Imagine a monster whose primary interest is to embrace philosophy and then power—Roman power, Greco-Roman power, and Greek philosophy, in other words, human power. Origen.  You know what he loved.  The ugliest, most vile, sinister, and self-serving sin, zealously and passionately preached by everyone I know. The worship of state, ethnicity, family, religion, but especially philosophy—for example, your blood-soaked liberal values—embedded in your “Greekdom.” Profoundly and inexorably disgusting.  Likewise, the human clan, the family, the irredeemable evil character that the gospel itself presents as the arch-enemy of Jesus Christ.  Peter: Equally revolting and unworthy of God. Origen, who learned Hebrew, not to teach Scripture but to increase his importance in order to undermine the Rabbis. Alexandria: Self-involved academics and money-grubbing politicians. A marriage made in Hell. Don’t believe me? Ask your kids.  “All you need,” Fr. Paul thunders, “is to read Galatians 2 fifteen times in a row.” As if. He who has ears to hear, let him hear.  (Episode 323)

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Origen Was a Monster

Each week, Dr. Richard Benton, Fr. Marc Boulos and guests discuss the content of the Bible as literature. On Tuesdays, Fr. Paul Tarazi presents an in-depth analysis of the biblical text in the original languages.

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The canon—not the text—of the Septuagint dates back only to the fourth century, to the area of, you guessed it, Alexandria.  The canon—not the text—of the Septuagint comes from sources like Codex Alexandrinus, Sinaiticus, and Vaticanus. The canon—not the text—because the Septuagint text, Fr. Paul explains, was rendered by the original authors (or their followers), who, unlike Philo and Origen, were committed to teaching Scripture, not using it for their own gain.  We pretend that political violence is shocking or surprising. However, early Christian leaders, Fr. Paul continues, influenced by Platonic philosophy, behaved exactly like Herod and the Sadducees.  Like politicians.  They behaved like Netanyahu. But long before Netanyahu, there were others.  Men like Emperor Justinian did their genocidal work quickly, by hand. They did not take seven months and did not require advanced technology.  Influenced by Platonic thought, these same men loved the idea of a “divine spark” in each person.  And why not?  If you want to be a god, what better way than to embrace a vast intellectual, literary, religious, and cultural tradition that leads to the undue adulation of human beings and then use that library to undermine the biblical teaching and distort the Christian message? Western values, anyone? Or perhaps an ice cream cone will suffice. (Episode 324)

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Paul Warned Us

No statement more fully captures the anti-scriptural sadism of colonial solipsism than the American expression, “If you can’t beat ‘em, join ‘em.”  Unless, of course, the “em” is a shepherd standing at the midbar, reciting the written command of the Scriptural, inexistent, invisible, unseen, indomitable God who has no egregious, obscene, man-made statue or temple. By all means, join him, if you can.  In 1932, according to the Yale Book of Quotations (yes, the same Yale that arrested Jewish kids this week for following the Shepherd), the Atlantic (yes, the famous liberal magazine that once, long ago, fought to protect Jewish kids) cited that ungodly saying (which is a much older saying) as uttered by a U.S. Senator. Once the Atlantic and then Yale published it, it became a colonial reference—just before many terrible things took place under its spell.  That senator would have loved Philo or Josephus Flavius. The latter lived in Palestine and fought against the Romans but later decided, “if you can’t beat ‘em, join ‘em.”  “There was a tension,” Fr. Paul thunders,  “Between the originators of scripture and some of their followers.” “There was an intellectual fight.” Fr. Paul continues, “This took place in Alexandria. Remember, Philo was in Alexandria.  And that’s the head of the Asp, as we say in Arabic.  It’s Alexandria, which was the intellectual capital of the Roman Empire.” Against Alexandria, the Shepherd cries: If you can’t beat ‘em, submit to God!  Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord. Hosanna in the Highest!  Bring more evils upon them, O Lord. Bring more evils upon those who are glorious upon the earth. Arise, O God, judge the earth, for to thee belong all the nations.  Blessed Pascha to all peoples. Peace in the Middle East.  (Episode 322)

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If You Can’t Beat ‘Em, Resist

It gets so old—your universal declarations, your philosophies, your ideologies, your heightened sensibilities, your values, your propaganda, your Kool-Aid.  Your gods.  Hearing Fr. Paul teach, it hit me like a ton of your rubble. When people hear the words of the biblical Prophet, they can’t help but respond by preaching their civilization. It’s an obvious, if not childlike, attempt to assimilate and digest the biblical Prophet—to neutralize the bitter pill.   “How can we make this ours?”  One only needs to visit the British Museum to understand the mechanism.  But Prophets cannot be digested. Like a statue of Dorothy Day or Malcolm X, they cannot be made to fit in. You want them to fit because you fit in. But that’s why you can’t hear Scripture.  So you draw a picture of your city, the god of Reagan, and write the name “Jesus” or “Mary” on it, and then tell stories about your holy wars.  I wish I were talking about fringe extremists, but as we speak, the most evolved, educated, liberal, and enlightened scholars of your civilization conspire to kill Saracens in defense of their gods.  “There is tension,” Fr. Paul explains: “There are insiders that are opposing the message. And I’m convinced that things were worded in this way because the original authors…knew that they were talking against the grain…that’s why they included—in their stories—a preemptive strike against those who would not agree with them, and it is this that is my basis when I critique the Liberal Arts and Reception History.” It’s tempting to call those praying to kill the Saracens “idiots,” but this is a grave error. An extremely intelligent person with an Oxford degree in the humanities is not only capable of conspiring to kill Saracens (in the service of his gods) but has been doing it openly for the past six months.  The word you are looking for is not “idiot” but “monster.” If adding modifiers like “authentic,” “evolved,” or “enlightened” helps, please do so.  It’s your civilization.  (Episode 321)

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Stop Preaching Your Gods

Every immigrant, every minority, and every colonized person living under a human boot faces the same dilemma: how to live without imitating or accepting the ways of the human gods that impose their glory. “We have,” a wise poet once said, “on this earth what makes life worth living.” Scripture, Fr. Paul has explained many times, forged a path for living in the ancient world by refusing to accept the glory of Alexander, the Seleucids, and all who came after them by pushing back. Not by working within their system.  Not by playing their game or thinking like them.  Least of all by adopting their language.  With no hope, from under their boot, Scripture came up with biblical Hebrew to force the Greeks to submit to the Scriptural God. They did not study Greek or capitulate to Greek culture in order to convince or get ahead in Greek society and maybe attract a few wealthy people to their secret cult. You’re thinking of the harlots in 1 Corinthians.  Don’t be like the harlots in 1 Corinthians.  You become what you accept. So, reject everything and become nothing, like the biblical prophets.  Trust me.  When you are nothing you have more free time to study Semitic triliterals. The more you know Semitic, the better your chance of hearing God speak. So when in Rome, smile at the Romans, the Greeks (or the freedom-loving ice cream people), politely ignore them and do what Paul says.  (Episode 320)

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Origen Was a Monster

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