The following blogspots center on a variety of subjects, which I have initiated. You are invited to look and respond.

http://esoschronicles.blogspot.com/ Not-Violence main subject

http://melnaysjanis.blogspot.com/ Temple of Janis (John) site

http://the-not-voter.blogspot.com/ Arguments for systems change

http://the4thawakening.blogspot.com/ Sacrificial crisis in Latvia

http://oedipusrexrewritten.blogspot.com/ Oedipus Rex Rewritten

I suggest you look at the links imbedded in these blogs or at the end of the blog as an integral part of my argument.  * text between [ ] is not part of quote.

The 4^th Awakening

40 John to be Mocked Again? (2)

© Eso Anton Benjamins

For over twenty years now Latvia has endured a failed statist government disguised as a parliamentary democracy. In the preceding blogs I have traced some of the cultural and social mechanisms that have been contradicted by the current statist model, which has necessarily resulted in a schizophrenic and thus sick and failing state.

One of the chief hindrances to cooperation between the state and the citizens has been the surreptitious destruction by the state of the rural habitat of the nation in favor of one or at most a few urban centers.

The mass exodus of Latvians in search of jobs elsewhere not only illustrates the abandonment of the traditional “land” of the people, but the Latvian statist government at work. While on the one hand the government has painted itself as a supporter of Latvia for Latvians by exclusionary activity against those who cannot pass a test that proves that they can speak the Latvian language, which spells the government as jingoist, said jingoism has serves the government as a tool in the consolidation of its urbanite orientation.

The loss of possibly half a million people in twenty years [I am counting not only the 300,000+ emigrants, but the demographic loss due to dramatically lowered birth rates (1990=38,000 vs 2010=19,000) and increasing number of pensioners] has virtually guaranteed that by 2050 the total population of Latvia (baring an influx of ‘guest’ workers) will be 1.3 million or less in place of the current 2.2 million inhabitants.

One frequently hears that about a hundred years ago, Riga, the current capital of Latvia, was the third largest city in tsarist Russia. This statistic is brought out by many as if to forecast the future of the now dilapidated and shrinking Riga. True, this glorious past of the city was not brought up (as far as this writer knows) at the extremely boring “foreign policy debate” at the Latvian Saeima a few days ago (27/1/2011). On the other hand, no one suggested that growth is something that Riga could expect. At best, a former Prime Minister Shkhehle (Šķēle) argued for a federalized Europe. No one brought up the possibility that in the future, Riga could be the capital of the European Union instead of Brussels—if the EU were to include Russia.

In short, the statist (and static) government of Latvia is preparing the future of Latvia by imagining itself as the periphery of Europe rather than its centre. To bring its policy of failure to its abysmal conclusion, the Latvian people have to be in effect destroyed. The Latvian government—incidentally with the cooperation of Brussels—is rather successful from this point of view.

How can Latvians overcome the fears instilled in them by their statist government and forge themselves another, a more creative future?

In my previous blog, I spoke of Karlis Ulmanis failure to close the “sacrificial crisis” brought to Latvia with the occupation of Latvia by the Soviet Union. [The earlier sacrificial crisis was closed by the sacrifices of Latvia’s soldiers during WW1.] I suggested that President Ulmanis failure to sacrifice himself in protest of the Soviet occupation failed Latvians not only seventy years ago, but failed to look into the future which is now. Now Latvia has lost its sovereignty in a financial sense, the people in the countryside are preparing themselves for yet another mass exodus (if the rest of the European economy holds up), the country is demoralized to the point where policemen are turning robbers and shooting other policemen dead, debates in government circles are a safe bet to be duds, and people have been ‘dumbed down’ to trust a parliament that in its myriad self-contradictions is both statist and inert.

The ongoing “sacrificial crisis” (failure to lead by example among others) may of course be seen as an opportunity. If such an opportunity is to become real, there has to occur a major earthquake within the statist government. How is this to be done, when the parliamentary Saeima, the popularly unelected ministers and president, all appear to be of the belief that government is modeled on now proven failures, re: Plato’s “earthborn” ruling class, the boyars of the countryside seizing the city for themselves; or Aristotle’s kinship originated State by way of family to community to State. Neither of the two philosophers suggests that the State is the result of freedom in a state of chaos (libertarian?) brought together into a community by self-sacrifice, what I have argued to be not-violent self-sacrifice [see esos chronicles].

The failed presidency of Karlis Ulmanis, which left behind a demoralized people, nevertheless points the way to the solution, because the failure of self-sacrifice by the president is as evident as are evident the horrific consequences to the Latvian people and the State.

