Why [still] bother with Breivik?
[ by Charles Cameron — popular opinion, informed decision-making, journalism and analysis in reference to Oslo / Utoya ]
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At least two regulars here on ZP, Cheryl Rofer and Joey, have wondered whether it’s even worth bothering to track Anders Breivik’s thought — fifteen hundred pages of cut and paste from all across the web, interspersed with page after page of his own musings.
Joey wrote, “I’m not sure this guy deserves the kind of close analysis he is getting” — and Cheryl:
I’m not at all sure that examining his “writings” tells us much beyond that these themes have been pulled into a particular orbit of hating. What might be interesting is why those themes have been found so suitable for that purpose.
I believe that tracking Breivik’s thought processes are important for two main reasons, and for two main audiences: the general public (and by extension the journalists who inform them), and policy makers, military and civilian (and thus also the intel analysts who brief them).
1: media and public
It’s important for the general public not to be left with the wrong impression, specifically as regards who or what is to blame — so that the events in Oslo do not contribute to a further deterioration in public debate.
There are a number of ongoing public conversations around Islam, Islamophobia, Christianity, the clash of cultures, the “socialist” left or “fascist” right, the media, the internet, the pernicious effect of gaming, etc., where it’s not just useful but necessary to establish some clarity on what can and cannot fairly be said about Brevik — who he was, who influenced him, who ignored him, who publicized him, who he really hated, whether he was simply mad, and above all, whose fault “it” was.
And as always the truth is more nuanced than black and white – so that in all this morass of claims and counterclaims, there are slippery slopes to be avoided, and significant distinctions to be drawn..
2: analysts and policy makers
There are also a number of areas of intel analysis where his writings may provide significant leads, and where intelligent intelligence (forgive the play on worlds) is at a premium.
As an example, I have suggested that just as it’s important to know the history of the far enemy and global jihad concepts in studying contemporary jihadism, it would be helpful to know if Breivik’s manifesto is the first place where Hindutva and Odinist and militant Christian and Masonic strands have been brought together in what I can only call an “ecumenical” manner.
I’ve no doubt some of this is of importance to those whose job it is to prosecute or defend Breivik himself: but it’s the significance Breivik has as a marker of otherwise barely detected currents of thought — “undertows” in my personal shorthand — and of the fact that such currents can now easily connect across the net to create an increased complexity of the unexpected, that most concerns me.
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By now, most of the specific groups and individuals mentioned by Breivik have been identified, and those with specific interest in them have taken note: thus the Indian press has reported on his interest in Hindutva and quotations from Sita Ram Goel, both the UN-recognized “International Templar Order” and his own Masonic order have disowned him, and so on – so there’s no point in my posting separate comments on the role of the Hindutva movement in his thinking, nor of his fascination with the Templars and their symbolic presence in other places of interest such as Joseph Di Mambro and Luc Jouret‘s Order of the Solar Temple (locus of mass suicides/murders in France, Switzlerland and Quebec, 1994), or more recently the Michoacan La Familia cartel offshoot Los Templarios – a link which John Robb was one of the first to make…
Mexico, not Norway…
I will, however, post two more roundups of articles: one of pieces that strike me as outliers from the usual media coverage, touching on some of these specifics, the other noting the most thoughtful and informed coverage I have seen from scholars of religion.
I offer these as resources for those who have good reason for continuing interest in Breivik, in the hope that they may turn up some data points that are illuminating when connected — but also to help correct some of the erroneous linkages that have already been made.
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I am also hoping to make a post here shortly on Romanticism and the significance of myths, rituals and dreams — focusing mainly on the recent Requiem and obsequies for Otto von Habsburg, but with, I suspect, relevance to a strong romantic streak in Breivik, too…
August 5th, 2011 at 4:49 am
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all good points, charles. i quite agree. and i look forward to your next round-up, for i found the prior one very helpful.
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since i have my own angles of interest, i’d like to request that you include, if you are able and if you spot anything, resources that relate to the “tribal” aspects of his mindset. also “space” and “time” orientations (e.g., as in the space-related point you make noting the far-out connections he assembles).
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i know i should do my own research, but i’m just not focused on this matter right now, interesting as it is. anything you can pass along would help out.
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August 5th, 2011 at 5:08 am
I’ll keep those points in mind, David — thanks!
