What if the King had Conceded to Colonial Demands?

In response to my last article on the causes of the Revolutionary War, a friend on twitter asked me (in twitter speak, so revised):  ‘What if King George had granted representation and a few of the colonist’s demands, would the war have happened?’  It was an interesting thought experiment, though I could not give a veritable answer in 120 characters, therefore blogging it only seemed appropriate.

However, I must stress that this sort of activity is stepping into the realm of science fiction; unlike some students of history, I do not presume to be omniscient.  I’m no Hegelian (re: imperialist determinist), not even by a stretch.  There is no way to no definitively what could or would have happened, supposing things had gone differently in, say, 1773.  Still I do think that understanding the sociological framework for the war itself can lend some clues to one possible alternate future (and I’m no J.J. Abrams either, just for the record–though Abrams may be a Hegelian for all I know). With that caveat fresh in the reader’s mind, we can proceed.

1. An Adequately Understood Timeline

A lot of back-and-forth took place between the crown and the colonies.  Most of it had been divisive and none had been missed on either side.  As far back as the 1760′s, rumors and actions led to suspicions of one another; the British accused the colonists of trading with the enemy during the French and Indian war and the Americans were increasingly upset with the continued loss of property and lives on the frontier settlements.  Worse, the British navy increasingly became abusive to New Englanders as a result of these rumors, often blaming them for all sorts of things as a result.  Their assaults on individuals spread through newspapers and incited unease among the population.

Then came taxes.  It is important to keep in mind that as far as the tax rate goes, the colonists had it pretty good.  The figures suggest that the colonists paid less taxes than those on the British mainland, and rightly so as they had more expenses–especially following the war, along with rebuilding destroyed estates and hiring a workforce and purchasing new lands with which to farm and subsequently supply Britain with continued goods.   Economically it made sense to allow the lower tax rates.  But as time went on, despite the low amount that was due, more taxes continued to pile up on things that previously had not been taxed.  Stamps, tea, glass–things that were necessary for living started getting a little pricier.

Again, it was not the money that was an issue; for the colonists it seems it had to do more with the principle of it.  Things perhaps would not have been so dire had there been 13 representatives in parliament, elected by the colonists, to speak on their behalf.  As a consequence, the levied taxes–and the arrival of troops and a fleet of war ships–felt unjustified and harsh, as well as unfounded.  Town meetings were held (legally) and votes were cast; individuals started boycotting the purchase of British goods.

The situation went from bad to worse, as the population–especially in New England–grew mortified by the actions of the King.  Things became violent.  As public outrage grew against the crown and the Loyalist enforcers, groups of people started to work against the British more openly.  Crowds gathered, effigies were hung with symbolic messages attached, Paul Revere worked on several engravings which would continue to spur resistance (like the one below).

Engraving from Paul Revere, adapted from an English original (click to enlarge).

It is important to note that localities in America had already started to move towards developing their own governing laws without consultation–and often in direct defiance of–parliament.  Patrick Henry had moved to resolve the current tax acts in place and commanded for the established bureaucracy in Virginia the powers to impose and enforce taxes, for example (though these were rescinded by conservative members the next day), and certain congresses had arisen to do the same in other colonies.   Then came the response in 1766 from Great Britain: the the Declaratory Act.  This act stated (re: reaffirmed) that all individuals were under the sole providence of the King and as subordinates under the dominion of Great Britain, all should recognize that only the crown has authority and power.  As one can imagine, this quite enraged the people of America further.

 Within four years time, from 1766 to 1770, life in the colonies was overshadowed by their ‘big brother’ with additional taxes and acts being supplemented.  But in 1770 the Boston Massacre occurred.  This incident set off a new series of events that launched the colonies towards independence and war at a much faster pace.  In 1772, the Gaspee Affair occurred–remembering the way that British naval officials had treated them years before (and continued to treat them), a few hundred individuals rushed the schooner Gaspee, killed the commander of the vessel, and burned it in the harbor.

After the Stamp Act (top), came the Anti-Stamp Act movement which included public displays of defiance against the British (e.g., the hanging of an effigy of a colonist chosen to enforce the act in 1765), which led eventually to the Boston Massacre in 1770–five years later.

In 1773, the Boston Tea Party stood in direct opposition to the taxes on tea, instituted by the crown in favor of the debt-accruing East India Company, sparked additional support and rage from colonists.  Again, we must keep in mind that tensions were considerably high–a lot had occurred in several years time that had rubbed both sides the wrong way.  With mounting resolve, parliament instituted additional acts to quell rebellion and subdue the Sons of Liberty.  But these ‘intolerable acts’ would only further incite insurrection, leading to the first Continental Congress in 1774 and the perhaps inevitable confrontation one year later at Lexington and Concord.

2. What If?

I know that last section was long.  But remember, we’re trying to figure out what would have happened if the King had just accepted the demands of the colonists and without some background there is no way to do that.  But now, it seems, we all have some adequate information on the various milieux of the period.  So what if?

For me, the question should also be a matter of ‘when’.  When would the King consider this request?  Would it be after the French and Indian war, when the colonists had sacrificed so much–and prior to the institution of the Stamp Act?  Would it have been following the Stamp Act in 1765?  After the Boston Tea Party in 1773?  When the King would have considered these requests and at which point he would have permitted the colonist’s demands will ultimately bear upon our answer, would it not?

This may never have materialized.

Had the King chosen, following the French and Indian war, to bring representatives in for each colony in America, it seems less likely that a war would have broken out at the time it did.  It may be that a war would have happened later–but those circumstances are, obviously, unknown to us so presuming such a thing is not recommended.  Still, had this been done early on, there is a greater chance that public opinion would not have wavered so fervently towards independence.  After all, what reason would they have to complain?  Taxes were low and even if new taxes were instigated, it would have been at the hands of their elected officials–not the crown itself.  Additionally, the Sons of Liberty might never had formed, meaning that Paul Revere’s engravings and the tactics of his constituents to instill a sense of rebellion would never have come to pass.  There would not have been a Boston Massacre, a Tea Party, etc…. a form of peace would have probably been the status quo.

Now, had the King considered this premise in the early 1770′s, chances are likely that the war would have happened anyway–perhaps it would not have occurred the same way (such as the battles at Lexington and Concord) but it may have played out in a different manner and, quite possibly, with more egregious consequences; maybe France would not have felt the urgency to get involved, which would have meant no incoming supplies like weapons and munitions, leading to a Continental defeat.

What remains is merely speculation.  There is no one solution to the question(s); had the King displayed some leniency towards the colonists at all, it is always possible that history might have played out differently.  But this is precisely why we study the past.  We have the luxury, hundreds of years later, to enact these sorts of mental exercises.  The colonists certainly did mull it over.  Rightly, they could have fought back in 1770 following the Boston Massacre, but they waited, delegated, and considered options.  There are implications for that as well (e.g., that enough people were against a war that they allowed Great Britain additional liberties to tax them and attempt to contain them).

