Tichenor How The Bible Changed Our Lives (Mostly For The Better)

1. Auflage 2012
ISBN: 978-0-9886612-0-2
Verlag: Reduced Books
Format: EPUB
Kopierschutz: Adobe DRM (»Systemvoraussetzungen)

E-Book, Englisch, 120 Seiten

A born-again and an atheist walk into a bar... From the creative minds behind the internationally-renowned comedy troupe, the Reduced Shakespeare Company, comes this irreverent celebration of the greatest story ever sold! A comic exploration of both the Old and New Testaments, 'How The Bible Changed Our Lives (Mostly For The Better)' is also a journey of discovery and transformation for two longtime friends who find their friendship tested, their beliefs challenged, their bodies slightly broken, and their souls (more or less) saved. Throughout this whimsical and outrageous examination of every book in the Bible, authors Martin and Tichenor also experience epiphanies both personal and religious as they examine the 'really good parts' of the Bible, revealing the hidden treasures of scripture you may have missed while reading the parts you were forced to read. Treasures like: * Creation, or the origin of the six-day work week * the brighter side of Job and Lamentations * Observing the Sabbath, and what that means for professional and college football * The intersection of Holy Writ and entertainment: Hollywood and Divine * The steamy adult sections of the Bible they don't teach you about in Sunday school * Yes, Jesus's mother was a Virgin, but go back a few generations and it gets kinda complicated * HWJV - How Would Jesus Vote? * Newly discovered responses to Paul's letters * The Holy Trinity, and why Three is a magic number 'How The Bible Changed Our Lives (Mostly For The Better)' is an affectionate comic memoir, sure to delight the most devout as well as the most skeptical reader. (WARNING: Contains sects and violence. May cause unease among the humor-impaired.)

Autoren/Hrsg.

Tichenor, Austin

Leseproben

Creation

The Six-Day Work Week, and What's The Deal With The Platypus?

(Reed)

Genesis. The Beginning. A very good place to start.

Genesis is the first of the five books of the Pentateuch - the first five books of The Bible. Pentateuch translates as "the law" or "to teach". Maybe it's just me, but "the law" and "to teach" seem like significantly different translations of the word Pentateuch. This clearly indicates that the scholars doing the translating didn't really know what the dickens Pentateuch means. In fact, my own research shows that the word actually breaks down into two distinct parts - Penta, meaning "five", and Ateuch (pronounced "uh-TUCK") meaning "A tuck". Hence, Pentateuch means "Five tucks".

Traditionally the entire Pentateuch, including Genesis, is attributed to Moses. In a remarkable bit of authorship, Moses actually gives an account of his own death and burial in Deuteronomy 34:1-12. While many authors have continued to write long after their careers were dead, Moses is one of only a handful of writers who continued to write after they were actually dead, joining such legendary figures as James Michener and L. Ron Hubbard.

The books of the Pentateuch take us from creation to the end of the Mosaic era. The end of the Mosaic era came when humankind no longer made pictures primarily with small pieces of glass and stone, but rather began to explore other media such as photography and the internet.

The first two chapters of Genesis are concerned with the creation of the universe in six days, after which God rested. Because God is all-powerful, nobody really understands why He was tired after working for only six days. Some scholars believe that God wasn't tired, but that He simply wanted to watch a football game. In the Christian tradition, it is believed that the seventh day -- the day of rest -- fell on a Sunday. In the Jewish tradition, it is believed that the seventh day fell on a Saturday. To keep both sides happy and well rested everyone decided that both Saturday and Sunday would be days of rest or weekends, with college football games being scheduled for Saturdays and professional football games scheduled for Sundays. God's preference for NFL over NCAA football remains a subject of debate to this day.

You may be interested to learn how the days of rest at the end of the week were named. (Note: This is the first of those hidden treasures we promised to reveal throughout the book.) It seems that everyone was so tired and weak from his or her five days of work, that the week's end is marked by two days of rest called weakened.

I'm not making this stuff up. My pastor told me about the origin of the word weekend. My pastor is the man I most admire in the world. He's my spiritual advisor and the leader of a Presbyterian congregation in a small community in the western United States. Being a self-deprecating man, my pastor has asked me not to use his name in connection with this book. Austin says the real reason my pastor doesn't want to be associated with this book is because he thinks I'm a nut. This is simply not the case. I have had many lengthy conversations, debates, and arguments with my pastor -- Reverend Alan Knudsen -- over the spiritual issues and biblical facts that I will discuss in this book. These lively discussions have been extremely helpful in clarifying my beliefs. My pastor, always the joker, says he disagrees with me on nearly every significant point we've ever debated. He has also suggested that I leave him alone and seek a new place of worship. It's this sense of humor that I find so compelling about the man.

