The Pete Quiñones Show - Reading Ivan Ilyin's 'On Resistance to Evil by Force' w/ Dr. Matthew Raphael Johnson - Pt. 16

Episode Date: July 11, 2026

64 MinutesPG-13Dr. Matthew Raphael Johnson is a researcher, writer, and former professor of history and political science, specializing in Russian history and political ideology.Pete and Dr. Johnson continue a reading and commentary of Ivan Ilyin's 1925 book, "On Resistance to Evil by Force."Tolstoy's "What is a Jew?"The Lies of Leftism: Ivan Ilyin, Atheism and the Death of Reason in the East and West by Dr. Matthew Raphael JohnsonDr Johnson's PatreonDr Johnson's CashApp - $Raphael71RusJournal.orgTHE ORTHODOX NATIONALISTDr. Johnson's Radio Albion PageDr. Johnson's Books on AmazonJohnson's Law in Action: Venezuela and the Foreign Policy of Mass PresumptionDr. Johnson's Pogroms ArticleThe Orthodox Nationalist: Karl Marx “On the Jewish Question” (1844)Article: Karl Marx’s Theses on the Jews and the Necessity of Free Trade: Zur Judenfrage (1844) by Matthew Raphael JohnsonPete and Thomas777 'At the Movies'Support Pete on His WebsitePete's PatreonPete's SubstackPete's SubscribestarPete's GUMROADPete's VenmoPete's Buy Me a CoffeePete on FacebookPete on TwitterBecome a supporter of this podcast: https://www.spreaker.com/podcast/the-pete-quinones-show--6071361/support.

With election time approaching, political ads will be inserted into the episode, along with other ads that, frankly, I'm not going to like and you aren't going to like. So please ignore them, skip by them, whatever you have to do. I don't endorse any of the ads that are inserted, but it is another way for me to generate income. So I appreciate you guys putting up with them. If you don't want to deal with them, go to the Picanuena Show.com. can subscribe through Patreon. You can subscribe through Substack, which is my preferred one. Because with both of those, you get an RSS feed, only Patreon and only Substack give you an RSS feed. There's also a link to my website, Gumroad, and SubscribeStar, where you will get

the audio files that you can download and listen to or you can stream in most cases through those locations as well. So if you want to avoid the ads, consider supporting the show, If not, just know none of these ads get any endorsement from me. Skip by them. Do what you need to do. I appreciate all of you. Head on over to Piquino Show.com. You can get the show early and ad free over there.

If not, here's a show. I want to welcome everyone back to our reading of On Resistance to Evil by Force by Ivan Aline, Dr. Johnson. How goes it today? I'm in a pretty good mood. Temperatures down to 84, believe it or not. Still inhuman, but I could handle it. For our listeners, if they haven't checked out the Hegel stuff I'm doing with Thomas,

please do. We're having a great time with that. I guarantee you, I guarantee you this is the best time anyone's had dealing with Hegel ever in the history of intellectual life. I have to agree. I have to agree. And the constant trying to pull it into real life examples. I hope people are following that. That that's exactly what's going on there. Yeah. At least reading. Now, I did upload a new version of my what is Hegel, what does Hegel mean by Dialectics paper? I was dissatisfied with the first one when I reread. it. It was a little sloppy. So I redid it. And there I make fun of a lot of the, you know, Patriot conservatives who pretend that they know something about Hegel and talk about his dialectics

in a way that proves that they have no conception of what they're talking about. The Searquell Schopenhauer's out there. And so that's it. At least that is a worthy something, something to look at, something to read. Yep. I already uploaded it. it. Thank you. All righty. Picking up where we left off last time, here we go. Compare the following formula of spiritual nihilistic utilitarianism, worthy of any consistent materialist and entirely following from sentimental hedonism. Quote, in this one manner in the struggle with nature, man receives, if we separate it, complete satisfaction of the physical and spiritual demands of his nature. To feed, clothe, and take care of oneself, and one's loved ones is the satisfaction of a

physical need. To do the same for other people is a satisfaction of a spiritual need. End quote. If we grasp this point of view and trust it, it turns out that man is not an individual spirit with a living relationship to the living and personal God, with sacred rights to participate in the life of the God-created world, with a vision of insensible mystery and sensual beauty, with the study of the law and the knowledge of wisdom. No, all this is rejected and extinguished. Man is, on the one hand, a suffering subject, and therefore an object of pity and compassion.

On the other hand, he is a pitying subject and, accordingly, an object protected from suffering. The entire life of humanity boils down to people's suffering and causing each other's suffering, that people sometimes pity each other and sometimes do not. Yeah, this could have been written yesterday. and it would have had the same, it would have been equally relevant. The notion of offense, someone being offended.

When I was in grad school, I had a guy, he should not have been a grad student. He did drop out. He told me that my views were not compassionate. And I said, views can't be compassionate or not compassionate. They're either true or they're false. I don't know what the hell you're talking about here. I mean, he was a very, very likable guy, jolly fat guy. But he dropped down.

He didn't have that mentality. Speaking like that, proves that he didn't have that mentality. He did cause some of the professors a lot of trouble. So I had a soft spot my heart for him. But this is, and, you know, keep in mind something. And we were just talking about that before we came on the air. that his commentators know that Tolstoy was an atheist. He completely rejected.

