Tag Archives: Noah

The 500-Year-Old Ceiling That Still Brings Down the House!

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Michelangelo’s fresco on the Sistine Chapel ceiling turns 500 years old today! (10/31/2012) The Renaissance artist realized long ago, that the best way to make sure your painting does not get taken off the wall is to make sure your painting IS the wall.

People have praised his upside-down artistic achievement for most of these five centuries—though I believe it was El Greco who saw the ceiling and basically said, “Yeah, I coulda done better.” So instead of addressing the artistic achievement of the ceiling, I thought I’d reveal a few of its most endearing oddities and the corresponding Bible quotes.

This first scene I’ve chosen shows an unflattering angle of God as he creates a fairly un-majestic bush, recalling this Bible verse:

And again the Lord said, “Behold there is a place near me, and thou shalt stand upon the rock. And when my glory shall pass by, I will set thee in a hole of the rock, and protect thee with my right hand, till I pass. And I will take away my hand, and thou shalt see my back parts, but my face thou canst not see.” —Exodus 33:20-23

The next image is one you don’t see often in religious paintings: Noah as an old naked, drunk. Not to say that Michelangelo was plagiarizing himself, but it’s basically the “Creation of Adam” composition but with the Adam/Noah figure too wasted to point back to the finger that’s pointing at him. But hey, it’s a big ceiling; all those little kids touring the Vatican would hardly even notice the passed out 600-year-old man exposing himself, right?

He drank some wine, got drunk, and lay naked inside his tent. —Genesis 9:21

We also have Moses’ cure for those who were dying from being bitten by the fiery serpents that God was sending down to them. All you had to do back in those days was look at the brass serpent Moses put on top of a pole, and you would not die. I don’t know if this cure still works. Next time you’re bitten by a snake, you may want to ask to your doctor if Brass Serpent Beholding is right for you.

And Moses made a serpent of brass, and put it upon a pole, and it came to pass, that if a serpent had bitten any man, when he beheld the serpent of brass, he was made well. —Numbers 21:9

One of the many prophets that Michelangelo painted was Ezekiel. The Book of Ezekiel has this underpreached treasure:

Your kerchiefs also will I tear, and ye shall know that I am the Lord. —Ezekiel 13:21

as well as this one:

And he said to me, “This is the house of the kitchens wherein the ministers of the house of the Lord shall boil the victims of the people.” —Ezekiel 46:24

 

And finally, this lovely scene of Judith, who, after beheading Holofernes, needed to stash the head somewhere!

And she struck twice upon his neck, and cut off his head, and took off his canopy from the pillars, and rolled away his headless body. And after a while she went out, and delivered the head of Holofernes to her maid, and bade her put it into her wallet. —Judith 13:10-11

So congratulations Michelangelo for having created such a lasting work of art, that still amazes to this day. 500 years is a very long time indeed. How long, you ask? 500 years is exactly the amount of time it took until Noah was finally able to father his three sons.

After Noah was 500 years old, Noah fathered Shem, Ham, and Japheth. —Genesis 5:32

I can only hope my paintings are still around in 500 years, but with medical advances and clean living, I’m quite confident that I will still be around fathering children to populate my space ark.

 Michael Morris is the author of Bible Funmentionables: A Lighthearted Look at the Wildest Verses You’ve NEVER Been Told!, which features all of the shocking and hilarious verses that your minister, rabbi, or charismatic cult leader is afraid to preach.

The 6 Most Boring Passages of the Bible (And Why You Should Avoid Them)

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Most kids think church is boring. No news there. But now, in classic man-bites-dog style, it’s a Catholic bishop who has made headlines by complaining that church is too boring!

Retired Philippine Catholic Bishop Teodoro Bacani claims that boring sermons are hurting the church’s market share, as many are seeking out the El Shaddai Catholic charismatic movement instead of their traditional Catholic parish.

Boring sermons may cause drowsiness in the Philippines, but according to the Bible, boring sermons can kill!

A certain young man named Eutychus sat in the window, weighed down with deep sleep. As Paul spoke still longer, being weighed down by his sleep, he fell down from the third story and was taken up dead. —Acts 20:9

To avoid boring their congregation to death, Bishop Bacani recommends that priests learn a more effective and “livelier” way of communicating their message. For a religion that claims to offer the ultimate truths of life, creation, and heaven and hell, it seems superficial to attempt to repackage those eternal truths to accommodate the short attention span generation.

