Luther and Liberalism

December 19, 2019 Hunter Wallace Christianity, Liberalism, Religion 108

This article at Patheos this morning has drawn my attention to another article on Luther and the origins of liberalism by Korey D. Maas in the July/October 2019 edition of Concordia Theological Quarterly:

Concordia Theological Quarterly:

“What we have on the table, then, are three interpretive and evaluative options. Characterized with gross simplicity, they are as follows:

1. Luther was a proto-liberal, and that’s a good thing.

2. Luther was a proto-liberal, and that’s a bad thing.

3. Luther was not a proto-liberal, and that’s a bad thing.

If for no other reason than symmetry, though, a fourth option deserves to be in the mix, which is that Luther was not a proto-liberal, and that’s a good thing. So far as I am aware, however, no one is setting forth in any serious or sustained fashion the argument that (to revise Deneen) “liberalism is constituted by a substantive set of philosophical commitments that are deeply contrary to the basic beliefs of Lutheranism,” and therefore we ought to be “wary of [its] basic premises.”40 Perhaps it is an argument that cannot convincingly be made. Or perhaps it can be, but we have so accommodated ourselves to liberal modernity that we would rather not entertain it too seriously. That it is not currently being made, however, means that there is at present no “Lutheran Showdown Worth Watching.” But I leave you with the suggestion that it is a showdown very much worth having.”

I agree it is a showdown very much worth having.

Martin Luther was not a proto-liberal. It is a Catholic myth that the Reformation inexorably led to liberalism. The Anabaptists were the most radical fringe group that came out of the Reformation. Today, Anabaptists are the most socially conservative religious group with the highest birthrate in the United States. The Amish population has exploded since the 1960s. In fact, the Amish are projected to overtake the current American population in 200 years.

It was the issue of indulgences that sparked the Reformation.

Martin Luther was a pious Augustinian monk who objected to the idea that the wealthy could purchase forgiveness for their sins. He was offended by the corruption of the Renaissance Papacy which was owned by the Medicis. It was Rome that was liberal. The effect of the Reformation in what is now Germany was to promote marriage and family and to do away with the monasteries and convents that promoted celibacy among the upper classes. Instead of going into the clergy and becoming celibate or keeping a concubine, intelligent people were encouraged to get married and have lots of children and to become literate in order to read the Bible.

Lutheranism made Northern Europe more literate and industrious than it had been under Catholicism. It did not lead to liberalism. Just the opposite is true. The result of the Reformation was the territorial state. Far from weakening the state, which is the object of liberalism, it strengthened the Lutheran monarchs and princes and led to absolutism in the region. Luther preached obedience to the state and brought it into the life of the church. Far from leading to religious tolerance, which is also an objective of liberalism, it led to religious homogeneity and the expulsion of non-conformist minorities who were labeled schwärmer or fanatics. Luther condemned all his enemies in the harshest terms whether it was Catholics, Jews, Muslims, Reformed, Antinomians or the Anabaptists. The Jews were expelled from Electoral Saxony in his lifetime and he literally died condemning the Jews in his last sermon in Eisleben.

The Reformation overlapped with the Age of Discovery, the Renaissance and the Scientific Revolution. There were other important things going on in Western Europe in the the 16th century. The roots of liberalism can be traced back to the rediscovery and translation of classical texts in this period that revived naturalism, skepticism and materialism and the development of modern science and technology that discredited the cosmology of the Medieval world which was based on Aristotle and Ptolemy. It was making sense of these developments that inspired modern philosophy in the 17th century. The development of seafaring global commercial empires by England and the Netherlands led to population growth and made London and Amsterdam into the first large modern cities. Luther was an Augustinian. John Locke was a Pelagian. It wasn’t Luther that led to Locke. It was the empiricism that was the foundation of his philosophy.

The Republic of Letters which was the forerunner of the Enlightenment wasn’t Protestant or Catholic. It was a secular intelligentsia that developed long after Luther’s time when the first scientific institutions like the Royal Society and the French Academy of Sciences were being established in the late 17th century. Liberalism was essentially an attempt to create a new moral paradigm that was grounded on the new science. In total contrast to Luther and Augustine, it was based on an optimistic view of mankind that holds that man is born good and isn’t tainted with Original Sin and is only corrupted by society and that reason and the will is capable of discerning and acting on the good or that we are sanctified through our works or that our society is progressing and becoming morally better all the time.

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108 Comments

  2. You know what Lutheranism led to, HW? The Thirty Years War, one of the most devastating conflicts in Western history. Germany never fully recovered from it and in terms of genetics Europe was left permanently altered by it.

    And to be honest I find the idea of keeping a concubine or two rather appealing.

      • The lesson is that religious fanaticism and hypernationalism are both harmful to race and civilization. A sensible, moderate approach is advisable in dealing with any problem.

      • Well more wilson’s disingenuous referendums feeding irredentism as well the reichsbank’s inflationary policy

        On the 30y’s war, i see it as irrelevant. Why? Luther wasnt the 1st to question it nor from the non-african angle

        By the same logic, the germanic tribes are responsible for rome’s mismanagement or Jesus for just war

        After all, just war didnt takeoff in any theory so popular till augustine

        What are 1400y to the 1870s intl code, europol, NATO simply since none the popes nor kings utilized the approach over this course?

        Or by the same logic, it is Plato’s fault that Alexander imported persian ideas & brought jews to india? After all he arose on denouncing the trial of his teacher who “corrupted” the youth & aristotle taught alexander but that he hated alexander, forced to flee under an oligarchic proto-modern state like that of 1500s italy ongoing guiseppe doesnt matter?

        Even the alleged scriptural openness accusation as behind 1789 holds more weight

        Wars happen. I mean…

        Besides, they didnt shift as much he alludes

        Those who did did so not only w/in europe but contributed+assimilated

        Walloons to urbanization (not planning), these were less ethnic grounds the ease by which they integrated than religious. Culturally it was minute

        if jews are the issue, they were here prior

      • National Socialism did nothing wrong. Hitler made a lot of mistakes. He should have purged all Jews from Germany and Austria, and the slowly work outwards. He, alas, didn’t do what he’s been slandered with.

        JEWS wrecked Germany. Period. The end.

    • Germany had well and truly recovered from it by the 20th century. It was only some very poor decisions made in the last hundred years – above all the “Great One’s” decision to gamble it all in ’41 – that dealt Germany a blow from which it may never recover.

      • I dont believe i disputed that

        my issue is the statism not the anti kike sentiment

        though brutal, spd did it to emselves

      • Hitler was too conservative in his military thinking. Unfortunately, it didn’t workout.

        Brezhnev in his memoirs openly admitted that the USSR was planning to attack Germany while it was distracted and weakened in Western Europe and North Africa. That’s why the German Armys encountered enormous Soviet forces immediately after initiating Operation Barbarossa, and why the Wehrmacht captured so many Soviet prisoners in the summer of 1941.

        Silver, stay in your lane. You do not know of what you speak.

        • Nobody disputes that the Soviets were building up their forces. They signed the non-aggression pact to buy time to do precisely that.

          The question is whether they would have launched an invasion. The evidence for that is very thin.

          Even if the Soviets attacked, Germany’s chances in a defensive war, in which their lines of communication were not overstretched, would have been much better than the Hail Mary attempt of Barbarossa.

    • “And to be honest I find the idea of keeping a concubine or two rather appealing.”

      Spawn, what does your wife have to say about that? LOL

      “The roots of liberalism can be traced back to the rediscovery and translation of classical texts in this period that revived naturalism, skepticism and materialism and the development of modern science and technology that discredited the cosmology of the Medieval world which was based on Aristotle and Ptolemy.”

      HW, you really need to read Michael Hoffman’s “Occult Renaissance Church of Rome.” I think it would help your rather one-sided attempt to deify a German Augustinian monk who had a stubborn streak….

      • Vindication isnt the same as Deification nor at least necessarily – in all cases adulation

        I do as noted elsewhere find the coupling of liberalisms here problematic which is prolly why i fit better at id dixie

        That said i dont think it is his conclusion he got wrong

        I can get over the liberal historiography beefs to hit at the real issue – expelling leftism

        note i didnt say expel leftists. Advocates of leftism…im not looking for an inquisition so much as recognize we need secession…though i enjoy woods, i think nullification died with the 14a so itll involve revolt

        Inevitably also a purge. Ive no issue with that but by that i mean drag the military bureaucracy, congress, judiciary, presidents etc by their napes along with any legalized or visa greencard asylee …make em fight cia agents as a collosseum outta their thai black site or just drop em into the ocean

        Tbh ressentiment can be dangerous which i dont mean as a pacifist so much as strategy

        Thats why prosecuting statists as block notes is imho naive but due process in birthright assumes validity in legalization in the 1st place under a document that im sorry but to paraphrase molyneux is like paying a bodyguard to beat you up or id call thief watching the henhouse – wolves made to chickens, coyotes into pigs leading sheep

        Any case sad as it is i think the violent will be inevitable for man acts on desperation & till then, itll accelerate

        The shorter the tyrannical democidal mass persecutory draco stage the better to move past

        Then that incumbency befalls the same fate while eternal truths thatve woven empire to empire like torch in father to son continues

        Do i believe thatll see ancap? Sadly no but laws can be abolished – laws cannot undo the genocide of white demography nor the cultural deterioration. If there is no culture there is also no market but weve sold away our heritage for a quick buck ironically under the dogma of profit shame. it is the corporatist multicultural dialectic any democracy – a form of state conceptualized mechanistically (epistemic implies general will or liberty as this is inherently then antidemocratic in abstract as well concept?) Relies upon to manipulate, herd, buy votes & throw you to the gators in the name of gramscian retribution

  3. 350 million Amish in North America by the middle of the 23rd century, HW? That is arguably the most absurd prediction I have heard this year! But even if it turns out to be true it doesn’t matter, since they are not taught to be racially conscious. So by 2250 we shall have 350 million people who are part Amish and part Romulan.

