What is Religion?

What is Religion?

When I first came to Christian Identity, I gave much thought to the meaning of the word religion. Perhaps this sermon by Bertrand Comparet, titled What is Religion?, had helped to stimulate that process. The primary definition of the word religion in the Oxford Dictionary is “the belief in and worship of a superhuman controlling power, especially a personal God or gods.” But although that is what it has come to mean, I believe the original sense of the Latin word from which it was derived has a much deeper meaning, and that this deeper meaning is relevant to our Christian Identity profession. The Latin word religio was used in a manner much like we use the word religion today. But the related word religo is a verb meaning to tie back or tie up, and religatio is a tying back or up. So, according to The New College Latin & English Dictionary, the word religiosus, which is probably the closest antecedent to our word religious, was used to refer to something which was “subject to religious claims, under religious liability.” Liability is “the state of being responsible for something”, so there is the connection to the meaning of the root word religo, in the sense of being tied or bound to a thing.

This in turn brings several Scriptures to mind. First, in Matthew chapter 18, we read in the words of Christ: “15 Moreover if thy brother shall trespass against thee, go and tell him his fault between thee and him alone: if he shall hear thee, thou hast gained thy brother. 16 But if he will not hear thee, then take with thee one or two more, that in the mouth of two or three witnesses every word may be established. 17 And if he shall neglect to hear them, tell it unto the church [assembly]: but if he neglect to hear the church [assembly], let him be unto thee as an heathen man and a publican.” Then, after admonishing His disciples about sin and guilt and the need to reject men who do not accept correction along those lines, Yahshua Christ had also said “18 Verily I say unto you, Whatsoever ye shall bind on earth shall be bound in heaven: and whatsoever ye shall loose on earth shall be loosed in heaven. 19 Again I say unto you, That if two of you shall agree on earth as touching any thing that they shall ask, it shall be done for them of my Father which is in heaven. 20 For where two or three are gathered together in my name, there am I in the midst of them.” So binding and loosing are related to Christian fellowship and community, or communion, and that in turn is based on an abstention from sin and a keeping of the commandments of God. Paul’s example of such loosing is found in 1 Corinthians chapter 5, where he encouraged the assembly at Corinth to ostracize a fornicator from their community.

In these modern times, a man may believe anything he chooses, but if he is not bound or obligated to something tangible, then he has no true religion and he is a nihilist whether he acknowledges it or not. On the other hand, if he is not a party to the covenants which Yahweh had made with Israel, or if he is not a party to the wider Adamic covenants, then he may as well be a nihilist because he is not bound to God or Christ, and he has no obligation in that regard, and therefore he should have no part with the Body of Christ. But if you are from any of those tribes with whom those covenants were made, then you should view your religion as what you are bound to, to that which you have an obligation to fulfill, and govern your life by the covenants which Yahweh God had made with your ancestors. For Christian Israel, that is the New Covenant, and religion is therefore a keeping of the commandments of Christ.

In this day, following the so-called ages of “Reason” and “Enlightenment”, we are raised thinking that we are free to choose for ourselves what to believe, and doing that we all walk in darkness. Our ancient ancestors bound us to the covenants of God, and as their children we are obligated to them whether we like it or believe it or not. So Paul of Tarsus told the Galatians that “the law was our schoolmaster to bring us to Christ”, over 700 years after their ancestors were taken captive by the Assyrians, and warned the Corinthians not to commit fornication as those same ancestors had done in the land of Moab after the Exodus, over 1200 years after their ancestors migrated from Palestine into the Peloponnese. Then Paul asked the Corinthians, in chapter 6 of his first epistle to them “ 15 Know ye not that your bodies are the members of Christ? shall I then take the members of Christ, and make them the members of an harlot? God forbid. 16 What? know ye not that he which is joined to an harlot is one body? for two, saith he, shall be one flesh. 17 But he that is joined unto the Lord is one spirit. 18 Flee fornication. Every sin that a man doeth is without the body; but he that committeth fornication sinneth against his own body.”

Fornication is race-mixing, but it is also prostitution, and in the Scriptures the word was often used in other ways to describe relations between people and even nations which are contrary to the laws of Yahweh our God. The people were under the rule of the Roman Empire at the time Paul was writing his epistles, and the Empire itself participated in all the sins of intercourse between the diverse races of people and nations for which the ancient children of Israel were sent off into punishment in the first place. Joining people of diverse races and religious beliefs under one government required State control of what one was permitted to believe, which in turn regulated other aspects of one’s life. So the apostle John wrote in his first epistle “15 Love not the world, neither the things that are in the world. If any man love the world, the love of the Father is not in him.” Likewise, James had written “4 Ye adulterers and adulteresses, know ye not that the friendship of the world is enmity with God? whosoever therefore will be a friend of the world is the enemy of God.” In the wider context of all of these statements, James, John and Paul were all making the same profession, that the world is replete with sinners, and that Christians should separate themselves from them all. Recognizing the fact that we are the children of Yahweh our God, accepting the obligations of the New Covenant which He had made with the children of Israel, and binding ourselves to Christ by restricting our communion to one another, loving our brethren and keeping His commandments, that is the true religion. That is also the essence of His words in John chapters 14 through 17. That is the only way to please Him.

So with this, I am going to present and offer critical commentary on a Bertrand Comparet sermon of this title, What is Religion? Clifton Emahiser had republished this sermon in February of 2007 from transcriptions originally made by our friend Jeanne Snyder, a woman who was also a life-long friend of Bertrand Comparet. After having corresponded with Jeanne for 8 years, I was saddened when she passed on December 26th, 2006, and I never got the chance to actually speak with her. There is a reproduction of a version of this sermon found on audio cassette at the Comparet audio archives at Christogenea. Clifton added some critical notes, and we will also include those here.

I am also persuaded that by presenting this sermon here I can help our listeners understand a couple of significant concepts in relation to the history and perception of our own so-called religion, Christian Identity. When Comparet wrote, he perceived that White Christians were still a controlling majority in America, and that therefore White Christians could control the political course of the nation. That was the perception most White Christians had at the time, and many of them still have that perception today. But it is wrong, and all those who have held it for the past hundred years have deceived themselves, which includes Bertrand Comparet.

