You mean you kill people... at the behest of your superiors?

predicted, going to crank up at least one of the middle east wars, not end it as promised, is just too good. It looks like the “Senate investigation” right out of Godfather II.

As Fredo said, “Hyman Roth owns him.”

True then, and true now.

The lack of publicly-accessible debate and cross-examination puts us at a disadvantage: perhaps Miss Edmonds is herself a disinformation agent. But there is enough that fits with what we have already been able to figure out about the forces behind the scenes, that it has the ring of truth. On the assumption that her story is true, it adds another important puzzle piece to figuring out the composition of our regime. One thread is espionage and corruption of the legislature. The other thread is drug running into Britain and the US. Each thread involves agents of two foreign powers: Turks, as well as… well, guess. The time of the crimes goes back to the period before and after the 9-11.

Here, I summarize some of the names and themes, as the narrative can be a bit dizzying without a guide. Then, go here to read the interview, using the list as a crib sheet.

Turkish crime syndicate

Mehmet Eymür — head of Turkish paramilitary group for their intelligence service. Activities in England, Germany, Italy, and Balkans. Turkey transferred him to US to prevent him testifying; he now lives in McLean. The criminal activities are not specified, but by connecting dots apparently includes drug-running.

Abdullah Catli — central figure in the Turkey-Europe scandal; 1989 most wanted by Interpol; moved to Chicago, where he continued activities until 1996.

Sabri Sayari — Turkish spy in Washington, DC

Espionage

Unless specified, identifications refer to the time of the ring, not necessarily today. For example, Lantos is now deceased.

Marc Jew Grossman — Undersecretary of State (#3 highest position); had been ambassador to Turkey 1994-7. Picked up numerous Turkish and Israeli contacts while there.

Douglas Goy Dickerson — Air Force Major, worked for Grossman in Turkey

Tom Jew Lantos — Congressman from California

Alan Jew Makovsky — Lantos assistant, worked for AIPAC (now works for Washington Institute for Near Eastern Policy, a pro-Israel think tank)

Richard Jew Perle  – assistant Secretary of Defense (Reagan administration); Defense Policy Board Advisory Committee, 1987 to 2004

Douglas Jew Feith — Under Secretary of Defense for Policy 2001-5

Paul Jew Wolfowitz — Deputy Secretary of Defense, President of the World Bank.

Brent Goy Scowcroft — former National Security Advisor. Client of Turkey. Worked out the plan to attack Iraq, then later opposed it when Turkey’s conditions were not met by Bush administration.

Richard Goy Armitage — Deputy Secretary of State (#2 position)

Dennis Goy Hastert — former House Speaker, now agent of Turkey

Bob Goy Livingston — Rep (R) Louisiana (now, a lobbyist)

Dan Goy Burton — Rep (R) Indiana

Jan Jewess Schakowsky — Rep’ette (D) Illinois

We already knew this, but further documentation: the war against Iraq was already discussed months before the 9-11, including getting the necessary clearances from Turkey.

The big picture is clear: Israel has opened up Turkey as a surrogate player in the game of espionage against the US. This gives them sources that are not directly traceable to the usual Israeli suspects, along with a little plausible denial. Plus, a whole new network of professors and grad students at American universities with access to secret information. Plus, additional sources can be recruited that might have scruples about giving secrets to Israel but might regard Turkey as more benign. Or: since the Khazars were a Turkish tribe, it may just be that blood is thicker than water?

But what do the goy Americans that wink and nod and curl their greedy little fingers around a wad of bills have to say for themselves? What do we say about them? More importantly: what are we going to do about them?

Somehow, there needs to be some true loss when these millionaires lose their concentration — perhaps while thinking about changing travel agents or some such — and botch easy plays.  It does seem like a good argument for some notion of just wage.

When our Führer arises, he will have his work cut out, even in sports.

2. That Bam-bam got the Nobel Prize says nothing about him. There is nothing to say about him in respect to “peace.” Standing around like Alfred E. Neuman with a shrug and a “what, me worry?” in respect to our ongoing, endless wars for Israel is hardly world-class peace prize material.

It does say something about the Committee, and their outlook. Perhaps the prize is supposed to memorialize the end of White America. Or, perhaps rushing to give Yomama the prize not even one year into his reign suggests they worry it might be too late to do so next year.

