Author: Daniel Juster

The West Shows Lack of Moral Courage in the Face of Ideologies of Terrorism 

We see this in the response to the killing of Ismail Haniyeh and the idea that he was negotiating for hostages and should not have been killed.  But he was responsible for hundreds of deaths and then the 1200 killed on October 7.  I would love to see a doctrine in the West and Israel that terrorist leaders forfeit their right to live and are legitimate targets.  That would include Iranian leaders. 

 

Two articles in the Jerusalem Post Weekend edition noted the lack of moral courage in the West.  The Biden administration allows Iran to be supplied with tens of billions of dollars even now through evading oil sanctions and this finances their proxies and terrorism.  The idea of living with terrorist nations and having accommodations is foolish and temporary and will lead to much greater loss.  They are pledged to destroy the United States and the West. Believe them!  The lesson of appeasement with Hitler has not been learned. One article by strategic think tank thinker David Weinberg was especially powerful.  I read him every week. It was entitled “Getting strategically “unstuck.”  The West accommodates Iran.   Israel sought to accommodate Hamas and Hezbollah and find ways to just live with them.  Iran should never have been permitted to move toward an atomic bomb and regime change should have been policy.  Israel’s policy should be that no terror regime will be allowed to rule in a nation on the border of Israel.  Also, any nation threatening Israel’s existence is a legitimate military target.  Weinberg hopes that the killing of Haniyeh will now open the way to get unstuck since Iran’s response and Israel’s response to that get us unstuck.  Even a pre-emptive strike before that response comes to full fruition gets Israel unstuck as painful as that will be.  Finally, Israel seems delivered from its delusion of living with Hamas Hezbollah on its border.  

 

A second amazing article was by Marziyeh Amirzadeh, an Iranian now in the United States.  She was arrested and sentenced to death for converting to Christianity.  The article did not say how she escaped after 9 months in prison, but her husband and best friend were tortured and lost their lives. Here she rightly rails against a Jewish Israeli historian, Alon Ben Meir.  He writes about the opportunity to get along with a more moderate Iran now that a more moderate President has been elected, President Pezeshkian.  What a delusion!  But this is window dressing for the West.  She is stunned that Israel allowed Hamas to be funded and armed and now the West falls for such a foolish response to Iran.  Iran is totally under the Ayatollah and no other official will make a difference. When they tell you what they want to do believe them and fight them before they have great power.  But as Weinberg says, the West has lost its moral courage.  Is it possible that this loss is rooted in postmodern leftism that cannot grasp a battle of good against evil?  Morals have fallen to a terrible degree.    

 

One other article also showed the moral bankruptcy of the West.  Gil Hoffman reports on news coverage of the terror missile bombing on the Druze Village of Majdal Shams in the Golan.  In several major papers, what happened just was not represented.  It was emphasized that this was occupied territory.  It is not.  Tell the Druze who live there and are pro-Israel.  The articles did not clearly note the Hezbollah attack and wrote as if Israel was somehow responsible and that this was a response to Israel’s attack on Hamas and Haniyeh.  One writer noted that when Netanyahu visited after the attack he was shouted at (as if they were anti-Israel) but their shouts were demanding that he take revenge for them. (This total misreporting was from Sky News in Britain).  U. S. papers in the legacy press simply are so anti-Israel that they could not report it right. 

 

These are very dark days, and we need so much prayer support in Israel as we prepare for an attack from Iran.  Some of the weapons that were delayed from the United States are dearly needed now.  Why? Again, the lack of courage and fear of escalation.  God help us, really.  May our Christian supporters have a clear moral vision and make a difference. 

Vice Presidential Candidate J. D. Vance

I wanted to understand the candidate J. D. Vance.  Who is he?  What makes him tick?  Then I found out that there was a memoir of his life.  It covers his childhood to his early 30s and the post-Yale Law School period very briefly. It is call the Hillbilly Elegy.  I am trying to discern what God is saying.  I am also trying to be discerning of all the prophetic voices, and some not too trustworthy.  Wouldn’t it be wonderful if all the media prophets would be accountable to a real eldership and would post where their accountability is? I am trying to discern. With the positives and negatives of Donald Trump, if God really desires him to be President, he will win. Surely this would fit the classic old hymn, “God Moves in a Mysterious Way His Wonders to Perform.”  My interest is seeking the sense of God’s working in all of this to hope that it could be part of an outpouring of revival in America.  This is the most important thing.

But now back to Vance. The Hillbilly Elegy is one of the most amazing books I have ever read.  Vance grew up in the Hillbilly area of Kentucky.  He grew up poor.  The book is raw in honesty and sometimes coarse in language.  He pulls no punches in describing his family members and their terrible dysfunctions.  The drug addiction of his mother, the many men in her life, and the instability.  He lived in so many places.   His grandparents were separated though they lived near each other.  They provided stability for his life between and in the midst of the upheavals.  His older sister came out well and an aunt and uncle.  He himself lived out several dysfunctions, rage, anger, and reactions, doing poorly in school for a season.  In later high school, things began to turn around.  He spent some time with his biological father who became a Fundamentalist Pentecostal.  For a season he went to church with him and read the Bible from time to time. Finally, he joined the Marines seeking a a step forward.  He served in Iraq.   Interestingly, he describes the white underclass of the Hillbilly community as very similar to the Black underclass.  Despite the claim that he is a white supremacist, it is clear that he empathizes with the black underclass.  After the Marines, he did Ohio State’s 4-year program in two years and then went to Yale Law School. This had never happened to any in his community.  Then he married an Indian classmate after graduation.  He credits much of his growth and maturing in the years at Yale and after to her.   He therefore is in an interracial marriage with interracial children.

