Mordecai

The BRB app has been undergoing review of the filter tags. This review is clarifying our thinking about which editors are responsible for what types of edits. In this blog we look closely at Mordecai. Also this week, updates to the 400 app.

Filter Tag Review

At the end of last week's blog I briefly mentioned that we have been in an extensive review of the filter tags in the BRB. These tags assign likely editors to passages which we do not think are inspired.

To do this well requires good understanding of the literary purposes of each editor. Essentially every list of 6 things spread across the inspired text are lists which reference the villains.

One of those lists, the Armor of God, is particularly useful for getting a clearer understanding of Mordecai. I did a blog on this list, here is the link.

Armor of God (Paleo.in Blog)

That blog goes over how the list of 6 different armor sections map to the six editors, the primary villains of the text.

In that blog I show how Mordecai maps to the shield of faith.

On the one hand we are to use our own shield of faith to defend ourselves from the actions similar to Mordecai that exist in the world today. On the other hand the word 'shield' tells us something about Mordecai and his motives for editing.

The idea here is that Mordecai hides behind some sort of shield. If we can figure out that shield we can understand him. We can also understand the ongoing patterns in the world where we need our own shield of faith for defense.

Identifying Letter

If you have followed our work for awhile you know we interpret Acts 15 to tell us to find a set of letters that identify each editor. Solomon's letter to Hiram for logs and Jezebel's letter to get Naboth killed are but 2 examples.

We have previously assigned the letter referenced in Esther 9:20 as Mordecai's letter. In this letter Mordecai establishes the holiday of Purim. The problem with this is that it does not grid very well with various villain lists.

Purim is not an offensive assault on people. Contrast this with Solomon needing logs for building his temple. This is an assault on the faith that had been based in Shechem and stretched back to Abraham. Jezebel's letter to get Naboth killed is another assault against people of faith.

The defense against Mordecai is the 'shield of faith' that is able to quench the flaming darts of evil. The words in this bigger passage hint at both the editor's modes of action and what we need to do instead. 'Shield' is the keyword here that should be informing Mordecai.

After scanning the textual account for some other letter, something where a shield might be implied, we found a reference to other letters that Mordecai had written. This reference is in Esther 8:9-10, here is the link.

Esther 8:9-10 (BRB)

If you read that paragraph to the bottom you see that this set of letters was written by Mordecai and then sent under the seal of the king.

Here we find our villain's use of a shield. Mordecai's wishes are hiding behind the authority of the king. The king is Mordecai's shield.

So the shield of faith has the purpose of defending believers from the actions of people who are using government as their shield. There are many ways people use governments against other people. We have several modern terms for using government in this way.

The most common business or MBA level term is called 'Regulatory Capture.' Businesses can artificially create demand by bribing governments into requiring their products be purchased as a matter of law.

If a business has a patent or is otherwise the sole supplier, that business can become quite profitable. This is a commonly taught business school level strategy for success. It works at all levels of government, especially state level governments.

As a recent example, car dealers in the state of Mississippi got a law passed to prevent direct sales of EVs in their state. To buy a Tesla there now requires going out of state. Those dealers are attacking EV buyers using the state government as their shield.

The case we studied in school was Tyvek building wrap. It was a patented and often poor replacement for various types of tar paper. A professional builder who lived through that Tyvek fiasco told me that under certain common but regional climate conditions Tyvek dissolves in water.

By making Tyvek part of the American building codes Tyvek effectively cornered the market, even though not all informed buyers would choose their product. Because it was required by law, and they were the sole supplier, they could charge whatever they wanted.

Rockefeller medicine has a similar vile history. Childhood vaccination schedules exist because of regulatory capture. They are not products a well informed public would normally choose to purchase. There is a large set of safer, cheaper and often better alternatives for staying healthy.

Note that so far the excuse usually used to convince modern governments to impose regulatory capture is public safety in various forms. The common argument will boil down to something along the lines of everyone must do something in order for anyone to be safe.

Regulatory capture usually works against the interests of the public at large. But it usually hides behind appeals to public safety, which gives it an apparent public benefit.

All other forms of special interests live under the umbrella of going to government and getting their pet project authorized as a matter of law.

Federal reserve notes replacing currency issued by the US Treasury is another fine example. New York bankers used the federal government as their shield. By privatizing the currency they built the financial slavery system we know now.

Essentially none of these are fundamentally in the public interest. It is a consequence of having a king. So far all of these examples can be covered under the excuse of public interest. The example in Mordecai's case goes one more step. In his story the rule of law under the authority of the king was used to kill.

Using This Shield To Kill

What happens when we run into someone who flat out wants to kill many people? Haman is a good textual example. Haman used regulatory capture to try and kill the Jews in his day. He used the king's own authority. He used the king as a shield,

A modern expression of this is the WWII era holocaust. It happened because the German government went along.

Or what about Bill Gates? He is publicly on record for wanting to reduce the world's population by 15 percent using vaccines. He cannot do this himself alone. He is using multiple strategies, but in general he is hiding behind various government shields to kill about 1 billion people.

Mordecai was doing this too. His motivation was to reverse the actions of Haman. Mordecai's motive was revenge, but his use of government decree was the same mechanism as Haman. Mordecai used the same evil tools as Haman. The 2 men were cut from the same cloth. Mordecai hid behind the shield of the authority of the king in order to kill people.

The text is using this example because this is what regulatory capture ultimately grows into. This is the worst expression of hiding behind the authority of government. This is not an authority that should be granted to governments at all.

Other Letters

So Esther 8:9 suggests that Mordecai had already written some set of letters. Where might we find those letters?

There are a bunch of passages that are against various people groups. These passages form a general type of Biblical literature. Mordecai is the editor who is likely responsible for them all. A good example starts in Jeremiah 46.

Jeremiah 46 (BRB)

This chapter has a series of curses against 3 different nations, Egypt, Babylon and Amon. Chapter 47 is against the Philistines. Chapter 48 is against Moab. Chapter 49 is against Amon, Adam (Edom) and then Damascus, Kedar and Elam. Chapter 50 continues and is against the Chaldeans and Babel.

Does this sound like Mordecai? Yes.

Writing like this is spread across the text. All passages of this style appear to be originally written by Mordecai. These appear to be Mordecai's various letters.

The only caveat is that these letters may have floated around independently until being inserted by Ezra when he was later canonizing the OT.

The armor of god passage teaches that we must fight this through faith. This means we curry favor with Joshua our king. We can then take shelter behind Joshua too. We do that through prayer and doing what he says.

Debt Ceiling

The largest single industry that springs from Mordecai's community is banking. The historical big European banking family name, Red Shield, is hinting back to the textual symbols used with Mordecai.

Banks are collectively the largest special interest. They enable deficit spending by governments. In doing this they rob from the future of a country.

They need to control armies in order to enforce national level loans. This is another example of regulatory capture being used to kill. This is why they must meddle in the government of whatever country has the largest army.

An illustration of this is playing out in Washington DC with the fight over the debt ceiling. Throughout US history that ceiling has always been raised. The disputes are usually political theater. We will see in another few days if this pattern still holds.

400 Stories (400.paleo.in)

The 400 stories app has been updated this week with change in the formatting of the main table. That table is now presented with 4 different sets of labels on the rows and columns.

The first view is labeled based on the internal structure. 3 more views are labeled based on holiday reading plans.

To get at each view there are now 4 distinct pages. On phones you can swipe between pages. On all platforms the drop down menu can be used as well. Check it out using the link above.

More Later,

Phil