Masses
Masses
"The masses continue with an appetite for benefits and the habit of receiving them by way of a rule of force and violence. The people, having grown accustomed to feed at the expense of others and to depend for their livelihood on the property of others... institute the rule of violence; [1] and now uniting their forces massacre, banish, and plunder,[2] until they degenerate again into perfect savages and find once more a master and monarch." [3] [4]
- Polybius saw the downfall of the republic by way of their free bread and welfare a 150 years before the first Emperor of Rome and 175 years before the birth of John the Baptist and Jesus the Christ who opposed these same systems of free bread at your neighbor's expense.
- The authoritarian State often uses force and violence to become the Benefactors of the people if the covet what is their neighbors'. They make a social contract where one class of citizen is forced to provide for another class through "legal charity" which is not true charity. The writings of the Apostles warned along with countless passages of ancient writings of the prophets including Proverbs 23 which warned them about what Christ forbid which was the covetous practices of socialist forms of government.
Are you the masses spoken of by the Historian of Historians?
When any nation becomes accustomed to benefits of the state, the dainties of rulers at the expense of their neighbor i.e. legal charity through the state, then the masses lose the moral authority and power virtue to stop tyranny or even recognize it.
If people are seeking the gratuities of legal charity from the rulers who call themselves benefactors but exercise authority one over the other they cannot honestly claim to be Christians who are suppose to seeking the kingdom of God and the Righteousness of God.
Such covetous practices were forbidden by Moses and the Ten Commandments as well as by all the prophets concerning the dainties of rulers. If you do have an appetite for any form of legal charity you certainly can not honestly claim to be a Jew, nor even a Moslem.
Are you a part of the "great unwashed" masses of Edmund Burke and John the Baptist?
Unwashed masses
Edmund Burke first wrote of the "great unwashed" masses in regards to the mobs of the French revolution who desired to throw off their rulers with violence.
Those "unwashed masses" are said to be "The collective group ("mass") of people who are considered by someone to be somehow uneducated, uninformed, or in some other way unqualified for inclusion in the speaker's elite circles."
There are those who imagine themselves to be elite in every generation or nation who desire power over their neighbor or fellowman.
They seldom can seize power unless the people fail to love God and His charitable nature and love their neighbor as themselves.
Washed masses
John the Baptist preached the simple solution to the "great unwashed" masses of his day but the modern Church and its followers have been suffering from the psychosis of the church of [[Constantine] for centuries.
To the early Christians the "unwashed" would be all the people who have not received the "baptism of repentance"[5] which was a part of the process of seeking the kingdom of God and His righteousness which leads to the remission of sins.
Filthy masses
To fail to teach the people that we are not to covet our neighbors goods even through the men of government who exercise authority is the result of the blind leading the blind.[7]
The people accepted the Corban of the Pharisees just as the Romans accepted the free bread of Rome and Americans accepted the New Deal of FDR and the Great Society of LBJ.
Christ commanded that his ministers make the people sit down in groups of ten. The early Church, like early Israel, was organized in these small intimate groups of tens but were also networked together in a broader and even an international network which we see saved during a series of "dearths" in Acts by those ministers of service appointed to be the ekklesia or called out of Christ.
We see the Church and its ministers rightly dividing daily bread from house to house in the temple and also bringing relief all over the known world through ministries of love by men like Paul and Barnabas.
"Love does not begin with the “great unwashed masses” but with one’s neighbor."[8]
Washed individual
The heart of the individual is washed through Christ and sins forgiven as we forgive those who trespass against us and love those who may not love us which is fervent charity and is The Way.
The kingdom of God begins within the heart of the individual and their personal repentance. They must come together in love for one another to seek the righteous way of loving their neighbor as themselves through a system of faith, hope, and charity.
"For if ye love them which love you, what reward have ye? do not even the publicans the same?" Matthew 5:46
The seed of faith is to nourish the social bonds of a free society and draw the Holy Spirit within these intimate groups of tens to bring light where there was darkness. But this love is only the beginning of a testimony of love going out to all the world.
"To be attached to the subdivision, to love the little platoon we belong to in society, is the first principle (the germ as it were) of public affections. It is the first link in the series by which we proceed towards a love to our country and to mankind." [9]
The heart of the individual must be willing to sacrifice for the heart and health of his fellow man. That is religion. And without pure Religion there is no liberty. Edmund talks about the need to be attached to and "love the little platoon" which is why Christ commanded His disciples to sit down in tens. By organize themselves in this network of sharing and caring where each small intimate group of tens are connected to each other small group until hundreds and thousands create a body bound by those social bonds of a free nation.
