Up Front by Emma Hart

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Up Front: How About Now?

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  • Sacha, in reply to nzlemming,

    "Outside, Harris!"

    teeshirt

    Ak • Since May 2008 • 19745 posts Report Reply

  • Geoff Lealand,

    I was drummed out of bible class* at an early age (9 or 10) for asking, "But aren't these just metaphors?" about the loaves-and-fishes stories and such I was being told.

    * the only place of social intercourse (with a very faint hope that it might lead to the other kind) growing up in South Taranaki in the 1950s.

    Screen & Media Studies, U… • Since Oct 2007 • 2562 posts Report Reply

  • nzlemming, in reply to Geoff Lealand,

    Mine were more along the ‘questioning the internal logic’ lines:

    “If Adam and Eve were the first man and woman, made directly by God, and they had Cain and Abel, and Cain slew Abel, who did Cain marry?”

    edit gods but my speeling is atrocious today

    Waikanae • Since Nov 2006 • 2937 posts Report Reply

  • Lucy Stewart, in reply to Geoff Lealand,

    I was drummed out of bible class* at an early age (9 or 10) for asking, “But aren’t these just metaphors?” about the loaves-and-fishes stories and such I was being told.

    I dunno if anyone's run into Kiwi Camp, which is a school-holidays-and-school-camps place north of Wellington, but I really hacked off a few people there on a three-day horse camp when I was twelve by asking questions like "What happens to people who live and die without meeting missionaries?". Given that they'd already hacked me off by sitting me down and telling me that women shouldn't have the vote, I felt this was fair.

    (They were also ACT supporters. The party's inexplicable lack of attraction to women voters may have some explanation there...)

    Wellington • Since Nov 2006 • 2105 posts Report Reply

  • giovanni tiso, in reply to nzlemming,

    “If Adam and Eve were the first man and woman, made directly by God, and they had Cain and Abel, and Cain slew Abel, who did Cain marry?”

    Actually, I think you'll find that even in Sunday school at least a third son is mentioned, Seth, but Adam had other sons and daughters (as per Genesis). The daughters are not mentioned by name except in apocryphal texts, but then that's the patriarchy for you.

    So Cain either married a sister or a niece (ie one of Seth's daughters).

    Wellington • Since Jun 2007 • 7473 posts Report Reply

  • nzlemming, in reply to giovanni tiso,

    So Cain either married a sister or a niece (ie one of Seth's daughters).

    That was pretty much my point in asking the priests the question, but they would always sling me out before I got to "So, the human race is based on incest, then?"

    Waikanae • Since Nov 2006 • 2937 posts Report Reply

  • Lucy Stewart, in reply to nzlemming,

    That was pretty much my point in asking the priests the question, but they would always sling me out before I got to “So, the human race is based on incest, then?”

    Oooh, oooh, I know this one: incest was totes OK back then, because Adam and Eve were created perfect and didn't have any terrible mutations to be brought out by inbreeding. Or, alternatively: there were a bunch of other people created, it's just the Bible forgets to mention them because they're not that important.

    Never underestimate the capacity of literalists to bullshit creatively. Just...don't.

    Wellington • Since Nov 2006 • 2105 posts Report Reply

  • Islander, in reply to Lucy Stewart,

    Lilith? The OT Lilith? Where's she in all this?

    (The Presbytarian bible school that my mother sent two of us to (after my father died) politely asked her to remove us because 'they're questioning the teacher. All the time.' I suppose a couple of kids, 10 & 11, who'd had their world turned upside down over the past 18th months were a leetle less than inclined to accept 'because
    the bible says so'...especially when its more blatant stupidities were illustrated and supposed to be coloured in - camel? Through the eye of a fucking needle*? Get real!)
    *Yes, I did become aware of apologetic exogesis later. Still unconvincing.

