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ROMANS 13The Most Disastrously Misinterpreted Scripture
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In a previous paper on Angels and God's Throne of Government we saw very, very briefly, the activity of Angels in maintaining social order and cultural prosperity.
In this paper we shall examine the other side; the activity of evil angels -- demons -- in tempting us all to neglect God's Covenant and His Government and to fashion a form of Government which denies the power of God's Government and Covenant.
Politics -- human-centered control and management of society -- is an attempt to supplant God's Government. It is a falling into Satan's temptation to "be as gods" (Genesis 3:5).There are two kinds of angels, Godly and unGodly. The Godly ones want to serve (Hebrews 1:14; Ps. 34:7; 91:11,12). The thesis being set forth in this paper is that the fallen angels, instead of serving, seek to rule, and one way they do this by deceiving men and setting up empires, or states. (And just to head off the argument, we are not denying that "good" angels might also bring evil.)
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Any Biblical theory of the State must begin with the basic Scriptural distinction between ruling and serving. God does not want us to rule others (dominate, force to serve us), He wants us to serve them.
Especially important here is Mark 10:42-45. A true Christian will try to help the person in need gain the ability to solve his problems by himself, becoming an elder, wiser, and more mature Christian. Serving others, sacrificing self-interests (seemingly) in the interests of restoring the image of God in others, is true power; bringing about Godly obedience in others is true leadership. In the parallel passage (Luke 22:24-30) Jesus, after telling His disciples not to emulate the gentile politicians, goes on to tell them that they will be given true thrones and true judgment through obedient service. The opposite of Spiritual kingship is political kingship. People resort to politics when they fail at true service; they call on the State when their efforts are not rewarded by the Spirit.
A false Christian will want to enslave others to his service. This is the essence of kingship among men: they want to be exalted over others. A particularly delightful parable is found in Judges 9:7ff.: The good trees preferred to remain productive, rather than become a king. It was the thistle that chose to be a king. And verse 9:4 tells the kind of people that follow after a king: those that desire a kind of vicarious kingship. Such people glory in a king; the more powerful the king is the more important they feel. God was angry at Israel for wanting a king (I Samuel 8).
We seldom think about angels. We seldom take thought of the fact that angels take an interest in the affairs of each of us (Luke 15:10; Genesis 24:40; Matthew 18:10; etc.). We have a very naturalistic view of the universe, and hence of Government, which we reduce to "politics." We do this because we have assimilated so much evolutionary thinking. We don't think in terms of our Edenic past, and we ignore the present movement toward an Edenic future. Recent works by the "Christian Reconstruction" movement force our attention to the relationship between Eden and Government by showing Satan's role in the Edenic model.
Satan was originally the "covering cherub" (Ezekiel 28:14; evidently the highest among the cherubim, who are those in the angelic hierarchy closest to the throne of God Himself [Psalm 99:1]). His position was thus one of great proximity to the origin of all government, God Himself. Chilton elaborates on this by speaking of the "canopy" in Isa. 4:4-5:
"This Cloud-canopy of God's Presence, full of angels' wings, is called a pavilion, a covering (2 Sam 22:12; Ps. 18:11; Lam. 3:44; Ps. 91:4); and the same word is used to describe the position of Satan before the Fall, who as a perfect member of the heavenly host was 'a covering cherub,' a part of the Cloud-canopy that covered the Garden of Eden (Ezek 28:14,16). And that is why this word covering is used to describe the position of the carved cherubim that were placed hovering over the Ark of the Covenant (Ex. 25:20)." ("Eden and Salvation," The Biblical Educator, June 1982.)
The Godly angels gladly served God both in His Heavenly Throne and in the Edenic Throne-Model. Some despised that role (Jude 6, II Peter 2:4) and rebelled. Their basic motivation was to be powerful and to rule (I Timothy 3:6; Isaiah 14); in short, pride (Ezekiel 28:11ff.).
Satan and his followers fell from their position of service when they set out to maintain a government of their own. They are bent on tempting men to form States to do the same. Some refer to Isaiah 14 and Ezekiel 28 to discuss the fall of Satan, when he was cast down to earth (Revelation 12:9) and took a third part of the stars (Revelation 12:4). But these chapters are directly addressed to kings of empires (Babylon, for one) and can only be attributed to Satan in an indirect way. It is certainly significant that the Prophet can move so easily from the State to Satan.
