Jonestown
Audiotape Primary Project : Transcripts
Transcript prepared by Fielding M. McGehee, III. If
you use this material, please credit The Jonestown Institute. Thank you.
Tape Number : Q 932
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To read the Tape Summary, click here.
Jones: I've sincerely and conscientiously (Pause) not only to attempted
to prove, but I have proven that you cannot base your faith upon the Bible.
Did you get what I said here tonight? You cannot do it. (Tone of self-evidence)
You can't do it. If you have any doubts about that, I'd hit the floor. I wouldn't
be hypocritical about it, I'd get it out. (Pause) And you'll not find anyone
with the para-psychological, extra-dimensional, the paranormal, the ESP, whatever
you wish to call it, the pre-cognitive, the extra-terrestrial or paranormal,
it makes no difference what you name it, para-psychological, as I said, or the
gifts of the Spirit, you'll find no one that has them developed on this continent
to this intensity. (Pause) And you've got a lot of things about the knowledge
that– that you've heard, metaphysically about karma and reincarnation and
so forth and so on, but how do you know it's true? You don't know a thing is
true. Only what you've been told. (Pause) Until something's proven empirically,
epistemological concepts at– or whatever your conceptual ideas, they have
to make a juxtaposition with reality someplace, so that you know, by empirical
evidence, that what you have said was reality is tested to be reality, and proven
to be reality. Now if that was above some of your heads, I was throwing that
out for a few out here that think that they are too intellectual for us. (Short
laugh) There are always a few that come in and think that they have a great
deal of wisdom that they can somehow give we poor struggling people here, (Pause)
polarized as we are in the lower end of the socio-economic income picture, and
they think that uh, they can reach down to our ra– drab existence and lift
us up. Maybe we could take you out of your drab existence and free you.
Crowd responds.
Jones: Something to consider. Yes, sir. (Pause) Yes. Umm-hmm.
Voice too soft.
Jones: Well, that's a very honest opinion. How can you nu– ah, know what's truth in the Bible. It's not that simple, uh, unless your judgment is based upon (Pause) a very high evolutionary understanding. If you have a deep refinement in your super-ego, then you could trust your judgment of the Bible. (Pause) First it would have to be– this would be required: you would have to be socialistic to be able to trust the Bible.
Male: (Unintelligible) What does that mean– (unintelligible)
Jones: Well, I'll explain that. (Pause) The only ethic by which we can
lift mankind today is some form of socialism. There's a smattering of it in
the– in the New Testament. It's very evidently clear on the day of Pentecost
that they– they that believed were together and had all things common. They
bought their possessions to the apostles' feet, and the apostles departed– and
parted every man as he had need. From each according to his ability, to each
according to his need. Now we've been told that this was a Marxian, uh, Marxist
uh, concoction, but it isn't. It's– it's older than (clears throat) the Bible
by far, it's a couple thousand years and then even more than that in– in its
age. You can t– you can trust no judgment that is not based upon the highest
ethic of socialism. Now when I say by the highest ethic, the dialectic of history
proves, I think, unquestionably, that man is capable of perfection, that he
does evolve and grow to a better and uh, and a more mature understanding. With
two out of three babies going to bed hungry, (Pause) with wars based– uh, caused
by the appearances of nations and color and churches – we're fighting over flags,
really not fighting over flags, we're really fighting, uh, to suit the whim
and circumstance of the cartelist, the international bankers and the, the great
money-mongrels. They make the wars, they decide what area of the world they
want. I saw General David Shupe said, the commander of the Marine Corps, he
said that um– and he put it in the Congressional Record by Senator [Tom] Harkin
[D-Iowa] – that's all right, keep standing if you wish – he said that uh, the
commander of the Uni– United States Marine Corps said that all of our effort
in Vietnam had been for tungsten, tin, rubber and oil. Right now 60 oil companies
are fighting over areas there, and that's the– that's the problem. (Clears throat)
America– three percent of the Americans own 60% of the world. I don't know if
you were familiar with that or not. Something like 200 families own 90% of the
United States. And those same 200 families influence and dominate sixty-some
percent– 67% of the world. They own, literally, 67% of the world. General Shupe
– not Jim Jones – Ocause I'm just a little ole preacher, prophet– and what'd
you say, what does the metaphysician have to do with such geopolitical matters.
