The Politics of God

When the brooding Emperor of Rome – Tiberius – fills the river Tiber with the dead bodies of all those he imagined were the supporters of the Julii, he betrays a fear of something he cannot allow to abide under his rule; namely, opposition. Even just the threat of potential opposition.



The couch of some decadent tyrant or potentate...
Let's get one!

The Roman political undercurrent in the Jesus story is that from the very start, when three wise men from the East, seek out a new-born child in order to proclaim that this child is a king, and not just a king, but some kind of special king – from this start, the folklore matches entirely with the political suspicion that Plutarch gives words to, in writing, namely that Julius Caesar's son Caesarion was spirited away to India, and not murdered, and that in the time both of Augustus and Tiberius there was a fear that there may have been still remaining, someone in the direct bloodline of Julius Caesar that the Julii might eventually put forward as the legitimate, and actual Caesar.

There were, in Rome at the time, two main and powerful opposing families: the Claudians and the Julians or Julii.

Now as far as the other psychopath Herod goes, not very much is ever given completely decisively as to the reason the usurper Herod sets about to kill babies, but the assumption has always been that he feared some claimant appearing that would stake out an hereditary local kingship that the local public would agree with; something he did not have himself. That Herod was extraordinarily ambitious and materialistic and suspicious and ego-centric and murderous and maybe mad as well, is fairly well-attested to by most authors of the time.

Chopping down the king of trees...
An ancient tradition!

Objectively, and from some distance in history, it is very difficult to steer away from the ironical prospect that rather than a tame and peaceful god or any quiet-voiced preacher, one group of rulers feared the rise of a popularly political figure, such as an accepted hereditary king of the East, and another group feared the rise of a popularly accepted hereditary king of the West – Caesarion or any of his 'possible' offspring would have provided just such an identity, being both a descendant of Cleopatra VII the Pharaoh, and Julius Caesar.

So on one level, the Christmas Story is a highly political and earthly one. It's about babies, and the eminence of them, and the sinister interest politicians and rulers have in them for highly obscure reasons; it's about the birth of kings and popular feelings about magic and power, and days off from doing the work of slaves; it's about material expectation, wealth, celebration and events out of the ordinary; and it's about plum dough (pronounced 'duff,' as you know) and alcohol and reaching a divine ecstacy through overindulgence in food and wine...

In short, one is able to celebrate the Jesus wine and bread thing along the lines of the more typical of your Epicurean ideals – 'eat this drink this get this imbibe this, and you shall surely experience heaven forsooth...'

Well in my mind you see, it was this Augustus fellow and his gloomy follower Tiberius who started all of this austerity nonsense, for one thing, and suppression of the common good, and this accounting for every sin and crime except not of the elite's ones of course, and especially all of this forcing the public into debt for no altruistic purposes. On the other hand, by my reckoning the earthly politics of god, goes along these lines: 'take this fish and open its mouth, and within it you shall find a coin, sufficient to pay taxes to Caesar.'

Oh for a real god and a real Caesar!

Alas for the present for the most part we must make do with a fake Douglas Fir made in China, a Bitcoin and a GMO piece of fish-filler.

Personally I have been endeavouring to search for some fantastic and fascinating expensive luxury gifts to lust after or salivate over during this latest Christmas Season, and I believe I have observed that even the obvious up-scale usual places in which to find this sort of rubbish are coming up pretty short-handed on the lust-inspiring. That is not good.

What? Are all the billionaires feeling sad and bored, or lost and stale?

Or maybe just clueless and unable to get away with it ever since money itself was thrown into the River Tiber by more recent psychopathic administrators.

I wonder what threat real money poses to those in power...?

The new Rolls Wraith film clip

Yet, miracle of miracles! I have myself not made sufficient profits this year to have to pay any false Caesars their levies. There is a god afterall, it seems. My type of god of course. And a very devious sort that sort is too! But it does for me. I know I should lift my horizons to more difficult tasks in the line of miraculous interventions. A Rolls Wraith is under consideration. I shall not be leaving the girl at the iron gate though - in case my god is taking hints only from the company's marketing...!

...And by the way please leave the girl in, By Jove!