Primary Source Analysis: Pope Leo I the Great & the Council of Chalcedon, 5th Century CE

Pope Leo I's letter to the bishop Flavian regarding the heretical theologian Eutyches, alongside the definition of the faith from the Council of Chalcedon, are both documents written in the year 451 CE during a period of recurring theological dissonance between different arms of the Church throughout the fragmented and decaying Roman Empire. Pope Leo, also known as Pope Leo I the Great, was in constant correspondence with many disparate portions of Christendom, intervening in an attempt to mend theological schisms through rebutting heresies and implementing strong sanctions on those who did not strictly follow the tenets of the faith.¹ The Bishop Flavian is addressed in the letter also intended as one such Papal intervention in the proceedings of the Council of Chalcedon, elaborating on Christological concerns regarding the proper relationship between God the Father and God the Son in light of a strictly defined institutionalized orthodoxy.² The primary focus of this paper will be on such Christological concerns as they appear in the primary source documents already named above, placing them and their authors in the historical context of the fourth and fifth centuries, as well as identifying some of the religious themes and theologies surrounding.

Though eastern Byzantine Christian orthodoxy was slowly yet inexorably drifting away from the purview of the western church, during the time of the Council of Chalcedon in the middle of the fifth century, the two sects had not completely removed themselves from the others orbit. As such, it was not highly unusual for the western papacy to occasionally involve itself in the activities and controversies of the east. Pope Leo I, whose pontificate was dedicated to the preservation of orthodoxy and the unification of the western church, felt compelled to contribute to the ecumenical debate in Chalcedon through letter, condemning Eutychianism and reaffirming the equally human and divine natures of Christ.³ The letter itself, written in the evocative, religiously-layered prose typical of the time, was probably first penned in Latin from the Pope's residence in Rome and sent to Chalcedon by way of sea or land. Eutyches, who had first seen himself ejected from the priesthood on the grounds of his alleged heresy, was reinstated a priest until the Council of Chalcedon in 451, when, according to Leo, he spoke of renouncing his heresies, thus deserving mercy under the doctrine of the church.⁴

The heresies allegedly committed by Eutyches were primarily Christological in nature. Whereas the orthodox position, articulated by Leo, held that Christ was both human and divine since his conception, Eutyches emphasized the divine nature of Christ, seemingly to the neglect of any human nature if we are to accept Pope Leo's interpretation of Eutyches' beliefs.⁵ The orthodox position was reaffirmed in the definition of faith from the Council of Chalcedon, a statement of collective religious belief and prescribed dogmas agreed upon for the eastern Byzantine church by the close of debate.⁶ The statement also clarifies the purpose of Leo's letter to Flavian as having been written also for the Council of Chalcedon. As well, nowhere is a single author named for the definition of the faith, but the start of the document specifies that both the Council and the resulting agreement were decreed orthodox by Marcian and Valentinian Augustus, the latter, as emperor of the Byzantine (or Eastern Roman) Empire, and the former, as emperor of the Western Roman Empire during its period of final decline.⁷ The overarching purpose of the definition of the faith is a reaffirmation of the beliefs and dogmas decided upon at the Council of Nicaea in 325 CE, alongside the Council of Constantinople in 381 CE. Partially affirmed, as well, is the consensus on doctrine agreed upon at the Council of Ephesus in 449 CE. However, in explicitly designating the Nicaean and Constantinopolitan councils as more authoritative in their consensus than Ephesus, this definition of the faith in some sense 'repealed' the heretical doctrines put forth two years earlier without rejecting them entirely.⁸

Near the end of the definition of the faith, there is a more nuanced rebuttal to a heretic other than Eutyches, as the document turns its attention to those who refuse to apply the title of “God-bearer,”⁹ or as it was known in its original Greek, “Theotokos,”¹⁰ to the Virgin Mary. This heretic, who went by the name of Nestorius, was officially challenged and disgraced in his beliefs through letters written by Cyril, the pastor of Alexandria until his death. In these letters, Cyril asserts that through rejection of the God-bearer title, it is implied that Nestorius thus did not believe that Christ was God.¹¹ What one must wonder is whether or not this was a broad-sweep misinterpretation of Nestorian theology, one which saw all alternative Biblical interpretation as a serious sin, perhaps in part because of the perceived threat it posed to existing orthodox structures and doctrine. Interesting as well is that “Theotokos,” the original Greek terminology for “God-bearer,” has often also been translated as “Mother of God,”¹² and is likely the etymological source of the use of said title as a statement expressing sudden shock or disbelief. Certainly, the Christian reverence for the Virgin Mary would also in part be causative of the strong emotional tone usually associated with its cultural use as an expression.

Central to both the definition of the faith and Pope Leo's letter to Flavian and the Council of Chalcedon itself is the Nicene Creed, indirectly referenced earlier with the mention of the First Council of Nicaea in 325 CE. Pope Leo, in his letter, articulately paraphrases it as “the common and undivided creed by which the whole body of the faithful confess that they believe ... [one:] in God the Father almighty, and [two:] in Jesus Christ his only Son, our Lord ... who [three:] was born of the Holy Spirit and the virgin Mary.”¹³ This creed, authoritative in both the eastern and western churches, was explicated and approved as dogma at the above mentioned Council of Nicaea, establishing the doctrine of the Holy Trinity as a counterweight to theologies such as Arianism and Sabellianism. Whereas, on the one hand, Arianism stressed significant difference in substance between God the Father and God the Son, Sabellianism, on the other hand, pushed an argument which emphasized that both God the Father and God the Son were of a single, unified substance.¹⁴ As examples, Arianism and Sabellianism are two among many, a well-spring of competing theologies which posed a threat to the institutionalized centralization of power in the hands of existing church structures, both east and west. Sabellianism, as well, is similar in theological substance to the ideas disseminated by Eutyches. Though the heresies of the fourth century differed slightly from those of the fifth, the tradition of countering opposing theologians by convening an ecumenical council and coming to (or forcing) a consensus was, by this time, over a century old.¹⁵ It must be clarified that during this period in history, the divide between the eastern and western churches was not so dichotomous. Pope Leo I's involvement in the Council of Chalcedon, hosted as it was in Byzantine Anatolia, is evidence of this, as both east and west continued to push their doctrines as universal despite their growing so far apart over time as to become as discernible from one another as they are today. Though the Nicene Creed remained a mutual doctrinal bedrock for both sects, nuanced differences piled up and evolved over time to create the Eastern Orthodox and Catholic churches as we know them. Pope Leo I died ten years after the Council of Chalcedon, in 461 CE,¹⁶ earning the posthumous moniker of “the Great” for his many important contributions to early Christianity, as well as for the effort he expended to maintain orthodoxy throughout Christendom. One must wonder if a heretic is something nearly exclusive to monotheism, with its insistence on a single deity and thus a single, irrevocable truth. In conclusion, this truth is a clumsy set of contractual mantras. Stipulating a contract not so much with God as with a religious bureaucracy defending its sacred hierarchies, these final words from the definition of the faith spell it out clearly enough: “no one is permitted to produce, or even to write down or compose, any other creed or to think or teach otherwise.”¹⁷ Such singular universalisms bred the religious conflict so typical of the day, as each new and nuanced interpretation was taken as a revelation that now needed to be imposed on the world for its own wicked sake. Structures of oppression were given an unassailable religious legitimacy that elevated kings and popes into men appointed by a metaphysical deity for the good of all. As regards this and all religious conflict, one can perhaps reflect on the words of Pope Leo himself when he said of all heretics, of which he was one in contrast to others, that “[b]y not being pupils of the truth, they turn out to be masters of error.”¹⁸

PLEASE NOTE: THIS WAS WRITTEN AS AN ESSAY FOR A HISTORY CLASS ON EARLY TO MID-MEDIEVAL EUROPE, ANALYZING DIRECTLY THE PRIMARY DOCUMENTS LISTED BELOW AND SUPPLEMENTED WITH CONTEXTUAL INFORMATION FROM THE PROVIDED TEXT.