At any rate, Henry Morris seems to be correct in saying
"Satan thenceforth became 'the prince of the power (exousia) of the air' (Eph 2:2) and has concentrated his efforts and those of his angelic followers on trying to defeat God's plans for man. God's holy angels, on the other hand, have continued faithful to God and are continually keeping watch over the 'heirs of salvation.' It is clear therefore that there is a continuing cosmic warfare between 'Michael and his angels' and 'the dragon and his angels' (Rev 12:7). Aspects of this conflict are glimpsed occasionally in Scripture (Dan 10:5,12-13,20; Ps. 34:7; Jude 9, etc.)" [And notice the involvement of empires or the state in these passages.]
Henry Morris was the fellow who first got me to believe that one could take the Bible seriously. I had always thought that since the Bible was so dreadfully wrong on matters relating to science and evolution that it was not very reliable in general. Morris (and those to whom he referred me) showed me that scientists believed in evolution not because it was true or "scientific" but because they hated Christianity.
A number of his books deal with the subject of stars and idolatry. One book is The Troubled Waters of Evolution. We shall quote from it at length.
Morris' thinking shows reliance on the inadequate work by Alexander Hislop, The Two Babylons, as he traces the origin of evolutionary thought. But even Hislop recognizes an undeniable fact: All pagan religions or philosophies are evolutionary. Morris suggests a common origin, spoken of ever so implicitly in Genesis 10:8-10 and in Genesis 11:
Pantheism, polytheism, astrology, idolatry, mysteries, spiritism, materialism -- all this great complex of belief and practice, superficially diverse, but fundamentally one -- constitutes the gigantic rebellion of mankind against the true God of creation. Always, whatever the outward appearance, the underlying faith is in eternal matter, in a self-contained cosmos evolving upward out of chaos toward future perfection. Though in some cases, particularly isolated tribes, the people seem to have retained some kind of dim awareness of a great High God, far removed in time and space from their personal lives, their practical interests have from primeval times invariably been centered in the various divinities connected with their own immediate environments. Such identification of ultimate reality with finite natural objects is nothing but evolution. Matter in some form, not God, is their original and eternal cause of all things (See Romans 1:25).
Furthermore, this system is invariably identified in some way with astrology, and all the various divinities are associated with their own particular stars or planets. To the pagans, these heavenly beings were not considered as mere religious ideals, but as living spirits, capable of communicating directly with men through oracles or seers or mediums [sic -- media?].
The origin of evolution as a religious philosophy (and that, of course, is all that it can ever be) is thus locked together with the origin of paganism, which in the post-diluvian world was undoubtedly at Babel. This is also intimated by Scripture, when it speaks of "Mystery: Babylon the Great, the mother of harlots and abominations of the earth" (Revelation 17:5). Since Nimrod was the founder and first ruler of Babylon, it seems reasonable to propose that he was responsible for the introduction of this entire system into the life of mankind."
(Actually, the theory of evolution goes back to Cain and to the serpent before him. But Nimrod is clearly the important post-Flood figure in the origin and nature of the State, according to the Bible.)
To the modern skeptic, of course, Nimrod is merely a non-existent legendary hero like all the other names recorded in the early chapters of Genesis. Such skeptics should at least realize, however, that the literature of antiquity frequently refers to many people in ancient times, in addition to the writer of Genesis, who regarded him as real.
We need not apologize, as Morris seems to, for seeing the Bible as an inerrant historical document, a reliable record of ancient history, and the necessary presupposition for all archeological and historical endeavors.)
There are numerous ancient historians who recognize Nimrod and his exploits, and various sites in the Babylonian-Ninevah region are associated by the Arabs with his name. It is quite probable that the chief God of the Babylonians (Marduk, or Merodach), really represents the same Nimrod, deified after his death.
I seem to recall this theory invoked to explain all Roman and Greek gods - deification of national heroes: An old statist tradition.
Morris does not adequately convey the force of the Biblical references to Babylon. All through the Bible we have continual references to Babylon; even in the New Testament, long after Babylon's "literal" demise, she is still with us. In the Biblical story, Babylon is clearly the great antagonist. Nimrod is still a part of this picture, long after his death (e.g., Micah 5:6).
