10/31/26

Looking at Ian Hodder’s Book (2024) “Entangled.” (Part 1 of 22)

0001 The full title of the Work before me is Entangled: A New Archaeology of the Relationships between Humans and Things (Second Edition). The author is emeritus professor at Stanford University, California, and affiliated with the And Koc University in Istanbul, Turkey. The publisher is Wiley Blackwell (Hoboken, New Jersey). The identifier is ISBN 978 111 985 5866 (paperback).

0002 The first edition is published in 2016 and titled Studies in Human-Thing Entanglement, which is quickly followed in 2018, with Where are We Heading: The Evolution of Humans and Things (Yale University Press). This boost is examined in Razie Mah’s blog (June 30 to 16, 2023, Looking at Ian Hodder’s Book (2023) “Where We Are Heading”).

0003 The second edition (2024) involves a significant rewrite. The topic is the same, but the emphasis changes. The change is captured in the title of the first chapter, “Thinking about Things Differently (from Things to Flows)”.

0004 Section 1 of chapter 1 (S1C1) starts with the question, “What is a thing?”

For me, the question is addressed in a recent article by Mariusz Tabaczek, eliciting a response by a capable semiotician, who posted a draft in the website academia.edu titled Response to Mariusz Tabaczek’s Article (2025) “Contemporary and Classical Versions of Hylomorphism”.

0005 The response relies on the definition of “entanglement” developed in Razie Mah’s blog in December, 2025, titled Looking at Igor Pilshchikov and Mikhail Trunin’s Article (2016) “The Tartu-Moscow School of Semiotics”.

0006 The term, “entanglement” stands like a mirror of the term, “substantiation”, thereby confounding the structure of Peirce’s category of secondness.

I will explain in the following points. For further introduction, consult Razie Mah’s e-works, A Primer on the Category-Based Nested Form and A Primer on Sensible and Social Construction.

0007 What is a thing?

According to Aristotle, the first step in natural philosophy is to regard a thing as matter [and] form. The brackets are there for a reason. Aristotle’s hylomorphe (hylo = “matter”, morphe = “form”) is an exemplar of Peirce’s category of secondness. Secondness consists of two contiguous real elements. For Aristotle’s hylomorphe, the real elements are matter and form. The contiguity, [and], is hardly adequate. So, Razie Mah purloins the much-abused term, “substance”, to replace the conjunction.

0008 Here is the result.

0009 Of course, the use of the word, “substance” (a noun), as the label for the contiguity between matter and form may be regarded as controversial. However, the act only adds a technical definition to an already discarded label. Modern thinkers have no idea what the term originally means, so they are convinced that whatever meaning that a modern assigns must be appropriate. “Substance” means whatever a modern says that it means.

What a message.

0010 The idea of entanglement comes up, because, once matter [substantiates] form, then the form may get entangled with other matter. The thing remains a thing, but now other matter becomes apparent. For Tabaczek’s review of contemporary commentaries on Aristotle’s hylomorphe, certain philosophers say that the form entangles a principle of unity.

A principle of unity becomes the entangled matter.

0011 Here is a picture.

0012 This principle of unity allows the person to regard the form as a hole… I mean, whole… as in holistically.

One might think that a principle of unity does not constitute matter. But, has that thinker ever framed a picture? That frame is confounding.

0013 Another example is found in Hodder’s research fieldwork.

Long long ago, the inhabitants of Catal Hoyuk (the anglicized version of a Turkish label) frequently plaster their walls as a solution to the undesired habits of mud-clay bricks. They tend to slump. Plaster helps control the loss of integrity that slumping entangles.

Here is a diagram.

0014 Happily, plastering the walls solved other issues as well. The text explains.

10/7/26

Looking at Ian Hodder’s Book (2024) “Entangled.” (Part 22 of 22)

0285 What do I mean by “not enough”?

0286 From this examination, I have demonstrated that Hodder’s sociological and anthropological appreciation of “entanglement” mirrors, so to speak, a philosophical definition of a confounding. Using Aristotelian terminology, a confounding occurs when the form of a thing entangles other (non-originating) matter. Form is contiguous with two matters, one originating and one entangled. The two contiguities are “substantiation” and “entanglement”.

0287 This applies to content-level and situation-level hylomorphes. In the following figure, entanglement connects form on one level with matter on the adjacent higher level. This connection also occurs in the sign-relations isolated by scholastics of the Latin Age.

0288 Clearly, this expression of entanglement theory stands outside the Hegel-Marx Overton window.

This expression stands outside of the range of ideation among modern anthropologists in 2026.

0289 The story is even more complicated. The three-level interscope fully contains two sign-relations, the specifying and the exemplar, familiar to Latin Age scholastics. Even that is not enough.

There is one more confounding that resolves into a sign-relation. The interventional sign connects the perspective-level of one interscope with the content-level of another. What is constituted_2cf in one interscope stands for matter_3am in another interscope. The discovery of the interventional sign-relation completes a line of thought that started during medieval times.