But General Shupe, General Ridgeway, General Clark, General Gavin, Rear Admiral
True, General Hugh Hester uh– that's just to name a few – have said the same
thing, that we were never in Vietnam, for instance, for (Pause) the people.
We were there to preserve the fact that we were working people for sixteen cents
a day and getting cheap tungsten. That's the only reason any of you Americans
here have anything today, is that your yellow brothers and black brothers have
been napalmed to death so they could be robbed of it over there, and they give
you just enough to keep above the wolves, to keep above the wolves. And– you
think you've had it good, but you– if you're sick and have to go to the hospital,
you're in trouble, I don't care if you're a middle-class person, and own your
business, if you have to go to an intensive ward of a hospital – that's why
we're so thrilled at this atmosphere of the actual conscious presence of God
or socialism has kept us free of death for five years. No one has died in our
Temple nuclear family in that– in that length of time. But still, the reality's
out there. And last week, I had to save by prophecy (Pause) the head of our
buses. (Pause) I stepped off of my pulpit, as (stumbles over words) always is
my custom, and I told everyone to describe the scene that I saw, before the
buses came in, and I saved him– a bus fell on him, but no harm came to him.
Response.
Jones: No harm. It rested on his shoulder, but a miracle feat happened,
and nothing– nothing happened to him. That's just one service that's Wednesday
night. (Pause) And we're glad for that consciousness, but we're still not going
to be like ostriches in the s– head in the sand. We realize the significance
of living in a real world. And it's a fact that any one of you can get ill,
and if you go to an intensive ward – in fact, if you get to an intensive ward
– (Pause) uh, uh, you cannot even get on a dialysis machine, (Pause) most of
you, because you're too poor, and the wrong color. People are given up. They
have to decide to die in this California by the hundreds and the thousands throughout
the nation because they don't have enough money to pay for a dialysis machine.
If you don't have that w– means of cleansing the kidneys by this special equipment
that costs over twenty-some thousand dollars, and there's a line waiting on
it, and then there's pull on who gets it, still most hospitals operate with
the very important persons, Ocause I've been an e– I've been an executive in
a hospital, I know – if you (stumbles over words) all done on the QT, but people
come in, get the best service, more attention, uh, all the special care, based
on how important they are in the capitalist structure.
Applause
Jones: And I say capitalist structure. This is a society based on money,
a society that your position is not determined by what the Constitution says
that it is your god-given right, that you are endowed with certain inalienable
rights, you are endowed with no rights in this country, unless you have money.
Applause
Jones: Plea– no, no clapping. We want to get t– the truth. (Pause) Too
important. In other words, if you go to– I've been in– just out last night all
night on a matter, where someone has been deprived of their constitutional rights
to trial by jury, speedy trial defense. Case after case that we rush into in
our church, where nobody else will go in to help them. And it's a fact that
in the United States, no one's ever died that had $50,000 in an execution. Like
gallows, gas chamber or electric chair. If you have money, you can get good
attorneys. If you have no money, you have no more freedom in a court than a
goose does. You are fixed in the– the society by the money you have or the power
that you've been able to get. (Struggles for words) You either have one or the
other. Mr. [Richard] Nixon started with very little money, but he sold out to
the power structure. Now he has money. Strange enough, he's come up with a few
hundred thousand dollars. He didn't earn it, but he has it. His assets reveal
it. And now in fact, I said (struggles for words) they now say he's a millionaire.