It is significant that the phrase 'the host of heaven' is applied in Scripture both to the stars and to angels. Similarly, the worship of the sun, moon, and stars, as well as the mythological deities, and the graven images which represent them, is also frequently identified in Scripture with the worship of angels, especially with the fallen angels and the demonic hosts who are following Lucifer, the "day-star" (Isaiah 14: 12-14; Revelation 12:4) in his attempt to replace God as king of the universe. (I trust you're using this as an opportunity to look up verses in your Bible. You will then notice that Isaiah is talking about a king, not Lucifer directly. More about the relationship between the State and Satan shortly.)
In common with all the other great temple-towers of antiquity, it is likely that the original Tower of Babel (Genesis 11:4) was built, not to "reach unto heaven" in a literal sense (Nimrod was no naive character in a fairy tale to attempt such a thing as that) but rather with a "top unto heaven" (the words "may reach" are not in the original). That is, its top was a great temple shrine, emblazoned with the zodiacal signs representing the host of heaven, Satan and his "principalities and powers, rulers of the darkness of this world" (Ephesians 6:12). These evil spirits there perhaps met with Nimrod and his priests, to plan their long-range strategy against God and His redemptive purposes for the post-diluvian world. (Of course, this does not mean omniscience on their part, just a planning action.)
The solid evidence for the above sequence of events is admittedly tenuous. As a hypothesis, however, it does harmonize with the Biblical record and with the known facts of the history of religions; whereas, it is difficult to suggest any other hypothesis which does.
If something like this really happened, early in post-diluvian history, then Satan himself is the originator of the concept of evolution. In fact, the Bible does say that he is the one "who deceiveth the whole world" (Revelation 12:9) and that he "hath blinded the minds of them which believe not" (II Corinthians 4:4). Such statements as these must apply especially to the evolutionary cosmology, which indeed is the world-view with which the whole world has been deceived.
We assume, therefore, that the Babylonian mysteries were originally established by Nimrod and his followers at Babel. They have somehow since been transmitted throughout the world and down through the centuries, corrupting all nations with their materialistic glorification of the "host of heaven," changing the "glory of the incorruptible God into an image like to corruptible men, and to birds, and fourfooted beasts, and creeping things" (Romans 1:23). Because they "did not like to retain God in their knowledge" (Romans 1:28), they proceeded to change "the truth of God into a lie, and worshipped and served the creature more than the Creator" (Romans 1:25).
The remarkable similarities and antiquities of the Zodiacal constellations and the astrological systems that have come down from all the early nations, provide strong evidence of the primeval unity of heathendom. It therefore is a reasonable deduction, even though hardly capable of proof, that the entire monstrous complex was revealed to Nimrod at Babel by demonic influences, perhaps by Satan himself."
I freely admit that when I first read these comments by Morris, some years ago, I put the book down in disgust: "No way. Morris is good in some areas, but not here." If you're in the same position now, be open, and listen to the evidence, and then reject it if you must. There are good reasons to give thoughtful attention to Morris' interpretation. If Morris is unconvincing it is because he has understated the case. Let us consider
Morris' specialty is refuting evolutionism, and he is very much taken up with the subject of evolution per se (i.e., in a strictly "scientific" or anti-"religious" sense). As a result, his perspective is unnecessarily constricted. Paganism is broader than philosophy and religion in the narrow sense of those words. The influence of pagan economics, law, education, etc, have been much greater than pagan religious practices. This is Alexander Hislop's basic mistake. Everything in Babylon is seen as a religious, liturgical, or cultic mistake, rather than an economic, legal, or political one.
We have seen, in the works of Rushdoony for example, the broad scope of God's Law; that it has concrete guidance on such social problems as inflation, poverty, education, and national defense. Biblical Law contains a complete program for justice, welfare, and the functioning of a prosperous society. No economic, political, or legal issue is not addressed by God's Law-Word in the Bible. A student of God's Law and its application in society should get interested in reading about the excavations at Ebla. Ebla is to Babylon what Long Beach is to L.A. Not as close geographically, but as related. The overwhelming majority of tablets discovered have been political, economic, legal. Of course the ones that get translated first and written up in TIME magazine are what they claim are the "poetic/religious" tablets. All sorts of stupid comments are made about the relationship between these Babylonian "creation hymns" and the Biblical "creation hymn" in Genesis one. The records of the State-administered agriculture systems, the Central Banking system, and the legal system, are all seen as less relevant by the theologically-trained archeologists. They do not recognize these as records of the statism and oppression so vehemently denounced by the Prophets. Nor do they see these same political practices in our day. They fail to understand the abiding validity of Biblical Law. But those are the ones that should interest students of Rushdoony. The parallels between the Babylonian political/economic system and ours are striking.