He used the language of God in the New Testament just to be able to reach your typical Russian of the day. But he rejected the supernatural entirely. It's sort of like Jim Jones. In his letters, Jim Jones letters to North Korea and China, trying to get out of Guyana, he says that, no, I'm a full materialist and hence an atheist. I only use this God stuff just for the sake of, you know, building a movement.

It was no different than Tolstoy. He, and he wrote something that I hadn't looked at in a very long time on the Russo-Japanese War when it, and even when, well, you know, it would have been an applicable. to the rules of Japanese War. And since even if you're attacked, responding still is illegitimate, no matter how many people are killed. And when he was questioned on this kind of thing, he says, since you can't look into the future and see how that's going to be either successful or not, there's no reason to do it. In other words, there's no reason to reply. Which I think is a very weak argument. The other thing he does a lot in that article is he makes the arguments of his

opponents for us. And of course, they're all straw men. And so he answers, you know, his own version of what people like us might say or Eileen might say. And then answers those. So typical, you know, typical leftism. I mean, you know, Tolstoy, you know, you know, was right in the agrarian life he was dead right on in many ways um and in fact he should be read in that regard um his anti-modernist stuff is excellent too uh for traditionalists whether catholic and orthodox that's um but you know he ruins it with um this kind of nonsense and the fact that there really is no creator uh ruins it even further The highest goal of humanity is to pity and not to torment.

The highest perfection accessible to man is reduced to all-encompassing compassion, to pity everyone with one's whole soul. Righteous action consists of protecting everyone from suffering, even at the cost of one's own suffering and one's own life. Beyond this, the sentimental moralist sees, demonstrates, and teaches. He rejects and ridicules everything else. ultimately this point of view is condescending that you see it you see it today the left often speaks for it's you know the alleged victims of our words uh i recall when um the washington redskins

took their um changed their their logo on their helmet which was drawn by an indian by the way no American Indian tribe had any problem with it. It was all white liberals, mostly women, you know, berating the organization to do that. There was nothing wrong with it. It showed a very strong-looking warrior on there. But the Indian tribes, you know, so-called native to the area, they had no problem with it.

So these women that were berating the, the, you know, the Regan organization, you know, they were claiming to be protecting the Indians from being offended. It didn't matter that they weren't. You know, and this is really what he's talking about here. It's almost, it's very condescending compassion. And they really think that they've done something wonderful. And I've come across this in many debates. The white liberal woman will speak for the non-white, whoever you're talking about

and make straw man arguments and everything else. And for some reason, the red-skinned thing just came into my mind because that's really what he's talking about here. It is precisely in this that the limitations and simplifications of his understanding of life are revealed with complete clarity. His sentimentality, this heightened and acute but objectless and weak-willed sensitivity, responds extremely easily, quickly, and sharply to any human dissatisfaction, to any suffering of others. It is wounded by it.

Shudders, is horrified, and begins to weakly dream of its elimination, of its cessation, of its end, and all life's wisdom boils down to this. Suffering is evil. That is the first hidden axiom. I'm I personally, I'm an empath, I've always been. I'm extremely sensitive to the suffering and pains of others, whether it be animals, whether it be humans, whether it be anybody. And yet I don't translate it into Tolstoy's point of view. Because, you know, he says here, the sentimentality, and you notice, and I kind of struggled in putting this together.

so I settled on the term objectless. In other words, it's just generalized sensitivity. Whereas for a goodie an empath like myself, it actually has an object. It may have a person as a thing, has an ethnic group, has a family. There is an object to it here. It's just being as such. And, but ultimately that's exposed to be the same thing as nothing. You can't love everything.

You can't love everyone. You can't be sensitive to everything and everyone. And for the most part, they're not sensitive to our suffering. That's for damn sure. So, of course, there's always exceptions to this. But yes, and it's not really a hidden axiom. It's out in the open. Suffering is evil unless it happens to us.

This wisdom from which all else has derived, If suffering is evil, then causing suffering is also evil. Conversely, the absence of suffering is good, and sympathy for the suffering of others is a virtue. This determines the fate of our main problem. In the struggle against suffering, is it permissible to inflict new suffering, multiplying, and complicating its overall volume and composition? Quote, Satan cannot cast out by Satan. untruth cannot be cleansed by untruth. Evil cannot be conquered by evil, end quote.

And this answer is only consistent. If suffering truly is evil, then who would agree to increase its volume while striving to decrease it? Or who would agree to enter the path of the devil in order not to enter it? Thus, the fundamental principle of sentimental morality is revealed. It rests on hedonism. Let me give an example. Another example here that we've used before. you walk into a room and there's a man assaulting a child.

The theory, as it's laid out in this paragraph, would be in attacking the guy that's hurting a child, you're now increasing suffering. It's not just the little kid is suffering, but now the adult is suffering, and you're suffering too, maybe. is probably going to be a fight. Therefore, intervention here physically is out of the question. And you notice how quite often Tolstoy keeps it in the abstract, rather than, you know, he'll never use an example like I've used because he'd have zero followers at that point.

