to say that I embrace atheism. I do not. But I think that any viable conception of God must recognize that the view of God as person-like and supernatural is deeply problematic. If we are to retain concepts of deity, they must be of a different nature. I've discussed this elsewhere and refer my readers to that earlier material.

The reader may already guess where I am going with this. Just as it is possible to reject a supernatural and person-like creator without eliminating God all together, it seems to me that it is possible to reject a continuation of ourselves as persons after death without rejecting some essential continuation of ourselves all together. What I have in mind is something like this: Perhaps it is true that we do not "go to heaven," do not continue to exist after death in the same person-like state (filled with memories, images, sense-perception etc.) after our death - at any rate I'm inclined to believe that we do not so exist; but this need not mean that we completely cease to exist. It could well be that there are important senses in which something non-personal but essential about us continues to exist for eternity.

It is such non-personal conceptions of eternal life that I will consider in my future posts for this series.

Dissertation Defense : Videos of the Questions and Answers Round 1

Following the post of my summary of the dissertation, I thought I'd add some videos of the first round of the question and answers sessions. In many ways this is more important and interesting than my summary:

Spinoza's theory of individuals: Video of my dissertation defense

Hello Readers!

I successfully defended my dissertation today and am now "Dr. Wion." It is very nice to have earned this degree after 16 years of toil, debt, and struggle. I provide here the videos of my summary of the dissertation. The Q&A sections of the defense will be posted later. If you don't know Spinoza's thought that well, I recommend that you read the Introduction to my dissertation which I have pasted here right below the video.

Introduction

Spinoza speaks often of individuals. Indeed, the well-being of a particular set of individuals, namely human individuals, is the principal focus of his philosophy. Naturally we expect such a systematic philosopher as Spinoza to provide a theory about what, precisely, an individual is. This expectation is bound to be present with regard to any philosopher who stresses the importance of individuals. For Spinoza, however, the problem is particularly acute, for he famously argues that there is only one substance, one self-existent being. If there is only one substance, it seems to follow that there is only one individual. Since substance in the western philosophical tradition is ordinarily restricted to particular individuals, this seems to be a sensible conclusion. It thus appears that Spinoza would conclude that there is only one individual. He does not do this, however. He repeatedly speaks of individuals in the plural, in particular of human individuals and their well-being. It is obvious that Spinoza holds that there are multiple individuals. Since he holds that there are many individuals but only one substance, it follows that most individuals are not substances. This invites the question of what an individual is for Spinoza.

In this study, my principal concern is to answer the question of what Spinoza holds an individual to be. My secondary aim is to argue that Spinoza's conception of an individual has important moral and political consequences regarding the nature of the state and the role of the community in the life of the individual.

I will present my reading of what an individual is for Spinoza and the moral and political implications that follow from his conception of individuals over the course of five chapters. Chapter 1 will argue for and explain my reading of Spinoza's system as a whole. We cannot begin to understand Spinoza’s conception of an individual without a firm grasp of the nature of his larger metaphysical system. This means that we must first clarify Spinoza’s central metaphysical concepts. These concepts are principally found in Ethics 1 and 2. They include the concepts of substance, attributes, and modes, as well as the central ideas which Spinoza offers on the relationship of the mind to the body, and his argument for universal casual determinism. A thorough investigation of Spinoza’s conception of the individual requires an adequate comprehension of these concepts.

In my second chapter, I will look closely both at Spinoza's primary texts for his understanding of what an individual is and at the work of leading interpreters on this aspect of his thought. The critical issue that I will examine in chapter 2 is what exactly counts as an individual for Spinoza. Although this issue, for reasons that will be presented, cannot be fully resolved, I will venture some conclusions about the origins of Spinoza's account of individuals and what he considers to be paradigmatic individuals.

Chapter 3 proceeds from the doctrine of individuals in general to a particular application of that doctrine. My focus here will be on whether or not the state (or “civil society”) counts as an individual. This question is important because Spinoza claims that the human individual is part of some larger individual, though he never explicitly says what this larger individual is. Since, for Spinoza, to be part of a larger individual is to have one's very nature determined by that individual, it is absolutely critical to determine what that individual is. In this chapter, therefore, I will carefully examine the work of Alexandre Matheron and his critics, primarily Steve Barbone and Lee Rice. Matheron argues that Spinoza thinks of a civil society as a kind of individual of which human beings are a part. Rice and Barbone argue against Matheron's reading.

