The King's Hall - Last Stands： Jan Sobieski, The Winged Hussars, and The Siege of Vienna

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00:00:37.280 The Ottoman Empire had tormented European Christendom well into the 17th century.

00:00:43.320 Under the rule of Suleiman the Magnificent, the rapidly encroaching Turks had caused serious concern for Christian rulers across the continent.

00:00:51.300 The Ottoman Empire's success, however, wasn't without a few critical defeats.

00:00:56.340 The Holy League, for instance, which was a coalition of Catholic states arranged by Pope Pius V,

00:01:02.080 had inflicted a major defeat on the Ottoman Empire's sea fleet in 1571 during the Battle of Lepanto,

00:01:08.500 which was the largest naval battle in Western history.

00:01:11.760 And for all his victories, one prize evaded Suleiman.

00:01:15.340 He was not able to capture what the Turks considered the golden apple of the West, the city of Vienna.

00:01:21.140 Islamic forces tried to take the city in a siege in 1529, but were successfully rebuffed.

00:01:28.680 Vienna was the capital of the Holy Roman Empire and, as such, was a crown jewel the Ottoman Empire deeply coveted.

00:01:35.520 By the 1670s, the Turkish Empire had reached its zenith and renewed its focus on Vienna.

00:01:41.120 Under Kara Mustafa, the Grand Vizier of the Ottomans, plans were remade to destroy this Christian city and its populace.

00:01:49.100 Known for being fanatically anti-Christian and ruthless, Mustafa wreaked havoc on Christian

00:01:54.900 peoples. In one horrific example, he captured a Polish town in 1674. The prisoners he took

00:02:01.620 were flayed alive, and their skins were sent to the Sultan as a sort of barbaric boast.

00:02:08.020 Emboldened by several victories, in 1683, Mustafa began marshalling the largest Muslim

00:02:13.520 army ever to invade Christian territory. He was given the standard of the prophet by the sultan

00:02:18.900 and charged with the extirpation of infidels and the increase of the Muslims. Boasting in his pride

00:02:24.960 and vainglory, he defiantly proclaimed that he would not only capture Vienna, but would soon

00:02:30.020 thereafter stable his horses at St. Peter's in Rome, then take the whole of France. Mustafa

00:02:36.300 marshaled some 200,000 combatants as the march towards Vienna began, mostly comprised of Turks

00:02:42.360 and Tatars. Surprisingly, two Christian vassals marched with Mustafa's troops, the Lutheran count,

00:02:49.220 the Coli, and the Calvinist Transylvanian prince, Apothe. On July 7, 1683, a massive horde of 35,000

00:02:57.460 Tatar horsemen approached Vienna, sending the city into a panic. Holy Roman Emperor Leopold I

00:03:04.020 abandoned his own capital, fleeing to Bavaria. He left 12,000 soldiers to defend the city under

00:03:09.680 the command of Ernst von Staremberg. By July 14th, Mustafa sent word to Staremberg that he had come

00:03:16.940 with the intention of conquering this citadel and preaching the true religion of Islam. Staremberg

00:03:22.740 refused the offer to submit and receive peace, which he knew to be false. Mustafa had recently

00:03:28.660 made a similar offer to a town nearby, but after issuing the offer of peace, Mustafa had reneged.

00:03:34.660 He then massacred and enslaved the entire population. Siege works were built against

00:03:39.080 Vienna's walls. Medium artillery was used to pummel the town. Mustafa utilized Austrian slaves

00:03:45.260 to dig trenches under the city walls, where he planned to place black powder to burn down the

00:03:49.960 walls. Janissaries were sent to dig. These were the Ottoman Empire's most elite combatants.

00:03:56.220 With their help, progress was made at destroying the walls. By August 12, a massive mine was

00:04:02.220 detonated. The explosion was so large that it is said half the town was shaken by the blast.

00:04:07.260 Sagenberg now facing a desperate situation ordered all able-bodied men to report to the

00:04:14.220 defense of the walls matters grew worse when on September 4th a giant blast ripped through the

00:04:20.140 which was the city's strongest bastion by then an English bystander would write quote the powerful

00:04:27.240 enemy had so vigorously attacked Vienna with 200,000 men by endless workings trenchings and

00:04:33.700 minings and had reduced it almost to its last gasp. Vienna was on the brink of defeat. Indeed,

00:04:40.580 the city and capital of the Holy Roman Empire was just days from total annihilation at the

00:04:45.700 hands of Muslim forces. It was gasping its last breath. With its defeat, the whole of Christendom

00:04:51.820 and the West with it would fall. So monumental was that moment in world history. J.R.R. Tolkien,

00:04:59.140 who drew inspiration from the Battle of Vienna for the return of the king, penned the following

00:05:03.420 words, which were spoken on the Pelennor fields, but could just as easily have been written about

00:05:07.980 the siege. It was dark and dim all day. From the sunless dawn until evening, the heavy shadow had

00:05:15.100 deepened, and all hearts were oppressed. Far above, a great cloud streamed slowly westward

00:05:21.620 from the black land, devouring light, born upon war. But below the air was still and breathless,

00:05:28.420 as if all the Vale of Anduin waited for the onset of a ruinous storm.

00:05:33.640 On September 8th, an all-out Muslim assault succeeded as the Burg fell and was captured by Turkish forces.

00:05:40.900 Starenberg would be forced to fight in the streets of Vienna, which was an impossible task.

00:05:46.740 His much-depleted forces of just 12,000 would be matched against the Ottoman Empire's 200,000.

00:05:53.480 All hopes seemed lost.

00:05:55.460 Light was fading in the west.

00:05:57.640 The city of Vienna was just a few days from complete annihilation.

00:06:02.740 Meanwhile, standing in stark contrast outside the city walls,

00:06:06.440 Mustafa had arranged a lavish court of concubines, slaves, and luxurious animals.

00:06:12.060 He held court like a pompous king, already assured of his victory over the West.

00:06:16.380 Then suddenly, on September 11, 1683, Mustafa's attention was fixed on the hill overlooking his position.

00:06:24.000 He was arrested by the shouts of a Christian war party

00:06:27.020 in the glint of an unmistakably armored band of soldiers.

00:06:31.780 The mounted warriors on the overlooking horizon were well known to the Turks.

00:06:36.480 The sight of them caused great consternation among the Ottoman hordes.

00:06:40.380 Christian forces were led by none other than Jan Sobieski,

00:06:44.120 the Polish king who had long been the scourge of the Ottoman Empire.

00:06:49.140 Sobieski had won the throne not because of genetic lineage,

00:06:52.300 but because of his astonishing renown on the battlefield against the Turks in battles from

00:06:57.600 days gone by. Now older, fatter, but no less obstinate, Sobieski had come for one reason.

00:07:04.860 His Christian devotion compelled him to defend the West when all others had abandoned him.

00:07:09.900 Despite his age, he was then 54 years old. This grand jihad, quote, had stirred up his military

00:07:16.120 ambition and his Christian fervor, end quote. Sobieski said, it is not a city alone that we

00:07:23.220 have to save, but the whole of Christianity, of which the city of Vienna is the bulwark.

00:07:28.400 The war is a holy one. His presence had no doubt struck fear into the heart of Mustafa,

00:07:33.560 who knew well of the king's exploits. Even more terrifying to the Turks, Sobieski stood at the

00:07:39.380 head of his famous winged Hussars, a Polish heavy cavalry regiment that was renowned for its ability

00:07:45.460 to devastate the line of an enemy force in an instant. They were nicknamed the Angels of Death.

00:07:51.860 Serving as a shock troop, the winged hussars were clad in blazing armor on the chest, arms,

00:07:56.980 and head. At the back of their saddles were attached giant wings constructed from the

00:08:01.680 feathers of great raptors. The hussars were clad in armor and wings to strike fear into their enemies.

00:08:07.880 They were the Angels of Death, ready and willing to dole out God's judgment against the jihadists.

00:08:14.200 At that point in history, they were an unstoppable force, and the Turks knew it.

00:08:19.540 Sobieski had also recently met with and gathered forces with Duke Charles of Lorraine,

00:08:24.460 Emperor Leopold's brother-in-law.

00:08:26.540 Together, they had about 70,000 fighting men.

00:08:29.540 Sobieski had come with 25,000 Polish warriors and was in charge of field operations.

00:08:34.560 As Sobieski sat atop the hill, his keen military eye made quick work of the enemy's position.

00:08:40.720 Of Mustafa, he said, this man is badly encamped. He knows nothing of war. We shall certainly defeat

00:08:46.240 him. Sobieski had 20,000 men with him, including the winged hussars, blazing in their armor and

00:08:52.240 winged for death. On the brink of battle, Friar Marco Diaviano, Emperor Leopold's spiritual

00:08:58.900 advisor who was instrumental in his support of the Holy League, conducted mass on the hilltop

00:09:03.340 among the men. With a large crucifix in hand, he courageously roused the army to war.

00:09:10.160 He told the men that they were not merely fighting for Vienna,

00:09:14.040 but for their wives, children, and all of Christendom.

00:09:17.800 Desperate and stricken by the sight of Sobieski,

00:09:20.720 Mustafa ordered that the adult males among the 30,000 Christian slaves in his camp be executed,

00:09:26.300 and so he had their throats cut.

00:09:28.380 Muslim fighters were ordered to rape the young women

00:09:30.560 and cut off the heads of the old men and women as well.

00:09:33.760 It was a tragic bloodbath.

00:09:35.220 On the early morning of September 12th, the battle had begun, first with artillery fire,

00:09:41.960 then with the descent of the Austro-German troops into armed combat. By afternoon,

00:09:47.160 the wearied liberators paused. Where was Sobieski? When would he make his move?

00:09:51.900 At the moment when the hope of the West began to wane, a large white banner, emblazoned with a red

00:09:57.520 cross, appeared on top of the opposite slope. It was the Poles, loudly crying out, descending down

00:10:03.480 the hill in a deafening roar. Sobieski had ordered his charge. The hussars took flight

00:10:08.980 down the slopes as hoofbeats sounded out the drums of war. After the battle, Turkish survivors said

00:10:15.240 it was like a flood of black pitch coming down the mountain, consuming everything it touched.

00:10:21.320 Carefully discerning the location of Mustafa's tent, the king of Poland took aim. Sobieski led

00:10:27.020 the charge with his son by his side from the front. Despite his age, the king was roused to

00:10:32.420 formed by the pulse of combat. The winged Hussars slowly picked up speed until, by the time they

00:10:38.080 reached the Turkish line, they were at full gallop. Sobieski, it is said, looked as the meanest of

00:10:44.300 soldiers, leading his emblazoned troops into the Turkish front. They were a sight to behold. The

00:10:50.120 besieged Viennese soldiers said the Hussars looked like winged liberators. Turks said they looked

00:10:55.580 like avenging angels come to deliver death. Little wonder Tolkien was inspired by this epic

00:11:02.280 moment when he rode of Theoden's charge at the Pelennor fields. Those famous prose lines could

00:11:07.440 easily apply to Sobieski's valiant attack. Suddenly, the king cried to Snowmane, and the

00:11:13.180 horse sprang away. Behind him, his banner blew in the wind, white horse upon a field of green,

00:11:18.680 but he outpaced it. After him thundered the knights of his house, but he was ever before them.

