Excerpt from The Death of Secular Humanism

The competition that poses a threat to the West today is not economic competition. Economic competition is peaceful. The expansion of the division of labor increases everyone’s wealth. What poses the main threat is demo­graphic competition between Islamic immigrants and Europe’s secularism. This creates competition for control over the legal order, which inevitably has to do with legalized coercion: civil sanctions.

Unless Europe experiences a Chris­tian revival, its culture will not exist in 2100. Islam will have achieved in the bedroom what the Ottomans did not achieve on horseback, 1500–1700:victory.

It is time to stop worrying about secular humanism, which is losing its cultural grip as the various media decentralize. Its institutional monopoly is breaking apart. It is time to start wor­rying about Islam and the civilization it brings.

Another war is in progress.

This war will be even more serious because the stakes are visibly higher. This was true in 650. It will be true in 2050.

Source: The Death of Secular Humanism written by Gary North and published in Faith for All of Life, March/April 2006

Animosity Against Comprehensive Redemption

Statism, Pietism, and Christianity present three rival worldviews. Statism has many forms: communism, Mohammedanism, and interventionism known in the past as fascism. 

Pietism agrees with and opposes Statism at the same time. It agrees with Statism when it comes to the application of humanism in politics and economics. It opposes Statism in areas of life when the laws made by the State becomes a threat to its survival. Pietism is the dominant faith in Christianity today. It is also known as monastic or escapist Christianity. 

Biblical Christianity gives us a different vision of the world and history. The impact of Adam's sin is universal. It includes man and all his affairs even the realms of economics and politics. 

However, as a result of Adam's sin, mankind has been subjected under the worst form of slavery, the slavery of sin. But the Son of God came into this world to liberate mankind and the entire creation from the power of sin. And since the work of redemption is already complete and Jesus is now sitting at the right hand of the Father, reigning until the time that all his enemies will submit under his rule, the duty of the church is to proclaim this message of redemption. 

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Jesus Christ claims that all power in heaven and on earth are already His. On the basis of this authority, Jesus has given the church a commission to disciple all nations, to proclaim the whole counsel of God. This means that the gospel starts in personal transformation, but it doesn't end there. Personal transformation should affect families and societies and all the institutions in them. This is how I understand comprehensive redemption.

Unfortunately, the idea of comprehensive redemption has numerous enemies. Foremost among them are the statists, Marxists, and pietists. See how Gary North describes such animosity: 

So whenever the church begins to declare God's holy standards of civil rule, the state is outraged. "How dare you! It is your job to keep the people quiet," says the present ruler. "It is not your job to speak out on political questions. They are of no concern to the church."

The revolutionaries are equally outraged. "It is your job to preach revolution, not reform," says the Marxist liberation theologian. "It is not your job to preach peaceful change, the reconstruction of society by the preaching of the gospel, and the decapitalization of the state. No, the goal is to capture the state, strengthen it, and make it even more powerful."

The escapists are also outraged. "Look, we come to church to have our spirits soothed. You keep bringing up unpleasant topics. There is nothing we can do about any of the world's problems outside the four walls of the sanctuary. Preach Jesus, and Him crucified-and be sure to leave Him hanging on the cross, where He belongs."

The preaching of the full-scale gospel scares those who believe in political salvation, as well as those who believe in irresponsible, world-denying salvation. The message of the Bible is simple in principle: comprehensive redemption. Everything is to be brought under the dominion of Jesus, through His people who represent Him as ambassadors and judges on earth. Everything. This means that Christ redeemed (bought back) the whole world. It means that there is no neutrality between Christ and Satan. Christ's rule must be established over everything before He delivers the kingdom up to His Father (1 Corinthians 15:24).



Source: Gary North, Liberating Planet Earth, 1987, pp. 91-92

Seeking Wisdom Early

I love them that love me; and those that seek me early shall find me. Riches and honour are with me; yea, durable riches and righteousness. My fruit is better than gold, yea, than fine gold; and my revenue than choice silver (Proverbs 8:17-19 - King James Version).

How soon should men seek wisdom? Early. By seeking wisdom early, men are guaranteed success. The harlot (folly) calls to men in the twilight, to spend the night illicitly. Wisdom calls early, as at daybreak. The day is to be given over to seeking wisdom. He who is diligent in the quest will be rewarded.

By comparing the treasures of wisdom with the precious metals, Proverbs drives the point into the minds of men: the most valuable asset of all is wisdom. Solomon was already wise when he asked for wisdom; he recognized that he was asking for the most valuable of all assets. Wealth subsequently flowed to his kingdom (I Kings 10:14–21). The fame of this rule spread everywhere (I Kings 4:3–11). The powerful and wealthy came to him for counsel (I Kings 10:11–13). In short, he achieved indirectly, through wisdom, the goals that other men seek directly through intrigue, magic, and violence.

God speaks clearly to men. They can understand His words because they are made in His image. He communicates to them by means of analogies and metaphors. When He compares the value of wisdom with gold, He speaks a universal language. Like the pocketbook parables of Jesus, the economic language of wisdom personified can be grasped by anyone, in the day of Solomon or in the twenty-first century.

The universality of gold and silver as desirable assets to lay up in one’s treasury reinforces the words of wisdom. When men think about the universal forms of wealth, they think of gold and silver. Across the globe, men understand the value of the precious metals. Abraham’s wealth was counted in these metals (Gen. 13:2). When men speak out against the economic importance of gold and silver, they speak nonsense. When John Maynard Keynes spoke of gold in 1923 as a barbarous relic, and when Lenin suggested in 1921 that the victorious Bolsheviks would someday use gold for public lavatories, they proclaimed utopianism (“utopia”: no place). These two spokesman of their era spoke for both sides of the Iron Curtain. Both men had contempt for Christian society. Keynes the atheistic homosexual and Lenin the atheistic revolutionary knew enough about Christianity to prefer the harlot of the twilight.

