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06/25/2005: "GOD (Part I: Bird "doing it" with Mummy)"
INTRODUCTION (God is my copilot)
"And you may ask yourself, 'Well, how did I get here?'"
When an organization's Chaplin complains that the organization has
become too aggressively Christian, we can safely say that some sort of
line has been crossed.
On Wednesday, a panel which had been formed to investigate allegations of
religious intimidation at the Air Force Academy in Colorado Springs found
that there had been no "overt religious discrimination" …only
"insensitivity". [Check out the different spins placed on the story by the
Voice of America and the World Socialists Website] The panel also and
lauded the academy's leadership for taking great strides to confront issues
of religion.
Their findings are sure to surprise Capt. Melinda Morton, a Lutheran
Minister, who made news when she claimed that she'd been dismissed from her
post as a Chaplin at the Air Force Academy for insisting that that
evangelical Christians were attempting to "subvert the system" by creating
a hostile environment for non- evangelical cadets. Examples of this hostile
environment included an incident in which a staff chaplain reportedly told
newly arrived freshmen that anyone not born again "will burn in the fires
of hell."; promotional fliers for a screening of "The Passion of the
Christ" being placed on the breakfast plates of all the nearly 4,000
cadets; over 250 people at the academy signing an annual Christmas message
in the base newspaper which stated that "Jesus Christ is the only
real hope for the world"; and the case of an atheist student who was
forbidden to organize a club for "Freethinkers."
In the words of Casey Weinstein, a Jewish graduate who is now a now a
second lieutenant at the Los Angeles Air Force Base (and, no doubt, the
fastest Jew alive), "I could give you a million examples," says Weinstein,
now a second lieutenant at the Los Angeles Air Force Base. "There was a
large and vocal minority of evangelical Christians who regularly blurred
the line between church and state, but there was no system at the Academy
to keep that in check."
One can't help but wonder what the academy was like before its
leadership took great strides to confront issues of religion. "Private
Weinstein, report to Sergeant Torquemada: on the double! Move, you
worthless, Kosher maggot, move!"
For sheer irony, it's hard to beat the Air Force Academy story. First of
all, there's the fact that the academy's last scandal involved rape and
sexual harassment. But for me, as an "outsider", the real irony is that,
once again, people who worship the same God (with the exception of
the of that atheist cadet, Private Beatupalot) are pissing each other off.
What is it with Jews, Christians, and Muslims that makes it impossible
for them to not only be incapable of getting along with each other but
also makes them so divisive in their own ranks?
And why is it that Christians feel the need to spread the "good news"
(that God so loved his only son that he let him hang on a chunk of wood
in the desert for a couple of days) to African villages and metropolitan
shopping malls alike? It's not like I've ever been approached by a Wiccan
who wanted to bend my ear with the "good news" of The Green Man. For the
love of Xenu, there are even Evangelicals in Baghdad!
How did this shit get started? Whose idea was this, anyway? I want some
answers…on the double! Move, maggot, move!
Part One: The Man Who Invented God
"And you may say to yourself, 'My God, what have I done?'"
Philadelphia, 2003 CE: While on a visit to the University of Pennsylvania
Museum, my wife begins hurling loud insults at an image of Queen Nefertiti
. Within seconds a guard appears and asks her if she wouldn't mind showing
a little less enthusiasm towards the exhibits. "Do you realize what a pair
of complete assholes her and her husband were?", my wife asks the guard.
This doesn't help matters. "She's a follower of Bastet and Sekhmet", I
weakly offered. The guard's expression quickly changed into the same look
of confusion that you, gentle reader, are wearing right now.
Thebes, 1364 BCE: It's moving day for the entire Royal Court. There moving
to a new city where "the one true God" will be exalted… and it's very
likely that more than one person is cursing Queen Nefertiti. You see, the
Queen's husband Pharaoh Amenhotep IV has been doing some very odd and
un-Egyptian things lately. First, he changed his name from Amenhotep
("Beloved of Amon") to Akhenaton ("Splendor of Aton") "Well", said the
average Egyptian, "shit happens: he's the Pharaoh; he can call himself
'Pricilla, Queen of the Desert' if he wants to. Amon is a sun god and so
is Aton. What's the difference?" and they went back to farming the banks
of the Nile and, occasionally, being devoured by crocodiles.
Next, Akhenaton did the unthinkable (by Egyptian standards: and for people
who often practiced "ass magic" the term "unthinkable" carried a lot of
weight) he banned the worship of all gods and goddesses (including my
wife's beloved Bastet and Sekhmet) with the exception of Aton. This made
even the Egyptians who were busy being dragged into the Nile by crocodiles
take a minute to scratch their shaved heads and wonder if they were being
Punk'd.