A more reliable solution is to know which Bible passages to avoid in the first place! So as a service to preachers everywhere, I offer this Do Not Read List of The Bible’s 6 Most Boring Passages. Attempting to read these passages may not be mortally monotonous, but they could easily cause a loss of tithing churchgoers. And as most preachers know, to quote the church leader in the movie Help!, “without the congregation there’ll be no…more…me.”

1. The Table of Nations: Genesis 10-11 (Genealogies of People You’ll Never Meet and You Couldn’t Care Less About)

And these are births of the sons of Noah, Shem, Ham, and Japheth, and born to them are sons after the deluge. Sons of Japheth are Gomer, and Magog, and Madai, and Javan, and Tubal, and Meshech, and Tiras. And sons of Gomer are Ashkenaz, and Riphath, and Togarmah. —Genesis 10:1-3

2. Setting Up the Tabernacle: Exodus 40 (Moses Puts up a Tent)

And it came to pass in the first month in the second year, on the first day of the month, that the tabernacle was reared up. And Moses reared up the tabernacle, and fastened his sockets, and set up the boards thereof, and put in the bars thereof, and reared up his pillars…And he took and put the testimony into the ark, and set the staves on the ark, and put the mercy seat above upon the ark. And he brought the ark into the tabernacle, and set up the vail of the covering, and covered the ark of the testimony…And he put the table in the tent of the congregation, upon the side of the tabernacle northward, without the vail. And he set the bread in order upon it before the Lord…And he put the candlestick in the tent of the congregation, over against the table, on the side of the tabernacle southward…And he put the golden altar in the tent of the congregation before the vail. And he burnt sweet incense thereon…And he set up the hanging at the door of the tabernacle. And he put the altar of burnt offering by the door of the tabernacle of the tent of the congregation…And he set the laver between the tent of the congregation and the altar, and put water there, to wash withal…And he reared up the court round about the tabernacle and the altar, and set up the hanging of the court gate. So Moses finished the work. —Excerpted from Exodus 40

3. Burnt Offerings: Leviticus 1-10  (Because the Lord Wants to Smell Burning Animals)

If the offering is a burned offering of the herd, let him give a male without a mark. He is to give it at the door of the Tent of Meeting so that he may be pleasing to the Lord. And he is to put his hand on the head of the burned offering and it will be taken for him, to take away his sin. And the ox is to be put to death before the Lord. Then Aaron’s sons, the priests, are to take the blood and put some of it on and round the altar which is at the door of the Tent of Meeting. And the burned offering is to be skinned and cut up into its parts. And Aaron’s sons, the priests, are to put fire on the altar and put the wood in order on the fire. And Aaron’s sons, the priests, are to put the parts, the head and the fat, in order on the wood which is on the fire on the altar. But its inside parts and its legs are to be washed with water, and it will all be burned on the altar by the priest for a burned offering, an offering made by fire, for a sweet smell to the Lord. —Excerpted from Leviticus 1

4. Curses for Disobedience: Deuteronomy 28 (Before Hell Was Invented, Curses Were God’s Way of Ensuring Good Behavior)

You will be cursed in the town and cursed in the field. A curse will be on your basket and on your bread-basin. A curse will be on the fruit of your body, and on the fruit of your land, on the increase of your cattle, and the young of your flock. You will be cursed when you come in and cursed when you go out. The Lord will send on you cursing and trouble and punishment in everything to which you put your hand. —Deuteronomy 28:16-20

5. Historical Records From Adam to Abraham: 1 Chronicles 1-9  (It’s Like Hearing Stories About People You’ve Never Heard Of—But Without the Stories)