      • Yes we need more racially aware wignats, not more white people having babies and living a pious life free from material goods and social media

        I doubt we will have multi racial star trek future to look forward too considering what liberalism and crony capitalism has wrought spahn but who knows… a part amish romulan? I doubt religious freedom will be granted especially Christianity, only space Judaism, atheism and scientific thought allowed

    • Great video, except for ONE SMALL THING.. the world ‘alone’ truly IS IN NO EXTANT N.T. MANUSCRIPT.
      So, while the author of the video did a GREAT job lambasting Francis the Heretic, this foundational error still has not been dealt with.

  5. You dont take several factors into account that I would be interested in hearing your take on. Perhaps Luther did prefer homogeneity but Lutheranism has not remained so. Theres conservative and liberal branches. Arguably thats because of liberalism itself, but even Luther expressed frustration that in his own time others were using his reformation to do their own reformation. From what I know, admittedly very little, Luther’s revolution didnt lead to homogeneity. At least not globally.

    The argument from people like me isnt that Luther was a through and through Liberal. In fact, being a product of his time he looks like an illiberal extremist. But thats relative. As i see it, the very act of divorcing yourself from authority rather than reforming it internally is liberal. Maybe just the faintest spark of liberalism in an otherwise illiberal movement but as we have learned thats about all it takes.

    The act of morally removing authority from the church by appealing to scripture alone, in practice, meant that the individual was the authority because the individual must then interpret scripture for himself. Again, that is a more liberal mindset in practice if not necessarily in theory.

    Im not sure I could say conclusively that Luther’s reformation was responsible for liberalism generally, but I still think it’s reasonable to consider it possible and i certainly would say that either way it had many liberal characteristics to it.

    But I would he interested in hearing your take on these things. Hopefully you havent addressed them already and I just missed it.

    • 1.) Lutheran Europe was as homogeneous as Catholic Europe. Lutheranism was the state religion and other religions were banned until the 19th century.

      2.) Lutheran Europe gradually ceased to be homogeneous after the Enlightenment in the 19th century when religious tolerance was adopted.

      3.) Luther’s position was that the princes should always be obeyed and he famously encouraged the princes to put them down in the Peasants War. The Scandinavia states and the German states were all reformed internally.

      4.) Absolutism was the opposite of liberalism and that was the form of government which tended to be predominant in Lutheran Europe.

      • Absolutism was the opposite depending on where you were or when

        Louis held moral absolutism but it wasnt just in the early phases economic – aristocrats were pissed with him with the exception outside physiocrats, a selfprofessed pennypincher who taxed peasants extra

        Compare that to the civic humanism that found its roots in stuart england however futile or overstated or mischaracterized magna carta was

        The social contract prominently core in locke or montesquieu were waaay prior the switch to a constitutional monarchy in the uk

        It was these stuart ideas that drew from continental roman ideas yes ok behind natural law but were quickly enough turned civic by the tudor era under westminister confession

        That was when tort extended to just price – ok yes also exactly same lineage as praxiology or communism but again both not only aquinas but also augustine

        So really EVERYBODY INFLUENCED EVERYBODY

        But usually is socrates / pythagoras vs plato-aristotle it all goes back to

        Aristotle then formed origin of both social contract as well common law if again thru a scotan mod…aristotle writing on monarchy describes liechtenstein or the saxons but neither bourbons nor stuarts

        Plato reflects luther maybe best – no statesmen but still a state essentially

        Then stoics though hegel denied it were behind the hermetic revival that also saw vattel as behind the un or civitas maximas or repurposement of montesquieu on trade for dyadic wolfowitz doctrine

        These happened postlocke though technically not by having read the hermetic revival

        These stoic hermetic ideas that the peripatetics opposed were considered after the churchs shift west considered heresy with exception to paris under 1 bishop

        So it isnt just classical liberal vs neolib OR old left

        It is aquinas liberal vs civic humanist liberal

        In that sense, all human politic is either derived from ancient liberalism (conservatism) or civic liberalism that in locke classical brought neo or old left in ways as you note were at odd absolutism

        Social darwinism is an example of this liberalism logically coherent an empire approach

        Conquest glory etc though they only began citing it to justify or hofstadter to blast

        But survival of the fittest is essentially inequality as a natural aka nonattempt to rectify the laissez selection of favored breed aka eugenic from winning above the weak cuz it needs muh fairness

        Something that characterized louis’s shift from monarchy proper

        Other words republicanism is little better than condorcet full democracy – though sparta was more that

        But republicanism can then be split between machiavelli or the althing or saxons

        Vs

        Locke or magna carta etc

        1 was the holy roman empires dictum…

        Many the monarchs you cite being its product

        So…we all are in 1 sense or another

        But liberalism in that sense is far older

        Issue is social liberalism

        Social liberalism is something else than the eugenic origins in aristotlean induction

    • ” As i see it, the very act of divorcing yourself from authority rather than reforming it internally is liberal.”

      Ding, ding, ding! We have a winner!

      This was the whole thrust of Pole’s Defense of the Unity of the Church.” Of course, the Orthodox still say, ‘Rome was the first Protestant.’ So, Luther was just following his church’s praxis in this matter…..

      • Can you reform validity? No as validity is or isnt

        Can you reform power? no as power wants power & the leviathan simply captures, usurps etc

        Notice the 06 proconsumer bill that hurt consumers for instance

        It isnt just the reformers dilemma but reform that weakened validity

        It did NOOOOT weaken power

        The potus has FAR MORE power than the kings ever did

        So yes divorcing from authority is always bad. divorcing from power might or not be not as if the opposite is true ever but in that natural selection shows places like africa are both tribalistically violent as well due to multiculturalism in nigeria eg that foments it so really can it be anything else? on the other hand the west is built genetically for liberty. stewards, ralliers but leaders not rulers. God is the law instead. That is the concept of victor legibus

        beyond that reform FOLLOWED social laxation NOT CAUSED it INITIALLY

        It BECAME the MAIN cause of social degeneracy but then laxation isnt the same type of openness

        Openness as in plural or threshold?

        So it really a matter of democracy an ill that brought socialism from determinatio

        I cant say that then reform was unnecessary but what sense?

        What distinguishes islam eg from xianity isnt only distinction the types of laws (not the same as curia regis) but that you can reform so to say the norm to normed without God being mutable or malleability turned into autopoetic fluidity

        however xianity suffered a shift to wwjd. In that it saw the earthly formula enforcing this become a death sentence to the same tradition that sprung it

        That is the pendulum of a state

        It is however also then why xianity is more about the proxy for tradition than mere belief

        • Oi,

          I did like your comment that the President of the Unites States has more power than the kings of old. Technology, centralized taxing authority, police, etc. make this true.

      • Divorcing from power i dont mean as from glory even if i think nietzsches take on historiography is noteworthy per

        Natlism itself shifted while civic pacifism became its own jingo of a sense

        Offices are legitimacy. Caste like facts are valid

        If amnesty became law we would oppose it on grounds it is disorderly

        Is that thuggish or to be an outlaw? The rule of which laws?

        We can argue whether it is best enforced by law or not

        But that is a separate debate from whether they are the same

        Democracy is law. it is also egalitarian

        Monarchs werent legal. they were however authoritarian

        Reforms make it worse

  6. The roots of liberalism can be traced back to the rediscovery and translation of classical texts in this period that revived naturalism, skepticism and materialism and the development of modern science and technology that discredited the cosmology of the Medieval world which was based on Aristotle and Ptolemy.

    You say that like it’s a bad thing. The rediscovery of the classical texts was of great benefit as it was a rediscovery of our European/Western/White history and tradition after millennia of censorship by the Semitized Imperialist Church. Naturalism, skepticism, materialism and science are the closest humans can come to truth; despite what E. Michael Jones says, these lead to our best understanding of Logos, not first-century Flavian propaganda romances.

    Those who decry “materialism” are simply peddling superstition and failing Occam’s Razor (“Entities should not be multiplied without necessity”) in the most puerile way. Instead of observing reality, they create make-believe ghosts that they can neither prove nor even demonstrate. Mostly, it’s a failure of language and grammar. Et suppositio nil ponit in esse.

    There’s a simple, Biblical fix to superstitious supernaturalism.

    And God said unto Moses, I AM THAT I AM: and he said, Thus shalt thou say unto the children of Israel, I AM hath sent me unto you. – Exodus 3:13

    “I am” is the first person singular form of the verb to be. You are not supposed to take the Lord’s name in vain. So, go ahead and try to explain your supernaturalism without using the verb to be.

    Here’s a helpful guide:

    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/E-Prime

    Stop using the Lord’s name in vain and it will decrease significantly the falsehoods and nonsense you can express. Seriously, try it. You will be enlightened.

    Liberalism was essentially an attempt to create a new moral paradigm that was grounded on the new science.

    Liberalism was typically more concerned with ethics as opposed to morality. Liberalism is an expression of Anglo-Saxon cognition and social structure. There’s nothing wrong with liberalism. Liberalism is a white privilege and only white people can create liberal societies. After all, liberals are the real racists.

