“Same Old Story” (another SOS!)

In recent days, a commenter (#48, 53) at the TIMES AND SEASONS website¹ wrote how he had heard Ayn Rand quoted and recommended in priesthood meeting. And why not?! Despite her fervent atheism, didn’t she propagate profound truths? Just ask Paul Ryan.² Or Ron Paul. Or Rand(al) Paul. Or Alan Greenspan. Or scores of evangelicals. Or unnumbered current and former BYU students.

Ayn Rand for years was the most popular author by far here in the [BYU] bookstore. They would sell more of her books than any other [author's], and her books have such titles as The Virtue of Selfishness.³

It has been the same [old] story all along, only suddenly we have reached a new level. For the first time selfishness goes by its own name: "The virtue of selfishness" is the testament of Ayn Rand, the guru of Milton Friedman, Alan Greenspan, and James Watt, long the favorite reading of BYU students. "No other civilization has permitted the calculus of self-interest so to dominate its culture," writes R. L. Heilbroner; "it has transmogrified greed and philistinism into social virtues, and subordinated all values to commercial values." This is exactly what Thomas More said: "What has heretofore passed as unjust, . . . they have turned upside down, and in fact proclaimed it publicly and by law to be nothing less than justice itself." Mr. Ivan Boesky, in a college convocation, commended "healthy greed" as a virtue to be cultivated by the young.⁴

This was my response (#57) at the Times and Seasons:

(Re: # 48, 53) The love affair with Ayn Rand that “informs” the political economy of too many Mormons (and other Christians) is simply a déjà vu seduction—the latter-day version of God’s perpetual complaint against His chosen^[5] people (as detailed in Isaiah, Jeremiah, Ezekiel, Nephi, etc.). A condensed version of Rand’s philosophy can be found at Alma 30: 17. For the looong version read John Galt’s radio address from Atlas Shrugged. Or if you have [one has] the time and endurance, read the book and monitor the skill of seduction. Then do your own comparative; (mine is at http://www.dejavu-times.blogspot.ca/2012/11/comparatively-speaking.html ). Considering the enduring influence of Rand, maybe more of us need to be informed enough to protest the co-mingling of Rand and God, which I suspect is anathema to both.

A digital PDF version of Galt’s speech can be found at pp. 767-814 http://www.mises.ch/library/Rand_AtlasShrugged.pdf

So you see, it’s the “Same Old Story” (SOS!). Seeing [snippets of Ayn] we see not; hearing [sound bites of Ayn] we hear not how utterly flawed her premises are. She was always advising others to check their premises. Her own premises, having emerged in her mind at the age of 2½ years,⁶ were beyond further scrutiny (or observation).

The altruism she despised, that had been preached for thousands of years, was, for her, the root of evil. If she had believed in God, she might have checked her premises against both His word AND “objective reality” (which we can all do). In scripture, she would have found the lament that evil arises, not by the failure of altruism, but the failure to live its precepts; by the insistence on doing and having things our own way; and through neglect of the two great commandments.⁷ But no, Ayn’s supposed solution was to espouse the same old selfishness (SOS! again) that has plagued the natural man⁸ since before Day One.

So yes, let us get informed about Ayn and her [faux-]Objectivism and refuse to sustain the unsustainable. Some of her criticisms of government have legitimacy, but her solutions have NONE. If we don’t understand that, her proffered solutions will only exacerbate the dire problems of selfishness that she falsely attributed to altruism.

