Introduction:
In the Orchard of Eden, when God gives His instructions to Adam, he makes it plain that the man and the woman, and presumably their progeny, are to rule the earth and subdue it. The Hebrew words used in this passage are significant. God first says that they ought to make man to rule creation and then when He blesses the man and woman, as representatives of all humanity, saying that they are to 1) Multiply 2) Fill the Earth 3) Subdue the Earth 4) Rule over the Creatures.
Subdue and Rule are not the same word. “Subdue” is the word “Kahvash” (כבשׁ) and “rule” is the word “Rahdah” (רדה). The nuances of the words are significant. Kahvash, or subdue, is often used in the context of using violence, even sexual violence.[1] Rahdah, on the other hand, is a much kinder and gentler word, having a more general sense of ruling.[2] The key concept of Kahvash is to take power over something for the purposes of exploiting it. Thus Adam and Eve were commanded to take control over inanimate creation for its exploitation, and to rule over the animals, for their edification.
The significance of this command being given to humanity, placed in an orchard, and being told to take control over inanimate creation for its exploitation is not to be ignored. Humanity is, essentially, being told to “make the world Eden.” All of God’s creation was good – but Eden was better! Forests are good, but orchards are better. Cultivation of Creation is the purpose for which man was placed on Earth with physical bodies. The planet was to be “Edenified” or, to put it another way: Humanity’s purpose was to make the world Eden.
Now, it does not take a theologian to tell you that the world has NOT been made into Eden. Certainly, humanity has learned how to exploit the Earth and its resources for our purposes – whether those purposes can always be properly described as “for our benefit” is another story, altogether. Humanity’s exploitation, our subdual of the Earth, is a very mixed bag. We can effectively feed, clothe, and house 7+ Billion people. But there have been, and there continues to be wanton destruction of the planet, prodigal squandering of resources, and the overall worsening of conditions.
In many ways we have “subdued” the Earth – but to claim that this has been done in the way which God intended in the Garden is a failure to understand history, theology, or both. The Fall of Man into sin has corrupted all of our personality, including the corruption of good and godly impulses.
To subdue the Earth for Edenification is a good thing; to subdue it for pure greed, and to recklessly abuse it is a bad. Moreover, many have misunderstood the command in the Garden. They believe that man is to also “subdue” other people! They have recognized the God-given impulse to exert power and authority over inanimate creation for its exploitation, and have presumed that that God-given impulse to “subdue” the Earth extends to their fellow image bearers. This effort to “subdue” human beings is largely the content of history books.
While much could be said about different historical periods, particularly among Expansionist and Culture-Impositionalist/ Exportationalist societies, I would like to focus on 2. First, I want us to look at Imperial England/ Britain. Second I want us to look at contemporary Social Justice Warriors.
Rule Britannia:
Despite the massive cultural unpopularity of “Colonialism” among the youth of America, most, if not all, have marched in their mortarboards to the merry and magisterial paean of patriotic praise, Pomp and Circumstance, by Edward Elgar. Few are aware of the lyrics that are still sung, to this day, by patriotic Brits; the chorus:
Land of Hope and Glory, Mother of the Free,
How shall we extol thee, who are born of thee?
Wider still and wider shall thy bounds be set;
God, who made thee mighty, make thee mightier yet,
God, who made thee mighty, make thee mightier yet.
The song, written at the very height of England’s world power, the same year Queen Victoria died, demonstrates the hopes and aspirations of the British people: namely, an ever expanding empire. To the British, their land was the God-blessed land of the free, whom God had made mighty and would make them mightier yet. Ironically, the hopeful and glorious land also had violently subjugated Ireland and kept India, much of Africa, and parts of East Asia under its boot.
While everyone is aware, as well they should be, of the flaws, grievous flaws, within Colonialism as a system of thought, and Imperialism more broadly, few people today stop and consider the historical phenomenon in its own cultural, historical, and intellectual milieu. Few recognize that in many, if not most, places Colonialism provided a net-benefit to the Colonized.[3] Surely, the benefits that came from the Colonial system to not eradicate its abuses. No one is claiming that abuses didn’t exist and that they weren’t horrific.
