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The Pete Quiñones Show
Reading Ivan Ilyin's 'On Resistance to Evil by Force' w/ Dr. Matthew Raphael Johnson - Pt. 22
01:07:42
68 Minutes PG-13 Dr. Matthew Raphael Johnson is a researcher, writer, and former professor of history and political science, specializing in Russian history and political ideology. Pete and Dr. Johnson continue a reading and commentary of Ivan...
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- [00:00]
A
Sam,
- [00:38]
B
With election time approaching, political ads will be inserted into the episode along with other ads that frankly, I'm not going to like and you aren't going to like. So please ignore them, skip by them, whatever you have to do. I don't endorse any of the ads that are inserted, but it is another way for me to generate income. So I appreciate you guys putting up with them. If you don't want to deal with them, go to the Peak and yonas show.com you can subscribe through Patreon. You can subscribe through Substack, which is my preferred one because with both of those you get an RSS feed. Only Patreon and only Substack give you an RSS feed. There's also a link to my website, Gumroad and SubscribeStar where you will get the audio files that you can download and listen to or you can stream in most cases through those locations as well. So if you want to avoid the ads, consider supporting the show. If not, just know none of these ads get any endorsement from me. Skip by them, do what you need to do. I appreciate all of you. Head on over to the Peak and yonashow.com you can get the show early and ad free over there. If not, here's the show. I want to welcome everyone back to our reading of On Resistance to Evil by Force by Ivan Ilien. Dr. Johnson, how are you doing today?
- [02:07]
A
You know, when I was a kid, the word math didn't have an S at the end of it. What is that? What is maths? Is that a technical term? I'm not sure what that refers to. I didn't start hearing the plural math until I was in my 40s. I don't get it.
- [02:30]
B
Are you sure it's not somebody just using, like, more guttural talk, like slangish, Like a slangish kind of thing? Oh, we got. I'm not doing too good in the maths.
- [02:44]
A
Yeah, I'm not sure of anything. I'm not sure of anything. But it is odd and you hear it quite often and I have no idea what it means and it's irritating.
- [03:03]
B
All righty, well, let's get into this chapter 15 about the boundaries of love. Further, the beginning of the spiritual life limits the beginning of love, indicating the spiritual limit to its immediate naive outpouring to everyone. Spiritual love is not merely religious devotion, but at its core it is a clear, living, objective choice. If we understand love not in the sense of a sentimental, objectless tenderness, but in its objective definition and functional fullness in the totality of living, sympathy, assistance and communication, even to the point of artistic identification with the beloved object, then it is clear that it is impossible to truly love everything, for example, both the perceived and the unperceived, or everything equally, for example, both the near and the distant, both the divine and the ungodly. In any case, this is inaccessible to man while he is still a man.
- [04:08]
A
Yeah, love is by definition limited. There used to be bumper stickers a while ago, God bless all. It was right after 9, 11 and they were God bless all nations. I remember thinking how empty that is, how empty it is in general. You do have people who claim this. I love everyone. And that's how it is until they talk to me for, you know, 10 minutes. But I don't think anyone actually does that. You know, we're considered hate figures, so it's okay to hate us. So. And again, he uses the word sentimental and there's no object to it. And if there's no object, there's no object. There is no obligation. There's not a list of things you have to do if there's no object. So it's just usually a female trying to sound profound without having to do anything. If there is no object, there is no obligation.
- [05:20]
B
Anyone who says he loves everyone is either mistaken in self knowledge or in reality, loves nothing and nobody. Love as a psychic force is completely incapable of such an objectless expansion. And love as a spiritual state is not called to it. If by love we understand only benevolence, and by this benevolence we understand spiritual perfection, for example, the victory of good over evil, then a person with religious insight desires the good of all and to that extent loves all. For the mere presence of evil already evokes suffering and disgust in him and compels him to sincerely wish everyone well. If we understand love in its fullness as an integral union and creative acceptance, then such a person cannot love everyone, nor everyone equally, nor could he set himself such a task.
- [06:14]
A
Yeah, they sound good when they say it, though. But it's kind of like saying everyone's special, everyone's special, therefore no one's special. It's an empty phrase that makes people sound good, makes people feel good, but it has absolutely no meaning to it.
- [06:34]
B
Sometimes nowadays it seems like everyone is special, but in a retarded way.
- [06:40]
A
Yeah. Any other way? In the other sense? Yeah. Hey, there's nothing wrong with the word retarded. I grew up with a few, you know, I understand them very well. The down syndrome kids are the most hilarious Kids on the planet, I'm telling
- [06:57]
B
you now, they are cool.
- [06:58]
A
Yeah, they are cool. They have. There's something that I. I've always had a soft spot for them. So, yeah, when I was working with the Barnes Review, I commuted with a Down syndrome guy on the. On the train because I lived in Virginia, so I had to take the Metro to. To D.C. and I always wondered, what does he do?
- [07:21]
B
Politics.
- [07:22]
A
Very serious. Yeah, he had a. He had. He had a briefcase and everything. He had a mustache. I wanted to talk to him, but I never got a chance. Yeah. So, yeah, I think that's a fitting explanation to this paragraph.