Vance came to see that no amount of welfare can make up for a stable family and that this is the key to the way out of poverty. Many have argued this though today’s crucial race theory denies this. He therefore became a conservative.  His identity is the working class and his heart is with the working class.   He sees how the policies of the government have destroyed the economy of these poor areas, and they are economically hollowed out.  In the afterward, he attributes his success to those who imparted to him.   His gratitude to them is amazing.  His forgiveness for his most dysfunctional family members is noteworthy.  I teared up reading this.

Finally, after wrestling with Christianity and the many denominations, after writing this book he became a Catholic.

The Democrats now paint him as anti-woman due to an unfortunate statement about some of the single miserable women in the elite as cat ladies (women who cannot find acceptance in marriage and family and thus adopt cats. Amazing.  We used this term when I was a kid.  I wonder if this is a term in the Hillbilly community.  But he is not anti-single women and attributes so much of his success to his grandmother.

The book is so honest, raw, and coarse.  Ron Howard made it into a Netflix movie. So, Donald Trump picks a Hillbilly who graduated from Yale as his V. P.  He is today a man interested in Christianity in a serious way.  His heart is with the underclass.

I see the story as an amazing testimony to the grace of God. Can we look at such an unusual story of overcoming without seeing the hand of God in his life? J. D. Vance is unlike any politician in history, an overcomer from the greatest dysfunctionality who admits his ongoing battles with some of his inherited demons.  I am convinced that God has his hand on him but cannot say what this will lead to.  But I am convinced by his book that he is no racist, no white supremacist, and loves the underclass, black and white, and the working class.  He desires policies that really help. He does see that some government help is beneficial but some programs are destructive.  His identification with the underclass poor and the working class could be a revolution for the Republican Party, a significant re-alignment.

At any rate, I was moved by this book.  May he find God’s power at new levels and may he come into such a place with his beautiful Indian wife that they could contribute to a revival in America.  That is my prayer.  I also note that he is pro-Israel. I heartily recommend reading the book.

Forgiveness, Confusion, and Healing

The literature on physical healing through prayer and inner healing (also called spiritual healing) emphasizes that unforgiveness is a hindrance in both types of healing.  Book after book presents a prayer for the one receiving ministry to forgive those who have wronged them, to release them, and to release their own emotions to God.   However, the theology of this forgiveness is shallow, and I believe, hinders what is desired, namely releasing the person from the bondage of emotions of hate, revenge, and bitterness. This hindrance is especially the case if it is thought that the person who has done the evil act is let off the hook and is no longer to face justice.  For example, when a person owes money, the one who forgives the debt absorbs the loss and releases the person from obligation.  The forgiveness of Yeshua through His sacrifice releases us from the obligation to pay the price for our sins.  He paid the price.  Is this what we mean by forgiveness in healing contexts, that the person who did wrong is relieved from the obligation and no longer has to fulfill the claims of justice?  It is a profoundly important thing in our Biblical theology that we get the relationships right in being true to the Bible’s teaching on love, justice, and forgiveness.

To clarify the problem, let us give an example.  Suppose your child was snatched off the street by a pervert who then violated your child.  You and your child would experience deep trauma.  The pervert somehow escapes and is not located for arrest though the police try hard.  Some years later, you find yourself with a terrible back ailment.  During this time, the police find the perpetrator.  Some ten years have passed but there is no statute of limitations for this crime.  When you go for prayer at a healing prayer service in your congregation, the visiting ministry team leader asks if there is any bitterness or unforgiveness in your heart that could hinder the healing.  You think of this pervert and your desire that he be brought to justice.  There is still anger, bitterness, and revenge in your heart.  Imagine what you have been through trying to bring restoration to your child, now a mid-teen. What does forgiveness mean?  That you do not testify and seek to put the pervert in jail?  That you have forgiven means that he is released from having to pay the price that justice requires.  Where is justice in this definition of forgiveness?  Does forgiveness mean that we do not pursue justice?  What of the many verses in the Bible that command us to pursue justice?  If forgiveness means that the criminal is released from your pursuit of justice, then we have a great contradiction in Biblical teaching. In addition, if we do not pursue justice, the pervert can endanger other children.  Yes, I can release a monetary debt, but can I responsibly release an evil person from a just sentence?

This is why in my book Due Process, I distinguish between transactional forgiveness and non-transactional forgiveness. In transactional forgiveness, the person interacts with you and asks for your forgiveness.  He or she repents of the wrong and offers to give restitution. The thief restores what was stolen! Yeshua speaks of transactional forgiveness when He says that we are to forgive the brother who seeks our forgiveness 70 X 7 (Matt. 18;22).  The person can release the other from debt in some situations, for example, a financial debt.  It is their choice.  Also, they can forgive the bad act but as in the Torah can still require restitution for the good of the person as well. What was stolen is restored and then some. This is all part of transactional forgiveness. We can release from debt for ourselves personally, but not for others and society might still require a penalty for stealing.

When Yeshua interceded on the cross and said, “Father forgive them for they know not what they do,” (Luke 23:34) He was voicing forgiveness without a transaction of repentance from those who crucified him.  This certainly extends to the soldiers who carried out the crucifixion.  Was Yeshua speaking also of the religious leaders who sought his death or to the Roman official Pilot who pronounced his judgment?   On the other hand, Yeshua did not voice forgiveness for Jerusalem though He desired to see them blessed.  He pronounces judgment because they did not recognize the time of their visitation and should have (Luke 19:44).  Yeshua in his ministry does not only voice love and forgiveness but also very strong words of condemnation.