So certainly, you know, if I punch someone in the back of the head who's doing that, I might break a lot of the bones in my fists. Remember, you punch something. You always use this forward. Never use like a, you know, Clint Eastwood. You break every bone in your hand. Not only that's suffering, but the guy I hit his sufferings. Now you have three suffering people. You don't know if that's even going to fix the problem. Hence, you shouldn't intervene. That's the nature of the objectant, objection to intervening in that very extreme example.

And it says it right here. Despite all this, in reality, man, with his nature, his drives, his abilities, and his tasks, is constructed in such a way that the easiest thing for him is a satisfaction of his needs and pleasures, while, and the hardest thing for him is the will to spiritual perfection, the efforts to lead it and its attainment. Man has always drawn downward toward pleasure and especially towards sensual pleasures, and rarely is drawn upward, toward the perfect, toward the perfect, toward its vision and creation.

The path upward is revealed to man and granted to him, but it is granted only through suffering. For the essence of suffering consists primarily in the fact that the downward to lower pleasures is closed and inaccessible to men. This closure of the lower path does not necessarily signify spiritual attainment, but is the first and fundamental condition of assent. This is Ilin speaking here now. He's done with Tolstoy.

And I think it's very clear. It's also extremely profound. Anything worth having you have to suffer for. You know, giving birth is the most extreme example. But, you know, even education, you know, you struggle to get through, you know, you're studying, you're doing, you're sacrificing time and a lot of money. Anything that happens. Anything good that you've become has occurred through suffering. In other words, to say that suffering is a bad thing is idiotic, but only certain types of suffering.

And we've mentioned this on this show, maybe even on the Hangel show before. I look back my real dark times over the decades, and I almost have a sentimental point of view towards it, or nostalgic point of view I should use, is I know that what I've become is the result. of those of those brutal times. Brutal times are times when you are forced to sit down and say, who am I? And what do I want to be? There are people, usually attractive women who don't really know what suffering is.

They never have to ask themselves that. Yeah, the princess types. You know, they're treated as princesses from babyhood through to adulthood. They're hot enough. What sort of personality is that going to create? Suffering is exactly what's necessary. unfortunately, for us to ask the deep and hard questions. And of course, he's going to give exceptions, obviously, in the next paragraph.

But this is a very profound statement here. Not every form of suffering elevates, for it requires a certain true direction of the suffering soul and a certain inner skill. But every genuine spiritual movement and achievement grows out of suffering, whether ancient or new, briefly profound or long-lasting, forgotten or unforgettable. Only that part, only that strength of the soul, which has not found pleasure and peace in primordial earthly activities, ascends to God. Only that part that has not outlived itself in human satisfactions, which did not rejoice in them but suffered and was ashamed and terrified at their approach. Suffering is the price of spirituality and the limit of our animal natures. It is the limit to the careless pleasure-seeking that entices all men. It is the source of will and spirit, the beginning of purification and vision, the foundation of character and wisdom.

So it's not just any old suffering. It's suffering that we have to go through to reach a goal. You know, my father used to say, you know, he went to Paris Island in 1950. It was brutal. I don't know if I used this example before. But he used to say, you know, those guys. Did they do that because they hated me? No, they did it so I would survive.

I'd be a Marine, a good Marine. And that is partially why he made it through. If you only look at them, you know, beating someone up, you say, oh, my God, what's wrong with them? They're sadistic. Then you understand that there's a reason behind it. There's a mentality behind. And that's sentimental, very effeminate, you know,

revolting from that kind of thing. I don't know if you ever seen the movie Whiplam. Now, I'm not saying that the physical violence was justified. Yeah, I've seen it. But for the most part, for the most part, Fletcher was correct. Greatness doesn't come from indulgence. And if you can't handle it, you're not going to be able to handle the music business. So we could say this about anything.

Discipline requires this kind. Now, again, when he beat the kid up that, you know, he can go to hell. But he did it very well. What an actor he is. Simmons, J.K. Simmons, or J.R. Simmons, whatever his name is. But that was his theory. Now, he was able to justify pretty much anything he did there, and it doesn't. But he was correct in the abstract that, you know, a teacher is never your friend.

A teacher, a true master in something, whatever you want to do, bringing you out of the earthly pleasure seeking into something else. They aren't your friend. Friends don't want you to suffer. You're suffering for a very, not doing it because they hate you. They're doing it because this is the nature of warfare. Or this is the nature of the music business.

Or this is the nature of elevating the soul. You know, asceticism is painful. It sucks a lot of the time. But there's a reason for it. You know, it's so easy to go downward. as he says here. You know, because of our fallen natures, if we just don't do anything, we just, you know, collapse into just basic utilitarianism. Utilitarianism is just what happens when you have nothing else. It's not profound. It's not interesting. It's just pleasure upon

pleasure, which, of course, in the long term, isn't pleasurable at all. It's the maintenance of discipline that takes constant effort and constant vigilance. And I just wonder with the present young generation if that's plausible anymore, but it's a simple fact. So if this short-term utilitarianism mentality, the Tolstoyans, is correct, then, you know, it's really, it comes down to the ideology of your suburban liberal woman who's out there and the, you know, immigrants welcome, refusing to. believe any other rape issue or anything else. Immigrants welcome, because it is 90% women in these demonstrations in Europe and elsewhere. That's the mentality that he is laying out here. It's as relevant when he wrote this as it is yesterday.

