Later in the Declaration, we find the list of grievances those facts submitted to a candid world that explain why Americans were justified in dissolving the political bands that connected them to Britain. Few Americans today are familiar with the Declaration's grievances, but to most readers in 1776, they were far more important than the political principles summarized in the second paragraph. Did the actions of the British government, however unwise or unjust they may have been, signify a deliberate design to extinguish American freedom? If this question could not be answered in the affirmative, then a revolution could not be justified. And this is why the list of grievances was viewed as the most crucial feature of the Declaration.


Live from Washington, D.C., it's theCUBE, covering AWS Public Sector Summit 2017, brought to you by Amazon Web Services and its partner ecosystem. Good morning, welcome back here on theCUBE, the Silicon Valley or SiliconANGLE TV flagship broadcast here as we continue our coverage live from the nation's capital, Washington, D.C., the AWS Public Sector Summit, 2017. I'm John Walls, we're glad to have you here on theCUBE along with John Furrier. Good morning. Good morning. Good night. Great night. I had two great meetings, learned some information, got some exclusive material for a story that has to do with the government stuff. So you were kind of working then, weren't you? I'm always working. In D.C., I went from my year to the ground. I went home once. I had all these stories back to my show, Silicon Valley Friday show, which has been on hiatus during the month of May and June for all theCUBE events. Slacker. I got some great, great metadata, as they say. Data about data. I went home, I watched the Natscape last night. That was my big night. Jeff McAllister is with us now. He is the GM of the Americas for Druva. And Jeff, glad to have you here on theCUBE. We appreciate the time. Oh gee, thank you for the opportunity. It's a pleasure to meet you. All right, so you guys, you're all data all the time on the cloud, right? All about data protection and security, availability. Tell us a little bit more just about Druva. And then we'll get into maybe your relationship with AWS. But first off about you, about Druva. I've been fortunate to be with Druva since we really embarked on our enterprise strategy. I've been part of the team that made the investment a couple years ago to start to pursue FedRAMP and some of the specifications for the federal government. And as you know, we are cloud native. We are for the cloud and built on the cloud. And we've been a partner with AWS for over eight years now. So we've had a very strong working relationship with them and the opportunity to come and speak here today with you gentlemen has really been tremendously exciting. And frankly, they're absolutely wonderful partners to go to market with. Yeah, talk about how integral that obviously is to your business to have not just the relationship but to have the relationship that you do with AWS. Well, AWS obviously provides a world-class platform on which to build a service like ours. For our customers, it means tremendous levels of security, tremendous data durability, reliability and availability of that data. But also the idea that many of our customers are very mobile. They have great geographic disperse and among their employees, their employees are engaging in other parts of the world. So availability of that cloud and that cloud infrastructure in local areas is tremendously important. And for our federal customers, the certification for ITAR and other things that are specific to that market, having a platform like GovCloud built specifically to their specifications to service them creates great leverage for us and our customers. I mean, eight-year relationship, and that's going back. I mean, they're only 10 years old and they just spent their 10th birthday going on their 11th year just AWS. So obviously they saw some federal action right away or public sector action right away, nature of the cloud, very friendly to developers back then, but still they was building blocks foundational back then. That's right, exactly. What's changed? I mean, how would you chronicleize that change other than the massive growth we've seen in the marketplace, which we've chronicleized as well. But I mean, from your perspective in the public sector, this is not a nice trajectory. It's, you know, I've been in the business now for over 30 years, started out at Data General through Sunmarker Systems and I've seen much of the industry change. But one thing that has been very impressive with the public sector is that the interval in product innovation would come to the public sector a year to two years behind what we saw in the commercial marketplace. That time in space is absolutely shrinking down to nothing. Yeah, they are pursuing the same business continuity data transformation issues, the cloud first strategies that our commercial customers are and frankly the government worker today has become more mobile and the requirements to protect that data and secure it are at an all time high and the AWS platform in combination with we do really provides a level of security that is hard to do on your own. Yeah, so yesterday we talked about a term I coined or phrase I coined around the seminal moments in GovCloud's history and really in Amazon public sector is called the shot herd around the cloud. And that was the CIA deal where AWS came in and beat IBM, which had a lock in spec and then their old school IBM, they know how to sell. The sponsorships, they had everything locked and loaded. Who knows if they were doing wine and then dying and you know, the federal government is very much baked out, everything's gotten up and then boom, shadow IT is happening, Amazon wins. Since then, you've seen a lot of change in how people are procuring, how people are deploying. No better example than data protection because there's no walls, there's no firewall. You're in the middle of it. Talk about that dynamic, about how the no walls, no perimeter in the cloud has changed the role of data and data protection. Sure, so gone are the days where we can dictate the device, how somebody wants to work, what solutions are going to use cloud applications like Office 365, Box, Slack, other have really created an environment where the IT folks want to stimulate innovation, stimulate the work in places where people want to get done but then provide the same level of protection and governance that they would on an on-platform solution. So watching that evolution take place, it's really driven us to really have to be mindful that we are in the performance business and with that performance, we have to be respectful of the requirements from a security and protection standpoint that our customers call for. FIP certification became fundamental for us to be able to service the government. That led us into the pursuit now of FedRAMP. We're sure now FedRAMP ready. But all of those things provide the infrastructure to allow them to embrace these new strategies and this digital transformation be it in my cloud first strategy or my mobility strategy and be able to extend that same level of security that I would need and provide that flexibility for my end users to get their jobs done. You know, and obviously cloud native we, as you know, we love cloud native. We do too. We cover it from day one. Cloud first is kind of like a moniker that people use. It's kind of an ethos. It's more of a manifesto, it's a real agile but really Amazon has never hidden the ball in effect what they believe the future will be and that is API economy. And then from day one it's all about APIs and they believe that APIs everywhere. The cloud has no perimeter so that changes the security game. But the one thing that's emerged out of all this is a new SaaS business model for businesses and government and federal and education. So everything's as a service. Correct. That is a huge deal and this is maybe nuanced a bit but how does public sector turn into a service model with the cloud? Because that's something that everyone's kind of going at. You know cloud native is great. We're going to be cloud native check but really what they're getting to is everything's as a service. Right. It's created a lot of flexibility in the buying process. First of all, you're bringing that elasticity of demand, right? So they are able to embrace the idea that I only pay for the services I actually consume. So should I have a movement in employees? Should I change in structure? Should my usage suddenly spike? I have the ability to adjust on the fly. That's a big part of it. But the other piece of it is that we can deliver our service at a fixed price cost for a certain period of time within that government fiscal year. So not only does it become easy to manage technologically, but from a budget standpoint, it makes it a very predictable cost. I no longer have an explosion of data that I have to manage and go off books to try and find data to provide those IOPS and storage on site. I can simply continue to go at the same budget level that I've already set aside. One dynamic that's come up and while you've brought this up because I think it's relevant to you to what we're just talking about is lock-in, right? I mean the word lock-in has always been vendor lock-in but really that's on one side of the coin. The other side of the coin is user lock-in. So last night, one of my secret meetings I had last night was with a senior government official and we were talking about how they're all pissed because they got Microsoft Surfaces instead of Macs. They wanted Macs.  