In truth, while America was founded upon the good intentions of many White Christian men, it was poisoned by the popular ideals of Liberalism and subverted from the beginning. As the words of Yahshua Christ say in Revelation chapter 17: “17 For God hath put in their hearts to fulfil his will, and to agree, and give their kingdom unto the beast, until the words of God shall be fulfilled.” Under this circumstance did the Untied States of America come into existence, and under the tyranny of that beast we all suffer today, as we have no control over the political destiny of our own nation. So I see true Christians in a similar condition to what they had endured during the time of the Roman Empire. The Word of our God explains perfectly the causes and reasons for our current reality, and Identity Christians must conform themselves to this revelation, and act accordingly. If our expectations differ from the will of our God as it is outlined in Scripture, then we are only going to be disappointed and fail in our endeavors. The followers of the apostles, the Christians of the first century, would not have been found waving Roman flags and cheering on the emperor.

In the history of our Christian Identity religion, if I can call it that in order to make a point, British Israel failed because it worshipped the British Empire, and that had failed. Now it is a laughing-stock, an object of scorn and derision. Then the Christian Identity professions of men like Howard Rand and Bertrand Comparet failed, because they were dependent on many of the same concepts, but only transferred them to the American empire. As we shall see, Comparet saw America as White and Christian, and the enemies of America as non-White and non-Christian, even Russia. But in fact, many Russians are White and Christian, and the same nefarious forces which controlled Russia during the Cold War were also in control of America. However even today many Identity Christians do not yet realize this failure. We have no political solution, and we cannot define what is White and Christian along worldly political lines. Recently, even many Identity Christians have been caught up in fervor over the Alt-Right movement and the election of Donald Trump. Now Trump has made them all look like fools, as I warned that he would before he even got elected, but many of them still do not even realize that, so this year they will wave the flag for Trump again. Christian Identity is truth, but the truth can be found only once we separate our religion from worldly politics and worldly pursuits. We must be bound to our God, and not to the world, and that is the basis for our religion, as our obligation is to Yahweh our God. If we do that, we shall stop looking like fools every time some worldly entity fails.

That being said, much of Bertrand Comparet’s sermon is excellent, and he was certainly on the right path in most of his statements. So here is:

WHAT IS RELIGION?, by Bertrand Comparet

Of the many voices competing for the nation’s attention, very few dare tell a really substantial part of the truth in the fields of politics or economics. Those few who do, are subjected to the most evil and vicious smear campaign imaginable. Even in the field of religion, very few dare tell all the truth and those few are called bigots. Not very many have the courage to face such a campaign of abuse, so many that know the truth are silent. Naturally nothing like this could escape the foreknowledge of Yahweh, it is one of the signs of the time of the end of this age. Yahweh prophesied in Amos 5:13, “... the prudent shall keep silence in that time: for it is an evil time.” [Both Jeanne and Clifton changed Comparet’s text, since in his recorded lectures, Comparet himself always used the titles Lord or God, and not the name Yahweh.]

Comparet did not distinguish who he meant by the “many voices competing for the nation’s attention”, but since the majority of media outlets have been controlled by Jewry since the inception of modern media, it cannot be assumed that the voices which are in their employ ever sought to tell any truth. So perhaps Comparet’s outlook was a little naive, but in the next paragraph he shows an understanding that the media is controlled. Likewise, the churches have been bound by agreement with the IRS not to speak truth in the areas of race, religion or politics ever since the inception of the 501c3 tax exemption. They are prohibited from either endorsing or interfering with candidates for office, and also from “any purpose that praises or calls for discrimination”, meaning that they are not permitted to be bigots or they would lose their tax exemption. So the denominational churches had long ago joined themselves to the beast, and the media outlets were part of the beast from their beginnings. Therefore, how many truly Christian voices actually have had the ability to tell people the truth even if they knew it? In Comparet’s time, independent Christian writers had to self-publish their books and tracts, and distribute those and their recordings by mail order, where the chances of being heard or read by a significant audience were very small. It was not until the advent of the Internet that independent Christian voices could be heard by those who might stumble upon them by chance. And yet Comparet is right, that those few who can get the truth out are scorned.

He continues, and what he says next is still true, even with the Internet:

Therefore, only a small portion of the people have the opportunity today to hear the full truth in any of these vitally important fields, which today are becoming literally matters of life or death. Instead, they hear the constant repetition of propaganda aimed to influence public action or inaction in a way to serve the interests of those who control the media of public information. Particularly unfortunate is the fact that most people do not get to hear the word of Yahweh [God] on these matters, matters which Yahweh considered important enough to give us specific warnings about. But again this was foretold by Yahweh Himself, also through Amos. Amos 8:11 tells us, “Behold, the days come, saith Yahweh, that I will send a famine in the land: not a famine of bread, nor a thirst for water, but of hearing the words of Yahweh.”

The media in the West began with small local newspapers printed by various lords or princes in medieval Europe as a public service so that the people living under their dominions could be informed in whatever it was that the nobility wanted to share. In the 18th century, when these newspapers began to be privatized, they were almost immediately used to serve private interests, and like the nobility, their new owners sought to mold the opinions of readers rather than to inform them. Regardless of the appearance of impartiality, printed media has always been partial. But its purpose was never to inform the people as to the Word of God, and the churches have also failed in that manner. The late medieval Roman Catholic Church sought to maintain control of the people by prohibiting them from having access to the Word of God, and the Protestant churches have always politicized it while insisting on interpreting it for the people themselves. If one ever truly gets the chance to study Scripture in its correct historical context, it becomes evident that the communities of men have always been dysfunctional, and that Christianity has never truly been practiced.

But the point I want to make is that media has always been controlled by private interests, and the denominational churches, while they were always politicized, were diverted for the political purposes of the same demons that control the media, especially since 1913. The tax-exempt status was developed in 1913, side-by-side with the same laws that created the modern federal income tax and the mechanisms by which it is collected. So in the modern age, people never had any real opportunity to hear the truth of the Word of God from any established organization for any significant length of time, as they are all beholden to the forces which control the government, and the government is no longer a Christian government. In that manner Comparet continues:

Since these are days of terrible and increasing danger, never were Yahweh’s words needed more than today. Many people wonder why Yahweh would permit any interference with the teaching of His word, why isn’t it made available to all? Why isn’t it blazoned into everyone’s ears the way communist propaganda is broadcast in Russia? It is because this condition is not the cause of our problem it is the result, we are reaping what we have sown. Time was when the full truth could be spoken or printed in this country. Some people would bitterly disagree with you of course, but they could never silence you. Then we allowed our enemies to teach us that to oppose them was controversial, that it was always vaguely bad, in some undefined way. By some unexplained magic, their opposition to you was not controversial, it was just a liberal recognition of other points of view, theirs only of course.