    • I spent a great deal of time looking into the origins of liberalism and it is clear to me that it developed in the 17th century as a reaction to modern science. It was not a product of the Reformation. Descartes, Hobbes, Spinoza, Locke and Leibniz were all responding to materialism, naturalism and skepticism rather than the theological issues raised a century before

      • Hegel hated newton as he assumed too empirical but it wasnt reductionist even though hume was imho spot-on critiquing his epistemology

        Yes they were responding to materialism but id not say they were antinaturalist

        Rather naturalism has several types. these were mainly latitudinarians, parsons, etc

        Newton in his ethos had several antimaterialist regards but it is more they were opposed to the commercialism due to supporting materialism as OPer characterizes in defense

        They were very much anti epistemological materialism

        But this has even more variants

        Voltaire blasted biological materialism vociferously

        Yet his doctrine was more or less a form thereof

        As to descartes, guy was INSAAAAAANE

        I honestly dunno whether atheist or not but he wasnt xian or if hed been he was playing devils advocate. personally just insane nutters loony is my gist

        Though i prefer old venetian like pre 1200 republicanism NOOOT civic humanism i cant help but find use in some the EARLY 1s like malebranche. im NOOOO fan of montesquieu though nobody i loathe more than rousseau

      • Yes also not theological issues…that said while i consider the use of natural theology (i said teleology somewhere else, meant theology) a good for sci as well a bastard misnomer

        The latter doesnt matter but fwiw it ought dispel preemptively any indication in counter what drove these guys

        Since what luther brought up was nonexperiental

        That said unless ive misread or skipover something as ive not slept in 3d, i didnt see him argue contra your article that luther caused secularism so much as how you got to it

        Ive seen you support absolute monarchy which could mean simply pre magna preyolk or as in anticonstitutional ancien regime but many ideas not crossover like your economic views are populist – i generally keep my mouth shut but my point here isnt a random critique however longwinded i am (caffeine after months of sobriety) than that i tend to see things rigidly but am on nobodys “side” here per se to get on nerves

      • Epistemology cannot be ideological or else it siezes to be science than wholly ideology but at this pt ill clarify my sorta weaseling between classical liberal & traditional conservative commenters here

        “Epistemological liberalism”

        Again yes yes a nonthing but bear with me

        In the sense it is empirical or intellectual rather than based on nichomachean ethics

        Aristotle is an example. He stood at odds the epicurean hedonism but also rejected socrates’ view on what is considered virtue or pleasure

        So by this i mean science though drawn from metaphysic, a reaction against mysticism

        As opposed to political liberalism

      • Again im sorry i need to refresh my mental faculties before posting anymore comments after this 1 so i think all i wanna say before submitting

        But so:

        in retrospect i should note not all nonempiricism is mystical in the mythical sense but piety overtook basic sci as we saw in WJB

        So what separates conservatism is piety intact but it does so by a method that contorts to the epistemology noted above

        Beyond that you could have a socially leftist dictator OOOOR a socially conservative communist but tradinistas…what? russia sees ethnonationalism.as heresy, eurasianism is semicivic. Other hand liechtenstein is as religious if not moreso than poland or hungary or finland w/o either the tendency towards censoring muh far right or gay antidiscrimination laws

      • The moral vs ethic brings us to how the bible saw judges

        Mores are a way. Moral an end in the sense of transcendance

        Both classical lib+conservatism reject an end as in a goal but not all CL is without ends be it whig (mill neo) or transcendant (barnes, rushdoony, voltaire)

        That is where it might be then best split between compliance or association

        A contract is power to the masses locke tried to optimize but also power to the state in drowning out the monarchy

        So this autonomy was seen as multilevel next in trifunctionality, family etc

        Property inherited between generations. castle doctrine dowries etc

        Though blut defined the nation as a tribe, what was built on land shaped geographic borders as a sovereign. This however while good in sense of civilizationism also meant a nationstate built upon nation would become merely a sovereign in intl law of states till another state wins a war, choosing to setup protectorate, decolonize leaving you with a buncha rugrat untermenschen & a full state model

      • When i clarify civic liberalism, notice i say state drowning out the monarchy

        The state wasnt the monarchy till later…by then was due to the liberalism be it a reaction-to using in france or concession like england

        Bible said judges not statesmen nor kings

        Saxon kings were like judges. Kings to fiefs as such, stewards

    • It is indeed not a bad thing but what was was which liberalism

      i take heavily from the classical liberalism sponsored by the church

      I however recognize that this must be demarcated

      Not only which liberalism but which usage of it

      Conservatism accepted this even pre-1776

      Also many variants of royalism in europe

      I would argue luther relied upon aquinas

      Thing is the naturalism in aquinas was more an aristotle commentary, the pieces on genesis not significant in his thought

      Beyond that, we can only say the conservatives who werent feudal era sense of it nor legitimist were proto smithian

      But not all liberalism is this

      Weber notes how the enlightenment caved

      He was a rationalist

      Same on voltaire a rationalist but in the same sense he opposed it

      So you are right but that doesnt change the conclusions

      Im defo more about analysis over synthetic so my tendency towards the libertarian shows

      But then this libertarianism was prominently antiegalitarian

      The enlightenment wasnt homogeneous so chaos theory isnt only scapegoaty but reductionist

      The good here was not what was derived into later rationalists

      I dont think it changes impetus of the later rationalists from the good old liberalism

      But we could say the same of ultraroyalism. Maybe a better Q is which development?

      One (nature) to 2: egalite/”positive freedom” vs order/liberty

      So artificial vs natural

      Organic nations aristocracy law

      Vs a concoction we are all equal

      it all goes back to genesis+athens

      Be it stoic or intuitionist or naturalist etc

      But leftism never influenced luther

      I think hunter is oft too hard on the old liberalism but in this filiation i got to which he intended & thats why i agree wholeheartedly

      It is why none us wish to …as if possible undo the enlightenment

      Rather we wish to darken aka return to aquinas…that revival era

      That was what sprung 3 in initiative: the post eastern churchs counterreformation, the reformation, correlationism

      What it did that bifurcated was a combo of errors by grotius, false allegations by hegel & teleological desires by eckhart

      Stoicism is not from aristotle. when i say it came from i mean:

      A: it made everyone a publisher+philosopher as a seen virtue (not wrong but not always right either…just wrong to crush it & wrong to conflate openness w/ plural validity)
      B: it too saw in plato what was a revision away from a largely monadic socratean philosophy into a revived pythagoras pitting khaldun or id argue even scotus wasnt truly nominalist

    • I am prolly an outlier like you on this site

      That said, leftists are dialecticians. They exploit diversity is why they need it

      You are right materialism is oft a lobbed empty label but so the reason is defining consumerism

      says law in theory seems anti commercial? But it isnt. it is axiomatic. neoliberalism was born of the weimar, schacht, fabian “market socialism”

      Antimaterialism is either a metaphysical take like that of bastiat or it is hegelian

      Irony of hegels antihedonism is it was the metaphysic in bastiat that drew conservative antimaterialism as well laissez faire but hegels antihedonism that produced an antihedonic tallpoppy syndrome as well interdependent exim, EET equilibrium, intl bodies thru the repurposement as much of corporate romanticism as counterboer imperialism

      the only difference in britains old labor was maninism but it was also the foundation of a frankfurt school beyond unionism. I agree again with you we needa differentiate these

      Nonetheless it is offtopic to the thesis no matter how correct you are

      • Oi,

        Have the people at Guinness Book of World Records contacted you? You may be presenting with the worst case of Asperger’s Disease anywhere or at the very least, you’re incredibly high on the autistic spectrum.

    • Stop worshiping a fake genetic background, [‘Anglo-Saxon’]of which you are most likely a miscegenate bastard, if we are looking at genetics- just like the rest of us.

      And, as Jews are not Semites… [“after millennia of censorship by the Semitized Imperialist Church”]

      https://www.darkmoon.me/2013/european-jews-are-not-semites-by-rehmat/

      …your idiotic and sophomoric comments about “superstitious supernaturalism’ merely show you to worship your own self as the Idol of your own imagination.

      The one thing that belief in Christ, and covenant membership in the Body of Christ clearly does, is restore fellowship with God the Father, and restore us to status as ‘sons,’ and not bastards.

      Which you clearly are.

    • Materialism is the outcome of Newton’s process of mechanization of the universe. It’s ultimately reductivism, atomization, and alienation. Alienation from nature, mind, and consciousness. If you want to construct an unnecessarily constricting box around your thoughts and perceptions, go ahead. And no, I won’t be proving anything to you based on your parameters. I’m not artificially limiting myself.

  7. I agree that traditional liberalism is a sin. It was repeatedly condemned as such in the 19th century especially by the Catholic Church. The Liberalism condemned was Classical Liberalism with its emphasis on equality, freedom, support for revolutions etc. What nowadays would be called Libertarianism, modern Conservatism, and the Republican Party.

    What is currently called Liberalism is Communism, degeneracy etc. That would be condemned as something separate from classical liberalism and is still evil. The current Left was condemned in Laws against Communism, International Socialism etc.

    I never thought that Protestantism led to liberalism. 18th century Britain still had disabilities on Catholics, traditional beliefs on male /female relationships, etc. Prussia was still conservative to the best of my knowledge.

    The American and French Revolutions led to the modern concepts of liberalism and the Left. The French Revolution was strongly against religion and was condemned by Catholic, Orthodox, and Protestant alike.

