13 “Woe to you, teachers of the law and Pharisees, you hypocrites! You shut the door of the kingdom of heaven in people’s faces. You yourselves do not enter, nor will you let those enter who are trying to. [14] [b]Now "Woe to you", or ouai in the greek dialect that Matthew was written in, does not mean a pleasant warning of future misfortune. Really, according to the gospel, Jesus is saying FUCK YOU to these people in no uncertain terms. He is saying that those who co-opt the memory of the prophets1 are actors. Matthew uses a word ὑπόκρισις (hypokrisis), which up until this point had a neutral meaning without a negative connotation, to describe the actions of priests like this, who ignore the heart of the Pentateuch, taking houses from widows, while they make sure to be careful to tithe a tenth of the fruits of their house plants. The way he uses the word hypokrisis, it definitely now has a negative connotation.
15 “Woe to you, teachers of the law and Pharisees, you hypocrites! You travel over land and sea to win a single convert, and when you have succeeded, you make them twice as much a child of hell as you are.
16 “Woe to you, blind guides! You say, ‘If anyone swears by the temple, it means nothing; but anyone who swears by the gold of the temple is bound by that oath.’ 17 You blind fools! Which is greater: the gold, or the temple that makes the gold sacred? 18 You also say, ‘If anyone swears by the altar, it means nothing; but anyone who swears by the gift on the altar is bound by that oath.’ 19 You blind men! Which is greater: the gift, or the altar that makes the gift sacred? 20 Therefore, anyone who swears by the altar swears by it and by everything on it. 21 And anyone who swears by the temple swears by it and by the one who dwells in it. 22 And anyone who swears by heaven swears by God’s throne and by the one who sits on it.
23 “Woe to you, teachers of the law and Pharisees, you hypocrites! You give a tenth of your spices—mint, dill and cumin. But you have neglected the more important matters of the law—justice, mercy and faithfulness. You should have practiced the latter, without neglecting the former. 24 You blind guides! You strain out a gnat but swallow a camel.
25 “Woe to you, teachers of the law and Pharisees, you hypocrites! You clean the outside of the cup and dish, but inside they are full of greed and self-indulgence. 26 Blind Pharisee! First clean the inside of the cup and dish, and then the outside also will be clean.
27 “Woe to you, teachers of the law and Pharisees, you hypocrites! You are like whitewashed tombs, which look beautiful on the outside but on the inside are full of the bones of the dead and everything unclean. 28 In the same way, on the outside you appear to people as righteous but on the inside you are full of hypocrisy and wickedness.
29 “Woe to you, teachers of the law and Pharisees, you hypocrites! You build tombs for the prophets and decorate the graves of the righteous. 30 And you say, ‘If we had lived in the days of our ancestors, we would not have taken part with them in shedding the blood of the prophets.’ 31 So you testify against yourselves that you are the descendants of those who murdered the prophets. 32 Go ahead, then, and complete what your ancestors started!
33 “You snakes! You brood of vipers! How will you escape being condemned to hell? 34 Therefore I am sending you prophets and sages and teachers. Some of them you will kill and crucify; others you will flog in your synagogues and pursue from town to town. 35 And so upon you will come all the righteous blood that has been shed on earth, from the blood of righteous Abel to the blood of Zechariah son of Berekiah, whom you murdered between the temple and the altar. 36 Truly I tell you, all this will come on this generation.
37 “Jerusalem, Jerusalem, you who kill the prophets and stone those sent to you, how often I have longed to gather your children together, as a hen gathers her chicks under her wings, and you were not willing. 38 Look, your house is left to you desolate. 39 For I tell you, you will not see me again until you say, ‘Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord.
Never Forget is not a direct critique of hip-hop, but West says rappers have to be responsible for what they say and portray.posted by the man of twists and turns at 1:20 AM on January 21 [12 favorites]
"We know that misogyny is shot through the culture," West says. "It's in country. It's in rhythm and blues. It's in the White House, and it's on Wall Street. So you can't just single out the hip-hop artists and have them bearing the burden for the whole culture. On the other hand, Snoop Dogg is just as accountable as anybody else."
