Of Science, Christianity, Jews, War, Demography and Islam

 

We can cover the initial item, the war against the Jewish People, with a simple recognition of historical fact which has become so well known and uncontestable, as stated in the Passover Haggadah, “In every generation one rises up against us.” That simple sentence states the minimal condition where there is one person who will rise up and call for our murders. The unstated and unfortunate reality is that one is often a political leader, a leader of a nation, or the dictator of an empire who is the one rising to destroy us. The list is filled with illustrious names of their eras with names such as Pharos Ramses I and Pharos Ramses II, Haman, Nebuchadnezzar, King Ahasuerus, Tsar Nicholas II, Ottoman rulers Sultan Mehmed I, Mehmed II, Suleiman I, Mustafa I, Murad IV, Suleiman II, Mahmud I, Abdülhamid I, Mehmed V, Musa Çelebi and the remainder of the Ottoman leadership throughout the ranks all used the Jews to fund their positions. This continued from invader to invader and foreign rulers and dispersion sent Jews throughout the Roman and later the Ottoman Empires and beyond to every corner of the globe driven most often through the necessity to flee pogroms, rioting or genocidal efforts to destroy the small minority of Jews within almost every border.

 

Probably the least obvious but greatest surprise was the reaction by the Japanese High Command when visiting Nazi SS officers demanded that the Japanese release their Jews and send them to the German death camps. The Japanese flatly refused the German demands threatening to turn against Germany should these demands persist. The Nazi officers left empty handed and with much challenged authority after having their wings clipped. The Palestinians and their Arab and Iranian backers are the most evident threat to Jews with many others in the background ready to launch into the picture. Anti-Semitism has returned across much of the globe including Europe, Russia, the Arab World and even to include the United States and the rest of the Developed World. The new anti-Semitism includes two new forms, anti-Israelism and anti-Zionism. The sad part is that many far left Jews are what are referred to as Post-Zionists who no longer believe in a Jewish nation and instead call for a joint nation allowing all the Arabs claiming to have been dispossessed to return with full rights. The small problem is that under their solutions, hundreds of thousands of Arabs claiming refugee status would take advantage of the opportunity to move to the area and live in an area where the economy functions. These Arabs would far outnumber the Jews who would soon find Arab rule destroying their efforts and stealing all that has been built leading to their eventual destruction. Israel would be dissolved and the Jews fleeing or dead should such a plan ever be enacted. The problem is the leftist parties already within the Israeli governance who are willing to do whatever it takes to get into power and enact just such a dream under the idea of solving the problems. There are two ways of solving problems, allow the problem to win or to continue the limited immigration rather than opening the floodgates and surrendering to the coming destruction of all which has been built.

 

All right, so the Jews have been persecuted in both the Muslim and Christian worlds nearly constantly and before by the major idolatrous powers for close to four thousand years should one include the exile in Egypt which was where distrust of the Jews, known then as the Hebrews, first began and has continued unabated ever since. But the Christians have controlled almost half of the world for the past eighteen centuries, how are they now included as persecuted? That is an easy one to answer, there was the remainder of the world which they did not control and sometimes they suffered from Christian upon Christian violence such as the War of the Roses. the Hundred Years’ War, Second Hundred Years’ War (the first lasted 116 years and the second lasted 126 years), the Eighty Years’ War and the entirety of the Catholic-Protestant wars including the Thirty Years’ War and more all of which were ended by the treaties named the Peace of Münster and the Peace of Westphalia. Another war which has taken many forms and been fought on many fronts have been the wars between the ever expanding Islamic forces against Christendom which started as early as 622 AD or 625 AD (see map below) depending on the source, but all sources would agree that Christianity was being conquered by Islam and was well underway by 650 AD (see map below). This war is still being fought today, at least by Islam even if not by Christendom.

 

Christian World 500AD

 

 

Islamic Conquests Under the Caliphs

 