    Liberalism is a threat to all organized religions, decency, and social and political order. It goes against everything I hold dear.

    • Traditional liberalism was the church’s own project as well the bourbons at 1 point, the saxons as well the kingdom of venice

      Gop is neoliberal coming from mill

      It is also watered down lincoln trotskycon

      But equality is something else

      Doesnt that make the church, the ancien regime & machivelli sinners? The saxon monasteries?

      Even augustine had CERTAIN traditional liberal subsumptions & he built the church

    • Also prussia was civic

      Kulturkampf got backlash from ethnic rx

      Historicism in BOTH phases was not the old mercantilism but closer that of bretton woods

      Enlightened despotism was DIIIIIIIIRECTLY due to the enlightenment it got formulated

      Bismarck though not laicist & yes targeted catholics also targeted SOME proddies

      The common law of old was diluted & it ceded ground like a democracy to the left

      Haym was esp. adamant for hegel – the reason he was seen as an agent of the state

      Id DISPUTE THIS. That said there wasnt total absence truth

      Dont gemme wrong, bismarck was a GOOD leader & i like him

      But his conservatism was much closer to the gop under lets say taft or eisenhower than the old monarchs be they demaistre OOOOR saxons

      So that if anything fits the semi equality infusions as you note gop is guilty of

      But remember your randolph: “im an aristocrat: i love liberty, i hate equality”

      He was the biggest influence on russell kirk

      The assumption it is only american conservatism that syncretized this is a myth

      That THAT EITHER only happened by the 20c is ALSO a myth

      That the policies of EITHER antifed ooor fed were either-or is false too

      See what in paine is diff from wilson, wilson from hamilton, washington from adams or hamilton, jefferson not only akin paine but a particular protojacksonian strand in massechussets that broke both presidencies. even hamilton felt for the jacobins but stuff like copyright wasnt jeffersons idea to later be seen

      Things arent linear. Back to bismarck, the nobility largely got coalesced into a lower baronage

    • Though rousseau was an atheist (unlike hobbes), it is worth noting their opposition to xianity was w/ the exception of a closet atheist whose name i forget was a clergy guy too, deist

      Deism is the link to the grand lodge. masons suck

      But recall the cult of reason was “superseded’ by the cult of the supreme being

      That is since they also saw strict atheism generally as vulgar –

      Robespierre didnt…hed no issue but most jacobins did

      This isnt xianity. deism is mystical but secular

      My aim isnt to argue deism invalidates that line

      However just worth noting, so it was fideism

      Fideism was condemned as heresy

      This is also behind paine a deist too

      Both cults were supposed to replace xianity but atheism was seen as an aristocratic privilege to “pick+choose”

      The real consequence of 1789 is the abolished feudal framework

      But this was damaged by protomodernist kings at odds the antimodernism behind our views

      So the kings were not the same over time

      They like the enlightenment shifted towards these ideas as well

      Whether that is what fixed the economy — debt of versaiiles still a biggy or it is akin the reforms by tsar alexander ii that drove away the old aristocrats in his cabinet producing the tocqueville effect is the larger question as the liberal reforms it did do unlike the modernism came from official church doctrine anyway

    • Hanovers were already a democracy by the time we seceded

      It wasnt a monarchy as you might be thinking nor was parliament any longer an event

      So 1776 only provided the jumpstart for hope not the ideas themselves. Rather, both were products of if in different ways

  8. EXACTLY. Unfortunately mainline went for the altruistic bull as we see at pew – why black metal blasts the church

    I WOULD note he wasnt opposed ALL PRIMITIVE liberalisms https://mises.org/library/messianic-communism-protestant-reformation

    But as you note this was NEEEVER secularist

    He opposed a benedictine rule. he also however opposed secularism. anarchopapist sadly blames luther

    Thats like blaming salamanca for it but the church held traditionalist family values intact for centuries under that model

    Anticlericalism is to oppose clergy. antiecclesiastic to canon but he supported vehemently the mosaic over noahide if sans ceremonial

    I do think he misread paul but i agree on his concluded proposal

    This is all culturally. Economically? Also never liberal in anymore a sense than coolidge or kirk or the bourbon kings or saxons were

    Albeit more burkian so smith the neoliberal but even so

    he was thus less a demaistreian guy but no less that line of cultural thinking

    Calvin even moreso. Calvin said you cant impose earthly laws by the herd as the world is herded in irrationality. This chooses sin so instead of freely excommunicating you just mandate a neocatechon of sinful values

    Revolution of thought or regimes? We hold to pacifism or conserving the boomer generation but those old eras were far less dogmatic than is recalled

    They however knew the dangers of democracy

    Enlightenment wasnt 1 idea. That is why weber saw it needed to darken as yarvin notes

    Reason is killing us. we need order. that needs if in liberty to do so responsibly

    As such we need a monarchy. not a democratic hybrid nor an ancien regime that persecutes huguenots (disclaimer: my ancestors along w/ the bourbons who did this)

    Louis xiv said he is the state. Stole power from the church. Any coincidence it centralized nobles, bankrupted the nation in decadence?

    Simply put the balance is in finding how religion stays the crazy w/o becoming what it despises

    Is secularism anything per schmitt anything other than an inside out theonomy?

    Theocracies per rushdoony arent the same

    • Having known Rousas Rushdoony personally, may I make a suggestion? Learn proper grammar, punctuation, and sentence structure, before you post again. Oy…..

      • Fr. John,

        i agree. I am not sure what he is saying. Either way I go by my religion and it’s traditional condemnation of both classical liberalism and the Left. As well as how we define them..

        If someone disagrees and thinks liberalism and/or the Left are wonderful then they will definitely love the modern world.

        • So called “classical liberalism” was the seed that eventually grew into the tree, bearing its own kind of fruit, under which we live now. As Zippy Catholic was so apt to remind us during his life, the only sure remedy for liberalism of any kind or any variety is to repudiate it root and branch, or, as I am often prone to state it, “nip it in the bud.” Luther was a liberal, there is no doubt about that to my mind; he just didn’t like the fact that his rebellion against what he perceived as “unjust authority” or whatever (like a teenie bopper school girl rebelling against the authority of her father) was taken by a certain faction to its ultimate conclusion. But I really don’t care to argue over that point right now. Maybe later.

          • T. Morris,

            Some good points you made. I also understand picking your battles as well. I am surprised that this article struck a chord with so many people. A lot of comments here though half of them are by one person.

      • I see this all the time in the internet circles in which I fly. And those are generally the better of the internet circles, so there ya go. If it doesn’t all “run together” in a punctuation-deprived, capitalization-deprived, spacing-deprived senseless rant, every single (incomplete, punctuation-deprived) incomprehensible sentence is separated by double spacing. For what, effect? I own that I don’t know. My guess it that it ultimately ties to a rejection of authority when you boil it all down. I got onto one of my sisters for writing like this a few years ago, and she reacted by telling me that I was “behind the times,” that we’d “moved past all of that” and this and that. She can’t spell for sh*t anyway, and I was really just trying to be helpful in the way of advising her that she appeared to be “a lot stupider than you are” in writing. lol. She really isn’t very smart in any case, so I guess I should cut her a break.

  9. EXACTLY. Unfortunately mainline went for the altruistic bull as we see at pew – why black metal blasts the church

    I WOULD note he wasnt opposed ALL PRIMITIVE liberalisms mises[_]org/library/messianic-communism-protestant-reformation

    But as you note this was NEEEVER secularist

    He opposed a benedictine rule. he also however opposed secularism. anarchopapist sadly blames luther

    Thats like blaming salamanca for it but the church held traditionalist family values intact for centuries under that model

    Anticlericalism is to oppose clergy. antiecclesiastic to canon but he supported vehemently the mosaic over noahide if sans ceremonial

    I do think he misread paul but i agree on his concluded proposal

    This is all culturally. Economically? Also never liberal in anymore a sense than coolidge or kirk or the bourbon kings or saxons were

    Albeit more burkian so smith the neoliberal but even so

    he was thus less a demaistreian guy but no less that line of cultural thinking

    Calvin even moreso. Calvin said you cant impose earthly laws by the herd as the world is herded in irrationality. This chooses sin so instead of freely excommunicating you just mandate a neocatechon of sinful values

    Revolution of thought or regimes? We hold to pacifism or conserving the boomer generation but those old eras were far less dogmatic than is recalled

    They however knew the dangers of democracy

    Enlightenment wasnt 1 idea. That is why weber saw it needed to darken as yarvin notes

    Reason is killing us. we need order. that needs if in liberty to do so responsibly

    As such we need a monarchy. not a democratic hybrid nor an ancien regime that persecutes huguenots (disclaimer: my ancestors along w/ the bourbons who did this)

    Louis xiv said he is the state. Stole power from the church. Any coincidence it centralized nobles, bankrupted the nation in decadence?

    Simply put the balance is in finding how religion stays the crazy w/o becoming what it despises

    Is secularism anything per schmitt anything other than an inside out theonomy?