Aldous Huxley, fervent defender of evolution and descendant of T.H. Huxley, Darwin's right-hand man, has made explicit the motivation for accepting an evolutionary world-view: it serves as a rationalization for rejecting God's Law in politics, education, and family.
I had motives for not wanting the world to have a meaning; consequently assumed that it had none, and was able without any difficulty to find satisfying reasons for this assumption. The philosopher who finds no meaning in the world is not concerned exclusively with a problem in pure metaphysics, he is also concerned to prove that there is no valid reason why he personally should not seize political power and govern in the way that they find most advantageous to themselves. . . . For myself, the philosophy of meaninglessness was essentially an instrument of liberation, sexual and political.
Considered in the light of Biblical Law and the mandate for Christian Reconstruction contained therein, Babylonian culture displays a systematic assault on Biblical government. The program begins with an evolutionary cosmology, but this view of the distant past serves merely to justify a rejection of Biblical Law in law, politics, education, and every aspect of society. We must not reject Morris' interpretation just because he doesn't see how broad Babylon's influence was, and because he seems to suggest that Satan and his demons were sitting on the Tower of Babel planning what Darwin would write. Modern science is only the capstone of a long philosophical maturation that includes evolutionists from Aristotle to Kant to Hegel, and their students from Pharaoh to Nero to Hitler.
Read Dt. 4:19 and Gen 2:1. Are these verses talking about the angels or the stars? Compare Hebrews 12:22 with Jer. 33:22 Is there a single verse that is clearly talking about the stars and not the angels when it speaks about the host of heaven? See Dt. 17:3, Judges 5:20, 2 Chron 18:18, I Kings 22:19.
Meredith Kline, the influential Old Testament scholar at Westminster Seminary, says that when trying to understand "the heavens" of Genesis 1:1, you must look at Nehemiah 9:5ff., and Psalm 103:19. (Also Ps. 148:1-4, and Colossians 1:16.)
Now the tricky thing, when studying angels and stars, is to figure out whether they are the bad angels or the good angels (and whether it makes a difference). It is difficult because the bad ones started out good and even the good ones can be wrongly (or over-) reverenced. Many references seem to be to bad angels: 2 K 17:16; 21:3,5; 23: 4,5; 2 Chron 33:3,5; Is. 13:10; 34:4; Jer. 8:2; Dan 8:10; Zeph 1:5; Lk. 21:6; Acts 7:42; I Cor 8:5.
Henry Morris writes,
Another problem that has been associated with Genesis 1:16 is found in Job 38:4-7. This passage has been read as contradicting Gen. 1:16. The Hebrew construction (of Job 38) makes it clear that the "morning stars" are actually the same as the "sons of God." The latter were the created beings called angels and they are frequently associated in Scripture with the stars. Both the stars and the angels are, in fact, called the "host of heaven" in many places in the Bible.
The physical stars, which are somehow associated with the spiritual host of heaven, may thus also be involved in this heavenly warfare. The "stars" associated with the solar system would be particularly likely to be involved, in view of the heavy concentration of angels, both good and bad around the planet earth.
There are a number of Biblical references indicating that in some way the stars may actually be participating in human battles (Num. 24:17; Judg 5:20; Rev. 6:13; 8:10, etc.)
Immanuel Velikovsky and other modern writers have stressed the possible significance of the host (pun?) of ancient traditions and myths dealing with the "wars of the gods." Such "wars" and "gods" were always for some reason associated with the various stars, whose names they shared. The long fascination of men of all nations with pagan astrology can only be understood if it is recognized that there is some substratum of truth in the otherwise strange notion that objects billions of miles away could have any influence on earthly events. Certainly the physical stars as such can have no effect on the earth, but the evil spirits connected with them are not so limited. Furthermore, the well-documented association of certain "UFO" sightings with occultic influences and tendencies suggests that the "rulers of the darkness of this world" (Eph 2:2) are increasingly imaginative in their battles for the minds of men." (I have a book by Clifford Wilson, maybe you have it too, called Close Encounters: A Better Explanation. Thesis: UFO's are demonic. Rushdoony recommended it. Still haven't read it; guess I'd better.)
