Studies in Eschatology – Zechariah

At Evening Time… Light

Professor: Dr. R.J. Rushdoony

Subject: Religious studies

Lesson: 15-15

Genre: Lecture

Track: 154

Dictation Name: RR127H15

Location/Venue:

Year: 1960’s-1970’s

Our scripture today is the 14th chapter of the book of the prophet Zechariah. At Evening Time… Light.

“14 Behold, the day of the Lord cometh, and thy spoil shall be divided in the midst of thee.

2 For I will gather all nations against Jerusalem to battle; and the city shall be taken, and the houses rifled, and the women ravished; and half of the city shall go forth into captivity, and the residue of the people shall not be cut off from the city.

3 Then shall the Lord go forth, and fight against those nations, as when he fought in the day of battle.

4 And his feet shall stand in that day upon the mount of Olives, which is before Jerusalem on the east, and the mount of Olives shall cleave in the midst thereof toward the east and toward the west, and there shall be a very great valley; and half of the mountain shall remove toward the north, and half of it toward the south.

5 And ye shall flee to the valley of the mountains; for the valley of the mountains shall reach unto Azal: yea, ye shall flee, like as ye fled from before the earthquake in the days of Uzziah king of Judah: and the Lord my God shall come, and all the saints with thee.

6 And it shall come to pass in that day, that the light shall not be clear, nor dark:

7 But it shall be one day which shall be known to the Lord, not day, nor night: but it shall come to pass, that at evening time it shall be light.

8 And it shall be in that day, that living waters shall go out from Jerusalem; half of them toward the former sea, and half of them toward the hinder sea: in summer and in winter shall it be.

9 And the Lord shall be king over all the earth: in that day shall there be one Lord, and his name one.

10 All the land shall be turned as a plain from Geba to Rimmon south of Jerusalem: and it shall be lifted up, and inhabited in her place, from Benjamin's gate unto the place of the first gate, unto the corner gate, and from the tower of Hananeel unto the king's winepresses.

11 And men shall dwell in it, and there shall be no more utter destruction; but Jerusalem shall be safely inhabited.

12 And this shall be the plague wherewith the Lord will smite all the people that have fought against Jerusalem; Their flesh shall consume away while they stand upon their feet, and their eyes shall consume away in their holes, and their tongue shall consume away in their mouth.

13 And it shall come to pass in that day, that a great tumult from the Lord shall be among them; and they shall lay hold every one on the hand of his neighbour, and his hand shall rise up against the hand of his neighbour.

14 And Judah also shall fight at Jerusalem; and the wealth of all the heathen round about shall be gathered together, gold, and silver, and apparel, in great abundance.

15 And so shall be the plague of the horse, of the mule, of the camel, and of the ass, and of all the beasts that shall be in these tents, as this plague.

16 And it shall come to pass, that every one that is left of all the nations which came against Jerusalem shall even go up from year to year to worship the King, the Lord of hosts, and to keep the feast of tabernacles.

17 And it shall be, that whoso will not come up of all the families of the earth unto Jerusalem to worship the King, the Lord of hosts, even upon them shall be no rain.

18 And if the family of Egypt go not up, and come not, that have no rain; there shall be the plague, wherewith the Lord will smite the heathen that come not up to keep the feast of tabernacles.

19 This shall be the punishment of Egypt, and the punishment of all nations that come not up to keep the feast of tabernacles.

20 In that day shall there be upon the bells of the horses, Holiness Unto The Lord; and the pots in the Lord's house shall be like the bowls before the altar.

21 Yea, every pot in Jerusalem and in Judah shall be holiness unto the Lord of hosts: and all they that sacrifice shall come and take of them, and seethe therein: and in that day there shall be no more the Canaanite in the house of the Lord of hosts.”

Late last night I was reading a book written by a man in Detroit Michigan. This man who was born in England and came to this country by way of Canada, published this book at his own expense, because he felt so strongly about the faith that he expressed therein. The book was a remarkable production in blasphemy, because for him the culmination of history, and the coming again of Christ in history has already taken place, because the new incarnation of Christ, and the new savior of the world, the word of God, is by his own statement the United Nations. All our hope, every kind of dream, paradise on earth, is to be realized in and through this world Christ, the United Nations. And those who are enemies of it must be destroyed for this brave new world to arrive.

