The Pete Quiñones Show - Reading Ivan Ilyin's 'On Resistance to Evil by Force' w/ Dr. Matthew Raphael Johnson - Pt. 25

Episode Date: August 12, 2026

62 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 Pekino 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 Eileen. Dr. Johnson. How are you? I'm more or less okay.

I do want to make an announcement to our listeners. My book on the murder of the Russian royal family, when I read the hard copy, there were things in there, there were errors in there, not a fact, there were things, you know, there were formatting errors,

there were so many problems with it that I didn't even realize that I am doing a full second edition. And I'm almost finished. with it and we're going to release it fairly soon. You know, they were just, um, pages like, you know, were printed twice, you know, weird things like that. That wasn't in the original. So, uh, and plus, you know, I'm adding more things and a few, a few issues.

And so I just want to let everyone know that book, which is fairly popular, um, is going to have a second edition within the month. Awesome. When you release that, we'll come on, we'll record from my regular show to talk about it. Oh, excellent. Very good idea. All righty. Let's get going here. Chapter 17 on the connection of people with good and evil. Evil must be resisted, firstly, by internal dissolution, transformation, and reorganization of the evil presence. secondly by internal and external coercion and disciplining of the will and third by external coercion and the suppression of the evil deed

both of these latter methods of resistance must serve the first just as lower levels serve the higher not replacing it but elevating it and making it accessible this is this is not an easy paragraph here um internal dilution dissolution transformation reorganization of the evil uh presence that's more or less something like rehabilitation. But the second one has to do with the person who's eventually going to use coercion has to do with us, making sure that our soul is okay

before we do anything. And of course, to eliminate the evil deed. But regardless of what method you use, you start, as we said, in the last chapter, you start with the weakest method possible. And if nothing works, then you go to the more, and then you end up with the most intensely physical methods to get rid of it. And he's mentioned this many times.

But, you know, transformation of the evil presence. Reorganization. As far as I can see, he's really talking about someone coming to their senses. someone being confronted verbally or something like that. And, you know, it's sort of like when people say that Al Capone would have been a brilliant businessman, most people agree with that. Now, if he were capable of reformation and he would go into business afterwards, well, that would be a transformation and reorganization. but I like the fact in this book that he always makes reference to our, or not our, but whoever is doing the work of suppression,

that their soul is in the best shape possible. Only then can you use any kind of coercion or suppression, as he says. The recognition of this rule is not only a correct understanding of evil and love, but also a correct understanding of human communication and life together, regardless of whether they know it or not, whether they want it or not, are connected with each other by universal natural connection and good and an evil, and this connection imposes on them certain irrevocable mutual obligations and subjects them to certain spiritual rules.

In order to be convinced to this universal connectedness, it is necessary to see it as if one's own eyes in one's own mental and spiritual experience. Yeah, I could have done better there. but I think that's actually pretty close to the original. He's really talking about the nation. You know, because in order to do any of it, you have to speak the same language. And have the same, you know, basic background has to be the same. So, you know, the connection of people with good news, well, it's of a specific group of people, you know, Russians or, or, you know, Bulgarians or whatever it might be.

I didn't make that explicit, but I should make that explicit here. In fact, man is designed by nature in such a way that his mental and spiritual life is hidden from all other people and is directly accessible only to his own consciousness and, to some extent, to self-observation. My soul is inaccessible to others, and others' people's souls are inaccessible to me. Knowing this and greatly overestimating their hiddenness and inaccessibility, most people base their lives and behavior on the results. possibility of self-division, what I keep to myself and what I reveal to others. At the same time,

they often imagine that they know themselves completely and that others know only what they have deemed necessary to conceal about themselves. This double self-deception is often supported and reinforced by a sense of decency, which forbids people from concealing from each other the true extent of their mutual knowledge. In fact, every person knows himself poorly and always finds himself different in all his basic qualities and inclinations in his entirety. Now, he shifted to psychology. I think that last line is extremely important. Knowing yourself takes a huge amount of work.

You might not like what you see. People create myths about themselves. stories about themselves, just like any other group would. But there's so much going on. The concept of mode, one good thing about psychology is that they've really smashed to pieces, the liberal connection, the liberal idea of just rational choice. Because the free market and liberal democracy are based on the population being rational. and psychology, for a better or force, has destroyed that idea.

