Princess Elisabeta The Ibbur, Or a Judeo-Calvinist Interpretation of BRAM STOKER'S DRACULA

The most recent episode of the film podcast Myopia Movies covers Bram Stoker's Dracula, the 1992 Francis Ford Coppola classic known for its beautiful visuals, the awesomeness that is Winona Ryder, and Keanu Reeves' questionable accent. The following discussion contains spoilers for a movie that's nearly 30 years old, so be ye warned...

When I first saw it in high school, what stuck out to me was that they gave Dracula of all people a redemption arc. The count (Gary Oldman) begins the story as a Christian warrior fighting the invading Ottoman Turks and renounces God when his wife Elisabeta, incorrectly thinking he was killed in battle, commits suicide and the priests tell the grieving Vlad she's in Hell. What I remembered was that upon learning Mina Harker (Winona Ryder) was the reincarnation of his lost love, his resolve to do evil weakens--he initially refuses to turn Mina into a vampire even though she very much wants it (!) and when the hunters confront him, he initially flees rather than try to fight them. This I attributed to his realizing that Elisabeta is not in Hell--was his rebellion against God and the atrocities he committed as history's infamous Impaler a mistake? Is he now reconsidering all his life choices?

More recently, as I became more familiar with Calvinism, I even concluded that although most vampire fiction is very heavily Catholic, this one is actually rather Reformed. Dracula was predestined by God for salvation from before Creation (see Ephesians 1:4), but he rebels against God, cursing Him for Elisabeta's death and (he thinks) damnation. However, those who are truly His are never out of His hand, even though they may try to jump from it. God is determined that Dracula be redeemed and so He allows Dracula to become a vampire--the count will be saved even if it takes 400-odd years to do it.

(In the meantime Dracula commits all sorts of horrors, but if God is in control, one could argue He allowed this for His own purposes--delaying the Ottoman invasion of Europe to prevent mass apostasy from Christianity, punishing the corrupt boyars and criminals the historical Vlad was known for treating harshly, etc. And given how some historians think Vlad's crimes might have been exaggerated by his enemies, he might not have been as monstrous as one might think.)

But what about Elisabeta? Doesn't reincarnation go against the Bible? Hebrews 9:27 pretty explicitly says man dies once and then the Judgement and in Bram Stoker's Dracula, Christianity is explicitly true--crosses/crucifixes, communion wafers, etc. have supernatural power against evil. I'm assuming Elisabeta was a Christian and the idea that people who commit suicide automatically go to Hell is not biblical, so one would assume she's in Heaven. However, the Bible does contain the account of the Witch of Endor, who manages to summon from the dead none other than the prophet Samuel, who repeats the prophecies of divine judgement he made on Earth. Some Christians believe this was actually a demonic being impersonating Samuel, but this entity does not seem to be any different from Samuel when he was on Earth. In any event, Samuel's prophecy of Saul's death comes true and a test of a true prophet is whether their predictions come true. And then there's the spirit God sends to torment Saul (see 1 Samuel 16:14-23), although that could be depression or some kind of mental illness rather than an actual supernatural entity--"spirit" in this case could mean "mood" rather than an angel or demon. After all, when David shows up he soothes Saul by playing music, not by exorcising him. :)

So perhaps Mina Harker in the present day is not actually a reincarnation of Elisabeta, but is sort of possessed by her? The notion that a living person can be possessed by the spirit of a dead person actually ties in with the Jewish concepts of dibbuk and ibbur. Although the idea comes from 16th Century Jewish folklore rather than Scripture, it does seem somewhat appropriate given that Winona Ryder's father is Jewish and she describes herself as such too. An ibbur is a dead person temporarily possessing or at least joining with a living person in order to accomplish a religious duty. In this case, tying in with the idea that Vlad was predestined for Heaven despite his crimes, this is Elisabeta returning to Earth for the purpose of leveraging Vlad's ultimate repentance. This would explain why Mina only starts remembering her "past life" as Elisabeta when she encounters Dracula in the present day--there is no indication beforehand she's anything but a sweet-natured (but as I noted in my review, extremely horny) British schoolteacher. And it's appropriate that Jonathan and Mina get married in what seems to be the Eastern Orthodox fashion--as a princess of Transylvania, Elisabeta was probably Orthodox herself, even though Jonathan is Anglican in the novel and I assume Mina is too.

(This could also cycle back to Catholicism--Elisabeta might be in Purgatory and redeeming Vlad, whose renunciation of God was prompted by her own suicide, could be part of the sanctification process prior to her own entering Heaven. However, Dracula's sins are so egregious that even if his last-minute repentance means he doesn't go to Hell, if there's a Purgatory he'll be spending a lot of time there while Elisabeta goes on. That kind of weakens the romanticism a bit, although they'll be reunited eventually.)

However, upon actually watching the film, it seems I didn't recall a lot of the details correctly. Vlad's resolve to do evil does weaken, but his repentance is much vaguer--after he is mortally wounded by Mina's husband Jonathan and their American friend Quincy Morris, Mina takes him to the long-abandoned chapel of Castle Dracula. The dying count reaches for the cross and asks God why He has forsaken him (ummm...you forsook Him). However, when Mina tries to pull the blade out of his chest, Dracula stops her and tells her "it is finished" (sound familiar?).  