In chapter 4, I will shift my analysis to the moral and political implications that follow from Spinoza's understanding of what an individual is. I will argue that Spinoza, contrary to some common readings of him, is not an egoist. Spinoza is not an egoist because his conception of individuals is primarily a relational one; whereas egoism, I will argue, depends upon a non-relational theory of individuals. To demonstrate this contrast between a relational and non-relational understanding of individuals and its role in interpreting Spinoza's position, I will carefully examine the work of feminist scholars who have written extensively on this issue. I will also contrast the work of these thinkers with the contribution of Rice.

Chapter 5 will briefly examine some political implications for Spinoza's theory of the individual. In particular, I will argue that Spinoza's understanding of the individual requires a strong commitment to what is often called “the welfare state.” To illustrate his commitment to a strong welfare state, I will argue, on the basis of his general political theory and several key texts, that Spinoza would support universal health care coverage.

Spinoza: The Movie

I have just discovered that there is a movie about Baruch Spinoza! As I have written my dissertation on Spinoza, I find this very interesting.

The film does not present a very deep or even an entirely accurate understanding of Spinoza's philosophy. But presenting Spinoza as "the Apostle of Reason," weeping, cringing, screaming, and feebly coughing blood as tuberculous saps his life away, makes for interesting viewing.

As he implores all those around him to think rationally and live honestly, the irrational fanaticism of his society grows more violent, more deceptive, and ever less sane.

As you watch (it's only 52 mins long) pay special attention to the angry mob and Spinoza's reaction to their ways.

Here's the film:

How to Become a Teacher...: Preface: A Change of Plans

So I just discovered a new blog on teaching that I think all my readers should check out. Here it is:

How to Become a Teacher...: Preface: A Change of Plans: "A funny thing happened while pursuing my dream of becoming a philosophy professor. I hated, (this may even call for all caps) HATED my mast..."

Mr. Moore comes to Madison

The protests on part of unions in Wisconsin is drawing big names. Michael Moore gave a speech in Madison today to support the cause. Here is that thirty minute speech:

A Word about Unions

As the conflict in Wisconsin over Gov. Walker's proposal to strip unions of their right to collective bargaining continues, I find that many still do not understand what the debate is all about and why Walker's actions are terribly wrong and even deeply immoral.

First, let us dispel a few red herrings. This debate is not about whether unions have their flaws and foibles. Unions, like any other organization, have weak points, make mistakes, and are imperfect. So what? The criticisms of unions are no different than any other type organization. Second, the debate in Wisconsin has nothing to do with "balancing a budget" or "reducing the state deficit." To begin with, taking away the right of unions to bargain collectively does ABSOLUTELY NOTHING to reduce a deficit. Even worse, since Walker created the so-called deficit by giving tax breaks to his rich donors and even refusing stimulus money and the jobs that would be created by high speed rail, he can hardly say that we "must" strip unions of anything, let alone their right to bargain collectively!

Second, there are those who think this is about union members' greed. The unions have agreed - I would not have - to the cuts in their pensions and to pay more for health care. They insist only on holding onto to collective bargaining. Furthermore, many of the same people who insists that teachers are greedy for having a good health care plan also claim (out of the other side of their face I guess) that we have no right to raise any taxes on millionaires! If I hear from someone that millionaires should be given a break from their estate tax, but that teachers getting a solid pension is what we should really cut, I will simply laugh off this kind of stupidity and address it no further.

Third, I hear, all too often I am afraid, that public employees should not be given "fat benefits" that private employees lack. This is just absurd! If you think that public employees enjoy better jobs than their private sector counterparts, then you should fight to bring back union membership to private workers, to get them those "fat benefits," rather than want to remove them from public employees! Again, however, this misses the point. Unionized public employees and their allies are not fighting for better benefits, but for their right to bargain collectively! Let's please stay on track here.

