go all right welcome to Quick show my name is Greg Matson and I am your host in this episode we bring back Dan
Ellsworth Dan welcome to the show thank you thanks for having me all right we are going to go there with this we're
going to go there uh we're going to talk about is Marxism the great an abominable
church and we're going to lay this out Bring up some scripture delve into this a little bit but first I know that you
got interested in this for a reason why are you interested in looking into and studying Marxism so a few years ago I
was invited to join a discussion group of latterday saints and and former
latterday Saints and some people who were kind of in between right and the
discussion group those those tend to not go very well um they tend to be pretty
contentious and and I kind of knew that going in but what I was not prepared for
was there was a completely different vocabulary used by a lot of members of
the church and former members they kind of shared a a different
vocabulary and I I kind of understood what they were saying but uh they it
seemed like any time we taught or or promoted any gospel principles they
seemed to be countered with some combination of these terms and and these
ways of thinking around this vocabulary and I'm talking about words like
intersectionality like systems of Oppression centering uh
marginalization and this vocabulary so so I
understood the just the the basic meanings of those terms but the way that
they were being used was it was I I could not actually
have a productive conversation with anybody who were who were using those
terms you you couldn't it was it was almost you know I sometimes use the
metaphor of like a vat of acid right anything any gospel principle that you
teach it just goes into this vat of acid and it was really uh honestly it it kind
of messed with my head uh it it this was spring of of several years ago
and I left that group and I was just I I don't know I was kind of overwhelmed and
blindsided by the whole experience of getting exposure to this uh you know I I
I'm just going to come out and say it a religious belief system right and I
ended up fasting a lot to just I it felt like there was this toxic cloud in my
mind after being in that group and it went on and on and I ended up fasting
for days and days I ended up fasting half of the month of April a few years
ago like 15 days out of that month I was fasting to try to get this toxic mess
out of my head um and but I didn't really know what it was right until a
couple of years ago I started actually you know I got some exposure to the work of James Lindsay and some others and
and James Lindsay in particular you know his his main approach to things is to
just read Marxist literature yes and talk about it he's like here are their
words and then he offers a little bit of commentary here and there but he's mostly just reading their
words and I was listening to his podcast and all of a sudden that whole horrible
experience made so much sense and and it just became so clear to me
how um you know why it was so toxic and frustrating it's it's because you're
you're you're dealing with a different religious worldview and even among people who call
themselves latterday Saints right on once they've adopted this you know I couldn't reach even members of the
church and agree on like basic gospel concepts with them
so uh having that exposure through James Lindsay and some others uh it it led me
to write some things for Public Square that that kind of explored uh some of these dimensions of
Marxism and I went back and and thought through like okay I read the book Wild Swans when I was in college which is a
wonderful snapshot of Marxism in action in China right and how it works
and it since then it's been an area of interest for me because I frankly I I
want to counter its influence any way I can it's kind of part of my mission in
life in the church to be honest so that's a little bit of background and context for it okay so that's great I
think that that is the you know I I I talk about this a lot obviously on the podcast and it it's you
know what I always get push back on this it's well this isn't really what it is
you don't really understand what's happening Greg I remember once Dan I this was not this was maybe four years
ago I had put out a podcast and it was about some things seeping into BYU and
and I had an A A an English Professor a 10year English professor at BYU come
back at me saying that these things are not have nothing to do with Marxism
critical race theory is only a legal Theory and and I went back and forth and then
what I did is exactly that I went back and I copied and pasted the Contemporary authors that
bring on Marxism and use it and say they use it and say they're marxists and this
is what they use and then you see the language that you're talking about yeah sprouting up around exactly what they're
talking about as they are bringing their Source material from Marx and angles and
Marcus and Grampy and others yeah and it's like no and I put this out there and then he just stopped yeah then he
said okay you know he he didn't have anything any rebuttal these things are happening and this is the DNA yeah from
this that we're seeing today the vocabulary if we add it in postmodernism
we add in radical feminism um th this which are all they're still all rooted in the same
thing yeah but uh this is exactly what what you were experiencing well one of
the ways that people will will try to confuse the issue and and sometimes
maybe they don't even really know better but what they'll do is they'll say oh Marxism
is uh you know 19th century communism and that's not what I'm preaching that's
not what I'm teaching so I'm not a Marxist and and so if you come up with like a really narrow definition that's
erroneous by the way of Marxism uh then you can kind of squirm out of the
reality that you're a Marxist right and so they that's kind of a straw man like
