Here's a nice little Bible story for the kids. In Genesis 19:8, Lot protects some of God's angels by offering his "virgin" daughters to the men of Sodom instead."I have two daughters which have not known man; let me, I pray you, bring them out unto you, and do ye to them as is good in your eyes."
This is a horrible story! Can you imagine a father doing such a thing? Actually, Lot was lying about the virgin part. According to Genesis 19:14, they were both married.
A little later, in Genesis 19:32, Lot's "virgin daughters" get him drunk and seduce him. See my comic from April 2007 The "just and righteous" Lot.
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9 comments:
Maybe Lot was simply already trying to save the lives of the people of the city.
If you try to rape a virgin daughter, with her father's permission, you'll probably stay alive.
Try to rape an angel... Well, let's just say that there isn't a single recorded incident in history of someone raping an angel and living to tell the tale.
So Lot, being a kind and loving man, decided that two raped woman, even though they're his own daughters, are better than a large bunch of totally dead men.
A bad call in the long run, since they were all killed anyway, but he couldn't know that at the time.
;-)
This is what happens when sin enters the world.
No one ever said the Bible was a children's book.
It also never says that what Lot and his daughters (re: the previous Lot comic) did were right. This and other parts of the Bible are storytelling without commentary. A lot of it shows what happens when people take matters into their own hands instead of relying on God to do what he promised.
Phinehas, people taking matters into their own hands, rather than waiting for God, is a problematical issue.
Didn't wait for God and tried to handle things yourself? Bad. Why didn't you wait?
Waited for God? But God provided you opportunities, and you squandered and ignored them by simply waiting instead of doing something. Heard the joke about the old lady and the flooded city, waiting for God to provide?
"Try to rape an angel... Well, let's just say that there isn't a single recorded incident in history of someone raping an angel and living to tell the tale."
ROMAFL! You sure?
I've read some fantasy comics with some seriously weird shit happening in them...
Maybe the guy's sons-in-law were impotent? If they lived under the same roof as a typical jewish monster-in-law, I can inagine how consuming the marriage might get compromised on a daily basis.
And then there's that disturbing redneck-like infatuation of the girls for Daddy... Ay, Papi!
"So Lot, being a kind and loving man, decided that two raped woman, even though they're his own daughters, are better than a large bunch of totally dead men."
Besides, under the pater familias Roman-like law which Moses would later make official, the children are the property of their parents, to do with as parents wish. Disobedience equals death.
I've known cattle being treated better. How's Lot any different from a selfish, sordid, calculating, modern-day Taliban?
Even if, technically, it wouldn't have been rape. Just a non-consensual gang-bang in public...
"No one ever said the Bible was a children's book."
That's not what a huge number of Christians believe and practice. Among the many books left at my home by my pre-school nephews, is a "Bible for Children", which starts with the insultingly naive myth of Adam and Eve [child-like, but with concealed genitals to hint that bath time is sinful], and ends with a described image of that most swell and kind guy, Jesus, being nailed on a cross and killed.
That stuff will give them nightmares!
If Passion of the Christ wasn't a film about religion, it would've caused an outcry far greater than the Saw series.
If the main protagonist of such a scenario had been a woman, the film would probably have been banned worldwide.
I recall being shown images (rather simple drawings) of the babies slaughterd in Bethlehem in Catechism, when I was just seven. Some of the trauma and nausea lingers to this day. I remember thinking: "What kind of insane people would want to settle in a place where their babies are butchered and then neatly aligned as if after some hunting party? Is somebody intending to cook and eat them?"
In the same school year, we were shown a film about the persecutions of early Christians. With many vicious torture scenes, very explicit. I can still see some of the images when I close my eyes.
At least, in DragonBallz, people barely bleed, and many that die are bad guys or dubious heroes.
I'm positive that porn would harm a young child far less than snuff.
I do recall the day when I held my first XXX mag. A very fond memory, and utterly untraumatic, on the contrary!
"It also never says that what Lot and his daughters did were right."