1. William R Cook and Ronald B Herzman, The Medieval World View, 3rd ed. (New York: Oxford University Press, 2012). 44.

2. Leo I. The letter of Pope Leo I the Great (440–61) to Flavian, bishop of Constantinople, about Eutyches. 451.

3. Leo I. The letter of Pope Leo I the Great (440–61) to Flavian, bishop of Constantinople, about Eutyches. 451.

4. Leo I. The letter of Pope Leo I the Great (440–61) to Flavian, bishop of Constantinople, about Eutyches. 451, [15].

5. Leo I. The letter of Pope Leo I the Great (440–61) to Flavian, bishop of Constantinople, about Eutyches. [4].

6. Definition of the faith from the Council of Chalcedon. 451.

7. Definition of the faith from the Council of Chalcedon. 451, [1].

8. Definition of the faith from the Council of Chalcedon. 451, [4].

9. Definition of the faith from the Council of Chalcedon. 451, [10].

10. William R Cook and Ronald B Herzman, The Medieval World View, 3rd ed., 60.

11. Definition of the faith from the Council of Chalcedon. 451, [7].

12. William R Cook and Ronald B Herzman, The Medieval World View, 3rd ed., 60.

13. Leo I. The letter of Pope Leo I the Great (440–61) to Flavian, bishop of Constantinople, about Eutyches. [2].

14. William R Cook and Ronald B Herzman, The Medieval World View, 3rd ed., 54.

15. Definition of the faith from the Council of Chalcedon. 451, [3].

16. William R Cook and Ronald B Herzman, The Medieval World View, 3rd ed., 44.

17. Definition of the faith from the Council of Chalcedon. 451, [11].

18. Leo I. The letter of Pope Leo I the Great (440–61) to Flavian, bishop of Constantinople, about Eutyches. [1].

Debunking the Myth of the Ecologically Noble "Indian" (properly titled Natives, First Nations, or First Peoples):

Since contact, European settlers and their ancestors in North America have come to believe a series of sweeping oversimplifications regarding the First Nations, assumptions applied to a population mistakenly imagined as part of a monolithic entity, one which is seen as at least being relatively homogeneous in terms of custom and culture. This has led to such overarching stereotypes as the “uncivilized savage,” which in turn generated its more positive mythological antitheses, that of the “noble savage.” Now, as history has lurched onward, this same mythical archetype has developed modern offshoots, the debunking of which is the mandate of this paper. The Aboriginal populations of North America have been victim to erroneously conflated perspectives since European contact. Though attitudes have evolved, this tendency towards the mass conflation of such diverse and complex societies alongside how they interact with one another and the world around them has led to much self-perpetuating misinformation. Among this flood of misinformation, much of the modern environmentalist movement has taken the old stereotype of the “noble savage” and renovated it to assert that aboriginal peoples are the original conservationists, having lived in a pristine, conscientious balance with nature. The issue with this misguided appraisal of all aboriginal peoples is that it relies on the claim that Natives did not intervene in the environment in any significant way (such as species overkill) whereas recent evidence suggests that many aboriginal populations had deliberately and significantly been altering environments to meet their needs for millennia prior to contact.

In the epilogue to his controversial 1978 book “The Keepers of the Game”, Calvin Martin points to this stereotype of the ecological Indian as being the assumed equal and opposite reaction to the stereotype of European-Americans as environmentally destructive and irresponsible¹. In this sense, the narrative of both myths rely on and reciprocate with one another dangerously, creating cultural presuppositions that bleed into the ideological dispositions of the modern global environmental movements. In looking to challenge these myths, Martin points to the fur trade in Canada during the 17^th and 18^th centuries, and how tribes became complicit in, and, in some places, the major driving force behind the commercial overkill of fur-bearing animals. As an example, he found that by 1635, the Huron tribe of the Lake Simcoe area in modern-day Ontario “had reduced their stock of beaver to the point where Father Paul Le Jeune, the Jesuit, could flatly declare that they had none”². This severe exploitation of such fur-bearing animals as beavers was at its most acute within the vicinity of major trading posts and among the tribes already closely associated with the trade, such as the Mi'qmaq and League Iroquois. This, in stark contrast to the tribes beyond effective European influence at the time who enjoyed abundant beavers and other fur-bearing animals within their regional localities.³ Quoting Nicolas Denys, a merchant who spent 40 years living with the Mi'qmaq, Martin relays that "few in a house [beaver den] are saved; [the Mi'qmaq] would take all. The disposition of the Indians is not to spare the little ones any more than the big ones. They killed all of each kind of animal that there was when they could capture it."⁴ From this, Martin extrapolates the following: “In sum, the game which by all accounts had been initially so plentiful was now being systematically exterminated by the Indians themselves.”⁵ Of course, as must be noted, this is due to the mass incentive provided by trading posts which were looking to satisfy the high demand for pelts in the European market. Denys, already quoted above, comments on this fact when he says that, prior to and during the formative years of contact, the Mi'maq's “greatest task was to feed well and to go hunting. They did not lack animals, which they killed only in proportion as they had need of them”⁶.

In his Aboriginal overkill hypothesis, Charles E. Kay of Utah State University asserts that “[i]t is often claimed ... that Native Americans' religious belief systems prevented those peoples from over-utilizing their resources.” However, “Native Americans tended to view wildlife as their spiritual kin where success in the hunt was obtained by following prescribed rituals and atonement after the kill. A scarcity of animals or failure in the hunt were not viewed as biological or ecological phenomena, but rather as a spiritual consequence of social events or circumstances”⁷. In other words, if Native Americans could not find game to harvest, it was not due to overkill; it was because their animist deities were displeased. In his paper “Transcending the Debate over the Ecologically Noble Indian”, ethnographer Paul Nadasdy discusses these same misunderstandings when he points to the example of the Rock Cree first nation (of what is today northern Manitoba) who did not believe humans could affect or deplete animal populations through over-hunting, thus making them anti-conservationist in the modern Euro-American sense.⁸ During the pre-contact era, the Rock Cree concept of respect came bundled with the belief that all hunted game would be reincarnated and offer itself to the same hunter at some point in the future. This ideological framework also assumed that hunters had to kill all the animals they saw, whether or not necessity demanded. This was because it was thought that if an animal offered itself to a hunter, to refrain was offensive to the creature, thus jeopardizing ones chance of receiving these offerings in the future. It is thought this is what caused the Cree hunters to play a major (though unwitting) role in the near-extinction of local beaver populations in the early to mid-1800's.⁹ In fact, there is no evidence to suggest any prohibition on waste or over-hunting until well after European contact, likely as a result of the already mentioned near-eradication of the local beaver, after which it is thought the Rock Cree began to gradually reformulate their relationship with animals, coming to see human over-hunting as one potential reason for population declines. After awhile, this prohibition on waste entered as a key element into the Cree concept of respect.¹⁰

The example of the Rock Cree of northern Manitoba is only one historical trajectory among many. Whereas the Cree eventually adopted something akin to typical conservationist principles, the Yup'ik Eskimos of western Alaska still hold strongly to the belief that hunted animals are constantly reborn and that as such, over-hunting is impossible. This has lead to much tension between the Yup'ik and state wildlife management,¹¹ muddying the monolithic myth of the ecologically noble savage into a larger, richer, and more ambiguous arena of complexities in need of deeper investigation. Having partaken in over-hunting in some places while subsisting on settled agriculture complete with urban centres in others, the Aboriginal populations of North America were much more complex, consequential, and advanced than has generally been recognized until very recently. In whole, it can be said that pre-contact natives exerted a much more anthropogenic influence on their environment for innumerably diverse reasons, all fitted within a spiritual framework often largely divorced of any 'conservationist' ethic as we would understand it today. In conclusion, with all of the provided examples, author John Green's pithy maxim rings true: “truth resists simplicity,”¹² as it always has and always will.

1. Calvin Martin, Keepers Of The Game: Indian-Animal Relationships And The Fur Trade (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1978), 160.