Source:

Excerpt from Wisdom and Dominion: An Economic Commentary on Proverbs by Gary North pages 83-84.

The Death Of Political Capitalism

I stumbled with a paragraph from Max Weber quoted by Gary North in Volume 5 Appendix D of the latter's economic commentary on Exodus:

The closest connection between ethical religion and rational economic development—particularly capitalism—was effected by all the forms of ascetic Protestantism and sectarianism in both Western and Eastern Europe, viz., Zwinglians, Calvinists, Baptists, Mennonites, Quakers, Methodists, and Pietists (both of the Reformed and, to a lesser degree, Lutheran varieties). . . . Indeed, generally speaking, the inclination to join an ethical, rationed, congregational religion becomes more strongly marked the farther away one gets from those strata which have been the carriers of the type of capitalism which is primarily political in orientation. Since the time of Hammurabi political capitalism has existed wherever there has been tax farming, the profitable provisions of the state’s political needs, war, piracy, largescale usury, and colonization. The tendency toward affiliation with an ethical, rational, congregational religion is more apt to be found the closer one gets to those strata which have been the carriers of the modern rational enterprise, I.e., strata with middle-class economic characteristics. . . .

Before giving my comment, I would like to add two additional paragraphs from North himself: 

Men’s universal understanding of the civil law reduces the arbitrary decisions of the authorities, and this in turn reduces a major area of uncertainty. This reduction in bureaucratic arbitrariness reduces production costs. 

Yet it is not simply the universality of the legal system that is important. Specific aspects of the legal system, such as the honoring of private contracts, the respect for private property, the nondiscriminatory nature of the tax system, and the restriction of the civil government to the preservation of order, primarily by preserving public peace and preventing private fraud and coercion, have made it possible for capitalism to flourish. 

Observations

In the above paragraphs, we notice three things: 

First, according to North, Weber distinguished between "political capitalism" and "modern rational enterprise," which the former describes as "market capitalism" elsewhere. 

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Second, we also notice based on Weber's statement that the more religious the people became, the lesser was their inclination to political capitalism and the greater was their tendency to embrace market capitalism. In today's debate, libertarians commonly understand political capitalism as related to statism in the forms of interventionism or crony-capitalism. So following Weber's line of thought, we could say that the greater the commitment of the people to faith communities, the less statist they become and the more they are inclined to free market. 

Third, this insight is from North. Paraphrasing the two paragraphs, we could say that the more people understand the nature of civil law and its "specific aspects," the more the power of bureaucracy is reduced, and the more free market flourished. 

Implications

Let us now consider three implications from the above assessment. If the assessment of both Weber and North is correct, it tells a lot about our present situation. Most people these days are increasingly becoming more statist. This is particularly true among large number of intellectuals. They hate free market and they are inclined to favor the expansion of government bureaucracy. Based on the above assessment, this deterioration is just an indication of growing irreligiosity and ignorance of civil law. 

Let us advance this idea further. If both Weber and North are correct, it therefore follows that in the past we have a precedent how to kill political capitalism and advance market capitalism. This was done through religious revival and education of the people in civil law. In order to materialize the first means, what is needed is for the Church to preach the gospel. Moreover, concerning education in civil law, this is best done by recovering the heritage of classical liberalism. Furthermore, for people to appreciate market capitalism, retrieving the Austrian school is the suitable task. 

Finally, we could also say that the humanist and the atheist's argument that religion is a major source of wars and deaths is not at all credible at least as far as Weber is concerned. It is argued that the world will be more peaceful without God and without religion. This is a dangerous proposition for in 20th century alone, it is actually atheistic and humanistic ideas in the forms of socialism and Marxism using the power of the state that committed far greater crimes against humanity. 

Source: North, G. 2012. Authority and Dominion: Economic Commentary on Exodus Volume 5. Dallas: Point Five Press. 

Too Young to Appreciate

I was 19 when I first stumbled with Gary North's Bible economic commentary. That was 1986 when I was taking my bachelor's degree in theology. I was surprised with Its content. I find his "sarcasm" and "arrogance" entertaining and his concrete thoughts enlightening. After reading several chapters, I thought that time that better to assign it as part of my future reading task for I had other academic obligations. After 28 years, still I never finished reading even one of his books. 

I forgot the exact year I returned to North's books. If my mind serves me right, I think that was the time when I was pursuing my master's degree in theology. I think it was 1998. The primary reason for my return was prompted by my dissatisfaction with then existing discipleship materials for I was also pastoring a church at that time. It was then that I discovered North's deep connection to Cornelius Van Til's thoughts. Through North and then later John Frame, I started tracking the books of writers coming from Christian Reconstruction. So the names and works of John Rousas Rushdoony, Greg Bahnsen, Gary deMar, James Jordan, and David Chilton became familiar to me. Still, I faiiled to come up with discipleship materials from those resources, maybe because I considered them too difficult and academic for church members or perhaps their sizes were intimidating or maybe I was too lazy and disorganized. 

It took me 8 years to finish my master's degree. I was tasked to teach Pentateuch in our seminary, and so I took that chance to create lectures using North's and Rushdoony's materials. I only came up with 7 lectures. And then in 2006, I pursued my doctoral course in educational leadership and incorporated Van Til's and North's books in my papers. Since I had the financial resources that time, I took advantage of it to collect Van Til's books, Rushoodny's Institutes of Biblical Law Volume 1, and 2 volumes of North's Bible economic commentary.

