A Lot Of Bullets For A Lot Of Them



In our first look at Wesley Swift's Wednesday Night Bible Study, we found a session dated June 26th, 1968, which most likely took place in early March of that year. The reverse is probable here. The given date is in late March of 1968, while the content suggests it occurred sometime after the murder of US Senator Robert Kennedy, as Swift talked about him in the past tense and made references to bullets and burials. Assuming the latter represents some gloating very near Kennedy's death and burial, a probable date for this session would be June 12th, 1968. Interpolations by the tape's transcriber are in regular parentheses. All italics are my emphasis, and my comments are in square brackets.


WARNING: If you choose to read the following material, be advised that it contains the words of Wesley A. Swift, the original leader of the racist extremist group known as Aryan Nations. The content is extremely offensive, especially as it is presented in the language of Christian scripture and represents a warped version of Christian beliefs. It is rightly classified as hate speech.




WEDNESDAY NITE [sic] BIBLE STUDY
3-27-68   By DR. WESLEY SWIFT   [6-12-68 is probable actual date of session-dwd]


QUESTION: -- Is Anti-Christ one or many? It seems some places in scriptures that he is one and in other places many.

ANSWER: -- We had a young man here from Mississippi. He had been in a Baptist Seminary. He stayed nine months. That was all he could take. He had Jewish teachers who told him in his classes that the Bible was full of folklore and traditions. And out of that the Christians have evolved an area of philosophy. That in the teachings of Jesus there were some things that were of merit, but they were to remember, that He was just a man and sometimes He was wrong. Didn't understand certain things. That Jesus was an anti-Semitic at times and that was not good. When the Jews got thru telling these things to this Christian boy, he didn't want any part of this school. This was a Baptist Seminary and they had sent these professors form Baylor to take charge of this Baptist Seminary. This was a so called Orthodox Seminary and it had been taken over by Baylor, and now had all these Jewish pagan philosophers with their psychology and so forth. These my friends, are deceivers and anti-Christ.

......But the head over them is to be Lucifer King of the bottomless pit or the Netherworld.... Of course when the (climax) of the battle of Armageddon starts it tells you that God is going to gather all these pagans together from the corners of the earth to be Anti-Christ. Thus the Asiatics and the Negroids are gathered together for this great day of God Almighty.... So Lucifer himself takes control and the incarnate form of Lucifer is in power. And whoever he selects as the top man over these armies could well be called the anti-Christ. But the scripture doesn't say too much about this. So Lucifer himself could be that one. But the scripture does say that God will seal this whole bunch up.... But you do have the Nethermost chambers called the bottomless pit. And it talks about holding them there for 1000 years. It talks about the beast and the false prophet being thrown into the Netherworld. The beast is the head of all political systems, the false prophet the head of all false religions, -- this is the world order. And the two witnesses are church and state, the House of Israel and the Church of God. And also there is the false system of a false pattern of religion. And of course Mystery Babylon is the name of all this false pattern of politics, religions, and social, usury system.

Therefore we note that there were many anti-Christs. They were already showing up in the days of John. They are showing up by the thousands in our time. So it doesn't mean that you just have to have just one bullet for just one, but a lot of bullets for a lot of them. This is the picture.
[an obvious implicit argument here is that it's okay for you to shoot and kill anyone that you believe -- or are TOLD -- is "an anti-Christ," but more to the immediate point, it was one bullet that ultimately killed Robert Kennedy (and Martin Luther King, Jr., for that matter)-dwd]

Remember now that Anti-Christ is going to come against your country because your country is a country of the Kingdom. The blessings of God are upon it. But anti-Christ will be against your nation. Will be against every process of Gods law. What God is for, they will be against. God is for segregation and they are for integration. God is for no interest, and they are for usury. God says thou shalt have no other gods before me, and they will bring them all in. Therefore, the way you tell anti-Christ is -- in the simplest way is that they are against the Christ. You can get a lot of Christians who throw away their heritage because they want to be ignorant. But they still don't deny the Christ. And 65% of your country and maybe more will be in this company. They are already admitting that. They say that 65% of the people of this country will fall out with the Democratic Party because of the attitude toward [President Lyndon] Johnson and Bobby Kennedy. And because of the wars. But they said that the minorities in the United States make up 30% and they can carry all the minorities.

