Resentment

Passages

Every passage tagged with this emotion in the Vela corpus. Search the body text, narrow by source or register, click through to a book’s profile to see how the passage sits with the rest of the work.

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• From The Battle for God (2000)

  At Dayton, the secularists won the battle and, by pouring scorn on the fundamentalists, seemed to have vanquished them by showing that they could not and should not be taken seriously. The fundamentalists went quiet after the Scopes trial, the liberals gained control of the denominations, and there seemed to be a détente. William Bell Riley and his followers appeared to have given up their struggle; by the end of the decade, Riley was willing to sit on a panel with the liberal Harry Fosdick. But in fact the fundamentalists had not gone away. Indeed, after the trial their views became more extreme. They felt embittered and nursed a deep grievance against mainstream culture. At Dayton, they had tried—badly—to fight the view of the more radical secularists that religion was an archaic irrelevance, and that only science was important. They could not express this point of view effectively and chose the wrong forum in which to do it. Bryan’s anti-German phobia was paranoid, and his demonizing of Darwin inaccurate. But the moral and spiritual imperatives of religion are important for humanity and should not be relegated unthinkingly to the scrap heap of history in the interests of an unfettered rationalism. The relationship between science and ethics has continued to be an issue of pressing concern. But the fundamentalists lost their case at Dayton, and it seemed to them that they had been treated with contempt and pushed to the margins of society. Fifty years earlier, the New Lights had constituted a majority in America; after the Scopes trial, they had become outsiders. But the ridicule of such secularist crusaders as Mencken was counterproductive. Fundamentalist faith was rooted in deep fear and anxiety that could not be assuaged by a purely rational argument. After Dayton, they became more extreme. 36 Before the trial, evolution had not been an important issue for them, and even such literalists as Charles Hodge had accepted that the age of the world was more than six thousand years, whatever it said in the Bible. Few fundamentalists had believed in the so-called “creation science,” which argued that Genesis was scientifically sound in every detail. But after Dayton, fundamentalists closed their minds even more, and Creationism and an unswerving biblical literalism became central to the fundamentalist mind-set. They also drifted to the far right of the political spectrum. Before the war, fundamentalists like Riley and John R. Straton (1875– 1929) had been willing to work for social reform and with people on the left. Now the Social Gospel was tainted by its association with the liberals who had defeated them in the denominations. This will be a constant theme in our story.

• From The Battle for God (2000)

  The success of the revolution had given many Americans a sense of empowerment; it had shown them that established authority was fallible and by no means invincible. The genie could not be put back into the bottle. The Jeffersonians believed that ordinary folk should also enjoy the freedom and autonomy preached by the philosophes . In the new newspapers, doctors, lawyers, clergymen, and other specialists were ridiculed. Nobody should have to give total credence to these so-called “experts.” The law, medicine, and religion should all be a matter of common sense and within the reach of everyone. 69 This sentiment was especially rife on the frontiers, where people felt slighted by the republican government. By 1790, some 40 percent of Americans lived in territory that had only been settled by white colonists some thirty years earlier. The frontiersmen felt resentful of the ruling elite, who did not share their hardships, but who taxed them as harshly as the British, and bought land for investment in the territories without any intention of leaving the comforts and refined civilization of the eastern seaboard. They were willing to give ear to a new brand of preacher who helped to stir up the wave of revivals known as the Second Great Awakening. This was more politically radical than the first. These prophets were not simply concerned with saving souls, but worked to shape society and religion in a way that was very different from anything envisaged by the Founders. The new revivalists were not learned men, like Jonathan Edwards and George Whitefield, who had studied at Yale and Oxford. They hated academia and insisted that all Christians had the right to interpret the Bible for themselves, without submitting to the theological experts. These prophets were not cultivated men; in their preaching they spoke in a way that ordinary people could understand, often using wild gestures along with earthy humor and slang. Their services were not polite and decorous, but noisy, rowdy, and highly emotional. They were recasting Christianity in a popular style that was light-years from the refined ethos of the Age of Reason. They held torchlight processions and mass rallies, and pitched huge tents outside the towns, so that the revivals took on the appearance of a vast campsite. The new genre of the Gospel Song transported the audience to ecstasy, so that they wept, rocked violently backward and forward, and shouted for joy. 70 Instead of making their religion rational, the prophets relied on dreams and visions, signs and wonders—all the things that were deplored by the scientists and philosophers of the Enlightenment. And yet, like the Jeffersonians, they refused to see the past as the repository of wisdom, conservative-wise. They were moderns. People should not be bound by learned traditions. They had the freedom of the sons of God, and, with common sense, relying on the plain facts of scripture, they could figure out the truth for themselves.

• From Satyricon (1)

  “The greatness of Rome was founded on the rare and almost incredible alliance of virtue and of fortune. The long period of her infancy was employed in a laborious struggle against the tribes of Italy, the neighbors and enemies of the rising city. In the strength and ardor of youth she sustained the storms of war, carried her victorious arms beyond the seas and the mountains, and brought home triumphal laurels from every country of the globe. At length, verging towards old age, and sometimes conquering by the terror only of her name, she sought the blessings of ease and tranquillity. The venerable city, which had trampled on the necks of the fiercest nations, and established a system of laws, the perpetual guardians of justice and freedom, was content, like a wise and wealthy parent, to devolve on the Caesars, her favorite sons, the care of governing her ample patrimony. A secure and profound peace, such as had been once enjoyed in the reign of Numa, succeeded to the tumults of a republic; while Rome was still adored as the queen of the earth, and the subject nations still reverenced the name of the people and the majesty of the senate. But this native splendor is degraded and sullied by the conduct of some nobles, who, unmindful of their own dignity, and of that of their country, assume an unbounded license of vice and folly. They contend with each other in the empty vanity of titles and surnames, and curiously select or invent the most lofty and sonorous appellations --Reburrus or Fabunius, Pagonius or Tarrasius--which may impress the ears of the vulgar with astonishment and respect. From a vain ambition of perpetuating their memory, they affect to multiply their likeness in statues of bronze and marble; nor are they satisfied unless those statues are covered with plates of gold, an honorable distinction, first granted to Achilius the consul, after he had subdued by his arms and counsels the power of King Antiochus. The ostentation of displaying, of magnifying perhaps, the rent-roll of the estates which they possess in all the provinces, from the rising to the setting sun, provokes the just resentment of every man who recollects that their poor and invincible ancestors were not distinguished from the meanest of the soldiers by the delicacy of their food or the splendor of their apparel. But the modern nobles measure their rank and consequence according to the loftiness of their chariots and the weighty magnificence of their dress. Their long robes of silk and purple float in the wind; and as they are agitated, by art or accident, they occasionally discover the under-garments, the rich tunics, embroidered with the figures of various animals.