He'll explain why in just a minute. So believe it or not, psychology has done something positive. And you have, you know, psychology on the one hand, you have classical economics and, well, classical, I hate when they say that, classical refers to Greece and Rome. Economics coming from Madam Smith on the other side, and coming to totally different conclusions. or I should say Adam Smith starts with the conclusion of that people know what their interests are, they know who they are, they know what they want, they know why they want it, they know how to get it efficiently. And that's simply not the case. Man knows himself poorly, firstly, because every human soul consists to a large extent of unconscious

contents, abilities, drives, inclinations, and habits, as well as semi-conscious sensations, moods, associations, and nuances. Only someone who has systematically explored their unconscious and their character can understand and measure the extent to which people actually have a limited and inaccurate understanding of themselves. Secondly, man knows himself poorly because he very readily, easily, and imperceptibly forgets much that is unpleasant and bad about himself. He reinterprets it all in a positive light and therefore idealizes himself, likes himself,

and becomes angry when he is supposedly unfairly criticized. Or those with low self-esteem will do the exact opposite. He forgets everything good about himself and reinterprets everything in a negative lie. You know, mental illness is essentially, all mental illnesses come down to delusion, believing something is there when it's not, or vice versa.

And this is what I mentioned. before, exploring the unconscious. That's not easy to do. Usually it comes from a traumatic event. You know, when I went through various periods of my life where I suffered, I literally had to sit myself down and say, okay, what do I want from this? Who am I? What do I want? And why do I want it? I'm lucky in the sense that I've never deviated. I know what my purpose in the world is. I know why I'm here. That's a wonderful thing. People never reach, they even know the right questions to ask to reach that. I'd never had a problem with it, but only because there were various traumatic events

over the years. And he doesn't say that explicitly, but we talk about systematically, not bit by bit, but as a unit exploring the subconscious. I think, at least today, anyway, that comes from trauma. I'm not a big fan of therapy. I know it doesn't help people. Therapy doesn't make a whole lot of sense to me. It's simply logic. But and people who, you know, sociopaths just use therapy to get an ally.

I'm not a fan of it necessarily. But that's what I mean by this last part here is what I meant by creating a myth about themselves, either positive or negative. And it's unfortunate that the regime has taken psychology and used it and weaponized it. Like, for example, giving the most ridiculous and unearned high self-esteem of young black males and low self-esteem to white. Do you think just even the music, the music that we remember, you know, songs like Loser and creep and all that.

I hate myself and I want to die, which comes from Nirvana. You're not going to find that in quite the opposite in black music. But there are plenty of people that we know who idealize themselves. I like to say romanticize themselves. And it's really hard to get to that person.

And you think, you know, this person doesn't really know himself very well. If they don't understand what they're doing, it's wrong and why it's wrong. They know nothing about themselves. They live in this myth about themselves. We know that Jews are in this boat more than anybody. The eternal victims that could never do anything wrong. It's a lie. And they get angry, all right, when they're unfairly criticized.

All criticism is unfair as far as that group is concerned. So this is extremely important. With such a naive self-perception, a person usually doesn't even suspect that their physical appearance accurately expresses and faithfully conveys their soul in all its unconscious and conscious components. In reality, a person is constructed in such a way that their body, eyes, face, facial expression, head structure, arms, legs, gait, mannerisms, gestures, laughter, voice, voice intonation, and all other external actions not only conceal their soul, but also reveals it and with the precision of a good mirror. I could hardly hear you. I don't know what happened. But this is going to become a very important idea in this chapter. It's not to say that you immediately judge a book by its cover, but evil people

tend to have an evil countenance. Now, I know that there are the cyclopaths who do just the opposite. But, you know, someone who is lying or someone who's a liar has a specific way of talking. There's certain body language, so to speak. This stuff is very hard to hide. Now, evil is famous for hiding. You know, in demonic possession, the demon usually hides behind the person they're possessing, their personality. The point of

ectracism is to bring that demon out and to expose it. Well, it's no different with anything. We're talking about here, taking it out of the subconscious and bringing it to consciousness. That comes straight out of Hageel, long before Freud. But normal people

reveal who they are, reveal much of who they are, and all of these subtle things. facial expression, whatever. It is not a purely private matter is what he's saying. And yes, you have sociopaths and psychopaths who hide it beautifully. But even there, even there, you usually see that there's something wrong. You don't know what it is, but for normal people, the overwhelming majority of the population,