You think MLK would say something this bloviating and petty? Hell no. He'd take the opportunity to pray that the President will swear to step up his peace game,Just out of curiosity, what on earth makes you think you know more about MLK then Cornell West?
Er? It's documented fact. Dr. King was a deeply flawed human being with important ideas, not a pure and innocent soul.Well, they are kind of orthogonal issues, though. The problem for west is that he views MLK as a peace and non-violence guy, an anti-poverty guy and thinks Obama fails to live up to that, so the tarnishing or whatever is in terms of those virtues. The philandering, etc is a side issue. Also (plagiarism? I think most people view that as a fairly minor vice, something fairly common - hardly something that makes someone 'deeply flawed'. I remember some of my college classmates talking about it as if it was something everyone did.)
only that Obama hadn't yet lived up to what MLK was about. Which is also true.'Everyone who's never been violent or supported segregation? The vast majority of people don't even have enough power in their lives to fall short.
[Cornel West] should maybe start with calling out hip hop culture's fetishizing of crime, guns and misogyny. ... but surely he gets the most press- and love from the left- when he criticizes or chastises Obama in inflammatory ways, rather than calling out black superstars.If you really believe that - can you explain why it is you don't think all the white, suburban kids who listen to hip-hop don't go out and become gang-bangers too?
O Daughter of Babylon, doomed to destruction,Of course, I always forget which parts of the bible can be conveniently forgotten and ignored. God sure is funny when he kids around about infanticide.
happy is he who repays you
for what you have done to us—
he who seizes your infants
and dashes them against the rocks.
Psalm 137
It is criminal to teach a man not to defend himself when he is the constant victim of brutal attacks. It is legal and lawful to own a shotgun or a rifle. We believe [hoists a semi-automatic assault rifle] in obeying [looks out the window, then back to the audience] the law [grins].posted by pracowity at 6:47 AM on January 21 [4 favorites]
I rather think that makes him far more interesting and inspiring than the idea that he never did anything even remotely shady, ever. The truly great among us are flawed and HUMAN, and I believe that gives them a better understanding of justice, compassion, and plain old human decency.It's interesting to see the sanctification of a real human being happening in the present. The same happened with Mother Theresa (almost literally sanctified as of 2003), who is on record as feeling "no presence of God whatsoever" and completely doubting Christ's power, despite spending her entire life telling people to have faith in God and to never doubt Christ's power, and caring for the poor under the auspices of a religious faith. Some people think this makes her a fraud, just as some people would say MLK's probable plagiarism makes him a fraud, but they're not frauds in my eyes. To me, these are real people. They've made mistakes, and if they were around today, they'd still be making mistakes. Looking backward, we can probably assume that all the prophets, seers, saints, and sages of the past – e.g., the Mother Theresa's of 500 BC – were equally flawed.
Miko: He actually was a serial adulterer and a plagiarist: it's not a values judgment."But it's true!" is not proof that the statement isn't a values judgment. The fact that such judgment-laden words as "serial adulterer and plagiarist" were chosen pretty much makes it a values judgment.
A German who complains about American warmongering may have a valid point, but even the pacifistic American can't help hearing a little voice at the back of their minds saying, "who are you to speak?".I don't really think that's a good example, given the fact that WWII was seventy years ago. The Germans are actually fairly anti-war these days.
He's a 1950s conservative democratA 1950s conservative democrat? WTF are you talking about? In the 1950s, "conservative democrats" were people like George Wallace. And beyond that, in the 1950s and 60s the new deal was still popular, conservative democrats, and even mainstream republicans supported expansive social welfare programs. The left/right divide was completely different at the time.
Well for one thing I think Dr. King would be very proud that we've all found this occasion to snipe at each other on the internet.Did you know MLK was a huge Star-Trek fan? Based on that data point I'm going to extrapolate wildly and assume he would have thought the internet was pretty cool.
EmpressCallipygos:I follow @YesYoureRacist, so I've seen the worst-of-the-worst today: Hundreds of people wishing their followers a happy James Earl Ray day....And I just had the cynical thought that somewhere out there on Twitter, there are some very ugly racial things being said about Obama's inauguration and/or MLK day. *sigh*
.@cornelwest: President Obama Doesn’t Deserve To Be Sworn In With MLK’s Bible bit.ly/WRAg3H << Who the HELL are YOU to say?—Goldie Taylor (@goldietaylor) January 21, 2013
I'd rather he use MLKs book than the one owned by the warmongering Lincoln. The American Civil War was the antithesis of non-violent political change.