oh I'm not that you know I'm not one of these stalinists or whatever I don't I
can't relate to that no it's it don't when when we talk about Marxism
we're talking about a set of assumptions about how the world works it's a
worldview it is a worldview absolutely we're we're talking about a set of
assumptions we're talking about a system of thought that uh and and it did not have
its Origins with Karl Marx it's ancient right whenever I read in the
Book of Mormon of the ancient plans around the acquisition of power I this comes to mind
right I I think we and anyway we can go a little bit further into that as we as
we proceed but I I definitely see it in in a lot of these scriptural
accounts right so you start off you know You' given me some a little bit of an outline of kind
of what your thought process is on this but first of all you're talking about what Mark is you've already said that it's it's not the same as communism and
people need to understand that sometimes people use that term communism yeah and I get it I I understand but but
there's what we deal with today for example is not the same thing right
communism is is based on uh you know a material economic class type of an
environment right though that is the the victim versus oppressor yeah what we deal with today is very cultural and it
has to do with race and it has to do with sexual orientation a it has to do
with the institutions of education and medicine and law and media and this is
how it conquers and divides and creates oppressor and victim so communism is is
like Marxism 1.0 yeah if you at least modern right modern it's a Marxism 1.0
today what we might call wokeness or what I usually I refer a little bit more into critical theory this is 2.0 this is
cult why don't you go into a little bit of what you studied about Mark let's talk
about his character this is always important to understand because the whole DNA behind where we're getting
this is from characters that are very unsavory individuals right right so talk
a little bit about Marx himself yeah so Marx was he was born into a family that was Jewish but they converted to
Christianity and depending on who you read they'll say that they some of the
some of the biographers are in disagreement on was that conversion of
their family before Marx was born or was it after and that's kind of neither here
nor there but uh what they are in agreement on is that his family
converted to avoid persecution of Jews right and so they became
Christian it's interesting he was in high school and one of his teachers
remarked that he was really good at articulating Christian faith you know he
would write papers and things and and he just seemed like a model student right
but there came a point where something happened and it was manifest in a
project that he and his classmates were all tasked with doing and it was a writing project project and in that
project Marx started using the word destroy and he used the word destroy six
times and nobody else in the entire class used it in their paper um but for some reason he started
using this word destroy and it actually became his nickname his classmates they
referred to him as destroy that was his nickname and so something happened
within him where he just became fixated on
destruction like and And he gravitated as as time went on he would he would
read and internalize uh you know characters like in in gira's play faou where you have
this exploration of demonic influences right and mephistophiles has the this
this quote in that play everything that exists should be destroyed and Marx used to love to he
used to quote mephistophiles at length but he used that phrase a
lot so something happened in his mind where
he we sometimes talk about what was his religious
worldview and and it's it's a common a common answer that people give is to say
that he was atheist but that's not necessarily accurate he was what we would call a
misotheist which you know when you talk about an atheist you're talking about
somebody who does not believe in God in the existence of God Marx he he hinted
at that sometimes but when you look at language and plays that he wrote and and
things that he gravitated toward in in terms of his influences and things he communicated he was a misotheist and
that's someone who hates God so a
misotheist even when he was articulating his economic Philosophy for example you
you would think that that would be something that would be neutral about the existence of God and and so forth
but Marx had a Theology and he his the
idea was make God irrelevant remove God from the equation because he hates God
right he hates he there there's there's another I've I've looked for a term and
I cannot find it but but another way of describing what Marx thought was just
hatred of reality he hated that anything anything at all
existed um and this was sort of an all consuming thing to where at one point
his father wrote him a letter and said I think you have a demon I really think
you actually are possessed and as time went on if you
when you look at his behavior and Greg you and I have done past episodes talking about the
Demonic and the psychology of Satan basically right this
insecure um needy godh hated um this this psychology that that
demands uh equality or or I should say Equity right sameness and if and if
sameness can't occur then differences need to be destroyed and eliminated um so so like when you look
at for example in communist countries where they embraced some of these
assumptions that Marx held you see what's called brutalist architecture have you ever seen that
before you know it's where buildings are just made ugly and the idea is don't make any
beautiful buildings well why not because there might be a building that's not as
beautiful somewhere nearby and then it's not fair to have a beautiful that's all
of Marxism that is let's bring everything down let's let's bring it
