When Donald Trump won the 2016 presidential elections with the help of 81 percent of self-identified white evangelicals, liberal commentators, relying on folk-conceptions of religion that privileged concepts like morality and belief, struggled to understand how someone who seemed to lack both could garner such support. Since then scholars have provided various explanations, relating to Christian nationalism evangelical appeals to authoritarianism, and straightforward racism. This article aims to expand this discussion by analyzing the way that evangelical Christian Zionists have supported Trump by rhetorically identifying him as God’s instrument on account of his support for Israel and withdrawal of the United States from the Iran Nuclear Deal. In addition to analyzing the process by which Trump is constituted as God’s instrument, the article also demonstrates more generally how religious discourse functions as a legitimating discourse for those who seek to gain, or maintain, positions of power.

中文翻译：

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从居鲁士国王到以斯帖王后：基督教犹太复国主义者对唐纳德特朗普作为上帝工具的话语建构

当唐纳德特朗普在 81% 自我认同的白人福音派人士的帮助下赢得 2016 年总统选举时，自由派评论员依赖于民间宗教观念，这些宗教观念优先于道德和信仰等概念，难以理解一个似乎缺乏两者的人如何能够获得这样的支持。从那时起，学者们提供了各种解释，涉及基督教民族主义福音派对威权主义的诉求和直截了当的种族主义。本文旨在通过分析福音派基督教犹太复国主义者支持特朗普的方式来扩展这一讨论，因为他支持以色列和美国退出伊朗核协议，在修辞上将他视为上帝的工具。除了分析特朗普成为上帝的工具的过程之外，