- [07:36]
B
Thus, no one is called to love evil as such. And if we think of the devil as the true and pure center of evil, then love for the devil, in his evil, must be recognized as completely unnatural. There is sense in wishing the devil's transformation, and there is deep meaning in praying for the devil, but there is no sense in turning to him with creative acceptance, that is, accepting his goals and interests as one's own, sympathizing with him or helping him. And there is no reason to enter into an alliance with him and unite his work with such evil.
- [08:12]
A
Yeah, Rolling Stones fans do not like this paragraph at all. But I remember every exorcist I've ever read, whether Orthodox or Catholic, says, the last thing you ever want to do in any kind of an exorcism is to try to parlay with the demon. You're going to be totally destroyed. And I don't know what you think about Malachi Martin, but I used to read him many, many years ago, and he has many stories of people, of priests, being totally, I mean, physically destroyed, because they are. Well, for two things. They say that they are the ones casting them out, not God, and just meeting on this debating field as equals. And that can't be the case. Now, that brings us to something else where you have the notion, and that was, you know, accepted by St. Gregory of Nyssa of eventually everything will be saved. Everything will eventually, after a long time of purgation, will be cleansed and including. Including demons, including the evil ones and everything else, and be brought before God. That's not the majority of the church fathers, but St. Gregory did accept some version of that, that God's love is all transforming. I'm not sure. I don't accept that at all, because it would require us to love evil. Unless you were to say, evil's not a thing, it was a perversion of a thing. But even in scriptures, every and all are not Terms that you find very often, and they don't mean the same things that they mean today. There is no obligation to love everyone because we're not equal to each other. And that goes not just as individuals, but as groups as well.
- [10:32]
B
A person strong in spirit can decide to perceive the devil in all his disguises, to admit his pure evil into his soul for testing, understanding and wisdom. He can even bring these trials to a certain artistic identification, devoting the fabric of his soul and the forces of his personality to this painful and repulsive experience. But this admission will never transform him into loving acceptance. And this realization will never involve or capture his spiritual sensor or lead him to sympathetic action and cooperation.
- [11:07]
A
Well, there are those out there who, Alexander Dugin being one of them, that really promote the idea of creating the. You know, when you're developing, spiritually speaking, to seek out the worst possible circumstances, it is only in the worst pit of your own hell that you're ever going to be cleansed and understand what the spiritual life is. That's eccentric. I don't know of a whole lot of other people who claim that. And in 2026, we don't need to seek it out. You know, one of the reasons that I don't except purgatory is that we live. We're living in it. And we've already talked about why angels don't get another chance. Because human beings see things in a, you know, empirically, step by step. Because we have a body. Well, they don't have a body. They see things in terms, in formal, informal ways, like a Platonic form. So there is no question that they've made their choice forever. Well, we are always learning new things. They're not learning new things. But this is also why demons need to show themselves in disguises. But let's be clear. Evil is not a thing in and of itself. Evil is a perversion of something that God has created. And the essence of demonism is inversion to turn things upside down. So rather than having spiritual life on the bottom and the material life on the top of social sympathy is just one example. They symbolize that all the time. Every time I come across someone, once in a while I come across demonstrations of a pagan with an upside down cross. I always say, you know, I really appreciate your devotion to St. Peter. And I don't think they get it. I've done it a few times. One had earrings, one had. Or even if I see someone who's trying to just be edgy, go up to them and say, I appreciate your devotion to St. Peter. And they. You have to go through the whole. But by the time it's over, you know, they don't want to wear this thing anymore because they're afraid there's going to be confusion between the two things. That's just a small hobby of mine.
- [13:54]
B
The torments of these trials will consist not only in the perception of the repulsive, but also in the voluntary bifurcation of his spiritual fabric. It will express itself in a continuous disgusted shudder of his entire spirit, both in its evil feeling parts and in its evil free center. Moreover, this trial, which sears the soul like coal and quickly suffers in agony while the spirit hardens and grows wiser, has a single justification and purpose. The resistance to evil the recipient perceives only in order not to accept. The one who identified himself only allowed this to happen in order to resist evil. The full force of one who has measured, seen, and understood the enemy. In this trial, he gained insight and armed himself. And having armed himself, he was then called to the inexorable defeat of the devil, tested in all his destructive and diabolical evil.
- [14:56]
A
If you.
- [14:57]
B
You added something there, I'll let you go.