It is not surprising however that man would so naively and blasphemously give expression to such a faith, to the point of paying out several thousand dollars for the publication of it. After all, this is what we are hearing in high places. In all churches, in politics all around us.

I was also reading in a prominent thinker yesterday, and about him as well. This man, a prominent geologist, a Jesuit priest, a man now internationally acclaimed who although a few years ago was regarded as somewhat heretical, is now regarded as one of the most foremost thinkers of the modern world. Pierre Teilhard de Chardin. His influence today in every kind of circle is phenomenal. And he is getting converts in high places. Unhappily one of those who have gone over to Chardin’s perspective is Bishop (bomachine?)

And what is it that Chardin has to say? Chardin believes in infallibility, most passionately. Teilhard de Chardin is an advocate of the doctrine of infallibility. But, when he uses the word infallibility he does not apply it to scripture. Nor does he as a Roman Catholic Priest apply it to the Pope. He reserves the word infallibility for the evolutionary process. So that, for Chardin, infallibility in the world is at one point, in this vast process of evolution. And what is to be the culminating point of this process? Incarnation. And what does he mean by incarnation? For Teilhard de Chardin incarnation means that all the divinity essentially in history, the divine act in history will culminate in the unity of all mankind in a one world order, and in a one world religion.

Is it any wonder then, that simpler men give voice to this faith? This is the gospel according to modern man. And the true incarnation is to be in this one world order. The one world religion which includes all religions.

Now the Prophet Zechariah as we have seen, foretold the birth, death, and resurrection of our Lord. and in this, his concluding chapter, he gives us a vision of the consequences of the incarnation, what it does to the world. From the early centuries, in the church fathers to the present, all responsible commentators have generally said that this is one of the most difficult chapters in the whole of the Bible, as far as understanding the details of the symbolism are concerned. And yet there has been quite general agreement among these responsible commentators as to the basic meaning of this prophecy. And it is simply this: That Jesus Christ in His coming, in His incarnation, came to bring not peace to a sinful world, but a sword, division. To divide His church, ancient Israel. And to continue to bring division to the church in terms of the truth. To divide men in terms of the truth. To divide as he said, a Father from his children, children from their parents, and members of a household from one another; so that His coming shall be judgement in order that it might be salvation.

And so as he speaks of the coming of the Lord and its implications, Zechariah sees it as first of all judgment upon the church, whom he together with the rest of Scriptures calls Jerusalem, Israel, Judah, Zion. And he says that the immediate implications will be the destruction of the outward Jerusalem, the outward church. And of course this is a matter of historical record. The outward church Jerusalem, Judea, was ravished and laid waste in the Jewish Roman war. And again and again and again through history God as He has declared in His world comes in judgement upon His people. Because God punitive justice begins according to scripture in the house of God. So declares 1st Peter 4:17, Jeremiah 25:29, Ezekiel 9:6, and many, many other passages.

And in the first 7 verses of this prophecy, Zechariah declares that the judgement of God will come upon the outward church, because of their unbelief, because of their apostasy, because of their compromise. But at the same time there will be a cleavage. And he portrays this as the cleaving of the very mountain on which Jerusalem sat. There will be a division, a separation whereby God gives over a part of His people to judgment and destruction, and puts a valley between the two to separate His own.

And as Gods judgment begins to descend in history over and over again, it is described as a time of growing darkness, as a twilight. The twilight of an age. The twilight of a culture or of a world. So that it is neither light nor darkness, Zechariah says. And man lives progressively in this unrelieved darkness, or approaching darkness, without any relief from the oppressiveness of the situation, with the threat of judgement from all sides, the threat of destruction, whether it be militarily or economically, or naturally; catastrophe stares man in the face on all sides. And it shall not be clear nor dark. But then in words that have been a source of comfort to the church for countless centuries: “At evening time, it shall be light.” At evening time it shall be light. The church has never failed to understand the essence of this chapter. And they have found it in these words. Gods Judgment shall approach, and it shall appear to be, and unto the ungodly, shall be the twilight before the darkness descends upon them. and that evening time shall be the beginning of an unending night for the apostate, for the ungodly, for the reprobate, for the compromisers. The word to God to His faithful remnant is this: “At evening time, it shall be light.”

