Anarchy Alive

Manchester University Press have just released the new collection “Anarchism and Utopianism“, edited by Laurence Davis and Ruth Kinna, a 304-page collection with the last chapter written by myself. It’s only in a pricey hardback edition for the moment, but anyone with access to a public or university library can recommend it for ordering.

Here’s the blurb and table of contents:

This collection of original essays examines the relationship between anarchism and utopianism, exploring the intersections and overlaps between these two fields of study and providing novel perspectives for the analysis of both. The book opens with an historical and philosophical survey of the subject matter and goes on to examine antecedents of the anarchist literary utopia; anti-capitalism and the anarchist utopian literary imagination; free love as an expression of anarchist politics and utopian desire; and revolutionary practice. Contributors explore the creative interchange of anarchism and utopianism in both theory and modern political practice; debunk some widely-held myths about the inherent utopianism of anarchy; uncover the anarchistic influences active in the history of utopian thought; and provide fresh perspectives on contemporary academic and activist debates about ecology, alternatives to capitalism, revolutionary theory and practice, and the politics of art, gender and sexuality.

Contents

Notes on contributors
Preface
Acknowledgements

Introduction – Laurence Davis

Part I – Historical and philosophical overview

1. Anarchism and the dialectic of utopia – John P. Clark

Part II – Antecedents of the anarchist literary utopia

2. Daoism as utopian or accommodationist: radical Daoism reexamined in light of the Guodian Manuscripts – John A. Rapp
3. Diderot’s *Supplément au voyage de Bougainville*: steps towards an anarchist utopia – Peter G. Stillman

Part III – Anti-capitalism and the anarchist utopian literary imagination

4. Everyone an artist: art, labour, anarchy, and utopia – Laurence Davis
5. Anarchist powers: B. Traven, Pierre Clastres, and the question of utopia – Nicholas Spencer
6. Utopia, anarchism and the political implications of emotions – Gisela Heffes
7. Anarchy in the archives: notes from the ruins of Sydney and Melbourne – Brian Greenspan

Part IV – Free love: anarchist politics and utopian desire

8. Speaking desire: anarchism and free love as utopian performance in fin de siècle Britain – Judy Greenway
9. Visions of the future: reproduction, revolution and regeneration in American anarchist utopian fiction – Brigitte Koenig
10. Intimate fellows: utopia and chaos in the early post-Stonewall gay liberation manifestos – Dominic Ording

Part V – Rethinking revolutionary practice

11. Anarchism, utopianism and the politics of emancipation – Saul Newman
12. Anarchism and the politics of utopia – Ruth Kinna
13. ‘The space now possible’: anarchist education as utopian hope – Judith Suissa
14. Utopia in contemporary anarchism – Uri Gordon

We had very low expectations going in, and they were all fulfilled…Pay attention that the following non-binding declaration was not even actually adopted by the parties but only “noted” by the secretariat. For more materials summing up COP15 see the UNFCCC website.

Copenhagen Accord

The Heads of State, Heads of Government, Ministers, and other heads of the following delegations present at the United Nations Climate Change Conference 2009 in Copenhagen: [List of Parties]
In pursuit of the ultimate objective of the Convention as stated in its Article 2,

Being guided by the principles and provisions of the Convention,

Noting the results of work done by the two Ad hoc Working Groups,

Endorsing decision x/CP.15 on the Ad hoc Working Group on Long-term Cooperative Action and decision x/CMP.5 that requests the Ad hoc Working Group on Further Commitments of Annex I Parties under the Kyoto Protocol to continue its work,

Have agreed on this Copenhagen Accord which is operational immediately.

1. We underline that climate change is one of the greatest challenges of our time. We emphasise our strong political will to urgently combat climate change in accordance with the principle of common but differentiated responsibilities and respective capabilities. To achieve the ultimate objective of the Convention to stabilize greenhouse gas concentration in the atmosphere at a level that would prevent dangerous anthropogenic interference with the climate system, we shall, recognizing the scientific view that the increase in global temperature should be below 2 degrees Celsius, on the basis ofequity and in the context of sustainable development, enhance our long-term cooperative action to combat climate change. We recognize the critical impacts of climate change and the potential impacts of response measures on countries particularly vulnerable to its adverse effects and stress the need to establish a comprehensive adaptation programme including international support.

