Dear diary,
When you have stability and security in life, you can afford to engage in deeper thinking. That’s why this current age is so ugly: the ruling class paints the people’s security as entitlement, so the people allow their security to be taken away, thus society becomes unstable, and nobody can afford to think more than cheap shallow thots.
Yesterday I ended my entry with a couple of Bible passages that I contentiously referred to as “pro-abortion”. The reason I did this is that the topic has been in the news lately. Everyone’s arguing about abortion again — it seemed to have stopped, or at least died down, for about the last decade, but now it’s back with a vengeance:
People’s eyes well up with tears and they declare in their squeaky mouse voice: “How can you murder a little tiny infant?” Then they school you about how the sperm and egg, mere moments after they have joined together in holy matrimony, develop a heartbeat and the ability to praise and worship God.
Now their opponents, the anti-life crowd (I like to use the pejorative labels “pro-abortion” and “anti-life” instead of “pro-choice” because I side with this side, and I think it’s more distinguished to give yourself the disadvantage: it’s like saying “My stance is so strong that you can present it in the worst light possible and it’ll still win the day”) — I say, then the pro-abortion mob counters with this argument:
“Well, if you care about life so much, and you think it’s so precious, then why don’t you help out all these mothers who are trying to raise up all these fetuses that you forced them to bear into poverty? For lo, you pass legislation that makes aborting a pregnancy illegal, and then you pass other legislation that bars any guardian of children from being able to support said children: there are no jobs that pay a living wage, there are no pensions, no social security, and the healthcare industry is a funnel towards bankruptcy. It’s like you’re saying ‘God forbid that this fetus dies peacefully: no! it must be dragged weeping into the broken world so that we can jail it or make it become a wounded war vet.’ Pardon me for raising my voice; I must remember that I am advancing an argument on behalf of all anti-lifers everywhere. Now allow me to summarize our point. Our question is this: Why bear children into a system that, for more than 2000 years, even after having solved the problem of food shortage & housing shortage & resource scarcity, cannot bring itself to learn the wisdom of redistribution but instead refuses to change its mantra from ‘slavery or death’?”
“Yourselves know how ye ought to follow us: for we behaved not ourselves disorderly among you; neither did we eat any man’s bread for nought; but wrought with labour and travail night and day, that we might not be chargeable to any of you. Not because we lack power, but to make ourselves an ensample unto you to follow us. For even when we were with you, this we commanded you: If any would not work, neither should he eat. For we hear that there are some which walk among you disorderly, working not at all, but are busybodies. Now them that are such we command and exhort by our Lord Jesus Christ, that with quietness they work, and eat their own bread.”
—II Thessalonians 3:7-12“Yeah, fuck off!”
—Officer Duke, from the film Wrong Cops (2013)
The most striking fact in this debate is that if we simply were to heal the economy — and I don’t mean anything fancy: just to guarantee that all basic needs are met — that alone would cause the abortion rate to drop so low as to be immeasurable. In other words: Mending the economy will eradicate abortion naturally. For people who are economically secure do not…
Blah, blah, blah: you get the picture. Or if what I’m saying doesn’t convince you, then who cares: you win.
But verse 11 in the above quote, which is attributed to mine enemy the Apostle Paul, bugs the heck out of me: “For we hear” he says, “that there are some which walk among you disorderly, working not at all, but are busybodies.” This interests me because it’s an attempt to show the evil of Jesus’ way. For Jesus was a communist who believed that we should feed and clothe and house every single person, no questions asked. Matthew tells us that Jesus said (5:40-42) “If any man will take away thy coat, let him have thy cloke also. And whosoever shall compel thee to go a mile, go with him twain. Give to him that asketh thee, and from him that would borrow of thee turn not thou away.” Whereas Paul splits hairs about whether each recipient is worthy: he warns his readers about those who prefer freedom to slavery; those who refuse to labor when he whips them: he slanders these rebels as “disorderly” and calls them “busybodies”.
OK, but if disorderly means undesirable, then what’s so attractive about order? Didn’t the Nazis follow orders? Following some so-called order is what got us to the point where we’re all bankrupt & homeless: for it would be unfair to the rich if we forgive all debts and fairly distribute resources; and just forget about the fact that wealth, as well as the economic system that bottlenecks it, are entirely manmade. The first letter of John says:
Beloved, believe not every spirit, but test the spirits whether they are of God: because many false prophets are gone out into the world. (I John 4:1)
I think we should do the same for the billionaires. Believe not every orderly taskmaster, but test each billionaire to see if he’s got humanity’s best wishes in mind when he attempts to cheat you. (Hint: ALL billionaires shall prove themselves wrong, until the day when no one’s not a billionaire — and I don’t mean that everyone must be absolutely equal: I mean that no man is worth even TEN, let alone 400 times more than his fellow.)