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1. http://timesandseasons.org/index.php/2012/11/still-outside/
2. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WmW19uoyuO8&feature=endscreen&NR=1 . (There are other avowals of Rand influence, but Ryan backed off those in 2012 because of adverse publicity.)
3. Hugh Nibley, Teachings of the Book of Mormon--Semester 1: Transcripts of Lectures Presented to an Honors Book of Mormon Class at Brigham Young University, 1988--1990 [Provo: Foundation for Ancient Religion, 310.
4. Hugh Nibley, Approaching Zion, edited by Don E. Norton [Salt Lake City and Provo: Deseret Book Co., Foundation for Ancient Research and Mormon Studies, 1989], 466-467.
5. “Chosen,” not in the sense of unearned favors, but chosen to be witnesses and examples to the world that there is more to life and eternity than power, fame, and stuff.
6. Ayn Rand interview with Tom Snyder (1 of 3) from 8:09 – 8:38 seconds at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4doTzCs9lEc [Sept. 3, 2022: Since this video is no longer available, paste this link in the internet archive - WayBackMachine - to access it there.]
7. New Testament Matthew 22:36-40: Master, which is the great commandment in the law? Jesus said unto him, Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy mind. This is the first and great commandment. And the second is like unto it, Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself. On these two commandments hang all the law and the prophets.
8. Book of Mormon Mosiah 3:19: For the natural man is an enemy to God, and has been from the fall of Adam, and will be, forever and ever, unless he yields to the enticings of the Holy Spirit, and putteth off the natural man and becometh a saint through the atonement of Christ the Lord, and becometh as a child, submissive, meek, humble, patient, full of love, willing to submit to all things which the Lord seeth fit to inflict upon him, even as a child doth submit to his father.

Handbook to Hell?

And it came to pass that Adam, being tempted of the devil—for, behold, the devil was before Adam, for he rebelled against me, saying, Give me thine honor, which is my power; and also a third part of the hosts of heaven turned he away from me because of their agency; And they were thrust down, and thus came the devil and his angels; And, behold, there is a place prepared for them from the beginning, which place is hell. And it must needs be that the devil should tempt the children of men, or they could not be agents unto themselves; for if they never should have bitter they could not know the sweet— (Doctrine and Covenants Section 29:36-39; bold emphasis added)

Have you ever wondered what “the pitch” was that turned a third part of the hosts of heaven toward the opposition? Was it a mix of truth and lies? Did it contain more truth than lies? Was that the great persuasion—the truths so pervasive and apparent that the lies became lost in translation? Or was the truth so mocked, exaggerated, contorted and disparaged that good appeared evil and evil good? Perhaps it was a mix of both approaches.

If you want to experience a disturbing déjà vu of those pre-mortal times when the adversary pitched his case, you might consider John Galt’s lengthy radio address¹ (begins p. 767) from Ayn Rand’s Atlas Shrugged.

The alarming (though perhaps expected and déjà vu) thing is how persuasive² the pitch still remains in this world—our second estate.³

How persuaded are you?

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1. A digital PDF version of this speech can be found at pp. 767-814 http://www.mises.ch/library/Rand_AtlasShrugged.pdf . Galt’s devotee Francisco d’Anconia also gave a speech on money at pp. 313-316 (PDF) that could perhaps be considered a mortal addendum to the pre-mortal pitch. [The 35th Anniversary hard copy Plume Book version (© 1992) has 1168 pages; the PDF has 891.]

2. “In 1991, a survey conducted for the Library of Congress and the Book-of-the-Month Club asked club members what the most influential book in the respondent’s life was. Rand’s Atlas Shrugged was the second most popular choice, after the Bible.” [from http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ayn_Rand under “Popular Interest” subheading.)

3. (Pearl of Great Price | Abraham 3:26-28) And they who keep their first estate shall be added upon; and they who keep not their first estate shall not have glory in the same kingdom with those who keep their first estate; and they who keep their second estate shall have glory added upon their heads for ever and ever. And the Lord said: Whom shall I send? And one answered like unto the Son of Man: Here am I, send me. And another answered and said: Here am I, send me. And the Lord said: I will send the first. And the second was angry, and kept not his first estate; and, at that day, many followed after him [bold emphasis added].

(New Testament Jude 1:6) And the angels which kept not their first estate, but left their own habitation, he hath reserved in everlasting chains under darkness unto the judgment of the great day.

Some Choice!!!

Yesterday, a die-hard, grass-roots conservative said to me, “If I had to choose between government corruption and corporate corruption, I would choose the corporate.” He does not seem aware that much of the current government corruption is “purchased” by huge corporations in order to enhance and protect their own (not just national, but) global profits and devastations. He has bought into the Libertarian idea that government regulation is the root of (unfortunate) free-market and social evils. He, like most of his ideological mates, is utterly naïve about the true nemesis of a Zion society.