These red herrings dispelled, we can now look at the justification for the existence of unions. In the employee/employer relationship the employer has all the power. The employer pays the wages, hires and fires, decides who takes breaks, when, and for how long, and so forth. If each employee must face their employer alone, they simply lack the power to fight for better wages, more time off, better working conditions, etc. The only way for employees to have anything like the power of their employer in this relationship is to come together and bargain collectively. This is what a union is, this is why unions are needed, and this is why their right to collectively bargain must be preserved.

The heart of the Battle in Wisconsin, and other states, is the battle to allow working people some power, some equality, some voice in determining their working conditions. As the collapse of unions in the private sector has already made clear, when unions go, working conditions for people fall dramatically. Without the existence of unions the power is solely in the hands of the employer, and we should all have long since understood that history clearly reveals that in any and all relationships where the power is all one side, the powerless never find themselves treated justly.

Walker asks Unions to "Sacrifice," but cuts taxes for the Rich!

The Battle for Wisconsin: What's happening and why

The working people of Wisconsin are under attack. The hand-picked corporate stooge that is now Governor of the state has decided to risk his entire political career and the well-being of the people of Wisconsin (admittedly the latter mean little, if anything, to him) to destroy unions, to hurt the opposing political party, and to strip away one of the very few protections left to working people. I intended to blog about what is happening in Wisconsin and what it means, but Mother Jones has already written exactly what I wanted to say! Here is what MJ says (I will add my own thoughts at the end):

What's Happening in Wisconsin: Explained

— By Andy Kroll

| Fri Feb. 18, 2011 3:30 PM PST

Activists protesting new GOP Gov. Scott Walker's anti-union proposals have occupied the rotunda of the Wisconsin capitol building in Madison for the past week, but Walker is pressing ahead anyway.Flickr/Peter Gorman.

If you need to know the basics of what's going on in Wisconsin, read on. If you're already up to speed, you can follow the action on Twitter or jump straight to today's updates from our reporter on the ground in Madison.

—With additional reporting by Nick Baumannand Siddhartha Mahanta

The basics:

For days, demonstrators have been pouring into the streets of Madison, Wisconsin—and the halls of the state's Capitol building—to protest rookie Republican Governor Scott Walker's anti-union proposals. Big national unions, both major political parties, the Tea Party, and Andrew Breitbart are already involved. Democratic state senators have fled the state to prevent the legislature from voting on Walker's proposals. And the protests could soon spread to other states, including Ohio [....]

What's actually being proposed?

Walker says his legislation, which would strip most state employees of any meaningful collective bargaining rights, is necessary to close the state's $137 million budget gap. There are a number of problems with that argument, though. The unions are not to blame for the deficit, and stripping unionized workers of their collective bargaining rights won't in and of itself save any money. Walker says he needs to strip the unions of their rights to close the gap. But public safety officers' unions, which have members who are more likely to support Republicans and who also tend to have the highest salaries and benefits, are exempted from the new rules. Meanwhile, a series of tax breaks and other goodies that Walker and the Republican legislature passed just after his inauguration dramatically increased the deficit that Walker now says he's trying to close. And Wisconsin has closed a much larger budget gap in the past without scrapping worker organizing rights.

What's really going on, as Kevin Drum has explained, is pure partisan warfare: Walker is trying to de-fund the unions that form the backbone of the Democratic party. The unions and the Democrats are, of course, fighting back. The Washington Post's Ezra Klein drops some knowledge [emphasis added]:

The best way to understand Walker's proposal is as a multi-part attack on the state's labor unions. In part one, their ability to bargain benefits for their members is reduced. In part two, their ability to collect dues, and thus spend money organizing members or lobbying the legislature, is undercut. And in part three, workers have to vote the union back into existence every single year. Put it all together and it looks like this: Wisconsin's unions can't deliver value to their members, they're deprived of the resources to change the rules so they can start delivering value to their members again, and because of that, their members eventually give in to employer pressure and shut the union down in one of the annual certification elections.

You may think Walker's proposal is a good idea or a bad idea. But that's what it does. And it's telling that he's exempting the unions that supported him and is trying to obscure his plan's specifics behind misleading language about what unions can still bargain for and misleading rhetoric about the state's budget.