0290 The Hegel-Marx approaches that the author discusses in chapters 10 and 11 (C10 and C11) need to be adjusted in order to account for phenomena regarded as observable and measurable facets of a noumenon characterized by substances, confoundings and sign-relations.

0291 The story of the emergence of Lotman’s thing is told in Razie Mah’s blog for December 2025, titled Looking at Igor Pilshchikov and Michael Trunin’s Article (2016) “The Tartu Moscow School of Semiotics” as well as follow-up examinations appearing in January through March of 2026.

0292 Juri Lotman (1922-1993) is a Soviet era academic with expertise in the arts of the Slavic civilization. He and a collaborator, Boris Uspenskij (1937-present), find that Marxist vocabulary is inadequate to discuss the phenomena of Slavic historical art production. So, they adopt semiology and structuralism in order to build models of artistic and literary productions. The models allow them to discuss Slavic art-works according to modern, scientific sensibilities.

0293 In sum, for Juri Lotman and Boris Uspenskij, Marx’s thing entangles the matter of semiotics.

0294 The confounding resolves in… what appears to me… to be the new Overton window for the social sciences for the twenty-first century.

0295 I wrap up with three noteworthy conclusions.

0296 First, Hodder’s anthropological theory of entanglement associates with Marx’s thing. Razie Mah’s hypothesis that the human niche is the potential of triadic relations associates with Lotman’s thing.

Second, despite occupying different poles of the twenty-first century Overton window, Hodder’s sociological theory of entanglement and the philosophical definition of “entanglement” as a component of a “confounding” do not exclude one another. They either complement or align.

Third, excavations at Catal Hoyuk permit the suggestion that cultural emissaries from the Ubaid of southern Mesopotamia influence a change in things_2a, embodiments_2bfand processes_2cm associated with Level VII (starting around 6600 B.C.). This suggestion is consistent with the hypothesis of the first singularity proposed by Razie Mah.

0297 Here is a summary of Razie Mah’s e-works on human evolution.

0298 My thanks to Dr. Ian Hodder for this book, as well his many collaborators. I hope that this examination adds value to his inquiries.

09/30/26

Looking at Dr. D. Basak’s Book (2025) “Sumerian Mythology…” (Part 1 of 20)

0001 The full title of the book before me is Sumerian Mythology, Ancient Civilizations, and the Epic Search For Humanity’s Origins. That is a great title. This publication is the 13^th in a sequence of 37 books downloaded into the Amazon product line between the end of July, 2025, and the start of January, 2026. This literary output is staggering.

0002 Plus, it raises a question in my mind.

How does one identify an artificial intelligence (AI) produced article or book?

0003 Every sentence is well constructed. The text is highly segmented.

Are these clues?

0004 For example, the preface divides into A (5 subsections) and B (1 subsection). Each subsection contains two paragraphs. The preface also includes additional material, C, informing the reader what to expect, why this is essential reading, and how this qualifies for understanding.

Of course, this is standard textbook formatting.

However, the two clues, well-constructed sentences and high segmentation, still apply to the question at hand.

0005 Here are some other clue.

Flat statements contain no wordplay. The entire book consists of (1) direct statements and (2) a negative followed by an affirmative. No, I don’t mean to be negative, it is obviously better to be positive.

Fractal repetitions appear within the book’s organization. For example, the preface’s B subsection constitutes (what may be called) “Chapter 0”, which recapitulates the topics of the subsequent 15 chapters.

0006 Here is a picture of the list of chapters.

0007 Even though the text itself does not state that it is AI generated, one may raise the question and ponder the clues. These clues do not prove an answer, one way or another. But, they do raise another question.

If the work at hand is AI generated, then what does that imply?

0008 The postmodern scholastic will start with Aristotle’s hylomorphe, which is an exemplar of Peirce’s category of secondness. These concepts may be derived from Razie Mah’s e-books A Primer on the Category-Based Nested Form and A Primer on Sensible and Social Construction.

The book that I have before me is a thing. A thing is composed of two contiguous real elements. For Aristotle, the real elements are matter and form. The contiguity is placed in brackets for clear nomenclature.

0009 Here is a diagram.

0010 My question as to whether the book is AI generated and what that implies is called “an entanglement”. The following diagram is sort of confusing (something that an AI would avoid), because two expressions are linked in that they have the same form.

0011 In the hylomorphe, describing the book before me, the phrase, “AI generated”, is put into parenthesis because the question remains open. The form is a book.

In the second (upside down, so to speak) thing, the (AI generated) form entangles another matter. That “other matter” is a question about how the AI learns what it is going to say. Obviously, the answer will include the originating matter. One may wonder, “What else?”

A thing and its entanglement consists in two matters (one originating and one entangled) and one form. The technical name for this pair is “confounding”.