But, when studying policies which affect people as a whole, and trying to measure the pros and cons of policies we have to look at the effects of policies, insofar as they may be known and measured against counterfactuals, as they affect populations as a whole. To say that the Belgians provided a net-benefit for the Congolese does not mean that there was not a better way to export European culture, but that the Congolese were better off having been colonized than they would have been had they not been colonized.
Of course, one can, and should, and frankly must, criticize the failures and abuses of the Colonial system(s), but to claim that it was bad and wrong and evil, and was a net-negative for the human race is ahistorical. Moreover, it is worth understanding that while there were, indeed, selfish purposes for the exploitation of the resources: animal; vegetable; mineral; and human, there were also altruistic purposes in Colonization. Rudyard Kipling gives a moving, if not somewhat cynical, defense of the altruistic impulses of Colonizers in his famous poem:
Take up the White Man's burden— Send forth the best ye breed— Go bind your sons to exile To serve your captives' need To wait in heavy harness On fluttered folk and wild— Your new-caught, sullen peoples, Half devil and half child.
Take up the White Man's burden— In patience to abide, To veil the threat of terror And check the show of pride; By open speech and simple, An hundred times made plain. To seek another's profit, And work another's gain.
Take up the White Man's burden— The savage wars of peace— Fill full the mouth of Famine And bid the sickness cease; And when your goal is nearest The end for others sought, Watch Sloth and heathen Folly Bring all your hopes to nought.
Take up the White Man's burden— No tawdry rule of kings, But toil of serf and sweeper— The tale of common things. The ports ye shall not enter, The roads ye shall not tread, Go make them with your living, And mark them with your dead!
Take up the White Man's burden— And reap his old reward: The blame of those ye better, The hate of those ye guard— The cry of hosts ye humour (Ah, slowly!) toward the light:— "Why brought ye us from bondage, Our loved Egyptian night?"
Take up the White Man's burden— Ye dare not stoop to less—Nor call too loud on Freedom To cloak your weariness; By all ye cry or whisper, By all ye leave or do, The silent, sullen peoples Shall weigh your Gods and you.
Take up the White Man's burden— Have done with childish days— The lightly profferred [sic] laurel, The easy, ungrudged praise. Comes now, to search your manhood Through all the thankless years, Cold-edged with dear-bought wisdom, The judgment of your peers!
While it is easy to read these words and feel a well-discipled disgust for the presupposition of cultural superiority which Kipling felt, one must ask, was it causeless? Is it any wonder that people who had the wealth, power, culture, and technological superiority of the European Colonial Powers should find themselves CULTURALLY superior to those whom they colonized?
Was there racism? Surely! but in Kipling’s words we see not a desire to keep down non-whites, but to lift them up. There is a presupposition that it is Western values, and European knowledge, and, principally, Christianity which have cause the Europeans to have such a massive cultural superiority over others.
It was this presupposition, and not an unwarranted one, which added to the Imperialist impulse of the English. Just as God had told man to “make the world Eden”, the British took up the mandate to “make the world England.” In the view of Kipling and Elgar, both Victorian era men, making the world England was good, and the duty of the English.
They did not entertain any self-contradictory notions of “multiculturalism”. All cultures were not equal then and are not equal now. Some cultures were superior – which anyone who advocates a multicultural culture must admit. Either a multicultural culture is superior to a monocultural culture or it isn’t. If it isn’t, then the multiculturalist ought to be quiet. If it is, then some cultures (namely multicultural cultures) are superior and the entire presupposition of multiculturalism is undermined by its epistemic incoherence.
Did England err is “making the world England”, instead of “making the world Eden”? Of course. But insofar as they brought peace, prosperity, human flourishing, and of course the Gospel of Jesus Christ, they did well. Because to that degree they made the world Eden. To the extent that they brought exploitation, subjugation, and degradation, to that degree they were simply making the world England. Is there overlap between making the world Eden and making the world England? Of course. But where it is only England and not Eden, there is sin.
In conclusion, it is well to recognize that the mission of the British Empire, was to “make the world England” through Colonization. To some degree this was a net-benefit to humanity. To some degree this was extremely harmful. It is the job of the historian and the theologian to parse those degrees, but it is foolish and arrogant to pretend that Colonization did not have pros and cons.