2. We agree that deep cuts in global emissions are required according to science, and as documented by the IPCC Fourth Assessment Report with a view to reduce global emissions so as to hold the increase in global temperature below 2 degrees Celsius, and take action to meet this objective consistent with science and on the basis of equity. We should cooperate in achieving the peaking of global and national emissions as soon as possible, recognizing that the time frame for peaking will be longer in developing countries and bearing in mind that social and economic development and poverty eradication are the first and overriding priorities of developing countries and that a low-emission development strategy is indispensable to sustainable development.

3. Adaptation to the adverse effects of climate change and the potential impacts of response measures is a challenge faced by all countries. Enhanced action and international cooperation on adaptation is urgently required to ensure the implementation of the Convention by enabling and supporting the implementation of adaptation actions aimed at reducing vulnerability and building resilience in developing countries, especially in those that are particularly vulnerable, especially least developed countries, small island developing States and Africa. We agree that developed countries shall provide adequate, predictable and sustainable financial resources, technology and capacity-building to support the implementation of adaptation action in developing countries.

4. Annex I Parties commit to implement individually or jointly the quantified economy-wide emissions targets for 2020, to be submitted in the format given in Appendix I by Annex I Parties to the secretariat by 31 January 2010 for compilation in an INF document. Annex I Parties that are Party to the Kyoto Protocol will thereby further strengthen the emissions reductions initiated by the Kyoto Protocol. Delivery of reductions and financing by developed countries will be measured, reported and verified in accordance with existing and any further guidelines adopted by the Conference of the Parties, and will ensure that accounting of such targets and finance is rigorous, robust and transparent.

5. Non-Annex I Parties to the Convention will implement mitigation actions, including those to be submitted to the secretariat by non-Annex I Parties in the format given in Appendix II by 31 January 2010, for compilation in an INF document, consistent with Article 4.1 and Article 4.7 and in the context of sustainable development. Least developed countries and small island developing States may undertake actions voluntarily and on the basis of support. Mitigation actions subsequently taken and envisaged by Non-Annex I Parties, including national inventory reports, shall be communicated through national communications consistent with Article 12.1(b) every two years on the basis of guidelines to be adopted by the Conference of the Parties. Those mitigation actions in national communications or otherwise communicated to the Secretariat will be added to the list in appendix II. Mitigation actions taken by Non-Annex I Parties will be subject to their domestic measurement, reporting and verification the result of which will be reported through their national communications every two years. Non-Annex I Parties will communicate information on the implementation of their actions through National Communications, with provisions for international consultations and analysis under clearly defined guidelines that will ensure that national sovereignty is respected. Nationally appropriate mitigation actions seeking international support will be recorded in a registry along with relevant technology, finance and capacity building support. Those actions supported will be added to the list in appendix II. These supported nationally appropriate mitigation actions will be subject to international measurement, reporting and verification in accordance with guidelines adopted by the Conference of the Parties.

6. We recognize the crucial role of reducing emission from deforestation and forest degradation and the need to enhance removals of greenhouse gas emission by forests and agree on the need to provide positive incentives to such actions through the immediate establishment of a mechanism including REDD-plus, to enable the mobilization of financial resources from developed countries.

7. We decide to pursue various approaches, including opportunities to use markets, to enhance the cost-effectiveness of, and to promote mitigation actions. Developing countries, especially those with low emitting economies should be provided incentives to continue to develop on a low emission pathway.

8. Scaled up, new and additional, predictable and adequate funding as well as improved access shall be provided to developing countries, in accordance with the relevant provisions of the Convention, to enable and support enhanced action on mitigation, including substantial finance to reduce emissions from deforestation and forest degradation (REDD-plus), adaptation, technology development and transfer and capacity-building, for enhanced implementation of the Convention. The collective commitment by developed countries is to provide new and additional resources, including forestry and investments through international institutions, approaching USD 30 billion for the period 2010 – 2012 with balanced allocation between adaptation and mitigation. Funding for adaptation will be prioritized for the most vulnerable developing countries, such as the least developed countries, small island developing States and Africa. In the context of meaningful mitigation actions and transparency on implementation, developed countries commit to a goal of mobilizing jointly USD 100 billion dollars a year by 2020 to address the needs of developing countries. This funding will come from a wide variety of sources, public and private, bilateral and multilateral, including alternative sources of finance. New multilateral funding for adaptation will be delivered through effective and efficient fund arrangements, with a governance structure providing for equal representation of developed and developing countries. A significant portion of such funding should flow through the Copenhagen Green Climate Fund.

