I AM STRONG

JESUS IS WOKE

CURSED ARE THE MEEK
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“We’re going to go on offense, not just on defense. Maximum lethality, not tepid legality,...Violent effect, not politically correct. We’re going to raise up warriors, not just defenders.”

Pete Hegseth, US Secretary of War

“We won World War I, we won World War II, we won everything before that and in between, and then we decided to go woke, and we changed the name to DOD. So, we’re going Department of War.”

Donald Trump, President of the United States


Jesus Is Woke
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And he opened his mouth and taught them, saying:

“Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.
“Blessed are those who mourn, for they shall be comforted.
“Blessed are the meek, for they shall inherit the earth.
“Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, for they shall be satisfied.
“Blessed are the merciful, for they shall receive mercy.
“Blessed are the pure in heart, for they shall see God.
“Blessed are the peacemakers, for they shall be called sons[a] of God.
“Blessed are those who are persecuted for righteousness' sake, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.
“Blessed are you when others revile you and persecute you and utter all kinds of evil against you falsely on my account. 

Rejoice and be glad, for your reward is great in heaven, for so they persecuted the prophets who were before you.

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Cursed are the Meek

The Anti-Christian Theology of Donald Trump

​"He's not a war hero," Trump said. "He's a war hero because he was captured.
I like people that weren't captured."  (Trump on John McCain)
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​Trump ties the intrinsic worth of a person with worldly success and power.  His theology is about dividing the world into strong people and weak people, about not being a "loser."   It makes a mockery of the humble Nazarene who reached out to the poor and powerless; who valued empathy and humility, generosity and vulnerability, compassion and care; who said "Blessed are the meek, for they shall inherit the earth."  The Nazarene is far too weak for Trump's liking.  Had Trump been alive at the death of Jesus, he - like the Roman imperialists -- would have declared it the fitting end to such a weak-willed loser.  Jesus, like John McCain, should have escaped.

How to describe this theology?  Some say it is Nietszchean in its inner ethos.  See Peter Wehner's article in the New York Times:  The Theology of Donald Trump.  Others, in defense of Nietzsche, say that Nietzsche would be appalled at Trump, because Trump is such a far cry from the true "ubermensch" Nietzsche had in mind.  See Richard Schacht's Response: Donald Trump and Nietzsche.  One thing for sure.  For the 45th president of the United States, meekness is for losers.  Trump's beatitudes will say: Cursed are the meek, for theirs is the kingdom of losers.  

- Jay McDaniel

Nietzsche's Critique of Christian Morality

"Melvyn Bragg and guests discuss Nietzsche's On The Genealogy of Morality - A Polemic, which he published in 1887 towards the end of his working life and in which he considered the price humans have paid, and were still paying, to become civilised. In three essays, he argued that having a guilty conscience was the price of living in society with other humans. He suggested that Christian morality, with its consideration for others, grew as an act of revenge by the weak against their masters, 'the blond beasts of prey', as he calls them, and the price for that slaves' revolt was endless self-loathing. These and other ideas were picked up by later thinkers, perhaps most significantly by Sigmund Freud who further explored the tensions between civilisation and the individual." (BBC)

Nietzsche on the Ubermensch

​"Some time, in a stronger age than this mouldy, self-doubting present, he will come to us, the redeeming man of great love and contempt ... This man of the future will redeem us not just from the ideal held up till now, but also from the things which have to arise from it, from the great nausea, the will to nothingness, from nihilism, that stroke of midday and of the great decision which makes the will free again, which gives earth its purpose and man his hope again, this antichrist and anti-nihilist, this conquerer of God and nothingness – he must come one day ...

The Theology of Donald Trump

​"What Mr. Trump admires is strength. For him, a person’s intrinsic worth is tied to worldly success and above all to power. He never seems free of his obsession with it. In his comments to that gathering of evangelicals, Mr. Trump said this: “And I say to you folks, because you have such power, such influence. Unfortunately the government has weeded it away from you pretty strongly. But you’re going to get it back. Remember this: If you ever add up, the men and women here are the most important, powerful lobbyists. You’re more powerful. Because you have men and women, you probably have something like 75, 80 percent of the country believing. But you don’t use your power. You don’t use your power.”

-- The Theology of Donald Trump, Peter Wehner, July, 2016

What would Nietzsche Say?

​Mr. Wehner’s summary of “Nietzschean morality” is a simplistic caricature. Nietzsche was convinced that power relations are fundamental to everything that goes on in life and the world (religions and moralities included). So to condemn power is to condemn life, and affirming life requires affirming power, which he does.

But that is no blanket endorsement of all expressions of the basic disposition he calls “will to power.” Power for Nietzsche is the name of the game, but what is at stake in it is something more: the fragile possibility of a “higher” humanity.

Nietzsche’s moral vision revolves around the idea of realizing this possibility, upgrading rather than degrading power relations in human affairs. Mr. Trump’s, to put it mildly, does not.
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Nietzsche the master psychopathologist would have a field day with it.
Photos from kennethkonica, PaulNeedham, wwarby
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