- [15:00]
A
Yeah. I wrote in 2026, we don't need to go find it. It finds us quite easily. But I think men especially have. By the time they're roughly our age, I'm 54, whatever the hell you are. We've been through a couple periods of time where you don't see a light at the end of the tunnel. I had at the beginning of my divorce in 2014. I did eventually, of course, but my faith throughout didn't change. God is not this, you know, cafeteria. God is not this. This vending machine where I could just go and get whatever I want. He gives me whatever I I please. He's not going to create utopia for me. My faith didn't change in the slightest as I. As I suffered terribly, and especially when you suffer alone. And the spirit hardens, as he says here, and grows wiser. Unfortunately, it does affect other people's spirit. And maybe they will reject God. They will reject the faith because God's supposed to create utopia for him, I suppose, which is really what they're saying. And again, I know I've said this before, but a very common stupid argument from atheists is that all the evil in the world, the innocent suffering, how can there be God? And then you answer, well, why stop there? Why don't us remove anything that we don't like? Why is it just that? And then in Utopia, of course, you have no freedom and as Dostoevsky said, you would be bored out of your mind and you would destroy it. Free will means suffering. The existence of free will. It's one of the great things. When you read Dostoevsky and his brothers Karamazov in his Grand Inquisitor section, you get a very, very different point of view. Something even that popular didn't like. And Christ's response was not to, you know, not to. Not to argue with him. He kissed him and walked away. But I know in my personal case, these times of suffering, which I could recall at an instant did not affect my faith, and they made me much stronger. And I wouldn't be the man I am without them. Go through something awful. I mean, not just terrible like your mom dies, that's going to happen. It's something existentially awful. You lose everything overnight. And you come out of that, you'll come out of it more sane than you were going in, if you have the strength. I don't think my faith could ever be remotely touched anymore because it's been through that. And it reminds you of Christ ascending into Hades. Not hell, but Hades, and preaching to those who are trapped there. And unfortunately, suffering is. Is not necessarily. Not necessarily something to be avoided. I'm not saying you go into a, you know, doctor's office and I want to be operated on without anesthesia. I'm not saying that. But, you know, suffering is, you know, the utilitarian mentality fails because suffering is something that creates who we are. We become calloused and tough. I guarantee you right now, I am not the same man in 2014 than I am in 2026. I could guarantee you that I become harder. I become maybe a little bit more difficult. I become more suspicious. But the faith hasn't changed even a little bit, because that's not what God is for. Orthodoxy and Catholicism, I guess, talks about trials all the time. Even if they're of your own making, it doesn't matter. That just makes it worse. So that's a victory for God. That's a victory for your guardian angel. It's a victory for everything. And it just goes to show, remember in the book of Job, Satan shows that Satan kind of does what God wants him to do and doesn't realize it. Satan goes to God and asks him, you know, Job is. It just does what he does, and he's so happy. And he prays, praises you all the time just because he has all this stuff. How about I go down there and take everything away? We'll see what he is Then. And his faith survives. That's why it's in the Bible. You know, every time Satan thinks he's won a victory, it's actually a failure. Because demons would love you to believe that they're autonomous. They do what they want. No, they do what God wants. They exist because God's created them. Of course they made their choice on their own, but they create suffering circumstances for us thinking that they won something. And in fact they haven't. We just become tougher as a result of.
- [20:52]
B
Is clear that for a weak man such trials can turn into temptation and that can lead him to submit to evil. And this temptation and fall can occur not only through the usual blind or naive infection of evil, but also as a result of a misunderstanding of the limits of love. It is enough for a soft hearted person to lose sight of the fact that love ends where evil begins. That one can and should love only a spark, a ray. And the countenance provided they have not yet been completely dimmed by the violence of the present evil. That in turning to evil all that remains of love is spiritual benevolence. And that this spiritual benevolence directed at the devil can always acquire a unique form, that of a cleaving sword. If one loses sight of this, the victory of evil is assured.
- [21:42]
A
Yeah, that's why humility is so absolutely essentially important in our salvation. It's something that I stumble with quite a bit. I have the attitude that I'm too smart to be fooled and when I say that I'm usually being played like a violin. But if you've gone through any of the. This also works on the ideological level. You know, I had no choice in grad school but to read the works of all of our enemies. And I'm very happy that I did. It was rough in certain areas, it was very good in some other areas. But it means that I have a full understanding of where they're coming from. But they don't have an idea where we're coming from. Your typical academic, especially younger academic, is very soft intellectually. I keep saying that they're very soft intellectually partially because they have. They're surrounded by censorship and they're in a bubble. Same thing for media people. Everything is, is, is censored and sanitized. They don't even know where to get our point of view. If they use Google, you know, as their search engines, they couldn't begin to tell you where to go to get this. Our political theory, when they come across it, that's a different story. What happens to them is very strange. I'm not sure really. I can't describe it here because it's too complicated. But it's sort of like the person who will eventually say, oh my God, these guys are making sense. But it's too expensive for me to accept it. So I go back to the old ways. But I have, you know, I'm forced to read the most demonic works. And I came out of it as a Russian Orthodox nationalist. No question. I know the atheist arguments. Dostoevsky always said, you need to know your opponent's arguments better than they do. You know, if you're fighting atheism and you don't know Feuerbach, you're in trouble. If I were an atheist, Feuerbach would be my guy. Brilliant man, phenomenologist. Roughly around the time of Post Hegel. And that was really the real inspiration for a lot of Karl Marx's atheism. And I read him in great detail and he was easy to read. Well, either read for me if you don't bother with that stuff. You just read stuff from our friends and you come across a scholar with Feuerbach or Nietzsche or anything else, you're going to be destroyed. You don't even know what they're going to say. You've never heard these arguments before. It's very important. So it goes on the ideological side too. And my work is on the ideological side. And you don't necessarily love it, but it's something that I'm very glad I had to do.