So that as the very judgment with all its horrors descends, for them, instead of the darkness, it becomes the dawning.

Then Zechariah continues in the second section of his prophesy, verses 8-11: to give a picture of living waters springing up from this true Jerusalem, and going out into the surrounding area. We have a much more detailed vision of this through Ezekiel. And Zechariah does not gives us the great details that Ezekiel does, but the picture is still unmistakable. The true church becomes in the midst of all this, a spring that flows continually. In summer and in winter it shall be. And it flows out with living waters, and the direction of its flow is significant, it is to the dead sea. Ezekiel makes it very clear and specific without giving us the direction, he tells us in no uncertain terms: “It goes to the dead sea.”

What is the significance of this imagery? Simply this: the dead sea is a symbol of the deadest portion of the entire world. It is given to us as something that is made alive again, and God says through Zechariah: “Out of my true church living waters shall go forth that shall bring life to the deadest portions of the world, that shall bring regenerating power, the power of Jesus Christ unto every portion of the world, the deadest culture included. So that they shall be alive again, and men shall dwell in these dead places, and there shall be no more utter destruction or better translates, nor more curse. The curse shall be removed because the redemption of Christ is apparent. And Jerusalem shall be safely inhabited.

Then in the third section Zechariah continued in verses 12:19 to give us a picture of the judgment upon the enemies of God and the blessings that God has for his believers. It is a vivid declaration. God will bring judgment upon His enemies, and the first element of the punishment is corruption. They are portrayed as having the very image of a living death, in which the moldy rottenness of death is combined with the vivid conscious sensibility of life. Then again their condition is portrayed as one of mutual hate and contention, so that the enemies of God are used by God to destroy one another, to cancel out one another. In the 14th verse, their loss of the blessings previously enjoyed is cited. As the enemies of God begin to dream of the power that shall be theirs. They accumulate the wealth of the earth, the gold and the silver, the natural resources; concentrate them, as they dream: “We shall govern the world.” But Zechariah declares: “These things shall be taken from them, and given to the people of God.” And then the infectious nature of sin is described by Zechariah, so that it defiles everything it touches, and like a plague destroys all those who are infected by it.

Then in the culminating section, verses 20 and 21, Zechariah declares that the true Jerusalem of God, His true church, His true community, is holiness to the Lord. All the distinctions between clean and unclean are abolished. Everything that men do represents their service of God. God having redeemed His people, And established His dominion amongst them again, claims the whole world as His own. And men and all their possessions are so wholly consecrated to His service that there is no longer any uncleanness, and whether they eat or drink or whatsoever things they do, all things are pure and holy in Gods sight, because God has dominion over them. There shall therefore be universal holiness, and universal happiness. And there shall be no more the Canaanite in the house of the Lord of hosts. The Canaanite, the unbelieving, who although residing in the promised land were not a part of the promised people, shall no more be in the church. The goal therefore of history is, through successive crisis and judgments God intends and does cleanse the nations, purge His church, in order finally to smash the ungodly with all their pretensions totally, and to make for a world in which holiness unto the Lord governs all things.

This then is the purpose of history. In Revelation 21:27 we have a picture of the true church, and we are told there will in no wise enter into it anything that defileth, neither whatsoever worketh abomination or maketh a lie. But they which are within, written in the lamb, the lambs book of life, they alone shall reside therein. The true church cannot be defiled. And the true church shall be brought by Jesus Christ triumphant through the crisis of history, and the judgments of our God. Let us pray.

Almighty God our heavenly Father, we thank Thee that Thou art at work in our day. That Thou art bringing judgment upon apostasy and unbelief, that Thou art preparing Oh Lord to destroy the ungodly, and to smash them in pieces as a potters vessel is smashed. And we thank Thee our Father that in Jesus Christ we have the assurance that Thou art mindful of us, that in Him we are more thank conquerors. In Him we have the assurance of victory. And so our Father in this confidence we commit ourselves and our households, into Thy keeping. In Jesus name, amen.