0012 With the above confounding in mind, I may consider Chapter 1.

Here is a list of the learning objectives.

0013 This list suggests that the search for humanity’s origins, involving the Sumerian civilization and its mythology, arises in response to the precarious and fertile landscape between the Tigris and Euphrates Rivers. Annual floods from both rivers deliver silt. They can also deliver floods and destruction.

Excavations at locations in southern Mesopotamia find strata associated to floods during the Ubaid, Uruk, and Sumerian Dynastic archaeological periods.

0014 The irrigation systems control the rivers and redirect their water into productive agricultural uses. These systems require large scale labor under central (yet local) authority.

0015 To me, these conclusions are precisely what an AI program would deliver, after processing the literature (web-pages) cited at the end of the chapter. But, these are my suspicions. I have no proof.

0016 However, I can construct a confounding. There is one form, the land between the Tigris and Euphrates Rivers. These rivers are subject to annual crests that deposit silt and may cause catastrophic flooding. The originating matter is the geology and climate of southern Mesopotamia during the Ubaid, Uruk and Early Sumerian Dynastic archaeological periods. The entangled matter is the mind of the Sumerian people, who celebrate the mythology that this book addresses.

0017 Here is a picture of the confounding.

0018 The confounding leaves this reader with a hypothesis. Sumerian mythology is an ideological component of an organizational imperative. The Sumerians must figure out how to organize to channel the rivers in order to irrigate their fields and to avoid catastrophic flooding.

In the process, the organizational imperative captures the Sumerian imagination.

09/29/26

Looking at Jess Beck, et al.’s Article (2026) “Changing the Landscape of Archaeological Publishing” (Part 2 of 20)

0019 Why am I concerned about AI?

0020 Well, I have another manuscript before me. The article appears in Current Anthropology 67(1), pages 155-180 (https://doi.org/10.1086/739789). The essay goes online in February, 2026, which is around the time when Dr. D. Basak finishes downloading his 37 books on various topics in human evolution, origins and archaeology. Surely, none of the 23 authors of the proclamation in Current Anthropology know about Dr. Basak’s efforts. Artificial intelligence is barely mentioned.

0021 If AI is not the future of publishing in Archaeology, then what is this lead essay about?

Young academics in the field of archaeology are getting crushed by their dual mandates of teaching and research.

0022 The article reminds me of when I heard about the beveled-rim bowl of Uruk. This standardized hastily spun pottery found popularity as towns were becoming cities. Some speculate that the bevel-rimmed bowl was used to measure rations of grains.

0023 The exploitation of labor by a religious and political system is not new. Archaeologists, of all experts, should know that. The irony of the contemporary complaints is startling. Postmodern academics are caught in the same dilemma as the laborers who dredged canals or cast bricks of mud and clay, thousands of years ago.

0024 The first sentence of the article reads like a manifesto. It is time to change academic publishing in archaeology.

If Dr. D. Basak has his way, it has already changed.

0025 The complaint is serious. Twenty-three authors sign the manifesto. These include Jess Beck (University of Ireland), Rowan Flad (Peabody Museum, Harvard University), Bridget Alex (Peabody Museum,), Ari Caramanic (Vanderbilt), Andre Costopoulis (University of Alberta), Nicholas Kawa (Ohio State University), Ben Marwick (University of Washington), Christina Warinner (Peabody Museum), Lewis Borck (University of Oklahoma), Kristina Douglas (Columbia Climate School), Alan Farahani (University of California, Los Angeles), Mackinley FitzPatrick (Peabody Museum), Lars Fogelin (University of Arizona), Laura F. Heath-Stout (Stanford), Scott R. Hutson (University of Kentucky), Matthew Magnani and Natalia Magnani (University of Maine), Ana Cecilia Mauricio (Pontificia Universidad Catolica de Peru), Lisa Overholtzer (McGill University), Mattaus Rest (University of Fribourg), Daniel Scott Souleles (Copenhagen Business School) and Renata Verdun de Silva Carmo (Universidade Federal do Rio de Janeiro).

I type each author’s name because each deserves a citation, adding to a number that… um… administrators might use in their promotion considerations.

0026 A citation is like a scoop of grain using a bevel-rimmed bowl.

Ironically, these academics are the winners in a “publications arms-race”. They teach. They write. They review. They work over forty hours per week. Are they investigating what they love to study? Do they feel that they are flourishing? Or are they keeping the canals clear of sediments and the dikes capable of withstanding turbulent waters?

0027 What are these academics hoping for?

They hope that their activities further their academic careers. Their rimmed-bowls of citations carry the promise of security. Some call it “tenure”. Some call it a false hope amidst economic turmoil.

0028 At the end of the introduction, the authors elevate three “tensions”.

First (1), the theory of publishing to communicate results to other scholars clashes with the practical incentives to please hiring, promotion and granting committees.