- [25:07]
B
There is a wise Christian legend about a hermit who long triumphed over the devil and all his guises and every temptation he unleashed, until at last the end. Enemy knocked at his retreat in the form of a wounded, suffering raven. Then a blind, sentimental compassion prevailed in the hermit's soul. The raven was let in and the monk fell into the devil's power. It is precisely this sentimental love, born of weakness and acting as a snare that spiritual discernment and spiritual will sets limits upon. Set limits upon. They compel a person to draw a proper boundary for their indiscriminate and unprincipled sentimentality and turn their awaken gaze toward the guiding figures of archangel Michael and St. George the Victorious.
- [25:55]
A
I do not like this paragraph at all. I think we're all animal lovers. If that were to happen to me, we would let the animal in unless it was poisonous or something like that. I've not come across a story like this before. I don't know what he's referring to. Maybe in the other English translations. There's a footnote, but I also don't really know how helping a raven or anything like that leads you to fall into the devil's power. That doesn't make any sense. You're not being sentimental in the sense that you love everything all of a sudden. So he helps a poor suffering animal, and he is then, you know, into the. In the demon's power. I have a big problem with this paragraph.
- [26:56]
B
It would be futile to cite by way of objection the commandments of Christ, who taught us to love our enemies and forgive offenses. Such a citation would merely demonstrate a lack of careful reflection on the part of the person invoking it. In calling upon us to love our enemies, Christ was referring to a person's own personal enemies, those who hate and persecute him, whom the aggrieved party is naturally free to forgive or not to forgive. Christ never called us to. Christ never called upon us to love the enemies of God, to bless those who hate and trample upon all that is divine, to aid blasphemous corruptors, to show amiable sympathy towards those possessed by a drive to corrupt souls, to look upon them with tender emotion, or to take pains to ensure that no one stands in the way of their wickedness. On the contrary, regarding such people, and indeed even those far less culpable, he wielded the fiery word of condemnation. And there's just a. A load of scriptures right here. The threat of rich. Yeah. The threat of retribution. Again, many scriptures cited. The scourge of expulsion. Many scriptures cited. And the warning of eternal torments to come. Matthew 25 and John 5.
- [28:18]
A
Yeah, that's what it amounts to. It is impossible for anyone to love. To be a Christian man and to love everyone and therefore essentially not resist evil, personal enemies. You know, that's a different story. Our job is to, especially if they're a member of the church, is to figure out what is wrong and go and fix it. You don't leave your gift at the altar until you fix whatever's wrong with you and your brother. That's the Bible says. I guarantee it's in here. But enemies of God, that's a completely different story. And I'm very happy that Elyn only uses New Testament sources. I have the feeling if he's really going after the Tolstoyans, they probably don't accept the Old Testament at all. But even with the New Testament, you know, how many examples do you need of Christ acting like that? You know, Christ was not a. You know, he was a very difficult, tough man, he used foul language. I mean, in his day. Foul language. You know, this pacifism. And every once in a while I come across it in all churches, some churches worse than others. But to condemn. If you know what's happening right in front of you and you have to condemn, you have no choice. Your own personal enemies. Your job is to fix what's wrong, what's the problem between the two of us, and fix it not to hate them. And hate them, meaning doing harm to them. But, you know, someone doing all these things, the corrupt soul, look upon them with tender emotion, is simply to join their cause. There's no getting out of it. And I mentioned in. I forget which one now, Tolstoy's works where he claims to be refuting his enemies, and he really doesn't. He avoids most of these arguments. There's something else going on with him. But I would just go to the Old Testament right away. The Old Testament is a very violent set of books. What's the Psalm 121? I think. May your mother burn in hell. May your mother's family get roasted. I forget now. Most harsh words. I think it's 121 the harshest terms for an enemy of God who also just happens to be your enemy. Or in other words, you make the enemies of God your personal enemy. If someone were to blaspheme in public, you know, I would. It would take. Take a lot to keep me from acting very harshly towards them, regardless of the. Of the consequence.
- [31:45]
B
Therefore, a Christian striving to be faithful to the word and spirit of his teacher is by no means called upon to force, in a manner contrary to nature, feelings of tenderness and tender emotion from his soul toward an unrepentant evildoer. As such, nor can he find in his. In his. Nor can he find in this commandment any grounds or pretext for refraining from resisting evildoers. He need only understand that genuine, religiously faithful resistance to evildoers involves contending with them not as personal enemies, but as enemies of God's cause on earth. Thus, the less personal enmity there is in the soul of the one resisting, and the more he has inwardly forgiven his personal enemies, all of them in general, and especially those against whom he is contending. The more spiritually sound, worthy, and practically effective that struggle against evil will be for all its necessary severity.