Suddenly the light shines down, the candles in the chapel ignite, and the cross Dracula had desecrated so long ago heals. Things get a little theologically fuzzier from there--Mina thinks it was her love that released everybody from the powers of darkness and claims her and Dracula's love is stronger than death--but the light of God does revert the demonic-looking Dracula to his human form. At Dracula's request Mina shoves the knife all the way through his heart and the burn from the Communion wafer disappears from her forehead, indicating that her own growing vampirism has been quelled. Dracula dies apparently seeing something pleasant, Mina cuts off his head to make sure the deed is done, and the film ends implying Dracula and Elisabeta have been reunited in Heaven. Here is the complete scene for your review.

So although claiming Bram Stoker's Dracula is some kind of Christian film is really stretching it (although belief in reincarnation is blatantly heretical, the idea that God temporarily sent Princess Elisabeta's soul back to Earth to ensure Vlad goes to Heaven is still really pushing it), I figured some folks might find this interesting. 

If you want to read BSD in a purely orthodox fashion, Mina remembering a past life as Elisabeta could be the result of Dracula consciously or unconsciously using psychic abilities to fill her head with memories of 15th Century Romania, her consuming mind-altering absinthe, the fact she's a late teen or early 20-something with an overactive imagination infatuated with handsome, charismatic foreigner, or a combination thereof. Mina's thinking it was her love and not God's manipulating circumstances over 400-plus years to save Dracula is her own ego (this is, after all, from her diary written after-the-fact), not a definitive theological statement. After all, the fact she all but commits adultery with a monster who imprisoned and tormented her husband and killed her best friend shows she's not perfect.

Christian Themes in the Movie "Hellraiser"

In a couple previous posts I've made on the movie Hellraiser, I've discussed the character of Frank Cotton and the theme of godly versus worldly sorrow (see 2 Corinthinians 7:10). Seeking Biblical truth in a horror film centered on sadomasochism may seem quite strange--and many will see it as just as excuse to justify watching a movie with gross and immoral content--but there's actually a good bit of thought in there.

Below are some Christian themes I've noticed in the film:

Godly vs. Worldly Sorrow

2 Corinthians 7:10 states the following:  Godly sorrow brings repentance that leads to salvation and leaves no regret, but worldly sorrow brings death. The article above goes into more detail, but I'll summarize a bit for the TL; DR crowd or for those who might not be interesting in visiting a Christian website. "Godly sorrow" is sorrow for the immorality of one's actions--the disrespect shown to God and harm done to others. "Worldly sorrow" is regret for the personal costs of sin only.

And in Hellraiser (and the novella it's based on, "The Hellbound Heart") "worldly sorrow" is epitomized by Frank Cotton. Frank is an unrepentant hedonistic pleasure-seeker who in the book describes having smuggled heroin and in both the book and film seduced his own brother's fiancee. The book elaborates by describing how the only reason he doesn't "snatch her from under her would-be husband's nose" is that he would soon tire of her and have his vengeful brother after him. He grows bored with "dope and drink" and endless fornication and seeks out the Lament Configuration, which promises wonders and pleasures beyond human comprehension.

Well, the ones bringing said wonders and pleasures have some very different ideas of what constitutes fun. Frank is abducted by the Cenobites and subject to gross physical and sexual abuse, which he escapes purely by accident. He regrets his involvement with the Cenobites--this early draft of the "Hellraiser" script shows how deeply the Cenobites have traumatized him--but not the immoral lifestyle he has led. This same early draft of the script depicts him attempting to rape his own niece when he sees her for the first time in years, and in both the book and the film he treats Julia as a means to an end, disposing of her when she is no longer convenient. In "The Hellbound Heart," he seems interested in applying some of what he learned about pleasure and pain in Hell to Julia if only she would set him free, which implies he intends to go straight back to sleeping around if not worse once he's fully reconstituted.

And in the end, Frank's worldly sorrow leads to death. In his desperation to rebuild his mutilated body, he and Julia murder several people so he can feed on them. When Kirsty threatens to expose him, he murders his own brother, and when he and Julia attempt to kill Kirsty, he accidentally stabs her and then feeds off her remaining life-force rather than trying to help her. He attempts to kill Kirsty (his niece in the film, a friend of his brother in the book) and is ultimately reclaimed by the Cenobites, dismembered alive and returned to Hell. In Hellbound: Hellraiser 2, he ends up getting killed by the damned Julia, who uses the exact same words he told her before he tried to consume her.

Conscience and Universal Knowledge of Morality

The first two chapters of Paul's letter to the Romans are something I have always had problems believing. Romans 1:18-32, which states outright universal knowledge of the nature of God and universal human rejection of what they know to be true, is what Carl Sagan would call an extraordinary claim needing extraordinary proof. Furthermore, many conservative Christians, especially Calvinists, have taken it so far as to claim that everybody knows the Christian religion specifically is true and simply rejects it out of desire to sin. Seriously, we're talking about people who call ISIS "God-haters," never mind that they're fanatics of a different religion rather than irreligious. Romans 2:12-16 describes how the laws of God are written on the hearts of Gentiles and in particular suggests the human conscience is divinely ordained. The conscience in my opinion is more malleable than that.