down so that there is no disparity because if you you you know Equity
requires tyranny in that sense it requires to take away the beautiful it requires to take away success it
requires to take away productivity it requires all these things yeah because
if one is above another then and this is to a to an absolute extreme right where
they were they would go out and kill a farmer because he had an extra cow or
because his his his his house was 20 square feet bigger than the neighbor neighbors y right provided quotas and
these things and it was uh that's at the core of this is to break it down break
down the system so that everybody can be equal yeah absolutely that's a core core
element of the satanic worldview and the Marxist worldview so
what do you mean by now what do you mean by the satanic worldview there in the scriptures we get glimpses of Satan's
worldview you know this demand for Equity saying not one soul will be lost he said that
in pre-existence right just this insane preoccupation with
Equity um also jealousy just just a real
deep jealousy of the father and the Christ like envying and coveting yeah
and viewing everything in terms of power relationships you know if if God has
glory and I don't then there's a a power imbalance that needs to be remedied and
how am I going to remedy that I'm going to destroy everything I'm going to destroy everything that God
creates because if anything adds to his glory I I can't allow that because I'm
so insanely jealous right you get these glimpses of Satan's psychology in the
scriptures in the temple Endowment in lots of places and
that is it would be very inaccurate I think to say that Marx was a Satan
worshipper you know I've I've heard some people say that and I say no that's a
mischaracterization but he is somebody who shared kind of you know these elements
of a satanic worldview and these assumptions about how the world Works
How the Universe should be you know so in that that sense I say
he uh he I I hate saying he was satanic because again people might gravitate
toward this idea of a Satan worshipper which he was not right but he
definitely in his writings and in his poetry you see him uh just identifying
with the figure who fell in Isaiah 14 how art thou Fallen oh Lucifer son of
the morning this comes up in Marx's poetry and so it's not Satan worship but
it's kind of an identification like that's that's how we should be right it's
an or an adoption yeah yeah right you know it's interesting you say that you
know I wonder that that's a great point because I mean that would be a
great testimony question even that would be a great a a great theological
question period is I don't know if I've ever heard heard anybody express it but what was Satan's
world view what is his world view and how would you put that together so if you said okay I want you
to write down I don't if we'd ever do this in Sunday school but write down on a a sheet of paper based on
scriptures what is his worldview what would you deduce from this right right
from these scriptures what would the world viiew be and then because I we need to do that because you you've
you've got to understand what the Mist Of Darkness are I believe I think an awareness is key of what these
philosophies of men are so that you are not you and your family are not pulled into them right you gota you got to know
what you're stepping into yeah and and to know that I think that is a great point a question that should be asked is
what is Satan's worldview yeah you get a you actually in in the restoration you
get the most full and Rich glimpse of Satan's psychology his
worldview his intentions his assumptions I I'm going to read a couple
of quotes and these are from people who were in Marx's Circle okay so one of
them is miky bakunin and he was an associate of Karl Marx and I want to
read what he says about Satan okay he says here steps in Satan the
Eternal Rebel the first freethinker and the emancipator of
Worlds he makes man ashamed of his beastial ignorance and obedience he emancipates him stamps upon his brow the
Seal of Liberty and Humanity in urging him to disobey and eat of the fruit of
knowledge so that's not Satan worship but it's it's Satan kind of
idolizing right like wow this amazing character that we can emulate
right um here's another true yeah yeah so here's another associate of KL Marx
uh who who was an influence on him William Godwin he said why did Satan
rebel against his maker it was as he himself informs us because he saw no
sufficient reason for that extreme inequality of rank and power which the
Creator assumed he nailed it yeah so these are people in Marx's Circle yeah
you know and between this and Marx's satanic poetry where you have all these
illusions that Echo Isaiah 14 and and some of these other kind of satanic
themes you get a picture again it's erroneous to say that they were Satan
worshippers but they did idolize him they thought he was cool they thought he
was edgy and and someone worth emulating so in that
sense you know that that's why when I talk about Mark's being satanic that is
what I'm wor I'm I'm referring we need a new word for Satanism or or satanic
right Satan revering or I don't know what to say but but you can tell they
really did rever him yeah Theory yeah yeah so this is part of that satanic
worldview right modern Satanism um you have blanch Barton who's
a leader in the Church of Satan saying the idea of worshiping worshiping Satan
is ridiculous we worship ourselves first and foremost and we use the satanic as a
metaphor for calling forth the powers within ourselves that we find enriching
or enlivening that is a satanic worldview
right yeah it's Pride that goes directly to Pride in
that case and I think um it's
it's well it's antithetical to the doctrine of Christ number one and it is
you know it's always interesting to think about that worldview that he has and that egalitarianism