In other words, the piece of coal in the pie that in the days of old chose the one who would sacrifice appears to point at the milquetoast president of Latvia today. When Karlis Ulmanis seized the reigns of Latvia by coup de tat in 1934, he took upon himself all the consequences of that deed. His failure to meet all of the demands of his Presidency (which from a theoretical point of view may also, paradoxically, be called the rule of a Monarch, not impossibly a Sacred Monarch) now rests with the head of the Latvian State. That is to say, the saying “One for All and All for One” today rests with said One. The alternative is that of a federalized state, an administrative periphery of the EU, stripped of its identity much the way it is stripping itself of its citizenry.

The Story of Crazy Jane and Clever John, Part 3

(…story begins at blog 15)

Clever John fell for a long time it seemed. He finally fell on a large sandy dune by the sea. He was quite knocked out. However, wouldn’t you know it; he had fallen right on top on a large hoard of gold. Moreover, his fall had dug a large crater, which is why the gold was there all shiny and bright for his eyes—as soon as he woke up.

How did the gold get there?

(To be continued.)

Asterisks & Links of Interest

* text between [ ] is not part of quote.

Unchanged Feature: What is reality, what is myth?

http://www.voltairenet.org/article167588.html

Changing Feature: In the preceding posts, I started a compilation of video clips, which when seen as a linear sequence tell a story in a context which I hope will become apparent. No, I do not yet know where it is going to lead. This is a story with no end. If it began in the past (it must have), it is now moving parallel to the day we live in. Watching the film may or may not contribute to your understanding of my meaning. Put this clip as a tail to your communication so http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fWaLL9Gyees&feature=related others may see. The origin of this post is at http://the4thawakening.blogspot.com/ 

The following blogspots center on a variety of subjects, which I have initiated. You are invited to look and respond.

http://esoschronicles.blogspot.com/ Not-Violence main subject

http://melnaysjanis.blogspot.com/ Temple of Janis (John) site

http://the-not-voter.blogspot.com/ Arguments for systems change

http://the4thawakening.blogspot.com/ Sacrificial crisis in Latvia

http://oedipusrexrewritten.blogspot.com/ Oedipus Rex Rewritten

I suggest you look at the links imbedded in these blogs or at the end of the blog as an integral part of my argument.  * text between [ ] is not part of quote.

The 4^th Awakening

39 John Mocked Again (1)

© Eso Anton Benjamins

Following the removal in 1940 of the K. Ulmanis regime by the Soviet Union and Ulmanis’s failure to self-sacrifice himself in the name of the Latvian community (or state), the authoritarian president

1.     failed himself;

2.     diminished Latvian confidence in themselves;

3.     mocked the resurrection of Johns by confirming their death;

4.     confirmed the continued rule of the pseudo democratic elite;

5.      kept the idea of monarchy as government in continued disgrace though
        made a step in its direction.

All of the five points above are closely related, which is why the word “mocked” is the active verb that unites them all.

This blogger has already argued that John was long ago mocked and diminished by the secular elites, when they called him “pagan”, which word derives from pa-Yan, a word that attempts to diminish the meaning of Yan (John), the son of the Goddess Sun. The mocking tone brilliantly shows its colours in Mozart’s opera “Die Zauberfloete” and the well known song by Papagena and Papageno.

If it is true that the Herrnhuters, also known as the Moravian Brotherhood, taught proto-Latvians (~1729 - ~1740) choir singing in order to recruit them to their ranks, it is more than likely that they found among the war (Great Northern War, 1700-1721) demoralized proto-Latvians preexisting cultural and social infrastructures on which to base their efforts. The moral rebuilding of the proto-Latvians, while no doubt changing their perception of themselves (they largely forgot the Sun as their Dearest Goddess), brought back into the light many old traditions. Therefore, the now nearly forgotten Johns Songs (YouTube  stands as an example of their dearth), once as special to the Latvian Midsummer Johns Festival as Christmas songs are to the festival of the winter solstice, were not only preserved, but implicitly continued the Arch-Christian tradition of Christianity here and now rather than in a Neo-Christian no-place called heaven.

During the life time of K. Ulmanis (1877-1942), Johns Songs were still widely known and widely sung. One did not yet have to have a “cultural organizer” to misinform the celebrants that the Johns Festival was better known as Lihgo Festival (literally a “halleluia” festival) at which no one felt like halleluing. Though the Bear Wrestler had replaced John during that time as the Latvian hero, the new hero still had enough of the old one left in him for a full throated song.

In any event, when Karlis Ulmanis felt that Latvians had to be rescued from tearing themselves apart in a parliamentary and “democratic” Latvia by presuming himself to become their leader, he took upon himself the responsibility of a community generating self-sacrifice. Alas, he had never heard of such a thing, because no Western head of state—ever since the guillotining of the French KingLuisXVI during the French Revolution—had ever even thought of leadership that way.

