There is in the world of Biblical interpretation a key principle which serious, wise scholars and preachers observe. It is this.
a text out of context becomes a pretext
In fact, this principle applies not just to the Bible but to any document. Indeed, it is a wise principle in every context.
It goes to the heart of an every day problem we have as human beings, and it is the antidote to that problem.
The problem is this: that human beings have a propensity to deceive themselves and to seek to justify their sense of deception with some form of excuse or reason cited from an authoritative source.
So in the history of religion we have witnessed the most bizarre and dangerous teachings based on particular Bible verses. People have even managed to justify war in the name of Jesus Christ, even though he taught and lived the very opposite, dying in illustration of his pacifist doctrine.
The willingness to corrupt an authority is ever present. The willingness to seek a justification for the unjustifiable is too tempting.
And this is the explanation for the absurd assertions about Prime Minister Boris Johnson’s prorogation of the UK parliament for 5 weeks this autumn, 3 weeks of which are the customary Party Conference season anyway when parliament effectively stops. This comes at a time when the current session of parliament has been inordinately long.
MPs have known the result of the Referendum for over 3 years but have wasted much time rehashing the Remain campaign claims. They have had more than enough time already to debate Brexit. But the Remain fanatics refuse to give up their campaign.
Their angst at this juncture is because Brexit is upon us but they still cannot accept it. They mouth the self deceit that they fully accept the outcome of the Referendum but that they want a deal with the EU because disaster will follow otherwise.
The Deal with the EU is still on the table; the EU has again today reiterated that this Deal is all they are prepared to offer; the Commons has voted on 3 separate occasions already to reject that EU offer.
In the real world we have reached the end of the road on this subject. We are well into extra time – play was due to stop on March 29th 2019.
The real problem behind all the absurd claims about Dictator Johnson and the threat to democracy is really this: the Remainiac’s psychology.
That is the real threat to democracy.
Remainers are hurting because their dream idea is about to vanish. They simply cannot accept the facts of life.
And it is not just their Ideal which is at stake. It is what they believe about the alternative. The idea in their heads is a simplistic and warped misconception which leads them to have real fears for the future.
They have bought into the propaganda lie that any one who opposes their Materialist, Humanist, Internationalist agenda is a raving Racist, and authoritarian Nationalist ready to imprison minorities and abolish human rights.
The subliminal image they have for all this is the 12 year nightmare in Germany 1933 to 1945.
This warped and shallow notion is powerful. It is also dangerous. It therefore requires contradiction.
The maniac who ruled Germany in those 12 years belongs to that tradition and phenomenon represented firstly by Lenin, then Stalin [who of course operated before, during and after Hitler’s reign and with worse human massacres], through to Mao in China and Pol Pot in Cambodia.
You and I are utterly revolted by what these people represented and what they did. It runs counter to every normal, moral human instinct. It is therefore vital to understand the mindset which brought these people to act as they did.
They got an Ideal in their heads. They then painted everyone who disagreed with their Ideal as an enemy, not as a fellow human being with a brain and feelings. Their obsession with their Ideal was such that any action they took to achieve their Ideal was justified by the terms of their obsession and its aims.
That is how all these ideological fanatics ended up being mass murderers. I doubt that any of them set out to murder people; I doubt that they could even see that they were obsessed.
They were obsessed with a particular idea of how to put the world right. And they were obsessed with the idea of how wrong the world is without their Ideal to solve all its problems. With that mindset, the unacceptable becomes acceptable because the Cause is Supreme.
All moral bounds are cast aside. All traditional institutional constraints are either perverted or thrown off [check out the history of each for yourself].
Which is what disturbs me about the psychology of the Remainiacs [for that is what they are].
This state of mind filters out all facts contrary to its belief system; it then accentuates details [particular texts from the overall context of events] out of proportion to what they actually represent.
Boris Johnson having the Queen suspend parliament for 5 weeks at this stage is neither unconstitutional nor illegal. Remainer academic and peer, Peter Hennessy, stated this explicitly this morning on BBC radio 4.
It is, however, unpalatable to the Remainiac because their ability to get a law through parliament to stop Brexit is curtailed. Yet their ability to debate the outcome of the EU council meeting in mid October is not curtailed [that meeting occurs after the prorogation, and that meeting alone may make a material difference to any further debate].
But the mindset of Extreme Remainers is a worrying indicator of the state of our politics today in the English speaking world.
It is a politics where the perspective and terms of the political class and the media is fundamentally Marxist [ie materialist, egalitarian and internationalist where the State is used by an enlightened elite to impose the values, terms and perspective of their Ideal].
No value is placed on the collected wisdom of the ages. Morality is derived from an Abstract Ideal, inspired by the Englightenment assertion of the Rights of Man.
This, of course, stands in marked contrast to the English Tradition of liberty based in the old Common law of the anglo saxon peoples, expressed in Magna Carta of 1215, reinforced by the Constitutional settlement of the late 17th century, explained by the philosopher and politician Edmund Burke, leading on to universal suffrage gained independently of the continent – which is why women in Britain had the vote decades before France, home of the Declaration des Droits de l’homme et du citoyen.
It is because the philosophical approach of English tradition is inductive, not deductive. It arises from our psychological approach which is pragmatic, not Idealistic.
Demonstrators in Hong Kong much prefer the days of British colonial rule to contemporary Chinese pretensions. Even without the vote, the English legal tradition assured liberty and security of person and property, even against the State.
Hong Kong is an inconvenient reminder to the Politically Correct mindset, that our English tradition – not ideology – is the historic foundation for true liberty.
A real battle for democracy and liberty today is being waged in Hong Kong. The present confected crisis in the UK is the symptom of false Ideals, obsessive psychology, and ignorance of English history.
Ray Catlin
Update: Sunday 8th September 2019
The events of the past week have merely served to illustrate the thesis on this post. More than 20 Conservative MPs have voted against their party and Brexit, and must take the consequences. EUromainia is the sole explication for the bizarre proceedings in parliament this week which passed a political resolution in the form of a Bill to stop a so called No Deal Brexit. This fanaticism has cast aside all the normal constraints of constitutional convention and party loyalty. One cause alone matters, EUropa.
Veteran MP and former minister, Sir John Redwood, makes important observations on the daily blog posts on his site this last week – see johnredwoodsdiary.com
RC
Conservatism Institute 