Adam, Sheth, Enosh, Kenan, Mahalaleel, Jered, Henoch, Methuselah, Lamech, Noah, Shem, Ham, and Japheth. The sons of Japheth; Gomer, and Magog, and Madai, and Javan, and Tubal, and Meshech, and Tiras. And the sons of Gomer; Ashchenaz, and Riphath, and Togarmah. And the sons of Javan; Elishah, and Tarshish, Kittim, and Dodanim. The sons of Ham; Cush, and Mizraim, Put, and Canaan.  The sons of Cush; Seba, and Havilah, and Sabta, and Raamah, and Sabtecha. And the sons of Raamah; Sheba, and Dedan. And Cush begat Nimrod: he began to be mighty upon the earth. And Mizraim begat Ludim, and Anamim, and Lehabim, and Naphtuhim, And Pathrusim, and Casluhim, (of whom came the Philistines,) and Caphthorim. And Canaan begat Zidon his firstborn, and Heth, The Jebusite also, and the Amorite, and the Girgashite, And the Hivite, and the Arkite, and the Sinite, And the Arvadite, and the Zemarite, and the Hamathite. —Excerpted from 1 Chronicles 1

6. The New Temple: Ezekiel 40-43 (Now You Can Build Your Own Temple Without the Benefit of Blueprints)

Then he brought me into the inner court through the south gate, and he measured the south gate; it had the same measurements as the others. Its alcoves, its projecting walls and its portico had the same measurements as the others. The gateway and its portico had openings all around. It was fifty cubits long and twenty-five cubits wide. (The porticoes of the gateways around the inner court were twenty-five cubits wide and five cubits deep.) Its portico faced the outer court; palm trees decorated its jambs, and eight steps led up to it. Then he brought me to the inner court on the east side, and he measured the gateway. It had the same measurements as the others. Its alcoves, its projecting walls and its portico had the same measurements as the others. The gateway and its portico had openings all around. It was fifty cubits long and twenty-five cubits wide. Its portico faced the outer court; palm trees decorated the jambs on either side, and eight steps led up to it. —Excerpted from Ezekiel 40

Left for theologians to discuss is the age-old question of why God felt it necessary to include these insufferably long, repetitive, spiritually-bereft verses in a book that many believe is the actual word of God. They say God works in mysterious ways, and evidently sometimes he works in mind-numbingly tedious and uninspiring ways as well. It doesn’t seem to have hurt Bible sales too much. You do have to wonder how much more popular the Bible would have been if God had deleted these chapters and focused on penning some practical solutions to day to day problems people face: reliable nutrition information, disease prevention strategies, or detailed instruction on how to build your own bicycle.

So remember, preachers, avoid these chapters in order to keep your congregation coming back for more, and keep people from falling to their deaths like Eutychus.

Who might actually want to seek out these verses?

  • People who never again want to be asked to choose the reading at their Bible study group.
  • Priests who are ready to hang up their collar for good and want to go out in style with the longest and most wearisome Bible recitation ever.
  • Insomniacs—even the Bible admits that it’s boring enough to put a king to sleep:

On that night could not the king sleep, and he commanded to bring the book of records of the Chronicles, and they were read before the king.—Esther 6:1

Michael Morris is the author of Bible Funmentionables: A Lighthearted Look at the Wildest Verses You’ve NEVER Been Told!, which features all of the shocking and hilarious verses that your minister, rabbi, or charismatic cult leader is afraid to preach.

Pray Away the Tornado

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St. Peter’s Catholic Church of Quincy, IL after the tornado of April 12, 1945. From family archives

One problem with believing the entire Bible is literally true is that you can sometimes come to distasteful and contradictory conclusions. Here are Pat Robertson’s insights into God’s role in the recent deadly tornadoes:

  • God deserves credit for setting up the conditions that allow deadly tornadoes, but he doesn’t deserve blame for sending them.
  • Those killed by tornadoes deserve blame for living where tornadoes happen—i.e. in every state but Alaska—and for not praying enough.
  • A blameless, omnibenevolent God could have stopped the tornadoes, but chose not too because too few people prayed for him to do so.

When true believers face the question of why God allows great suffering (e.g. 9/11 and Hurricane Katrina) the most common explanations are

  1. We can’t understand the mind of God. (In other words, I have no good answer. Let’s talk about something else.)
  2. When someone dies, they’re in a better place. (But what if they would actually prefer to still be alive?)
  3. It is an opportunity to find strength in God. (As if there is no other way to learn this lesson.)
  4. God is punishing us for being sinful. (Let’s not blame God, let’s blame those people that don’t believe what we believe.)