August 5th, 2011 at 2:02 pm
Hi David, You comment triggered a recent title, The Tribal Imagination, by Robin Fox…I’ve read parts, and it is pretty good.
August 5th, 2011 at 4:46 pm
scott, many thanks for the pointer. fox is excellent, and i did not know about this new book. the word "imagination" in the title should appeal to charles too. in my view, breivik displays considerable tribal imagination.
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charles, here’s a pop psych article by a joe navarro that focuses on narcissism and paranoia in breivik’s personality:
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http://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/spycatcher/201107/lessons-the-oslo-terrorist-attack
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it’s interesting — and tracks with my interests — but feels a bit too standardized.
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August 5th, 2011 at 5:30 pm
Scott:
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I guess I’m a Fox fan already, having quoted For & Tiger in my piece here on The DARPA arts — though I’ve not read The Tribal Imagination. Thanks.
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David:
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I saw the Navarro piece too, and wasn’t terribly impressed — the world doesn’t always slice up neatly into little DSM cubicles — nomenclature isn’t nature any more than correlation is causation…. In fact, one of the things I like about Jung is his emphasis on the word "individuation".
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If we were going for psychiatrists with relevant experience, I’d wonder what Marc Sageman and Jerrold Post would have to say about Breivik.
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[ edited to add: I’ll comment in an upcoming post on Sageman’s piece for CNN, which isn’t very specific about Breivik. ]
August 5th, 2011 at 8:45 pm
charles, thanks for pointer to sageman’s analysis. his emphasis on “subculture” is a variation on tribe and clan. his concluding point about trying to “help tone down the rhetoric of exclusion” speaks to a spatial orientation. but even so, his write-up seems analytically prosaic.
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i’d look forward to seeing something by post. he is skillful. but his main theme tends to be “malignant narcissism” in characters like breivik, as navarro has picked up.
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August 6th, 2011 at 12:28 am
My hope is that people on the "far right," or, who we might call "middle American radicals" (eg..Conservatives, radical traditionalists, patriot movement types, white nationalists/pro-Whites [AKA "white supremacists" in the main stream media] , anti-NWO crowd, radical people within the tea party, libertarians, survivalists, etc) will fully realize the foolishness and counter-productivity of using violence.
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The NWO cult (which uses the resources of the US government) have the most powerful military force in history. They have weapons we won’t know about for 30 years. They have microwave weapons that fry the brain, they have holograms you can touch, they may even have weather weapons (see HAARP)? They also have almost total information dominance. The education system, entertainment media, and news media are totally controlled and used for furthering globalist interests. Not only can they crush you with their weapons, they can frame and portray you as pathological, insane, and/or "a Nazi who wants to kill six million Jews." A guerrilla campaign is not possible without the support of the people and the situation had not gotten bad enough (visibly) where the people will support such a campaign.
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Violence also usually only kills innocent people. Mid-Level bureaucrats or left-wing teens at summer-camp HAVE NO POWER, nor do they have a true sense of who does, nor an understanding of the processes in which power is exercised. The events which do feature clusters of the global elites are heavily defended by rings of security. The so called "Bilderberg meeting" would probably require two Ranger battalions and maybe 100 Delta Force operatives to take down.
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It’s better to try to get the global elite to inflict violence against your side (middle America or whoever). When the globalist elite do a Waco, or a Ruby Ridge, or beat mothers in Boston for opposing forced busing, it helps your side to win the moral contest. In fact, I will go as far as suggesting that the Middle American struggle be a peace movement under the Gandhi model. It should work with other groups across the globe to oppose the globalist octopus. The globalist octopus uses middle Americans for wars in the developing world and then uses people from the developing world to force integrate in the West.
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The basic system of forced integration of the West works as follows:
1) Flood Western countries with millions of people from the developing world.
2) Force integrate these people into the communities, institutions, and families of the White/Euro populations.
3) Use media power to maintain a narrative that portrays Western Man and/or "whiteness" as the enemy of humanity. Program the masses to associate opposition to forced assimilation as being pathologically evil. Destroy and subvert traditional aesthetics and replace with multi-cult and Talmudic spirituality. Tear down old heroes and myths and replace with new heroes and myths.
