Those Americans in government who are supporting Putin in his miserable diatribe. These people are traitors.
They care nothing for our democracy and do everything to help further the despotic regime of a corrupt killer.
They have jumped on board with this villain and his protégé, Donald Trump , who offers a ‘bloodbath ‘ to all of us who don’t support his corruption . He also continuously distorts the truth . And gets his legal fees paid by his supporters.
As Timothy Snyder has pointed out how critical journalists are for the survival of Democracy, he himself is a truthteller. I have considered him to be a part of my soul, as a person of deep knowledge who will share history and the truth as well as he possibly can. Thank you, Timothy Snyder.
Spent the weekend reading about past terror attacks within Russia and stumbled upon some history that I was not previously aware of, the Circassian genocide during the near 100 year Circassian War. Circassian region is what is now Russia that borders the Black Sea, Sochi was not Russia until the 1860’s. The similarities of this history have a lot in common with the invasion of Ukraine today. Circassians were mostly Sunni Muslims, and called “subhuman” by Russian Generals. Circassians suffered a similar fate as the Crimean Tatars and Cossacks. Forced relocation. Mass executions of civilians, complete burning and destruction of their cities, towns, and villages, replaced by ethnic Russians. Those that survived, including children were sent deep inside Russia in order to dilute and extinguish their cultural existence. So it’s not a coincidence nor surprising that Sunni Isis K has a grievance with Russia from recent Syria, Georgia, Chechnya, Afghanistan, and long ago Circassia.
Putin and his ilk, have no love for Jews or Muslims — or anyone not ‘pure’ (whatever that means) Russian. It’s an easy bear to poke, reliably violently reactive.
And yet Netanyahu has pointedly failed to condemn the Russian aggression in Ukraine, and refuses to involve Israel in sanctions against Russia, even though many of Putin's strongest supporters, whether oligarchs or leaders in the Russian Orthodox Church, are avowed antisemites. Figure that one out!
You did a good job of reading between the lines. In particular the parallels between Netanyahu and Trump: Both clinging to power to stay out of jail, both playing to religious extremists, both racists and xenophobes. But the parallel is not total: Bibi knows how to read, and speaks at least two languages.
Sorry I was editing while you were responding. I thought I might have been too vague in my brief response.
Bibi knows how to read and speak two languages because of his heritage and upbringing where learning and knowledge are long respected actions in much of the old world. DT only needs/needed money to have power/influence.
Didn’t Bibi receive some college education here in America? He started out being the “golden boy” for Israel. His brother died in the Six Day War and I truly believe that is when he entered into the dark side.
Jewish right wing religious extremists have made common cause with Christian right wing religious extremists to appropriate Zionism for their own purposes. They seem to ignore that the Evangelicals' impetus is the in-gathering of Jews to herald the Second Coming when Jesus will convert Jews or condemn them to purgatory. With friends like that ... go figure.
I had the idea of writing a dystopian novel about the Christian fundamentalists taking over and expelling all the Jews to Israel. The second coming does not happen, so they conclude that they have not found all the Jews. They double down, attempting to expel anyone with Jewish ancestors. But still it doesn't work. The story's main character is someone who is of Jewish descent, but not practicing. The subplot concerns that person's efforts to remain undetected. It is a kind of tragicomedy, as the very premise is ludicrous. If you're a writer and like the idea, please, be my guest!
More to the point of your comment: I agree. The hard core Zionists may find the promotion of antisemitism to be useful, because they see it as a way of promoting immigration of Jews to Israel. Indeed, I would not put it past Netanyahu's deliberate murder and starvation of innocent Palestinians as being part of a plan to make life difficult for Jews in the diaspora. Certainly the current Israeli government has given lie to the notion that as victims of persecution in the past, they are a righteous people.
Penelope, your statement really made me shiver. The Holocaust comparison is simply wrong and terribly unfair. Netanyahu is not representing all Israelis. In fact, many abhor him and what he is doing. He practically has given us a big FU in the form of continuing his diabolical plan. Hitler, on the other hand, went after Jews, gypsies, the disabled, and gays. I am the daughter of Holocaust victims. What you wrote really upset me.
100%, but I forgot Antarctica! I should have excluded. Of the populated continents, it’s Africa. Because it was the last to get internet. I learned that listening to a lecture by Dr. Barbara Walters, who’s field of study is destabilization/civil wars.
What about the genocide in Rwanda, and all the ethnic strife going on elsewhere in Africa today? The 2023 genocide in Darfur, and the killings by Boko Haram in Nigeria?
Rwanda genocide happened pre Social Media. It would have been much much worse in today's digital ecosystem. Understanding these facts, should drive us to understand why new legislation/regulation is necessary prevention. Elon Musk would be on the opposite side of this argument and that informs us of how important this issue is for democracy, tolerance, education, and peace.
Think of authoritarianism as a religion in itself -- perhaps a meta-religion? Then it's not hard to see what Putin, Netanyahu, Modi, Orbán, Trump, et al. have in common. Along with authoritarianism, this meta-religion tends to be into misogyny and racial purity. As the feminist philosopher-theologian Mary Daly wrote decades ago, patriarchy is the religion of the planet and the various religions (and, I'd add, ideologies) are its denominations.