• most milita members favor 3rd Party candidates
• Ron Paul etc are or have been 3rd Party candidates
• Therefore, people with Ron Paul (or the others’) bumper stickers should be watched

We can chuckle at the logic of this no doubt government-school educated governor. But not at his content.

A militia is the citizenry armed to defend itself — whether against roving criminals or a rogue regime.

In the uneducated mind, there is an ambiguity in our Second Amendment, when it says, “A well regulated militia, being necessary to the security of a free state, the right of the people to keep and bear arms, shall not be infringed.” Is it the “milita” or the “people” that have the right? ask our government-indoctrinated subjects.

In a free republic, these entities are congruent: the same citizenry that gives its consent to the civil rule also constitutes the militia. There is no contradiction between them. When the citizens must take up arms against their own government, it means the government has failed; has usurped rights not ceded to it: it has become a tyranny.

To his partial credit, Chuck Baldwin’s response (which also contains a link to the official response from all three) never exactly ratifies the tyrants’ condemnation of militias. However, it is only partial credit, for Baldwin says

The obvious inference of the above statement links Ron Paul, Bob Barr, and myself to potential dangerous “militia members.”

This statement is fraught with ambiguity. Does he object only to “potentially dangerous” militia members? (And what good is any militia unless it is potentially dangerous?)  Moreover, putting “militia members” in quotes draws attention to the unreflected appropriation of the term as used by Tyrant Nixon, but leaves other issues unaddressed: the implicit slander of real militia members and the need to affirm the crucially important role that militia as such should play in preserving our liberties against tyrants like Jeremiah Nixon.

Instead, Baldwin’s response is basically two arguments: (1) a populist protest that 75% of all Americans agree with at least one thing on the list of terrorist-favored items, and (2) profiling is wrong.

(In passing, note that amongst whites, probably essentially all would “fail” Nixon’s test by the criterion of at least one item in the list, and amongst non-whites, it would probably be at least 50%. So the total would undoubtedly be higher than 75%, but any number given would also obscure a significant underlying reality.)

More importantly, profiling is not wrong. Profiling is a most necessary law-enforcement concept. Without it, criminals would rarely be caught.

What is wrong is this particular profile: the tyrants that have gained power in Missouri are calling darkness light, and light darkness. They are profiling against the good, and favoring the wicked. They are servants of Satan occupying the seats of Justice. They are proof of the ongoing need for militias.

That is what should have been pointed out. Instead, our fearless leaders gave the tyrants a good, sound beating with their hankies.

“I said: ‘Get me President Bush on the phone,’” Olmert said in a speech in the southern Israeli city of Ashkelon. “They said he was in the middle of giving a speech in Philadelphia. I said I didn’t care: ‘I need to talk to him now.’ He got off the podium and spoke to me.”

Source: Washington Post.

Why is it attractive? I suggest, because of the driving beat and the just-add-water profession of friendship. Consider first the latter. “I want to wish you a Merry Christmas”.

You do? Have we met?

“From the bottom of my heart.” Tell you what, next time I’ll settle for the top of your heart.

The driving beat is indicative of what is wrong with modern popular music. The Dorian Toccata and Fugue has a driving beat also, but it arises immanently from the exemplification of its own structure. When rhythmic pulsation must be sustained by banging on a drum, it is a sign that sense and spirit have become jaded, inert; something that must be poked and prodded once or twice per second, like an exhausted mule. It is joyless exuberance and spiritless animation.

By title, opening line, and style, the song is obviously Mexican. Then, it breaks into English. “I wanna wish…”

It is as if we are first being entertained by a Mexican band “out there” somewhere — perhaps, on the stage of a convention hall — which then shifts to addressing us in the second person, in our language.

A culture is presupposed — a multi-culture. Mexican accent and drum beat is unapologetically imposed, its right to do so taken for granted.

We the audience are allowed to keep a little space in our own land — these folks “wanna wish us” a Merry Christmas, after all, and they are even willing for a moment to condescend to the use of our (soon to be foreign?) language.

Below I shall give the highlights of the bill and interpose some analysis and comments along the way.