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Attacking the globalist elite with violence is attacking them at their strongest point. Nobody (known) on earth can defeat these people with raw military power. The weakest point/node in the globalist, multi-cult system is their ideas! Political correctness exists precisely because their ideas are so weak. Smashing the globalist/multi-cult/Luciferian system requires full scale (peaceful) attacks on the contradictions, assumptions, discourse, symbols, and narrative of global talmudization program.
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The Berlin Wall is a good lesson. The Berlin Wall did not fall from bombs or guns. The samizdat dissidents pointed out contradictions (OVER AND OVER) in the soviet system. They made simple observations such as "if communism is so great, why do they need walls to keep us in" and then repeated this over and over. Eventually the State became such a joke that the East Germans just decided one day that they were walking to West Germany (9 November 1989). But imagine if some dissidents decided to shoot at guards or attack some soviet apparatchiks? The State would have cracked down and the people may have supported it out of fear.
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It’s important to remember the lesson of the "far right" in the 1990’s. After Waco the far right grew. After Oklahoma City the far right disappeared. The globalist anti-White, anti-free speech organizations (like the SPLC, ADL) jump for joy at incidents of right wing violence. By using violence you play right into the hands of the globalist octopus. Middle Americans, European Nationalists, and other people under the globalist jackboot need to point out contradictions (over and over), stay on message, and produce aesthetics that inspire people to the struggle. Make your message and aesthetics so powerful that the globalists will have no choice but to implement "hate speech" laws, and Internet censorship, and/or use force to stop you.
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This was a public service announcement 🙂
August 6th, 2011 at 3:33 pm
Seerov, I believe we have much more to fear from the leftists than those on the right. The left has been using terror and violence since the French Revolution. A disproportionate amount of the incendiary rhetoric in American politics is uttered by those on the left. Wes Pruden has a great column on the phenom in today’s Washington Times. Just yesterday, Biden referred to the Tea Party folks as "terrorists." Your Berlin Wall example is very good. I believe most rational folks would prefer a non-violent solution to our struggles with the globalists (I call them statists—because the moniker seems to fit and is more specific). In America, I believe the coming election we will see an up-tick of violence on the left—their extreme is in plain view, and most Americans don’t like what they see. Lexington Green pointed out that we have tectonic shifts in America about every 70 years; we’re due. Cheers!
August 6th, 2011 at 6:38 pm
Hi, Seerov:
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My theological curiosity is roused: what do you mean by "Talmudic spirituality" and where would I find examples? Both parts of that phrase are subject to a wide variety of interpretations.
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Is, for instance, Benedict XVI "talmudic"? Karl Marx? Freud? Is "spirituality", as you use the term, a dogma-free approach to religion? or simply another word for “ideology” perhaps? Does "talmudic" mean hair-splitting (as in "pilpul")?
August 6th, 2011 at 6:53 pm
"I believe we have much more to fear from the leftists than those on the right." Fear of the Left or Right? I think it is more reasonably to assume that we have found the enemy and it is us. The Left and Right are the same people, only one is decentralized and one is centralized, one is a thinker and one is a non-thinker, and one wants to enforce conformity East and West; while the other wants to generate diversity until there is no East and West.
August 6th, 2011 at 8:24 pm
Hi Larry, I beg to differ. The left has a history of violence and violent rhetoric. IMF or World Bank meetings have become violent precisely because the left embraces violence. I assume you’re referring to our fiscal situation—and there again we had a choice and our leaders chose poorly. The right wanted to cut, but the left insisted on the status quo, and the left inserted violent rhetoric into the debate. So, with all due respect, the left and right are not the same people…and the folks on the right tend to have better manners. Cordially
August 6th, 2011 at 8:35 pm
Scott-
From a European perspective, and that is where the whole thing came from after all . . . there is no "Left" and "Right" in US politics today, just various flavors of "business friendly".
August 6th, 2011 at 9:57 pm
Seydlitz, I understand. My original comment was in response to Seerov who introduced American politics into the thread. That may be how we present to Europe, but living here, be assured there is a distinction.
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I wish I knew Clausewitz well enough to offer insight into your excellent essay, but alas, my Clausewitz is "work in progress."
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Cheers!
