Spiritual Sunday
Today’s post is repurposed from one written on August 19, 2017
Military.com reported Friday that certain commanders are painting the current attacks on Iran as “rooted in Christian biblical prophecy”—which means it’s time to revisit what the Bible says about Satanic temptations. I turn also to Milton’s dramatic reenactment of Satan tempting Jesus in Paradise Regained.
First, here’s the report:
A complaint shared by an anonymous non-commissioned officer to the Military Religious Freedom Foundation (MRFF) claimed that non-commissioned officers were told that the Iran war is part of God’s plan and that President Donald Trump was “anointed by Jesus to light the signal fire in Iran to cause Armageddon and mark his return to Earth,” as originally reported by journalist Jonathan Larsen. Between Saturday and Tuesday afternoon, MRFF logged more than 200 similar complaints across 50 installations encompassing every branch of the military, its founder, Mikey Weinstein, told Military.com.
Matthew’s temptation story kicked off the season of Lent two Sundays ago:
Again, the devil took [Jesus] to a very high mountain and showed him all the kingdoms of the world and their splendor; and he said to him, “All these I will give you, if you will fall down and worship me.” Jesus said to him, “Away with you, Satan! for it is written,
‘Worship the Lord your God,
and serve only him.’”Then the devil left him, and suddenly angels came and waited on him. (Matthew 4:8-11)
In Milton’s version, Satan shows Jesus the capital of the Roman Empire, tempting him in ways that would appeal to Trump and to Christian nationalists like Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth:
The city which thou seest no other deem
Than great and glorious Rome, Queen of the Earth
So far renowned, and with the spoils enriched
Of nations. There the Capitol thou seest,
Above the rest lifting his stately head
On the Tarpeian rock, her citadel
Impregnable; and there Mount Palatine,
The imperial palace, compass huge, and high
The structure, skill of noblest architects,
With gilded battlements, conspicuous far,
Turrets, and terraces, and glittering spires.
He doesn’t mention White House ballrooms and triumphal arches but, if he were talking to Trump, he would have.
Then Satan contends that, by expelling a “monster from his throne”—think Ali Khamenei in the present case—Jesus can obtain absolute power:
This Emperor hath no son, and now is old,
Old and lascivious, and from Rome retired
To Capria, an island small but strong
On the Campanian shore, with purpose there
His horrid lusts in private to enjoy;
Committing to a wicked favorite
All public cares, and yet of him suspicious;
Hated of all, and hating. With what ease,
Endued with regal virtues as thou art,
Appearing, and beginning noble deeds,
Might’st thou expel this monster from his throne,
Now made a sty, and, in his place ascending,
A victor-people free from servile yoke!
And with my help thou may’st; to me the power
Is given, and by that right I give it thee.
Aim, therefore, at no less than all the world;
Aim at the highest; without the highest attained,
Will be for thee no sitting, or not long,
On David’s throne, be prophesied what will.”
Actually, this is not a bad description of Trump golfing at Mar-a-Lago, not to mention what we’re learning from Trump’s “horrid lusts in private,” which he’s ordering the Justice Department to redact from the Epstein files.
Jesus is not interested in such power, however, but with the Devil who drives such people (“what if I withal/ Expel a Devil who first made him such?”). When “my season comes to sit,” he informs Satan, it shall be “as a stone that shall to pieces dash/ All monarchies besides throughout the world”:
Know, therefore, when my season comes to sit
On David’s throne, it shall be like a tree
Spreading and overshadowing all the earth,
Or as a stone that shall to pieces dash
All monarchies besides throughout the world;
And of my Kingdom there shall be no end.
So no, God hasn’t appointed Trump to unleash holy hell upon Tehran. And if Hegseth and his Armageddon commanders think otherwise, it’s because they have fallen for Satan’s temptation.