    Theocracies per rushdoony arent the same

  10. I cant refind the EXACT quote by calvin but it reminded me of neibuhr saying you cant impose justice in an unjust world or chesterton, break the big law then you get a bunch of smaller 1s

    https://www.9marks.org/article/the-story-of-john-calvin-and-martin-bucer/

    Ever read thomas molnar, hunter? Lookup god+knowledge

    I am deeply influenced by aquinas though i do feel molina isnt incompatible

    Though i prefer calvin (yes yes, i liking beatniks bash my own ancestors) over erasmus, worth noting the latter along w/ a catholic who joined my huguenots influenced cervantes

    Twain had it wrong. it bashed the protokeynesian aspects but it was more a macromonarch book than marxian critique of markets

    That in turn influenced jefferson

    I am an odd crossroads but i am a big fan of the reformation

    Molnar hits at as what marx said, left rises to heaven, the right descends

    • It’s not that you aren’t imparting a lot of interesting info, Oi, but it’s scattershot in appearance. Some of your references, and what you’re trying to get it, aren’t always easy to understand. You write in an elliptical, shorthand style. It’s a deep stream of consciousness, blasted at us out of a machine gun mind.

  11. Private Judgment has the germ of liberalism within it. It is a big mistake to presume that because a fossilized group like the Amish has roots in the Anabaptists that the Anabaptists were not the radicals of their time. Within our lifetime fossilized state Communism was called “right-wing.” Mennonites are not particularly right-wing, Matt Groening being a famous example. Hussite Bohemia became Calvinist Bohemia became Masonic Bohemia, now one of the most atheistic states in Europe. The state Lutheran Churches of Scandinavia have incubated the modern Scandinavian. From dissenter Protestantism to the political correctness of modern England is largely an organic development: including the special favoritism shown to Jews. Luther abandoned the concept of the priesthood, married a nun, abandoned 5 of the sacraments and the Real Presence, and set in motion private judgment. To call him a liberal or even a proto-liberal is anachronistic. To say that the conditions for liberalism to flourish were established by the Reformation is not an idea that can simply be dismissed. And not to get theological, but Justification by Faith alone is obviously opposed not only to Tradition but is flatly rejected in Scripture. In reducing religion to Faith alone, it destroys the basis for social obligation in a Christian society. Protestants could be ruthless slavers without any qualms, because they perceive owing nothing to their fellow man, since they are already justified. In Protestantism there is not only “free thought” implicit in sola scriptura (personal interpretation of scripture), there is also “liberty” in the libertarian sense of pure selfishness and sinfulness being justified by Faith. Sin boldly, judge the Bible for yourself. If Luther didn’t have land-hungry princes to protect him, how would he be remembered?

    • 1.) The Anabaptists were the radical fringe of the Reformation in their time, but anyone trying to go back and trace the ancestry of liberalism back to them won’t find a convincing case for that theory. They are the most socially conservative group of Europeans in the world.

      2.) Centuries later, the Lutheran state churches became infected with liberalism in the 19th century.

      3.) Prussia fought against the French Revolution.

      4.) The French Revolution exploded out of Catholic France

      5.) The reason that happened is because as I explained above the Enlightenment wasn’t Catholic or Protestant but grew out of the intelligentsia of that time which was reacting to the new science

        • spahnranch1969,

          He kidnapped the Pope and got him to crown him Emperor of France in 1804 I think, even though the lawful ruler was Louis XVIII. At the last moment Napoleon crowned himself showing that the people had voted him in and made him Emperor.

          Napoleon only barely tolerated the Catholic Church. He tried to make the principles of the Revolution a little less odious. That particular Pope was feeble minded and was recognized as such back then.

          Napoleon represented the principles of the Revolution, usurped a throne not his, and caused the deaths of millions. His unjust invasion of Spain particularly angers me. The Spanish people fought a holy war against the Revolution after their armies were smashed.

          That is where the term guerrilla came from. Little war or skirmishing. It is said that the Spanish guerrillas killed more Frenchmen than the Spanish and British armies.

          Yes, the Spanish from 1807-1814 were helped by the magnificent British Army with Wellington as the general.

          Napoleon lost most of his best soldiers in Spain and Russia .Two history lessons——–1. Do not attack our religion. 2. Do not invade Russia.

  12. It was the carmelites, partly the wesleyans later on, all the universal unitarians / quakers who ruined xianity

    Barth made it worse. I know my idol rothbard likes quakers but i cant…just cant

    Diggers they remind me of. Oh gawd

    I think johnson is right that when xianity means anything it means nothing

  14. Obviously ‘the Left’ is characterized by tearing down the traditional culture, being anti-hierarchical and anti-authoritarian.

    Luther, who was obsessed with his INDIVIDUAL, personal salvation, saw in his visit to Rome corrupt bishops and clergy using their power for financial gain. Instead of trying to reform the Church from within, he began to attack the very nature of the Church from the outside against what he saw as the authoritarianism of the Church.

    This anti-authoritarianism of the Reformation can be summed up in the notion of ‘sola scriptura’ which allowed for the INDIVIDUAL to determine if he or she was to be saved! The focus is on the INDIVIDUAL and how he interprets the Bible! No emphasis is laid on the traditional, hierarchical structures! The Church was seen as unnecessary because the INDIVIDUAL could determine for himself! This laid the foundation for the French Revolution!

    This opened the Pandora’s box of countless denominations of Baptist’s, Pentecostals, and Evangelical Protestant’s openly defying tradition even within their own churches. No unity!

    Below is a sharp young girl who recently struggled with her Protestantism and eventually converted to Catholicism. She gives 10 reasons as to why Sola Scriptura is wrong:

      • Anecdotal here as youre right w/ your point but huguenots largely began lutheran

        Im big into studying em because as said thats my ancestors. I believe it means dirty ape or something

        But yes

        Deism though not atheism largely influenced it

        though jefferson was naive here they loved rousseau who hated natural law so many assume it was a natural rights rebellion but it only revolted natural order

        Hence why most conservatives as well moderates like burke or liberal orleanists opposed it

        Demaistre began a masonic type but voltaire crossed w/ late demaistre makes a useful companion tocqueville

        Acton was more forceful in his opposition to equality than tocqueville sans the dumb funding of brown that cheeses me about spooner

        So robert owen is largely the origin of the modern left as far modern origins go

        All go back to ancient examples but owen was like the diggers. Voltaire got race & was far less smithian burke. He was a deist though too so obv not all were the same anymore than many xians are dumbarses now but id almost prefer atheism to deism some days

      • Tbh with the exception of the physiocrats, henry was the last good king imho

        Ofc im biased as again i note my ancestry

        That said i only believe my royal dna took from phillip de orleans’ branch

        my huguenots stayed behind but never converted. By contrast the catholics i mention above fled

        Many stayed underground.it was also under richilieu not mazarin if i recall but i might misremember

      • He seems to be confusing scripture for hamartiology, eschatology or esp. again, the mosaic law

        Canon law was seldom enforced in France, never in the UK. Mainly italy even if france mixed this with ius commune

        Nonetheless, the people were already revolting the church prior like many dominicans or Hus

        Further, though louis xiv did transform away from the clergy, the aristocracy was what kept this enforced as the cardinal advisors to the king never directly technically executed his own directions

        Especially true this was when the nobles were still minores than of the court

        The ultramontanism was esp. desired in the same people too that louis xiv consolidated power from

        Did louis target aristocracy or go laicic? No

        Enforcement doesnt assume people are unaware alt ideas. Though many we call atheists of ancient werent, demaistre is wrong to assume lacked vocal questioning of the bible constituted a sudden emergence

        So really all it did was surface it. Since the same theonomic persecutions remained, the shift in power wasnt in policy substance save for the deficit or infrastructure etc

        Is it true info travels? Yes which isnt the bad thing. It isnt even possible even if good to censor. the vital part is having the irrational pawns in check. that is what regicides – the ideas acted upon, not merely whether it has been heard

        But this was also nonscriptural. So luther did like jacobins oppose certain ideas but that is like saying we are like femen since they oppose islam too. Hitler was opposed to the weimar but was no antistatist

        If we wanna play tradition, lutherans were far less libertine than the openly gay or boobchasing kings, etc

        Authority or power? It is hard to argue the ancien regime any longer provided the former

        THAAAAAAT SAAAAID i think hes referring to COLLATERAL noooooot luther himself

        I dont mean he is right STILL nor was it your thesis but just to guess-clarify his intent

        I think it is just the way societies rise then decline

        Diff is 1848 was no better except graduality

        But itdve happened regardless

        BESIDES BESIDES…the CHURCH ALSO funded the resources that QUESTIONED ITS OWN so to blame reformation for collateral meisel ALSO blame the counterreformation, ORIGINAL jesuits too

        If it is that manichean in blame than just how diffusion effectuates political formulai, that only makes the church as much to blame even if the bourbons didnt wrestle to rule their own

        So that brings us simply to: everybody was at fault

        Since man is inevitably ideological, rejecting everything gives no alt

    • Ed- going from Protestantism to Novus Ordo Catholi-schism is damning yourself, twice.
      Conservative Protestantism at least holds out the reality of a valid Scripture and the biblical means of salvation, even if they are ‘cut off from the vine.’ But Rome (as she exists today) is nothing but a noxious WEED, with only poison and sodomite clergy to offer.

      Sorry, no. I’d rather be a confessional sacramental Lutheran, than suffer through one more ‘Novus Ordo “Liturgy” with “Father Hal.”

      UGH.

    • “Luther, who was obsessed with his INDIVIDUAL, personal salvation, saw in his visit to Rome corrupt bishops and clergy using their power for financial gain. Instead of trying to reform the Church from within, he began to attack the very nature of the Church from the outside against what he saw as the authoritarianism of the Church” – The apostle Paul too was concerned with INDIVIDUAL salvation, and he discussed it in very exact terms in much of the New Testament. Luther rightly saw the massive differences theologically from what the NT says about salvation and what the RCC taught – and that’s because he concentrated much of his effort in trying to understand what Paul and Jesus taught as opposed to it being told to him by self-appointed RCC clerics over what it means. Luther, In spite of his faults, got this issue right and he is to be commended for “rightly dividing the Word of Truth” as Paul commanded.

