The Last of the Mohicans — A Brief Review

The Last of the Mohicans — A Brief Review
Lon Clay Hill, Jr.
[25 June 2019]

The Book:
James Fenimore Cooper (1826) The Last of the Mohicans; A Narrative of 1757 (2 vols). Philadelphia: HC Carey & I. Lea.
James Fenimore Cooper (1983) The Last of the Mohicans; Introduction by Wayne Franklin. Belknap Press of Harvard University: Cambridge, MA, USA & London, England. xxxii+478 pages, paper.


James Fenimore Cooper’s The Last of the Mohicans is a book I read in high school (1954-1957) following a suggestion by my English teacher. I recently saw a Turner Classic Movie inspired by the book and was prompted to reread the book ~53 years later for a second time. Let me make it clear, I make no claims for my overall knowledge on the subject of those people who came to the “New World” before the first Europeans came upon the two continents, their peoples, and the outlying islands of what are now commonly referred to as North and South America. However, I can report a couple of experiences which have informed my thinking and which lead me to some comments about what I think about some issues which are confronted — however adequately or inadequately — in Cooper’s book.

I grew up in Eastern Kentucky and many of my views of the Amerindian or native peoples were influenced by the general notions of the area — reinforced by many movies about what has been described by many US citizens of primary European ancestry (restricting ourselves  to the past 2-4 centuries) as the “Winning of the West.” However, my own thoughts were especially influenced and irrevocably altered by a 1973? trip from Phoenix, AZ to Gallup, NM after a young native American activists was apparently murdered by the police. We (5 native Americans and myself) rode for several hours o join a protest on his behalf. I still remember several incidents during the trip and the protest — but I mention only 3. I myself am usually a somewhat sociable and even a little garrulous at times, but this group (except for a couple whispering to each other on the other side of the back seat) was a very quiet and taciturn group. So I restricted myself to an occasional comment every 10-20 minutes. I was, however, quite pleased that they responded with interest when I pointed out a double rainbow well off to the left or right of our path. However, the most memorable event for me occurred as we approached the large group preparing for our protest march which would occur over the next couple of hours. I heard the rhythms of the tom-toms accompanied by the distinctive “hi-ya hi-ya…” chants that I knew all-too-well. But these beats and chants were right here in the lived moments — and not in the nearly forgotten movies of my pubescent youth in which John Wayne and others gloried in their struggles with no less than “God” on their side (No less than  "THE ALMIGHTY GOD" many would have said).

The story of the native peoples in the Pre-Columbian 10-20 millennia before 1492 is quite complex and varied — and, it is, for me, mostly an undigested background where only a few strong images emerge. However, there are — it seems to me — several ways in which Cooper touched upon the genuine problematics which accompanied the realization by Europeans, perhaps a century after Columbus’s accidental encounter with the islands of the Caribbeans, that besides plunder and gold, there were vast tracts of land where people might settle to live. Of course, that is the rub — were there indeed any of these vast tracts of land places where equitable relationships between newcomers and the earlier inhabitants might cohabitate in relative peace and harmony? Now, it is quite obvious to me that the actual history has been that harmonious and fair relationships between the newcomers and the earlier peoples have been much the exception than the rule. Furthermore, even if we were to grant that some traders, missionaries, homesteaders, and farmers lived in peaceable harmony with the earlier inhabitants [And many would not grant that stipulation] — even if we granted that a few newcomers acted honorably many would argue that the “good deeds” of such persons were largely superseded by the great majority of European-derived settlers who either believed (1) that “the only good Injun is a dead Injun” or (2) stood by in cowardly silence as treaties were broken, the land was stolen, and other misdeeds occurred. While massacres of native people such as those occurring in King Phillip’s War (1675-1678) and at Wounded Knee (1890) did not occur every day — they were not rare and they were — understating the case — all too common!

With these (unresolved) issues in mind, however, I would like to say that when Cooper published his novel in 1826 he portrayed in his characters some cultural-social-political realities which even now may help us to get beyond the mere tallying of “good and evil” from any perspective. So, after a few words about the novel’s structure, we detail some marked qualities about the main characters.