Babylon is happy to point her engorged finger at government. She is delighted to deflect attention from her abuses. She is thrilled to shift blame. She spends millions attempting to silence voices of warning. And more millions to produce enough pop, porn, paraphernalia, and propaganda to keep people sufficiently sick, addicted, debt-ridden, and deceived that the voices go unheard. Voices like:

The Future of Food ¹
Inside Job ²
You, Me & the SPP ³
The World According to Monsanto ⁴
Toxic Sludge is Good for You! ⁵
Sweet Remedy: Adulterated Food Supply ⁶
Corporate Crime and Violence ⁷

This is but a miniscule sample of the voices crying in the latter-day wilderness. Perhaps we could take an hour or two a day for ONE week and listen. Would it make a difference? Would we finally clue in that the (déjà vu) “natural man”⁸ operating in the artificial form of a faux-person has become an insatiable, collectivized, rampaging beast?

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1. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Future_of_Food ; http://www.thefutureoffood.com/
2. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Inside_Job_(film) ; http://topdocumentaryfilms.com/inside-job/
3. http://topdocumentaryfilms.com/trading-democracy-for-corporate-rule/ http://watchdocumentary.com/watch/you-me-and-the-spp-trading-democracy-for-corporate-rule-video_06d2f63f7.html ;
4. http://topdocumentaryfilms.com/the-world-according-to-monsanto/
5. http://www.prwatch.org/tsigfy.html ; http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yaMh8KGfkTM
6. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SUubCJz2d8U or http://topdocumentaryfilms.com/sweet-remedy/
7. by Russell Mokhiber. Read his 1988 book entitled, Corporate Crime and Violence: Big Business Power and the Abuse of the Public Trust. Things have not improved. http://multinationalmonitor.org/hyper/issues/1987/04/editorial.html
8. (Old Testament Ecclesiastes 9:3) … the heart of the sons of men is full of evil, and madness is in their heart while they live, … ; (Old Testament Jeremiah 17:9) The heart is deceitful above all things, and desperately wicked: who can know it? ; (New Testament Romans 8:7) … the carnal mind is enmity against God: …. ; (Book of Mormon Mosiah 3:19) For the natural man is an enemy to God, and has been from the fall of Adam, and will be, forever and ever, unless he yields to the enticings of the Holy Spirit, and putteth off the natural man and becometh a saint through the atonement of Christ the Lord, and becometh as a child, submissive, meek, humble, patient, full of love, willing to submit to all things which the Lord seeth fit to inflict upon him, even as a child doth submit to his father.

“If it were possible …”

There seems to be a certain complacency amongst some of my fellow Christians that in the last days, “the very elect” will not be deceived because it will be impossible to deceive them. They count on the Lord’s words:

For there shall arise false Christs, and false prophets, and shall shew great signs and wonders; insomuch that, if it were possible, they shall deceive the very elect. (New Testament Matthew 24:24)

Some seem to think “the very elect” are immune to deception because they know the truth; they have the gift of discernment; they are in tune to the things of God. Others take comfort in the backup alternative that “very elect,” trusted leaders will never be deceived. Thus, they think, the rank-and-file should not be unduly concerned. If they themselves are not “elect” enough, their leaders are. Therefore, the safe and sure course is to “Follow the Leader.”

But what if the signs and wonders are so GREAT that EVERYONE would be deceived—even the very elect—were it not for direct, personal revelation from God exposing the deceptions? In other words, full-scale deception will not be possible ONLY because God will intervene.

We might think this creates but two categories: 1) deceived followers of false Christs and false prophets; and 2) “the very elect” who are not deceived (and who reject the false Christs and false prophets) because they are able and willing to receive personal revelation. But what if there is a third group constituting an unsuspected peril for the rank-and-file Christian? What if there are some “very elect” who, with their eyes opened to the deceptions, choose, for whatever reason, to side with the false Christs and false prophets? Or seek to become one?

Is that why we have been counseled innumerable times not to trust in the arm of flesh? Why we are tutored, often in painful ways, to learn how to recognize and listen to the voice of the Spirit? Is that what the gift of the Holy Ghost is largely about?