- [32:45]
A
There have been times where there have been personal enemies. Now it's not 121, damn it. I'm trying to find that psalm that's very, very harsh. Everyone Loves the Psalms. Right. Except they forget this one. I should know it by now. But, You know, one of the. One of the worst things about social media is that we, you know, we're coming into confrontation with a lot of different sorts of people for a lot of different sorts of reasons, usually stupid ones. And I tend to apologize right away. I'm sorry. You know, unless it's a blasphemy, you know, I'm sorry. I was wrong. I should have put my blinker on, whatever it is. That's what a Christian should do. Even if I did put it on, even if it's not my fault. But that has nothing to do with what Christ was talking about. Absolutely nothing to do with what Christ was talking about. Would there be Christianity at all in the world without the great Christian empires, East and West? And the answer is no. The answer is absolutely no. It's these empires and the fact that the emperor saw himself as a man
- [34:14]
B
who
- [34:17]
A
was to convert those outside of the empire and to protect the church within. Would there be a church at all or would it be so tiny as no one would have heard of it? Yeah, it's true that people were corrupted. Corrupted, sorry. People were inspired and converted by the feats of the early martyrs. Oh, my God, look at these guys. They go to their grave for this stuff. It must be true. But that was in a situation where they had no choice. There was no fighting. In that case, new martyrs of the Soviet Union, for example, there's simply no option. You could join different rebellions. And if they failed, and they all failed at one point or another, you go to the camp and you suffer. But once you're in the camp, those within it you treat like your brothers in the sense that you. You forgive them. And that's. That's a real struggle here. That's tough enough, let alone with what Tolstoy wants us to do. And, and as I said before, Tolstoy lived in a very healthy society, in a very healthy era. He never had to deal with the crap. I'm a big Chris Hansen fan. He never had to deal with anything like that. That was not an issue back then, what we consider almost normal. He never had to deal with how easy it is to talk like this when you're being protected by the most professional army in Europe? Did he believe that the army shouldn't be fighting his enemies, should be fighting Russia's enemies, In which case he wouldn't be a landowner anymore, and God knows he would be. God knows what happened to him. I mean, he did have A message to soldiers that they should abandon their post and stuff like that, even though he was one for a while. But the only reason he's able to talk, the way he talks about talked, is that he was so protected. It was as easy to do what he did at the time. And this is a problem that he never dealt with fully and his followers never dealt with fully.
- [36:48]
B
The only thing I would argue with is that you didn't need a Chris Hansen back then. When you read the accounts of Freud's patients and what they were doing with their children, it's pretty friggin horrifying.
- [37:06]
A
Well, in that case, I read some of that. I know Freud fairly well. Jung a bit more so. A lot of that stuff was done privately. A lot of people think that, that there was no punishment for stuff like that, that there were no laws on the books, that there were no, like domestic violence cases, for example. And actually you go back to say, 100 years ago in America and you realize how brutally those guys were treated. They even had their own courts in a couple of states. But who knows if Freud's even telling the truth? He's promoting this agenda. He's all drugged out. This could be wishful thinking on his part. And then he's, you know, he doesn't reveal names obviously, but you know, this is a. This is his Jewish wish list, so to speak.
- [38:04]
B
I'll send you an article after this.
- [38:06]
A
Well, that will be wonderful.
- [38:08]
B
Okay.
- [38:09]
A
All right.
- [38:10]
B
This applies equally to the commandment regarding the forgiveness of offenses. According to this commandment, a person is called to forgive those who personally wronged him. At the same time, the extent of one's forgiving kindness and patience must be truly infinite. Yet even when dealing with a personal offense, the Gospel establishes conditions under which your brother who has sinned against you may come to be regarded by you as a Gentile and a tax collector. Matthew 18:15, 17. Acknowledging the power of personal hardened obstinacy that yields to no persuasion, Luke 17:3. The gospel points to the judgment of the Church as the ultimate authority. Disobedience to this authority entails the compulsory corrective isolation of the hardened offender. Clearly, appealing to this authority and excluding the offender from fellowship in no way hinders the act of inner forgiveness. Conversely, the act of personal forgiveness, while resolving the issue of one's own resentment, does not at all resolve the problem of the offender in his hardened state. Yet beyond all this, Christ foresaw and identified certain heinous acts which in his judgment, make the death penalty as the best outcome for the Wrongdoer quote. But he that shall scandalize one of these little ones that believe in me, it would be better for him that a millstone should be hanged around his neck and that he should be drowned in the depth of the sea. Matthew 18:6, Mark 9:42 and Luke 17:12.
- [39:48]
A
That's one of the most brutal parts of the entire New Testament. Why would Christ even mention that a young believer being whatever bullied, hit even, you know, attacked for it, who can't defend himself. He uses this kind of imagery. This isn't, this isn't imagery Tolstoy would even vaguely recognize. And he did foresee this. You know, every generation seems to get worse pretty much after, after the, the fall of the third Rome, things seem to get worse and worse and worse and worse. And, and yeah, we talked about this in many, many times, both in Scholz and Eason and in this, in this book that, you know, these societies didn't have prison systems. Sometimes they'd be isolated in monasteries. Both Ethan west too. And even if that didn't work, then they needed to be exiled or they simply had their head chopped off. But other than that and payment of fines, your family had to pay fines. There was a capital punishment for many acts in Christian Europe and scandalizing little ones who believe in me. In other words, young Christians should be punished so harshly that they wish they were never born again. They were never born. But these are, especially for the time period, extremely harsh words. He's using very difficult, tough language. But you know, we live in, surrounded by constant violence. Even a lot of it's artificial, but it, you know, it doesn't, doesn't hit us as much. Sometimes the Bible gets. Blunted by repetition. But this, this phrase Matthew, Matthew 18 is extremely harsh. And I still can't find that damn psalm. I'll find it.
