(This is the second -- and probably the final -- post on gnosticism and its presence in today's world, a sequel to my earlier post: Roots of Modern Gnosticism)
_____________
For the gnostic, the old world -- that is, traditional society and its institutions -- must be destroyed to make way for the new. Change, then, means destruction. This transformation will take place thanks to the knowledge -- the gnosis -- possessed by the elite who will manage the process. We see shades of this gnostic thought among politicians, intellectuals, academics, revolutionaries, media pundits, and others who desire to transform the world through programs run by experts, by those in the know. In other words, the gnostic, rejecting the God who acts in and redeems the world, believes in self-salvation through human knowledge.
Eric Voegelin, one of the more stable and believable 20th-century philosophers, reminds us of the gnostic's "prohibition of questions." Using Karl Marx as an example, Voegelin describes Marx's unwillingness to answer questions as central to his philosophy. To paraphrase Marx: For socialist man, questions become an impossibility. When socialist man speaks, man must be silent. Indeed, for Marx, questioning his thought "becomes a practical impossibility."
Interestingly, Rudolf Hőss, the commander of the infamous Nazi death camp at Auschwitz, when asked at trial why he did not question or disobey the horrific extermination orders, replied that such a thought would never even occur to him. "Something like that was just completely impossible...I had to carry it out," he said. Yes, indeed, for all socialists questions become "a practical impossibility." It matters little whether they are communists (international socialists) or Nazis (national socialists) or run-of-the-mill socialists (democratic socialists), since they employ identical tactics -- some just more subtle than others -- when it comes to exerting power over others. Too many people have forgotten, or perhaps never knew, that the word, “Nazi,” was shorthand for the full name of the political party founded by Adolph Hitler, the Nationalsozialtische Deutsche Arbeiterpartie, or the National Socialist Workers Party. There is really very little difference between extremists on the left or right.
Interestingly, Rudolf Hőss, the commander of the infamous Nazi death camp at Auschwitz, when asked at trial why he did not question or disobey the horrific extermination orders, replied that such a thought would never even occur to him. "Something like that was just completely impossible...I had to carry it out," he said. Yes, indeed, for all socialists questions become "a practical impossibility." It matters little whether they are communists (international socialists) or Nazis (national socialists) or run-of-the-mill socialists (democratic socialists), since they employ identical tactics -- some just more subtle than others -- when it comes to exerting power over others. Too many people have forgotten, or perhaps never knew, that the word, “Nazi,” was shorthand for the full name of the political party founded by Adolph Hitler, the Nationalsozialtische Deutsche Arbeiterpartie, or the National Socialist Workers Party. There is really very little difference between extremists on the left or right.
[Note: If you have about 22 minutes to watch a homily that addresses the role of Divine Mercy in the conversion of Rudolf Hőss before his execution, watch the video I've embedded below. As my eighth-grade teacher, Sister Francis Jane, often said, "You might be surprised whom you meet in heaven...assuming you get there."]
We see this prohibition of questions, too, in the response of today's leftists to serious questions, a response that inevitably centers on attacking the questioner. The gnostic mob -- regardless of what it calls itself -- silences its questioners with personal attacks, both verbal and physical, and with noise. It screams it’s irrational chants as it tries to destroy the symbols and ultimately the foundation of the existing society.
The gnostic "spirit", however, is largely a revolt against God. Marx, in his doctoral dissertation, provides us with the perfect example of this. Like Prometheus, Marx writes:
In a word, “I hate all the gods” is its own confession, its own verdict against all the gods heavenly and earthly who do not acknowledge human self-consciousness as the supreme deity. There shall be none beside it.
Fascism and communism are both manifestations of the modernist and socialist ideology that rejects God. In a sense they embrace the first sin in Eden — “you, too, shall be like gods” — and like all evils attempt to imitate good but ultimately embrace the culture of death. From the beginning of recorded history to 1900, governments murdered an estimated 133 million of their own citizens. Between 1901 and 1987, governments killed nearly 170 million of their own citizens. Stalin slaughtered 41 million, Mao 35 million, and Hitler 21 million. Another 38,5 million died in state-sponsored wars during the same period.
If you can make your way through such modern philosophers as Heidegger, Hegel, Nietzsche, and Marx you will encounter the core of modern gnostic thought. Marx was probably the most influential, although Nietzsche was certainly the most readable. Yes, they were all intellectuals, but those who took their ideology into the streets — Hitler, Stalin, Mao, and all the rest — were really just thugs. In fact, once the thugs gained control, the intellectuals and the academics were usually the first to go. During the so-called “Cultural Revolution” in Communist China (1962-1976), Mao first adopted the slogan, “Never Forget Class Struggle.” Under this slogan Mao encouraged the students to rise up against their teachers who were labeled bourgeois intellectuals. The students, who evolved into the infamous and brutal Red Guards, beat and imprisoned their teachers. Mao even attacked the party itself because he believed too many of its functionaries were insufficiently revolutionary. This phase was spurred on by the slogan, “Sweep Away All Monsters and Demons.” Mao later demanded the Red Guards erase all vestiges of the old culture, which led these young thugs to attack virtually everyone. Destruction was universal — churches, temples, shops, libraries, cemeteries, museums, monuments, statues, even pets were destroyed — and countless people were slaughtered. The entire process was orchestrated by Mao as a form of directed anarchy, violence from below but with approval from above.