Walker's proposals do have important fiscal elements: they roughly double health care premiums for many state employees. But the heart of the proposals, and the controversy, are the provisions that will effectively destroy public-sector unions in the Badger State. As Matt Yglesias notes, this won't destroy the Democratic party. But it will force the party to seek funding from sources other than unions, and that usually means the same rich businessmen who are the main financial backers for the Republican party. Speaking of which....

Who is Scott Walker?

Walker was elected governor in the GOP landslide of 2010, when Republicans also gained control of the Wisconsin state senate and house of representatives. His political career has been bankrolled by Charles and David Koch, the very rich, very conservative, and very anti-union oil-and-gas magnates. Koch-backed groups like Americans for Prosperity, the Cato Institute, the Competitive Enterprise Institute, and the Reason Foundation have long taken a very antagonistic view toward public-sector unions. They've used their vast fortunes to fight key Obama initiatives on health care and the environment, while writing fat checks to Republican candidates across the country. Walker's take for the 2010 election: $43,000 from the Koch Industries PAC, his second highest intake from any one donor. But that's not all!:

The Koch's PAC also helped Walker via a familiar and much-used political maneuver designed to allow donors to skirt campaign finance limits. The PAC gave $1 million to the Republican Governors Association, which in turn spent $65,000 on independent expenditures to support Walker. The RGA also spent a whopping $3.4 million on TV ads and mailers attacking Walker's opponent, Milwaukee Mayor Tom Barrett. Walker ended up beating Barrett by 5 points. The Koch money, no doubt, helped greatly.

What are the Democrats and the unions doing to respond?

Well, they're protesting, obviously—filling the halls of the Capitol and the streets of Madison with bodies and signs. They're calling their representatives and talking about recalling Walker (who cannot be recalled until next January) or any of eight GOP state senators who are eligible for recall right now. Meanwhile, all of the Democratic state senators have left the state in an attempt to deny Republicans the quorum they need to vote on Walker's proposals, but if just one of them returns (or is hauled back by state troopers), the GOP will have the quorum they need. (Interestingly, the head of the state patrol in the father of the Republican heads of the state senate and house of representatives, who are brothers.) Finally, Wisconsin public school teachers have been calling in sick, forcing schools to close while teachers in over a dozen other school districts picket the capitol, plan vigils, and set up phone banks to try to block Walker's effort.

How could this spread?

Other Republican-governed states are trying to mimic Walker's assault on public employee unions. The GOP won a resounding series of state-level victories in high-union-density states in November. Now they can use their newly-won power to crack down on one of the Democrats' biggest sources of funds, volunteers, and political power. Plans are already under consideration in places like Ohio, Indiana, and Michigan.

Speaking of Ohio:

As Suzy Khimm outlined on Friday, an estimated 3,800-5,000 protestors came out in full fury in Columbus, Ohio, to vent their anger over a similar anti-union bill that would limit workers' rights to bargain for health insurance, end automatic pay increases, and infringe upon teachers' rights to pick their classes and schools. As in Wisconsin, both the Ohio state house and governor's mansion flipped from blue to red last year. "This has little to do with balancing this year's budget," former Governor Ted Strickland told the AP. "I think it's a power grab. It's an attempt to diminish the rights of working people. I think it's an assault of the middle class of this state and it's so unfair and out of balance."

How are conservatives working to support Walker?:

It was only a matter of time till the Tea Party got in on the action. Stephanie Mencimerreports that activists are bussing into Madison, and are "promising a massive counter-demonstration." The push is being led by American Majority, a conservative activist group that trains impressionable young foot soldiers to become state-level candidates (check out their ""I Stand With Scott Walker Rally" Facebook page). Founded by Republican operatives, the well-funded group (which, according to tax fillings, had a budget of nearly $2 million in 2009) gets much of its money from a group with ties to those adorable Koch brothers. Conservative media baron Andrew Breitbart will be leading the rally, and will be joined by presidential candidate Herman Cain and maybe—if we're lucky—Joe "The Plumber" Wurtzelbacher. Expect fireworks.

I wish to add to Mother Jone's analysis only this: The rights of workers in this country are under serious assault. This is an absolutely historical moment. If we fail, if Walker successfully destroys the unions in Wisconsin, we are headed back to the age of robber barons and unaccountable corporate power. We have already taken too many steps in that harmful and unjust direction. Not only must we stop walking toward such an abyss, it is time - NO LONG PAST TIME! - that we turned around and walked the other direction.

