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[ by Charles Cameron — ISIS and Dabiq, with Stephen O’Leary on the Millerites in parallel ]
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I have a longish post in the works about the battle for Dabiq which will soon be upon us, in which I’ll give some preliminary indications about the ways in which groups spin things when prophecies on which they’ve depended don’t occur as prophesied and planned. It’s a wonderfully complex business, and one with direct bearing on the current situation.

Meanwhile, Colw Bunzel fills us in on the ISIS strategy this time around, in a tweet today which I’m posting while still working on my longer ZP piece:

Islamic State assures readers in al-Naba' that current struggle for Dabiq is not prophesied "greater battle of Dabiq." That will come later pic.twitter.com/eR0GCXzkTV

— Cole Bunzel (@colebunzel) October 14, 2016

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Postponement.

This is reminiscent of the Millerites, whose prophet William Miller predicted , “I am fully convinced that sometime between March 21st, 1843, and March 21st, 1844, according to the Jewish mode of computation of time, Christ will come.” Stephen O’Leary, in his magisterial Arguing the Apocalypse: A Theory of Millennial Rhetoric, comments:

When the End failed to materialize by March 22, the movement’s first crisis of confidence occurred. Various attempts to recalculate the chronology were made. The puzzling failure of the Lord to return was interpreted as the “tarrying time” of the biblical parable of the wise and foolish virgins (Mt. 25:1—12), a key text for the Millerites. Attempts were also made to justify the failure of prophecy on the grounds that the Lord was testing the believers’ faith.

O’Leary’s chapters 4, Millerism as a Rhetorical Movement, and 5, Millerite Argumentation, are definitive, and Festinger‘s When Prophecy Fails is the classic psychological exploration of prophetic failures, and subsequent work by scholars of apocalyptic and new religious movements have refined and expanded our understanding of such processes. But more of all that in my pending post here, My latest for Lapido: on the fall of Dabiq & failure of prophecy.

[ by Charles Cameron — remembering the Ted Cruz Christ / Antichrist (and Obama ditto) rhetoric from an earlier post ]
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Dismal, both of them:

Sources:

NBC News, Trump Calls Clinton ‘The Devil’

NYT Magazine, I’m the Last Thing Standing Between You and the Apocalypse

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I could be wrong, but I somehow doubt that either Trump or Clinton is using the terms “devil” or “apocalypse” (respectively) in their literal religious meanings here.

For that I’m thankful.

But then..

In contrast to the two posts I’ve linked to above, these two below appear to me to be making overtly and deliberately religious appeals with respect to the current election.

Alex Jones, InfoWars, Hillary Clinton: Demonic Warmonger

Andy Crouch, Christianity Today, Speak Truth to Trump

I’ve included the InfoWars video clip because it makes it very clear that Alex Jones, at least, claims he is being “Biblical” — his own word — when he calls Hillary Clinton demonic — and the Christianity Today piece because it represents a distinguished Evangelical response to the general tendency of Evangelical Christians to support Donald Trump‘s candidacy.

In somewhat related news, I am saddened to report that Christianity Today‘s literary magazine Books & Culture will close at the end of the year. John Wilson, the editor, is a long time and valued friend from Pasadena bookstore days — see his kind words about the late Bill Tunilla, the bookman who introduced us, in this Letter from the Editor.

[ by Charles Cameron — offering context for a remarkable court appearance ]
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David Hall, a member of the Sovereign Citizen movement, appeared before Judge John “Jay” Hurley, Broward’s First Appearance and Extradition Judge, and the exchange in the upper panel below is a transcript of a portion of their interaction:

The lower panel is taken from Alice in Wonderland, a book written by the individual Rev. Charles Lutwidge Dodgson — a mathematician and logician at Christ Church, Oxford — in the person and under the assumed name of Lewis Carroll.

The distinction drawn by Mr Hall between the individual and person who go by the name “David Hall” follows much the same surreal logic as that of Lewis Carroll’s Red Knight. Judge Hurley handles the matter with gravitas and grace, as you can see:

Hat-tip: JJ MacNab, author of The Seditionists: Inside the Explosive World of Anti-Government Extremism in America

[ by Charles Cameron — Jefferson and Adams reverberating still ]
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For your current interest: words eschanged between two candidates for the Presidency of the United States some two centuries back, as presented in a neat DoubleQuote today by John Robb:

….. pic.twitter.com/cqGH3tsDqD

— John Robb (@johnrobb) March 6, 2016

I can’t improve on John’s presentation of thesse two quotes — but I might perhaps point out that they were similarly relevant to poiitical discourse in 2010, when ReasonTV posted the following video on YouTube:

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As a conoisseur of coincidence, I appreciate the fact that Jefferson and Adams died within hours of each other — fifty years to the day after the signing of the Declaration of Independence. As Jorge Luis Borges observed of the rival theologians Aurelian and John of Pannonia, “The end of this story can only be related in metaphors since it takes place in the kingdom of heaven, where there is no time.”

[ by Charles Cameron — slightly tongue-in-cheek, intrigued at a rhetorical level, not sure who here, if anyone, necessarily believes the words they speak ]
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Okay, let’s see now.

• In December 2009, Israeli PM Netanyahu said, “You don’t want a messianic apocalyptic cult controlling atomic bombs. When the wide-eyed believer gets hold of the reins of power and the weapons of mass death, then the entire world should start worrying, and that is what is happening in Iran.” 
• In April 2012, former Israeli Shin Bet intelligence chief Yuval Diskin, said “I don’t believe in either the prime minister (Netanyahu) or the defense minister (Barak). I don’t believe in a leadership that makes decisions based on messianic feelings…” 
• In October 2013, Israeli PM Netanyahu told the UN General Assembly, “In our time the Biblical prophecies are being realized.” 
• In January 2014, Israeli Defense Minister Moshe Yaalon is quoted as calling Kerry “obsessive” and “messianic”.
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  I told you messianism was a big deal. Now will you listen?

  At the very least, it’s heating up the rhetoric of the the quest for peace…

  So how many “wide-eyed believers” have gotten hold of “the reins of power and the weapons of mass death” at last count?

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  I coulda made at least two DoubleQuotes out of that little lot.