I suppose that a discussion about the book of Genesis is also good place to discuss in greater depth the genesis of this book. I didn't want to write it. Don't get me wrong, I'm fascinated with the subject matter and as a God-fearing man I felt I had something to say about it. The advance was tempting - well into the three figures. But I'm a busy guy. I had other fish that needed frying more urgently. Ultimately, though, I decided I had to write this book for the benefit of Austin. I love him like the gerbil I never had. We've been collaborators since the late 1800's. He's a fine man, but (unlike me) Austin lacks spirituality in his life. I think even he would admit that he is envious of my deep faith and spirituality. I'm certain Austin wishes he were as pious and humble as I am. And it is because I am such a religious man that I have decided to co-write this book with Austin in the hope that the experience of researching and writing a book about The Bible points him in the right direction.

That being said, let's get back to Genesis the book. What does The Bible say that God created on Days One through Six? Is the story credible? Although I'm a spiritual man, I'm also a questioning man. God gave us faith, but he also gave us a critical mind. We have the ability to reason. With that in mind, let's closely examine the creation story.

Day One

Genesis says that on the first day God created the Heaven and the Earth, and that He divided the Day and the Night. It says that just prior to this moment the land was formless and empty, dark all over and covered with water. So it existed before it existed. It's a paradox, but it's also quite simple to understand. It's like the chicken and the egg. And you can't create a universe without breaking a few eggs.

Day Two

On the Second Day God made the sky -- a place for the sun, moon, stars and birds. He also "made water above the sky." This is an odd reference in Genesis. One can only presume that God considers the entire universe his own and, like a cosmic camper, He can make water anywhere He chooses (although I don't recommend doing it in poison ivy).

Let me make another observation at this point. For purposes of research, I have used the King James Bible. However, after months of work I happened upon this shocking fact: King James could not possibly have written the Bible. He succeeded Queen Elizabeth I as the Monarch of Britain in the 1600's while all evidence indicates that the Bible was written between 1500 BC and 100 AD. In addition to the obvious chronological discrepancy, there is a question of language. While the Bible was certainly written in English, there is little evidence that King James had the time or linguistic ability to write such a book. I will continue to look into this question. It may turn out to be the subject of my next book.

Day Three

God would like us to believe that He was extremely busy on Day Three, but don't believe it. He says He separated the water and the firmament and then created plant life. Other than the plant life, this sounds suspiciously like what God had been up to the previous day when he created firmament in the midst of the waters to divide the waters from the waters. If the firmament dividing the waters was not land, then what was it? In my opinion, God kind of took it easy on Day Three. He made plants. Don't get me wrong. Plants are fantastic. It's just that God sorted of padded his "Daily Report" when he says he also separated land from water on Day Three and tries to make it sound different from what He did on the previous day. Then again, maybe it took Him two days to separate water and land. This, too, is okay by me. Heck, I couldn't separate the water from the land in a thousand years. So maybe it took God two days to do it. And maybe He was embarrassed that He couldn't do it in the blink of an eye, so He listed this achievement over two days and tried to make it sound like two different things.

Very early texts refer to God's creation of television on the third day and his subsequent disappointment that cable service did not yet exist. For reasons never clearly understood, this portion of the creation story has been purged from later versions of Genesis.

Day Four

On Day Four, God gave a purpose to the lights He had created on the first day. They were to separate the day from the night, and to "mark seasons and days and years." It is not clear what the lights were doing during the two intervening days. As with Days Two and Three, what was created on Day Four sounds almost exactly like what was created on Day One. Maybe God took a day off on the fourth day, but denied it and made up some lame story about giving the lights a purpose. God continues to deny this accusation, but still looks awfully uncomfortable whenever the subject is raised.

As well as the sun and the moon, Genesis says that God made the stars on Day Four. This shows how far back religion and celebrity have been intertwined. No wonder celebrities so often publicly thank God when they win an Oscar or a Super Bowl. He made them. That God created stars (i.e. "celebrities") on Day Four, but didn't make average human beings like Adam and Eve until Day Six speaks volumes. And it answers a question that has been on the minds of studio heads and sports executives for generations. Stars are made, not born.

Day Five

Living creatures of the sea and the sky were created on Day Five. This was an awful lot of work. Whether amphibians were created on this day or on Day Six, when creatures of the land were made, is unclear. Perhaps tadpoles were made on Day Five and frogs on Day Six. I would not want to speculate on which day the platypus was created.

A brief side note to Day Five: Some people who call themselves Christians actually question whether the days of creation were...