Technorati Rank #3,184,338! (And Slinky Jazz Babe #1)

WHOOT!!! 
I’m shooting for Technorati # 2,724,358, though. 

 With Molly Rose typing:   4at8w9kvnu    I should make it soon…

Miss Molly Rose Bean, part time computer expert. “Going intto ‘Sleep Mode’ cures most problems”, she says, “especially when the computer is turned on and is warm”. 

And just to show off my mad computer skills, here are some more embedded pictures and an audiovisual extravaganza. Warning: this is NOT an excuse to include a gratuitous sexy babe picture. I’ve gotten over that. This is, in fact, the first time I’ve featured a

SLINKY JAZZ BABE 

and so it is art appreciation and not coarse lechery.

Sophie Milman, born in Russia, lived in Israel and now Canada. 

Visit her website: http://www.sophiemilman.com/

Her new album released only a month or two ago is called “Take Love Easy” or as I prefer, the “Blue Dress Album”.

GO HERE  to listen to it.

Ever since Tommy Gun Annie at CXKU got me hooked on jazz, not all that long ago, I’ve been fascinated with how old pop and rock tunes get reinterpreted by jazz artists. On her latest, Milman covers Bruce Springsteen’s “I’m on Fire” and does a great version of Paul Simon’s “50 Ways to Leave Your Lover”. 

Her previous album from 2007 “Make Someone Happy” or “The Second Slinky Black Dress Album” (See photo above for the cover) has some great tunes along these lines, including a wonderful rendition of Stevie Wonder’s Rocket Love, and B.T.O.’s Undone (Randy Bachman even plays guitar on it)! It won a Juno in 2008 for the best vocal jazz album. 

 

Her first album from 2004, just called “Sophie Milman” (presumably because that’s her name, but I call it “Slinky Black Dress Album 1) is also great, and she has a Live EP, too.

I’m hardly one to comment on jazz since I really know so damn little about it, but I really like Milman’s albums. The pop/rock reinterpretations are wonderful, her voice is beautiful and very adaptable and she does light hearted, uptempo stuff and very haunting tunes equally well. One thing I have noticed about jazz singers is that they have no reservations about singing in other languages. Milman sings in English, her native Russian, Hebrew

One of my favourite tunes is on the “Make Someone Happy” Album. “Eli, Eli (A Walk To Caesarea)” was a poem written by Hannah Szenes in Hebrew. Szenes was a Hungarian resistance fighter executed by the Nazis. Even if you don’t know the words, its deep spirituality comes though, and even though I’m hardly a spiritual kind of guy, it does break me up. 

Anyway, let’s end on a positive note:

Sophie Milman on CBC’s Canada AM, May 6, 2009 with the title track from her latest.

 

Technorati Tags: jazz, slinky+jazz+babe, Sophi+Milman, cat, music, technorati+rating

A SOBER GOVERNMENT: The Selective Biblical Principles Party on the rights of the downtrodden

A NEW POLITICAL PARTY THAT WILL

SAVE CANADA!!!!!

BY THE FINEST SELECTION OF BIBLICAL PRINCIPLES

See the Original Party Announcement here

The S.B.P. Party, under the inspiration of its Official Officials, 

 Rev. Dr. Hermann Newt-Icks, MA, MB, MC, M.etc., PhD, Dphule, PDQ
and his excellentness,
Jebus B. Gobley, Prophet, Seer, Intercessor, Bishop of Kipp (AB) Pope of Cymric (SK)

are pleased announce the first plank in its platform to transform the True North Strong and Free into a land God will be pleased to keep.

But why the S.B.P.? First, we all know that the Bible is intended for all people and all times, even those people  who have never heard of it because they lived in times in which it didn’t exist. One cannot expect, therefore, that all of the Bible is equally relevant all the time to all people, even though, of course, all of its parts, including the maps at the back, are inerrant. Obviously, some kind of selection is necessary to manifest in the world the totality of its non-historically determined meaning, once and for all. 

Don’t be fooled by the Christian Heritage Party! They claim to be the “right conservatives” and blither about “biblical principles” in some vague sort of way.  They are more worried about being conservatives than pricipled Christians. Heck, if it didn’t matter which biblical principles form the basis of Canadian government, law, judiciary, education, economy, boardrooms, bedrooms, bathtubs, and backseats, then we might as well pool our money and property, like that silly church in the book of Acts and live like a bunch of godless commies sharing everything. Can’t have that!  

There are many problems facing Canada. With the economic meltdown, hippies, liberals, tree-huggers, spam artists, and that Sham-Wow guy running amok on the airwaves, we need the Bible more than ever. The most pressing problem in these troubled times, of course, is poverty. As we learn from our Lord and Saviour™, “The poor will be with you always”. Also, many people are facing immanent death, or are otherwise less than pleased with their lot in life. God did not intend us to be over-burdened by their weeping and wailing.  Still, the poor and the downtrodden are simply part of God’s creation and we should accept them gratefuly as such. Indeed, we should help them realize the full potential of their God-given state and devise laws that ensure that the “poor in spirit” may be truly blessed in their afllictions.

So here is the first plank in the S.B.P. party’s platform:

ON THE RIGHTS OF THE DOWNTRODDEN

PROVERBS 31:4-7

It is not for kings, O Lemuel, it is not for kings to drink wine; nor for princes strong drink:
Lest they drink, and forget the law, and pervert the judgment of any of the afflicted.
 Give strong drink unto him that is ready to perish, and wine unto those that be of heavy hearts.
Let him drink, and forget his poverty, and remember his misery no more.
           (King James Version, of course).