00:11:24.420 Eomer rode there, the white horsetail on his helm floating in his speed, and the front of the first

00:11:29.640 Eored roared like a breaker foaming to the shore, but Theoden could not be overtaken.

00:11:35.540 Fae, he seemed, or the battle fury of his fathers ran like new fire in his veins,

00:11:40.400 and he was born up on snowmane like a god of old, even as Orome the Great in the battle of the

00:11:45.960 Valar when the world was young. His golden shield was uncovered, and lo, it shone like an image of

00:11:52.580 the sun, and the grass flamed into green about the white of his steed. For morning came, morning and

00:11:58.260 a wind from the sea, and the darkness was removed. And the hosts of Mordor wailed, and terror took

00:12:03.380 them. And they fled and died, and the hoofs of wrath rode over them. And then all the hosts of

00:12:08.660 Rohan burst into song, and they sang as they slew, for the joy of battle was on them, and the sound

00:12:14.200 of their singing that was fair and terrible came even to the city. Sobieski's shock troops decimated

00:12:19.940 the Turkish front. Panic filled their ranks. In sheer horror, Mustafa ordered the Khan of Crimea

00:12:25.900 to redouble his efforts. The Tartar prince replied that it would be better for Mustafa to run.

00:12:31.680 He said he knew the king of Poland by more than one proof, and any hopes they had of victory were

00:12:36.760 lost at his appearance. Mustafa tried to rally his men, but it was too late. Hundreds of janissaries,

00:12:42.920 his best fighters, were slaughtered where they stood as the hussars charged deep into the heart

00:12:47.180 of enemy ranks. The king of Poland had won the day, but the joy of victory was quickly replaced

00:12:52.680 by the deeply grievous sight before him. One bystander recalled the scene. Sobieski was

00:12:58.460 pierced at the sight of an infinite number of slaves whose throats the infidels had cut after

00:13:03.160 their defeat, and whose bodies yet chained were extended confusedly among the dying and the

00:13:08.160 wounded. The king was particularly touched with a child about four years of age who seemed to be

00:13:13.640 admirably beautiful, notwithstanding he was covered all over with blood from a wound he

00:13:18.080 had received on his head, end quote. One Polish account recorded the scene when the king entered

00:13:24.340 the city he had helped to liberate. Desolation was nothing less than the city of Vienna, where

00:13:29.660 the king entered the day after the battle and found heaps of ruins rather than houses, and even

00:13:34.960 the emperor's palace reduced to ashes by the cannon and bombs. But he was eased of the grief which

00:13:41.120 this dismal spectacle had occasioned by the acclamations of the inhabitants, who thinking

00:13:46.280 no more of their past calamities, were transported with joy for their unexpected deliverance,

00:13:51.620 the city not being able to hold out two or three days more. Some kissed his hands,

00:13:56.560 some his feet, and others his robe. They called him their savior, end quote.

00:14:01.460 An Englishman present at Vienna said that the king of Poland had the greatest share of the

00:14:06.000 glory of this day which he best deserved, for he may truly be styled one of the greatest kings

00:14:11.060 of Christendom and the Most Valiant. Quite famously, Sobieski wrote to Pope Innocent,

00:14:16.240 echoing the words of Julius Caesar, We came, we saw, God conquered. Sobieski was awarded the title

00:14:22.640 Defender of the Faith by the Pope. September 12th would come to mark the Feast of the Most Holy

00:14:27.900 Name of Mary, since her appellation had been on countless lips, including Sobieski's during the

00:14:32.820 conflict. For his part, Kara Mustafa fled to Belgrade. There, Sultan Muhammad ordered that

00:14:39.760 he be executed, and so he was strangled to death for his calamitous failure. The Battle of Vienna

00:14:45.500 and Jan Sobieski's deeds there cannot be overstated. If he had failed, the city would

00:14:50.660 have fallen and Christendom very likely would have been lost, yet he did not. And so, as Raymond

00:14:56.660 Ibrahim writes, the Ottoman Empire began to shrink. Quote, the Holy League formed under Pope Innocent,

00:15:03.560 spearheaded by Sobieski's Poles and the Austro-German forces, remained intact and went on

00:15:08.700 the offensive against the Turks. Two years later, Orthodox Russia joined the Catholic League.

00:15:14.320 Between 1683 and 1697, 15 major battles were fought between the Turks and Christians,

00:15:20.240 12 won by the latter. By 1699, the Ottoman Empire, which had terrified Christendom for

00:15:26.680 over 300 years, was reduced to signing the humiliating treaty of Karlowitz, which required

00:15:33.440 it to cede large territories back to its infidel enemies and thus marked the beginning of the end

00:15:38.680 of Islamic power. As Bernard Lewis puts it, the last great Muslim assault on Europe, that of the

00:15:44.680 Ottoman Turks, ended with the second unsuccessful siege of Vienna in 1683. With that failure and

00:15:51.280 the Turkish retreat that followed, a thousand years of Muslim threats to Europe came to an end.

00:15:56.180 End quote. Despite the victory, however, Islam would never truly go away. As Ibrahim writes,

00:16:02.620 for wherever and whenever Islamic empires waned but Muslims remained, the jihad collapsed back

00:16:08.300 to its more primordial, piratical form.

00:16:11.240 The Battle of Vienna began on September 11th,

00:16:14.000 which was a significant date in Muslim memory

00:16:16.180 and probably the reason for the attacks

00:16:18.540 on the World Trade Center in 2001.

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00:17:11.860 Well, gentlemen, welcome to this episode of the King's Hall podcast. We, of course,

00:17:15.560 are in season three. Jan Sobieski and Dan, the Winged Hussars have arrived.

00:17:21.280 They've arrived.

00:17:21.880 Brian I don't know if you've been

00:17:23.700 Sabaton maxing with the winged hussars

00:17:25.820 as we have been you know guys

00:17:27.700 I don't know Swedish rock history is your

00:17:29.780 thing I have to be honest

00:17:31.660 is it Swedish history rock

00:17:33.820 or Swedish

00:17:34.500 biopic rock like what do we call

00:17:37.660 this genre if you guys haven't looked it up

00:17:39.740 give it a listen like it might

00:17:41.800 not be your cup of tea but it'll get you fired up

00:17:43.860 I'll give it that if it's not your cup

00:17:45.800 of tea why are you

00:17:47.620 we just ask simple

00:17:49.640 questions I agree I think Brian was

00:17:51.720 actually saying he didn't prefer it wow what are you talking about sabaton i have a sabaton tattoo

00:17:56.640 on my lower back you are gay okay that actually didn't help that didn't help tattoos are gay

00:18:02.840 anyway anyway gentlemen uh i'm one of your hosts eric khan we have of course dan burkholder brian

00:18:08.760 sauve brian it's really interesting to me because as we delve into this episode i don't know how you

00:18:15.420 take you know when they're they're actually charging the emirs are charging that they're

00:18:19.640 going to take france your people and i said like hell they are it's interesting when you read the

00:18:25.600 history here though because the french were like yeah the holy roman empire can fight on its own

00:18:29.660 we don't care about actually i mean it was kind of a major l look the every great nation has to

00:18:35.960 have a few like for example everything after the french revolution to the present moment that's

00:18:41.780 right uh it is interesting though when you look at the history we started with the battle of

00:18:45.680 Yarmouk. There's obviously a lot in the middle. Oh yeah. Right. But then you get to 1683. This

00:18:50.980 is kind of the other bookend of the major, major conflicts with Islam. Yeah. Why do you think it's

00:18:55.980 so important? I mean, this, we talked about it in the cold open you read, but it's crazy to me how

00:19:00.960 pivotal this battle was. Yeah. You know, we, I like this, that we opened with the defeat of

00:19:07.300 Christian forces that opened the door, the loss of the Eastern kingdoms and the Eastern realms.

00:19:12.080 The reason we even think of Christendom as the West today largely traces back to Yarmouk.

00:19:18.640 But then we get to this other bookend, what, 800 years later, more than 800 years later, and we see the Christian forces standing.

00:19:26.840 But again, it wasn't a gimme.

00:19:29.400 It was like – it did remind me of Pelennor for sure with the horses.

00:19:34.020 It also reminded me of Helm's Deep.

00:19:35.600 Oh, yeah.

00:19:35.900 When, you know, Gandalf on at dawn on the third day, look to the east, you know, and then you look up and you see Gandalf up there.

00:19:43.480 And in in the second in the two towers, it was, of course, you know, a glorious Mayar reborn from his death fight with the Balrog riding on the white horse descended from the father of horses in the you know, the story that we just read with Jan Sobieski.

00:19:59.240 It was an overweight 54 year old, you know, not quite, not quite the same.

00:20:04.660 Like he wasn't gleaming.

00:20:05.600 He didn't have a magic stick or anything like that.

00:20:07.720 But just if you're not fired up when you hear about the Christian forces slamming the door back closed after centuries and centuries of rape and pillage and murder by these filthy Mohammedan hordes.

00:20:24.440 i don't even know if you're like do you even have a heartbeat in your chest what's wrong with you

00:20:30.620 what is wrong with you at that point yeah it's a great question dan i want to ask you you read

00:20:35.420 this story largest calvary charge in history at least 20 000 winged hussars come pouring down

00:20:44.060 the hillside and just annihilate the janissaries which are like their special forces

00:20:49.960 As you hear and read this story, how do you think you, but also other people, how do you think you should be inspired, moved, or instructed by this battle?

00:20:58.720 I do think it's interesting, like Brian said, that we had looked at Yarmouk where Christians actually outnumbered the Muslims and the Muslims defeated the Christians in that battle.

00:21:10.320 And here you have a story.

00:21:11.740 I mean, this should inspire you.

00:21:13.980 This should light a fire in your chest.

00:21:15.860 i know it did for my young six-year-old boy because on the way to school one day i was like

00:21:20.860 hey son you want to hear a song about the winged hussars and then i told him the story and that day

00:21:26.600 he asked me no fewer than three times to retell the story he's like he was so excited running back

00:21:32.760 to hear about the winged horsemen yes ran down the turks and destroyed an enemy that was 10 times

00:21:40.280 larger than they were. I mean, this is, this is an incredible, incredible display of courage.