This last explanation, that human suffering is caused by sin, is seen throughout the Bible:

The LORD saw how evil humans had become on the earth, so he said, “I will wipe off the face of the earth these humans that I created. Not only humans, but also domestic animals, crawling animals, and birds.” —Excerpts from Genesis 6:5,7

And a favorite of the fire and brimstone preachers:

For the wages of sin is death. —Romans 6:23

God punishes and kills off sinners in the Bible with incredible regularity—check out the book Drunk with Blood for all the gory details. Since Bible literalists see so many examples of this, it is easy understand why Pat Robertson and Jerry Falwell famously fell into the trap of arguing that God allowed the 9/11 terrorist attacks because of the actions of the ACLU, federal courts, abortionists, pagans, feminists, gays, lesbians, People for the American Way, and those who want church/state separation. As unlikely as it sounds to non-evangelicals, God hated the exact same people that Robertson and Falwell hated.

It’s very difficult for a preacher to sermonize that innocent people sometimes suffer and die for no good reason, and it’s much more convenient for them to blame their own political enemies.

However, in a little reported decree from Jesus himself, we find a very different explanation of human tribulation:

What about those 18 people who died when the tower at Siloam fell on them? Do you think that they were more sinful than other people living in Jerusalem? No! I can guarantee that they weren’t. —Luke 13:4-5

So here we have Jesus clearly stating that sometimes bad things happen to good people, and it is not because they were sinners. This passage is underpreached because it offers little solace to people who are grieving. Plus preachers who ignore it can continue to blame the sinners of their choosing.

So the Bible tells us that disasters happen to sinners and that disasters also happen to innocent people, but there’s one more category that’s is rarely heard of in the Bible: those innocent people that God goes out of his way to strike dead. Gather the family around to hear the no-good-deed-goes-unpunished story of Uzzah who steadies the ark of the covenant when his oxen bump into it:

Uzzah put forth his hand to the ark of God, and took hold of it, for the oxen shook it. And the anger of the Lord was kindled against Uzzah, and God smote him there for his error. And there he died by the ark of God. —Excerpts from 2 Samuel 6:6-7

So instead of encouraging people to pray tornadoes away, how about something a little more practical: to lessen your chances of being hit by a tornado, your best bet is to not be a male resident of a hotel or mobile home, 10-35 years old, in Kansas, Oklahoma, or north Texas from 3-9pm from May to June. Or just move to Alaska.

The Top 7 Bible-Themed Rides You Won’t Find at the Ark Encounter Amusement Park

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Ark Encounter RideJesus expected his followers to have faith strong enough to command a tree to wither and die, and, for no particular reason, to send a mountain into the ocean. To date, no one has accomplished either of these destructive acts of faith.

But when it comes to showing Bunyanesque quantities of faith in the Bible though, it’s hard to beat the folks at Answers in Genesis who are now in the process of creating a life-size Noah’s ark and accompanying theme park.

Controversial to some, due to its proposed $43 million in tax breaks from the state of Kentucky, Ark Encounter may run into even more controversy as they create other Bible-themed rides for the non-ark portion of the park. Currently, their only other major ride in development—the way they plan to attract tourists away from Disneyworld and other parks—is The Ten Plagues of Egypt. You can almost hear the kids fighting in the back seats of cars across America:

“I want to see the plague of boils first!”

“No, I want to see the death of the firstborn first.”

Since this is the second best ride they could find from the Bible, they appear a little desperate for ideas. In order to help them avoid picking an even less appealing ride, I offer my Top 7 Bible-Themed Rides You Won’t Find at the Ark Encounter Amusement Park. If you’re a praying person, you may want to pray that these never get chosen.

1. Porkvalanche!

You loved how God killed off animals in the Great Flood, now see his son take a turn as Jesus makes 2,000 pigs commit mass suicide. Audiences will roar at the demons being hurled into the porcine herd, compelling them to jump off a cliff and drown in the sea. All the fun of a waterside, all the horror of a slaughterhouse!

The evil spirits came out of the man and went into the pigs. The herd of about two thousand pigs rushed down the cliff into the sea and drowned. —Mark 5:13

2. The Undead Jamboree

Even though Acts 26:23 insists that Jesus was the first person to rise from the dead, the Bible has over eight resurrections that predate Jesus’ return to the land of the living, and two that followed.