This passage is rarely invoked in discussions of social problems, but it is plain to see that it applies. First, note how monarchs are forbidden to drink lest they trample on human rights, especially those of the biblically downtrodden. On the contrary, it is the poor, fatally afflicted and folks otherwise down in the dumps (a policy on landfills and recycling is in the works, by the way, stay tuned) who need a good stiff (and free) drink. A government that would pay for the monarch to booze it up while the rank and file are crying in their “preferred” soda pop is one that is totally morally bankrupt. 

Queen Elizabeth shares a drink with Mexican President Felipe Calderon at Buckingham Palace in March 2009. Her Majesty is the one on the right, in the fancy hat. Both Britain and Mexico are in the throes of economic woes. Is it a coincidence? We doubt it. 

It has therefore been revealed to us what must be done. Her majesty and all of her princely offspring, and, just for good measure, assorted hangers on, must become total teetotalers, while the riff-raff gets freely totaled.

 ”Outlook determines outcome”, as they say. What better way for people to pull themselves out of poverty than by making sure they forget that they are poor and/or miserable?  But also note the verb in the clause “Give strong drink”. If our plan to solve the problem of national uncheeriness is going to work, our government must provide the people with the resources to do it! But how? After being careful to be guided by the Holy Spirit™ in the way that suits our needs best, we have correctly selected another Biblical Principle!

Leviticus 27:14-15

And when a man shall sanctify his house to be holy unto the LORD, then the priest shall estimate it, whether it be good or bad: as the priest shall estimate it, so shall it stand.

 And if he that sanctified it will redeem his house, then he shall add the fifth part of the money of thy estimation unto it, and it shall be his.

What is a “consecrated house”? A church, of course. So, all churches will pass to the Crown and will be appraised by the ministry of taxation (minister=priest). Before the congregation can employ their building for any religious purpose, they technically must “redeem” it (i.e. buy it back) at 120% of the appraised value. Of course, since they already paid for it once, it would be unfair to ask them to pay for it again (in the olden days people built their own houses, and besides, Leviticus is in the OLD Testament and we are free from the law). With this act of Christian mercy, an S.B.P. government will only charge the biblically mandated value-added “love offering” of one fifth (20%) of the property value for lawful redemption. This redemption, should, of course, happen each year the congregation want to use their building as a church consecrated to God. That much is obvious. God never changes. If He needed your 20% once, he needs it always. 

THEREFORE, the Selective Biblical Principles Party has decided that WHEN it is elected, all taxes on alcoholic beverages will be abolished and that people who can prove that they are either poor, sad, or really really really need a drink (verbal depositions to this effect will be accepted), will not be charged for their self-prescribed liquid medications in liquor stores, bars, pubs, etc. Proprietors of such establishments will forward the tab to the government who will then reimburse them out of a special “Medicinal Purposes-Care” fund created by the collection of redemptions from the churches.

This Chicago ad for a Bible Study course says it all: America is
far more religious that Canada. That’s why we missing out on
God’s Blessing! 

Our plan sounds bold, even a little crazy, doesn’t it? BUT ITS BIBLICAL! So it must be good for us. Remember, Jesus turned water into wine! So here it is in a nutcase:

THE S.B.P. PARTY WILL TAX THE CHURCHES 20% PER YEAR TO BUY BOOZE
If that don’t cheer this place up a bit, we don’t know what will! 

HELP MAKE THIS MIRACLE COME TRUE!
JOIN THE SELECTIVE BIBLICAL PRINCIPLES PARTY!

 THE RIGHT PRINCIPLES MAKE US THE RIGHT PARTY! 

And now, a musical interlude:

The Official Officials of the SBP Party would like to thank Dr. Jim for providing space for this announcement and especially for not posting a gratuitous sexy babe picture at the end of this post. That would be very inappropriate. We are also grateful for his willingness to advertise upstanding Christian music for the younger audience who may happen on this page.

Krystal Meyers. Gospel Singer. Please, no lusting, coveting or jealousy.

We’re serious, you must resist. Here, we will try it again.

 

Technorati Tags: Canadian+government, politics, biblical+principles, Bible, Christianity, atheism, Krystal+Meyers, tax+churches, alcohol,

The Many Prophets of Ancient Mari: Public Professor

Back in December, Dan Johnson and I started a weekly column in the Lethbridge Herald called “The Public Professor”. We twist arms on campus to get profs to write short bits on academic stuff of interest to the wider community. Its been a lot of fun but sometimes  harder than one imagines: we cannot get technical and they have to be around 600 words. Perhaps it is karma for demanding my students not get overly wordy.

The column comes out on Saturdays and are posted online, but I thought I would reproduce mine here.