Frank's life before he's taken by the Cenobites is not discussed much in the film at all (beyond the whole "seducing/semi-raping his brother's fiancee" part), but the book describes his imagination as "fertile" when it comes to "trickery and theft" and among other things he smuggles heroin. He apparently owes a lot of people money, which he probably spent on "dope and drink" and prostitutes. However, and this is the important part, he knows what he's doing is wrong. The prologue refers to him growing bored and dosing himself with whatever opiate "his immoralities had earned him." This is from his point of view, not the narrator's, so even if he had "suppressed the truth in unrighteousness" (i.e. convinced himself superficially his behavior was not immoral despite knowing better), on some subconscious level he knows that his lifestyle is evil.

In Which Frank Quotes the Bible

In the film, when Frank is speared repeatedly by the Cenobites, his last words are, "Jesus wept" (John 11:35). That's the shortest verse in the Bible, in which Jesus mourns for His dead friend Lazarus, whom he later resurrects. I'm not sure what Frank is referring to in that context--according to some Googling, the line was ad-libbed by the actor and Barker decided to keep it.

Movie Review: Hellraiser (1987)

A few days ago I got rather interested in the Hellraiser franchise of films, in which people who toy with a magical puzzle-box summon the leather-clad Pinhead and friends, "explorers of the farther reaches of experience," whose idea of fun involves torture and sadomasochism (in which a good time is not had by all). So I decided to give the original Hellraiser a watch. Combined with my recent watch of Gremlins, it's turning into a very 1980s horror movie December.

Here goes...

The Plot

Married couple Larry and Julia Cotton move into an old house formerly owned by Larry's ne'er-do-well brother Frank, with whom Larry has not been in contact in some time. The reason for that is that Frank has solved a mysterious puzzle box and been dismembered. A moving-day accident spills blood on the floor of the upstairs room where Frank was taken and soon he's back as a flesh-eating skinless monster intent on restoring his human body with other people's blood. Trouble ensues, and Larry's daughter Kirsty soon finds that someone else is looking for Frank...

The Good

*The characterization is quite good. Within the first fifteen or so minutes, we know that the Cotton household isn't exactly a happy one and nobody says "I'm unhappy." Instead Larry and his wife Julia argue about moving into the new house, Larry and his daughter Kirsty argue about her decision to live on her own and have a job rather than living at home, and when she comes to visit we see some subtle hostility between her and Julia (whom a brief conversation between Larry and some workmen reveal is Kirsty's stepmother, not her mother). Julia's boredom at Larry's party just before she learns that Frank isn't quite as gone as she thinks shows that this is not a happy marriage and sets her up to be tempted by her back-from-the-dead brother-in-law.

However, though Julia is one of the villains of the piece, we see some sympathetic actions on her part--in flashback she initially resists Frank's advances (advances that come off as kind of rapey, no matter how much we later see her enjoying the results) and she quickly sees to Larry's welfare when he's injured. And when Frank wants to finish his resurrection by killing Larry, Julia is willing and able to fend him off. At least initially. And Frank--Frank is the Calvinist principle of total depravity in its most extreme form epitomized. Years in Hell haven't turned him off the path of selfishness, depravity, perversity, etc. and he's willing to commit all sorts of sins to ensure that he doesn't go back.

*The movie is genuinely creepy throughout, starting with the weird doings that start when Larry bleeds on the floor and then when the bored Julia returns to the room where Frank was taken to Hell and encounters, well, you'll have to see it. And then when Kirsty solves the box herself, things start getting scary again.

*Though the special effects are a bit dated in places, mediocre practical effects are, as a general rule, much better-looking than mediocre CGI. Frank's resurrection from the floorboards does look a bit puppety, but at least the viewer knows something is really there. And it's appropriately gruesome. Skinless resurrected-Frank looks pretty realistic.

*Although we don't see the Cenobites until rather late in the film--the resurrected Frank and Julia are the primary villains--it's still a suspenseful and well-done film regardless.

*Doug Bradley, the actor who plays Pinhead, has an amazingly deep voice and excellent delivery. No wonder they kept him on for the near-generation of sequels that followed.

The Bad

*The film shows its budgetary limitations in places. When Frank solves the box and the hooked chains come out, we see very little of what they do to him--only before and after shots. In contrast, when Capt. Elliott Spenser solves the box in the opening of Hellbound: Hellraiser II, we see a lot of hooked-chains-into-flesh and his transformation into Pinhead. According to Wikipedia, the first film had a budget of only $1 million (albeit in 1987 dollars), which could explain it.

*The movie should have ended a few minutes earlier, once Pinhead and friends find Frank. Granted, the awesome, "We have such sights to show you" line would need to be placed elsewhere or removed entirely, but good writing is about killing your darlings. Obviously some kind of resolution would need to happen, but the way the Cenobites go from, "This is not for your eyes" to doing what they do doesn't really make sense.

*Why didn't Julia try to use her own blood to finish reassembling Frank rather than jumping to murder? She immediately jumps from "unhappy wife" to "kill people" without any intermediate step (other than fear/hesitation when she brings the first man home). If she tried to use her own blood and it didn't work (perhaps the blood had to be forcibly taken, perhaps like Harry's blood used to resurrect Voldemort?) or Frank was in a hurry due to fear of the Cenobites finding him again and needed a lot of blood immediately, that would explain why she jumped to more extreme measures.

*The film starts out slowly--although we know from the prologue (Frank solving the puzzle box) that supernatural doings are afoot, until Larry cuts himself and the blood starts disappearing into the floor, it seems like a domestic drama.

*The resurrected Frank and Larry eventually encounter one another, but it's never seen. Given how they're estranged and Frank clearly has a great deal of contempt for Larry, this would have been interesting to see. And the results of this encounter, which we do see, strain credulity. Not going to go into detail for spoiler reasons, but you'll know it when you see it.