9. To this end, a High Level Panel will be established under the guidance of and accountable to the Conference of the Parties to study the contribution of the potential sources of revenue, including alternative sources of finance, towards meeting this goal.

10. We decide that the Copenhagen Green Climate Fund shall be established as an operating entity of the financial mechanism of the Convention to support projects, programme, policies and other activities in developing countries related to mitigation including REDD-plus, adaptation, capacity-building, technology development and transfer.

11. In order to enhance action on development and transfer of technology we decide to establish a Technology Mechanism to accelerate technology development and transfer in support of action on adaptation and mitigation that will be guided by a country-driven approach and be based on national circumstances and priorities.

12. We call for an assessment of the implementation of this Accord to be completed by 2015, including in light of the Convention’s ultimate objective. This would include consideration of strengthening the long-term goal referencing various matters presented by the science, including in relation to temperature rises of 1.5 degrees Celsius.

from Denmark Indymedia

Indymedia action timeline | live radio stream | icop15 agreggator.

At 18:00 there will be a press conference by CJA in the grey room of klimaforum. One of the topics to be adressed is the arrests of 4 media spokespersons before and during the Reclaim power actions. The police is targeting spokespersons and thereby frustrating the freedom of speech.

Today’s Reclaim Power action held a people assembly outside the Cop15 Bella centre calling for Climate Justice after protestors marched to the conference and tried to breach police lines (call for action, press release, video). 

Multiple marches tried to make their way to the Bella Centre where the COP15 is held. The group meeting at Orestad station (Green) was surrounded by police and some arrested [pic], but other managed to move towards COP15. A second block (Blue), of more than 1000 people, made their way to the Bella Center whilst resisiting attempts from the police to break it [Video 1 | 2 | 3]. The bike block has been blocked by police and redirected away. Police have been repeatedly attacking the crowds with batton charges and pepper spray, as well as arresting protesters throughout the morning, and arresting medics [police line]. Corporate media report 200 to 250 arrests.

Meanwhile at the COP15 Friends of the Earth, Avaaz and Via Campesina were refused entry despite aquiring a second accreditaton. Delegates staged a sit-in protest [pic, video], whilst 200 others from NGOs, indigenous people and the Global South marched out [Pics 1 | 2 | 3 | video] but police with battons and pepperspray prevented them from reaching the People’s Assembly. An hour later a protest breaks inside the COP15 plenary with the slogan “Climate Justice Now!” .

The People’s Assembly took place at midday outside the Bella Centre, without those inside the Bella Center that were prevented from getting out. After speeches the assembly decided to move towards the centre of town, while the police snaches people, and blocks it intermittently.

Timelines Indymedia DK (castellano) | Modkraft.dk (dk | en) | Motkraft.net (se, en) | Global Project (it) | Politiken.dk (dk | en) | Lahaine (castellano)
Previous days’ COP15 reporting: 10th, 11th, 12th, 13th, 14th and 15th December 2009

A collection of links to photos and videos of the street actions until now…

1. Photos of friday actions

2.BBC photo series global solidarity actions

3. Reel News footage of Saturday demonstration

4. Photos from demo on Saturday

5. Police breaking the demo of Saturday

6.…and another one

7.The Guardian on Saturday actions and police mass arrests

8. Photos of mass arrests on Saturday

9. Action in Utrecht

10. Press Conference on Torture Complaints

11. CJA Press release about mass arrests on Saturday demonstration

12. Photos on the HtP police action

13. Video of police taking the sound truck on the Sunday action

14. Photos of mass arrests on Sunday

15. CJA Press release about police conduct at Sunday action “Hit the production”

Something I had published today – a little less explicitly radical than what I’m used to writing, but sometimes camouflage is inescapable…

System change, not climate change

As the first week of the world climate summit in Copenhagen draws to a close, all hope seems lost for immediate steps to prevent a global warming catastrophe. Already in the run-up to the summit, officials were doing their best to lower expectations, with both the Danish prime minister and the UN secretary-general saying that the best that could be expected from Copenhagen was a “politically binding” agreement – a very diplomatic term, but empty of real content.

Negotiations so far have revealed an unbridgeable chasm between rich and poor nations. Caribbean countries and small island states are using terms like “ecological debt” in their calls for more severe emissions cuts by the rich countries, and demanding that any agreement be geared toward global equity. On the other hand, a proposal drafted in secret by Denmark, Britain and the United States (and leaked to The Guardian newspaper) would allocate to rich countries almost double the emissions quotas of poor ones, and hand over effective control of climate change finance to the World Bank, which would condition adaptation funds for poor countries on their acceptance of further privatization of their economies and cuts in social spending.

