Fabianism

[Impenitent]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RBOiSjXMiMk

at least he wasn't illiterate...

-Imp

[Gary Childress]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RBOiSjXMiMk

at least he wasn't illiterate...

-Imp

Thank you for your usual contribution to the discussion. It was amusing as always.

[Iwannaplato]

Jesus was a Fabianist.

More an anarchist.
But whatever he was most conservatives and many liberals would call the police if Jesus returned with his entourage anywhere near their homes.
And he wasn't conservative. Nor was he quite liberal. A kind of progressive, not afraid to change tradition.

[Immanuel Can]

Regarding your views; so your view is that we should live in a society where the wealthy "earn" their wealth and use it to do good for society in the process. Is that correct?

Not quite, but you've got the idea...sort of.

There are good ways to get wealth, and there are bad ways. Socialism is kind of stupid about that: it takes the assumption that wealth is a zero-sum game, one in which any amount of wealth is somehow stolen from those who have less. But just how does the inventor of some new device -- let's say a computer, since we all have one -- get his money? He gets it because he's solved a problem for other people. People want to communicate faster, get more information, do more complicated calculations than they can do in their heads, or access new forms of entertainment...and a computer does that. So people very willingly buy the product, because it makes their lives better, and the inventor becomes wealthy because he benefitted those same people by inventing something they couldn't.

And let's go the next stage. The inventor can't market his product; it's not his area of expertise. So he employs a businessman, who employs some salesmen, who all volunteer to work in exchange for the money they stand to get, and all of them get rich -- or at least earn their living -- by accessing the market for the inventor. And then there are the retail outlets, who also give salaries to employees, and the delivery people who drive the trucks loaded with the computers, and the repair people who work in the shop...a whole ton of people are getting their livings off the cleverness of the inventor, and not one of them has stolen anything, or exploited anyone, or is not deserving of the wage he/she has willingly contracted to receive in exchange for his/her participation.

This is how value is created: new things are invented, or new uses for old things, or new resources are accessed, or new strategies created, and each one of them adds value to the world. And every person in that free society benefits from such ingenuity, and nobody is robbed of anything that they have earned.

Are you merely suggesting that the Fabian society has hijacked socialism to make it more palatable for the wealthy?

Much more than that. There is a class of elitists, not only the Fabians, but the Pelosians, the Carneyans, the Abanesians, the WEFers, the Neo-Marxists...you can name them by the score; and they all think they're entitled to take over any society, or all of them, and manipulate them to create whatever vision they think desirable, whatever serves their interests. And today, Socialism is the tool they are using to do it: Socialism for you, but not for them. They can escape it, but you cannot. And the same fixtures Socialists advocate, such as confiscation of property, censorship, devoicing and political correctness, taxation, a singular, centralized government, a welfare state, nationalization of industry, control through the major mass media, and so forth, are the furniture they use to stage their own ambitions.

Or what exactly is your takeaway from all of this?

That's easy: that you're being lied to. And the more you back Socialism, the more you forge the chains of your own imprisonment. These Socialism-using elites will never give you what you think they will; they'll only ever let you have the absolute minimum they can get away with, and the rest goes to them.

Is it simply that you want wealthy people who have "earned" their wealth while making the world a better place for all to be in power?

Think carefully, Gary: what has wealth got to do with the right to rule? Are people with more money better people than others? Are people with less money better? And what would make you think that, say, an inventor or entrepreneur would be a good ruler as well?

Ruling is its own skill. The more it is disassociated from things like money and personal advantage, the better for everybody.

Something democracy got sort of right: people should be allowed to vote for their leaders. But at the same time, they should have choices about what sort of leadership they want. Moreover, there should be strict limits on the power and wealth available to the people who lead, and term-limits to keep them from becoming dictators. But Thomas Sowell is also right: even in a true democracy, there are no solutions available through messing about with government or power. What we should hope for from our politicians is that they are honest, that they only ever get limited power for a limited time, and that when their term is up they have to surrender their place to the next person. And we would want them not to be doing in for money or power, but for the common good.

If you know such men, please send them along. They don't seem to be in politics today.

[Immanuel Can]

Jesus was a Fabianist.

More an anarchist.

Decidedly not. He said "render unto Caesar the things that are Caesar's."

A kind of progressive, not afraid to change tradition.

Also decidedly not that. A "progressive" is one who believes in "progress," obviously. Jesus said that human beings could not "progress" at all without the salvation He offered them. And while he did contradict the Pharisees' "tradition," He also said of the Mosaic Law that not the least stroke of it would pass away, even if heaven and earth did.

That would be fairly conservative, I think you'd have to agree.

I would say you'd be hard-pressed to find a human political category He represented. And it certainly wasn't Fabianism...that much is pretty obvious.

[phyllo]

That would be fairly conservative, I think you'd have to agree.

If Jesus was "fairly conservative" then there would have been no reason for them to be astonished at what he said.

[Immanuel Can]

That would be fairly conservative, I think you'd have to agree.

If Jesus was "fairly conservative" then there would have been no reason for them to be astonished at what he said.

Actually, there would. He was a carpenter, by trade. He was not supposed to be an educated man. His family was well-known, and undistinguished. And yet he knew far more about the Word of God than the Pharisees, who'd spent their whole lives studying it. And it was that that amazed them. (Matt. 13:54-56)

[MikeNovack]

.a fact which the Sadducees and Zealots, two parties of his day who certainly had very strong political ambitions, continually complained about.