00:21:47.800 And I just love how Jan Sobieski is like, these people know nothing of battle. Look where they're

00:21:53.900 in camp. We're surely going to destroy them. 200,000 to one idiots. What a Chad. The other

00:22:01.860 thing is this guy, uh, you made a point in the cold open, Eric, Eric wrote it to say that he was

00:22:07.480 fat and that he was old he was like 54 years old is that correct yeah and for just to be clear for

00:22:13.520 a king who's been leading for the last yeah decade and a half leading his people in war

00:22:17.380 it was shocking if you made it much further than that oh yeah absolutely you know yeah yeah i mean

00:22:22.880 all that to say though is like as i creep in you know closer to my 40s and stuff i'm like

00:22:29.260 man this so by esky this chunky dude like he's still got it he's maybe i still got it his dead

00:22:35.180 lift though was probably easy 400 yeah that's what I'm saying like it's the it's the cut guys

00:22:41.400 they they're useless let's just be honest totally useless they they're like my macros weren't right

00:22:48.500 I gained a pound my body fat percentage I think Brian's coping okay yeah I am 100% coping but

00:22:54.160 just let me have let me have this but then it's the big power lifter guy that comes out and he's

00:22:59.360 like eats that guy first he eats the cut guy in three bites and then he deadlifts 700 pounds and

00:23:06.500 that's how i picture sobieski like that's how i choose to remember him i mean a total chad king

00:23:12.380 i want to ask you guys about the winged hussars because this this whole imagery at one time uh

00:23:19.000 we'll get into the davis vault we'll tell the whole history of the winged hussars and who they

00:23:23.160 They were originally sort of this like nomadic mercenary people who come to Poland.

00:23:28.940 Sobieski really bring them into their prime fighting shape, I guess.

00:23:33.700 But really, I think when you look at the pictures of them and you can look them up, they look

00:23:37.500 a lot like the Rohirrim, except they have the wings on them, which is way cool.

00:23:44.180 I mean, it's amazing.

00:23:45.580 If you look up a painting of them, like I'm looking at a painting right now and it's just

00:23:49.500 like, where can I get this kind of drip?

00:23:53.160 Would you want 20,000 of those guys marching?

00:23:56.820 I mean, not just marching.

00:23:58.340 I mean, they said when they collided with Turkish forces at the line, it was really a matter of momentum.

00:24:04.440 Like, they weren't stopping.

00:24:06.620 It basically, like, you can watch the battle of the right of the Rohirrim, and it kind of gives you a feel for the look on the orc commander's face.

00:24:13.600 Yeah.

00:24:13.940 When he's like, oh, no.

00:24:15.680 Yeah, imagine being on the other side of the charge, not on the horse, on the other side, and you have winged heavy cavalry coming at you.

00:24:22.400 and you know that they're called the angels of death.

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00:28:44.020 Yeah, and you know that since you invented zero as a Muslim, there's going to be zero.

00:28:49.800 You have a zero percent chance of surviving.

00:28:52.720 Like the Christians always held hope because they only had one percent.

00:28:56.040 That was the worst they could get to.

00:28:57.300 But the Muslims knew the second they saw those.

00:28:59.980 i was about to say the second they saw those winged cavalrymen it was it was over here's

00:29:06.380 the thing though i do think it's worth noting that when we stand at a certain point in history

00:29:11.040 we tend to to read the story as if we're in the last chapter right like oh here you know

00:29:18.660 we've now arrived i am here it must must be about the epilogue because the main event is you know

00:29:24.000 it's me here it is so we tend to view this as bookends just because oh this was not quite 400

00:29:29.500 years ago but it's been a while like clearly christendom defeated the muslim hordes and i go

00:29:35.040 no no 400 years from from now 500 years from now a thousand years from now there'll be other battles

00:29:39.900 that they'll be writing about between christendom and islam well this is 100 this is one thing i

00:29:45.120 love about sobieski um you know we we say this today it's a phrase like he's a guy who knows

00:29:49.820 what time it is sobieski unlike many people in his era like a lot of people didn't come including

00:29:55.620 the french yeah a lot of people didn't come to this battle they're like whatever lose vienna

00:29:59.460 he he knew the time he knew what time it was he shows up and he fights and one of the things that

00:30:04.540 concerns me about christians in america particularly right now we heard it from covid it was like well

00:30:10.280 this isn't the hill to die on it seems like there's never a hill to die on yeah yeah and i think for

00:30:15.040 us by way of encouragement there has to be hills where you recognize the significance and then you

00:30:21.080 fight for that hill and you i mean we've kind of done that with the school even with education

00:30:25.340 Yeah, that's right.

00:30:26.400 The education of our children is a hill we're going to die on.

00:30:28.820 Yeah.

00:30:29.220 So help me God.

00:30:30.140 We might be outnumbered, you know, hundreds of millions to our hundred.

00:30:34.920 There's 48 million public schoolers grades want like K to 12 in America today.

00:30:39.460 I think it's like 48 or 50 million.

00:30:41.340 A couple million.

00:30:41.780 Yeah.

00:30:42.100 And we have 30 students.

00:30:43.960 30 students.

00:30:44.440 But you know what?

00:30:45.880 I'll take those odds.

00:30:47.140 I'll take those odds.

00:30:48.500 Maybe not quite yet, but yeah, it's a great point.

00:30:51.440 yeah needing needing to just recognize the moment and then stand and fight i think there's also

00:30:56.240 something about the masculine soul dan you talk about your kids sons and men were made for last

00:31:02.440 stands i mean because you think about sobieski if he had died there would you rather die decrepit

00:31:08.580 in a nursing home or die in the glory of that battle i choose the battle you know this there's

00:31:14.600 a i don't know if you're familiar with the etymology of the word hasar where it comes from

00:31:19.020 It comes from, I think it's a Serbian word or something like that.

00:31:23.320 And it was the word that meant wanderer or brawler.

00:31:27.120 So the idea was that these were.

00:31:29.260 It's like Aragorn, right?

00:31:30.220 The Rangers.

00:31:31.100 They're wandering brawlers, right?

00:31:34.660 And a point to see is that a lot of the time, like you guys pointed out, the error of today is never seeing it as a moment to fight.

00:31:44.860 It's always a moment for more diplomacy.

00:31:47.440 see. It's always a moment for more talky talky. It's always a moment for more of this or that,

00:31:51.640 but it's rarely a moment in the modern evangelical mind to be like, no, no, no,

00:31:55.520 we die here or we win. And if we don't win here, our children's children are done.

00:32:02.480 And what you need in that moment, and often why it often one of the features that makes it the

00:32:10.120 most hated group in the world, or is the man who's willing to stand and be the wanderer,

00:32:15.640 the brawler he you know because a lot of times it's not someone who's we've talked about this

00:32:20.020 already someone who's come up through the ranks of the you know elites and who's christened by

00:32:25.780 the powers that be and then they go yeah like this guy says we should fight all right PCA

00:32:30.420 everybody like we've decided we're gonna go to war now it's usually some guy out on the fringes

00:32:36.000 who's like yeah but but we need to fight like can we he's you I'm kind of describing Eric

00:32:43.400 con in a few and an uncut to an uncomfortable degree actually it is funny because you mentioned

00:32:49.480 that about jan sobieski and the thing i love about him he reminds me sort of of jephthah

00:32:54.720 in the book of judges where the people say we want you to be our king and he says after we win

00:32:59.180 the battle then i will be your king and so here's a guy he he wins the throne because he's conquered

00:33:05.540 on the battlefield and i think that's often missed today like yeah you might be an elite but what have

00:33:11.340 you won. I mean, that's ultimately, you know, Dan, you've said it, we've said it, you know,

00:33:15.780 men are going to follow courage, not titles. The other thing I think that's really important,

00:33:20.680 we have sort of bands of young men like this today who are disenfranchised from society.

00:33:26.620 Maybe they're a little bit brawly type guys, but it's, it's shocking to me how few Christian

00:33:32.620 leaders will look at a guy like that and go, you know, we could win them and they could be like

00:33:37.840 our hussars i mean maybe like the meme lord hussars even and you we think that's like it is

00:33:43.780 kind of funny in one way but it's like right now people and institutions are actually crushed by

00:33:48.800 the meme wars yeah words matter like the gospel coalition is basically impotent and or completely

00:33:54.280 its people are completely gone from twitter because of a non-meme warring largely oh yeah

00:34:00.520 they caught fire with other people people started to see the error so i think a big part of it

00:34:05.980 Really, I was telling Dan this the other day, I was lifting weights, trying to be like Jan Sobieski.

00:34:17.920 Yeah, just a little bit more like him.

00:34:19.280 And I was listening to the Winged Hussars, and I had this moment where I was thinking of what Theoden said as he's dying.

00:34:28.420 I go now to the halls of my father, in whose presence I will now feel so ashamed.

00:34:32.760 Yeah. And I was thinking, you know, one day, God willing, I'm going to stand in a mead hall with Jan Sobieski and King Alfred.

00:34:42.320 And I sure hope that I'm worthy of these men. Yeah. And I think that's correct me if I'm wrong, but like that's what history should do for you.

00:34:49.240 These are actually your fathers in the faith. Yeah. It should inspire you in that way. Dan.

00:34:53.580 Yeah. You were telling me that story and you had also mentioned, you know, we're, we keep instructing people to honor your father and mother, especially, well, yes, your real father and mother, but also your historic fathers. You should honor them. And when you start putting, this is why stories like this are so important. You start putting names to, no, that's Jan Sobieski is my father in the faith. Like I want to honor him.

00:35:20.880 It gives you an actual target to hit, you know, and there's there's obviously theological heroes and there's kingly heroes and there's battle lord heroes and martyr heroes.

00:35:32.440 And so it's important to have a range.

00:35:35.420 A question I think is ought to come to our minds when we when we hear this kind of story, because you mentioned theological forefathers and we often know those names.

00:35:46.100 We know John Calvin's name.

00:35:48.660 We know Martin Luther's name.

00:35:49.700 We know Augustine's name.

00:35:51.280 Like we know these names.

00:35:52.920 Why don't we know Jan Sobieski's name?

00:35:55.920 Because there would be in a very real sense, there is no work for the great theologian.

00:36:02.900 He doesn't have room to do his work unless you have city fathers and kings and warriors

00:36:09.520 and soldiers who are willing to go out and shed blood and have their blood be shed in

00:36:15.480 order to defend the realm of Christendom.

00:36:17.880 There's no sitting in a seminary writing your commentary on Galatians if the Muslims have enslaved you and everybody you love and taken over the entire world.

00:36:28.240 So why don't we know these names?

00:36:30.540 Well, it's interesting because as we've been going through the guild elder training at Refuge, we've been reading through church histories, you know, Bruce Shelley, Yusel Gonzalez.

00:36:38.940 And one of the things I think that struck everybody is we get the ecclesiastical church history.

00:36:44.520 Yeah.

00:36:45.080 But is this not also part of church history?

00:36:47.020 There would be no church in the West if Jan Sobieski and his winged hussars had not valiantly defended Vienna.

00:36:54.360 That's just reality.

00:36:55.960 Yeah.

00:36:56.180 God uses means to preserve and defend his people.

00:37:00.240 And one of the means that he appointed, like this was God's idea, not ours, was a civil magistrate who wielded the sword.

00:37:07.800 And that's the sort of civil punishment, but it's also the sort of defense.