uh equal outcomes which has to be forced there's no other way to do it right
right forced equal outcomes requires tyranny and it requires a loss of
agency well that's the interesting thing is when you when you listen to marxists
talk about their ideas implementation of that belief
system they never talk about a tyrant because they have this Vision
that oh it can be done with everybody having equal status and power and stuff
yet every time they actually boots on the ground nuts and bolts try to
implement Marxism they end up with the worst tyrants in the history of the
world and I me Hitler was bad there's no question about it but like in terms of
just the the suffering and death yeah suffering and death you you cannot touch
you know marxists you just can't touch them they do suffering and death
and in these movements these Marxist movements you you see the emergence of
the worst tyrants I mean horrible horrible tyrants so that's kind of a lie
that is sold to people is oh this can be done without tyranny no it can't yeah
another thing that there's a lie is you'll go back and you'll hear a lot of people that are trying to be a little bit apologetic about you know 19th or
20th century Marxism and they say well you know Lenin he wasn't that bad or or
you know he had Stalin and mael they they were just power hungry and they used this a way of of of getting their
power right and you know look power is certainly a part of it right give me all your glory yeah but the again if you
actually read The Source material you read who they are from their own mouths
yeah these people are in complete converts they are religious zealots for
Marxism yeah they they are hookline and sinker yeah so much so that they kill
and murder and starve people to bring about this religious
Utopia I would say that they're they're working toward right Hegel call it an alph hobin it's it's they believe that
that anything all means are acceptable to reach the end right and and one of
the weird things one of the absolute Twisted things about Marxist
societies is that they have to force people to stay
geographically in you know behind walls in their Marxist Society this hey we've
built this Marxist Utopia you can't leave it we're not going to let you ever leave it we're
gonna and I I love this quote this is from Paul kangor he said um he said so
restrictive was communism in the 20th century that its implementers routinely
refused to allow citizens the right to exit that is escape the destructive
systems imposed within their borders in some cases they erected walls to herd
and fence in the masses they claimed to Champion that bears repeating so
restrictive was communism that its Advocates had to build walls poured with
cement to with barbed wire patrolled 247 by secret police with automatic weapons
turned on their own citizenry to keep their people from fleeing that's
incredible I mean imagine if a revolution started and one of their
initial selling points as they're going out trying to win converts was once we do this you will
not be allowed to leave how how many people do you think would go along with
it like we are going to build walls you will not be able to leave here ever and that's what they did in society
after Society that's incredible that's astounding why would you have to keep
people in right well drag you slowly by chains into captivity right right and
it's a brutal captivity what one of the things that we
saw with maois China for example we we talk about the destruction of the
family and a lot of people don't understand that Marxism is actively
hostile toward the family as an institution under Mao they broke up
families and they just they marched children out to the countryside broke them away from their
parents they they did these these really perverse things
in Russia and China where they would incentivize children to to actually turn
on their parents and get them incarcerated right they would actually
hold them up as Heroes when they did that so it it's really it was incredible
the effect that Marxism the you know these Marxist movements had on families
where where they've been implemented um and and that's again that's something that a lot of people
may not be aware of the current leader of China was one of those kids who was
broken away from his family and look at him I mean the guy has no
qualms you know unleashing horror he has no qualms about it that you think about
the effects of of what he experienced as a kid it probably messed him up a lot
which is why we see this so coming
to really the Crux of of what we're talking about here how is this the great
and abominable Church spoken of by the Angelic host with
Nephi so I uh as we begin to answer that question I
want to tell your viewers and listeners Please Don't Go to gospel
Doctrine and repeat what I'm about to say okay this is my view I happen to
believe it's true uh but don't take it as gospel Doctrine it's it's it's the
way that I interpret these passages okay now when we talk about the great and
abominable church and the two churches right in in Nephi's apocalyptic
Visions we have these these word this word church is important to understand
because we in our day we when we think of the word church we think of an actual
institution that has filed you know bylaws with a government agency to say
hey we're a church we have nonprofit status you know we think of an actual organization with a higher Archy and so
forth I think and and I think in the past there has been a lot of
speculation about okay what is the great and abominable church and and some people said oh it was it's the Catholic
church or it's and they would point to an institution and
fortunately our view of that has has kind of has become more intelligent it
has expanded to a great degree and it's a lot more accurate to
think of the great and abominable church as a system right it's a
system that works together to undermine God's purposes in the world and a system