- [42:14]
B
They are acts of internal forgiveness, but act of personal forgiveness, while resolving the problem of resentment, does not at all resolve the problem of the offender and his bitterness. However, beyond all this, Christ foresaw and pointed out such crimes. Generally speaking, it takes sheer spiritual blindness to reduce the entire problem of resisting evil. To the forgiveness of personal grievances to my enemies, my haters, and to my mental and spiritual overcoming of this resentment. It would be utterly in vain to attribute such spiritual blindness to the Gospel. Naturally, a naive person with their, with their purely personal and meager worldview fails to see good and evil in their extrapersonal dimensions, their social, universal and religious ones. This is precisely why they believe that personal forgiveness extinguishes evil and resolves the problem of combating it. But in reality that is not the case. Forgiving an offense extinguishes its malignant power within oneself and prevents the flood of hatred and evil from entering. But this does not at all mean defeating the power of malice and evil in the offender.
- [43:26]
A
Yeah, sometimes people use the word forgiveness and it really just comes down to them letting it go so they feel better. I guess that's one definition. I've always saw it as a two way street. Person who's wronged you has come and says I'm very, very sorry and then you absolutely have to forgive. The gospel examples of giving a huge debt, someone comes with a small debt and you lose your mind. That these examples show that it's a two way street. This is not just about your own feelings, which is important. I'm not saying it's not important, but forgiveness is a two way street. Forgiveness and repentance go together. Sometimes there's people who just simply can't be. Reached by any means. I had that problem on a family level. Well, I use, I used to. They're so atrophied that they can't see what they've done. But for my own sanity sake, I have to just let it go. Make excuses for them, you know, but that doesn't change the fact that they're all atrophied. You know, it's the someone breaks a car window, yeah, you have to replace the car window, but you also have to be punished for the act of breaking the car window. There's two separate things. And so personal forgiveness of course does not extinguish the evil unless there is an act of repentance. Our sins aren't forgiven unless we go and we recognize them and we go and we confess them. It's a two way street. So maybe another word should be used rather than forgiveness. I'm not 100% sure. I don't know if you notice, I use my haters here, which of course you probably wouldn't use back many years ago, 100 years ago. But I think we're going to get his point across. So. But in spiritual overcoming of the resentment, yes, you don't want to have a heart attack over these people. But I think true forgiveness comes with repentance.
- [46:03]
B
After forgiveness, the question remains open and unsolved what to do with the offender. Not as someone who has wronged me and who has owed revenge or retribution from me, but as an unrepentant and incorrigible perpetrator for being a villain is not a problem for the victim alone and not just to the extent of their failure to forgive. It is a problem for everyone, including the victim. Not as the victim and the unforgiving one, but as a member of that social community called to mutual education and the organized struggle against evil. The offended can and should forgive their offense and extinguish their resentment in their heart. But it is precisely their personal heart and their personal harm that limit their competence in forgiving. Anything further exceeds their rights and their calling.
- [46:50]
A
Yeah, again, using the example of the smash window. You know, you don't just go to, you know, just get arrested for smashing the window. You also have to replace it. Now, in the Middle Ages, for the most part, I was talking in the Freudian case. I'm talking mostly about the Middle Ages and early modern period. Freud's a 20th century figure. That's why fines were so important. The first law code of all Russia under Yaroslav was almost just this list of fines. And because you had not just the family, but the very extended family that did have the money to pay it, it was workable. And it's almost odd for us to read that today, because it's not just an individual. The individual didn't exist. They were part of a very extended family who of course are embarrassed by all of this, and they have to come up with the money. The individual came into existence and all of a sudden they're debtors prisons,
- [48:00]
B
which
- [48:00]
A
of course are illegal in the US except when it comes to child support. Although I tend to accept that. I agree with that.
- [48:11]
B
It hardly needs proof that a person has neither the ability nor the right to forgive an offense inflicted on another or a crime that violates divine and human laws. Unless, of course, they are a priest with the authority to absolve the sins of the penitent or the highest state body with the authority to grant amnesty in every injustice, every violence, every crime. Besides the personal aspect of insult and damage, there is also a supra personal aspect that brings the criminal to the judgment of society, the law and God. And it is clear that the personal forgiveness of an individual cannot extinguish this jurisdiction and these possible sentences.
- [48:49]
A
This is one of the central reasons that society exists. This is part of natural law. You can't get away from it. Natural law refers to those aspects of our nature you can't. You can't get rid of. Yeah, you're going to have sinners. You're going to have people doing the wrong thing. Therefore, you need some forum that the community can express itself. How are they going to make it up to you. And, and hopefully, I mean, you know, it's not this, you know, two kids fight and they say they're sorry because, you know, they have to. Hopefully it's not like that. Hopefully it's, it's genuine. There are people that just don't like fighting. And so they, they just wanted to go away. And they're very happy to say, I'm sorry, it's my fault even when it's not. But. You know, again, this, this is starting to come into the idea that forgiveness is truly a two way street. It is not just, you know, you forgive when there is an act of repentance and if it's genuine, you have absolutely no choice but to reply in kind. To say, yes, I accept may be difficult, depending on the nature of the offense. But you know, again, these things were attached to society very different than our own. I think we live in one of the most savage, ridiculous societies that ever existed. I don't know how, you know, especially in the race issue and all this, the total lack of trust, the contempt for each other. But in a place like, you know, more monoracial place, a place with one religion that was taken seriously, it was a different story. They realized that they really had to do this. They didn't want, they were believers. And so, yes, when they said I repent, they meant it and that God was watching. As you said, yes, I accept your repentance. And it's gone now, it's wiped away and we're back like we normally were. You still have to replace what you did though. But that's up to the extended family to do.