if they are in the wrong or if they are lying or if they are cheating in one way or another, it shows itself. It's not purely private. Fortunately or unfortunately, people know little about this. Pay little attention to this body cipher of the soul and are poor deciphering it with their consciousness. But unconsciously, people perceive each other in this encrypted form as holistically as they themselves were expressed in their bodies. The fact is that everything that exists with men, man, exists not only as a mental state, but also as a physical state and vice versa. Every bodily state of a person inevitably has a spiritual existence,

although the person himself is often unaware of this and unaware of how exactly it is expressed. With each of his states, a man seeks to speak two languages at once, the language of the body and the language of the soul. And so, thanks to this doubled existence, the human body seems to babble what the soul, perhaps, would like to hide not only from others, but also from itself. This is the whole, you know, people, people laugh at the whole body language field. You go to YouTube and you, you, um, you see these videos of analyzing the body language of someone who's already been convicted. Well, of course, you're going to be able to see it then. The trick is seeing it beforehand that guilty people act in a very different way than innocent people.

Again, sociopathy put to one side. that to think that there is this strict division between body and soul is absurd. The soul expresses itself through the body. And bodily needs, of course, are found in the soul as well. And we've all had experience with. I'm pretty sure all of us have had experience with this. Someone who thinks that they're getting away with something, and we could just read it on their face,

that there's something wrong. And we're not talking about sin. We're talking about anything, really. Anything negative is expressed in so much about themselves. And then it becomes a public matter. There is no strict division between body and soul. And despite the tremendous ability of evil to hide itself, most of the time it has to hide itself.

This still remains true. Each of us, with our entire soul, is, as it were, infused into our body and is fully revealed within it. And therefore, those who see and hear us, often without knowing it, experience our entire soul and its fundamental structure at any given moment. This is precisely why people often know far more about each other than they themselves realize or can express in words. In the unconscious experience of communication, a person perceived.

from another everything that their body expresses and reveals about their soul. Naturally, only a relatively small portion of what is perceived penetrates the consciousness of the recipient, while the rest, perceived but not conscious, does not evaporate or disappear, but abides and lives in depths inaccessible to consciousness. When it does reach consciousness, it usually appears in the form of vague sympathies and antipathies, trust, and mistrust, or premonitions and suspicions. All these glimpses of knowledge may be completely true in content, but consciousness cannot and does not know how to grasp, clarify, and substantiate them.

However, such knowledge can be refined and brought to true insight through appropriate, long-term spiritual work. I think Heidegger might be the only major philosopher to actually deal with the phenomenon of the gut reaction, which is something that. comes from experience. You don't, you couldn't express it in normal, you know, you couldn't make an argument. You just know that something is off. Which again, comes from experience, especially with someone you know.

If you have a spiritual father, this is, I think, more significant in the Orthodox world than in the Catholic world. Someone, the only person you go to confession with, someone who knows your spiritual life and who knows you, they could see, they could discern when you're covering something up. when you're embarrassed to say something. And again, it's a gut reaction. Sometimes it's not in what you say. It's what you don't say.

Now, depending on who you read, I've come across maybe 10% of communication is verbal. Sometimes it's 5%. Sometimes it's slightly higher than 10%. Suggesting that communication is something that is cultural. And hence ethnic and national. You know, different ethnic groups have different rules at the most minute level that you kind of have to, you know, experience for yourself to understand. You know, the show, the TV show Seinfeld, which I know guilty pleasure.

I thought it was funny. I know the New York sense of humor. the entire show was not about nothing, it was about just these subtle rules that are never written down anywhere. Like, how close do you have to be to someone for it to be not weird and creepy to talk?

And a million other things. Every episode was about that. These unwritten rules in society that we hardly ever even consider, bringing those to light, we don't even consider it. But different cultures have a very different attitudes towards that.

So when I say that the nation is bound by language, and I do say that, and of course, religious faith, language is not just words, syntax and grammar. No, it's all forms of communication, hence communion, including, you know, gesture, anything. That's also language, and it's also at a cultural level. And so the gut reaction is something that, and then they're quite often correct, not always, but your gut reaction is quite often correct. People say, go with your gut for better or for words. What is a gut reaction?