St. Valentine's Day: Celebrate love and justice

A standard joke on American sitcoms is a single person, lonely on Valentine's Day, who says that the day is "nothing more than a bogus holiday dreamed up by corporate interests to sell greeting cards, candy and flowers." In fact, I once held this view myself (both when I was single and when I was in a relationship).

Obviously there is truth in this view of the holiday. Mass produced and overly sentimental "love" is largely what Valentine's day is in our commercialized culture. But - and I freely concede that being happily married to a wonderful woman has affected me here - I've come to see meaning and purpose in this holiday.

If we step back and think of this day as a day to set aside for the celebration of love, we shall see that it is well worth the observing. And I mean ALL LOVE. We love our family and friends, our lovers, and to some degree - when we are at our best - all of our fellow human beings. Having a day to recognize this love is important. Of course, the day loses meaning if we don't love the whole year around, but holidays serve as symbolic reminders that bring such truths to our consciousness.

Love is what is best about human beings. Yes, I know that we are also full of hypocrisy, hate, greed, and foolishness. And for this very reason it is all the more important that love be remembered, that love have the final say in our lives.

There are various legends and tales about a supposed St. Valentine. These tales come out of the later middle ages and the 19th century, and have nothing to do with any possible "Historical Valentine." Common to all the tales is the idea that either Valentine himself, or young people whom he as a priest married, were forbidden to love and wed by the forces of tyranny, oppression and empire. Valentine defies these powers and their laws, celebrating and sanctifying love. For his courage, Valentine is martyred.

The message in the tales of St. Valentine is that love liberates us. By loving each other we discover ourselves, and only then. This, in the legends of Valentine is why love is forbidden and why Valentine is proclaimed a hero for championing love against the power of empire.

Romantic love in particular is celebrated on this day. I used to hold that this was nothing more than a bias on our part. Privileging one kind of love over the others. Well, we do in fact misconceive and over sentimentalize romantic love (just as we do childhood). Nevertheless, romantic love unites two people like nothing else can.

Romantic love burns down the walls that separate us and compels us to grow, mature, and change in ways we never thought possible and never knew we could. I have come to see, however, that we cannot celebrate Romantic love, or even all love alone, we must also remember to celebrate justice.

The Biblical scholar John Dominic Crossan has often written that love and justice require each other. In The Greatest Prayer, he writes that:

Think, then, of justice as the body of love and love as the soul of justice [....] Combined you have both; seperated you have neither. Justice without love or love without justice is a moral corpse. This is why justice without love becomes brutal and love without justice becomes banal.

In short, love by itself is not always just or world-transforming, and there is a real danger it will degrade it to an empty and sappy sentimentality; and justice without love shows no mercy, heeds no compassion: we must have both together. And what is justice? For this Crossan has an answer as well:

The biblical tradition insists that God is a God of "justice and righteousness," that is, of distributive justice and restorative righteousness. Think, for example, of this divine claim:
"I am the Lord; I act with steadfast love, justice, and righteousness in the earth, for in these things I delight, says the Lord" (Jeremiah 9:24). Furthermore, rulers are expected to participate in that same divine character. "Thus says then Lord: act with justice and righteousness, and deliver from the hand of the oppressor anyone who has been robbed. And do no wrong or violence to the alien, the orphan, and the widow, or shed innocent blood in this place" (Jeremiah 22:3). The most serious and far-reaching misunderstanding of that biblical tradition is to interpret divine justice as retributive rather than distributive, as if it meant a proper punishment for some rather than a fair share for all [....]

The biblical tradition got that vision of God from the most obvious source imaginable, from growing up in a decent home and a well-run household. Most children either experienced that normalcy positively or recognized its absence negatively. The Bible simply took that expectation of a decent household and applied it to God as the Householder of the World-House. Given their world's patriarchal prejudices they spoke of God "as Father" but God "as Householder" is what that title meant.

