1 Samuel 25:1-22
I have mentioned before that for this two-year lectionary cycle I am studying with the King James Version. This evening I was reading along, following a typically awful Old Testament-style story of betrayal and bloodshed in 1 Samuel (the chapter which begins, by the way, with the death of Samuel...even though there are five more chapters to go, plus 2nd Samuel) but was taken aback when I got to the last verse of the lesson where David is praying to God for assistance in avenging an insult by slaughtering a bunch of innocent people, vowing by morning to have killed "any that pisseth against the wall."
Come again? LOL.
Curious, I turned to the other translations on my shelf (the NRSV, the NIV and the NKJV), all of which instead simply (and preferably...) refer to "men" or "males."
I Googled the phrase, and while admitting it's not like I spent hours of research on this, it does appear that in fact the King James has the more literal rendering of a Hebrew idiom for "men." (The phrase "that pisseth against the wall" appears in the KJV a second time in 1 Samuel 25, and in four verses of 1 & 2 Kings.)
But what really blew my mind was a video that came up of a Baptist pastor citing these verses to insist that God wants men to pee standing up. I won't link to it, you can find it yourself, if you're of a mind.
He relates a story about visiting Germany and seeing signs over toilets asking men not to pee standing up, and, explaining that his wife is German, he asked her, "Is this a joke?" and she apparently said, "No man in Germany pees standing up." "That's where we're headed in this country," says Pastor Steven L. Anderson.
Where to start?
I lived in Switzerland for a year and have visited Germany a couple of times. I lived in a university dorm in Zurich and, yes, there were signs over the toilets in the restrooms saying that peeing standing up was verboten. Now, this isn't because Switzerland has been taken over by anti-Christian feminist zealots, it's because, well, some men have really terrible aim, and no one likes to have to wipe someone else's pee off a toilet seat before using it. Duh. It's called etiquette.
But the idea that there is some sort of Teutonic cultural prohibition against urinating in a vertical position on principle is ridiculous. Any public restroom -- especially in train stations, etc -- will have urinals. In fact, in Switzerland, where the German dialects are sprinkled with French words, the common name for a men's restroom is a pissoir, where there's not a toilet in sight, and not even individual urinals, but just one long porcelain wall (!!!) with a drain at the bottom.
Moreover, "Sitzpinkler" -- which literally means "one who sits to pee" -- is a very common German derogatory word for a less-than-manly man, specifically one who can't stand up for himself.
Anyway, this has nothing to do with poor St Macrina, whose feast unhappily coincides this year with this particular lesson, and who deserves a better post.
Pastor Anderson goes on to caution his listeners against judging him for using bad language by arguing that this word "pisseth" comes directly from the mouth of God, via the Bible. He rails against other translations, including the New King James, for rendering the euphemism as "males" instead of keeping the word-for-word idiom, and cites this as evidence of the extent to which anti-Christian feminizing political correctness has infested even the church itself, in what basically amounts to a xenophobic, sexist, homophobic rant where a holy concept of "masculinity" can be so narrowly defined as to require certain orthodox, patriotic postures for peeing.
I lament that this is the sort of sermon that gets regularly posted to YouTube, and this is what has the potential to go viral. When I think of the hundreds or even thousands of thoughtful sermons that must be given in all kinds of churches every Sunday, to think this is the sort of pathetic nonsense that will form or reaffirm some people's ideas about Christianity and the Bible, I am filled with anger and despair.
Showing posts with label crackpottery. Show all posts
Showing posts with label crackpottery. Show all posts
Tuesday, July 19, 2011
Friday, October 24, 2008
Where Have I Heard That Before?
From the New York Daily News:
"Rep. Pete King (R-N.Y.) said the Arizona senator wasn't talking about "real New Yorkers."
"He's talking about Park Ave. and the upper West Side, which is inhabited by the liberal socialites and the media types who, yeah, are certainly elitists," King said.
As it happens, the U.S. zip code that's given the most to the McCain campaign - $909,128 - is Manhattan's 10021, which includes a swath of Park Ave. "
* * * * *
Also this today from James Carville: "The reason Republicans are happy about Joe the Plumber is they're glad they got somebody hanging around a toilet other than Larry Craig."
"Rep. Pete King (R-N.Y.) said the Arizona senator wasn't talking about "real New Yorkers."