It's precisely this. The person who you're communicating with is letting you know something is wrong. They don't know they're doing that, but there's something off about them. You hear that all the time. very difficult to explain until you get to know them even better but that should be taken seriously it's rarely dealt with as a philosophical topic but here it is here

at the same time Heidegger was a lot and it's something in social philosophy that does make a lot of sense and it is national it's it's ethnic it's part of the language of the people and you know a culture, you know, how do you separate orthodoxy from Russian culture? It doesn't make any sense. The Soviets try to many times. What does it mean other than, you know, the dress, even the dress has theological significance.

The cuisine, even the cuisine has theological significance, especially in Russia and Ukraine. Everything does. There is no culture without that. Everything exists as an organic whole. There was no Soviet culture. It was artificial. It was imposed on people, but it's precisely within a real culture that you can come to this. You understand that someone is off. He's not behaving like he normally does. And you can't explain it right away. You have a gut reaction that something is wrong, and that's what he's talking about here. It is precisely because of this integrity and depth of unconscious communication that no good or evil event in a person's personal life remains the exclusive property of their isolated soul. In a thousand ways, it is always manifested, expressed, and transmitted to others, and not only because they desire it, but also because they do not.

Every internal act of malice, hatred, envy, revenge, or contempt inevitably alters the fabric and rhythm of a person's own spiritual life, and just as inevitably, albeit imperceptibly, is expressed through the body and transmitted to everyone around them and through them in echoes further and further. In other words, private sin and private evil really isn't private. Every act of sin and malice, it does change you in a very tiny, barely perceptible way. When he says imperceptibly, he means really at such a nuanced level, it only affects your subconscious. But it will come out at one point or another. And the person that you're dealing with really doesn't know that. this. They don't know. They think that, you know, they're fooling you, that they're, that they're able to hide it. But because the evil in someone is expressed that way, and to you, it's expressed

that way to everyone they deal with. So we're not talking about acts of evil are never private. They all end up being public. It inevitably alters the fabric and rhythm of a person's own spiritual life. It certainly does. They don't know that. and if you bring it up, you know, they get very defensive. There's some of these things that, you know, over time, you know, young guys maybe don't know that as much as an older guy might. But in my experience, that's usually the case. In fact, it's always been the case. And it's very subtle.

But the minute you mention it, they get very defensive. So you know now something is wrong. it's never purely private. The wave of vice and evil, this wave of vice and evil is all the stronger and more noticeable, the more it is repeated, the deeper, the more integrally the soul surrenders itself to these states. It is clear that in the faces of Judas, Richard III, Pope Alexander the 6th, and Maluta Scorotov, man, we had to go back to names, didn't we? I thought, I know, I know, I'm sorry.

again. I apologize. So it's all right. Everyone will read with their consciousness what would imperceptibly come across their soul and the perception of an ordinary person. In the same way, every interactive kindness, love, forgiveness, reverence, sincerity, prayer, and repentance inevitably alters the fabric and rhythm of spiritual life. And imperceptibly expressed in one's gaze, face and gait is imperceptibly transmitted to

everyone else. Again, this wave of kindness, purity, and nobility grows stronger and more noticeable the more deeply the soul has been reborn in these states. And it is clear that in the faces of Macarius, the great, Francis of Assisi, patriarch hermogenes, and the Optina elders, everyone will see something they would fail to recognize in the faint glimmers of everyday kindness. You see, he's trying to be ecumenical here. You know, he's using both Eastern and Western examples of both good and evil. And, you know, I like the examples he uses. Skuratov is not a good one, but that's a different story.

But the good actually also have the same effect on people as evil. It's still a wave, you know, that you can perceive, at least subconsciously at first. and it changes things. And it affects everyone, whichever it is, it affects everyone around you. And when he refers to it as a wave, I spent some time, you know, okay, he really does mean a wave, meaning that it goes from person to person to person to person. Therefore, evil acts aren't merely your own. that the Opina elders, a famous monastery in Russia,

had Dracomognees who the Poles starved to death during the time of troubles. These were men of such extraordinary virtue that when people left their presence, they felt differently. They were never quite, the same again. They said the same in the West, but for Francis of Assisi. Just how he looked at people, it's impossible to come to any other conclusion. It's very, you can't quantify it, so it's not scientific, but it doesn't mean it's not real. So the problem is, as far as social

life is concerned, when the evil that exists reaches a certain critical mass, and the good either isn't present or is more or less neutral, then the society is going to die. And, of course, the reverse is also true. Good deeds of these great or evil men, good atolle being an exception, reverberate, not just historically, but with everyone around them,

it changes things, and it changes the people they have to deal with every day. How many times have you heard researchers going into prison talking to people who've been convicted of mass murder and they come out and they feel differently? They don't feel the same. They're shaken by it. Even though the conversation was perfectly normal, they're shaken by the person's presence. And they're like this is new to them. Well, it would be weird in a society based around the individual.