The speech was a bold refutation of almost everything the Republican party has stood for over the past 40 years. It was a loud — and, for this president, damned near derisive — denouncement of all the mindless, reactionary bunkum that the Republicans have come to stand for in 2013; you could hear the sound of the punch he landed on the subject of global warming halfway to Annapolis. But the meat of the speech was a brave assertion of the power of government, not as an alien entity, but as an instrument of the collective will and desires of a self-governing people.posted by ob1quixote at 3:05 PM on January 21 [9 favorites]
[…]
He reclaimed government as a manifestation of a country's aspirations, and not as an anchor on its progress. And he refuted, with precision and neatly camouflaged contempt, many of the most destructive ideas that have poisoned out politics for nearly four decades now. He did nothing less than redefine patriotism in a progressive way. That is already bothering all of the right people. This, I tell you, is what gives me hope.
(f'rex,Obama tried to shut down Gitmo; the GOP and "progressive" Democrats nixed that)He didn't exactly try very hard, and he didn't even want to put the prisoners on trial. He wanted to keep them indefinitely detained without trial in other prisons in the U.S, rather then at the particular prison in Gitmo (actually he proposed three classes of prisoners - some would get civilian trials, some would get military trials, and some would get no trials).
Remember when he ended the Iraq War?I remember when the Iraqi government kicked us out, against the administrations position by refusing to renew the status of forces agreement
Remember how he negotiated a deal with Afghan government, to withdraw troops and military supportyears after his failed disastrous "surge" expanded the war and extended it for year? Obama campaigned on expanding the war and when he was elected, he did. Obviously you can agree or disagree over whether or not it was a good idea, but to claim his handling of Afghanistan is some kind of exemplar of peace is really pretty ridiculous.
Remember when his efforts got Egyptian president/dictator Mubarak to leave the Egyptian government to the people, to determine their own fate?Are you kidding? The Obama administration issued a few tepid statements after it was Obvious that Mubarak was over. The way you wrote that makes it sound as though Obama was personally responsible and he somehow let the Egyptians 'determine their own fate'. I'm pretty sure they are the ones who made that happen.
Remember when he took action to use NATO to limit the slaughter in Libya, so that the Libyan people could topple the Khadaffy (sp?) government and determine their own fate?Obviously this is something people can agree or disagree was a good idea, but getting involved in a civil war and arming one side is not an act of peace.
delmoi, when you find the perfect candidate for the American presidency, I'd love to hear who that person is. But if you went back to 2004 and said to progressives, "In 2008 we're going to elect a black president who's going to pass some form of national healthcare" ... they would have said "Talk to me when you're not high anymore." Regardless, when I compare Obama's achievements against the context of past presidential disasters,Okay. Do you understand the difference between "Accomplishing things" and/or "being a good president" and being pro-peace in the way MLK advocated? Because
That's true during the election when it comes to getting the vote out, but I don't like the suggestion that Cornel or other "leftists" should be silenced from criticizing him.This is what I'm talking about with respect to "butthurt" from some people. Rather then having a debate about whether or not Obama is living up to MLK's ideals, or any other criticism of the president they demand that everyone get in line and support Obama unquestioningly. It's a mirror image of the Bill O'Riley types who said you couldn't "support the troops" if you didn't support their leader and their mission i.e. support bush. You were "unpatriotic" if you didn't support bush, and now "liberals" are running around demanding that everyone support Obama, silence all their criticisms, and so on.
Hey Delmoi, do you remember that all of his wars were there before he got into office? And he has to clean up the shit that the Bushes dropped?Hey splunge, do you remember this? Or this? or this? Also, the problem with Afghanistan is that Obama actually greatly increased troop levels for a while, getting a lot more people killed and accomplishing nothing. Either way, we are killing people in more countries now then when Obama took office.
They then ended the session in memory of Stonewall Jackson.
