Tom’s podcast with Dominic is the most entertaining, dare I say addictive, podcasts available. It’s called “The Rest is History” and it will have you literally laughing out loud.
"Literature adds to reality, it does not simply describe it. It enriches the necessary competencies that daily life requires and provides; and in this respect, it irrigates the deserts that our lives have already become." C. S. LEWIS
Thank you so much. In a non-religious setting, a free and public discourse, with respect and carefully chosen words, a significant mind addresses the actual root of civilisation, the very mansion of our culture.
I've read 3 of Tom's books: In the Shadow of the Sword, Persian Fire, and Rubicon: Last Days of the Roman Empire, he's got such a talent for bringing history to life. Great author of our time
*WHAAAT?!* he wrote that book? I have it! And he disparaged God (of Israel and by extension the God of Israel in Christ after the New Testament) many times. This man is a Christian?! I am so shocked right now...
Any educated person instinctively knows these things but it takes courage to stand up for your intellectual position. It broadens you and when shared can broaden others.
"The cross is such an odd thing to have as a focus of veneration", says Tom. I couldn't agree more. This is my introduction to Tom and I'm beginning to Tom and I'm beginning to like what he says very much.
Yes, it's what founded my feelings as a teen that there was something evil and sadistic about Christianity, seeing as how it worships a bloody tortured body. As an old woman, with a tortured body and an understanding that this is the common fate, I no longer see the cross as diabolic.
@@anomietoponymie2140you missed the point…god is worshipped for loving us, living among us to model how we should treat each other. As your body fails you, you may want to pray for life after death
Mr. Anderson does us all a service through his open-mindedness. Tom Holland does us an even greater service by stimulating independent thought on the ideas he discusses without militancy.
Interesting times! Non-religious people from various walks of life are beginning to lament on how a desacralised way of life and ideologies are a dead end. For the onlooker it appears to be almost synchronised... - the Lord is a great master of timing!
If you'll pardon the US football analogy, one of my songs goes, "'Keep running, Donald [Donald Driver, the former Green Bay Packer wide receiver]. 'I can't see the football.' 'Keep running anyhow.'" Brett Favre's pass would be so accurate and the planned play would be so beautiful that Driver, on a dead run, would simply have to look up and reach up, and the ball would be there, synchroniz/sing two separate "walks" of life.
Interesting that some proportion of atheists are simply more inclined to think of God in ways that are not popularly or publicly represented; and thus can easily misidentify himself.
Dominion is a brilliant book, both sophisticated and easy to read. Even if you don't like reading history you might want to give it a try. But take it slow if you want to get something out of it.
Another great interview. Great fan of Tom Holland and his history podcast with Dominic Sandbrook. Bought several of his books over the years. Nice bookshelves.
Tolkien had a very sophisticated idea of 'myth' which rejected the word as indicating something false, but rather as something intrinsically true but presented in a different fashion than that of science.
I believe he helped Lewis understand that Christianity is a myth that is true. The late Dr. H. Wilbert "Will" Norton of Wheaton College Graduate School translated John 14:6 as Jesus saying, "I am the Way, _both_ [Greek _kai_] the Truth and the Life."
What Tom is really saying is that no matter how much the atheist/humanist types try to distance themselves from Christ, their efforts will be for naught as their very assumptions about human rights stem from Jesus. It's hilarious when you sit back and see it through Tom"s eyes.
Superb interview. Tom is a first class historian but he misses the point re the resurrection and the power of the cross is not it’s ideal but its power to change people.
YES! you can operate from a Christian value system, but without Christ leading you, you are doomed to fail. That is why western civilization is failing. It's not enough to have Christian values you must submit your whole life to Christ. You must have a relationship with Him. You must repent. You must believe and have faith in him. We love because He loved us first. We give because He gave His life for us. Otherwise we're back at the old testament living under the law.
I may be 60, but I am not deaf, yet! I had no trouble hearing Tom, but Anderson, unlike in Triggernometry, for instance, he seemed to be mumbling here, talking to himself. I had to turn up the volume of my speakers to their maximum in order to hear him!
We really appreciate your guests and topics John, but sometimes cannot hear, especially deep male voices. Can you alter your sound system to pick up the volume somehow.
distributed cognition has flourished beyond measure in Christian grammar based societies. Enough of us think in terms of mutual benefit projects and embedding ourselves in projects larger than ourselves which, in turn are embedded in even greater projects, ultimately embedded in an inclusive, good faith open future infused with a generative benign spirit. Many are reluctant to see that sprit as God shining through the culmination of sufficient goodness.but it is most assuredly related to Christian grammar, whatever you chose to call it, and it is glorious.
Brilliant. A friend of mine has written a book called 'The Rebirthing of God', in which the current image and reality of the Christian Church is dying a death, only to be reborn in a far more mature form that is no longer fearful and small minded, locking out other wisdom traditions, and is no longer obsessed with original sin, but recognises original blessing and also recognises the sacredness of the Earth and the natural realm.
But to discriminate means to exercise judgement. To exercise judgement of good snd evil means to accept responsibility, yet, as a Christisn to admit one's imperfection. To admit one's imperfection while facing reality is to embrace the duality : awareness of God and God's grace.
Wedgewood's political slogan "Am I not a man and a brother?" is lifted directly from Paul's letter to Philemon (a slaveowner) about what to do with his escaped slave Onesimus who Paul had found. "12 I am sending him-who is my very heart-back to you. 13 I would have liked to keep him with me so that he could take your place in helping me while I am in chains for the gospel. 14 But I did not want to do anything without your consent, so that any favor you do would not seem forced but would be voluntary. 15 Perhaps the reason he was separated from you for a little while was that you might have him back forever- 16 no longer as a slave, but better than a slave, as a dear brother. He is very dear to me but even dearer to you, both *as a fellow man and as a brother* in the Lord." This is another example of just how radical Christianity is. Imagine if America's Fugitive Slave Act had been written on this actual Christian basis.
"The fact that there is power in being the victim..." No. Christianity is about there being power in being the SERVANT. Christ was *serving*, when He was on that cross. The idea that Christianity is worshiping something pitiful for its pitifulness, is a heresy. Probably the heresy of our time.