The third and I hope the last influence that brought me again to North's books was most unusual; it was a personal crisis. It happened in 2009. And as a result of that, I could no longer concentrate in pursuing my doctoral course, and so I stopped. And due to that crisis, I resigned from my teaching job.

After more or less six months of suffering pain, I finally decided to face reality, and besides I have three sons who are depending on me. And so I tried to look for other sources of income. It was that time that I met a business community advocating financial literacy. The books of Robert Kiyosaki were their primary sources, and it was Kiyosaki that led me to Edward Griffin, then to Ron Paul, to the Austrian school, and then back to North again. 

The realization that Gary North is both an Austrian economist and a Van Tilian thinker is something I did not see before. This time I am thinking of making it a goal to read his books and that's the reason why I am writing this article, to remind myself. Unlike North, I don't want to make it as a vow. It is just that at this point I want to take North's challenge that none except him has read his 31 volumes Bible economic commentary. It is really surprising to know that it took him 52 years to finish this project. Compared to Murray N. Rothbard, which many are already impressed with his 7 years of commitment to finish 'Man, Economy, and State," I can't find appropriate words to describe North's perseverance. To serve as my guide, I want to post here Gary North's past accomplishments and future goals in his so-called "four phases" of his calling:

• Phase 1 - Contributor to The Freeman, Marx Religion of Revolution (1968), The Concept of Property in Puritan New England, 1630-1720 (1972), Introduction to Christian Economics (1973).

• Phase 2 - Bible economic commentary

• Phase 3 - Conversion of the commentary into YouTube videos, a new website - The Covenantal Structure of Economics, and a comprehensive treatise comparable to Ludwig von Mises' Human Action.

• Phase 4 - A book on epistemology of economics and historiography

North wrote: "Be careful what you select as your life's calling. Do it early. The clock is ticking." I can no longer recover my "wasted years." My interest as of now is to read both North's and Rothbard's books. I hope that before 2014 ends, I can finish "Man, Economy, and State" and a couple of books from North's Bible economic commentary. 

From Misesian Revival to Christian Reconstruction

Just finished reading this morning Joseph T. Salerno's "The Rebirth of Austrian Economics - In Light of Austrian Economics." In it, I gleaned at least three insights: the tension between creativity and institutionalization within the Austrian camp, an overview of Murray Rothbard's works, and the revival of Austrian school through his influence. The second insight provides a good reading list for those like me who want to study the Austrian school from Rothbardian perspective. After reading Salerno's essay, I thought of the need for a parallel revival within the camp of those who adhere to reformed theology. Under this, I also want to give an overview of distinctive of one school of thought within the umbrella of reformed theology. 

Creative Thinking and Institutional Framework

Joseph T. Salerno started his argument by identifying two strands of thoughts within the Austrian camp. These thoughts are about the creativity of an isolated genius and the need for an "institutional framework." The founding fathers of the Austrian school, Carl Menger and Eugen von Bohm-Bawerk, says Salerno, had committed a mistake for emphasizing only the creative aspect at the expense of the institutional framework. Because of this one-sided emphasis, the contribution of the Austrian school to the growth of economic science has suffered setbacks. Nevertheless, Salerno saw that even in Menger's theory of goods and Bohm-Bawerk's theory of "time preference", ideas can be deduced that could support the need for institutional framework. In this aspect, Salerno argues, the two founding thinkers are inconsistent. 

Ludwig von Mises' position concerning these two issues was "ambivalent" says Salerno and if not for the works of Murray Rothbard, Mises' recovery of Austrian tradition would perhaps be buried due to the absence of that necessary institutional framework. So it was through the influence of Rothbard that creative Austrian thinking was institutionalized and revived. 

Overview of Rothbard's Works

At this point, I just want to enumerate Rothbard's "institutionalization" of Austrian ideas through his published books and essays and two influential journals:

• Man, Economy, and State (1962)
• America's Great Depression (1963)
• Power and Market (1970)
• For a New Liberty (1973)
• The Journal of Libertarian Studies (1977)
• The Myth of Neutral Taxation (1981)
• Law, Property Rights, and Air Pollution (1982)
• The Ethics of Liberty (1982)
• Quarterly Journal of Austrian Economics (1982)
• The Mystery of Banking (1983)
• The Federal Reserve as a Cartelization Device (1984)
• The Case for a Genuine Dollar (1985)
• What Has Government Done to Our Money? (1990)
• Egalitarianism as a Revolt against Nature (2000) 

Salerno gave a brief description of selected works from the above literature. He described "Man, Economy, and State" (1962) as follows:

". . . . a contribution to Austrian economics and to pure economics in general that ranks as one of the most brilliant performances in the history of economic thought. The book was a two-volume treatise of nearly 1,000 pages written in scintillating English that logically deduced the entire corpus of economic theory step by step from the undeniable fact of purposeful human action. It integrated the insights and theorems of dozens of previous Austrian economists from Menger to Mises into a systematic and comprehensive organon of economic theory. Perhaps the greatest of Rothbard’s many contributions in his treatise was the elaboration of a unified theory of production, extending over five of the treatise’s 12 chapters and encompassing the capital structure, interest rate determination, factor pricing, and the entrepreneurial role in production. While many elements of the theory had been developed previously by various Austrian economists, they had never been fully integrated and several elements were still missing. Rothbard’s methodical treatment of production repaired one of the few serious gaps remaining in Austrian economics after Mises. Rothbard’s book also contained critiques of contemporary neoclassical and Keynesian theories and a critical analysis of typical state interventions into the economy" (pp. 116-117).