The kind of forgiveness required for healing is not to let the criminal off the hook. One may choose to forgive a financial crime but for the good of the thief may exact the penalty. If one forgives the sexual pervert and lets him off the hook one may be guilty of a civil crime!   Rather before God one is replacing a desire for vengeance and a heart of bitterness with the desire for good for the criminal.  One replaces hatred with love. This releases the person from the bondage of damaging emotions, another effect of the crime from which the person needs to be delivered. The pervert, one will find, often experienced abuse as a child.  There is a case for love. However, love in this case, for the criminal, and for the other potential victims, seeks justice.  It seeks to see the criminal put in jail, so others are not abused. The just thing is the most loving thing.  However, with this type of forgiveness one pursues justice for all who are involved, both the criminal and the victims. It increases the chance for the criminal to be reformed.   However, the transaction where bitterness and the desire for revenge are replaced by love and seeking the good of the other is a supernatural change of heart through the Spirit. It releases the person who was wronged from the continued suffering from anger and vengeance which holds the victim in bondage. When people receiving healing ministry voice forgiveness for the offender, I believe this is what is happening in the Spirit even if the theology is not right. Many teach we are to pray blessing upon the perpetrator of the evil for Yeshua taught us to bless our enemies.  Yet, what is the blessing?  Surely, we are not to pray that an evil person be prosperous and blessed in doing evil, thus reinforcing their evil behavior. The greatest blessing for such a person would be to find, from the Holy Spirit, a spirit of repentance, to turn from their wicked ways and find God.  Unlike Jonah, we want to see repentance and blessing, but in the right way, a way that is just. Jonah with a vengeful heart did not want Nineveh to repent and enter into the blessing that would follow repentance.

Our pursuit of healing ministry will be greatly aided if we can explain to the person seeking help that we do not mean the kind of forgiveness that necessarily lets the violator off the hook.  Rather we seek a supernatural transaction in God by voicing forgiveness that pursues justice with love for all the parties involved in the difficult situation.  I find it strange is so little understood and is almost never taught.

The Amazing Demonic Intelligence of Hamas Leader Sinwar

The Hamas plan in the war against Israel has been amazingly intelligent, brilliant, evil
and demonic at the highest level. Let’s review.

1. First, Hamas created a military fortress of weapons and tunnels the lengths of
the New York subway system, under civilian areas with the means to come
above ground to fire rockets and other ordinance at Israel. The tunnel shafts are
in civilian homes, schools and hospitals.
There has never in history been such concentration of military weapons so
concentrated in civilian areas. It is human shield strategy on steroids. Hamas
knows that it can use the death of civilians in propaganda to turn the world
against Israel. This was all brilliantly pre-planned. It is the strategy of Hamas to
get a significant number of civilians killed. Hamas lies about statistics, and about
attacks that did not happen (remember the hospital in the early days?) Its lies
are reported by a corrupt western media as truth.

2. The Hamas invasion and slaughter of October 7 th was an act of evil horror. But it
did not end there. Rather, Hamas took hostages. Sinwar rightly understood that
the hostage issue could eventually be used to undermine the willingness of
Israelis to fight the war against them. While in the early months the Israeli public
by a clear majority supported prosecuting the war over getting the hostages out,
though this was really important too for all Israelis. The pain of the hostages
would wear down the will to fight. Sinwar knows the Israeli mentality well enough
to have anticipated this in his strategy. In addition, the hostage strategy would
divide Israel between the prosecute the war faction and the get the hostages out
at all costs faction even if it means Hamas remains in power. Sinwar anticipated
this and he plays Israel like a master.

3. Hamas depends on media to distort the reality of fighting an urban war. Civilians
will always die in such a war and according to the expert from West Point,
Jonathan Spencer, Israel’s casualty rate is the best in history on protecting
civilians in urban war. Hamas depends on the fact that Israel can be accused of
genocide apart from its legal definition. The genocide and war crimes are on the
side of Hamas. But people do not carefully read the conventions that were
approved that define war crimes, and who bears the responsibility for civilian
deaths. Hamas is responsible for almost all such deaths. They kill their own
people over food distribution, over criticism of Hamas and more. They depend
on the ignorance of people to make claims not based in law. The actual law is
too nuanced and requires real thought. Those accusing Israel are radically
misinterpreting the law. But Sinwar and Hamas knows that people will by the
definitions of propaganda and not respond according to the actual law.

This level of intelligence shows a brilliant demonic inspiration. It has to be defeated by
much prayer as well as by military might.

Religious Freedom and Woke Tyranny

When the founders of the United States declared freedom of religion in the United States they set a direction that broke from more than 1400 years of the Western tradition, which first only allowed one legal religion supported by the government, Catholic in the West, Orthodox in many nations east of Western Europe, and then Lutheran in Germany and Scandinavia, and Reformed in Holland and various cantons in Switzerland.  It was difficult for people of those times to believe in an ordered society without a state-enforced religion. Then toleration was embraced in the nations of Europe.  The United Kingdom embraced their Anglican state church but promoted toleration.  State churches were favored with tax support but the non-state churches, sometimes called free churches, also flourished. Roger Williams in Rhode Island Colony founded the first true religious freedom state.