• From Shunned (2018)

  Have you told your mom yet?” “That will happen tomorrow,” Ross said. “I’m taking her out for lunch.” “I’m sure she’ll be shocked,” Mom said, then turned back to me. “Lindy, that’s another horrible thing about this: it’s a scourge on Jehovah’s name and reflects poorly on our family. What will Elaine think when she finds out about this?” “I think she’ll be sad and feel protective of Ross and jump at the chance to support him,” I said. “I doubt she’ll give a second thought to Jehovah.” I was growing impatient with her predictable line of thinking. “It’s time for us to go,” I added. Everyone stood and hugged goodbye. It was difficult for me to read my father’s emotions, to tell if he was sad for me or disappointed in me, but when we embraced, he held on for a few extra moments. “Call your sister” were my mother’s parting words. [image "Images" file=Image00000.jpg] The next day, Lory called with an invitation. “Come over,” she said. “We’ll sit in the sunroom and you can tell me what’s going on.” I sensed her capacity to empathize with my unhappiness. My aching heart was drawn to her warmth and support. But there was only so much I could take in one week, and I told her I wouldn’t come until Saturday. That would give me time to recuperate from the polemic of the previous week. Ross and I found new ways to move around each other in the house. We were both considerate yet clumsy, experimenting with our independence, trying not to get in each other’s way. He started sleeping on a futon in his office. We stopped our occasional carpooling to work, and I left off calling to tell him when I’d be home or to discuss dinner plans. Tuesday night, I made a point of arriving home after he’d left for the Kingdom Hall. He’d left a note in the kitchen, encouraging me to eat the leftover chicken. I started a fire with a Presto log, and then I sat for a while, sipping a glass of wine, staring at the flames, my mind uncoiling with each flicker of light. After eating, I put Gloria Estefan on the stereo and danced in the living room to “Get on Your Feet,” replaying it several times until my clothes were damp with perspiration. I relished the huge release of energy and felt just as spiritual as—and much happier than—I would have felt sitting through another Bible lesson. By the time Ross came home, I was fast asleep in bed. Chapter 7 [image "Images" file=Image00000.jpg] I’m not intolerant. I just know what it says in the Scriptures. —Jesse Helms M y sister’s home was tucked behind another house on Oak Street, just a few blocks from my parents’. I walked down the short paved sidewalk and entered through the back door. I found Lory in the bathroom.

• From Shunned (2018)

  The waitress set down our plates of salad, quiche, and beef burgundy. “I’ve spent more time on this than anyone else on the team, so the owner of the agency asked me to go. He thought it would be nice for me to meet the client, and he knew I had a daughter in Chicago. Of course, he has no idea of our situation and I’m sure the work will be piled high on my desk Monday morning.” Our situation. Yes, we definitely have a situation. We started eating. “You’d better be careful of too much business travel,” I teased, hoping she’d get the joke. “It puts you in contact with all sorts of worldly people, and before you know it you’re letting your guard down. Then any number of untoward things can happen.” “Yes, I’ve observed this phenomenon.” She rolled her eyes, mildly disgusted. Then she set down her fork, signaling the end of small talk. “Listen, sweetheart,” she said, “I’m really happy to see you. Everyone in the family misses you so much. Our dinners just aren’t the same without you. And things will not be the same until you come back. I know you probably want to hear news about everyone, but I’m going to tell you only that everyone is healthy and doing well. If you want to know more, you’re going to have to make things right with Jehovah first.” I slowly chewed my last bite of food, then swallowed hard as I absorbed this last stipulation. The one thing I’d wanted was being withheld. “Then why did you come here, Mother? If you won’t come to my home or share any family news, why are you here?” My voice was shaky, hysteria bubbling just below the surface. “Why?” “Oh, Lindy, I told your dad I couldn’t come this close to Chicago and not see you. And since I don’t plan on making a practice of seeing you, I told myself it was understandable, even forgivable. I wanted to see you with my own eyes and perhaps talk some sense into you.” Her hands were resting on her lap, and her jaw was clenched. “I see. So, are you counting your time? Will this show up on this month’s field ministry report for Ruth Tucker?” “No, Lindy, of course not. You know this is hard for Dad and me, but especially for me. You are my daughter, and I thought we would have all this time together. Whenever we go to the assemblies, people still ask about you. ‘How’s Lindy?’ ‘Have you heard from Lindy?’ And we never have good news to share with them.” She looked down at the hands in her lap. “Have you ever thought, Mom, about how hard this has been for me?