Salerno gave an overview of other works of Murray Rothbard. "America's Great Depression" (1963) and "What Has Government Done to Our Money" (1990) are follow-ups to Rothbard's 1962 book. Salerno described the first book as an application of Austrian Business Cycle Theory to analyze the Great Depression in the 1930s. The second work is a booklet, which Rothbard aimed to provide "a primer on Austrian monetary theory" (p.117) where he "originated a praxeologico-historical analysis of the transformation of gold money into fiat money. . . ." (ibid.). "Power and Market" (1970) contains "an exhaustive . . . . analysis, based on value-free economic theory, of the myriad of government interventions into the economy" (ibid.). Rothbard also dissected here the existence of "taxation and government spending as types of intervention into the free market economy. . . . (ibid.). In "For a New Liberty" (1973) and "The Ethics of Liberty" (1982), we read here the "anarcho-capitalist" version of libertarian political economy. 

In terms of monetary theory, Rothhbard also published a book, "The Mystery of Banking" (1983) and two essays, "The Federal Reserve as a Cartelization Device" (1984) and "The Case for a Genuine Godl Dollar" (1985). To appreciate the importance of the book, Salerno mentioned historical details related to the distortion of monetary system caused by an influential book co-authored by Milton Friedman and Anna Schwartz, "Monetary History of the United States." Salerno narrated:

"The Mystery of Banking was a theory and history of money and banking written from an Austrian perspective and, as its title suggests, accessible to the non-specialist in economics. Nonetheless it contained an important extension of Austrian monetary theory. Specifically, Rothbard integrated a detailed exposition of the multiple bank credit expansion process into Austrian monetary theory. This task had never been undertaken before by Mises or by Rothbard in his treatment of money in earlier works and constituted a lacuna in the Austrian explication of the money supply process. The arcane process by which a fractional reserve banking system operates to multiply demand deposits was first systematically expounded by the Austrian-oriented American economist, C.A. Phillips in 1920. In addition to this expository contribution, Rothbard corrected an erroneous deviation from Phillips’s path-breaking analysis that began to crop up after World War II and especially after the publication of Milton Friedman’s and Anna Schwartz’s influential Monetary History of the United States in 1963. Whereas Phillips had derived a simple but versatile 'reserve' multiplier capable of distinguishing between the influences of central bank policy, commercial bank operations, and the actions of the non-bank public on the money stock, modern money and banking textbooks following Friedman and Schwartz (1963, pp. 50–51) operated with a seemingly more sophisticated formula, the 'high powered money' or 'monetary base' multiplier, which conflates these separate influences. In rectifying this technical error and rescuing Phillips’s original analysis from oblivion, Rothbard restored the proper analytical framework for interpreting historical boom-bust episodes such as the Great Depression" (p.123).

The Significance of Rothbard's Institutionalization

I mentioned earlier that without Rothbard's institutionalization (According to Salerno, it was actually Llewellyn H. Rockwell who ought to be credited for this institutionalization) of Austrian thoughts, Mises' recovery of Austrian tradition would have been lost due to the influence of other thinkers within the Austrian camp. It is a new realization for me that there are diverse versions of "Austrianism" such as "Lachmannians," "Hayekians," "Kirznerians," and "Misesians." For Rothbard, Misesians are the true Austrians. Salerno cited two relevant quotations to describe this internal tension within the Austrian school. In the first quotation, Rothbard exposed Ludwig M. Lachmann as "nihilist," "Keynesian," and "anti-economist", and therefore not an Austrian in the Misesian sense (p. 121). In the second quotation, Rothbard identified that the real contention over the naming of the scholarly journal aimed for the institutionalization of the Austrian thought is "the abandonment of Austrianism itself" (pp. 124-125). In that battle over the journal's name, finally Rothbard gained the upper-hand, and so the "The Review of Austrian Economics" as the official name for the journal serves as a landmark in the victory of Misesian version of Austrianism. 

Personal Assessment of Trend in Reformed Theology

As a theological educator, after reading Salerno's essay on economics, I could not avoid reflecting on the present state of Reformed theology. I see a parallel experience. My mind led me to think about the works of the pioneers of Reformed theology - John Calvin, Abraham Kuyper, Herman Bavinck, and Benjamin Warfield. After a year or two of exchanging ideas with my fellow educators both offline and online, I suspect that the existing trend in theological education particularly in the Philippines and as far as the "evangelicals" are concerned is either leaning towards new modernism through the influence of Karl Barth or the Kantian idea of historical consciousness, existentialism, and process theology either through the British or German branch. Unfortunately, some proponents of this trend still want to retain an appearance of orthodoxy and adherence to reformed theology. I think, it is in situation like this that the recovery of reformed theology through the works of Cornelius Van Til plays a significant role. 

One school of thought within the Van Tilian camp is known as the "Christian Reconstruction." Gary North, an Austrian economist belongs to this school. Among the many expressions of reformed theology, the Christian Reconstruction came up with five distinctives: sovereignty of the Triune God over creation, providence, and redemption; covenant theology; the three uses of the law; eschatology of victory, and; presuppositional apologetics. Difficult theological questions such as free will and theodicy are covered under the first point. Understanding covenant theology and the three uses of the law provides a distinctive social theory. The fourth point, which is victorious eschatology appears a baseless utopian at first glance. But a deeper look will help you see that such view of future things is actually rooted in Christology, most especially the finished work of Christ. And finally, presuppositional apologetics is about explaining the worldview of Christian Theism to non-theists.

For now, in my mind, there is a disconnection between these two schools of thought: Austrian and Christian Reconstruction. My goal is to study the Austrian school from the lens of Christian Reconstruction. Rothbard's list provides a good start in the study of Austrian ideas. Concerning Christian Reconstruction, I also consider reading the Bible economic commentaries of Gary North a worthwhile goal. 