Here is my most recent contribution from June 27, with some pictures added.

~~~~~~~~

Most societies throughout history have had prophets of various sorts, select individuals said to communicate with gods, spirits or ancestors about hidden or future matters. One of the oldest collections of ancient prophecy comes from a city called Mari (in modern Syria). Among the thousands of clay tablet documents found, there were approximately 50 letters referring to prophets. Their recipient was King Zimri-Lim, who reigned from around 1775 BCE to 1761 BCE.

One of Zimri Lim’s documents from Mari. Wikipedia’s photo of the artifact in the Louvre.

These prophets would speak in the name of several deities, including Dagan, Marduk and the goddess Ishtar. They would advise the king about wars, diplomacy, building projects and religious matters. On occasion, the king would be criticized for shirking religious obligations. Prophets might receive their messages through “incubation,” or sleeping in temples to promote dreams. Trances or altered mental states could be induced in other ways, perhaps with the aid of alcohol or other intoxicants.
There were many categories of prophet including the apilum, “answerer,” the muhhum, “ecstatic,” and Ishtar’s ritual singers, “assinnum.” Most of these were men who worked in temples with close connections to the royal court. Different classes of prophets more open to women would serve the lower ranks of society.

One Mari text predicts Zimri-Lim’s victory over the “man of Eshnunna.” That man, King Ibalpiel II, was himself the recipient of a few prophecies. His goddess, Kititum (one of the many guises of Ishtar) tells him in one text that under his rule, Eshnunna could look forward to peace, security and wealth. She says, “I, Kititum, will strengthen the foundations of your throne; I have established a protective spirit for you.” Perhaps both sides were just being told what they wanted to hear!

Prophecies would be tested by various forms of divination, including the rather gory technique of extispicy. Diviners would sacrifice an animal and then inspect the creature’s liver for clues that the prophecy was trustworthy. Of course, extispicy, like tea cup reading or astrology, has its own credibility issues but people tend to remember success more readily than failures. More importantly, prophecy and divination create the feeling that the world is knowable, predictable and ordered, rather than completely arbitrary or nonsensical.

In one Mari text, a servant of Zimri-Lim reports how a muhhum of Dagan called for the return of missing religious artifacts. He demanded to be given a lamb belonging to the king to eat. The report continues:
 “I gave him a lamb and he devoured it raw in front of the city gate. He assembled the elders in front of the gate of Saggaratum and said: ‘A devouring will take place! Give orders to the cities to return the taboo material.’“
The prophet’s meal does more than illustrate his point about an angry god. It seems based on the kind of symbolic relationships that were thought to give magic its power to change reality. In the eyes of the people of ancient Mari, divine punishment was likely imminent because of what the prophet did to the poor lamb. 

Readers of the Bible may recognize some aspects of the Mari prophetic texts. Young Samuel sleeps in a shrine and receives messages from God. Saul falls in with ecstatic prophets while Isaiah, Jeremiah, and Ezekiel perform bizarre symbolic acts. Many oracles declare salvation to the nation and many more predict doom. Yet, the Old Testament prophetic literature remains very different from that of Mari, written more than 1,000 years earlier. The biblical materials also went through a radically different process of writing, editing and collecting, a process that began around the same time as the Assyrians in northern Iraq began copying collections of prophetic oracles, too. But since the Assyrian and Israelite prophetic writings are already well over 2,000 years old, they can safely wait for another week’s column!
 Quotes are adopted from Martti Nissinen, Prophets and Prophecy in the Ancient Near East (Society of Biblical Literature, 2003), pp. 38, 94.

Ishtar or Inanna, probably the former because we can compare it to this more recent photo of her:

WHICH BRINGS US TO THE TRADITIONAL GRATUITOUS SEXY BABE PIC:

Singer Ishtar of the group Alabina, perhaps the Jewish version of the virgin Mari “Madonna”
Visit her website for more reveal-ations   

Actually, according to Wikipedia, Ishtar (Eti Zac) served as a helicopter technician in the Israeli Army and sings in Hebrew, English, French, Arabic and Spanish, although presumably not all at the same time. She has some solo albums, and some with the group Los Niños de Sara under the name Alabina. All sorts of musical influences. I know I’m influenced.

A statue of  Ebish-II, attendant of Zimri Lim, found in Mari’s Ishtar temple (from Wikipedia).
I know why his eyes are like that. Ain’t nothin’ to do with old Zimri, though… 

DR. JIM CRASHES THE CHRISTIAN HERITAGE (HOMO)SEXY PARTY!

      
 

Bill 44 and the evil homosexual agenda were the topics of an incredibly STUPID letter by Geoffrey Capp almost a month ago in the Lethbridge Herald. The bill revises Alberta’s human rights code to include parents pulling their kids from school classes dealing with topic contrary to parent’s religious sensibilities, like anything to do with sex, sexuality, or religion. Needless to say, the Conservative bill pleased Capp to no end. I fired off a response and forgot to post it here, so here it is a little late with some relevant new epistolary and commentarial developments.

Capp was the local candidate for the Christian Heritage Party in the last election. He didn’t win.

Y’know, I’m starting to think that all the shit raised by the Religious Right about sex is kind of a surrogate pornography for them. They get to study and denounce all this smut and debauchery and get their jollies. Anyway, just a theory… 

First, Capp’s original letter from June 11.

Parents deserve right to shield kids from liberal curriculum

Geoffrey Capp (from CHP page)

So long as our schools are going to teach on moral issues and do so using only what is considered “politically correct,” parents must have the right to exclude their children from segments of the school curriculum.

I don’t mind the schools teaching the children how to do mathematics, spell, write, read, understand geography, know the basic history of the world, learn physics, chemistry and biology, learn about nutrition and the vital body functions, etc. But if the schools are going to teach about sexuality and reproduction, I draw the line.

Modern schooling is somewhat biased to begin with, biased by teachers trained in liberal-minded universities. The bias becomes acute when it comes to sex education. They teach about homosexuality and teach only the implication that people might be “born that way,” but they don’t teach the alternative belief that it is socially caused, possibly by, for example, the absence of a father positively involved in his children’s upbringing.