  • The widow of Zarephath’s son (resurrected by Elijah) —1 Kings 17:17–24
  • The Shunammite’s son (Elisha) —2 Kings 4:32–37
  • The corpse thrown into Elisha’s tomb (Elisha’s bones) —2 Kings 13:21
  • The widow of Nain’s son (Jesus) —Luke 7:11-15
  • Jairus’ daughter (Jesus) —Luke 8:49-56
  • Lazarus (Jesus) —John 11:39–44
  • The post-crucifixion saints of Jerusalem (Spontaneous and simultaneous revivals) —Matthew 27:51-53
  • Dorcas of Joppa (Peter) —Acts 9:36-43
  • Eutychus (Paul) —Acts 20:9–12

Kids would be thrilled to see recreations of their favorite dead Bible heroes being brought back to life, but parents may frown on their children quite likely getting the impression that Jesus was just one in a long line of back-from-the-grave Bible embellishments.

As a quick aside, though most Bible miracles such as talking bushes and snakes have tapered off in modern times, resuscitating people is more prevalent than ever. I saw it happen to my own father. The miracle worker that saved his life when he was down and out with a sudden heart attack is known by three initials: AED. If you are unfamiliar with how to recognize and operate a defibrillator, please watch this video. There are plenty of people walking around today who are eternally grateful to people who learned how to operate these simple and amazing machines.

3. Everybody Must Get Stoned

Imagine “It’s a Small World” but with better music and innumerable depictions of every capital offense described in the Bible. Here are but a few:

  • Cursing your parents —Exodus 21:17
  • Worshipping other gods —Exodus 22:20
  • Gathering sticks on the Sabbath —Numbers 15:32-36
  • Disobeying a priest —Deuteronomy 17:12

The ride could end in two different ways. Riders, now consumed by bloodlust, could exit through the “Stones for Every Occasion” gift shop and purchase rocks at prices way over wholesale, or you could have Jesus come on and spoil the mood by saying, “Let him that is without sin cast the first stone.”

4. Ye Old Testament Sideshow

“See God’s Back Parts (as shown only to Moses), watch the 99-year-old Abraham agree to get circumcised, marvel at Jacob, the Canaanite Casanova: two wives plus two handmaidens plus one septuagenarian = 13 kids and one exhausted Jacob!”

5. Tamar’s Wild Ride

Warning: Riders must keep there eyes in their sockets at all times.

There is never a dull moment as Tamar marries Er. God then kills Er because of an unspecified transgression. By law, Er’s brother Onan must then impregnate Tamar. Onan’s seed is spilled on the ground, so of course, God kills Onan. Onan’s brother is next in line to marry Tamar, but when that is delayed, Tamar is so desperate to get pregnant, she dresses as a prostitute and tricks her father-in-law into fathering her children. When he discovers she’s pregnant, he demands that she be burned to death, until he realizes he is the father.

So once we get off this ride and shake off our temporary PTSD, what is the moral lesson gained from this biblical soap opera? According to Genesis 38:26, between not giving your son to his widowed sister-in-law on the one hand and prostitution on the other, the thing that gets God murderously enraged is failing to impregnate a sister-in-law. So why is that legal but prostitution is illegal? God’s not going to be happy about that.

6. The All New Testament Sideshow

“Step right up and prove your faith in Jesus today by handling 100% poisonous snakes, drinking 100% poisonous poison, and treading on genuine serpents and scorpions.”

They will pick up serpents, and if they drink any deadly poison, it will not hurt them. —Mark 16:18

It’s not every religion that tells its followers that it’s absolutely fine to drink poison. You have to love the adaptability of Christians today who have decided to play down this test of faith, given how it has proven itself deadly to some of the most faithful believers who ever lived, and died.

A marginally safer route is snake handling, but sadly the County Health Department would shut down this carnival fare fairly quickly.

7. Noah’s Post-diluvian Carcass Roundup

You already had a chance to see all those cute animals that got saved on the ark. Now see what Noah found once the waters receded. You can’t just leave all those drowning victims, human and animal, lying all over the ground. Do you really want to go out for a nice, quiet stroll at night and have to worry about tripping over a waterlogged orangutan carcass? Faced with this massive cleanup effort and very few humans left to help him, Noah’s course of action when he finally hit dry land makes a bit more sense:

He drank some wine, got drunk, and lay naked inside his tent. —Genesis 9:21

The Bible is full of wild, evocative, and sometimes disturbing stories. Setting aside the Great Flood’s death and destruction that often gets swept under the rug, the story of Noah’s Ark has captured believers’ imaginations like no other. For someone like me, who sees biblical literalism as an intellectually untenable position, Noah’s story is a case study in the length believers will go to in order to preserve some highly implausible beliefs.