Well, it DOES say that Lot & Co were righteous people, unlike the destruction-worthy cities. Implying that people who commit incest are okay, but consenting adult sodomites are not.
I'd love to hear Westerners today declare that having sex with your own parents/children, and with the GOAL of having babies, too, is far more okay than homosexuality, or any sort of promiscuous life between unrelated consenting adults.
"people taking matters into their own hands, rather than waiting for God, is a problematical issue."
You don't effing say!
I'm so sick of people who want to take God's death penalty into their own hands! And not just in Pakistan or Saudi Arabia...
"Heard the joke about the old lady and the flooded city, waiting for God to provide?"
Actually, I have. Except it wasn't a joke. That Katrina survivor seemed... I don't know if it's total denial, or plain post-traumatic insanity.
"I've lost everything, my whole life, I saw my husband drown before my eyes, but praise the Lord." Yeesh!
Pascal, not that I don't agree with some of what you say, but you seem to take almost everything that you quote, and reply to, in a direction different from that intended in the quote...
Making the same statements, without the preceding quotes, would have been more relevant and made more sense.
Hmm, you do have a point there. I tend to quote stuff, not to respond directly to it, but just as a start for my own issues, and in a way that's improper.
Noted. I'll try and amend my ways before I err again. ;-)
I would echo what Yaron said, though you definitely had some opinions that came through.
re: the no-genitals potshot, how many children's books do you see that show genitals? Are they also implying that sexual feelings are a sin [hint: the Bible doesn't either].
Also, you seem to think that because there's a children's book about the bible that many christians believe the Bible is a children's book. A children's book about the Bible is NOT a Bible, just a way of relating many of the stories to kids.
I'm not familiar with the catechism in Bethlehem. I'll check it out after writing this, but if it involves the murder of babies and children in the modern day, it most certainly isn't Biblically founded. People killing in God's name is not the same as it being right in God's name. The issues in the OT are a different story (people love to bring 'em up). Why are they different? Because God was directly communicating with his chosen people (the Jews). That time period in history, when the Jews were gaining back the promised land is entirely different from people killing in God's name today.
Well, how about that? A deep believer who's also got a very open mind, one who read my daring positions without howling in horror. You're a rare breed, Phineas. Always a pleasure meeting one of you people. :-)
A rare breed, yes. I dare say, a gem in the mud. For instance, you say the Bible doesn't imply that sexual feelings are a sin. Within the rather strict frame of heterosexual marriage, that's perfectly correct. However, you have to admit that the uptight mentality against all things sexual and nude is vastly widespread among highly religious people. It might have showed, but I'm feeling a saturation towards the moralist bigots.
Religious people with an open mind, on the other hand, I don't mind one bit. We can agree to disagree, and even get along. :-)
Back on topic, I know many children's books that aren't shy about genitals, much like innocent real-life children themselves. But, I happen to not live in a markedly frisky country like the USA, the UK, or Australia. European books are matter-of-fact, taking a natural approach to the body, innocent and non-sexual in children's books.
A few examples:
- I have a book for children ("5 years and up") about genetics and heredity. It talks about genes for hair color, eye color, and gender. All illustrated, all treated equally. The naked children are sometimes drawn in their bath, but not always. It's rather medical, in fact. Most un-shocking.
- I also have a very cutely drawn book, "The Big Book of Sexuality", made precisely for that time when the kids will spontaneously start asking questions (that's the right time to explain stuff). It shows genitals, anatomy, and even coitus, explaining everything with equal detail. No emphasis, no concealing. I myself was taught all about it by my parents at age five, and it seems to have made me much more balanced regarding sexual matters and the body than most adults around me.
- Check this comic series, about baby Cupid whose job is to make earthly creatures fall in love. A naked angel baby boy, with StPeter for a boss. For all ages. In Europe. Probably banned by the elastic US laws on "obscenity". Then again, sex crime rates in America are much higher than in Europe, I've seen the WHO's statistics on rape. Again the perverse effect of frisky concealment?