First, as one can surmise in the movies — and is even clearer in the novel (serially presented as 33 chapters — Cooper delivers a crisp heroic and romantic tale which is tailored for a relatively large public readership. The extraordinary tightrope in managing the main characters in the book — only in Chapter 32 is the story’s main villain killed shortly after two of the novels heroes are themselves tragically dispatched (Uncas, the last Mohican Warrior; Cora, a noble frontier maiden). The serial nature of the novel with its unlikely turns reminds me of the improbable escapes of Box Office Action Film heroes which enthrall so many of the younger audiences, especially. Cooper established himself financially with this book. However, while there are indeed clearly delimited heroes and villains in the book — there is much more to these heroes and villains than their virtuousness and villainy. To begin with — none of the main characters is a pure villain or a pure hero. Indeed, some of the characters [Bumppo & Chingachgook, especially] are portrayed slitely differently in other Cooper novels which suggests that Cooper’s understanding of relationships between the native people and the onsurging Americans was both tentative and evolving. Secondly, the prominence of the forested land [both the earlier, sparsely populated virgin forest and it present more populated and partially cleared status] is much more than a backdrop for the story. At some level the land in this novel is more prominent in this novel than the chorus of a Greek tragedy. At times it seems that Cooper tends to believe that “geography is destiny” and at other times he intimates that some of the characters are haunted by the ‘ghosts’ of uprooted tribes — indeed, this pervasive whisper suggests to me that he himself was haunted by such ghosts. The novel is set during the Seven Year’s War (1756-63), known in the USA and by English Canadians as the “French and Indian War.” If one reads Cooper’s other novels set in different time periods, it is clear that Cooper is preoccupied with the influence of both the land and the native people upon, especially, the character of those people who came here as British settlers but who had become “Americans” (USA variety).

In this context, I briefly describe and characterize, in my own words, the 7 most prominent characters in the book:

(1) Natty Bumppo (“Hawk-eye”; “La Longue Carabine”), the ostensible narrator, is a young frontier man. (2) Uncas (“The Bounding Elk”; “le Cerf Agile”) is the son of Chingachgook and a superb and noble Mohican warrior. (3) Cora Munro is a dark-haired young, virtuous, and courageous frontier woman. (4) Major Duncan Heyward, a brave — but sometimes unwise — British officer who is in love with Alice. (5) Magua (“Sly Fox”; “le renard subtil”), an unusually intelligent demagogic and vindictive Huron nursing wounds from former indignities — including an introduction to the British “fire water” — which would drive him to inflict other cruelties upon others. (6) Alice Munro is a young, protected and emotionally fragile frontier blonde woman. She is Cora’s sister by a younger mother. (7) Chingachgook is an old man and, at the end of the book, the last surviving Mohican. Leaping forward in time to Fenimore’s day — we would say that Bumppo and the two Munro daughters are “Americans” [USA variety], Heyward is an Englishman, and that Uncas, Magua, and Chingachgook are native Americans. We have mentioned that none of the main characters is a pure villain or a pure hero. Bumppo, Uncas, and Cora are clearly on the very virtuous end of the scale while, standing almost alone, Magua represents a very dark side of humanity. However, even Hawkeye indulges in some gratuitous scalping which characterizes the supposedly inferior behavior of the native people rather than the military necessity of a “civilized” man. Similarly the noble Uncas is killed by Magua at the end of the novel partially because his headstrong love for the captured Cora allows Magua to take lethal advantage of his foolishly headstrong rush to save her. Even Cora — it is suggested — is tainted somewhat by her modest African “blood” (apparently a “quadroon” or even an “octaroon” in the more precise lexicon of Louisiana and Caribbean slavery”. [Who is actually tainted we will discuss below.]

Cooper uses proper names and nicknames in both English and French to convey that the various parties in the story themselves have different perspectives on good and evil. And, while I believe that a fair reading can sometimes indicate the general perspective of Fenimore’s tale — it is true that Cooper usually writes in an indirect style that leaves many options still on the table. I myself have only two serious explicit objections to his tale (speaking, of course, with the “benefit” of historical hindsight). First, while Cooper is quite willing to honor friendships between persons of different tribes and skin “tints” [still crudely lumped into the term “color” in US English even today] — he has some deep reservations about interethnic and, especially, “interracial” unions and marriages between men and women. Cooper usually tries to be fair and dispassionate about such matters — but by suggesting that the tragic deaths of Cora and Uncas were “inevitable” suggests to me that he should have studied the history of single Frenchmen alone on the North American continent and their interactions with native women. Of course, the study of French colonialism — like the study of British colonialism — will reveal many public wrongs and private abuse. However, the Catholic French — with all their “sins” if you will — never adopted the lie (later developed into a full blown ideology) that separated the “races” of children of African slaves and/or native American women (& men) from the “races” of their parents. When Cora and Uncas are murdered, they are not fully exonerated as Romeo, Juliet, and Desdemona were exonerated in Shakespeare’s tales. In actual fact, I believe, no murder is inevitable — not surprising sometimes, or sometimes even “predictable”  — but not really “inevitable”. The ubiquitous pejorative use of the term “squaw man” used for fair-skinned men of predominantly European ancestry who lived with native women bespeaks a profoundly personal-disorder which gives the lie to any claim of genuine or true “civilization” on the part of countless settlers of predominantly European ancestry