Catholics already know this and have known it for 1,900 years. It's you idiotic protestants and your laughable 'reformation' that have lead to fools like Nietzsche spreading that victim interpretation of Christianity.
What a fascinating lense with which to look at the world. The bit about the WWII Germans was very intriguing. I had always accepted them as evil, but now knowing, thanks to Tom Holland, that this is simply because I was indoctrinated into a Christian way of thinking is going to force me to take a de novo look at the Germans, and reexamine what I think about them. I think we all must.
We all accept a very shallow narrative about Europe in the inter war years 1919-1939. We are not encouraged to look deeper and it's not made easy for us. A lot of horrible evil was carried out by people who felt freed from moral constraint but we need to look much more deeply into the political world of mitteleurope then. As usual it was MUCH MORE COMPLEX than we are allowed to think.
I was here in Minneapolis when G. Floyd died. I was struck by the Christ-like veneration and reaction supporting Floyd across the country and western world. Here a criminal tortured into submission by the all-powerful state, replayed the Crucifixion story before our eyes. However, Floyd was not a facsimile of Jesus, but rather an actual criminal many times in his life, nonetheless deserving mercy.
Daniel Shaver deserved mercy, too. Perhaps even more so since he appeared to try to comply with the all-powerful state's orders. But he was white, so who really cares.
The only people who would make a marter out of a man who at one point held a gun to a pregnant womans stomach our the reprobate minded Democrat/Socialist Americans the rest of us didnt agree w/ the knee on the neck but arent crying either cause its less of our tax payer money to feed and house a career criminal /drug addict...
Christianity Today magazine ran a piece titled "The Faith of George Floyd." Thomas Sowell, and Magatte Wade interviewed by Jordan Peterson, are among the black voices calling for, if I may borrow the words of Bill Milliken, "tough love."
Floyd was a hopeless sinner. The policeman who squeezed the life of him was a paranoid amateur, living in fear, and wrecking retribution on the moral enemy. Regarding race, one of the o the cops was Asian. The shopkeeper who reported Floyd was Asian. They were attempting to maintain order in an extremely violent, and confused society.
What would would the fundamentalist Christians within the The Kings School and the other GPS schools think I wonder, John? Is there not still an arrogance exhibited amongst these elite schools that we no longer see in British schools of the genre. they have moved on. They are not bound by the limitations we here in Australia continue to impose on ourselves. It's time we grew up, and and became a little more sophisticated and aware of the how we fit into the world beyond trade. The depth of Tom's analysis and his breadth of knowledge seem to lead the way. His analysis is fresh, takes risks and is fearless, a quality Australians once had about 150 - 50 years ago. A great choice for an interview, John, but he's not answering your questions. He's moved beyond the questions.
Would it be possible to get just a few less ads? I understand monetization, but it is really hard to follow the argument when it is interrupted every couple of minutes…
Interesting point made by Tom Holland about the idea of access to food being a fundamental human right coming from Christianity. He is nevertheless somewhat selective as to what he quotes from the Apostle Paul. After all, it was Paul who said “if a man does not choose to work, neither shall he eat.” 2 Thess 3:10.
Sounds like we shouldnt give people stuff just so they can continue to lay around and be lazy. We all need to strive toward a better version of ourselves, even the poor people.
@@SidekickSam24 It's called theistic evolution, or in the words of Francis Collins and his BioLogos Foundation, evolutionary creation. God instituted the beautiful system of evolution/"survival of the fittest," yet "occasionally" calls us to override it with unconditional love. Someone has put it, "Work as if it all depended on you. Pray as if it all depended on God." It does, and it does.
I also have a problem when ‘human nature’ is thrown up in conversations to explain any particular thing. Human Nature: Anything that a human can do is human nature. Be it extremely harmful or extremely good, and everything in between. What is never discussed is that it is a choice what particular thing manifests. What you must recognise is that when you do not share a thought system, you are weakening it. Those who believe in it therefor perceive this as an attack on them. This is because everyone identifies them-self with there thought system, and every thought system centres on what you believe you are. If the centre of the thought system is true, only truth extends from it. But if a lie is at its centre, only deception proceeds from it. I Believe JC said this
I, Claudius and Ben Hur were my introduction to Roman history and was absorbed. Unfortunately I didn't stick with it. That was in tge late 70s. Fast forward to 1993 and converting from atheism to Biblical theism, Rome became relevant again. Rome being in Judea, the Gospel spreading throughout the Roman Empire, the diaspora of the Jews because of the Jewish-Roman Wars, and the relationship between the Christians and Israel which is very important in our age.
"The king is subject to the same law as the lowest person in the land, and that we get from Christianity" Are you sure? It seems like the story of Brutus and Tarquin also reflects it, although Suetonius reports a certain backsliding that is the opposite of David's trajectory in his story with Uriah and Bathsheba.
Great interview and most interesting but I believe Tom makes a fundamental category error: 1. Jesus was not a 'victim' - He went to the cross willingly as a substitute for sinners, thereby defeating and making a spectacle of the forces of evil (vindicated by the resurrection, which if not true makes our faith futile and useless, as the Apostle says in 1 Corinthians 15:12-18); and 2. "The last shall be first" is not a political statement or mandate. It describes the voluntary attitude of Christ's followers to themselves and others. It is fundamentally a personal stance. Yes, it transforms society, but not because kings are de-throned and peasants made rulers (in fact, Proverbs warns against such a course) but because Christians and churches bless those around them, which was dramatically true from the very first days of the church, even when it had no power at all and was ruthlessly persecuted in both Palestine (first) and by the Romans (later).