Marine Le Pen and her niece Marion Marechal both fit right in with these guys, and they have political parties whose main raison d’être is being racially pure French with no immigrants.
No. Don't further confuse an already confused picture by pretending that evil and Satanic acts may be conflated with religion. They are its opposite. That evil acts have been committed in the name of religion is a different thing. That is misuse of religion.
Also, don't confuse Daly's brilliant metaphor with literal truth. Literalism is part of the scourge of fundamentalist self-styled "Christianity" or, better put, "Jesusism".
What do you mean by "religion"? I'm inferring from what you say that you believe religion is by definition a good thing, a positive force. I disagree. I believe, from what I've seen and read over the decades, that religion, like anything else created by humans, can be positive or negative, good, bad, or downright evil, and anything in between.
My meaning of "religion" was more technical, where you seem to be coming more from the point of view of its effects, which, as you say, can be good or bad.
I base my metaphysics in the work of Rudolf Steiner, which is probably the best and most comprehensive available publicly in the Western tradition (check out RSArchive.org).
Steiner described successive stages in human evolution over the past 9–10,000 years—since the time science describes as the end of the Ice Age and what esoteric tradition describes as the sinking and end of Atlantis.
Early on, humans had more of a shared, group soul—a natural clairvoyance inherited through the bloodline. Through this, they were able to experience the stars and heavenly worlds directly. Later, a more individualised consciousness started to develop, and with it, a commensurate loss of clairvoyant ability. At this time, from around 4,000–3,000 BC, religion began to appear, because the people now needed external teaching from a priestly leader to substitute for what they could no longer experience directly for themselves. Later still, by around 2000 years ago, the old clairvoyance was completely lost, remaining only as an atavism in a few isolated individuals. This was when individualised consciousness, our fully separate selves, our enclosed earthly egos, became firmly established. The incarnation of Christ brought this process to fruition. According to Steiner, now, 2000 years later, the time for religion—the authority of traditional external teaching—has passed. No authentic new religion can appear, because evolution has moved on. Today, the urgent demand is for people to take responsibility for their own development by personal spiritual work following a modern spiritual path. To this end, formerly esoteric teachings have now largely been made public and are available to all.
So that's the sense in which I was speaking of religion—it was brought to the various peoples of the world as a metaphysical good, but its time has now passed. It is interesting to investigate various newly arisen fundamentalist cults in this light. For they are cults, not religions, whatever they may call themselves.
As I understand it, fundamentalists use religious symbols to obtain power. It has nothing to do with practicing one’s faith. It uses religion for political gain.
This is a subtle point. Yes, fundamentalists use religion and religious symbols to gain political power. But actually, unfortunately for the rest of us, this appears to have everything to do with practising their faith. Because their faith and the teachings underpinning it stem from defective revelation, where traditional religion has been altered and the distinction between Church and State obliterated so as to serve political power ends.
Fascism seems to work the same way. Read the accounts of ordinary Germans who were drawn to Hitler and Nazism and this often comes up: the importance of being part of a community, a nation, a whole. Unfortunately this usually (always, or almost always?) requires excluding some people from membership. The way the so-called "Christian nationalists" and many garden-variety Republicans these days exclude anyone who isn't of white European descent from category "American."
Netanyahu is a self serving authoritarian like Putin. They understand one another. This has everything to do with staying in power at any cost no matter what.
Yes, Putin will enrage both sides: Jewish and Muslim, to get them to go after each other -- much as he continues to try to divide Ukrainians and their Western allies and, thereby, weaken them as a force for him to fear.
I recall Putin's FSB blew up Russian apartment buildings -- murdering Russians within -- as pretext for Chechen war. From that perspective, letting ISIS do the actual killing of Russians so as to blame Ukraine is accepting a gift.
You seem to suggest Putin planned this. Dr Snyder is saying the Islamists planned and carried it out and Putin is trying after the fact to make an opportunistic intervention to twist the pointer falsely to Ukraine.
Ouch... This window story is even harder to believe than the old "little green men" story. Let's hope that the Speaker of the House will need the Dems to keep him in office, and in exchange, the Speaker will allow the house to vote to help out in the Ukraine. It is a crazy world where we talk about windows and little green men and the Dems helping a Jan 6 insurrectionist, but there we are. You can't make this stuff up.
I still cannot believe Republicans like Johnson keep supporting Putin. They must have a death wish or are too stupid and arrogant to realize they have been played. This is beyond pathetic and dangerous for everyone involved.
Forgot to mention…there are two articles in today’s Guardian about this incident. One covers the known information about the attack while the other one analyzes how the Kremlin’s messaging is diverting attention away from its sprawling FSB’s failure to take the warnings of an ISIS-K imminent attack seriously. I couldn’t help seeing an implied comparison to the way Netanyahu’s security apparatus wasn’t convinced of any immediate Hamas danger. Of course, I could be wrong here because it is a convenient frame but it may not be an accurate frame. I’m assuming both Bibi and Putin will keep any evidence of the security missteps out of view for as long as possible.