2. Calvin Martin, Keepers Of The Game: Indian-Animal Relationships And The Fur Trade, 27.

3. Calvin Martin, Keepers Of The Game: Indian-Animal Relationships And The Fur Trade, 27.

4. Calvin Martin, Keepers Of The Game: Indian-Animal Relationships And The Fur Trade, 28.

5. Calvin Martin, Keepers Of The Game: Indian-Animal Relationships And The Fur Trade, 28.

6. Calvin Martin, Keepers Of The Game: Indian-Animal Relationships And The Fur Trade, 33.

7.Charles Kay, Aboriginal Overkill And Native Burning: Implications For Modern Ecosystem Management, ebook, 1st ed. (Logan, Utah: World Journal of Applied Forestry, 1995), accessed September 23, 2016, 122-123.

8. Nadasdy, Paul. "Transcending the Debate over the Ecologically Noble Indian: Indigenous Peoples and Environmentalism." Ethnohistory 52, no. 2 (Spring 2005): 291-331. Academic Search Complete, EBSCOhost, 308.

9. Nadasdy, Paul. "Transcending the Debate over the Ecologically Noble Indian: Indigenous Peoples and Environmentalism," 308-309.

10. Nadasdy, Paul. "Transcending the Debate over the Ecologically Noble Indian: Indigenous Peoples and Environmentalism," 309.

11. Nadasdy, Paul. "Transcending the Debate over the Ecologically Noble Indian: Indigenous Peoples and Environmentalism," 309.

12. YOU ARE WRONG!, video (YouTube: Hank Green, 2011). 

PLEASE NOTE: THIS WAS ORIGINALLY WRITTEN AS AN ESSAY FOR MY UNIVERSITY HISTORY COURSE, "CANADA TO CONFEDERATION."

A Lowdown on "The Villages," Billionaires, and Christina Grimmie

Saturday, June 11th, 2016
The Villages, Sumter County, Florida
United States of America

From the scant research I've done thus far on the "census-designated place" (or CDP) I find myself in known only as The Villages, it's a retirement development community that has, for the most part, sprung into its current iterated existence only in the last 5 or 6 years. It lacks a real municipal government (hence why it is a CDP and not an incorporated municipality), and is headed by the current generation of a rich development family who began with Michigan businessman Harold Schwartz selling tracts of land in the area via mail order. Long story short, the American government passed a law prohibiting the sale of land and real estate through mail order in 1968, which left Schwartz and his business partner, Al Tarrson, with large tracts of land in the area, prompting them to begin the development of a mobile home park in the early 1970's. When, by the 1980's only 400 units had been sold, Schwartz bought out Tarrson's share and brought his son, Harold Gary Morse, on-board in 1983.

Taking the hint that vapid suburban developments are worthless without the filler of hyper-convenient consumer amenities, Morse began to commercially upgrade the sprawling suburbia and created a community endlessly peppered with large tracts of land turned into giant golf courses between streets and neighbourhoods... so much so, in fact, that one of the most common ways to get around, whether you golf or not, is with golf carts.

Not surprisingly, real estate in the area is expensive, and as the brain-child of a now deceased billionaire, it shouldn't be surprising to anyone that both The Villages and the larger area it is incorporated within have a heavy bias towards the Republican Party. In the past, it's been a key campaign stop, both for Republican's attempting to secure their party's nomination, as well as for Republican's that have made the ticket and are looking to further woo area residents with promises of lower taxes on the rich and assurances that climate change is a liberal conspiracy to undermine economic progress. During this current election cycle, both Ben Carson and Marco Rubio made appearances in the community to do just that. And in 2012, after having secured the Republican nomination, Mitt Romney and his then-running mate Paul Ryan made a few stop-overs on their quest to actively destroy the world by way of deliberate political negligence.

So, for me, it's a novel experience to explore a truly gated community... one that is not only gated in action, but in theory as well. The kind of place that proves the maxim that if you've got more, you've got more to lose. And thus, more to fear. Of course, in gated communities like this one, crime is a truly rare occurrence. The only recorded murder I could find from the last two decades occurred in 2006, during what appears to have been an armed break and enter. By all logical evaluation, this area is extraordinarily safe, but only as a component part of a much larger problem that endangers the existence of the entire human race.  

Libertarian socialist polemics aside (and I apologize for any sweeping generalizations, I do want to point out there are Democratic voters in The Villages that complain of the distinctly Republican tilt, tho we do have to admit that the binary split between Republicans and Democrats can't be the only two visible demographics in the area and that we must also admit that the breakdown is based on who people vote for, not necessarily their genuine political disposition), my whole experience here has been one very conducive to writing. Perhaps because I've felt more troubled than I usually do. Travel does that to a wuss like me (a wuss who says to himself, "yes, you're gonna be terrified, depressed, and confused at times, but perseverance through such discomfort is just part of the adventure!").

So, what, does that reveal me a wuss? Or does it reveal a particular kind of bravery? Either way, weathering myself to acceptance of potential discomfort doesn't make said discomfort any more comfortable. Perhaps it does give me something to grasp on to when I'm freaking out, though. It's also just a sign of my slowly getting to know myself better and better as the years roll by.

Once again, here I am, staying back at our rental timeshare in the heart of The Villages' suburbia, writing like it's what I'll one day do for a living. At the very least, I can hope. But at the very most, I can keep writing, and it just might occur as a happy side-effect of my belatedly embraced passion for the Word. (My Word, not God's).

In rather distressing but lugubriously unsurprising news, 22 year old Christina Grimmie, a woman just a year younger than me and a past winner of The Voice, spiritual successor to American Idol, was senselessly shot to death yesterday after a concert she held in Orlando. While signing fans autographs, a boy (or man, I'm not enlightened to particular details) whipped out a gun and quickly unloaded on her before the singer's brother tackled him to the ground, then prompting the assailant to turn the weapon on himself. Needless to say, he was successful in killing both her and himself, adding to a list of recent and not-so-recent murders endemic in America thanks to a continued misinterpretation of the Second Amendment via the powerful NRA lobby in Washington.

Coming from Canada, my observer's logic is painfully simple. Guns at Wal-Mart, gun shows free of background checks, and just basic Grand Theft Auto-style gun outlets equals only one thing: a whole bunch of criminals empowered by their intrinsically greater lethality (I mean, come on, what kind of gang feels 'empowered' when all they've got are a bunch of sharp objects? The only time gang violence is a notable problem in Vancouver is when said gangs smuggle guns in from across the border), and a whole bunch more people who would not have otherwise become criminals or committed suicide were it not for the acquisition of these weapons being close to as simple as getting a six-pack of beer. But hey, it's one of those logical observations that's so close to most Americans noses that it's become entirely invisible... save for when one looks in the mirror. A metaphorical mirror. No, Donald, I'm not suggesting that if you look in the mirror there will be a gun below your nose. And yes, Donald, that one movie where Harrison Ford lands the plane is, well, just a movie. I know you're disappointed.
                       

On My Trip to the Sunshine State, Bernie Sanders, Third Party Candidates, and Being Humiliatingly Destitute for my Girlfriends Parents

Thursday, June 9th, 2016
"The Villages," Sumter County, Florida
United States of America

I sit awkwardly hunched over a TV stand I've made into an impromptu table / desk for the dual purposes of both writing these words in my pocket Moleskine journal, as well as finishing the last half of a decked-out Publix sub sandwich, apparently a favorite snack here in Florida.

This trip, even when of a particular subjective discomfort, has been plenty worth it. I'm not sure if it's just basic anxiety, or if all the rent and tenancy drama back home in Victoria has made me as moody as I have been at times throughout. It may also have something to do with the seizure, as brief as it was, that I had in an Orlando Disney World resort hotel room shower just under a week ago. Jen's parents have been so consistently sweet and assistive with me, even though I showed up on their doorstep deadbeat broke. The fact that they have covered 90% of this trip for me makes me feel like I am potentially being ungrateful any time I either want or need time to myself. I know, as a previous and long-term sufferer of anxieties both social and general, that this is likely more perception then it is reality, but it gnaws at me quite often nonetheless.

