Who were the Pharisees?

Vincent J. Curtis

7 Apr 25

Who were the Pharisees, and why do they appear so often in the Gospels? The Gospel of Sunday, April 6, related the story of the casting of the first stone. In the story, a group of Pharisees hauled an adulteress before Jesus, and demanded from him to know how she should be punished, reminding Jesus that, in accordance with Mosaic law, she deserved to be stoned to death.

The Pharisees, I learned from Gibbon, belonged to a sect of Judaism that strictly adhered to the Mosaic law.  They weren’t just pious, they were ostentatiously pious; and they may have been mutely righteous in their expectation that others be pious as well. Self-righteously pious people exist today, afflicting many religions, and the Pharisees formed a cult of them within Judaism.  When Jesus made reference to people who, during times of fasting, made it obvious to others that they were fasting, he was likely referring in particular to Pharisees.  That they gained no credit with God for their ostentatious piety, was likely taken by Pharisees as a biting criticism, not only for undercutting their pretensions to superior piety, but also because Jesus implicitly was claiming to know the mind of God.

Jesus did not respond immediately to the claimant question put to him about the adulteress by the mob of Pharisees; he sat down and began to draw something with his finger in the dirt.  Making them wait had the effect of quietening the mob, and forcing them to think a little.  After being questioned a second time by a quieter mob about what to do with this woman who deserved by the Mosaic law to be stoned to death, Jesus responded, “Let he who is without sin cast the first stone.”

Jesus caught the Pharisees dead to rights; they were hoisted on their own petard.  Not one of them, in their sanctimonious piety, could claim to be without sin. Avoiding sin was the certainly basis of their piety; but the forgiveness of sins was unknown to Judaism; and not one could claim, in the presence of others of their kind, to have avoided sin entirely during their whole lives.  Having concentrated their minds by delay, and by this challenge to their conceit, Jesus returned to ignoring them; and, one by one, the mob realized the game was up, and departed in defeat, leaving Jesus alone with the woman. “Neither do I condemn you; go and sin no more.” he told the woman.  The prospect of the forgiveness of sins was revolutionary in the Jewish world.

Next Sunday will be Passion Sunday, followed by Holy Week, and finally culminating with Easter. Here again, the Pharisees play a central role in this story.  By claiming to be the fulfillment of the Mosaic Law, Jesus was upsetting to their entire world view: he had to be eliminated, ‘cancelled’ (as we’d say nowadays) in the most emphatic manner possible.  Their plan was for Jesus to be put to death, publicly and officially, by the Roman magistrate, Pontius Pilate.

Palestine was then a province of the Roman empire; it was a particularly rebellious one, as it was peopled by the Jews.  The Jews were monotheists in a world of Polytheism; Yahweh wasn’t simply one god among many, on par with Jupiter of Zeus, but the only god there was; Jupiter and Zeus were utter fictions, as well as all the lesser gods of Polytheism.  The Jews groaned under the weight of a Roman government and the abomination of an official religion of Polytheism; they gained no sympathy for their plight by the rigor of their contempt for the treasured gods of Polytheism.

The Roman magistrate administered justice in accordance with Roman law; it was beneath the majesty of Roman justice to adjudicate disputes of religious doctrine among sects of Judaism.  Another, and even more important, responsibility of the Roman governor was to keep the peace; riots and rebellion in the province which he governed were not favorable indicators of his quality as a Roman administrator.

To have Jesus condemned by Rome, the mob, led by Pharisees, took Jesus before Pilate and claimed that Jesus was disturbing the peace, and saying that he was “King of the Jews.” These accusations were calculated to raise the ire of a Roman magistrate: first, by the spectre of public disturbances; and, second, by the threat characteristic of the Jews of forming their own kingdom on the territory of the Roman empire. Pilate was more impressed by the riotous mob before him than by the capital charges against Jesus when he took Jesus into custody.  Jesus was known to have said, “Render onto Caesar that which is Caesar’s, and onto God that which is God’s.”; and, so far as Roman justice was concerned, this was a perfectly lawful position for a Jew to take. When, as Roman magistrate, Pilate questioned Jesus about his ‘kingdom’, and Jesus responded “My kingdom is not of this world,” Pilate knew he was in the presence, not of a criminal rebel, but of yet another Jewish mystic who was embroiled in another, tedious religious dispute.  It was beneath the dignity of Roman justice to execute a man who was guiltless of a crime under Roman law, and Pilate knew he could not be party to an official execution of Jesus.  “Truth? What is that?” spat a very worldly Roman magistrate, pressured by the riotous mob on his hands.