Dictators follow a pattern. In order to maintain popularity and control inside the state, they all too often contend that the state is threatened by outsiders.
Do you think that Putin deliberately ignored the warning, believed it was real but ignored it so that he could use it for his propaganda? And, the videos, are they not only to attract recruits but to dissuade reluctant Ukraine supporters from further involvement through horror, disgust, and intimidation at the carnage they see in Moscow but don't see so vividly in Ukraine?
That, too, is my question. It's probably going to take some time before we know whether or not Putin ignored the warning.
As for the videos, it might be the case that, rather than using the videos to "dissuade reluctant Ukraine supporters from further involvement," the mere sharing of the videos itself might have the *effect* of dissuading, assuming it does dissuade reluctant Ukraine supporters. After all, these videos are being shared by ordinary people all over the world, for no other reason than they just want to share them.
What I find most interesting in this essay are TS's comments about the meaning of "window" in KGB jargon. "By speaking of a "window" Putin indicated that the terrorists had Russian confederates preparing their exit, which he presumably did not mean. It seems that Putin was hastily making things up." I'm wondering if it was actually a slip-up that people make when they've knowingly факт up and are trying to hide the truth, but accidentally divulge something that gives them away.
My work in esoteric spirituality backs up Dr Snyder's statement that the Isis videos are designed to attract further killers. (Not designed to put off Ukraine supporters.) Those of us working behind the scenes in the realms of black occultism know that the deliberate piling up of killings at the gate of death is producing innumerable catastrophic consequences for human society. Specifically, consciously generating such deaths is itself a form of black initiation which gives actual power to the perpetrator. Initiation on the black path requires murder.
The general public hasn't the faintest idea of the true depths of the evil that the Ukraine war and Islamism are generating. Putin and Isis leaders must be understood as high level black magicians with powers beyond the ordinary. That is why Dr Snyder, who appears to understand these dimensions, is so adamant that Ukraine must win. You cannot settle with black magicians. They don't want peace. They work for murder and mayhem to directly increase their personal power.
False flag attacks like this one may be, have been a tool of dictators and other political leaders forever. The Reichstag fire just a century ago helped Hitler solidify his grip on Germany. The WMD debacle at the UN plunged the US into misdirected decades of loss of blood and treasure in Iraq - for what?
The House is in recess now for two weeks. It must be brought back and the aid bill for Ukraine MUST be passed. The votes are there. The only one blocking it is that Putin-Trump tool, Mike Johnson. More congress people (including Democrats) need to sign the discharge petition to sidestep Johnson and get the bill to a floor vote. It is that simple.
It is so maddening how many breaks the House has taken! When oh when will the cards turn in our favor? Each of their paychecks should be docked until a resolution is reached. Oh…that’s right, Mike Johnson doesn’t get a paycheck. Where oh where is he hiding the ş?
Russian media are reporting that the four men apprehended in Bryansk, which is as close to Belarus as it is to the war zone in Ukraine, were paid $5,000 each by ISIS. Perhaps they were paid — as decoys.
All seemed to be Tajik. At least one spoke no Russian. They were spotted early on driving a conspicuous Renault. ISIS promptly released a photo of three of the men together, as if to say, Yup these are our boys. Clever of you to catch them.
Are these the kind of people ISIS, or Al-Queda before it, would recruit to infiltrate a sophisticated, security conscious target?
Perhaps the real terrorists melted into the frightened crowd (many of whom were not allowed to drive their cars home) and are safely en route to home base, perhaps south across Uzbekistan to Afghanistan, to rest up for another strike.
As an octogenarian I don’t intuitively understand how to keep a thread going on substack. Consequently I don’t know how to add another very important source of what’s happening in Russia’s war-footing press releases - the Institute for the Study of War (ISW) daily provides the latest documented evidence on the Russo-Ukrainian war, the Israeli-Hamas war, and the threats in the China-Taiwan situation. It’s truly a treasure trove of reliable information and yesterday’s report goes into detail about the topic of Russia’s informational strategy and tactics.
Thanks Dr. Snyder for all those details and, more importantly, reminding us that the Kremlin will turn to its spin doctors to add a chaotic sense of confusion about the incident in their unstated effort to unsettle their citizens’ efforts to understand what happened so that they find it difficult to blame the Kremlin in any way…as well confuse the Kremlin’s supporters abroad by giving them fodder for writing/airing supportive stories of the Kremlin being beset by its self-described enemies Ukraine and/or NATO while ignoring the ISIS-K claims.
Typically great piece by Professor Snyder. If you have not done so, read his masterpiece, “Bloodlands,” a book that will stay with you for as long as you live.
Just a point regarding your prayer: in the spiritual worlds, just like in our world, all things move and change. This includes spiritual beings, who evolve and progress just as we do.