that would be manifesting an ideology I mean eventually you've got to have a a
Guist that is influencing this right right so what are the elements of this
system well the scriptures say that it it comes about among the nations of the
Gentiles right so check we know that's true of of Marxism it slayeth the saints
of God right uh Marxism has always persecuted the religious uh persecuted
Christians uh it the devil he was the founder of it we talked about just kind of the satanic psychology and
assumptions about egalitarianism and just the hatred of
power the hatred of differences and all of those kinds of things and I think those are a really good description of
you know what it means for the devil to be the founder of something something actually shares his views his attitude
toward God and and Humanity right uh so the gold and silver silks
and Scarlets and fine twined linen and and precious clothing and harlots are the desires of this great and abominable
Church now neo-marxist movements they
tend to be very hedonistic right so for example you look
at a pride parade right which is has the The Pride movement has very strong
Marxist underpinnings uh queer Theory and and all of these other things they're very
much outgrowths of marxist thought and one of the other things well
what about wealth and and riches like it talks about in in first Nephi well uh
Marxist movements that's the thing they claim to not be about the acquisition of
wealth but when their Elites kind of solidify their power over the population
they get really really wealthy compared to their populations so you have like Joseph
Stalin showing up to meet with world leaders and he dressed in you know this
common workers attire to show oh I'm I'm one of the common people I'm one of the
little guys I can relate to them unlike you know Churchill here and and uh you
know these other world leaders but man he was so much more wealthy than any of
those other world leaders he amassed so much wealth to himself and that's what
they tend to do right so again there there's kind of this claim
of the movement oh we're not we're not in it for the money well but when it actually
solidifies they get very wealthy the people who are kind of steering these
movements so that's another one that I think fits pretty well but then we have in first Nephi
1326 we have this passage that I think I I I have kind of a different
interpretation than most people and it talks about the formation of the great
and abominable church and they have taken away from the gospel of the Lamb
many parts which are plain and most precious and this is talking about after
scriptures go from the hands of the Jews to Gentiles right then there are taken
away elements of scripture that are plain and precious now what would that mean well
some people think that it's modifications to scripture that happened
you know during the biblical periods uh some people might say oh it's the deuteronomist school you know importing
some Greek thought or or what I don't know uh importing some Gentile Notions
of things into into scripture I'm not going to Discount that completely that
that may have some truth to it but we can see in our day critical biblical
scholarship okay uh that arose very heavily in Germany right
German scholarship arose and started absolutely destroying people's
traditional understanding of the Bible and with very Marxist
underpinnings over time a lot of these biblical Scholars adopted the Marxist view that
religion needs to be criticized Marx said that the beginning he said
criticism of religion is the beginning of all criticism okay that is one of his most
famous statements religion is the opiate of the masses so you have to criticize
religion that's your starting point if you're going to criticize everything else so you have this field called
critical biblical scholarship and what has it done over time well it has
undermined people's confidence in the biblical text it has undermined people's
understanding of the witness of the prophets in the bible it has destroyed
those things it has taken away very plain and precious understanding of the
Gospel critical biblical scholarship has done this and I'll give you a couple of
examples there was a a there was a a
Biblical writer or biblical scholar named Robert Odin and he wrote a
book giving a fantasy kind of view of can we do the
Bible can we study the Bible without any theology right without any claims about
God so he wrote a book called The Bible without theology which is kind of
insane and he was critiqued by another Bible scholar named Edgar Conrad and he
said Odin has overstated his case here by ignoring the role played by other ideologies such as Marxism and feminism
in the University he has also failed to see that his own positivistic reading which
is a a reading of the Bible where you kind of dismiss the possibility of Miracles or or try to just kind of
bracket that out he says it's no more objective than historical criticism but
is in fact another form of confessional reading so this other Bible scholar comes in and and says look if you're
going to try to do that you have to be honest and say that you have your own faith commitments you can't remove
theology from the Bible if you're bringing your own theology in the form of Marxism or these other things I love
that quote because it's one scholar who's kind of keeping another scholar honest he's saying you you can't just
pretend that you don't bring anything to the Bible right uh and D it supports the idea that
you know I mean as you say he he he wants to take theology out of it but he is using the
Theology of Marxism yes right so it just goes along and supports the idea that
look Marxism is a religion Marxism is a world viiew right there is a theology to
it it may be Godless but it is a it is a view of the world to the point of what is our
purpose um how should we live how do we get along with each other right what is you