It was permissible under Roman law to employ torture to extract a confession; and after having Jesus scourged and crowned with thorns, Pilate presented the tortured figure of Jesus before the mob and said, “I find no case against him.”  When the Pharisees protested about the religious disturbances Jesus was causing, Pilate said, “Take him yourselves and crucify him; I find not case against him.”  Thus, the effort by the Pharisees to have Jesus discredited, legally and officially by a Roman magistrate, failed; and by turning Jesus over to the bloodlust of a mob, Pilate quieted the incipient riot.  A tawdry murder of Jesus would not achieve the religious end the Pharisees desired; and hence the Pharisees carried out a quasi-official crucifixion of Jesus, undisturbed by Roman authority, by which they expected to ‘cancel’ Jesus and the growing religious movement that percolated around him.

For me, learning who the Pharisees were added a new authenticity to the Gospels.  Now, it makes perfect sense for these Pharisees to be the ones who repeatedly challenged Jesus on his knowledge of, and adhesion to, the Mosaic law.  The shadings of local colour in the story of the casting of the first stone aren’t things a writer of pious fictions could retrospectively invent; that story actually happened, and somebody recorded it

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Spec runs hit piece on Tulsi Gabbard

Vincent J. Curtis

9 Feb 25

RE: Canada, start worrying about Tulsi Gabbard. Op-ed by Wesley Wark, a senior fellow at the Cetner for International Governance Innovation. The Hamilton Spectator 8 Feb 25.

Why is the Spectator running this shit-hit piece on Tulsi Gabbard? That desperate for content?  The Spectator knows squat about Tulsi Gabbard, and that goes for their boy, Wesley, who wrote the piece.

Their boy Wesley relies on Hillary Clinton for insight on Tulsi, that she’s “a Russian asset”? Tulsi Gabbard resigned as Deputy Chair of the DNC in 2016 and endorsed Bernie Sanders when she saw how the game had been rigged against Standers and in favor of Hillary. Their boy didn’t mention that.  Nor did he mention that Tulsi is opposed to “regime change wars’ such as the one Hillary launched against Muammar Gaddafi in 2013 (in which Canada participated).  So now, there are slave markets in Benghazi and Libya is the place where refugees depart for Europe. Thanks Hillary. Their boy didn’t mention why Hillary might bear a grudge against Tulsi.

As to her alleged lack of qualifications: so, qualified like James Clapper who lied to congress about not spying on U.S. citizens? (That’s what Trump wants to put her in charge: to stop these abuses.)  Tulsi has a Top Secret clearance already and a clean FBI background check. Their boy Wesley doesn’t have those creds.

As for Canada: Tulsi hasn’t said boo about Canada. How, exactly, does she “threaten the trust-relationship at the heart of our intelligence sharing” that Trump doesn’t already threaten? Their boy doesn’t say. What secrets to we have that she can’t be trusted with, given that ODNI isn’t a line collection agency (& therefore the U.S. has already)?

There’s lots more to say, but the Spectator has to stop publishing Democratic Party shit as if it were journalism. If Tulsi were working for a Democrat, they’d condemn what their boy said as blatant sexism.

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The weaponization of history

Vincent J. Curtis

1 Feb 25

RE: We live in a world where history is being weaponized. Op-ed by Paul Racher. The Hamilton Spectator.

It might be useful to know where this world is that Paul Racher writes about.  One gets the impression that some Western Civ chauvinist dominated his life, but such a person is not representative of real Western Civilization.