August 6th, 2011 at 10:04 pm
Hi Charles –
Having been in a Nordic country when events were unfolding in Norway, and having been able to follow them on BBC (well, that was the only English tv available), I see the Norwegian government’s (and, apparently, the majority of Norwegian citizens’) response as being what we should be looking at as a model for responding to the craziness we’ve just had to endure in the US.
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We’ve been too caught up in the past and the motivations of those who are driven to destroy; that’s tied up with all the fear around. We look at the terrible things the destroyers must have been thinking (although it’s really, really hard to get into their heads, part of my point about Breivik) and find it frightening; or we take our fear and project how frightening what they were thinking must have been. Focusing on the fear limits and weakens us. The compassion that Prime Minister Jens Stoltenberg, in particular but not alone, has been emphasizing is the productive way forward.
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As to how Breivik will be perceived by the public (of which country?), that little episode seems to have been buried by the faux crisis engendered by those in the US for whom crisis engenderment is a way of life or profitable, and I’m sure something else shiny will turn up soon, maybe the financial difficulties that will emanate from that crisis. More to keep people frightened in more dimensions.
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Overall, I wouldn’t say don’t try to figure out what that manifesto might mean. But I have some real reservations, in this day of cut and paste, that there is any meaning at all in it. The Templars, as others have pointed out, can be taken to mean many things. Wolfram’s Tempeliesen are a mystery, and there is the historical record, but everything else about them goes in many directions with the combination of religion and war, down to the trivialization, as someone else noted here, of video games.
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I’ve got some more thoughts stewing in my head, but they pertain more to compassion and the future. And you know how it is with blogging – sometimes I get to writing the post, and sometimes I don’t.
August 7th, 2011 at 1:18 am
Charles Cameron,
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Regarding "Talmudic spirituality."
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I use this term as an umbrella term of sorts for describing the Anglo-American-Globalist Elite’s whole spiritual system. In my study of the globalist elite, the Talmud appears (I’m not 100% sure) to be the highest law in their spiritual tradition. Not a lot is known about the text, as even the globalists must obtain certain "ranks" to see more of the text. What we do know about this text is that it permits and even encourages global domination over the "Goyim," which is a word for cattle. This controlling of the cattle is permitted by God, because they are "God’s Chosen People." The "Goyim" are born to serve "God’s Chosen People." Therefore "Talmudic spirituality" may be defined as "spirituality designed for God’s people and their cattle." But really, there’s more to it than the Talmud.
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If the Talmud is their great law book, Freemasonry and Kabbalism are their symbolic and ceremonial elements. They place this symbolism across the media spectrum. Architecture, music, fashion, popular culture, movies, coat’s of arms, monuments, etc are filled with their symbolism. Here’s a link to a website that analyzes this symbolism. If you’re new to this kind of thinking just keep an open mind and remain tolerant. Spend a few hours reading the site: http://vigilantcitizen.com/
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The elite also seem to worship a deity that they call "the light bearer." He is generally related to and associated with the serpent across mythologies and faiths. He had a disagreement of sorts with God. This deity is supposed to sit in their temple once the "New World Order" is implemented. But what you really want to know is the nature of his game?
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The Owl is very important to them. They meet once a year in California to worship a giant stone owl while wearing togas. The Owl "sees in the dark" so it may be a representation of the "Light Bearer?" "Seeing wisdom in the dark."
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They have lucky numbers, such as : 3, 9, 11, 13, 33.
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Other symbolism includes : the Star of Saturn, Pyramids, one eye, checkerboard floor, duel pillars.
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They also have an interest in Chimerical creatures. They’re on the forefront of science that mixes humans and animals. Nobody knows why? Their pop-music/pop-culture is very eager to push and glamorize multiculturalism and multi racialism. They like mixing of all sorts.
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That’s the best summary I can give you. Really, "Talmudic Spirituality" is only one aspect of their spiritual system. I probably shouldn’t single out the Talmud because it’s bigger than that and suggests I’m only describing Jews. There are pictures of George Bush on google walking with his Talmud. But again, it’s more than the Talmud, so I’ll just call it "Luciferist Spirituality" to make it simple .What I’m describing is a total spiritual system. It’s a faith/religion/philosophy/ideology/cult/program for humanity that places them at the top of the pyramid while the "Goyim" are situated as our usefulness to them permits.
August 7th, 2011 at 6:20 am
Some additional characteristics and elements of the globalist spiritual system.