know what the purpose of life and suffering all of these things are are accounted for becoming the new man is
part of Marxism right just like for Christianity there's the idea of becoming for them it's it's a corrupted
version but it's still very very much focused on who you're becoming and how
you're going to become that individual right and now if you bracket God and you
say God is irrelevant or God if you just take an atheist stance and say God does
not exist therefore we can read the Bible without you know pretending that he exists each of those those are
theological claims you cannot do the Bible without making implicit
theological claims you can't but here's an interesting quote and it's from a
Bible scholar named David Klein and in 1976 he wrote a book all about Isaiah
53 so Isaiah 53 is the greatest witness
testimony of the atonement of Christ in all of the Old Testament right he was
despised and rejected of men a Man of Sorrows acquainted with grief he was wounded for our transgressions bruised
for our iniquities the chastisement of our peace was upon him with his strength we are healed and so forth right I mean
plain and precious witness testimony of Christ from the prophet
Isaiah and here's what David Klein said in his in his 1976 book he said Isaiah
53 has become a casualty of historical critical scholarship it is not the only biblical
text in that plight but its injuries are more grave than those of many others
why why would so many Bible scholars gravitate toward Isaiah 53 as the focus
of their attack in their historical criticism why that chapter you know why
not Isaiah 20 why not Jeremiah 5 why would Isaiah 53 draw so much focused
fire it's because they're trying to remove a plain and precious truth from
the Bible That's why and the historical critical
method it it it's an an amazing tool for doing that it has destroyed massive
amounts of testimonies of convictions among Christians uh since its implementation
it it's incredible how devastating the historical critical method has been and
again it's all under this pre of oh we bracket God no you can't you cannot bracket God
out of your your analysis of the Bible to do so is to make a theological Claim
about God's existence and his relevance and so forth
so those are those are all elements of you know the great and abominable
Church described in first Nephi 13 and I think it's I I think there's some very
very strong correspondence yeah and and again as you said Church in Greek what is it ecclesi
ecclesi I think it's it just means a congregation an assembly a number of people and that's that's simply what you
look at but it's interesting as you say this you know it's there is a light right which is
Christianity which is the truth and and everything else that goes against that
light is simply in that case a reaction yeah to it it is a justification of
something else how do I justify a different reality right it's like saying
well gravity exists but how do I pretend it doesn't how do we how do how do we
liberate ourselves that's what the focus of Marxism really is is how do I liberate myself and take off the
shackles of of of natural law yeah and and and say
you know this is my reality to me to get because the DNA of all of this all of
them say the same thing it it is let's throw off the shackles of natural law and the Order of God and then we will be
the new man Y and and we will be one with reality at that point yeah and we
can do this without God right that's the idea and so so you have these and and
it's interesting that uh years ago Jonah Goldberg wrote a book called liberal
fascism and he said you know it's it's it's a misunderstanding to portray fascism as
in opposition to Marxism they're it's it's a European Trope yeah yeah they're
family Fascism and Marxism are family and that's why they hate each other so much they're like these squabbling
siblings are is what they are but both of them have this basic premise we can
achieve a perfect utopian society without God they're just fighting over
how to do it one of them fascism says it's blood and soil Marxism said it's
you know equity and you know I I think it's
accurate to say that fascism is kind of of a male version and Marxism is a
female version of the same thing right they they they really are kind of the
same thing so Jonah Goldberg his book liberal fascism is a really great
resource for understanding that but you said a minute ago Greg you know you talk
about Christianity and everything else well in first Nephi 14 we have this
discussion of the two churches well how how can we characterize these things as
just two right well it's again if you
think of churches as systems two sets of assumptions and and two sets of ideas
and and worldviews the Marxist what we've we've been observing and this is has been kind
of amazing and I don't think people really understood this until very recently is that Marxism gobbles up
everything else and I think over time we are going
to see kind of a continuation of this where people who used to consider them
themselves Progressive now are like wait a minute I don't know what that is because I'm I'm
not a Marxist so what am I now or people who consider themselves just classical
liberals or just liberals in general you know and a a lot of them are like wait a
minute I am not Marxism and Marxism is devouring everything that I used to
belong to in Academia in politics and everything I mean it devours everything
it cannot tolerate Rivals so I see a lot of
consolidation of kind of rival forms of thinking under that umbrella of Marxism
it's devouring them but I also see I mean you had James Lindsay on your Show recently how
interesting is it to see James Lindsay and Jordan Peterson sit down like they
did a while ago and talk about scripture in a way that you just can't believe
like how accurate and you know their insights are you're like wow so in