*It's not clear why Frank freaks out when Kirsty gets hold of the box. Is he afraid she'll solve it and bring in the Cenobites? He gets angry rather than relieved when she throws it out the window. Is he concerned for her safety? It seemed like he was intent on either feeding off her to finish his resurrection or molesting her, plus he was willing to kill his own brother for his blood, so familial loyalty isn't exactly his strong suite.

*There's a scene where Frank cuts up a rat with a knife where the rat looks like a toy. I'm not sure what the point was. And on the matter of rats the room where Frank was hiding was crawling with them, but he never tried to use their blood to restore his body. Given how he's desperate to get away before the Cenobites come looking for him, this could be shown by him chasing down and feeding on rats for what little regeneration something that small could provide. If only human blood will work, his trying and failing could give him a more rational reason for driving Julia to kill.

*There's a doctor character later in the film (just over an hour in) whose actions seem like their whole purpose is to drive the plot rather than something a doctor would realistically do. And Kirsty's actions soon afterward verge into horror-film-character stupidity. At the very least, I would expect a lot more hesitation mixed in with the curiosity once, you know, a gateway into what looks like another world appears in the wall!

*Kirsty's British boyfriend isn't well-developed. He's not in very many scenes and the movie might've been better off without him at all.

The Verdict

Creepy and generally well-done, but with some storytelling flaws. 8 out of 10.

The Sovereign Grace Meltdown Continues...

Things are getting more interesting at Sovereign Grace these days.  Here's something I found today at SGMSurvivors.

http://www.sgmsurvivors.com/?p=2779&cp=all

The Washington Post getting involved could make things very dicey for Mahaney and his allies, especially if, as many of the people at SGMSurvivors and its associated site SGMRefuge have alleged, real crimes have been committed or covered up, including sexual abuse.

And it seems to me the members of these sites, despite having rejected SGM's authoritarian ways, still haven't gotten all the Kool-aid out of their systems.  In addition to the comments on that thread indicating fear of the secular media, some people from SGMRefuge have announced they aren't cooperating at all.

http://sgmrefuge.com/2011/08/17/the-washington-post-the-blogs-and-sgm/#comments

Here's where I vent:

One strategy to maintain power if you are a tyrant is to create an enemy to keep people rallying around the flag and obedient to the leadership.  The Nazis in Germany used the USSR and the worldwide Communist movement, the Soviets used the Western powers, the more obnoxious left-wingers in this country use the threat of a Religious Right theocracy, and the more obnoxious right-wingers make it sound like al-Qaeda is going to impose Islamic law in the United States if the U.S. withdraws from Iraq or somesuch.

In this case, the secular world and the media are serving as the monster intended to keep the rank-and-file blind and deaf to problems experienced by others and silent about their own experiences, just like "the bloggers" were used by the less moral SGM leadership.  Until the identity of the reporter inquiring about the doings within SGM was revealed, many people thought the Post would use the SGM situation as a club to bash Christianity and turn people off to the Gospel.

(Never mind that if the doctrine of election is true, there is no need to worry about how people view the Gospel since God will save whom He wills.  For all their talk of soli dea gloria, the Calvinists seem to place an ideologically-inconsistent amount of responsibility on man.)

I'm a newspaper reporter.  I've been an editor at a weekly since last January and worked at a daily for three and a half years since I graduated from college.  Before that, I learned journalism from some damn fine people at the University of Georgia.

Nowhere was I taught to be biased in favor of one side or the other, in favor or against any religion or political ideology.  In fact, one of my professors told me it was none of my business who he voted for.  Even though many reporters I've worked with were not always especially religious or politically conservative, all of my editors and publishers are/were Christians and at least some of them were Republicans, even if none of them were foaming at the mouth ideologues.

In journalism, we are taught to be factually accurate and not take sides.  If what we report pisses someone off, pardon my language, then chances are we're goring someone's sacred cow rather than lying.

(This is not to say dishonest or biased people are not active in journalism.  There are some, to our shame.  However, at least we're trained not to be biased or to let our biases interfere with our work.)

Certain parties like Tim Challies as well as those who still have some Kool-aid in their systems are quoting Scriptures about publicizing disputes within the church, gossiping, etc.  I imagine they're quoting the same Scriptures the Catholic leadership did over the years to justify covering up the fact that there were sexual predators in the priesthood, that efforts to treat them in-house had failed, and they were reoffending wherever the church moved them.

Remember the Lord Himself said that the Sabbath was made for man, not man for the Sabbath (Mark 2:27).  Jesus, Paul, etc. were concerned that the good name of Christianity not be dragged through the mud by people's stupidity and pettiness, not that gross sins and outright crimes be covered up.  Remember the Old Testament prophets criticized misbehaving kings and prominent people in public and Paul named names at times, so the Bible does not teach that we should indulge in sordid coverups and victim-blaming whenever bad things happen within the church.

And of course, one can't discuss SGM without Joshua Harris.  Harris is one of the few people in the Reformed movement who have weighed in the situation who is showing significant integrity, as witnessed by Al Mohler and Ligon Duncan as well as Challies.  He has acknowledged critics have legitimate points and even apologized when one of his statements was misinterpreted in an insulting way.  Although I have my issues with Josh both professional (complementarianism) and personal (the "courtship" ideology has not been good for my social life), I can respect honor, backbone, and doing what is right no matter the cost.