Comparet’s comparison to conditions in the time of Amos is apt. The people of that time had accepted, even embraced idolatry, and for that they were punished and Yahweh God withheld His Own Word from them. A more complete portion of Amos chapter 8 reads: “11 Behold, the days come, saith the Lord GOD, that I will send a famine in the land, not a famine of bread, nor a thirst for water, but of hearing the words of the LORD: 12 And they shall wander from sea to sea, and from the north even to the east, they shall run to and fro to seek the word of the LORD, and shall not find it. 13 In that day shall the fair virgins and young men faint for thirst. 14 They that swear by the sin of Samaria, and say, Thy god, O Dan, liveth; and, The manner of Beersheba liveth; even they shall fall, and never rise up again.” So the people were being punished for accepting the idolatry of Jeroboam I, who was the king that had insisted that Israel depart from the worship of Yahweh and return to the paganism of the golden calves. That punishment took over 200 years to come to fruition. Today people are once again accepting government-enforced idolatry in the form of laws upholding multiculturalism, diversity, tolerance, and the widespread fornication and sodomy which have also resulted from those same policies. Again, the punishment may take 200 or more years to come to fruition, although we have been under the yoke of the bankers and international corporations for over a hundred years already. Now Comparet continues, where he talks about what is now known generally as political correctness, a term which he seems not to have used, although he lived until 1983:

We have come to regard expressing the truth as bad taste, since the truth always offends those who are engaged in some evil activity. This is especially true of the word of Yahweh, which always offends all evil people. Therefore, we have allowed ourselves to be taught that the word of Yahweh must not be used. Even His name must not be mentioned in our schools or public institutions because it offends those who hate Him.

Not only has the name Yahweh been practically banished from public discourse, but even the mere title, God, to which is what Comparet was referring. The Jews, in their abject hypocrisy, even despise the title for God, and not just His Name. For example, at the Chabad.org website, the title is always spelled “G-d”, as if that were the Name that they have always tried to prevent the use of, when it is not. First century Jews commonly used the equivalents of the titles God and Lord in the languages which they spoke, but they forbid use of the Name, which in English is best rendered as Yahweh. Again Comparet continues:

This famine of hearing the word of Yahweh has come upon us, not as our misfortune, but because we have acquiesced in it. We have even supported the politicians who have pushed it the hardest. It is our sin. When we had the truth, we allowed it to be suppressed. The consequence is Yahweh’s judgment as He says in Hosea 4:6, “My people are destroyed for lack of knowledge: because thou hast forgotten the law of thy God, I will also forget thy children.” As a consequence, our forgotten children have died in the jungle swamps of the South Pacific, the freezing mud of Korea, in the scorching deserts of North Africa and the bomb shattered cities of Europe. For what? To create the hell on earth which faces us today.

This is true even if the men who fought our wars could have understood the level of betrayal among those in control of their own government. Their deception is also a result of their acceptance of idolatry. The Romans were not punished because they turned to Sodomy, but rather, as Paul explains in the opening chapter of his epistle to them, Yahweh God had given them up to Sodomy because they had forsaken Him and exchanged His truth for idolatry. Now Comparet discusses what he calls “political truths”, where perhaps a phrase such as “truths of God regarding political matters” would have been more appropriate:

Perhaps a few people are disturbed because we dare mention what some would call political truths as well as religious, in these lessons. These people have been taught [that] you should never mix the two. You see, there are some people who wouldn’t worship your God if they knew you weren’t a left wing, new deal democrat. There are others who wouldn’t listen to the truth on political matters if they knew you didn’t belong to their church. They think that Yahweh is a politician who must hide His principles in order to get more votes. Yahweh has never worried whether the majority would give Him more votes. Yahweh has never worried whether the majority would follow Him. If they would not, this was their own tragic loss, but the truth was never compromised.

Actually, it is evident that most people do not care about what principles are expressed in the Bible, and only want to imagine that God would verify their own worldly principles for them. Where he spoke of “the hell on earth which faces us today” Comparet had displayed quite a degree of prescience. Most of Comparet’s sermons, according to those who were familiar with his ministry, were done in the 1960’s and early 1970’s. But this one in particular seems to have been from the early 1960’s, where he makes no references to the debauchery of the later half of the decade, where he speaks about integration but not about immigration, and where he mentioned the “communist propaganda… broadcast in Russia” as if it were at the height of the Cold War. Then later on in the sermon he refers to “600 BC, about 2,560 years ago”, which brings us to 1960. So this sermon is as old as I am, as I was born in 1960, but while the early 1960’s were a comparatively innocent time, already Comparet was astute enough to observe the problems which would be caused by the political course of that time, so that by the 1970’s most of American society was indeed plunged into a “hell on earth”.

As I was growing up, I do remember hearing people frequently attest the opinion that religion had nothing to do with economics or politics. That is the secularization of society, and the Latin word saecularia, the source of our word secular, means worldly, which is something that Christians are supposed to despise. In hindsight, I also believe the idea must have been promulgated through the media, as so many common people today have become mere parrots for whatever it is that they continually hear on television. As we had explained earlier, religion is your perception of what you are bound to, of what you are obligated to do, and if you are a Christian then you are bound and obligated to keep the Word of God, to obey His commandments and to love your brethren, which are those of your own race and nation. But if you profess Christianity and do not keep the commandments of Christ, you are no true Christian. Continuing with Comparet, he attempts to demonstrate that behavior in political and economic spheres of life must be governed by our religious beliefs, that they cannot be justly conducted apart from our faith:

In speaking to you on economic as well as religious matters, we are just following in the footsteps of the prophets. Yahweh spoke through them on all these matters. Economic principles determine whether we shall have prosperity or poverty. Political principles determine whether we shall have freedom or slavery. Therefore He has instructed us on these matters in the Bible. We must speak the word of Yahweh and if any are offended, we can’t help it, truth compromised would no longer be the truth.

As Paul had declared in Galatians chapters 2 and 5, Christians have liberty in Christ. But Christ insisted that we keep His commandments, so ostensibly, that liberty is only maintained if we do so. Therefore Comparet is right to examine the things which God commanded in this context, and to insist that we must conduct ourselves and our Christian society according to those precepts. So he continues:

I want to review in a general way, the subjects discussed in the Bible. Note into which class each falls, economic, political or religious, all in the same book. On the authority of this book, the Bible, in these lessons we take this stand and we will not deviate therefrom. Now let’s see what authority we have for this broad coverage.