For thousands of years the Egyptians, like every other culture on the planet
at that time, worshiped a rich (and really twisted) pantheon of Gods. For
example, there was Isis whose brother/lover, Osiris, was hacked to pieces
by his bother/hater, Set. As the story goes, Isis managed to gather
together all of the pieces of her late brother/lover, except for his penis
which had been…wait for it…swallowed by a fish! Undaunted, the
resourceful Isis substituted a stick for Osiris' missing member and …wait
for it…turned herself into a bird and had sex with his mummy.
Wanna see a picture?
Sure, it's easy for us to laugh at this story (Dude, that bird is "doing
it" with a mummy), but it's import to remember that to the Egyptians
under Akhenaton this was history, and the Pharaoh was taking it away
and replacing it with…
…a golden circle? Yes, not only had Akhenaton decreed that only Aton could
be worshiped, but he also ordered that Aton was to only be depicted
as a golden circle. OK, class, which do you prefer?
Aton
or...
Bird "doing it" with mummy?
I thought so.
Finally, Akhenaton got it into his head that he (and, by extension, his
Royal Court) needed to put some distance between himself and the stench of
the old gods and goddesses at Thebes; so he decided to found a new city
(Just like Emperor Constantine: and Charles Manson…and David Koresh) where
a huge temple to Aton, called "the Mansion of the Sun-Disk" was erected.
This was the "Sun-City" of On ("Heliopolis") and you can see its ruins
today at a place called Tell el-Amarna, about 180 miles south of Cairo.
So what happened? Well, Akhenaton died for starters. While the Pharaoh
spent seventeen years ruling from distant On, dissent quietly brewed in
hearts of the followers of the old religion. So, no sooner was Akhenaton
dried out and his vital organs placed in canopic jars then the Sun-City
was abandoned and the capitol moved back to Thebes: where the old temples
of the gods and goddesses where promptly reopened. And there was much
rejoicing.
This experiment with a "One, True God" left such a bad taste in the mouths
of Egyptians that they soon set about chiseling Akhenaton's image off
temple walls (fortunately for us, they left those great pictures of birds
and mummies getting it on with each other), and they even struck the
"Splendor of Aton"'s name from the official list of kings. In fact, so
hated was Akhenaton for messing with the country's religion that the
Pharaoh who succeeded him (Akhenaton's son-in-law) immediately changed his
own name from Tutankhaton to Tutankhamon: yes, the same
"Boy king" that Steve Martin used to sing about.
So, Akhenaton was a failure, right? Well, maybe not. It's possible that
Jews, Christians, and Muslims - today's Monotheists- owe a huge debt to
Neferiti's husband. Here's a hymn to Aton that was, most likely, composed
by Akhenaton: "O Though only God, there is no other God than Thou" and
here is the fundamental tenant of Judaism: "Hear O Israel, the lord thy
God, the Lord is One." As a Professor of Egyptology at Heidelberg
University with the hilarious name of Jan Assman pointed out "Were not the
Egyption 'Aton' and the Hebrew [word for "Lord"] 'Adonai' the same name?"
Shit Luther, in his book Moses and Monotheism, Sigmund "Sometimes a
banana is just a banana" Freud proposed that Moses had been a priest of
Aton who brought his religion to the Israelites.
Of course there is another book which poses a different theory: it's
called "the Bible" and we'll learn all about it in Part II.
Recommended reading:
God Against The Gods by Jonathan Kirsch
A History of God by Karen Armstrong
Secret Origins of the Bible by Tim Callahan
The Bible Unearthed by Israel Finkelstein
Replies: 40 Comments
on Saturday, June 25th, Rodney said
I'll be adding links to Diety trading cards over the ext few days, so keep checking back.
Pedro fix later, OK?
on Saturday, June 25th, Doc said
Oy...how come Baal worship never caught on? Now that's a religion with some fun to it...
on Saturday, June 25th, Rodney said
Baal will be turning up in Part II
on Sunday, June 26th, dogfaceboy said
oh, didja know that Akhenaton's mom Queen Tiy was considered some kinda mutant at the time, and passed on a number of "physical peculiarities" (depicted in surviving tomb portraits) to her offspring? the interesting thing about that is that for a long time, scholars hazarded a guess that she was a Negro, but recently some boffins have examined the whole thing a little more closely. not only have they pointed pointed out that the color of Tiy's skin (and Akhenaton's for that matter) is actually no different from that of the rest of the court in the paintings ... they also realized that the "peculiarities" depicted are actually dead ringers for the physical defects that modern medicine associates with forms of Down Syndrome.