The United States Constitution promoted profound freedom with no favored national religion.  There was a profound understanding of the importance of individual conscience.  At the time of the founding, there was not much thought of other religions outside of varieties of Christianity and Judaism.  There was general support for the Christian consensus for almost 200 years. Religious freedom implied including non-Christian religions and no religion at all.  Abraham Kuyper, a Reformed theologian and politician, and the Prime Minister of Holland at the beginning of the 20th century expanded the ideas of religious freedom by thinking in terms of worldview and justice.  For Kuyper, religious worldview freedom was very tied to education and being able to raise children in the context of one’s worldview, but of course, in support of the democratic values of Holland.  This means equal support for public education through different schools reflecting different world views but required to teach the basics that all need to understand.  These profound ideas influenced Northern European nations and still have an effect to this day. 

However, the new woke movements of LGBTQ+, transgenderism, and critical race theory transgress religious freedom in ways that are historically unprecedented.  Ideas of civil rights naturally expanded to include alternative lifestyles once the Western nations accepted alternative lifestyles as legal and the psychological and psychiatric medical associations removed these lifestyles from their categorization as mental diseases.   None of this implies a necessary conflict with religious freedom as long as religious people can still minister and teach their standards and the power of God and spiritual counseling to enable people to conform to biblical norms.  However, this freedom is being challenged.  

Promoters of the new woke movements are not content with civil rights but are fostering a new faith confession, a religious level of affirmation that now violates the conscience of many who embrace traditional faith confession.  This profoundly contradicts freedom of religion. When traditional faith people are required to work with a flag celebrating alternative lifestyles, then there is a violation of conscience.  There is a requirement now that all must confess these alternative lifestyles as right and good.  This violates, especially, biblical teaching.   We now have lawsuits where artists are being pressured and even prosecuted for not creating art that celebrates alternative lifestyles.  Workers are being pressured to work under a pride flag, including some who work in government agencies, work as firemen, and in police precincts.  Plus, Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion, DEI, training pressures employees to embrace alternative lifestyles as good.  These directions are profound contradictions to religious freedom and promote a new type of religious tyranny.   There is a gray area when traditional faith people run businesses that are public accommodations and general services.  They might think that their providing is promoting the sin of the customer.  While some libertarians have defended those who do not want to provide such services, arguing that others are willing to provide them, this argument will not be upheld in today’s courts.  However, cases have been won even in the Supreme Court, to free people from that which endorses and celebrates or requires using one’s creative art to represent or support alternative lifestyles. 

However, we should be aware that today’s alternative lifestyle movements do not just seek civil rights and a live-and-let-live society.  It is the commitment of many to marginalize and see the rejection of those who do not celebrate and embrace alternative lifestyles.  This is one of the great civil rights battles of our time, the full civil rights of the people of traditional Christian and Jewish faiths, and perhaps the Muslim faith as well.

Islamic Fascism

Some years ago, I got into an argument with a famous theologian about Islam.  Basing my argument on an amazing book, Islamic Jihad, by Andrew Bostom, I argued that it would be difficult for Islam to reform because its foundational texts have so many calls to conquer the infidel by war and even endorse and demonstrate very gross violence, torture, and beheadings, etc…  He called me a textualist and argued that we could not evaluate Islam on the texts.  A reformed Islam need not give literal interpretations that require following these texts.  I argued that he was right In part because many Muslims find a way to not orient themselves to violence and conquering, but whenever there is a return to being faithful to the origins there is a return to violence and the sword to conquer.  Bostom argued that again and again in multiple places, Islam would return to such violence.  Religions often develop movements that promote a return to be faithful to the literal scriptures and the early patterns.  In Christianity, this is often a return to a semi-pacifism.   Reading Luke 6 and Yeshua’s words on love for our enemies is a case in point.  Just war theory from Augustine did require some serious interpretation.  He argued for only defensive war. Christianity that conquers by the sword is contrary to Yeshua for sure.

Recently I read a book by a secular Muslim or former Muslim.  He does not say.  He was a radical Islamic Fascist.   Abdel-Samad Hamed has written an amazing book that goes over the history of Islamic violence and terror, conquering by the sword, beheadings, rapes, and tortures.  It is a frightening book.  From the 7th Century to the 20th, this very comprehensive presentation gives the lie to the idea that Islam has been primarily peaceful.  He is careful to not tar all Muslims as jihadists.   However, there are enough radical fascists who seek a world Muslim caliphate that we should be concerned.  In Hamed’s view, the West does not face what they are up against.    The truly moderate Muslims who would desire a reformed and peaceful Islam that lives in pluralism and mutual toleration with other religions, are in fear of the radicals and do not stand up and fight as they should.  Some who have done so have been killed.  At the risk of his life, Hamed stands up. I note he lives in Germany and fights the battle there. The fascist element includes the desire for a strong dictator as the way of government to enforce Islamic law on society, Sharia.

After the October 7th massacre in Israel, the World still does not get it.  They worry more about Gaza civilians, many of who have accepted radical Islamic Fascism as their own position.  Israel does worry about the civilians but worries more about the Islamic Fascists who have attacked them.  The West is still in denial.  There is a division between Shiite Islam and Sunni Islam, but both have strong fascist movements.  While some fight each other, for example, The Islamic State/ ISIS fights the Iranian-backed Shiite Iraqis and Syrians. In the present war against Israel, some Sunnis align with Shiites, for example, Iran and Hezbollah in Lebanon with Hamas, the Sunni group in Gaza.  I suppose they think they can fight it out later, but destroying Israel and the West comes first.   