Michael no longer holds the position of archangel, but now occupies a more exalted position. He is now the Archai for our present age, the Sign of the Times, embracing the whole world as the arbiter of Time. The new Archangel representing the Face of the Sun is the Nordic Vidar, formerly an Angel in the Northern Mysteries. With Vidar's new role, a new path through the elemental realms to the Etheric Christ has been opened.
It is vital, if you are into these things, to keep abreast of changes in the spiritual worlds. Praying to the past brings back the past!
Chronos or Kairos = Saturn. True, in one set of contexts.
However, the activity of the reigning Archai or Time Spirit in this context refers to the Sun's position against the background of zodiacal stars at Dawn on the day of the Vernal (Spring) Equinox, when the Sun in its cosmic zodiacal orbit crosses the earthly equator.
Because there is a slight mismatch between the length of the earthly year measured around the equator and the time taken for the Sun to complete its circuit of the Zodiac, this Vernal Point moves backwards (regresses) round the Zodiac at the rate of 1° every 72 years. The Sun takes 24,920 years to complete one circuit of the Zodiac, which is known as the Cosmic, or Platonic, Year. Plato taught this.
So at the turning point in time 2000 years ago, at the time of the Mystery of Golgotha, the vernal point moved back across the cusp from the sign of Aries, the head of the Zodiac, to that of Pisces, the Feet. The Ram became the Fishes.
The vernal point is now located near the head of the Second Fish, some 27° from the cusp but not yet in the sign of Aquarius. We are not yet in the Age of Aquarius, despite what the musical says! Modern science accurately depicts the position of the vernal point in the night sky. So you can look up and see for yourself. (By contrast, popular astrology fixed its vernal point 2000 years ago when the Sun stood at 0° Aries. So it has now become backward-looking and removed from our current physical reality—it deals in abstract psychological "signs" as opposed to actual visible zodiacal constellations and the Sun's position in them.
This explains why Michael still represents the Cosmic Sun, but at a higher level. Not as an Archangel but as an Archai, he governs our times, as the Sign of the Times.
This is interesting stuff right now, as we approach Easter, if you know the deeper cosmic history of this Festival. Originally we humans were more clairvoyant in a natural group-soul way. Then we could contact the stars naturally and directly together in a shared experience. In those days, the Equinox itself was celebrated. Later, as humans moved towards greater individual expression on the physical plane, this power was partially lost, but people could still tune in to the Moon. So the celebration was moved to the first Full Moon after the Equinox. Later still, people lost the old clairvoyance almost totally, being firmly established now as separate individuals in our physical world. So the Festival was moved again to the Sunday following the first Full Moon after the Equinox. Sun — Moon — Day on Earth. The Christ Being had now fully incarnated.
If you know this, you can "read" the various religions and discern from when they take their origins. Star religion? Sun religion? Moon religion?
Unfortunately there are parallels between the majority of Russians and the majority of supporters of authoritarian rule, whether they be the adherents of Trump in the US, LePen in France, or Orban in Hungary, just to name three of many. These folks are somehow dependent on their strong [sic] men for guidance as to what their opinions should be, and abandon any notion of thinking for themselves. It is sad, more so because ultimately they damage their own futures as well as those of the rest of us.
A lot of people admire bullies because bullies so often are able to get their way, and those people feel weak or unappreciated or.... A lot of people fear bullies because bullies will do anything to anyone to get their way. Bullies aren't strong men -- they are their venom, their malice.
Rene Descartes once said something along the lines of "To truly believe, you must deny everything and begin again." For the majority of folks, especially in difficult political and socio-cultural circumstances, it's much easier to simply believe, and turn away.
Spot on! We are now enjoined urgently to develop our own strong, stable, independent individuality. Only on this basis can we then reach out from "I" to "We" in a healthy way to foster a positive future.
Those Americans in government who are supporting Putin in his miserable diatribe. These people are traitors.
They care nothing for our democracy and do everything to help further the despotic regime of a corrupt killer.
They have jumped on board with this villain and his protégé, Donald Trump , who offers a ‘bloodbath ‘ to all of us who don’t support his corruption . He also continuously distorts the truth . And gets his legal fees paid by his supporters.
As Timothy Snyder has pointed out how critical journalists are for the survival of Democracy, he himself is a truthteller. I have considered him to be a part of my soul, as a person of deep knowledge who will share history and the truth as well as he possibly can. Thank you, Timothy Snyder.
My feelings exactly, Fern!
Marlene, quite a while ago, I knew that Timothy Snyder spoke to and for my soul. Hello there, sister.
Hello, my sister-in-arms!💓
BIG SMILE!
Hey, Fern! Hey, Marlene!
Hey, Ms. Lynell!!
Spent the weekend reading about past terror attacks within Russia and stumbled upon some history that I was not previously aware of, the Circassian genocide during the near 100 year Circassian War. Circassian region is what is now Russia that borders the Black Sea, Sochi was not Russia until the 1860’s. The similarities of this history have a lot in common with the invasion of Ukraine today. Circassians were mostly Sunni Muslims, and called “subhuman” by Russian Generals. Circassians suffered a similar fate as the Crimean Tatars and Cossacks. Forced relocation. Mass executions of civilians, complete burning and destruction of their cities, towns, and villages, replaced by ethnic Russians. Those that survived, including children were sent deep inside Russia in order to dilute and extinguish their cultural existence. So it’s not a coincidence nor surprising that Sunni Isis K has a grievance with Russia from recent Syria, Georgia, Chechnya, Afghanistan, and long ago Circassia.