Offspring (or something less)?

“Just thinking.” “Let my people think.” These are watchwords of an organization of powerful and thoughtful Christians (RZIM) who are striving to make a positive difference in the world. But, like almost every soul who has ever lived, have they attached themselves to assumptions that are stalling further enlightenment? How often do we all carry forward the mindsets of our families, cultures, religious beliefs, secular understandings, etc. to the point of being unable to think or even reason beyond them? Can we not take a lesson from the Apostle Peter and his vision of the clean and the unclean?^[1] Shouldn’t we be open to the entire scriptural texts as well as enlightenments of the spirit? Do we not sometimes need to rethink our assumptions—test our presumed knowledge?

I ask these questions because of recent publicity and comment relating to Mormon teachings about the identity and destiny of man. So much criticism have been levied without apparent awareness of text and history supporting the Mormon view that man is the offspring of God; that his mortal identity and destiny have revealing parallels to his eternal identity and destiny.

I intended, when time allowed, to research and write an apologia of the Mormon view, but today I encountered a devotional address that says it all far better than I could have done. Here then, for the inquiring mind, is the reason why Mormons believe that identity and destiny are eternal concepts.

Devotional address given at Brigham Young University on August 14, 2012 by Tad R. Callister, entitled, “Our Identity and Our Destiny” found at

http://byutv.org/watch/796f060f-dd2a-4e47-b350-da6ec6e214e0/byu-devotional-elder-tad-r-callister-81412

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[1] New Testament Acts 10 & 11

Suffering in Silence

Where is the tipping point between silence and open questioning?

In listening to a recent TED talk* (“Dare to Disagree”), I wondered about our churches. I wondered whether the faithful (on all levels, in all faiths) do a disservice to themselves and their congregations by silent acceptance and obedience to things/decisions/practices that distress their spirit. How many faithful have found continued affiliation so painful or dissonant that their only recourse seemed to be to withdraw? If we spoke our concerns, would we find them shared? Would it make a difference?

In the 30s A.D., were there faithful Scribes, Sadducees, Pharisees (and common folk, too) who kept silent because potential conflict was to untenable in their culture of hierarchy and submission? Was Nicodemus one of those?** Is the choice between silence and conflict one of the persistent déjà vus of this life experience? What choices are we making? Are they for the best?

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* http://www.ted.com/talks/margaret_heffernan_dare_to_disagree.html
** Like Joseph of Arimathaea (New Testament John 19:38; see also 12:42)

Ayn-alyzing ~ (3)

(More reflections on Ayn Rand for Christian consideration)

IF the history of mankind, as recorded in Scripture, is a déjà vu litany of man’s delusions of grandeur, as in this small sampling:
(CAPITAL emphasis has been added in all quotes below.):

And thou say in thine heart, My power and the might of mine hand hath gotten me this wealth. But thou shalt remember the LORD thy God: for it is he that giveth thee power to get wealth, that he may establish his covenant which he sware unto thy fathers, as it is this day. (Old Testament Deuteronomy 8:17-18)

They would none of my counsel: they despised all my reproof. Therefore shall they eat of the fruit of their OWN WAY, and be filled with their own devices. (Old Testament Proverbs 1:30-31)

Woe unto them that are wise in their OWN EYES, and prudent in their OWN SIGHT! (Old Testament Isaiah 5:21)

All we like sheep have gone astray; we have turned every one to his OWN WAY; and the LORD hath laid on him the iniquity of us all. (Old Testament Isaiah 53:6)

Yea, they are greedy dogs which can never have enough, and they are shepherds that cannot understand: they all look to their OWN WAY, every one for his gain, from his quarter. (Old Testament Isaiah 56:11)

If thou turn away thy foot from the sabbath, from doing thy pleasure on my holy day; and call the sabbath a delight, the holy of the LORD, honourable; and shalt honour him, not doing thine OWN WAYS, nor finding thine own pleasure, nor speaking thine own words: (Old Testament Isaiah 58:13)