And what is a busybody (the other Pauline slander for non-worker)? “A meddling or prying person; an officious or inquisitive person.” OK, so if a fascist is defined as “a follower of a political philosophy characterized by authoritarian views with no tolerance for opposing opinions,” then who but a fascist would dislike those who pry, meddle, & officiate inquisitively? My point is that a busybody is not necessarily the lowest calling in the galaxy.
But I do understand why the term itself is disliked. It annoys me that St. Paul has lured me, yet again, into defending an idea that I’m not even inherently attracted to, just because he took a stance against it. (A good way to get me to be anti-abortion is to have St. Paul write a pro-abortion epistle. But so far only Job and Jeremiah did that; and I like those guys — and I should specify that I mean the POET who wrote the Book of Job, not so much the character; also, in truth, I’m not the biggest fan of Jeremiah, but I identify with his whiny carping attitude; thus, insofar as his personality overlaps with Nietzsche’s, I welcome my prodigal.)
Busybody. This word seems to be a compound of two smaller words: “busy” and “body”. Think of “busy work” — is that EVER a good thing? A body that’s busy; a person who’s busy: a businessperson — is THAT ever a good thing? But isn’t it strange that, in the letter’s context, while aiming to denote “the antithesis of one who works”, Paul ends up dangerously close to our modern businessman? Maybe it’s not too weird after all. (What’s weird is that I’m attempting to defend these leeches.)
Now I wonder: would Paul consider office work worthy of earning a meal? Or would he say: “No, only tentmakers should be blessed by God.” In other words: I wonder if the Apostle Paul was a capitalist who would’ve sided with the manager class & the rentiers, OR if he was actually only another dirty advocate for the Labour Party.
After these things Paul departed from Athens, and came to Corinth; and found a certain fellow named Aquila, lately come from Italy, with his wife Priscilla; and Paul came unto them. And because he was of the same craft, he abode with them, and wrought: for by their occupation they were tentmakers. (Acts 18:1-3)
So Paul befriended Aquila and Priscilla — or instead of befriended maybe I should say: Paul lodged at the house of Aquila and Priscilla (“he abode with them”) — on account of their shared occupation. I imagine Aquila & Priscilla meeting the Apostle for the very first time and asking him “What’s your line of work?” and I imagine Paul answering “Are you questioning whether or not I’m gainfully employed? Well I’ll have you know that I graduated from Harvard with a degree in tentmaking. Therefore tentmaking is my career. And how about yourselves — what do YE do for a living?” and then I imagine Aquila and Priscilla admitting “We are tentmakers by trade, as well,” and then awkward silence follows.
But I also wonder if “tent” was sort of a code word. For the term “tabernacle”, in the King James Bible, acquires a sacred connotation, due to its being reserved exclusively to refer to Jehovah God’s tent. (If you are a nomad, you live in a tent; & if you fashion a deity in your own image, this God will require a tent when he dwells among you.)
And the LORD spake unto Moses, saying: Let them make me a sanctuary; that I may dwell among them. According to all that I shew thee, after the pattern of the tabernacle, even so shall ye make it.” (Exodus 25:1; 8-9)
Now what is a tabernacle? It’s “a movable habitation.” To me, that’s a synonym for tent. So, roughly 15 centuries after Moses built God’s tent, the Apostle Paul, contemporary of Jesus and fellow adherent of the religion of Moses, defines himself as a tentmaker — isn’t this the same as someone roughly 15 centuries after Christ defining himself as a cultmoger or crafter of new religions?
And another funny thing is that the word “nomad” is a synonym for “homeless person”, therefore tents and tabernacles are homes that are not homes. “Jesus saith unto him: ‘The foxes have holes, and the birds of the air have nests; but the Son of man hath not where to lay his head’.” (Matthew 8:20) Thus, one who spins religions is like a busybody performing busywork: a modern businessperson (or con artist), whose creations are ultimately worthless, albeit boasting the placebo effect.
CONCLUSION:
Merrily, life is but a dream.
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