Therefore, life's wisdom consists not in fleeing suffering as an evil, but in accepting it as a gift and a pledge, in using it and drawing inspiration from it. This acceptance must be made not only for oneself, but also for others. It does not mean that one will deliberately torment oneself and others. Rather, it means that one will overcome one's fear of suffering, cease to see it as an evil, and will not strive to end it at any cost. Moreover, one will find the resolve and strength to inflict suffering on oneself and one's neighbor

to the extent of a higher spiritual necessity, taking care that this suffering does not damage the power of spiritual clarity and spiritual love within oneself, for the spirit is greater than the soul, and suffering is the price of the spiritual life. I don't think there is a lot of evidence that people pursue their own self-interest very well. I don't think most people are rational in 2026. Self-destruction seems to be more and more the norm.

In that case, it's suffering for nothing. If you follow the short-term idea that Eileen is talking about here, you'll die young. Because you won't be disciplined in your diet. Even something as simple as that. It's not our fault that we're born into a world where we have to exercise to burn off our excess calories. That's not our fault. Those are the expectations we were raised with, but we have to deal with it. and that means that even more discipline you know again my my example of of being forced to work

in a bar that's how it is that's how it is for for young men especially young men out there and any you know pastor has to be has to keep that in mind um that's what it's like and um and also keep in mind that when you fall in that environment God fully understands and will bring you back up again. It isn't, you know, and yet we have to deal with people who have no standards calling us hypocrites for not being able to reach our very high standard. And that drives me insane. It was before this tragic law of human existence that the sentimental moralists stopped,

shuddered, and did not accept it. He did not accept such. He denounced the price of spiritual life and closed his eyes to the fundamental tragedy of man. He experienced suffering as evil and rejected it. In line with this rejection, he began to seek a path to inner pleasure and found it in the rapture of pity. He began to pity everyone who suffers and posited as the highest goal, the non-infliction of suffering on others.

Further, he rejected not only the path of suffering, but also the very goal of suffering assent. His sentimentality poured out into hedonism and led him to materialism. The entire spiritual treasury, all of humanity's spiritual endeavors, were condemned. and rejected so that man would not suffer and offend each other for the sake of a single supreme achievement, the universal enjoyment of universal mutual pity. In my opinion, this began at the Reformation. This began when the ascetic life was laughed at by the more radical reformer.

And things like fasting were completely rejected. now we're in a society that stuffs themselves the secular argument for fasting is irrefutable and yet I think it goes back to the Reformation nominalism liberalism these things in one way or another go back to the rejection

of this structured life leading eventually to this sentimental hedonism and the stupid argument that I can't handle anymore when people say, you know, I don't believe God exists because of all the suffering and the innocent suffering in the world. And they may point to some terrible event and everything. And I say, well, why stop there? You're saying you want God to create a world where there is no suffering, there is no pain whatsoever. And, you know, they don't really

know what I said, well, then there's also no freedom. There's also no purpose there. Now, Adam and Eve weren't perfect. They were innocent. They were like children. And, you know, I mean, even something along the lines of having kids, there's a lot of pain in that. There's a lot of work and there's a lot of struggle. And you do things not because you dislike your kids, but because we know what they're going to be going into very soon. Thank God Almighty, I was successful. I had two boys. I don't know guys with daughters. I have no idea what the hell is going on there. But, you know, this is something I thought out.

I followed my own father's idea. There's suffering there. There's pain there. And on both sides. And the only reason that happens is because you were trying to create a personality that will go out into the world and to be able to handle the evil that surrounds them. And thank God. And I give it the, God is one who allowed me to be successful in that respect. Other men or not, whether it's their fault or not, is a different story. All these things that even things we consider good contain suffering all over the place.

The sentimental hedon, this sentimental hedonism teaches that there is nothing higher in this world for which people should suffer themselves and impose suffering on their neighbors. The entire task is for everyone to internally transform their suffering into compassion and thereby pave the way to the highest pleasure. There is nowhere and no point in going higher than this. This cannot be achieved by force and therefore violence as a needless multiplication of human suffering is unconditionally condemned. But this also means that spiritual nihilism is a product of sentimental hedonism. The doctrine of nonviolent resistance to evil as a consistent conclusion from both. Now, use the example of walking into a room and seeing that horrible situation.

If you accept Tolstoy, you can't violently intervene. You can go as he's doing something awful and maybe read from the Psalms, you know, or something equally ridiculous under those circumstances. but over time, if you maintain that mentality over time, you will soon see what that guy is doing as not problematic except that it causes suffering in the child. And maybe it's not problematic at all. So you don't have to intervene.

His whole argument is that you don't know what's going to happen when you intervene. It could make suffering a million times worse. So let's say you find a father somewhere and you beat the crap out of them and you say it's because of what you do to your kid. He may go home and make the kid suffering even a million times worth. That is a point. But he makes that a generalized point.