They teach about homosexuality as an “optional lifestyle” but they don’t teach about the negative aspects of it such as health issues, clinical depression, the high frequency of substance abuse and the substantially shortened life expectancy. They teach about methods of contraception but they don’t promote abstinence until marriage. They teach about abortion but they don’t teach about the health risks of abortion such as an increased risk of breast cancer.

As long as the schools are biased and don’t give the proper emphasis on the hazardous aspects, parents should have every right to exclude their children from an educational arrangement that may put their children at risk of hurting themselves or others. We teach our children the Great Commandment, which includes a commandment that they must love everyone, including homosexuals.

My preference is that schools provide impartial information to parents and encourage them to teach the children at home. My wife and I have a fine set of books, the first of which is designed for children as young as five, and in fact we have used them when the children were younger but asking. We are not shy about discussing it, and that is the best any parent can do for their children.

Thank you, Alberta PCs, for being willing to let us, if it is our preference, keep our children out of the liberal-minded curricula.
Geoffrey Capp

The Herald is usually pretty slow in printing letters, it often takes over a week. One good thing, however, is that they do not mind long letters. They seem to have an upper limit of about 400 words, which is way longer than a lot of other papers. Even so, I couldn’t write everything I wanted to say. I did come up with a great first paragraph, though.

My response (June 25).

  Writer’s views on origins of homosexuality ‘troubling’  

Yours truly with baby, Spike.

Geoffrey Capp doesn’t mind students being educated in biology and “vital body functions” but not sexuality and reproduction. I wonder where Capp thinks babies come from, if not from “bodily functions.” Perhaps he thinks schools should “teach the controversy” and propose a stork theory. 

More troubling is Capp’s view on the biological origins of homosexuality. He favours the “alternative belief” that it is determined by social factors, such as the absence of a father figure, be taught. What studies have linked homosexuality to absentee fathers? “Beliefs” do not cut it as the basis of a formal education. That diseases are caused by demons is a religious belief that won’t go away, but it is hardly the basis for teaching students about health.

The “health issues, clinical depression, the high frequency of substance abuse and the substantially shortened life expectancy” Capp associates with homosexuality are more likely to be the result of the social stigma against it, a stigma Capp is only perpetuating. Massive social problems of this sort can be found in any marginalized and persecuted population. Capp’s boast that he teaches his children to love everyone while demanding the right to excuse his children from hearing about people who make him squeamish is a self righteous hypocrisy we can do without. If students do not learn that homosexuality exists and does not interfere with people leading lives beneficial to society as a whole, where will they learn it? From the Bible that teaches universal love while equating same sex relations with murder and that homosexuals should be executed?

A final point: the idiocy of Bill 44 cuts both ways: I don’t imagine Capp would be too pleased if atheist parents pulled their children from classes on Canadian politics lest the youngsters learned about the Christian Heritage Party, for whom Capp ran in the last election. 

AND FINALLY, the STUPID GETS STUPIDER! Here is Aris Slingerland, who was Capp’s campaign manager in a letter on a somewhat related topic, the Pridefest held June 9. My comments are in bold italics.

Re: Article on Pride Fest, June 9.

It is not something for Lethbridge to be proud of. Instead it should make us weep and mourn for several reasons.

1. That we live in a society where the Bible and prayer is banned from most schools so young people are no longer taught about responsibility. A picture of all of us is found in Psalms 81:11-16. Our hearts are desperately wicked. Mine, too, but that does not mean we can do what we like.

Ok, so the only way “responsibility” can be taught is through teaching the bible and praying in school? How the fuck does preaching “Original Sin” (a doctrine completely foreign to the Old Testament Psalms) teach responsibility? Heaping any hope of doing right on some deity’s intervention is not responsibility, it is passing the buck. Sure, people do some desperately wicked things. Judging them harshly for things they are not responsible for (like being homosexual) is one of them.

2. That this group of people distorts the truth of the Bible to their own purpose. God gave His law by Moses, specifically the 10 Commandments. The seventh commandment reads “Thou shalt not commit adultery.” Read Leviticus 18 and 19 for an explanation of what that means.

And to write as if we do not have to pay attention to what Paul wrote is very wrong. It is also part of the inspired Word of God.

 Who are “this group of people”?  Is there any church anywhere that bases its doctrine solely on unbiased analysis of the what the Bible actually says? I doubt it. Hell, even “St.” Paul could be accused of cooking the books to his own ends. Remember, the New Testament is a tendentious interpretation of the varied documents comprising the Old Testament. Reinventing the what the “word of God” says has been going on ever since, and probably even before, the Bible itself was invented. 

Even though they claim the government has no business in the bedrooms of the nation, the government is still responsible to uphold the Law of God in public life.

Really? Where the fuck does it say that the government is supposed to uphold the law of “God”? Whose god is that? And whose version of this deity’s laws? Here Slingerland is mixing up the agenda of his theocratic party with the function of a government of a pluralistic society. The government is bound by law to uphold the constitution which guarantees freedom of religion. The CHP want to change the fundamental basis of what government is about.  And notice how the first two of Slingerland’s “several reasons” are numbered while the remainder are not. Maybe he couldn’t count higher.

What we see today, though, is people are not willing to heed what the Bible teaches. Neither are they satisfied with the freedom to do evil in their bedrooms, but they try to justify themselves by demanding public recognition. How sad.

“Freedom to do evil”? Consenting adults playing with each other is “evil?” What about all the child molestation that churches cover up? Why no uproar about that? 