Jen's father, Bill, was kind enough to provide me with some analytical and summary work related to his profession as a forensic toxicologist. I essentially just combed through a binder of documents  on a case involving alleged intoxication and workers compensation eligibility following a catastrophic on-the-job accident in which an electrical lineman contracted to work on live transformers along a back-road in St. Augustine, Florida, removed one of his protective rubber gloves, ostensibly to perform a particularly delicate operation, and slipped, only to accidentally electrocute his entire right arm and have it amputated in the emergency room. Though I couldn't claim to know all the variables of the case, the impression I got was the one Bill communicated to me: that, because he was a recreational marijuana user with trace metabolites in his blood, the company he worked for used the pipe found on his person and the trace metabolite readings from his post-accident urine sample as presumptive evidence. That is, guilty until proven innocent. And a very convenient excuse to allow them to break the already broken back of this broken man by refusing any health coverage or subsidy.

As if this one-armed man, now presumably out of most work forever, could use the extra bad news that the company he was employed with was now going to toss him out like a tainted piece of meat.

Alas, this really is the unadulterated logic of neoliberal capitalism. And the United States has been sick with this cancer for decades. They've even often "been down with" (as in, assenting to) "the sickness."

There are truly no real upsides to dirt-cheap liquor in a land already so systemically neglectful of health. I mean, with my epilepsy, mood issues, and, at times, horribly debilitating eczema, I would have been a long-lost cause were I born American (and I am truly thankful I wasn't, though I do not say that in a resentful sense... nor do I say it with a boyishly naive sense of Canadian nationalism).

I say it because I know what I need, at least insofar as I've always had it. Were I to dedicate myself to the pursuit of a more horizontal social order, egalitarian healthcare would still top my agenda for everyone's sake.

Writing all this has already imbued me with some psychic release. As I started this entry, I had been sipping on a fine Portuguese vinho verde. I rather insensitively finished the bottle, and am now sipping at a cold bottle of Yuengling amber lager, a beer which claims to be from "America's Oldest Brewery," established in 1829. It's a favorite down here, and one you can't find in my neck of the Canadian woods.

Since I've been down here, history has reached a few new milestones and points of interest, as it always does. In particular, I refer to Hillary Clinton's "clinching," as so many news sources put it, of the Democratic Presidential nomination (surprise, surprise). Bernie, of course, is going to keep his word and not be a "spoiler," as he himself calls it. After a rather notable meting with President Obama, Bernie has pledged to support Clinton and assist in the effort to defeat Donald Trump.

I'm not going to start throwing around revolutionary credentials and claim Bernie is assenting to an iron will, of sorts, or that he has somehow revealed himself counter-revolutionary (I mean, that sort of baseless claim to a sole revolutionary legitimacy and the arrogant name-calling tit-for-tats are what I dislike and disrespect so much about Karl Marx and his inner circle, and we all know the 19th century ended 116 years ago), but I will be honest about what I think is possible for Bernie, and the potential outcomes, both good and not so good, I can foresee.

First off, the Green Party nominee for President, Jill Stein, has been suggesting both her and Bernie team-up on the same ticket for months now. With Hillary securing the Democratic nomination, she has once again extended that olive branch to Sanders' and his supporters. I would be silly to call it the "best" option Bernie has, but it's not a bad one, and would be noble in the attempt alone. The "spoiler" argument, first levelled on Ralph Nader as the American left looked for someone to blame for the neoconservative victory of Bush Jr. in 2000, is not a truly valid argument against third party voting when held-up to the expounded democratic rhetoric of American ideologues.

Of course there should be a plurality of parties to choose from. Is it not neoliberalism that thinks of competition as virtue? Or is that an older version of capitalism I'm thinking of?
Regardless, competition in the public eye forces more comprehensive change, as each party will always be guaranteed to try to appeal past its base and offer something meaningful to further flung demographics. Sure, it's all still marketing, but it's time the American voting public started using these usually manipulative political marketing strategies to theirs (and the worlds) advantage. With a more plural and fractured political class, the efforts of a greater range of people can begin to be felt in elite circles. Even if Bernie ran on the Green ticket, if he could succeed in the minimal sense of throwing the Greens upward to 15% of the popular vote, this would guarantee that, during the next election cycle in 2020/21, the Green Party nominee would be mandated to debate on an equal footing and in the same live mass broadcast venues as the two main party candidates. In this sense, it might be a more worthwhile objective to break the two-party system than it is to keep the Donald out of the White House (though I still struggle with the thought myself).

- - -

Breaking from the political rant, I feel it may be important to return to myself.

My note-to-self on this Florida overture for future adventures would have to be: don't come without at least a few hundred bucks next time. Though I love Jen's parents and truly appreciate everything they've done for me, travel when it isn't at least possible for some self-direction some of the time makes me feel bonded to other's circumstances, for better and for worse. At some point in the next decade, I would love to return to Florida with a few of my Canadian friends in tow. It'd be a fantastic opportunity to see the much weirder parts of the state, fabled on the internet for surrealism and excess. It's too bad, at this point, that I'll neither ever attend a Bernie or Trump rally, both of which would have been fascinating from a historical point of view.

Not that I ever made it to a partisan rally in Canada during our last election cycle, however.

Northern Gateway: A Comparative Analysis of the Positions of the Canadian Association of Petroleum Producers and earth scientist David Hughes of the Post Carbon Institute

The Northern Gateway pipeline, first announced by Enbridge in 2002,¹ is a proposed double pipeline running a 1,177 km route from Bruderheim, Alberta to Kitimat, British Columbia carrying 525,000 barrels of oil per day west to the coast for export, and 193,000 barrels of condensate a day back east for use in thinning oil for transport from the tar sands.² The route, which crosses “more than 800 streams and rivers, including sensitive salmon spawning habitat in the upper Fraser, Skeena, and Kitimat watersheds,”³ has led to dedicated resistance from many within British Columbia, alongside a great many within Canada as a whole. Recommended for approval in December 2013 by a federal Joint Review Panel with 209 conditions attached,⁴ the project had already met a second level of conditional approval with the provincial government of Christy Clark when she laid out her five conditions for similar acceptance in British Columbia in June of the same year.⁵ However, until and unless all of these conditions are met, Northern Gateway will remain stalled in the planning phase.

In full support of the project is the Canadian Association of Petroleum Producers (CAPP), the influential advocacy group for—and legitimate representative of—Canada's oil and natural gas industries on a whole.⁶ The support stems from CAPP seeing great potential for profits from new markets, job creation and growth, and industry expansion. Following Northern Gateway's conditional approval, in June of 2014, CAPP's vice-president Greg Stringham spelled out company line in a short news release praising the decision, saying it is “another important step for Canada to access global markets and world prices, and earn full value for our oil resource. While more work needs to be done to achieve this goal, significant progress has been made, including work by the federal and B.C. governments and industry to ensure world-class land and marine safety systems.”⁷ One primary goal for CAPP and the companies it represents is an obvious one in the case of Northern Gateway: to further open Asian markets to Canadian oil,⁸ even if it means ramping up tar sands production to dangerously unsustainable levels.