The Solution

(1) Section 6 authorizes the Secretary of the Treasury (Secretary hereafter) to spend up to $700 billion on mortgages and mortgage-related assets.  According to section 12(1), a “mortgage-related asset” is  a “residential or commercial mortgages and any securities, obligations, or other instruments that are based on or related to such mortgages.”  This means that the Secretary is authorized to not only buy the bad sub-prime mortgage packages that Fanny and Freddie bundled together and sold on open exchanges throughout the world, but he may also purchase credit default swaps and any other over-the-counter derivatives that are in any way related to mortgage assets.

The reason for this flexibility is obvious.  The sub-prime mess is not the underlying problem.  The real problem is the huge amount of money at risk in the over-the-counter derivatives market (particularly credit default swaps) that are connected to the bad loans.  While the amount of the mortgage loans is over $7 trillion, the notional value of the credit default swaps is over $60 trillion.  (To put this figure in perspective, it is roughly equivalent to the combined GNP of every nation in the world.)  Defaults on sub-prime loans are merely the fuse that have set off the derivative bomb.

(2) Section 2(a) says the Secretary can spend this $700 billion at his own discretion.

(3) Section 2(b)(5) says that the Secretary will regulate himself.

(4) Section 8 states that of the Secretary’s action pursuit to the authority given to him in the bill may not be reviewed by any agency or court.

Taking (1)-(4) together, the proposed bill gives the Secretary a check for $700 billion to spend however he wishes within wide and vague parameters.  The Secretary, moreover, has the authority regulate himself with no outside interference.  And, to cap it all off, none of his actions are subject to lawsuits or outside review.

But this is not all.

(5) Section 2(b)(3) authorizes the Secretary to make private or corporate financial institutions agents of the government.  The Secretary may, thus, at his own discretion, nationalize any or all banks, savings and loans, and other U.S. financial institutions.

(Think of the many implications of this.  Here is one.  Suppose your bank is taken over by the Department of the Treasury.  Suppose further that the IRS, a bureau of Treasury, says you own $25,000 in Federal income tax.  What is to stop Treasury from freezing your account or taking the $25,000 outright?)

(6) While the $700 billion figure is staggering, it is not the limit the Treasury may spend on mortgage-related instruments.  Here is the language.

“The Secretary’s authority to purchase mortgage-related assets under this Act shall be limited to $700,000,000,000 outstanding at any one time”

Note the qualifier, “outstanding at any one time.”  This means that the Treasury, at the direction of the Secretary, can buy up to $700 billion worth of over-the-counter derivatives from banks and other financial institutions, sell them off and then buy more of these assets.

This is how the scam works in simple terms.  On Monday the Secretary goes all in and buys $700 billion worth of assets from at-risk banks and other financial institutions — paying, of course, full face-value price for instruments worth practically nothing.  On Tuesday he sells these “assets” off for a penny to the dollar.  (This assumes they will fetch anything; but no matter, if the garbage cannot be sold on the open market, it will be laundered through Goldman Sachs who will purchase it with money “lent” to it by the Fed.).  The result is a  $693 billion loss.  You might deduce from this that the Treasury now has only $7 billion left to buy more assets.  Simple math, right?  Wrong.  After clearing these “assets” from its books, the Treasury account now has, well, no assets.  And if it has no assets, it has no money outstanding.  Thus the Secretary is free to spend another $700 billion.  This process can be repeated as many times as the Secretary deems necessary.  And with trillions of dollars worth of garbage entered on the balance sheets of the financial institutions, he will go to the well as many times as necessary to restore confidence in the mortgage and credit default swap markets.

The language of this bill, in effect, gives the Secretary unlimited funds.  He could literally buy up all of the mortgage-related assets in the United States.

(7) Since section 8 says that the Secretary’s actions are non-reviewable and no legal action may be taken against him, and since section 2(b)(3) says that the Secretary may designate private financial institutions as agents of the federal government, it follows that no legal actions may be taken against them either.  In other words, if Goldman Sachs is designated an agent of the government, then it is immune from legal action as long as it can claim it was working on behalf of the Treasury.