Alright then basically the white man is moving to the right. There are no, or at least not many conservative minorities. Therefore there is only about 7 or 8% of Liberals with great influence and that is only because the Press puts them up front. But today the country is turning away from what the Democrat Party has to offer. And the Democrat Party knows this and they are trying to woo them back. Hippies and all the Negroes were for Bobby and a lot of respectable white people flocked around him. But if you had 5%, it would be a big crowd. There were even silly women swooning before him saying we just love his voice. He just talks so nice. -- Well, we also thought that of [Franklin] Roosevelt, when he said: -- 'My friends'. They all swooned then. Today we may have about as many as we will have in the right wing camp, or the moderate camp and they are fast coming to identity. But the churches are full of minorities and Jews. They say that the Christian Scientist church is almost one-half Jew today. The Jews joined this church because they don't have to acknowledge the blood atonement, or those things. So they joined to take it over. And I know many patriotic Christian Scientists and their paper used to be all white. But now they are disgusted with their paper. The Jews have gotten in with it and the white people are disgusted with it. So I just laugh at them and I say -- you are teaching that these Jews never really existed. You seem to like them, so why get disturbed about this. But they are, you know.

So I tell you that there are many anti-Christs and the devil is the biggest one. And whoever the top man is, he may be called the anti-Christ. I mentioned the other night, that the Bible Institute had this big Evangelist here in 1936 or 37. And back in 1936 when Mussolini invaded Ethiopia, he said that Mussolini was the Anti-Christ and the Roman Empire was going to be resurrected and I challenged him. Then when war came along, he said Hitler was the Anti-Christ -- king of the north and Mussolini was king of the south. And they were joining hands. And the Roman Empire would be resurrected. So this was more than I could take. So I went down and challenged him to a debate. But he didn't want to debate at first, but finally he did. I said: -- 'I am going to make a prediction that the stars and stripes are going to fly over Italy before this is thru and Mussolini is not going to be the Anti-Christ. So you go back to Australia and when you see the stars and stripes flying over Italy, then Mussolini will not be the Anti-Christ and I want you to acknowledge it. But if Mussolini rises up and organizes all of Europe and stretches out the Roman Empire, I will give up all I believe and come over and join you.'

So pretty soon we took all of Italy and then an evil bunch of Albanians who were supposed to be standing up for the Italians, took Mussolini (and they were headed by Jews) and they tortured Mussolini. They crucified him and hung him head down, cut him open and everything else which no one deserves. Mussolini may have had an area of fascist dictatorship which we wouldn't like concerning our type of freedom. But I will say this that he wrote some beautiful books. I can turn to my library and pick up "The Story of John Huck" by Mussolini. And that was the man who was martyred. He believed that men should live by faith and he stood up to the Priestcraft and evil. It is one of the most beautiful books you have ever read. There is so much in it that you can tell that the writer was so enthused about the life of John Huck. You can read it like a novel. And I have three volumes in here by Mussolini and everyone of them is on Christianity and its martyrs.

Now, this man was not anti-Christ. Wasn't to begin with. The Catholic hierarchy thought he was because he made the Catholic church pull in its horns and thus in 1928 signed a confident [sic, "concordat"] with Rome. But he said that Rome would not interfere. They were to leave their hands off the affairs of state. The Pope of Rome said that the only thing that the Pope of Rome would put his nose into anymore was his handkerchief. Well, I think that was probably a good thing. But after Mussolini, then Hitler was the anti-Christ. But he didn't close any Christian Churches in Germany during the war except one. And that was this ___________ (Mediar??) [sic, transcriber's interpolation, probably mis-heard "Niemoller"-dwd] and I would have closed his church even today and put him in a concentration camp. This fellow doesn't believe in the Deity of Christ, or the Virgin Birth. But is supposed to be a big preacher. But the reason why he had to take it on the lam, and why his church was closed was because every doctrine he taught was the doctrine that the Jews taught. And Germany didn't want him to preach anymore. I am going to tell you something. During W.W. II, every Christian Church in Germany ran full blast. I happen to know that the Pentecostal churches that operated in Germany were, you would say, if the state was going to close a church it would get these people because some call them fanatical. But they never even had any trouble in Germany at that time.

So Anti-Christ has to be those who deny Christ; are against Christ and deny He is the son or embodiment of God.

But now they are trying to find a new Anti-Christ, when they are running all over town and stirring up the Negroes and trying to move their program forward....