Someone Proud of Being a Conspiracy Theorist 5

Then what is the hope? The hope is for people of principle to educate their own children and other children who may want to come along for the ride. Educate them in the principles of persuasion rather than power. Parents are going to have to fund their own children’s educations, and to keep those children away from the public school textbooks. They are going to have to develop new curriculum materials. They are going to have to teach, or find reliable people on the Web to teach, in order to help their children avoid the indoctrination by all tax-funded education. That is the minimum place that we have to begin. Anything beyond this is gravy.

This is our principle of action: replacement, not capture. We should not attempt to take over the existing systems of power and influence; we should attempt to create alternatives that are more reliable, more efficient, and more beneficial to the general public. We can’t beat something with nothing. We also can’t beat the system by capturing the system and maintaining the system. We are not smart enough to do this, and in any case, we are not ruthless enough to do it.

What I have outlined here I was taught almost 50 years ago. Rushdoony understood this. Leonard E. Reed understood it, and so did the editor of The Freeman, Paul Poirot. These men persuaded me that the quest for power in today’s society is the devil’s own quest.

I do have a sense of optimism about the younger members of the movement, who follow Ron Paul . . . Paul understands these principles. He is the only politician in my generation at the national level who has understood this position. This is why he is now known to millions of people, and no other congressman is. He stood alone when it paid nothing to stand alone, and he is now the representative of a movement that could turn into an effective political force at the local level. He exercises this influence precisely because he has not sought to extend power to the Federal government. He has not been involved in a quest for power; he has been in a quest for the decentralization of power, and the de-funding of power.

When the Soviet Union proved that communism could no longer maintain power, Western Marxists lost their faith. They had been Marxists only because they believed in power, and they somehow believed that they, as intellectuals, would be powerful people in a Communist society. They had not read carefully what Stalin did to intellectuals. They had not read what the Pol Pot did to intellectuals in Cambodia. He sent them to the farms or had them executed, if they had hands without calluses or if they wore glasses. He knew an intellectual when he saw one. They died.

You don’t change the system from the inside. You create an alternative system, and you wait for the existing system to go belly up. That is how you change people’s minds.

You can’t beat something with nothing. This is why people don’t really want to change it. It costs too much money, too much commitment, and too much time. That is why we face a crisis. 

But, if individuals at the local level begin to organize, this may change. 

We also have to develop institutions that are based on persuasion rather than power. 

Source: https://www.lewrockwell.com/2010/07/gary-north/how-to-fight-conspiracies/

Someone Proud of Being a Conspiracy Theorist 4

It does no good to expose the conspirators. Hardly anyone will believe you, and even if the person does believe you, there’s not a thing you or he can do about it. The public has finally figured out that the system at the top is structured against them, because they saw what happened to the banks in 2008. They saw the banks get the bailout money, not the man in the street. This upsets them, because they wanted the bailout money. . . They have only come to this conclusion recently. The far Left and the far Right have known about it since 1913. But who took them seriously?

I enjoy reading books about conspiracies. I especially enjoy reading heavily footnoted, carefully documented books about conspiracies. I enjoy books that do three things. First, they follow the money. Second, they follow the confession of faith. Third, they follow the media. If you show me what leaders believed, how they financed their beliefs, and how they got out their message to the general public, you have shown me what I really need to know about the history of any organization, any society, and any government. I don’t care whether you’re talking about conspiracies or the good old boys who were aboveboard about everything. You have to show me what they believed, how they financed what they believed, and how they got their message out to the voters.

Almost no book does this. You can look at the anti-conspiracy books, and they may follow the money, but they don’t usually concentrate on what the fundamental ideas were all about. And they almost never talk about media, except after 1930.

So, I am a conspiracy theorist. I believe there are lots of conspiracies, and most of them fail. 

The problem is not the conspiracies. The problem is the widespread acceptance by the voting populations around the world that it is legitimate for the government to send out tax collectors and extract wealth from certain groups of society in order to fund the favored boondoggles of some other group in society. The moment people think that they can make a living by voting instead of making a living by producing, they turn the government and the social order over to one or another conspiracy.

Secret or not, they could not get into our wallets unless we allowed them to. It is the essence of the conspiracy to persuade the public that the right and moral thing to do is to allow the state to help some group. As soon as the conspiracy persuades the public of this, the game switches from persuasion to power. It switches from donations to taxation. It switches from liberty to tyranny.

Source: https://www.lewrockwell.com/2010/07/gary-north/how-to-fight-conspiracies/

Someone Proud of Being a Conspiracy Theorist 3

Think about the World Wide Web. The establishments of the world did not think in 1990 that anything like this would be possible. The basic communications technology existed, but until Tim Berners-Lee developed a system for setting up addresses on the Internet, the World Wide Web did not exist. The Web now is undermining establishments all over the world. Yet there are people who are convinced that the Web is itself a conspiracy, and the conspirators are somehow using the Web to gain control over the population. I realize that there are not many of these people, but I do get e-mails from time to time telling me that the Web is capable of being used effectively by the conspiracies against defenders of truth, justice, and the American way.

The problem is not the conspiracies; the problem is the corruption in the hearts of the people. The fact that the voters would allow and even promote the creation of the modern welfare state is indicative of the fact that larceny is in their hearts. It does no good to replace one conspiracy with another conspiracy if you leave the system intact that enables the conspiracies to gain power.

This goes back to the famous chapter 10 in F. A. Hayek’s book, The Road to Serfdom. The chapter is titled, “Why the Worst Get on Top.” Hayek argued that the modern socialist state, meaning the modern welfare state, encourages the worst people to get on top, because the worst people are the most successful in seeking and maintaining power.