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They have a "new age" element. Organizations like "Share International" (Maitreya followers) or the so called "Railians" seem to be vehicles for their interests. These organizations push global government in the context of being in an intergalactic polity (with little grey aliens). With the right holographic technology think about the false flag operation you could carry out to bring in global government? If people will burn the Reichstag, or blow up the Lusitania, why not push the level of deception up and have grey aliens "force" the earth into accept global government with "God’s Chosen" as "system administrators?"
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They also seem to be into certain traditional mythologies, especially Egyptian?
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They’re interested in Alchemy. Apparently, anyone who knows anything about alchemy realizes that it’s actually a social science. Its purpose is not changing base metal into gold. It’s about changing human minds into thinking that base metals ARE gold! It’s about social engineering. The movie, music, and entertainment media are the mediums for alchemical operations, programming the masses into believing that base metals are gold (think "diversity is strength").
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They also have interests in astrology. Another possible false flag speculation involves a "2012 incident" that will be used to form global government with "God’s Chosen" as the enlightened overseers. Regardless, they take alignments of rocks in space and time very seriously.
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I almost forgot Zionist Christianity/leftist Protestantism/post V2 Catholicism/LDS. These are religions for the masses. The elites have the Talmud, fraternal systems, alchemy, pagan mythologies, secret hand shakes, and the mysteries, while the cattle get faiths that elevate self hate ("we’re all sinners") and not ironically, requires special treatment for "God’s chosen people" (lol..who woulda’ thought?). These religions keep the hooplehead masses in line.
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This doesn’t mean there isn’t value in Christianity or the Bible. All ancient texts and mythologies offer key insight into who human beings really are. Besides, Jesus/the Kalki/Thor might actually come back (in a spacecraft) one day and end up throwing these elite types in a "pit of fire?" lol This might be a good anti-violence mantra for the "far right?": "Let Jesus take care of the violence." or "Don’t use violence, Jesus will handle it."
August 7th, 2011 at 7:53 am
Hi Cheryl:
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I am in agreement with the general thrust of your post, and certainly have the impression that the Norwegians have responded with commendable restraint and dignity to the tragedy in their midst.
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My own reason for continuing to post on Breivik is similar to yours for continuing to illuminate us as to the actual scale of the Fukushima event — ie to clarify in an area where exaggeration and misinformation are otherwise threatening to capsize reasonable and informed thinking.
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It is always good to see you commenting here, and should any further comments occur to you, I hope you will find the time to express them.
August 7th, 2011 at 8:29 am
Hi, Seerov:
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You’ve said quite a bunch there, and it will take a little while for my to respond in full – but I’d like to begin with a quick comment on your suggestions that "even the globalists must obtain certain ‘ranks’ to see more of the [Talmud] text" and "There are pictures of George Bush on google walking with his Talmud."
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As someone who studies religions, I have a copy of the Babylonian Talmud (in English, alas, my Hebrew is even less than Shakespeare‘s Greek) on my laptop. You can download the whole thing here in the Soncino edition, or purchase the Artscroll editions of both the Balylonian (Bavli) and Jerusalem (Yerushalmi) Talmuds here in various formats. Either way, it’s a multi-volume set — but not something you have to be terribly elite to possess.
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FWIW, the volume of Talmud George W Bush is pictured as carrying on the net:
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is from the ArtScroll edition — but the same picture has also been used to show him carrying a "Presidency for Dummies" book:
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and it’s pretty clear the image itself was photoshopped from the Artscroll site.
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The Talmud is actually an extremely interesting, consciously polyphonic work, presenting several layers of text and commentary, and offering the voices of a cluster of frequently disputatious rabbis – and can thus be seen as an antecedent of hypertext, and of the "blog post and comment" form of written debate.
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Rabbi Eliezer Segal of the University of Calgary has a particularly fine interactive page illustrating the way the Talmud is put together here, and the fine short introduction to Talmudic reasoning drawn from HA Wolfson‘s Crescas’ Critique of Aristotle here includes the following:
All in all, a fascinating study, and one that sometimes makes me wish I had seven lifetimes to run concurrently.
August 7th, 2011 at 1:28 pm
Hi Charles –
I think what I’m trying to do is to figure out what’s important in the Breivik story, why, and what we can actually know about it. I’m also concerned about the levels of fear that far too many factors have been stoking for the last decade and trying to see a way past that fear.