• From Martin Luther (2016)

  Then in early 1517, he had unilaterally nominated and confirmed a priest to the benefice at Orlamünde, a parish directly subject to the foundation of All Saints. Friedrich had taken umbrage because Karlstadt had not asked his permission; the Elector even threatened that if he did not back down, he would appoint someone else and pay him from Karlstadt’s income. Relations were strained for some time thereafter. 5 And they were strained within the foundation of All Saints, too. Although Karlstadt’s position as archdeacon was well paid, it involved spending a good deal of time saying Masses and officiating at church services, which he found difficult to combine with his academic pursuits. He had therefore long nursed the ambition to gain one of the highest-paid benefices, such as the office of provost of the foundation. He secured the doctorate in law that was necessary for the provostship, spending the years of 1515 and 1516 in Rome and Siena. Alienating the Elector yet again, Karlstadt’s Italian sojourn had lasted far longer than the agreed four months, he failed to provide a replacement at All Saints during his absence, and he returned only when the provost threatened to imprison him. Money troubles apparently dogged him, and he had a ghoulish habit of lobbying for the benefices of recently deceased clerics. 6 He also had a weakness for fine clothes. Luther remembered that when Karlstadt returned from Italy, he sported strikingly beautiful outfits, and when in mid-1521 he was to be sent on a mission to Denmark, he asked for the chapter to provide him with a “damask gown trimmed with a good lining” and even a gown in black or purple—the most expensive colors—so that he would be worthy to appear before the Danish king. 7 Karlstadt was therefore in the unenviable position of being financially dependent upon the Elector, yet finding himself caught in positions where he had to assert himself against his ruler’s authority. The relationship with Luther was also complicated. Karlstadt, three years younger than Luther, had arrived at Wittenberg in 1507, and his first tract, De intentionibus, published in the same year, was also the first major book to be published by a member of the Wittenberg faculty. Christoph Scheurl lauded it in an oration at All Saints: “If we had a lot of Karlstadts, I think we could easily…be a match for the Parisians.” A convinced Thomist at the time, Karlstadt was the new star of the university, and with the patronage of the rector, Martin Pollich von Mellerstadt, soon became archdeacon of All Saints. The archdeaconry also involved university duties, and Karlstadt speedily rose to the position of dean of theology. In this role he had taken Luther’s doctoral oath in 1512, presiding at his doctoral disputation. He was an aspirational humanist, too, with one humanist visitor to Wittenberg praising him as a “very famous philosopher, orator, poet and theologian.” Between 1517 and 1521, however, Luther’s reputation eclipsed Karlstadt’s almost completely.

• From Martin Luther (2016)

  7. Some of Luther’s discomfort over the exchange at the inn is evident in the letter of advice he wrote Wolfgang Stein in Weimar, who was to interview Karlstadt. He should admonish him that the guilder meant nothing, because he had always done as he pleased, so why should he seek favor now? If he were to allege that he was being prevented from debating, he should be asked why he didn’t engage in debating and arguing at Wittenberg, fulfilling the duties of his university office. WB 3, 774, early September 1524: Luther seems determined not to allow it to appear as if Karlstadt had been given permission to publish. Instead he stuck to his view that the exchange was a declaration of enmity, writing in Against the Heavenly Prophets, Part 1 of late December 1524, “Dr. Andreas Karlstadt has deserted us, and on top of that has become our worst enemy”; LW 40, 79; WS 18, 62:6–7. 8. WB 3, 785, Oct. 27, 1524. Reinhard was ordered to leave Jena; Luther told Amsdorf that he had begged in the church for money, weeping; WB 3, 811, Dec. 29, 1524; Luther, who did not trust Reinhard, wanted him expelled from Nuremberg. 9. Furcha, ed. and trans., Carlstadt, 161–62; Karlstadt, Was gesagt ist, fo. F i (r). 10. Sider, Karlstadt, 174–97; the legality of Karlstadt’s calling was bitterly disputed by Luther. See also Barge, Karlstadt, II, 95–143. 11. Furcha, ed. and trans., Carlstadt, 369–70; Karlstadt, Anzeyg, fo. F (r). LW 40, 117; WS 18, 100:27–29. 12. Barge, Karlstadt, II, 97; Sider, Karlstadt, 183–87; he paid people to pick grapes and employed others to make hay. 13. WB 3, 818, Jan. 18, 1525. 14. WB 3, 702, Jan. 18, 1524; 720, March 14, 1524, where he repeated the joke. 15. Furcha, ed. and trans., Carlstadt, 134; Karlstadt, Was gesagt ist, fo. A ii (r). 16. In his Latin liturgy for the Mass of 1523, however, Luther reinstituted Communion in both kinds; WS 12, 197–220; 217. This still stuck quite closely to the format of the Mass, retained the elevation, kept the words of institution in Latin, and involved a good deal of chant, including of the gospel. The use of incense and the lighting of candles when the gospel was read was permitted. Luther did not institute a German Mass until 1526. 17. LW 40, 116; WS 18, 99:20–21. 18. Although Luther attacked Karlstadt for taking on a parish where he had no calling, Karlstadt had in fact been careful to gain the duke’s approval, and the congregation had also formally called him. 19. WB 3, 818, Jan. 18, 1525 (Glatz to Luther).

• From Martin Luther (2016)

  This made it much more difficult for a populist movement based around religious conviction to gain traction there again. It marked the end of distinctive versions of evangelicalism in Augsburg, Ulm, Strasbourg, and a host of other cities, though it would not mean the permanent obliteration of alternatives to the Lutheran model. In Geneva, Calvin would develop his theocratic vision of a reformed community, an inspiration for a new generation. 72. Lucas Cranach the Elder, Martin Luther, 1548. This woodcut portrait produced after Luther’s death shows his bulky frame as authoritative and comforting. In the German lands, Charles V imposed on May 15, 1548, the “Interim,” a settlement that required Lutheran preachers to accept many traditional Catholic practices, including the existence of seven sacraments, although it did permit married clergy and Communion in both kinds. It split the Lutheran movement between those who were willing to compromise and those who were not. Many preachers went into exile. Long-standing divisions among the Lutheran leadership also became evident, as Melanchthon was prepared to reach an accord while Amsdorf angrily rejected any deviation from what he saw as Luther’s legacy. The tensions that had long underlain the alliance between Luther and Melanchthon began to play themselves out in public; Luther was no longer there to arbitrate and balance the opposing factions, and Melanchthon lacked both the authority and the personal charisma to lead. The movement started to splinter. 73. Lucas Cranach the Younger, Martin Luther, 1553. This was also part of Luther’s legacy, because, though he opposed the hierarchy of the papal Church, he had not created an institutional structure to replace it. While his 1539 tract On the Councils and the Churches had grandly rejected conciliarism, it failed to detail how his new Church should function, or what the relationship should be between the individual congregation and the Church as a whole. No overall organization constrained the haphazardly created “superintendents,” who were, as Luther recognized, bishops in all but name. Lutheran preachers, subordinate to the secular authorities who paid their salaries, now had to plot their own course through the doctrinal wars and wishes of the local political powers; if they modeled their behavior on Luther’s prophetic mode, they often found that charisma availed little against local authorities. Adulating Luther, the movement also saddled itself with a model of preacherly authority that encouraged each local pastor to counter anything he considered a deviation in doctrine as though it would open the door to the Devil—a recipe for acerbic, public argument. Luther’s personal network had enabled him to place “his” men in parishes all over north and central Germany, even as far as Denmark, Bohemia, and Poland, and had given him the ear of many rulers and princes, but this network died with the personal authority that had generated it.