Given these gaps, it appears that no binding legal agreement will replace the Kyoto Protocol, which will expire in 2012 amid a general failure to meet its targets. Instead, what is likely to emerge is a patchwork of country-specific policies with fundamentally inadequate goals. Thus China has declared it will reduce its economy’s “carbon intensity” – the amount of carbon dioxide emitted per unit of GDP – by 40 percent by 2020. Yet this figure represents only a continuation of China’s current rate of improvement in carbon efficiency. With its GDP projected to grow by around 400 percent in the same period, its emissions will more than double.

President Barack Obama, for his part, has declared that the United States will reduce emissions by approximately 17 percent from 2005 levels by 2020, in line with the bill passed by the House of Representatives in June. Yet this is only equivalent to a 4-5 percent reduction from 1990 levels, the baseline established in Kyoto, and far less than what the United States would have had to reduce had it signed the protocol.

As for Israel, without a new agreement, it will retain its abnormal status as a developed country with no binding reduction targets. Environmental Protection Minister Gilad Erdan will arrive next week in Copenhagen with a promise that Israel’s emissions, instead of doubling by 2030, would grow by “only” 37 percent. And even this goal has not been approved by the government, which in the meantime presses on with plans to construct a new coal-fired power station in Ashkelon.

Such measures are hardly in step with present public concern about climate change. A recent survey of 4,400 citizens from 38 countries found overwhelming majorities supporting an urgent deal in Copenhagen, one that would include substantive reductions by developing countries.

Locally, a poll by Ben-Gurion University last month found that no less than three-quarters of the Israeli public demand “significant and urgent” steps to confront climate change, and want to see the country commit to a 90 percent reduction in carbon emissions by 2050.

To be sure, such expectations are often not backed up by a willingness to make the required lifestyle changes. But the rich countries’ reluctance to re-divide the pie is sending precisely the wrong message, with their insistence on maintaining current patterns of inequality and over-consumption.

Ultimately it is the capitalist system’s need for constant economic growth that continues to trump the long-term concern for future generations. Political and business elites may privately agree to the inconvenient truth – that there can be no infinite growth on a finite planet. But they also understand that turning away from the precipice would mean abandoning much of their own power. This is the facile but honest explanation for the continuing failure to address global warming.

Scientists generally agree that we are rapidly approaching the tipping point in terms of irreversible destabilization of the world’s climate. The current rate of growth in carbon emissions already exceeds the worst-case “business-as-usual” scenarios of the 2007 Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change. At this rate, this century will see a permanent loss of Arctic ice, unprecedented flooding and droughts, massive species extinction and a threat to half of the earth’s fresh water supplies.

To preserve a stable climate, the global concentration of carbon dioxide must be reduced from its current 385 parts per million (ppm) to 350 ppm at most, and probably lower. This means a reduction of at least 80 percent in global emissions by 2050. Such a reduction is entirely achievable – but only if rich countries let go of some of their power. A just transition to a sustainable world will indeed require us to slow down and consume less – but it would also guarantee us a healthier and more democratic future.

This coming week, as the summit enters its ministerial stage, the streets of Copenhagen will be taken over by mass demonstrations and acts of civil disobedience reminiscent of the World Trade Organization protests in Seattle 10 years ago. On Monday, thousands of people will attempt to enter the summit premises and turn the proceedings into a public forum, where delegates will finally have to listen to their demands for climate justice.

Copenhagen may yet turn out to be a defining historical moment – the moment when citizens took change into their own hands.

Uri Gordon is a lecturer at the Arava Institute for Environmental Studies.

A non-exhaustive summary of recent carbon trading resources – thanks to Kevin of Carbon Trade Watch for compiling these.

Offsetting: A Dangerous Distraction – FOE – UK
Examines the record of the main offset scheme – the CDM. The report shows that in practice offsetting isn’t leading to global emissions reductions or benefiting developing countries. Instead it is simply leading to more ingenious ways to avoid cutting emissions.

A Dangerous Obsession – FOE – UK
Report by Friends warns against the UK Government’s obsession with carbon trading.
It says that expanding carbon trading risks both economic and climate collapse.

Carbon Trading – How it works and why it fails – Carbon Trade Watch
Report demonstrates that the EU-ETS has consistently failed to ´cap´ emissions, while the CDM routinely favours environmentally ineffective and socially unjust projects. This is illustrated with case studies of CDM projects in Brazil, Indonesia, India and Thailand.