"Hosts" means armies, we have always been told, but armies of what? The subject of armies is important, so let's digress.
As you go through the Old Testament, you'll come across the word "sword" quite frequently. It is almost always in connection with warring armies. Armies, in turn, are always an arm of a nation, empire, or, as we say today, the State.
The one notable exception is Abraham's family in Genesis 14, who had every characteristic of a "State" except rebellion against God.
We have always thought about the sword in Romans 13 as referring to capital punishment. It is not because I no longer uphold capital punishment as valid in the New Testament that I say this, but it doesn't appear that capital punishment is in view in Rom 13, at least in a legal-penological sense. In the Old Testament, "sword" is a symbol of war. Now, the better expositors and commentators have noted that in the Old Testament war was a form of national capital punishment, in which an entire nation was utterly destroyed for their sins, like all the nations of Canaan were intended to be destroyed by the Israelites. But sword --always as far as I can tell-- symbolizes war -- imperial conquest and subjugation -- not individual penal sanctions. When God threatens to send a sword, He is speaking of an invading army, not an electric chair. That a few individuals are recorded as having been killed by a particular sword of another individual does not alter the generic usage of "sword" as a symbol for war. When God in His wrath threatens to "send a sword," He is threatening to send false gods and their hosts. Individual penal-legal sanctions are symbolized in the New Testament by the cross (as this was the prevailing form of capital punishment in the NT); Stoning is the individual penal sanction in the Old Testament. That warfare is a ceremonial service is also evident in Numbers 4:30,35,39,43; 8:24, 25.
Very often, when a distrusting, faithless Israel makes a treaty with an apparently powerful nation to help defend herself against another nation, or with the desire to pacify a nation so that it would not attack Israel, then we find references to the pagan nation, or to Israel, worshipping the armies of heaven, presumably meaning the evil angels (or distorting the true purposes of the good angels). So when Israel makes an agreement with Egypt to gain their military support, Israel also worships the stars.
Rushdoony has pointed out that "Moloch" means king. So when someone made a Moloch statue to "worship and serve" were they really worshiping some dumb statue, or some king? And what of the relationship between the king and the stars? Morris says, "Behind this facade of images lurked a real 'host of the heavens,' the angelic and demonic hosts of Lucifer, the 'day-star.'" Morris is referring to Isaiah 14, and as I said, this is only more confusing as it is literally addressed to the king of Babylon! The tie between and Satan the national god goes back to Nimrod, as Morris notes in words similar to those earlier quoted:
How much of this new system of religion (at the Tower of Babel) came by direct communication with Satan himself we do not know, but there is abundant evidence that all forms of paganism [statism] have come originally from the Ancient Babylonian[s] (see Rev. 17:5). Nimrod himself was apparently later deified as the chief god of Babylon (Merodach or Marduk).
Read Judges 10:6. Verses like this tend to make the relationship between idolatry and the state clearer. Who are the gods of these foreign countries? Their kings? Past kings -- their Kennedys, FDR's or Lincolns (magnified in political power to an appropriate degree)? Baal means "lord" (cf. I Cor. 8:5). Molech means "king."
It may be that some of these gods are not strictly political, e.g., Ashtaroth may be the Linda Lovelace or Marilyn Chambers of society, spoken of with justifiable poetic license, or as popular and depraved as their kings were powerful. More likely than sheer pornography, such sexual idols represented fertility, which was important because a in pre-industrialist society, human beings were a valuable resource. Nobody knew this better than emperors and pharaohs, for whom "fertility" was a "compelling state interest," and the masses yearned for fertility to gain imperial approval. And again, we see that most idolatry was statolatry.
But how many of the names of these idols were once kings, like Merodach (Nimrod)?
One of the continuing problems with Israel was that they continually relied on other nations and their military power for security, rather than upon the LORD. They wanted visible power, coercion, and rule, like the other nations (I Samuel 8:5,20) rather than service-dominion and Supernatural Government (Providence). It should be noted that the phrase "strange gods" which, if you are reading through the Bible, you will run across frequently, is better translated "foreign gods" or "foreign dignitaries" or "foreign powers."
