The exploits of Solomon, he who we are told was the wisest of men, resemble those of Nero with one striking difference, YHWH put a stamp of approval on them.
He strikes Adonijah, sends Abiathar to exile, orders the killing of Joab, restricted Shimei’s movement just to name a few.
Or maybe this is how to be wise, eliminate your enemies first.
Angel Gabriel once approached YHWH with a troubled expression on his face. The following conversation took place:
Gabriel: Lord, I have a few questions about Jonah and the whale that I find puzzling.
YHWH: Ask away, Gabriel.
Gabriel: Well… for a start, how did Jonah fit the throat of the whale, yet whales notoriously eat only the smallest of plants and planktons, due to their small throats?
YHWH: Ah, that was easy. I enlarged the throat of the whale, temporarily. I went like: “Let the throat on that mammalian fish enlarge magically!” And it enlarged.
Gabriel: Hmmm. Okay. But how did Jonah survive in the belly of the fish for three days without suffocating?
YHWH: I made Jonah anaerobic, temporarily. I went like: “Let this geezer become anaerobic for the next three days, like yeast!” And he stopped breathing for the next three days.
Gabriel: Interesting. Still, how is it that the stomach acids in the whale’s belly didn’t digest Jonah, or at least burn his skin?
YHWH: That was a bit of a challenge, but I found a way around it too. I, the lord of hosts, gave Jonah a brand new skin – made of a certain thermoplastic polymer that I had just invented. This new skin was acid proof, and so he remained completely safe and sound there. I went like: “Let there be a skin covering Jonah consisting of polymerized ethylene and short-chain alpha-olefins!” And it happened.
Gabriel: Fascinating. And on the third day, you made the mammalian fish to vomit Jonah again.
YHWH: I totally did, Gabriel. I went like: “On the third day, right amongst the whale’s ambergris, let there be Jonah, safe, sound, and submissive!” And it came to be.
Gabriel: You are awesome, Lord!
YHWH: Ha ha. I know, right?
N/B: For access to all anecdotes in this series, check out List of all “Chronicles of YHWH” notes.
We learn in Genesis that once in a while, that is before he chased away the tenants of the small garden, he would take a walk in the afternoon to see how his creation was doing. I was doing my stroll in blogland this afternoon and found a post which was well written and a comment that has informed our choice of title and this will be made clear in a short while.
The OP is an attempt at a response to an atheist who questions whether a person who let his enemy torture his child was worthy of any respect/ worship. This is in reference to Job about whom, if we are to believe the bible, became sport for god and the devil to test how long he would last in his belief if all he had were taken away from him.
Those who have read the book know Job is described as being faultless. If there is any question that we should get an answer for in this book, it is to know why Job, and by extension we, suffer. Anyone who, in defense of his god, argues we suffer because of our faults has surely not read the [sic]good book.
Why does the believer defer to faith and not knowledge? Why must the theist always defer to this tactic when the facts he is presented with are uncomfortable? Is it not more honest to say there is no answer than to ask us to have faith?
It is a long stretch of imagination to read in Job the hope for a future Christ, one born of a virgin. There is nothing in Job that can be read to mean he is making a prophecy of a future Messiah.
Now, the comment that informs the title to this post is written by a person who I believe thinks atheism is only in America. The world is a big place, atheists are found everywhere, and no, for the umpteenth time, they don’t hate god. On the contrary, they lack a belief in any god or gods.
There is no difference in believing in a god who thinks suffering is the best way to meet results and believing in a fiend whose modus operandi is pain.
I don’t know the expectations of Americans, however, any reasonable person who believed in an all powerful, benevolent and provident god wouldn’t be asking for too much if they asked they be well provided for. What would be the use then of believing that you a provident master and you suffer like one who has no such master? Isn’t this madness?
The best response to the statement that
I also believe that the majority of the modern American militant atheists are NOT actually atheists. They believe in Him, yet they hate Him. If you TRULY believed that there was no God, and there was no meaning to life, and when your body dies, you simply wink out of existence, then there would be no point in anything whatsoever.
is to say there are actually no theists. If one believed they were headed for heaven, they wouldn’t be holding on to life as hard as they do even in the face of terminal illness. If there were true theists, they would be praying more than they are actually doing and we would have them concerned more seriously in finding out which of the many religions is the correct one for insurance against finding oneself in the wrong place. And I think if they truly believed the words found in Mark, none of them would work, they would live like birds expecting their god to provide for them. Being non-believers, they pray halfheartedly knowing all they believe is a lie and do it only for show. They work their asses off because no god is going to bring food on their tables.
It is beyond irony for one who believes a being, with the help of a magic wand and a few words created all there is to turn around and make a mockery of the sciences he seem to have no idea about.