That's bullshit, nobody here has told you or anybody who criticized President Obama to shut up and put up.Put up what? What are you even talking about?
You're getting pushback because some people (like magstheaxe) recognize that he has done good.Yeah, and I went through and explained how the list of items magstheaxe mentioned was actually full of complete nonsense. Like giving Obama credit for the Egyptian revolution - or claiming that getting involved in a civil war in Libya was somehow a mark of being "pro-peace"
And whether or not the good balances out the bad or if it any amount of good can balance out the bad is a judgement that each individual makes.Yes, but again, This is not a question of "good" or "bad" but whether or not Obama is acting in a way consistent with MLK's ideals. Amazingly some people seem completely incapable of distinguishing the difference between their own views and MLK's. They seem to think that because they like Obama, MLK must have as well.
The suggestion that Obama among others can't pick and choose what he likes from the great figures he likes is just ideological purism.Because MLK didn't have an ideology? He was clearly and explicitly anti-war. It wasn't a minor issue for him. It's completely reasonable to point out inconsistencies between people who reference historical figures and what those historical figures actually thought.
I don't think it's that uncommon.Since when is "not uncommon" the same as "not stupid"? If people are criticizing Cornell West for pointing out the distinction between MLK and Obama, their criticisms need to be based on what MLK thought, not what they think.
they will probably think that MLK would agree with them what is good.Yes, and that's incorrect.
As Dr. Carl T. Bogus wrote for the University of California Law Review in 1998, "The Georgia statutes required patrols, under the direction of commissioned militia officers, to examine every plantation each month and authorized them to search 'all Negro Houses for offensive Weapons and Ammunition' and to apprehend and give twenty lashes to any slave found outside plantation grounds."posted by Golden Eternity at 11:12 PM on January 22 [1 favorite]
It's the answer to the question raised by the character played by Leonardo DiCaprio in Django Unchained when he asks, "Why don't they just rise up and kill the whites?"
By the time the Constitution was ratified, hundreds of substantial slave uprisings had occurred across the South. Blacks outnumbered whites in large areas, and the state militias were used to both prevent and to put down slave uprisings. As Dr. Bogus points out, slavery can only exist in the context of a police state, and the enforcement of that police state was the explicit job of the militias.
Patrick Henry:
"If the country be invaded, a state may go to war, but cannot suppress [slave] insurrections [under this new Constitution]. If there should happen an insurrection of slaves, the country cannot be said to be invaded. They cannot, therefore, suppress it without the interposition of Congress . . . . Congress, and Congress only [under this new Constitution], can call forth the militia."
Like most rights, the Second Amendment right is not unlimited. It is not a right to keep and carry any weapon whatsoever in any manner whatsoever and for whatever purpose: For example, concealed weapons prohibitions have been upheld under the Amendment or state analogues. The Court’s opinion should not be taken to cast doubt on longstanding prohibitions on the possession of firearms by felons and the mentally ill, or laws forbidding the carrying of firearms in sensitive places such as schools and government buildings, or laws imposing conditions and qualifications on the commercial sale of arms.posted by zombieflanders at 5:09 AM on January 23
I'm mainly here to bash on Cornel West, whose does not simply say that MLK would oppose Obama on war and other matters but that MLK in general must not be "sanitized, deodorized, and sterilized" and taken up for political reasons outside "the tradition" of the figures he names that "produced" MLK. ... That's ideological purism--a classic exhortation against culture/power dilution, really ... what he's achieved and aspects of what MLK stood for, then they're warranted, and it's not inconsistent in itself for him to do so, nor does it deplete the power of MLK as a symbol.Why are you assuming that "ideological purism" is universally regarded as a bad thing? You seem to be saying you think it's perfectly fine if people completely ignore half the stuff someone believed in when they were alive if they feel like it. It's something that certainly pisses people off if it happens when they're alive. The other day some random idiot compared himself to MLK because of his fight against the contraception mandate in Obamacare. Despite the fact that MLK was pro-contraception and praised Margaret Sanger.
« Older The Cypherpunk Revolutionary: Julian Assange... | Reset is a game about the biza... Newer »
This thread has been archived and is closed to new comments
posted by Potomac Avenue at 9:42 PM on January 20 [86 favorites]