And Harris has paid a price already.  He has resigned, I suspect under pressure, from the SGM board, and two of Mahaney's sons-in-law have left Covenant Life.  I have read that he and Mahaney have historically been very close, so this must not be fun at all.  And if a breach between SGM and Covenant Life comes--which is possible, given how other leaders at Covenant Life have reached out to SGM's critics--I imagine the wrath of the various Reformed leaders who have sided with Mahaney will come down on him and his.  These are people he respects, so that sure as heck won't be a picnic.

Of course, he's still got his flaws--rather than telling all church members to read the documents revealing all the behind-the-scenes shenanigans among SGM leadership and then make an informed decision about staying with the church, he said heads of households should do that.  Said heads being, I would imagine, husbands and fathers.  Patriarchal democracy is an improvement over oligarchy or outright dictatorship, true, but every believer is a priest before God, not just male heads of household.

(Many Reformed and complementarians seem to think the husband/father is the priest of their family before God, which contradicts the doctrine--based on 1 Peter 2:9--that all Christians are priests.  The Reformers who fought against the Catholic system of priesthood would be spinning in their graves at the notion that not each and every believer is a priest before God, even if they weren't the most female-friendly people.)

There.  I'm done.  Now, the Bible does tell us to pray, so we should pray for everyone concerned, that justice be done if needed, that hurts be healed, and that the truth would win out.

Female Independence...In The Old Testament

I was reading on SGM Survivors about how Joshua Harris had apologized for some of the bad practices in the Sovereign Grace churches and found the following link in a discussion about the situation.

The Bondage of Betrothal

The article cites some passages in the Old Testament that openly contradict one of the sacred cows of the so-called "courtship movement" -- the notion that adult women must have some male figure in charge of them, be it their father if available, the pastor of the church or someone else if not, and he has veto power over their marriage decisions.

In I Kissed Dating Goodbye, Harris states that if one wants to ask a woman to marry him, he must ask permission of those "responsible for the girl"--until that point, I agreed with a lot what the book was saying about not dating stupidly, but that passage jammed down on my personal Berserk Button something fierce.  He later modified his position to be less controlling and reactionary in Boy Meets Girl: Say Hello to Courtship, but the principle is still there, albeit expressed in a more benign and good-intentioned way.

(The father as a means of deterring scummy, dangerous men, not as owner of property to be passed around.)

Although the Biblical passages are linked within the article, I'll post the links here as well.  After all, the Bible should be the standard, not the words of a charismatic speaker or writer on one side of the issue or another.

Numbers 27-Daughters come after sons (as was usual in the context of pre-modern societies) but before other male relatives in inheriting property.  The need for a male protector was much greater in those days due to society being poorer and more violent, but the passage does not say to give the property to male relatives and insist they provide for/oversee single daughters until they are married.

Numbers 36-In which fatherless daughters who have inherited property may marry whomever they like, provided it is within the father's tribe (to avoid land being transferred from tribe to tribe).  I don't think land is really an issue now.

As the article states, there is no reference to adult women being treated as being under the authority/protection of a related male until they marry.  No references to male "covering" or any of that un-Biblical nonsense.

I Just Made a Pro Sale!

I checked my e-mail this morning and found I'd gotten some really good news. The online publication Digital Science Fiction accepted my short story "Coil Gun" for publication.  Details are pending, but the company tends to produce eBook anthologies available on Amazon.com and elsewhere.  The first one, First Contact - Digital Science Fiction Anthology 1, is already available for purchase.

I'm excited because it's $0.05 per word.  At the current word count, this comes out to be roughly $250, which is much larger than the haul from my BattleTech story "Skirmish at the Vale's Edge" ($196) and larger than my other three payments combined ($105 for three stories, only one of which was actually published).  Plus, if I get a certain number of these sales at "pro" rates ($0.05/word plus), I can join the Science Fiction Writers of America and get to vote on the Nebula Awards.

The story takes place in a universe inspired by a challenge on my alternate-history forum.  The board member whose handle is reddie challenged board members to create a timeline where there was a cold war between the United States and "the apartheid juggernaut"--a white-supremacist but overtly Afrikaner state similar in size and power to the Anglo-Saxon Draka of S.M. Stirling's novels.  Think our world's apartheid regime on horse steroids, complete with our history's religious justification.

I started writing the timeline when I was studying abroad in Britain in 2006 and began writing the first short story set in that universe, "Picking Up Plans in Palma," the day after I returned home when I couldn't sleep.  I started writing "Coil Gun" somewhat later but actually finished it first.  What I ultimately ended up with was a cold war between the United States and the League of Democracies, this world's version of NATO, against the Indian Ocean-spanning Afrikaner Confederation and its allies in the Middle East and Southeast Asia, who form an organization called the Self-Determination Compact (this world's Warsaw Pact--they call themselves that because they view themselves as under siege by subversive Enlightenment values like secularism and democracy).

When it goes live, I'll post a link to where the anthology containing it can be purchased and then give you all a special treat--a link to the complete timeline of the Afrikanerverse, from the point of divergence during the Dutch revolt against Spain to the the decade after the war whose opening hours are depicted in "Coil Gun."  I was planning on posting it tonight, but I don't know what kind of edits Digital Science Fiction would require.  Changing the story might necessitate changing the overall timeline, depending on what's required.