Secondly, while is usually stays in the background and only comes into the story “as needed” Cooper makes quite a point of the seemingly “uncivilized” savagery of the Indians during their scalping, murder of women, and unusually vicious murders of infants at the Fort Henry scalpings [which comes front-and-center in Chapter XVII, and is well-documented in historical records]. Cooper argues (often thru Hawkeye’s internal monologues) that this is a step beyond the excesses of British and Western Civilized society. I am also quite prepared to accept that some of the ugly and revenge-driven practices utilized by native peoples against each other and against European settlers are sui generis — just as today some of the Isis beheadings, orgies of destruction, and rapes in the name of an “Islamic” caliphate are sui generis. These are wanton acts of violence which are utterly unjustified — chosen acts of evil by human actors. On the other hand, the fact that these deeds are evil — does not mean that other acts of evil chosen by persons of predominantly European ancestry are somehow less ignoble. The slave trade was still active while Cooper was writing. And, by the middle of the 19th Century many a soldier and outlaw of predominantly European ancestry had learned to scalp native women as well as native warriors. The culture-social-political implications of “Let him who is without sin cast the first stone” are more profound, I believe, than the fact that as individuals most of us are, at least modestly, non-judgmental with our friends and family. Nietzsche stated that “Insanity in individuals is rare, but in groups, nations, and epochs, it is the rule.” I myself would say that claims of moral superiority by groups, nations, and “races” are usually reliable indicators that deep-seated and morally questionable blinders are in play.

While I have alluded to the role of women in Cooper’s female characters above, the pervasive reality of generic “feminine” traits and generic “male” traits — and conspicuous exceptions to these trends — remains with us today in a multiplicity of controversial formats. These pervasive complexities prevents me here from doing much more than making a suggestion. The two major females are quite present and Cora is in many ways quite a strong character. However, neither they or any other of the minor women characters are as public as historical characters such as Heloise, Joan of Arc, and Abigail Adams, writers such as the English feminist Wollstonecraft, or as characters in books by the contemporaneous Jane Austin. Of course, I would not expect that Cooper would have made the necessary effort to become aware of the near contemporaneous Wollstonecraft or to know the writings of his contemporary Jane Austin. What I am suggesting is that there is an implicit aura in this book which suggests that women, like children, may be seen, but they should not be heard in public in anything other than a subservient role. As this problem is hardly an exclusively USA “American” problem, I refer to this problem more as as perhaps a necessary consideration in addressing our contemporary cultural-political landscape rather than a particularly “stand-alone” problem in considering Cooper’s work.

During this past week of June 2019, there have been protests and problems at a US detention facility in Fort Sill, Oklahoma where the Trump nativism machine wishes to house “undocumented” migrant children in a manner apparently inconsistent both with existing law and standing court orders. Fort Sill is also a place where native people were once separated from their parents to be educated into the supposedly superior culture of the “pale faces” and, later, where native US citizens including wives and children of Japanese ancestry were separated from their families during War World II. So, the problems present in Cooper’s The Last of the Mohicans are still present with us today. However, in spite of these persistent problems involving the relationships between US Americans of predominantly European ancestry and those people whose  ancestry is predominantly non-European, Cooper’s work points to some solutions to the problems involved in the confrontations between the people of the [European] “Old World” and the inhabitants of what most of us call the Americas. [We are again restricting ourselves to the last 400 years.] In some ways this novel is more pertinently complex than many more seemingly up-to-date contemporary perspectives. I elaborate:

(1) When human beings from Europe came to the Americas, they began to change — their language, their customs, and their political loyalties. They did not plan to change. The simplest example is the development of American (USA-variety) English. These Americans did not plan to use “non-standard” English when they said “corn” instead of maize — they simply used in a new way the fact that the amerindian-developed plant was now in so many instances their primary grain. Thus, it was, that new primary dialects arose in the USA as well as in Australia and New Zealand. Other changes such as spelling color, favor, and humor for the French-derived standard British “colour”, “favour”, and “humour” are — I believe — not neutral, but positive changes. [Whether, the British or the Americans wish to believe it or not — the archaic spellings of almost all varieties of English are a treasure trove for those who are interested in the fascinating etymological changes of the English language. They are, however, a practical disaster for the millions of children and foreigners who wish to learn our language.] Nevertheless, while the changes in American English are usually only mildly controversial, other changes in the American landscapes, and the populations were much more complex — and, in their very nature, of continuing disputed consequence.

(2) As the United States of America is gradually, but inexorably, beginning to pay an increasingly expensive price for its reckless pursuit of “slash and burn” and “Drill, baby, drill” exploitation to fill the coffers of the rich — it is becoming clear to those who will not blind themselves that we do need to learn from the pre-Columbian guardians of the Land. Today, insects, fish, and birds recognize that global warming is a reality — many of them have changed their migration patterns by several hundreds of kilometers and by 2-4 weeks as they adjust to the new weather patterns. However, human beings have the capacity to deceive themselves and/or each other — especially with respect to the costs of their short-sighted immediate gains. Part of the recognition of our actual present straits involves relearning from contemporary native Americans the rich insights they had earned over hundreds and thousands of years from the rich earth.