On the other side of the debate is David J. Hughes, a prolific and credited earth scientist, president of the environmentally-minded consultancy group Global Sustainability Research, and a senior fellow with the Post Carbon Institute, an alternative energy think-tank based out of Santa Rosa, California.⁹ His opposition stems primarily from his focus on sustainability and issues of climate change, seeing in Northern Gateway the same concerns shared amongst many of the projects opponents: further potential for pollution and environmental degradation. His rationale for opposition also extends beyond the realm of environmentalism, however, as he argues that the relentless focus on maximizing economic growth is too short-sighted when the non-renewable nature of these petroleum resources is considered. Hughes argues that “[p]roposals such as Northern Gateway ... require uncontrolled growth to the detriment of the national interest” and that “the non-renewable nature of the majority of the energy inputs to Canadian society ... represents an extreme vulnerability to the long term energy security interests of Canadians.”¹⁰ In a 31 page report on Northern Gateway published in 2011 by Forest Ethics Canada, Hughes suggests that a National Energy Strategy geared towards sustainably safeguarding both environmental interests and long term energy security would be in the wisest interest of all Canadians, as without one, “there are no constraints on the uncontrolled liquidation of Canada’s intrinsic energy resources.”¹¹

The Canadian Association of Petroleum Producers, with millions of dollars in industry money behind it, is able to afford the cost of advertising campaigns to present its positions and push its collective agenda nation-wide. In 2012, CAPP bought a half-page advertisement in the Globe and Mail with a picture of an arcadian forest bathed in the golden glow of sunrise;¹² superimposed across the picture was a headline that read: “Energy the world needs. The approach Canadians expect.”¹³ Shirking specific details, the only time the word 'oil' made an appearance was in the provided URL: “OilSandsToday.ca.”¹⁴ The ad's fine print notes the homely arcadian forest is “a ... reclaimed mining operation ... in Alberta’s vast boreal forest, executed by [Canada's largest single source producer of synthetic crude oil,¹⁵] Syncrude.”¹⁶ With this, the advertisement spells out its ultimate intention to create and peddle a friendlier image of Canadian oil, one which associates the industry with some level of environmental responsibility, utilizing vague feel-good mottos and pristine nature images to this effect. Similar CAPP advertisements continue to appear in Canadian newspapers, magazines, websites, and television, always attempting to craft and maintain a market presence that does not conjure up images of black crude bubbling up from within a fissured pipeline.

David Hughes, as an individual, doesn't have the same level of financial backing. He does, however, have the backing of the Post Carbon Institute and is thus able to disseminate his positions on energy via research papers he publishes through the think-tank.¹⁷ He has separately been able to publish through other organizations as well such as Forest Ethics Canada, as was already mentioned on the previous page, and, as was also previously mentioned, he is the president of the Global Sustainability Research energy consultancy group. He has written detailed reports which have called to task many diverse players involved in the energy market,¹⁸ including Enbridge and CAPP,¹⁹ picking apart each organization's forecast reports to create credible contrary reports of his own. In his report “The Northern Gateway Pipeline: an affront to the public interest and long term energy security of Canadians,” Hughes points out that “[t]he need for this pipeline is based on oil exports that would be generated by the Enbridge forecast of more than tripling oil sands production in Alberta by 2035 over 2010 production levels,”²⁰ and that “[e]ven in CAPP’s “growth” scenario, which would see oil sands production grow by two and a half times over 2010 levels by 2025, there is sufficient capacity in existing and near term planned export pipelines”²¹ meaning, primarily for the sake of practicality, that the Northern Gateway pipeline is not necessary, and that its supposed benefits are deliberately embellished and/or unrealistically optimistic.

The Canadian Association of Petroleum Producers, at least until the recent election in October 2015, spent money and effort not simply lobbying the federal or provincial governments, but, as has been shown, the general populace as well. In June 2014, as the debate on Northern Gateway was at a critical pitch in British Columbia, CAPP's Vice President yet again decided to push industry line, entering the debate with an opinion piece in the Vancouver Sun. In it, he finishes with a forceful plea to end one-half of the debate, demanding: “[w]e need to turn the conversation to how we do this responsibly, not whether we can do it at all.”²² This is, at its core, the same plea Hughes is making, though he's directing it at the industry, pointing out that the perceived need for the Northern Gateway pipeline is based on industry-authored forecasts by Enbridge and CAPP which assume an “unreasonable ... oilsands production growth rate” of more than tripling output by 2035 over 2010 levels.²³ “There already is enough export pipeline capacity for a reasonable ramp up in oilsands. You could double them and still not run out of capacity,”²⁴ Hughes argues. The considerably more aggressive forecast put out by Enbridge amounts to a “no-holds-barred liquidation” of the natural resource,²⁵ meaning it is based on projections which imply the oilsands will be ruthlessly stripped of all petrol-based resource value over the course of the next couple of decades. Not only is this a very serious environmental concern, it is also, as Hughes elaborates in the title of his report, “[a]n affront to the public interest and long term energy security of Canadians.”²⁶ Even within the most reductive form of industry logic—guaranteeing future access to petrol and opportunity for profit—this is not a sustainable business plan. Since the project has been conditionally approved, however, and has thus gone through the review process and is now subject to its 209 conditions, CAPP believes that “naysayers missed their chance.”²⁷ After “18 First Nations, environmental groups and a labour union”²⁸ launched an appeal directed towards overturning the regulatory approval of Northern Gateway, Lewis Manning, a lawyer representing CAPP, told a Federal Court of Appeal in Vancouver that “the joint review panel made ... every conceivable effort ... to accommodate participation and would have done its best to mitigate any concerns.”²⁹ Unfortunately for Manning and CAPP Vice President Greg Stringham, the debate has not (and likely will not) move away from whether or not it should be done in the first place, as many, including David Hughes, would stand firm in the conviction that to “turn the conversation to how we do this responsibly”³⁰ may mean not doing it at all.

It is unlikely, then, with all these factors considered, that there would be any meaningful way to reconcile CAPP's strong position in favour of Northern Gateway with Mr. Hughes's equally strong rebuttal. CAPP, as the lobby group representative of Canada's oil industry on a whole, has a salesman's mandate to embellish the facts and sell these projects to the public. Though they are wisely responsive to opposition and critique, they are also locked into whatever self-aggrandizing bias is needed to push their product. David Hughes, on the other hand, sees no good reason for the project to go ahead, arguing that it currently undermines both the public interest and the country's long term energy security. Though he is not necessarily against all pipeline infrastructure, as a senior fellow with the Post Carbon Institute he is part of an organization which is considering alternatives to fossil fuels. It follows that he would be wary of developing any new oil infrastructure that further locks us into an expanded dependence for the foreseeable future. As Premier Christy Clark has even begun to say, companies cannot simply rely on meeting the basic legal requisites for project development and construction, but must also secure meaningful social license in every community affected. Otherwise, it won't matter if the debate shifts from whether such projects can or cannot be built to how to build them responsibly. They will simply remain stalled in the planning phase unto perpetuity, just as the Northern Gateway project is at the time of writing.

________________________________________________________________________________

1 - Global News. “Northern Gateway: Timeline”. Global News, June 17th, 2014.

2 - Enbridge. “Gateway Facts: Project Overview”. Northern Gateway official website.

3 - Pipe Up Against Enbridge. “The Enbridge Plan”. PipeUpAgainstEnbridge, 2012.

4 - Global News. “Northern Gateway: Timeline”.

5 - Enbridge. “Gateway Facts: Five Conditions”. Northern Gateway official website, 2013.

6 - Canadian Association of Petroleum Producers. CAPP official website.

7 - Canadian Association of Petroleum Producers. “Northern Gateway decision reflects measures to assure world-class safety, environmental performance and need for ongoing consultation”. CAPP official website. June 17th, 2014.

8 - Jones, Jeffrey & Brent Jang. “Northern Gateway pipeline approval boosts oil producers' Asia export hopes”. The Globe and Mail, December 19th, 2013.

9 - Post Carbon Institute. “Our People: David Hughes”. Post Carbon Institute official website.

10 - Hughes, J. David. The Northern Gateway Pipeline: an affront to the public interest and long term energy security of Canadians, 2.

11 - Hughes, J. David. The Northern Gateway Pipeline: an affront to the public interest and long term energy security of Canadians, 29.

12 - Turner, Chris. “The Oil Sands PR War”. Marketing Magazine, July 30^th, 2012.

13 - Ibid.

14 - Ibid.

15 - Syncrude. “Abous us”. Syncrude official website.

16 - Turner, Chris. “The Oil Sands PR War”. Marketing Magazine, July 30^th, 2012.

17 - Post Carbon Institute. “Our People: David Hughes”. Post Carbon Institute official website.

18 - Ibid.

19 - Hughes, J. David. The Northern Gateway Pipeline: an affront to the public interest and long term energy security of Canadians, 2.