The Story of Cap and Trade – Free Range Studios
A fast-paced, fact-filled look at the leading climate solution being discussed at Copenhagen and on Capitol Hill. Host Annie Leonard introduces the energy traders and Wall Street financiers at the heart of this scheme and reveals the “devils in the details.”

The CDM in the Philippines: Rewarding Polluters – Focus on the Global South
In the Philippines the multi-billion peso CDM money trail leads to the doors of some of the country’s richest men and largest business conglomerates, with interests in “dirty” industries such as mining, fossil fuel-based power generation, oil and gas exploration.

Brazil: The Money Tree – documentary by Centre for Investigative Reporting
Mark Schapiro travels deep into Brazil’s forest to investigate how this abstract carbon economy is affecting real people.

The Carbon Supermarket – Your Future for Sale – Kate Evans
A short comic that illustrates some of the problems with the carbon market

Upsetting the Offset: The Political Economy of Carbon Markets – forthcoming
A new book compiled by two academics from the University of Essex which collates contributions from more than 30 leading experts.
To be released in Copenhagen.

When Markets Are Poison Learning about Climate Policy from the Financial Crisis – The Cornerhouse
Studying the financial crisis and the climate crisis together can provide useful tools for understanding how to tackle both. Overconfident commodification of uncertainty helped precipitate a global economic crash. Overconfident commodification of climate benefits (in the form of a trade in carbon) threatens to hasten an even worse catastrophe.

Subprime Carbon? Re-thinking the World’s Largest New Derivatives Market – FOE US
As policymakers debate Wall Street reform, they are not paying adequate attention to whether new regulations will be adequate to govern carbon trading and the carbon derivatives markets, which many experts believe could become larger than credit derivatives markets.

Here is the action guide to Copenhagen from Climate Justice Action

English
Action Guide to COP15
Action Map for COP15… Online version of this map:

http://tinyurl.com/yhevc5c

German
Protestleitfaden für die COP15
Aktionskarte… Eine online version dieser Karte:
http://tinyurl.com/y98hy6z

French
Le Guide d’Action pour la COP15

La Carte des Actions… Voir la carte en ligne:
http://tinyurl.com/y85p4op

Spanish
Guía de Acciones para el COP15
Mapa de Acciones… Version ‘en línea’ de este mapa:
http://tinyurl.com/ycqolgo

Check out this excellent new text, Intro to the Apocalypse, published towards the Copenhagen climate summit by people associated with the Institute for Experimental Freedom and obviously inspired by recent French insurrectionist writing. 68 pages covering issues from green capitalism and eco-fascism to “communisation” and revolution. I’ll give away the last paragraph:

There is a secret meaning to the apocalypse. It is not the end of time, but the end of this particular time. Not the end of the world, but the end of this particular world. In other words, the end of capital and the state. By projecting the apocalypse into the future, all human agency in the present becomes frozen and lost. Yet this entire understanding of time as a coming apocalypse is a mere fantastic invention. With a little shift, agency returns to the present. History is redeemed. The peasant revolts, the Paris Commune, the Spanish Civil War, Kronstadt, the Seminoles, the Panthers, autonomia, the antiglobalisation movement, suddenly transform from a litany of failures to past moments that were building precisely to this present moment. The future transforms from a bleak nothingness to one rich in possibility, where any moment can open the door to insurrection. In the present, every breathe is infused with a new kind of intensity. A certain quickening of the blood that was long thought disappeared from humanity returns, a clarity of purpose that is available only to those whose life is given not to waiting for the apocalypse, but to the survival of life. Far more important than the theoretical possibility of revolution, revolutionaries appear, as does a kind of redemption that lies not in the future, but in the here-and-now.

A new short article, published in the November issue of Iconoclast – an anarchist zine from London, Ontario associated with the Empowerment infoshop.