No, no offense, Microsoft. I love the surface personally, but I got Mac here. The point is they didn't want it. Right. They was forced down their throat. We just shut that for a moment here. This is the old leg. We made a decision. We're going with this product. So this is really the flexibility point is they're interesting, right? Because now with Cloud, you can actually do these really agile deployments. Exactly. And give people more choice. That's right. The time to value on these products, we have a very large defense contractor inside the Beltway. We were able to deploy to 23,000 users worldwide in under six weeks. But we understand that we're in the deployment business or in the performance business. And the idea that our customers could leave us at any point in time when the term is up keeps us very conscious of the specifications that they require. And frankly, it requires us to be innovative on their behalf, certainly taking their feedback, but really starting to anticipate their requirements so that we continue to earn that business year over year. And frankly, if you want to talk about lock-in, SaaS provides tremendous flexibility to switch when a contractor isn't performing the spec versus a perpetual license where I'm locked in for the duration. And this is for you, and obviously they're going to use their dollars wisely. I want to get you to weigh in on Drova's digital transformation impact of the customer. Obviously you guys are doing well. You're in the sweet spot. Obviously, data protection is a hot area. Thank you. It's one of the hottest areas no one really kind of looks at, but it's really hot with the Cloud. What impact are you having with customers and how are you rolling out your value proposition to the public sector? What are the key highlights? I mean, I see, how they work with you. Is it FedRAMP? I mean, what are some of the, is it GovCloud? Just take us through your value proposition with respect to that. Our value proposition I think is fairly unique. So first we run on the most widely accepted cloud platform by the public sector, AWS GovCloud, without question the market leader there. We bring all of our experience from the commercial marketplace into that same experience on GovCloud with the added certifications of FIPS certification 140 dash two moderate, our FedRAMP in process. We're also HIPAA certified so that we have the ability to address HHS and FDA as some of our customers. Because they also process a lot of personal information that is unique to that particular agency. But at the end of the day, the piece that really is most interesting to our public sector customers is one, this is a very easy service to bring to the cloud at lower cost and frankly, higher value. The plethora of features and the security and the ease of management that we bring, relieving them of having to manage hundreds of terabytes of data and IOPS on behalf of this service is tremendously beneficial. The predictability of the cost year over year makes it very, very easy to manage. But I think the biggest thing that people have come to embrace is that the innovation that takes place in the cloud comes to market so much faster in the cloud. Just think of the QA cycles and how they've been reduced because we're QA'ing for one platform. Being able to consistently quarter in, quarter out, deliver that additional feature set and additional value at no additional cost to our customers is really what they've really gelled around. How do you guys handle the certification processes that are going? I'm sure there'll be more. Yes, there will. I mean, with all this free flowing data, I'm sure there's going to be a lot of regulations and policies and governance issues. But you got to move fast. That's right. You got to move fast to certify, is there a secret sauce? Is there a secret playbook? How do you guys stay on top of it? Is it automation, machine learning? What's the secret sauce? I think it's interesting. Part of the uniqueness that is, Druba, I think is our ability to anticipate market demand. I think we have a very experienced team of individuals look at the choice to go to AWS eight years ago. It was unthinkable at that time, but it's turned out to be a visionary sort of choice. We identified that FedRAMP and FIP certification three or four years ago was an absolute mandate to play in this marketplace. So we went there way ahead of our success in the market, but we saw a very unique opportunity to go there. So I think it's just a tremendously creative group of people. It's a very dynamic marketplace, and it's one that requires a little bravery and a little bit of thinking in advance of the marketplace. I don't know that we have any magic sauce, but so far it's worked out. I think it's worked out all right. I would ask you to do it. Oh, that's a good question. But to that point, though, eight years ago, when you went, it was a leap. It was. Big leap. And now here you are, 2017. Things are rolling along. I imagine your sale or your pitch has taken on a different tune because you have so much proof in the pudding now. It does. A long time ago, it was strictly backup. We've now moved into governance, e-discovery, the idea of user behavior analysis so I can find anomalies that may occur so that I can avoid crypto lock or other sorts of viruses or things that may be able to affect the operation of my customers. All of those things have come into play that weren't there four years ago. So it's really been an advancement of the added services beyond what we just did in backup that have really kind of driven the business and differentiated us from the market, but it's still kind of fundamentally that idea that I'm going to protect your data, make it available to you, and separate you now from your device and really help you manage your data wherever you're doing your work. I know we're running tight on time. I do want to get one more question in from your perspective because, again, present creation is really a benefit to Druva. Congratulations on that. Thank you. You can ride the wave and now the wave's bigger and more sets coming in as they use the surfing analogy. But talk about the perspective from your personal standpoint, just the changes going on in this marketplace right now.  She's knocked on a lot of doors. Eight years ago, what the hell's cloud? You don't even know what it was, right? And then the shot heard around the cloud with the CIA deal and then just more and more momentum. This is a great business opportunity for Amazon, web services, not just the enterprise which they're doing well in now. They own the startup market. This could be, I think it could have a 90% market share of the fellow sector. That's right, that's right. Talk about the change, what's going on? What's, is it the perfect storm? Is it like right now? Is it, what's the progress? Well, you know, it seems like it's a perfect storm but for somebody who's been banging at it for the last four or five years, it seems to be a little bit more evolutionary. But it's interesting when I started at Groova, if I looked across our opportunities across the Americas, it was fairly evenly split between the idea that I'm going to do this on premise or I'm going to do it in the cloud. Today, if I look across all of North America and all the commercial entities and public sector entities that we're dealing with, we're probably engaged in well over 500 opportunities at any one time. Literally less than two. Quarter over quarter is now on premise. People have come to embrace the idea that this is a place where I can conduct business safely and securely. And frankly for us, is you look at that digital transformation or business transformation, we become two really compelling services to start and experiment with moving to the cloud. So very often we are the tip of that spear. Let's back up our endpoint devices to the cloud. Let's get out of that business, because we can do it much more effectively with the Groova than we can for ourselves. And it's almost a reverse of what on-trem was. I mean, I've been in many opportunities where I've bumped into IT practitioners, friends and whatnot in the industry. Oh, I forgot to do the backup plan. We all got the procurement going on. It's kind of an afterthought. It's been kind of an afterthought. Kind of oversimplified, but generally it's not the primary. When you go outside the walls of a company into the cloud with no perimeter, it's the first conversation. That's right. So I hear what you're saying, and I totally agree. This is unique. It's a complete flip around. Well, it's amazing. So often we're backing up server data to the cloud. So now it used to be just backing up to the cloud. Now it's, I have the application running in the cloud and I want to back it up and secure it into another cloud. It's completely morphing into all sorts of interesting places. But the part that's really interesting is that we will bring to our customers disaster recovery, for example. Well, that's a service. We turn it on. And if you never experience the disaster, you don't pay for it. It just creates a whole new mindset of how we're going to think and how we're going to approach the infrastructure that we're now building. No license fee. It's just if you need it, you get whacked on it and then you deserve to get whacked on it because you need the service. Well, they know what the cost will be, right? We've set it up for a nominal fee, but if you're fortunate enough that you never experienced the problem, why should you pay for it? So literally cutting that price in half, removing the requirement of two XL servers and 430. It's a new operating model. And the flexibility that it creates to change to your computing requirements is just phenomenal. Well, phenomenal, I think would be a way to describe your ascent as well. Oh, thank you. So congratulations on that front. Glad you could be here with us, Jeff, at the show, continued success. And we hope to see you down the road on theCUBE. John, John, it was a real pleasure. First time, right? It was. It was. First time, good to have your Tor alumni or a CUBE alumni. CUBE alumni. Good to have you with us. Thank you. Thank you so much. With Truva. Back with more here from AWS Public Sector Summit 2017 on theCUBE. You're watching live in Washington, DC.


While the look of joy and excitement could be seen on the faces of many anglers on Lake Bemidji over the weekend and this week's Northwood's adventure at Josh Peterson shows us how fishing has no boundaries brings a family of anglers together each year. 22 pontoons line the shore of Lake Bemidji Saturday as part of the 27th annual Fishing Has No Boundaries which provides anglers of all ages and disabilities a chance to go out on the lake and catch some fish. For many of the participants this is their only opportunity to enjoy this time honored Minnesota tradition. Living in northern Minnesota, not being able to get out on the water and do some fishing is kind of heartbreaking so one time a year we allow these people to be able to get out. This year 81 anglers took part in the fishing event. For the volunteers who put on the event they do it for the smiles and the look of joy on all of the participant's faces whether they catch a fish or not. I mean the smile and and and this the greatsons will be here from these people they catch a little perch or a rock bass or even a bull head or whatever the smile and they remember this. This yearly event draws participants from all over the Midwest for many fishing has no boundaries is compared to a family reunion providing an opportunity for old friends to share a common bond over catching the prize fish. Every year they all have stories about the fish they caught or getting rained on a little bit or getting a boat ride and the meals and everybody gets because they know they're going to get together one time a year. For the 81 anglers that were fishing they feel the event is a great way to meet new people and bond with friends that they rarely get to see. This is my like third year of doing it and nice to meet new people and made new friends and everyone had a fun time. For those who are lucky enough to catch a fish stories of reeling in their fish will last a lifetime. It was just a surprise for me but but it just came up and was he said it was Jimmy said it was time to reel in to move on and then the walleye came up. Those stories will echo throughout the year and will be retold again at next year's fishing has no boundaries. With this week's Northwood's adventure in Bemidji, Josh Peterson, Lakeland News. If you've enjoyed this segment of Lakeland News please consider making a tax deductible contribution to Lakeland Public Television.