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I’ve done enough digging into the knightly stories of the twelfth and thirteenth centuries, most (but not all!) associated with King Arthur, to try to figure out societal attitudes to know that there’s an awful lot we’ll never know. It seems to me that there is an analogy to Breivik’s writings there: multiple unknowns about how and why they were composed that may never be clarified. The chains of association may be easier to trace in Breivik’s case, but the roles that various symbols played in people’s heads will be much harder to illuminate.
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How does a person become disposed to this level of hate and the willingness to act on it? Genetics? Upbringing? Social standing? Later associations? All of the above, plus more? I’m not at all sure we can separate the strands via his writing; this is more of less what I’ve been trying to do with those medieval stories. I think I see some big themes, but I can’t support them anywhere near as strongly as I’d like.
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And then there’s the argument that if a person is, for whatever reasons, disposed toward hate and destruction, he (and it’s almost always he) will find some justification for it. That justification is likely to be entwined with contemporary societal themes, but, once again, it’s not clear that they are determinative.
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Thinking out loud, mostly.
August 7th, 2011 at 7:36 pm
Hi Cheryl:
Funnily enough, I was just reading one of my friend Richard Landes‘ "Studies in Early Medieval Honor-Shame Dynamics" from a forthcoming book of his, A Medievalist’s Guide to the 21st Century.
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I’m interested in the Arthurian legends too — for the notion of chivalry, for the "once and future king" motif so poignantly expressed by the good men of Bodmin, for the eucharistic resonance of the Grail in some tellings, for the zen-like quality of the Conte de la Charette…
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You ask, How does a person become disposed to this level of hate and the willingness to act on it?
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I think there’s a sort of fierce moral purity which despises hypocrisy in oneself, and that that’s part of it — perhaps akin to the Catholic notion of scrupulosity, the error whereby one cannot believes one’s confessed sins have been forgiven, and thus confesses them over and over to a variety of different priests…
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But you’re right, in my view, the exact nature of the congeries of thoughts, memories, interpretations and emotions that go into the mix is unlikely to be discoverable. I do think, however, that we may learn quite a bit along the way…
August 7th, 2011 at 9:29 pm
Charles Cameron:
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Thank you for replying. I’m trying to put a language together for describing the elites spiritual system. This conversation is forcing me to think about my terminology much closer. I tend to think in concepts and sometimes use words that make me have to have three day conversations with objectors. Thank you.
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The picture of Bush is most likely a photo-shop, nevertheless it is meaningful in a "protocols of the elders of Zion" (a forgery) way. Whoever created it was attempting to give a warning of sorts (in fact, the "Protocols" are the greatest piece of futurism EVER CREATED).
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Regarding the Talmud. I am certain that there is wisdom in the Talmud. But there is also a lot of heinous material. The most important part being the "Gods Chosen" and "Goyim" stuff. I believe we need to bring attention to this book, the same way Fox News Conservatives bring attention to the Koran.
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You are correct that the Talmud is available. But the interpretations differ as you move up in rank (this is the same with Freemasonry). The interpretation that a college freshman gets at a Talmud 101 class at Brandise is different than what a rabbi/judge will claim on the 3rd floor of the Israeli supreme court law library.
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The global elite are highly concentrated in Anglo-America. London appears to be the hub. It is made up "Blue Bloods" (Most European Royalty and the Eastern Establishment in the US) plus "global Jewry." They are fierce proponents of private central banking. They also have minions across the world. If you sell your soul to their God they will put you in power. Eighty years ago European Right-wing Revolutionaries described a conspiracy of internationalist Freemasons and Jews. This is basically true, but unlike the European Right Wing Revolutionaries we should not condemn everyone attached to those entities. Most Freemasons and/or Jews have no idea that their entities are involved with global domination.
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If you compare freemasonry and Jewish Cabalism you will notice that most of the symbols overlap. In fact, a masonic temple is set up like the Jewish temple in the Torah. So in a symbolic and ritual way the global elites are all "Jews." But not in the way people generally think.
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Once you folks know about this symbolism you won’t see the world the same again. I encourage everyone reading this to spend at least 2-3 hours on the "Vigilant Citizen" blog that I posted above. I didn’t realize how blind I was until I learned about symbols.