Let’s start with Moses. The Book of Genesis introduces us to our God, to that extent it is religious. It also contains Yahweh’s promises to Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, ancestors of the Anglo-Saxon race. They were to be a blessing to all the earth, other nations shall bow down to us. We shall be blessed with all good things, in other words, the “have” nations. These promises are economic and political. Exodus gives the religious ordinances of the Passover, the ark and the tabernacle, the priesthood and the sacrifices, the altar and the holy days. It also gives the ten commandments, of which only the first four are religious, the other six are social and political.

Where Comparet said “other nations shall bow down to us” he seems to have embraced the Dominion Theology of British-Israel to some degree. We should not care what the other races think, and today the other White nations are as much of the children of Israel as ourselves. Of course, the descendants of the children of Israel are not only Anglo-Saxons, but also many of the related nations of White Europeans and the formerly White Near East. The references to Anglo-Saxons are a vestige of British Israel and early Christian Identity, and I am also probably guilty of making them at times. Continuing with Comparet:

The next book Leviticus is partly religious, dealing with offerings, sacrifices, consecration of priests and the great feast and holy days. It also contains the agricultural laws, dietary laws, and rules for healing the sick. It also contains the great economic laws of the year of rest, release of debts every 7th year and the restoration to the poor of their lost homesteads every 50th year. These are definitely economic and political laws.

Exodus and Leviticus also organized society based on agriculture, which was necessary to the health of the economics of the nation beyond the sabbaths and feasts and other things that they imposed. Continuing again:

The Book of Numbers gives the laws of conscription, military training and war, which are certainly political as well as religious. Moses’ last book, Deuteronomy, reviews the ten commandments and the holy days. [As Comparet had said, the commandments were first found in Exodus - WRF] It also gives the organization of the nation, the dietary and agricultural laws, economic laws, and the laws of warfare, which are certainly social and political. Moses wrote under the direct inspiration from Yahweh. He intermixed what some call religious, because it pertains to the forms and ceremonies with which we like to dress up our expression of our relation to our God, with the rules governing all the practical aspects of our civilization and all the rules governing man’s relation to his fellow man, both as an individual and as organized society. Remember Moses wrote this at the dictation of Yahweh. The economic and political rules are stated upon the same authority as, “Thou shalt have no other gods before Me”, or “Thou shalt not make unto thee any graven image”, the direct commandment of Yahweh.

The prophet Isaiah wrote some of the grandest religious statements and prophesies ever expressed by man. He also gave many political explanations and prophesies to the people, some of these applied to his own time. They had not kept the nation pure, they had allowed alien elements to rise to power in their capital city of Jerusalem. Isaiah 3:8-9 records, “For Jerusalem is ruined and Judah is fallen: because their tongue and their doings are against Yahweh, to provoke the eyes of His glory. The show of their countenance doth witness against them: and they declare their sin as Sodom, they hide it not. Woe unto their soul! for they have rewarded evil unto themselves.” For this cause he warned them, Yahweh would judge them. Their enemies would invade and conquer the land, no alliance with other nations could save them. This warning of existing political evil in their government and its penalty of military invasion and defeat, surely deals with so-called political subjects.

And here in this passage from Isaiah it also dealt with an important social subject, as the people “declare their sin as Sodom”, and it is not a coincidence that our word Sodomy refers to certain sexual perversions that have now become prevalent in our own society.

Another aspect of society that most people do not comprehend is this: when laws that people have had for hundreds or thousands of years are suddenly being changed, it is a sign that the nation and people have been subjugated by other forces, whether those forces are immediately apparent or not. In war, when people are conquered and subjugated, the conqueror changes their laws to suit himself. Not even a hundred years ago Sodomy was outlawed in virtually every State in America, and in most States race-mixing was also prohibited. Now the acceptance of Sodomy, like the acceptance of fornication, or race-mixing, is being forced upon us and that proves beyond doubt that we are not the masters of our own nation. Now Comparet makes a conclusion which should be obvious to anyone who has ever read a Bible:

Don’t tell me [that] we must separate politics, economics and religion!! Yahweh does not distinguish between them. He separates right and wrong, good and evil, what is right and good in economics and politics, He commands by His religion, as a part of it.

No prophet in the Bible wrote entirely for his own days, part of their message was a warning to us who live in the 20th century. As Paul reminds us in 1 Corinthians 10:11, “They are written for our admonition, upon whom the end of the age is come.” This is especially true of Isaiah. In Isaiah 8:9-14 Yahweh gives us the clearest warning against our wicked folly of joining the United Nations. Yahweh warned us in clear and strong language. “Associate yourselves, O ye people, and ye shall be broken in pieces; and give ear, all ye of far countries, gird yourselves and ye shall be broken in pieces; Take counsel together and it shall come to naught: speak the word and it shall not stand. For Yahweh spake thus to me with a strong hand, and instructed me that I should not walk in the way of the people saying, Say ye not a confederacy, to all them to whom this people shall say a confederacy, neither fear ye their fear, nor be afraid. Sanctify Yahweh Himself and let Him be your fear and Him be your dread. And He shall be for a sanctuary.”

While Comparet is wholly correct, that White Christian nations should never make treaties or associations with non-White so-called people, or even with White non-Christian people, he was not entirely correct about the United Nations. He saw the United Nations as the second beast of Revelation chapter 13, which is not true. That beast was clearly the papacy of Rome. What the United Nations is, however, is an arm of the eighth beast which is prophesied in Revelation chapter 17, which is represented by the international banks and their global corporations. This is the beast which the harlot has joined herself to, and the United Nations is only one symptom of that unholy union. That union was finalized in 1913, as Jewry gained full control of the American economy.

But in truth, White Christian nations should never have made any agreement with Jews, or with aboriginal natives, with Arabs or Indians or Orientals, or with anyone else of any other race. Instead, they should have simply pushed all these other peoples out of the way as Christendom expanded abroad. But before the age of overseas expansion, the churches of Europe had already been corrupted by the devil. Continuing with Comparet, he is on the right path, but the problem was much broader in scope than he described it:

We have been warned not to associate ourselves with these pagan, Christ hating nations. Those who do join this association shall be broken in pieces. Isn’t this a perfect picture of the utter futility of this pagan organization? “Take counsel together and it shall come to naught, speak the word and it shall not stand.” Just seventeen words perfectly sum up decades of effort to govern the earth by the power of Satan, in an organization where the name of Yahshua cannot be mentioned. How could we claim to be speaking the word of Yahweh, the true religion, if we failed to bring you this warning spoken by Yahweh to His prophet Isaiah. This is a warning essential to our very survival in the near future.