Alright guys, it's K. I'm here. We're back with another pattern tutorial today. The pattern we're going to be learning is I've been getting a lot of requests for the TK pattern tutorial so with that being said let's jump right into it again We're in 4-4 right keeping a simple guys dancing on the floor. Let's go. So we got the B. We got the kick drum We got the IS and we're snare T hi-hat K our snare and You techno kick If you don't know any of those go back to my channel and watch those tutorial guys once you have those learned Let's get into it. Okay, so we're gonna get the metronome guys. You know the drill by now We're starting out at 60 right so I'm gonna go through it with you guys for two measures And then you guys are gonna repeat it back to me and then we're gonna increase it rinse and repeat so two three and Great job guys. So if you got stuck there Rewind it rewatch it and practice it again at that tempo, right? Everything's there for you the metronome and everything there's on it for you. Just go back and rewind it We're gonna jump up to 80 now same thing two three and Awesome heck yeah guys are we gonna do a hundred now? five six seven Yeah, good job guys. So let's say we're in the gym, right? Okay, and you know, we just got in the gym We did our warm-up set at 60 and And 80 right and then we know we sat down and we're like, okay, you know, we did 70 last week Let's go back to 70. Well, we're gonna start with this week and we got it done You know, let's say that was the 100 BPM, right? So now we want to take it up a notch, right? If you do if that was really easy push yourself, right push yourself until you mess up, right? So we're gonna go to 120 and see how we fare. They're all right five six seven Yeah, so you see what I mean guys, maybe that one pushed you a little bit. Maybe it didn't okay if it didn't go up to 140, you know what I mean keep going until you get a decrease in quality of Any of these sounds guys, right?   So be sure to when you're practicing this pattern make sure all the sounds sound good These are great methods to practice these individual sounds as well if you don't feel like practicing them Individually with the metronome. So that's it for this episode guys. Let me know if you have any questions DM me on Instagram. I'll see you guys in the next video


My name is Sam Wagner and I am the author of Malignant Self-Love, Narcissism Revisited. Prone to magical thinking, Narcissist is deeply convinced of the transcendental meaning of his life. He fervently believes in his own uniqueness and mission. He constantly searches for clues regarding the hidden, though inevitable, meaning of his personal odyssey. The Narcissist is forever a public persona, even when he is alone in the confines of his own bedroom. He still has this public aura, as though he has an invisible audience surrounding him and watching him at all times. His every move, his every act, his every decision and every scribbling is of momentous consequence, he feels. The Narcissist often documents his life with vigil for the benefit of future biographies and generations. His every utterance and shred of correspondence are carefully and meticulously orchestrated, as befitting a historical figure of infinite import. This grandiose background leads to an exaggerated sense of entitlement. The Narcissist feels that he is worthy of special and immediate treatment by the most qualified people. His time is too precious to be wasted on bureaucratic trifles, misunderstanding, underlings, social conventions or daily chores. His mission is urgent. Other people are expected both to share the Narcissist's self-assessment and to behave accordingly, to accommodate his needs, to instantly comply with his wishes, to succumb to his wins. But the world does not always accommodate, comply and succumb. It often resists the wishes of the Narcissist, mocks his comportment or, worst of all, ignores him altogether. The Narcissist reacts to these with a cycle of frustration and aggression. Still, it is not always possible to express naked aggression. Many cultures frown on directness and encourage white lies or outright deception in order to avoid or mitigate conflict. Straight talk in your face may be dangerous, counterproductive or perceived as silly. Even the Narcissist cannot attack his boss, for instance, or a policeman or the neighborhood bully with impunity. So, the Narcissist's aggression pent up, boiling, seething, about to flood him altogether, whereas many geysers assume many forms. The Narcissist suddenly becomes brutally honest or bitingly humorous or smotheringly helpful or sexually experimental or socially reclusive or behaviorally different and eccentric. All these are forms of aggression. Some Narcissists find yet other ways to express their scathing and repressed hostility. They're very creative. Narcissists often label such thinly disguised aggression tough love. The Narcissist's favorite sadistic cocktail is brutal honesty coupled with helpful advice and concern for the welfare of the person thus attacked. The Narcissist blurts out, often completely unprovoked, hurtful observations, painful sentences. These statements are invariably couched in a socially impeccable and acceptable context. This is akin to anger management. The sadistic Narcissist also requires truth management to teach him how to contain his impulsive and offensive honesty and directness. So, a Narcissist might say, Do you know that you have bad breath? You will be much more popular had you treated it. True. Fact. Sadistic. Or the Narcissist can suddenly blur it out out of the blue. You are really too fat. You should take care of yourself. You're not young, you know. Who knows what this is doing to your heart? Obesity is ugly. Again, impeccable, acceptable, helpful, even friendly. But the way it is uttered, the context, the timing, as a consequence of frustration is clearly an aggressive statement. Narcissist may say, These clothes do not compliment you. Let me give you the name of my tailor. Again, helpful. Or Narcissist can criticize and say, You are behaving very strangely lately. I think that talk therapy, combined with medication, may do wonders. And so, you get the gist of it. Sentences disguised as helpful advice are actually harmful, hurtful, painful, stabbing attacks. The misanthropic and schizoid Narcissist at once becomes sociable and friendly when he spots an opportunity to hurt people, to avenge himself. He then resorts to humor, black, thwarted, poignant, biting, sharpened and agonizing. Thinly disguised barbs follow thinly disguised threats, cloaked as jokes or humorous anecdotes. Another favorite trick of the Narcissist is to heart on the insecurities, fears, weaknesses, frailties and deficiencies of the target of aggression. If the Narcissist is married to a jealous spouse, he emphasizes his newfound promiscuity and need to experiment sexually. If his business partner has been traumatized by a previous insolvency, the Narcissist berates him for being too cautious or insufficiently entrepreneurial while forcing the partnership to assume outlandish, speculative business risks. If the Narcissist cohabits with the gregarious maid, he acts the recluse, the hermit, the social misfit or the misunderstood visionary. In this way, he forces the partner to give up her social life. Anything to frustrate, to damage, to hurt, to corner, to inflict pain. The Narcissist is seething with enmity, hostility and venom. He is a receptacle of unbridled hatred and immocity. When he can, the Narcissist often turns to physical violence, but the non-physical manifestations and dimensions of his pent-up bile are even more terrifying. More or pervasive, more lasting. Beware of Narcissists bearing gifts. They are bound to explode in your faces, or poison you or something.  Remembering this has a survival value for you.


الحمد لله رب العالمين له الحمد الحسن والثناء الجميل واشدوا الله إلا الله وحده لا شريك له يقول الحق وهو يهدي السبيل واشدوا نسيدنا ونبينا محمد صلى الله عليه وعلى آله وأصحابه والتابعين لهم بإحسان إلى يوم الدين أما بعد إن شاء الله تعالى we're going to carry on the introduction to Arabic grammar as I touched on last lesson and I mentioned last lesson that the Arabic grammar that we're going to be speaking about is not analyzing the Arabic language and looking at structures of sentences and etc we're not doing that we're just going to speak about the formation, the development and the history behind the Arabic grammar that's what we're going to be discussing and we spoke about last lesson the importance of the Arabic language and we also spoke about in our last lesson the claim that people come with our Arabic is hard I can't learn it and that that is not true we also spoke about what was the reason why Arabic grammar was placed what was the reason why did the scholars write it what necessitated it we said it was because people were speaking Arabic wrong and so it forced the grammarians or it forced scholars to say let's make principles to protect this language are you with me brothers because remember brothers the people implementing the verse إن أكرامكم عند الله اتقاكم that the best amongst you is what the one who is the one who is pious so that none Arab and the Arab will get married based on what grounds إن أكرامكم عند الله اتقاكم there was no hostility there was no racial profiling there was no discrimination إن أكرامكم عند الله اتقاكم the best amongst you is one the one who is pious but this was causing a problem which is the Arabic language was diluting the Arab and the non-Arab when they got married the non-Arab was coming with what he was coming with his own language it was diluting and that's when they felt okay let's save the language are you with me brothers let's save the language and protect this language funny enough the people who said let's save the language is the non-Arab it was who the non-Arab overwhelming majority of the grammarians are non-Arab are you with me brothers so who wrote grammar who placed it who put it down there are five views how many views five views of who was the person who wrote the Arabic grammar who started it the first view is عليب نبي طالب he himself wrote it عليب عليب نبي طالب and it's the view pushed by الانباري رحمه الله الانباري الانباري what did he say عليب نبي طالب it's the one who wrote the Arabic grammar the second view is this is the view of جنغور المؤرخين متقدمين ومتأخيرين the early generation and the late comers the overwhelming historians they say it was عليب نبي طالب عليب نبي طالب عليب نبي طالب عليب نبي طالب عليب نبي طالب عليب نبي طالب they said he was the one who wrote it this is the view of who the majority of the historians then they differed amongst themselves again in two views one view said it was on the command of عليب نبي طالب عليب نبي طالب عليب نبي طالب are you with me brothers so they said okay is عليب نبي طالب they did it with the command of who عليب نبي طالب the second group they said no it wasn't عمر رضي الله عنه told him to do it who told him to do it عمر رضي الله عنه عمر رضي الله عنه told him to do it and there's even a third view regarding that as well a third view sorry which was he did it because not because عليب told him and not because عمر told him but because عليب Had hobbies عمرbus عمرana عليب عليب عليب عليب عليب عليب عليب عليب ما إي which explains as what what in the sky is beautiful and then he said to her نجومها the stars what is it that makes the sky beautiful the stars and then she said to him no that's not what I intended I wanted to say she wanted to say ما أحسن السماء what is more beautiful than the sky are you with me so just a heart a she said ما أحسنو صح and she was meant to say more ما أحسناء because if you say ما أحسنو السماء then he said نجومها the stars but if she said ما أحسن السماء then that means she's amazed with the sky she's not asking a question but the first one she's in is an understanding but the second one is تعجب second one is تعجب means she's fascinated what is more beautiful