    Big O, Mahitahi, Te Wahi … • Since Feb 2007 • 5643 posts Report Reply

  • giovanni tiso, in reply to nzlemming,

    but they would always sling me out before I got to “So, the human race is based on incest, then?”

    Well, of course it is. And probably survived at various times in human history via various degrees of inbreeding. I fail to see the problem there.

    Wellington • Since Jun 2007 • 7473 posts Report Reply

  • Islander, in reply to giovanni tiso,

    Such almost certainly concentrated survival traits - some of 'em quite nasty...

    Big O, Mahitahi, Te Wahi … • Since Feb 2007 • 5643 posts Report Reply

  • giovanni tiso, in reply to Islander,

    *Yes, I did become aware of apologetic exogesis later. Still unconvincing.

    I think it's a wonderfully poetic image, me. And the first time I was told that it was supposedly a mistranslation for getting a tow-rope through the eye of a needle, or that (worse) the eye of a needle was actually a gate in Jerusalem, I was quite disappointed. But then apparently that's not the case - Jesus really said camel through the eye of a needle, updating an older Talmudic aphorism (which crammed an elephant in there).

    Wellington • Since Jun 2007 • 7473 posts Report Reply

  • Islander, in reply to giovanni tiso,

    Excellent to learn!
    Us poetic literalists can still appreciate etc. etc. - but not when the thing was illustrated ( and badly.)

    Big O, Mahitahi, Te Wahi … • Since Feb 2007 • 5643 posts Report Reply

  • Lucy Stewart, in reply to Islander,

    Lilith? The OT Lilith? Where’s she in all this?

    I’ve mostly absorbed Bible apologetics of the Independent Baptist variety. They don’t hold with all that apocryphal stuff. It’s practically pagan.

    But then apparently that’s not the case – Jesus really said camel through the eye of a needle, updating an older Talmudic aphorism (which crammed an elephant in there).

    I seem to recall hearing – and am fully prepared to be corrected on this – that pretty much all the neat aphorisms attributed to Jesus in the Bible are just updated versions of previously-existing pieces of wisdom. Kind of like how Mark Twain and Oscar Wilde between them apparently had the nineteenth century’s entire allotment of witty remarks, only, er, more religious.

    Wellington • Since Nov 2006 • 2105 posts Report Reply

  • giovanni tiso, in reply to Lucy Stewart,

    I seem to recall hearing – and am fully prepared to be corrected on this – that pretty much all the neat aphorisms attributed to Jesus in the Bible are just updated versions of previously-existing pieces of wisdom.

    An anti-Christian polemic by Piergiorgio Odifreddi I read is full of examples of this, although why that ought to lessen our opinion of JC (as the author clearly thought it should) is beyond me.

    Wellington • Since Jun 2007 • 7473 posts Report Reply

  • Islander, in reply to giovanni tiso,

    Quoting from the past = excellent acknowledgement of ancestral storytelling/evidence. Even if done by later scribes...

    Big O, Mahitahi, Te Wahi … • Since Feb 2007 • 5643 posts Report Reply

  • Steve Barnes,

    Ah, the days of arguing with Bible teachers, or whatever they were called back then. I was banned from Sunday school after being told off for arguing with the teacher and coming back with the excuse that "Jesus argued with the priests in the temple so I'm like Jesus"
    Not a popular boy was I.
    ;-)

    Peria • Since Dec 2006 • 5521 posts Report Reply

  • Islander, in reply to Steve Barnes,

    Ah, the days of arguing with Bible teachers, or whatever they were called back then.

    Presbys didnt actually like the term 'Sunday school teachers' way back then...

    There seems to be a few of us who can say 'Kicked Out Of Indoctrination Course" eh? Pity it's not a good acronym...

    Big O, Mahitahi, Te Wahi … • Since Feb 2007 • 5643 posts Report Reply

  • Ian Dalziel, in reply to Steve Barnes,

    turn tablist...

    “Jesus argued with the priests in the temple so I’m like Jesus” Not a popular boy was I.