I'll leave y'all to draw your own conclusions as to what THAT indicates.
on Sunday, June 26th, ScreamingMan said
I think the great injustice pointed out in this piece is the evangelicals in Iraq. Christ almightly! It's bad enought we're killing them; now we're using inhumane torture methods, like jesusbible love bunk on them?!?!
it never endz...
on Sunday, June 26th, razlerja said
You had me at 'ass magic'. I'm a Nuit man myself: "Now, therefore, I am known to ye by my name Nuit,...I am Infine Space, and the Infine Stars thereof, do ye also thus. Bind nothing! Let there be no difference made among you between any one thing & any other thing; for thereby three cometh hurt." ~The Book of the Law
As a Hermetic Alchemist, I've never felt the need to 'convert' anyone. The forces of Birth, Growth, Prutrefaction, and Death all move alone in perfect balance without any help from me. Although the Death Cult of Christianity seems to be getting out of hand, they will drink to the bitter dregs of the Cup of Sorrow that they have mixed for themselves, "for they have shut their blood in their hearts".
on Sunday, June 26th, SirAtededge said
Putrefaction comes before death? That explains "eau de subway".
on Sunday, June 26th, billzebub said
It's "Pedro feex later, OK?" You have to add the corny-racist Mexican accent to it for pure comedic effect.
Friday afternoon at work I wasted an hour getting witnessed to by an eveangelical who was worried about my soul. I promtly reported her ass to the corporate diversity board, stating that I am an athiest and am sick of being harassed. She asked me if I had a personal relationship with Jesus Christ.
Oh, how I wanted to state, "No, but I admire his work." But it would have gone over her head and I'd have still had tolisten to a lecture.
on Sunday, June 26th, hedgroz said
I imagine your diversity board is not unlike my human resources department or the "fair treatment policy" HQ. Regardless, nice work, let's just hope that the people that have to hear your complaint aren't the type that actually respect Pat Robertson, or even worse, Kirk Cameron.
on Sunday, June 26th, hedgroz said
Nice piece, Rod, I always enjoy your work...I was hoping you'd make it over to the Ram thread at some point and maybe say something poignant...or at least say some kind words...you're a magnificent writer, and I know that having met Ram, he must have left some sort of mark on you, not unlike he did on me...
on Monday, June 27th, Ktesibios said
Minor quibble- "imn-htp" (sorry, can't do a proper transliteration font here) actually translates as "Amon is satisfied". "Beloved of Amon" would be mr-n-imn.
on Monday, June 27th, Sid said
"HAVE YOU ALL BEEN SAVED YET!!!!"
Sorry i couldnt resist....
hahaha
on Monday, June 27th, Nigel Tailwind said
Jesus saves.
Moses invests!
on Monday, June 27th, eric said
i have given up on all forms of religion but am not an atheist. I just don't really give 2 shits anymore. we control our own destiny and thats all there is to it.
on Monday, June 27th, briannirvana said
jesus is lord
on Monday, June 27th, jimbob said
God was my co-pilot, but we crashed in the mountains and I had to eat him.
on Monday, June 27th, billzebub said
on Tuesday, June 28th, razlerja said
Yes, Prutrefaction comes before Death. You can substitute 'Decline' if you want to, but Prutrefaction is the technical alchemical term. It is a circular system; so that after Death comes Birth, Growth, etc. again. You can pick any place on the circle to proceed from. There is no beginning or end.
on Tuesday, June 28th, briannirvana said
bill, who painted that?
have you ever seen William Holman Hunt's The Light of the World. He was a prerapaelist. i love the light of the world painting.
i dont know how to post images on the thoughtless section.
on Tuesday, June 28th, Rodney said
I wonder he he's trying to hand out copies of "Watchtower"?
Great picture...no "bird doing it with mummy" but still a great picture.
on Tuesday, June 28th, billzebub said
I dunno who painted that particular painting, but there's variations on it...it's Jebus knocking on the door to your heart, or in this case, my heart. My heart has the "No Soliciting" sign on it. Bugger off, Jebus. Go sell crazy somewhere else, we're all stocked up here.
The Methodist church I used to attend as a youngin had a version of that pic on the stained glass.
on Tuesday, June 28th, Grundy Sherwood said
I used to have a "No proselytizing" sign on my door. It's hilarious how many Jebus freaks don't know what that means. They would come to the door, try to hand me one of their pamphlets, and I would give them a sour look and tap on the sign. Invariably they would squint at it for a few seconds, then look at me confusedly for a couple, then I guess my face would give it away, because they would say, "Oh, ok, sorry" and go away.