If the book of Job was to answer any question for us, that question should at least have been why we suffer or worse, why good men suffer. It doesn’t. God doesn’t. When presented with the opportunity to give that answer, he tells Job to STFU!
In my opinion, the book of Job doesn’t answer why we suffer.
In the Garden of Gethsemane, a terribly worried Yeshua fell to his knees, and pleaded with YHWH. The following conversation ensued:
Yeshua: Father, if it is your will, relieve me of this cup of suffering.
YHWH: Can’t. It is your destiny to drink from that cup.
Yeshua: Make it such that it becomes my destiny to fight that destiny, then.
YHWH: If I did that, you wouldn’t be able to resist the destiny to fight your destiny. And if you thus fought your destiny, my plans for mankind’s redemption would be foiled.
Yeshua: But what if I fought the destiny to fight my destiny by not fighting it?
Short pause.
YHWH: You are starting to irritate me with your word play. Not very wise of you. I’ll make your cup of suffering bigger. I’ll make it into a mug of suffering.
Yeshua: No! Please don’t do that. The cup is fine, dad. Actually, if you could make it even smaller, I’d be ever grateful. Say, a thimbleful of suffering.
YHWH: A thimbleful of suffering is not enough. The minimum amount of suffering you should drink is a cupful. We are trying to wash away the sins of ALL mankind, remember?
Yeshua: But isn’t it all symbolic? The cleansing?
YHWH: It IS symbolic, yes. But even symbolic gestures have to scale in relation to the reality they represent. In this particular case, cleansing the entire human kind requires you to drink at least one cup of suffering.
Yeshua: I think your scale of reference is arbitral.
YHWH: Keep talking like that, and my arbitral scale will arbitrary award you with an entire pot to drink the suffering from.
Short silence.
Yeshua: What if I can’t drink an entire cup of suffering? What if the cup proves to be too much, and I drink, say, half the suffering?
YHWH: Then only the Jews will be cleansed. You’ll have to drink another cup for the gentiles later on. AND ride the donkey once again, into Jerusalem.
Yeshua: Whoa. I’ll drink the entire cup of suffering at a go, then. Didn’t like the donkey ride at all. People started calling me “Ass-Rider” from that day.
YHWH: Wise decision, son. Drink the entire cup at a go.
N/B: For access to all anecdotes in this series, check out List of all “Chronicles of YHWH” notes.
In the beginning, there was darkness all over. And water. YHWH used to swim in the darkness with his angels, subsisting on manna soaked in the water around. At one time, though, this diet gave Angel Gabriel a stomach upset, and he started farting in the darkness.
YHWH: Wha… who is that?
Gabriel: It is I, Lord. Angel Gabriel, your faithful servant.
YHWH: Stop farting, Gabriel. You are making the waters around acidic.
Gabriel: Sorry about that. I’ll stop.
Brief silence.
YHWH: You’ve just farted again. What is wrong with you?
Gabriel: I’m sorry. I’m not sure what’s happening. I think some of the manna is going bad in all this water around. And I can’t see anything, so can’t determine which manna is good, and which is not.
YHWH: You need to hold your farts in. Squeeze the dime.
Gabriel: Will do.
Brief silence.
YHWH: Dammit, Gabriel! You’ve just let loose yet another one! Are you trying to put us all under siege with your gases? I can hear the other angels swimming away from us now!
Gabriel: I’m really, really, terribly sorry, Lord. That last one sneaked out against my best efforts to contain it.
YHWH: It sounded like a thousand trumpets!
Gabriel: Perhaps if we had some light around, I could swim further away from the rest of you until my stomach settles down again.
YHWH: Fine. I’ll create some light.
And hence YHWH proclaimed, in a loud, booming voice: “Let there be light!”
N/B: For access to all anecdotes in this series, check out List of all “Chronicles of YHWH” notes.
YHWH: Lucifer?
Lucifer: Speaking.
YHWH: What’s that bluish glow I’m seeing in hell?
Lucifer: Radioactive cores. Uranium and Plutonium.
YHWH: What are radioactive cores doing in hell?
Lucifer: I run out of sulphur and brimstone a while back. Too many sinners trooping in. Besides, the radioactive cores create a much hotter flame. And they can last for much, much longer.
YHWH: Ah, interesting. Good thinking. How many sinners are you barbecuing, currently?
Lucifer: Almost five billions. The atheists, the Muslims, the Rastafarians, the Hindus and Buddhists, the Communists, and the Pope. I hear that some evangelical Christians are also on the way.
YHWH: Yeah. Some of them were wearing linen underwear, against my orders. Who wears linen against the skin, anyway? Creeps.