than the sky are you with me so when he saw this mistake in his own daughter he went and he placed ربا that's a second third view so the first view was who عليبنا بيطالبين the second view was what أبي أسود we did abby أسود how many views three views what about the third view the third view is نصر ابن العاصم الليثي نصر نصر ابن العاصم الليثي he's the one who wrote the Arabic grammar so we have number one علي عليبنا بيطالبين the second one is أبي ثاد the second one is نصر ابن عاصم ثاد عبد الرحمن ابن هرموز so you forth and five خليل ابن أحمد الفراهيدي those are the five views and the strongest of them all is what the strongest is that abby أسود it was the first to write it okay so abba أسود ادو علي was what he was the first to write it are we all together brothers and he wrote it how many views did we say there were three right the عمارة view is wrong that's incorrect how many it was left علي and they don't eliminate each other now علي did command him and also he saw his own daughter are you with me brothers both of those incidents do not eliminate one another does that make sense his daughter speaking wrong was brought it as well and then علي's command also made him do it as for عمارة رضي الله عانو that's wrong are you with me brothers abby أسود is from what he's from بصلة I want you to remember that keep that in mind another point now we need to we need to speak about abby أسود أبو أسود الدو علي we said he's the father of the first person to write grammar what did he write in grammar I'm on what grounds was he writing the grammar was he writing grammar in general or was he writing the grammar based on the mistakes that he saw he wrote the correct version for it does it make sense that which seems apparent from history is that the things that the لحن the mistakes happened was what he wrote the grammar on so the grammar that I will ask for the do I was writing was whatever was incorrectly said it was writing the rulings for it and that he wasn't generally writing grammar in its totality does that make sense because that's what the narrations show are you with me brothers is that making sense yeah so abby أسود's authorship was based on the mistakes that he was seeing the people say now we're going to go into these stages and the levels in which Arabic grammar went through are you with me brothers the stages in which it went through I want you to all remember in شاء الله و تعالى and keep in mind the first people who woke up to the concept of grammar and felt a need to place the grammar was the people of بصلة 100 years before أهل القوفة how long زهاء قرن 100 years they were into the authorship of grammar and that's when I'll go for woke up I'll go for woke up 100 years later I'll ask what was what from abby أسود's time up to خليلي من أحمد الفراهيدي أهل بصلة with the only people who were speaking about grammar are you with me brothers am I making sense yes أسود I think he died 60th هدر year 60 are you with me brothers and خليلي من أحمد is what 170 something that's how long brothers that's 100 or something years أهل بصلة و dealing with grammar that was there's 100 years when we break it down later we're going to break it down into طبق طبقات أما we're going to at war levels who's the first 100 years the people of after that who woke up أهل القوفة their first initiative and their first walk towards grammar was 100 years after أهل بصلة went in and that was from the time of who خليلي من أحمد الفراهيدي خليلي من أحمد الفراهيدي خليلي من أحمد فراهيدي you know who he is he's the teacher of سيبوهي سيبوهيس teacher are you with me brothers سيبوهي where is he from سيبوهيس from بصلة brothers let me break something down for you the grammar in the Arabic language is that was dividing into two بصلة and what خوفة and then later it became at the ending of the third century who came in who intervened بغداد what did the people of بغداد try to do the people of بغداد tried to take the people of بصلة and the people of خوفة and they made the مدهب together emerged it are you with me brothers yes no and then from بغداد three groups of places took over sham and the loss and must Egypt are you with me brothers so now what i'm going to do is i'm going to talk about the first 100 years of the people of بصلة are you with me brothers we're going to break the first 100 years of the people of بصلة into two levels are you with me each level we're going to mention three people from them and you have to know who they are and read the biographies insha'Allah تعالى the first of them is نصر ابن عاصم الليثي you wrote him somewhere here he is he's the one right under ابو أسود الدوالي he's right under him because he took from him he took from who he took from ابو أسود he we start with him who do we start with we start with him نصر ابن عاصم الليثي he's the first level within the first level of the 100 years is who عبد الرحمن من هرموس his I love you are you with me brothers the third person is yeah yeah am I going too fast yeah one more time I just mentioned the grammar in the Arabic language they were two schools صح they were two schools what were the two schools بصلة and who started first how long were they early how long were they before the people of 100 years from whose time to whose time from ابو أسود's time up to who the five that I mentioned here all of them are بصلة بصلة بصلة بصلة بصلة yes tell now the people of they know nothing who is the leader of who started it for the first person who started it for who was ابو جعفر الرؤسي ابو جعفر الرؤسي was the first person who woke up he took from خلين محمد فراهدي 100 years so what I said was the people of بصرا I'm going to break them into two two levels two levels three people here three people here the three in here are who for the 100 years before the people of who for coming is who نصر من عاصمة اللي في عبد الرحمن بروه حر موز and the third one is يا حياء ابن يعمر do you know who you have me عمرس brothers do you know بالله عليكم do you know who you have me عمرس الله all of you know this حديث if I tell told you do you know the famous حديث جبريل do you know the famous حديث جبريل who came to the door I put your hand up when I did the door I in the door I did we do the photo حديث if I'm I'm I'm I'm عبد الرحمن عبد الله عبد الله ابن عمر two people came to him right who are they يا حياء ابن يعمر and حميد عبد الرحمن الحماري they were the two people who came to عبد الله ابن عمر يا حياء ابن يعمر he's from them if you remember a name once you see somewhere write it down you might see that person again somewhere and it makes sense start a map will open for you are you new brothers you know what I do in my house you know how I remember names you know what I do I take you know how the FBI when they're looking for somebody they stick his picture in the middle but I don't do the picture what I do is I write the name in the middle and I do a web from him wherever I come across him I in my book I write him I saw him somewhere here okay what is he doing here you start to realize this person is connected to so many people I saw this that this that would and it will help you a lot you start to realize the person is the Imam in the Arabic language and he's an Imam in this field okay oh so he he got married to who he got married to this one okay he started realizing a lot of things will come up for you names are very important brothers these people should be more beloved to you than your own parents he's an imma who brought this religion to you are you with me brothers بعد الله عز وجل after الله this religion it would have been lost if it wasn't for these people are you with me brothers so three people نصر من عاصم اللي في عبد الرحماري بروه هرموز ويحبنو يعمر these three all that they did is that they placed basic concepts of grammar nothing really big am I making sense basic basic issues of grammar is what they wrote they didn't really write much they didn't write much then the second the second three that came is these are the second second three the second three is أبي إسحاق الحضرمي second is عيسة ابن عمر ثاقفي أبي عمر أبو عمر ابن العلاء أبو عمر ابن العلاء and those are the other three أبي إسحاق الحضرمي and عيسة ابن عمر ثاقفي أنا أبو عمر ابن العلاء are we all together do you guys know who أبو عمر ابن العلاء is أبو عمر ابن العلاء is from the قراء السبعة from the from the narrators he is the narrators he is the narrators he is the Imam of the Qur'an all of these imams while they are talking about the people of the Qur'an haven't come yet into the picture does that make sense they haven't come well that is why the people of the Qur'an who introduced them into the Qur'an خلير من أحمد الفراهيدي they all came to they all came to him and took from him and then went back to the people of كوفة أبو جعفر الرؤاسي أبو جعفر الرؤاسي who did he go to he went to خلير من أحمد الفراهيدي and he went to Yunus Ibn Habib are you with me brothers even one of the scholars of the the madhab is who كسائي right كسائي is what عليب نحمزة الكسائي he is from the people of كوفة from the people of كوفة he is from the Qur'an of the قراءات السبعة are you with me brothers he is from كوفة he came to خلير من أحمد الفراهيدي and then خلير sent him to he said go to the Bedouins and meet the Bedouins and take from them and then he spent 10 years with the Bedouins taken Arabic from them and he said to say to him I did what you told me to do but when he came خلير من أحمد was dead who was sitting in his chair Yunus Ibn Habib and then him and Yunus Ibn Habib started to discuss and then Yunus Ibn Habib said your language is better than mine take my position and we'll speak about that more in details next week anything which I have said I'll see you next week


For those of you visiting with us this morning or new to this class, we've begun a series on Sunday morning that we're calling A Theology of Public Life, Lessons for Lot in the City of Sodom. And if you're unsure what a theology of public life entails, what that's all about, Charles Matthews describes it as answering the question, what has Washington to do with Jerusalem? That's sort of what we're gonna be talking about. What has Washington to do with Jerusalem? We're gonna go a bit around our elbow to get to our thumb to get to that answer to that question. But I pray that the formative work that we're gonna do here before we get to the answer to that question will be helpful to you. A sound biblical theology of public life is comprised of or consists of principles to help instruct the disciple of Christ in how to faithfully engage the public in the cause of Christ. Now that certainly entails the Great Commission. Certainly entails preaching the gospel and we are called commanded to go into the world with the gospel, preach the gospel to every creature. But it goes beyond the preaching of the gospel to the ways in which a genuine Christian, genuine believer is to live out their faith in this lost world in which we are pilgrims and sojourners. We have a responsibility to this lost world not only with the gospel, but to address or engage this world with the cause of Christ. So that's not limited to merely discussing a life of public theology. That's not exactly what we're talking about, right? A life of public theology. In other words, just living out our theology in public. But more, it's refusing to be modern day monastics and living openly in accord with what we believe. But it's more than that. It's a theology of public life. In other words, engaging the public sphere in accord with what we believe. We see those examples of that throughout scripture. We're gonna talk about those some as we go. Paul tells us in 1 Timothy chapter two that we're to pray for those in authority so that we might lead a quiet and peaceable life. Well, the relatively quiet and peaceable life, that has been the experience of the church now in our country for the past 250 years since our founding. And we've not been compelled by necessity as brothers and sisters who went before us to answer this question in the way that they have or to deal with this issue in