Think, for a moment, about the first-century world of Jesus and especially of that prayer which begins with, "Our Father in Heaven." There is an especially striking irony when God-as-Householder is called God-as-Father by Jesus. Demographers of the Roman world agree that, owing to the late marriage-age of males, one third of young people would have been fatherless by the age of fifteen -- across all strata of society. Women married around 12 or 13, men married around twice that age, general life expectancy was under 30 years, so that a father as actual householder must have been mostly theory rather than practice and nostalgia rather than reality. In other words, in a first-century household across the Roman world, hear "father," think "mother," but understand "householder." And, as on earth, so also in heaven.

If, in that first-century world, you entered a small family farm and its courtyard house, how would you judge the householder? Are the fields well administered, the livestock well provisioned, the family members well-fed, well-clothed, well-sheltered?? Does a sick child get special care? Does a pregnant mother get special concern? Does everyone get a fair share? Does everyone get enough? You would judge the householder not by the criterion of egalitarianism but of enoughism. That is how -- then as now -- you would assess the householder of any home. Is there a fair distribution of goods and resources, of duties and obligations?

But what if some of the children were starving and others were over-fed? What if some received food while others did not? What would you think of that householder -- then or now? That is the mega-model or mega-metaphor underneath the biblical tradition's understanding of its God. That is why the biblical God can demand of the powers-that-be, the rulers of this world, that they,

Give justice to the weak and the orphan;
maintain the right of the lowly and the destitute. (Psalm 82:3

So let us celebrate love today, let us celebrate each other. But let us celebrate justice as well, for we need to honor both, and the two must never be separated.

Our Wedding

I thought I would go ahead and share my wedding video with my blog readers, provided any are interested. My wife and I got married on Jan 1st, 2011. Here is the wedding ceremony in two parts. Watch if you'd like!

They are guilty for their violent words!

Rep. John Dingell today read out a list of quotes of violent rhetoric from the right wing:



This is not at all new and has been brewing for some time. Bill Moyers, a couple of years ago, did a whole segment on it:



I know what those who would defended the far right - Note: we should distinguish between a right-winger and a conservative, they are not identical - will say. They will say that words don't kill people, that no real violence was actually intended by those who used violent language, and that you can't blame pundits and politicians for the actions of a few wackos.

This argument is too stupid to take seriously. When Glen Beck tells us that he wants to strangle Michael Moore, and kill Charlie Rangel with a shovel, when Sarah Palin tells us to reload because Obama and his people are dangerous socialists who will kill off grandma with their death panels, when tea-baggers bellow that they must "take their country back," "water the tree of liberty," and that Obama is a secret Muslim terrorist who is going to ruin our country from within, can we honestly say this does not lead to a violent political climate? Can so many violent and fearful comments really never lead "some wacko" to kill? That is nearly impossible to believe.

But if you are still in doubt that this does lead to such disasters, I quote Robert Wright from yesterday' New York Times

People on the left and right have been wrestling over the legacy of Jared Loughner, arguing about whether his shooting spree proves that the Sarah Palins and Glenn Becks of the world are fomenting violence. But it’s not as if this is the only data point we have. Here’s another one:

Six months ago, police in California pulled over a truck that turned out to contain a rifle, a handgun, a shotgun and body armor. Police learned from the driver — sometime after he opened fire on them — that he was heading for San Francisco, where he planned to kill people at the Tides Foundation. You’ve probably never heard of the Tides Foundation — unless you watch Glenn Beck, who had mentioned it more than two dozen times in the preceding six months, depicting it as part of a communist plot to “infiltrate” our society and seize control of big business.

Predictably the right-wing hate mongers have responded to the recent violent attacks in Arizona by whining and playing the victim. Sarah Palin, who has taken much heat because of rifle targets she put on a map over several democratic congress districts (including the poor woman who was shot!), responded by crying that we demean and offend her by saying her words could of led to this, and saying that we commit "blood libel" if we hold her in any way accountable.

Palin's response is, of course, shameful. Even worse are the many pundits who rushed to her defense, as if the real tragedy of the Arizona shootings is that some people thought Palin should tone down her violent rhetoric!

When some idiot like Palin runs around saying that the President of the United states "pals around with terrorists," wants to create "death panels" to kill grandma, puts bull eyes over districts of the opposing parties representatives, tells people that Obama wants to take away their guns and Bibles, can anyone honestly tell me that she is not contributing to a climate of violence?