Isaiah gave many other warnings directly inspired by Yahweh, on matters which may be called political. Let us leave him for the present and go on to some of the other prophets, for a fair cross section of the Bible on this question. Let’s take Jeremiah next. Jeremiah opens with Yahweh’s denunciation of mongrelization, intermarriage with other races. Jeremiah 2:21 states, “Yet I had planted thee a noble vine, wholly a true seed: how then are thou turned into the degenerate plant of a strange vine unto Me?” In this Jeremiah is reminding us of Yahweh’s stern warning against mixed marriages and integration. For example in Leviticus 20:24 Yahweh said, “I am your God, which has separated you from other people.”

Comparet, writing in or around 1960, the integration struggles of the so-called Civil Rights movement for Negros were a matter of recent history, and he writes in that context. In America, this process of integration became inevitable after the War Between the States, when Negros suddenly acquired the status of “people” and were granted equal citizenship with Whites. So Isaiah’s words apply to that as well as to the United Nations. Returning to Comparet:

Moses taught this to the people. Exodus 33:16 records, “So shall we be separated, I and all of Thy people, from all the people that are upon the face of the earth.” In Deuteronomy 7:3, Yahweh again emphasized the point. “Neither shalt thou make marriages with them: Thy daughter thou shalt not give unto his son, nor his daughter shalt thou take unto thy son.” Joshua repeats this warning. “If ye do in any wise go back and cleave unto the remnant of these nations, even these that remain among you, and shall make marriages with them, know for a certainty, that they shall be snares and traps unto you, and scourges in your sides and thorns in your eyes, until ye perish from off from this good land which Yahweh your God has given you.”

After this ample and repeated warning, Yahweh challenges us to answer Him. “Yet I planted thee a noble vine, wholly a true seed: how then art thou turned into the degenerate plant of a strange vine?” Hosea 5:6-7 also reminds us, “They shall go with their flocks and their herds to seek Yahweh, but they shall not find Him: He hath withdrawn Himself from them. They have dealt treacherously against Yahweh: for they have begotten strange children.” The Hebrew word translated strange is zuwr, meaning of a different race. Therefore, when the prophets give Yahweh’s warning that integration and mongrelization are a terrible sin against Him, how can we be silent upon this? We can’t be silent if we propose to speak His word. Call it social or political if you will, but it is the direct commandment of Yahweh to us, therefore it is a part of our religion and must be preached as such.

Under the New Covenant, this commandment still stands, the proof being that Peter called his Christian audience a “chosen race” and a “holy [or separate] nation”, and Paul warned the Corinthians not to commit fornication, illustrating his warning with a race-mixing event from the Book of Numbers for which the children of Israel were severely punished, so he must have been warning them against race-mixing. Comparet continues with Jeremiah:

Jeremiah knew this, in Jeremiah 6:10-11 he tell us, “But to whom shall I speak and give warning, that they may hear? See! Their ears are sealed and they cannot give heed; the word of Yahweh has become to them scorn, they find no pleasure in it. Therefore I am full of the fury of Yahweh, I am weary of holding it in. Pour it out on the children in the street and on the gathering of young men also.”

Not all of the people of Jerusalem, or all of the subjects of Jeremiah’s prophecy, were mongrels. But they were all cooperating with the sins that led to the race-mixing that the prophet described earlier, so they would all share in the punishment. In this regard Comparet continues, where if we uphold our obligations, the basic meaning of the word religion, perhaps we would not suffer likewise:

We also see our duty in these lessons. The Bible is not just a message to the individual, telling us how to gain salvation, this is only a small part of it, over 5/6ths of the Bible is a message to the nation, telling us the laws of Yahweh by which the nation should be governed. It warns us of the terrible consequences of violation of these laws. No matter how good the individual is, if he allows his nation to become corrupt and evil, he must pay the penalty of living in corruption and evil. If he will not heed Yahweh’s warning that certain national sins bring war and invasion as their penalty, then he must send his sons to die upon the battlefield. He must endure the bitterness of conquest and slavery. Call this political if you will, but we find it in the Bible and what we find there is our religion.

It is evident that in 1960, Comparet still thought that America could be reformed. We probably may have thought that also. But today Christians should know better, and they should be preparing to get out of Babylon before it falls. Returning to Comparet:

Who should be most concerned with speaking the whole truth boldly, letting the chips fall where they may? Surely the men of God, the clergymen, should take this duty seriously. But no, most of them have been trained to avoid anything that is controversial. They stick to those things so carefully selected that Satan can find nothing to oppose in them. You see, this avoids controversy and hard feelings, and it never drives anyone away, it takes in everyone and makes for unity. Isn’t it wonderful, or is it?

So because the mainstream clergy never opposed evil, evil has become normal, and those of us who might oppose it are compelled by law to accept it, and even embrace it. We find ourselves in violation of their law when we seek to obey our God. When we do not oppose evil, evil swallows us up and consumes us. Again returning to Comparet:

These clergymen prefer to forget the most controversial figure in all of history was Yahshua. He never compromised right or truth, never remained silent for fear of offending the wicked. It is our basic principle that Yahweh’s truth shall be spoken. If it offends those who hate our God and hate our nation, then they will be offended, for Yahweh’s truth must be spoken. If the forces of the anti-Christ choose to attack it and make it controversial, then it is their controversy, but Yahweh’s truth must be spoken anyway.

Many Identity Christians have now experienced this directly, and it gets worse with every passing year. Now we have no chance of ever being a majority, of ever prevailing with numbers, but we must continue the fight. The Old Testament prophets were also a distinct minority, especially in Jeremiah’s time, where Comparet continues:

In Jeremiah chapter 8 Yahweh denounces those scrambled eggheads who pretend that we can have peace with those who hate Yahweh and our nation, men who pompously pretend to be intellectuals and wise. At verses 9-15 we read: “The wise men are ashamed and taken: lo, they have rejected the word of Yahweh and what wisdom is in them? ... from the prophet even unto the priest, everyone dealeth falsely. For they have healed the hurt of my daughter but slightly, saying peace, peace when there is no peace! Were they ashamed when they had committed abominations? Nay, they were not at all ashamed, they knew not how to blush; therefore shall they fall among them that fall: in the time of their visitation they shall be cast down, saith Yahweh ... Why do we sit still? Assemble yourselves and let us enter into the fortified cities, and let us be silent there: for Yahweh hath put us to silence and given us water of gall to drink, because we have sinned against Yahweh. We looked for peace, but no good came; and for a time of health and behold! trouble!”