• From Shunned (2018)

  “Do we really need to hear the long version of the story about how you landed the ‘big sale’ for the Overhead Door Company?” I realized this was a very condescending thing to say but said it anyway, like the bitch he had accused me of being. “Erik and Marie loved that story, especially the punch line,” he said, leaning back, both hands resting on the steering wheel. “Linda, you are not allowed to make fun of my work. I don’t make light of what you do, running all around the country, thinking you’re better than me. That’s not okay. Especially in front of our good friends.” His eyes were watery. I took a few deep breaths but couldn’t ignore the miasma of frustration and sadness hanging between us. I wiped a tear from my cheek. Ross was looking straight ahead. We were headed in a direction I wasn’t ready to go in, and I wanted to slow things down, to escape. “I’m sorry,” I said, my voice lower. “You’re right. I acted like a child.” “Linda,” Ross said, turning in his seat to face me, “do you still love me?” His directness startled me. He was looking right at me, holding my gaze. “Of course I love you, Ross,” I said, putting my hand on his. “Of course.” But I had paused too long, giving him time to read the truth behind my eyes. [image "Images" file=Image00000.jpg] It was a perfect day for a barbecue. We had been asked to bring a blueberry cheesecake, a bottle of wine, and a six-pack of 7UP to Jerry and Julia Mendez’s for a going-away party. Scott Chapman had realized his boyhood dream of being accepted into Bethel, the worldwide headquarters of Jehovah’s Witnesses in Brooklyn, New York. The entire congregation was very proud of him, especially those who had watched him mature from a snot-nosed punk into a handsome, articulate young man of nineteen. It was difficult to find a parking space. The streets were filled with the cars of Scott’s well-wishers. “We should have come earlier,” Ross said, wedging the car into a narrow space four blocks from the party. “Excuse me,” I replied, “but I don’t recall you offering to help make this dessert.” It was Sunday, so our morning had been consumed attending the two-hour service at the Kingdom Hall. After we’d shopped for ingredients and arrived home, we’d had just enough time to assemble the cheesecake and allow it to set in the fridge. Ross used that time to watch sports on TV; I pulled out my laptop and composed a letter to an important client. During that day’s sermon, my mind had drifted to a complex business proposal I’d been formulating with my boss, and the perfect words to describe it had come to me. I’d written it down on the back cover of my Watchtower and was happy to have captured it in a typed document.

• From Shunned (2018)

  She had her troubles and went outside her first marriage, causing all sorts of problems for herself. But she took her licks and got back on the straight and narrow. Look at her now, happy, living in a beautiful home, married to a good man.” The idea of living my sister’s life made me shudder—it was the life I’d spent the last year escaping. “It was a long, tough road back to ‘good standing,’” Lory said, twisting herself around from the front seat to face me. “But you’re a lot stronger than I am. If I can do it, you can, too.” “You can come back home,” Mom said. “You can live with us; we’ll support you on the condition that you start attending meetings again.” Dad was watching my face in the rearview mirror. I tried to keep my face blank. I didn’t want to seem ungrateful for the offer, but it was the furthest thing from my mind. I was a few weeks shy of my thirty-third birthday. I had a good job and good prospects. But more than anything, I had my freedom. Under these circumstances, why would I move home? Once again, I felt entirely misunderstood. All support from them was conditional: a shared religion. They refused to see any other path for me. I wanted to laugh out loud, giddy from the absurdity of it all, but I knew that would mock their desperation. “Listen, everyone,” I said, glancing out the window, grateful to see we had just turned onto the airport exit. “I appreciate your offer, really I do, but that’s not going to happen. My life is in Chicago now. Coming back to Portland is inconceivable. It just feels like I’d be going backward.” Mom looked away, out the window, collecting herself. “Just keep it in mind.” She paused and turned back to face me. “And don’t be too haughty when you meet with the elders.” We all knew I was doomed. I’d meet with the elders, and I’d get disfellowshipped. We were resting in the final moments of togetherness, and I felt compelled to talk about that future. “I wish you could understand my point of view, but I see that isn’t possible. I hope we can keep in touch somehow.” The words were coming out strong and clear. I marveled at my equanimity. “And if you ever need anything, you can always ask me.” Mom looked blankly at me. Dad kept his eyes on the road. It was Lory who spoke, still twisted around, her hand holding the back of the seat to keep herself in place. “I assure you, if we ever need anything, you’re not someone we would come to for help.” She let go with her hand and turned to face the road. We drove the last few miles in silence, until Dad slowed and stopped at the curb.