Had anyone but Nietzsche and Žižek understood Hegel, they could have drawn the correct lessons which most people still don't appear to notice: to social animals, the primary impulse of empathy is directed toward individuals who display the greatest signals of neoteny, ie children and women. The mechanism of power is not physical force or threat of tyranny - that is a temporary power, and those who live by the sword shall die by the sword. Rather the lasting power is in him or her who can inspire the greatest empathy in the group and no one can do that better than the noble righteous victim. The Church had only one story - the story of an innocent man tortured and killed. And look at the power it wielded with that story. This is the power of wokeism, and the sooner people understand it, maybe we can have some hope in dealing with it. The pursuit of justice, the instinctive sense humans have to protect the weak, stems from our empathy towards children and those displaying neoteny; it is regulated by a social demand to fall in line in protecting children, then women, then the disabled and the weak, etc, and its author is not Christ. It's author is nature. But its weaponization is Christ. Gandhi took down the British Empire in a sack. MLK ended the American apartheid in the South. No story is more powerful than the woman who was unjustly assaulted sexually by her abusers. Entire rooms full of people fall silent when a survivor speaks. The brilliance of Christianity is to recognize that you can use psychological warfare against the biggest and most powerful army with a story of injustice. the moment you fight back when someone strikes you on one cheek you no longer retain your position of the noble victim and you are now someone capable of defending themselves losing immediately the sympathy that the group had instinctively to protect you. In other words it is our social impulses and instincts towards helping one another that is weaponized when the victim is so obviously and transparently displayed before us which is why icons and Christianity are so important and why the image of a tortured Christ is so important because our empathy and morality stems from our visual cortex instincts of seeing something suffer or seeing something display neotenous features.
The West is wholly Christian, it is true, but Christian in a super-Jesus way. That Christianity has become religious from philosophical is such a wonderful development. The Christ figure, the Redeemer, the one, who takes YOUR burden on HIS own shoulders and rids it from you and for you, that truly is THE WESTERN raison d'etre.
The redeeming and uplifting value of the cross is FORGIVENESS. Jesus said, whilst suffering on the cross, "forgive them for they know not what they do".
Probably one of the most obvious examples is the Christian idea of redemption built into our criminal justice system. For just about every prisoner there is the hope their lives can be turned around by activities and programs run in the prisons.
There is so much conveniently left out of Mr. Holland's understanding of Christianity that he doesn't *quite* get it. The cornerstone of Christianity is not the philosophy of political egalitarianism but the extraordinary love of God and an invitation to intimate union with Him. Everything else cascades from that.
Thanks for adding this important point. Thankfully, the Bible stays clear of falling into the political egalitarian philosophy. It's almost miraculous that it doesn't, while still dealing with the divine incarnation+ speaking encouragingly to the weakest in society.
Yes, but he is not a theologian and not a Christian either (as far as I know). His argument is for people to see that liberal ideals are firmly based on Christian ideas however much the Western cultures tried to divorce themselves from anything religious.
I listened to your podcast on Oppenheimer, and watched the movie yesterday, they did not make the scene of Oppenheimer forceful of kissing one young lady in the train when her fiancé out for smoking.
It's wonderfull to have a little device, so, despite of a poor knowlidge of the spoken, it's possible to see and listen diferent personalities. The one has his watch hidden, time does not exist, the other has his thin watch like the walk on a thin cord, visible, time has no patience.
It’s interesting to see how different interviewers try to skew Tom’s genuine attempt at objectivity as support for their positions. It seems humans abhor objectivity as much as nature does a vacuum.
A secular mindset can never understand the spirituality of Islam which is purely revealed but it accepts the function of human intellect within the domain of experience
HOPE, they do it for HOPE! HOPE that there is more than just life here on earth, that there is an eternal life in the new Jerusalem. To have this HOPE for the wedding banquet in heaven allows me and others the ability to look past the distractions of life that may consume us otherwise. In this HOPE I am called to not just me get to heaven but my spouse my children my family and friends through serving the other and that other is a child of God who is loved by God and God calls me to love his children. Serving through the corporal works of mercy, feeding the hungry, giving drink to the thirsty, sheltering the homeless, visiting the sick, visiting the imprisoned, burying the dead and giving alms to the poor. Yes, it's radical compared to the secular culture. Once I was one way and now I am radically different. Yes I am a poor rotten sinner, God have mercy on me. May I strive to be Jesus to all of God's children and may I see Jesus in them.
I find it very bizarre that Tom Holland thinks National Socialism is a form of Fascism. It's a type of Socialism obsessed with the power dynamics that Marxism is obsessed with. The Fascists (and there have been more than a few versions of it) believe the Nation State is a corporation and the people must serve it - much as Republican Rome thought. Musollini's Mistress was Jewish, and 30% of Italian Jews were members of the Fascist party during the 1930s.
Mr Holland, being an intellectual and of course leaning on his own understanding, makes the fatal error of saying he sees no “proof” of God. When in reality it’s all around him. He then seems to contradict himself when he points out Christianity is ubiquitous in history, why we know right from wrong, good from evil, dark from light. But his stand on God can easily be explained in 1 Corinthians 1:18-25.
No mate! Slavery is wrong because people are hurt and that is not a nice thing… We might have deep Christian influences but it is normal to feel sorry for another and whether I was Christian or not I would still have rejected slavery…
Loved this...As for any changes of society, ideas can only go so far. Only the human heart, each heart--that has been given the freedom to 'say' yes to God (the Yes latent or blatant)--can participate in transforming and 'saving' the world....The No-sayers who choose to Be Like God in self-exalting rather than 'merely' human, made in God's image, are the self-deifiers... Superhumanism is all over the place, inside or outside of religions. The streak to individual power that resides in each heart--in its refusal of own creatureliness--is forever 'the problem'. Thanks to Life happening, that can bring one to hitting bottom, Dark Night of the soul, we each, sooner or later, have the occasion to turn our eyes to Something Transcendant 'up there'.....or close the heart, in a fist. God doesn't crash parties, but awaits invitation, or a simple 'Help!'...to come in, and galvanize with the power of the Cross, stronger than death and empires: Love!
The arc of desacrilizing what has gone before is interesting though a very incomplete picture. The Christian/Catholic church desacralized paganism but retained the supernatural by ascribing such things to demons. The Protestant reformation desacralized the sacraments of the Church but also marginalized the supernatural. The Enlightenment (and eventual rise of scientism) then eliminated the supernatural entirely. Nietzsche was just the final nail in the proverbial coffin. Modern manifestations are only superficially Christian but are in fact heavily influenced by paganism, gnosticism, and Nominalism. I mean, seriously, we already sacrifice our children on the alter of self convenience - at least the Aztecs were worried about the World ending.
