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     ## ##  ###    I S S U E   # 0 7 2        0 6 - 1 0 - 0 0   ###  ####   
    ###  # ###                                                   #######    
    ####  ###               "Jason on the Bible"                   ###       
     #######                      by Jason                            
      ####                                                                  

        I like to think I know more about the beliefs and motives of
 religious fundamentalists than most people.  After all, I have some serious
 education, having spent all but three years of my pre-college education in
 Catholic schools which ranged from conservative to surprisingly liberal in
 atmosphere.  Then I went to Grove City College, the American equivalent of
 Teheran School of the Young Jihad.  It was this school where I learned what
 true religious fanaticism was, where I got hounded for daring to think free,
 where the majority of students took the Bible word per word (or at least
 pretended to), and conversion attempts were as fervent as during the height
 of the Inquisition.  Yeah, I know how they think and the depths of their
 escapist philosophy.  I certainly know more than my coworker, who didn't
 know who Jesus's dad was (that's the same one I made a prostitute in
 Minneapolis for a day).

        Now to clarify: religious people are fine as long as they're not
 killing and embezzling (which happens a lot), but all of the self-righteous
 self-delusion gets annoying, particularly when they deny all common sense.

        My NEWEST attack on the brain-dead denizens of God's Secret Fan Club
 is the basis of their belief: the literal infallibility of the Bible.  Well,
 any person with more than 2 fluid ounces of sense and the capacity for free
 thought knows that that is simply impossible.  First, the good old Genesis
 story defies every ounce of physical evidence with got.  Second, the rest of
 the books, if you've ever read them, have oodles of truly glaring holes,
 contradictions, and complete incongruity, making God sound like a psychotic.
 Third, many of the book were written centuries after the stories supposedly
 happened.  Finally, they have been translated and re-translated so many
 times, it probably barely resembles the original version.  In spite of all
 this, people insist that absolutely every word was dictated by the Almighty.

        OK, so let's just ASSUME, for argument's sake, that the Bible WAS
 written by God.  Let's assume that the ol' Jehovah whispered into the ears
 of the writers and translators to make sure that every word, every
 inflection, every meaning was transferred perfectly from God's unfathomable
 mind to paper.  Let's assume that what we read is exactly what he intended
 and is absolute, inviolable truth.  Even so, it STILL can't be taken
 literally.  Why?

        The Bible says that man made God in His own image.  In reality, the
 opposite is true.  When Martin "I'll come up with five more Theses tomorrow"
 Luther nailed his revolutionary document to the Church in Thingamaburg, he
 fully intended to have the Bible available to everyone in the vernacular so
 that they will be free to read and interpret it themselves.  The problem
 was, he assumed that everyone would interpret it the same way he had.
 Hundreds of splinter groups later, we realize that this was a forlorn hope.
 How is it possible that two people can look at the same document and read
 the same Divine words and come up with radically different meetings?

        I'll tell you how.  People pick and choose what they want to believe.
 In doing so, they'll emphasize some verses, conveniently forget others, try
 to twist the meanings of verses by digging up archaic and obscure meanings
 of certain words, or, when all else fails, they make shit up.  Purgatory,
 The Rapture, and the idea of some big mysterious Trinity are all examples of
 strongly held beliefs that have little or no Biblical basis, and those are
 BIG beliefs.  God only knows what little tweaks people make in their minds,
 thinking to themselves, "God really meant this, even though He says that."
 People have already decided what they're going to believe, and if they need
 a Biblical basis to back it up, they'll find it.  It's not just
 Christianity, of course.  Every other religion has the same sectarian
 properties, but few, like Hinduism with its ten billion gods, admit it.

        Some fun sites:  www.bibledecoded.com (Unreal; if you can understand
 this guy's ramblings, you're as mad as he is), www.jesusveg.com (What?  The
 Bible doesn't say that Jesus was a vegetarian?  Don't worry about that. This
 guy sure doesn't.), or www.christian-aryannations.com (which proves that
 Jesus, at least half-Jewish, hates Jews).  When you're done with that, you
 may be ready for www.subgenius.com, the only thing that will make sense.

        So is the Bible the true, inspired word of God?  What difference does
 it make?  People read what they want to, as proven by the extreme examples
 above, and the less extreme fact that no two people, even in the same sect,
 will have the same beliefs, even if they've both memorized the entire Bible.
 
        People are so stupid. 

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 # (c)2000 aNAda e'zine                              aNAda072 .*.  by Jason #
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