Covenant Care Adoption Services Has Reached Its Goal

In an earlier entry, I called on my readers to donate money to assist Covenant Care Adoption Services, a Christian non-profit whose function is to facilitate adoption of unwanted children.

Well, my friend Michael (who clued me on this) and his wife Angelyn both posted this on Facebook today.  Apparently Covenant Care has not only reached, but exceeded, its goal and soon a worker for Augusta will be hired.

Good job to all of you who helped out.  And to anyone who might not have seen my earlier link or not been able to donate, I imagine they'll still need money for other purposes, so one can still donate.

People Hate Me, So I'm Righteous?

I dropped in on www.sgmsurvivors.com , a blog run by former members of the Sovereign Grace movement, this morning.  For those of you who aren't aware of what Sovereign Grace is, it's a hybrid Charismatic-Calvinist movement whose best-known figure is Joshua Harris, the writer of I Kissed Dating Goodbye.  The people who run this site seem to have a high opinion of Harris as a person (at the very least they view him as salvageable, unlike Sovereign Grace founder C.J. Mahaney), but they really don't like the denomination (oh, sorry, "family of churches") due an excessively authoritarian leadership structure.

http://www.sgmsurvivors.com/?p=2088

The most obnoxious material in Mahaney's post isn't Mahaney's own words, but the words of John Calvin.

None are more exposed to slanders and insults than godly teachers. This comes not only from the difficulty of their duties, which are so great that sometimes they sink under them, or stagger or halt or take a false step, so that wicked men find many occasions of finding fault with them; but added to that, even when they do all their duties correctly and commit not even the smallest error, they never avoid a thousand criticisms.
It is indeed a trick of Satan to estrange men from their ministers so as gradually to bring their teaching into contempt. In this way not only is wrong done to innocent people whose reputation is undeservedly injured, but the authority of God’s holy teaching is diminished….
The more sincerely any pastor strives to further Christ’s kingdom, the more he is loaded with spite, the more fierce do the attacks upon him become. And not only so, but as soon as any charge is made against ministers of the Word, it is believed as surely and firmly as if it had been already proved. This happens not only because a higher standard of integrity is required from them, but because Satan makes most people, in fact nearly everyone, over credulous so that without investigation, they eagerly condemn their pastors whose good name they ought to be defending.

I'm not going to deny that pastors have a difficult job and standing up for unpopular truth can be costly, but this goes down a dangerous road.  I concede that I often do not take criticism well, but a lot of the time, criticism has a legitimate purpose--to show you where you are making mistakes.  That doesn't mean that all criticism is valid, but unless it's really absurd, it should at least be considered.

This also ties in with a problem I have with certain values of Protestant who, when something that they teach offends someone, assumes that they've "struck a nerve" or induced the conviction of the Holy Spirit and that people are offended because they know the teacher in question is right, not because the teacher in question insulted them.  There was a thread on FreeRepublic, the online conservative-turned-loony forum, in which a religious war over Catholicism erupted and one anti-Catholic (I believe some flavor of Calvinist) claimed the reason Catholics were so offended at his or her claims was that the Holy Spirit was at work.  I'd post the link, but I'm having trouble finding it.  When I last checked, it was over 800 posts long, and that was months ago.

If I go down into the 'hood in the middle of the night, walk up to a bunch of gang-bangers and start preaching the Curse of Ham (the notion that God cursed black people, allegedly the descendants of Ham, with dark skin and decreed they would be slaves of the descendants of white people, allegedly the descendants of Shem, because Ham mocked Noah for lying around drunk and naked), and get the crap kicked out of me, did my inspired preaching convict them of their sins and did they lash out in rebellion against God, or am I just being an ass (and preaching false doctrine to boot)?

After all, if the amount of hatred from "the world" that one's teaching provokes is proof of one's own godliness, then Fred Phelps is the godliest man in America.

Help An Adoption Agency Out...

My friend Michael posted the link to Covenant Care Adoption Services on Facebook this morning.  The organization seeks to expand into Augusta and needs $50,000 to fund a caseworker.

http://www.adoptaugusta.com/donate/

It's a Christian organization, but it seems cross-denominational--in addition to Baptists and Presbyterians (PCA), they also have Catholics.  Anyone who is interested in helping provide homes for children who would otherwise be in risky situations should consider donating some money.

On Coed Wrestling In Iowa....

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20110217/ap_on_sp_ot/us_girl_wrestler_default

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20110218/ap_on_sp_ot/us_girl_wrestler_default

Came across this online the other day. This is likely to get inflammatory so here goes...

Firstly, I will give Joel Northrup credit for having convictions he's willing to suffer for. He could have won this tournament had he been willing to bend on this issue. Furthermore, this might even jeopardize his position on the wrestling team and through that, college scholarships and the like.

A lot of people pay lip service to a particular code or creed but aren't willing to stick to it when the time comes to sacrifice for it. And I will also give him credit for, despite he and his family likely having ideas about proper female behavior I don't agree with (see who is supporting him on this), not talking trash about the two female wrestlers for being unladylike, rebelling against their "God-given" gender roles, etc. and claiming that he's preaching truth to power or whatever excuse people use to make offending people into a sacred act.

The father of Cassy Herkelman, the female wrester Northrup didn't want to face, agrees with me too. Despite how he looks to others (see some discussion below), the man's got class. So does his daughter, based on her comments. Given the amount of crap I imagine they get because she's a girl competing in what has traditionally been a boy's sport (heck, see some of the comments from the Freepers), I could imagine both of them having gigantic chips on their shoulder about the issue, but they don't. Bravo.