another sense there's almost another consolidation happening where you know
10 years ago if I had met somebody like James Lindsay I would have said I I I don't know if I can relate to this
person at all but nowadays we're like man he he feels like family sort of in a
sense he's seeing so many of the same things that we are and and like a lot of
people are doing that people who are not necessarily members of the church but who are like really really really
accurately describing gospel realities to an extent that's pretty shocking
right yeah it's I I think what happens Dan this is my take on that is
that we're we're we're at a an axial time in in history and and what I mean
by that is what's happening right now in the west especially in the US but really in
the west as a whole with with really these marxian thoughts and World Views
starting to I mean look they've taken over almost every institution in the United States yeah already I mean they
they they are the power behind almost every institution in the United States right now and this creates a watershed
moment for people and it's it's like okay well I've I've maybe I've I've been a liberal and
um I'm leaning left well am I going to have more my heartstrings tug that kind
of draw draws me into this Equity idea or am I more anchored in the
Enlightenment with a lot of liberals right in in the enlightenment that is focused on science and a man is a man
and a woman is a woman and biology is in place and and and where where you get a
good portion not all of it because the enlightenment definitely pushed off on religion but where you get a a good
portion of americanism right and and the philosophy of americanism comes from the enlightenment in Christianity I think as
a whole bringing together and so they shift you've got Jonathan height you've got Stephen Pinker um uh Harris right
all these guys that are atheists Bill Maher yeah that are atheists that are
all of a sudden turning away from this and and
and you know really their classical liberal roots are shining a lot more as
they push away from what's kind of happening on one end where on the other end you also have and especially because
today you've got you know some people trying to push away from Trump and you've got people saying also well my
heartstrings are getting tugged and the lgbtq issues and other things the equity here the The
Compassion I believe it's a short-term compassion but it's the compassion is what's going to pull me over here where
I have always been over here yeah so this demographic shift is is as you're describing here really is I think it's
going to continue quite a bit I I think for example and this is crazy but I I think Utah for
example is going to be a blue State soon I would be surprised I would not be
surprised at all it it this consolidation is really interesting and
and I I I love this quote from ezera Benson he gave a talk called I testify
in October 1988 conference and it's one of my favorite conference talks of all time he Saidi testify that as the forces
of evil increase under Lucifer's leadership and as the forces of good
increase under the leadership of Jesus Christ there will be growing battles between the two until the final
confrontation as the issues become clearer and more obvious all mankind
will eventually be required to align themselves either for the kingdom of God
or for the kingdom of the devil as these conflicts rage either secretly
or openly the righteous will be tested God's Wrath will will soon shake the
nations of the earth and will be poured out on the wicked without measure but God will provide strength for the
righteous and the means of escape and eventually and finally truth will
Triumph so this is extraordinary you know he's talking about he says over
time as the issues become clearer and more obvious you'll see realignments
that's what he said in 1988 and I think in my lifetime I've
never seen more realignment um people who I could not
have imagined being aligned with in in
any number of things are sounding like our best friends right people who who
are not necessarily of our faith but they see there you know this Clarity is
coming and people are are recognizing it and I think that is going to continue and it's probably going to surprise us
how that develops over time do you think Dan that
that the idea of well let's go into this a little bit you you talked about you know Marxism
doesn't start with Marx that's just what we call it yeah right in in a modern a modern vernacular but but it's always
existed and and you've got some examples here of Prophecy and things coming from The Book of Mormon um let let's go over
that first and talk about things more anciently yeah where do we see not
Marxism really and and not critical it's actually more critical theory but it's
right where do we see elements of this anyway in scripture oh dear The Book of
Mormon you know the gadianton Kish cumin uh you you are seeing the tactics
of you know the maest rebels right in the book of and
the again I go back to that language of the ancient plans around the the
acquisition of power and and it it is interesting
how once again I think it's a huge mistake to say that Fascism and Marxism
are opposed to each other they really when you actually like read history and
you read what these movements were about and their socialist kind of common
ancestry right and the things that they the ways that they operated it they
sound like indistinguishable in a lot of ways they just have like they're just
kind of different flavors of the same thing but in Scripture it's the Book of Mormon that's where you see it probably
most strongly I think but well it's written for our day right it is written for our day what I say about Marx is he
did not invent something new he systematized things that already existed
he just kind of brought them together in a way that people actually they could
say okay this is a system whereas all these threads they've been going on