20 - Hughes, J. David. The Northern Gateway Pipeline: an affront to the public interest and long term energy security of Canadians, 2.

21 - Ibid.

22 - Stringham, Greg. “Opinion: Canada can develop oil sands responsibly”. CAPP official website, June 26th, 2014.

23 - Krugel, Lauren. “Northern Gateway unnecessary: study”. The Globe and Mail, December 20th, 2011.

24 - Ibid.

25 - Ibid.

26 - Hughes, J. David. The Northern Gateway Pipeline: an affront to the public interest and long term energy security of Canadians, i.

27 - The Canadian Press. “Northern Gateway naysayers missed their chance: CAPP”. Maclean's, October 8th, 2015.

28 - Ibid.

29 - Ibid.

30 - Stringham, Greg. “Opinion: Canada can develop oil sands responsibly”. CAPP official website, June 26th, 2014.

PLEASE NOTE: THIS WAS ORIGINALLY WRITTEN AS A RESEARCH ESSAY FOR MY POLITICAL SCIENCE SPECIAL TOPIC COURSE ON PIPELINES AND POLITICS. IT IS NOT "A" GRADE MATERIAL (TO MY DISMAY), BUT IF ANYONE WISHES TO REQUEST A COPY OF THE CONNECTED BIBLIOGRAPHY FOR FACT-CHECKING OR SOURCE VETTING, YOU MAY DO SO BY LEAVING A COMMENT BELOW, OR EMAILING ME AT: katvolver@yahoo.com  

Vacith: A Preliminary Re-visitation, Draft Outline Part 1

Introduction to Vacith

This project has, as its origin, an expansive idea for a world—somewhat fantasy, but perhaps science fiction in terms of its worldly connection to our own history and planet—which I generated between the ages of 15 and 16, writing a rudimentary 50 page history of a Kingdom that develops on the Pacific Northwest coast of North America some seven or eight millenia after our own.

Essentially, the history traced the emergence and development of the so-called Royal Domain of Vacith (built atop and around an asymmetrical radius of the largely disintegrated remains of Vancouver) alongside the re-emergence of civilized humanity after a large scale extinction event. This extinction event took the form of a deadly epidemic disease, with an odd, tiny minority of people surviving as a result of fluke genetic immunity. These survivors, spread throughout the width and breadth of the globe and representative of most of the diverse elements of the human race, presided over the first steps in a collective regression of the human condition. Some facilitated the preservation of artifacts and stories from one generation to the next, while others either tried, only to fail due to the eventual extinction of their 'tribes' or groups to inter-tribal warfare, new diseases, a lack of sustainable survival strategies, or connection and immersion with other groups, etc., or a simple series of mistellings, mistranslations, general misinterpretations, or literal interpretations of storytelling elements originally used only as metaphorical or allegorical devices of description for a lack of better words.

The original inspiration for the world came from Walter M. Miller, Jr's famous post-apocalyptic neo-medieval novel, A Canticle for Leibowitz. Instead of a North American neo-medievalism arising as a result of nuclear war, however, the extinction (or, near-extinction) event was, as already stated, an outbreak of an epidemic disease sometime in the early to mid 21^st century. My original draft ideas for both the history and story were excellent starts, ones I am proud to have made as an interested teen, but were better left to simmer on a very low heat as I grew older and learned much, much more. Though I had been excited about the story and the history I had made, there was always a part of me that felt my ignorance was still too great at the time for any reliably believable expansion of the world, let alone a novel set within it. My attention span as well was too frantic and fragmented for any consistent focus on my part.

Over the course of the next 7 years, I never wholly revisited the world, but new limbs of nuance began to sprout from the vastness of the idea in itself. My relentless pursuit of intellectual, historical, and worldly context often evoked deeper contemplation of what such a world could actually be like. I decided there had to be a major dislocation between perceived historical medievalism and this fantastically fictional neo-medievalism; it had to have evolved on its own progressive thread, not one so closely mirroring the true historical “Dark Ages” as we know it, with its Kings and Queens, monasteries and monks, horses, swords, bows, and arrows, as realistically speaking, many of these things would not exist in such a painfully clear template. This is something even Walter M. Miller, Jr could not escape in A Canticle for Leibowitz, having created a world—an incredible world, no doubt—but one which essentially fused actual medievalism with 20^th century modernity. Written in 1959, it was a timely work which addressed the most pressing fear of its era—nuclear war—and acted as a sort of fantasy warning of what was possible now that humanity had the ability to annihilate itself.

“The Distance”

In the world I created (and am still creating), there was no nuclear extinction, and therefore there are still many surviving relics of our era, to which little to nothing is known by the inhabitants of this future planet. Anything which is known was passed from one generation to the next, and, like a very long game of telephone, the message distorted in most places over time to interpret stories of flying machines—planes, obviously—as sorts of strange, unemotional mechanical deities capable of transporting the good to where ever they wish to go, or laying waste to entire cities and regions if a form of karmic recompence isn't reconciled before a predicted day of judgement, during which it's said the 'sky would be covered to black by the cylindrical wing gods,' and those tribes found guilty of disgression would be bombed into extinction, and tribes found worthy of redemption would be carried away to a spiritual transit point (not unlike Purgatory) where they would be ritually purified before becoming One.

The survivors of the original disease, at least in the parlance of the region at the heart of the story, are seen as semi-deities who oversaw the transition of the world from the hands of the departing god-race to their world: a delicate world of omnipotent mortality. The survivors are termed “the Ancient Immunites,” and are acknowledged to have lived among the previous mythological civilizations of gods, but were not gods themselves, hence why they were not called to become One with the rest. They are seen as the most perfect incarnation of current humanity, with every human born of them since seen as regressing a step lower in divinity with each new generation. This regression is known to most as “the Distance.”

“The Distance” became a very ingrained metaphysical concept with the developing tribes of the old Pacific Northwest. Different religious and philosophical orientations sprouted from it as some saw “the Distance” as something that would grow eternally wider and wider until men were once again part of the earth, coming to be One in a literal, organic roundabout sense. This is in contrast to others who saw “the Distance” as growing wider and wider over time, only to reach a certain zenith and begin to close by progression in the opposite direction, at the end of which the 'cylindrical wing gods' would arrive to black out the sky and bring all worthy souls to ascension in the said spiritual purgatory until they became One, erasing all the rest into physical and spiritual non-existence. Still other, more unorthodox thinkers believed “the Distance” was something which ebbed close at times, and dipped far away at others, coming to this conclusion through the observation of moving tides.

Vacith Society

More important than the actual history of the world is the myriad of ways this history is interpreted by the differing general portions and religious / metaphysical sects of Vacith society, and how these interpretations are applied both practically and spiritually in contemporary individual, group, and societal settings and circumstances. For example: how does the concept of “the Distance” affect one spiritual sect to abstain from all forms of resource extraction, while to another, “the Distance” seems closer to being closed by a somewhat relentless project of urban infrastructural development and material¹ contribution to the cultural high arts?