If you can make your way through such modern philosophers as Heidegger, Hegel, Nietzsche, and Marx you will encounter the core of modern gnostic thought. Marx was probably the most influential, although Nietzsche was certainly the most readable. Yes, they were all intellectuals, but those who took their ideology into the streets — Hitler, Stalin, Mao, and all the rest — were really just thugs. In fact, once the thugs gained control, the intellectuals and the academics were usually the first to go. During the so-called “Cultural Revolution” in Communist China (1962-1976), Mao first adopted the slogan, “Never Forget Class Struggle.” Under this slogan Mao encouraged the students to rise up against their teachers who were labeled bourgeois intellectuals. The students, who evolved into the infamous and brutal Red Guards, beat and imprisoned their teachers. Mao even attacked the party itself because he believed too many of its functionaries were insufficiently revolutionary. This phase was spurred on by the slogan, “Sweep Away All Monsters and Demons.” Mao later demanded the Red Guards erase all vestiges of the old culture, which led these young thugs to attack virtually everyone. Destruction was universal — churches, temples, shops, libraries, cemeteries, museums, monuments, statues, even pets were destroyed — and countless people were slaughtered. The entire process was orchestrated by Mao as a form of directed anarchy, violence from below but with approval from above.
Under Marxism — and, folks, socialism, even Bernie’s and AOC's so-called “democratic socialism,” is founded on Marxist principles — human beings are seen as socially determined by their historical and material circumstances; they are not defined by their infinite worth before a transcendent God. According to Marx himself, Marxist revolution implies “the replacement of religion by politics as the source of man’s liberation, since evil is a consequence of society...and not of an original sin,” and it ultimately leads to an ennoblement of violence and the extinction of ethics.
Revolutionary ethics sees its own version of violence as liberating, unlike what it claims is the repressive violence of the established order. Marxism approves of the former as the means to overcome the latter. We will continue to encounter this "liberating" violence so long as those who should know better continue to support and bankroll violent revolutionaries.
Barack Obama called for the "fundamental transformation of America" but to the far left these words simply mean total revolution. And in total revolution violence becomes just fine, a necessary tool to achieve the complete alteration of the society. Ethics, too, at least ethics as we know it, becomes meaningless, since such concepts as justice, freedom, and morality are incompatible with revolution because they represent and legitimize the existing order which must be destroyed. Oh, these words and others like them will be parroted to recruit those who believe society is oppressing them, but to the revolutionary they mean little.
Because the modern gnostic elites believe they know better than the masses, they really can’t stand the thought of the uninitiated being free to use the gifts God has given them. For the same reason, elitists, whether of the liberal or revolutionary variety, always crave power. For the revolutionary, the only acceptable form of democracy is mob rule, the democracy of violence which for them is the pathway to power. Liberal elites are more subtle and strive to convince the masses to trust them because they know better, all the while working within “the system” to undermine the people’s freedom. Publicly they minimize the violence of the revolutionaries, although they fear it could get out of hand and threaten their personal power. And yet this same fear leads them to continue their quiet support of the revolutionaries.
A recent Rugters University study found that the social media profiles of some anarchists gained hundreds of thousands of followers since May. According to Pamela Paresky, one of the study's co-authors:
"The systematic, online mobilization of violence was well-planned, coordinated (in real tme), and celebrated by explicitly violent anarchy-socilaist networks that rode on the coattails of peaceful protest...The ability to continue to spread and to eventually bring more violence, including a violent insurgency, relies on the ability to hide in plain sight -- to be confused with legitimate protest, and for the media and the public to minimize the threat."
As I mentioned in a recent post -- Madness Rising -- the similarities with the early years of the Russian Revolution are striking.
What’s behind it all? For the true believers, it”s driven by their ideology and their quest for power. For the followers, Lenin’s “useful idiots”, I really believe that too many today simply refuse to recognize that which is good, that which is beautiful. Modern education has taught them that the world of man lacks goodness, and the wonders and beauty of God’s creation escapes them. Lacking moral imagination, the concept of sin and disorder in the human soul means nothing to them. How can it, since they reject the very idea of the goodness of creation by a transcendent, loving God who acts in the world? One gets the impression they’re just bored with it all.
There is much evil in the world today, but that’s nothing new. The evil — and that means Satan and all his followers — are unable to fathom the motives of the good. We see evidence of this in the way so many haters simply cannot understand religious values, particularly Christian values. One need olny read the mainstream media's coverage of things Christian, and especially that related to the Catholic CHurch.
We who believe, though, live on in trust and in hope; and hope is knowledge, the firm knowledge that "all things work for good for those who love God, who are called according to His purpose" [Rom 8:28]. God will indeed bring all things to good because the good is far more powerful than any evil and will emerge the victor.
No comments:
Post a Comment