Yes?

[Audience Member] ...?...

[Rushdoony] Yes…

[Audience Member] ...?...

[Rushdoony] No, this is talking about our very present real world.

[Audience Member] ...?...

[Rushdoony] Yes. Christ’s purpose in saving us is not to take us out of this world into heaven, immediately, or to lead us to desert the world in any sense other than spiritually forsaking the way of the world. It is to reestablish His dominion over the world, because Christ is the true king of creation. Now, God declared when He established the Hebrew commonwealth, that He was the true king of Israel. When the nation sought another king, God made it clear that they were deserting Him. He told David that He would send in the fullness of time a greater Son, who was to be Gods only begotten Son. Who would reestablish the kingdom of God over all creation. Now, Jesus Christ is therefore that promised King, who is to reestablish the kingship of God over all creation, and over the earth specifically. Now if Christ’s purpose is to reestablish His kingship over the earth, it is not His purpose to have His people therefore surrender the world to the devil and say: “We have nothing to do with the world, we want to be rapture out of it.” On the contrary, it is His purpose as king to reestablish His dominion. And the end purpose is as Revelation makes clear, that the kingdoms of this world might become the kingdoms of our Lord and of His Christ. Yes?

[Audience Member] At one time you spoke of the Biblical view of history, now this is (?) different from the description in here isn’t it?

[Rushdoony] Yes.

[Audience Member] ...?...

[Rushdoony] Now, the Biblical view of history has been called linear, that is, that it is a line, not a straight line but an ascending line or you might say zigzagging upwards. And in the course of history you have ups and downs, judgments, but the basic direction is towards a given goal, a goal given by God. Now the cyclical view of history which you find everywhere except in the Bible, says that history is nothing but endless recurrence. A perpetual cycle. There will be variations as to the nature of this cycle, but all history does is to endlessly repeat itself. It has no progress, it is simply perpetual repetition of good and bad, cultures rising and falling, getting nowhere in particular, that ultimately the universe is going to run down until you have nothing but dead atoms, and then it will again mount upward and you will have creation evolving out of it, and you will have men and civilizations and cultures, and then they will decline, and again this will repeat itself endlessly. So that, those who hold to the cyclical view of history say: “Oh but we’ve had, probably, a 100 or a 100 million worlds and universes, and they have all evolved out of the fortuitous concourse of atoms, arisen, the suns have died, the suns in the heavens, the worlds have died, people have died, and you have had this endless return.” And for men spiritually they say: “You have successive reincarnations until they work out their Karma, and then they return to nothingness. They go to Brahma, or they go to nothingness, whatever the case may be, until the whole of this cycle of evolution or whatever you want to call it, again disintegrates into nothingness, and then it begins anew.” So that, there is nothing but perpetual repetition, which is totally without meaning. The truth, the ultimate truth is nothingness.

Now for us, God is ultimate. For Hinduism, for Buddhism, for all other religions the ultimate truth is nothingness.

[Audience Member] Now in regards to that, ...?... History repeats itself …?...

[Rushdoony] Yes, good point. This phrase history repeats itself originally goes back to Greek and Roman observations, the cyclical view. As it is so often used by us, what we do mean is that there are lessons in history, so we use it in another sense, but in origin the remark was totally pagan. Now we meant that you need to learn from history because it has an example, it teaches something. Yes?

[Audience Member] In picturing of Jesus until recently you could always recognize …?... how do you know what He would look like?

[Rushdoony] We have no real description of Him. There are a number which claim to be authentic, but none of these have any real validity behind them. Some of the earliest pictures of Christ that we have vary so greatly that it is obvious that these coming from the late 2nd and 3rd centuries were not even attempting to picture Christ; because some show Him as beardless, and some as bearded, some show Him very young, some show Him looking very mature. So it is obvious they were not trying to give us a picture of Him. There is a shroud that has some testimony in its favor and it seems to give a picture. Again we cannot be sure, it is a very different picture than we usually have of Him. But the reality is we have no way of knowing how He looked. Over the centuries artists began to stylize Christ’s appearance so He would be easily recognizable in ecclesiastical art, but this was simply an artistic stylization for purposes of recognition. However scripture tells us that when we see Him we shall know Him, it will be that obvious. We shall recognize Him, because everything in Him will immediately, not only the manner of His coming at the end of history and the supernatural manifestation, but it will so readily answer the heart of every man that we will recognize Him as our Lord, or our judge. So that there will be an instantaneous recognition.