Addenda

(8) The bill that I am commenting on was the one proposed on Friday.  This week we learn that there have been a few changes over the weekend, specifically section 2(a).  Below is the original wording:

“Authority to Purchase.– The Secretary is authorized to purchase, and to make and fund commitments to purchase, on such terms and conditions as determined by the Secretary, mortgage-related assets from any financial institution having its headquarters in the United States.”

(a) According to Henry Paulson, the revised proposal allows him, as Secretary of the Treasury, to purchase mortgage-related assets from financial institutions wherever it has its corporate headquarters.  So the Secretary may buy up the non-performing assets of British (say Barclays), Swiss (say UBS), German (say Deutsche Bank) and Israeli (say the Bank of Israel) institutions.  This implies that American taxpayers could possibly buy out all of the world’s bad mortgage-related securities.

(b) According to the Treasury Department’s Fact Sheet on the proposed bill published on Saturday (September 20), the Secretary has further powers:

“Treasury will have authority to issue up to $700 billion of Treasury securities to finance the purchase of troubled assets. The purchases are intended to be residential and commercial mortgage-related assets, which may include mortgage-backed securities and whole loans. The Secretary will have the discretion, in consultation with the Chairman of the Federal Reserve, to purchase other assets, as deemed necessary to effectively stabilize financial markets.”

Either the proposed bill has been amended since Friday or the Treasury department interprets “mortgage-related assets” (section 2(a)) so broadly that it includes any assets at all.  Whatever the case, when the bill passes, the Secretary will have the authority to buy GM, Ford, Delta, Google, Microsoft, and Wal-Mart stocks.  And more than this.  He can, in principle, buy corn, lumber, rum, and the warehouses to store them in, if he deems it necessary.  And remember, he needs nobody’s approval to purchase any of these things.

If (b) is combined with (a), the Secretary will have the authority purchase stocks, bonds, land, sugar, vodka and plastic toy soldiers from any country in the world.

(9) Congress this week has expressed some concern about section 8 (the section that turns the Secretary the dictator of the U.S. economy).  This will probably be amended to allow for an oversight board to review the Secretary’s decision.  Such a board will in actually do nothing proactive.  Its only function will be to provide a platform for politicians to grandstand from when the dollar begins to melt away to nothing due to the massive deficits and monetary creation that will be caused by implementation of this bill.

Conclusion

This bill will pass.  It may not pass in its present form, but any changes to it will be cosmetic.  Do not bother to write your Senators and Representatives.  There is nothing you can do about it.  Remember, this is the pre-planned solution to the pre-planned crisis.  Even if morons in Congress had the wit to understand the implications of this bill, they do not have the courage to stand against it.

But what you can do is prepare for bad economic times.  The nation’s debt is already unpayable unless the dollar is inflated to oblivion.  This bill ensures that the rate of inflation will accelerate. Foreign dollar-holders see the writing on the wall.  Some have already begun to move away from the dollar.  When China and Japan start to diversify out of the dollar, the game is over.

The dollar is going to tank.  The only question is how fast.  Your dollar-denominated assets will fall with the dollar.  In order to protect yourself from this collapse, get out of the dollar.  Remember, in a collapsing market, the suckers are always the last ones out.  You can bet your last nickel that the big boys on Wall Street are taking their huge bonuses and buying non-dollar denominated assets.  Do not be a sucker.

On last thing.  When the dollar collapses, the economy will collapse.  When the economy collapses, all the veneer of a free republican government will be peeled away.  This will result first in social upheaval (the next crisis), then a call for the feds to protect us (the reaction) and then, obligingly, the feds will grant us social stability in the form of a police state and a new regional or international currency.  Of course the U.S. is already a police state in theory, but after the economic fall, it will become one in practice.  You would do well to prepare for this also.

I’m not big on birthdays any more. However, the occasion makes a convenient excuse to answer questions and explain a few things.

By now, the reason we do movie reviews should be apparent. They are a major part of our culture, so criticism thereof must be part of a broad critique of that culture. My goals in reviewing movies are modest, and can be stated simply: 1. Share at least one thought that is “out of the box,” whether that should be highlighting a subtle theme of the movie itself, or its hidden agenda, or its social backdrop. 2. Say enough about a movie that a reader that is tracking with us can make a decision to view or not to view. 3. Be brief. As to (1), each reader must decide for himself if the goal is met. But in view of that intent, I urge even those that do not watch movies to give a few of our reviews a try. Some general societal or theological comments might be found interesting, even apart from the goal of (2).