The evangelical world has plenty of the supernatural, sometimes taken to excess. George Muller, who founded an orphanage in Bristol, England in the 19th century, told of suppertime without food. He instructed the children to thank God for the food. There was a knock on the door. A food wagon had just broken an axle. Don Richardson said that the Greek _musterion_ meant "mystery," not just "sacrament". Jesus refused to flaunt the supernatural, but used it (Greek _semeion_, or "sign", in the Gospel of John) to prove who he was, help people, and glorify the Father. I could cite a clear personal experience of the supernatural and many compelling experiences.
Although Tom Holland made many valid points. He totally lost the plot by comparing Floyd with Jesus Christ. He obviously doesn't understand Christianity nor who Jesus was in depth. Christ represents the innocent dying to save humanity that is lost. He does not represent criminals and thugs.
We have/had great foundations in Western society that worked for a long time. Those fiundations have been corrupted by the worst of our nature. Is it possible to keep those tried and trusted foundations, identify and root out the villians, and restore with upgrades of course, the structures here in the West that have been the envy of the world. The current approach of destroying everything and heading into a future with no guardrails or solid fiundations is frightening and will not end well.
When Christ came everything changed. The world was never the same Caesar Augustus was a fantastic ruler who stopped civil war Opened trade routes. Established the Roman peace. He found Rome built in brick and left it covered in marble. After his death he was declared a god and every citizen honored him as the god that unified the empire. If Caesar came back today he would be astonished to learn that we began our calendar with the life of Christ and not his.
Watching this after hearing Tom speak on this at the Theos lecture in London last night. I agree with his position in many ways, and have come to value Christianity as meaningful myth, but I do think that he's overplaying the idea that its only Christianity that can underpin 'humanist liberal values'. I was brought up a Quaker, and respect them greatly, but the thing that actually brought me to universal compassion was Buddhism. That incorporates the more general Indian spiritual philosophy of 'Ahimsa' (non-harming), and in many ways that has greater and wider compassion than Christianity, for instance, Buddhists were debating whether monks should be vegetarians 2500 years ago! So I think it's really a 'spiritual perspective of oneness' that can sustain these values, and hence there is a much wider support for them than this suggests
@@geoffstemen3652 that's not the point I'm making, whether humans should be vegetarians isn't what is in question here, what is being discussed is whether other spiritual traditions have a very wide ranging deep compassion and value for life and the suffering of others, and I'm just pointing out that several Indian ones DO, so I don't think Christianity is unique, which to my mind is extremely helpful, as I don't think we can really hope the Christian myth will become universal, and given that I consider it a 'meaningful myth' the question for me is what is behind that myth that can be asserted as true in the modern world? For me I see that as spiritual oneness that several traditions support, based on 'accessible experience' and backed up by modern science i.e. science confirms everything is of one essence.
Tom seems to have missed the gross inaccuracies of the main BLM media hypes--in fact police racist incidents are extremely low; these are statistical realities, not media realities. Still his main points here are important.
Tom fast becoming one of my favourite thinkers. Great discussion.
Tom’s podcast with Dominic is the most entertaining, dare I say addictive, podcasts available. It’s called “The Rest is History” and it will have you literally laughing out loud.
"Literature adds to reality, it does not simply describe it. It enriches the necessary competencies that daily life requires and provides; and in this respect, it irrigates the deserts that our lives have already become." C. S. LEWIS
Thank you so much. In a non-religious setting, a free and public discourse, with respect and carefully chosen words, a significant mind addresses the actual root of civilisation, the very mansion of our culture.
Tom Holland is an amazingly articulate speaker, which makes his talks and interviews even more enjoyable.
Excellent interview! I really enjoy listening to Tom Holland. He has a magnificent mind. Kudos to you, John, as well, for the inspiring dialogue.
Unfortunately his voice is irritating.!
I've read 3 of Tom's books: In the Shadow of the Sword, Persian Fire, and Rubicon: Last Days of the Roman Empire, he's got such a talent for bringing history to life. Great author of our time
yeah but he is apologetic i can't wait for his next book the sword of christianity
*WHAAAT?!* he wrote that book? I have it! And he disparaged God (of Israel and by extension the God of Israel in Christ after the New Testament) many times. This man is a Christian?!
I am so shocked right now...
@@kafon6368 he's not Christian. I think he says in this very video that he drifted out of the faith gradually.
You should read his Dominion book. It’s really good.
@@kafon6368 It's amazing you own that book since neither in Amazon nor Wiki, does it mention Mr. Holland wrote of book of that title.
Any educated person instinctively knows these things but it takes courage to stand up for your intellectual position. It broadens you and when shared can broaden others.
"The cross is such an odd thing to have as a focus of veneration", says Tom. I couldn't agree more. This is my introduction to Tom and I'm beginning to Tom and I'm beginning to like what he says very much.
Yes, it's what founded my feelings as a teen that there was something evil and sadistic about Christianity, seeing as how it worships a bloody tortured body. As an old woman, with a tortured body and an understanding that this is the common fate, I no longer see the cross as diabolic.
His writings have changed my life, I couldn't be more grateful
@@anomietoponymie2140you missed the point…god is worshipped for loving us, living among us to model how we should treat each other. As your body fails you, you may want to pray for life after death
You are such a fast learner John.
I have been learning from you, for two years now, many thanks to you both.
And how was he as a politician? Very curious as to what you might think.
Not perfect like you n me .@@anomietoponymie2140
Mr. Anderson does us all a service through his open-mindedness. Tom Holland does us an even greater service by stimulating independent thought on the ideas he discusses without militancy.
Great interview! Tom was at his sharpest.
Always learning with you John, forever grateful.
This is a great interview. Most appreciated. The triumph of the Christian Faith despite its cultured despisers comes across clearly. Love it.