Therefore have I poured out mine indignation upon them; I have consumed them with the fire of my wrath: their OWN WAY have I recompensed upon their heads, saith the Lord GOD. (Old Testament Ezekiel 22:31)

… the more part of them had turned out of the way of righteousness, and did trample under their feet the commandments of God, and did turn unto their OWN WAYS, and did build up unto themselves idols of their gold and their silver. (Book of Mormon Helaman 6:31)

They seek not the Lord to establish his righteousness, but every man walketh in his OWN WAY, and after the image of his own god, whose image is in the likeness of the world, and whose substance is that of an idol, which waxeth old and shall perish in Babylon, even Babylon the great, which shall fall. (Doctrine and Covenants Section 1:16)

Behold, thus saith the Lord unto my people—you have many things to do and to repent of; for behold, your sins have come up unto me, and are not pardoned, because you seek to counsel in your OWN WAYS. (Doctrine and Covenants Section 56:14)

And the anger of God kindleth against the inhabitants of the earth; and none doeth good, for all have gone OUT OF THE WAY. (Doctrine and Covenants Section 82:6)

WHY THEN, do we not recognize that Ayn’s “new, original” philosophy is neither new nor original? All her heroes are obsessed with pursuing THEIR OWN WAY according to their own “rational” judgments. But then so are her despised anti-heroes—the ones who abuse and misuse power in pursuing distorted, corrupted visions of “social justice.”

Of course there are unending reasons to complain about mankind’s failings. And Ayn does plenty of that because in her worlds (real and fictional), reliable, competent creators and employees are so despairingly scarce. Her heroes are the exceptional, rational, incredible few that everyone else is trying to use or destroy.

Here are a few quotes from (or about) her heroes in Atlas Shrugged:

Dagny Taggart: “There was no flattered pleasure in his voice, and no modesty. This, she knew, was a tribute to her, that rarest one person could pay another: the tribute of feeling free to acknowledge one’s own greatness, knowing that it is understood” (p. 86). “I think that only if one feels immensely important can one feel truly light” (p. 150, 236).

Hank Rearden: “We haven’t any spiritual goals or qualities. All we’re after is material things. That’s all we care for. … whatever we are, it’s we who move the world and it’s we who’ll pull it through” (pp. 87-88). [To Dagny] “It’s I who produced that wealth and it’s I who am going to let it buy for me every kind of pleasure I want—including the pleasure of seeing how much I’m able to pay for—including the preposterous feat of turning you into a luxury object” (p. 371). “I work for nothing but my own profit. I earn it” (p. 480).

Francisco d’Anconia: “We are the only aristocracy left in the world—the aristocracy of money. … It’s the only real aristocracy, if people understood what it means, which they don’t” (p. 90). “The code of competence is the only system of morality that’s on a gold standard” (p. 100).

John Galt: “By the grace of reality and the nature of life, man—every man—is an end in himself, he exists for his own sake, and the achievement of his own happiness is his highest moral purpose” (p. 1014).

About herself, Ayn writes: “my life purpose is the creation of the kind of world (people and events) that I like—that is, that represents human perfection” (p. xvi).

Yes, Ayn and her heroes do expound many powerful truths about the dismal state of mortal affairs, but:

IF God is right that … “my thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways my ways, saith the LORD. For as the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than your ways, and my thoughts than your thoughts” (Isaiah 55:7-8); and

IF we are in the middle of a three-act play,^[1] without memory of the 1st Act and subject to revelation^[2] (by a more advanced Being/Director) on how to play the 2nd in preparation for the 3rd,

then maybe Ayn’s rational, “my way” achievement isn’t going to achieve what she and her devotees think. What if, “my way” cuts off further achievement in Act Three because gifts and mercy were rejected by the perfect man’s preference for 2nd-Act earnings and justice?

Ayn seems to reject any concept of a third act, having become fixated with achievements in Act Two. If there is a third act, maybe it transcends (but includes) rational. What if trans-rational seems irrational only because from our present view, we can’t (or prefer not to) tell the difference?

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1. 1) Pre-mortal; 2) Mortal; 3) Post-mortal.
2. Or the “mystical, irrational,” as Ayn would call it.