Those who have talked of peaceful coexistence with the very essence of evil have spoken the doctrines of Satan and by their misleading are propelling us to our destruction. We are compelled to learn [that] there is no peace, while evil is permitted to rule. We sinned against our God in ever making treaties of friendship with His enemies, we find the fruit of our own doing [as] bitter as gall! It is some comfort to know [that] Yahweh will punish those who have led us into this impasse but, where they have led, we have followed. So, we must still face the situation which is of our own making.

This is the actual fact today, this warning is no easy afterthought, in the light of hindsight. It was written in the year 600 B.C., about 2,560 years ago and it has been in the Bible ever since. It was just as plain and clear when Franklin D. Roosevelt gave life to the dying monster of communism in Russia because some of his best friends were communists, he did this revolting wickedness to gain their support. It was just as easy to see when we betrayed Chiang Kai-shek and all of free China and helped Mao Tse Tung turn friendly China into an enemy. It didn’t take the 7th son of the 7th son to understand this warning. Our own president sold out our brothers of white Christian Europe to Stalin, at the infamous conferences at Yalta and Potsdam, in return for the assistance of Stalin and Satan to accomplish what? What good had we any right to expect from such a source? Hadn’t all communist leaders such as Marx, Lenin and Stalin plainly and often stated that the only agreements they would ever make with us were those intended for our own destruction?

While Comparet was prescient in some areas, here he displayed one shortcoming: he did not imagine that the alliance with Chiang Kai-shek was every bit as evil as an alliance with any other alien, regardless of whether or not he was friendly. The Gibeonites were friendly to Israel, yet Yahweh punished Israel for their foolish return of kindness to them.

In his publication of this paper, Clifton Emahiser had the following footnote in regard to this statement and something that Comparet had said earlier:

“I do disagree with Comparet, though, where he said: “They [Israel] were to be a blessing to all the earth, other nations shall bow down to us. We shall be blessed with all good things, in other words the ‘have’ nations.” In a similar remark Comparet said: ‘It was just as easy to see when we betrayed Chiang Kai Shek and all of free China and helped Mao Tse Tung turn friendly China into an enemy.’ This goes contrary to Numbers 23:9 which says: ‘For from the top of the rocks I see him (Israel), and from the hills I behold him: lo, the people shall dwell alone, and shall not be reckoned among the nations.’ What is there about the words ‘dwell alone’ that we don’t understand? Therefore, we are not to commune in any way, shape or manner with the other nations!”

Returning to Comparet:

Can we be silent about such things? Yahweh’s warnings to us in His book the Bible, are surely as much a part of our religion as His warning not to steal. All churches and all men of Yahweh should be giving this, and the other divine warnings with all the force they have.

Instead, they have all embraced the sins of the world, but for now we shall continue with Comparet, where he speaks of Jeremiah’s contemporary, although Ezekiel was in captivity and not in Jerusalem:

Ezekiel also gave this warning against the lying prophets of peace. Ezekiel 13:3-10 warns, “Woe to the foolish prophets who prophesy out of their own mind concerning things they never saw. O Israel, your prophets are like foxes among the ruins: they have not stood in the breaches, nor built a wall for the house of Israel that it might stand in battle in the day of Yahweh. Therefore thus saith Yahweh: because ye have spoken vanity and seen lies, therefore behold, I am against you saith Yahweh. And Mine hand shall be upon the prophets that see vanity and that divine lies: they shall not be in the assembly of My people, neither shall they be written in the writing of the house of Israel. Because, even because they have deceived My people saying peace, and there was no peace.”

Of course, the lying prophets of today are those on television claiming to speak for God, and promoting the deeds of devils. They proclaim “peace” when there is no peace, because the Negros are raping White women and robbing and murdering elderly White men. This situation is now greatly magnified over what Comparet had seen in 1960, but he was nevertheless aware of it. Continuing with Comparet, he describes an extrapolation and exploitation of the false precept of “separation of church and state” which the founders of this nation certainly never even imagined:

We have the truth confirmed out of the mouth of two witnesses, Isaiah and Ezekiel, according to the Bible’s own law that there shall be two witnesses to prove a fact. If our churches are Christian and take their religion from the Bible, how can they fail to understand this? How many clergymen ever raised a voice in protest or warning, when false leaders started our nation down this path to destruction? This is what I have been saying, they accepted the devil’s doctrine that religion must be kept out of politics and politics must be kept out of religion.

The clergy have been taught to concern themselves only with what they call saving souls. How many souls do they think they are saving in Russia today, how many souls are they saving in the enslaved nations of eastern Europe? You never save a soul by helping Satan and his children to gain supreme power over a nation. No, you merely commit the ultimate wickedness of delivering the innocent into the hands for evil martyrdom and their innocent children to be raised under the doctrines of Satanism. No true religion can be silent about this, not when Yahweh has spoken so clearly about it in the Bible.

The Bible has warned us very plainly not to fall into that death trap the United Nations. Not only does the eighth chapter of Isaiah contain a clear warning, but there are others which are unmistakable in the light of present-day conditions. God prophesied that He will gather all nations together for simultaneous punishment in a great war, something which could not happen except through the United Nations.

Note these examples: Jeremiah 25:31-33 says, “A noise shall come even to the ends of the earth: for Yahweh hath a controversy with the nations. Thus saith Yahweh, Behold, evil shall go forth from nation to nation and a great whirlwind shall be raised up from the coasts of the earth. And the slain of Yahweh shall be at that day from one end of the earth even unto the other end of the earth.” Zephaniah 3:8 adds, “Therefore wait ye upon Me, saith Yahweh, until the day that I rise up to the prey: for My determination is to gather the nations, that I may assemble the kingdoms, to pour upon them Mine indignation, even all My fierce anger: for all the earth shall be devoured with the fire of My jealousy.” How is this likely to be brought about? What will bring all nations, with their diverse and conflicting interests, together for this purpose?