Putin and his ilk, have no love for Jews or Muslims — or anyone not ‘pure’ (whatever that means) Russian. It’s an easy bear to poke, reliably violently reactive.
And yet Netanyahu has pointedly failed to condemn the Russian aggression in Ukraine, and refuses to involve Israel in sanctions against Russia, even though many of Putin's strongest supporters, whether oligarchs or leaders in the Russian Orthodox Church, are avowed antisemites. Figure that one out!
I'm thinking that Netanyahu is more like Trump, Putin, Orban, etc. than many would like to realize....
You did a good job of reading between the lines. In particular the parallels between Netanyahu and Trump: Both clinging to power to stay out of jail, both playing to religious extremists, both racists and xenophobes. But the parallel is not total: Bibi knows how to read, and speaks at least two languages.
Sorry I was editing while you were responding. I thought I might have been too vague in my brief response.
Bibi knows how to read and speak two languages because of his heritage and upbringing where learning and knowledge are long respected actions in much of the old world. DT only needs/needed money to have power/influence.
So does Trump if you count Gibberish.
Mango Unchained.
Didn’t Bibi receive some college education here in America? He started out being the “golden boy” for Israel. His brother died in the Six Day War and I truly believe that is when he entered into the dark side.
Netanyahu went to Cheltenham High School outside of Philadelphia.
I have thought that since day one.
Jewish right wing religious extremists have made common cause with Christian right wing religious extremists to appropriate Zionism for their own purposes. They seem to ignore that the Evangelicals' impetus is the in-gathering of Jews to herald the Second Coming when Jesus will convert Jews or condemn them to purgatory. With friends like that ... go figure.
I had the idea of writing a dystopian novel about the Christian fundamentalists taking over and expelling all the Jews to Israel. The second coming does not happen, so they conclude that they have not found all the Jews. They double down, attempting to expel anyone with Jewish ancestors. But still it doesn't work. The story's main character is someone who is of Jewish descent, but not practicing. The subplot concerns that person's efforts to remain undetected. It is a kind of tragicomedy, as the very premise is ludicrous. If you're a writer and like the idea, please, be my guest!
More to the point of your comment: I agree. The hard core Zionists may find the promotion of antisemitism to be useful, because they see it as a way of promoting immigration of Jews to Israel. Indeed, I would not put it past Netanyahu's deliberate murder and starvation of innocent Palestinians as being part of a plan to make life difficult for Jews in the diaspora. Certainly the current Israeli government has given lie to the notion that as victims of persecution in the past, they are a righteous people.
Two wrongs don't make a right. The Holocaust never gave anyone the right to commit further atrocities.
Simple!
Agree. No one people has a right to a mono theocratic ethno state.
Penelope, your statement really made me shiver. The Holocaust comparison is simply wrong and terribly unfair. Netanyahu is not representing all Israelis. In fact, many abhor him and what he is doing. He practically has given us a big FU in the form of continuing his diabolical plan. Hitler, on the other hand, went after Jews, gypsies, the disabled, and gays. I am the daughter of Holocaust victims. What you wrote really upset me.
Please God. Deliver us all from religious zealots.
Radicalization across all fronts. Which continent has the least crazies, lowest polarization, and why?
Antarctica for the simple reason that it is essentially uninhabited
100%, but I forgot Antarctica! I should have excluded. Of the populated continents, it’s Africa. Because it was the last to get internet. I learned that listening to a lecture by Dr. Barbara Walters, who’s field of study is destabilization/civil wars.
What about the genocide in Rwanda, and all the ethnic strife going on elsewhere in Africa today? The 2023 genocide in Darfur, and the killings by Boko Haram in Nigeria?
Rwanda genocide happened pre Social Media. It would have been much much worse in today's digital ecosystem. Understanding these facts, should drive us to understand why new legislation/regulation is necessary prevention. Elon Musk would be on the opposite side of this argument and that informs us of how important this issue is for democracy, tolerance, education, and peace.
Think of authoritarianism as a religion in itself -- perhaps a meta-religion? Then it's not hard to see what Putin, Netanyahu, Modi, Orbán, Trump, et al. have in common. Along with authoritarianism, this meta-religion tends to be into misogyny and racial purity. As the feminist philosopher-theologian Mary Daly wrote decades ago, patriarchy is the religion of the planet and the various religions (and, I'd add, ideologies) are its denominations.
Marine Le Pen and her niece Marion Marechal both fit right in with these guys, and they have political parties whose main raison d’être is being racially pure French with no immigrants.
What they have in common is that they are all MEN! They seek power and control over their peasants.
And especially over the wombs of the women.
Thank you for stating this so clearly.