• From Martin Luther (2016)

  Then in early 1517, he had unilaterally nominated and confirmed a priest to the benefice at Orlamünde, a parish directly subject to the foundation of All Saints. Friedrich had taken umbrage because Karlstadt had not asked his permission; the Elector even threatened that if he did not back down, he would appoint someone else and pay him from Karlstadt’s income. Relations were strained for some time thereafter. 5 And they were strained within the foundation of All Saints, too. Although Karlstadt’s position as archdeacon was well paid, it involved spending a good deal of time saying Masses and officiating at church services, which he found difficult to combine with his academic pursuits. He had therefore long nursed the ambition to gain one of the highest-paid benefices, such as the office of provost of the foundation. He secured the doctorate in law that was necessary for the provostship, spending the years of 1515 and 1516 in Rome and Siena. Alienating the Elector yet again, Karlstadt’s Italian sojourn had lasted far longer than the agreed four months, he failed to provide a replacement at All Saints during his absence, and he returned only when the provost threatened to imprison him. Money troubles apparently dogged him, and he had a ghoulish habit of lobbying for the benefices of recently deceased clerics. 6 He also had a weakness for fine clothes. Luther remembered that when Karlstadt returned from Italy, he sported strikingly beautiful outfits, and when in mid-1521 he was to be sent on a mission to Denmark, he asked for the chapter to provide him with a “damask gown trimmed with a good lining” and even a gown in black or purple—the most expensive colors—so that he would be worthy to appear before the Danish king. 7 Karlstadt was therefore in the unenviable position of being financially dependent upon the Elector, yet finding himself caught in positions where he had to assert himself against his ruler’s authority. The relationship with Luther was also complicated. Karlstadt, three years younger than Luther, had arrived at Wittenberg in 1507, and his first tract, De intentionibus, published in the same year, was also the first major book to be published by a member of the Wittenberg faculty. Christoph Scheurl lauded it in an oration at All Saints: “If we had a lot of Karlstadts, I think we could easily…be a match for the Parisians.” A convinced Thomist at the time, Karlstadt was the new star of the university, and with the patronage of the rector, Martin Pollich von Mellerstadt, soon became archdeacon of All Saints. The archdeaconry also involved university duties, and Karlstadt speedily rose to the position of dean of theology. In this role he had taken Luther’s doctoral oath in 1512, presiding at his doctoral disputation. He was an aspirational humanist, too, with one humanist visitor to Wittenberg praising him as a “very famous philosopher, orator, poet and theologian.” Between 1517 and 1521, however, Luther’s reputation eclipsed Karlstadt’s almost completely.

• From The Battle for God (2000)

  For decades, the more conservative religious people who felt, for different reasons, slighted, oppressed, and even persecuted by their secular governments, had been seething with resentment. Many had withdrawn from modern society to create a sacred reservation of pure faith. Convinced that they were in danger of being wiped out by regimes committed to their destruction, they felt embattled and defensive. They had evolved ideologies to mobilize the faithful in a struggle for survival. Surrounded by social forces that were either indifferent to religion or hostile to it, they had developed a siege mentality that could easily tip over into aggression. By the mid-1970s, the time was ripe. All had become aware of their strength, and were convinced that a crisis was at hand and that they were facing a unique moment in their history. All were determined to change the world before it changed them. In their view, history had taken a fatal turn; everything was awry. They now lived in societies which had either marginalized or excluded God, and they were ready to re-sacralize the world. Secularists must abandon their proud self-reliance, which made man the measure of all things, and acknowledge the sovereignty of the divine. Secularist observers had, for the most part, been unaware of this religious reaction. The various societies had become so polarized that liberals in the United States or Westernized secularists in a country such as Iran tended to underestimate the religious counterculture that had been developing over the years. They were wrong to imagine that this aggressive piety belonged to the old world; these were modern forms of faith that were often highly innovative, ready to jettison centuries of tradition. At the same time as the fundamentalists, in all three religions, had rejected modernity, they had also been influenced by modern ideas and enthusiasms. But they had a lot to learn. These early offensives represented the glory days of the fundamentalist era, but, as we shall see in the following chapter, it is very difficult for a religiously inspired movement to retain its integrity once it has entered the plural, rational, and pragmatic world of modern politics. A revolution against tyranny could become tyrannical in its turn; a campaign to abolish the separations of modernity in order to achieve an integrated, holistic state could become totalitarian; the translation of the mythical, messianic, or mystical visions of the fundamentalists into political logoi was dangerous. But at first, fundamentalists felt that after decades of humiliation and oppression they carried all before them and that they would indeed reconquer the world for God. The Iranian Revolution was the event that first drew the attention of the world to the fundamentalist potential, but it was not the first movement to make a successful venture into the world of politics.

• From Martin Luther (2016)