the way that they have. But our brothers and sisters in history certainly have been compelled to consider this subject and it certainly appears that we're going to need to do that as well. The time has come for us to think soberly and biblically about a theology of public life. So a theology of public life is a very broad subject. And so what we've done is a limit the scope of our study to two parts at the forefront of our concern. Part one, we're entitling Leviathan Rising. It's a broad overview of our responsibility for and relationship to the government as instituted by God. And we're gonna cover in part two, a social injustice. Little play on words. We'll deal more specifically with the subject there of social justice. By way of brief review then, as we get into our subject this morning, our objectives for this series are relatively simple. The first objective is to better understand the times in which we now live. And that's what we've spent last Sunday and now this Sunday doing. We wanna understand the times in which we live, the background of this subject, why it has become so important, maybe give some understanding as to why things have seemed to have changed so much in the last several years. And we want to objectively interpret our current circumstances from a biblical worldview. So first, we wanna better understand the times in which we now live. Secondly, we wanna determine from the Bible how it is that a believer should think and believe and act and engage. We cannot be modern day monastics. We've been called out of this world, but we are charged with being ambassadors for Christ to this world and we wanna be faithful in our responsibilities. And then third, having thought through those things, we wanna prepare ourselves to do that which we have determined with the Lord's help to do. And that's an important step. Also, we wanna think through what it is that we're responsible to do. And by the end of this study, we'll have some concrete plans in mind for what we are to do. And we'll be excited about talking through those with you. But then we as a church want to be faithful in laboring to do what it is we've determined to do with respect to this. So if you're following along your outline, we're in part one, Leviathan rising, we're covering point A now, the rise of the new religion. I've broken this first section, the rise of the new religion out into two parts. Last time we were together a couple of weeks ago, we considered out with the old. And so this morning we're gonna think about in with the new, out with the old, in with the new. And I want this to be casual. I'd like to be able to open it up for questions. If you have questions, please feel free to stop me. I just wanna have a casual conversation about these issues in hopes that it'll help us think more about this issue we're facing. In out with the old a couple of weeks ago, we described, if you remember, the generational replacement that's been going on in our country with respect to Christianity in particular. As millennials in particular are abandoning any affiliation with religious norms or traditions. Quite often that means a shift from old moral codes that have been traditionally upheld by Christianity. Those old moral codes now seem to be oppressive to true freedom and they are establishing a new moral code of their own making. We'll talk about that. That's what the social justice movement is. And as we add now adults to the population, these adults, many of them millennials are increasingly describing themselves as nuns. Not N-U-N-S but N-O-N-E-S. Agnostic, atheist or nun referring to no religious affiliation at all. And just for purposes of our understanding, anyone have a, understand the difference between an atheist and an agnostic? Can someone explain that for us? The difference between an atheist and an agnostic? Yeah, Noel. Thanks brother. I'll wait for a mic to come around for Noel. Hi guys, good morning. So new millennials are beginning to describe themselves as nuns, N-O-N-E-S. That includes either atheistic, agnostic or no religious affiliation whatsoever. We have that microphone yet? Oh, here we go. So we're looking at the difference then between atheist and agnostic. What do you got brother? An atheist would say, you could say like they would say definitively God does not exist. Whereas an agnostic would say, well, I don't know. Maybe he does, maybe he doesn't. Yeah, very good, very good. So athas or atheistic, no God, ag or agnosis, meaning no knowledge, right? So an atheist would say there is no God, an agnostic would say, I don't know. That's a good, fair description of atheists or agnostics. And others just have no religious affiliation at all. However, that term, nun, as we've talked about, N-O-N-E, is highly deceptive. And what we're seeing today is both the institution and the development of what we would characterize or describe as a new religion. They would themselves often describe it as a new religion. And it's really not a new religion, it's really an old religion wrapped up in new wrapping paper. And we're gonna take a look at that today. There are many today who are describing the social justice issue as a new religion. The social justice itself really isn't the new religion. Social justice seems to be the morality of the new religion. And what the new religion actually appears to be is a repackaged secular humanism, a repackaged secular humanism. And we're gonna talk about that some this morning just so we understand what that is. We're calling it a new religion, but it has very old roots. Secular humanism has been around for a very long time. And what the secular humanists in our day have done is they've now co-opted or adopted cultural or social Marxism as the morality of their new religion. We're gonna put all that together for you so we know at the end of all this exactly what that means. Secular humanists have now, it's interesting if you think about secular humanism, one of the objections that atheists or secular humanists themselves have had about secular humanism in the past is they don't believe that it can last or that a society can last apart from an objective morality. Right, apart from an objective morality, cultures, countries crumble. And we've seen that in history. And so the thought is by those who object to secular humanism is that without an objective transcendent morality, a morality that comes from outside you, the individual, without that, then societies can't last. They eventually crumble and die. But what's interesting about today's version of secular humanism is they seem to have adopted a morality that is somewhat objective and that's the morality of social justice and we're gonna see how those two things are connected. All right, so we're gonna talk about both a little bit here this morning. Let me give you first, I wanna give you an introduction of a broad overview, a very broad overview of secular humanism. And to do that first, I want you to turn with me to Romans chapter one. So we're gonna talk about it, I wanna give you a broad overview to secular humanism. But first I wanna, I want us to see the basis for that in the Bible from Romans chapter one. This is actually a text that we're gonna talk about this morning during the morning service and the sermon. And in Romans chapter one, why don't you look beginning at verse 22? Actually, let's back up a little bit and let's just begin at the beginning of our text. We're gonna be covering that this morning. So verse 18. For the wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men who suppress the truth in unrighteousness. So first thing they're doing, we've talked about this in the sermon so far, men are suppressing the truth in their unrighteousness. In their sin, men are shoving off any knowledge of God. They don't like to retain God in their knowledge. And so they want to disavow anything to do with God. They suppress the truth of God in their sin because verse 19, the way in which they do that, what may be known of God is manifest in them for God has shown it to them. For since the creation of the world, his invisible attributes are clearly seen being understood by the things that are made, even his eternal power and Godhead so that they are without excuse. Because although they knew God, they did not respond in accord with that knowledge by glorifying him as God, nor were they thankful, but they became futile in their thoughts and their foolish hearts were darken. We're gonna talk about what all that means this morning. And professing to be wise, pretending to be wise, claiming to be wise, they were made fools. And they changed or exchanged the glory of the incorruptible God into an image made like corruptible man and birds and forfeited animals and creeping things. In verse 23, the glory of God is not something that can be changed, right? We don't add to his glory. We don't take away from his glory. So what Paul means there in context is that they exchanged the glory, which should have been the object of their worship, the glory of God. They exchanged that for something else. They put something else in its place and worshiped that instead. They changed or exchanged the glory of the incorruptible God into an image made like corruptible man. I like the contrast there, right? Incorruptible God into an image like corruptible man, birds, forfeited animals and creeping things. This is what we would call the dark exchange, right? The dark exchange. What man does in suppressing the truth of God in their unrighteousness can't get rid of the knowledge of God altogether. Can't get rid of the fact that the knowledge of God or the law of God is written upon their heart. They're made in the image of God. Solomon says that eternity is bound up in the heart of man. So they can't get rid of all of the knowledge of God. So what do they do? They cover it over with false religion, right? It's a dark exchange. They exchanged that verse 25, exchange the truth of God for the lie and serve the creature rather than the creator who is blessed forever, amen. So part of this dark exchange is the covering up of the truth with a lie. It's the exchange of true religion, the worship of the true and living God with false religion and the worship of what is a figment of man's imagination, okay? So secular humanism is a result in our day of that dark exchange. There are many false religions in this world, many false religions. All of them, all of them represent this act of sinful man to cover up the truth of God with a lie and secular humanism is just another form of that. It has a religious fervor. It has a religious theology. It has a religious doctrine. It has a religious morality. It has a religious mission. We're gonna talk about eventually the sacraments of the new religion. This is for all intents and purposes, a new religion. And that new religion, secular humanism packaged up the way that it is today, has four essential components, right? That characterize it or qualify it as secular humanism. First, it involves a dethroning of God. It involves a dethroning of God. The foundation of humanist belief from start to finish is the denial of God and the supernatural, denial of God and the supernatural. Atheism is the belief that there is no God, no supernatural creator, no divine moral lawgiver and no ultimate judge of man's actions. The humanists have come up over the years with a three different, what they call manifestos, humanist manifestos. In the humanist manifesto two written by Paul Kurtz is his name in 1973, it says this, we find insufficient evidence for belief in the existence of a supernatural. It is either meaningless or irrelevant to the question of the survival and fulfillment of the human race. As non-theists, we begin with humans, not God, nature, not deity. I think that's a good definition of what secular humanism is. As non-theists, we begin with humans, not God, nature, not deity. We can discover no divine purpose, no providence for the human