Overview
- Hegseth led a Pentagon prayer service Wednesday that featured a reading called “CSAR 25:17,” which outlets found mirrors Pulp Fiction’s famous speech rather than the biblical Ezekiel passage.
- A fuller video shows he presented the text as a pilot unit prayer from Sandy One for combat search-and-rescue crews and said it was meant to reflect Ezekiel 25:17 without crediting the film.
- The wording swaps Pulp Fiction’s “righteous man” for “downed aviator,” changes “poison and destroy” to “capture and destroy,” and ends with “my call sign is Sandy One” instead of “my name is the Lord.”
- He framed the reading as a tribute to A‑10 rescue crews who recently pulled downed pilots from near Iran, a moment that drew online criticism as House Democrats filed impeachment articles with little chance in a Republican Congress.
- The real Ezekiel 25:17 is a short line about divine vengeance, while the longer version popularized by the movie is largely invented and traces back to a 1973 Japanese martial‑arts film.