In the end, and I stress this again, the war was never about a single issue–it was about a build up of multiple issues over a long period of time.  Primarily, it was the result of a monarchy treating the colonists like second rate people; there existed no equality between the colonists and the British even though they had shed the same blood defending the land over which, later, they would fight (and shed blood again).  If one were to take anything away from this experiment, it should be this solemn fact.

The American Revolution Was NOT About Modern Issues

I was born and raised just a handful of miles from where General Sullivan started his long (and doomed) campaign north against the native Iroquois Confederacy and the British; in the town where I was raised, there lived a Declaration of Independence signer and on one day every year, ‘Heritage Day’, we celebrate the fact that where we live, over 200 years ago, was one of only three locations where the Declaration of Independence was publicly read.  A few miles west of me, the Liberty Bell was carried and hidden during the British occupation of Philadelphia.

Modern view of the Forks of the Delaware.

And the county in which I lived raised 9 companies to fight in the continental line, and one of those individuals is my direct ancestor.  Of those individuals raised to fight in the militia, almost all my direct ancestors were called to duty (though not all saw action).  My childhood home rested on what was once Leni-Lenape territory; land that was, in a large sense, stolen from them by the family of William Penn.  The area, called the Forks of the Delaware, was where the Treaty of Easton was signed, and where during the 1760′s, dozens of settlers were forced to flee their land, their homes, because of raids by the natives–some were killed.  General La Fayette, George Washington, and Benjamin Franklin were among those who visited the town and spent time in its local establishments.

I raise these points because I want to be clear that not only do I have an keen interest in the American Revolution, but I have practically grown up around symbols and places directly related to it.  Anyone with a sliver of situational awareness, who comes into my hometown, is immediately aware of its rich history.  Even the very flag of our town is modeled after the stars and stripes (13 of each).  One might say all this history is what spurred me on my own research.

Flag of Easton, PA (cir. 1776?)

One of the most important functions of the historian is to be able to explain why things happen–not just that they happen.  Sometimes it is important to express that something that is believed to have happened actually never happened at all.  In this way, the historian must always follow the evidence and not simply presume something based upon preconceived notions.  When it comes to the American Revolution, it takes a real patriot (in my humble opinion) to recognize the complexity and nuance of the times rather than presuming a fantasy or mythology about it.

One of things you learn is that a lot of our modern mythology of the period comes from after the time of the Revolution.  It is situated first upon America’s second war with the British–the War of 1812–and before and after the American Civil War, when many of the veterans of the Revolutionary War were dying (much like our present situation with veterans of WWII–basically 60-80 years after the war ended).  What we had were concerned citizens who started to realize that the founding of our nation–used so poetically during the War of 1812 and the American Civil War–may be lost to posterity if histories and biographies and lineages weren’t put to paper immediately.  And what followed were grandiose accounts of heroism and embellishments of deeds–not often by the veterans themselves, but certainly by those taking notes.  A picture of a perfect American movement were formulated in the minds of readers everywhere.  But this world is not one founded upon fact; it is a ‘master story’ wherein the sitz im leben and the cultural milieux of the day are all forsaken for what is essentially a world based in propaganda.

The issues of independence were not always black and white; the grey area between the extremes was the frontier farmer who–though a pacifist–was forced to fight a war which pulled him away from his family, leaving them vulnerable to British and native attacks.  It was the the burning of native villages and the murder of their people that helped forge this nation; while people were decrying British tyranny, they were murdering native women and children (though native attacks were just as brutal).  It had been luck–sometimes more than tactical advantage–that had brought victory for beleaguered and wary continentals on the battlefield.  And without the aid of the French (granting us arms and soldiers to fight, and experience with which to train Continental troops) who knows what might have happened.  The British were not the only enemy that had been faced; local corrupt government officials, put in place by opportunity, were as ruthless as some of the British dragoons.

In our modern time, these issues–our ancestors’ issues–are relatively unknown to the masses who wave their flags on the 4th of July.  Instead, anachronistically, certain individuals will try to make their own petty issues the issues of the patriots who fought to create this nation.  Like spoilt children, these modern day ‘tea baggers’ attempt to subjugate the past; they confuse ‘not always getting what they want’ with ‘tyranny’ and don’t have the slightest clue what the word ‘tyranny’ means.  They link modern hot-button topics like gun control and women’s rights to the Revolution, as if Benjamin Franklin and Thomas Jefferson and John Adams got together because the British were trying to enact stricter regulations on the sale and distribution of firearms (they weren’t), or as if Patrick Henry decried ‘Give me liberty, or give me death!–because I don’t want a public option or universal healthcare!’  The absurdity of it is astonishing (and speaks to the troubles of America’s education system–clearly standardized testing has failed us).

No, this hasn’t happened and no, it won’t happen.

At the time of the American Revolution (which broke out in 1775, not 1776 as some of these website owners seem to think), the British had troops in country already. In other words, aggressive foreign troops were on colonial soil–we don’t have that problem in the contemporary United States.  Additionally, the issue of representation was really important.  The problem was not that American colonists had to pay taxes (the taxes, compared to Englishmen on the mainland, were relatively low) but that they were unfairly taxed without any representation in parliament.  In these contemporary United States, we have so much representation we don’t know what to do with it all (and barely anyone writes to congressmen anymore and not everyone who can vote does vote–essentially nullifying the whole purpose of having representation).

The modern myth is that the American government is acting tyrannically.  But the problem with this myth is that the government is “of the people, by the people”.  We elect our own officials every few years.  We have a series of checks and balances in place precisely to prohibit a dictatorship.  And yet somehow–in some bizarrely paranoid and delusional worldview–there exist individuals in this country who actually believe that the United States government is a tyrannical one lead by a ruthless dictator (that the majority of this country elected twice).  Since these individuals are partially responsible for the government (you know, since we have free and open elections), one has to wonder what that says about them.

The irony here is that those involved in the Tea Party do not seem to have a grasp of what the term ‘patriot’ means, nor do they even seem to be able to follow their own rhetoric.   Their website claims that they are a ‘grassroots’ organization, but the Koch Brothers’–who help found the organization–are anything but (as their activities suggest).  Their claim that they are a 501(c)4 organization that does not endorse political candidates is simply false.  They claim that they want limited government help, but that doesn’t stop members from collecting from the government any chance they can get.

Hypocrisy.

If I can be so bold, the only thing this modern day Tea Party has in common with the founding patriots of this country is the level of illiteracy (if their constant grammatical and spelling errors are anything to go by) and the style of clothes (though Revolutionary War patriots didn’t hang tea from their hats).   Their concept of a Neocon or Libertarian system was so foreign to the founders that they would not have recognized it as a legitimate form of government; instead they used the ideals most commonly associated with French revolutionary and philosophical thinking and the Bill of Rights was most dependent upon Classical ideals of democracy (though in a form of a Representative Republic).  Interestingly enough, the modern Neocon movement is one that would take away representation from the people and place it in the hands of the wealthy elite.  These are the same people supported by the Tea Party (who claim falsely that they were hijacked by Neocons, but in actuality their founders *are* Neocons).