It didn't keep the salespeople away, so I put up a sign that says "No soliciting or proselytizing". I guess even illiterate evangelicals know what soliciting is, and they know that they're doing it.
Oh, and great picture.
on Tuesday, June 28th, billzebub said
The lady at work asked why I quit believing in god and I said, "Ineffability just didn't answer all my questions anymore."
Blank stare. She had never heard of ineffability. Geez. If you're gonna save sould, you had better know more about religion than the damned!
on Wednesday, June 29th, briannirvana said
i do profess my faith and express my desire to teach people about christ. but i have never forced my beliefs on others. not every christian does that. and the ones who do are just trying to change the world, whats wrong with that?
on Wednesday, June 29th, eric said
what would happen if the world was completely converted to christianity? Somebody give me their ideas on the aftermath of such an event
on Wednesday, June 29th, ebbv said
and the ones who do are just trying to change the world, whats wrong with that?
because they're trying to make it gay.
on Wednesday, June 29th, Grundy Sherwood said
Brian, Hitler was just trying to change the world. What was wrong with that?
Eric, do you mean converted voluntarily or by force? Actually, it's kind of a moot point, as a voluntary conversion could not be conceived of, and therefore the effects of which could not be guessed at. It would be far more likely that everyone wisened up and figured out the whole god thing is bullshit. Then there would be a lot of suicides and a little bit of rioting, some heads would roll, and then everything would settle down and humanity could start making some real progress.
If you mean conversion to christianity by force, well, we already know what that's like on a national level (look at all of history for examples), and I don't think it would be much different on a global scale.
on Thursday, June 30th, razlerja said
If the whole world became Christian nothing would change in North Ireland. Prods and Caths could keep killing each other...
on Thursday, June 30th, billzebub said
Yeah. We'd just fight over what kind of Christian we all are.
on Friday, July 1st, briannirvana said
or live as i do and have multiple friends of different religions who will teach you what they are about.
its cool to explore all alternatives from the one you were raised and had drilled into your head.
on Saturday, July 2nd, dogfaceboy said
... and to then not bother choosing a more intelligent alternative.
on Saturday, July 2nd, briannirvana said
if you already have a cow why buy milk or cheese?
on Saturday, July 2nd, dogfaceboy said
because the cow stinks, shits all over the yard, and trampled millions of people to death over the past 2,000 years.
on Saturday, July 2nd, Grundy Sherwood said
Oh, and the cow is actually a bull, so it never gave milk in the first place. You still have to buy your milk and cheese, and you also have to feed the bull.
on Saturday, July 2nd, razlerja said
Adonis - A Bull God of Northern Africa and parts of the middle east also 'associated' with Christ...at least some unusually interesting similarities...you know, the whole dying and then rising from the dead in three days thing. But, for Gods from that area, I've still got to put my lot in with Baphomet. 'DeMoley thou art avenged!!!!'
on Sunday, July 3rd, the drunk mailman said
tower of babble
talk of religion
is all for naught
the fact remains
there is no god
except for those
who are insane
forgive me father
i have a brain
amen
on Tuesday, July 5th, online gambling said
Ills on the internet continued apace today with a report from children's charity nch which claimed online bookies are failing to stop children from gambling
on Friday, July 8th, Oneword said
These people that call them selves christians just go around and fuck every thig up.this is what relgion does to people.The whole point that God made in the bible is to stop trying to please Me, its imposible to please Him, He said every thing has been finished thruogh jesus. so just sit back be patient and watch and learn.But you have all these "christians" running aruond giving people orders, thinking that they are some kind of God.Religion is a sin againts God.We are Gods religion, not the other way aruond.thats why christians are hated so because they dont understand there own bible.Hate is evil, and Mr. Sherwood,you are bringing your self down to there level also by showing hate toward them,
on Friday, July 8th, Grundy Sherwood said
Disdain and hatred are not the same thing. I don't hate any group of people, only certain individuals, and not because they are christian. And the only ones here on their level are you, Brian, and Mykel.
on Monday, July 11th, Servet Of The Most High said
Get off the juice of the devil. There are Kings coming and there was a shining star. Holy people are waiting for the Good King. You best forget about the acid punch and get on your knees and hope the Creator reveals himself to you before it is too late. I can just imagine what evil garbage you listen to and read. May he have mercy on you.
-A Servant of the Most High