species. While there is much that we do not know, humans are responsible for what we are or will become. No deity will save us, we must save ourselves. If you're an atheist, save yourselves from what? I would ask, you know. All right, so the first step of the first essential component to a secular humanism is a dethroning of God. Any questions so far? Okay, all right. Secondly, after dethroning of God, you need the deification of man. Secular humanism involves the deification of man. Humanity is the supreme authority. Paul Kurtz again, a leading humanist writer, says that God himself is man deified. The goal becomes for the secular humanist in deifying man, the goal becomes an authentic life, not constrained by external forces imposed upon him. Secular sociologist Charles Taylor said this. He says, the understanding of life which emerges with the romantic expressivism of the late 18th century is that each of us has his or her own way of realizing our humanity. All right, we each have our own way of realizing our humanity. We each have our own responsibility for realizing or fulfilling our own humanity and that it is important to find out and live out one's own humanity as against surrendering to conformity with a model imposed on us from the outside. What do you think that model is that they're primarily referring to? Religion, Christianity, okay? By society, by the previous generation or by a religious or political authority. So the aim of secular humanism is for each individual person to find their authentic self, right? Their authentic identity to live an authentic life and an authentic life is defined as one not constrained by moral codes or not constrained or compelled by external moral forces imposed upon him from outside not surrendering to conformity. That's gonna become important so we consider how this thought is prevalent today. The defecation of man. Third, there is a foundation of humanist ethics involved with secular humanism. Humanists reject any moral code that exists outside themselves. Again, humanist manifesto two. The traditional supernaturalistic moral commandments are especially repressive of our human needs. They are immoral insofar as they foster illusions about human destiny, heaven, and suppress vital inclinations. Now it's interesting if you start looking at secular humanism as it relates to the scientific community, in particular the writings of secular humanists over the last couple of centuries. The repression they're talking about is a sexual repression. The repression of what they would consider to be natural desires that are expressed through human sexuality. That becomes extremely important as we consider where we are today with LGBTQ movement and the rise of transgenderism. Carl Truman wrote a book and that's an excellent book. I highly recommend it to you. It's called The Rise and Triumph of the Modern Self. And in the book, Carl Truman begins to break down the thinking of today. How did we get to this point in society where it is completely acceptable or common to hear someone say, I am a man trapped inside a woman's body?  If anyone said anything remotely close to that, you would have been a sick disease individual. We've gotten to the point in today's society where that's not only common, but acceptable.  So he says, how do we get to this point where we can make such a statement? And there's a way that that has developed. We'll talk about it some. All right, so there is a foundation of humanist ethics. We don't want to repress our human needs or suppress vital inclinations and the way that that movement typically conceives of those things is sexual. Christian moral codes are baseless. They are without warrant and do not allow people to fulfill their conceptions of an authentic or a good life. In other words, anything that is imposed upon you from the outside limits or restricts your ability to live out an authentic or a real life. It inhibits your person and anything seen to inhibit your person is considered to be repressive or oppressive. And if it's oppressive, it's immoral, right? So the objective of humanism is to do away with those moral codes. They've done a pretty good job of that. Herbert Schneider calls morality and experimental art saying that it is the basic art of living well together. What is morality? It's just living well together. Doing our best to live well together. We want to be good neighbors to one another. The secular humanist motto has become in our day in absence of an objective morality. It's become do no harm. So as long as you can live your life and do no harm, you're willing, able to pursue your own interests, live by that mantra, do no harm, and that's where their morality comes from. Moral right and wrong, therefore, must be conceived of in terms of moral standards generated in a particular society. It's interesting. If you read literature on this subject, in particular, if you read secular humanists or you read sociologists, many will refer to what one sociologist, Charles Taylor, called a social imaginary. A social imaginary. And I don't know if you've wondered this. I've thought about this myself. Like you watched the news and over the past several years, we've seen this collective change in the way that people think and talk. And it's as if there's a puppet master behind the scenes pulling all the strings and there is pulling all the strings. People tend to exhibit group think in all of this. How is it that one campus in California can be shouting out cancel culture and driving a conservative speaker out of off the campus while a campus on the East Coast with no relation to that campus is doing the exact same thing for the exact same reason? Where does this collective group think come from? It's called what they've called social imaginary. And basically what it entails is what we don't realize is that the writing or the thought of social elites ends up trickling down. People who, for example, a lot of what goes on in science or sociology today, psychology today is related to the study of Sigmund Freud. A lot of what Freud taught and wrote about has been completely rejected and debunked. But there are a couple of kernels involved with what Freud has taught that are widely accepted. And it's interesting to think about how the thought and writing of Sigmund Freud has crept into a culture where a vast majority of the population has never even read the first word from Sigmund Freud. But it's this trickle down effect. You have people at the top, secularist thinkers, last week when we were together we looked at an example of that with A.C. Grayling who's a leading secularist humanist writer and how that thought process trickles down into the population. And before you know it, you have, as is the case in our day, an entire population thinking in the same way, reacting in the same way. Where did this group understanding of victimhood come in or this social justice morality? It seems to have all come together at one time. A widespread across our country and we know that we're not fighting a battle against flesh and blood. We're fighting spiritual forces, spiritual warfare. So we understand a biblical conception of how that works. But it's amazing how that just infiltrates the thinking of people in our culture. I'm gonna give you another example of that in a minute that I think really explains where we're at today. But it's called the social imaginary. We as a culture, I wanna give you an example of how that impacts even us and the way that we think. We think today differently than my dad's generation thought. And there are reasons for that. And we've used that example many times of the frog in the boiling pot of water. You put a frog in a pot and you turn the temperature up on the pot, the frog is incapable of sensing the gradual increase in the temperature and a frog will boil to death. Well, brothers and sisters, we are in this culture. We're not to be of the culture. We're in this culture and we, in solidarity with the culture, are influenced. This can influence our thinking, the way that we think and feel and believe and act. And so we've gotta be really, really careful to anchor and ground ourselves in the truth of God's word, laboring in the word of God to transform or renew our minds so that we're not influenced by the thinking of this wicked culture. Cordless Lamont said this, another humanist. The humanist, for the humanist, this is interesting. Stupidity is just as great a sin as selfishness. And the moral obligation to be intelligent ranks always among the highest of duties.  That's right. Those who would put their faith in a mythological God. The implication of that statement by Lamont, who's also a leading humanist writer, is that only intelligent people, leading elitist secular humanists, only intelligent people are capable of making correct moral choices, leading to the assumption that intelligent people are to act as the moral compass for the rest of society. And that ends up with power in the hands of a select few humanist elites to create dogma that all others must follow. That's where we got to last time when we were looking at the example of A.C. Greeling and those poor kids that were taken to the Creation Museum in Ohio, right? And he saw that as an act of a human rights violation to take those poor kids to the Creation Museum. And who do you think it is that will be leading the charge to legislate against taking your kids to the Creation Museum as soon as he's able? Humanist A.C. Greeling. Lastly, the pursuit of secular humanism. The pursuit of secular humanism is radical autonomy and social equality. Radical autonomy, meaning that there's nothing that is acceptable that could be said to impinge or constrain the free actions of the self and then social equality, meaning social justice and equality of outcomes. We'll talk about that more as we get to the social justice subject. Okay, that's a quick broad overview of secular humanism. It begins with the dethroning of God. It continues with the deification of man. Right, and we see it's pursuit of ethics, it's pursuit of morality and the pursuit of autonomous, the autonomous individual. What questions do you have any questions about that brief overview? Oh, brother, yes, Tom. Morning, brother. Morning, brother. The Christians, specifically Christian leaders that are out there espousing or supporting the social justice, have they been influenced by this same secular humanism? Yes, I believe so, brother. Yeah, it's a really good question. That's one of the reasons we wanted to cover that social justice issue in the second part of this study is because it is absolutely wreaking havoc on the professing church today. We talked about it last time that a part of the problem with this is that what we see largely in United States today is a sham counterfeit Christianity. The Lord's Church, the genuine church has always been there, always will be. The Lord says, I'll build my church and he's faithful, right? But what has been predominant in our country is a fake counterfeit Christianity, a weak, formalistic, moralistic sham, a husk of something that's true. And so what's happened is that, I think this is the reason for it, what's happened is that because those professing, their Christian churches in name only, those professing churches have latched on to something that is counterfeit, they're not adhering solely to the word of God. They are lackeys to every wind of doctrine that comes along. They're tossed to and fro like children. And so when a movement like this comes through, we've seen it multiple times in church history before, a movement comes through. The church is only too quick, the professing church, only too quick to gobble it down, to jump on the bandwagon. And most of the time what you see is not only does the professing church gobble down the error, but then they turn and they persecute those who don't, right, the genuine church, the true church that's taking a stand against it. So yeah, I think what