Another reason to mourn is city council so readily gave their consent. For by their consent, they have scorned the feelings of the majority of citizens, and become partakers of the evil. How sad! 

What part of the old democratic live and let live does this guy not quite understand? Regardless of what the majority might want, freedoms must be extended to minorities, too. 

Since I had a letter in only a few weeks ago, I don’t see them publishing me again, so this will have to be my response. In any case, Slingerland’s letter got posted to the LDS email list, so it went around some of the most liberal, skeptical, clever, mischievious and down right twisted minds at the university. Ah, yes, the Lethbridge District Skeptics. WHO DID YOU THINK I WAS TALKING ABOUT???

Anyway, some of the folks at LDS were pretty offended, although I don’t think Slingerland’s letter constitutes “hate literature”, as some on the list suggested. I’m hardly the one to champion censorship unless there is a call for violence or outright dehumanization of someone. Still, it will be nice to read the responses, I’m sure they are coming!

I have decided to end the tradition of adding a gratuitous and entirely sexist babe photo, not that there have been any complaints, mind you (no one reads this crap I write).  

Oh, what the hell!!!?????!

Anti-gay marriage pageantess Carrie Prejean reads her Bible.
(AP Photo/Denis Poroy, April 26, 2009)

Yup, that’d be Carrie, again. Don’t know where her Bible is.

 

THERE’S PROBABLY NO PADDING…

It has been AGES since I posted a new bra in my “If Religions Made Bra” page, and then I found this on

Hemant Mehta’s Friendly Atheist site, a contribution to the Atheist Bust Campaign. 

The Friendly Atheist post has a long series on comments on whether or not this is sexist. It might be, but this might be:

Dr. Jim’s Now Standard Horribly Sexist and Totally Gratuitous Babe Picture that is not exactly contextually relevant so sue me. 

Nicole Kidman in the movie that pissed off religious folk around the world, The Golden Compass. Perhaps she could do endorsements for Hemant’s creation?

Check out the rest here. 

Dr. Jim on Bill 44.

Dr. Jim has a lot of opinions on Alberta’s Bill 44 that would give parents
the “right” to pull kids from classes deemed religiously offensive or that
deal with sex or sexuality. The provincial government was long overdue
in updating the human rights legislation to recognize gay rights and so
finally including this, they thought they had to “balance” this by giving the conservative (in more ways than one) religious folk in the province some additional “rights” of its own. Hence, you have the right to keep your kids ignorant, and teachers would have the obligation to warn parents in advance if they intend on talking about potentially offensive subjects in class. 

Of course there has been a massive backlash, and some nut jobs celebrating the proposed changes. The Calgary Herald ran a letter on the 21st by someone complaining that teachers who oppose the bill were “distrustful” and “antagonistic” towards parents. To which I replied (published May 25). 

Re: “Parents first,” Letter, May 21.

Public education should not be a means of producing ideological clones of students’ parents, but to prepare students for being independent. I wonder if the proponents of the relevant parts of Bill 44 are not unreasonably distrustful and antagonistic towards teachers and an education system they cannot micromanage according to their own inward-looking perspective.

Religion and sexuality are as important political topics as they are private issues. Why should schools need parents’ permission to raise these topics? Parents objecting to discussions of sex, sexual preferences or religion are probably more in need of such classes than their children. At least in the higher grades, sex education and courses on world religions taught from a non-confessional standpoint should be mandatory. No exceptions should be allowed for public, separate, charter, private or home-school students.

Giving parents a “right” to veto their children’s participation in such subjects amounts to an educational and intellectual ghettoization and sectarianism. Students caught in the middle are not given the opportunity to develop the skills to participate fully in society.

Gratuitous Slinky Babe pic:

Audrey Tautou, who starred in The Da Vinci Code. Why is it relevant? It really isn’t. She is just gorgeous. But I thought I would include since The Da Vinci Code is probably the level of many people’s views on religion. See, I’m not just some pervert. I’m a snarky pervert. 

 

 

 

Hector Avalos on “Film and the Apologetics of Biblical Violence”

Hector Avalos of Iowa State University has published an excellent article in the online journal JOURNAL OF RELIGION AND FILM.  The published abstract:

Most films that depict biblical violence are part of a broader apologetic effort to justify violence by biblical protagonists. In order to understand the variety and complexity of these apologetic efforts, the author introduces a typology that consists of five logical techniques that can be applied to biblical stories depicted on film: 1) deletion of violence; 2) addition of violence; 3) minimization of existing violence; 4) maximization of existing violence; 5) reconfiguration of violence. The author focuses on specific episodes in Jesus films and in films dealing with the life of Moses to illustrate his thesis.

A not particularly happy Hebrew in C. B. De Mille’s The Ten Commandments

From Avalos’ conclusion:

[32] The Code of 1934 also forbade graphic depictions of killing. Thus, we cannot expect a lot of graphic violence by protagonists or antagonists during the Code period. Deletion and minimization reigned under the Code. Yet, the Code explicitly directed that religious characters be depicted positively. We can see that there was a difference in how violence by biblical protagonists could be reconfigured to justify them. Reconfiguration was always applied to Moses’ killing of the Egyptian, whereas no justification is ever offered for the Egyptian beating the Hebrew slave (e.g., could that have been reconfigured into self-defense?).

[33] On the other hand, addition and maximization of the violence is the standard for pagan acts of violence against biblical champions. That is certainly the case with The Passion of the Christ , which has extremely graphic violence perpetrated by Romans and Jews against Christ. Hammering of the nails into Jesus’ hands, albeit shown at a distance, is already there in the Life and Passion of Christ (1903), which certainly would be a Pre-Code movie. But it is clear that addition and maximization became prominent after the 1960s, after the Code ceased to exist. Yet, with few exceptions, enhanced violence is still mainly on the part of the antagonists against biblical protagonists.