Please get your timing right. Correct about the Sudducees (the Pharisees didn't take over the Sanhedrin until well after AFTER Jesus was dead -- likely causing the confusion because the Gospels were of course written after). The Zealots later still, not till the 1st revolt 66-73.

Jesus NOT a liberal-progressive (rulings more "letter of the law"). You can't see that from the Gospels. Need to look at the rulings of the Mishna sages. Hillel (the elder) would be on the liberal/progressive end of the spectrum. A touch earlier than Jesus (still alive in the boyhood of Jesus). To tell conservative vs progressive you can't just look at the decision of a sage but the WHY they give for their ruling.

[Immanuel Can]

.a fact which the Sadducees and Zealots, two parties of his day who certainly had very strong political ambitions, continually complained about.

Please get your timing right. Correct about the Sudducees (the Pharisees didn't take over the Sanhedrin until well after AFTER Jesus was dead -- likely causing the confusion because the Gospels were of course written after). The Zealots later still, not till the 1st revolt 66-73.

I didn't say anything about the Pharisees' political ambitions, or for that matter, about who had the Sanhedrin in hand. Their role seems to have been more theological, and only secondarily political. The Sadducees, on the other hand, were pretty steadily political. And the Zealots were around and kicking at the time of Jesus, being specifically identified in the gospels as such.

Need to look at the rulings of the Mishna sages. Hillel (the elder) would be on the liberal/progressive end of the spectrum. A touch earlier than Jesus (still alive in the boyhood of Jesus). To tell conservative vs progressive you can't just look at the decision of a sage but the WHY they give for their ruling.

Oh...another misunderstanding. The words "progressive" and "conservative" have a different meaning today than merely Conservative Judaism or a "progressivist" hermeneutic in Judaism. It refers to a particular group of primarily Leftist political orientations that cluster around the idea of gradualism or "progress" in human development. It was in that latter sense that I was speaking.

[MikeNovack]

Actually, there would. He was a carpenter, by trade. He was not supposed to be an educated man. His family was well-known, and undistinguished. And yet he knew far more about the Word of God than the Pharisees, who'd spent their whole lives studying it. And it was that that amazed them. (Matt. 13:54-56)

DUH --- All Rabbis were expected to have a nominal trade (and to be married). Agreed, they might actually be making their living teaching, acting as judges, etc. << just like Omar Khayyam didn't make his living sewing tents >> You can't assume Joseph was just a simple/poor carpenter. We should not assume Jesus was uneducated.

Some of the sages came from poverty. In some of these cases noticed early (Hillel) and allowed in school free. But the classic example of really poor and late to education would be Akiva (killed in the Second Revolt) By tradition he was 40! << a story: His very rich father-in-law went to a sage saying how his daughter had run off with a poor uneducated shepherd and how happy he would be if his son-in-law even knew how to read, could he be taught. Akiva, replied aleph, bet, gimmel , ....... (his father-in-law had not recognized him)

PS timing again --- other Gospels not making the canon discuss James, Note the date of his death was during the 1st Revolt just before Jerusalem was besieged. So possibly all the various versions "who killed him" wrong and it was political << there were LOTS of assassinations between factions at that time -- we do not seem to have a record where the earliest Christian Church stood on the Revolt >>

[phyllo]

That would be fairly conservative, I think you'd have to agree.

If Jesus was "fairly conservative" then there would have been no reason for them to be astonished at what he said.

Actually, there would. He was a carpenter, by trade. He was not supposed to be an educated man. His family was well-known, and undistinguished. And yet he knew far more about the Word of God than the Pharisees, who'd spent their whole lives studying it. And it was that that amazed them. (Matt. 13:54-56)

Way to dis Jesus.

[Gary Childress]

Is it simply that you want wealthy people who have "earned" their wealth while making the world a better place for all to be in power?

Think carefully, Gary: what has wealth got to do with the right to rule? Are people with more money better people than others? Are people with less money better? And what would make you think that, say, an inventor or entrepreneur would be a good ruler as well?

I wish you would think carefully. Wealth has nothing to do with the right to rule. It has everything with the ability to rule. A businessman who owns a factory calls the shots and holds absolute power over his employees for as long as they work for him. Have you ever worked in a large business before? You don't seem in touch with reality if you have ask me how wealth and power relate.

[Immanuel Can]

Wealth has nothing to do with the right to rule. It has everything with the ability to rule.

No, it has nothing to do with that, either, Gary. It may confer some ability to manage inert resources, but people are not mere resources, and simply managing them is not what governance is supposed to be about. It's supposed to be about serving the people, and aiming at their good, not about maximizing one's own profits.

[Immanuel Can]

If Jesus was "fairly conservative" then there would have been no reason for them to be astonished at what he said.

Actually, there would. He was a carpenter, by trade. He was not supposed to be an educated man. His family was well-known, and undistinguished. And yet he knew far more about the Word of God than the Pharisees, who'd spent their whole lives studying it. And it was that that amazed them. (Matt. 13:54-56)

Way to dis Jesus.

Yeah, they didn't get it, either.

[Iwannaplato]

That would be fairly conservative, I think you'd have to agree.

If Jesus was "fairly conservative" then there would have been no reason for them to be astonished at what he said.

He went against local authorities of all kinds spiritual and manifest. He reinterpreted and extended the OT. He reframed law from obedience-centered → human-wellbeing-centered and healed on the Sabbath, saying it was for man, not man for the Sabbath. He challenged social authority through is social connections and behavior with them. He made the enormous shift from behavior centered morals to attitudinal, emotional internal morality.

The conservatives of his day hated him precisely for upsetting traditional order.