A friend of mine once said after a visit to a small Hopi village that she recognized that the lore still held by this small, out of the way village, was just as essential to our survival on this planet as the science and technology of the rest of the country. The smell of fresh water, the call of a bird, the rustling of leaves, the stealth of a squirrel, and the quiet opening of a flower are still every bit as essential to the health of our land and peoples as they were believed to be by the first inhabitants of this continent.


A scientific note: The long view

Almost all humans on the planet have mitochondrial RNA derived from an African “Eve” who lived 100,000-300,000 years ago; a relatively few humans (contemporary Africans with apparent partial “Pygmy” ancestry) have a moderately distinct female gene pool — another very early “mother” than the great majority of humans. After early Africans made their way into Europe they interacted with Neanderthals to provide a relatively small assortment of non-African genes to the subsequent “European” populations. Of course, over time a number of genetic mutations arose in the relatively isolated populations that have inhabited various continents of the earth. The most distinctive “colors” of humans are critically dependent upon two essential and sometimes conflicting needs of any human population — (1) the need for protection against too much exposure to the sun’s UV radiation and (2) an absolute need for adequate amounts of vitamin D. Consequently, most human groups that have lived in the tropics for many generations tend to be very dark and most  most human groups that have lived far from the tropics zones for many generations tend to be much fairer or lighter than other humans. Two very interesting intermediate groups are the Maori of New Zealand, usually moderately dark in skin color [but distinctly lighter than most Polynesians] and the brownish Bushman of the Kalahari [again, distinctly lighter than those Africans who have lived nearer to the equator]. There are some exceptions: Eskimos who consume large amounts of fish oil in their diet are much darker than Swedes or Norwegians who live at similar latitudes. With Vitamin D already in their diet there is no need to risk the debilitation of occasional sunburns. For individuals and groups who have moved from their ancestral homes within the past few centuries, of course, their “color” may reflect their ancestry more than their present environment. Other words — the ‘red man’ for native Americans and the “yellow race” for Chinese and Japanese  are derived from a more complex stock of physical features. One hears for example of the ‘rainbow’ of colors found in human beings. As a metaphor I find this an attractive descriptor. However, the actual tints that are seen in human beings are not well described by the physics of laboratory measurements. People use eyes to see and the receptors in our eyes are differentially sensitive to 3 different ranges of light — the Red, Green, and Blue of some color wheels. These tints were well described by Goethe and, in actual fact, represent a much richer range of hints and hues than does a scale based on wavelength measurements alone [i.e., blue ~ 400 nm; red ~650nm]. And, of course, in human beings variations in skin tones and hues are often accompanied by variation in physical features. Thus an albino with soft wooly hair and large lips might self-describe hemself (herself, hisself) as “black” or “Afroamerican” to emphasize connections to known familial and ancestral roots. It would simply be impossible for almost all humans to avoid “color” in short and long descriptions of other human beings.

Personal caveat:

Cooper actually gives considerable attention to the physical features of his characters — with perhaps special attention to the color of the “Red” man. These comments and speculations are, admittedly, usually expressed in tentative or suppositional terms.  First, I simply assert my own belief that there is and has never been a pure “White” “Black” “Red” or “Yellow” or “Aryan” race. There have been and still are relatively homogeneous populations which can be innocently described by various terms which include color terms. However, and this is the more important point. It seems clear to me that when such terms are used with the supposed moral superiority of the speaker’s group in mind that these terms have become reference points for Western Civilizations greatest crimes — (1) the Holocaust; (2) Slavery (esp. chattel slavery in the USA; (3) numerous genocidal episodes in the subjugation of native peoples of the Americas.

Current Hypocritical Landmarks (I) — “Evangelists” and the Right to Life

Current Hypocritical Landmarks (I) — “Evangelists” and the Right to Life

More Complete Title: Current Hypocritical Landmarks (1) — Self-described “Evangelicals”, the Right to Life, and a Total ban on Abortion. Focus: 3 Hard Questions for self-described “Evangelical” Christians who support legislation which would make all abortions criminal offenses punishable by imprisonment or fines.