    How'd ya go with those moneylenders, then?


    get it off yer chest...

    If Adam and Eve were the first man and woman, made directly by God

    I thought that was just gentile ribbing...

    Christchurch • Since Dec 2006 • 7953 posts Report Reply

  • Kyle Matthews,

    I was prepared to make it the one and only firm veto power I'd ever use, if it came to that. It didn't, which is great because ultimatums suck arse.

    Yeah, well I vetoed, and we're currently about two or three weeks away from a judge deciding for us. Which feels stupid, but here we are.

    My daughter keeps piping up from her car seat with things she's been taught about god. Today she told me she loved god more than everyone because god was everywhere and everything. I wish it was illegal to indoctrinate kids like that :(

    Since Nov 2006 • 6243 posts Report Reply

  • bmk, in reply to Kyle Matthews,

    My daughter keeps piping up from her car seat with things she’s been taught about god. Today she told me she loved god more than everyone because god was everywhere and everything. I wish it was illegal to indoctrinate kids like that :(

    Man that sucks so much.. I had religious parents when I was young and I always doubted the existence of this 'God' character. I remember expressing my doubts to my mother who told me that the doubts were the devil inside my head and I was evil if I listened to them.

    So my mother has been clearly instructed that if she mentions god to my kids she will lose the right to see them. I am just grateful that my ex is an agnostic. Would be horrible to be in your situation.

    Since Jun 2010 • 327 posts Report Reply

  • Kumara Republic, in reply to Kyle Matthews,

    Doesn't that bring to mind the Parsons kids from 1984?

    The southernmost capital … • Since Nov 2006 • 5446 posts Report Reply

  • Lilith __, in reply to Islander,

    Lilith? The OT Lilith? Where’s she in all this?

    I think Lilith is only mentioned in one of the Apocrypha, as Adam's first wife, made from the earth along with him. As I recall, he divorced her for being too uppity, and replaced her with Eve, who was subservient by design.

    Her origins apparently go further back into Mesopotamian and Indo-European mythology.

    One of my reference books says the name means "lily" and derives from the Sumero-Babylonian word lilu , meaning lotus. Her obvious connection with sexuality and fertility is no doubt what makes her demonic in Hebrew mythology.

    Dunedin • Since Jul 2010 • 3895 posts Report Reply

  • Ian Dalziel, in reply to Lilith __,

    I know what you did last Sumer...*

    Her obvious connection with sexuality and fertility is no doubt what makes her demonic in Hebrew mythology.

    Well, that and the killing of neonates (newborn children) used to annoy them as well...

    A mantle piece...
    I guess the being made from earth thang could explain the Lith part of the name - as in lithosphere...

    Something to reflect on...
    What's more Lilith and/or Lamia can possess women by entering them, through mirrors! A nifty trick...

    Cleanliness is next to godliness...
    I'd stick with the Lotus connection it has more Elan and what's more it's self cleaning

    :- )

    * referenced

    Christchurch • Since Dec 2006 • 7953 posts Report Reply

  • Lilith __, in reply to Ian Dalziel,

    Ian can I just say…I don’t know what you have for breakfast, but I’m pretty sure you could patent it! ;-) [Lithosphere, indeed!]

    Regarding the transition from Mesopotamian goddess to Hebrew demon: it’s amazing how old stories and images never seem to get thrown away, just reused for new purposes.

    Dunedin • Since Jul 2010 • 3895 posts Report Reply

  • Jeremy Andrew, in reply to Kyle Matthews,

    I wish it was illegal to indoctrinate kids like that :(

    As I saw quoted on the intenets somewhere recently:

    Religion is like a penis:
    Its ok to have one,
    Its ok to be proud of it,
    But don't bring it out in public,
    And don't try and shove it down my kids' throats.

    Hamiltron - City of the F… • Since Nov 2006 • 900 posts Report Reply

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