For the [Stupid] Love of Money

From Judge Anna

I am a scientist by nature and training---analytical to the bone. It always comes as a shock to people that I take the Bible seriously. I shrug and say, "There are 648 prophecies in the Bible (at least so far as I can count) and all but a handful have come true."

Go figure, eh?

This could be because we are in some sort of cosmic feedback loop, reliving yet another version of what has already happened before, and which is therefore happening again according to generally known parameters.

According to modern physics and mathematical theories, it's possible. Time viewed as an ever-expanding matrix of information could have a repeat pattern as predicted by fractal mathematics. Our experience of "history" could simply expand like adding another chamber of larger size but similar shape to a chambered Nautilus shell.

This would explain the "eternal return" of things and the existence of such mythic patterns as "the once and future king".

We are in this day and age in the midst of such a repeat pattern and facing a known and ancient evil that first entered the written history of mankind approximately 8,000 years ago. It is the same evil that Abraham fled when he left the Babylonian city of Ur, the same evil that Moses fled when leaving Egypt. No doubt it is the same evil that led to the Flood and which is prophesied to cause the destruction by Fire.

That great evil is idolatry, and it's chief form is --- money.

Most people in the Western World have read the Bible or heard the statement that "Money is the root of all evil." and that "It is easier for a camel to pass through the eye of a needle than for a rich man to enter the kingdom of heaven."

But why? Money seems to be nothing but a handy tool, used to expedite trade----at least, that's what it could be, but inexorably it is corrupted by greed and lust into something else. It becomes an idol, something men worship, and always eventually adopts the form of a graven image.

Look at what passes for money in your pockets and what do you see? Images graven on paper, on metal, on plastic.

Another thing we can observe about money--- it is always a "symbol of value" whether or not the thing used as money has value in and of itself. Even a gold coin which has intrinsic value has "other" value attached to it, which is mysterious and nebulous. Why should a one ounce Canadian Maple Leaf be worth more or less than a one ounce gold coin issued by any other nation?

It's idolatry again---- what Hollywood film makers call "image" for a good reason.

Image is an illusion of value always associated with idolatry, and it always results in false worship, literal "idolization".

Money itself is just a thing like hammer handles and canning jars and door locks. It's what we make of money in our minds and hearts that does the damage.

It's the way we think of money, the value and image we attach to it, and most of all, the belief we have in it that makes it into an idol---a process that has nothing to do with whatever we are using as money, but which instead has to do with a fatal failure of logic that we take for granted and excuse.

Like children listening to a fantastic fairytale, we literally suspend logic when it comes to money. Someone tells us that a piece of paper has value, and so it does. Usually the one telling us this lie is the maker and vendor of the idol, the modern day equivalent of Sashimir, the Idol-Maker.

The government or the bank producing "money" for sale is like all other manufacturers and vendors; their object is to keep their costs low and their profit margins high. Making money from paper does that most efficiently, so it is most popular.

Now you see why we have paper money and the motives of those who literally produce money for our use. In addition to creating demand for their product and for keeping cost down and profit high, the governments and banks involved zealously guard their copyrights and have even given the infringement of copyright related to money a special name: counterfeiting.

At the end of the day, aside from the profit margins of the literal "money makers" it doesn't matter a fig whether money is made out of paper or gold or pure titanium. It could be made out of wood, rock, shells, or painted beans just as well. The principal and process is all the same and the result is the same: the bizarre spectacle of men cheating and lying and murdering each other over things that are essentially hokum--- vain idols made of graven images.

If we took the same men to a fakir's tent in India and suggested that they fight over a small statue made of human bone and semi-precious stones, they'd laugh until next week--- never realizing that they are doing the same thing every day on Wall Street.

Money is a false idol and the worship of money is indeed the root of all evil in the world. The delusions associated with it cloud men's minds and ruin men's lives with boring alacrity. Some men have more than they could ever use or wish, and others starve to death on the caprice of so-called "market forces", but nobody seems to STOP and think--- hey, wait, this is all just an illusion.

The actual value underlying all economies is vested in control of labor and natural resources. Money at its best is just a yardstick, literally, used to measure the value of labor pools and natural resources against each other---but it's not even an honest yardstick. It's more like a yardstick envisioned by Salvador Dali, melting here and freezing there, "hard" one moment and "soft" the next.

Really, in the end, what good is money at all? Why bother worshiping a known false idol, no more valuable or important than a stick wrapped with ribbons? Or a tie-dyed and mummified rabbit's foot?

If it were not such a tragic mistake, it would almost be funny.

Just stop for a moment and really "grok" the fact that you are working your rump off merely for the use of a stack of pretty printed paper someone else makes as a product?

Or even worse, for numbers simply typed into a ledger book in cyberspace? Hello?

Isn't it time we stopped all this, grew up and stopped worshiping false idols?

We could just as well give everyone on earth an account filled with sufficient numbers of Whatever to buy everything they could ever legitimately need, simply in exchange for their promise to get up every day and try their best to make this world a better and healthier and kinder place.

Anna von Reitz