Why, some apparently wonder, do we spend so much time talking about niggers, kikes, degos, and honkies? Glad you asked.

The first level of answer is, we don’t “spend so much time.” Scan through the last 30 or 50 posts and see. The perception that we do is itself a sign of how the mental nerves of our people have been rubbed raw and become swollen and hyper-sensitive by the systematic manipulation of our enemies. Speech that was common among men 50 years ago (see Godfather I and II, for example) has now gotten even males all in a tizzy for reasons that they would be hard-pressed to identify. What is most ludicrous is to hear Christians, even pastors, go on as though the politically correct etiquette is actually a mark of sanctification — as if the blaspheming jews who have fobbed this new morality off on us via the various media would have been in a position to instruct the nation in the rules of Christian morality — a morality that the nation was earlier unaware even existed!

In this matter, we are sensitive to the Great Divide between the sexes. There are vulgarities that ought never to be broached in mixed company even if each sex might, on occasion, use them within its own company. I am quite sure that our biggest problem in this area, however, is not the ladies, but rather the feminized of the male sex. The latter do not become real women, but they have ceased to be real men either. They are useless to both. The good news, however, is that it has been shown that even a beaten dog can be retrained to a restored dignity. Certainly, we have become a nation of beaten dogs!

We will not be able to rise up, protect our women, and throw off our enemies as long as we are timidly looking over our shoulder and saying, “am I allowed to say that?” Therefore, a complete purge of politically correct (philo-semitic) speech is necessary, even if you must for a time go to the opposite extreme to restore the creased paper. This instinct is confirmed by the practice of the vast majority of our reawakened people.

We have evolved toward certain anniversary topics throughout the year. I like the idea, even if some may need to be dropped and others added from time to time. Here is what we have so far:

9/11 — The date of the worst false-flag hoax in 40 years, which has had the effect of tethering our nation’s fortunes even more tightly to the interests of our mortal enemies.

1/15 — Marty’s birthday. If God gives me strength, I would like to say something every year about this wicked man who has done such lasting harm to our nation, for at least as long as my alma mater Westminster Seminary continues to honor him. A variant on this might be to “remember” Black History Month — which might better be called “The Black Unmaking of History Month.”

2/13 — the destruction of art-city Dresden, Germany by the “Allies.” Likewise,

7/24, the destruction of Hamburg by the “Allies,” featuring the first deliberate use of napalm on civilians.

Two WW2 anniversaries per year may be too much to sustain. On the other hand, it can give the wrong impression by way of understatement. For more than two years, the murder and mayhem inflicted on German civilians was a nearly daily affair. The proper way to bring this home might be to do an “anniversary post” every day for a year, showing pictures of the story-book town that we burned to rubble on that day. But that is a lot of work for a working man.

Other, more positive anniversaries might be selected. I’m thinking of April 14, the date of Lincoln’s assassination, or May 10, John Wilkes Booth’s birthday, for example.

A year ago, I wrote (but never got around to posting) “our growth has been slow but steady. We now have a bit more than a battalion of unique visitors each week. About 25% are foreign. Remember that Google offers a translation utility, so let no one be put off by the English language. Welcome to all.” On the subject of foreign readers (now more like 30% of the total), we encourage especially our European readers to make comments, even in your own language. If in German, French, Italian, or Russian, I will attempt to render a translation into English. Of course, the same rules for posting apply.

That growth continued through May of this year, to the point that several times we exceeded a half-battalion in single days. Then the jewgle google censorship kicked in. As a result, we have fallen a bit below where we were a year ago. The biggest disappointment is that our message will tend to be “preaching to the choir” to some extent. The dragnet that brought in others has been cut by the enemies of our people. But we will fight back. It is all the more important to spread the word by linking or notifying your friends, if you like our message, or even just find it worth pondering.