You have no idea what your actions are going to do in the future. Therefore, you don't do anything, which of course is a non-secretory. But over time, you have people, especially if the guy beating his kid is, you know, of a certain race, you start to make excuses. Maybe there's a cultural reason for this beating. Maybe, you know, and you start making these ridiculous, very effeminate excuses for them, over time, maybe that doesn't seem so bad. Maybe it's not suffering at all.

And therefore, you really have no right to intervene. That you eventually end up with this spiritual nihilism that seems to, maybe not logically, but at least, you know, practically follow us from this mentality. All this can be expressed this way. Tolstoy's morality sees an element of love and the idea of goodness and fails to recognize the element of spirit. Therefore, it affirms as the highest value a love that is non-spiritual and even antisiritual, which turns out to be weak-willed, sentimental pity, and drags down all the higher values of life to the level of elementary, instinctive mediocrity. accordingly in Tolstoy's morality, he sees an element of hatred in the idea of evil and fails to recognize the element of anti-spirituality. Therefore, it sees the gravest sin in hostility or its outward manifestations, condemns a spiritually correct separation of the good from the evil, and fails to notice what it itself includes in its ideal. So obviously these men didn't live to see the Vietnam War. Suddenly you had, you know, from 68 to 73, roughly, you saw this massive increase in pacifism,

especially among young people who were subject to the draft in the U.S., which is sure, is just a coincidence. Now, their pacifism was, of course, utter nonsense because they were also violent when they fought the cops and everything else. The hippies are, to this day, no matter how many bombs that group, you know, the left in the 60s planted. I think it's like 5,000 now total. They're still being promoted as this resurrection of

legitimate pacifism and lovers of peace. And it weren't lovers of peace. They just didn't want to get drafted. So many of the demonstrations disappeared after the draft was ended, 1973. When Congress cut off A to South Vietnam, they were aware of what the North was going to do. Now, the South Vietnamese Army, contrary, I know the whole topic, but I don't care, was some of the bravest and toughest in Asian history. They fought right to the end,

contrary to the mythology about them. The, most of the casualties in the war, in fact, occurred at the very, in the last three years, three, four years. They fought. right to the end, sometimes with no ammunition. They were aware of what would happen when aid was, eventually became dependent on American assistance, ammunition and everything else. But I suppose you would have no choice in that case, that either just to lie to yourself and even lying to yourself

will lead to this idea that there really is no evil. or the suffering that they're doing is for a good cause because the left is doing it. I published a paper. I actually put it on my Patreon, but I talk about it quite a bit about North Vietnamese policy to South Vietnam. And it was a slaughter. So you have eyewitness. You have so many, you know, their own writings in the North. They're very clear of what they're going to do.

They even had quotas in some cases. So the passive is hippies, you know, you couldn't talk to them about this. To this day, I guess they're in their 70s now. The boomers, you can't talk to them about this. Many of them eventually did turn on North Vietnam, like Joan Baez. She came across something, oh, my God, I can't believe I supported this government, but you did. As always, our people were right and their people were wrong.

they had this sentimental, very effeminate view of the North. You know, Nomchomsky supported both North Vietnam and the Kimmer Rouge. Quite a bit, actually, to a great degree, intellectually and personal. And so, isn't it convenient that over time, you start to refuse to even make a distinction between good and evil? Or what we would consider evil, they'll either cover it up or say it's really evil. it's really for the good. And always keep in mind that when we suffer, it's not a problem. It's only everyone else.

The hallmark of inherent evil is anti-spirituality. Consequently, the entire doctrine of good and evil is distorted and invalidated. Goodness is presented in a shallow and trivial form, hedonist and self-sufficient, spiritually dead, and sentimentally idyllic. Evil is presented in a comparatively harmless form, external, violence, easily overcome, devoid of its essential toxicity, and at the same time evoking in the moralist in an inappropriately exaggerated, affected indignation. The entire distinction between good and evil turns out to be incorrect.

Spiritualally nihilistic, sentimentally vulgar, weak-willed, and spiritually irresponsible moods and actions are considered virtuous. On the contrary, heroic, strong-willed, prophetically angry deeds that suppress evil and punished a villain are considered among the most shameful and base manifestations of man. And above all, this reigns the straightforwardness of reason and the naivete of the reasoning layman. You know how difficult this was to translate? I mean, the, I mean, you know, the machine did, did okay. But it certainly didn't say this. Um, and, and, And it was an absolute struggle. And I'm 90% sure I got the, I did it.

I think this is coherent. I think it does make sense. Now, apart from the arguments that the Tolstoyan type would make, I'm not so sure that you can consistently be like this. Again, when we suffer, it's not a problem. these moods only tend to arise when the left is a target, let's say, of military action. But, you know, where is the anti-war movement now that America's opponents have been, roughly speaking, right-wing either, you know, nationalist, nationalists, nationalists, or religious nationalists?

Nowhere to be found. There were huge demonstrations against the most movement of nuclear. weapons into Germany in the early 80s. Today, nuclear weapons are being moved all over, even to Finland, and no problem. There may be small demonstrate, nothing like that. Media aren't going to talk about it. These things seem to develop depending on who the victim is. The anti-war movement was the creation of the regime, or else it would exist now.