But he has married his will to the great (Pause) money system, the magnates
that control this country. And this is the only way you get anything, is to
sell your soul out to the other fellow, and then they won't– they'll sell you
out too. Uh, really, the only thing that keeps you – and there's no real keeping
power in that – is money. Because even the rich, their young will fight over
it, as we've seen in our nursing home. They'll come before they die, ready to
devour them, and fight over what little articles they have. Even little memory
books or some little article of clothing, so if the rich could only see it,
there is no security in this system. But they have it as long as they are able
to (Pause) pay for enough people to watch them, watch out for them. But they're
not happy. Howard Hughes, who is so afraid of germs that he has uh, felt shoes,
he won't walk over a floor, he's afraid he'll get sick and die, and he has to
have all these officials around him, and he's always firing someone, hiring
someone new, he's got a whole bunch of Mormons around him now, because he thinks
I guess the Mormons are more honest. I don't know what he'll do since that Mormon
hijacked that plane all the way out here.
Laughs.
Jones: So it's (struggles for words) changed the tarnished images of
the Mormons, uh, Ocause that fellow pulled a pretty slick one, until he went
back to his own Mormon community and bailed out. (Pause) And uh, (struggles
for words) I like to mention that, because they're always mentioning it, any
time a black does something, black man. (Pause)
Laughter. Calls of "That's right."
Jones: Black man on certain street did this, black man run through a
traffic light, so any time now, until they stop telling everything black people
do, every time I see a Catholic do something or a Mormon do something or a Mennonite
do something, I'm going to tell it.
Applause
Jones: People should not be judged by their race, neither religion.
But every time a black pers– every bit of news is slanted these days to make
prejudice against brown and black and Indians. You'll see it. They won't mention
that somebody's an Irishman, if he holds up a bank. They won't mention somebody's
a– an Irishman or (struggles for words) a German if he– like, over in the East
Bay, where he uh, attacked that minister's wife and raped her. (Pause) But if
it's a black, they always want to tell the– the absolute dimensions, how big
he was, how broad-shouldered he was, and all this. Now uh, surely the color,
the complexion might have some meaning, but all the things they go into, no
no no. Um– so as I said, your ethics must be evolved to that point. If you are
a socialist person, if you are a free-thinker, if you hold no um, conclusions
about (Pause) anything you've not experienced – see, I've experienced the extra-dimensional
world, and still I'm pretty open about it. I'm not an atheist, but I behave
as an atheist. I do good for good's sake, with no thought of compensation, and
of– I've evolved to the point where I don't care a thing about getting rewards.
That's why I don't even like people to clap for me. I don't want any ovations
or (struggles for words) singular, uh, recognition or collective recognition.
I just want to see a better world. And if you've evolved to that point – are
you following me, brother? – if you've evolved to that point, then you are able
to s– see errors of the Bible and know the truths of the Bible. If you operate
from a humanistic and a socialistic ethic– the socialistic ethic says, whether
you– one likes to surrender all of his will or not, he must, when two out of
three babies are going to bed hungry. That's a crime. When wars have been manufactured,
as even our generals and the head of the Marine Corps says, has been done only
for the profit of the few– see, this country's ruled by the few, this is not
a democracy. This is a plutocracy, a, a, an oligarchy uh, regime at best. A
government by the few. You have a right to vote for the few that have the most
money to buy the nomination of their particular office. The Kennedys bought
the office. [Nelson] Rockefeller's bought the governorship four times, with
seventeen point six million dollars, that's how much money he paid out to get
the election of New York, four times. You don't have any democracy here. A poor
man's hasn't got a Chinaman's chance, he hasn't got a snowball's chance in hell
to get elected. Said, Mr. [George] McGovern's [Democratic presidential candidate]
going to spend a, a, three million dollars in California. And he's one of the
better ones. I'd say of all the lesser evils, all of you – you got your right
mind – will vote for McGovern at this particular juncture. I don't like to choose
between the lesser of, of devils, or opportunities or alternatives, but it's
realistic. Certainly it is wo– it would've been better if we'd had Humpty Dumpty
[Hubert Humphrey, 1968 Democratic presidential candidate] than what we've got
Tri– in Tricky Dick [Nixon].
Laughter.