To bring this back around, the most glaring (and damning) missive came from Michele Bachman (whose conspiracy theories always amuse me) who claimed that the POTUS had released information about the IRS “scandal” (of which it is not) as a way to ‘wag the dog’.  But ‘wagging the dog’ is something that conservatives have been doing since the days of Bush II.

If you haven’t seen ‘Wag the Dog‘ (1997), you should.  Robert De Niro stars in the film, so you know that someone is getting shot.  The premise is a simple one (yet prescient): How do you keep power when the country doesn’t like you (through either a scandal or something else)?  You use the media to spin something new; you start a fictional war.   You create an incident, you rally support by claiming you’re a patriot, and then fabricate a war which, under the guise of patriotism, is entirely supported by a populace who does not want to be considered a traitor (or condemned as committing treason).  Ring any particularly loud bells?  It should.

Michele Bachman’s base are precisely the group most ‘wagged’ by the dog.  They steal the language of the American Revolution to fit their own selfish means; words such as ‘patriot’, ‘liberty’, ‘tyranny’, ‘freedom’ and they alter the meaning of these words, take them out of context, and utilize them to justify their own political agendas.  Granted, both parties do this, but I don’t ever recall seeing Obama in a whig and tricorne.

In my opinion, modern day Tea Partiers have hijacked and diminished the vital roles of our ancestors and disgraced their sacrifices–and for what?  For more corporate power over the American worker, who cannot get a job because Tea-Party-backed legislators are making it easier to send work overseas?  For lower wages for the American family so poverty is a bigger issue in this country?  For poor healthcare and zero accountability?  The Tea Party would demolish all the progress this country has made; they seek to deny rights to others so fervently by spouting slogans like ‘read the constitution!’ and ‘protect our rights!’  And they would so eagerly forget about the religious oppression which drove so many of our ancestors to the port cities of the United States–like Boston, New York, and Philadelphia–to escape such persecution; they forget this, and then demand more religion in our modern government.

The real tragedy here is that they fail to see how completely inconsistent their own rhetoric has become; America is not rushing in to confiscate their weapons (though they have no problem wearing assault rifles in public, around children), no one is shutting them down, they still publicly assemble–their rights are still firmly intact, all the while lamenting them as if they have already been stolen away.

The hanging of an effigy of a Stamp Distributor.

In conclusion, we need to stop allowing this sort of rhetoric to continue.  If it seems as though I’m bringing the hammer down hard on the Tea Party, or that I’m being unfair, it is only because they are the ones so adamant about using this rhetoric.  To be clear, and I must stress this, liberals should not be using rhetoric of the founding fathers either.  However, the Tea Party seems to have completely adopted this rhetoric and have most prominently used it and that is problematic.  No current political party in the public eye has any basis for which to claim solidarity with the Sons of Liberty.  We just don’t live in such a world anymore; our policies, our goals, our sitz im leben is not theirs.  They fought and died so we wouldn’t have to face such challenges again.  Despite protestations from the Tea Party, we still don’t face those challenges.  We have, instead, a whole new range of challenges ahead of us and hijacking the past to incite the present is just plain dishonest.

The American Revolution and the Debate Over Gun Control

While doing research for a side project in which I have a great interest (American History), some general myths have been debunked (for me, at least) in the process.  One such myth is the notion of gun access and the American Revolution.  There is this (somewhat fictive) notion in some parts of the country, by certain individuals, that citizen soldiers–every one of them armed with his own gun–turned aside the British occupation and invasion of the colonies.  Some (like David Kopel) have argued that the British attempted to confiscate and limit gun access to the general public and this, somehow, facilitated the start of the American revolution.

The classic (that is to say, the modern, media-driven) impression of the militiaman is that of Mel Gibson, running out of his burning home carrying an assortment of six or more muskets and rifles.  But how accurate is this pro-gun argument?  What does history tell us?

There is no way that the NRA leadership did not squee during this scene.

The notion that an armed populace rising up against the British, angry at the seizure of weapons in Boston, is a simplistic one that does not take into account the variety of other factors leading up to the war.   Interestingly, those American militiamen and minutemen who fought at the first battles of the war–Lexington and Concord–seem to have been armed by the community (generally there were magazine stores, buildings filled with barrels of gun powder, and weapons stores where muskets would be kept somewhere in outlying areas) and also, in some ways, by the British themselves.  As colonies of British empire, communities in the New World were required to keep up an active duty militia of armed men and artillerists with working cannon.  While the wars in Europe spread to the Americas, the French and their Native American allies were a constant threat to the frontier regions of many Northern colonies (all of New England, New York, Ohio, and Pennsylvania, though also Maryland and Virginia).  During the 1760′s, the rise in bloody raids by French and Native forces, along with the burning of crops and farms (and amounting to the deaths of over 200 Pennsylvanians), the edict of arming the general populace and maintaining military associations seemed only reasonable and expected.

It should be noted strongly that certain factors, socially and regionally, led to the consequence of a some-what armed populace–mainly required military enrollment.  However that isn’t to say that everyone was armed; this myth needs to be dispelled.  The notion that every farmer had a rifle is one that is often played upon by politicians and activists without knowing the facts.  For a large part of the war, a good portion of the Continental Army just wasn’t armed (either because munitions were left behind in a struggle or because new munitions had not yet arrived from Europe).

David Kopel writes, “The Patriots of Lancaster County, Pennsylvania, resolved: “That in the event of Great Britain attempting to force unjust laws upon us by the strength of arms, our cause we leave to heaven and our rifles.””  But even if this had been stated, an attempt to suggest that this had started the war is nothing more than a fantasy.  In Pennsylvania, when the Militia Act went into effect in March of 1777, and classes of men were called up to serve (essentially drafted) and sent to the lower PA counties to participate in the Philadelphia Campaign under General Washington.  It was the job of the local governments to arm and supply provisions for these men, though if men had arms, they were requested to show up with them.

Why is this important? On October 3, 1781, the state of the Lancaster militia, residents of Lancaster who were called up to arms (the men who so gallantly charged the claim that they would raise their illegal arms to fight the British–in Kopel’s fantasy world, that is), had been so depressing that Governor Reed wrote to General Lacey that he had “no arms here, Mr. Moore having last week delivered all in the store to our militia of the town, and after this, you know, there is no recovering them” (which, by the way, supports the contention that these were not arms belonging to individual gun owners, but to a community magazine and storage area).  After which, Reed wrote that, “Colonel Ross called yesterday to inform me that he had a battalion of 690 in the same naked condition.”  The disposition of these troops was such that, without arms, they were useless and so Reed had to actually call them back home (though they were not discharged).  During the Battles of Germantown and Brandywine, hundreds of Pennsylvanians sat around camp in the regions of Chester and Trappe waiting for muskets instead of joining the fight.

These kids are better armed than many of the militia companies during the Revolutionary War.