Second (2), on one hand, papers are supposed to be presentations of knowledge. On the other hand, papers are products that publishing corporations leverage for profit. There is a price that the author (or the author’s institution) must pay in order to establish open access. Otherwise, the article goes behind a paywall.

Third (3), the academic must teach classes (and perform other pedagogical duties), which are not as valued (by the aforementioned committees) as productive (paper publishing) research.

0029 To me, by the end of the introduction, these young upcoming academics in archaeology articulate the same complaints as the corvee laborers during the Uruk period, saying (more or less), “We are compelled to labor in an exploitative system that extracts profits without compensation, restricts research results from the public and biases stories about the human past.”

0030 Biased stories?

Yeah, look at chapter 1 of Dr. D. Basak’s book, which could serve as a textbook for any classroom on the subject of Sumerian mythology, ancient civilizations, and the epic quest for the origins of humanity.

09/8/26

Looking at Dr. D. Basak’s Book (2025) “Sumerian Mythology…” (Part 20 of 20)

0249 Chapters 11, 12 and 13 are devoted to debunking an agenda, called “the ancient astronaut theory”, proposed by various hucksters starting in the 1950s. This theory is multifaceted, since there is more than one proponent. Basak’s book says that the theory sweeps into public popularity because of the uncertainty following the second battle among the Enlightenment gods, the hot war among fraternal ideologies (1938-1945 AD) and leading into the third battle among the Enlightenment gods, the cold war among materialist ideologies (1945-1989).

0250 Against this interpretation, which explains this social phenomenon in terms of a model where material arrangements after the Second World War and the start of the Cold War [substantiate] conditions ripe for scam-ideas about ancient civilizations, I place a Lotmanist suggestion that the social popularity of the ancient astronaut theories is accounted for by the inadequacies of Marxist-interpretations of archaeological research into the Neolithic period.

0251 Here is a picture of the framework of the latest cycle of Neptune in Aries.

Highly successful excavations by Western archaeologists offer the promise of coming to terms with the rise of ancient civilizations, based on Marxists formulations.

The Marxist thing does not quite do the job, so alternate theories are proposed by hucksters anticipating an explanatory breakthrough. Basak’s exercise in debunking the very entertaining alternatives only replays the Marxist thing. Basak relies on the Marxist thing to debunk the alternatives that arose from the lack of explanatory power of the model that material arrangements [substantiate] human conditions.

Now, anthropologists are starting to realize that all those people who entertained the now-debunked “ancient astronaut theory” were not as stupid as the Marxist thing presumes.

0251 Once again, Razie Mah’s four part blog, Looking at Melinda A. Zeder’s Article (2025) “Unpacking the Neolithic”, offers insights. The results of anthropological research into the so-called “Neolithic” does not… indeed, cannot… account for another trend hidden within the data. That trend is towards unconstrained social complexity. Basak’s AI program (my speculation, of course) trains only on results and discussions produced by researchers interested in looking for the material arrangements that substantiate neolithic conditions. They cannot account for a change in semiotic practices. They cannot account for what Razie Mah’s hypothesis of the first singularity suggests.

0252 Therefore, why not postulate ancient astronauts?

Surely, ancient monumental constructions, such as pyramids, stone circles, and tracks of figures that can only be seen from the sky indicate ways that civilizing humans communicate with these alien beings.

0253 If this is not a cry for a semiotic accounting for the emergence of unconstrained social complexity, I don’t know what is.

0254 Chapter 14 offers a standard summary of the achievements of ancient Sumeria.

0255 Chapter 15 returns to the topic of the Sumerian creation myths. Once again, the text re-iterates established points. On one hand, the Marxist thing can provide an explanation that cannot be challenged because… well… it is supposedly just like a mathematical or mechanical natural science model. On the other hand, the Marxist thing cannot account for the emergence of unconstrained social complexity in southern Mesopotamia.

Lotman’s thing can.

0256 Here is a picture.

0257 Although this pair of options may appear stunningly simplistic, the ancient astronaut theory shows that stunningly simplistic can work. It can offer an off-ramp to the current academic highway of a publication-based arms race, where young professional archaeologists struggle to pass through the substance called “tenure” only to realize that they have merely passed from antithesis to thesis (see points 0124-0128).

0258 Beck et al.’s manifesto, “Changing the Landscape of Archaeological Publishing” (Current Anthropology 67(1) (2026), https://doi.org/10.1086/739789), is well worth contemplating as a marker for the end of one Neptune in Aries spiral and the beginning of another.

08/31/26

Looking at E. Michael Jones’s Book (2025) “Walking with a Bible and a Gun” (Part 1 of 27)

0001 The book before me is published by Fidelity Press. The subtitle is “The Rise, Fall and Return of American Identity”. The author is editor of Culture Wars Magazine. And, everyone knows what “culture wars” means.

For students who are pursuing Semiotics and History, please have a copy of this book at hand. Look at the title and read the table of contents. The instructions in this examination should be clear.