"He's talking about Park Ave. and the upper West Side, which is inhabited by the liberal socialites and the media types who, yeah, are certainly elitists," King said.
As it happens, the U.S. zip code that's given the most to the McCain campaign - $909,128 - is Manhattan's 10021, which includes a swath of Park Ave. "
* * * * *
Also this today from James Carville: "The reason Republicans are happy about Joe the Plumber is they're glad they got somebody hanging around a toilet other than Larry Craig."
Sunday, August 10, 2008
The Antichrist is a White Male Evangelical Christian in his 60's from Sullivan County, Indiana, Who Drives a Blue 1998 Nissan Sentra
Is Barack Obama the Antichrist?
Short answer: no, long answer: what kind of biblically illiterate douchebag asks such a question?
Last week, the McCain campaign released an ad that purports to mock Obama's alleged "messiah" status with his followers (who would be, according to any and all available polling, a majority of the nation), but numerous observers have noted that, as Eric Sapp of The Eleison Group puts it, "If the McCain camp was trying to spoof Obama as Messiah, they missed a number of more obvious images and did a very poor job with this ad. If they were trying to draw parallels to Obama as Antichrist, they nailed it."
I continue to be appalled, saddened, infuriated and frightened that so many people insist on pushing the myth of "the Antichrist" while citing a "literal" interpretation of the Bible. A genuinely literal reading of the handful of relevant passages -- all from the first and second epistles of John -- would require one to acknowledge that "even now many antichrists have come."
So despite the fact that by the end of the first century the apostle John (as the tradition of authorship holds) is telling us that multiple antichrists are already in the world, many people today are on the lookout for "the One."
In an article for Time rife with errors on the Barack-as-Antichrist meme, Amy Sullivan points to a chain e-mail currently in circulation that "claims that the Antichrist was prophesied to be "a man in his 40s of MUSLIM descent."
Here is where Sullivan truly misses the boat. She points out that "the Book of Revelation was written at least 400 years before the birth of Islam." It's more like 500, but that's irrelevant, especially since the point here is that End Timers assert that Revelation predicts the future. First, the phrase "the Antichrist" is not found in Revelation, nor in Daniel, another apocalyptic writing she points to but messes up the reference. She refuses to call the bluff of the literalists who insist the Bible says what it plainly does not say.
In one particularly embarrassing instance, Sullivan compares Barack Obama to the description of the Antichrist (in the character of Nicolae Carpathia) in the popular (and nonsensical and heretical) Left Behind novels of Tim LaHaye and Jerry Jenkins; in one sentence she gets multiple facts wrong about both Carpathia and Obama.
Here, though, is where she could really have gone in for the kill and written a great piece. In a predictably excellent post on the McCain ad, Slacktivist quotes LaHaye himself (via The Wall Street Journal) debunking the Obama rumors: "The Antichrist isn't going to be an American, so it can't possibly be Obama. The Bible makes it clear he will be from an obscure place, like Romania." [Emphasis mine.]
How is it that if the Bible is so clear on the identity of the Antichrist, no one agrees on who it is?
Jerry Falwell insisted that the Antichrist would be Jewish.
Others say he will be homosexual. (I guess that's not mutually exclusive.)
Historically, the favorite candidate has been the Pope.
Maybe it's Putin. Or Ahmedinejad. Or Suri Cruise. Here's an article that claims the Pope says George W. Bush is the Antichrist.
And all of this absurdity is pushed by people who insist they're just reading the Bible "literally."
The real story here isn't that some people think Barack Obama is the Antichrist; it's that the "Rapture" and "the Antichrist" are extra-biblical myths hawked by charlatans -- false prophets, if you will -- who distort Scripture to support their own secular agendas and call it "literalism."
Short answer: no, long answer: what kind of biblically illiterate douchebag asks such a question?
Last week, the McCain campaign released an ad that purports to mock Obama's alleged "messiah" status with his followers (who would be, according to any and all available polling, a majority of the nation), but numerous observers have noted that, as Eric Sapp of The Eleison Group puts it, "If the McCain camp was trying to spoof Obama as Messiah, they missed a number of more obvious images and did a very poor job with this ad. If they were trying to draw parallels to Obama as Antichrist, they nailed it."