The future of this site bodes more of the same, only more so. There seems to be no end to the fallacies of our sick age that need exploding, even in the church. As MB said earlier in a nice turn of phrase, “one of the few benefits of living in an era of insanity is that it makes the peddlers of the most prosaic and obvious truths appear like sages.”  The “look” certainly needs refurbishing — ours has to be one of the visually most ugly blogs out there. In time, dear reader, in time. We expect to do more and more podcasts, for those that prefer audio. Also, I hope to start providing some teaching aids for home-schoolers that might be able to utilize some of our material, in the form of review questions and quizzes. The translation of Solzhenitsyn will resume. An idea I am considering is to do a weekly exposé, over some period up to a year, of the zionist propaganda disguised as Christian reporting known as World magazine.

On with the fun!

This course has been a life-changing experience for me. The relation between ordinary language and logic, and the relation between logic and Scripture, are alone worth the investment. Had I mastered the material in this course prior to college, I would have figured many things out in five years that ended up taking 30 instead.

And it is never too late!

Retirees wanting to make in impact in their golden years, home-schooled teenagers, students about to embark on college, grad students, pastors, and vacationers looking for some intellectual stimulation can all expect to profit from this course.

Plan to attend the modular course in Atlanta August 25-29, 2008.

Go to the Christ College site and follow the links, or call 770-614-0209 to finalize your plans.

Do not let the $500 fee stop you if that is a problem. Scholarship money is available. Your time and diligence is what is needed.

None of what follows should be taken personally. I love Dr. Enns as a man that is respectful of opposing viewpoints, affable, and easy to talk to. I would love to have him as a friend, a neighbor, and someone to watch operas with (if he liked opera, which he doesn’t). On the other side, I count at least one of the “movers and shakers” on the right as a friend, and I love and respect many in the right wing, regarding them as my superiors both as Christians and scholars. None of what follows changes any of that.

1. The left wing, as always, is particularly noisy. There are dark rumors of threats that “the students” might go on strike and so forth. This is of course nonsense. Most students, under any circumstances, just want to finish their course requirements and move on, and besides that, many students share the concerns about the teaching of the Bible department at Westminster. Nixon was right about the “silent majority” in 1972, and the same reality holds in 2008. That inertial mass is a source of social stability, but it is also frustrating to those seeking reform, whether on the left or right. Regardless of which “wing” we belong to, those of us that bring arguments for positions different from the mainstream — or different from what seems like the mainstream while the current is propelling our little boat — are frustrated chiefly, not by the rebuttals, but by the yawning “who gives a $&!#?” that is the normal response to the arguments.

2. Leaving aside the pigeon-holes of left or right for a moment, it must be said that the majority of students that stepped up to the microphone at the April 1 meeting formulated very valid questions. They may be summarized along these lines: if it is heterodoxy, why does no one in authority step forward and say so? Why are the issues not debated publicly? Why is everything being done behind closed doors, in whispers and furtive glances?

One of the things I love about the OPC is that heresy trials must be open to the public. No discretion is permitted to the courts here. There is to be no star chamber.

But this is a necessary principle, if the Protestant view of the holy catholic church is correct. The idea that robes should just be trusted implicitly is sacerdotalism.

3. In his short statement on April 1, the Speaker for the Board appealed to the many constituencies of the Seminary besides that of the student body — notably, some Presbyteries that have voiced concern, and some major donors. Notably absent was any reference to a fiduciary obligation to the foundational purpose of the institution as expressed by Machen and his associates. The “major donors” reference particularly sticks in the craw. Donors should be encouraged to be generous because they agree with and wish to further that which the institution stands for. It is putting the cart before the horse to make reference to the wishes of the donors, as if the institution exists to carry out their wishes.

4. All the statements I have heard from cognizant authorities, numbering three independent lines so far, make reference primarily if not exclusively to Prof. Enns’ book. But the content of the book has been the theme of the required course of OT Intro for many years prior to the appearance of the book. Other courses go even farther. It does not take very much reading between the lines to realize that nothing is done about what is taught in the classroom, as long as the world does not know through some embarrassing medium like a published book.

The lesson for the astute is obvious: don’t publish controversial ideas. Teach what you want, but limit your publications to boring academic monographs on how to decode Sumerian steles or what not.