Because central economic planning centralizes power, it grants to the state the right to confiscate the wealth of the public. We should not expect kindly people to be successful in the pursuit of power within such a system. We will find, and what we have found, is that the most ruthless people seek out the levers of power, precisely because the levers of power enable them to achieve their goal: control over other people.

. . . it is a moral obligation to preach and teach against the welfare state, because the welfare state is based on the principle of theft. It is based on the principle of the right of one group legally to extract wealth from another group. The moral foundation of the welfare state is corrupt.

Source: https://www.lewrockwell.com/2010/07/gary-north/how-to-fight-conspiracies/

Someone Proud of Being a Conspiracy Theorist 2

I was fortunate in the fact that I first discovered about conspiracies from my study of America’s entry into World War II. I wrote a high school term paper in 1958 on how Roosevelt maneuvered the United States into the war by pressuring the Japanese government to attack us. I have not changed my mind. This alerted me to the fact that wars are major means of expanding the power of the Federal government. I understood early that Presidents maneuver the country into war in order to expand their own power and the government’s power over the general population. Presidents find that the public does not oppose the entry into war, once we’ve gone into war. All resistance ceases. The expansion of the government then can go on without resistance. This is beneficial for the groups that are associated with weaponry. It is also beneficial to all the groups associated with the banking system, which funds the expansion of the arms industry.

In graduate school in 1965, this suggestion was considered a form of lunacy. Later, this began to change when Johnson pushed deeper into Vietnam, and the Gulf of Tonkin attack turned out to be a myth. In graduate school, Franklin Delano Roosevelt was untouchable. He was retroactively the great saint of the 20th century. Any suggestion that Franklin Roosevelt deliberately lured the country into war was considered conspiratorial crackpotism. I was one of the crackpots, so I generally kept my mouth shut on this issue, except in an upper division course on revisionist histories of World War I and World War II — the only such class in the United States in 1962.

This attitude has not changed today. The difference is, today more historians are willing to admit that Roosevelt did maneuver the Japanese into war. What we find, however, is that these historians say that Roosevelt’s action was wise. They applaud the fact that he used conspiratorial tactics to get the country into war. Anyone who says it was wrong for Roosevelt to have done this is regarded as a crackpot, but at least these days you can say that Roosevelt did it. You just are not supposed to say that was a bad thing that he did. 

Source: https://www.lewrockwell.com/2010/07/gary-north/how-to-fight-conspiracies/

Someone Proud of Being a Conspiracy Theorist

I would like to share a series of excerpts from a proud "conspiracy theorist", Gary North. I took these excerpts from his two articles posted in LewRockwell.com. The second article is very long and not many people today are patient enough to read such a long content. So readability is the reason why I divided North's articles into five.

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I have been a conspiracy buff for over 45 years. I got my spurs at age 16 when I wrote a paper on Roosevelt and Pearl Harbor. As far as I am concerned, that one is still in the top five. 

Over the years, I have stumbled into lots more conspiracies. Their name is legion. Some are more evil than others. Some are harder to prove than others. Some are hidden in plain sight — or, in the case of 9/11, plane site. Others are deep.

There are so many of them that no one can pursue all of them. In fact, the mark of a deranged conspiracy buff is someone who pursues dozens of them at once. He believes that there is one grand conspiracy behind all of them. . .

All of us who have spent any time following through on this or that conspiracy have met these deranged people. Their world is filled with conspiracies. 

I feel sorry for them. They do not specialize. They really do not know much about any of these conspiracies. . .

. . . For these people, there are only four kinds of people: conspirators, the ignorant masses, disciples, and enemies. 

Source: http://www.lewrockwell.com/2006/01/gary-north/my-conspiracy-is-bigger-than-your-conspiracy/

A man who sees conspiracy everywhere is a gravedigger. . .a gravedigger gives up hope. He works diligently, but he has no future. He is not going to be able to escape the plans of the executioners. This is how thousands of conspiracy theorists view their own efforts. They give up any thought of reforming the system that has been infiltrated. They offer no plans to replace it. They just wring their hands and cry, “The Conspiracy! The Conspiracy!”

I recall one man who spent his life clipping newspapers and photocopying items about how conspirators have done this or that. I never heard him offer a solution. I never heard him offer a theory of civil government or economics that would serve as an alternative. Yet he spent 35 years in the presence of the libertarian activists and conservative leaders. I never heard him quote an idea from Mises, Rothbard, Hayek, or anyone else. He was completely devoid of ideas. His entire life was spent with no theory of God, man, law, sanctions, and the future. He had no theory of conspiracies and causation. He only had clippings.

. . . people who are looking for ways to avoid personal responsibility for working to change the infiltrated system have a tendency to blame the conspiracy for having infiltrated any organization that might plausibly produce significant social change. In other words, they dismiss the activities of individuals who really are working diligently to transform the system. 

. . . whenever I found myself surrounded by people who attribute most of what takes place in life to a single conspiracy, I would be wise to disassociate myself from that group. He was convinced that it does no good to participate as a gravedigger. The goal is to transform society, and the way to do this is through religious and intellectual evangelism. 

. . . word and deed evangelism is a system. He (North referring to his father-in-law) was convinced that any form of evangelism, for whatever perspective, that does not include programs for transforming the world is simply spinning its wheels. He called this pietism. He also called it Neoplatonism. He was convinced that both pietism and Neoplatonism were basic to 20th-century Christianity. 

Source: https://www.lewrockwell.com/2010/07/gary-north/how-to-fight-conspiracies/

Wallis or North?