Enough nonsense. Let us please be honest the words of these hate-mongers are violent and they must be held accountable for that.

Sarah Palin's words are not likely responsible for the shootings in Arizona. But the violence in her words and the words of many like her are creating a climate of fear, hostility, and anger. Those who speak like her must be held accountable for their words.

Mrs. Palin, Obesity is no laughing matter!

Sarah Palin is taking a lot of heat as a result of the Arizona shooting. This blog post, however, is not about that. If you wish to know my views on that matter, another writer has stated them quite well, and I refer you to that link here. This post is about Sarah Palin's curt dismissal of Michelle Obama's efforts to fight childhood obesity. In this matter too, I find that another person has stated my own opinion better than I could.

With her permission, I reproduce here an open-letter to Sarah Palin from my friend Eve Parker

Dear Mrs. Palin,

I recently read about your objection to Michelle Obama’s “Let’s Move” initiative and the Child Nutrition Act . I am sure this is not the only letter you have received on this matter, but I am deeply concerned with your lack of interest in this issue. As an obese child to a family who were not the most educated or able to provide healthy meals, I relied heavily on my school district to provide me with the nutrients my developing body needed for breakfast and lunch, the two most important meals of the day. I received breakfast pizzas, buttered waffles, chicken fried steak, and corn dogs. Is this the adequate food choices you have been talking about?

CDC.gov highlights the obesity rate amongst children which has tripled in the last 30 years. They are expecting to watch this figure grow if no affirmative action is taken. Does this show how well our country is doing by leaving all meal planning in the hands of our parents when clearly children eat at school? According to “Fighting Obesity in the Public Schools,” children ages 6-15 consume one-third to one-half of their daily calories there. If parents are left completely responsible for their children’s food choices, does that honestly allow schools to turn a blind eye and serve children what is proven to clog arteries, increase risk of high blood pressure, and effect cognitive functions?

Wiping your hands clean of this issue since you feel we have bigger issues and assuming all American families are willing and able to provide their children with a well balanced meal is foolish. “Support parental choice for what is best for their children,” sounds like you are playing it safe. Why not intervene and join forces with Michelle Obama when in 2007 researchers from Harvard Medicine School’s showed nearly 1 out of every 5 children are considered either overweight or on their way to becoming obese? Do not assume everyone understands what a serving size is or what an adequate amount of protein is, let alone how much Vitamin A a child needs. I believe too many parents are more concerned with convenience when planning meals rather than the nutrients their children are getting from their diet. I also think it is reasonable to consider child obesity as a form of child abuse, seeing as how disregarding the health and future of your child is neglect. Just because your children didn’t suffer from it doesn’t mean it isn’t happening Mrs.Palin.

If your focus is on the future and making our country optimal and efficient, why do you not care about the future generation and their well being? I can hear your contagious laugh as you read this, but truly that is what you are doing when you scoff at the First Lady’s efforts. Obesity is amongst the top preventable disease affecting our country today. If we do not have healthy children it decreased their chances of being healthy adults, and without healthy adults we do not have a fully functioning society.


I find it sad that a 24 year old Nutrition major has to even write such logic to a well-educated politician. I employ you to reconsider your narrow-minded attitude toward this country’s children. A quote by an unknown author exemplifies the problem with nutritional education “An educational system isn't worth a great deal if it teaches young people how to make a living but doesn't teach them how to make a life.”


Sincerely,

Eve Parker

Well said Eve! And thank you for your permission to post this.

The real problem with Ebenezer Scrooge

How can I even begin to review the book that, more than any other source, gave us the modern Christmas?!

I've read A Christmas Carol at least 6 times and I always find something new to enjoy about it with each read. The narration is absolutely entrancing, the dialogue beautiful, and the story - even to call it "gripping" is to underestimate it.

The story is too well known to repeat here, but I should point out that, as a result of over saturation with many film adaptations, we don't properly understand the story. All too often, we think of Scrooge as a greedy miser who simply does not want to be charitable. Though this is correct, it is trivial and even peripheral to the character. Scrooge's basic problem is a failure to relate.