When we think of the vast size of the Jihadist Fascist movements, it is alarming.  We begin with those who surround Israel.  First are Hamas and Islamic Jihad to the south in Gaza, Hezbollah in Lebanon, and Islamic groups in the West Bank.  The Islamic groups also have dominant control in Syria and somewhat in Iraq.  Then there is Iran itself, a terrible almost nuclear enemy of the West and Israel.  Turkey under Erdogan plays a double game and acts as if he is with the West, but I believe is really an Islamic Fascist.  Then we have the movement in Africa, Boko Haram and Al Shabab.  It is terrible in Northern Nigeria and the Horn of Africa.  Al Qaida still exists as does ISIS.   The slaughter in Africa is terrible.  We also see such movements in Chad and even Mozambique.   Farther away, Afghanistan, Pakistan, India (not a Muslim nation), Malaysia, Indonesia, and the Philippines (not a Muslim nation) have racial Islamic Fascist movements.  The democratic nations of the West have not begun to face this, but their governments are still in denial.  This cannot be defeated without a clear understanding and all-out effort.

Will this lead to the final war?  George Otis Jr., Walid Shobat, and Joel Richardson argue that the last war against Israel that leads to the return of Yeshua will be Islamic.  Maybe.  This now requires great prayer.  There is some significant Gospel progress in some of these nations, especially Iran.  Let’s also pray for this.

ONE WHO WAS WOKE FROM WOKE

Batya Ungar-Sargon is a high-up editor with Newsweek Magazine.  This is a pretty prestigious position.  I found out about her from an article in the Jerusalem Post.  In the article, she professed that she had awakened from being part of the woke leftist side of thinking and opinion.  I was so impressed by the article that I bought the book that was featured, Second Class.   The book so well fits my argument on economics in my book Social Justice.  Ungar-Sargon is a mystery person.  She is an Israeli, but is she Arab or Jewish or a descendant of a mixed marriage?  She keeps her history private.

I begin with what I argued in my book.  I argued that believers are to be engaged in fighting for good laws in society that are more in accord with the Law of God but only evangelism and revival can change the consensus to have Law that is more in agreement with the Bible.  We, the Body of the Messiah, are to be engaged in all of culture but live out according to one’s own unique calling in life.  One part of my book argues that we should support the economic system that best lifts the greatest number of people to adequate provision.   We are to be concerned for the poor, the working class, and the middle class but with policies that really work.   In this, I argue that only a rightly regulated free enterprise system can create wealth expansion to lift people, but that the concentration and power of wealth in a very few is wrong.

Ungar-Sargon was a woke leftist but got more truly woke and was delivered from woke leftism.  She was delivered by studying the working class, lower middle, and middle class, but also did not ignore the poor. She did address the attitudes and beliefs of the upper middle class and the rich, the elite.  What she found changed her life outlook.  I have often said that the woke are actually just the opposite of being woke but are more like the zombies who became such by being infected by the seedpods in the great sci-fi classic, The Invasion of the Body Snatchers.

Ungar-Sargon found that the policies of the elite in both political parties have been bad for the middle and lower middle classes.  It has deprived them of their potential to attain the American dream economically.  The dream is that by honest work, one can own a home, provide for a family, have a decent modest annual vacation, and save for a comfortable retirement.  This includes healthcare. This was much more attainable 40 years ago.  She details the many policies that have undercut these classes.  I will not detail them all.  Three of them stand out.  One is free trade. This has enriched corporate titans and stockholders at the expense of workers.   The theory was that free trade would lead to specializations where countries would do what they do best, and the U. S. would have more high-paying tech jobs and services.  I read this argument years ago and thought that someday in India they would do the tech jobs at a fraction of the cost, that good-paying union jobs would be shipped overseas, and that it would backfire.  This was a big issue in the Ross Perot campaign for President in 1992.   Indeed, the great industrial jobs were lost, China grew greatly and America’s high-paying blue collar jobs decreased.  Wages were lowered over time and did not keep up with inflation.

The second is mass immigration which suppresses job opportunities.  To say one wants to regulate immigration so as not to suppress the wages of the lower middle class is said to be racist.  But it is not racist, but reasonable.  Mass illegal immigration has been terrible for poor blacks and lower-middle-class citizens.

Finally, she comes against the direction of society that one must have a college degree. Job after job is limited to those with a degree though there is nothing in the job that requires such an education.  Tens of thousands are spent on colleges with no purpose other than to enrich the education establishment.  Jobs are refused to those who more than are capable of doing the work. In addition, training people for jobs in apprenticeships and through trade schools is much more fitting for most people.

She finds that working people have much commonsense wisdom.  They really do not care about what political elites care about, are not racist, and want a social structure where all can get ahead.  Then she finds that the concerns of the elite left are just not relevant to most people.   She finds that DEI (Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion) programs make little difference in lifting people but cost a lot of money.  Transgenderism is just not of concern to the working class who see it as a diversion from their concerns.   They are more than live and live-oriented but want to see policies that really work.  She finds that stable families are more important than race as a factor in success by far.   White privilege is way overstated.

Then, horror of horrors, she found that Trump’s policies of bringing jobs back and expanding opportunity really worked.  Ending free trade for fair trade, enterprise zones, and stronger immigration policies were good for the working class.

One could say that Ungar-Sagan became truly woke and is now a champion of the working class which has been abandoned by the Democrats and not yet adequality championed by the Republicans.   For a Biblical worldview orientation her book is hardly adequate, but it goes in the right direction and is in my view closer to a Biblical social justice position.