you see today, if in that brother, we together are in the same kind of a boat, we have to be able to see it clearly, understand it, diagnose it, interpret it from a biblical worldview, so that we can take a biblical stand against it and not be swayed by it. And I think the social justice issue, it's amazing to me that churches, pastors, that we would have a short time of go otherwise would have considered faithful and orthodox sound biblical. We can no longer consider to be because they've given in to what essentially is a false gospel. And we'll talk about that when we get to the social justice issue, but it's really making its rounds through the church today. Okay, any other questions or thoughts about any of that? Yeah, Alfredo. I was curious, why do you think that at least among some relatively orthodox Christian leaders, it's rather like, why has it been difficult for them to say treat social justice the same way that they would treat a subject like say, like if they were doing an analysis of Hinduism, they might treat that as something fundamentally like unbiblical presuppositions about the world, like why wouldn't it be any different for something like critical theory or social justice? Why would it be? Give me any different for critical theory or social justice. Yeah, I think there's an element of that, right? Doing good to your neighbor, loving one another, right? Right now, the big or the mantra under which social justice spreads in the church is love, right? We need to love our brothers and sisters and this is the way that we demonstrate our love for them and it's removing those things which are oppressive. We're gonna see in a second, we'll catch a glimpse of it in the way that people begin to think about what is oppressive and what isn't. We've moved out of the realm in which, like if you go back to, for example, my dad's generation, right? Boomers, as the kids would call them nowadays, baby boomers, that generation and before. To somebody from that generation, oppression was a theft of property or an injury to your person, right? That was what oppression was. Somebody who attacked you or attacked or damaged your property. Today, that's not the definition of oppression anymore, is it? Harmful words are oppressive. That's the psychologized man. Harmful words are oppressive. Harmful thoughts are oppressive. Harmful attitudes can be oppressive or oppressive and so our definition of what is a victim or our definition of what is oppressive is completely changed. And yeah, I think a lot of the professing church is bought into that nonsense. So we'll get there. Okay, all of this is fundamentally based upon a change or a shift in the way that man thinks today. And I wanna introduce to you, this is what we're sort of talking about. We're touching on it. All of this depends upon a fundamental shift in the way that man thinks today. Carl Truman wrote this book, The Rise and Triumph of the Modern Self. It begins to trace the development of this shift in a chapter in the book entitled Reimagining the Self. And so I wanna give you some of what is contained in that chapter. I think it's really helpful. The shift begins with a change in worldview. And I think it helps us to be knowledgeable of what this change in worldview looks like. It's a change from what is called a mimetic worldview to a poetic worldview. A mimetic worldview to a poetic worldview. Mimetic, two Greek words. Mimetic is where we get our word mimic from. Mimetic regards the world as having a given order, a given structure, a given meaning. You didn't come up with it yourself. It's been given to you. It's been handed to you. Human beings are required to discover that meaning, to learn that meaning and to conform to it. Something that exists outside of them and their purpose in life is to understand what it is and to conform to it. We've often thought about culture in that way, right? When people immigrate to our country, in the past, I know people have used terms like assimilate. You wanna move into the culture and you wanna assimilate. You're no longer Dutch, you're American, right? You're no longer Italian, you're American. You're no longer German, you're American, right? Assimilate into the culture. That's an example or an illustration of a mimetic worldview. The culture, the norms, the codes, the morality all exists outside of you. Your worldview is to understand what that is and to conform to it. True self is something given and something learned, right? It's something given, something learned. When you go to school, you're learning how to conform to society. You take civics, you take government, you take economics. You conform your thinking to the culture or conform your thinking to those external norms. That's a mimetic worldview. The poetic worldview means that the world is merely raw material and circumstance for you to make of it as you will. Human beings are free to create meaning and to create purpose for themselves and no one can or should dictate meaning to you. The true self is something that the individual himself or herself creates and not imposed on them by anyone else. If anyone imposes their worldview on you, that's oppressive or repressive. The poetic worldview is essentially humanistic. I can see the difference, can't you? The poetic, not poetic, poetic. Poetic worldview is man-centered. Man-centered eventually, it's not necessarily so, but eventually so it's atheistic, right? Because man is the one who determines. The self is sovereign and the self dictates where meaning comes from and what's authentic or not or inauthentic, okay? Nimetic versus poetic. Reasons for the shift. One example Truman gives in the book that is a reason for this shift is the change or the shift from what was an agrarian society to an industrialized or a technological society today. And if you think about it for people who had to plant and trust God for the increase who were dependent upon the environment, they couldn't plant in December and reap a harvest in April. That's not gonna go very well and they're going to starve. There were authoritarian, objectively authoritarian laws at work that compelled men to conform to forces that were beyond their control, that existed outside of themselves, that transcended what they could do themselves. And for millennia, that was also expressed in religious terms where people who abandoned the truth of God exchanged the truth of God, Romans chapter one, verse 25, exchanged the truth of God for a lie and worshiped and served the creature rather than the creator who was blessed forever and gave themselves over to false religion for millennia. This became a huge part of life that was determined for you from the outside. But that changed, right? It's changed today, hasn't it? As mankind has become more and more through technology, more and more in control of their circumstances, more and more in control of engineering seeds and engineering plants and controlling the watering of those plants and even genetically engineering plants and seeds and animals, right? Mankind has taken more and more control over their circumstances, over their culture, so to speak. And so there's been this gradual shift in the mind of man from a memetic worldview to a poetic worldview, from that which is imposed upon me from the outside to that which I make for myself. A man becomes more and more self-involved, self-absorbed, man-centered, essentially humanistic. Another example of this is medical treatments or medical advancements. Diseases that just a few decades ago would have meant a death sentence today are cured. We don't see any more. Some of them absolutely wiped off the planet. Maybe the China virus with it eventually. Maybe it may have been medical advances that created that thing in the first place. But diseases that once were a death sentence are now curable. Truman says, all these developments have served to weaken the authority of the natural world and persuade human beings of their power. In other words, over time, as we advance, in particularly with technology, the more that we advance, the more humanistic we become, right? The more man-centered that we become and the less God-dependent we believe ourselves to be, we go from a mimetic worldview to a poetic worldview. Reality is increasingly something that we can manipulate according to our own wills and desires. Increasingly not something that we must conform ourselves to or passively accept. The shift from a mimetic to poetic is one in which the transcendent crumbles gives way to man's will. Given purpose, collapses, crumbles, and any purpose I choose for myself, any purpose I choose to create for myself, human nature is something that I invent. Human nature is something that I have control over, even at the point of identity. Identity is something that I have control over. These two terms, mimetic and poetic, serve to explain the ways in which people have traditionally thought about themselves in the world, right? Two polar opposites, two polar opposite worldviews. And that shift from mimetic to poetic really has taken place in the 20th century. Since after the Industrial Revolution, we've seen that shift from mimetic that had been in place for millennia to now poetic and psychologized man. We've seen that shift take place in the 20th century. Mimetic worldview works within a traditional view of culture. Sociologist Phillip Reef says this. He says, culture directs people outward. Culture directs people toward community purposes, right? Communities in which the self is realized or the self is satisfied for millennia, we found meaning or purpose in community. And Reef talks about this in terms of four different kinds of men, four different kinds or categories of mankind. First is political man. That arose with Plato and Aristotle, where political man is somebody who's involved in civics, involved in public life.  And he would roll over in his grave to see what it's become today. Involved in civics, involved in public life, and it's in that political sphere in which he finds meaning, finds a sense of self or purpose. There was religious man. Religious man was something that Reef describes as a medieval period man where literally the entire focus of his existence was the church, the community of the church and the sacred order of the church, the functions of the church, the mission of the church. Medieval man or religious man. Third was economic man. Economic man rose during the Industrial Revolution, found his meaning or sense of purpose in trade, in making money, work, production. It's interesting, there's an example, I wanna read this to you, of economic man and the way that economic man thinks. Let me read this to you from Truman. Let's see here. Let's see if you can relate to this. So relating economic man to what today has become psychologized man. He says, take for example, the issue of job satisfaction. Why they do job satisfaction surveys. So let's say we're gonna do a job satisfaction survey, something that's significant for most adults. They wanna have satisfaction on the job. He says, my grandfather, left school at 15, spent the rest of his working life as a sheet metal worker in a factory in Birmingham, the industrial heartland of England. If he had been asked, if he found satisfaction in his work there, there's a distinct possibility he would not even have understood the question. Given that it really reflects the concerns of psychological man's world. In other words, job satisfaction wasn't something that was a priority to economic man. What was a priority to economic man? Putting food on the table, caring for your family. It was a purpose outside of yourself. You found purpose, found meaning, found the necessity of hard work in your job and your trade, right? Says that question really reflects the concerns of psychological man's world to which he did not belong. But if he did understand the question, he probably would have answered in terms of whether his work gave him the