I mean, you have, the worst, the other, you know, at least the, you know, the Vietnam War, there was a specific goal, you know, to keep the north out of South Vietnam. America's wars in the last 25 years have no goal. And it's just led to tens of millions being killed. I'm not seeing these huge, massive demonstrations. There's no woodstock out there condemning this kind of thing. So the point being is that, you know, I tend to think that the adoption, of this kind of ideology exists relative to the target.

If we were at war with a leftist government somewhere, matter how evil they might be, you'll see anti-war movement, you'll see hippies, you'll see all that. But if the target is, let's say, the government in El Salvador in the 80s, or even today, there'll be nothing. I'm sorry, they'll be absolutely, yeah, there'll be absolutely nothing. or an absolute minimal. You won't see these massive demonstrations anymore.

So it's not just that they eliminate the concept of good and evil. They become so fluid that they apply it wherever their ideological interest fit. It's evil when the January 6 guys... It's not evil when the January 6th guys suffer. But when Antifa suffers, it's evil. and terrible, it needs to stop. And I think, you know, most groups, organizations that believe this kind of thing, people that believe this kind of thing, I think you almost have, it's very rare that you find a totally

consistent pacifist point of view in the way to Tolstoy is being explained here. Naturally, with the rejection of the spirit and the decisive preference for a soul without a soul, one that pities and indulges in pleasure. Everything in life is displaced and devalued. That for which man deserves to live on earth and suffers falls away, and that which remains and strives to take the place of what has fallen away turns out to not be worth the suffering and dying for. Indeed, the spiritual principle in man is the instrument of divine revelation. It gives man something for which to live, something worth educating himself and others, something worth bearing suffering and lifting burdens. Here is a trend of the truth. Here is a trend of

you're worth living for and worth dying for. It gives meaning to life, suffering, and death. The sacredness is not only greater than the individual, greater than personal morality and personal enjoyment. It is greater than any collection of people who have rejected it and set themselves in opposition to it. For by it, this sacredness is to find what is essential, real, and sacred in man, in a nation, and in humanity. The Greek word abulia. I first came across it in something that Michael Hoffman had written many, many years ago. And it means like a generalized lethargy, but more specifically, it means this lethargy exists because there's nothing worth fighting for.

It's very much, you know, a Gen Z kind of mentality. That it, you know, this conception of a lack of refusing to distinguish good and evil it's just that a laziness more than anything else. Abulia is a great, I use it all the time, and I think it's very common in Western populations because it's not just, it's not laziness, it's lethargy, but a lethargy that exists because they're convinced that there's nothing worth

being energetic about. There's nothing worth dying for. I always laugh when I, you know, if the U.S. were to institute the draft tomorrow, I think maybe, what was it, 15% according to Newsweek, 15% of young men in this country could be drafted. Even less than that, because everyone else either has, you know, mental illnesses or overweight.

Obviously, there wasn't the case in 1968. But even if the draft were instituted, there's no one to draft. And Abulia has a lot to do with this. This mentality is imposed and it was imposed. And when it exists and it is enforced over time, it creates A bulia. And A bulia, thank God, I don't have it. You don't have it. Thank God, my kids didn't have it.

those afflicted by it live miserable and meaningless lives. And I feel bad for them. With the apostasy of this sacred thing, everything is reduced to a multitude of individuals, sometimes indulging in mutual insults and violence, sometimes enjoying mutual compassion. They are all equal moral atoms, and among them there are no servants or organs of the sacred thing, responsible to it, authorized by it, representing it, dying and punishing for it. There is no church, the keeper of Revelation, no homeland, the living treasury of the spirit, no wisdom, and national assent to it, no beauty, no heroism, no honor, and their living tradition. Crude and vulgar violence is seen where, in fact, the living mystery of political unity is being worked out.

Can you imagine living that way? I mean, now he's gone a little bit past Tolstoy here, and he's talking about now what we would call liberalism, more generally speaking. concept of social atomism that or or individualism the individual owes nothing to anybody he exists you know in and of himself you know the Hobbesian idea and one atom is equal to any other realm and you know Hobbs is the creator of the modern world intellectually speaking I believe in Renaissance Britain and he was unbroken unbelievably corrosive and of course was anomalous and everything else. But I would say, I don't know, I don't know if you would agree with me, but the percentage of typical American,

the percentage of American males who live this way would be more than a majority maybe. No church, no homeland, no, no, you know, there's nothing to discipline yourself for. no heroism, no honor. God knows no national idea. And when they see it in others, they're terrified of it. The ethnic churches that I used to go to and I would bring people there. They would say stupid things like, oh my God, they worship Ukraine or they worshiped Serbia. What are you talking about?

Yeah, there's a flag there and they use the language. But they were so put off by the idea of an ethnic church. that they were, they were, they were, they were, they were, they were, they were, they were, they were, they were, they were, they were, they were terrified by it. And it's actually was a quite moderate, you know, idea. I think churches are, you know, the hallmark of, of orthodoxy for the most part. And it's been, been a very good, very good idea. And so when there's kind of like throwing someone who's freezing into a, a bath of hot water, um, they just go into a conyptych. And I don't know, do you think a majority of America? males live this way? I think a majority of Americans live this way. One of the things that I say all the time is, is that there are no good denominations. There are only good churches, like individual churches. And anyone who's, yeah, parishes, anybody who's been to multiple denominations knows that this is right. So that means that basically you're looking at the majority of churches in every in every denomination are basically lost.