No. Don't further confuse an already confused picture by pretending that evil and Satanic acts may be conflated with religion. They are its opposite. That evil acts have been committed in the name of religion is a different thing. That is misuse of religion.
Also, don't confuse Daly's brilliant metaphor with literal truth. Literalism is part of the scourge of fundamentalist self-styled "Christianity" or, better put, "Jesusism".
What do you mean by "religion"? I'm inferring from what you say that you believe religion is by definition a good thing, a positive force. I disagree. I believe, from what I've seen and read over the decades, that religion, like anything else created by humans, can be positive or negative, good, bad, or downright evil, and anything in between.
My meaning of "religion" was more technical, where you seem to be coming more from the point of view of its effects, which, as you say, can be good or bad.
I base my metaphysics in the work of Rudolf Steiner, which is probably the best and most comprehensive available publicly in the Western tradition (check out RSArchive.org).
Steiner described successive stages in human evolution over the past 9–10,000 years—since the time science describes as the end of the Ice Age and what esoteric tradition describes as the sinking and end of Atlantis.
Early on, humans had more of a shared, group soul—a natural clairvoyance inherited through the bloodline. Through this, they were able to experience the stars and heavenly worlds directly. Later, a more individualised consciousness started to develop, and with it, a commensurate loss of clairvoyant ability. At this time, from around 4,000–3,000 BC, religion began to appear, because the people now needed external teaching from a priestly leader to substitute for what they could no longer experience directly for themselves. Later still, by around 2000 years ago, the old clairvoyance was completely lost, remaining only as an atavism in a few isolated individuals. This was when individualised consciousness, our fully separate selves, our enclosed earthly egos, became firmly established. The incarnation of Christ brought this process to fruition. According to Steiner, now, 2000 years later, the time for religion—the authority of traditional external teaching—has passed. No authentic new religion can appear, because evolution has moved on. Today, the urgent demand is for people to take responsibility for their own development by personal spiritual work following a modern spiritual path. To this end, formerly esoteric teachings have now largely been made public and are available to all.
So that's the sense in which I was speaking of religion—it was brought to the various peoples of the world as a metaphysical good, but its time has now passed. It is interesting to investigate various newly arisen fundamentalist cults in this light. For they are cults, not religions, whatever they may call themselves.
As I understand it, fundamentalists use religious symbols to obtain power. It has nothing to do with practicing one’s faith. It uses religion for political gain.
This is a subtle point. Yes, fundamentalists use religion and religious symbols to gain political power. But actually, unfortunately for the rest of us, this appears to have everything to do with practising their faith. Because their faith and the teachings underpinning it stem from defective revelation, where traditional religion has been altered and the distinction between Church and State obliterated so as to serve political power ends.
David Satter comments on communism this way. Like a religion to give people a greater meaning to their existence.
Fascism seems to work the same way. Read the accounts of ordinary Germans who were drawn to Hitler and Nazism and this often comes up: the importance of being part of a community, a nation, a whole. Unfortunately this usually (always, or almost always?) requires excluding some people from membership. The way the so-called "Christian nationalists" and many garden-variety Republicans these days exclude anyone who isn't of white European descent from category "American."
Netanyahu is a self serving authoritarian like Putin. They understand one another. This has everything to do with staying in power at any cost no matter what.
Yes, Putin will enrage both sides: Jewish and Muslim, to get them to go after each other -- much as he continues to try to divide Ukrainians and their Western allies and, thereby, weaken them as a force for him to fear.
Putin and so many thugs like him do not know how to live period.
I recall Putin's FSB blew up Russian apartment buildings -- murdering Russians within -- as pretext for Chechen war. From that perspective, letting ISIS do the actual killing of Russians so as to blame Ukraine is accepting a gift.
You seem to suggest Putin planned this. Dr Snyder is saying the Islamists planned and carried it out and Putin is trying after the fact to make an opportunistic intervention to twist the pointer falsely to Ukraine.
Ouch... This window story is even harder to believe than the old "little green men" story. Let's hope that the Speaker of the House will need the Dems to keep him in office, and in exchange, the Speaker will allow the house to vote to help out in the Ukraine. It is a crazy world where we talk about windows and little green men and the Dems helping a Jan 6 insurrectionist, but there we are. You can't make this stuff up.
I still cannot believe Republicans like Johnson keep supporting Putin. They must have a death wish or are too stupid and arrogant to realize they have been played. This is beyond pathetic and dangerous for everyone involved.
They do it to please Trump.
Putin is the guy who claimed the CIA packed a Malaysian airliner with corpses and crashed it into Ukraine to make him look bad. Russians bought it.
Forgot to mention…there are two articles in today’s Guardian about this incident. One covers the known information about the attack while the other one analyzes how the Kremlin’s messaging is diverting attention away from its sprawling FSB’s failure to take the warnings of an ISIS-K imminent attack seriously. I couldn’t help seeing an implied comparison to the way Netanyahu’s security apparatus wasn’t convinced of any immediate Hamas danger. Of course, I could be wrong here because it is a convenient frame but it may not be an accurate frame. I’m assuming both Bibi and Putin will keep any evidence of the security missteps out of view for as long as possible.