Christianity has been facing an even more insidious encroachment which has been eating at it from within. This has been the modernization and the growing Secular Humanism belief where there is no longer any reason to believe in a Supreme Being as technology and science have described most of what was originally attributed to the gods or to a Supreme Being. The rest of the reasoning for Secular Humanism claims that humans can act honestly and ethically without any expectations of rewards or punishments from any higher source. The only need is to rely on ourselves, our better inclinations, the laws we write, and the communal expectations and limits which are mutually agreed upon to prevent actions which would be deemed undesirable. Should we have any problems, those can be resolved through government actions and laws which will become the new guides as to how we live our lives. The new guardians of our humanity will be the new anointed ones in long robes, the judiciary, which will act by the cold application of the laws. This revolution has all but stripped the heart out of Christian Europe leaving it without the steadying guidance of a traditional set of moral truths which have been replaced by what one would expect of any faith where mankind is the highest moral judge, hedonism. This hedonistic value system which places the personal freedom and pleasures above any other expectation has led to a precipitous drop in the reproductive rate leaving Europe, including Russia, with a steadily declining population which has an ever increasing average age as in many instances the reproductive rate has fallen to 1.5 births per woman or even lower. Some examples include Moldova and Portugal with 1.2 births per woman; Bosnia-Herzegovina, Greece, Poland and Spain at 1.3 births per woman; Cyprus, Hungary, Italy, Malta and Slovakia at 1.4 births per woman; Austria, Bulgaria, Channel Islands, Croatia, Czech Republic, Estonia, Germany, Luxembourg, Macedonia, Romania, Serbia, Switzerland and the Ukraine at 1.5 births per woman. The replacement rate in the developed world is 2.1 births per woman with it reaching as high as 3.4 births per woman in some developing countries with higher infant mortality rates and with the global average being 2.33 births per woman. Modernity and the related influences have also had an effect upon the Islamic world or, as some have theorized, the conditions have grown unbearable to the point that people no longer desire to bring children into this world in these countries which does not explain why their birth rates were so much higher ten, twenty, thirty and fifty years ago. The evidence is the introduction of electricity, television, modern comforts and conveniences have brought the same problems to the Islamic world as it develops as it has the Christian world though in the Islamic world none dare claim they are Secular Humanists for fear of being executed. The other variable is education and literacy. These are related issues and for the majority of MENA nations, they have just started to witness changes in these areas. Below we have a graph of the literacy rates for women aged fifteen to twenty-four years of age in Oman, Iran, Algeria, Egypt and Morocco as these are the prime start of childbearing ages and increased literacy usually leads to higher grade education and even increased college admissions which raise the age of initial childbearing thus lowering the average number of births per woman in a nation.

 

Literacy in Oman, Iran, Algeria, Egypt and Morocco

 

Where this will make a difference in the future is with lower births, Islam will soon approach or possibly equal Christians in reproductive rates and thus an equilibrium will have been met. The main factor which has spurred the recent upsurge in Islamic expansion was a combination of retaining high reproductive rates while experiencing lower infant mortality rates thus leading to a rapid increase in populations which strained the economic growth, or lack thereof, across the MENA states. This was brought on with the introduction of modern medical facilities in many if not most of the major cities thus providing better prenatal and post-birth care resulting in lower infant mortality and better reproductive health for the women as well. But modernity has started to catch up in the form of education and literacy which has provided women with more information and a greater opportunity to work and find economic improvement. These are items which most often have produced dropping reproductive rates in nations worldwide. The MENA nations of the Muslim world are no different. With a more steady population returning, these nations are not going to be likely to feel any need for expansionist policies nor will they be demanding greater ability for their excess population to migrate into Europe and the rest of the developed world. Further, as their world develops they will find the need to retain their populations, especially their now educated population, and this will lessen their pressures on the rest of the world. This will lessen the pressures Islam has been pressing on the Christian world and the lines will remain drawn as they currently are with hopefully a lessening in the levels of violence experienced in these regions, particularly the African Transition Zone (see map below) where some of the greatest Islamic-Christian conflicts have occurred.

 

African Transition Zone

 

This will still leave the threats posed by the increasing Secular Humanism but there may even be a light in the darkness here as well. The last centuries have seen science remove much of the mysteries in our lives and explain away things we thought mystical removing their magic and cementing explanations. Now the scientists are really getting into the very fabric which our universe consists of and they are finding some things which are changing opinions and the argument. The first item was the realization that had any of numerous constants been different by even less than one single percentage point in relationship with all of the others, then our universe would have been very different or not have existed at all. Even had it simply been different, that would still have made lifeforms, such as ourselves, impossible, and that does put a different look to things. We are now realizing how extremely special and precious our universe actually is and that it appears in many ways to have been designed especially for life to exist. Still, even with such a design we are realizing that intelligent life, if that is what we qualify as being, may not be anywhere near as abundant and actually so special that there may only be a small number of other intelligent species in our galaxy if even one other and even so, they may not exist in our time frame. We are starting to see that we may be the only intelligent life in the Milky Way at this time and as such, we may not find other intelligent life with whom we would have anything in common. It may be that if there is another intelligent lifeform, they have colonized other star systems and are so far advanced from us that we would have nothing in common, and we would be fortunate if they even considered us intelligent. On the other hand, we may be the first and foremost intelligent lifeform and should we reach the point of colonizing other star systems, then when the next intelligent lifeform evolves, we might be so far in advance of them that we would not realize their being intelligent, though we would probably think so much of ourselves that we would posit we would be capable of realizing their intelligence. Our lack of ability to see the abilities of animals on our own planet does place this in danger.