The New Colonizers:
Much to their chagrin, if they were aware of it, Social Justice Warriors are extremely similar to the British Empire in that both have a view of how the world ought to be and the will to make the world that way, even if by force.
The British sought to “make the world England”. Social Justice Warriors seek to “make the world Equitable”. While Wokeists have many purposes and plans, it is clear that all Social Justice Warriors (though few would now use the term in self-description) wish to effect social and cultural change. They wish to recreate America, and the West more broadly, and ultimately the world, into a world that is “Equitable”.
To do so they have and will continue to broadcast their message, infiltrate places of power, silence and ridicule opposition, change the definition of words, constantly antagonize and demonize those who oppose them, “never let a crisis go to waste”, as well as employing other tactics. To pretend that these efforts are not concerted and directed towards effecting social change is ignorant. Moreover, to pretend that those who desire these changes are simply behaving organically and without premeditation is to ignore the massive body of literature that has existed for decades wherein progressives, Marxists, radical Feminists, CRT theorists, Homosexual Rights advocates, Transgender Rights advocates, and more have advocated taking power, changing people’s minds through bombardment and social conditioning and ultimately changing the culture. Kirk and Madsen, advocate using a 3-step process as a propaganda campaign to normalize homosexuality which mirrors brainwashing techniques!
The Wokeist wishes to make the world Equitable.
And he has a plan to get there: by changing culture incrementally and taking political power to give their agenda and worldview the force of law. This is intellectual colonization. Moreover, this is religious colonization, as Wokeism is a religion and seeks to syncretize and then assimilate all other religions into itself.
Wokeism is Colonialism. It is the effort to replace a culture with one considered superior by the one effecting the change. God commanded man to make the world Eden. The British tried to do this by making the world England; the Woke are trying to do this by making the world Equitable.
The same impulse that caused Benson to pen “Land of Hope and Glory” and Kipling to preach about the “White Man’s Burden” is THE EXACT SAME IMPULSE that leads Social Justice Warriors to advocate a Cancel Culture. The great irony is that few of the Woke recognize that what they are doing is Colonizing. Fewer would admit it. They would rebel, arguing that Colonialism was bad, and since they are doing good, they cannot be Colonialists, or that they are fighting for the rights of the disenfranchised and powerless and that Colonialism is the exploitation of the weak by the powerful.
But one must ask: when one has the power to overhaul society can one still be powerless and marginalized?
Conclusion:
As I conclude, I wish to reiterate that Man’s duty is to make the world Eden. To the degree that we affect culture to make the world Eden, that’s good. But to the degree that we change culture to make it less like God’s plan is bad.
As a rule of thumb, those who wish to “subdue” their fellow image bearers are in the wrong. It is wrong to subdue men and women as one would subdue the rocks and trees and skies and seas. God did not give Man the right to treat other image bearers as objects to subdue. And whether that subdual comes through making the world England or Equitable, to the degree that it is dissonant with making the world Eden; to that degree it is evil.
Notes:
[1] Here are all the passages of the Bible where the word is used:
Genesis 1:28; Numbers 32:22; Numbers 32:29; Joshua 18:1; 2 Samuel 8:11; 1 Chronicles 22:18; 2 Chronicles 28:10; Nehemiah 5:5; Esther 7:8; Jeremiah 34:11; Jeremiah 34:16; Micah 7:19; Zechariah 9:15.
[2] The uses of Radah:
Genesis 1:26; Genesis 1:28; Leviticus 25:43; Leviticus 25:46; Leviticus 25:53; Leviticus 26:17; Numbers 24:19; 1 Kings 4:24; 1 Kings 5:16; 1 Kings 9:23; 2 Chronicles 8:10; Nehemiah 9:28; Psalm 49:14; Psalm 68:27; Psalm 72:8; Psalm 110:2; Isaiah 14:2; Isaiah 14:6; Isaiah 41:2; Lamentations 1:13; Ezekiel 29:15; Ezekiel 34:4; Joel 3:13.
[3] Though the Social Justice Warriors did much to eradicate this piece from our social consciousness, it is available and is very worth reading.