5. The nub of the issue bearing on continued employment by the Seminary is Confessional subscription. The “honesty” of someone’s subscription is hinted at. And at times, this aspect can indeed be questioned. I heard a WTS professor claim that he subscribes to the Confession “when read according to the historia salutis.” But the meat at the center of the Westminster sandwich is clearly ordo salutis! (If you are fortunate enough not to know what those terms refer to, that’s okay. Keep reading.) That kind of qualification goes beyond a mere quibble: it is playing with words.

But in general, the “honesty” question is barking up the wrong tree. We should assume that a Christian man’s claim of subscription is honest. That is not the question. The right question is, is his actual system of beliefs consistent with the Confession?

In the next breath, as if sensing the weakness, the attack is altered to refer to the “historical understanding” of the Confession. This is getting closer to the real issue, but it is still subject to misapprehension. As such, the “historical understanding” is a question for the church history department. Unless the Seminary is a museum, it is still not the whole of the matter. Putting the matter that way reduces the matter to an academic curiosity, an abstraction.

Confessionalism is an organic concept: it refers to men that ex animo embrace the body of truth expressed in a document and are formed into a corporate body that lives and breathes and marches forward in actions that exemplify that shared understanding. When one departs from that understanding, he must be ejected, not because his honesty is impugned, and not because some historian has determined that some men four hundred years ago did not think like that, but because he has departed from what we believe, today.

It is a fine boundary line, but it is a chasm. The historical question plays an important role as self-definition, in terms of continuity. The Confession is not to be a procrustean bed, reinterpreted to fit every man’s idiosyncratic views. But at issue is that “we” believe these things, not that “they” did.

The matter is not to be settled by summoning a Council of church historians. The body confesses these things today. If someone is to be ejected, the ejectors should be able to say, “we believe these things, the same things that the organization has believed for centuries, and you depart from us in these specifics: A, B, and C.” An antecedent question, then, is “what is the relevant living body?”

6. The logic of the matter presses us, I submit, to suggest that the body that stands organically together around a shared confession should be the church. Westminster Seminary is not, however, an institution under ecclesiastical control. We must conclude that Machen, the Magnificent in so many ways, erred here. A mere group of professors can hardly stand de jure upon a shared Confession in any meaningful way other than as an academic abstraction, an object of detached historical inquiry.

A possibly-adequate remedy to this situation would be to insist that the professors must be ordained as teaching elders in their respective Presbyteries. In this way, the organic meaning of Confessionalism could be rescued.

The original faculty as good churchmen did this instinctively. But they failed, apparently, to see that it must be explicitly required.

Then the question is, “ordained in which churches?”

Given Westminster’s history, the only possible answers that make sense are either (1) like the original faculty, the OPC, or (2) a broader assembly, namely NAPARC (North American Reformed and Presbyterian Churches), which captures the Reformed principle of the holy catholic church in light of our particular situation and history.

If Westminster were located in Stuttgart, it would not make sense to speak of NAPARC. But in Philadelphia, with its OPC origins, NAPARC is the only body that makes sense in view of option (2).

7. Apart from the ecclesiastical problem, there is the basic question of Right.

On the one hand, we must surely insist that an educational institution has the right to hire and fire according to its own purposes. The notion of “tenure” as securing some divine right to do whatever one wants to is surely a self-serving idea fostered by the insiders for their own benefit. (I am speaking of our culture, not WTS specifically.) As if gaining a Professorship is like a lifetime prize, distinguishing its recipient as a Very Important Thinker, for whose every pearl of wisdom dropped from an unassailable pedestal the world now waits with bated breath.

This is a much bigger problem than WTS. It is a national, nay international problem. It has created a self-propagating guild. What is the difference between a “mainstream” and “revisionist” historian? Answer: if the historian has been groomed by the guild in the tenure-track, he is “mainstream.” Or, if he falls in line and sucks up to that point of view, he gets the title vicariously.

8. On the other hand, there are legitimate expectations that one forms while employed. Commitments are made, choices are made, and the time invested cannot be recovered. If libertarianism means that the venerable old man can be dropped in favor of some attention-grabbing upstart, then we must stop being libertarians.

Prof. Enns, as well as his even more radical colleague, were inducted into the guild very recently — during the past two or three years. I am not aware of any conspiracy to keep their views secret during the process.