So that's or are not following apostolic teaching. So when you take that into consideration that even the churches themselves, the majority of people who don't go to church and then probably the majority of people who are in churches, it's the overwhelming majority of the population. I think, so you say overwhelming majority of the population. This is a, it's a terrifying idea. And it would explain depression. It would explain this generalized anxiety.

It would explain obesity. It would explain all of them. Why wouldn't they be obese? You know, they really, they have no conception of discipline. You've looked at my 600 pound life. They don't know what discipline is. You know, and this is a terrifying idea that we're surrounded by this. and we are looked at with great suspicion

because we don't live that way and we're quite happy to suffer for as we both have. I certainly have. But no wisdom, no beauty, no honor, this is just, it's not a human life. I think my cats live far more purpose-filled life than they do. They actually have a purpose being animal.

I think these people are even lower than that. It's a terrifying concept, a reality, I should say. Men have no reason to coerce and educate each other, so we're told. Man feels only his personal insult and the desire for revenge, and his task is reduced to not taking revenge, but to forgive and pity. If he succeeds in loving those who have offended him and offending no one else, then his life's task is accomplished. The sentimental moralist fails to see that he has spiritually devastated the human soul, and and pledged it into a state of blindness and vulgarity. He fails to understand that man is significant

only to the extent of his spirituality and that to the extent of his lack of spirituality and anti-spirituality, man is blind and vulgar. He fails to see that a spiritually empty soul, turning away and mocking, becomes a religiously monstrous phenomenon, deserving not of tender pity, but of anger and sobriety. He fails to understand that the vulgarity of others is no better than my own and in no way deserves love, support, or sacrifice, that altruism does not consist in serving the vulgarity of others simply because it is foreign. That love for one's neighbor is love for his spirit and his soul and not simply pity for his suffering flesh. He preaches love and does not notice that he is degrading and stripping this great principle,

separating it from spirituality. Yeah, the word vulgar, and I use it a lot in all. I think most Arabian Indo-European languages, it comes from the same root as common. It's the opposite of aristocratic, but the true mark of an aristocratic man is the willingness to suffer and die for a very good cause. So I put the so we're told up there to, you know, this isn't, this isn't Ilin talking about himself by any means. This is an extended description of what the Tolstoyan idea leads to, mentally speaking. You know, there's a personal insult.

If he doesn't take revenge, he's done something wonderful. Okay, I have no problem with that. But then that's, of course, generalized to everybody. I've come to hate the words, everybody and all. because in the ancient world phrases like that, terms like that didn't really exist partially because there was no conception of zero practically speaking that came from

India later on but every and all would be the same as nothing it's mass society that you could say God loves all men but what does that mean? In the Old Testament, that means either their total destruction or their reward for moral action, including taking part in that destruction.

This is why Tolstoy has no difficulty in just using a few lines in the Old Testament. He's materialist. He's pretty much, he's an atheist, generally speaking, using religious terms just to reach his own peasants and the peasants and other people in Russia, who in his lifetime, you know, literacy was quite high. There was certain, you know, old school peasants who didn't, had no reason to read, but had tremendous memories. So this is generalization, the notion of the last,

of revenge. We're not talking about revenge here. We're talking about justice. Two very different things. On the personal level, especially if they're a member of the church, we have to calm down. We have to apologize, even if it's not our fault. But when you generalize that, as Tolstoy demands that we do, then insult or attack even to something like Virgin Mary or the nation, everything else, that also receives absolutely no response. And, you know, it's like his argument that we simply don't know what's going to come of this. He assumes that it's just going to lead to more violence and more hatred.

Of course, we don't know that. We could use his own language against him. I give money to the poor, even though, even if they are going to use it on something terrible, I don't care. That's my obligation. Christ said I go to hell of it unless I do that. You know, unless you're fraudulent or something like that. But the concept of vulgar comes up a lot here. And essentially is, I want to say something like mass society.

Because its root comes from the common, in a bad sense, you know, common in the sense of not mattering. the aristocrat, you know, the aristocracy, I know in all Russia, there was really no class. They didn't have, or Byzantium didn't have actually specific classes. Like you had in the West so much. But the old boyar class, they were expected, they were mostly military men. And if they died, they died. And in return, the peasants would serve him and they would have certain honors and everything else. For the most part, they were as poor as their peasants were, but, you know, that's what a true aristocrat is.

The opposition to that is the vulgar, and that's what comes from Tolstoy's philosophy. Now, we all know that Christ commanded what he did for the sake of our personal. Someone, again, especially if they're a member of the church insults us, we let it go on a strictly personal level. that's hard to do. But when you told the story, this sentiment, this objectless sentimentality, which has been the issue here, says now that should be applied to everyone and everything, those awful words, because everyone and everything is equal to you. And in practical terms, that simply isn't true. The aristocrat and the vulgar are very, very different people. Yeah, I was looking it up while you, I took Latin.