I wish I could say that everyone with an opinion on the issue is similarly honorable, but there are people on both sides who are acting like complete imbeciles. I think I'll break it down by category.

Northrup's Supporters

Northrup's pastor is a member of http://www.freerepublic.com/, an online conservative (although lately it's taken a turn for the wacko, being infested with birthers and Obama-is-a-Muslim conspiracy theorists) site and there is a heated discussion going on there.

I'm not going to link to individual threads and comments when there were so many of them, so I'll just link to the threads tagged "wrestling" and you'll find them all there.

http://www.freerepublic.com/tag/wrestling/index

One person said that he didn't think women should wrestle, as that doesn't prepare them for what God wants them to be.

What does God allegedly want them to be? Spineless and unconfident? Weak and vulnerable and dependent on men for protection? Given how a lot of so-called "complementarians" seem to think women should live at home until they're married and not work if at all possible, I guess making women unprepared for the dangers of the outside world is a good way to make sure they stay within "God's bounds."

I'll go on the record and say if I had a daughter, I'd send her to karate (or to be really scary, Krav Maga) class from the age of five. That way, she'll be able to defend herself against bullies, slimy teenage boys who want only one thing, and psychopathic vagrants on the Applachian Trail.

(This is a reference to the case of Gary Michael Hilton, the vagrant in question, who robbed, raped, and murdered people on the Appalachian Trail. One of his victims was a grad student at the University of Georgia when I was a student.)

Another poster made some comment about Herkelman's parents not caring about her "respectability." Just because someone is a tomboy doesn't make them a slut. I'll go out on a limb here and suggest that the basis for this mindset is something like "she plays roughly with boys/she must not be a virgin/she's not worthy of marriage." Given my objection to attributing motives to people (see below), I will not claim this is what the person actually believes, but I will suggest that this is the origin of the social attitude.

Some people also took issue with Herkelman's dad, saying he looks like Charles Manson. Just because the guy's unkempt doesn't make him a bad person. Surely this person was taught in elementary school if not preschool not to judge by appearances.  They've also claimed both he and the daughter have no shame, the daughter is a gender-confused freak, etc.  Someone tell those characters to shut up, since they're bringing both the Christian religion and political conservatism into disrepute with their antics. 

(I will give credit to the Freepers for coming down on the guy who said if he was wrestling her, he would deliberately hurt her to deter her from wrestling again. Someone who would do that is utter scum and should be treated as such.)

A whole lot of people on FreeRepublic, especially the religious ones, are claiming coed wrestling is defying God's plan for the sexes or something like that. I challenge them to find Scripture backing that up, since right now, all they have backing them are their own opinions. Loudly insisting God is on your side doesn't win you any arguments against someone who isn't intimidated by bluster.

There's also the fact that John Piper, a member of the Council for Biblical Manhood and Womanhood, has said in the past that Northrup's was the right course to take.

www.desiringgod.org/blog/posts/over-my-dead-body-son

I would put "Biblical" in quotation marks because I don't think it is the only Biblical view or, for that matter, the correct one, but that might look like I was misrepresenting the organization's actual name.

Piper indulges in the usual "everyone knows deep down I'm right and the only reason they disagree is they're afraid of being criticized" B.S. common to Calvinism these days. In fact, he explicitly DENIES that defending female participation in wrestling is about committment to equality of the sexes but is really about fear of criticism. I once saw a video online of him claiming those who don't believe in salvation by grace through faith really want to be God and not for any other reason. His arrogance in claiming he knows what people *really* are thinking, without evidence, grinds my gears.

(That being said, he applies the same attitude to himself--he said if he ever abandoned the Christian faith, he meant he *must* have become a pastor only for the public praise and not because he had a sincere view and then changed his mind. At least he's consistent, even if he puts ideological correctness ahead of reaching a conclusion via examining evidence.)

It is entirely possible to disagree with someone for good reason (not wanting to deny women opportunities, not thinking the case against coed combat sports is strong enough to justify not participating), not bad ("fear of men" or secretly wanting to grope one's opponent). Piper needs to not assume everyone who disagrees with him is evil or cowardly. I will acknowledge even evil causes can have virtuous champions (Robert E. Lee for the Confederacy, Erwin Rommel for the Third Reich) and it would do Piper well to do the same.

Furthermore, I could argue the fact it would seem "weird" has nothing to do morality and everything to do with brainwashing by society at large. Piper invokes conscience, but the conscience is shaped by one's upbringing and culture and is therefore not always a reliable moral guide.

Northrup's Opponents

The issue is also being discussed on http://www.democraticunderground.com/, the left's equivalent of FreeRepublic. These are the guys claiming Bush would cancel elections and make himself dictator, that most people in the upper levels of the American economy and government are psychopaths (methinks because calling someone "evil" evokes concepts like sin and they don't like that), that Obama is governing in a more centrist manner because the people who assassinated JFK showed him footage proving their involvement and told him to moderate, etc. The one good thing about DU is that it's largely pro-gun-rights.

Since there are fewer DU threads discussing it, I'll just supply two links:

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=439x439330

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=439x452646

One person on DU is claiming that Northrup should be ejected from the team, since he cost the team points and is not being a team player. Although there is some sense behind that argument, we should be wary of letting the group take precedence over the individual conscience--this was not the act of some petulant whiner or a coward afraid of losing to a girl.