Yesterday, I listened to Jim Wallis' idea about US shutdown. After watching, I read Gary North's critique of Jim Wallis' video. Both claim to have biblical basis for their messages. No wonder, many are confused. Whose voice do you think tells the truth?

Monetary Policy and the Philippine Economy - Biblical Critique of Inflation

This is the 4th and last part of my series in "Monetary Policy and the Philippine Economy". The content will be taken from Gary North's "The Biblical Critique of Inflation". I want to present North's material in four parts: 

• Identifying currency debasement as a concrete call to repentance

• The law commands honest measurement and money

• Consequences of inflation, and

• Multiple indebtedness

Concrete Call to Repentance

North started his critique by citing that unlike today's church leaders, Old Testament prophets confronted both the nation as a whole and their civil governments with a concrete call to repentance. Isaiah 1:22 is an example of such call. In this verse, prophet Isaiah declared that Judah was guilty of economic dishonesty. Currency debasement and deceiving the public about the quality of the products in the market were considered normal and ordinary.

Precious metals such as silver and gold were used as money both nationally and internationally during biblical times. North mentioned that you can find "over 350 references" showing various contexts where silver and gold were used. Example passages include 2 Kings 5: 5 and 2 Kings 12:13.

Honest Measurement and Money 

Since gold and money were used as medium of exchange, honesty in economic transaction was vital. North argued that the law's provision concerning honest weights and measurement was also applicable to honest money. He quoted Daniel-Reps' study to show the importance of honesty in economic transaction: 

"Exactness of weight was important not only for dealings in corn and other goods, but also as a guarantee of the soundness of the currency...The practice of weighing money rather than counting it was still general in the Palestine of Jesus' day, as it was all round the Mediterranean. The scales also served to ensure that the coins were of the true metal and that they had neither been filed nor clipped.; indeed, this inspection was one of the banker's and money-changer's chief tasks" (Gary North, Introduction to Christian Economics, 1973, pp.5-6).

During Isaiah's time, silver and gold coins were not yet in existence. They were used as money in the form of "ingots" (p.6). Exactly, the debasement of ingots with cheaper metals was the offence committed by the people of Judah during the prophet's time. 

For North, that was an act of monetary counterfeiting. He considered it fraudulent, an act of theft, and immoral. He then equated it with the use of legal tender laws. And he contends that not even the government is above the law concerning the use of honest money. North explains why this is so:

"...legal tender laws are immoral; currency debasement is immoral; printed unbacked paper money is immoral. To mix cheap metals with silver or gold and call the result pure gold or pure silver is totally fraudulent. Yet this is what was being done in Isaiah's day" (ibid.).

Such act of monetary dishonesty was not new in Isaiah's time. It happened long time before his day. Proverbs 25:4 clearly identifes the command "to take away the dross from the silver".

Consequences of Inflation

"Currency debasement is the oldest form of monetary inflation" (p.7). North warns about the destructive impacts of monetary inflation on the economy. He quoted four paragraphs from Murray Rothbard's "What Has Government Done to Our Money?". I gleaned twelve destructive consequences of monetary inflation from those paragraphs :

• Gain for counterfeiters

• Losses for late receivers

• Redistribution of wealth in favor of first-comers

• Distortion of business calculation (consumers' demands and operation cost)

• Illusory profits

• Suspension of free market's penalty for inefficient firms and rewards for efficient firms

• Business cycle

• Decline in quality of goods, services, and work

• Popularity of get rich quick scheme

• Penalizing thrift, saving, and lending

• Encouraging debt and spending

• Reduction of standard of living in the name of creating "prosperity"

 See how North concluded Rothbard's analysis:

"Rothbard's analysis indicates why God so opposes monetary inflation, whether practiced directly by the State or simply private fraud which is tacitly sanctioned by the State. Currency debasement is theft. It involves the redistribution of wealth. Those on fixed incomes suffer. The quality of production tends to decilne. Monetary inflation (currency debasement) is a fraudulent, invisible tax, and the Bible prohibits it. The nation which permits monetary inflation to persist, as if it were not a terrible moral evil, will suffer the consequences described by Isaiah and Ezekiel (22:18-22)" (p. 8). 

Multiple Indebtedness

Since monetary inflation promotes debt instead of thrift and saving, a corollary economic and monetary phenomenon occurred. North described this as "multiple indebtedness". He got this idea from Exodus 22:25-27.

The passage speaks about the use of interest in lending money and the use of a pledge or collateral. It is this use of collateral where North got this idea of multiple indebtedness. For him, the cloak as pledge serves as a protection for both the creditor and the debtor. The debtor cannot use the same cloak as collateral in multiple loans or transactions. He is confined by his immediate assets. This economic principle prohibits multiple indebtedness. 

1. Fractional Reserve Banking

After laying down the basis for multiple indebtedness, North claimed, "The entire public sphere of civil government rests on the violation of the principle. The whole structure of modern credit is based upon the idea that men should not escape from perpetual debt" (p.11). Particularly, "fractional reserve banking and the limited liability corporation" (ibid.) have violated this economic law. This violation was later organized and designated as "the monetization of debt" (ibid.). Notice how North described this economic phenomenon:

"The central bank of every nation...prints up the money to finance the deficits of the central government, and in return for this fiat currency, the government gives an interest-bearing bond to the bank...From a biblical standpoint, this is utterly corrupt: 'The wicked borroweth and payeth not again' (Psalm 37:21a). The civil authorities do not intend to reduce this debt and repay the principal. They favor perpetual indebtedness. Laws that are transgressed in God's universe will be found to contain their own built-in punishment...Massive national indebtedness is highly dangerous" (ibid.).