Naturists understandably insist on that obvious idea, that the best way to put emphasis on something is to try and conceal it. And there are many christian naturist organizations, very official, who live like Adam and Eve, including their priests. They pray, and all, in the nude. Google "Christian naturism"...
I've grown up with depictions of Adam and Eve who, while supposedly living in the innocence of their creation, always seemed to be crouching behind bushes, shoulders down, as if feeling cold or something... and looking less like naturists than like the voyeurs lurking near them. Or who always happened to have something conveniently positioned in front of "some place", like in those suggestive Austin Powers gag scenes. Trust me, a child knows when something isn't just "not shown", but unnaturally hidden. A child is also curious. I was very young when I noticed that some parts of A & E's bodies were NEVER visible. And that I could never know, for instance, if he was circumcised.
In strict islamic countries, from constantly concealing women's hair, the men view it as a highly erotic sight. In 15th century Europe, a woman baring her breasts was nearly meaningless, but the glimpse of an ankle was equivalent to porn.
My point is, classic religious education, as I've lived it and witnessed worldwide, reveals a very ambiguous attitude about the body. In the book I mentioned, "My First Bible [hands-on]", Adam and Eve are drawn like children, to create a closeness with the little reader, but as usual, the surrepticious censorship is there.
Sure, that book's not THE Bible, but you're with me on this: the whole topic should be strictly for the above 12 years, not "ages 0 to 3 years". That stuff is violent, often brutal. And this "kiddie book" is representative of widespread mainstream christian publications.
Such pernicious propaganda is what makes me so wary of any religious education. Because I know it happens everywhere. The vast majority of proselytes are simply toxic, and THEY consider that the Bible is good for children of all ages.
Further on, the book tells about Joseph's brothers, jealous of a mere dream he had, selling him in slavery to be taken very far away from his home. Hello phobias. We've all heard such stories, "we'll give you away to gypsies/a circus one day when the parents are absent". If God says these things do happen, and routinely it seems...
Then comes adorable kiddie David, who was granted "the courage to kill Goliath because he was saying bad things about God and his people". Very educational. If I had gotten into a fight every time somebody insulted my mother or my ethnic origins...
We move on through many pages which basically just repeat through ultra-sketchy biblical episodes that God systematically helps and protects from harm those who are good boys. God, God, God, God... again never ever being vaguely defined, just hammered like a mantra. And suggesting that every time something DOES happen to you, you must've been a bad believer.
Arrives the very sinister illustration showing three men nailed on crosses atop the Golgotha, among which Jesus, killed by hateful people which he loved, with no other explanation than "it was God's will". Why would God want Jesus to die, of all the super-nice people? Guess for yourself, kiddo! "Because I, God, said so"?...
But fear not! Very soon Jesus is non-dead, happily smiling, and promising in a dream John had [Revelation] that "there will be no more tears, no pain, no death, ever, just happiness and joy". Hooray.
I can just imagine the mess in a kid's head if, after reading all that fumbled jumble, he gets confronted to violence, crime and death. "What about God's promise?"
I, like most everybody, wanted to be a good boy and learn what I was tought. Then I had to clean up all the mental clutter, bin the blatant nonsense, all the tradition grafted on faith like leeches. I amaze myself that I did NOT choose atheism after all that.
But atheists, like other religions or political beliefs, are ordinary people, and those among them who have sense and open-mindedness, I love to befriend.
"That's caslled tolerance of the different,. baby. Something not taught in the school cursus, learned it on my own."
"I'm not familiar with the catechism in Bethlehem."
Hey, I said it was catechism ABOUT Bethlehem. I've never been there.
It was in a religious school, almost our first introduction to catechism, logically "starting at the beginning" [of Christiannism], with the events surrounding the birth of Jesus. Among which, the slaughter of all babies by Herod's order.
So much for "the Bible is not a children's book". You know that, and I know that, but... (sigh)
For the record, I was born and raised in Lebanon. Which you could consider to be a normally religious country, equivalent to Poland or Italy or Spain. No fanatism, overall (save for the usual eccentrics), just insistence on religion in all communities of our mosaic nation.