August 8th, 2011 at 5:15 am
"and the folks on the right tend to have better manners. Cordially" I have found this true also. The left will just ignore you, if all else fails, which to me is pretty rude.
August 8th, 2011 at 5:46 am
What I meant about them being the same people was that it is the logic in their relationship that is common. Logic aligns the left and right perpendicular to each other. Its not "their" logic that is common, but the logic that forms the structure that is the result of these two forces acting on each other perpendicularly. Because of this logic, there is a logic, rhythm, and tempo to their movement at right angles to each other. The forces left and right are not in tension, as one would presume, but together they give their movement direction and a magnitude of that direction. Violence is therefore a matter of logic, rhythm and tempo, and how they use them to their advantage. Together the left and right form a center of gravity, which if they were aligned in tension, they would represent two centers of gravity. The logic has to do with how they position themselves. Positioning is their way of orienting themselves in the same environment that they each observe, but from different advantages, and without a gap between them. Without a gap they have a commonality based relationship. Separately, each may represent a different magnitude and force moving in a different direction, but together they have only one force and one direction. In the end, the violence and direction our country takes because of these two forces is exactly the same, it just depends on honor, interest and fear that pushes each in different directions and at different magnitude.
August 8th, 2011 at 2:12 pm
Hi Larry, Thanks for the explanation!
August 12th, 2011 at 6:00 pm
charles, in comment #20 above you used the apt term “congeries” to describe breivik’s thinking, at a moment when i was wondering about another term too: bricolage.
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clay spinuzzi just posted a review of the classic anthro study — “the savage mind” by claude levi-strauss (1968) — that first raised the bricolage notion in connection with mythical thinking. i thought you might like to see the following quote from clay’s review:
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“Levi-Strauss famously introduces the notion of the bricoleur here, the craftsman or jack-of-all-trades whose "heterogeneous repertoire, even if extensive, is nevertheless limited" (p.17)
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According to Levi-Strauss, mythical thought is bricolage: it "builds up structured sets, not directly with other structured sets but by using the remains and debris of events" (pp.21-22).” (source: http://spinuzzi.blogspot.com/2011/08/reading-savage-mind.html)
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i’ve not been a fan of levi-strauss’ writings, but i think he is on to something here that applies to breivik. #
August 12th, 2011 at 8:50 pm
Hi David:
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I was just thinking about Levi-Strauss just yesterday in fact; a friend pointed me to his essay on Myth and Music. And I’m familiar with bricolage, if for no other reason then through David Miller‘s essay, Bricoleur in the Tennis Court: Pedogogy in Postmodern Context, which I read as an extension of his book Gods and Games — which in turn is of great interest to me as someone with roots in theology whose avocation is the exploration of Hesse‘s great Game…
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I actually heard Levi-Strauss speak once, at UCLA I think it was, when the university was giving him an honorary doctorate or some such. He was introduced by a big wig, the Vice-Chancellor I believe, as the winner of a French newspaper poll to name France’s greatest living intellectual, of all things – what a strange honor for an academic to use in introducing a fellow academic, eh? –but we live in interesting times!
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Bricolage and Breivik, yes. I was thinking how similar Breivik’s writings are to the output of some NRMs a couple of days ago, and in particular of:
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* Aum Shinrikyo, whose [i] theology is a blend of Isaac Asimov, Tibetan vajrayana, Nostradamus, and John of Patmos… and
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* Cao Dai, which [ii, iii] venerates both Buddha and Jesus, numbers Victor Hugo among its major saints along with Sun Yat Sen, and also draws inspiration from Muhammad, Joan of Arc, Descartes, Napoleon, Shakespeare, Churchill, Jefferson and Lenin!
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Beat that, Anders Breivik!
September 21st, 2012 at 8:03 pm
The Presidency for Dummies was created by me in 1999, anything that was produced from that image, like the ArtScroll were produced later. I retouched this AP image the day it was published. It was W’s first week on the “job”.
September 21st, 2012 at 8:51 pm
Interesting, fascinating — you’re saying there was an AP version even earlier, eh? D you happen to have a URL?
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In any case, your work went viral, eh?
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I’ve also seen versions with Edv. Munch’s The Scream under his arm, and one with various comics, X-Men included…