  The phrase echoed Luther’s insistence before Worms that he had not been given a hearing, and that he had not been proved wrong by Scripture. 40. WB 3, 785, Oct. 27, 1524, 361:13–14. 41. Burnett, Karlstadt, 68, 143–47; Martin Reinhart had Karlstadt’s work published in Nuremberg but was exiled from there, getting the Dialogue finally finished in Bamberg. 42. Barge, Karlstadt, II, 18; Gerhard Westerburg, Vom Fegefewer vnd Standt der verscheyden selen eyn Christliche Meynung, Cologne 1523 [VD 16 W2215]. It opens with a dedication letter to the mayor and council of Cologne. Publication in Cologne was very important because it was the gateway to the Netherlands, and three thousand copies were reportedly sent on there. It was published in Augsburg as well. On the preaching visit, Barge, Karlstadt, II, 20–21. 43. WB 3 887, June 11, 1525, 527:2, Paul Speratus to Luther, describing the arrival of Martin Cellarius in Königsberg. See also WB 3, 756, July 4, 1524. Cornelius Hoen in the Netherlands and Franz Kolb at Wertheim had already written to Luther arguing similar sacramental positions (WS 15, 384); Luther wrote complaining of the number of people taking Karlstadt’s position in late 1524; WB 3, 793, Nov. 17, 1524 and WB 3, 802, Dec. 2, 1524; 817, Jan. 13, 1525. See Barge, Karlstadt, II, 144–296. 44. WB 3, 796, Nov. 22, 1524; 797, Nov. 23, 1524; and Gerbel reported that in Strasbourg Karlstadt was blaming Luther for his expulsion, complaining that he had been neither heard nor warned. 45. WB 3, 858, Strasbourg, April(?) 1525, 477:29–31. 46. Valentin Ickelsamer, Clag ettlicher Brieder, an alle Christen, von der großen Ungerechtigkeyt und Tyranney, so Endressen Bodenstein…vom Luther…gechicht [Augsburg] [1525] [VD 16 I 32]. Ickelsamer was a supporter of Karlstadt. 47. LW 40, 204; WS 18, 194. Luther also accuses Karlstadt of “envy and vain ambition,” and “envious hatred,” in Against the Heavenly Prophets, and, in an extended passage, accuses him of being subservient to “Frau Hulda,” or Reason, a capricious elfin figure of folklore. Natural reason, Luther argues, is “the Devil’s prostitute,” and he condemns Karlstadt as a clever sophist who cannot see the plain meaning of Scripture, “This is my body.” For his part, Karlstadt would accuse Luther of delighting in trying to make him feel “gramschaft/neyd/hass/vngnad” (anxiety, envy, hatred, and disgrace), Anzeyg, fo. E [iv] (v). 48. WS 15, 391–97, Dec. 14–15, 1525. 49. WS 15, 384, Dec. 31, 1524 (Capito to Zwingli). 50. WS 15, 394:12–17; 24; in typical fashion, Luther argued that the more Karlstadt “schwermet” (enthused) about the idea that there was no Real Presence, the stronger Luther’s conviction that he was wrong. 51. WB 3, 779, Oct. 3, 1524, 354:15. A year later, writing about Duke Georg, and echoing his earlier language, Luther compared him to Karlstadt, who along with the sacramentarians were “the sons of my womb”; WB 4, 973, Jan. 20, 1526, 18:7. This was powerful language indeed. 52. WS 18, 66:19–20. 53.

• From Martin Luther (2016)

  Luther, however, soon became convinced that Müntzer was dangerous, and his writings from the summer on are peppered with references to the “spirit of Allstedt.” In late July 1524, worried that the authorities were not intervening, he published his Letter to the Princes of Saxony Concerning the Rebellious Spirit . 24 Luther reminded the worldly rulers that false sects have always attacked Christendom, and linked Müntzer with violence and rebellion. He also proclaimed that all those who destroy images are driven not by the “spirit,” as they claim, but by the Devil—an argument that implicitly bracketed Karlstadt with Müntzer. Luther did not name either man, referring only to the “spirit of Allstedt,” but the term could be seen to include Karlstadt’s theology. After all, both men prized Gelassenheit, although Müntzer, who knew the insecure life of a clerical proletarian, placed far more emphasis on suffering as part of the process through which the believer found God. Both had created godly parishes, removed images, and reformed the liturgy, and they had corresponded with each other. Karlstadt too had argued that the letter of Scripture was worthless without the spirit, and that academic theology was not the path to truth. As he had told Müntzer in 1522: “I have said more about visions and dreams than any of the professors.” 25 These people, Luther argued, claim to be so spiritually superior, but they had not fought the Pope as he had. To underline the point, he provided a brief autobiography, including his debate at Leipzig and his appearances at Augsburg and Worms, 26 presenting himself as the sole Reformation hero while obliterating Karlstadt altogether. The Allstedtian spirits were profiting from Luther’s victories “though they have done no battle for it and risked no bloodshed to attain it. But I have had to attain it for them and, until now, at the risk of my body and my life.” 27 In a rhetorical tour de force, Luther here made the touchstone of truth his own physical existence, his preparedness to put his “body and life” on the line. He equated the evangelical movement with the narrative of his own deeds, even with his physical being. This had already been evident in the words attributed to him at Worms: “Here I stand”—his body implacably the guarantee of his truth and commitment. Karlstadt’s brush with danger, as Luther well knew, could hardly stand comparison with his own. Yet the “martyr’s crown” was important to both men. It had been the prospect of martyrdom that had impelled Karlstadt’s heightened understanding of Gelassenheit, and with it, the unfolding of his mystical theology. However, by “spirit”—so important to his understanding of how the Bible should be read—Karlstadt did not mean the spirit of violence, but the spirit of God with which the soul should seek union, through Gelassenheit, and in preparedness for martyrdom.

• From Martin Luther (2016)

  He pointedly did not correspond with him from the Wartburg and he wanted Melanchthon to become the leader of the movement in Wittenberg, a snub to the older and more experienced man. In fact, Melanchthon turned out to be less clear-thinking, more mercurial, and less constant. 56 Yet there is no sign that Luther blamed Karlstadt for what had happened in Wittenberg until after his return from the Wartburg. Then he rapidly personalized developments: It had all been the fault of Zwilling and Karlstadt. Their headstrong preaching had caused the populace to riot and had undermined civic order. This was of course the line that the forces of reaction—the conservative canons of All Saints—had been pushing for some time, presenting minor disruptions of church services as serious breaches of public order. As Luther set about restoring this “order,” his indebtedness to them became clear. He repeated their slur about people taking the sacrament after drinking brandy, although he had them drinking after they had taken Communion; and he told the story about the hosts that dropped on the floor, exclaiming that the sacrament was treated with such disrespect “that it is a surprise that thunder and lightning didn’t strike you into the ground.” Taking the wafer in your hands, Luther reckoned, does not make one a good Christian—at that rate, a sow would be the perfect Christian because it could pick it up with its snout. 57 Zwilling rapidly fell into line. He apologized and recanted so fully that Luther recommended him to Altenburg for a post as pastor, getting him safely out of the way but putting him under the Elector’s supervision in a town dominated by one of Friedrich’s castles. That left Karlstadt alone with his head in the noose, as he later put it. 58 The ban on preaching, to which Karlstadt had already agreed, was reinforced and when he tried to publish, he found the university censor would not permit him to have his work printed. 59 It is hard to resist the conclusion that Karlstadt was a convenient scapegoat. While Luther forgave Zwilling with remarkable speed, he did not readily forgive Karlstadt, to whom he had been much closer. In Luther’s narrative the events in Wittenberg were transformed into the story of a broken friendship, and a personal betrayal by Karlstadt. He was the first in what would become a long line of former acolytes who were seen to have betrayed their leader. There is something chilling about the no-holds-barred nature of Luther’s hatred. In the Invocavit Sermons, he had refrained from criticizing Karlstadt directly, but there is no mistaking the note of sarcasm as he called his former colleague “Dr. Karlstadt.”