David Chilton, in his exposition of Matthew 24, has called attention to the traditional interpretation of verse 29, abandoned by evolution-influenced modern expositors. Many Christians think that this verse refers to some great cosmic disturbance, interpreted "literally." Obviously it's not being interpreted "literally," for a literal interpretation would apply it to a literal nation, because, as Chilton and others have pointed out, prophecies like this are found in the OT, such as Isaiah 13:1, 34:4, etc., and the prophecy literally came to pass with an empire literally falling. Stars were used to communicate truths about nations. Why? Was it be- cause the stars or their evil angels really had something to do with the way a nation behaved? (see Luke 10:18-19).
There are quite a few verses you will run across, should you read through the Bible, that don't make a whole lot of sense unless you understand a relationship to exist between evil angels (and their star-homes [?]) and evil nations: Amos 5:26; Hosea 7:5; Habakkuk 1:16; Isaiah 14:14; Zephaniah 2:15; Isaiah 47:8-10; Ezekiel 28:2,9; Ezekiel 20:32 + I Samuel 8; Jeremiah 10: 7-9,2; Jeremiah 50:2,38; Ezekiel 43:7,9.
I'm somewhat confused by the use of the word elohim in Scripture, but I think the concept of evil angels and idolatry equated with (among other things) serving a pagan king or State, will help clear things up. (I hope I don't sound too repetitive in this tirade against the State; but the State is surely the most dominant subject in the Scriptures. It does seem that evil angels provide the impetus for the formation and function of the State; that idolatry is the worship of (1) the State, or the worship of (2) sex, which may be tied to the State (through sanction or subsidy), or the worship of (3) money, which is always tied to the State, or the worship of (4) political power, best exemplified in the Whatchamacallit.)
As you surely know, Elohim is a name of the LORD. But it is also used of gods, in idolatry. Interestingly, it is used also of rulers, i.e., in Israel (Ex. 21:6, etc.). Just as human kingship (e.g., Saul, David) was not God's prescriptive will (I Samuel 8) neither was it God's will that only a few appointed heads work under Moses to administer justice (Num. 11:29). Israel was continually falling into a slave mentality, envying the statists around them, and requiring God to make for them a State.
We have already suggested that Satan originated the idea of having (or being) earthly gods (rulers). Our analysis of Genesis 3:5 has continual confirmation in the pages of the Old Testament as it unfolds the languishing of a Spiritless patriarchal system in the face of Babylonian political gods; the rise of earthly elohim. Genesis 3:5 is the introduction of a theme of temptation to political godhead that permeates the struggle between Israel and the nations, highlighted by insights into the angelic conflict behind it (e.g., Daniel 10). The struggle is culminated and terminated (in principle) when Satan re-issues his political temptation to the Second Adam (Luke 4:5-7) Who, unlike many of His Zealot contemporaries, withstood the temptation and relied on God and His Word, the Source of True Power. The very essence of the State is non-theonomic judicial decision making, which is what we see originated in Gen 3. It is also the antithesis of servanthood, and this contrast is the heart of the Gospel (Genesis 3:15; Philippians 2:5-8; Isaiah 42:1ff.; Mark 10:42-45).
This is but a sketchy introduction to some questions that have emerged in my own study of the Bible. Any comments you might have on any aspect of this paper would be greatly appreciated. Kevin4VFT@vftonline.org
Christian "Anarchism" is Our Goal | | All Evil is Predestined by God | | Pray for a Servant's Understanding | | Angels and God's Throne of Government | | Stars and Idolatry | | Why the State Always Encourages Immorality | | Unlucky 13 -- Romans 13, Revelation 13 and Isaiah 13 | | A Roman's-Eye View of Romans 13 | | "Principalities and Powers" | | Lakes of Fire in "Smoke-Filled Rooms" | | Romans 13: The Burden is on the Archists | | Taxation, Representation, and the Myth of the State | | Why the State is not a "Divine Institution" | | Angels and Autarchy | | 95 Theses Against the State | | Here is what a Christian Anarchist looks like after he has joined The Christmas Conspiracy.
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