Another person is claiming he was "scared shitless" that she would "beat his ass." He knows this how, precisely? If he gets tossed off the team next week, that's one thing, but the one making that comment has no basis beyond his or her own prejudices for thinking that.

On FreeRepublic, on DemocraticUnderground, and on the CNN site, there are people who are taking issue with Northrup participating on the high school team, since he is home-schooled. They're saying since he doesn't attend the school, he should not participate in the program.

However sensible that sounds, home-schooling parents pay taxes that support school athletics too. Furthermore, being on the wrestling team is something Northrup had to earn--he had to compete with everyone else to get it, it wasn't just a matter of signing up and automatically getting a spot.

Also, many opponents of home-schooling claim home-schooled kids are being isolated from "mainstream society" and indoctrinated and this is why home-schooling needs to be suppressed or at least closely regulated. As one of the Freepers pointed out, it's hypocritical for them to complain about alleged isolation going on and then when one home-schooler decides to un-isolate, not wanting him around.

Plus there's the usual trash-talking about alleged religious indoctrination. I will admit I find a lot of the religious home-schooling distasteful due to the stuff that's being taught (young-earth creationism, reactionary ideas on women's rights, etc), but there's no need to hate on Christian home-schooling in general.

A Controversial Manhattan House of Worship...In 1785

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/10/08/nyregion/08zero.html?_r=2&partner=rss&emc=rss

Now this is interesting.  I was aware there was widespread anti-Catholicism in the early United States, but I thought it became really "a big deal" much later on, when enormous numbers of Irish came fleeing the Potato Famine.

(Colonial anti-Catholicism struck me as something largely limited to the Puritans, on theological grounds.)

The claims of those who claimed Catholics would turn the U.S. over to the Pope did not come true, even when we elected John F. Kennedy, a Catholic, as U.S. President. Islam, which is far less centralized than Catholicism, would be even less of an "infiltrator threat."  After all, the closest thing Islam has had to a universally-acknowledged leader is the Caliph, and there has not been a Caliph since 1922, when the last Ottoman Emperor was deposed.

In fact, Catholics have gone on to make many great contributions to the United States.  Our open society is one of our greatest strengths and we should not let the fears of the moment potentially deprive us of talented people.  I agree with Father Madigan on this issue.

Still, it's good to hear that the backers of the Cordoba House (the so-called "Ground Zero Mosque") are not accepting foreign money, let alone money from the Middle East.  At the very least, it's generally a good idea to avoid even the appearance of evil.

Jim Raynor: Christ Figure? Spoilers...

I had a thought the other day that Jim Raynor, especially in Starcraft 2, is actually a Christ figure, in a particularly Reformed sense.

The main Scripture I am using for this is Romans 5:8, whose text follows:

But God demonstrates his own love for us in this: While we were still sinners, Christ died for us.

Jim Raynor clearly loved Sarah Kerrigan in a self-sacrificing way (agape) and eventually intended to free her from the Zerg swarm.  Although Kerrigan, after her infestation by the Zerg, was less hostile toward Raynor than toward other characters, she still made war against him, especially when they were both after pieces of the Xel'Naga artifact or when Raynor and Valerian invaded Char to deploy it against the Zerg. 

This is similar to the Reformed position, based on their interpretation of Romans 8:7, whose text follows:

The sinful mind is hostile to God. It does not submit to God's law, nor can it do so.

The Reformed believe that this means man cannot accept Jesus on his or her own--God must act on them first.  Kerrigan did not ask for Raynor's help in Starcraft 2, but was actively opposed to him.  And of her own free will as well--she was no longer under the control of the Overmind, but was acting according to her nature (albeit warped by the Zerg--a moral, compassionate person beforehand, the infestation destroyed her conscience and moral sensibilities and rendered her a de facto psychopath).

Other characters play roles similar to the Pharisees and Sadducees who opposed Christ during His earthly ministry.  Arcturus Mengsk tells Raynor "that treacherous b***** cannot be saved," which reminds me somewhat of the religious leadership that for the most part looked down on "sinners."  Raynor's friend Tychus Findlay and even the well-meaning Matt Horner are also skeptical of Raynor's insistence that Kerrigan can be saved.

The saga even has its own Judas Iscariot--Findlay himself, who is a mole for Arcturus Mengsk, albeit under duress (he's locked into a suit of armor that will kill him on command).  When Raynor and his personal guard find the de-infested Kerrigan, naked and dazed in the ruins of a Zerg hive, Findlay attempts to kill her under orders from Mengsk.  Raynor has to kill his old friend, who was his brother-in-arms during the Guild Wars and fought alongside him during the events of "Wings of Liberty."  This parallels the description of Judas as one who shared in Christ's ministry (Acts 1:17).

However, Raynor's story and that of Jesus Christ do not match up 100%.  Although Raynor risks his life, he does not die, and his love for Kerrigan is romantic/sexual (eros) as well as agape.  Mengsk is also the cause of the situation--he abandoned Kerrigan to the Zerg in the first game--rather than merely a skeptical religious leader.  Raynor also initially intended to kill Kerrigan in revenge for her murder of his Protoss friend Fenix, something he abandoned after Zeratul revealed Kerrigan's prophesied role in the defeat of an evil power that would, without her, take control of the Zerg and use them to exterminate the Terrans and the Protoss.

That being said, there are a whole lot of parallels.