When the British marched on Lexington and Concord, they did so not to harm any of the people, but to destroy the weapon stores and magazines in those areas to prevent rebellion (though they had already invaded at this point and had established a foothold in Boston–the war had already begun).  In other words, they did not go house to house and remove weapons from individuals (this is a mythic construct), but were headed to a community building where these arms were located to destroy them.  Through good intelligence, colonial militiamen and minutemen had already emptied the magazines and store houses and had armed themselves, some with those very armaments, and prepared for a fight.  Such is confirmed in eyewitness testimony of one Sylvanus Wood, a man who joined with other militia on the green at Lexington.  In 1858 his account was published, wherein he writes that the Captain of the militia at Lexington yelled:

“Every man of you, who is equipped, follow me; and those of you who are not equipped, go into the meeting-house and furnish yourselves from the magazine, and immediately join the company.’

Further supporting my position here is the fact that none of these men were solid shots.  While they may have drilled with weapons on occasion, they were not accustomed to firing a weapon often, as many citizen soldiers weren’t skilled at shooting as the math proves (don’t let your eyes gloss over, keep with me here–it pays off).

Assuming that every casualty inflicted during the battles at Lexington and Concord were the results of musket and rifle fire (they weren’t, some were caused by bayonets and bladed weapons–but for the sake of argument), just 15 out of every 100 rounds fired from the colonial militia (numbers unknown, but said to be around 70 at Lexington and around 1000 by the end of the engagement at Concord)  found their target (inflicting about 15% casualties on the British; about 270).  Of the British forces (numbering about 1800 regulars), they did slightly worse; less than 1 out of every 10 shots fired struck a colonial militiaman, which amounted to about 90 casualties.

While the number of British wounded and dead seems high, at the onset of the Battle of Lexington, the British (numerically superior, about 250 to 70-ish American militiamen) inflicted 19 casualties while receiving none.  So while potentially hundreds of rounds were exchanged in the beginning of the fight, by the British, loosely speaking only 8% hit someone.  Marksmanship just wasn’t important; the value of a musket was not in its accuracy but in the amount of them you could bring to the battlefield.  Most muskets were not rifled, so when a volley is fired by a company of men with muskets, within 50-75 yards, it acts like a shotgun.  Sometimes you hit and most times you didn’t.  But the real value to muskets was their fast-loading time and ability to keep up a continuous and steady fire upon the opposing forces.

“It’s a good thing we don’t have to fire at will, I can’t see a damn thing with all this smoke flying about.”

As well, during the Siege of Boston in 1775-6, the militia participating in the siege had been given spears to use in case of an enemy assault, partly because ammunition stores were low and some men just didn’t have weapons to fire.  Later in the war, the situation had not much changed.  While many Pennsylvania riflemen were expert marksmen, the accuracy rate was abysmal amongst them.  We’d like to think that the hardened frontier made these men crack shots, but even in the thick of combat, as skilled as some of these veteran soldiers were in 1778-9 (like during the Sullivan campaign), hundreds of rounds were expended with few finding their mark.  As has been noted elsewhere, at the skirmish of Wetzell’s Mill, at least two dozen veteran riflemen fired at Lt. Col. Webster as he rode, on his horse, right towards them at close range; somehow, every round expended missed him and his horse.

The implications here are obvious; while some men on the frontier made it their livelihood to hunt for food and defend against attacks from local tribes, a good portion of the population did not bother with them.  Worse yet for Kopel’s position, even those who did own and use guns (which were expensive) did not seem to use them regularly to be efficient with them.

The fact is that the 2nd Amendment has never been about owning a gun.  Such language is not present there at all:

A well regulated militia, being necessary to the security of a free state, the right of the people to keep and bear arms, shall not be infringed.

The context–given that it was written during the Revolution–is quite clear, that this is related to the function of an well regulated militia which, by the way, is run by the state government (and which played a key role in the American revolution); today we call them the National Guard.

Not the definition of a ‘well regulated militia’.

The notion of owning a firearm was not unheard of during the period of the Revolution, but it was more common that weapons were kept in community areas specifically for use by the militia who would need them in times of crisis.  In other words, the American colonials had already established a form of gun control, wherein private ownership–even on the frontier (of which most of Pennsylvania was included)–was rare enough that people simply could not arm themselves to fight in the Revolution.  The random speeches and poetic tracts of leaders, notwithstanding as anything more than propaganda, does not prove otherwise.  Attempts to saddle the issue of pro-gun ownership on the founding of this country, when the facts are on the table, are doomed to failure.

Recognizing Fiction in History: “Give Me Liberty, or Give Me Death!”

As I delve further into the background narrative of the Revolutionary War in America, I’m learning a great deal more about the power of rhetoric and fiction in the development of this nation.  The most powerful part about this research are the similarities I have had in my own work on the ancient past.

For example, the famous Patrick Henry speech containing the words ‘Give me liberty, or give me death!’ may have not been Patrick Henry’s at all.  Much like the figure of Jesus, it seems, the next generation of followers (or believers, or patriots in this instance) may have fabricated most–if not all–of Henry’s rousing words.  Certainly, we know he said something, but what that ‘something’ is seems to have been completely forgotten by those individuals who were eyewitnesses.  Jefferson remarked in one instance that he had been persuaded by Henry’s words but for the life of him, he couldn’t remember what he had said–not even following the speech!

The words we now know seem to have come from a nineteenth century retelling of the events a few years following Henry’s death (1817).  The author of this retelling (or should we say, reworking) of the speech is one William Wirt (who would have been about 3 years old when Henry delivered his speech).  With eyewitnesses in short supply, and with not many capable of remembering what was said, Wirt seems to have taken liberties with the reconstruction–likely he kept the tone correct, but the words?  Is it possible that ‘Give me liberty, or give me death’ had been Wirt’s and not Henry’s?

Why would someone wholly or even partially invent a speech?  This is not a new phenomena.  The very first ‘historian’ Thucydides invented speeches for his own agendas–idolizing Pericles and portraying him as the ultimate pro-democracy, Athenian statesman in his funeral oration.  Many after Thucydides, including Cicero, accepted his portrayal of the speeches as historically valid, whether they were or not (even though Dionysius of Halicarnassus didn’t much care for it, he stilled suggested it be emulated).

Thucydides wasn’t necessarily being dishonest; he believes he is doing something valuable for humanity.  In fact he appears to have had the same problem faced by Wirt; those who were there just couldn’t get the story straight in their recounting of the events (assuming here that he is telling the truth and not just using this as a rhetorical means to gain forgiveness from his reader for fabricating the speech in the first place).

What I find perhaps most interesting is that no one challenged his portrayal.  No one wrote accounts that his fabrication was a fabrication; no direct attestation from someone who had been there exists, to my knowledge, stating that Wirt’s presentation of Henry is inaccurate.  That, to me, is very telling of the state of usefulness of fabrications; that is to say, they are just as useful as the real thing.

During the time Wirt was writing, his generation started to realize that the veterans of the first war of American Independence had started to die off.  There was a rush, especially before and directly after the Civil War, to create biographies, histories, and lineage notes about various communities, families, and individuals of the Revolution.   Wirt undoubtedly was a part of that national push, especially by elites of society, to develop a cultural history of the time before all the veterans were gone.  In this way, we cannot necessarily fault Wirt for his portrayal of Henry and this famous quote, but we must still–as much as we don’t like it–be suspicious of it.