Loss of the Moral Vision of the West

The protest movement against Israel’s war against Hamas in Gaza is the most bizarre protest to my knowledge.  We studied protest movements as part of history; the protest that led to the beginning of English rights and the Magna Carta in 1215; the protests leading to the American Revolution in 1776;  the protest storming the Bastille leading to the French Revolution in 1789; the protests leading to the Russian Revolution in 1917; the anti-Vietnam war Protests in the late 1960s and early 1970s, and we can name so many more.  Most of them were for some kind of political social rights or greater economic equality.   These movements may not have been solidly based on good religious, economic, or social views, but there was some level of coherence and the people were usually professing, foundationally, the same goals or values.  But this is not the case with these protests. 

For one thing, the protests are more based on mega lies more than any other I have ever studied.  And secondly, the protests bring together three very different groups.   The first group is the Islamic Fascists, who believe in the dictatorship of the Caliph or Muslim rulers world Caliphate.   Hamas and its world partners, Boko Haram in Africa that kills and tortures Christians, ISIS in Iraq and Syria, and other such groups seek to violently overthrow the present order of the West and replace it with the Islamic Sunni world state.   Hamas partners with another world movement of radical Shiite Islam led today by Iran and including its partners, Hezbollah in Lebanon, and the Houthis of Yemen.   Surely if these groups were to defeat the West, they would then turn to fight each other since this is an alliance against a common enemy, the enemy of my enemy is my friend, but they would no doubt resume their battle of over 1000 years against each other, Sunni against Shiite.  

The second group is the Neo-Marxists for whom Israel is the white colonial oppressor and the Palestinians are the darker oppressed group.  The Islamic Fascists may mimic the rhetoric for the sake of destroying Israel, but this is not their philosophical or political worldview.  They are good at manipulating media and knowing what these “woke” neo-Marxists want to hear to gain their help to destroy Israel.   Ultimately these two groups would fight.  One needs only to note that the oppressed in neo-Marxism include women gays, lesbians, and indeed the whole gamut of LGBTQ2+ people.  There are people that the Islamic Fascists would and indeed did, toss off buildings and stone.   Women would not have rights but would be covered as they are forced to do in Iran today.  Are the neo-Marxists too dumb to realize this or are they using the chaos to overcome the capitalist West and believe they can deal with Islam later?  After all, joining together produces just the destabilization they desire that Herbert Marcuse called for in his Essay on Liberation (1969).  When it is all destroyed,  a new society can be built.   The goal for these folks is not the destruction of Israel only, but of the American order and the Western order. This group includes Antifa and various radical groups.   Scholar revivalist Michael Brown said that this alliance is so incoherent that it is like Jews for Nazis or blacks for the KKK. 

The third group is all the naïve young people and not-so-young people who really believe these protests are about human rights, a national movement for Palestinians.  Many may not understand neo-Marxism and certainly, they do not understand Hamas, Hezbollah or Iran and their radical support for terrorism.  We have never seen a college population so uneducated and naïve and unable to think, weigh the evidence, and come to good, reasoned conclusions.  Education standards have declined drastically with the decline of the West.  These are just totally subject to the most gross propaganda and don’t even know what they are chanting, the meaning of intifada, or from the River to the Sea.  Yet it feels exciting to be in a chanting marching group for liberation!  

The propaganda attack against Israel is grossly immoral as can be believed.   It is lies from the father of lies at a huge level.  The nation of Israel is attacked by the Hamas movement whose charter and actions are genocidal by the United Nations Treaty on Genocide (1951).  The parallel to this was the genocide promotion and propaganda of the Nazis.  In the most bizarre Orwellian twist, whose promotion would even cause Orwell’s head to spin, the Islamic Fascists accuse Israel of genocide when they defend against genocide and do what they reasonably can to save civilians while prosecuting the war against the genocidal terrorists who showed their total depravity on October 7.  It is a reality reversal. 

The roots of this in Islamic radicalism are not hard to discover.  We have a long history of texts, genocidal war history, and murder that show us that this is only a more recent iteration of a satanic worldview.  However, the roots of Neo-Marxism can also be explained. For us in the West, how did this neo-Marxism gain such sway in our universities and then partner with Islamic Fascism, especially after the fall of the Soviet Union the revealed failure of Communism?  The key is to understand that this is the result of the loss of the moral vision of the West rooted in the Bible.  Once this has been abandoned, all kinds of false “isms” that are not well thought out, nostrums, fill the void.  The reasoning is emotional. 

The moral vision of the West was built up over centuries and was a joining of the best in Greco-Roman civilization and Biblical standards,  but then all was reformed by Biblical norms.  We see this in Augustine’s rules for just war that still inform the West.  We note that genocide was common in the warring tribes of the ancient world and even more recent times, in India, China, and Africa.  The idea of the worth of each human being, and standards for reasoning, evidence, and logic became part of creating the first universities.  The moral vision looked for a society where human rights and material provision could be made available for all who were diligent. It looked for a society where kindness, love, and law were established.  We note today that the importance of a lawful society and enforcing the law equally are today rejected and excuses are given for not enforcing the law. 

The loss of the moral vision of the West has produced Western leaders who have no moral courage.  This is seen in the university presidents that gave in to intimidation and bullying.  People with moral vision and culture do not give in to such tactics, but the culture-formation elite of our universities are largely morally bankrupt.  Only not giving in to bullying can stop bullying and intimidation. 

If we were thinking like FBI or CIA operatives the approach to fighting this movement would be, to paraphrase Eric Bern’s Games People Play, “Let’s You and Him fight.”  We could imagine getting the Neo-Marxists and Islamic Fascists to fight each other over women’s rights and gay rights.  We could envision getting the Sunni Muslim radicals to fight the Shiite Muslim radicals.  Sunni Isis is murdering Shiites in Iraq!  Then it could all fall apart. 