I received in the mail today, a whole page of concentrations on time from Howard Rand. But what ever time God has ordained, there is a perimeter on this thing whether we are smart enough to figure this thing out or not. And I tell you that your time will be shortened. He said: -- 'I will shorten this time for the Elect's sake before the whole earth is destroyed.' Because the enemy with his horrible weapons, does not destroy you. God said in the book of Matthew, that for the Elect's sake, the time would be shortened (for Lucifer to control) or there would not be anyone left on earth. There would be no one left for the fallout would finish those not in the path, if they set one of those upper bombs off.
[Howard Rand was apparently a well-regarded Bible Prophecy prognosticator at one time-dwd]

But it doesn't mean that just because the time is shortened for the Elect's sake that the world need not to be looking for his coming, because a lot of these false people who try to move in among 'My People' will say they are looking for the coming of the Messiah. For when HE comes, it will not be well with them. For He is going to bring destruction on their cities, and their houses, and their private property. And you know who that is. These are the false ones who say they are waiting for Messiah, when He has already come. And all of you have been redeemed, been saved. Yet all these kikes run around and say they are waiting for Messiah. This is what God is talking about. You couldn't pin it down any closer on people. I am going to site [cite] this. We are in turbulent times. We are seeing more and more violence. There is no question of this.

The Police Department tells how they are badgering them to go easy on the Civil Rights Workers and they are not liking it. The Sheriffs Department? They may manipulate. But the Police Department is getting ready to fight Negroes in Watts. The Police Department says they have had a wave of murders this past month to contend with. They do this in gas stations and all over. And Negroes do it. He said you just don't know what is going on in this whole area. So the law enforcement may not go as some think it will across the nation. How long will it last? Well -- until the end. But that may not be as long as you think. If it is two [or] three years, that is even too long. But remember this that when the Anti-Christ attacks, whether with black hoards, or Jewish ones, or even so called whites who have been filling up the hoards of Anti-Christ, they aren't going to get very far. There will be no mercy.

Now, if some of you are feeling merciful, we will have to bury you too. (Ha) -- [sic, transcriber's interpolation, possibly reflecting laughter of others on the tape, and all presumably reference and reaction to Robert Kennedy's recent burial-dwd] The people who feel mercy will be buried, there is no question on this. When Christ returns, He will find His people battling Anti-Christ. So I don't want Him to find me hiding out behind the corn crib. After all, we have waited so long for this crisis of Armageddon. Because this is the day of our deliverance.
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Oh What A Relief: Summary And Conclusion


The most obvious problem posed by the Far Right Reverend Wesley Swift is the racist hate speech coming from a foundation of Christian ideology. That was not so hard to do, unfortunately, given certain aspects of Christian scripture and tradition far less admirable than others, as I've tried to demonstrate to some extent elsewhere. In essence, Swift found confirmation in those aspects for his profoundly racist orientation, veering overtly toward Nazism. That resulted in him providing a voice for a disturbingly warped, blasphemous, downright devilish travesty of what it means to be a Christian. And he supplied that voice, over and over again, in the form of a minister preaching from a pulpit, over three decades of American history.

If that was all there was to it, we might put it down as an aberration and have some confidence knowing that such extremism has been marginalized and thought of as wrong-headed, even ridiculous, by most people. Americans can and should take pride in that fact. But some issues should not be obscured.


As previously mentioned, researching the murders of US Senator Robert Kennedy and Dr. Martin Luther King was the original reason for looking into all this. In Senator Kennedy's case, we know of a few potential Far Right connections. Jerry Owen's friend, Rev. Jonathan Perkins, was a former top associate of Gerald L. K. Smith. Michael Wayne (or Wien) was a suspect put in custody by hotel security immediately after the attack on Kennedy. He initially claimed to be Jewish but would later volunteer odd information about having visited a "Nazi store" in Glendale, California. And Khaibar Khan Gudarzian gave Wayne a ride -- home, allegedly -- from Kennedy's presidential campaign headquarters earlier that evening. So it's not clear what if any involvement he could have had in Wayne's later conspicuous appearance at the Ambassador Hotel.

There's also an admittedly tenuous connection (because Wesley Swift's church in Los Angeles was on Figueroa Street) involving an allegation by an unidentified letter writer. The writer claimed that on the morning after the attack at the Ambassador Hotel, he saw a woman fitting a description of "the girl in the polka dot dress," who
used keys to enter an automobile rental office at 7th and Figueroa Street opposite the Statler Hilton Hotel at about 9:00 a.m. and conducted herself as if she belonged and was employed there.... The girl then had the appearance of being hysterical and tired as if she had been out all night, and upon entering, wandered about the office as if in a daze, and finally sat down behind the counter and put her hands to her face as if taking a nap.