      “This anti-authoritarianism of the Reformation can be summed up in the notion of ‘sola scriptura’ which allowed for the INDIVIDUAL to determine if he or she was to be saved! The focus is on the INDIVIDUAL and how he interprets the Bible!” – The NT was written in Koine Greek which is the everyday language of the people. God wanted the average person to be able to understand what he wanted known in His word. Sure, there are some parts that are more difficult to interpret, but that only serves to show the importance of understand Hermenutical principles. It’s not that we can’t seek the expertise of scholars and hierarchical leaders, it’s only that we don’t rely on their words as infallible or as the sole arbiters of Truth. We seek the wisdom of those in leadership, but we ultimately rely on the Holy Spirit to guide us, employ proper Hermeneutics to Scripture, and ferret through the text carefully. This is because God Himself wants his people individually to know its meaning.

      “This laid the foundation for the French Revolution!” – I’ve heard this many times over the years, but it’s unfounded. It’s unjustly blaming the excesses, abuses and degeneracy of the French Revolution on the Reformers who awakened to the hypocrisy and authoritarianism of the RCC. It’s a stretch at best, and ultimately the NT itself demonstrates that ‘Sola Scriptura’ is right. The RCC opposed ‘Sola Scriptura’ because it benefited them to keep the people both ignorant and dependent on them for all things spiritual.

      In sum, the Reformers were correct in their SOTERIOLOGY, but wrong in their ECCLESIOLOGY. They maintained the error of infant baptism, heavy clericalism, and an almost complete disregard for what the NT teaches about church leadership. In brief:

      Church leaders are humble men, who have first been proven, are usually older men and have a wife and children who are in submission to them.

      Church leaders do not employ self-exalting titles for themselves, but are seen as humble, everyday men who work for a living and are in a position to help others rather than always being on the receiving end of others’ charities.

      Church leadership in the NT is plural and not singular. Paul appointed a plurality of elders to pastor the churches and not one man alone. While there might be first among equals concept among elders by virtue of their ability to lead and to teach, there is no “Senior Pastor’ or “Pope” among them.

      Church meetings in the NT were participatory in nature, and not relegated to a one-man show as in most churches. ‘Clergy’ (Greek Cleros) and ‘Laity’ (Greek Laos) as used in the NT denotes ALL of the people of God, and not a select few who perform religious ceremonies on behalf of other people.

      The Lord’s Supper in the NT is not a token meal consisted of a thumbnail of juice and a tiny cracker, but a FULL MEAL consisting of real food. It was a fellowship meal that prefigured the future Marriage Supper of the Lamb.

      Again, both Catholics and Protestants got it wrong when it comes to NT Ecclesiology!

      • “In sum, the Reformers were correct in their SOTERIOLOGY, but wrong in their ECCLESIOLOGY. They maintained the error of infant baptism”…

        So close, and yet so far from the Kingdom. Right on the first part, UTTERLY WRONG on the second part. The uselessness of denying the covenant to children is akin to the Halfway covenant that destroyed New England, right at the start. God loves children, Christ confirmed that, and the praxis of the Church, East and West, was to see baptism AS THE SUPERCESSION of Circumcision!

        Only a stupid Baptist would disagree…

  16. Ironically positive law derives from decretalism

    Common law from Scotus

    the gothic law was never the basilicae

    https://calvinistinternational.com/2013/03/23/dont-forget-jus-gentium/

    Issue is vattel relied on concepts from the east. this got us neoliberalism

    Calvins hesitance was more toward commercialism than the old feudal laissez faire

    But all relied on god. they found antitheism repugnant, democracy dangerous

    Paul only drew upon earlier laws visavis adultery but if you see his act 17:26, he referred to adam+eve as the family of mankind

    Gnosticism is dangerous imho even as bad restorationism is http://www.amerika.org/texts/racial-nihilism-richard-mcculloch/

    physical purity or spiritual purity? this is what weber got at but how the paradox hedonism is also found in hegel beyond internal theory, logical necessity even if dialectic never got uttered etc

    Jesus on the other hand merely noted race doesnt decide salvation. he didnt as molnar calls out of plotinus seek to create a xian nwo in prep heaven

    Luther understood this. Barth is the unreasonable man shaw demanded

  17. All the issues of secularism were in religious articulation to the eastern kikes

    Anabaptists etc

    Unfortunately the western culture subverts itself
    http://www.nlnrac.org/earlymodern/law-of-nations

    Salamanca did contribute to the hapsburgs treating slaves humanely which is as forgotten as the fact this was part ham-nigger

    But that was all fine/dandy

    Now cassus belli is found in ideas from augustine. Shaw wanted a utilitarian empire

    Youre a huge fan of aristotle hunter

    I began a fan of plato but have moved to aristotle over 2y now

    His description of the ideal king is alongside induction the bedrock of anticulturalist praxiology

    Thing is…we are bombarded by pragmatists – a word that means pinko

    They rely on abduction like jain, divinization like zen

    The lack of soul

    The band ghost writes this:

    If man could be god he would no longer need god

    The video shows a future…comrade selected for the privilege

    Youd tame the laws of nature it says

    but if all can be king all can be slaves

    By that only can some be kings or all slaves

    A king of his own domain is no king of society

    Man is natural

  18. You’re a liberal. You support some leftist dog eater to be the president of USSA for example
    The so called indulgences?
    Martin Luther’s main opposition to indulgence sales was not theological, it was because he assumed that money raised in Germania was sent to Rome and wasted there.
    But the opposite was the truth. Construction across Germania of colleges, orphanages, hospitals, parish churches, etc.
    The brand new college at Wittenberg, where Luther taught, had been built with indulgence sales.
    Students at Wittenberg paid no tuition because of endowments from indulgence sales. Luther was freed from all traditional monk duties to be a full time college professor because of endowments from indulgence sales.

    Catholic Church had a lot of problems and crimes in its history. So if some groups wished to separate, who cares? But at least build something logical and sane to replace it. Free interpretation of the Bible is insane for example, wasn’t it obvious the consequences?
    It was the Catholic Church who taught your ancestors how TO WORK for a start.
    It’s a total infantile view of history some peoples have, no wonder a couple of million of Jews manage with ease hundreds of millions.

      • Also in all fairness, huguenots derived the idea of federalism from subsidiarity

        Though im proud my huguenot ancestry ive no beef BRUTALLY CHASTIZING federalism

        Separate branches wasnt how feudal society worked anymore than napoleonic code was how hammurabi operated…wellington far closer than recalled

        Some liberal monarchists like ben constant supported the kings dissolution of parliament – an inverse formulation of locke

        Lord acton is far closer to original subsidiarity. id not say ive zero disagreements with him but traditional catholicism ran thru his blood very thoroughly so to say…obv no catholic blood

        I mean id argue both his cosmopolitanism isnt how the word now means – even less welbegriffy than rosenzweig AS WELL *aaaaaaaany* extent of such plurid is imho a poor wtg but fwiw as he is also an idol not just by many evangelicals but the baser types – those who didnt just like frank meyer oppose lincoln but breathed it like calhoun

        Yes btw calhoun .talk about confederate bastiat

    • “Martin Luther’s main opposition to indulgence sales was not theological, it was because he assumed that money raised in Germania was sent to Rome and wasted there.”

      I sincerely doubt that, after reading what Luther saw when he went to Rome. And there is historical reason for that disgust, after reading Hoffman’s “Occult Renaissance church of Rome.”

      Luther had a Doctorate in Sacred Theology. He KNEW his dogma. That was why he was on firm ground, in his digust with indulgences.

  19. Luther energised some positive societal reforms, but he also re-Judaised Christianity, making a fetish out of words on scrolls, collated in a book suddenly easy to print and distribute

    Luther’s Judaic revival, linked to his youthful early Kabbalah studies, led to a new Christian version of Jewish Talmud debates … the ground of liberalism

    Debates were sparked because the Bible compilation, with some truly awful text in it, doesn’t hold up well to intensive reading, and so liberalism grew right underneath official Protestant orthodoxy, given the way the Bible creates cognitive dissonance

    Yes for a couple of centuries, people in Lutheran societies, didn’t rock the boat too much, because they avoided thinking a lot about the Bible, they just went to a now-less-intrusive church and enjoyed the music, theatre, and companionship … but there is no going back to that half-foggy Christianity

    For those more earnest, tho, the sequence is this: Re-make the world in accord with the Bible … re-make the world in accord with interpreting the Bible … hell, just re-make the world … in other words, liberalism

    Nice beautiful stuff in the Bible, but also horrific stuff, e.g., genital mutiliation of children as one of its core concepts … terrorising people with ‘eternal hell’ … and Luther increasing some fears such as re ‘pre-destination’ … Bible religion quite falls apart if anyone seriously looks at it … you only stay Christian by ignoring much of the book

    Liberalism was fuelled in part by horror at some Christian doings … Tens of thousands of people got burned alive as witches, because of how people received the Bible’s grimmer texts, under Luther’s advice to read the whole book

    Witch-burnings ended as Christian belief started collapsing … and the anti-torture movement of the Enlightenment, also was co-ordinate with Christianity imploding (in the Bible, Jesus himself seems to accept torture, without criticising it)

    Rabbi’s grandson Karl Marx then supplied other holy books, to add to the Judaic, Mohamedan and Pauline ones … but a similar meta-frame is behind them all