 

However, the above is tongue-in-cheek, though it would be a type of justice. Rather the only answer for this situation is a massive revival of Biblical faith in the West.  Only then can we restore moral vision, real education in universities, the enforcement of law, and the recovery of courage. 

 

The Government and Standards of the Body of Messiah, comments on Rev. 2, 3

In my book Passover, Key to the Book of Revelation, I give a reasonable interpretation of Chapters 2 and 3 as preparation for tribulation.  These letters fit the circumstances of the first century when they were written, but will apply in the last of the last days to prepare the worldwide people of God for the final Great Tribulation.  The congregations are exhorted to maintain passion for Yeshua, not lose their first love, and maintain moral purity and doctrinal truth.  The two actually go together.

The letters are written to the angel, or messenger of each congregation.  I argued that the angel addressed is the leader of the elders of the congregation.  A letter given to a heavenly angel would not have any effect for it has to be delivered to the messenger who can actually deliver it.  The messenger is the one that conveys God’s word to the congregation.  I also argued that we Westerners do not rightly understand the nature of the Body in these cities at that time.  It is not like what we call a local church today. By that time, some Church historians argue that when we talk about the seven churches we should see some as in the thousands. By that time, the signs and wonders with the progress of the Gospel led to thousands of believers who met in houses all in different parts of the city, but they were all linked together in an eldership of the city under a lead elder.  In the early second century, this lead elder was called the bishop.  He was not yet a monarchial bishop as in the later second century but governed with the elders of the city (Presbytery).   If this is a correct picture of the situation in the seven congregations of Rev. 2 and 3 and if the messenger is the leader of the elders and a bishop kind of figure, it would bring a clearer understanding of the circumstances of Rev. 2, 3.

The question is raised how some congregations could be both commended and then also corrected strongly for tolerating bad doctrine or loose morals.  The question is raised, who is being addressed as tolerating sin or error, and who is being called upon to correct it?  Two examples suffice to illustrate this point.  With regard to Pergamum, Yeshua says that they “Hold firm to my Name.”   They did not deny their faith even when one of their leaders, Antipas, was put to death.  They have withstood persecution.   This then leads to the question of how a people like this could also be rebuked for sexual immorality and of eating food sacrificed to idols, and the false gnostic doctrines of the Nicolaitans.  (This compromise with sin would fit the loyalty to the city rituals in connection to sacrifices to the city pagan gods and temple prostitution connected to the sacrifices even if the one gathering in the pagan temple did not actually go into the cult prostitute.)  If the congregation was just one gathering in a large house, how could this be possible?  However, if it was dozens or even many more gatherings in houses under an eldership of the city with a lead elder, then it is easy to see that some house groups could have allowed error to creep in.  The leader of the house gathering was compromised and compromising. The messenger is addressed as responsible for bringing correction or discipline.  We assume he could do so with the authority of the elders of the city over all the house gatherings.

We note the same kind of situation with Thyatira.  The commendation is amazing.  “I know your deeds and your faith and service, and that your last deeds are greater than the first.”  Wow!  This is a great commendation.  However, the contrast is stark.  They allow Jezebel to influence them, a false prophetess, who fosters sexual immorality and eating food sacrificed to idols.  This again could well be connected to compromise with the city pagan cult for the sake of civic loyalty but a loyalty contrary to faith in Yeshua.  Again, the angel/messenger has to bring discipline.

When we read these letters in the context of the congregation of the city having many gatherings and most being commendable, but some go astray, we can understand how great commendation can be joined to stark rebuke.  Submission to the elders and the lead elder of the elders is required if there is to be Body discipline.  This gives us a window to government and the importance of elders enforcing doctrinal and moral standards in the first century.

This is a warning for our day.  We indeed are called to enforce standards of good Bible doctrine and Biblical morals and not to compromise with the world or we can lose the Spirit of God, our lampstand of testimony.

Israel’s Radical Right Religious Nationalists Where should we as Yeshua’s Disciples stand? The First Century Zealot Movement, Parallel to Today

In the first century, there was a Messianic movement that believed that the way to see Israel’s redemption was to rise up against Rome in revolt and to cast them out of the Land of Israel.  They were the Zealots.  The Sadducees opposed the Zealots.  They controlled the priesthood and the Temple and were the party most in collaboration with Rome.  The Pharisees also mostly opposed the Zealots.  Many of these two parties believed that the Zealots would bring destruction upon Israel.  Indeed, this fear is manifest in the plan of Caiaphas to arrest Yeshua since the idea of proclaiming someone the Messiah could bring the wrath of the Romans, and the level of autonomy and rule that Romans allowed would be lost.  “You do not realize that it is better for you that one man dies for the people than that the whole nation perish.” (John 11:50)”  

Many think that Yeshua chose two disciples from the Zealots, Judas Iscariot, and Simon the Zealot. Of course, He chose them for a different path, but some think Judas never really left his Zealot leanings.  This may have been a factor in his frustration and betrayal.  Yeshua’s predictions about the destruction of Jerusalem were based on the failure of Israel under its leaders to realize their time of visitation in Him, and hence destruction would come. However, in addition, He no doubt anticipated that with His rejection, false Messiahs would lead Israel to destruction.  (False Messiahs did not enter by the legitimate door but were as thieves and robbers. (John 10:1 ff.)  At the time of His arrest, He warned that those who take up the sword would perish by the sword (Matthew 26:52.)  This could also be an anticipation of the terrible destruction that would happen due to the Zealot revolt.  They rejected Him and thus the Zealot revolt came. 