00:37:11.880 It's the sort of repelling the invading army.

00:37:15.840 It's the sword of God's justice that even though he who lives by the sword will die by the sword, it's actually the sword that enforces that principle.

00:37:24.860 So we've been seriously imbalanced, I think.

00:37:28.640 This is one of my biggest takeaways from preparing for the season and thinking through these things is like, why did I not hear about nine out of ten of these names until I was in my 30s?

00:37:39.080 Well, and it is interesting because like Sobieski being a case study, I went to Apple podcast, you know, researching the last couple weeks, last month for the show.

00:37:47.900 I typed in Jan Sobieski and there are a lot of church fathers who and people in the church who talk about them.

00:37:53.900 They're all Catholic. So it's like Father whatever from Oklahoma is doing this amazing episode on the Hussars and, you know, Jan Sobieski.

00:38:02.520 But I think Protestants is particularly a Protestant phenomenon that we tend to – I think it's a sphere issue.

00:38:10.820 Like typically in America, for example, like we're very ecclesiocentric.

00:38:15.640 Yes.

00:38:16.080 Everything is about the church.

00:38:17.120 If it's not about the church and evangelism, then we don't care.

00:38:20.400 Yeah.

00:38:20.640 And I think that's part of pietism.

00:38:23.140 Joe Boot has described it as churchianity, ecclesiocentrism.

00:38:27.260 That is just we don't need to even think about the state.

00:38:29.680 That's, you know, something that we don't even think about that as like having Christian princes.

00:38:34.160 Yeah, we've failed to think clearly about categories and institutions other than the church.

00:38:40.300 Yeah, that's right.

00:38:41.000 Dan, I want to ask you, I want to get your take on the church history side.

00:38:43.540 I know you're a big church history buff.

00:38:45.360 You've done a lot of teaching on it, actually, here at the church.

00:38:48.260 But why do you think these heroes are not generally told in our histories?

00:38:54.040 And often if they are, like a Constantine, it's usually like, yeah, but he was really bad.

00:38:57.980 Actually, Constantine is a really good example of what Brian was talking about. If you don't have men like Jan Sobieski, you don't have ecumenical councils. And that's proof positive by Constantine because the first ecumenical council at Nicaea was almost 300 years after the resurrection.

00:39:14.180 And so it took that long before church fathers, you know, met and decided on doctrinal issues.

00:39:20.740 And then you see that actually growing through Christendom, you know, for the following thousands of years.

00:39:27.180 And so men like this are very important.

00:39:29.880 So it is interesting that Constantine is villainized or particularly by Protestants.

00:39:36.080 I don't think this is a Roman Catholic issue or an Orthodox issue.

00:39:39.180 This is a Protestant issue, is that they praise Nicaea and they shun Constantine, who made Nicaea possible through his efforts.

00:39:49.660 Yeah.

00:39:49.820 I mean, was the man messy?

00:39:51.080 Like, yes.

00:39:51.840 I'm sure Jan Sobieski had some probably issues.

00:39:55.760 Yeah.

00:39:56.040 I mean, that's probably the case.

00:39:57.540 You don't get men.

00:39:59.460 We talk about it here when we're looking at leadership development.

00:40:02.520 You want more woe men than giddy up men.

00:40:06.240 Meaning you want guys that are driven that you have to say like, whoa, settle down, slow

00:40:11.280 down there, buddy, slow down the guys that you're saying, like, would you just do something

00:40:15.180 like giddy up, please?

00:40:16.620 Even if you just make a mistake, that'd be an improvement.

00:40:20.060 Those guys there, they don't do anything.

00:40:23.060 So it's hard for them to actually commit many errors in their sloth or their lack of zeal

00:40:28.460 where the guys that are, that are motivated, the, the whoa guys, the Konstantines and the

00:40:34.280 Sobieski's often come with, with some other issues because of their aggressiveness, because

00:40:39.720 of their ambition and things like that.

00:40:42.020 And so I don't remember what your original question was, but the Protestants, I think

00:40:46.040 really do have a hard time with anything outside of this realm of pietism.

00:40:52.100 You know, we look at it again, this isn't just historical, but a guy like David, how

00:40:59.360 can you understand David Psalms unless you understand and love David, the man after

00:41:04.160 god's own heart this prototype of christ the king this victor over his enemies and not also in a

00:41:11.640 non-symbolic or typological way meditate on the fact that this man killed a giant and cut his head

00:41:17.920 off and then went this man paid a bride price in piles of four skins from his dead he killed people

00:41:25.240 and cut skin off of their penises from their dead corpses and then carried those around i'm assuming

00:41:32.960 in some kind of little foreskin baggie and presented it at the feet of his father-in-law

00:41:38.600 and said, may I have your daughter now?

00:41:41.800 And he was, this was a man, Saul has slain his thousands, but David has slain his 10

00:41:46.560 thousands.

00:41:47.460 And yes, there were like, God also said, and you can't build the temple.

00:41:50.580 Your son will build the temple because you're a man of war.

00:41:52.640 You have blood on your hands.

00:41:54.300 But God wasn't displeased in David in being a warrior.

00:41:59.540 In fact, David, Psalm 144, blessed God for training his hands for war, that he could bend the bow of bronze.

00:42:06.520 So we need to have a category.

00:42:08.520 Protestants need to stop spiritualizing every aspect of everything down to some kind of floaty ethereal nebulae that you can't grasp or apply to anything that's not just thoughts in your head.

00:42:20.780 Oh, yeah.

00:42:21.260 It's a huge error.

00:42:22.220 Well, and one of the areas I've seen it most, like I was – I think Sunday school – no, I'm sorry.

00:42:28.280 It was for chapel.

00:42:29.540 I was teaching through judges on Samson.

00:42:32.160 And so I was posting some of this stuff on Twitter.

00:42:34.260 And it was amazing how many guys in our camp were like, no, the only thing that Samson was, was a picture of sin and failure and weakness.

00:42:41.780 And Ben pointed this out to me.

00:42:43.760 And he goes, let's read Hebrews 11, verse 32.

00:42:46.340 And what more shall I say?

00:42:47.920 For time would fail me to tell of Gideon, Barak, Samson, Jephthah, David, and Samuel, and the prophets, who through faith conquered kingdoms, enforced justice, obtained promises, stopped the mouths of lions, and it keeps going.

00:43:03.140 So scripture looks at Samson and says a man of faith.

00:43:06.960 Yeah, he conquered by faith.

00:43:08.260 Who conquered?

00:43:08.540 Was he faultless?

00:43:09.360 No.

00:43:09.540 He lit a bunch of foxes on fire and waged asymmetrical warfare against the enemies of God by burning their crops by faith.

00:43:17.920 And scripture, the New Testament says of Samson, this should be a model for you of faith.

00:43:24.460 So I think, again, another picture of kind of the problem of where certain strands of

00:43:30.360 Protestantism at least have come to.

00:43:32.300 One of the things I want to focus on, I actually had planned this at the end, but since we're

00:43:35.960 talking about it, reading Raymond Ibrahim, a really important question came to mind.

00:43:41.100 and it was is some of that pietism in the the base in the foundation of what protestantism is

00:43:48.580 so i'm going to read this but one thing raymond ibrahim points out in the sword and the cemetery

00:43:53.180 is that the protestant reformation which began in 1517 actually weakened christendom whether

00:43:58.240 they meant to or not and the ultimate effect was to strengthen and to benefit muslims

00:44:03.020 luther's initial response to the crusades was not positive and was probably an overreaction to rome

00:44:08.160 He condemned the concept of crusading and originally preached passivity against the Muslim invaders.

00:44:14.900 He said that although the sultan, quote, rages most intensely by murdering Christians in the body, he, after all, does nothing by this but fill the heavens with saints, end quote.

00:44:25.020 Oh, my goodness.

00:44:26.220 Now, later, Luther's position changed after Suleiman the Magnificent captured Belgrade and laid siege to Vienna.

00:44:33.420 However, John Calvin likewise said that the Islamic prophet and the pope were, quote, two horns of the Antichrist, end quote.

00:44:40.700 Ibrahim points out by saying that the pope was as bad or worse than Muhammad, it seems to have weakened the cause of Christendom.

00:44:47.520 So my question for you, gentlemen, this is a very different view of the Protestants than we sometimes get, namely that the Reformation, while necessary, also produced problems for the church.

00:44:56.740 So I just want to start unpacking this and getting your thoughts on, Brian, we got your quick react.

00:45:02.640 Yeah.

00:45:02.900 On the Luther quote, but yeah, respond to that.

00:45:04.860 Well, so I think it's first we need to say we need to avoid the errors of either or 100 percent, 100 percent, 0 percent thinking.

00:45:14.340 So one of the errors we can make when we're reading history is we put white hats on certain character characters and black hats on others.

00:45:21.080 And so we say Protestants, well, we're Protestants, therefore Protestants, white hats, Roman Catholics, black hats, everything.

00:45:27.420 And then we're tempted to start arguing as if everything the Protestants ever did was great and wonderful.

00:45:32.900 And, you know, they were kittens and rainbows issuing forth out of, you know, the Protestants, you know, mouths with every word that they spoke.

00:45:41.580 It's like, no.

00:45:42.880 And that the Catholics always did things wrong.

00:45:44.640 I think that what we see here is the messy, the messiness of politics and human relationship

00:45:52.140 across sin, where the Roman Catholic Church absolutely unequivocally needed reform.

00:45:58.780 And humanly speaking, I'm not God.

00:46:00.900 I don't write the story.

00:46:02.240 It seems to me that the best possible outcome would have been repentance for some of the

00:46:06.460 serious sins of the Roman Catholic Church and the reformation of that church and a remaining

00:46:12.700 unity.

00:46:13.600 What happened instead was the Protestant Reformation where there was defensiveness and failure to repent.

00:46:19.440 And then there was schism.

00:46:20.560 And that's not a positive thing.

00:46:22.780 It's not a positive thing when you have schism and disagreement and a failure of unity in Christ's church and where you have a failure to repent of sin.

00:46:30.240 But one of the things I think ended up happening because we have all of this bad blood and people warring, Christians warring against one another and the Roman Catholics killing the Protestants.

00:46:40.540 Like we have all of this intramural fighting across Christendom.

00:46:44.780 And I'm even speaking politically here, just the political civil realm of Christendom, right?

00:46:49.740 We have all this warring.

00:46:51.080 And what happens when you're fighting your brother is that sometimes you forget that there is an enemy at the gate who will gladly slip both of your throats and desecrate the name of Christ with every breath that he breathes.

00:47:04.900 So the error, I think, was in failing to recognize an ordering of issues and failing to team up and properly fighting against, like, think of what could have happened if throughout the entire history of Christendom, there had been complete unity, not just at Vienna, but I mean, throughout the entire period, we're human beings.

00:47:28.420 There's a reason Christ warned us again and again and again about the failure of unity

00:47:32.420 and love within his church and how grievous a sin that is.