But we do not have any knowledge as to His actual appearance. Yes?

[Audience Member] ...?... You alluded to today …?... I would like you to comment on this business.

[Rushdoony] Yes, I think…

[Audience Member] ...?...

[Rushdoony] No, but I do know from various persons in various projects that we have very little inkling of all the kind of research that is being conducted with taxpayers money. That the purpose is trying to demonstrate evolution of course, and to bring it about. So I could believe that almost anything is being attempted somewhere or other. Certainly some of the things that have been reported in Life Magazine and elsewhere about experimentations with people are appalling, but very definitely they are planning to use man as the prime guinea pig and to work with him.

Along those lines I was interested recently to learn of a very interesting bit of legislation, I believe I brought it with me…

Yes. This is from the weekly compilation of presidential documents, Monday July 25, 1966; setting up the exchange peace corp. What is the exchange peace Corp? I am reading: “The exchange Peace Corp is a new program which would bring in the first year 500 volunteers from other countries for service in the United States.” And it goes on to say that this was recommended to Congress on February 2 1966 by the president. And what will Exchange Peace Corp volunteers do? The first year of the Exchange Peace Corp in the United States will be one of experimentation to determine the most effective use of this new resource of talent, and teaching Exchange Peace Corps volunteers may be employed by school systems to introduce New World culture courses into the classroom. One school system for example plans to use a team of teachers, possibly one Latin American, one Japanese, one African, and one Indian to introduce a new 9th grade world studies course; and so on. Then, they will be used in community service agencies with youth groups or in public youth clinics, or hospitals.

Now, the question is how can our hospitals take some of these people out of Nigeria and out of the Congo and use them? What standard of qualification will there be for them as doctors, or as teachers, or as anything else? It says that in most cases, but not all, exchange volunteers will be college graduates, and fully licensed or qualified in their professional field in their own country; so that whatever standard the Congo or India or Nigeria sets up for a doctor or for a teacher, will make them eligible to teach in our schools. Now, some of you have some idea of the standards in these countries, so that you shouldn’t be too surprised if you see some witch doctors in some of our hospitals. Yes?

[Audience Member] ...?... to me it didn’t define that it had anything to do with it, it had absolutely nothing to do with what they were doing.

[Rushdoony] That’s right, they are free to do whatever is decided.

[Audience Member] They could come over here and be a janitor, also.

[Rushdoony] No…

[Audience Member] It doesn’t say they are to do anything.

[Rushdoony] They are to be excepted in terms of the qualifications in their countries, so if they are qualified as a doctor, a doctor, a teacher, a teacher. A welfare worker a welfare worker.

[Audience Member] But ultimately to do what? To accomplish what, what is the object?

[Rushdoony] To produce a world culture.

[Audience Member] ...?...

[Rushdoony] That is right.

[Audience Member] The world culture is what?

[Rushdoony] Well, to produce a one world order, in which everybody thinks alike and believes alike so that there is no discrimination with respect to race, color, or creed.

[Audience Member] ...?...

[Rushdoony] Yes, yes.

[Audience Member] ...?...

[Rushdoony] Nigeria has had especial attention because it has been believed that Nigeria represents the most advanced part of Africa, of Negro Africa. And (Cereboo Abekar?) I have forgotten exactly the form of his name, was regarded as one of the ornaments of the world, intellectually. He had gone to Oxford I believe. Unfortunately his government was overthrown this year, as you know, and (Cereboo?) and his cabinet ended up in the pot, very literally. They were asked to dinner by an opposition party and became the main course. But they are still regarded as one of the most enlightened and advanced areas of Africa, so that great things are expected of them.

I would be very pleased if some of our diplomats were asked to dinner in Nigeria. Yes?

[Audience Member] ...?...