I’m Being Harassed and Threatened by Ralph Ellis

Dear Friends and Family,

Since April 8th, Ralph Ellis has been running around Google searching for my name and sending out hateful and spiteful emails to colleagues and friends (also to me, because he doesn’t realize the sites that he is emailing are run by me) because I wrote negatively about his online work (suggesting Jesus was King Arthur, that his relative was Cleopatra, and that Jesus was King of Edessa–so yes, I wrote some scathing posts about them).  This is completely legal and within my rights under the 1st Amendment and through my experience as a student majoring in the field at a high tier research university.

He has libeled and harassed me and continues to do so however, and I want you to be aware that this individual may be dangerous.  He has threatened to ‘run me off’ and I have been saving all the emails and notifications that many of you have sent along (thank you).  I am compiling a portfolio full of his harassing and threatening messages so I continue to ask you all to send everything to me that he sends out to you.

I want to be clear that this isn’t a minor issue.  If Ralph Ellis were simply an internet troll or someone with whom I just disagreed, this wouldn’t be that big of a deal.  But he is actively trying to discredit me to people I’ve known for years and while he will not succeed, he is breaking the law and willfully engaging in bullying tactics in order to force me to remove my negative reviews of his work.  I will not bow to this bully and I want you to know that,

This is the stalker:

Here is how Steve Caruso (and here and here), James McGrath (and here), Diglot, and Joel Watts have handled his threats and libel.  Also Aaron Adair (and here) and Rod from Political Jesus have also jumped into the fray to lend their support.

Daniel McClellan has also offered some helpful thoughts on this whole matter; here is a snippet:

Next, the link in the comment takes one to a website entitled “Thomas Verenna Is A Lying Idiot.” Obviously such an insulting and unprofessional attempt to undermine Tom’s credibility does more to expose Mr. Ellis’ own lack of scruples, but it gets worse. Ellis’ accusations of dishonesty are incredibly ironic in light of his rather transparent habit of posting multiple anonymous and/or sock-puppet comments on his and others’ blogs in an attempt to make it seem like his claims have broad support. This kind of childish and petulant behavior flatly undermines any and all claims on his part to objectivity or scholarly erudition. Mr. Ellis is apparently submitting comments like these all over the internet, and as the link above shows, he’s starting blogs to personally attack Tom.

In another post, Dan writes in response to Mr. Ellis’ complaints:

The worst methodological mistake you make throughout all of your texts, however, is your insistance on synthesizing select data from various different disparate sources, while dismissing data that conflict with your preconceptions. You refuse to acknowledge errors where errors are beyond doubt, while asserting errors where the texts are clearly accurate, all in an effort to manipulate the sources in the aid of your presuppositions. Then you bark about people not being in the know, and not understanding because they’re trying to do history instead of acknowledging that the truth is cryptically hidden underneath the surface of the text. This is pseudo-scholarship, pure and simple.

Ralph Ellis is not in his right mind, as you can see.

Courtesy of Steve Caruso

Here are some links with more information:

• The Aramaic Blog on Ralph Ellis and his ‘Izas Manu’ Creation (Thomas Verenna)
• A New Theory That Jesus Was King of Edessa? Not So Fast, Mr. Ellis! (Thomas Verenna)
• Ralph Ellis, Jesus, and his Myth of the King Jesus of Edessa (Thomas Verenna)
• King Jesus of Edessa by Ralph Ellis — Er.. What? (Steve Caruso)
• More Ralph Ellis Conspiracy Nonsense: The Final Debunking (Thomas Verenna)
• When Did Josephus Leave Judea? Does it even matter? (Thomas Verenna)
• Aaron Adair on Ralph Ellis and Jesus as King Arthur

Thanks,

Tom

Using the Bible to Support ‘Pro-Life’ Arguments

Bob Cargill shared an interesting verse this morning from Genesis 6, which portrays a frustrated god that so regretted his creation (man) that he sent a flood across the world that swallowed all life–all life, except a remnant that could fit on a relatively small ship comparatively (based on the measurements in Genesis, it would translate to roughly 500 feet long; smaller than the Titanic).  But I think that Bob’s apt point is that if God is ‘pro-life’ then why would he wipe it clean?  It is important to recognize that  those who take the genesis account seriously, those who take the biblical narratives literally, must believe that we’re not just talking about grown men and women with exceptional cognitive abilities to choose right from wrong, we’re talking about infants and disabled individuals who can not always make decisions on their own due to their limitations (you know, since babies really can’t decide where they are born or who their parents are, let alone make any sort of vital cognitive decision beyond whether or not to poop themselves).  Not to mention the perhaps thousands of women who might have been pregnant at that exact moment god decided to wash away the sins of the world (by quite literally washing away everything that had the potential to sin).

“Seriously, you’re all going to die.”

I know some may seek to justify this by making the argument that Jesus’ death had changed everything.  His coming signified the change in god’s personality, or so goes the argument.  God no longer orders the taking of women and children as war plunder, the dashing of children on rocks, or giant she-bears to go terrorizing and mauling mischievous children who don’t believe in resurrections.  It’s like god spent a few months at rehab and emerged a changed deity; he’s a gentler, kinder god on a 12-step plan to happiness.  While this is pleasant enough for me (I’m grateful we’re not still stoning people for picking up sticks on the Sabbath, don’t get me wrong), the idea that ‘all life is sacred’ is not really a big part of the biblical narrative.  How can it be?

Bob says it best:

People of faith must put their faith – and the claims made about their faith – in a real, modern context. Rather than rushing to regurgitate some worn out apologetic claiming, “God cannot tolerate evil,” or “It’s not genocide if God does it,” people of faith must consider that the one they consider to be the “objective moral foundation” for all things ethical at one point in history killed everyone on earth because he regretted creating them! Imagine this same death sentence on the world’s population today. It is nothing less than genocide.

Dude has ninja angels.

Taken in broader sweeps, the Hebrew Bible is far from being ‘pro-life’; indeed it is quite the opposite, portraying god as a sort of vengeful, wrathful warlord who demands the ultimate tribulation while single-handedly destroying his enemies.  At some points he even permits (and actually participates in) the massacre of a whole family of his loyalist servant (Job), and while he may have given Job back twice what he had, he still killed dozens of people who did not deserve to die (that little fact often gets glossed over in Sunday School).  Imagine your wife and children slain before you; don’t worry, you’ll get a whole new wife and more children.  Does that make it better?  Does that justify it?  No sane human being could find any justification in such atrocious (and needless) acts of violence.   And I would seek to remind everyone that Matthew is pretty clear that Jesus did not come to bring peace, but a sword (Matt 10.24)–nor did he come to abolish the law (Matt 5.17; that is, the Torah, and not one iota is to be removed).  The argument commonly made that none of that matters because he fulfilled the law is a non sequitur; he is specifically portrayed to say he did not come to abolish it, and clearly Matthew believed this was true, as he does all he can to situate Jesus as a priestly Moses figure who makes this very claim!