Short Prefatory Remarks: The issue of the definition of the “right to life” and our collective responsibilities for protecting those fragile unborn, born, and living entities which may, are, or have become a young human child is a very complex issue. Human beings here in the USA and elsewhere have and will continue to differ in their responses to such issues for both rational and irrational reasons — and in their motivations. The issue of the definition of the “right to life” and our individual responsibilities for protecting such fragile creature is also a very complex issue. However, the issue of any human’s individual responsibilities includes such diverse motivations and individual experiences that I normally hesitate to make anything more than somewhat vague remarks on specific issues. However, whenever our responses involve either public words-and-deeds and/or blatantly partisan, often self-contradictions political activities — then such responsibilities often require rather sharply focused remarks about religious hypocrisy — most especially with those who proclaim their own righteousness and are investigated with ascendant political power. I begin, however, with a brief explanation of why I find myself concentrating on these issues as a living human being who has himself also read many of those Scriptures — some of them many times — so seemingly important to those who describe themselves as “religious” or “Christians” and — most especially — as “Evangelists.” There are, of course, an extraordinary number of diverse people who might describe themselves with such words. However, I am here concerned primarily with those prominent persons who believe and assert that they and their cohorts are “more righteous” than those who differ or oppose them by disposition, belief, or deeds. For myself I find myself in a situation not unlike Martin Luther who in 1521 asserted 'Hier stehe Ich, Ich kann nicht anders. (Here I stand, I can do no other).’ As one who grew up in a predominantly Protestant environment I am also acutely aware that whatever the merits of Luther’s challenge to the entrenched corruption in the Roman Catholic Church of his day and its hierarchy, it is true that other things he later said in the Peasant Wars and, towards the end of his life, about the Jews rivaled in wickedness the ills he had challenged as a young and intrepid monk.

An Assumption: The Author believes that the shortest way to hell (God’s awful grace) is to commit one’s self to fundamental Religious Hypocrisy.
A Confession: The Author must also must stipulate (1) that there are many roads to hell, (2) that he himself has traveled on too many of these roads, and (3) that he cannot assert that his own efforts should be believed by any specific human being. However, he must also assert (4) that he himself will not and can not remain silent!  What others will do is in their hands and hearts — with the author believing that the resolution of all such matters remains in God’s Rule over History and the Heavens.

An Aside: In this Short Series, the Author is addressing himself as an imperfect Christians to a prominent contemporary group of self-professed “evangelicals” who have sometimes outdone themselves in professing their own righteousness while engaged in acts that are notably shorn of charity. The author himself grew up in the Southern Bible Belt and at a very early age was exposed to a number of important (Christian) Biblical teaching. Furthermore, both in his childhood and his adulthood he has been exposed to other Christians whose acts, thoughts, and beliefs were more obviously related to the charity and love that should characterize self-professed Christians than many activities of the author himself. In other blogs which attempt to make a more explicit regard for a decent respect for the opinions of all mankind — the author will refer more explicitly to those who do not share such Christian beliefs or, indeed, any explicitly religious beliefs. The author (quaintly perhaps to some) believes that heretics and atheists are here to remind all of us that Christians and other “religious” persons are all-too-frequently prone to hypocrisy and other human weakness.

Concerns such as the author’s are not new. We provide a couple of them with each of our “Landmarks”.
I. Woe is me! I am lost, for I a man of unclean lips and I live among a people of unclean people — and my eyes have seen the Lord! [Isaiah, Chapter VII, paraphrase of the New English Bible]
II. In the Kingdom of the Blind, the one-eyed man is King. [An ancient and, apparently, pre-Christian saying]

The Hard Questions
Question#1.
(1a) Do you believe your attempts to criminalize all abortions will earn you a first row seat at St. Peter’s Table in Heaven?

(1b) [ 1a Alternative] Do you believe that fervent opposition to all abortions makes you a better person than those persons who participate in any abortion.

Note #1a — Jesus of Nazareth is quoted as saying “Why call me good, only the Father is good.”
Note #1b — This witness (lchj) believes that “Hell” or “Gehenna” is a spiritual or purgative fire  — which is not to be confused with revengeful fantasies of “everlasting torture” concocted by human being who hide their unloving side behind an uncharitable “faith”.
Note #1c — There are, of course, a multitude of reasons why various people are generally opposed to abortions. However, it is quite apparent that among the loudest of those who oppose abortion are a prominent horde of politically active persons who call themselves “pro-life” and are simultaneously missing in action when it comes to our responsibilities for life after birth of the poor and downtrodden.

Question#2.
(2) Do you believe that a woman who has a headless (“acephalic”) fetus within her body has a duty to carry that natal being to term?

Note #2a — A relevant passage here, I believe, is Jesus’s question — "Is man made to the sabbath or the sabbath made for man?" Of course, St. Paul said that we should be “fools” for Christ. However, Paul did not say that we should be damned fools for Christ. Paul meant that truth — including key Christian truths partially seen thru the eyes of faith — may very well seem to be foolish to those who do not or have not yet been able to recognize them. Women are no under no obligation to undergo the pain and danger of childbirth to bring forth the partial semblance of a human being which does not have a brain. A dog or a monkey is higher in the order of creation than a headless human torso.

Question#3.
(3). Do you believe that a woman who has a dead or dying fetus within her body has no right to an abortion??

Note #3a — A few years ago the Catholic hierarchy in the Irish Republic succeeded in delaying an abortion until the fetus died and the woman herself was killed by the dead corpse within her body. I personally believe that the hierarchy’s behavior was (1) an act of murder [a public deed] and (2) an apparent ‘mortal’ sin [Actual “Judgment” always in the “Hands” of a Merciful God.]