Interesting times! Non-religious people from various walks of life are beginning to lament on how a desacralised way of life and ideologies are a dead end. For the onlooker it appears to be almost synchronised... - the Lord is a great master of timing!
If you'll pardon the US football analogy, one of my songs goes, "'Keep running, Donald [Donald Driver, the former Green Bay Packer wide receiver]. 'I can't see the football.' 'Keep running anyhow.'" Brett Favre's pass would be so accurate and the planned play would be so beautiful that Driver, on a dead run, would simply have to look up and reach up, and the ball would be there, synchroniz/sing two separate "walks" of life.
Brilliant, prophetic...Christian! 🔥🔥🔥
Many Thanks John, Many Thanks Tom
This fellow writes excellent history, especially ancient history. So entertaining, yet scholarly.
Interesting that some proportion of atheists are simply more inclined to think of God in ways that are not popularly or publicly represented; and thus can easily misidentify himself.
Probably entertaining, but hardly scholarly. As you could plausibly expect from an actual history scholar.
38:05 hahaha repudiated what Christians have enshrined? Hahah then why did the Catholic church enshrine the Nazis?
Hahahah😂 oh please
Loved Dominion. Always a pleasures listening to Tom H. Thanks!
Dominion is a brilliant book, both sophisticated and easy to read. Even if you don't like reading history you might want to give it a try. But take it slow if you want to get something out of it.
Bought the book last year... No stone unturned. Great read.
Another great interview. Great fan of Tom Holland and his history podcast with Dominic Sandbrook. Bought several of his books over the years. Nice bookshelves.
Thanks for mentioning this! I just looked it up. I listen to podcasts when I run, it sounds really interesting.
Tom Holland I a very erudite and competent scholar. His books are all gems.
Tolkien had a very sophisticated idea of 'myth' which rejected the word as indicating something false, but rather as something intrinsically true but presented in a different fashion than that of science.
I believe he helped Lewis understand that Christianity is a myth that is true. The late Dr. H. Wilbert "Will" Norton of Wheaton College Graduate School translated John 14:6 as Jesus saying, "I am the Way, _both_ [Greek _kai_] the Truth and the Life."
@@daneumurianpiano7822 I think I recall this point from the Carpenter biography of Tolkien
Absolutely, Profoundly Brilliant...thank you gentlemen!!
Thank you Tom Holland for the effort and sacrifice.
Such a wonderful conversation. I love it thank you again
It is a fabulous book. Very well written and a very enjoyable read.
Be kind to one another. You never know what a person is going through unless you speak to them and try to understand their situation.✝
Best discussion yet. So much food for thought.
What Tom is really saying is that no matter how much the atheist/humanist types try to distance themselves from Christ, their efforts will be for naught as their very assumptions about human rights stem from Jesus. It's hilarious when you sit back and see it through Tom"s eyes.
Our Father has given us this joy 🙏💪😀
There are so many nuggets of insight here my mind is whirling.
Thank you, gentleman. Our Creator is mighty indeed.
Superb interview. Tom is a first class historian but he misses the point re the resurrection and the power of the cross is not it’s ideal but its power to change people.
YES! you can operate from a Christian value system, but without Christ leading you, you are doomed to fail. That is why western civilization is failing. It's not enough to have Christian values you must submit your whole life to Christ. You must have a relationship with Him. You must repent. You must believe and have faith in him.
We love because He loved us first. We give because He gave His life for us. Otherwise we're back at the old testament living under the law.
I think the distinction you make is more about what makes a Christian religious. You might be right tho.
His law will be written in their gentile hearts (whether ‘they’ know it or not) 🥰
And Jesus comes with a sword next time… ⚔️
A sword of fire , like beric dondarian ( spelling?) in thrones.
Ideals are literally the agents of change.
I may be 60, but I am not deaf, yet! I had no trouble hearing Tom, but Anderson, unlike in Triggernometry, for instance, he seemed to be mumbling here, talking to himself. I had to turn up the volume of my speakers to their maximum in order to hear him!
Oh look! It's the guy who guest's on top, top, top historian Dominic Sandbrook's podcast!
We really appreciate your guests and topics John, but sometimes cannot hear, especially deep male voices. Can you alter your sound system to pick up the volume somehow.
I would love to see a long discussion between Holland and Peterson
distributed cognition has flourished beyond measure in Christian grammar based societies. Enough of us think in terms of mutual benefit projects and embedding ourselves in projects larger than ourselves which, in turn are embedded in even greater projects, ultimately embedded in an inclusive, good faith open future infused with a generative benign spirit. Many are reluctant to see that sprit as God shining through the culmination of sufficient goodness.but it is most assuredly related to Christian grammar, whatever you chose to call it, and it is glorious.
Brilliant. A friend of mine has written a book called 'The Rebirthing of God', in which the current image and reality of the Christian Church is dying a death, only to be reborn in a far more mature form that is no longer fearful and small minded, locking out other wisdom traditions, and is no longer obsessed with original sin, but recognises original blessing and also recognises the sacredness of the Earth and the natural realm.
Spider Man has been his best work to date.
Wonderful conversation, thank you John
But to discriminate means to exercise judgement. To exercise judgement of good snd evil means to accept responsibility, yet, as a Christisn to admit one's imperfection. To admit one's imperfection while facing reality is to embrace the duality : awareness of God and God's grace.
Wedgewood's political slogan "Am I not a man and a brother?" is lifted directly from Paul's letter to Philemon (a slaveowner) about what to do with his escaped slave Onesimus who Paul had found.
"12 I am sending him-who is my very heart-back to you. 13 I would have liked to keep him with me so that he could take your place in helping me while I am in chains for the gospel. 14 But I did not want to do anything without your consent, so that any favor you do would not seem forced but would be voluntary. 15 Perhaps the reason he was separated from you for a little while was that you might have him back forever- 16 no longer as a slave, but better than a slave, as a dear brother. He is very dear to me but even dearer to you, both *as a fellow man and as a brother* in the Lord."
This is another example of just how radical Christianity is. Imagine if America's Fugitive Slave Act had been written on this actual Christian basis.