We can look back now and see the sad history.  After Rome offended the nation with an idolatrous standard set up in Jerusalem, the Zealots finally led a revolt and gained control of the nation.  The fight was valiant and the people resisted the Romans for four years, but then, alas, all was lost. 

 

Today’s Zealots in the Land of Israel 

We are today seeing the same spirit in the radical nationalist Orthodox Jews who believe that the way for Israel’s messianic redemption is to take all the land and remove the Palestinian Arabs.  As the late Rabbi Meir Kahani, who led the Koch Party, said, “They must go.”  “Take the whole Land by force,” is a good description of their program.  To achieve this, their young adults set up illegal outposts in Samaria and Judea (the West Bank) with the hope that they will become towns.  The State of Israel sometimes dismantles them and sometimes legalizes them under the pressure of their one major coalition partner, Otzma Yehudit (Jewish Strength), under Itamar Ben Gvir.  Some of these Zealots in West Bank towns/settlements abuse Palestinian Arab farmers, uproot trees, and do violence to them.  This is not to overlook the terrible violence against Jewish residents in these territories by Arab terrorists.  The zealots of today believe that the way forward is to act in faith and take the whole Land that is promised.  It is this faith action that is understood by them as the kind of faithfulness that will bring redemption.  Amazingly some Evangelical Zionists support this orientation.   I one time asked a zealot what should be done with the Arabs, and he said, “Kill them.”  This certainly is not the spirit of Yeshua and does not show the humility that should be our orientation on the basis of the teaching of the Bible.   Here are some biblical considerations. 

 

Attaining the Full Borders of the Land is a Conditional Promise

Deuteronomy 19:8, 9 clarifies that the full attainment of the borders of Israel was conditional upon obedience to the Covenant of Moses and obedience to His Torah/Law. “Carefully obey all these laws I’m giving you today.  Love the Lord your God, and always do what he wants you to do.  Then the LORD your God will enlarge your land as he promised your ancestors, giving you the whole Land he promised them.”  

For us as Messianic Jews, we add the important fact that our people have not yet repented and recognized Yeshua.   However, an Orthodox Jew should look at the Torah and say, do we measure up sufficiently to believe we can at this time attain the full promise of the Land?   Only about 1/5 of the Jewish population of the Land seriously seeks to obey the Torah.  One would expect therefore that we would have difficulty in attaining the full Land promise and that the struggles we are having fit the condition of the Jewish people of this Land today.  How is it that today’s Orthodox zealots do not see this?  Their actions may bring disaster, not redemption.  We add the rampant sin in this nation, the abortions, the support for homosexual sexual relations, the support for radical LGBTQ agendas, and more. 

This zealot orientation is noted by democratic nations.  I totally disagree with President Biden and his administration interfering with Israel’s elected government.  Senator Schumer calls for a change of government in Israel.  The Biden Administration points out their difficulty with Israel’s radical right-wing government leader partners and the zealot behavior in the West Bank and with the treatment of Palestinians by the Army.  They even want to sanction an ultra-Orthodox army division today over mishandling a situation two years ago under the previous government.  This is a terrible policy in the midst of this hard war we are now fighting.  This Orthodox army division is not made up of only the radical nationalists but includes the ultra-Orthodox.  They have a range from being against the existence of the State of Israel (Satmor) to being pro-Israel but not willing to serve in the army and finally those who will accommodate army service. For the anti-state Orthodox, the state delays the coming of the Messiah who alone can set up the legitimate state.   However, this essay is about the ultra-nationalist Orthodox.  These Orthodox need to read their Torah and realize that their program is foolish. 

The Biblical Picture of Today’s Return to the Land

In addition, the most important text on Israel’s return to the Land in this period is Ezekiel 36:24 ff which states that Israel will return to the Land before she is given a new spirit and the Holy Spirit within that will move them to be an obedient people.  Texts about Israel in the Age to Come describe the full borders of an obedient Israel at that time under the rule of the Messiah.  The borders are more extensive than from the Jorden to the Mediterranean!  But that is after this age.  In Zechariah 12 and 14, we read about war and the probability that we have not attained the full promise until the Messiah comes in Zech. 14 and until we look upon him whom we have pierced and mourn for Him (Zech. 12:10)

 

Supporting Israel to Act Pragmatically

What shall our council then be?  It is that Israel has to act pragmatically.  We on the one hand recognize God’s hand in regathering and hope in Amos 9 that we will never again be uprooted.  However, the government needs to make the best decision based on what is most likely to bring security to the people.  Arabs west of the West Bank are citizens of Israel and it would be well for Israel to be more just in the distribution of services, roads, infrastructure, building permits, and police protection.  What to do with the West Bank?  There is nothing in the Bible that says everyone has to be a full citizen of a state as developed in the 19th century.  Robust autonomy for Arab areas, no military arms, and passports for a type of residency could be linked to Israel or Jordan.  Or after a generation of education in peace, there could be a state, but this seems unlikely.  As for Gaza, it can be freed again as it was in September 2005, but only after a generation of education for peace with the Jewish state.  Until then the freedom can only be partial. 

These are difficult issues.  Though we can imagine solutions, there may not be one that can be implemented before the Messiah returns.  But we should resist the idea that we can take the whole land and expel the West Bank Arab Muslims.  “They must go,” is probably not going to happen!  This would bring the wrath of the world against Israel.  

For us, let us pray and believe for revival in the Land that will reach even to Gaza and the West Bank so that many Jews and Arabs will come to faith in Yeshua.