The Statist Origins of Monotheism

The ancient Hebrews never believed in one god. There is nothing controversial about this claim. From the biblical narrative itself we learn how, in both kingdoms of Israel and Judah, one ruler after another “did evil in the eyes of Yahweh” by worshiping other gods and encouraging their ongoing worship among the people. Only a handful of “good” kings were dedicated to Yahweh alone and suppressed other cults. It is thus evident that during the First Temple period (c.1000-586 BCE), the population which had allegedly taken up the monotheistic covenant at Mount Sinai was in fact polytheistic, worshiping the selfsame family of goddesses and gods prevalent among the Western Semitic peoples of the age. Yahweh was nothing but the local name for this pantheon’s sky/father god, also known as El, and inseparable from his female partner and equal, the earth/mother goddess Ashera. A simple calculation from the Book of Kings will reveal that the typical wooden pole dedicated to the mother goddess stood in Solomon’s Temple for a full two thirds of its existence. Archaeologists have dug up literally thousands of Ashera figurines in Palestine/Israel, as well as inscriptions carrying blessings “from Yahweh and his Ashera”. No less popular were their son and daughter – the rain god Hadad, often referred to as the Ba’al (meaning “lord”), and the goddess of love and war Ashtoret, identical to the Mesopotamian Ishtar.

How then did this pagan nature religion transform into abstract monotheism, the basis for Judaism, Christianity and Islam? The answer lies not in theology, but in politics. The change took place in two stages, the first of which came with the sweeping campaign of religious and political centralization enacted in Jerusalem by King Josiah in 621 BCE. The chief instigators were the high priest Hilkiah, the royal secretary Shaphan, and the prophetess Huldah, a prominent noblewoman. During renovations in the temple, they “discovered” a forgotten manuscript, the Book of the Covenant, later incorporated into the book of Deuteronomy. Its centerpiece was the Shema – the passage beginning “Hear, O Israel, Yahweh our God, Yahweh the One” (Deut. 6:4) – along with harsh prohibitions on idolatry and exogamy, a stress on one exclusive temple, and threats of total annihilation of the people if they worship other gods. Presented to the king, these writings formed the perfect pretext for a wholesale centralization of theocratic power in the hands of the House of David and the Jerusalem priestly caste. Josiah acted swiftly:

He went up to the temple of Yahweh with the men of Judah, the people of Jerusalem…He read in their hearing all the words of the Book…Then all the people pledged themselves to the covenant. The king ordered…to remove from the temple of Yahweh all the articles made for Ba’al and Asherah and all the starry hosts…He took the Asherah pole from the temple of Yahweh to the Kidron Valley outside Jerusalem and burned it there. He ground it to powder and scattered the dust over the graves of the common people. He also tore down the quarters of the male shrine prosti¬tutes, which were in the temple of Yahweh and where women did weaving for Asherah…Josiah smashed the sacred stones and cut down the Asherah poles and covered the sites with human bones…slaughtered all the priests of those high places on the altars and burned human bones on them.
(2 Kings 23)

Josiah’s coup created and enforced a patriarchal state religion, to whose intellectual elite modern scholarship attributes the books of Deuteronomy, Joshua, Judges, Samuel and Kings – a retroactive historiography which would drastically reshape Judean identity and collective memory.

Yet the exclusive and centralized cult of Yahweh was still essentially a pagan affair – “monolatry” rather than monotheism. It was only following the destruction of Solomon’s Temple (586 BCE) and the forced migration to Babylon that the second stage took place. Over the next few generations, the elders of the exiled Judean community, having entirely internalized the Yahwist line, interpreted their traumatic uprooting as divine retribution for idolatry. This, along with the abrupt halt of sacrificial ritual, drove the Judeans towards an increasingly im¬material and ethical notion of the divine. Another likely influence was the encounter with the Zoroastrian religion of the Persians, who conquered Babylon and allowed the exiles to return to Jerusalem and rebuild the temple (444 BC). Their emperor Cyrus no doubt appreciated the utility of a universal faith, now enshrined in texts and ad¬ministered by a literate elite, in maintaining social order and obedience to his Judean vassals – as would Alexander the Great just over a century later. Left largely autonomous in their internal affairs, the Jews would go on to produce volumes upon volumes of exegesis and jurisprudence, taking the expedient lies of men for the sacred word of God.

Yet the ancient religion is not entirely lost. Its echoes are to be found in the songs and rituals of Jewitches and Hebrew pagans, a small movement of creative deviants who dodge the false choice between a ridiculously unfathomable God and a life barren of spirit. An older, gentler faith still lies dormant beneath the concrete blocks and bloodied soil of this orphaned land, await¬ing perhaps the day when the children of Ashera lay down their swords forever and seek reconnection to their deepest roots.

Recommended reading:
M. Smith, The Early History of God (Eerdmans, 2002)
R. Patai, The Hebrew Goddess (Wayne State, 1990)
L. Grabbe, Good Kings and Bad Kings (Clark, 2005)