Dr. E. Michael Jones, the author, reads and comments on literature from a Catholic point of view. His works are iconic, in so far as he is orthodox. “Ortho” means “right”. What about “dox”? Here, I mix terminology. Orthodox love icons. You know, those paintings that adorn the churches with names like “Saint Basil’s”.

0002 Of course, for the semiotics of Charles S. Peirce, an icon is one of three types of natural signs. An icon is a triadic sign-relation whose sign-object is based on the qualities of similarity, imagery, pantomime, likeness and so on. In other words, an icon offers a sign-vehicle that allows me to visualize its sign-object.

0003 But what about the icon rendered in E. Michael Jones’s text?

What about the icon on the wall of St. Basil’s?

Razie Mah’s blog appearing in January 2025, Looking at Boris Uspenskij’s Article (2016) “Semiotics and History”, contains a hypothesis about Russian icons.

0004 Boris Uspenskij (1937-present) is a Soviet era expert on Slavic literature who, along with Juri Lotman (1922-1993), proposes that semiotic arrangements substantiate the human condition. He does so in the 1990s, after the Soviet political system lost all credibility. The Soviet system enshrined Marx’s slogan: Material arrangements substantiate the human condition. How well did that thing work?

0005 Boris Uspenskij’s journey into semiotics begins in the 1950s, when the Soviet empire is intimidating and everyone senses that Marx’s slogan applies. After all, it sounds so scientific.

Uspenskij wants to offer a materialist explanation for the power of Russian iconography. Russian icons are portraits and scenes painted on the foreground with a background of thinly hammered gold foil. Uspenskij figured that icons are meant to be viewed by candlelight. The flickering light of candles produce the aesthetic effect associated with Russian icons.

0006 Of course, this is a materialist explanation for Russian iconography, fully congruent with the central slogan of the Marxist thing: material arrangements [substantiate] human conditions.

However, from the Korean War until the fall of the Berlin Wall, Uspenskij (along with Lotman) reach the conclusion that Marxism does not have the vocabulary to explain Slavic literature. Instead, they figure out the aesthetic effects of Slavic art by using the vocabularies of semiology and structuralism.

“Figuring out” means “bricolage”. They practice what they figure out. The vocabularies of semiology and structuralism hammer out a model. Then, when the form of the work of art is viewed in the flickering light of that model, an aesthetic effect is reproduced as matter. The work of art entangles the contemporary language of the positivist mind.

0007 In the flickering illumination of a semiological and structuralist model, the work of art begins to speak to the viewer.

The Tartu-Moscow School of Semiotics is discussed in Razie Mah’s blogs, spanning from December 2025 to May 2026. These blogs initialize an online course titled “Semiotics and History”. See Razie Mah’s blogs for October 3-6, 2025 for an introduction.

0008 This is confounding.

“Confounding” is a technical term, labeling a single form (B) that originates from one matter (A), yet entangles another matter (C)

A historical literary text (or a work of art, such as a Russian icon, A&B) becomes a form (from the perspective of a semiological and structuralist model, B alone) that entangles a voice (matter within the viewer, speaking to the viewer, in a contemporary vocabulary of meaning, presence and message, C).

0009 A as matter [substantiates] B as form. {A[&]B} constitutes a thing.

B as form [entangles] C as matter. {A[&]B[entangles]C} is a confounding.

0010 The question that I pose is this.

Does Dr. E. Michael Jones construct a similar cognitive apparatus in the USSA, during the years preceding the collapse of its big government (il)liberal and neoconservative Marxist ideations?

0011 I know what you are thinking.

USSA?

United Sycophantic States of America?

I love acronyms.

But, what the hell is a “sycophant”?

Okay, the author has another word that begins with “S”.

08/27/26

Looking at E. Michael Jones’s Book (2025) “Walking with a Bible and a Gun” (Part 4 of 27)

0033 Esse_ce [calls forth] essence.

Or, as the author puts it, “Existence precedes essence.”

0034 Some Christians may associate esse_ce to “nature” and essence to “grace”.

Some Christians may make the opposite associations.

Some Christians may flicker from one association to another.

0035 In regards to the provocative title of this book, I suppose that “matter [substantiating]” might cohere to the purely relational structure of the category-based nested form.

Here is a picture.

0036 For those unfamiliar with the above figure, consult Razie Mah’s e-books, A Primer for the Category-Based Nested Form and A Primer for Sensible and Social Construction.

A formulaic way to read the above figure goes like this.

A triadic normal context₃ brings a dyadic actuality₂ into relation with a monadic potential₁.

0037 The essence of Jones’s title flows into the esse_ce of the category-based nested form, as shown in the following figure.

0038 The triadic normal context₃ is walking₃. Walking₃ is different than staying put₃. Walking₃ is very natural for humans. It is the first adaptation away from our chimpanzee-like ancestors. Walking may be regarded literally as well as figuratively. Typically, walking₃ implies a path₂. That is where the Bible₂ comes in.