I continue to be appalled, saddened, infuriated and frightened that so many people insist on pushing the myth of "the Antichrist" while citing a "literal" interpretation of the Bible. A genuinely literal reading of the handful of relevant passages -- all from the first and second epistles of John -- would require one to acknowledge that "even now many antichrists have come."
So despite the fact that by the end of the first century the apostle John (as the tradition of authorship holds) is telling us that multiple antichrists are already in the world, many people today are on the lookout for "the One."
In an article for Time rife with errors on the Barack-as-Antichrist meme, Amy Sullivan points to a chain e-mail currently in circulation that "claims that the Antichrist was prophesied to be "a man in his 40s of MUSLIM descent."
Here is where Sullivan truly misses the boat. She points out that "the Book of Revelation was written at least 400 years before the birth of Islam." It's more like 500, but that's irrelevant, especially since the point here is that End Timers assert that Revelation predicts the future. First, the phrase "the Antichrist" is not found in Revelation, nor in Daniel, another apocalyptic writing she points to but messes up the reference. She refuses to call the bluff of the literalists who insist the Bible says what it plainly does not say.
In one particularly embarrassing instance, Sullivan compares Barack Obama to the description of the Antichrist (in the character of Nicolae Carpathia) in the popular (and nonsensical and heretical) Left Behind novels of Tim LaHaye and Jerry Jenkins; in one sentence she gets multiple facts wrong about both Carpathia and Obama.
Here, though, is where she could really have gone in for the kill and written a great piece. In a predictably excellent post on the McCain ad, Slacktivist quotes LaHaye himself (via The Wall Street Journal) debunking the Obama rumors: "The Antichrist isn't going to be an American, so it can't possibly be Obama. The Bible makes it clear he will be from an obscure place, like Romania." [Emphasis mine.]
How is it that if the Bible is so clear on the identity of the Antichrist, no one agrees on who it is?
Jerry Falwell insisted that the Antichrist would be Jewish.
Others say he will be homosexual. (I guess that's not mutually exclusive.)
Historically, the favorite candidate has been the Pope.
Maybe it's Putin. Or Ahmedinejad. Or Suri Cruise. Here's an article that claims the Pope says George W. Bush is the Antichrist.
And all of this absurdity is pushed by people who insist they're just reading the Bible "literally."
The real story here isn't that some people think Barack Obama is the Antichrist; it's that the "Rapture" and "the Antichrist" are extra-biblical myths hawked by charlatans -- false prophets, if you will -- who distort Scripture to support their own secular agendas and call it "literalism."
Monday, July 21, 2008
Non Prophet
Oh, my God. I agree with James Dobson.
"There's nothing dishonorable in a person rethinking his or her positions, especially in a constantly changing political context,” Dobson told the Associated Press.
Well, bravo. This is exactly right; in fact, that’s what mature people do, pause to re-evaluate ideas – even long-held beliefs – in light of changing circumstances and new information. Indeed, even (and especially) Christians should heed this call. It’s not merely not “dishonorable,” it’s frankly a moral imperative. It doesn’t mean you necessarily have to change your mind, but the responsible person is open to bouts of second-guessing themselves.
Okay, I snark, because while I find this morsel from Dobson agreeable, the context in which he said it is pretty deplorable.
"Speaking as a private individual, I would not vote for John McCain under any circumstances.” That’s James Dobson on January 13. Note his emphasis on ‘private individual’ – as head of the quacky “spank away the gay” organization Focus on the Family, Dobson has to be careful to refrain from commenting in an official capacity on elections to avoid jeopardizing the group’s tax-exempt status. Their budget for 2007? $150,606,000.00.
Well, apparently, Dobson is re-evaluating whether there might be, in fact, “any circumstances” under which he would not just vote for but actually endorse John McCain.
It turns out there is one: if a Democrat is leading in the polls.
Last month, Dobson assailed a 2006 speech given by Senator Obama on faith and politics at Call to Renewal in Washington, DC, and proclaimed that he was "deliberately distorting the traditional understanding of the Bible to fit his own worldview." Oh, the delicious, delicious irony, topped with a zesty hypocritical glaze…kind of like fruitcake, the word Dobson famously used in the same jeremiad to describe Obama’s interpretation of the Constitution.