The fact remains, at the end of the day, that using the Hebrew Bible or the New Testament to justify pro-life positions are doomed to fail.  After the bible portrays god as ordering the slaughtering of the first born children of Egypt, any attempt to portray him as someone who cares a great deal about human suffering and human life falls flat on its face.   I’m sorry, but there is no ‘human value’ that god holds dear–only subservience matters to him.  Those who believe are saved (most of the time) and those who do not god deigns them to misery and destruction and torture and death: whether man, woman, child, or those unborn.  It is horrid and obscene.

Anyone who attempts to use the bible to validate their pro-life position is wrong.  Simply put, they need to find a different argument.  I’m not saying I am all for abortion; I’m pro-choice, but I don’t think abortion would be a decision I would support.  But I’m not everyone and I’m not in everyone’s shoes; I’m only in my own.  Objectively, pro-life is unjustified for that very reason, at least that is my opinion.

Cats in the Cradle: The Importance of Family Trees

The Discovery

A while ago I wrote on the value of online genealogy tools like Ancestry.com and Fold3.com.  Through them I was able to discover some rather amazing facts about my family tree about which I had no idea.  I have to say, the commercials for Ancestry.com are on the mark (with some caveats which I discuss at the linked article above).  Many of us go into family research blind, knowing nothing about our family history beyond two generations–unless, of course, you live in a castle somewhere with tapestries and oil paintings depicting your lineage (if so, you’re probably not reading this blog).    Tools like Ancestry and Fold3 give a glimpse of the past that may otherwise be completely lost and not everyone can find the time to go to the local courthouse and spend all day getting copies of their family documents (though I recommend it).

Since I wrote that first article, I have discovered a very rich history of heroism in my family.  It took a lot of legwork to track down most of these lines–sometimes cracking a line just takes a tenacious attitude and a lot of open tabs in your web browser to sites like findagrave.com and the Sons of the American Revolution  database and, of course, the state archives.  Knowing how to navigate through the data is something you pick up after years of doing serious research (which, thankfully, I have), but really it also utilizes a lot of common sense.  Also a healthy dose of skepticism can’t hurt–sometimes you find something that is just too good to be true and, in those cases, you must always validate (I repeat: always validate).  Validate, validate, validate.  I cannot stress that enough.  Validate.  (Okay, I’m done).

First the Awesome

Often people will discover some really amazing things about their family.  In my tree, I discovered at least eight direct ancestors (that is, someone who can be traced back directly) who fought in the American Revolution.  And for your curiosity, I’m sharing their names and some history I have gathered (some will be more complete than others):

Philip Neuhart (Newhard): Philip was born in America, his family having settled here as far back as 1733.  Enlisting in Thompson’s Rifle Battalion (later became known as the 1st Pennsylvania Regiment) in the regular army in 1776 (at the age of about 17), he went north to fight at the Siege of Boston.  Following that campaign, he journeyed with a large group of volunteers (many from Thompson’s Rifle Battalion and Daniel Morgan and his rangers) on what many would later write was a tedious and trying march to Canada with Benedict Arnold.  The volunteers from Daniel Morgan’s detachment and the men  from Thompson’s Rifle Battlion fought at the Siege of Quebec, but when they stormed the defenses–making it further than any other group of men–they were surrounded and captured before they could retreat.  Philip spent the next six months in grueling conditions at the hands of loyalists until he was paroled to British-occupied New York where his conditions only worsened.  Loyalists were said to spit on discharged patriots, many were beaten, chided, starved, and made to live on the streets with the rats.  A year or so later, Philip was finally permitted to leave New York under the accord that he would no longer fight against the crown–a truce that he apparently did not keep, as he shows up on muster rolls in the Pennsylvania militia in 1778 and through the rest of the war.  An alternate possibility (proposed by Bob Smalser, another family historian) is that he was exchanged in 1777 with Daniel Morgan and his men, but there is no direct evidence which links Philip with Morgan that I can find (though as a fellow rifleman, it is not beyond question as some of troops from Thompson’s Rifle Battalion were exchanged in 1777).

Captain Gerlach Paul Flick:  Having only arrived in America in 1752 on the ship Neptune, Paul Flick settled in Northampton County; he must have been an active participant in the community as he shows up on letters to the county government as a petitioner to build a series of guard houses along the Forks of the Deleware to protect against tribal raids from northern Native American tribes who, apparently, pushed south to raid the farmland and homesteads.  When the war broke out, he was commissioned a Captain (in Northampton County, and probably all Pennsylvania militia units, an officer was voted in by his peers) and given command over the 8^th Company, 4^th Battalion, Northampton County Militia.  His command shows up on rosters and returns during the Philadelphia Campaign.  It is possible that his company took part in the Battle of Germantown on October 4, 1777, fighting on the left flank against Hessian troops.  What is certain is that his company was responsible for picketing and skirmish action throughout the whole campaign.  Later in the war he joined up with a group of Rangers responsible for ensuring the safety of the Pennsylvania frontier, mainly meant to hold off the Native American tribes that the British had enlisted to help stop the rebellion.

The other individuals I know less about, but will list them in no particular order.

• Johann Conrad Rau
• Abraham Gross
• Philip Fenstermacher
• Deobald Schott
• George M. Zimmerman
• Johann Daniel Kuhns
• Johan Valentine Schaffer

Johann Conrad Rau

Abraham Gross

Captain Paul Flick

Philip Fenstermacher

Philip Neuhart

Deobald Schott

Additionally, I’ve learned that some of my ancestors fought in other rather vital wars that helped develop and shape this country.  Captain John Schaffer (son of Valentine Schaffer), my 5th Great Grandfather, fought in the War of 1812 and led men in the regular army against the British in what was widely considered the second war for American independence.  The War of 1812 is widely forgotten in America, which is unfortunate.  So having an ancestor who not only fought in the war, but was an officer in the war, is pretty cool.

I’ve also discovered that at least one direct ancestor fought in the American Civil War.  While the only photo I have of him is old, Peter Bruch was drafted into the 178 Pennsylvania Infantry regiment and saw some action until being posted to Washington as what must have been guard duty and provisional work.

Peter Bruch in old age.

The Interesting

Occasionally you find some ‘whoa’ moments while doing research.  The sort of thing you find really interesting, but isn’t quite so awesome as some of the other stuff you’ve found.  Usually this gets relegated to people not directly related–cousins, uncles, or aunts–that you may want to pass along your line anyway.

For example, during the Civil War, several Schall’s (great-great-great uncles and cousins) enlisted in the 153rd Pennsylvania (a Regiment made up of men only from Northampton County), just in time to take part in the Battle of Gettysburg, where Absalom Schall (distant uncle) received shrapnel wounds to his shoulder and arm from an exploding shell on the first day of the battle.

But sometimes you do find some pretty ‘Ah ha!’ stuff in your direct line and those are some good times.   Like the fact that I’m descended from nobility.  Oh, yes.

Nicholas Schall Sr. gravestone.

My earliest traceable ancestor was a Freiherr (Baron) in Germany: Baron Maximilian Ramian Henrich Schall von Bell. His wife, Baroness Anna Marie Elisabeth Hatzfeldt, belonged to a (still) illustrious lineage, which we can trace back to at least the 12th century (possibly earlier). Her father’s name was Melchior von Hatzfeldt, but because of some possible confusion with his birth/death date it is difficult to know if this is the same Baron Melchior von Hatzfeldt that led an army as a Field Marshall in the 30 Years War (but I have a suspicion it was him). What is certain is that both families—the Schall von Bell’s and the Hatzfeldt’s—were some of the oldest noble families of their time.