Let’s go on to Zechariah 12:2-3 & 14:2-4. “Behold, I will make Jerusalem a cup of trembling unto all the people round about. And in that day I will make Jerusalem a burdensome stone for all people: all that burden themselves with it shall be cut in pieces, though all the people of the earth be gathered together against it. For I will gather all nations against Jerusalem to battle.” Other scriptures tell us that this last event will close the final conflict of the day of Yahweh, the so called battle of Armageddon.

Now think it over. How could you get nations like Spain, Japan, Bulgaria, India, Burma and Peru, which have nothing in common with each other, and no interest of their own in Jerusalem to protect, how could you get these and all the other nations of the world gathered together to fight a great battle at Jerusalem? It couldn’t be done except through the machinery of the United Nations, whose actions represent them all.

Comparet took the references to Jerusalem in these prophecies literally, rather than as a symbol describing one or more of the future capital cities of the people of Yahweh in their new homes. Furthermore, I cannot agree that an agency such as the United Nations is necessary for Yahweh to accomplish His Word, but it is no doubt an evil agency, formed with evil objectives in mind. In truth, the Camp of the Saints is already surrounded by the enemies of God, and Christendom is already being invaded by aliens, without a military conquest and under the guise of peaceful means. This is all in the name of peace, when there is no peace. Comparet continues to foresee Christendom under siege in a literal war:

What will be the occasion for this battle? As I have told you in detail in the lesson, “Russia in Bible Prophesy”, the Bible clearly shows that Russia will make a double attack some time in the near future. One will be directed at the United States, and will come against us out of the north from eastern Siberia over the North Pole. The other will come through Iran and Iraq, then westward across Jordan and Syria, into Palestine and Egypt to seize the Suez Canal and all of North Africa. Terrific fighting will occur in Palestine and Egypt at the same time.

There is nothing Christian or Israelite in Jerusalem, although in the words of the prophet Malachi Yahweh did promise that the Edomites would build Jerusalem, and that is fulfilled in modern Jewry. Then He also promised to destroy it, in Malachi as well as in Obadiah, but that destruction would come by the hand of the house of Joseph, and not by the hand of the alien nations. The same international Jews who control the West are also in control of Russia and the rest of the world, so it is unlikely that the enemies of God, all in league with one another, would destroy the Jewish state in Palestine. Rather, they are already gathered by the Camp of the Saints, which is White Christendom.

As for the expected invasion of America by Russia, Clifton also had a comment when he presented this sermon, saying the following:

I must also scrutinize Comparet where he said: “... the Bible clearly shows that Russia will make a double attack some time in the near future. One will be directed at the United States, and will come against us out of the north from eastern Siberia over the North Pole. The other will come through Iran and Iraq, then westward across Jordan and Syria, into Palestine and Egypt to seize the Suez Canal and all of North Africa.” While I agree that we will come under attack by Gog and Magog in the future, I don’t believe it will be “a double attack.” I wrote an article on this entitled The Problems With Ezekiel 38 & 39 where I addressed the matter in some detail.

That paper was the first that Clifton had asked me to proofread and edit for him, when our relationship began back in 1999. I do not really remember all of the details, and today I no longer agree with the paper in at least some of its propositions. But of course it is difficult to refute an interpretation of prophecy regarding events which have not yet happened, and which may still be plausible, so I will not argue at length. Clifton’s paper is available on his website under the title The Problems With Ezekiel 38 and 39 & The Prophetic Attack of Russia on The United States.

Comparet continues:

Do you say well, that’s fine, they are fighting against Russia? Don’t you be too sure of that. How many of them will be fighting with Russia, instead of against her? Remember, Yahweh expressly says that He is gathering all these nations together for judgment upon them. Do you expect India or any of the Asiatic nations to oppose Russia when it is making an attack upon the white Christian world and Russia invites them to join in the attack and share the spoils? Do you expect the pagan cannibals of black Africa to oppose Russia in any such attack against the white Christian nations? You can be absolutely sure that they will eagerly join in any such attack upon us, if it appears to have even a chance of success. The United Nations is not an organization of freedom loving people, these are in the small and hopeless minority. It has become just a council of our enemies, yet one in which we participate and agree to be bound by their vote. We know in advance this vote will only be a demonstration of their fundamental and undying hostility to us, our ideals and our God. How silly can we get?

Presenting this sermon in the early 1960’s, Comparet could not have foreseen the radical change in immigration policy which began later in the decade, with the Immigration Act of 1965 that completely reversed all earlier United States immigration policies by favoring non-Whites over people of European nationalities. Through rampant non-White immigration and further illegal immigration, the United States is now becoming saturated with non-Whites, and the invasion of aliens described in Ezekiel chapters 38 and 39 is already upon us. In innocent ignorance of that development, he continues:

Yahweh foresaw all this and warned us not to become entangled in that nest of spies and wickedness. In 2 Corinthians 6:14-18 we are commanded, “Be ye not unequally yoked together with unbelievers: for what fellowship hath righteousness with unrighteousness? And what communion hath light with darkness? And what concord hath Christ with Belial? Or what part hath he that believeth with an infidel? Wherefore, come out from among them and be ye separate, saith Yahweh, and touch not the unclean thing: and I will receive you and will be a father unto you and ye shall be My sons and daughters, saith Yahweh the Almighty.”

Somehow, perhaps even instinctually, Comparet understood the racial connotation carried by Paul’s admonishment to “be ye not unequally yoked together with unbelievers”, as the King James Version has it. We would certainly agree, as it is translated in the Christogenea New Testament, “Do not become yoked together with untrustworthy aliens”, which I believe is a far more accurate rendering of the original Greek wording in Paul’s epistle. The word thing was added to the text, as the King James Version admits by putting the word in italics, and the reference is actually to the people whom the children of Israel are being commanded to come out from among. Thus he continues:

Can you say this is political? It is the direct commandment of Yahweh, what could be more definitely religious than that? True, our senate ratified the United Nations treaty and our president defies the laws and commandments of Yahweh to work for its evil purposes. But can wickedness and defiance of Yahweh change Yahweh’s commandment so it is no longer a religious matter? Or can the fact that politicians have chosen to act for their own purpose in this matter, take it out of the Bible? We have man made statutes in our law books which forbid theft and murder under legal penalty. Does this deprive the churches of the right to teach the ten commandments because they also say, “Thou shalt not steal” and “Thou shalt not murder?”