Yeah, the pagans are made out to be total depraved buggers and the Israelites are good guys, up until Jesus comes along and then the Jews are bastards along with the Romans. 

Anyway, it is a good little article that merits reading. And now for the moment some of you have been waiting for, the dreaded 

THEMATICALLY APPROPRIATE BUT STILL GRATUITOUSLY SEXIST BABE PIC.

Padma Lakshmi, from the TV miniseries, The Ten Commandments.

“Thou shalt not covet…” Damn, blew that one. Again.

Lethbridge’s “Militant” Atheist in Chief “Heralded” again.

BIBLE MAN, Dr. Jim’s Anti-Militant Arch-Nemesis 

“Blessed are the latent homo-erotic fantasy figures, for theirs shall be a sidekick of African descent”.

Yes, I am now officially (well, not really) Lethbridge’s Atheist in Chief. I’m continuing to catch hell from the faithful in the pages of the Lethbridge Herald, although not all the letters are showing up on their website (boo!).

Anyway, on April 8 someone names Andrew Joosse complained about my earlier letter in which I called faith a red herring (and that in response to another of my fans). I posted it here. 

So, I typed up a response and sent it in and it got published. Here it is, with some additional pictorial illumination and caption commentary.  

Andrew Joosse calls me “militant” for criticizing religion. Militant people carry guns and throw bombs. I wrote to my local newspaper. Luckily, I didn’t use upper-case letters for emphasis or Lethbridge might get a reputation as a terrorist haven.  

A gun shop, perhaps the one from where the noted militant, Dr. Jim, bought his deadly lap-top that has been striking common sense into sleepy town of Lethbridge . 

My views are said to confirm Augustine’s claim that Christians do not base belief on reason but rather believe in order to understand. OK, so Augustine was happy with a circular argument and a bit of special pleading that seemingly protects his views from criticism and self-doubt. I’m glad Mr. Joosse and I had the opportunity to clear that up. 

Gee, that was fun, lets have another go around that same theme (yes, cheap joke, but I like the cartoon, too).

 

I do not question many Christians’ charitable nature or work for world peace but the same can be said of Muslims, Jews, Hindus, Wiccans, agnostics, and atheists. My real point is that religions get undeserved preferential treatment. For example, organized religions enjoy special laws allowing them to issue tax receipts for donations, regardless of whether the money is put to any real humanitarian end. This is unfairly denied to other groups. 

To illustrate the Christian sense of “true religion”, Mr. Joosse employs a verse from the biblical prophet Micah that advocates doing justice and humbly walking with one’s god. We get a different perspective on it if we flip ahead several pages in the Bible to the prophet Malachi, who accuses poverty stricken Judeans of stealing from God by skimping on their tithes, offerings and sacrifices to the temple.  Some biblical passages are simply timeless. 

Before this letter was published, however, the Herald published another letter about my earlier note. This is not online so here is my badly typed reproduction. 

Brock Schuler writes (Faith has Value, April 15). 

I find it unfortunate when people refer to faith in derogatory ways when it has so much to offer. Faith provides foundations for morals and gives hope.

When people refer to the concept of a God like “mythology” or “magical” or a “pretentious red herring that merits little regard,” they are throwing away something of value. But I suppose more than one atheist blames his problems on religion.” And no, the atheist Ahab will not be slain by faith, but he is shown to be close-minded as he barely considers the possibility of a God, which is closer to shooting oneself in the foot.

I feel sorry for the naturalist / secularlist / scientist that has nothing to believe in. I find belief in God essential for my personal and spiritual development, even my intellectual development.

So, in sparing the Herald yet another of my letters, I will respond here, but I hope others do write in, as Schuler repeats a number of perfectly asinine generalities about atheism and misconceptions about morality that do need addressing in public.

Schuler think it “unfortunate when people refer to faith in derogatory ways” because it “ provides foundations for morals and gives hope.” Of course, morality does not come from faith at all, but evolution. The simple requirements of social living would demand a system of rules governing interactions.

What really bugs me is that religionists often appeal to “moral absolutes” enshrined by their faith but do not notice how other faiths–and godless folk–share many of the basic tenets like taboos against killing (in at least most circumstances). Beyond some basic issues, the contents of “moral absolutes” are pretty darn relative.

 

The contents of religious faith may be a way of externalizing and legitimizing morality as somehow a requirement for human life but it is hardly the only way. Religion (not “faith”) is an all-encompassing symbolic symbol system that articulates what believers find important, but it is hardly the case that without a religious context, the important institutions of human social life would be abandoned. 

One thing that really gets me about Schuler’s opening line is that “faith” and “hope” are taken as entities in their own right, rather than feelings or beliefs. FAITH IN WHAT? HOPE IN WHAT? These are religious keywords that carry a lot of symbolic baggage but little real content.

And why should the godless be utterly without hope of a good life for ourselves and loved ones? Sure, it would be nice to think that somehow all the crap one has to put up with will all go away, or that you would get the job you want, or your kids would have an easier life than you did, but what good is hoping on a god? It is scarcely a replacement for actually doing something to help your situation.

Of course, there are many situations that are completely out of one’s control, and perhaps “faith” in a deity or another can bring consolation, but it is an empty consolation in the long run. There will be no justice unless people want to make it work, no equitable distribution of goods until people stop being selfish. An atheist with a strong sense of attachment to all of humanity can have high ideals about making the world a better place, a sense of dignity and the strength of convictions. I see no advantage to “faith” in terms of hopes for a better life down here. 

And what of hopes of a more transcendent nature, that manifests itself in expectations of heaven for Christians? Well, a lot of religions have no counterpart or so utterly differently construe the afterlife and human condition, that Christian conceptions of “hope” are little more than statements of being comfortable with one cultural context while finding others strange or disconcerting. By the same token, the sense of interconnections with the universe that many atheists feel is totally misunderstood by most religious folks. There is no transcendence in the Christian sense, but there is a sense that one belongs to some far older and far more lasting than one’s own several decades of life (give or take several decades…). 