That is what the Kingdom of God was in the mind of the the early followers of Christ. The network they created by this love made it possible for Paul and the Apostles to send aide during the dearths that swept across the Roman Empire in Acts.
The early Church provided all social welfare through the charity of "pure Religion" rather than the "free bread" provided by the "]]legal charity]]" of the government temples of Rome. The social bonds of Early Christian were strengthened by that daily ministration of fervent charity for those who sought the kingdom of God and His righteousness through The Way of Christ. The Church of Constantine has always rejected Christ's teaching of not praying to the Fathers of the earth who are the ruler who exercise authority one over the other but call themselves "benefactors" because they offer the people the "reward of unrighteousness" through covetous practices.
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Footnotes
- ↑ Matthew 11:12 And from the days of John the Baptist until now the kingdom of heaven suffereth violence, and the violent take it by force.
- ↑ Luke 16:16 The law and the prophets [were] until John: since that time the kingdom of God is preached, and every man presseth into it.
- ↑ "But when a new generation arises and the democracy falls into the hands of the grandchildren of its founders, they have become so accustomed to freedom and equality that they no longer value them, and begin to aim at pre-eminence; and it is chiefly those of ample fortune who fall into this error. 6 So when they begin to lust for power and cannot attain it through themselves or their own good qualities, they ruin their estates, tempting and corrupting the people in every possible way. 7 And hence when by their foolish thirst for reputation they have created among the masses an appetite for gifts and the habit of receiving them, democracy in its turn is abolished and changes into a rule of force and violence. 8 For the people, having grown accustomed to feed at the expense of others and to depend for their livelihood on the property of others, as soon as they find a leader who is enterprising but is excluded from the houses of office by his penury, institute the rule of violence; 9 and now uniting their forces massacre, banish, and plunder, until they degenerate again into perfect savages and find once more a master and monarch." Polybius: The Histories (composed at Rome around 130 BC)Fragments of Book at Loeb's classic library, or see our comparison of translations at Polybius#Translations_compare
- ↑ An alternate translation in context, "9. For no sooner had the knowledge of the jealousy and hatred existing in the citizens against them which is replaced by democracy, emboldened some one to oppose the government by word or deed, than he was sure to find the whole people ready and prepared to take his side. Having then got rid of these rulers by assassination or exile, they do not venture to set up a king again, being still in terror of the injustice to which this led before; nor dare they intrust the common interests again to more than one, considering the recent example of their misconduct: and therefore, as the only sound hope left them is that which depends upon themselves, they are driven to take refuge in that; and so changed the constitution from an oligarchy to a democracy, and took upon themselves the superintendence and charge of the state. And as long as any survive who have had experience of oligarchical supremacy and domination, they regard their present constitution as a blessing, and hold equality and freedom as of the utmost value. But as soon as a new generation has arisen, and the democracy has descended to their children’s children, long association weakens their value for equality and freedom, and some seek to become more powerful than the ordinary citizens; and the most liable to this temptation are the rich. (which degenerates into rule of corruption and violence, only to be stopped by a return to despotism.) So when they begin to be fond of office, and find themselves unable to obtain it by their own unassisted efforts and their own merits, they ruin their estates, while enticing and corrupting the common people in every possible way. By which means when, in their senseless mania for reputation, they have made the populace ready and greedy to receive bribes, the virtue of democracy is destroyed, and it is transformed into a government of violence and the strong hand. For the mob, habituated to feed at the expense of others, and to have its hopes of a livelihood in the property of its neighbours, as soon as it has got a leader sufficiently ambitious and daring, being excluded by poverty from the sweets of civil honours, produces a reign of mere violence. Then come tumultuous assemblies, massacres, banishments, redivisions of land; until, after losing all trace of civilisation, it has once more found a master and a despot." Translator: Evelyn Shirley Shuckburgh, Release Date: November 8, 2013 [EBook #44126]
- ↑ Mark 1:4 John did baptize in the wilderness, and preach the baptism of repentance for the remission of sins.
- Luke 3:3 And he came into all the country about Jordan, preaching the baptism of repentance for the remission of sins;
- Acts 13:24 When John had first preached before his coming the baptism of repentance to all the people of Israel.