Thought-provoking points, I will need to consider them before deciding if I agree
“He who walks with wise men becomes wise
but the companion of fools suffers harm” Proverbs 13:20
Tom Holland is wonderful
This is a thought stimulating discussion.
"The fact that there is power in being the victim..."
No. Christianity is about there being power in being the SERVANT. Christ was *serving*, when He was on that cross.
The idea that Christianity is worshiping something pitiful for its pitifulness, is a heresy. Probably the heresy of our time.
Catholics already know this and have known it for 1,900 years. It's you idiotic protestants and your laughable 'reformation' that have lead to fools like Nietzsche spreading that victim interpretation of Christianity.
True, it is not victimhood that is exalted in the first will be last precept, it is servanthood service.
What a fascinating lense with which to look at the world. The bit about the WWII Germans was very intriguing. I had always accepted them as evil, but now knowing, thanks to Tom Holland, that this is simply because I was indoctrinated into a Christian way of thinking is going to force me to take a de novo look at the Germans, and reexamine what I think about them. I think we all must.
We all accept a very shallow narrative about Europe in the inter war years 1919-1939. We are not encouraged to look deeper and it's not made easy for us. A lot of horrible evil was carried out by people who felt freed from moral constraint but we need to look much more deeply into the political world of mitteleurope then. As usual it was MUCH MORE COMPLEX than we are allowed to think.
Thanks for this fascinating and important conversation, gents.
☝️😎
A great discussion! I look forward to reading the book.
Read Nietzsche first.
Great respect for both speakers
I was here in Minneapolis when G. Floyd died. I was struck by the Christ-like veneration and reaction supporting Floyd across the country and western world. Here a criminal tortured into submission by the all-powerful state, replayed the Crucifixion story before our eyes. However, Floyd was not a facsimile of Jesus, but rather an actual criminal many times in his life, nonetheless deserving mercy.
Daniel Shaver deserved mercy, too. Perhaps even more so since he appeared to try to comply with the all-powerful state's orders. But he was white, so who really cares.
The only people who would make a marter out of a man who at one point held a gun to a pregnant womans stomach our the reprobate minded Democrat/Socialist Americans the rest of us didnt agree w/ the knee on the neck but arent crying either cause its less of our tax payer money to feed and house a career criminal /drug addict...
Deserving mercy? He died in his sins. He is under condemnation/judgment from God as we speak.
Christianity Today magazine ran a piece titled "The Faith of George Floyd." Thomas Sowell, and Magatte Wade interviewed by Jordan Peterson, are among the black voices calling for, if I may borrow the words of Bill Milliken, "tough love."
Floyd was a hopeless sinner.
The policeman who squeezed the life of him was a paranoid amateur, living in fear, and wrecking retribution on the moral enemy.
Regarding race, one of the o the cops was Asian. The shopkeeper who reported Floyd was Asian.
They were attempting to maintain order in an extremely violent, and confused society.
Great interview with my favorite writer TH.
Fantastic interview. Technical point, turn up John's sound.
What would would the fundamentalist Christians within the The Kings School and the other GPS schools think I wonder, John? Is there not still an arrogance exhibited amongst these elite schools that we no longer see in British schools of the genre. they have moved on. They are not bound by the limitations we here in Australia continue to impose on ourselves. It's time we grew up, and and became a little more sophisticated and aware of the how we fit into the world beyond trade. The depth of Tom's analysis and his breadth of knowledge seem to lead the way. His analysis is fresh, takes risks and is fearless, a quality Australians once had about 150 - 50 years ago. A great choice for an interview, John, but he's not answering your questions. He's moved beyond the questions.
Would it be possible to get just a few less ads? I understand monetization, but it is really hard to follow the argument when it is interrupted every couple of minutes…
Interesting point made by Tom Holland about the idea of access to food being a fundamental human right coming from Christianity. He is nevertheless somewhat selective as to what he quotes from the Apostle Paul. After all, it was Paul who said “if a man does not choose to work, neither shall he eat.” 2 Thess 3:10.
Sounds like we shouldnt give people stuff just so they can continue to lay around and be lazy. We all need to strive toward a better version of ourselves, even the poor people.
He was also dead wrong and blasphemous for comparing Floyd to Jesus Christ.
@@SidekickSam24 It's called theistic evolution, or in the words of Francis Collins and his BioLogos Foundation, evolutionary creation. God instituted the beautiful system of evolution/"survival of the fittest," yet "occasionally" calls us to override it with unconditional love. Someone has put it, "Work as if it all depended on you. Pray as if it all depended on God." It does, and it does.
I also have a problem when ‘human nature’ is thrown up in conversations to explain any particular thing. Human Nature: Anything that a human can do is human nature. Be it extremely harmful or extremely good, and everything in between. What is never discussed is that it is a choice what particular thing manifests. What you must recognise is that when you do not share a thought system, you are weakening it. Those who believe in it therefor perceive this as an attack on them. This is because everyone identifies them-self with there thought system, and every thought system centres on what you believe you are. If the centre of the thought system is true, only truth extends from it. But if a lie is at its centre, only deception proceeds from it. I Believe JC said this
Gosh! The world needs so much a talk between tom holland and Jordan Peterson
Cosmic Skeptic on Jordan Peterson is good
TH extraordinary 😍
Still find it very difficult to understand Australians when they speak. Sure i didn't hear in full every time John Anderson spoke.
Brilliant interviewer!
Great talk!
I like and admire both these men.
BLM supporters would do well to listen to this fantastic interview.
Great book and discussion
Incredible human being
Excellent, just ordered the book
I, Claudius and Ben Hur were my introduction to Roman history and was absorbed. Unfortunately I didn't stick with it. That was in tge late 70s. Fast forward to 1993 and converting from atheism to Biblical theism, Rome became relevant again. Rome being in Judea, the Gospel spreading throughout the Roman Empire, the diaspora of the Jews because of the Jewish-Roman Wars, and the relationship between the Christians and Israel which is very important in our age.
