In case you didn't know, I try to attend services every Sunday at a nearby Episcopalian church. As you probably don't know, I occasional recite one of the readings to the congregation. This week I'm reading Paul's first letter to the Corinthians, chapter 8. It's... weird. Check it out. Maybe I'll analyze it in-depth here tomorrow.


1 Corinthians 8

1 Now about food sacrificed to idols: We know that we all possess knowledge. Knowledge puffs up, but love builds up. 2 The man who thinks he knows something does not yet know as he ought to know. 3 But the man who loves God is known by God.

4 So then, about eating food sacrificed to idols: We know that an idol is nothing at all in the world and that there is no God but one. 5 For even if there are so-called gods, whether in heaven or on earth (as indeed there are many "gods" and many "lords"), 6 yet for us there is but one God, the Father, from whom all things came and for whom we live; and there is but one Lord, Jesus Christ, through whom all things came and through whom we live.

7 But not everyone knows this. Some people are still so accustomed to idols that when they eat such food they think of it as having been sacrificed to an idol, and since their conscience is weak, it is defiled. 8 But food does not bring us near to God; we are no worse if we do not eat, and no better if we do.

9 Be careful, however, that the exercise of your freedom does not become a stumbling block to the weak. 10 For if anyone with a weak conscience sees you who have this knowledge eating in an idol's temple, won't he be emboldened to eat what has been sacrificed to idols? 11 So this weak brother, for whom Christ died, is destroyed by your knowledge. 12 When you sin against your brothers in this way and wound their weak conscience, you sin against Christ. 13 Therefore, if what I eat causes my brother to fall into sin, I will never eat meat again, so that I will not cause him to fall.

I think someone skipped lunch before writing to the Corinthians.

Autograph the Gideon Bible.

James Dobson angry that Barack Obama is reading/directly quoting the Bible

The statement of utmost hilarity:

Dobson and Minnery accused Obama of wrongly equating Old Testament texts and dietary codes that no longer apply to Jesus' teachings in the New Testament.

Because, y'know, they've been trying to overlook all that Jewish stuff for years, once it became clear that Jesus was an American citizen (but not in a Mormon way, of course).

I'm currently reading the Christian Bible cover-to-cover, and while I knew about many of the book's stranger, more contradictory, and horrifying stories already, there are still surprises around every corner. Firstoff, understand that it's not really a consistent narrative. Philologically speaking it's not a book, it's a collection of manuscripts (histories, poems, lawbooks, parables, etc.) written by different writers over the course of centuries. Add to this about 6,000 years of tradition, cultural upheaval, politics, war, schism, and more and you'll see that while some claim the Bible to be an infallible and incorruptible tome, it ain't. No, really.

It's funny that Dobson has such a problem with Obama's supposedly creative interpretations, since he and the rest of the fundies have been cherry-picking both sections of the Good Book for decades. They make frequent mention of the bits that approve of worshipping the Ten Commandments, maintaining the death penalty, warring on our enemies, stoning the homos, and the idea of everlasting torment for those who don't sign up with Mr. Christ. They tend to overlook, or at least downplay, the weirder parts, like the "bridegroom of blood" passage:

Exodus 4

24 And it came to pass by the way in the inn, that the LORD met [Moses], and sought to kill him.

25 Then Zipporah took a sharp stone, and cut off the foreskin of her son, and cast it at his feet, and said, Surely a bloody husband art thou to me.

26 So he let him go: then she said, A bloody husband thou art, because of the circumcision.

Huh? The rabbis and Christian scholars are still puzzling over that one.

Then there's the weird little asides like:

2 Samuel 21

20 In still another battle, which took place at Gath, there was a huge man with six fingers on each hand and six toes on each foot—twenty-four in all. He also was descended from Rapha.

21 When he taunted Israel, Jonathan son of Shimeah, David's brother, killed him.

What with the who now?

Then there's St. Paul's oinkish edicts on keeping the broads in their place, something the female-friendly Jesus never ruled on:

1 Corinthians 14:34-35

34 Let your women keep silence in the churches: for it is not permitted unto them to speak; but they are commanded to be under obedience as also saith the law.