    Re Christianity versus the ‘Republic of Letters’, intelligent people could see the Bible was half-awful, so they looked elsewhere for truth … and because they lacked a spiritual anchor, with the only one on offer the distasteful Bible one, intellectuals got lost, first a cold deism and then just devious destruction

    The older, greatly gay Vatican apparatus, with its own version of Judaic legalism, certainly deserved to be wrecked … but Luther’s concoction was unsustainable, the Lutheran ‘confessions’ convoluted, and quite pro-Judaic-cult despite Luther’s personal fury at Jews

    “Holy Roman Emperor Frederick II notably and openly stated that the whole world has been fooled by three imposters, Jesus Christ, Moses, and Muhammad” – Pope Gregory IX in 1239

    Vietnamese-American writer Linh Dinh, has said that he would wish for his fellow Asians to be free of all the gang of ‘Jewish saviours’ including Karl Marx

    Counting Communism as well as Christianity & Islam, we now see most of the world under ‘Abrahamic’ i.e., Jewish ideological sway

    • Your 1st line…context is warranted

      His reason for some judaic reinfusions were less to do w/ the messianism seen nowadays

      You could argue likewise paul was even more judaic despite many ideas luther revived were those paul rejected…despite nag hammabi seemingly at odds, its rivalry was no less shared in philo’s kabbalic magic

      I think his strength comes in effect over source per se

      I do think idolatry might be meaningless so much than just at least to me a sign of anticatholic resistance to toot my horn over

      But then again much the catholic doctrine itself if shifted in logoi or its peterine rebuke of paul, it drew upon this over that of the original teachings of jesus by the time of augustine as well

      In keeping the nomianism rejected by paul, dumping ceremonial, it kept a division of society moderated the negative counterpart a valuecentric doctrine

      In theory this is good but it went further if we mean theological basis for the cenobitic as opposed to politeia the main focus here

      It also largely gave hierarchical organizational weight to several pauline chuqqan tenets that werent adopted by paul so luthers critiques also covered much that only became a church idea in the 1300s like purgatory much as usury was pagan, only theoretical till calvinists grabbed the wheel in the NL

      This not only legally (old sense of the word) conflicted the law fabric seen in mainland europe or british isles by everyday folk with its form but substance made for a headbutt between bull decrees & the precedents, discovery process however diluted after the normans took over

      All in all, ideas in philosophy repeat

      Lao to quesnay, nietzsche from orientalism, kritarchs to ecclesiastum or shopeh (memory failing me?) to assize

      Take augustine who relied on zoroastrian influence

      The reason the papacy let go of several aspects even pre-13c was that its distinction broke from paul a bit but it is there

      Besides they barely listened to him anyway many cases besides specifically the council

      Point is, abrahamic OT or hellenic NT, supercession is about covenant, mishpatim about what is expected optimally. The rest is over divinity though ebionites were philosophically better despite imho theistic absurdities

      Luther was indeed trained esp. in the 1st 5 books so maybe it rubbed off but youll find origen far worse in the ideas that stayed the francis line & its universalism was in that sense only a matter of time to branch from the church anyhow

      Luther surely didnt foresee this far but in that sense i see no more reason to blame him over judaism than pope benedict over the sandinista phenomenon

      Like that of socialism from positive ius, it was a silent coup from lincoln to teddy to wilson to hoover or fdr to lbj to carter or so on

      The # of medicaid recipients went up 77% under reagan+clinton while the white population declined from 90s% to 40some since the late 60s. Even the consensus is off, only not a minority if we count nonwhite races visavis individually

      Luther building schools made him no dewey. Is there much a difference the indulgences from the irs insisting it be the almighty taxer while aliens repatriate? personally i think govt should be abolished but my point is, he was behind nein secularism. What he did as an administrator wasnt what even did influence secularism

      Im not justifying it. im just noting

    • Marx never noticed his absolutes as kolakowski notes didnt quit the teleological view of history or its inherently inconsistent take on universalism to property, aristoi, etc from hegel

      Though draco was the 1st recorded inrule pinko & karl attributed to babeouf, this is rooted in those like mendelsohhn but not spinoza for instance

      I think there is far less a polylogical issue not only given how it meant the word in different senses despite my fellow mises fans balk at this observation i make but still worth noting A.S. was right when he both noted the judaism behind communism as well that it wasnt per se the invention

      The core there in the ussr was mobilization as well some nonsense emancipation (much as the origin of descent story came in neither arrival –
      Hungary 1200s or italy 1500s etc nor only by the 1800s) despite the tsar neither white nor unwilling to relieve the pogrom executor from duty

      What sentiment beyond reactivity drove this as further, an ideological imperative, affirmative?

      Thats what drives bundism. Ofc though bundists were in DE largely unlike PL secular, the history of zionism like the JTO is complicated that indeed as you note pits much of theistic jews to that of marxian ideas even despite divergence some ultratrads in austria

      I cannot say this embodies luthers theological doctrine though. you can say it enabled these forces but all empires or bishopates do this. It isnt the same thing

      What was indeed was then as noted by the above commenter no less the case of the church

      Torture varied but it was never so dichotomic politically

      Idk much on that but i do of execution so lets try

      The basis in beccharia wouldve easily validated execution under culpability

      His humanistic criminology colleagues varied. 1 was for execution, another opposed

      Logical problem of evil didnt dictate the eg ancien regimes practice of torture nor execution but monarchs vary in type or relation the pope esp as seen re: lenders

      Indeed this was prominent preluther in torture but its willingness to execute ought be seen less an axiomatic than strategic matter no?

      The black laws were not only draconian but criminalized beyond the basic nonos of any society. Then again it was humanists who drove to nix it however much technically still remains

      Im not esp religious. i also enjoy the new atheists etc so im not like shilling for a reductionist view of trad as faithcentric as kirk did but i am noting the holes in these assumptions

      Nobody ought hail luther as a savior but thats not what we ought w/any personality. Still misses why he is an important figure to also get right in reading

      Simply put, much his faults were sorta already burgeoning so he didnt initiate everything so much as let it continue

    • Kabbalah is closer to that in karaites or neoplatonism

      Though luther was no peripatetic, was he a mystic? id argue that misreads his take on a catechon

      Was he particularly GOOD on markets etc? no but he at least got as did copernicus you dont wanna depreciate as justinian or maria theresa did

      Unless you mean his take on culture. Though gnosticism is bad, is a restorationist take better? that ends up in the same destination imho

      Read the differences between the 10words followed by those exiled by the babylonians from that of maimonades

      Marx defo reads like an eschatology as rothbard notes but the issue is divinization, the rejection of fact etc. Palamas, nicolaus, bogomil, donatists, the polish ferenc guys etc

    • Witchhunts if you mean literal were a north american phenomenon but also well prior xianity faded

      Or you mean sectarian persecution in general? I agree…those werent just

      That said now we instead jail people, excuse assassinations & steal their money, erase their id

      Have witchhunts vanished or are they just reframed in the ideological thru an excuse of de facto / de jure decided exception?

      Natural law might seem more ambiguous but popular constitutionalisms autopoeisis has no limits. demagogues mold to the people so the people mold to them

      That isnt just means but an end issue

      Enumeration only became an issue due to form

      The reformers dilemma demonstrates what happens in this scenario

    • Sorry for spam

      Luther didnt find predestination plausible. calvin did

      Ironically as noted elsewhere it was the predestinarians who tolerated dissent oft more than luther the omniscientist

      I neologize that word as open theism sounds too…imprecise – this anyway goes back to beckett

      Thougj i hate plotinus, eriugena mightve been an exception

      Though no big fan erasmus i hate beckett even more

      That said i dont think it is recalled his charges werent over heresy so much as infringing IRONICALLY on secular society

      by that i merely mean the way england was setup. Though popper is euphemic ontop naivety, ill recycle the term secularized to differentiate anticlericalism prereformation

    • “….terrorising people with ‘eternal hell.’

      Oh, I see what all this bloviating is all about… it’s your hatred for Christianity. YOU FEAR THE REALITY OF HELL! Well, you will go there, no ifs, ands, or liberal Butt(igeig)s.

      You can ‘pontificate’ all you like about your supposed ‘exemptions’ from the real world, but your own sinfulness will drag you to hell just as assuredly as Judas hung himself.

      Try again, and this time. Brabantian, be more honest.

      “For ALL have sinned, and fallen short of the glory of God.”

  21. Basically liberal theory or liberalist ideology

    Luther opposed the church on autonomic+scriptural/eschatological grounds but secularism is a “replacement.” Sola fide was just meant to boot the approval structure

    More was a humanist who in modern [ancient-judaic] liberal theory attempted to drive a reformed conservatism

    Instead his ideas though planted in god drove postmodernism however ironic given eg sartres seeming antithesis to basil but noticeable from origen to ficino

    Marcuse vehicularized consumerism this way as a creative destruction in marx. Julian huxley represents this abundant altruistic synthesis of all humans in peace

    That is the root of secular humanism

    Luther utilized liberal theory but did so in a way it did more than mobilize against a status quo infiniteness while preserving the conservative basis jesus intended to like paul remain without it becoming a system or a public reason, an order

    His was a revised conservatism more akin that seen in the u.s. but it saw not a separation of church from state than a use of biblical law to mediate this as the church did without the abuses muntzer intended

    Was muntzer secularist? not per se but like anabaptists these draw from similar ideas in josephus or alexandrian mythicism or coptic arches or confucius or hobbes, this all we saw in the arrians, donatists, now xian zionists like clapham

    So it was in form far more substantively protoliberal than luther

    The church once got this too but the reformers oft didnt even agree. eg calvinists didnt even dissent luther on anabaptism so much as his treatment

    Joachim is the root of the new jesuits as porodhetz their bugqueen even noted

    Wesley though he denied universal salvation imho opened the barth door

    It was the papal reason pander that in the industrialrev drove what i disagree with 1stthings was pro market so much as pro worker

    The trappists varied from waldensian to simonian

    Simonians the jacobin

    All this from the ideas of the original fransiscan order off which luther et al split

    As such caring for the poor became caring for muh refugees or ecology esp. by when ww2 ended

    The polish fight vs communism was maybe the last good

    Luther didnt just not intend it. The reason it became was it was no longer followed in the framework thatdve kept subversion abay

  22. The top photo shows a statue of Martin Luther in front of what I believe is the Frauenkirchen in Dresden. It was a huge, magnificent 18th century cathedral that was deliberately destroyed by the Allies during their murderous February 1945 firebombing of the city. But the Germans completely rebuilt it about 15 years ago.