0039 The dyadic actuality contains only one thing, the Bible₂. If I consider two real elements that compose the term, “Bible₂“, then scripture and us come to mind. Scripture_2am is like matter. We are like form_2af.

Maybe, I may also say Scripture as esse_ce [precedes] the essence of Americans.

0040 Here is a picture of the resulting category-based nested form.

0041 The monadic possibility of ‘the gun’₁ carries many contradictory implications. Such is the nature of the category of firstness, which is the realm of possibility. The logics of firstness are inclusive and allow contradictions. A gun can potentially do one thing really well. But, it is really a person using a gun that is accomplishing a goal. So, the gun is a tool. The question is a tool for what. The answer is many things.

What do these many things have in common?

0042 That is precisely the question that the author subtly raises (in potentia) and not-so-subtly answers, by announcing, right at the start, that the wilderness is Satanic.

What wilderness?

The wilderness that we (Americans) are walking into.

0043 What else?

The subtitles denote three historical phases, as well as the tripartite structure of the book. The central panel is twice the size of the side panels.

0044 So far, this examination of E. Michael Jones’s book brings me through the title.

Student’s who are looking at the book in conjunction with this examination should now read the Introduction and Chapter 4 before continuing.

08/26/26

Looking at E. Michael Jones’s Book (2025) “Walking with a Bible and a Gun” (Part 5 of 27)

0045 I review.

The author, Dr. E. Michael Jones, uses a model in order to illuminate historical texts and arts of America.

That model, in its most thing-like expression, is esse_ce precedes (or calls forth) essence.

I demonstrated the utility of this model using an empty category-based nested form as esse_ce and the title of this book as essence. The essence of the book transforms into a filled-in category-based nested form.

0046 Here is the first manifestation of the author’s model.

The gun₁ becomes a talisman not in service to a transcendental, but rather for protection from a Satanic transcendental, the wilderness, which is where we (Americans) are walking.

If the gun was a “symbol” of a transcendental, then the gun would represent its transcendental.

The gun is a “talisman” of a transcendental, so the gun is “an expression of”, or is “in touch with”, or “makes obvious” its Satanic transcendental.

That transcendental is um… not what is good or what is beautiful or what is prudent or what is wise.

It is potentially deadly foe.

0047 So far so good.

Have I missed anything?

0048 What about “American Identity”?

It is right there in the title.

0049 Oops. Maybe the American identity goes with essence.

Does that mean that the above nested form goes with esse_ce?

If so, then the esse_ce calls forth essence paradigm shifts, creating the space for an expanded model.

0050 The introduction says as much.

The Introduction opens with a question, “What does it mean to be an American?”

0051 Sam P. Huntington (1927-2008), famous for his book The Clash of Civilizations and The Remaking of World Order (1996), publishes a book titled, Who Are We? (2004).

Who are we (Americans)?

That is a good question.

We are the ones who are walking₃ with a Bible₂ and a gun₁.

This is like our esse_ce, writ large.

0052 Different views are common.

The so-called “triple-melting agenda” says that Americans classify as Protestants, Catholics and Jews.

Perhaps, another agenda divides people between um… capitalist and communist affiliations.

0053 The author notes that America starts as a Protestant nation. The Protestant work-ethic serves as a spirit of capitalism.

What else informs the American intuition?

0054 The author asks, “What about Paradise Lost?

Here is where a professor of literature has advantage over political and economic historians. John Milton (1608-1674) composed an epic poem titled, Paradise Lost (1667). Paradise Lost is not a political treatise. It is not an economic program. Perhaps, it is a theological disquisition. Most of all, it is a work of art, a vision, an icon of the intellect, depicting the rebellion of Satan, and the fall of Humanity.

0055 Paradise Lost begins with… hmmm… the personification of the transcendental whose talisman is the gun. E. Michael Jones does not draw this association. But, what better way to isolate the transcendental value animating the declaration, “I will not serve.”?

I not only will not serve, but I got a gun.

0056 Satan’s heroic proclamation resonates with King Henry VIII’s reform of the English Catholic Church (1509-1547), which was not so much a “reformation”, as a revolution.

How so?

Revolutions tend to be looting operations. This is the topic of Chapter 4.

0057 Furthermore, looting operations lead to civil wars.

Is it all about the booty?

Compare the time span between the Henry VIII’s first divorce (1533) and the start of the English Civil War (1642-1651) to the time span between the American Revolution (1776) and the start of the American Civil War (1864).

0058 King Henry VIII (1491-1547) and fellow travelers extracted the wealth of the great monasteries and churches of England and repurposing those lands and properties for um… their own personal advantages. One wonders, “Is this where the ‘capital’ of ‘capitalism’ gets its start?”

In order to do this, the king established a police state. His henchmen executed many minor establishment figures. He founded a precedent that becomes paradigmatic. If you get a lot of wealth, then temptations increase dramatically, and the only way to overcome those temptations is an equally dramatic exercise of one’s own authority.