Mr. Racher would do well to read Thomas Sowell’s book “Discrimination and Disparities” to learn why the civilization of Western Europe presently dominates the world.  He would also do well to watch at least the first two of the four episodes put on YouTube by historian and classicist Victor Davis Hanson on the origin and rise of Western Civilization, beginning around 850 BC in Greece.  What makes Western Civilization unique and special today is its absence of chauvinism, its willingness to absorb and assimilate what is good about other cultures, but most especially the fact that anyone regardless of race can be Western.  This is not true of the Chinese, Japanese, Indian, and many other cultures.

It’s easy to bash Western Civilization because it’s one of the few that will tolerate it and let you live.

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Greenland? Manifest Destiny!

Vincent J. Curtis

27 Jan 25

President Donald Trump stirred international controversy when he renewed his proposal that the United States acquire Greenland. Though many international observers found this proposal outrageous, it is actually consistent with historical American territorial expansion, and is taken seriously in the United States.

President Thomas Jefferson purchased Louisiana from France in 1803. President James Monroe declared in 1823 American opposition to European colonialism in the Western Hemisphere: the Monroe Doctrine.  In 1845, under President James K. Polk, it became the “Manifest Destiny” of the United States to expand across the entire continent. ‘Manifest Destiny’ became the justification for the Oregon Boundary dispute with Great Britain, which was settled in 1846 by the Oregon Treaty that demarked the 49^th parallel as the boundary between the United States and British North America.  The Republic of Texas was annexed in 1845, sparking the Mexican-American War of 1846-48, that also gained the United States the territories of New Mexico and California. The Gadsden Purchase of 1853 completed the acquisition of Arizona.

In 1867, under President Andrew Johnson, Secretary of State William Seward, purchased Alaska from Russia for $7.2 million, an acquisition called at the time “Seward’s Folly.” When Seward proposed purchasing Greenland and Iceland from Denmark, the proposal went nowhere. In 1910 and 1917, discussions with President Woodrow Wilson concluded with the U.S. acquiring the Danish West Indies (now the U.S. Virgin Islands); but Denmark made an agreement with Britain in 1917 to give her the right of first refusal should Greenland be sold, protecting loyal Canada from envelopment.

The United States occupied Greenland in 1941, after Nazi Germany occupied Denmark and the Danish Ambassador signed a treaty of defence. The U.S. used Greenland for bases to protect the Atlantic convoys carrying Lend-Lease aid to Britain

In 1946, the Truman Administration proposed purchasing Greenland for $100 million, but was turned down. In 1951, the United States signed the Greenland Defense Agreement with Denmark, which permitted the United States to keep the WWII bases and to build new ones.  The U.S. promptly built Thule Air Force Base, with a 10,000’ runway, that become a home to the Strategic Air Command, flying B-36s, B-47s, B-52s, and KC-95 tankers. Reconnaissance flights from Thule could keep tabs on Soviet activity in Murmansk, Novaya Zemlya, and Dikson. Thule still handles 3,000 flights a year.

Presently, the United States maintains 45,000 personnel in Greenland, and Thule AFB is now controlled by the U.S. Space Command.  BMEWS (Ballistic Missile Early Warning System) radars were first installed in 1961 to detect Soviet ballistic missile launches from Russian territory and from submarines operating in the Arctic and North Atlantic Oceans.

Thule people moving eastward from Canada occupied Greenland shortly after the Vikings did during the Medieval Warm Period; but while the Vikings died out, the Thules survived, and today comprise 90 percent of Greenland’s population of 56,000.  In 1721, Greenland was claimed it as a Danish colony. In 2009 Denmark granted Greenland self-governance.  President Trump has wondered aloud about the legality of Denmark’s claim on Greenland, and there’s talk that an offer of $400 billion would mollify Danish concerns about an American take-over.

Why would America want sovereignty over Greenland when it already has all the control it needs from a NATO ally, Denmark, for defense of North America? One answer may be mineral wealth. Greenland has large deposits of strategically vital rare earth minerals, the global supply of which is controlled by China.  Access to these mineral deposits may become viable if shipping routes that are blocked by ice year round open in the event of global warming.

Greenland forms the western boundary of the Denmark Strait, one of the passages from the Arctic Ocean into the North Atlantic.