Jones: Humpty Dumpty wasn't so bad about civil rights, he wasn't so bad about the laboring class, it is not as desirable as we would like it, but it is a certain reality that we– we have got us– ourselves into a bad shape now. This Haiphong Russian Roulette, playing with a nuclear war – and you see, I'm horrified by it, because I have given the date, the month and the year where nuclear war will take place. I want to be like Jonah of old, I want to be proven wrong. Jonah got mad when his prophecy went wrong. See, God showed him Nineveh was going to be destroyed, and then God decided not to, and Jonah got mad Ocause he didn't get the– the prophecy carried out, supposedly. Jonah didn't– uh, he wasn't happy that his own prophecy hadn't ca– been carried out. I'll be happy if one of my prophecies fail. They haven't yet, but I'll be glad when one of them does. Certainly the iconoclastic prophecies, the negative prophecies. I'll be so thrilled if it fails. There were exactly 14 cycles, we shall say, to that prophecy. Eleven of them have passed. Eleven explicit, tangible things that would happen at certain dates, times, places, personalities that would come into vogue in the leadership that were not in, that were– would be brought into power before that final date on which there would be a nuclear holocaust. Eleven out of 14 down. I'm getting nervous. And Mr. Nixon makes me more nervous, because he takes chances. He didn't give the– you've gotta give everybody a way out. Face-saving was important to the Soviets, but [former Soviet premier Nikita] Khrushchev backed down at the Bay of– at the Cuban missile crisis. He backed down, and his military– it cost him his– his office less than a year later, or a year later. It cost him his office. Now someplace, Mr. Nixon gonna have to realize (Pause) that the Soviets are going to have to quit backing down, (Pause) because they'll– they've got a face to save, too. But it's somehow in this uh, uh, bad illusion in this country– we've never had bombs strike us, and we think God– I saw a great protest march, uh, with this McIntyre, this religious nut, and a whole l– host of them that were supporting Nixon's war, and it showed on CK– CBS, said uh, big caption, if God is for Mr. Nixon, why can't we be for him. I– I thought this is incredible, in 1972, that Americans would have placards like that. If God's on Mr. Nixon's side, why can't we be? But that's the attitude of Americans. God's on our side.
(Pause) And that's the biggest farce that ever happened. It w– it caused the Jews to lose seven million people. (Pause) They thought God was with them, and it couldn't happen to them in Germany. And they were marshaled in like dogs, some of you that are sleeping down there, and they scratched on there– their marks are still on the ceilings, where they were supposed to be taking showers and they were gassed to death. Heads were cut off. Breasts were cut off. Eyes were put out. Hearts were transplanted. The hearts– while they would be living right there under local anesthesia and see some of this stuff. (Pause) Seven million Jews, supposedly God's chosen people, were wiped off the face of the earth. Nine million Jews, beg your pardon. Nine million Jews with that illusion, God is on our side.
(Pause) There ain't no such thing, (unintelligible word), you can get on the side of Truth, but God never gets on your side. And Truth is hard to come by, and if you get on the side of Truth, it costs you something. It doesn't promise you that everything is going to go rosy. But if– if I could get back to that, and it is– even though it is late– (Pause) what, is that clock right? (Pause) Socialist consciousness means that you believe in these days that some form must– of government must come whereby the means of production and distribution are owned by the people. That's what the New Testament spoke about. All the people holding things in common. The Indians had this. They didn't believe anybody could own the earth. We'd be better off if we had now– look what industries have done with it. We have the worst smog, we have the most– worst coal tar, we have more carcinogens in American air than anybody has, (struggles for words) that the love of money is the root of all evil, it will destroy even the people that have it. They will– they will corrupt their own streams, they'll destroy their own resources, seven more years is all we've got, and nickel– so– uh, some of the major minerals will be gone. Seven years, and the rich haven't got enough sense to even plan for it, in their money-grubbing. (Pause) They're wiping out the resources. But the love of money is the most deevilish– uh, devish, and uh, uh, devilish con– uh, concept I know of. It– it– there's nothing like it. It overrules. That's why I call capitalism the devil. And socialism is God. Now, why do I say that? God is love. (Pause) Isn't that what it says? God is love. (Pause) Well, you can't have perfect love, without having a society that will guarantee that someone won't get unloving and take over (Pause) again and hold and grab and push others down. So there has to be a structure (Pause) that's a long time coming due. But it can happen. It's happened in Peoples Temple. I don't worry about money. (Voice rises) I could put all my money in anyone else's hands, we pass our money together in collective common, and we know that no one will betray us, and of the people that have grown with us these few years, it– uh, we've never been disappointed.