Therefore, when Soviet leader Stalin challenged Ulmanis and “his” Latvian-Latvians, Ulmanis failed himself and the Latvians. In fact, such a failure of leadership was repeated by the “bloody” Stalin, who on his death bed yet tried to kill his doctors rather than sacrifice himself. Hitler did no better, because he killed himself only because he wished to avoid being hung by the Western Allies. The idea of the Sacred King was only a memory limited to poets. Even among them, he is more often remembered as the Fisher King, one lamed by a wound in the groin and unable to move unaided.

What is it that lamed not only Ulmanis, but has for so long (way before the French Revolution brought down Louis XVI) lamed all governments East and West?

Though Rene Girard argues so perceptively about the phenomenon of the scapegoat, and how human beings have no built in mechanism that checks violence (as it operates among some animals)—which is why there is a need for one time “generative violence” to establish rituals of peace—his failure to perceive Neo-Christianity (in his case Catholicism) as the institution that inhibits and lames men’s minds and forces them into inaction through the exercise of permanent violence (the hidden mailed fist), short-circuits his own break-through. Girard condemns Arch-Christianity in no less severe terms for its practices of self-sacrifice than did his Neo-Christian forebears whose violence instilled such fear in common man of the governing “elites” that it stopped the proper functioning of the mind of even the elites themselves. While the Neo-Christians have “apologized” for the violence of their “religion” and have promised to do so no more, the damage inflicted enabled the now long ongoing catastrophe of military-secular rule.

The pseudo or romantic democracy that has ruled the world, the West particularly, is a devastating farce for the planet and humankind. Of course, no major power or empire is going to shift their thinking until their ship of state falls and shatters. It is different and so much sadder when the small powers, the small communities and states such as Latvia, buy into the Western mindset. It is absurd of the Latvian politicians to insist that they are oriented toward the West, not the East, when the East is as Western as the West, and there is no threat from either, but the romantic system both now cultivate.

The Vatican is a monarchy, and so are Anglican England, and all milquetoast Lutheran archbishops. As Rene Girard writes: “What might be [is] concealed here is the desire to sacralize oneself and make oneself godlike—which quite clearly harks back to the illusion traditionally created by sacrifice.” In other words, fear the illusions of your enemies and let a few more million men die, which is all the more reason to procreate irresponsibly.

The Story of Crazy Jane and Clever John, Part 3

(…story begins at blog 15)

Clever John looked down and replied: “As large as a dead horse’s eye.”

As soon as Clever John had finished the words, the raven flipped on her back, and despite the hold that Clever John had on her feathers, he fell off her back.

Clever John fell for a long time it seemed. He finally fell on a large sandy dune by the sea. He was quite knocked out. However, wouldn’t you know it, he had fallen right on top on a large hoard of gold. Moreover, his fall had dug a large crater, which is why the gold was there all shiny and bright for his eyes—as soon as he woke up.

(To be continued.)

Asterisks & Links of Interest

* text between [ ] is not part of quote.

Unchanged Feature: What is reality, what is myth?

http://www.voltairenet.org/article167588.html

Changing Feature: In the preceding posts, I started a compilation of video clips, which when seen as a linear sequence tell a story in a context which I hope will become apparent. No, I do not yet know where it is going to lead. This is a story with no end. If it began in the past (it must have), it is now moving parallel to the day we live in. Watching the film may or may not contribute to your understanding of my meaning. Put this clip as a tail to your communication so http://news.google.com/nwshp?hl=en&tab=wn others may see. The origin of this post is at http://the4thawakening.blogspot.com/ 

The following blogspots center on a variety of subjects, which I have initiated. You are invited to look and respond.

http://esoschronicles.blogspot.com/ Not-Violence main subject

http://melnaysjanis.blogspot.com/ Temple of Janis (John) site

http://the-not-voter.blogspot.com/ Arguments for systems change

http://the4thawakening.blogspot.com/ Sacrificial crisis in Latvia

http://oedipusrexrewritten.blogspot.com/ Oedipus Rex Rewritten

I suggest you look at the links imbedded in these blogs or at the end of the blog as an integral part of my argument.  * text between [ ] is not part of quote.

The 4^th Awakening

38 The Incomplete Reawakening of John

© Eso Anton Benjamins

When Karlis Ulmanis failed to activate the synonymy that would enforce the self-sacrifice of the not-violent and rebirth the Johns of the Children of Johns (the proto-Latvians), he failed in more ways than one. His response to the Soviet occupation in a radio speech was: "I will remain in my place and you remain in your places”. The declaration acknowledges an event, but does not indicate the nature of the event. The military occupation of Latvia by the Soviet Union began on June 17, 1940.