Westminster must face the fact that there is something very wrong with how they have proceeded in the past that led to this situation. Was it a lust for academic prestige, for PhD’s, especially from prestigious universities? John Murray redivivus need not apply to teach at WTS today. His resume would not get past the first ring.

There is an evil here, a wrong that has been done not only to the community and the church it serves, but to the men in question. The solution is not to continue with the status quo, that grace might abound; but it is an evil nonetheless, and it must be confessed and remedied.

9. On the Confessional question itself, the Right Wing at Westminster is in disarray also. To be sure, the doctrine of Scripture which is in question in the case of Prof. Enns is foundational in a way that the subsequent chapters are not. Nevertheless, the Confession is the Confession. I admit to painting with a broad brush here, and do not want to imply that the remarks apply to all: they do not. But from the ranks of the Right Wing, I have seen the Sabbath mocked by exuberant pre-class discussions of NFL team exploits. The one faculty member still famous for his confessional view of the Sabbath politely declines to bring the subject up publicly. I attended a service presided over by another member of the Right Wing a few years back where the worship service was given over to a drama by the high school kids: so much for Chapter 21. And in a class I audited, arguments for the “Framework View” of creation were pressed that self-consciously ignored a fatal counter-argument that Calvin already made five hundred years ago!

I do not mention names, because I am not trying to embarrass anyone, at least in this forum; nor am I suggesting that a tit for tat housecleaning should take place. Instead, I am hoping that those men will also ponder carefully and reconsider some of their own positions.

10. Having cleared a great deal of rubbish off the table, it remains to address the doctrinal problem of Prof Enns. The protracted discussions suggest that it is a rather difficult matter to show that Prof. Enns’ book (and more importantly: his teaching) is contrary to the Confession. WCF chapter 1, on Scripture, is mentioned as the point of conflict

On the contrary, I don’t believe it is difficult to show the inconsistency of Prof Enns’ view with the Confession. What has made it difficult is erroneously focussing on chapter 1. But Chapter 1 is not the only, or even the most important issue raised by the book. In some ways, chapter 1 would be the easiest for Prof Enns to defend himself in terms of.

He would do so by appealing to the sovereignty of God even in the use of human error, and that he is explaining the “how” not the “that.”

The real problem with Prof Enns’ hermeneutic is that, once triumphant, you can no longer deduce chapters 2-33. Chapters 2-33 would become mere velleities of a certain subculture of Christendom. But if they are not drawn from Scripture, they are worthless as a church confession. Even the “sovereignty of God,” necessary to rescue an effective Word in the midst of error, would have to be secured either by a deliverance of natural theology, or a mere assertion of will.

One could “believe” and “confess” the propositions outlined in chapters 1-33 while holding Prof Enns’ view of revelation, by a sheer act of will. But that is a different kind of belief and confession than what is intended by confessional presbyterians. The latter intend their confession to be based on what the Confession itself states as the nub of the matter in Chap. 14: “a Christian believeth to be true whatsoever is revealed in the word, for the authority of God himself speaking therein.”

Try it from another angle. Professor Enns believes his outlook is rescued and vouchsafed as orthodox by two apodictic principles: the sovereignty of God and the empty tomb. How can God call a church together around a Word that is error-prone and self-contradictory? He can because he is sovereign. How do we know the Pharisees and Saducees weren’t right? Because of the empty tomb.

But the sovereignty of God in the full-orbed sense could not be deduced from Scripture from a radical accomodationist stance. Thus, Prof Enns must borrow from the world view of the earlier Westminster. It can be symbolized like this:

(traditional exegesis) –> (sovereignty of God established)
(sovereignty of God) –> (Prof Enn’s exegesis vouchsafed)

However,
(Prof Enn’s exegesis) –> NOT (sovereignty of God established)

His system is therefore inconsistent with the Westminster standards.

A similar line of attack can be pursued with the “empty tomb” basis. On his view of the Bible, the “empty tomb” will soon be deconstructed, and has been by his precursors.

And if these two pillars cannot stand, how much less the Sabbath Day, the Regulative Principle of Worship, and the golden chain of salvation?

Christianity is a system of truth, van Til observed. Take away a particular understanding of what it means for God to speak to his creatures, and all is lost — not only the specific content of the Westminster Confession, but indeed all knowledge whatsoever.

More will need to be said on these matters.