Genuine Problematics 
Continuing Commentary, Discussion, and (mild) Confessional Statements
[“Further comments including some with my own hair down.”]

When I was quite young (perhaps 10 years old?) my father told me that  — if it were ever come to it taht if he were in the position that he might have to choose between saving the life of our mother and one of his children [me or one of my siblings] that in such an event he would opt to save my mother’s life. It was an odd conversation that did not last very long and seemed unprompted and somewhat awkward. I have simply gathered that he felt that I should know this important perspective of his. Fortunately, he was never presented with that choice. I did not, however, at any time feel that I myself was obliged to follow his example.

At my advanced age, it is now relatively easy for me to believe that my own son’s survival is more important than that of myself or my spouse. However, I also know that such questions do sometimes present themselves in more difficult circumstances. In the mid-1960s there was a war-induced famine in Nigeria’s suppression of the Ibo attempt to create an independent “Biafra” nation. The general Ibo general practice then was to preserve the mother’s life because she might be able someday to raise new children — and because the earlier brood would almost never be able to survive on their own.

On the other hand, I can respect the fact that many women [presumably the great majority] — once pregnant — are predisposed to carry the pregnancy to term. I also respect the fact that many (often poor and/or young) who are unable to foresee a viable future for a prospective newcomer may/will [often with painful reluctance] put their newborn child up for adoption. Still there are also a number of physical, psychological, and diverse personal circumstances which lead other prospective mothers to choose an abortion [again, often with painful reluctance].

Because other living person’s are involved, I will make a brief remark about my own experiences. In an earlier time I was quite disturbed and made some very regrettable mistakes with someone whom I knew and loved and who sought an abortion against my advice. [At thirteen she had been left with 2 twins after a traveling Arab seduced her and went on his way…].

In such difficult matters of the heart, it seems clear that unless we are personally connected to people who very well may be making a mistake, that the words of Jesus to the people who would stone the woman accused of adultery “Let him who is without sin cast the first stone!” [John 8:11]. In a few cases, we may be close enough to a person to provide some advice as Jesus did when he instructed the woman to go and sin no more [John 7.53-8.11].

On a related matter, it is also quite clear that love operates in realms that require some people to break taboos that many of us would almost never consider [e.g., while my own sexual joys and temptations have been directed towards members of the other sex, in my mid-thirties my male roommate fell in love with another man — and I and other friends of his observed that he became a better person!]

As the Good Book says, Not all those who say “Lord! Lord!” will enter the Kingdom of Heaven. True religion does not provide us with a prescription for spiritual ‘safety’. Rather, it requires us to embark on a dangerous journey with A God who is adventurous beyond our wildest dreams.

There are some people who describe themselves as “evangelical” Christians who say they want a “Seat at the Table” with the power elites and, especially, with our current president (DJT). However, while it is true that Jesus certainly upset the normal working of the commerce inside the temple [“You have made God’s House as ‘Den of Thieves’”] — when Jesus was hauled before Pilate he was mostly silent. Jesus was politically relevant, but as the story of the Temptation in the Wilderness (Matthew Ch 4: 1-11) makes clear — Jesus was not prepared to make a deal with the devil as the politically-ambitious hypocrites of his day (Caiaphas) and of our day (Reed, Falwell, F. Graham…) were and are more than willing to do. We all have an individual voice and we may join with other so that we are more readily heard — but to seek an outsized voice is not a spiritual directive. When we sing “We’re going to sit at the Welcome Table” we are not seeking a Table with those who have committed themselves to seeking dominion over their fellow human beings. When Jesus rejected the entreaties of “Satan” [Matthew 4: 8-10] he set a general standard for which every natural leader must work out the details for himself or herself. There is, however, no valid Christian exception that allows a Faustian bargain for the conservative Christian or for a liberal Christian because they have a righteous concern.

More generally, of course, there in no moral exception for those of other religions, secular and/or atheistic beliefs. The Faustian bargains of Isis and Stalinism and various ills of the non-Christian or non-Judaeo-Christian world are every bit as reprehensible as those of the Christian world. The primary Christian responsibility is to remove the Beams from our own eyes [ Cf., Matthew Ch 7:1-5] — we can then share our message with integrity with others as well.


Dr. Lon Clay Hill, Jr. (retired)
Miramar, Broward Co., FL, USA, Planet Earth, The Universe

Impeachment! — Will they Cry “Peace! Peace!

Impeachment! — Will they Cry “Peace! Peace!

Short Title: Impeachment!— Will They Cry “Peace! Peace!

Full Title: Impeachment!!? — Leaders and/or Followers who Cry “Peace! Peace! when there is no Peace!