money to put food on his family's table, shoes on his children's feet. If it did so, then yes, he would have affirmed that his job satisfied him, right? His needs were those of his family and in enabling him to meet them, his work gave him satisfaction. That's how you judged on the job satisfaction in that time period, right? Focused on someone other than you. And, you know, think about that today. We can have the same mentality if we're not influenced by a psychologized man, right? I can do this work and take satisfaction in it because this is a job that God has blessed me with. God has provided work for me and this is the means that God has blessed me with through which I put food on the table and shoes on my kids' feet, right? That's not unfortunately how people tend to think today, right? He says my grandfather was, if anything, Arifian Peter Reef, economic man whose economic production and the results of that for others, his family, were key to his sense of self. Now, he says, if I am asked the same question, and maybe you think about this too, if somebody asked you, do you have job satisfaction, right? They gave you a job satisfaction survey. How would you think about that? He says my instinct is to talk about, he's a teacher, a professor, right? My instinct is to talk about the pleasure that teacher teaching gives me about the sense of personal fulfillment I feel when a student learns a new idea or becomes excited about some concept as a result of my classes. Now, he says the difference is stark. It is, isn't it? You think about the difference between those two things. Job satisfaction for his grandfather was empirical, outwardly directed, unrelated to his psychological state. For members of mine and subsequent generations, the issue of feeling is central. And that issue of feeling represents the shift from a memetic worldview to a poetic worldview. It also represents the shift from what Reef would call economic man to psychologized man. And psychologized man is what we see today. Psychologized man is characterized not so much by finding an identity through outward directed activity, but finding identity rather through an inward quest for personal psychological happiness. I wanna submit to you though too that in a similar way to that in which Truman would differ from his grandfather in his understanding of job satisfaction, it's also an indication of how easily influenced you and I are by how thinking in the culture affects us as well, right? And if you think about that just for a moment, we're absolutely bombarded with it, right? This worldview occupies every square inch of media, is the predominant prevalent view taught indoctrinated in the schools. Our politics has seeped into every area of life. So influence is how we think in those areas also. We are heavily influenced and influenceable. So it can impact us and we need to remain anchored to God's word. The psychologized man, what Reeve called the psychologized man, others have called expressive individualism and it describes what it means today to be a modern person. Very different, a very different way in which people today think about what it means to be a human being, what it means to be a person, what it means to relate to the world around us. The inner life is that which characterizes what it means to be an authentic person. Now this happened with a couple of reversals, a couple of shifts in our thinking. The first reversal was this. Psychologized well-being becomes the focus rather than socialization. It used to be with our kids, as our kids were growing up, we wanted them to be socialized, right? Part of the object or the intent of school was for children to become socialized, to learn social behaviors, social norms. I remember reading one time, said that the object of parenting was to teach your kids to be well-liked, right? That's socialization, thinking outside of themselves, adapting to and conforming to social norms. Well, with this psychologized well-being, I quote, therapy ceases to serve the purpose of socializing an individual. Instead, therapy today seeks to protect the individual from the kind of harmful neuroses that society itself creates through its smothering of the individual's ability to be her or himself. In other words, society's just trying to hold you down, keep you from being your authentic self. The second reversal in thinking is that commitment, commitment is no longer focused outside oneself. In other words, commitment is not focused in necessarily politics, religious commitment or economic commitment, workplace commitment. Rather, commitment is first and foremost to the self and is inwardly directed. Sounds like Romans one, doesn't it? We have abandoned God and we are idolatrous, worshiping ourselves rather than God, the dethroning of God, the deification of man.  Outward institutions then become in effect servants of the individual and their inner sense of well-being rather than servants like they were before of themselves. Outward institutions become in effect the servants of the individual. They cease being places of personal formation where, for example, on college campuses, they cease being places where students go to learn and for personal formation, they begin to be places where students go to be encouraged or affirmed in their thoughts and beliefs. Any school environment today that would challenge what someone thinks is repressive, oppressive, it's part of that old guard, that old notion of oppressive moral institutions that needs to be torn down, now they need to support and encourage and affirm the student where they can be their authentic self. That's what has given rise today of schools of safe places. Schools are required to be safe places, not where students are to be challenged but where students are to be affirmed and reassured. The result is then this slow but steady psychologizing of the self and what Truman calls the triumph of the inward-directed therapeutic over traditional outward-directed educational philosophies. That which challenges or attempts to falsify my psychological beliefs about myself and thus disturb my inner sense of well-being is by definition harmful and must be rejected. Institutions must be transformed to adjust the new morality. The aim is no longer a conformity of the individual, it's conformity to the individual. Everything is expected to conform to what the person believes is their authentic self. Otherwise it's just external authority which is oppressive. So-called external or objective truths then are simply constructs designed by the powerful to intimidate or control or harm the weak. Overthrowing those oppressive institutions like schools that don't conform or churches for example, becomes the aim of all these institutions. Personal authenticity is found through the public expressions of inward desires. So what this mean, let's summarize then and we'll talk about this one more week and we'll summarize it and how this has been systematized today. But what essentially has happened is that the inner psychological person has become sovereign. The psychological self dictates everything. Identity becomes then as unlimited as your imagination.  That's when we get, for example, the white woman who identified it as an African-American woman, right? We have men identifying as women, women identifying as men. We have more and more letters added to the acronym.  If you think about it in terms of those moral codes that are imposed by Christianity, the moral codes that, except for the first table of law, right? Commandments one through four, they want nothing to do with because that has to do with the worship of God. But the second table of the law, dealing with how we are to love one another, the thing that is, are the one commandment that is seen to be oppressive or repressive while the others remain currently anyway socially acceptable. The one that is repressive is the admonition against, or the command against adultery. Because it represses what secular humanists would consider natural desires, natural expressions now of identity and are born out of a repressive or an oppressive moral code that has no warrant or basis. And so where's the fight been with secular humanism? Homosexuality, same-sex marriage, transgenderism, the sexualization of our culture, the sexual revolution in the 60s, not a cause of what we see today, the sexual revolution of the 60s and 70s was a symptom of what we see today. It's just an example of what we see today. It wasn't the cause of it, but it arises out of wanting to deconstruct or do away with those oppressive moral codes. We'll talk about that more soon. I must not tailor my psychological needs to the nature of society that would create anxiety for me and make me inauthentic. Therefore, refusing to bake me a cake causes psychological harm. Words that cause psychological harm will need to be policed and suppressed. Used to be just simply damage to property or harm to someone's person. And now words and thoughts are a means of oppression. That's being characterized now today as hate speech. And we already see freedom of speech under attack. It's going to be more under attack. And then we see the rise of the new morality. The new morality that is helping to solidify or galvanize the movement is social justice, which is borrowed from Marxism. And we'll talk about that. That which oppresses, that which stifles the expression of our authentic selves, which is whatever our psychological self has determined. Psychological self is sovereign. That is the norm, the rule. Prioritizes, they prioritize victimhood, the sovereign right of the individual to find his own existence and the dignity of the individual. We'll talk about dignity some next week also. Right of time. Any last minute questions? This was a tough subject to sort of track and follow today. I pray it's somewhat helpful. It'll make more sense as we keep going through the lesson of the series, and we'll get more to a clear development of this next week, so Uncle Ron. And then, time for maybe two questions total. Yeah, Uncle Ron. Okay, so you and I talked a little bit on Friday about Armenians and their view that man chooses God. You know, ask Jesus into your heart. Oh yeah, yeah. So do you think that that weakens the church so that social justice and other causes can come in because it's man-centered? Yeah, absolutely. Right, man-centered gospels today, man-centered teachings today. You'll find this morning just the example of the Apostle Paul in Romans chapter one to be dramatically not man-centered. To be dramatically God-centered. And so a man-centered theology, man-centered preaching, man-centered worship, man-centered churches have opened themselves wide open to this error. And you see it pouring into the church, the professing church. So yeah, I definitely agree with that, brother. Last question, one more. The last thing that you was talking about, I can't remember the two terms, but is that like kind of like the enlightenment, like repackaged? Yeah, yeah, a lot of that secular humanistic thought came or rose during the enlightenment. And we're gonna talk about one in particular, probably here soon, that it started with. So yeah, a lot of it came from the enlightenment period. So good question. Okay, let's pray and get you out of here. Father in heaven, Lord, thank you for the blessing in a church like this to be able to talk about a subject like this. Please help us, Lord, to understand the, this world in which we live. Help us to understand our place in it as ambassadors for the Lord Jesus Christ. Lord, help us to be faithful to you in it. Help us to take the torch that's been passed down to us and to run our race with faithfulness. And I pray, Lord, as we seek to honor you in that, that you give us much fruitfulness for the cause of Christ and for the growth of the church. May you be glorified in these things. We love you. Be with us now as we seek to worship you and may you be magnified in Jesus' name. Amen.