(Pause) Man can evolve. Man can grow up till he can be trusted. That's what we're saying. The perfection of man. Christians say it, but they don't believe. [Karl] Marx said it. He said man is capable of perfection. Christians say, that you must be perfect like God is. Jesus said, be ye perfect, even as (struggles for words) I and the heavenly father are perfect. That's what he said. But when you start practicing perfection, the Christians say, it won't work. Say, you gotta go to heaven to be perfect. And that's the biggest cop-out in the world. If you die a devil, as a tree falls, so shall it lie. You're goin– If you've been a dollar-grubbing, miserly creep here, you'll be a creep, and you'd make a hell out of any heaven you went to. But the church tells you, you can't be good till you get to heaven. That's what they tell you. (struggles for words) Those– those uh, dreamer– dreamy-eyed socialist. Well, I'll tell you. We're going to have to dreamy-eye together, or we're going to get blowed up together. We're gonna live together, or we're going to die together. And being that I made you somewhat uncertain about your heaven, you better get about doing what Jesus told you to do, build a heaven here. He said, thy kingdom come, thy will be done in earth. Said the word is nigh you, the kingdom is within you. Here's where heaven's gonna have to be made. We'll make a heaven out of this place, or it'll be a hell. And if we don't make a heaven out of this place, nobody in the universe is going to trust us to go to another planet or another heaven, whichever you choose, when we've made such a mess of this, and we won't get our minds concerned about political government.
We say, oh, the church shouldn't have anything to do with government. Oh, yes
it should, the government is upon his shoulders. We have to get involved with
politics. (Pause) It's your duty. (Pause) And the– no planet's going to–
no heaven's going to take a bunch of people that were too creepy that they were
so lousy they wouldn't do anything to make this a better world. Now you better–
see, this is– see, we're asleep. They feed us wrong, they give us preservatives,
the worst kind of foods end up in the cheapest supermarkets– still a practice,
you in the black section, you get foods that came from the middle-class white
neighborhoods, that's a week old. That's why some of you sleep here. You got
a bad diet, you've been given poison gradually every day, you can't stay awake
to hear somebody when he's telling you the truth, and tomorrow you'll go (Runs
out of breath) – they've got us all– God, they've got us so screwed
up. (Pause) You can't get a handful out except to a healing meeting. And then
you can't keep them unless you keep it healing. I– Usually all my services
are healing, that's why we got a big crowd. (Pause) But e– either in our
black community, we gotta have the songfest, and get the dirtiest tramps, the
biggest whoremongers and whores in town, but as long as they can sing, we'll
come. (Pause) Come on, now, you know it's true.
Applause.
Jones: We'll get all the music que– we're on a music binge. It's just
beautiful. They've got us– they– they– they've made an image of us, and we have
let our dumb selves fall into their image. Said you– nobody can sing like black
folks. And we try to prove they're right. (Pause) (Cries out) I said, we try
to prove they're right.
Response.
Jones: The fact is, when these folks sing, some of my white singers,
sing just like what they call black folks singin'. There's no such thing as
white folks singin' and black folks singin'. And I'll tell you what right now.