00:47:36.320 So it's because it's a real human temptation.

00:47:39.300 So even like it, think about what this means for today.

00:47:42.360 We have the same kind of issues today where some of the times, like let's take Reformed

00:47:48.220 Baptists and Presbyterians or, you know, Paedo Baptists and Credo Baptists or whatever.

00:47:52.100 Some of the time when you start listing out like in your head, who are the biggest people

00:47:56.620 I got problems with?

00:47:57.940 And you start listing out like, oh, it's those guys over at whatever parachurch organization.

00:48:03.300 You know, those are my biggest problems.

00:48:05.020 While there are people literally worshiping the devil by cutting the penises off of children in your society.

00:48:11.860 So we need to have the wisdom to fight good battles within the church.

00:48:17.020 Those are good and we need to fight them, not be passive.

00:48:20.560 But also the wisdom to keep the order of battle in mind.

00:48:25.280 Like my brother in Christ, as errant as he is on some of these issues, is not my enemy.

00:48:33.100 He's my brother.

00:48:34.700 Yeah, and I think part of it is just, like you said, recognizing that the enemy wants to weaken you by pitting us all against each other.

00:48:43.040 But one of the things, too, that I think about is, you know, I've done this on the Hard Men podcast, but you can actually trace pietism today that we've described as problematic.

00:48:52.180 This is even in Britannica, they even say this, but I've, you know, looked this up elsewhere.

00:48:57.900 Pietism, influential religious movement in America today, traces back to German Lutherans

00:49:03.280 in the 17th century.

00:49:04.820 So about this time period.

00:49:06.860 So there is something that I think we have to be on guard against where I think what

00:49:10.120 they were doing was they were correcting against sort of the hypocrisies and abuses of the

00:49:14.860 church.

00:49:15.540 You're responding to that.

00:49:17.360 But as so often is the case, it can be an overreaction.

00:49:21.200 And I actually, we have this weird thing that happens with this podcast where I'll post

00:49:25.800 about King Alfred and then I'll get Roman Catholics who are like, you pagan swine.

00:49:30.400 Alfred would spit in your face.

00:49:32.260 And you're just like, okay.

00:49:34.020 All right.

00:49:34.320 Thank you.

00:49:34.640 We're trying to, we're trying to do something good here.

00:49:36.780 Thank you.

00:49:37.140 We're trying to bring, we're trying to bring some people together.

00:49:40.680 Some of it is also comical because there's an anachronistic reading of history.

00:49:47.080 Yeah.

00:49:47.300 Like calling certain people Roman Catholic when the Roman Catholic Church did not exist.

00:49:51.460 People are like, why do you guys talk so positively about Alfred?

00:49:54.820 Don't you know he was a Catholic?

00:49:56.780 And I'm like, as opposed to all those 8th and 9th century Protestants?

00:50:00.860 They didn't exist.

00:50:02.260 They didn't exist?

00:50:04.200 Come on.

00:50:04.860 So I think that's part of it.

00:50:06.680 The other part seems like, you know, a good lesson for us is not overreacting.

00:50:12.980 You know, and as you said, Brian, when you've got globalists and you've got the genitalia

00:50:18.800 choppers.

00:50:19.800 Yeah.

00:50:20.500 But you repeat yourself.

00:50:21.980 And the baby killers.

00:50:22.920 Yeah.

00:50:23.440 But you repeat yourself.

00:50:24.160 And Taylor Swift and the left, but I repeat myself.

00:50:26.140 When you have all that coming at you in full force, this actually isn't the time to go

00:50:31.100 to war over credo baptism.

00:50:33.200 Like, at least, like, have the—this is what we say in our church, and I'm literally teaching

00:50:38.900 the Westminster Confession of Faith right now in Sunday school.

00:50:42.200 And deep in the chapter on baptism right now, right?

00:50:46.100 I'm a pedo-baptist.

00:50:46.920 And so talking, we got a lot of credo-baptists, a lot of pedo-baptists in the church.

00:50:50.840 And the thing we've told our church many, many times is along these lines, here's what

00:50:56.440 we want to be able to do.

00:50:58.580 Every couple months or whenever it comes up or like once a year, we're going to have a

00:51:02.020 rousing debate around baptism.

00:51:04.500 And we're going to, you know, each get our best arguments forward and we're going to

00:51:09.140 try to come to unity on this issue.

00:51:10.820 and each try to convince the other.

00:51:14.480 And then at the end, we're going to sing a psalm as brothers and sisters.

00:51:18.680 We're going to eat a potluck to honor our Baptist brothers.

00:51:22.580 And then, you know, we're just going to be friends like that.

00:51:26.480 Maybe smoke a cigar for our Presbyterian brothers.

00:51:29.900 Like we're just going to be friends at the end of that and recognize that

00:51:32.760 these are important things.

00:51:34.520 Doctrine is really important.

00:51:35.860 don't hear us making light of distinctions theologically between all of these different

00:51:41.780 groups. These are huge watershed theological differences that genuinely affect the way you

00:51:46.720 live, that genuinely affect the way you view God and salvation and all these things. They're

00:51:50.600 important, but we need to also recognize that there is a distinction between the world that

00:51:59.460 needs to be converted and especially the yet unconverted world raging against the church

00:52:04.860 and hoping to destroy it altogether from the face of the earth,

00:52:08.160 and my brother who disagrees with me about the mode of baptism.

00:52:11.940 Can we make that distinction?

00:52:13.880 Yeah, I think we can.

00:52:15.000 I think that's important.

00:52:15.880 Dan, I want to get your thoughts, Lutheranism, Protestantism,

00:52:19.260 some of the reaction going on in the 1600s, particularly about Islam.

00:52:25.180 Just your thoughts on it.

00:52:26.220 Yeah, Lutheran Pietism's origins actually, like you had mentioned,

00:52:29.940 were partly motivated because of the wars with the Muslims

00:52:32.520 and wars of Catholics and Protestants.

00:52:35.640 And so there was a, it was a reaction to fighting amongst Christians and outside enemies.

00:52:41.820 And so it became the hyper-spiritualized version of Christianity that really doesn't touch

00:52:46.720 the physical world.

00:52:47.540 And we see this today.

00:52:48.380 I mean, if you peruse through Twitter or the bookstore, you get certain groups of people

00:52:54.580 and their whole worldview, the pass fail of any theological supposition or anything is

00:53:02.340 is this law or gospel or is it mingling the two? Is it rightly categorized law and gospel? This is

00:53:08.900 roots of Lutheran pietism in response for events like this. I did want to speak to the Catholic

00:53:14.760 and Protestant issue because we have had some Protestants saying, like you had mentioned,

00:53:21.500 aren't these guys Roman Catholic? And you seem to be calling this era Christendom,

00:53:26.760 but that would suppose that those people were actually Christians, but they're Roman Catholics.

00:53:31.520 so they can't be christians there's actually a lot of problems with that that presupposition

00:53:38.260 that that catholics can't be christians and that this wasn't christendom there there are many

00:53:44.300 issues but i think in order to really attack it you have to look down you asked about the

00:53:48.600 foundations of protestantism is pietism you know really baked into the foundations of protestant

00:53:55.960 Protestantism. And I think that really, you can see the criticisms from Protestants and from

00:54:03.260 Catholics towards the work that we're doing. And the nature of the criticisms actually reveal

00:54:08.760 the way that these two groups view the world. Primarily, when you're speaking to Protestants,

00:54:16.140 they'll be making some theological argument. They'll be saying the Catholics soteriology

00:54:23.700 is wrong. So therefore you shouldn't talk about them in a positive light or brothers, you're

00:54:30.360 pedo Baptists. And that seems to be a problem. Or we get questions like what flavor of, of

00:54:37.420 Calvinism are you? Because if you're the type that, you know, God predestines babies to hell

00:54:43.100 before they're even born, I don't want anything to do with you. Those are the types of, of

00:54:47.400 Protestant criticisms we receive now from the Catholics. They'll say things like, Hey, you're

00:54:53.120 close, you're not far from being away from the one true church. They'll speak about very positively

00:54:59.180 in the lights of saints and of their forefathers. And they're speaking more of a historical,

00:55:05.480 from a historical perspective, from events that have happened, tracing traditions of the church,

00:55:10.700 whereas the Protestants also traditions, but they're theological traditions. And so you can

00:55:15.540 see that where are these two groups really going to fall into error or overemphasize more than

00:55:22.680 error overemphasize certain aspects of that foundational worldview. Well, the Protestants

00:55:27.640 are going to make everything a theological argument. And largely related to soteriology.

00:55:33.500 Yes, yes, yes. Even baptism, it's not really, I mean, mode is, you know, is something that

00:55:39.900 should be, you know, immersion, sprinkling, pouring or whatever. But that's really even

00:55:45.060 amongst the most hardcore is still a secondary type issue. But really the question of baptism

00:55:52.800 is as it relates to salvation, right? And so everything in the Protestant worldview comes

00:55:59.740 down to those theological questions because those are the roots of Protestantism. It's

00:56:03.820 correcting the theological errors of the Roman Catholic Church, whereas the Roman Catholic

00:56:08.340 Church, they're going to be more concerned with their traditions and with the unity of the church.

00:56:12.320 That's very important to the Roman Catholic church is that they're the one church, one

00:56:16.980 united church.

00:56:18.100 And so I just think that really when you, when you, um, you know, we have mostly have

00:56:23.960 Protestants that listen to this podcast, I would really encourage the Protestants to

00:56:29.520 really take a step back and to examine a lot of the criticisms that we have.

00:56:34.400 Catholics are wrong on a lot of their theology.

00:56:36.300 I'm not, I'm not, I'm Protestant to my bones.

00:56:38.300 I'm not going to be Catholic.

00:56:39.180 Right.

00:56:39.680 So I'm not saying that.

00:56:40.540 But one of the things that we do, like Brian was saying earlier, we're, we have this spirit

00:56:46.520 of schismatism in our bones where we can't seem to fellowship across, like, are you going

00:56:55.000 to intinct for communion or not?

00:56:58.700 Do you keep the bread and the wine separate or do you dip?

00:57:02.080 Yeah.

00:57:02.320 Is it one shared cup or is it a familial cup or do you get your individual cup?

00:57:08.160 like, I just can't, I can't fellowship with you, brother. You, you know, you have a shared cup.

00:57:12.460 That's just not my, I just don't think that's right. And you schismatize and schismatize and

00:57:17.280 schismatize and fracture to the point where essentially this is a problem that we see

00:57:23.180 amongst many Protestants. You have mega church and then you have home church. And it's really

00:57:30.340 hard to find a lot of faithful believers kind of in between. There are a lot of small church.

00:57:37.420 I'm not saying that, but that's just the trajectory that, that Protestantism seems to be going.

00:57:42.960 It was that the 300 person church and the 100 person church fractures smaller and smaller as more people get more convictions over their theological distinctiveness.

00:57:51.140 It's internet theology too.

00:57:52.700 It does it.