- Acts 19:4 Then said Paul, John verily baptized with the baptism of repentance, saying unto the people, that they should believe on him which should come after him, that is, on Christ Jesus.
- ↑ False prophets and Guru theories
- Isaiah 42:16 "And I will bring the blind by a way [that] they knew not; I will lead them in paths [that] they have not known: I will make darkness light before them, and crooked things straight. These things will I do unto them, and not forsake them. 17 They shall be turned back, they shall be greatly ashamed, that trust in graven images, that say to the molten images, Ye [are] our gods. 18 Hear, ye deaf; and look, ye blind, that ye may see."
- Isaiah 30:20 "And [though] the Lord give you the bread of adversity, and the water of affliction, yet shall not thy teachers be removed into a corner any more, but thine eyes shall see thy teachers: 21 And thine ears shall hear a word behind thee, saying, This [is] the way, walk ye in it, when ye turn to the right hand, and when ye turn to the left. 22 Ye shall defile also the covering of thy graven images of silver, and the ornament of thy molten images of gold: thou shalt cast them away as a menstruous cloth; thou shalt say unto it, Get thee hence. 23 Then shall he give the rain of thy seed,..."
- Matthew 13:13 "Therefore speak I to them in parables: because they seeing see not; and hearing they hear not, neither do they understand."
- Matthew 15:14 "Let them alone: they be blind leaders of the blind. And if the blind lead the blind, both shall fall into the ditch."
- Luke 4:18 The Spirit of the Lord [is] upon me, because he hath anointed me to preach the gospel to the poor; he hath sent me to heal the brokenhearted, to preach deliverance to the captives, and recoveing of sight to the blind, to set at liberty them that are bruised,
- John 9:39 ¶ "And Jesus said, For judgment I am come into this world, that they which see not might see; and that they which see might be made blind."
- Luke 6:39 "And he spake a parable unto them, Can the blind lead the blind? shall they not both fall into the ditch? 40 The disciple is not above his master: but every one that is perfect shall be as his master."
- Acts 13:11 "And now, behold, the hand of the Lord [is] upon thee, and thou shalt be blind, not seeing the sun for a season. And immediately there fell on him a mist and a darkness; and he went about seeking some to lead him by the hand."
- ↑ False prophets and Guru theories
- Isaiah 42:16 "And I will bring the blind by a way [that] they knew not; I will lead them in paths [that] they have not known: I will make darkness light before them, and crooked things straight. These things will I do unto them, and not forsake them. 17 They shall be turned back, they shall be greatly ashamed, that trust in graven images, that say to the molten images, Ye [are] our gods. 18 Hear, ye deaf; and look, ye blind, that ye may see."
- Isaiah 30:20 "And [though] the Lord give you the bread of adversity, and the water of affliction, yet shall not thy teachers be removed into a corner any more, but thine eyes shall see thy teachers: 21 And thine ears shall hear a word behind thee, saying, This [is] the way, walk ye in it, when ye turn to the right hand, and when ye turn to the left. 22 Ye shall defile also the covering of thy graven images of silver, and the ornament of thy molten images of gold: thou shalt cast them away as a menstruous cloth; thou shalt say unto it, Get thee hence. 23 Then shall he give the rain of thy seed,..."
- Matthew 13:13 "Therefore speak I to them in parables: because they seeing see not; and hearing they hear not, neither do they understand."
- Matthew 15:14 "Let them alone: they be blind leaders of the blind. And if the blind lead the blind, both shall fall into the ditch."
- Luke 4:18 The Spirit of the Lord [is] upon me, because he hath anointed me to preach the gospel to the poor; he hath sent me to heal the brokenhearted, to preach deliverance to the captives, and recoveing of sight to the blind, to set at liberty them that are bruised,
- John 9:39 ¶ "And Jesus said, For judgment I am come into this world, that they which see not might see; and that they which see might be made blind."
- Luke 6:39 "And he spake a parable unto them, Can the blind lead the blind? shall they not both fall into the ditch? 40 The disciple is not above his master: but every one that is perfect shall be as his master."
- Acts 13:11 "And now, behold, the hand of the Lord [is] upon thee, and thou shalt be blind, not seeing the sun for a season. And immediately there fell on him a mist and a darkness; and he went about seeking some to lead him by the hand."
- ↑ Edmund Burke: Philosopher for classical education by Josh Herring, May 11, 2018.
- ↑ Edmund Burke published, in 1791, his Reflections on the Revolution in France.