The two offshoots from Judaism, Roman Catholicism and Islam, are both equally guilty of being wildly divergent from their origin. Frankly I wouldn't give either any more credence than Mormonism, a make believe sect so outrageously false that it baffles me how anyone can subscribe to such obvious lies. You might just as well pray to the Tooth Fairy or Father Christmas!
So whats with these saints? There's loads of them, many of whom I have never heard of and their basis of saint status is highly dubious, given that the Catholics seem to create them at the drop of a hat or crozier. Take for example the fairly recently deceased Mother Theresa of India, if anyone deserved sainthood it was her for her tireless work administering care to the poor.
Apparently sainthood is a sort of old fashioned telephone exchange! The devout place a call to Directory Assistance asking to be connected to saint so and so who will take their call and hopefully pass it on to the Almighty, if they can't answer it immediately by themselves. I suppose it depends upon the demands being made, a light shower for your lawn may be doable but a wrathful revenge for a wrong doing aristocrat may be a bit of a tall order.
However fear not, recognizing this little snag, the church allocates saints to specific tasks. St Christopher comes to the aid of travellers (I think) judging by the medallions one often sees in taxi cabs and St George is your man if a dragon is giving you problems. Why oh why do sensible well educated adults succumb to this utter nonsense? This includes men and women one would respect for their position and influence (like Joe Biden who is a Catholic President of the USA and so was Jack Kennedy).
I can understand and sympathize with some desperate immigrant out in the wilds of America on the Oregon trail being in such awful plight as to be ready to try whatever vaguely rembered catechisms from youth might still be remembered. Hell, I can even forgive outright hallucinations like mental mirages summoning up a phantom guide to help the lost survive. What I can't and won't forgive is loud mouthed charlatans deliberately taking advantage of the naiive beliefs of those too lazy, or stupid, to think for themselves.
THE EVILS OF ISLAM THE VIRTUES OF JUDAISM
Now although I have lambasted those two or three religions (if you can even call Moronism a religion) I didn't go into any details about the evils of Islam because frankly its terrorists have made it perfectly plain how intolerant and murderous they are (9-11 anyone, how about Hamas?) and they promise equally ludicrous rewards to their faithful and that includes the virgins and sherbert! Yuk to both! What experienced man would want a virgin when someone more adept is at hand and sherbert is just disgusting.
I won't do the same to Judaism because it doesn't earn my wrath. Its faithful don't proselytize and that alone is worth being thankful for and any weirdness is basically about traditional practices and dietary restraints which do not affect the rest of us however intolerant we may regrettably be about anything alien to our own way of life.
What's more I, who am married to a Jew (and was once before as a young man with much to learn about their culture) have found them to be generally courteous, intelligent, thoughtful and kind but also loud mouthed and argumentative as well as unapologetic on occasion but this latter is a personal observation because rudeness and shouting is anathema to this English man but I have my faults too and they are probably even more irritating to my dearest Tamar whom I love.
Judaism trains its followers from childhood to encourage discussion, argument and demands that its followers ask questions of their religion whereas Christianity's record is one of do as you are told because we know better and those who disobey us may be put to death in any number of horrible ways (remember the Inquisition?)
When you get right down to it Catholicism is Roman pantheism very thinly disguised and if any one person could be blamed for this, or at least for starting the divergence from Judaism, it is certainly St Paul or Saul of Tarsus as he was known then. If you bother to read the New Testament thoroughly, especially the Acts and Letters, you can spot this for yourself if you have any awareness of the nuances contained within these words.
According to contemporary sources (as far as I know) Saul was an unattractive person afflicted with various ailments but must have been a powerful speaker with influence possibly because of his Roman citizenship. He was also an opportunistic con man determined to get the early Church under his control, to subvert them into accepting non kosher foods, corrupting the practices of Judaism to allow anyone to join regardless of how much they would have been rejected formerly.
Tamar says "he was a scam artist and a tax collector" and more like the scum that worship Trump. "A low life criminal always being chased out of town on a rail no matter where he was".
Whichever of our appraisals of Saul are nearest to the truth this gave Saul the political power and support to outweigh all voices of protest and dissent, even those of the original disciples, including James the brother of Jesus (or so its said).
My point in starting with Saul is because he was responsible for altering Christianity to all its Romanesque pageantry, mythology and outright falsities. Its a jolly good thing Jesus isn't and wasn't the son of God because I don't see how He could have resisted pointing out their mistake if not just lobbing a thunderbolt into the lot. Well look what he did to Sodom and Gomorrah but Tammy claims God is supposed to allow us our mistakes, but not if you're gay, is that it?
Another furious religious argument has just broken out (again) between us because Tammy's take on that story is quite divergent from the facts as I recall them and I would bet any money God did not send down two queer angels as she claims! I'm damn sure I know the Bible better than she does...but she's checking it out online right now. Well that settles it, I remembered the episode accurately though she now claims she didn't believe in queer angels. I also did a rough sketch of God telling two angels to go down and sort it out but NO touching bottoms!
Now rabbis confuse matters with 'midrash' (midrashim - plural?) explaining various alternatives, some quite convoluted involving Ruth, the house of David, the Messiah (old Uncle Tom Cobbley and all - Widdicombe Fair song reference) all of which explain why Lot's daughters incestuous mating with their drunk father wasn't sinful at all because they meant well!
This is where Judaism and I part ways. Its the endless, minute arguing over the most trivial analyses of what the Torah REALLY meant and just check out the Chabad channel on YouTube to hear Rabbi Manis Friedman, (not sure about that surname) who I generally enjoy listening to, give some pretty bizarre explanations of various Biblical events.
Message Thread
« Back to index