[Here I might add that Obama is a recognized constitutional scholar, previously a member of the adjunct faculty at the famously conservative University of Chicago Law School where he lectured on that very subject.]
On a Focus on the Family radio broadcast today, Dobson moaned, "Barack Obama contradicts and threatens everything I believe about the institution of the family and what is best for the nation. His radical positions on life, marriage and national security force me to reevaluate the candidacy of our only other choice, John McCain."
Yes, indeed, Obama is so radical, so wildly out of touch with American voters that only a small majority of the country agrees with him. I mean, pulling out of Iraq and focusing on Al Qaeda in Afghanistan and Pakistan? That is some serious left-wing crackpottery. His foreign policy was recently lauded by Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki, who – I might add! – just happens to be a Muslim. Maybe there is something to those rumors.
Clearly one can’t in good conscience vote for Obama, right? We’d be much better off with a Commander-in-Chief who doesn’t know Iraq doesn’t border Pakistan and thinks Shiite Iran is training and funding Sunni Al Qaeda in Iraq. Plus, he’s almost mastered The Google. I’m so relieved that Dobson went back for some deep introspection on this matter. It shows such character.
"While I am not endorsing Senator John McCain, the possibility is there that I might," added Dobson. Today. On the not-for-profit Focus on the Family radio broadcast.
Hello…IRS?
"There's nothing dishonorable in a person rethinking his or her positions, especially in a constantly changing political context,” Dobson told the Associated Press.
Well, bravo. This is exactly right; in fact, that’s what mature people do, pause to re-evaluate ideas – even long-held beliefs – in light of changing circumstances and new information. Indeed, even (and especially) Christians should heed this call. It’s not merely not “dishonorable,” it’s frankly a moral imperative. It doesn’t mean you necessarily have to change your mind, but the responsible person is open to bouts of second-guessing themselves.
Okay, I snark, because while I find this morsel from Dobson agreeable, the context in which he said it is pretty deplorable.
"Speaking as a private individual, I would not vote for John McCain under any circumstances.” That’s James Dobson on January 13. Note his emphasis on ‘private individual’ – as head of the quacky “spank away the gay” organization Focus on the Family, Dobson has to be careful to refrain from commenting in an official capacity on elections to avoid jeopardizing the group’s tax-exempt status. Their budget for 2007? $150,606,000.00.
Well, apparently, Dobson is re-evaluating whether there might be, in fact, “any circumstances” under which he would not just vote for but actually endorse John McCain.
It turns out there is one: if a Democrat is leading in the polls.
Last month, Dobson assailed a 2006 speech given by Senator Obama on faith and politics at Call to Renewal in Washington, DC, and proclaimed that he was "deliberately distorting the traditional understanding of the Bible to fit his own worldview." Oh, the delicious, delicious irony, topped with a zesty hypocritical glaze…kind of like fruitcake, the word Dobson famously used in the same jeremiad to describe Obama’s interpretation of the Constitution.
[Here I might add that Obama is a recognized constitutional scholar, previously a member of the adjunct faculty at the famously conservative University of Chicago Law School where he lectured on that very subject.]
On a Focus on the Family radio broadcast today, Dobson moaned, "Barack Obama contradicts and threatens everything I believe about the institution of the family and what is best for the nation. His radical positions on life, marriage and national security force me to reevaluate the candidacy of our only other choice, John McCain."
Yes, indeed, Obama is so radical, so wildly out of touch with American voters that only a small majority of the country agrees with him. I mean, pulling out of Iraq and focusing on Al Qaeda in Afghanistan and Pakistan? That is some serious left-wing crackpottery. His foreign policy was recently lauded by Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki, who – I might add! – just happens to be a Muslim. Maybe there is something to those rumors.
Clearly one can’t in good conscience vote for Obama, right? We’d be much better off with a Commander-in-Chief who doesn’t know Iraq doesn’t border Pakistan and thinks Shiite Iran is training and funding Sunni Al Qaeda in Iraq. Plus, he’s almost mastered The Google. I’m so relieved that Dobson went back for some deep introspection on this matter. It shows such character.
"While I am not endorsing Senator John McCain, the possibility is there that I might," added Dobson. Today. On the not-for-profit Focus on the Family radio broadcast.
Hello…IRS?
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