The submission of Latvia to the Soviet ultimatum to allow an unlimited number of military forces into the country activated a new “sacrificial crisis”. The community renewed its search—albeit unconsciously—for the synonymy of “sacrifice” and “community” (though some may prefer the word “state”.) It is a challenge that faces the Latvian government to this day, but from which challenge the government runs away, because like all governments of our day, it is but consortium engaged in Neo-Christian rhetoric and presumption that humankind is born to community as handily as a hand is to a hand.

In blog 36, I wrote that Soviet Communism was—when all is said and done—a form of fascism. For a long time the Soviet regime of Stalin has escaped such a linkage, because the political left has been making apologies for Stalin’s violence as more justifiable than the violence of Hitler. But by putting both Communism and Fascism under the umbrella of the Arch- vs Neo-Christian conflict, we are able to bring the two under a single roof. One of the scholars that helps make the link is Anatoly Fomenko, the Russian mathematician-statistician, who reminds us that the Romanov tsars of Russia were westernizers. For all we know, they were western agents preparing Arch-Christian Tartary for Neo-Christian occupation beginning with conversion to secularism.  

In any event, while K. Ulmanis was in all probability sincerely miming whoever he may have believed John to have been, it escaped him that along with the role of John, he inherited its responsibilities unto death. Ulmanis’ failure to make a sacrifice of his life to the Latvian community, tragically cost the community its self-confidence.

Following fifty years of Soviet occupation, the easy victory of what is now known as “a Singing Revolution”, “hands cross the Baltics”, and “Days at the arricades", the post proto Latvians reemerged from the homus Sovieticus remake machine as post-Sovieticus Latvians. The Latvians found themselves almost instantly in need of the charisma of not-violent sacrifice, though, not surprisingly, they ignored this, and left the doors wide open for the stormy winds the post-Latvian era to destroy them.

When a tool and dye maker from Jelgava made the life offering (Buķis, 1993), the government, the target of the sacrifice, questioned his sanity. As a result, twenty years after getting out from under the Soviet yoke,the nation is closer to falling apart than it was under the Soviets. The presumption of politicians in a parliamentary democracy is that they have been selected for a semi-divine office. He-she is untouchable and secure in his-her secular theology (law) as a result of law that is enforced by the police. There is a presumption that no one will step over the red line and dare be violent, because the word belongs to Neo-Christian nonviolence (nonsacrificial order supported by the police) and not to Arch-Christian not-violence.

The Story of Crazy Jane and Clever John, Part 3

(…story begins at blog 15)

The raven flew higher and higher into the air and soon was flying over a large sea. Clever John could readily see the sea shrink in size. For all the crickets that he had ever bathed in the sea, he had never seen anything like this before. No wonder the raven is known as a wise bird, he thought to himself.

Just then the raven turned its large head toward Clever John and asked: “Tell me, Clever John, how large is the sea below us?”

“It is as large as a large lake,” answered Clever John. He was feeling the air getting cold and drew his bearskin coat a little tighter around himself.

“Kra, kra,” cawed the raven, “we have a while before getting there.”

The raven flew yet higher. Clever John saw the sea shrink all the way down to the size of a puddle. It was here that the raven turned her head and again asked: “Tell me, Clever John, how large is the sea now?”

Clever John—a clever wit as we may have by now noted—answered: “It is as large as a puddle made by a horse pissing.”

The air became doubly cold. Clever John was more than happy now to have the bear skin coat that the Sun had given him. Upon deeper reflection, it also occurred to him that he might have been wiser not to go looking for a princess, but bed down with Crazy Jane. Unfortunately, it was too late to do anything about that now.

Then just as he made the reflection, suddenly, before Clever John’s eyes there appeared Crazy Jane again. As before, she simply floated up before his eyes. “Yes, Clever John?” questioned Crazy Jane. “I thought that you would be dead by now.”

Clever John was surprised to see Jane. What did she want now? Then he realized that he had inadvertently rubbed her ring against the bear skin.

“Think what you will. I’m a touch cookie,” answered Clever John. At the very same instant the raven again turned her head and asked: “Clever John, how large is the sea now?”

Clever John looked down and replied: “As large as a dead horse’s eye.”

As soon as Clever John had finished the words, the raven flipped on her back, and despite the hold that Clever John had on her feathers, he fell off her back.

(To be continued.)

Asterisks & Links of Interest

* text between [ ] is not part of quote.

Unchanged Feature: What is reality, what is myth?

http://www.voltairenet.org/article167588.html

Changing Feature: In the preceding posts, I started a compilation of video clips, which when seen as a linear sequence tell a story in a context which I hope will become apparent. No, I do not yet know where it is going to lead. This is a story with no end. If it began in the past (it must have), it is now moving parallel to the day we live in. Watching the film may or may not contribute to your understanding of my meaning. Put this clip as a tail to your communication so http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rEmIha8B8To&feature=channel others may see. The origin of this post is at http://the4thawakening.blogspot.com/