00:57:53.340 Well, yeah, it's amplified because of availability of information and, and influencers instead of credentials, you know, credentialism.

00:58:00.660 It's now internet influencers.

00:58:02.160 So even, even people like us, um, while I would hope that we're making Christendom happen and we're making Christianity, Protestant Christianity, uh, healthier people get a hold of ideas that we say.

00:58:16.980 And then all of a sudden it's, well, if you don't have a Christian school or a home school

00:58:21.020 and you don't have, you know, paid out communion or you don't have parish model or you don't

00:58:26.080 have whatever the thing is, head coverings, we just can't fellowship here and we're going

00:58:31.280 to go somewhere else.

00:58:32.120 Oh, we can't find any other churches.

00:58:33.900 We're going to have to stay at home and do our own home church.

00:58:36.640 That's the instinct of the Protestant church.

00:58:38.660 The Catholic church, that's not it.

00:58:40.260 Their Pope is nuts, right?

00:58:42.620 The Pope is crazy.

00:58:43.900 He probably is the Antichrist.

00:58:46.420 I mean, he has the spirit of the Antichrist anyway.

00:58:48.680 I mean, he's like blessing homosexual marriage and everything like that.

00:58:52.560 But yet the Catholic church still values its unity.

00:58:56.960 Anyway, so I say all that as a long rambly diatribe to say that the way that Catholics

00:59:01.740 and Protestants are thinking about these issues are from completely different platforms.

00:59:06.740 Have you guys ever heard the heretic joke?

00:59:09.620 Which one?

00:59:10.420 Can I tell the heretic joke here?

00:59:11.820 Because it's so funny.

00:59:13.280 I first heard this from a megachurch pastor.

00:59:14.980 So it's this truly ecumenical moment here for the King's Hall.

00:59:18.480 It goes like this walking.

00:59:20.300 I'm just reading this from because it's long.

00:59:22.280 Walking across a bridge one day, one man saw another man standing on the edge about to jump off.

00:59:27.400 So the first man ran over and said, stop, don't do it.

00:59:30.940 Why shouldn't I?

00:59:31.860 The second man said, the first man said, well, there's so much to live for.

00:59:36.120 Like what?

00:59:36.860 The suicidal man said, well, are you a religious or atheist?

00:59:40.780 Religious.

00:59:41.660 Me too.

00:59:42.640 Are you Christian or Buddhist?

00:59:44.060 I'm a Christian.

00:59:45.200 Oh, me too.

00:59:46.160 Are you Catholic or Protestant?

00:59:48.220 Protestant.

00:59:49.020 Me too.

00:59:49.780 Are you Episcopalian or Baptist?

00:59:51.960 Baptist.

00:59:52.860 Wow, me too.

00:59:53.880 Are you Baptist Church of God

00:59:55.320 or Baptist Church of the Lord?

00:59:57.160 Baptist Church of the God or of God.

00:59:59.440 Wow, me too.

01:00:00.760 Are you original Baptist Church of God

01:00:02.820 or are you Reformed Baptist Church of God?

01:00:05.640 Reformed Baptist Church of God.

01:00:07.420 Me too.

01:00:08.920 But are you Reformed Baptist Church of God,

01:00:11.180 Reformation of 1879 or

01:00:13.240 Reform Baptist Church of God

01:00:15.020 Reformation of 1915

01:00:16.420 Well, Reform Baptist Church of God Reformation of

01:00:19.100 1915, the first man said

01:00:21.200 Die, heretic scum

01:00:22.960 And pushed him off the bridge

01:00:24.120 That's actually

01:00:27.240 Here, we actually have

01:00:29.360 Somewhere, oh

01:00:30.300 Oh, thank you

01:00:31.940 Because that's what everyone's going to be doing

01:00:34.260 That's what everyone's doing with that

01:00:36.100 Thank you, Eric, I appreciate that

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01:02:08.120 for more information.

01:02:14.440 Brian, it actually does get to part of the problem.

01:02:16.340 And what I would say to both sides of the camp,

01:02:19.180 I don't actually know on Dan's claim.

01:02:20.940 I think we have a lot of Protestants.

01:02:22.720 I know for a fact we have a lot of trad cats

01:02:24.720 in Eastern Orthodox who follow what we do.

01:02:27.860 And for the most part,

01:02:28.800 as I've had time to talk to these guys,

01:02:31.280 I'm not in an ecclesiastical way

01:02:33.640 trying to build a church with them.

01:02:36.120 But I am trying to say,

01:02:37.740 I think we could actually fight together with some of these guys, especially on the cultural issues where they're seeing a lot of the same things.

01:02:43.780 So my instinct in a lot of this is wanting to see things come together more, people working together, not pushing each other off the bridge for not being a whatever version of Reformation Baptist.

01:02:56.200 The 1915, yeah.

01:02:56.580 So, Brian, I just want to get your thoughts on that.

01:02:59.140 Do you feel like that's a true assessment of what we're trying to aim for with the show?

01:03:02.100 Yeah, I think that it's important to make a distinction between the theological roots of what would I positively argue for as a systematic theology when it comes to ecclesiology, soteriology, and so on and so forth.

01:03:18.200 Like, what do I believe from Scripture is the correct way of approaching that?

01:03:24.360 And even more foundationally, how do we actually come to the truth on those questions?

01:03:31.280 Because that's really the foundation.

01:03:33.080 Yeah.

01:03:33.540 Is it sola scriptura?

01:03:35.200 Is it, you know, in a robustly, not a straw-manned Roman Catholic Reddit tier level, like, you know, argument about sola scriptura, but really understanding what the doctrine is and isn't saying?

01:03:45.800 Or is it the magisterium?

01:03:47.480 Is it, you know, so when we, there are, there's that level of the debate and on that level

01:03:53.140 of the debate, just go listen to again, Westminster Confession Sunday school that I'm teaching.

01:03:57.540 And you'll hear me teaching all of the paragraphs in there that are many of them exist because

01:04:03.220 of the distinction that the Westminster divines were making between Roman Catholic theology

01:04:09.920 and the theology of the Westminster assembly.

01:04:13.420 And I agree with the Westminster divines on those issues.

01:04:16.300 But when it comes to the broader question, which is more of a cultural, political, sociological type of issue today, when we're talking about, OK, but where how can we work together?

01:04:29.720 Where can the lines you know, where can we draw clear lines but still come together and work?

01:04:34.740 Where can we be friends? And I err towards the side of greatly desiring friendship and meaningful discussion and meaningful contact between Orthodox, Roman, Catholic, Protestants and Protestants of various stripes, because I'm not Lutheran and I am not, you know, particular Baptist and I am not many things.

01:04:56.220 So not just Protestant to Roman Catholic and Protestant to Orthodox and all these, even within Protestantism, I greatly desire unity to whatever level it's possible and conversation, because I do believe that every Christian should desire the unity of the church and the true coming together of the church, the healing of schism, including the Protestant Reformation.

01:05:21.420 Even the most hardcore, all Roman Catholics are going to hell Protestant should desire

01:05:26.880 that.

01:05:28.060 In their view, it would just mean that the Roman Catholics agree with them on literally

01:05:31.700 every issue all the way down to the color of the carpet in the sanctuary, and then they

01:05:35.960 can be back on the team.

01:05:37.380 You know, I don't agree with them on that, but I err on the side of we need to be on

01:05:42.340 a team on some level at least and have cooperation on some level because right now in the world

01:05:50.540 that we live in what are the what's happening what are the enemies like where are the battle

01:05:55.660 lines drawn some of them are like do you want the entirety of the west to be erased and replaced

01:06:01.960 with either a islam or be a weird kind of spiritualist secular human that was a weird

01:06:07.720 combination but it really is a weird vaguely spiritual secular humanism right because that's

01:06:13.220 that is those battles are happening it's not like oh they're maybe they'll get here in 10 years

01:06:17.420 they're already fighting like they're at the front well and that's an interesting point because even

01:06:22.060 in lord of the rings you have like when mortar comes and the enemies of the dark powers are

01:06:27.480 banding together to attack the west it really does actually you know you have if you're rohan you

01:06:33.420 have to put aside all the things that you're ticked off at gondor about and there are real

01:06:38.400 failures you know and i think tolkien was smart about this like elves and dwarves are going to

01:06:42.560 have to work together again. Oh yeah. And I, I see even in this story with Luther, uh, by the time

01:06:49.360 they lease siege to Vienna for the first time and then attack again, he's like, yeah, no, we, we need

01:06:54.240 to defend against this. Like we can't just let them kill us. Yeah. Um, so sometimes an external

01:06:59.760 enemy and a foe can actually be a gift from God to force Christians to say like, look, yeah, I may

01:07:05.640 have this distinction in the Christian nationalism camp about how much authority the state, uh, you

01:07:12.220 know, the magistrate should have over against Ecclesiological, you know, all these things.

01:07:16.560 Yeah.

01:07:17.060 But it's like, but I'm not going to kill my brother.

01:07:20.340 No, I'm not going to kill my brother.

01:07:21.640 And this is hard to hear, but in the Christian nationalism camp and amongst the Christian

01:07:26.780 nationalism project in particular, who's in America, main idea is that America is fundamentally

01:07:32.440 founded as a Protestant nation and not to return to being a fundamentally Protestant

01:07:36.960 Christian nation.

01:07:37.620 I think that's historically true.

01:07:38.760 A great case can be made for all of that.

01:07:40.580 One of the things that Christian nationalists need to understand is that practically speaking, the way one of the stages that that will pass through is that you will not get Christian nationalism merely through a few higher liturgical particular Baptists and Presbyterians.

01:07:55.520 That's not going to happen.

01:07:56.820 What?

01:07:57.040 It's going to be grill Americans who go to their mega church on Sunday.

01:08:00.620 And you have to be able to figure out this is a big lesson that I've had to wrestle through, even myself, in terms of growing up megachurch and then coming to many convictions that I think are correct convictions or why would I follow them?

01:08:14.280 Right. But to actually, though, make sure that I don't fall into the error of like despising my my mother and father at their more normie megachurch Baptist church.

01:08:25.720 And I've had to actually temper and I hope mature on this issue to where it's like, I praise God for my parents and I praise God for even all of the megachurch normie Baptist stuff that I'm not super excited about on theological levels.

01:08:43.500 Because you know what?

01:08:44.940 That actually is part of the legacy of Christianity in my nation.

01:08:49.300 And it will inevitably be part of the key to its revival.

01:08:53.700 You can't do it with like, how many OPCers are there in the entire world?

01:08:57.320 Like 18?

01:08:58.260 There's 12.

01:08:58.860 There's 12.

01:08:59.400 There were 18 last week.

01:09:01.320 Six of them split off.

01:09:02.880 It was like, we're going to have to be able to link arms in some way.

01:09:07.360 It ties into another question.

01:09:09.340 And that's, can you make a Protestant Christendom?

01:09:12.860 We know that the first one really wasn't Protestant.

01:09:16.240 But could you have that now?