So vulgar basically meant common. The original Latin term was vulgaris. Well, not the original, which meant of the common people are ordinary. And that derived from vulgus, which was the masses. It evolved from describing basically a common people to basically, if you use it as saying, like something is crude, offensive, or in poor taste. you're basically using vulgar as slang officially. Exactly, yeah.

And it shouldn't be used that way, but I get it. But that's not how he's using it here. He's using it in his true sense here, I think. For the love of the sentimental and anti-spiritual hedonist does not come from the spirit and does not go to the spirit. It does not place itself or the presence of the beloved before the face of God. This is not a divine encounter, a shared experience and vision of him. mutual teaching, encouragement, education, inspiration, and the unification of the two spiritual passions.

No, this is mutual relaxation and mutual animal pity. This is the weak-willed indulgence of a sentimental person, most of all afraid of causing unpleasantness to his neighbor. This is a spineless sweet sympathy pouring out equally on the meek and the wicked, and harming both. Such anti-spiritual compassion is unworthy of man, his spirit and his calling. For love is humiliating for both and beloved, and for love is humiliating for both the beloved and the lover, unless it is, for all its joyful tenderness,

a spiritual will for the spiritual perfection of the beloved. This is a meaning, and these are the consequences of sentimental nihilism, put forward by Tolstoy and his followers as the only saving moral revelation. Yeah, again, I have, my God, he's repetitive. because he said this about 20 times now. But I think there's a reason he said it 20 times. This is something extremely profound, and it's worth repeating. This is the mentality of someone who thinks that a Christian is this guy,

you know, a Christian man, you know, kind of has his hands like this. You know, he tilts his head to the side, maybe a little bit. It just, you know, tolerates everything. You know, this view that Christ was this, this hippie who was against war and everything. You know, and it comes from this mentality. It comes from these people reading their weakness back into history. And it's blasphemy to do something like this. No, holy men did not.

Some of them, some of the main. have under certain circumstances. But for the most part, Holy Man, we're not like that. Read the writings of the prophet Amos. One of my favorite. Amos and Joel. Now, they weren't like that, or Jeremiah for that matter. Love required them, and it was only love, required them to harshly condemn Israel for its evil, for its stupidity, for its laziness. that's what love required. If he didn't act like that, it wouldn't be a loving encounter. This is why the word love, and I deal with so many,

the manipulation of words over the decades where you have. I still think the majority of the population would say that love is, you know, to love your neighbor is to not harm them in any way. Well, that might be technically true, but they'll go on to say that it means not to hurt them in any way. No, sometimes pain is a good thing. Every once in a while you say, boy, that guy deserves a good beating. Because on occasion, that beating might be the only thing that will change his mind on something.

You won't harm that kid anymore because he knows there's people out there watching. They're going to beat the cramp out of him again. You know, in that case, the suffering has been ended. And the only reason you do it, I mean, for the most part, we do it because we hate the guy. You know, that's true. But we should be doing it for love of the of the young, of the young man, of his victim. But also, in a way, as Socrates would say, you know, we're doing it for the benefit of the person who's being beaten up. He doesn't, you know, that guy deserves a beating.

No, I'm sorry. That guy needs a beating. You hear that all the time. And it means that if he received one, he would be a different. person, you'd be a better person. And I think I take that line very seriously in the past. And it's not a call for generalized violence by any means, but under very specific circumstances in personal life, you come across someone who needs a very harsh and abrupt way of dealing with him strictly out of love for his, it's for his benefit. He's never heard no before.

you know and hearing it the first time it's got to be like like nails on a talkboard but you know that comes straight from love i'm not talking about violence here really in reality but you know the simple no um and the sentimental moralist has a tough time saying no it's it's it's a very effeminate um uh lack of will as he says here classic abulia doesn't come from love whatsoever it comes from the fact that there's nothing worth fighting for. There's nothing worth, you know, dying for out there, nothing. So all that's left is my animal passions. Even that could be a problem.

So I think Ilin, although he's, you know, quite repetitive here, I think he's driven the point home. and I knew that this part of the book is going to make sense out of all the previous more theoretical arguments now we're getting to the meat of the matter this is why he said all that stuff be very careful when someone says

that they they their actions are based on love be careful it doesn't mean just generalized indulgence it could never mean generalized indulgence we live in a fallen world So yeah, he's repetitive, but I think he needs to be. All righty.

I will ask everyone to go over to the show notes and go over to the description in the video and donate to Dr. Johnson's work. Thank him for what he's doing here. I mean, five bucks a month is worth just for the translation on this. This is crazy. Oh, yeah, this is definitely, it's a labor of love, of course. it's probably good for me, but this is one of the examples of we're suffering

is a general positive thing as it is unpleasant. But it needs to be done. And, you know, my translation skills aren't all that great. I always need help. It used to be my dictionaries. Now it's Yendex translate or whatever.

But that can't be trusted entirely. So you have to know some things. And either way, it's a huge amount of work. And I'm still getting medical bills. I'm still getting bills in the mail. I can't believe it. From all my time in the hospital,

I don't even know what these people are talking about half the time. So yes, please, I ask humbly to assist me in this regard. And you're, as I said before, your audience is very generous, and I truly appreciate them.