“Gentlemen may cry ‘Peace! Peace!’ when there is no peace!”  [Patric Henry, 1775]

OUTLINE:

The Myth!?; Primary Reality (4 Horsemen); Political Reality; Moral Reality; Physical Reality; Subsidiary Considerations [No Magic Bullet for the righteous or the unrighteous]; Time and the Tide…

THE MYTH OF “SEPARATE” ISSUES WITH RESPECT TO THE IMPEACHMENT OF ONE DONALD JOHN TRUMP [Rhetorical preliminaries]

I have been hearing, seeing, and reading a number of comments about the complexities of “impeachment” proceedings versus the absolute need for defeating said DJT in the upcoming 2020 US Presidential election.

THE PRIMARY REALITY [4 of several prominent Deadly Horsemen…] 

Every day that Donald John Trump remains in the White House People will Die for want of the Health Care provided in The Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (aka, ACA [abv.]) signed into law in 2010.

Every day that Donald John Trump remains in the White House Foreign-born Children will be Willfully Separated from their parents and relatives by the Actions of the Trump Administration and the border patrol.

Every day that Donald John Trump remains in the White House Foreign-born the Destruction of our Environment will be Augmented by the foolish words and deeds of DJT, the willful actions of his Administration [accompanied by the continuing dominance of Energy Conglomerates over politicians in both parties as well as by the simple inertia of most Americans].

Every day that Donald John Trump remains in the White House Foreign-born the ungodly profit driven-assault by the NRA upon the lives of our children and the equally ungodly assault by sectors of the banking industry upon the financial health of higher education seeking young adults will be augmented by the foolish words and deeds of DJT and the actions of his Administration.

THE PRIMARY REALITY — ITS MOST PROMINENT POLITICAL COMPONENT

Every day that Donald John Trump remains in the White House People will Die for want of the Health Care provided in The Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (aka, ACA [abv.]) signed into law in 2010. They will die for three distinguishable, but inextricably entangled realities:

One, there are arguably hidden costs in the ACA which would usually prompt any conservative executive to proceed very slowly in implementing the law.

Two, the present administration is simply refusing to fully implement the law because the President and many opponents of the ACA have been driven by a sense of entitlement blind to the spiritual, political, and social consequences of an economy which celebrates greed.

Three, the president and members of his administration are both willfully and secretly breaking the law because they are both blind and indifferent to their oaths of office and their shared humanity with all people on this earth — including even their political supporters.

Both reasonable and unreasonable people will disagree about the relative effects of these three components of the President’s motivation, but the third component is both real and deadly.

THE PRIMARY REALITY — ITS MOST PROMINENT MORAL COMPONENT

Every day that Donald John Trump remains in the White House Foreign-born Children will be willfully separated from their parents and relatives by the Actions of the Trump Administration and the border patrol. Many of these children will be deeply scarred by these events even if they are eventually returned to their families. Others will never see their family again. While merciful humans on both sides of the US-Mexico border will be wonderfully helpful for some of these children & their families and while the ACLU and a few judges will blunt the force of these policies a significant fraction of the US citizenry are as deaf to the cries of the children at our border as were the citizens of Germany were deaf to the screams of those murdered by German planes, tanks, guns and ovens. It is, of course, quite common for humans to think that the evils that befall others will not befall themselves. Even the Poles were largely silent when the Germans marched into Czechoslovakia! [“Do not ask for whom the bell tolls, it tolls for thee!”]

THE PRIMARY REALITY — ITS MOST PROMINENT PHYSICAL COMPONENT

Every day that Donald John Trump remains in the White House Foreign-born the destruction of our environment will be augmented by the foolish words and deeds of DJT, the willful actions of his Administration, the continuing dominance of energy conglomerates over politicians in both parties, and the simple inertia of most Americans. Birds, fish, and insects already recognize global warming — in many instances they have already changed the timing of their migrations by several weeks and the geographical limits of their migrations by tens or hundred of miles or kilometers. Humans, however, are somewhat different — they have the capacity to deceive both themselves and others. Even worse, they are often strengthened in their self-deception when others share the same illusions. We will not escape the consequences of our failure to care for the world that nature has given us — and while, as always, the poor and the dispossessed are already suffering the effects of severe weather, aridity, stronger hurricanes, and fires — the high and the mighty as well as the dispossessed will be brought down by the continuing the careless addition of carbon dioxide and methane into our atmospheres, untreated sewage into our rivers and lakes, and plastics into our oceans. While we are not in the situation of Jor-El on the doomed planet Krypton, the disasters will continue to come. Each of us can work for our world — and the recipients in the next civilizations will be grateful. But don’t be fooled — collective moral filth in a government and economy is already wreaking havoc. Plutocracy is simply one of the most obvious roads to a terrestrial hell. Long before the prophets and the early Christians proclaimed that the fruits of ill-gotten wealth can destroy a person or a society, other societies had experienced this reality. The original story of Midas didn’t teach that “all that glitters is not gold” — it taught that the overzealous search for gold itself will destroy the searcher.

SUBSIDIARY CONSIDERATIONS — “Irrefutable” evidence of impeachable offenses.