• From The Battle for God (2000)

  In March 1979, the government established five regional councils on the West Bank with the power to levy taxes, supply services, and employ workers. Gush members usually had key roles, even though they now supplied only 20 percent of the West Bank settlers. 17 They had become in effect state officials, but their years of confrontation had made the Gush skeptical of government, however friendly, and after the Likud victory, members established Armana (“Covenant”) to organize and unify their own settlement activities, and Moetzet Yesha, a council of Gush settlements, to give them some independence. The Gush were right to be skeptical, for the honeymoon with Likud was short. On November 20, 1977, President Anwar Sadat of Egypt made his historic journey to Jerusalem to initiate a peace process and, the following year, Begin and Sadat signed the Camp David Accords. Israel would return the Sinai peninsula, conquered in 1967, to Egypt and, in return, Egypt recognized the State of Israel and guaranteed security along their common borders. The Accords looked forward to a “Framework for Peace,” possible future negotiations between Israel, Egypt, Jordan, and the “representatives of the Palestinian people” about the future of the West Bank and the Gaza Strip. On both sides, Camp David was a pragmatic agreement. Egypt got important territory back, and Israel gained a measure of peace. The Sinai was not sacred land; it was not included within the borders of the Promised Land described in the Bible. Begin had always been adamant that there was no question of returning the West Bank to the Arabs; he was also confident that the Framework for Peace discussions would never happen, since no other Arab state would countenance them. On the day the Camp David treaty was signed, Begin announced that the government would establish twenty new settlements on the West Bank. This did not appease the religious Zionists, the Gush Emunim, or the Israeli right in general. On October 8, 1979, the new Tehiya (“Renaissance”) party was officially launched, with the blessing of Rabbi Kook, to fight Camp David and prevent further territorial concessions. Religious and secular radicals now worked together in the same political party. In 1981, the Kookist and former Gahelet member Haim Drukman founded his own Morasha (“Heritage”) party to press for more West Bank settlement. For the Gush, Camp David was no peace. They pointed out the etymological connection between the words shalom (“peace”) and shlemut (“wholeness”): true peace meant territorial integrity and the preservation of the complete land of Israel. There could be no compromise. As Gush rabbi Eleazar Waldman explained, Israel was engaged in a battle against evil, on which hung the fate of the entire world: The Redemption is not only the Redemption of Israel, but the Redemption of the whole world.

• From The Battle for God (2000)

  They were officially known as conversos (“converts”), though the Christians called them Marranos (“pigs”), a term of abuse which some of the converts adopted as a badge of pride. The rabbis warned Jews against conversion, but at first the “New Christians,” as the conversos were called, became wealthy and successful. Some became high-ranking priests, others married into the best families, and many achieved spectacular success in commerce. This brought new problems, since the “Old Christians” resented the upward mobility of the new Jewish Christians. Between 1449 and 1474, there were frequent riots against the Marranos, who were killed, had their property destroyed, or were driven out of town. 5 Ferdinand and Isabella were alarmed by this development. The conversion of the Jews was not drawing their united kingdom together but instead causing fresh divisions. The monarchs were also disturbed to hear reports that some of the “New Christians” had lapsed, returned to the old faith, and lived as secret Jews. They had, it was said, formed an underground movement to entice other conversos back into the Jewish fold. Inquisitors were instructed to hunt out these closet Jews, who, it was thought, could be recognized by such practices as refusing to eat pork or to work on Saturday. Suspects were tortured until they confessed to infidelity, and gave information about other secret “Judaizers.” As a result, some 13,000 conversos were killed by the Inquisition during the first twelve years of its existence. But in fact many of those who were thus killed or imprisoned, or had their property confiscated, were loyal Catholics who had no Judaizing tendencies at all. The experience not unnaturally made many of the conversos bitter and skeptical of their new faith. 6 When Ferdinand and Isabella conquered Granada in 1492, they inherited a new and substantial Jewish population in that city-state. The situation, they decided, had got out of hand, and as a final solution to the Jewish problem, the monarchs signed the Edict of Expulsion. Spanish Jewry was destroyed. About 70,000 Jews converted to Christianity, and stayed on to be plagued by the Inquisition; the remaining 130,000, as we have seen, went into exile. The loss of Spanish Jewry was mourned by Jews all over the world as the greatest catastrophe to have befallen their people since the destruction of the Temple in Jerusalem in 70 CE, when the Jews lost their land and were forced into exile in scattered communities outside Palestine, known collectively as the Diaspora. From that time on, exile was a painful leitmotif of Jewish life.

• From The Battle for God (2000)