[Rushdoony] Except that they, the scientific elite will be the leaders, you see. And they are doing this for our welfare. This is for the welfare of all. This is not a new dream, you have all of this planned and spelled out in Plato’s Republic which most of you probably read in college. And here you have a blue print centuries before Christ, very clearly worked out. It is a total communistic order in which the philosopher kings, these scientific planners, do everything for everybody’s welfare. And one of the things of course insisted upon to make this job attractive for this elite is the communism of women, they have their pick. And Plato actually says: “Will this not make it a great attraction?” Now it is that bald, and yet this is taught and has been taught for generations of college students as representing the highest thing intellectually in Western civilization. The whole thing is the silliest nonsense. Childish ramblings.

[Audience Member] ...?...

[Rushdoony] Well, there is an excellent book out now, you said that they can’t understand each other, and that is true. It is by Rose L. Martin, you can find it on the table in the back, Fabian Freeway. Now in Fabian Freeway one of the things that Rose L. Martin points out, and of course the documentation here is very thorough on the part of Sister Margaret Patricia McCarran. The Fabian strategy is to produce ponderous, massive research documents in which you gather all the statistics, all reports and pile them into something, and make it as unreadable as you can, so that it is almost impossible to plow through. Then you tack on a conclusion at the end that says what you wanted to say at the beginning, and there will be no relationship really between all this massive documentation and this conclusion; just go through and throw in a lot of language to make it seem as though there is some connection. But there is no real relationship. And then you present this.

Now, this is the type of brief that is presented nowadays to the Supreme Court. This is the kind of thing that represents research in our universities, this is increasingly the new intellectualism. And of course the plain fact is that they don’t understand each other and these things are not written to be understood, you just produce something and somebody else looks at it, and they don’t want to admit that it doesn’t make sense to them, they don’t have the time to wade through that garbage to point out that it is nonsense, so they look at the conclusions, and they say: “Well, if he has proved it he has proved it, and who am I to argue with him?” And they all pull this on one another, and it is nonsense. They are stupid.

[Audience Member] ...?...

[Rushdoony] Of the what?

[Audience Member] ...?...

[Rushdoony] Well, the Warren Report does have massive documentation, I haven’t gone through the whole thing but it does leave a lot of questions. However I would just as soon let the Warren Report lie, I think we can only get ourselves into trouble having that thing reopened. We will end up the guilty persons however innocent we are.

[Audience Member] ...?...

[Rushdoony] No, however, I haven’t seen it but I do know that that is extensively the reporting that has been made. The reality is the only place in the South Pacific where there has been any progress among the natives is where Calvinism has been an influence upon them. Because when it has been imposed it’s sufficiently strong and strict that it does discipline an otherwise totally undisciplined people. And this is apparently what they need. So that the 7th day Adventists too have had some read success in the South Pacific. In other words, what they are saying is that they don’t need something as strong, when the reality is this is about the only thing that does work, so it has been a very strict form of Calvinism the South Pacific did get, usually. And that was about the only thing that took with those natives, so that what little accomplishment there has been has been where that has taken place. In other places with other kinds of missionary works, they relax, they enjoy it, and they go their own sweet way. And unfortunately that is what they are doing everywhere now, so that the decline of all missionary work in the Pacific is phenomenal, because there is no discipline left in any missionary work, it has become, all of it, humanistic. Yes?

[Audience Member] ...?...

[Rushdoony] Yes, well, it was congregational missionaries who went there, they were mildly Calvinistic. Until they went there the island was rent with all kinds of troubles and divisions, conflicts, cannibalism, everything. We don’t think of those natives as having been given to such practices, but they were. The only progress Hawaii had was under these missionaries and their families which remain there. Hawaii should never had been made a state. There isn’t the caliber of responsibility there. It is now (?) and nothing could have been better for Hawaii than to have remained under those ruling families, they brought Hawaii the only progress they ever had.