Dictators follow a pattern. In order to maintain popularity and control inside the state, they all too often contend that the state is threatened by outsiders.
Do you think that Putin deliberately ignored the warning, believed it was real but ignored it so that he could use it for his propaganda? And, the videos, are they not only to attract recruits but to dissuade reluctant Ukraine supporters from further involvement through horror, disgust, and intimidation at the carnage they see in Moscow but don't see so vividly in Ukraine?
That, too, is my question. It's probably going to take some time before we know whether or not Putin ignored the warning.
As for the videos, it might be the case that, rather than using the videos to "dissuade reluctant Ukraine supporters from further involvement," the mere sharing of the videos itself might have the *effect* of dissuading, assuming it does dissuade reluctant Ukraine supporters. After all, these videos are being shared by ordinary people all over the world, for no other reason than they just want to share them.
What I find most interesting in this essay are TS's comments about the meaning of "window" in KGB jargon. "By speaking of a "window" Putin indicated that the terrorists had Russian confederates preparing their exit, which he presumably did not mean. It seems that Putin was hastily making things up." I'm wondering if it was actually a slip-up that people make when they've knowingly факт up and are trying to hide the truth, but accidentally divulge something that gives them away.
My work in esoteric spirituality backs up Dr Snyder's statement that the Isis videos are designed to attract further killers. (Not designed to put off Ukraine supporters.) Those of us working behind the scenes in the realms of black occultism know that the deliberate piling up of killings at the gate of death is producing innumerable catastrophic consequences for human society. Specifically, consciously generating such deaths is itself a form of black initiation which gives actual power to the perpetrator. Initiation on the black path requires murder.
The general public hasn't the faintest idea of the true depths of the evil that the Ukraine war and Islamism are generating. Putin and Isis leaders must be understood as high level black magicians with powers beyond the ordinary. That is why Dr Snyder, who appears to understand these dimensions, is so adamant that Ukraine must win. You cannot settle with black magicians. They don't want peace. They work for murder and mayhem to directly increase their personal power.
False flag attacks like this one may be, have been a tool of dictators and other political leaders forever. The Reichstag fire just a century ago helped Hitler solidify his grip on Germany. The WMD debacle at the UN plunged the US into misdirected decades of loss of blood and treasure in Iraq - for what?
The House is in recess now for two weeks. It must be brought back and the aid bill for Ukraine MUST be passed. The votes are there. The only one blocking it is that Putin-Trump tool, Mike Johnson. More congress people (including Democrats) need to sign the discharge petition to sidestep Johnson and get the bill to a floor vote. It is that simple.
I’ve written to our senators and representative, but is there another way to reach more legislators about this? This is no time to take a break.
It is so maddening how many breaks the House has taken! When oh when will the cards turn in our favor? Each of their paychecks should be docked until a resolution is reached. Oh…that’s right, Mike Johnson doesn’t get a paycheck. Where oh where is he hiding the ş?
Excellent, as always.
Russian media are reporting that the four men apprehended in Bryansk, which is as close to Belarus as it is to the war zone in Ukraine, were paid $5,000 each by ISIS. Perhaps they were paid — as decoys.
All seemed to be Tajik. At least one spoke no Russian. They were spotted early on driving a conspicuous Renault. ISIS promptly released a photo of three of the men together, as if to say, Yup these are our boys. Clever of you to catch them.
Are these the kind of people ISIS, or Al-Queda before it, would recruit to infiltrate a sophisticated, security conscious target?
Perhaps the real terrorists melted into the frightened crowd (many of whom were not allowed to drive their cars home) and are safely en route to home base, perhaps south across Uzbekistan to Afghanistan, to rest up for another strike.
As an octogenarian I don’t intuitively understand how to keep a thread going on substack. Consequently I don’t know how to add another very important source of what’s happening in Russia’s war-footing press releases - the Institute for the Study of War (ISW) daily provides the latest documented evidence on the Russo-Ukrainian war, the Israeli-Hamas war, and the threats in the China-Taiwan situation. It’s truly a treasure trove of reliable information and yesterday’s report goes into detail about the topic of Russia’s informational strategy and tactics.
Yes, the ISW is the best, most complete, and most reputable source of current information on all 3 of these wars.
Thanks Dr. Snyder for all those details and, more importantly, reminding us that the Kremlin will turn to its spin doctors to add a chaotic sense of confusion about the incident in their unstated effort to unsettle their citizens’ efforts to understand what happened so that they find it difficult to blame the Kremlin in any way…as well confuse the Kremlin’s supporters abroad by giving them fodder for writing/airing supportive stories of the Kremlin being beset by its self-described enemies Ukraine and/or NATO while ignoring the ISIS-K claims.
Typically great piece by Professor Snyder. If you have not done so, read his masterpiece, “Bloodlands,” a book that will stay with you for as long as you live.
I just finished Robert Bellah’s Religion in Human Evolution and Bloodlands is next.