Like any society as seen in the non-conflated 'flesh,' if we may call it that, philosophical and religious diversity of opinion is the rule, rather than the exception. In the original draft of the history written about 7 years ago, there were times of authoritarian kings and rebellion, periods of openness, tolerance, and progression, as well as long spaces of time in which little to nothing of decided historical importance occurred. With this critical re-visitation and reevaluation of the world, as I said, the very existence of a medieval political structure of Kings and Queens comes into question. It seems clear that, regardless of any tidbits of real historical information on the medieval period which may have survived the mass extinction, or impressions of the pop-cultural representation of medievalism thereof, this would still not constitute a historical template with any sort of rational precedent justifying the literal adoption of a structure on par with, or exactly the same as those of medieval Western Europe. For this reason, it seems clear that a greater sense of creative depth will need to be applied in the reconstitution of this world's political structure, one which must start with the legacy of our own institutions as they would've been known to the Ancient Immunites. This may, in itself, preclude almost any reference to Kings, Queens, and royalty altogether, as the passing of seven millennia, with our real contemporary world as the precedent, would demand an entirely different (perhaps even alien, in some ways) evolution of human political structures. Of course, it must be noted that they would not be more advanced, as is obvious, but victim to the collective regression of the race, giving their society parallel to medievalism in the width and breadth of their dogmas, superstitions, and general lack of education beyond a few elite-groups who specialize in the 'arts of recall.'²

Another essential point, often inferred in the last few paragraphs, is that this society does not possess an egalitarian system of written literacy. This isn't to say that literacy has dissolved, however; more accurately, it is a deliberately 'endangered species,' of sorts; one that has survived in the ruling upper echelons, protected and taught to certain elite-groups in secret by an ancient Holy Order. Due to the teaching of literacy being such a tightly-guarded secret, many who witness a literate individual read and repeat what they've read are lead to believe this is a skill granted at birth through inheritance. Literacy is seen as a dangerous gift, useful in the hands of those cultivating order and balance, and chaotically empowering in the hands of rogue individuals. Strangely enough, however, is the fact of freedom of speech, and yet no freedom of literacy. To speak, it is suggested, is one thing; to write and record for posterity, completely another. Many in the ruling classes believe “the Distance” can only be closed through the careful and deliberate cultivation of a historical narrative as told through the Chosen, not through the free interpretation of such a narrative in writing as to cause the truth to become an apparently relative concept.

_ _ _

Now that we have touched upon the religious, philosophical, and metaphysical constructs and concepts central to this neo-medieval society (emphasis on “neo” for “new” as opposed to “neo” implying “here's literally the Medieval Ages transposed on a hypothetical future”), I feel it would be of immense value to give the reader an idea of what this world might look like in operation and in fact; one important exploration is that of politics and political terminology. This is still something I believe needs some mulling over in my head, so I'll start with describing the obvious consequence of all politics: defense in general, but military in particular.

The primary threat to the Vacith are the nomadic tribes spread across the continent on all sides. Many are only violent in defense, opting to strive for peace unless all other measures fail or necessity seems to demand it. Amongst the great multitude of nomadic tribes, however, there is no real homogeneous standard. Some abide by twisted cults of extreme violence and sacrifice, while others remain nomads in order to facilitate trade between established continental societies, as well as other tribes with wares of value. Still others resolve to remain neutral, either fearing the great societies or operatively indifferent to civilizations in general. A small minority of the neutral tribes were once ultra-violent enemies of one of the great societies, being decimated through warfare and henceforth remaining peaceful, at least toward the civilizations. Some remain arbitrarily violent toward other nomadic tribes for a multitude of reasons, or, at the very least, retain cults of extremely perverse sacrificial worship.³ Only in a very, very small minority of cases has a defeated tribe reversed its cultural practices entirely to reflect peace, rather than war. Often, this has only occurred to tribes within a very close standard proximity to one of the great societies who experienced military defeat more than once and hence succumbed to a felt external necessity to change drastically with regards to internal cultural practices.

The Vacith fight sporadic campaigns against raiding nomads on their borders, in some cases causing a cultural defection of sorts through which both individual as well as families of nomads come to settle inside Vacith territory and recondition themselves to a stationary, agriculture-based lifestyle. A select few of these nomads are drafted into the army as tribal intelligence sources as well as interpreters and intermediaries. There can even occasionally be a defected nomad who returns to live with their tribe as a representative Vacith emissary of sorts, kept in loyal reserve for times of need.

All able-bodied men and women, when they come of age, are conscripted into 3 years of compulsory service with the Vacith army. The Vacith army consists of 6 main echelons: the first is the general foot-soldier, the Hard-Boot, usually comprised of basic conscripts who have finished basic training and continue their training throughout their 3 years of active service; they are armed with either retro-fit axes usually used in the harvesting of timber, with a newly-attached mesh grip for better dexterity control, or a basic broadsword-style weapon mass-produced for war and civil defense. The second is the Wheel-Shod, a bicycle cavalry unit of sorts,⁴ comprised of trained and skilled riders who attach an extremely sharp iron pike to a fitted device on the front-right of the bicycle, being sure it exits sharply from the mid-left cleft of a built-on protective shield visor also made of iron. During a charge, the Wheel-Shod's try to find a declining slope from which to pedal and then glide into a concentrated group of enemies; once the bicycles make contact, the soldier is trained to leap off (preferably landing on their feet) and fight hand-to-hand with sharpened daggers specifically curved to allow quick-slice finishes to the throat. To minimize any lack of agility, each Wheel-Shod soldier is fitted with a light chain armor that does well against broadside slashes, but can be vulnerable to sharp and specific jabs. Members of these brigades are chosen on the basis of observed combat ability and skill, particularly in balance-related exercises.

The political structure of Vacith society developed gradually, having as its remote origins a council of different tribes rallied together by the granddaughter of the Ancient Immunite of the region somewhere around 200 years after the extinction event.

1 - Material, as in sculpture and painting as opposed to the 'arts of recall,' such as music and storytelling. Something with a permanent physical manifestation, not something requiring performance.

2 - For example: music (including instrumentation), storytelling, oral histories, poetry, and a strange trickled-legacy of hip-hop in the form of syncopated acapella rap-like poetry (slam poetry to very base rhythms, essentially).

3 - Though, it must be noted, this is often only seen through the eyes of the beholder, one must recognize both that the operative subjectivity's of these tribes see no wrong in their practices, and that the practices in themselves can include the sacrificial rape and murder of a newborn daughter or son as an offering of 'clean blood' to their animist deities. Witnesses, whether born of a civilization or another tribe, illicit a very strong emotional response from such practices, creating a loose collective standard of what can be considered “evil” or “barbaric” by groups in contrast.

4 - Though the 'bicycle' is not known as such, and is an elaborate evolution originating from the design of models whose practical use survived the extinction event.

PLEASE NOTE: THIS IS A PERSONAL PROJECT, AND STILL VERY MUCH A WORK IN PROGRESS. TO SEE THE ORIGINAL DRAFT PLANS FOR THE WORLD, WRITTEN BETWEEN 2009 AND 2010, FOLLOW THE LINKS PROVIDED BELOW:

The Original "Cali Rajiin" story outline:

http://katvolver.blogspot.ca/2009/05/cali-rajiin-story-outline.html

Old Map of Post-Apocalyptic North America + Political Descriptors:

http://katvolver.blogspot.ca/2009/04/post-apocalyptic-north-america.html

Old Map of Post-Apocalyptic Europe + Political Descriptors:

http://katvolver.blogspot.ca/2009/04/post-apocalyptic-europe.html

The Original 50-page Timeline of the History of the Vacith Empire: 

http://katvolver.blogspot.ca/2009/05/history-of-vacith-empire.html

All of the above are no longer relevant, valid, or, to get lofty, official, and Biblical, no longer "canonical" to the new phase in the story's development and the evolution of the world. They do, however, provide the basic bedrock for the current iteration.  

A Critical Reading of the Old Testament / TaNaKh: Academic Journal Entries, January 14th to 28th, 2016

Academic Entry for Class of January 14^th, 2016

Response 1: General Context

The history of Western civilization—and thus, most traditions of recorded history—root from the practical, political, traditional, and spiritual applications of the Bible in its many minutely altered forms. In this case, we are studying the “Genesis” of the Bible in itself, through its beginnings as the early Jewish holy book of the TaNaKh, long before a “New” Testament ever claimed to supersede its revelations.

In this study, its intractable ties to Mesopotamian mythology are made quite evident (for example: the uncanny parallels between the Mesopotamian myth of “enuma elish” and Genesis). What is clear is that most of the so-called Old Testament is a series of ancient creation stories amalgamated and re-purposed to fit the theological template of the ancient Israelites. This sort of cultural re-appropriation is nothing new in history, but this observation as applied to the Bible most certainly is. Until recently, the Bible had always been studied as a book of literal fact as opposed to allegorical myth. To question its authority was sacrosanct—or, at the very least, any new findings of fact were forced to somehow compromise with the TaNaKh as interpreted literally. Now, we have reached a level either of required cultural maturity (if one is to believe in progress) or cultural dissociation enough that we are able to study the Bible as thoroughly as we have studied other ancient texts. What one can find in exploring this subject themselves is akin to the intellectual excitement one feels reading The Da Vinci Code before realizing its horrible inaccuracy (though it never claimed to be anything more than a work of fiction, so it's of more meaning to critique Dan Brown's writing rather than his general plot points).