Ain’t it neat being part of all of this?

Schuler gets it all wrong when says people are discarding something valuable when they “refer to the concept of a God like “mythology” or “magical” or a “pretentious red herring that merits little regard,” adding, “I suppose more than one atheist blames his problems on religion.”

Hey, fucktard, I suppose there are many religious people who blame THEIR fucking problems on the existence of people who disagree with them. It needs to be said here that Schuler is, just like my other fans Knoch and Joosse before him, completely ignoring the real focus of my recent letters, to challenge the privileges religion enjoys. Instead of actually addressing the matter, they just assume I have some sort of psychological issue with religion. He continues:

And no, the atheist Ahab will not be slain by faith, but he is shown to be close-minded as he barely considers the possibility of a God, which is closer to shooting oneself in the foot.

Closed minded? Holy fuck! Time for cup of tea!

And at the end, Shuler feigns compassion

I feel sorry for the naturalist / secularlist / scientist that has nothing to believe in. I find belief in God essential for my personal and spiritual development, even my intellectual development.

What a pathetic little man he is. “Nothing to believe in”? Oh for Jebus’ sake, give me a break. Now, there is a nice point right at the end, though isn’t there? God is necessary for his INTELLECTUAL development?  Well, perhaps he should try believing in himself and his own natural intelligence rather than on vain hopes that Jesus will home-school him. Who knows, it might open his mind. 

And now for the best part of all my new posts, the gratuitous but thematically appropriate slinky babe. 

Elizabeth Hurley in Bedazzled. 

DR. JIM JUST SAID “NO” TO THE OPIUM OF BIBLICAL SCHOLARSHIP

YUP, THAT’S RIGHT! I SAID NO TO CONTRIBUTING TO A SURE-FIRE SUCCESSFUL PUBLICATION THAT WOULD HAVE GOT ME READ FAR AND WIDE FOR YEARS TO COME.

SHIT, I’M STUPID. 

No, I’m not. I just have principles, dammit.

Ok, here is what happened… Its the truth, the unholy truth, and nothing but whatever I want to claim the truth is. 

A week or so ago I recieved an email from InterVarsity Press. Someone had recommended me as a contributor to the new four volume Dictionary of the Old Testament. For the uninitiated, in Biblical Studies, the word “encyclopedia” does not exist. I do not know why. It just doesn’t. The word “dictionary”, however, does, and it is used for multi-volume encyclopedias. For example, the “Anchor Bible Dictionary” has six huge volumes (IIRC, ca. 1200 pages each). The InterVarsity would be small at 4 x 1000 pages. Anyway,three of the volumes have been published (Penteteuch, Historical Books, Wisdom and Poety & Writings) they asked if I would be interested in writing 7500 word on literary approaches to the Prophets. They would actually give me money. I said no. 

What the hell was I thinking?

Here is what I was thinking. InterVarsity is one of the biggest publisher of evangelical crap on the planet. That being said, they do have some useful books and some interesting ones. Their series on early Christian interpretation of scripture is very good. I have the volume on Genesis 1-11, edited by Andrew Louth.

It is a nice selection of how the early church fathers interpreted the primal myths of Genesis’ opening chapters (they were hardly very interested in a ‘literal’ interpretation!). The one volume of the Dictionary of the Old Testament that I skimmed (Historical Books) didn’t seem that bad (at least the bits I thumbed through). The entry on Kings even mentioned my published thesis in a very non-mocking manner (ok, that’s a point against the DOT).

Of course, the assignment was not to offer my own interpretation but to present the main lines of thought that characterizes academic work on the Bible’s prophetic books. So why should I have a problem with that? My own views would not be compromised by reporting what other folks think. But here is what IVP said their target audience of the DOT. 

Articles should be written with the following range of readers in mind: the educated lay person, the student of the Old Testament, the teacher and the minister. A large percentage of the anticipated audience will consist of persons who engage with OT texts as Scripture in order to understand and communicate its message to contemporary audiences.

Just the fact that they wrote “Scripture” (note the uppercase S) was damn near a deal breaker. But more seriously, why the hell should it matter what the religious views and ambitions of the audience are? Is that supposed to change the academic landscape of literary analysis of the Old Testament prophetic corpus? Am I only to report on the academic work that supports theological readings of the Bible? (o.k., that’s about 95% of it, but still…). 

I teach Old Testament and other Religious Studies courses to a mixed bag of students whose own religious views I neither know or care to know. It makes no difference and I would get into a hell of a lot of trouble if I asked. If I’m honest to the scholarship in the field, whether a student is a Christian, Jew, Buddhist or raving fanatical atheist is totally irrelevant. So why should the religious background of a reference book’s intended audience matter? 

THEOLOGY IS THE OPIUM OF BIBLICAL SCHOLARSHIP

Playing the theology game promises a paradise of a bazzillion bible schools, seminaries, etc. that will use your work and possibly think you are great and so insightful. But it is an addiction that must be resisted. Secular scholars play its game and I’m becoming increasingly aware of how it compromises serious academic work. 

A great read is Hector Avalos’ “The End of   Biblical Studies” (Prometheus Press, 2007)

Avalos argues that Biblical Studies as it has been practiced for ages honestly must end: it serves only to legitimize the continued misperception that the Bible is relevant to the modern world. Biblical Studies is essentially bibliolatrous, andeven secular  schoalrship is engaged in defending the bible to preserve its own right to exist as an industry. 

Avalos is right. Secular scholarship does play into the hand of the theological crowd and thrives parasitically on them. But at what cost? I suppose my own work up to this point can be criticized in this regard too. Well, I’m going to change that. 