It's not weird to a nationalist for anyone else who realizes that pretty much everything has a public presence. And the individual or the ego, I should say, is a myth, at least as the foundation of any society. To the point even where he says a soul can be reborn, you're around good people like this and you feel this constant wave of goodness, there's no way it's not going to. affect you positively. And the reverse is also true. People always criticize the American prison system, that they come out, you know, better criminals. So all they've done is saturate themselves with this energy. When people refer to energy, this is what they mean. Something happens to them when they're surrounded with these, these waves that are not scientifically explicable, but are certainly real. and everyone knows what I'm talking about but you know at the time writing it down is not easy

because it is an extremely subtle subconscious process and you want to bring subconsciousness to consciousness which is really you know the nature of spiritual growth the Hegel says this not just the great fathers and saints say this you know at the judgment your entire consciousness sub or otherwise is open no more excuses no more covering up and this is why there's two judgments you can't have a judgment just of the soul which is the first one because the body is clearly relevant in decision making therefore at the end when bodies are connected with the souls again as bizarrely unnatural as that is, but that's the nature of a sinful world, then you're judged in the final judgment.

That's really the individual. And in such a time, there is no lying. The entire subconsciousness is open, and there is no lying about it anymore. There's no more excuses. And this is what his future father is supposed to do. This is why Optinab became so young. The greats of Russian literature went there all the time.

time, even those who weren't necessarily 100 again. It told story went there and said the exact same thing. Not quite the same again. And they knew when someone was hiding a sin. And there were those who were so saintly that they knew they were hiding a sin to people that people they didn't know. And it's because of their behavior. Wait a minute. There's something missing in your story.

How did you get from A to Z right away? way, we've experienced this. There's something on the story has holes in it. They're holes in it for a reason. And the reason, of course, the holes exist because people don't want to deal with it. The phrase, one thing led to another is one of those. They don't want to talk about the, you know,

it's usually to excuse something that you've done. And it goes to show that the great fathers of the church, both east and west, understood the human soul centuries and millennia, in fact, before psychology did. And I love reading technological writings today because they come to the same conclusions that, you know, that people, you know, Moses of Optima, for example, and others came to, you know, 100 years ago, where the church fathers came to 2,000 years ago. And they think that they've discovered something.

because, of course, they have no connection to these men. And it exists, obviously, at the same, at the negative level, too. And bringing the subconscious to light is what spiritual growth really is. Because of this unconscious integrity of communication and transmission, neither good nor evil has a purely personal or private character in men's lives. Every good person, regardless of even their external actions, is good not only to themselves, but also to others. evil person, even if they are angry against themselves, is evil, harmful, and poisonous to all of

humanity. What I am, I multiply in other souls, consciously and unconsciously, through doing and not doing, intentionally and unintentionally. Man is not given the gift of being and not sowing, for he sows by his very being. Every man, even the most inconspicuous and insignificant, creates an atmosphere around himself, an atmosphere that reflects his devotion, his occupation, and his obsession. A good man is a living center of goodness and strength, while an evil person is a living center of evil, strength and evil, and weakness. People involuntarily ennoble each other with their purely personal nobility and just as involuntarily infect each other if they themselves are internally infected with vice and evil. Therefore, each person is responsible not only for himself, but also for all that he has transmitted to others,

what he has sent them, infused them with, what he has infected and enriched them with. And if this infection sent by him has infected someone's soul, poisoned it and led it to act, then he is responsible for these deeds and for these consequences. This is why, in living human communication, each person carries everyone within himself, and when they rise, they pull everyone along with them. And when they fall, they cast everyone down with them. Therefore, the city standing on 10 righteous men is not an empty phrase or an exaggeration, but a living and real spiritual fact. For anyone who truly perceives this universal living connection, both in himself and in others, it will be inevitable to draw a whole series of necessary conclusions and recognize a whole series