Concerning fractional reserve banking, its mechanism is unbelievable. It all starts with a citizen making a deposit either checking or savings account. And from that deposit, fractional reserve can create loans nine times the size of the original deposit. North referenced Wilhelm Roepke saying the same thing about fractional reserve banking as resting "upon the systematic violation of the biblical prohibition on multiple indebtedness" (p. 12). For Roepke, without understanding the mechanism of fractional reserve banking, we cannot understand also "the perils and the problems which currently beset our economic system" (p. 13). 

Fractional reserve banking violates the principle of multiple indebtedness for it indebts itself beyond its immediate assets by loaning money to borrowers. Banks do this for they assume that their creditors will not ask for their money simultaneously. The faulty foundation of this mechanism is exposed when a bank run occurs. 

2. Limited Liability Corporation 

LLC has been in existence for more than a century. North describes this institution as a creature that came out of the economic environment that promotes multiple indebtedness. Or we can also say that with the existence of fractional reserve banking and government intervention, LLC is another form of violation of the principle of multiple indebtedness. North describes three things about this institution. 

First, LLC works as follows: 

"The corporation...is responsible only for the value of its assets. Creditors can collect, in case of coporate bankruptcy, up to the value of the corporation's property, but they cannot gain access to the funds of the legal owners, i.e., the shareholders...Thus, the LLC tends to become a huge, impersonal structure in which effective ownership is separated from management" (p.15).

North's second observation is about the shift in responsibility. Here North relies on Rushdoony's comments:

"...the liability thus shifts responsibility away from the responsible to society at large...with limited liability, a premium is placed on profit irrespective of responsibility. The shareholder is less concerned with buying responsible ownership and more concerned with buying a share in profits. And then, as the state further protects the shareholder against liabilities in his irresponsible pursuit of profits, the shareholder becomes less and less concerned with the responsible and moral management of his company" (pp. 15-16). 

Finally, North identified the influence of government intervention preparing the way for socialism. The limited liability laws are actually one form of government intervention. They destroy personal responsibility before God and before men, they produce subtle people who know how to use bankruptcy laws, and they erode the very foundation of Western civilization. Notice how North explains the connection of limited liability laws to socialism:

"Limited liability laws have produced the era of the huge, impersonal corporations that have produced unquestioned material prosperity, but at the same time these laws are now producing something very foreign to free enterprise...The drift into socialism continues, for it is socialism, above all other systems, which destroys personal responsibility and removes power from ownership..." (pp.17-18). 

Conclusion

At last, after 15 days, I finished my series on "Monetary Policy and the Philippine Economy". So part 1 talks about Dr. Nye's lecture where he identified the economic problems of the country and offered a corresponding solution. Part 2 contains six recent news articles related to monetary inflation written from different perspectives. Part 3 deals with Mises' lecture on inflation. And this last part is about biblical critique of inflation.

In blogging this series, I recognize the existence of gaps. It is just a draft, which needs to be finalized to come up with a lecture format. At its best, this series and other related articles in this blog serve as an introductory overview in the study of monetary inflation.


Part 1 - Dr. Nye's Lecture

Part 2 - Summaries of 6 Related Articles

Part 3- Mises' Lecture

Reference: North, Gary. (1973). An Introduction to Christian Economics. The Craig Press. 

My First Article

Gary North is the Austrian economist and Reformed theologian who introduced to me the Austrian school of economics. He pioneered the idea about Christian economics solidly based on biblical exposition and sharing similar economic principles and practices with the Austrian school. He affirms that the Austrian school  is operating on the basis of what is given in nature.

After reading several books by Gary North, I decided to take a look at the pioneers of the Austrian school: Carl Menger, Ludwig von Mises, Murray Rothbard, and F.A. Hayek. This is an ambitious task for me for I am no economist.

The first thing I did was to proceed to Google Reader and search for articles. Initially, I find three, which I set aside for a while to read later and summarize their contents that I will share in this first article. Then I clicked Google Reader’s “browse for stuff,” clicked “search” and typed “Austrian economists” searching for available feeds. I found a total of 28 feeds with 141 articles. This will be a very exciting task for me to read and write about these existing articles for me “to have a feel” of how Austrian economics is perceived in our time. And after finishing this task, I intend to read the books written by the pioneers themselves.

By the grace of God, I hope to do this in the coming days and it is my prayer that God will grant me the strength to remain focused in this “self-imposed task.” The reason why I am doing this is that I want to really understand what is going on in the present global economy. I know that I can no longer trust the existing media, politics, and the academe. I have to think for myself for most people I know are still living in the “Matrix.”

After listening for several months from the messages of Alex Jones, Edward Griffin, Ron Paul, and Peter Schiff, I came to realize that the world I live in is not the only world. In fact, the real world is very far from the world that is imposed upon us. Unfortunately, those who see better were pushed into the sideline and many have never even heard of their names. But I firmly believe that the time is changing for the Austrian school of economics to gain a hearing. If the present economic crisis will not cause people to find answers for what is going on, things will get worse. But this is for our good, for us to wake up from the Matrix and see the real world. In that world, the Austrian school will be vindicated.

Prayer of Gratitude

Thank you Dear Lord that in your providence you allowed me to encounter Gary North. Thank you for his influence. Thank you also for LewRockwell.com and other Austrian economists who I came to know through their writings. Thank you also for your word, for the light that comes from it. I also thank you for your Spirit for guiding me, encouraging me, strengthening me, and giving me motivation to pursue this study.

I pray for my friends to forgive them for their pious excuses. I have nothing to boast. It is only by your grace that I now see. Just like you did to me, enable them to also see what is really going on and pursue what is supposed to be done. Let not fear hinder them. Cause us to continually trust in you. Amen!

Note: Posted in my WordPress blog last July 17, 2012