If such a connection is tenuous, one between a car rental office in Los Angeles and an auto dealer meeting in Miami would seem entirely dubious. But it seems there was such a get-together in Miami that raised official investigative concerns about some plotting afoot to kill both Dr. King and Senator Kennedy. And since the FBI subsequently interviewed an unidentified clairvoyant about his having predicted the killings of both men -- a man who had also previously predicted President Kennedy's death (with the near certainty that Wesley A. Swift was questioned along those lines after the president's murder) -- there would seem some reason to think Swift best fits the profile of the prophet in question. That would be my best guess as to why the transcriber of Swift's taped sermon of March 31, 1968, decided to suppress the contents of the second half of the tape.

We've seen that it's damned unlikely to have been censored for language, as in the use of words like kikes and niggers. And there doesn't seem to have been much concern about the controversial aspects of inciting people to violence, as that's likewise been very much on display (sort of a theme, really). And while we can presume that Swift's general absence from April to September of 1968 was due to health issues and convalescence (coincidental as that may seem), he apparently felt well enough to visit and inspire the flock on what may have been considered special occasions -- the first being two to three weeks after the murder of Dr. King, and then a few times later in the wake of Senator Kennedy's death (including what seem to be the only two sermons Swift delivered during his overall absence).

So it's reasonable to think that what Swift had to say in the second half of the March 31st sermon was nothing as simple as his typical inflammatory hate speech, or even strong expressions of hopes that King and Kennedy would be removed from the world by the Hand of the Almighty. If the tape's transcriber found the "current events" it mentions too problematic for open viewing by the public, it was likely because the prophecies sounded a lot like specific instructions. Or they otherwise contained too much detail, as what might seem like incriminating evidence of something coming from sources a little closer to home than the Celestial Planes.



I'll briefly address some other issues by way of closing this out. I assume with some confidence that certain people would complain that all this didn't pay nearly enough attention to the CIA. That's true, but over the years, I've found that so much "conspiracy theory" is indebted to paradigms of the Far Right that I long ago became skeptical of those who may have good reason to obscure evidence and interpretation in these matters. As such, it hardly makes sense to follow the John Birch Society's mandate of seeing the CIA everywhere. These are more like baby steps of an investigation, and I'm happy to leave it to those more familiar with the CIA to figure out its possible connections.

My general conclusion regarding Wesley Swift's preaching is that he was a purveyor of some really bizarre ideas apart from the obvious racism. And in that light, it's not easy to take him seriously as a "mover and shaker" or "top man" (someone directing political assassinations, for instance). But what he had to say was considered Word of God among not just a few people here and there, but a good many whose beliefs and attitudes were aligned with those of the Ku Klux Klan(s) and other right-wing extremists. And if we want to investigate other connections he may have had that might be more directly significant, some things to think about would be his relocation to Lancaster, California (which grew and grew due to its proximity to what became Edwards Air Force Base), and other evidence of apparent closeness between the Far Right and the US military (like the alleged command "given" to Troy Haughton during a Field Training Exercise).

A weightier issue is that while Wesley Swift's version of Christianity was obviously warped (into pure hatred), a good deal of his preaching covered the same themes and complaints of much more respectable Americans (then and now). The most relevant example is that of the ascendancy of religious conservatism in political debate in the United States since the 1970s. On the surface, the "Born Again Christian" movement was a revivalist phenomenon that involved a great many people who wanted to experience their religion in a more meaningful and personally fulfilling way, as an immediate sense of being "spiritually saved." But far too much of it was beholden to the interests of people and organizations with a reactionary political agenda. At the time, conservative white Southern preachers seriously maintained that their political involvement was "no different" than that of black preachers in the Civil Rights movement. That nicely obscured things as an "involvement in politics" issue (as opposed to problems of white backlash and institutionalized white supremacy). And since religious conservatives also tended to be Bible Prophecy believers, as Wesley Swift was, consideration and discussion of critical issues were often somehow guided by nonsense arguments. For instance, the idea that "being right with God" meant supporting the modern nation of Israel no matter what it does. Or that Bible Prophecy "showed" that Europe's Common Market was a "Revived Roman Empire," and the best way to keep the USA from being subjugated by the Antichrist was to elect Ronald Reagan as president.

But Martin Luther King, Jr. never had a weekly television program, most of the people of Israel long ago chose Pharaohs and Fascists for their role models, and The End Of The World was not delayed due to the Berlin Wall being knocked down with one punch by Ronald Reagan. The beat goes on, and the relevance of the larger issue lies in the question of whether or not Americans are ready to explore certain unpleasant aspects of our recent history or will merely continue to ignore it. As for me, I'm always just glad when I don't have to read any more of Swift's shit.


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