Many of Henry’s pals squandered their fortunes. They lost their ‘capital’. Not Henry. Henry had something that money cannot buy. Like Satan, he had celestial blood and an insatiable will to rule over his own domain.

0059 So, if Henry VIII conducts the revolution that slowly constellates a civil war, then who are the parties that were present at the beginning, who would fall into conflict, and battle within the one jurisdiction?

One party consists of Anglicans, who are Protestants in the mildest manner possible. They retain all the sacraments of the Catholic Church and reject the papal institutional framework, preferring to have their own “pope”, or something like that, in the person of the Archbishop of Canterbury…er… I meant to say, the King or Queen of England.

The other party includes the Puritans, who are Protestants in the most militant manner possible. They reject all the sacraments of the Catholic Church except for one or two (depending on the sect) and regard the papal institutional framework with derision, preferring authority to be constellated in the people (of the sect) or their charismatic leader.

0060 The Puritans follow Martin Luther (1483-1546) and John Calvin (1509-1564) in promulgating a slogan, which, in Latin, goes like this, “Sola fide, sola scriptura, et sola gratia”. The slogan translates into “By faith alone, by scripture alone and by grace alone”.

The Puritans are so successful that even the Anglicans adopt the slogan.

0061 Why?

Sola fide (by faith alone) jettison’s reason. They reject not just any reason, but the logic of the scholastics who had been so successful at taming the philosophy of Aristotle and bringing its logical powers into service of the Catholic Church. The rejection is in Latin because Latin is the disciplinary language of scholastics, who were the only educated people around. Scholastics ran the medieval universities.

0062 So, how does a Protestant become educated?

One learns to read the Bible, in one’s own language, and dismisses all the Aristotelian claptrap, which is in Latin. Faith no longer requires the logical reasoning of educated (and fat and manipulative) priests. Faith comes directly from reading the Bible.

Of course, the Puritans were very happy to provide you with a translation of the Bible in your vernacular, because of the invention of the movable-type printing press (by German Johannes Gutenberg, around 1440). The price was reasonable, but the authorities must never know.

With one’s own Bible in hand, then one can walk_3a in faith alone.

0063 Sole scriptura (by scripture alone) situates the actuality of the Bible_2a, as {scripture [substantiates] who we are}_2a.

Some of the doctrines of the Catholic Church are retained, even though every “educated person” (who can read the Bible on his or her own) can interpret the sacred text. For example, the doctrine of original sin is retained, but modified according to Luther, Calvin and other notables in the Protestant tradition.

0064 Sola gratia (by grace alone) situates the potential of ‘the gun’_1a, which is a talisman (an “enforcer”, if I may say) of the Satanic transcendental that declares, “I will be my own sovereign, even if against the will of God.”

Does that sound like essence, writ large?

08/25/26

Looking at E. Michael Jones’s Book (2025) “Walking with a Bible and a Gun” (Part 6 of 27)

0065 So, where am I going with this discussion of Chapters 1 and 4?

0066 To me, the following diagram applies.

The Protestant slogan, “sola fide, sola scriptura, et sola gratia” virtually situates the title of Jones’s book, “Walking with a Bible and a Gun”.

0067 The author’s model constitutes a two-level interscope. Esse_ce associates to content. Essence associates to situation.

For instruction on this purely relational structure, consult Razie Man’s e-books, A Primer on the Category-Based Nested Form and A Primer on Sensible and Social Construction. They are not long and will help immensely.

0068 On the content level, the normal context of walking_3a brings the actuality of the Bible_2a into relation with the potential of ‘the gun’_1a.

On the situation level, the normal context of sola fide_3b brings the actuality of sola scriptura_2b into relation with sola gratia (the potential of grace alone)_1b.

0069 Yes, sola gratia_1b labels the potential of grace alone_1b.

Plus, I already know that, in Jones’s mantra where existence precedes essence, grace is never alone.

0070 I review.

Jones’s dyad derives from Aristotle’s hylomorphe.

0071 If I imagine that esse_ce corresponds to the book’s title, “walking with a Bible and a gun “, and, essence corresponds to the slogan, “sola fide, sola scriptura et sola gratia “, then I can say that the American identity calls forth the Protestant reformation.

Hmmm, this seems to be the very opposite of what the author claims.

However, if the esse_ce of content calls to mind the essence of situation, then the following intuitively satisfying dyad results.

0072 “Walking with a Bible and a gun” intuitively calls to mind the slogan “sola fide, sola scriptura, et sola gratia”.

Content (esse_ce) [calls forth] situation (essence).

I think that provides an insight into the Introduction and Chapter 4.

0073 What else?

I suspect that there is a dyad that complements the above dyad. Plus, this complementary dyad contains the term, “identity”. This dyad derives from a post by an independent scholar, responding to a 2025 article on hylomorphism by Mariusz Tabaczek O.P., titled “Contemporary and Classical Versions of Hylomorphism: A Critical Evaluation”.