Lucifer: One impending problem, though.
YHWH: Yes?
Lucifer: The increasingly higher amounts of radioactive material needed might soon reach a critical mass, and detonate in a massive explosion. Hell will be no more.
YHWH: That’s fine. I’ll move heaven further away.
Lucifer: Oh. Alright then.
YHWH: Just ensure that those Christians wearing linen pants are nearest the cores when the explosion happens.
Lucifer: Uh, alright. Will do.
N/B: For access to all anecdotes in this series, check out List of all “Chronicles of YHWH” notes.
Moses once saw a burning bush in the desert. And Lo, the bush spake to him:
Burning Bush: Moses, come hither. Remove your sandals.
Moses: Hello there, weird burning bush. I’ve never seen a talking bush before.
Burning Bush: I’m not a burning bush. I am YHWH, the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob.
Moses: You look like a burning bush.
Burning Bush: The bush is an accessory. A visual prop, if you will. I’m actually the flames in the bush. It’s all magical. That’s why I’m not consuming the leaves of the bush.
Moses: So why are you hiding in the bush, if the bush is not part of you?
Burning Bush: Sigh. You are not getting the theatrical dimension to all this, clearly. I’m not hiding in the bush. The bush is like a costume. It’s all purely conventional.
Moses: So the bush is to you what my robes and sandals are to me?
Burning Bush: More or less. Now to the point of my visit. There are some Jews I’d like you to free from Egypt…
Moses: Wait. Are you telling me that you are wearing a bush, and that without it, you would be naked?
Burning Bush: Ostensibly. Look, it doesn’t really matter. Now these Jews…
Moses (Averting his eyes): I can’t bear to look at the burning flames now. It feels… indecent.
Burning Bush (Roaring): MOSES! FOCUS! I’M NOT NAKED!!!
N/B: For access to all anecdotes in this series, check out List of all “Chronicles of YHWH” notes.
One night, while Jacob was minding his own business at a place called Peniel, YHWH sneaked upon him, and started pinching him, provocatively. Infuriated, Jacob stood up, and gave YHWH a heavy beating for the whole night. A badly surprised YHWH dislocated Jacob’s hip joint in a bid to incapacitate him, but Jacob still managed to overpower him. Finally, at daybreak, YHWH begged for a truce:
YHWH: Please let me go, man. My body is aching all over.
Jacob: No, I will not let you go until you bless me.
YHWH: How can you ask me to bless you after beating me up like that for a whole night?
Jacob: You started it. You are the one who came and started pinching me for no reason at all.
YHWH: Yeah, but you didn’t have to beat me up like a step-son. I can hardly move. My left eye is swollen shut. My ribs are probably broken. You punch and kick like a mule.
Jacob: Look, just give me your blessings, and I’ll let you go. Otherwise, I’ll keep slapping you until you soil your loin cloth.
YHWH: No – don’t slap me again. Those slaps are too painful. My ears are ringing. I will bless you. What’s your name?
Jacob: I’m Jacob, son of Isaac.
YHWH: Fine. From today, your name will be Israel – for you have beaten God into a pulp. Now, please let me go back to heaven in peace.
And so Jacob – now Israel – let YHWH depart. And YHWH limped away, painfully. He never visited Israel again in a physical form.
N/B: For access to all anecdotes in this series, check out List of all “Chronicles of YHWH” notes.
Here’s how Adam formulated the first “request”:
Adam: “Hey Eve. I’d like to have my Pegasus foraging in your rose garden.”
Eve: “Say what?”
Adam: “I’d like to shepherd a thousand little pandas through your valley of the shadows.”
Eve: “What are you yapping about?”
Adam: “In short, I’d like to motorboat your bazoongas. Right here. Right now.”
Eve (Blushing): “Oh, you savage beast. Come here, and know me.”
YHWH (Bewildered): “Wait. What?”
N/B: For access to all anecdotes in this series, check out List of all “Chronicles of YHWH” notes.
Eve: “Come here, Adam. I want to count your ribs”.
Adam: “Wait. What?”
Eve: “You heard me. You were deeply asleep in the afternoon today. I saw you.”
Adam: “Uhh… what has my sleep got to do with my ribs?”
Eve: “The last time you fell into a deep sleep, YHWH created me from one of your ribs, remember?”
Adam: “Yeah but… I still don’t see…”
Eve: “Why did you fall asleep today in the afternoon? Are you trying to get another woman?”
Adam: “Uhh…”
Eve: “I’m I getting fat? Is that it? How many ribs did you give out today, you pig? How many women are you planning to have, besides me?!”
N/B: For access to all anecdotes in this series, check out List of all “Chronicles of YHWH” notes.
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