Scrooge is first introduced to us as a man who was

a tight-fisted hand at the grind- stone, Scrooge! a squeezing, wrenching, grasping, scraping, clutching, covetous, old sinner! Hard and sharp as flint, from which no steel had ever struck out generous fire; secret, and self-contained, and solitary as an oyster.

Nobody ever stopped him in the street to say, with gladsome looks, "My dear Scrooge, how are you? When will you come to see me?" No beggars implored him to bestow a trifle, no children asked him what it was o'clock, no man or woman ever once in all his life inquired the way to such and such a place, of Scrooge. Even the blind men's dogs appeared to know him; and when they saw him coming on, would tug their owners into doorways and up courts; and then would wag their tails as though they said, "No eye at all is better than an evil eye, dark master!"

But what did Scrooge care? It was the very thing he liked. To edge his way along the crowded paths of life, warning all human sympathy to keep its distance.

As if that were not enough to clarify that Scrooge's real problem is his refusal to relate to other people in any way other than through doing business, Scrooge tells us as much in his conversation with the "Portly Gentlemen" who come collecting funds for the poor

"At this festive season of the year, Mr. Scrooge," said the gentleman, taking up a pen, "it is more than usually desirable that we should make some slight provision for the Poor and Destitute, who suffer greatly at the present time. Many thousands are in want of common necessaries; hundreds of thousands are in want of common comforts, sir."

"Are there no prisons?" asked Scrooge.

"Plenty of prisons," said the gentleman, laying down the pen again.

"And the Union workhouses?" demanded Scrooge. "Are they still in operation?"

"They are. Still," returned the gentleman, "I wish I could say they were not."

"The Treadmill and the Poor Law are in full vigour, then?" said Scrooge.

"Both very busy, sir."

"Oh! I was afraid, from what you said at first, that something had occurred to stop them in their useful course," said Scrooge. "I'm very glad to hear it."

"Under the impression that they scarcely furnish Christian cheer of mind or body to the multitude," returned the gentleman, "a few of us are endeavoring to raise a fund to buy the Poor some meat and drink and means of warmth. We choose this time, because it is a time, of all others, when Want is keenly felt, and Abundance rejoices. What shall I put you down for?"

"Nothing!" Scrooge replied.

"You wish to be anonymous?"

"I wish to be left alone," said Scrooge. "Since you ask me what I wish, gentlemen, that is my answer. I don't make merry myself at Christmas and I can't afford to make idle people merry. I help to support the establishments I have mentioned -- they cost enough; and those who are badly off must go there."

"Many can't go there; and many would rather die."

"If they would rather die," said Scrooge, "they had better do it, and decrease the surplus population. Besides -- excuse me -- I don't know that."

"But you might know it," observed the gentleman.

"It's not my business," Scrooge returned. "It's enough for a man to understand his own business, and not to interfere with other people's. Mine occupies me constantly. Good afternoon, gentlemen!"

Seeing clearly that it would be useless to pursue their point, the gentlemen withdrew. Scrooge returned his labours with an improved opinion of himself, and in a more facetious temper than was usual with him.

Scrooge here comes off as an extreme libertarian who simply wishes to be left alone and to leave others alone; his affairs are no concern to them, nor should their affairs be any concern to him. He does not refuse to donate to the poor out of greed, so much as he simply thinks that he and the poor have nothing to do with each other, and he does no appreciate an attempt to get him to put himself in any kind of personal relation to them.

Most tellingly, Scrooge fails to even identify himself as a unique individual. He answers to the name of his firm, Scrooge or Marley! Scrooge has reduced all transactions, all relations with others, and even his own identity to matters of business transactions!

The story of his redemption is the story of reconnection. Scrooge remembers the relationships from his past, sees what relationships he fails to attain in the present, and, in the future, sees what life would be like if his wish to "be left alone" were granted ... he finally would be alone, "unwept, unkept, uncared for...." he finds that he cannot stand it.

So when you read A Christmas Carol read it with new eyes. Don't think of this as as story of a greedy jerk who learns to be kind and generous. Think of the novella rather as the tale of a man who thinks he wishes to be left to himself "warning all human sympathy to keep its distance" until he sees what that wish would really mean and what he misses out on by trying to live it.