throughout history forever these are the ancient plans around the acquisition of power but he systematized to them he he
kind of made it hey here is one handbook that you can turn
to instead of looking to you know this ancient behavior and and this the the
French Revolution was a huge influence on Marx and and Hitler and and all of
these tyrants and you know but he he just took these threads and kind of wo
them together into one thing that's all he did it's not new Marxism is not new
it is an I would even argue that that it's been systematized before in other ways I I think that with Marx
you know one thing you it's you know let's go back to the very beginning when you said you were interested you got interested in Marxism you're hearing a
language yeah right and so so he provided a language and a thought system
right the language has to go along with that yep you cannot communicate this and share it and spread it with without
language yeah and and so this he he was able to articulate certain things for
the time and it was very effective in places especially where there were a bunch of
peasants yep and and and and major conflict with the Kings and the royalty
and and uh whatnot and still effective in those places right it still can be very effective there um but I think it
has been systematized previously it's just a little different with him he provided a better language than even
some of his almost immediate predecessors right and then was able
[Music] to you know he was able to spread it with him with Praxis with the pregnant
idea of you have to be act an activist yeah with this or you were not true to
it at all I think that was a big part of creating kind of this virus that was
able to spread and spread very quickly that's all it is it's not new Marxism is
not it was not invented by Marx it is not new it has existed for a long time
it has worn different clothing it's it's been in various different disguises it
has adapted itself to different contexts throughout the historical record but it
is absolutely not new it has existed since ancient times it's always existed
it's always yeah Kan and abbl was brought up before it's it's the same idea there same same human nature yeah
and and and maybe amplifying a way to amplify and
codify and articulate a certain certain human desires and you know a couple
things here that brought up I want to finish with this there's a you brought up uh let's see this is 1
Nephi 1326 where it says that many parts which are plain and pre plain and most
precious you they were removed and then it says immediately after that and also many covenants of the Lord yeah and so
to me when I see that what I that immediately immediately takes me to the temple yeah and and and elsewhere in the
Scriptures it seems very apparent to me that along with the doctrine this
Doctrine fits under these covenants that I think overall is just
my view here that overall is the abrahamic Covenant yeah and and so if
you're you think about what is the abrahamic covenant What does it mean well it it's it's your agency to move
toward Christ it just think of the temple it is it is marriage yeah it is Zion and
Community um and Mar and is at the very center of all of it yep and Mark has his
own Covenant framework too yeah ex has his own Covenant it's a corruption and
it's okay how do I react to how do I I I'm against family yeah I'm going to you
know split parents from kids and uh push you know ideologies that are against the
family I'm going to push away on anything that would support the doctrine of Christ yeah right and you're going to
become an activist and for the Revolution and that's the Covenant so I
I I guess one of the things that I thought about earlier that I want to share with your listeners is if you want
to see the opposite of the Marxist vision for making a society better look
at BYU pathway if you want to see the opposite like the counter to Marxist
thinking about how you make the world a better place BYU pathway is perfect in
every way you you bring people in and you give them an affordable opportunity
to make their own lives better and lift people around them and take responsibility and create order out of
the chaos in their lives that's the opposite yeah and and
you get to I mean honestly you get to bypass some of the Marxist temples correct correct
universities correct and that is that's one of the beautiful things about it I
agree I I am hoping and praying for the success of that program I just oh it's
it's I think eventually it may just be the answer yeah I mean for Education
yeah but but it is the opposite of Marxism if you want to see like the
perfect contrast look at BYU pathway okay Dan is there anything else you
wanted to get in before we end here nope nope great discussion but once again
don't go teaching this it don't give a talking church about Maris don't don't
write the title of this video up on up on the Whiteboard right right exactly
yeah but I think it's a good discussion and again I think it's what's really key and you know this is something you've thought a lot about and and to be able
to make people aware I I think that's important I mean it's it goes right to what president Ezra Bon said here in his
his quote that you said it's it's we you know as Things become clearer well if your head's in the sand
and you don't know what's going on it things are not you're not going to have the opportunity to make a choice you're
not going to have an opportunity to make an educated choice at least right and and so I I think that Clarity here is is
is crucial really appreciate your thoughts Dan we want to bring you back and and talk about some other things I'm going to put a reference by the way in
the video when you bring it up to the other discussion that we had okay which was very interesting as well but thanks
so much and uh till next time yeah thanks for having me take [Music]