Of course, since Biblical Studies is so closely intertwined with theology that simply walking away is not possible. A lot of work on the Bible has been done by the confessionally minded and a good bit of this work is very good. Boycotting the religious scholars would be absurd, arrogant and generally not acceptable. Neither is boycotting publishing houses that also produce theological work: one would simply run out of places to publish. But it is practical to simply refuse to take part in projects that require granting a special status to religious sensibilities or to religion in general, and that is what I am going to do. I’m also going to stop turning the other cheek when it comes to overt or crypto-theology at confereces or in academic work. 

Dammit, it is about time someone started a Society for Secular Biblical Research. Wanna join?

EDITED TO ADD: Gratuitous sexist picture of a total babe actress to boost  my hit count (Dr. Jim’s new plan for world domination)

Jacqueline Logan: “Mary Magdelene” in Cicil B. De Mille’s “King of Kings”

Modern Atheists are Wussies!

THEY DON’T DISBELIEVE LIKE THEY USED TO!

That’s the conclusion of my friend and colleague in Religious Studies at the U. of Lethbridge, Tom Robinson, who has been studying the history of the girl evangelist movement in the 1920s and ’30s, and in so doing uncovered a lot of information about the atheist movement at the time. He published a brief overview of it in the Lethbridge Herald’s weekly column “Public Professor”. 

Tom’s article “Advertising atheism sparks backlash” begins by commenting on the recent bus ad business (alas, the Lethbridge campaign has not got exact fare, so it is stalled). Anyway, this is mild compared to the ’20s.

In 1925 the American Association for the Advancement of Atheism (the 4As, as it was called) was formed. It declared itself the “Militant Foe of the Church and Clergy.” The association tried to shut down campaigns of revivalist preachers, they established a Junior Atheist League for school children, they set up the American Anti-Bible Society, they successfully argued against having the Ten Commandments read in public schools in New York, they called the Bible “a cesspool of Asiatic superstition,” they established a seminary, and they may have encouraged their members to steal Gideon bibles from hotel rooms. They even sent out missionaries to foreign lands — to British Columbia and then to Sweden, apparently two areas of the world most in need of the message.

In a fit of brilliance that may have inspired Monty Python, one group developed their own atheist hymnal with this classic:

 Blame God from whom all cyclones blow,
Blame him when rivers overflow,
Blame him who swirls down house and steeple,
Who sinks the ships and drowns the people.

There was no youtube of itunes back then, apparently, so I don’t have  a recording, but here is Monty Python:

And then there is Queen Silver who Tom says began her anti-Church crusade at age 4.

Take that, Sam Harris! She’ll show you how its done!

Tom briefly mentions the “Godless Girl”, Cecil B. De Mille’s last silent film. Basically it is lust story of two kids who end up in reform school and try to escape , but the thing that sets the story up is a huge brawl that breaks out between the High School bible thumpers and the bible bashers. It is the thumpers who are more militant and try to break up an atheists meeting which ends up in one dead, and 2 imprison. 

One of the best scenes comes early when the atheist group is initiating new members. The “converts” to the godless cause have to swear their allegiance by putting their hand on the head of a monkey. 

The monkey survived the fight. The fellow here actually backed down from the oath after he was told he would have to give up Christmas. OOOOO They were hard liners back then!

Tom also recommends tracking down this old tome, if you are interested in the 1920’s religious landscape: Charles W. Ferguson, The New Books of Revelations: The Inside Story of America’s Astounding Religious Cults (Garden City, NY: Doubleday, Doran & Company, 1929).

Tom has published another Public Professor column in mid-February on the evolution controversy in early evengelicalism. Surprisingly, not all early evangelicals were opposed to it!

In The question of origins and the reading of ancient texts Tom writes:

Even some early so-called fundamentalists in the 1900s saw the Genesis story as more symbolic than literal. In the most definitive expression of fundamentalism at the time, the multi-volume collection of articles called The Fundamentals, James Orr, a Scottish churchman and professor, wrote an article titled “Science and the Christian Faith.” He argued that the Bible should not be treated as a textbook on science, since it “does not profess to anticipate the scientific discoveries of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries.” Orr reminded his readers that the world the Bible describes “is the world men know and live in, and it is described as it appears, not as, in its recondite researches, science reveals its inner constitution to us.” Orr even spoke of “a growing appreciation of the strength of the evidence for the fact of some form of evolutionary origenetic connection of higher with lower forms.” 

The Fundamentals was a multivolume set finished in 1917 as R.A. Torrey, A.C. Dixon (eds) The Fundamentals: A Testimony to the Truth Grand Rapids, MI: Baker Book House Co., Baker Books, 1917.

Tom also talks about the Scopes Monkey Trial of 1925 in which a Tennessee teacher was fined for teaching evolution in class. 

Tennesee, 1925, A monkey scopes out the flapper babes. 

Tom writes:

From that time, Christian fundamentalism came to be characterized by its opposition to the theory of evolution and by its defence of a fairly literal reading of the Bible. In part, the fundamentalist reaction can be explained by an increasingly nasty struggle between fundamentalism and more liberalizing fellow Christians (the modernists). Modernist views, arising out of new perspectives of the Enlightenment, questioned the concept of miracle and dismissed the ancient and pre-scientific worldview of the Bible as quaint. In the struggle between modernism and fundamentalism, the theory of evolution came to be seen by some as a choice between the truth of the Bible and the skepticism and rationalism of the modernists. Fundamentalists worried that a non-literal reading of the creation story might lead to non-literal readings of other parts of the Bible central to Christian teachings. Some thought that this might threaten traditional Christian belief at its core. Thus the theory of evolution became one of the prominent markers separating the two sides — the line in the sand, so to speak — and it still serves as one of the key battle lines for many today.

What this says to me is how religious discourses, like everything else, have histories. It would be hard to get many fundamentalists to see beyond the modern polarizations, and some atheists I know would also have trouble doing the same!

Anway, the only post I have ever made on this site that gets any respectable number of hits is the one with a nice picture of a total babe actress, so in a bit of total gratuitous pretty face mongering, here is another one:

Lina Basquette, the Godless Girl.