Response 2: From the Textbook

“You are attending a Sunday School class that happens to be discussing the book of Genesis. Your teacher says that it was written by Moses. You feel like showing off your newfound knowledge by explaining the reasons some scholars think otherwise.”

The idea of a singular Mosaic authorship of the Pentateuch—or the Old Testament in general—is contested by scholars of the Documentary Hypothesis. Though the dates of composition are relative to educated estimates, there are too many asynchronous passages, outright contradictions, and diverse terminology in the text for most scholars to entertain the idea of singular authorship anymore; as it stands, it's asserted there are at least four main sources: J, E, D, and P.

J stands for Yahweh, as J makes a Yah sound in German, denoting the Yahwist (or Jehovah) source, focused mainly on the bare-bones of the Bible, and with a preference toward Yahweh or Jehovah as the name of God. This is followed closely by (and, in the eyes of many scholars, inseparable from) the E source, E denoting Elohim as the preferred name for God. In the case of J and E, there is debate over whether both sources were written or redacted apart from one another, as the E source has nothing in the way of standalone text, and seems only to supplement the J source. The D source is the clearest of them all, D simply meaning Deuteronomy (or Deuteronomic), credited with the entire book of Deuteronomy and all interjected references to it in all the books prior and following.

Last, but not least, we have the P source. P standing for Priestly, this source concerns the etiquette of old Jewish ritual practices on purity, familial bonds, commandments, etc.

Still other Biblical scholars reject the JEDP hypothesis as they'd rather think of the Bible as a mainly oral tradition that eventually found its way to text; by this, they main to assert that both authorship and particular redaction are too multifarious to condense to only four sources.

Academic Entry for Class of January 21^st, 2016

Response 1: General Context

Just as the Mesopotamian creation story of enuma elish is mirrored in the start of Genesis, as is the Akkadian story of Gilgamesh mirrored in the tale of Noah and the Flood. This is an important point to bear in mind, as the Bible has often been seen as the source of all archetypes, when in fact it is simply a rich manifestation of archetypes which had already been in existence for centuries—perhaps even millennia—prior. It is a series of justifications (why did the people of Canaan deserve to be put to the sword? Because of that strange episode in Noah's tent with his Canaanite son), explanations (how did the world come to be? What is the meaning of life?), and cautionary tales (if humans, instead of God, try to decide what is good and what is evil, there is nothing but disaster, as is depicted in the fall from the Garden of Eden after Adam and Eve ate from the Tree of Knowledge; this episode also acts as an explanation for why humans must suffer and die). The story of Noah is also where the narrative of the Bible shifts from the story of the world, to the story of God's “chosen people,” the Israelites, tracing in rather rushed detail the advance of generations up to Abraham.

Response 2: From the Textbook

“You tell the teacher of your Sunday School class that you are taking a course that studies the Bible from a historical and literary perspective, rather than from the perspective of faith. Your teacher thinks that this is a waste of time, since only someone with a religious commitment to the Bible can understand it. Do you agree or disagree? State your reasons why.”

If I were being brutally honest, I would tell my Sunday School teacher this: from the perspective of faith—or, at least from a perspective of faith upon which it is presupposed that studying the Bible from any other perspective other than faith is a waste of time—it is a cultish obsession that does not investigate the work in context, but in and of itself for personal reasons. Sort of like reading Harry Potter as nonfiction or self-help.

In all honesty, the only real way to truly adsorb the lessons of the Bible may be through a reading of the text complimented with as deep an understanding of its context as one can possibly garner through academic study and personal investigation. If one is honest about where these books came from, and reads them not on an elevated pedestal, but eye to eye, the wisdom of the allegory becomes accessible, readily integrated on many different levels. First of all, one comes to understand the anthropological significance of the Bible, as the opening of Genesis spells out clearly the ancient three-tiered worldview (water above, in the firmament, and water below, with land floating precariously in between, though free of the burdens of our modern laws of physics so it may be less precarious than my intuition will allow me to acknowledge). Second, within the many tales of God's almighty (though at times petty) wrath, there really are stories with interesting, rather spiritually nuanced lessons to teach. One of my personal favorites is when God has decided to destroy Sodom and Gommorah, announcing these plans to Abraham during one of his appearances. Abraham's nephew, Lot, along with his daughters, are living in Sodom at the time, prompting Abraham to try and bargain with God. He asks, in numbered increments starting at 50 and going down, if God found however many innocent people within the city, would he spare it, to which God always replies with yes. In the end, angels come to warn Lot of the impending destruction, but the story finishes on a rather twisted note when Lot has sex with his two daughters after escaping Sodom, driving the point that the evil of Sodom has infected all three of them irredeemably (they are impure).

Academic Entry for Class of January 28^th, 2016

Response 1: General Context

Throughout the last half of Genesis, the format is reasonably compressed enough as to make one wonder if these stories were once larger at some point, connected as in a saga, but still self-contained in enough aspects as to warrant them standing alone. It gives the impression, at times, of being a series of rundown synopsis with the most essential excerpts injected or interjecting, sometimes entirely out of the blue, and at other times very fluidly. Perhaps the book of Genesis in itself was once comprised of more than one book—or, considering the age of the story, more than one self-contained oral tradition—which were integrated and amalgamated into the asynchronous format we have today. Some evidence for this comes in the form of the Documentary Hypothesis itself, with or without which one can still see God arbitrarily decide to rename Abram and Sarai to Abraham and Sarah, with God himself going by different names throughout the text: Yahweh, Elohim, or El Shaddai. This is not to mention the two separate accounts of Genesis in Genesis 1 and 2, or the rest of the otherwise non-sensical contradictions within the text. Some argue these contradictions are not separate sources, however, and instead the result of deliberate chiastic structure. In some regards, they may be right; but so far, the only Biblical scholars I've seen pushing this interpretation as a uniform standard are those who cannot let go of creationism (see, for example, the Biblical scholarship critiquing the Documentary Hypothesis on creation.com).

Response 2: From the Textbook

“Your roommate says that if the world was not created in six days, then there is nothing to learn from the Bible. What do you say?”

That's like saying “if Star Wars didn't actually happen a long, long time ago in a galaxy far, far away, then there is nothing to learn from Star Wars.” Perhaps this hypothetical roommate is a bit of an ideological scientific reductionist, and thus would agree with my statement on Star Wars, calling it a wonderful work of escapism, and nothing more. Though I too would call it a wonderful work of escapism, I wouldn't round this observation off with “and nothing more.” This would be a classic case of someone discounting the value and importance of myth in all regards; in the past, present, future, and general contexts. Star Wars has much to teach in the way of inherited archetypes, as well as illustrating a clear divide between 'good' and 'evil,' while still immersed in shades of gray, illustrating that humanity is capable of horror for what it may truly believe is a good reason. Both Star Wars and the Bible are myths of the highest order, and not in the derogatory “this is nothing but a silly myth” sense, but in the literary sense. One need only read Joseph Campbell's “The Hero With a Thousand Faces” to understand the mutual thread running through all myth, regardless of its place, date, or person(s) of origin. There are universal themes of failure and redemption, creation and destruction, heroes and villains, etc. all of which are of immense value when exploring the nature of the human condition, the history of human perception (both external and self-perception), and, in the case of the Bible and all other holy books, understanding a text that acts as a bedrock or precedent for three of the worlds largest religions (Judaism, Christianity, and Islam).  

PLEASE NOTE: THIS WAS ORIGINALLY WRITTEN AS A SERIES OF ACADEMIC JOURNAL ENTRIES RESPONDING TO EACH 3-HOUR CLASS ON CRITICALLY READING THE OLD TESTAMENT / TANAKH.