of laws and rules. This is what the church means when they say that original sin affected not just the two first humans, but nature itself. And sin multiplied over time. And nature rebelled. Remember in Genesis, the animals were now scared of Adam and Eve and their descendants. You had to go hunting them. Prior to that, it was pure innocence. Animals, you know, they could even speak to them in a way. nature itself is poisoned by sin and that's exactly what they're referring to here I'm pretty sure you know the Western

the old Catholic tradition says the same thing because of that or you know and speaking of animals we know dogs and cats especially cats have people who they are repulsed by and people who they love In all seriousness, my, my cat at the time the Empress, Buckers the first of all southern St. Louis, that was her shortened name, did not like my first wife when we first started going together, didn't like her peed in her shoes, peed in her purse. She was trying to tell me something. Of course, she was right. they perceive these things

maybe even in a more acute way than human beings do when the empress was she's long gone now when I brought the empress home my dad still had the funeral home she was a kitten maybe nine months

we had a viewing going on and she was very agitated she ran down trying to get it was crowded trying to get out the door. Eventually she did somehow. And she snaked her way, found the widow, and was sitting with her. And this is my father said this. He came to say, she's with the widow. How did she know who was the one who needed her, you know, purring services? How did she know? How did she know, you know, from behind the door? It's no question. This is one of the reasons why it can't

are all over. There's no monastery in existence doesn't have a bunch of cats. This is why it's not just for mice. Cats are permitted everywhere. The altar doesn't matter. They have the full run of the place because they could perceive things.

They could perceive things that humans either can't or don't want to perceive. That's the energy we're dealing with this here. What he's talking about here. And now when he says you're responsible for another's evil, he doesn't mean

that quite literally, he just means you're indirectly responsible. If you've infected someone with evil because you're evil, and then that person goes out and commits evil, you are not directly responsible. He is. But you are certainly indirectly responsible. You poisoned them. Bad parents create bad kids. It's not necessarily just because you beat them. It could be far more subtle than that. And when he says, city is standing on 10 righteous men, was he referring to Sodom and Gomorrah, where, you know, God kept telling Lot, you find he would spare the place if there were only a handful of righteous men still left. And Lot comes, he says, I can't find any, and that was the end of that.

I have an icon here of the burning of Sodom and Gomorrah, which is very important for us today. and that's what the city of ten righteous men refers to. God was willing to spare it if there was this a little bit of righteousness land. It may be why he hasn't burned a saw in the world today. There's enough holiness, even though there's not that many people, but there's enough holiness for that to be stayed for the moment. and you know there's there's no doubt about this this is a public this is a cultural matter this is beyond science it's really almost beyond psychology this is something a theology is

something that theology is given to us sin isn't just something that you do wrong it infects people around you it affects the animals around you when you get upset what does a dog do the dog gets upset even when you're trying to hide it they feel this very same thing sometimes they just want to run that's the energy that uh uh the elin is is talking about here and we all know it's true because you've all experienced it before firstly it becomes clear from this that the evil that resides in human souls retains its existence its power and its toxicity even when it does not manifest itself in any specific external acts it continues to live and multiply, poisoning both the soul that bears it and the soul that perceives it in reflection.

This is why the primary struggle against evil must be waged internally in the mental, spiritual dimension, while external measures of coercion and suppression will never be able to overtake it in its inner refuge and transform its wretchedness. This is one of the main problems that the book deals with. he's not just talking about the inner mind and soul of the person who is being suppressed he's also talking about the people who are doing the suppression and I know we've mentioned this before but it's very important to ely in that you go into combat you come back a very different man you've killed somebody

even for a legitimate righteous cause, you follow the rules of law, rules of law, of war, you've done everything correctly, it still affects you. So when you're called on to do this, your soul has to be righteous. The problem is when you have an unjust war,

it's very difficult for the soldiers involved to have a proper mental makeup, so to speak, or spiritual makeup. And physical coercion doesn't really, by itself, it doesn't do much. All it does is force people to do just enough to avoid being hit or shot or whatever it is. If you've seen the movie office space, which I love, of course. You know, all this does, all the system does is gives me the incentive.

do just enough not to get fired and that's what the simple coercion someone who yells all the time you eventually tune them out someone who yells very rarely when they do when they get very angry the world ends it changes everything um again every sentence here is saturated with with the not only um psychological truth but um it also comes directly from the the church fathers and the experience of the church in dealing with evil. So it's not merely that, yes, the primary struggle is internally. It's internal. This is why media, movies, that's why we have problems with these things.