Maximilian died in 1742 in Germany, and soon after his son Nicolas, age 43, came to the United States in late October of 1752 on the ship Neptune (a year after Paul Flick came over on the very same ship, mentioned above) with his wife Catharine, sons Andreas (who is my ancestor direct) and Nicolas Jr., and their daughter Mary Ann.  Probably the single most fascinating thing I discovered while doing research was my noble heritage; one would think something like that would have been talked about during family reunions, right?

Additionally, aside from running off and fighting in various wars early on, it seems most of my ancestors were land owners and farmers.  And, as it turns out, also moonshiners.  Yes, that’s right.  Moonshiners.  This tradition seems to have died out during the prohibition years, but pretty interesting none the less.

The ‘Not So Awesome’

You take the ‘not so awesome’ with the awesome when you’re doing family research.   Whether it is that rather odd-looking crazy great-uncle or that cat-lady for an aunt, there are going to be some members of your family that have some dubious backgrounds.  It just happens.  Not everyone can be a noble, war hero, or a moonshiner, I guess.

One of the things I’ve found in my search is that one of my great-great grandmothers seems to have been sold into a marriage my her father after her mother died.  I can’t really prove this, but it seems the only likely scenario as she was under age when she married and seemed to have been working as a laborer in a household not her own prior to this incident.  But she must have also loved her husband; she had several children with him and remained married to him until his death and, it seems, she never remarried.

Additionally, it also seems as though one of my great-grandmothers was a little bit of a grifter with men.  She married four times, though her first husband was my great-grandfather Calvin Schall–unfortunate, since the only thing I’ve ever heard about him was that he was just the nicest guy anyone had ever met.

Sometimes, though, you get some really dark–and I mean dark–family history.  On my grandmother’s side of the family (Ukrainian), I learned of several members–including my great grandmother–who were held in concentration camps during the German invasion of World War II.  Why?  Well, apparently they lived (in peace) in a predominantly Jewish village of Stankova.  It is quite difficult to fathom that sometimes; somebody in my family had been a victim of the Nazi holocaust.  How do you even… I can’t….

Making the Case

At one point in human history, lineage meant everything.  It was so vital to the early Christians that Matthew fabricated a genealogical tree that went back to Abraham (to show Jesus’s favor to the Jews while depicting him as a new Moses) and Luke thought it necessary to develop one that went all the way back to Adam (in a sense, overriding Matthew’s account as if to suggest that Jesus came for all, not just the Jews).  Paternal lineages defined many facets of ancient society: they forged political bonds, developed land grants, built estates, earned military rank, and lorded over serfs or slaves. In these ways, I think that lineage is outmoded and unnecessary.    Certainly I do not think lineage should be the determining factor in ones life—no one should be condemned or confirmed due to the actions of their parents (or grandparents).

Still, I do believe lineage is important.  While many know their direct family–parents, grandparents–I would say most people don’t bother to investigate their roots beyond that point.  Until I had done some research into my family tree, I had (falsely) supposed that my ancestors had come to the United States in the mid-nineteenth century or even the early twentieth-century.  Because family histories are often lost over time–lands are sold, Bibles (with family trees in them) go missing, pictures can bleach in sunlight–it is quite possible that most are unaware of even their great-grandparents.  But why is any of this relevant to you?

As a student of history, I’ve witnessed the fallout from a general ignorance of the past.  History doesn’t repeat itself, people repeat history and often to tragic ends.   But while I would say that our society’s past(s) represent our society’s memories–and the preservation of memories are always important (even bad ones)–our family histories represents our most sacred and personal memories.  In a sense, if societal memories represent the ‘what we had for breakfast’ type of memory, our family tree is more akin to our memory of our first kiss, our first favorite teacher, our first fishing trip, or the time we fell while learning to ride a bike.  We may be situated, generally speaking, in a large biological network–also socially, culturally, ethnically–we are also situated within this more personal network, environmentally, with which we are supposed to get encouragement, care, support, love, and our basic values.  As infants, we don’t first imitate society, we imitate our parents.  As we grow, we may strive to imitate the world around us more broadly, but we are first and foremost affected by those who raise us (even if they suck at it, unfortunately).

Knowing where we come from is instrumental in answering questions about ourselves.  Sometimes we just don’t know how relevant our family history can be to our current situations because we often isolate ourselves to the present.  I was raised Catholic, though my grandfather and all of his relatives and ancestors were Lutheran.  While growing up, I was taught to question everything because of the distinct differences of belief in my tree; I am an apostate of the Catholic church today most likely because of the events that unfolded with the excommunication of Maximilian Schall von Bell in the eighteenth century.  It really is the perfect example of a butterfly effect that I can conjure.   But these ripples defined me.  Don’t you think it is time to find out what ripples from the past have worked towards defining you?

‘The Bible’ the Novel About a Program About the Bible?

So while browsing through the New Releases section at Barnes and Noble yesterday, I came across this rather fascinating book:

Oh, yes they did!

In case you were wondering, yes, this is a novel based upon the History Channel special, ‘The Bible’–which happens to be a dramatization of….the bible.  So this is a watered-down book from a watered down television series about a very nuanced and multifaceted book (actually a large collection of books).  But the title and the function of this book is both condescending and ignorant for various reasons…

Yes, the History Channel has again contradicted itself by suggesting that both evolution and the bible are the story of ‘all of us’. How a 13 billion year old earth and a 6,000 year old earth are simultaneously ‘the story of all of us’ is beyond me. But not for a channel dedicated to conspiracy theories, I guess….

Of course the bible is not a ‘story of all of us’; it isn’t even a story of ‘most of us’.  No, the bible is a collection of theological narratives about a select group of people and primarily dedicated to a small part of the world.  It does not contain stories about even some of its closest neighbors, let alone those in the far east or those in the Americas (like the Native Americans) or in Sub-Saharan Africa where culture thrived (and continues to thrive) during this period.  The series and the book both take on a arrogant position that everyone is a believer and that is simply just not true.  And we all did not come from Adam and Eve, despite what some of the more conservative commentators would have you believe.

No, the bible is not ‘a story of us’ but a collection of philosophical and theological, metaphorical narratives about a very basic relationship between (1) a localized storm/war deity and his worshippers, (2) the interactions between these worshippers and various tribal nations, and (3) the development and syncretism of the religion within its socio-cultural settings as time progressed over a few thousand years.  And while this collection of narratives is interesting and valuable–especially for those who believe–it is not a very historically-useful one.

So it is quite sad–pathetic even–that the version that people should be reading (that is, the actual bible) is selling less copies currently than the craptastic watered-down book based upon a rather conservative (yet liberally rendered) televised dramatization of the bible.

Sad.  So sad.  And yet this says so much about Western society, does it not?