House Speaker Pelosi, overly mindful of the dangers of an overzealous political offense that targets only Donald J. Trump and his Republican allies and sycophants without simultaneously addressing other important issues [such as those listed above] has stated that we need irrefutable or “ironclad evidence” before proceeding to formal impeachment proceeding against Donald Trump. There are no ironclad cases! There was never an “ironclad” case even against Hitler — Hitler was right that the Treaty of Versailles (1919) had placed a terrible burden upon the German people as if the German government were the sole instigator of the 1st World War. But, here back in the USA, DJ Trump’s refrain that he always imposes tenfold punishment upon those who “cross” him is sometimes a boastful lie and, at other times, a sign that he has already — like Hitler, Huey Long, John Calhoun & other demagogues before him— jumped deep into an Ocean of Lies.

We should not fool ourselves. The German Communist said to themselves that they must keep to their ‘regular’ partisan activities — and that, after experiencing Hitler, the German people would naturally turn back to the communists. Before Allied and Soviet tanks rolled into Berlin — almost all of the communists, albinos, and gypsies had already been murdered well before the 6 million Jews, 7 million Poles, 20 million Russians and even several million Germans were dead from executions, starvation, and the other murderous consequences of the 3rd Reich.

Let me be clear, I do not think that DJT is either as intelligent or as fundamentally focused as was Adolf Hitler. DJT himself (reminiscent of Mussolini with Hitler) admires “strongmen” like Putin and Kim who do not admire other dictators. However, it does not really matter where Donald is on the scale of willful malevolence by a human being. When the poisons of blind ambition, greed, religious hypocrisy, fear, and cowardice reach a critical point fear-driven mob action may impel nation states and empires into self-destruction — and the United States of America may very well be very far upon a similar road to destruction.

There is, of course, hope that some Republican Senators may find their manhood or womanhood and there is — perhaps — a somewhat more realistic hope that the 3rd Branch of Government will check major excesses of the Trump administration. Whether our present Supreme Court — with a majority of members who functionally celebrate wealth as a reward of liberty and with a membership which includes at least one new member who was untruthful during his confirmation — can or will be courageous enough to avoid a second ‘Dred Scott’ decision may be determined in 2-3 years… If most Democrats think that their standard is only to be “better” than the Trumpites or Republicans, then those of us who are democrats are ourselves already deep into one of those sewer lines just below our political ‘swamp’. Today, our children now go to school knowing that this may be the day when it will be their individually specific duty to confront a gun-wielding outlaw and that he/she may need to step into the line of fire…

[Those of us who consider electability important need to keep other even more critical realities in mind. The notion that either sports or politics is only about winning is not a criteria for political behavior — especially for our highest offices in any branch of government.]

Three more things on the historical records …

For me, one often curious and perplexing characteristic of human behavior is the tendency for societies under stress to turn to a problematic “strong” leader who presents the semblance of consistency over more “rational” and “humane” leaders who think they can oppose such demagogues with half measures and other forms of “leadership.”

I, personally, do not honor Trump for his consistency in hating immigrants and praising retribution any more than I retrospectively respect Hitler for his consistency in hating Jews and Slavs. I see no ‘honesty’ in the consistency of such wickedness. However, I recognize that stressed and often fearful human beings frequently follow one who is “all in” on a downward turn over one who displays lukewarm virtue and compassion. Political leaders who do not know when it is high noon for a civilization will reap no rewards in heaven or in human memory if they think they themselves can decide when it is ‘smart’ to look away when a political whirlwind approaches…

A very personal note:

While I am myself an American-US Citizen with very deep democratic family roots, I do not myself believe that patriotism is the highest virtue — I live on a single planet within a universe of trillions of galaxies each one containing enormous numbers of stars, planets, and possible intelligent life. However, I very much believe that true morality consists in understanding how our own families and social-political realities are connected to other persons and groups — and acting upon those realities. I therefore celebrate the fact that some US citizens believe and act on the belief that loyalty to the United States is of a higher order than loyalty to one’s political party. It has been said that “All’s fair in love and politics” — and it is true that human beings often act as if it were so. However, I do not believe that it has ever been true. Furthermore, I am very clear in my own mind that a fear-driven “patriotism” or “nationalism” is one of the quickest roads to national disaster.

TIME AND THE TIDE AND THE NOONDAY SUN

Time and the Tide and the Noonday Sun…  

Human beings can choose and even plan to catch a wave, the high tide, a Spring tide, and to a lesser extent, they can even plan for a Tsunami. They cannot, however, choose the time the time of a tide, a wave, or either the first, second, or third wave of a tsunami — or the passage of the noon day sun. This, I believe, is as true for political waves as it is for those waves consisting only of gravitationally and wind-driven water.

Dr. Lon Clay Hill, Jr. (retired)

Miramar, Broward Co., FL, USA, Planet Earth