Because it creates an evil mind. We know what pornography does, the evil of pornography, what it does, to especially to youngsters. But when you're fighting against it, you also have to have the right reason and the right mentality. But if you use coercion and suppression right away, if you yell all the time, you're not going to be taken seriously.

Ultimately, you're just going to do enough to be, people are going to be hypocritical. They're going to tell you what you want to hear, and that's the end of it. Secondly, it is necessary to recognize that the universal mutual connection of people in good and evil is not merely a sociocological fact, but that it conceals within itself a certain spiritual task, establishing for people a great responsibility and a whole series of duties. For people are not connected, people are connected

not simply by interaction, but by interaction in good or evil, by mutual ennoblement or mutual destruction. If each man bearing within themselves a certain element of evil is responsible for both themselves and others, then the correct attitude towards this personal evil is expressed not in the fact that they can fight it if they wish, but in the fact that they are obligated to fight it under all circumstances and thus have no right to quench this struggle. For by quenching it, they harm not only themselves but everyone. The wells of human souls have a kind of unconscious connection, and he who clogs and poisons their own well clogs and poisons all others.

A man who does not observe spiritual hygiene is a source of universal social infection. That is why each person, in addition to the religious and spiritual calling, to fight against evil, also has a social duty to educate himself, to spiritually purify his soul, to restrain his evil will, to force himself to the necessary self-compulsion. I made a small error. It's for by not quenching it. they harm not only themselves but everyone I think regardless of what your ideological background is I don't know how this can be denied the individual you know individualism

in our in the enlightenment sense is incoherent in a thousand different levels this is just one of them it's not just you know to each his own that's that's that's that's utter poison to tell people sin affects everybody It affects everyone around them. There are books and books and books, thousands of them. That what pornography does to people, adults who partake in that. How it alters their view of the world, not just sexuality. And then, of course, it will affect everyone around you as well.

That's almost an extreme example. But there's others that are more subtle. I like the phrase spiritual hygiene. I went over that a couple of times. That's exactly what he says. Not observing spiritual hygiene is a source of universal social infection. He's using the language of a physician. So in fighting sin, in fighting evil, this is a social obligation, not just a personal one.

And again, he says, each person in addition to the calling to fight against evil has also a social duty to educate himself to purify your soul to restrain his own evil will, force themselves necessary self-compulsion. It's a common argument among pacifists. I haven't seen it so much in a toll story, but pacifists always say that warfare

destroys the men, the boys, always men, always men, that fight it. And there might be a limited truth to that. But it's certainly going to be lessened if the cause is just. If the kid knows why he's over there, accepts why he's over there, is educated, either by himself or by the army, as to what he's doing, That's going to killing random people. This is why you're doing this. I think that boys are destroyed when they're invaders in another country that doesn't threaten them.

We don't know what I'm talking about. You know, the Iraq war, the settlement thing never threatened the U.S. On the other hand, the Iranians today, they're fighting for their homes. The Taliban fighting for their homes. Completely different mentality. if you're fighting for your home, if you're fighting for your family against an invader, you will not be destroyed by it. You will be affected by it, but you won't be destroyed by it. It's only when, you know, you're fighting a clearly unjust war that you may be destroyed.

You're killing people for no obvious reason except as a mercenary for Israel or big corporations or whatever it might be. And I think that's one of the most important aspects of what he's been talking about here. And then that person, a soldier comes home and people around him or them are also affected. That same evil, maybe even breakdown, changes people around him, his family, everyone else. So it even, you know, and I think unjust wars are an excellent example of how to make sense out of what he's saying here. I think it's very important. so by not quenching this desire for evil they harm not only themselves but everyone

I hate you know you have groups you know the mafia is made up of of men who were born and raised with this with this line they don't really know anything else it's always a family connection we've talked about in the Solzhenitin book the Jews had the khal had this very tight ethnic connection where they couldn't possibly do

evil no matter what and so anything they do no matter who is hurt they're not evil maybe though deep in their subconscious they know better and that will affect those around them and then eventually you have a as we talked about in solzhen jews of russia who were essentially like a mafia group they were engaged in smuggling and tax evasion and and everything else, illegal alcohol, prostitution. And it was their cohesion and let them get away with this for a while. And it affects everybody. It's not just, you know, the Jews in one area.