35 And if they will learn any thing, let them ask their husbands at home: for it is a shame for women to speak in the church.

Or the old yo-ho-ho and a bottle of rum Jehovah:

Deuteronomy 20

10 When thou comest nigh unto a city to fight against it, then proclaim peace unto it.

11 And it shall be, if it make thee answer of peace, and open unto thee, then it shall be, that all the people that is found therein shall be tributaries unto thee, and they shall serve thee.

12 And if it will make no peace with thee, but will make war against thee, then thou shalt besiege it:

13 And when the LORD thy God hath delivered it into thine hands, thou shalt smite every male thereof with the edge of the sword:

14 But the women, and the little ones, and the cattle, and all that is in the city, even all the spoil thereof, shalt thou take unto thyself; and thou shalt eat the spoil of thine enemies, which the LORD thy God hath given thee.

15 Thus shalt thou do unto all the cities which are very far off from thee, which are not of the cities of these nations.

16 But of the cities of these people, which the LORD thy God doth give thee for an inheritance, thou shalt save alive nothing that breatheth:

17 But thou shalt utterly destroy them; namely, the Hittites, and the Amorites, the Canaanites, and the Perizzites, the Hivites, and the Jebusites; as the LORD thy God hath commanded thee:

18 That they teach you not to do after all their abominations, which they have done unto their gods; so should ye sin against the LORD your God.

Just leave the trees alone, man

19 When thou shalt besiege a city a long time, in making war against it to take it, thou shalt not destroy the trees thereof by forcing an axe against them: for thou mayest eat of them, and thou shalt not cut them down (for the tree of the field is man's life) to employ them in the siege:

20 Only the trees which thou knowest that they be not trees for meat, thou shalt destroy and cut them down; and thou shalt build bulwarks against the city that maketh war with thee, until it be subdued.

So, while there are some absolutely gorgeous passages, the book was already a little out there before Barack made his comments. "Fruitcake interpretation"? Parts of the book are a damned bake sale all by their lonesome.

This part of the article is especially strange.

Dobson and Minnery accused Obama of wrongly equating Old Testament texts and dietary codes that no longer apply to Jesus' teachings in the New Testament.

Well, kinda... It's called the New Testament by Christians because it was believed that Jesus was fulfilling the scriptures and introducing a new way after several thousand years of Mosaic law. So, yeah, a lot of the old rules about eating without washing your hands first, stoning people for inane infractions, healing on the Sabbath, and forgiving sins, were suddenly so last year, according to Jesus. On the other hand, Jesus was a Jew, and still had respect for the old rules:

Matthew 22

35 Then one of them, which was a lawyer, asked him a question, tempting him, and saying,

36 Master, which is the great commandment in the law?

37 Jesus said unto him, Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy mind.

38 This is the first and great commandment.

39 And the second is like unto it, Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself.

40 On these two commandments hang all the law and the prophets.

Also, Dobby, you can't dismiss the Old Testament that easily, because according to believers those are the books that validate Jesus Christ as the Messiah. That's the gist of the man's claim to Divinity and the basis of Christianity itself. Drop the OT and you lose Jesus' right to rule. The man wasn't called the King of the Americans after all.

Interestingly, Christ did have one other thing to say about the old rules:

Matthew 5

17 "Do not think that I have come to abolish the Law or the Prophets; I have not come to abolish them but to fulfill them.

18 I tell you the truth, until heaven and earth disappear, not the smallest letter, not the least stroke of a pen, will by any means disappear from the Law until everything is accomplished.

19 Anyone who breaks one of the least of these commandments and teaches others to do the same will be called least in the kingdom of heaven, but whoever practices and teaches these commands will be called great in the kingdom of heaven.

20 For I tell you that unless your righteousness surpasses that of the Pharisees and the teachers of the law, you will certainly not enter the kingdom of heaven.

So, put down the lobster, Dobson.