As a Canadian, a father and a grandfather,
I offer a timely Prayer on this Palm Sunday, for all of our world to mindfully use as we struggle against strong evil forces.
To preserve our Democracy here against Trump and preserve the Ukraine people against Putin.
"St. Joseph and St. Michael the Archangel defend us [them] in battle.
Be our [their] defense against the wickedness and snares of the Devil [advocates and agents],
May God rebuke them we humbly pray, and by the power of God,
Cast into hell Satin [Putin , Trump] and all evil spirits,
Who prowl about the world seeking the ruin of souls,
Amen."
Just a point regarding your prayer: in the spiritual worlds, just like in our world, all things move and change. This includes spiritual beings, who evolve and progress just as we do.
Michael no longer holds the position of archangel, but now occupies a more exalted position. He is now the Archai for our present age, the Sign of the Times, embracing the whole world as the arbiter of Time. The new Archangel representing the Face of the Sun is the Nordic Vidar, formerly an Angel in the Northern Mysteries. With Vidar's new role, a new path through the elemental realms to the Etheric Christ has been opened.
It is vital, if you are into these things, to keep abreast of changes in the spiritual worlds. Praying to the past brings back the past!
The real point is the evil force wielded by Putin, Trump and all their devilish advocates and agents needs to be called out and defended against.
Agreed wholeheartedly. Thankyou.
Chronos or Kairos
Chronos or Kairos = Saturn. True, in one set of contexts.
However, the activity of the reigning Archai or Time Spirit in this context refers to the Sun's position against the background of zodiacal stars at Dawn on the day of the Vernal (Spring) Equinox, when the Sun in its cosmic zodiacal orbit crosses the earthly equator.
Because there is a slight mismatch between the length of the earthly year measured around the equator and the time taken for the Sun to complete its circuit of the Zodiac, this Vernal Point moves backwards (regresses) round the Zodiac at the rate of 1° every 72 years. The Sun takes 24,920 years to complete one circuit of the Zodiac, which is known as the Cosmic, or Platonic, Year. Plato taught this.
So at the turning point in time 2000 years ago, at the time of the Mystery of Golgotha, the vernal point moved back across the cusp from the sign of Aries, the head of the Zodiac, to that of Pisces, the Feet. The Ram became the Fishes.
The vernal point is now located near the head of the Second Fish, some 27° from the cusp but not yet in the sign of Aquarius. We are not yet in the Age of Aquarius, despite what the musical says! Modern science accurately depicts the position of the vernal point in the night sky. So you can look up and see for yourself. (By contrast, popular astrology fixed its vernal point 2000 years ago when the Sun stood at 0° Aries. So it has now become backward-looking and removed from our current physical reality—it deals in abstract psychological "signs" as opposed to actual visible zodiacal constellations and the Sun's position in them.
This explains why Michael still represents the Cosmic Sun, but at a higher level. Not as an Archangel but as an Archai, he governs our times, as the Sign of the Times.
This is interesting stuff right now, as we approach Easter, if you know the deeper cosmic history of this Festival. Originally we humans were more clairvoyant in a natural group-soul way. Then we could contact the stars naturally and directly together in a shared experience. In those days, the Equinox itself was celebrated. Later, as humans moved towards greater individual expression on the physical plane, this power was partially lost, but people could still tune in to the Moon. So the celebration was moved to the first Full Moon after the Equinox. Later still, people lost the old clairvoyance almost totally, being firmly established now as separate individuals in our physical world. So the Festival was moved again to the Sunday following the first Full Moon after the Equinox. Sun — Moon — Day on Earth. The Christ Being had now fully incarnated.
If you know this, you can "read" the various religions and discern from when they take their origins. Star religion? Sun religion? Moon religion?
Hope you enjoyed this, even though a bit long…
Unfortunately there are parallels between the majority of Russians and the majority of supporters of authoritarian rule, whether they be the adherents of Trump in the US, LePen in France, or Orban in Hungary, just to name three of many. These folks are somehow dependent on their strong [sic] men for guidance as to what their opinions should be, and abandon any notion of thinking for themselves. It is sad, more so because ultimately they damage their own futures as well as those of the rest of us.
A lot of people admire bullies because bullies so often are able to get their way, and those people feel weak or unappreciated or.... A lot of people fear bullies because bullies will do anything to anyone to get their way. Bullies aren't strong men -- they are their venom, their malice.
Absolutely spot on, Stephen.
Rene Descartes once said something along the lines of "To truly believe, you must deny everything and begin again." For the majority of folks, especially in difficult political and socio-cultural circumstances, it's much easier to simply believe, and turn away.
Exactly. Anyone who sees Trump, Putin, Netanyahu or the rest of them as strong men has rocks in their head.
But hang on … They are strong men. Just the wrong sort of strong man.
Spot on! We are now enjoined urgently to develop our own strong, stable, independent individuality. Only on this basis can we then reach out from "I" to "We" in a healthy way to foster a positive future.
People who admire bullies want to be like them. Just like bullies, they are on the wrong path.