When they've got s– concentration camps planned, and they're already mapped
out and Title II of the McCarran Act is still in– not been revoked, and it's
only an emergency order away anyway, and Reno, Nevada has them. And Allentown,
Pennsylvania, several places throughout the nation, even up here in Tulelake–
(voice drops to husky whisper) My God. (Shouts) Concentration camps, I'm talking
about. (Pause) All they need's a stroke of the pen. Twenty-four hours. Say,
aw, it can't happen here. You must not know the Japanese. (Pause) Twenty-four
hours, every Japanese– I've got one of government– a friend (struggles for words)
Soyaki, it's in a– gov– government post now, his mother died in a concentration
camp without as much as a ounce of aspirin, for six months with cancer, a doctor
never came near her, in (draws out date for emphasis) 1943. Don't you tell me,
you silly people, that it can't happen to us. The Japanese owned a great section
of California, but their money wasn't even good enough for them. You and I,
all we– we don't have anything, the preacher's got it all. All we've got for
our money, they– they've got some great big church, they've robbed us blind,
we've made some Uncle Tom rich. (Pause) We've built fine churches and our homes
are– we don't have– we don't own anything. A– we owe our soul to the company
store, trying to keep up with Whitey. (Pause) We have the biggest color TV,
biggest Cadillac, we think that's gonna make us free. That's makes us more in
prison. That's why I don't own a car, I don't own any new furniture, I never
buy any new clothes, I have never bought a new pair of shoes in my life, and
that's why I am free, because I don't have to have anything. That's why I can
speak my piece, because I don't owe any bills. I'm not afraid of losing my job,
because I know I can go home and eat some greens on our church property. (Pause)
(Shouts angrily) I'm free. You're not free with your Cadillac. You're doing
just exactly what the Man wants you to. Buy his goods, so you'll never have
any real economic freedom. He wants you to buy everything he– m– he advertises
on TV, so he'll keep you perpetually owing your soul to the company store. You're
not free. You're a slave.
Applause
Jones: I saw some silly woman in the Sun-Reporter this last week had
four pages to celebrate her birthday. And I looked at her, a victim of malnutrition.
I don't know what her name was. Some name. Showed her with all these– she got
a few white folks she'd bribed in with pictures, I guess. You should see what
I'm talking about in the Sun-Reporter, there was four pages. This– this black
woman– and she was suffering from malnutrition. I could tell it, because as
a prophet, I could look at her body. It was quite evident. She was obese, she
was t– terribly heavy, and she was wasting her money trying to show somebody
she was something when I– you could look at the picture, those white people
lookin' at her. They really didn't want to take a picture with her. They didn't
want to be caught in the picture with her, but she had them come in like she
was somebody, and she was the biggest fool to ever walk on the face of the earth.
(Pause) Last week, Sun-Reporter, you saw it. If you saw it, this– this– this
fat woman, settin' there like she was a great free woman, and she was a dumb
slave. (Pause)
Response
One voice: Oh, you know it, sir.
Jones: Come promigating up in our furs and our clothes, and we fill
our churches, we– you'd think we all lived on Madison Avenue, till we come home
at night to the same stinkin' old neighborhood. (Pause) Now we're going have
to cure that, because the Japanese had power. They didn't have quite as many
numbers. But they had some money. (Pause) And if we had the money, with the
numbers we have, if we had the economic power, with the numbers we have, they'd
not do as much to us. But we have throwed our money down ratholes. For churches.
(Pause) For cars. For clothes. I'm going to tell you one thing, darlin'. (Pause)
It's a bad trite phrase of mine, I'm gonna tell you. I'm going to say this:
(Pause) (Voice climbs) You are the same– you and me are the same nigger (Pause)
to the white man, we're the same nigger, whether we've got on fine clothes,
or old robe. They don't think any more of us, they don't want any more to do
with us, whether we got on good clothes or old clothes, we're still niggers.
(Shouts) You know we're all niggers in here. (Pause)
Applause
Jones: They don't pay any attention to you. They just laugh up their
sleeve. Every– that's the white man's joke. Say, they look at– they– they say
look at those fool Negroes. Look at those fool fool blacks and Indians. Look
at those– or my people. I'm talking about me when I say nigger. I know I'm a
nigger. Some of you don't have enough good sense to know you're a nigger, but
I know I'm one. (Pause) That's the commonest joke of the whites. Say, look at
them walkin' down– them in their Cadillac. (Pause) (Calm) They don't worry about
you until you get some of the– the power or the money, or the property, some
of the businesses. Then they get worried.
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