It's just don't affect them and those who are immediately harmed by it. But in a more subtle way, affects the entire society. I think we should leave it there and finish up the chapter on the next episode. How's that sound? yeah this is this is very very very serious stuff i i loved translating it even though it took a long time um some of the machine didn't help me a little bit but they only go so far um um but this is we're getting to the core of the book here and um and i think uh i think our listeners if they've been with us from the beginning, no precisely, uh, how this is developing. I hope, I hope I'm

explaining well enough how this is developing so they understand. Yeah, some of these, I've made some of these arguments myself, albeit in a much more barbaric way, or not barbaric, but in a, um, not as an intelligent as way as he, uh, he, he does, you know, it's like, less philosophical of a way. Yeah, less philosophical. You know, it's like, I mean, if, if one, if one, you know, he, he does, you know, it's like, I mean, if, if, if one in six girls in Great Britain or have an only fan's account. Great Britain is doomed. Is that true? Yeah. I think it's even higher, actually. Yeah, they're doomed. You can't, you can't escape that. You know, it's like the libertarians will tell you, oh, you know, prostitution's perfectly fine and everything, you know, prostitution should be illegal. It's like, yeah, if, if, if, if, if, prostitution is going on in your town even before even off the streets your town is done your you're

your you're if prostitution is like you know if if and only fans is prostitution you know if one in 10 if one in 10 young women in your town are an only fans whore your town is toast done you know and it's and it's not just that's very good point. I didn't know it was so high in Britain. The chances of a girl making money there are almost zero. It's only the top. Well, I mean, unless they're Indian or Pakistani or they're a fucking, you know, they're from somewhere else. Well, yeah, well, I mean, you know, it's, there's a handful that make any kind of good money off Onlyfan. It's such a saturated market at this point. And it's not just that the moral society has collapsed. This has now become normal,

but you have enough omegas in the male population that are willing to pay for this and honestly believe that in their interaction, that's the whole point of Onlyfans, that you could have a personal interaction, that that's a relationship. That's the only chance they have. I don't know if I've mentioned this before, but listeners should look at up the Grant Amato case. I think it was Florida. Yeah, I think it was Florida. This is pre-only fans to see how bad this can actually get.

And so remember, there's always two signs. You have the collapse of the female mind, but this is what the sexual revolution is done. But also the collapse of especially white males, where you have such a number of, those who have no chance of any relationship that this is as close they're going to get and they're going to pay through the nose to pretend they have a personal relationship for some hot girl that won't talk to them if their credit card doesn't go through but they always have a way to explain

it you can always justify it somehow um you know grant de motto really believed that they were going to get married one day and when um his family cut him off financially he came back and shot them all. He used his father's dead, dead finger to use the, you know, the finger lock to get into the phone to pay this woman more money. Of course, it's an extreme example. But it's something you're going to be hearing about more and more. Maybe not, you know, shooting everybody. But clearly it has destroyed that guy.

You should look up grant a model to see what he looks like. but it destroyed this man and physically destroyed the entire family and I was following that when that first happened and it was frightening and it has very much to do what we're talking about here it is it's terrifying yeah and the the girl wasn't even in this country yeah from Bulgaria oh you know what I'm talking about yeah well I mean I know the name and I had forgotten about the case but I just pulled up the pulled up the Wikipedia What Italian family names their kid Grant? That's what I never understood.

Or the other, his brother's name, Cody. I don't know. But yeah, it's a case that I followed when it was going on. And it bears out to an extreme degree what we've been talking about here. I'm going to come and say, this wasn't only fans. It was just pre, just pre only fan. And she was from Bulgaria. you. All right. Let's get out of here.

Go head on over the show notes and the descriptions of the videos, donate to Dr. Johnson's work, and buy his new book when it comes out, well, not new book, but his rewriting and reformatting, the second edition. And we'll do an episode on that when it's ready. So, yeah, look forward to that. Yep. Thank you, my friend. All right. Take care. Bye-bye.