01:09:17.820 Is Protestantism capable of producing that?

01:09:21.680 Is it good?

01:09:22.420 Et cetera.

01:09:22.920 Well, I think yes. I think yes. And see America. Right. Like, I genuinely believe that it that has shown us some of the difficulties and challenges and temptations and ditches. But it's also showed us in many ways, a lot of the roadmap.

01:09:39.240 I think there was far too much deism and enlightenment philosophy that got mixed in and really poisoned the batch from the beginning in many ways.

01:09:47.760 And then the Civil War essentially was the ending of the project in principle in many ways.

01:09:56.040 I think we'll get into that in this season at some point, if I'm not mistaken.

01:09:59.840 Stonewall Jackson.

01:10:00.840 We got to talk about it.

01:10:01.580 All the way.

01:10:02.180 It's important.

01:10:02.800 But I do believe that you can have a Protestant Christendom, but what you can't have is a Protestant Christendom that is led by theologians primarily.

01:10:13.320 Yeah, what do you mean?

01:10:14.500 I mean that theologians primarily are not suited in the actual task of their discipline to this work.

01:10:21.220 Because theologians in their discipline and their task, what they're actually trying to accomplish, is as fine-toothed truth down to the minutiae as they possibly can.

01:10:30.740 And there's a place for that.

01:10:31.460 And I'm not against that at all.

01:10:33.100 I think it's wonderful and we need it.

01:10:34.880 You need people to be arguing and writing lengthy treatises back and forth on traducianism versus creationism, right?

01:10:41.560 Like that needs to exist because we need to know what the word of God says and what it teaches and what it means and how it applies and all these things.

01:10:48.020 But what makes you successful at that project is actually a thing that will make you almost guaranteed to fail when it comes to any kind of political project, which is why there's so often such a vast gulf.

01:11:01.460 between the theologians of the day and the political operators, even when they're both

01:11:06.520 Christians. Isn't this part of the significance though, that like with Constantine, Dan, you get

01:11:11.520 him saying to all these, you know, divisive, schismatic, all these bishops. And yeah, he says

01:11:17.460 to them like, you guys need to come together and you're going to agree on something. And that's

01:11:21.120 what we're going to do. And we're going to play nice. Yeah. Do you, do you see that to what Brian

01:11:26.500 saying as being important from coming outside, uh, necessarily like a theological person.

01:11:33.080 Well, yeah, but that's why I would say that Protestantism in its current form,

01:11:37.900 it would be an impossibility to have a Protestant, uh, Christendom.

01:11:42.440 Why?

01:11:43.280 Because of schismatics, because of the theologians it's led, who is going to say, all right,

01:11:48.360 everybody get in the room together.

01:11:50.060 We're going to talk about lady pastors and then we're going to follow whatever ruling,

01:11:53.740 you know the the council decides you almost need some sort of magisterium there's no unity so

01:11:59.520 even if you said okay we're going to go back to the original colonies and there's 13 colonies

01:12:04.760 and this one maryland is you know is the catholic one and you've got the lutheran one and you've got

01:12:09.260 the whatever dutch reform one like i i just don't i don't see that unity maintaining over time

01:12:16.240 Even America, you, you had a civil war within a hundred years of its, of its foundations,

01:12:23.720 you know, this formation.

01:12:24.740 That's the challenge.

01:12:25.420 Yeah.

01:12:25.640 You have to have some form of unity.

01:12:27.600 I think Protestantism is a viable, obviously right Christianity.

01:12:34.220 So it's not the, a theological problem necessarily, but it's a unity problem.

01:12:40.540 It's a political problem.

01:12:41.960 It is.

01:12:42.240 Yes.

01:12:42.660 Because a Protestant Christendom is going to look like a group of nation states or city states that have a leaning or formal leaning or some, you know, towards like you described in the colonies.

01:12:55.080 You're going to have a heavily Anglican area in Virginia, and you're going to have these different kind.

01:13:00.380 But then you have to have some kind of overarching cooperation.

01:13:03.540 And this is the old tug of war between the state and the federal.

01:13:09.420 It's the same kind of problem that you're going to have, whereas Roman Catholicism just says, well, you have a pope, of course.

01:13:17.280 But does that really solve the problem?

01:13:18.600 The answer is no.

01:13:19.400 No, it doesn't.

01:13:20.300 Historically, it didn't solve the problem.

01:13:21.160 I mean, historically, you also had theological convictions based on geographical areas.

01:13:25.740 Of course, even within the Roman Catholic.

01:13:27.440 Even in Nicaea, you had the East and the West.

01:13:30.000 They were at odds.

01:13:31.640 And then you have kings versus popes, and you have bishops versus pope.

01:13:35.300 And you have you're going to have inevitably, whether you're Roman Catholic in your ecclesiology or Protestant, you're going to have this problem of the federal versus the state, this centralizing versus decentralizing of power.

01:13:47.100 These are just problems that are very, very difficult, humanly speaking, to solve in the presence of sin.

01:13:53.300 They're just difficult problems.

01:13:54.740 I think that it's possible because the first Christendom fundamentally wasn't, you know, it's it faced all of the same problems that a Protestant one would face today.

01:14:05.300 It's just that we're not close to the initial conditions being present today for that to

01:14:10.320 arise.

01:14:10.660 There's a whole lot of other things that need to happen, but one of them is a distinction.

01:14:16.140 One of them is a category distinction that Protestants who struggle with pietism need

01:14:21.720 to get in their bones.

01:14:22.840 It's actually a big part of our entire project at Kings Hall.

01:14:25.560 We've talked about it in many different forms, and it's the distinction between the category

01:14:29.620 of the church, the state, the family, the individual, the business, the economy that

01:14:37.140 God made a world with multiple different types of thing. And he actually didn't make a world

01:14:42.940 where one of those types of thing is going to swallow up and flatten out all of the others.

01:14:47.500 And we would say it like the church, there's more to Christendom than just the church.

01:14:52.600 Right. So Christianity has to address all of that. Yeah. And the church,

01:14:57.760 And it's going to look different in each sphere.

01:14:59.880 The church is responsible for the ministry of the word and prayer, word and sacrament of church discipline.

01:15:06.840 It has a very, it's broad in one way because it's the discipleship of human beings.

01:15:12.140 And so it's going to touch on every aspect of what it means to be human in its discipleship in teaching men and women to obey all that Christ commanded.

01:15:19.200 But one of the errors the church can make is that because it has authority to teach on all of those things, that it actually is the authoritative center of all of those things.

01:15:28.980 And it's not like the pastor is not the president.

01:15:33.200 The pastor is not the king.

01:15:34.920 The pastor is not the senator.

01:15:36.780 The pastor is the pastor in the congregation.

01:15:39.120 The pastor is also not the businessman.

01:15:40.760 A pastor can be a businessman.

01:15:42.820 Paul was a businessman and a pastor or an apostle.

01:15:45.780 Like, I mean, I'm speaking kind of loosely here.

01:15:47.860 Paul made tents. And when he made tents, the institution of the apostle and the office of

01:15:53.860 the apostle wasn't making tents. It wasn't adding that to the job description of the apostle.

01:15:59.660 He was operating in a different type of sphere that God also made and gave clear rules over

01:16:05.500 and that we need to obey or death will happen, right? What I think happens in a lot of the

01:16:11.460 modern world today is that, um, theologically speaking, we tend to collapse out all of those

01:16:17.820 other categories or flatten them until, and that gets really important when you start trying to

01:16:22.740 understand something like what is a King supposed to do? Cause it's not going to be the same answer

01:16:28.000 as what is a Bishop supposed to, supposed to do. Yeah. Right. No, I think that's really helpful.

01:16:32.900 One of the things going back to Sobieski and we'll tie this all together. Uh, one of the things I

01:16:37.420 love about him is here you have this 54 year old guy he has the spirit of Caleb in his old age he's

01:16:43.040 devout he's he's fired up he's valiant on the battlefield and it struck me that that Christendom

01:16:49.080 produced largely a very different kind of piety but it seems like one of the questions we would

01:16:55.400 ask in Christendom that it seems like you have to have cultural Christianity now in in our day

01:17:03.780 evangelicals have a lot of them have smashed that idea that you have a culture with shared norms

01:17:09.140 ideas about the good life that sort of thing that are to the core basically christian it doesn't

01:17:15.600 mean everybody's necessarily regenerate but it does mean that you have a culture of christianity

01:17:20.600 as the broader context it seems like to me like you need that for christendom to thrive

01:17:26.840 yeah you have guys like russ moore who are like death to death to cultural christianity we hate

01:17:31.980 it it's been better when the church is on the ropes and persecuted.

01:17:35.860 It's just,

01:17:36.480 it's just historically ignorant to say that.

01:17:38.560 I mean,

01:17:39.140 just simply historically agree.

01:17:40.540 You need,

01:17:41.680 so the thing is,

01:17:42.360 Christendom produces cultural Christianity and cultural Christianity is needed to produce Christendom.

01:17:47.560 It's a chicken egg thing,

01:17:48.700 right?

01:17:48.840 You need enough Christians that you to have Christendom in the first place.

01:17:52.800 And if you have enough Christians,

01:17:53.840 you're going to have false converts and nominalism and those things present.

01:17:56.720 As soon as you have any single church,

01:17:58.560 you're going to have nominalism somewhere.

01:17:59.880 And as soon as you have Christendom, which is intentionally structuring society partly to privilege and incentivize people to confess Christ, that's literally like it's aligning the earthly and heavenly goods together within the sphere of the state and the civil power.

01:18:17.700 That's a lot of what it is.

01:18:19.720 So that is going to create some people who are nominal.

01:18:24.820 It's going to create cultural Christianity.

01:18:27.000 But this idea that cultural Christianity is a net evil or like it's worse than secularism, it's just ignorant.

01:18:36.160 It's such an idiotic idea that you'd have to be a bad actor.

01:18:39.220 I mean, I don't get how you, especially because guys like Russ Moore is he's a Calvinist.

01:18:45.160 And so you haven't the assumption is like, well, there's a bunch of nominal people out there that assume they're Christians, but they don't have regenerate faith.

01:18:52.600 And so it's actually better if they're complete pagans so that they can see their sin more

01:18:57.800 obviously.

01:18:58.720 Well, you're actually talking about two groups of unregenerate people.

01:19:01.480 And if you actually believe in Calvinism, that God chooses those whom you will save

01:19:06.340 through the preaching of the gospel and conviction of sin and by grace and through faith, that

01:19:10.800 can happen to a nominal Christian as the same it can happen to a complete pagan.

01:19:16.460 Why, though, would you not want an underlying assumption of Christian morality in your

01:19:21.840 society?

01:19:22.600 that, hey, maybe we shouldn't have stores open on Sundays, that maybe it's best if my kids don't go,

01:19:27.500 I don't know, like tip over porta potties and spray paint buildings and just, you know, just

01:19:34.220 typical behavior that we see today. Like we're going to, drugs are tolerable to a certain degree.