0074 Here is a picture.

0075 What does this imply?

These two dyads complement one another. They are not identical. They do not perfectly align. Rather, they offer two relational structures, one from an expert in literary analysis and one from a respondent to Aquinian philosophers. Both can be used in examining this book.

For example, the esse_ce of the title of Jones’s book provides a structure_3a for a thing_2a, according to the thing’s dispositions_1a. The essence of the Protestant slogan provides an identity_3b for an embodiment_2bf, according to the embodiment’s powers_1b.

0076 Further, the dyad opens into a two-level interscope that complements the interscope attained from examining the Introduction and Chapter 4.

0077 Students should now read Chapter 1.

08/24/26

Looking at E. Michael Jones’s Book (2025) “Walking with a Bible and a Gun” (Part 7 of 27)

0078 Here is a cue card for some of Jones’s terminology.

0079 The term, “existence”, corresponds to the Latin term, esse, or “matter substantiating”.

The term, “hidden grammar” corresponds to the substance, or the contiguity between esse_ce and essence.

The essence allows a contemporary meaning, presence and message to historical art and literature. Recall that the slogan, “existence precedes essence” constitutes a model that allows the matter of American history to substantiate the form of American literature in such a way as to entangle a contemporary language of meaning, presence and message (points 26-32).

0080 Chapter 1 starts with “A Brief Recognition of New England’s Errand into the Wilderness”, a lecture by Samuel Danforth, delivered in 1670, forty years after the founding of the Massachusetts’ Bay Colony. Of course, the natives who once lived on the hills of Boston are long displaced. Why? They did not have guns.

0081 Danforth regards the forested lands stretching inland as a desert, a “wilderness”, because… well… the Puritan colony compares to the tribes of Israel after they crossed the Jordan River… er… the Atlantic Ocean.

Yeah, I see the comparison, especially when the Puritan’s claim to fame is sola scriptura_2b.

Here is a diagram of my associations.

0082 On the situation level, covenant theology_3b is a version of sola fide_3b.

Here is the deal. Humans are well… totally depraved because of the Fall of Adam and Eve. So, God, through Jesus the Christ, pays for all the sins of humanity. But, there is a catch. If you are not predestined to failure (the fate of all Catholics, I am afraid to say), then God will offer you a covenant, which you may elect to join. Then, you are saved because your personal covenant with God_1b has been actualized.

Jones makes a great commotion about how a total depravity of reason (due to Adam’s Fall) does not allow the reasoning that goes into the above paragraph. However, the total depravity of reason associated with Calvinist theology does permit the above-mentioned reasoning.

0083 The Puritans’ personal covenants_3b allows the members of the English sect to migrate to a place where they will be free_1b from… you know… those criminal Anglicans who are their enemies in the English Civil War.

So, in the normal context of settling this Puritan colony_3a, the scriptural narrative of Joshua crossing the Jordan as matter_2am provides the hidden grammar for us_2bf, locating our new England_1a in the Boston hills.

0084 In Virginia, another English colony is founded for commercial, rather than religious, purposes. The Anglicans have plans for English colonies to supply raw materials for an always-improving British industry, under the auspices of a clever crown. Amazingly, after liberating the Church properties in the Revolution of Henry VIII, and then surviving the English Civil War (which was anything but “civil”), the crown was ready to do business.

0085 The theology is acquisitional. Recall, when Joshua entered into the promised land, he takes the title from the Canaanites who are already there. Similarly, Henry VIII takes the titles for the monastic lands and common areas and gives them to his buddies. Then, he executes anyone who says that such acts are… um… “ungodly”.

0086 Compared to cold, damp Britain, sunny Virginia seems like paradise. Plus, the crown is able to award large “plantation-sized” land grants. The parcels are larger than anyone can possibly farm without help. Happily, some enterprising agents start to supply indentured Irish… well, slaves. So, the labor shortage is solved… but wait… what about these Africans who are much less expensive and more clueless than those Irish slaves?

The English are so enterprising.

They can pluck the fruit of slave labor from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil and not get kicked out of paradise.

0087 Here is my guess as to Virginia’s sensible construction.

0088 Shakespeare (1564-1616) wrote a play about some of Henry VIII’s buddies who squandered great fortunes. The name of the play is Timon.

For theatrical purposes, Timon lives in Arcadia (the Greek analog to paradise) before he goes bust. So, theologically, Arcadia is the wonderful span between acquisition (of great wealth) and dispossession (a turn of fortune). The theology of acquisition mimics covenantal theology because God delivers some sort of bonus deal to certain people (the English plantation owners), but not to others (the folk that end up as property in order for others to command their labor).

An Archaeology of the Fall

A Horror Story by Razie Mah

Category Archives: Our current Lebenswelt is not the Lebenswelt that we evolved in