The list of questions that arise when challenging a literal interpretation of the ark account is long and intriguing. Biblical literalists are often willing to avoid these hard questions or to twist reality into knots in order to avoid admitting a possible mythic, non-literal component to certain elements of the Bible.

It is truly remarkable the absurd lengths that some people are willing to go to in order to defend the most absurd claims in the Bible. Jesus recommended casting a mountain into the sea, but he said nothing about throwing your common sense in as well.

Michael Morris is the author of Bible Funmentionables: A Lighthearted Look at the Wildest Verses You’ve NEVER Been Told!, which features all of the shocking and hilarious verses that your minister, rabbi, or charismatic cult leader is afraid to preach.

Answering Newt’s Prayer for Open Marriage

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Newt GingrichProposing to your wife, that you would like to have an open marriage, is a shocking bit of news, according to Newt Gingrich’s second ex-wife. But surprisingly, one place where such concepts are definitely old news is in the Holy Bible.

In the laws of the Old Testament, polygamy is spoken of in very matter-of-fact terms, without any hint of disrepute:

If he take himself another wife… —Exodus 21:10

If a man have two wives… —Deuteronomy 21:15

A candidate who really believed the Bible would tell us that traditional marriage is between one man and one woman…and as many other wives and concubines as the man can attract and afford.

To get a sense of how commonplace polygamy is in the Bible, the following is a list of biblical characters who carried on with more than one woman, and it reads like one of those too-boring-to-read-out-loud genealogies from First Chronicles (seriously, do not try to read 1 Chronicles chapters 1-9 at your next Bible study group!): Abijah, Abraham, Ahab, Ahasuerus, Ashur, Belshazzar, Benhadad, Caleb, David, Eliphaz, Elkanah, Esau, Ezra, Gideon, Jacob, Jehoiachin, Jehoram, Jerahmeel, Joash, Lamech, Machir, Manasseh, Mered, Moses, Nahor, Rehoboam, Saul, Shaharaim, Simeon, Solomon, and Zedekiah.

In the scriptures, polygamy originated rather humbly with Noah’s father, Lamech:

And Lemech took two wives, one named Adah and the other Zillah. —Genesis 4:19

And it culminates in the harem of King Solomon:

Solomon had 700 wives of royal birth and 300 concubines, and his wives led him astray. — 1 Kings 11:3

A man with a reputation for wisdom couldn’t forsee any problem living with 1,000 women?

In the New Testament, or as Rev. Lovejoy calls it, “somewhere towards the back” of the Bible, polygamy is definitely downplayed, though it was evidently accepted enough to work its way into one of Jesus’ parables:

Then shall the kingdom of heaven be likened unto ten virgins, which took their lamps, and went forth to meet the bridegroom. —Matthew 25:1

Throughout most of the Bible, multiple wives pointed to a king’s increased social status. Perhaps a similar urge affected Gingrich and the most recent batch of America’s polyamorous politicians from both major parties, including John Edwards, John Ensign, Bill Clinton, Mark Sanford, Arnold Schwarzenegger, Eliot Spitzer, and David Vitter to name but a few.

Officially, it should be stated, Gingrich has denied calling for an open marriage, but his admission of the affair and his shoot-the-messenger reaction to the story has left some unconvinced of his innocence.

The Bible clearly treats polygamy as an allowable practice, and nowhere is it unequivocally forbidden by God. As the practice became socially unacceptable in the U.S., the religions that wanted to stay in business decided to go along with public sentiment, just like they did with other biblically supported issues like slavery, the killing of witches, and the prohibition of tattoos.

In making his open marriage request, maybe the old Newt was making a point that the newly devout Newt would appreciate: it’s not adultery if we can all just agree to call her a concubine. Sadly for him, even those who interpret the Bible literally are unlikely to follow what the Bible says on this issue.

Michael Morris is the author of Bible Funmentionables: A Lighthearted Look at the Wildest Verses You’ve NEVER Been Told!, which features all of the shocking and hilarious verses that your minister, rabbi, or charismatic cult leader is afraid to preach.