 

What does any of this have to do with the threats to Christianity and Judaism or belief in a Supreme Being at all? What would be the result of science proving that there was an actual intelligent design to the universe? What happens when science postulates the existence of a Supreme Being which came before and may very well exist currently and will continue existing even after our universe dies? Does that definition sound familiar to anybody? Should science, or a fair number of scientists which has already begun, start to make an argument, then religion, Judaism and Christianity would find their beliefs becoming more aligned with science, actually, it would be science becoming aligned with them, and this could benefit both sides of that equation. There will always be those areas of doubt where science has yet to assign numbers and equations and is still somewhat fuzzy on what is occurring, but we are not referring to using lack of knowledge as the reasoning for Supreme Being. What we are referencing is that science will have found formulations and such proofs and items which point to there being a necessity for an ordering intelligence to the universe and that this creates the need in science for a Supreme Being. Professor Einstein believed in the existence of an ordering logic behind the universe and was a believer in Hashem. His belief may not have fit with your average Rabbi, Priest, Minister or Cleric, but at least he saw a necessary place for such belief. We know that Physicist Stephen Hawking is a doubter who does not believe or find any need for a Supreme Being. But what can you expect for a person who also lends his name to the BDS Israel campaign, which is an attempt to economically cripple the Jewish State. Guess one could say that Stephen Hawking and the Supreme Being are not in agreement, and we know on which side with which we prefer to reside. But, science is growing closer to religion and religion has learned from their mistakes and has left room for science, being assured in their belief that the proof is out there. Christianity can take faith from the fact that the Jews remain a force in the world that there is hope for them to have similar lasting power providing they remain open to ideas and willing to meet facts with reasonable skepticism and sufficient confidence to admit when perhaps they had made an error in their previous position. We can only hope that the world of science can be equally acceptive and honest.

 

Beyond the Cusp

 

Can President Trump Cure the Ills of America?

 

The United States new leader, President Donald J. Trump, promised to “Make America Great Again.” The real question should be can he cure the United States of her illness. This disease has numerous symptoms of which we will cover a few of the most threatening. The first on the list is a sinister little one which hides in plain sight. The current reproductive rate is 1.84 children per woman which is well below the 2.33 reproductive rate necessary for maintaining a nation’s population. This simply means that the United States will have fewer workers to support an aging population and this will only grow more and more serious over time. The only obvious solution is to allow for immigration, eventually massive immigration. From all expectation, any large immigration program will lead to a rebalancing of the predominant population statistics in the favor of whichever groups of foreign nations contribute to the immigration. The most readily available populations are from Central America and South America. This has been the trending for the past decades which is leading to a growing Hispanic population which is rapidly becoming the largest minority population and with time they will become the predominant population. There is a fortunate trait in that the vast majority of such immigrants hold similar religious identities and have a Judeo-Christian ethics and history which will make for a merging of the populations and not as much a shock to the culture or as much a threat for large changes in laws and outlook of the resultant population. Should the United States instead bring in immigrants from the Middle East and North Africa (MENA) there would be an inevitable confrontation between the emerging culture and the currently existing culture. If history is any indicator, an increasing Islamic minority would at some point lead to an actual confrontation which the aging Judeo-Christian community who would most definitely loses.

 

The Donald-Make America Great Again-Trump

 

This problem has been traced from demographic studies to have a direct relation to the legalization of abortion after the 1973 Supreme Court Roe vs. Wade decision leading to nationally recognizing a legal right for a woman to obtain an abortion. The good news is that the numbers of abortions have steadily decreased over the past few decades. The not so great news is that this has not led to any measurable increase in the reproductive rate as was expected. Demographic studies have shown that couples are waiting until later in life before getting married. This had led to the obvious postponement of starting families and, as in most cases both husband and wife are professionals with careers, they often put off having a family until even later leading to many couples having a single child , or worse, deciding not to have children at all. Societal studies have also seen a trending in millennials for their deciding to forgo marriage, children and even permanent relationships instead settling to have small groups of friends who have open partnerships or some simply leading singular lives dropping in and out of relationships never desiring to become involved in a permanent relationship. Perhaps these individuals will settle down later in life but that will likely lead to a childless relationship as they may wait until past the point of fertility. Whatever the future, the current trends indicate that the only solution to the American childlessness will be through immigration and praying that the new immigrants prove immune to the childless culture as they come from a more reproductive friendly culture.