  But when Qutb converted the mythos of the Prophet’s life into an ideology, he inevitably simplified it, limited its spiritual potential, and cut it down to size. He removed the complexities, ambiguities, and contradictions of the Prophet’s personal, multi-faceted struggle, to create the kind of streamlined program that a modern ideology requires, but in the process, the ruthless selection that this involved inevitably distorted the Islamic vision. Qutb saw the Prophet’s career proceeding in four stages; to re-create a rightly guided community in the twentieth century, Muslims must also go through this four-fold process. 23 First God had revealed his plan to one man, Muhammad, who then went on to form a jamaah, a party of committed individuals who vowed to fulfill God’s command and replace the jahiliyyah of Mecca with a just, egalitarian society that recognized only the sovereignty of God. During this first phase, Muhammad trained this vanguard to separate themselves from the pagan jahili establishment, which operated on quite a different set of values. Like other fundamentalists, Qutb saw the policy of dissociation (mafasalah) as crucial. The Prophet’s program showed that society was divided into two utterly opposed camps. Muslims today, Qutb urged, must also reject the jahiliyyah of their own age and withdraw from it to create a pure Muslim enclave. They could, and indeed should, be courteous to unbelievers and apostates in their society, but should keep contacts to a minimum and in general pursue a policy of noncooperation in such crucial matters as education. 24 This segregation of the faithful from the jahili mainstream intensified in the Prophet’s life when the pagan establishment of Mecca began to persecute the small Muslim community and eventually forced them in 622 to undertake the migration (hijrah) to the settlement of Medina, some 250 miles north of Mecca. Eventually there must be a complete rupture between the true believers and the rest of their Godless society. In Medina, during the third stage of his program, the Prophet established an Islamic state. It was a period of consolidation, brotherly affirmation, and integration, when the jamaah prepared itself for the coming struggle. In the fourth and final stage of the program, Muhammad initiated a period of armed struggle against Mecca, at first in small-scale raids against the Meccan trading caravans, and then by sustaining the attacks of the Meccan army. Given the polarization of this society, the violence was inevitable, as it was for Muslims today. But eventually in 630, Mecca voluntarily opened its gates to Muhammad and accepted the rule of Islam and the sovereignty of God.

• From The Battle for God (2000)

  For decades, the more conservative religious people who felt, for different reasons, slighted, oppressed, and even persecuted by their secular governments, had been seething with resentment. Many had withdrawn from modern society to create a sacred reservation of pure faith. Convinced that they were in danger of being wiped out by regimes committed to their destruction, they felt embattled and defensive. They had evolved ideologies to mobilize the faithful in a struggle for survival. Surrounded by social forces that were either indifferent to religion or hostile to it, they had developed a siege mentality that could easily tip over into aggression. By the mid-1970s, the time was ripe. All had become aware of their strength, and were convinced that a crisis was at hand and that they were facing a unique moment in their history. All were determined to change the world before it changed them. In their view, history had taken a fatal turn; everything was awry. They now lived in societies which had either marginalized or excluded God, and they were ready to re-sacralize the world. Secularists must abandon their proud self- reliance, which made man the measure of all things, and acknowledge the sovereignty of the divine. Secularist observers had, for the most part, been unaware of this religious reaction. The various societies had become so polarized that liberals in the United States or Westernized secularists in a country such as Iran tended to underestimate the religious counterculture that had been developing over the years. They were wrong to imagine that this aggressive piety belonged to the old world; these were modern forms of faith that were often highly innovative, ready to jettison centuries of tradition. At the same time as the fundamentalists, in all three religions, had rejected modernity, they had also been influenced by modern ideas and enthusiasms. But they had a lot to learn. These early offensives represented the glory days of the fundamentalist era, but, as we shall see in the following chapter, it is very difficult for a religiously inspired movement to retain its integrity once it has entered the plural, rational, and pragmatic world of modern politics. A revolution against tyranny could become tyrannical in its turn; a campaign to abolish the separations of modernity in order to achieve an integrated, holistic state could become totalitarian; the translation of the mythical, messianic, or mystical visions of the fundamentalists into political logoi was dangerous. But at first, fundamentalists felt that after decades of humiliation and oppression they carried all before them and that they would indeed reconquer the world for God. The Iranian Revolution was the event that first drew the attention of the world to the fundamentalist potential, but it was not the first movement to make a successful venture into the world of politics.

• From The Battle for God (2000)

  The Iranian Revolution of 1978–79 was a watershed. It was an inspiration to thousands of Muslims all over the world, who had long felt that their religion was under attack. Khomeini’s victory showed that Islam was not destined for destruction; it could take on powerful secularist forces and win. But the Revolution filled many in the West with horror and dismay. Barbarism seemed to have triumphed over Enlightenment. For many committed secularists, Khomeini and Iran would come to typify all that was wrong—and even evil—in religion, not least because the Revolution revealed the hatred that so many Iranians felt for the West in general and America in particular. In the early 1970s, Iran seemed to be booming. American investors and the Iranian elite alike both made a great deal of money out of the new businesses and industries created by the White Revolution. The American embassy in Tehran, far from being a center of espionage (as the revolutionaries would claim) was more like a brokerage center to put rich Americans in touch with rich Iranians. 49 But—again—it was only the elite that benefited. The state had grown rich, but the people had grown poorer. There was rampant consumerism in the upper echelons of society, and corruption and deprivation among the petty bourgeoisie and the urban poor. After the oil price increase in 1973–74, there was tremendous inflation, owing to lack of investment opportunity for all but the very wealthy. A million people were unemployed, many of the smaller merchants had been ruined by the influx of foreign goods, and by 1977 inflation had even begun to affect the rich. In this climate of discontent and desperation, the two major guerrilla organizations became active, assassinating American military personnel and advisers. There was much resentment of the American expatriates in Iran, who seemed to be profiting from the disastrous mess. During these years too, the shah’s regime became more tyrannical and autocratic than ever. 50 Many disaffected Iranians looked to the ulema, who responded to the crisis in different ways. In Qum, Ayatollah Shariatmadari, the most senior mujtahid, opposed any political confrontation with the regime, though he was anxious to see the 1906 constitution restored. Ayatollah Taleqani, who had been jailed many times for demanding a strict application of the constitution and protesting against the excesses of the regime, worked alongside such lay reformers as Mehdi Bazargan and Abolhassan Bani Sadr, who wanted to see an Islamic republic in Iran but not clerical rule. Taleqani did not believe that the clergy should have any privileged role in government; he certainly did not agree with Khomeini’s vision of Velayat-e Faqih, government by a charismatic jurist. 51 But Khomeini was still a symbol of steadfast and unbowed resistance to the regime. In June 1975, the students of the Fayziyyah Madrasah staged a demonstration to mark the anniversary of Khomeini’s arrest there in 1963. The police invaded the building, using tear gas, and killed one of the students by throwing him off the roof.