- [51:15]
B
Indeed, who gave me the right to forgive on my behalf? The criminals who commit the desecration of sacred objects, the villainous seduction of minors, or the destruction of the homeland? And what could be the meaning of this imaginary forgiveness? What does it mean that I do not condemn or accuse them, but who appointed me such a merciful judge? Or that I condone their atrocities and pledge not to interfere with them? But where could I get such an imaginary right to betray, to betray the sacred, the homeland and the defenseless? Or perhaps this faux forgiveness means that I refrain from any judgment, wash my hands of the matter, and leave events to their inevitable course. However, such a position of indifference, weakness and permissiveness has nothing in common with Christian forgiveness and cannot be justified by any reference to the gospel.
- [52:08]
A
You keep going.
- [52:09]
B
He who resists evil must forgive personal offenses. And the more sincere and complete this forgiveness, the more capable the forgiver is. Of waging an impersonal, objective struggle against criminality. And the more he is called to be a source of living goodness, not avenging, but compelling and suppressing. But there should be no room in his soul for naive and sentimental illusions that evil in the villain is defeated the moment he personally forgives him. Forgiveness is the first condition of the struggle against evil, or even its beginning, but not its end or its victory. For this great struggle against evil requires truly no less than 12 legions of angels. Matthew 26:53. And a real villain, until he sees these legions, will always see in forgiveness direct encouragement and perhaps even secret sympathy.
- [53:03]
A
Well, you know, maybe he's talking about the Bolshevik takeover. You know, he is in exile with millions of other Russians, shooting numbers of family members dead, the rest in prisons because they created prisons. And your personal forgiveness, it really means very little. That's not really what he means here because, well, you know, make him feel better. But you still have to destroy them. You know, you still have to. You still have to figure out a way to get rid of them. They're certainly not going to repent. Forgiveness is the first condition of the struggle against evil. That's true. Yeah. What did Christ say on the cross? They don't know what they're doing now. They really think that they're doing the right thing. This is an end of history here. They really believe that somehow someone brainwashed them into believing it. So in that sense, you have to be as charitable as humanly possible. That doesn't mean it ends there. That's just step one. It's only step one. Step two is forcing them to see the error of their ways. And that requires force, of course, when dealing with the Bolshevik Revolution. Very different story, very different situation. First of all, these weren't Russians. They have no conception of either forgiveness or repentant, and they absolutely despise the Russians and Ukrainians and those who they rule over. And that was common knowledge at the time. Not today, but it's common knowledge at the time. But naive and sentimental illusions, as he says, that the evil and the villain is defeated the moment he personally forgives him. But that doesn't mean that forgiveness isn't the first condition of the struggle against evil, if you want to define it that way, that you could forgive someone without repentance. I always wondered about that. I don't know if I have a problem with that or not. But that doesn't mean there needs to be punishment meted out for what they've done. You know, I'm good with it, but you still have broken the law somehow. So this is a complicated passage here, but he is mocking, of course, Tolstoy and the last few words, perhaps even secret sympathy. We shouldn't raise arms against this Bolshevik movement. Well, why would you say that? Maybe because you support them now? Of course, those guys ended up going to the Gulag anyway. But I think he said a mouthful there and I think he meant
- [56:22]
B
is in this context that the gospel words resist, not evil, Matthew 5:39 should be understood. The rule contained therein is clearly clarified by the words that follow in the sense of meekly enduring personal insults as well as generously g personal property and personal services. To interpret this call to meekness and generosity in personal matters as a call to weak willed contemplation of violence and injustice or to submission to evildoers in matters of the good and spiritual. Mat. In. Mat. In matters of the good and spiritual matters which would be contradictory and unnatural, is abandoning the weak to evildoers really an act of meekness? Or is one free to turn the other cheek to an attacker? Doesn't generosity extend only to one's own personal possessions? Or has someone who squandered public wealth and delivered his brother into slavery also demonstrated generosity? Or does granting evildoers the freedom to desecrate churches, spread atheism and destroy one's own homeland mean being meek and generous? And Christ called for such meekness and generosity tantamount to hypocritical righteousness and complicity with evildoers.