    • Sadly reconstruction isnt the same (i mean more than literal) imho

      not all such heritage is sturdy but statues do

      Stave churches got destroyed till like 1 original left or 2, relocated &these before that, survived miraculously despite being made of wood…sad esp there

      Fwiw Im not opposed firebombing so much as i see ww1 a result of multilateral support assurance, crimean war interests & MOST OF ALL, france pissed over a telegram THEY misread despite napoleon the original aggressor who took alsace from the germs

  23. The Reformation swept away the priesthood and religious, which was a huge aspect of 18th and 19th Century liberalism in Europe. Liberalism in Europe was ferociously anti-clerical. Look up the suppression of the Jesuits, one of the Spanish ministers actually conceived himself as emulating Philip the Fair in suppressing the Templars. It’s really almost impossible separate the anti-clerical aspect of liberalism from liberalism, even today, the subversion of Christianity is really an advanced form of anti-clericalism, the rainbow cult, the pervasive contempt, rejection and marginalization of the religious life is more intense today than it has ever been. The liberal rainbow clergy, including Catholic, celebrate the 500 years of the Reformation because they see it as a revolution in their favor. I don’t think one can argue that the anti-monasticism and anti-clericalism of Protestantism was in many respects a precursor to modern liberalism. Just Henry VIII and his minister Cromwell could be thought of as machiavellians, John Locke and Hobbes elaborated a nihilistic political philosophy in the times that preceded hysteria of “The Popish Plot” and the so-called “Glorious Revolution.” It may be unfair to blame Luther personally for liberalism, but the rainbow left-wing “Catholics” like Francis and his ilk celebrate the Reformation. They celebrate it, because they see it as an important step towards the current world order.

    • ” Just [as] Henry VIII and his minister Cromwell could be thought of as machiavellians…”

      Ah, yes. A king is not the common man. And Henry was trained to be a hierarch in the Church, so he knew his Scriptures. The Pope even gave him the title ‘Defensor Fidei’- Defender of the Faith.
      Did his understanding of absolute monarchy twist his heart? Yes. Did his desire for a male heir justify his divorce? Yes, it did in that day and age, and that he married his deceased brother’s wife, was also anti-biblical, for the times. Did he give the world a sovereign worthy of England, in Elizabeth the First?
      Most would say yes. Did his actions help England become free of popery, at its lowest nadir, save for the present time? Americans of the past two centuries, prior to JFK, would have said yes. Never mind Catholics like Pelosi, RFK, and all the rest of the godless Novus Ordo crowd…. they aren’t REAL Catholics. i.e., they don’t count.

      What astounds me is that those who are English-speakers and catholic christians, who don’t see the utter schizophrenia of trying to pretend that Rome is correct, when she has been, and has done so many, many EVIL things over the CENTURIES, acting as though the Sovereign Will of God was NOT served by the defeat of the Armada, the reign of Elizabeth, the creation of the BCP, Shakespeare, and the KJV as the triumvirate of English prose, for over four hundred years!?

      Sometimes, I think my Catholic English friends are like the Jews, post AD70, still bemoaning the loss of their language to the LXX of the Europeans, the destruction of the Temple (even predicted by God’s Son, himself) and their disenfranchisement from the covenant, because of their idolatry (which is exactly what Revelation documents!). God has moved on… why can’t you?

  25. Those who are raised in any Protestant denomination and convert to Catholicism : If they convert to Catholicism and then go to a novus ordo church they’re fooling themselves, for they will not be real Catholics. The novus ordo Vatican Two church is an ape of the real Catholic Church. If they convert to Catholicism and go to a traditional Catholic church-Catholic parish then that will be a true conversion to Catholicism. But traditional Catholic churches are few and far between. There’s hardly any left in the United States and it’s the same throughout the whole West, there’s hardly any traditional Catholic churches-parishes left in the West.

    I’m a Catholic. I would not try to convert any Protestant to Catholicism. Not these days. There’s plenty of good things in Protestantism. Stay with what you got and make the best of it. The Catholics these days are very confused as to what’s going on in the world of Catholicism. Those who weren’t raised Catholics and convert to Catholicism will only be more confused about what’s going on in the world of Catholicism as they’re new to it. And in the traditional Catholic churches/parishes that still do exist, things are awkward, as what happened in the 60’s with the 2nd Vatican Council was such a break with the past that now even traditional Catholics are a bit confused as to what constitutes real and true Catholicism.

    Also, there’s Catholic religious organizations that claim to be “Traditional Catholic” organizations but are NOT. Even Catholics born and raised in the Catholic world get fooled by these phony “Traditional Catholic” organizations. For example, the 1962 “Tridentine” Mass is NOT the real and true Catholic Mass of The Ages. A lot of Catholics can’t see that the 1962 Tridentine Mass is not the real and true Catholic Mass of The Ages ; I don’t know how a recent convert to Catholicism would be able to see that. Most Catholics can’t see all the deceptions going on these days, I don’t know how a recent convert would be able to see all the deceptions going on these days.

    There’s good and bad in every Church, in every denomination. Find what’s good in your denomination and work with that, build on that, IMHO.

    • Thank you, Joe. For being honest. It may be, that in order to save your souls, you HAVE to leave the Novus Ordo Cult. But God is merciful, and He alone truly knows the hearts of the faithful.

    • 1 Corinthians 14:33
      For God is not the author of confusion, but of peace, as in all churches of the saints.

      Psalm 71:1
      In thee, O Lord, do I put my trust: let me never be put to confusion.

      Nice to recall everytime a new Argument comes up

  26. Hunter, I haven’t read this in a long while, but it gives a partial answer as to why the Protestant Reformation has been said to have birthed liberalism: Paul Hacker’s “The Ego in Faith: Martin Luther and the Origin of Anthropocentric Religion”. Hacker, a former Lutheran who converted to Catholicism, argues, as I recall, that Luther’s teachings were rooted in his passionate egotism, causing him to substitute his personal authority and theories for the authority and historic teaching of the Church. Following on from Hacker, I find persuasive the argument that the content of justification by faith alone and his personal example were, despite his subjective intent, an expression of individualism and thus paved the way for the liberalism that has destroyed Christendom.

    • If that were the case, then it would be simple enough to trace the roots of liberalism from Luther to Descartes, Hobbes, Locke and Spinoza, but that isn’t how history played out in Lutheran Europe. It isn’t what the earliest liberals were concerned with either. They were all wrestling with the implications of the new science in the 17th century.

  27. I like John Wycliffe and the Lollards. They opposed the dumb parts of Catholicism but didn’t get rid of (or place in a different section) good books of the Bible. They also didn’t obsess over this “faith alone” nonsense.

    That being said I still appreciate what the church did in defending Europe from the hordes coming from the east. If I recall, didn’t Luther not want to fight the Turks, initially?

  28. “They also didn’t obsess over this “faith alone” nonsense” – Luther rightly made an issue over “faith alone” because the Roman Catholic Church had so perverted the clear and simple teachings of the New Testament. The apostle Paul made an issue over Justification and Faith Alone because religious leaders even during his time were already watering down and perverting apostolic teachings on salvation.

    “Faith Alone nonsense” is only “nonsense” to those who don’t understand precisely what Scripture says on the subject, possess knowledge of the relevant texts more than a cursory glance, and are ignorant to its history.

    • “Faith Alone nonsense” is only “nonsense” to those who don’t understand precisely what Scripture says on the subject, possess knowledge of the relevant texts more than a cursory glance, and are ignorant to its history.”

      OR to those who despise valid authority, think themselves the equal of learned men given the charism of the grace of Ordination at the hands of a lawful bishop [ https://energeticprocession.wordpress.com/2019/02/11/apostolic-succession-is-it-true/ ] and make of the Holy Bible a ‘paper pope’ to justify their own disobedience to both Law and Grace/Gospel.

      If Christ wanted 250,000 sects and cults, he would not have gone to death on the cross, to ‘fulfill all righteousness.’ The Stance you espouse is theological treason.

      yes, we are saved by grace. Period. But to add words to Scripture, and then incur the curse of God, is a very sandy spot to base an entire theology on…..

    • Thanks, November… but such is old news. (((They’ve))) also said his Holy Mother was a whore, He was the son of a ‘gentile’ (i.e., Roman Soldier), that he was a Magician, and that Mary Magdalene was his mistress. Jews (whether ethnic or merely intellectual) HATE Christ. As the posts on this forum clearly show, daily.

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