"The king is subject to the same law as the lowest person in the land, and that we get from Christianity"
Are you sure? It seems like the story of Brutus and Tarquin also reflects it, although Suetonius reports a certain backsliding that is the opposite of David's trajectory in his story with Uriah and Bathsheba.
Great interview and most interesting but I believe Tom makes a fundamental category error: 1. Jesus was not a 'victim' - He went to the cross willingly as a substitute for sinners, thereby defeating and making a spectacle of the forces of evil (vindicated by the resurrection, which if not true makes our faith futile and useless, as the Apostle says in 1 Corinthians 15:12-18); and 2. "The last shall be first" is not a political statement or mandate. It describes the voluntary attitude of Christ's followers to themselves and others. It is fundamentally a personal stance. Yes, it transforms society, but not because kings are de-throned and peasants made rulers (in fact, Proverbs warns against such a course) but because Christians and churches bless those around them, which was dramatically true from the very first days of the church, even when it had no power at all and was ruthlessly persecuted in both Palestine (first) and by the Romans (later).
I'm so glad u're meeting in person again. This webcam stuff was awful.
having listened to every single episode of his podcast it's really weird seeing video of Tom. He doesn't look like what I thought he would
Had anyone but Nietzsche and Žižek understood Hegel, they could have drawn the correct lessons which most people still don't appear to notice: to social animals, the primary impulse of empathy is directed toward individuals who display the greatest signals of neoteny, ie children and women. The mechanism of power is not physical force or threat of tyranny - that is a temporary power, and those who live by the sword shall die by the sword. Rather the lasting power is in him or her who can inspire the greatest empathy in the group and no one can do that better than the noble righteous victim. The Church had only one story - the story of an innocent man tortured and killed. And look at the power it wielded with that story. This is the power of wokeism, and the sooner people understand it, maybe we can have some hope in dealing with it. The pursuit of justice, the instinctive sense humans have to protect the weak, stems from our empathy towards children and those displaying neoteny; it is regulated by a social demand to fall in line in protecting children, then women, then the disabled and the weak, etc, and its author is not Christ. It's author is nature. But its weaponization is Christ. Gandhi took down the British Empire in a sack. MLK ended the American apartheid in the South. No story is more powerful than the woman who was unjustly assaulted sexually by her abusers. Entire rooms full of people fall silent when a survivor speaks. The brilliance of Christianity is to recognize that you can use psychological warfare against the biggest and most powerful army with a story of injustice. the moment you fight back when someone strikes you on one cheek you no longer retain your position of the noble victim and you are now someone capable of defending themselves losing immediately the sympathy that the group had instinctively to protect you. In other words it is our social impulses and instincts towards helping one another that is weaponized when the victim is so obviously and transparently displayed before us which is why icons and Christianity are so important and why the image of a tortured Christ is so important because our empathy and morality stems from our visual cortex instincts of seeing something suffer or seeing something display neotenous features.
Interesting- can woke be defeated or are we the Romans and they, a new radical Christian movement?
The West is wholly Christian, it is true, but Christian in a super-Jesus way. That Christianity has become religious from philosophical is such a wonderful development.
The Christ figure, the Redeemer, the one, who takes YOUR burden on HIS own shoulders and rids it from you and for you, that truly is THE WESTERN raison d'etre.
excellent as usual
The redeeming and uplifting value of the cross is FORGIVENESS.
Jesus said, whilst suffering on the cross, "forgive them for they know not what they do".
Probably one of the most obvious examples is the Christian idea of redemption built into our criminal justice system. For just about every prisoner there is the hope their lives can be turned around by activities and programs run in the prisons.
There is so much conveniently left out of Mr. Holland's understanding of Christianity that he doesn't *quite* get it. The cornerstone of Christianity is not the philosophy of political egalitarianism but the extraordinary love of God and an invitation to intimate union with Him. Everything else cascades from that.
Christian ideals divorced from Christianity devolve into something less pleasant. It's a reenactment of the Fall.
Folks need to learn to understand that there is a vast difference between the false God of religion and the true God of spirituality!
Thanks for adding this important point. Thankfully, the Bible stays clear of falling into the political egalitarian philosophy. It's almost miraculous that it doesn't, while still dealing with the divine incarnation+ speaking encouragingly to the weakest in society.
Quite agree... but what is also true is that we are all God's children and in that sense, all equal in His eyes.
Yes, but he is not a theologian and not a Christian either (as far as I know). His argument is for people to see that liberal ideals are firmly based on Christian ideas however much the Western cultures tried to divorce themselves from anything religious.
I listened to your podcast on Oppenheimer, and watched the movie yesterday, they did not make the scene of Oppenheimer forceful of kissing one young lady in the train when her fiancé out for smoking.
Prometheus created humans in the physical image of Gods before the Christian God ! A marvel to hear Mr Tom Holland anyway !
It's wonderfull to have a little device, so, despite of a poor knowlidge of the spoken, it's possible to see and listen diferent personalities. The one has his watch hidden, time does not exist, the other has his thin watch like the walk on a thin cord, visible, time has no patience.
This is sooo good
Not all of us agree.
It’s interesting to see how different interviewers try to skew Tom’s genuine attempt at objectivity as support for their positions. It seems humans abhor objectivity as much as nature does a vacuum.
A secular mindset can never understand the spirituality of Islam which is purely revealed but it accepts the function of human intellect within the domain of experience
This isn't the Tom Holland you were looking for.
But stick around. You'll learn something the one you _were_ looking for couldn't teach you.
HOPE, they do it for HOPE! HOPE that there is more than just life here on earth, that there is an eternal life in the new Jerusalem. To have this HOPE for the wedding banquet in heaven allows me and others the ability to look past the distractions of life that may consume us otherwise. In this HOPE I am called to not just me get to heaven but my spouse my children my family and friends through serving the other and that other is a child of God who is loved by God and God calls me to love his children. Serving through the corporal works of mercy, feeding the hungry, giving drink to the thirsty, sheltering the homeless, visiting the sick, visiting the imprisoned, burying the dead and giving alms to the poor. Yes, it's radical compared to the secular culture. Once I was one way and now I am radically different. Yes I am a poor rotten sinner, God have mercy on me. May I strive to be Jesus to all of God's children and may I see Jesus in them.