"God was directly communicating with his chosen people"
Says they. Any neutral witnesses?
My aunt also swears the Holy Virgin speaks directly to her when she prays in trance for hours. And Jesus. And God. And... she knows them all, up close and personal, they keep dropping by.
So far, none of her "revealed predictions" came true, but she's unflinching. Me, I'm considering possible hypoglycemia-induced hallucinations. :-P
And again, all priests of pagan religions similarly claimed that the god(dess) spoke to them directly, and not just in Delphi. Some might even have been sincerely convinced about it.
Can you even imagine somebody seeing/hearing God directly, and then remotely thinking of disobeying He who sees all? "God was constantly among His people", yet the bloody fools brought pagan whores to their tents in broad daylight? [Numbers 25: 1-6] Puh-leeze! Even my ordinary dad, although very modern-minded and easy-going, would never let me pull off such a stunt, not in HIS house young man!
The scribes wrote things the way that fit them best, that's all. And a rather naive way, at that. Just like "God told them how He created the Cosmos, the Earth and the Species". Allegedly. Where ends the allegory, where start the hard facts? Even in the NT, Jesus said he'd rebuild the Temple in three days, and didn't state out loud to the public what he meant.
Holy war of extermination, lapidation, cutting hands, betraying alliance promises, raiding and pillaging, bedding their women captives, slavery... These OT Hebrews had a mentality very reminiscent of today's Talibans. Would you trust THEIR religious leaders when they decree fatwas about Allah's orders?
I don't know about speaking German, but if Hitler had won WW2, we'd be hearing a very different official story about who the good and the bad guys were. Never base your certainties on the story of ONE side...
"That time period in history, when the Jews were gaining back the promised land is entirely different from people killing in God's name today."
Sorry, dude, but this is a very shaky statement.
Firstly, the very same attitude and logic is often invoked up to this day, not one jot or tittle sounds changed. Heard the Israeli and the Palestinians, at each other's throats around the Mount of the Temple?
"This is OUR most holy land. God gave it to us through Moses.
- Bull! This is OUR most holy land. God gave it to us through Muhammad.
- Yahve, smite them!
- Allah akbar, jihad on the infidels!"
You do believe things are supposed to be different today. But it's only your personal opinion. And as soon as any "promised land" is involved, you're clearly in the minority. Why would it even be different today? Where does the Bible say that God's procedures at some point cease to be "for all time"?
And then, there's the simple issue of the legitimacy of that whole Promised Land business. Since you're an open-minded fella, here's a mind game for you. Imagine the scene : 5,100 primitive years ago [around 3,100 BC], a population emigrating from faraway Egypt suddenly showed up in a place where other people had lived for countless generations, and declared "this land is ours, our God gave it to us, so either leave, adopt our ways, or perish". Conquest, plain and simple. Has anybody considered this from the perspective of the Moabites, Cananeans & Co?
Here are a few parallels :
-Israel in the 20th century. "This is our God-given land", said the Zionist settlers to Palestinians who had lived there for a measly 18 centuries. Since Rome dispersed the Jews in 180 AD, the Diaspora. Whose home is it, whose isn't it? [Bear in mind I'm not answering that. Everybody has a point.]
-"Allah told me to spread the Word, by the sword if need be, and subdue the whole world." Muhammad, around 780 AD, conquering from East to West, from China to Morocco.
-"Jesus wants us to convert the savages, and he says this New World is ours, he actually gave it to us." The American settlers, in North and South.
See a pattern? Constant re-runs...
If so many inconsiderate barbarians took God as a convenient excuse, what's to prove it was ever any different? A cult of ragtag strangers from Africa, led by a bearded old mystic with regular visions, disturbed by 40 years of wandering bare-headed in the desert, and yelling "God is mighty, kill them all" [Numbers 31: 17] while attacking the local populations... Just a cartesian hypothesis to consider.
I hope this time all quotes were à propos...
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