The proposal that the United States purchase Greenland is consistent with a 200 year history of expanding American control over the Western Hemisphere. The United States presently has all the military control it needs for defense, but the mineral wealth of Greenland might make it worthy of acquisition, as Alaska was.

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Elephants in the room

Vincent J. Curtis

23 Jan 25

RE: An economy built on waste. Op-ed by Wayne Poole. The Hamilton Spectator 23 Jan 25.

Once again, the Spectator publishes a Cri de Coeur from a climate nutter who fails to address the multiple elephants in the room. Never mind the nonsense “science” called upon by the writer, the article appears on the day when a foot of snow fell on New Orleans and the Florida panhandle, which border the Gulf of America.

One elephant is, “who is he talking to?” Canada, producing 1.5 percent of global CO2 emissions, isn’t part of the problem and isn’t part of the solution. The United States has just withdrawn from the Paris Climate Accord, and China alone will commission 100 coal fired power plants this year. Canada could disappear, and the alleged danger posed by rising CO2 would remain, which, given the snowfall on the Gulf of America, obviously isn’t going to turn the planet earth into Venus.

As to the dubious “science”: methane at 2 ppm, and nitrous oxides at the 500 ppb range, rank a distant fourth and fifth as greenhouse gases respectively. Carbon dioxide is no threat to global overheating, as demonstrated this week, and these latter gases are of theoretical interest only.  Calling for their demise is part of the anti-human agenda, which I deplore.

The climate hoax has been busted, and its time for the Spectator to acknowledge that.

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Like talking to a wall

Vincent J. Curtis

17 Jan 25

RE: Weather disasters are here to stay. Op-ed by Tricia Clarkson. The Hamilton Spectator 17 Jan 25. Clarkson is co-chair of the activist Peterborough Alliance for Climate Action

Like all other Canadian climate nutters, Tricia Clarkson believes that by her heroic efforts alone, Canada can stop the rise is atmospheric CO2, and thus save the planet from the bad weather that CO2 causes.

She writes, “If we don’t immediately reduce our CO2 emissions, we will have an increase in deadly weather events.” It couldn’t be plainer: CO2 causes bad weather. Absurd!

But also, she uses the pronoun “we.” To borrow from Ronald Reagan, “What’d ya mean ‘we’?”  Canada produces 1.5 percent of global CO2 emissions, and China is going to build 100 coal-fired power plants this year. If Canada disappeared tomorrow, China would make up for all that lost emission before long.

But don’t ask the climate nutters to justify their claims or explain what they expect us to do in light of all this because there’s nobody home. To repeat this message, press 3.

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Climate hoaxing again

Vincent J. Curtis

11 Jan 25

RE: Winters feeling warmer? News item by Matthew van Dongen The Hamilton Spectator, 11 Jan 24.

It’s all so soft and vague and dreamy, the insinuation of CO2 induced climate change: winter’s feeling warmer, sensing this, vaguely recollecting a distant past.  A busy-body, activist “research non-profit” called Climate Central “suggests”, on the basis of a model, that, “on average” Hamilton’s winters now have eleven more days of above freezing temperatures than they did a decade ago. And this is due to the agent “climate change”: it’s not ‘may be due to’, but is.  Being so programmed, the model says so. (Since it’s a program, that’s how they can obtain an average on the basis of a one-off; it’s a probability, not a fact.)

Okay, let’s take that as read: The Climate has Changed (albeit for the better!). We know from climate physics that bad weather is not caused by carbon dioxide; and we also know from climate physics that rising carbon dioxide levels cannot account for substantially increasing global temperature.  What isn’t admitted is that the planet is in an interglacial period; that it’s still thawing out from the Little Ice Age, and global temperatures today are cooler than they were during the Medieval Warm Period, and cooler still than during the Holocene Climate Optimum, when the Arctic ocean really was ice-free in summer.

The upshot is that the planet has been here before, and we’re just along for the ride. The claim that CO2 is responsible for bad weather and for planetary overheating are ridiculous nonsense designed to control people, not the weather.

It’s time to call B.S. on the climate hoax.

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