- [57:37]
A
Well, obviously now he is talking about the Bolshevik Revolution. And you know, the concept of a revolution is a modern idea. The idea of revolution, let's be clear here, among many other things, is that the Revolutionary Party believes that it understands history and that history is culminating in them, and therefore to cleanse the society of everything that was old is something that's ideologically mandated. It's a big difference between right wing and left wing violence. In terms of the state. Right wing violence is incidental. It's just, you know, we're get rid of a criminal class. Left wing violence is within their theory. It's actually within their philosophy. You have to cleanse a huge proportion of the society of those who may want to go back to the old ways, which means camps re education centers, mass graves. That's a part of the theory. You can't get out of that. The Marxist theory of revolution implies it. Now, this has nothing to do with what Christ was talking about. Resist, not evil. And to say that, especially in Matthew 5:39, to refer to something like the revolution is dishonest because it's immediately removed by what he says afterwards. This is not about you personally. The minute it affects someone else, you know, everything changes. The minute it affects someone else, you now are complicit. If you don't do anything, if you have the power to do something. To interpret this call to meekness and generosity in personal matters as a call to weak willed contemplation of violence and injustice or to submission to evildoers and matters of the good and spiritual matter would be contradictory and unnatural. And he's right. That would be abandoning, as he says, the weak to evildoers. It's like being chased by, by some animal and you trip someone, the animal gets them instead of you. It's essentially, you know, that's not a Christian thing, that's not a meek thing, But it's. And, and you know, personally it happens. But the minute someone else is involved, or if God's involved or the state's involved, or the society's involved, or the economy is involved, then everything changes. And. You know that last line, one of the last lines that's granting evildoers the freedom to desecrate churches, spread atheism and destroy one's homeland. Be meek and generous. I suppose if Tolstoy, you know, understood that, lived to see it, he would say yes. And you know, he never, Christ never called for this kind of meekness and he certainly never called for complicity with evildoers. So the argument against Tolstoy here is very simple and he lays it out very well.
- [61:16]
B
The teaching of the apostles and church fathers, of course, developed a completely different understanding. God's servants need the sword and do not bear it in vain. Romans 13:4. They are a threat to evildoers. And it was precisely in the spirit of this understanding that Saint Theodosius of the Kiev Caves taught saying, live peacefully not only with friends, but also with enemies. However, only with your enemies and not with the enemies of God. End quote. Thus the principle of the Spirit limits the action of benevolence in its immediate naive outpouring. Clearly, this limitation inevitably leads to a modification of its spiritual structure and appearance.
- [62:01]
A
This was a brutal five chapters I have to get. I haven't even started translating yet for the next time or Saturday, but I got plenty of time. Of course, I have two of us there. That's odd. St. Theodosius took the rules from Mount Athos for monasticism and brought them to the Kiev monasteries. And that became huge for the development of the Russian Church. Russian culture revolves around the church. But how can Tolstoy deal with this when he, you know, the rulers do not bear the sword in vain. Did he reject that part of it? Does he. You know, it's like he accepts, you know, like five lines in the New Testament and that's his religion. Well, I think that really means that he's not a Christian at all, that he has rejected it long ago. He is an atheist. He is a philosopher, weirdo, gnostic of some kind. And he uses that just so he can appeal to your typical Russian. It's like the Jonestown people. You know, if you read his letters to North Korea and China once, he was, when he was going to get kicked out of Guyana, he says blatantly, Jim Jones, he says all this religious stuff is just a. It's a sikam. It's just so, you know, these people, you know, support me. His letter to North Korea, if he wanted to move there, can you imagine? He says, oh, the religious stuff doesn't mean anything. Now. When they shot the congressman on the, on the, their. As he came in, that was a, you know, okay, now all of a sudden, we don't want you. We don't want to even talk to you. But he comes right up and says it. We don't, we don't accept this stuff. And so much of this, this has been very, very difficult, I think, mentally and very heavy. Five chapters where he's building this extraordinary argument that there is no logical or ethical or Christian understanding of resisting evil by anything but force. When it affects everybody else but you, someone else but you, you personally, that's a kind of a different story. But even there, sometimes that, that line is blurred. You know, it always has been interpreted on down. You, you live peacefully with your friends.
- [65:00]
B
You,
- [65:03]
A
you know, personal injuries are very different from injuries to the family, to the church, whatever. They're not the same thing, usually not done by the same sort of people. They're completely, they're ontologically different entities. Now, the concept of the individual didn't exist really at the time of,
- [65:28]
B
at
- [65:28]
A
any of these periods of time. It's really referred to communities more than anything else and extended families because they're the ones who have to pay for you when you do something wrong. But Tolstoy, again, his development, and he still has some followers out there, but they're simply not Christians. And I think he's demonstrated it here that they're not believers. They can't be. He has cited how many Bible verses Now, Tolstoy has cited maybe five or six. Jim Jones did the exact same thing. He very much limited his citations and to manipulate people. And he said it right in his letters. And for some reason, when I'm reading, you know, in translating this stuff, I'm reminded of Jim Jones. It's dishonesty. It's hypocrisy. And I think this was just one of the most extraordinary five chapters of a book people are going to read in a long time.
- [66:39]
B
All righty. I encourage everyone to go over to the show notes and to the descriptions on the video and donate to Dr. Johnson's work. Sign up for his Patreon. Buy his book. Buy. You can buy a lot of his books.
- [66:55]
A
That's right.
- [66:55]
B
And. And yeah, we will be back in a few days to continue this. Thank you, Dr. Johnson.
- [67:03]
A
Hey, no problem, my friend. I appreciate. Sa.