That was the Israeli Prime Ministers reaction to one last shot from Obama against the only democracy in the middle east. It is an interesting turn of phrase. The last twitches of yesterdays world. We are certainly seeing the last twitches of something. We quoted Augustine a few weeks back as he compared the world to a dying man.
In 410 Rome was sacked by the Visigoths. Augustine wrote his dying man image at that time. Twenty years later he had time to rethink and remember the dying man image because he himself was dying. The great city of Hippo in North Africa where he was the Bishop was being surrounded by the Vandals. For months, as the Vandals approached, refugees had come into the city since it was the only city in North Africa defended by a wall. Augustine as he approached the end of his life had the penitential psalms of David written down and fixed to the wall by his bed, so that he could read them. Confession and absolution were important for him as they should be for us. Care for the poor and needy and homeless was as well. When refugees came into Hippo Augustine welcomed them into his church and home. It is from these displaced visitors that Augustine probably caught the fever which ended his life. He did not live long enough to greet the invaders. It took a long time for the city to fall.
For 30 of his 75 years Augustine watched the twitching of yesterdays world without knowing what the new world would bring, but believing that the “City of God” was the world to come. Perhaps what the Prime Minister of Israel was noticing as the last twitch of yesterdays world was the natural result of what Augustine noticed about all the kingdoms of the world – “Justice being taken away, then, what are kingdoms but great robberies? For what are robberies themselves, but little kingdoms?”