I started out asking the question, “What is religion?” It must include not only all religious ceremonies and forms of worship, but also all that Yahweh has commanded man to do and all that He has warned man to avoid both individually and as a nation. Whatever is the word of Yahweh is part of our religion. If some of the wicked make money out of violating Yahweh’s laws, they say this is now an economic matter. Or they seek political power by pandering to the lowest instincts of the mob in violation of Yahweh’s commandments, so they say this makes it political. They cannot thus change Yahweh’s truth, it remains a matter of religion because Yahweh so commanded. All Yahweh has spoken is pure religion, and all churches should so teach it. We intend to teach the words of Yahweh on all subjects, He has commanded it!

In other words, everything which Yahweh spoke is religion, even though He spoke of politics, economics and social issues. So those things also come under the category of religion. There is no escaping it. All of those things should be practiced as we practice our religion, according to the Word of our God.

The word political was ultimately derived from the Greek word πολιτικός, which Liddell & Scott define as of, for or relating to citizens. So politics is what concerns the body of the people, and in a Christian context, the body of the people cannot be separated from the body of Christ. Therefore one’s politics should not be distinct from one’s religion, which is something to which one is bound and obligated, and in our White Christian society, only White Christians should matter, as only White men and women can possibly be Christian in the first place. Christ came only for the “lost sheep of the house of Israel”, which when He had come were found among the White nations of Europe and the Near East. As Comparet attested, only the devil convinced us that politics and religion should be treated separately.

Clifton Emahiser has some more notes on this sermon which for our purposes were better left here at the end, rather than being interspersed with the text:

Speaking generally, this has been another great composition by Bertrand L. Comparet, though the use of the term “religion” in the title may be a bit ambiguous. There’s an old saying that we must take a Dutchman as he means rather than what he says, and all we Israelites (including Comparet) are next-of-kin to the Dutch.

To bring the subject of religion into perspective, I will repeat what I said in my Watchman’s Teaching Letter #60 where we focused on the 4th chapter of Daniel. I have commented on this chapter several times before, but there is need to examine it in greater depth. To put the Babylonian stump-system into perspective which was to last “seven times” or 2520 years, I have devised the following graph to show how it has developed during that time. The average person on the street hasn’t the slightest idea what it’s all about, thinking everything is normal, while it is far from that. And they get “mad” if informed otherwise. [See below, the graph is actually found in Clifton’s Watchman’s Teaching Letter #63, but he also used it elsewhere.]

Although we have many problems today, the four in the above diagram represent the greatest. In the very center bulls-eye is the issue of RACE. Then around the RACIAL issue revolve the MONETARY, the POLITICAL and the RELIGIOUS. Once we can identify these four divisions of our dilemma, we can begin to rectify the status of our position. The above diagram is very much oversimplified. It needs to be broken down into smaller segments as follows: (1) Racial-monetary, (2) Racial-political, (3) Racial-religious, (4) Monetary-political, (5) Monetary-religious, and (6) Political-Religious. Therefore, all four of the above divisions interact with each other. [If] Should one try to combat any one of these six interacting divisions, one will find he must fight all six simultaneously. Not only that, but each of these six divisions have thousands of subdivisions like the tentacles of an octopus to entangle and destroy.

So Comparet was correct when he said: “Don’t tell me we must separate politics, economics and religion! Yahweh does not distinguish between them. He separates right and wrong, good and evil, what is right and good, in economics and politics He commands by His religion, as a part of it.” Had Comparet said, “He commands by His belief system, as a part of it”, it would have been a better than the term “religion.”

And of course Clifton refers to how the word religion is defined today, but once we study the Latin root of the word, we may find that it is not so bad after all.

Now I am going to comment on a news item, which is something that I rarely do but this will be an ongoing trend and being Christians who are often outspoken, we must be careful not to be caught in this trap. In Des Moines, Iowa, a mestizo named Adolfo Martinez, was found guilty of a hate crime after he stole a so-called “pride banner” from the building of the Ames United Church of Christ and burned it outside a strip club. For that act alone, he was sentenced on Wednesday, December 18th, 2019, to 16 years in prison. He got 16 years for burning a flag - thousands of men have done less time than that for murder. With 16 years for burning a flag, he would probably have not done much worse for actually burning a fag.

In a 1989 decision in Texas v. Johnson, which was further affirmed in a 1990 decision in United States v. Eichman, laws against flag-burning were invalidated by the United States Supreme Court, which decided in both instances that flag burning was constitutionally-protected free speech. So all the mestizo should have been punished for is petty theft of whatever is the value of the flag. Of course, his lawyers will have to figure that out, and if they appeal the decision, whether or not they prevail, sodomy will be glorified and defended by the media every step of the way.

So it is evident that Sodomy is now the official State Religion and all blasphemers shall be punished severely by the State. I won’t say any more about this. The devil has us in a position where if we openly protest this outcome, we are actually compelled to publicly express support for one of the devil’s own, for a bastard. It is a further reproach to White men that such a bastard made this protest, while White men do nothing. But we can only imagine how many years a White man may have gotten for this act, and how it may have attracted national attention if the one who did this was White. Being bound by law and court decisions like this one, the State Religion truly is the revival of ancient pagan Baal worship. Just as Jeroboam I had demanded that the children of Israel worship the golden calves, today the State demands us to join in their paganism and treat sinners who flaunt their hatred for our God with dignity.

It is also evident, that the enforced acceptance of Sodomy is also being advanced by many of the so-called Christian “churches” in collusion with the State. Recently we posted a video at Christogenea, which I will include here with this presentation, under the title The Church that Loves Sodomites. It depicts a wedding proposal which occurred during a ceremony at the so-called First United Methodist Church in Austin, Texas, on August 23rd, 2015. In response to that I had written that:

Without doubt, Sodomy is a sin. Men that pray together are expressly told in the Word of God not to lay together. This is why American churches need to be punished. This is why they are deserving of the plagues which are coming upon them. This is why Whites are being replaced by beasts in their own lands. Look at these supposed Christians in this church, as they are all gleeful that these Sodomites are going to get "married", all of them from the pastor down to the young children. We can only hope for fire from Heaven to put an end to this decadence.

This is the general state of Christendom today. So we can only wonder, at what point are real Christians ever going to resist? When are Christians ever actually going to practice their religion – to be faithful in that to which they are bound?