We are not told when we read about the South Pacific and all these loving natives with their grass skirts and their hula dances that they were cannibals, and that they were a particularly filthy and depraved people, nor are we told that usually by the time they finished their teens they had all kinds of diseases including Yaws, and they were going around with their legs puffed up with (?) or whatever it is, it was a hideous place. But men have always had some kind of dream area, you see. Before it was the South Pacific it was the Americas. Now this is hard for us to think about, because especially those of us who know what the Indians are like, to imagine that there was a time when the Indians were romanticized and the beautiful Indian maidens and princesses; there was no such thing as a princess among the Indians, but this was the stories about these beautiful Indian princesses was commonplace, all over Europe; and there were plays and operas written in Europe about the tragedies which these peoples suffered, these noble princesses falling for some trader or Spanish Conquistador, and how their heart broke when they left, and so on, the most ridiculous kind of nonsense, and the pure noble character of these people, there are still traces of some of this, but most of it, especially people in the west know is hogwash.

Now, when this kind of story disappeared, from the America’s, it was transferred to the Pacific and reality had nothing to do with it. Yes?

[Audience Member] ...?...

[Rushdoony] Well, it is interesting at the same time, that some of these stories were circling in Europe about the Indian, some of the poor Spaniards were running for their lives from these cannibals, because the American Indians were cannibals when they were first discovered. They didn’t have a horse either till the Spaniard brought the horse, but cannibalism was routine.

One of the most interesting things that you can read in this era is The Journey of Cabeza de Vaca who came with an expedition to Florida and was shipwrecked in the Gulf, and landed on the coast, made his way all the way to Mexico and joined up with the Spaniards there. It took him several years, during which time he had some frightening experiences, was a slave to one Indian tribe for a time, and gives a very candid, realistic picture of what Indian life was like then, it is a marvelous book, one of the finest things you can read.

[Audience Member] Well that brings up the subject of Spaniards who were out to make a new world too, when they came here, because they didn’t bring any women, they married with the Indians and that is where your Mexican comes from today; later on Spanish women came over, but I mean originally …?...

[Rushdoony] Yes, they did that predominately, there has been a great deal of nonsense written about the cruelty of the Spaniards, there is no doubt that you can make a stack of books by going to history and finding this and that incident, and saying: “See how cruel they were.” But if you take it on the whole, if you look at the over all picture, the Spaniards came here with the intention of making this their home, they were ready to live peaceably with the people and intermarry with them, they tried to convert them, they were doing everything possible to make this their homeland and the people a part of their society. So that the history books are very unfair, and one sided in giving a picture of unrelieved horror and persecution. There were incidents, very serious one, but the total picture has to be recognized. Yes?

[Audience Member] What caused the people …?...

[Rushdoony] First of all cannibalism has a religious significance, so that the idea was you killed someone and you gained his strength by eating him. That is the thesis of it.

[Audience Member] ...?...

[Rushdoony] Oh yes, so the idea was of course, a man didn’t eat a woman. He ate a man who was a strong man. Because he hoped to add to his strength by eating this man. Now that was one aspect of cannibalism. Second so far as an abundance of game is concerned, here again we have been propagandized, because while there were certain kinds of game that were seasonable such as the passenger pigeons that were in great abundance, you didn’t have them all year round. What were you going to do the rest of the year? Then, the buffalo. Before the Indian got the (force?), it was pretty hard for him to hunt the buffalo successfully. So, when you discount some of those things, and say: “What kind of food did they have?” you have to say they didn’t have too much. Because the game was not that plentiful. Consider for example that the eastern states coming as far as Illinoi and further West, you could walk from the Atlantic deep into the Midwest, almost to the prairies, and never see the sun, because it was possible all the way to be in such thick woods without working at it, that you never saw the sun. Now when you had such heavy forestation it meant that you didn’t have any growth under the trees, because when you have such heavy forestation, you have a mass of decaying leaves and vegetation underneath, some little shrubs along the riverbanks and little vegetation there, but for the most part the forest bed is devoid of vegetation, you don’t have enough light. And this was the reality. There was not much in the way of deer, they couldn’t live too well. So that the deer life in the forests and other animal life was limited.

Now when the white man came and he began to clear some of these forests and plant, what he immediately did was to make it possible for grass to grow, because it was now exposed to the sun, the grass was. Well, what happened? Around every white settlement… [Tape Ends]