Bill O’Reilly and the Polarizing Political Figure of Jesus

It has come to my attention that Bill O’Reilly will be publishing a book on the life and death of Jesus. This news has been making the rounds on the interwebs and of course I’m concerned. It isn’t necessarily because I don’t like O’Reilly, or because I find his views on generally everything to be atrociously flawed and morally questionable, but I am concerned because the last thing we need to happen is a “Which way would Jesus vote?” debate start dominating the conversation about the figure of Jesus.

Of course I’m aware that Jesus is often called upon by various politicians of all affiliations. But politicians most likely use this rhetoric to reflect what popular culture supports and, unfortunately, sites like Rapture Ready (a website for fundamentalist Christians who believe the world will end within their lifetimes) make the following (generally popular) claims about Jesus found in certain wings of evangelical Christianity:

There is one thing certain we can state, based upon the integrity of Bible truth. Jesus would never endorse or be a member of any party whose platform supports abortion, gay rights, and a general hostility to Bible-believing Christians.

Interestingly, Jesus is portrayed to have spoken thousands of words between all four Gospels, yet not one of those words was about abortion or gay rights. What to do about people who are hostile to Bible-believing Christians? Well, it gets a little hairy in this area, but there is that oft-quoted phrase “turn the other cheek.” So I’m not sure how certain anyone can be about endorsements, for or against, for any particular political party.

When it comes down to it, scholars have enough trouble coming to any sort of consensus on what Jesus may have said and what he might have done, let alone what his political views might have been (in some circles, questions are raised as to whether or not such a figure as Jesus existed at all, or if such a figure existed in a way similar to how he is portrayed in the New Testament).

And now that we’re on the subject, I don’t really hate bankers, or what they do, I just don’t want them doing their business in my house!

And the right side of the aisle are not the only culpable ones. While Jesus spoke of social change in theological terms, he was not the liberal, leftist ideologue that some would suggest (like those at Jesus was a Liberal believe). He did not come to bring class equality, he did not come to preach against the corporate state (‘render unto Caesar’ and all that), he did not bring it to ‘the man’ (‘the man’ crucified him). He did not resolve to rid the world of poverty, he only eased their suffering by promising them a better world when they died (of leprosy, of starvation, of a beating by a slave owner, etc…); he never promised the poor freedom from their current, earthly state of poverty-stricken existence.

And while it may shock some of you, on occasion, he got involved in a little saber rattling. Jesus was not portrayed as a pansy. He had his moments of testosterone (can God have testosterone?) fueled rage and sometimes he was pretty blunt about what to do with those who crossed him (“those who are not with me are against me” and “I did not come to bring peace, but a sword” and “these enemies of mine, who did not want me to reign over them, bring them here and slay them in my presence”).

Many of these verses were used during the inquisition of heretics and during the crusades by those in power to support (theologically) the violent acts they committed. Whether they were right or wrong (wrong, in my opinion) is just demonstrates how that liberal, hippie (not to be confused with ‘hipster’) Jesus with the ‘anti-war’, pacifist attitude is a myth (in John 2.15, Jesus made a whip out of cord and he whipped the crap out of people for goodness sakes!). But it is a myth in the same sense as the conservative, anti-gay, pro-guns Jesus that the right loves so much.

“I’m saving this one lamb from the evil meat-packing corporations! Huzzah!” said Jesus never.

So am I concerned about O’Reilly’s foray into historical Jesus studies? Oh, god yes. I’m terrified. But I’m terrified because of the way lay people and politicians will continue to construe and deconstruct the Jesus we have–even as unstable and contradictory an individual as he may be–and scholarship will continue to remain within a relatively isolated community of experts. In other words, books by the Bill O’Reillys and the Clint Willises (author of Jesus Is Not a Republican) of the world are the only books on Jesus that anyone will read. Because they will be the only books available and accessible.

Besides, broadcasters and talking heads don’t have the facts straight when it comes to their actual jobs (reporting the news). Bill O’Reilly can’t seem to figure out how what causes the tide, so just how well do you think he’ll do getting the historical Jesus right? Keep in mind, scholars can’t even seem to figure it out entirely–and they’ve spent their professional career trying to find answers. I’m betting that O’Reilly will not produce a very accurate picture.

He is already imaging Jesus much like how he views himself, a “beloved and controversial young revolutionary” who is constantly persecuted, but who fights for what that which he believes. It is a stunning pseudo-autobiographical portrayal of Jesus through O’Reilly’s eyes. And had O’Reilly been trained in the field, he would know that Bultmann pointed out this troublesome factor of historical Jesus scholarship decades ago. But O’Reilly isn’t a scholar, nor even an educated layman on the subject; he is a pundit on a news network with an agenda (like all politicians and political-pundits). That is precisely the problem.

“I should write a book on Jesus… but also on aliens.”

Jesus’ portrayal in the Gospels is multifaceted because we have at least four portrayals. But the nuance of the figure of Jesus is much greater, and so limiting Jesus to particular synchronic values does nothing but narrow his value to everyone. Even as a secular student of history, I can find value there because the study of these nuances is important to all–not conservatives, not liberals, not any particular sectarian group. So this is my plea to everyone: leave Jesus out of politics. You are not salvaging history, you’re destroying the future (of history).

More Potential ‘Catholic Church Depravity’ Just Coming to My Attention

This is just so disturbing.  This was published in May of last year, so not sure where the investigation leads, but this:

While the mobster’s presence on sacred ground has caused a scandal, it’s his role as an alleged pimp to senior Vatican figures that threatens to plunge the Roman Catholic Church into its gravest crisis yet — after astonishing claims about the sexual abuse and death of Emanuela Orlandi, a pretty 15-year-old girl and talented musician. It is those claims that led police to open the crypt.

Near the casket containing the body of the gangster, there was a box with other human bones, which police took for DNA testing, escorted by motorcycle outriders as they sped from Piazza Navona to a laboratory.

The family of Emanuela are waiting to hear if the tests confirm the bones are those of the schoolgirl, who disappeared in the summer of 1983 after leaving her family’s Vatican City apartment to go to a flute lesson in Rome.

Often seen playing within the Vatican walls, where her father worked as a lay official in administration, Emanuela was last seen getting into a green BMW in the centre of the Eternal City. She has not been seen since. If the bones in the tomb are hers, it will be a hammer blow to the credibility of the Church, amid allegations that the girl was abused at depraved orgies attended by some of the Vatican’s most senior prelates and advisers to successive popes.

To the dismay of Vatican officials, already reeling from disclosures about cover-ups involving paedophile priests, these claims come from an insider — a veteran priest with unprecedented access to the inner sanctums of the Vatican.

Father Gabriel Amorth, a priest for 50 years, believes the girl was the victim of a ‘crime with a sexual motive’ and that police should focus their investigations on the Vatican.

via Was this girl murdered after being snatched for Vatican sex parties? | Mail Online.

Even if the story of the girl turns out to be inaccurate (though, I suspect it will be the opposite and we’ll find yet another reason why I can not stand the Catholic Church as an institution), the fact that they let a gangster be buried in such luxury and extravagance, well… ‘corruption is as corruption’ does I guess.