 

Islamic immigrants would also have a higher reproductive rate than the current American culture. The one catch is that it has been found that as financial wealth of a society increases, reproductive rates plummet. This was what has struck Europe and has been given as one of the reasons the political rulers have been allowing a free import of Syrian and other MENA refugees. Whether such a program was a good idea or a potential allowing for an infiltration leading to an eventual takeover by Islamic policies is something which is still being debated. Time may settle that debate before any conclusions are forthcoming. The one certainty is that many of the existing European populations are not overly excited about the newcomers and may be voting in a whole new and opposing set of leaders as elections sweep across the continent. Should Europe start to become an Islamic based society, then that may play well for solving some of the system shock for the United States as many of the elite, and any others with sufficient means, would flee Europe for the apparent safety of the United States. Much of this future will depend on socioeconomic developments and for the existing confrontations and other dangerous situations not developing into a far broader set of conflicts leading eventually to an all-encompassing conflict. This might actually have the effect of shocking the current Western World out of its self-serving egoism and realizing that there is only a future if there exists a prodigy to which to hand over that future and that depends on having said prodigy. Having such a revelation sweep Western society would be a blessing though it would be preferable for it not to have to be impressed through some horrific conflict as such changes have been initiated in previous eras. Such conflagrations have also brought down empires which not much earlier had been considered a permanent fixture assured forever into the future. The lesson there for the United States is that nothing remains on top forever, not Rome, not the British, not the Spanish, not the Egyptians, not Alexander’s Greeks and not even China, one of the longest continuous empires still existing and asserting a presence in the modern age.

 

Another serious illness striking the United States is the political divide which has not only grown wider this century but has also grown far nastier and more toxic. This past week proved this beyond any shadow of doubt. When President Obama was first elected in 2008 there was disappointment on the Republican side but most Americans hoped for the best. Many were disappointed but still believed there was hope and President Obama was reelected. After the 2012 election there was a smattering of protests which were nonviolent and largely quiet. The media made sure they had a short self-life by largely ignoring their existence. This present Inauguration brought back the protests and cries of foul from 2000 except with far more violence and vitriol. Madonna spoke of dreaming of blowing up the White House. That was quite far overboard as that would be such a waste of the rebuild after the War of 1812 which was finally completed in 1817 and President James Monroe moved into the new and improved White House. The demonstrations were boisterous and somewhat over the top including the burning of President Trump in effigy. The problem was with the violent actors who destroyed property, attacked police, attacked injuring innocent people who were simply attending Inaugural Dances including the insulting, spitting upon and injuring of a Gold Star widow and her sister. Spirited protests and debate are one thing and destruction of property and assaulting people and police is a completely different and unacceptable form of protest and should be considered beyond the pale. People work and depend on those places for their families and futures and the destruction of their workplaces hurt innocents and since a good many of these places were in major cities, especially those in Washington D.C. where over 90% voted for Hillary Clinton, most of the people hurt by these unscrupulous acts were Hillary supporters. Whatever the presumed excuse, such violence, if left unchecked, only grows and eventually leads to the destruction of the society.

 

The other problem with the violence was that it was presumed to be in support of groups which resemble numerous fascist entities of the past such as the infamous Brownshirts which used violence in order to scare the German people into demanding the government do something, anything, just end the violence. Once the people agreed to the government assuming emergency powers giving them absolute power, the Nazis wiped out the Brownshirts replacing them with the SS who became the new enforcers. The possibility that hidden somewhere within the leftist ranks are those seeking a repeat from history, using the rabble to stir up sufficient troubles at some point in the future to takeover and put in place a dictatorial fascist governance is all too possibly the end result. This has been the manner in which virtually every democratic based government has fallen throughout history; so saying it could not happen here is a fool’s gambit. Many of the demonstrations resembled the Red Guard demonstrations at the beginning of the Communist takeover of Russia deposing the Russian Provisional Government which was democratically elected in a limited vote and was presumed to be setting up a democratic form of government when the Communists decided they didn’t need any democracy, they simply desired replacing one dictatorial government with another. Caesar also replaced a democratic republic of Rome relegating the Senate into an echo chamber until they decided to depose him old school. The assassination of Caesar did no good as all it did was immortalize his name making it the title for the reign of dictators until the fall of Rome centuries later. Obviously saying it cannot happen here is a blindness that no democracy can afford. Reportedly, American Abolitionist and liberal activist Wendell Phillips on January 28, 1852 speaking to members of the Massachusetts Anti-Slavery Society stated,

“Eternal vigilance is the price of liberty; power is ever stealing from the many to the few. The manna of popular liberty must be gathered each day or it is rotten. The living sap of today outgrows the dead rind of yesterday. The hand entrusted with power becomes, either from human depravity or esprit de corps, the necessary enemy of the people. Only by continued oversight can the democrat in office be prevented from hardening into a despot; only by unintermitted agitation can a people be sufficiently awake to principle not to let liberty be smothered in material prosperity.”

 

Beyond the Cusp