01:19:40.340 Now it'd be better to have an underlying assumption of Christian morality and then still preach the

01:19:45.400 gospel to these people. I just think they're bad actors. I think it's actually, it's so idiotic.

01:19:49.520 that's the only explanation. Yeah. It's interesting. I've thought about that even in

01:19:53.640 Utah, if you compare, you know, sort of like the cultural Mormonism, which in some ways it's,

01:19:59.760 it's at least closer than other forms of false religion to sort of some Christian morality about

01:20:04.840 family and, you know, that sort of thing. But yet you compare that to like a ghetto of an inner city

01:20:10.840 and which would you rather live in? Yeah. It's like the Mormons, the Mormons. Yeah. If I had

01:20:15.660 to choose between living in Mormon kind of land and the culture that that produces, which has

01:20:21.380 serious and systemic flaws, or a third world country where they worshiped, you know, like a

01:20:28.060 river God and sacrificed virgins in volcanoes. No question. Like San Francisco, is that what you're

01:20:33.940 talking about? Yeah, exactly. Well, because the Mormons are still, they're still stealing from,

01:20:38.140 as a Christian cult, they're still stealing from Christian ethical framework in some ways.

01:20:43.920 In others, they depart, as with any cult.

01:20:46.720 But it's that kind of question.

01:20:48.780 Like if you went to the early church and you said, would you rather have Domitian killing Christians or not killing Christians for being Christians?

01:20:56.380 The Christians aren't going to say, well, you know what?

01:20:58.420 We hope he keeps killing Christians because it really helps us to be serious about our faith.

01:21:02.480 And, you know, the tree of the church is watered by the blood of the saints and that kind of thing.

01:21:06.780 I'd say nobody would say that.

01:21:09.800 In fact, the church had to correct against the error of seeking martyrdom.

01:21:12.680 People would say that that aren't currently being killed.

01:21:15.280 Yeah.

01:21:15.680 I wish martyrdom would come so that there would be revival.

01:21:18.560 It's like, you want martyrdom?

01:21:19.720 Okay, I got some places just you could get on a plane and you find it real quick.

01:21:24.180 One of the things I love too about Sobieski, because he's in the middle of all this,

01:21:27.880 there's division in Christendom, but there should be an encouragement.

01:21:30.720 It seems to us that what is the battle set before you simplify things.

01:21:36.360 You know, David said, I don't set my eyes too high in some way.

01:21:39.020 It's like we, I can't control all the division in the fighting.

01:21:42.680 But for many of us, like, again, the school is a good example.

01:21:45.560 The church here, New Christendom Press, we said, but we can do this and fight and fight well.

01:21:51.480 Dan, I think particularly this sort of Theoden sort of being at least symbolically, you know, clearly there's some markers here from Sobieski, an older guy.

01:22:04.860 And an encouragement, I think, to a lot of older saints who may listen to the show, like you might have one more good fight in you.

01:22:10.880 and encouraging them just to do the work that's set before you and you can still be heroic and

01:22:15.720 valiant and courageous even if you can't fix all those problems so i wonder if you would just speak

01:22:20.340 to that well yeah i mean the thing is you look at a guy like sobieski is in his mid-50s and that's

01:22:25.100 usually when you start like you're just punching the time clock waiting for your medicaid medicare

01:22:29.800 whatever social security to to to kick in and you're cruising to the end uh and already like

01:22:35.640 planning for the end which is i mean you have to plan for your end as far as legacy and inheritance

01:22:41.540 but the issue is that guys that are in their mid-50s or 60 years old you may have 20 years

01:22:48.280 left lord willing 20 years that's a difference from 20 to 40 except you now have knowledge and

01:22:55.000 resources you might not have the physical ability but you have knowledge wisdom resources lord

01:23:00.000 willing, if you're actually wise and not just an old fool, but you have 20 years, what could you

01:23:06.020 do with 20 years? You know what? A guy that had a little bit of zeal, a little bit of testosterone,

01:23:11.380 maybe more hair than me. No, with, with, uh, that has a paid off house that has a steady income

01:23:19.480 that Lord willing has a savings account that has grandchildren. What could you do in 20 years?

01:23:26.200 I mean, don't throw in the towel. And I mean, I like, you know, Sobieski because it's like, hey, this is one last battle. Maybe I don't make it out of here, but what an end it will be. Right. And that's, that's all glorious. But in some ways it's just like, you know, you look at that and versus the long haul of working hard for 20 years to make sure that you secure your legacy and an inheritance and, and leave a good name for your family.

01:23:52.240 that's less glorious in the short term but in the long term there is generational glory and so i

01:24:00.560 would just encourage older saints not to neglect their older years but to actually pour them like

01:24:06.620 have renewed fire renewed zeal what a big part of it uh i love this picture of sobieski you know

01:24:12.400 he's got a son if you're a king you're training your sons to be kings but i love the fact you

01:24:16.960 think about in today's world, Tucker, there was a video on Twitter where Tucker was saying, yeah,

01:24:22.600 one of the reasons I detest Ben Shapiro is because he wants my sons to go fight in these stupid wars

01:24:27.540 and die for them. And so today our leaders are sclerotic old men and women who send the young

01:24:32.920 people to die. So they're fighting from the back. And yet here's Jan Sobieski saying, you know what

01:24:38.280 a king is? A king shows his sons, I'll fight till the end. I'll fight for the things that I find

01:24:44.220 good beautiful and true and Brian I want to ask you just the importance of our sons seeing us

01:24:49.440 fight the right fights and be at the front with them and saying son this is what kingship is about

01:24:54.620 yeah your sons need to see you as a as a man take heat and take blows and fight at the correct

01:25:03.480 front fronts and you need to be teaching your sons what those correct fronts are to fight

01:25:08.100 in how to restrain zeal and direct zeal, but not extinguish zeal. And this is just a very

01:25:15.160 difficult thing to do, I think in, in today's day and age, but also just humanly because of our

01:25:21.040 flesh, the desire of the flesh is always comfort and fighting is not comfortable. Like it's just

01:25:27.880 not comfortable. It's a lot of work. Risk. Yeah. A lot of risk. It leads to a lot of headaches in

01:25:33.060 your life, a lot of controversy. One of the most draining things in life is controversy.

01:25:39.240 I'm speaking from experience, like one of the most draining things in your life is controversy.

01:25:44.920 And when you've been in the battle, this is why Sobieski is so inspiring and ought to inspire us

01:25:49.640 is because this isn't like a king in his twenties or a general or commander in his twenties who's

01:25:55.880 still fighting his first fights with the zeal of youth. This is a man who's been there and done

01:26:00.760 that. He's led the charges. He's taken his risks and he survived. And to get back out there and do

01:26:08.220 it when the novelty is worn off. This is the kind of thing that our sons need to see is that we don't

01:26:13.800 just fight when we feel like it. And he could have rested on his laurels. Absolutely. He could

01:26:18.880 have sent the younger guys out first and been like, oh, you know, you've got this. And in many

01:26:24.000 ways they did. He had already won his spurs. He'd already led them successfully. They knew how to

01:26:28.680 fight, but he was out there demonstrating the correct fronts to fight because he realized

01:26:34.920 that, at least I didn't talk to the guy, but I like to think that he understood that one

01:26:40.300 of the most important aspects of his legacy was going to be not hanging it up, not changing

01:26:46.980 his example from his youth to his agedness, like of zeal into passivity, but to continue

01:26:54.160 to show, no, fight the good fight of the faith, leave it all on the field. This is what our sons

01:27:01.080 need to see because what are they going to see over and over? What are they going to be discipled

01:27:04.440 in? Passivity, please yourself, just be lazy. And a lot of it's cloaked in like, again, think of

01:27:11.840 the Hussars as brawlers in the origin of the word. There's going to be so many quasi-theological

01:27:19.640 excuses not to fight people are constantly going to be trying to extinguish the flame

01:27:24.340 to fighting the battles that need to be fought and as kings and priests

01:27:30.000 a father has to say no and teaches children how to do the same because the same and it starts with

01:27:37.480 your flesh and moves on outward because that's the that's the first fight it's like waging war

01:27:42.180 with your flesh that seek comfort and all that and then waging the correct battle externally in

01:27:46.680 your or in your home and then waging the correct battle in your church and like it all you can't

01:27:51.560 just do one of those things you have to do all of them holistically but i just think what are

01:27:56.640 what's what's at stake if we don't our children by the second or third generation we're going to

01:28:04.080 be overrun because someone else is going to fight right and they're going to fight to conquer and

01:28:09.640 fight to conquer you and your people and your your land and your faith and and impose their will

01:28:16.680 They're conquering will on you.

01:28:19.000 Like this is what we need to see is that fundamentally when Jesus talked about mastery, that's this is a principle that goes all the way down and all the way up.

01:28:26.380 You will either fight and master over the flesh and over the world and over the devil.

01:28:32.480 Or you will be mastered and all the way up and all the way down, you will be mastered.

01:28:37.520 That's what's at stake.

01:28:38.840 Yeah.

01:28:39.460 No, I love it.

01:28:40.020 One of the conversations I had with Ken Harrison, who's I think he was president, CEO of Promise Keeper or something like that.

01:28:46.340 But I said, why is courage so important for men today?

01:28:49.920 And he said, well, for starters, when you look at the book of Revelation and who's listed first in the lake of the fire, it's cowards.

01:28:56.520 Yeah.

01:28:57.080 And he said, so we need to be telling our sons like, and I love Ken's bluntness on this.

01:29:01.060 He's like, cowards go to hell.

01:29:02.680 Yeah.

01:29:03.340 And so fight for the things that you know are true, good and beautiful.

01:29:06.980 Dan, I want to pass it to you for a closing charge.

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01:29:29.640 Dan,

01:29:30.160 I'm going to turn it over to you

01:29:31.580 for the closing charge.

01:29:33.220 Sure.

01:29:33.680 I would just encourage you guys

01:29:35.220 that the reason that we're being overrun,

01:29:39.060 we're being overrun,

01:29:40.200 the churches are failing,

01:29:42.000 families are falling apart

01:29:43.240 and we're being replaced by illegal immigrants in our country right now.

01:29:47.220 And it's because, in part, God is judging us

01:29:50.040 because we have not honored our father and our mother.

01:29:53.700 And so let this be an encouragement to you to think of men like Jan Sobieski,

01:29:57.720 who would charge into 200,000 enemies of God with just one-tenth of the number,

01:30:04.920 with courage that God would see him prevail.

01:30:08.200 So honor your father and your mother.

01:30:10.300 Honor your historical father and mother, your spiritual fathers and mothers, and may God bless you the way that they did Jan Sobieski.

01:30:19.700 Amen. And we'll catch all of our listeners in the next episode.

01:30:23.020 Until next time, Fesinalente, make haste slowly.

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The King's Hall - February 23, 2024

Last Stands： Jan Sobieski, The Winged Hussars, and The Siege of Vienna

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