I find it very bizarre that Tom Holland thinks National Socialism is a form of Fascism.
It's a type of Socialism obsessed with the power dynamics that Marxism is obsessed with.
The Fascists (and there have been more than a few versions of it) believe the Nation State is a corporation and the people must serve it - much as Republican Rome thought.
Musollini's Mistress was Jewish, and 30% of Italian Jews were members of the Fascist party during the 1930s.
Hes 100% right
Mr Holland, being an intellectual and of course leaning on his own understanding, makes the fatal error of saying he sees no “proof” of God. When in reality it’s all around him. He then seems to contradict himself when he points out Christianity is ubiquitous in history, why we know right from wrong, good from evil, dark from light.
But his stand on God can easily be explained in 1 Corinthians 1:18-25.
When you say the "proof" is all around him, what does that mean? What is proof to you you may simply be your unproven belief to someone else.
No mate! Slavery is wrong because people are hurt and that is not a nice thing…
We might have deep Christian influences but it is normal to feel sorry for another and whether I was Christian or not I would still have rejected slavery…
Loved this...As for any changes of society, ideas can only go so far. Only the human heart, each heart--that has been given the freedom to 'say' yes to God (the Yes latent or blatant)--can participate in transforming and 'saving' the world....The No-sayers who choose to Be Like God in self-exalting rather than 'merely' human, made in God's image, are the self-deifiers...
Superhumanism is all over the place, inside or outside of religions.
The streak to individual power that resides in each heart--in its refusal of own creatureliness--is forever 'the problem'. Thanks to Life happening, that can bring one to hitting bottom, Dark Night of the soul, we each, sooner or later, have the occasion to turn our eyes to Something Transcendant 'up there'.....or close the heart, in a fist. God doesn't crash parties, but awaits invitation, or a simple 'Help!'...to come in, and galvanize with the power of the Cross, stronger than death and empires: Love!
The arc of desacrilizing what has gone before is interesting though a very incomplete picture. The Christian/Catholic church desacralized paganism but retained the supernatural by ascribing such things to demons. The Protestant reformation desacralized the sacraments of the Church but also marginalized the supernatural. The Enlightenment (and eventual rise of scientism) then eliminated the supernatural entirely. Nietzsche was just the final nail in the proverbial coffin. Modern manifestations are only superficially Christian but are in fact heavily influenced by paganism, gnosticism, and Nominalism. I mean, seriously, we already sacrifice our children on the alter of self convenience - at least the Aztecs were worried about the World ending.
PS the separation of church and state is modernist myth of convenience for a secular state that pretends to be neutral.
Ok. This is quite fascinating. Holland claims he's "Christianized" but he's clearly "Protestantized".
The evangelical world has plenty of the supernatural, sometimes taken to excess. George Muller, who founded an orphanage in Bristol, England in the 19th century, told of suppertime without food. He instructed the children to thank God for the food. There was a knock on the door. A food wagon had just broken an axle. Don Richardson said that the Greek _musterion_ meant "mystery," not just "sacrament". Jesus refused to flaunt the supernatural, but used it (Greek _semeion_, or "sign", in the Gospel of John) to prove who he was, help people, and glorify the Father. I could cite a clear personal experience of the supernatural and many compelling experiences.
Although Tom Holland made many valid points. He totally lost the plot by comparing Floyd with Jesus Christ. He obviously doesn't understand Christianity nor who Jesus was in depth. Christ represents the innocent dying to save humanity that is lost. He does not represent criminals and thugs.
We have/had great foundations in Western society that worked for a long time. Those fiundations have been corrupted by the worst of our nature. Is it possible to keep those tried and trusted foundations, identify and root out the villians, and restore with upgrades of course, the structures here in the West that have been the envy of the world. The current approach of destroying everything and heading into a future with no guardrails or solid fiundations is frightening and will not end well.
When Christ came everything changed. The world was never the same Caesar Augustus was a fantastic ruler who stopped civil war Opened trade routes. Established the Roman peace. He found Rome built in brick and left it covered in marble. After his death he was declared a god and every citizen honored him as the god that unified the empire. If Caesar came back today he would be astonished to learn that we began our calendar with the life of Christ and not his.
About half of Canadians can no longer afford to eat regularly. $100.00 for 1 bag of groceries. 40yrs of the politics of fear, corruption and dispair.
Allons-y Brandeau
Watching this after hearing Tom speak on this at the Theos lecture in London last night. I agree with his position in many ways, and have come to value Christianity as meaningful myth, but I do think that he's overplaying the idea that its only Christianity that can underpin 'humanist liberal values'. I was brought up a Quaker, and respect them greatly, but the thing that actually brought me to universal compassion was Buddhism. That incorporates the more general Indian spiritual philosophy of 'Ahimsa' (non-harming), and in many ways that has greater and wider compassion than Christianity, for instance, Buddhists were debating whether monks should be vegetarians 2500 years ago! So I think it's really a 'spiritual perspective of oneness' that can sustain these values, and hence there is a much wider support for them than this suggests
Did you learn about Buddhism in a Buddhist country or a Christian country? Why should humans value vegetarianism when omnivory predates “ethics”?
@@geoffstemen3652 that's not the point I'm making, whether humans should be vegetarians isn't what is in question here, what is being discussed is whether other spiritual traditions have a very wide ranging deep compassion and value for life and the suffering of others, and I'm just pointing out that several Indian ones DO, so I don't think Christianity is unique, which to my mind is extremely helpful, as I don't think we can really hope the Christian myth will become universal, and given that I consider it a 'meaningful myth' the question for me is what is behind that myth that can be asserted as true in the modern world? For me I see that as spiritual oneness that several traditions support, based on 'accessible experience' and backed up by modern science i.e. science confirms everything is of one essence.
Tom seems to have missed the gross inaccuracies of the main BLM media hypes--in fact police racist incidents are extremely low; these are statistical realities, not media realities.
Still his main points here are important.