Oh, look. Another jackass

Well, I seem to have made another friend.

I went wandering on the Dark Side again this week, and found a guy who felt he knew what he was talking about. So I kicked him.

Here's what he wrote:

Obama Reverses Himself On Embryonic Stem cells..After Two Days!

President Obama, in a highly publicized bit of political theater signed an executive order last Monday, March 9th reversing a 2001 executive order that President Bush had signed that allowed federal funds for research involving embryonic stem cell lines that was already in progress using embryos that had already been destroyed, but denying federal funding for new research that required the killing of any additional embryos.

Since the current occupant of the White House is an avid fan of abortion, even to the point of mandating that babies who survive an abortion be allowed to die of neglect, this was hardly a shocker.

But then, a mere two days later came the old switcheroo, buried in the 465-page omnibus appropriations bill that Obama signed Wednesday.

Known as the Dickey-Wicker amendment, it's been part of the annual funding for the Department of Health and Human Services for over a decade, and explicitly prohibits funding for "(1) the creation of a human embryo or embryos for research purposes; or (2) research in which a human embryo or embryos are destroyed, discarded, or knowingly subjected to risk of injury or death."

It not only prohibits the government from providing tax dollars to support research that kills or risks injury to human embryos, it specifically mandates an all-inclusive definition of “human embryo” that encompasses any human life even if created in a laboratory through cloning, in vitro fertilization or any other technology.

Sooo..what is President Barry Zero up to?

I see three possibilities: one, he simply didn't realize that the Dickey-Wicker Amendment was part of what he was signing; two, this was a window to allow well-connected `friends of Obama' to dump some stock they held (or short it) in companies specializing in embryonic stem cell research at a profit after it was artificially pumped up by the highly publicized White House announcement and make a tidy profit; or three he's planning an attack on Dickey-Wicker in Congress.

As a matter of fact, there's nothing to stop the any two of these from being true.

For the record, embryonic stem cell research has been almost entirely a waste of time, although a great deal of significant and valuable discoveries have been made using ADULT stem cells. The embryonic stem cells tend to mutate quickly and be unstable, which is why this research has mainly been a means to funnel government grants and taxpayer funds at certain scientists and companies specializing in the area. In states like California, New Jersey, Illinois, Connecticut, Maryland, Massachusetts and New York, the treasure trove runs into the billions.It's almost as lucrative as global warming.

So, in the spirit of Truth, Justice and the American Way, I felt that I should set him straight.

Well, I guess it's good to see that you have managed to be completely ignorant on the subject that you are expounding on. I suppose that's a good thing.

The Dickey-Wicker amendment has been in every budget since 1996, and has no effect on stem-cell research.

To start with, Dickey-Wicker banned funding only on reseach conducted on embryos themselves. While this includes the process of creating stem cell lines for further research (since the stem cells are taken out of an unused, non-implanted IVF embryo), but it does not prohibit the use of stem cells themselves, only the embryos they were taken from.

See, what you remain blithely ignorant of is the fact that a stem-cell "line" is a continuously-maintained collection of cells in laboratory flasks, which are transfered to new flasks as they divide and grow. One of the unique properties of stem cells is that they can be grown permanently in this way, unlike most other body tissues.

The line is created by taking stem cells out of an embryo, but that only has to be done once for each new line; after that, it's just the individual cells themselves that are grown - they do not form embryos, and could not be implanted to create a pregnancy, while they are growing in the culture medium. "Stem-cell research" uses these separated cells, not developing embryos.

Dickey-Wicker has always been interpreted as permitting funding for stem-cell research, but not for the creation of new lines of cells. Scientists accommodated this by using private funding to generate cell lines, and federal funding for research on the cells. Bush not only banned that, but imposed restrictions on the usage of existing cell lines that choked off vast amounts of ongoing research.

We'll ignore your potentially libelous statements regarding allowing "well-connected 'friends of Obama' to dump some stock they held (or short it) in companies specializing in embryonic stem cell research at a profit" - see, research companies aren't set up, and their stock made public, overnight. But we can tell that you aren't a fan of Barack Obama, so we'll assume that God will judge you for your lies, and we won't.

Instead, let's look at the following fascinating paragraph:

For the record, embryonic stem cell research has been almost entirely a waste of time, although a great deal of significant and valuable discoveries have been made using ADULT stem cells. The embryonic stem cells tend to mutate quickly and be unstable, which is why this research has mainly been a means to funnel government grants and taxpayer funds at certain scientists and companies specializing in the area."

Wow. I didn't know that you could be that wrong, that many times, in only 50 words.

Let's see - "embryonic stem cell research has been almost entirely a waste of time" - gee, I dunno, since Bush banned research except in 22 lines (many of which are played out, and sometimes contaminated), do you think that might have had an effect on the amount of research that's been done successfully?

(On the other hand, three days after Obama was sworn in, On January 23, 2009, phase I clinical trials for transplantation of an embryonic-derived cell population into spinal cord-injured individuals received FDA approval, making it the world's first human-embryonic-stem-cell human trial. The results of initial experiments suggest an improvement in locomotor recovery in spinal cord injuries after a 7-day delayed transplantation of human embryonic stem cells that were pushed towards an oligodendrocytic lineage. So, despite the anti-science attitudes of the former Bush White House, science marches on.)

"The embryonic stem cells tend to mutate quickly and be unstable" - well, no, not so much. Look at my description above, regarding stem cell lines. The fact that they don't mutate and become unstable is the very reason that the research is viable, you moron.

So, let's see. You have no idea about the federal budget process, and you don't know anything about stem-cell research that you don't read in biased pamphlets cranked out by medical Luddites. But here you are, expounding on both subjects, as if you had a clue (which, clearly, you don't).

Keep up the good work, OK?

Despite the fact that he moderates his board, that comment made it through. Followed by a response.

Fascinating.

First of all, the failures involved with embryonic stem cells have been pretty well documented.

Try here, here, here, here... as a matter of fact, when you google 'failure of embryonic stem cell research' you get about 350,000 hits.

The link you provided is an article of yet another experiment, which might succeed..or fail like the others have. On the other hand, the use of ADULT stem cells has a fairly good track record of success.

And obviously the scientist quoted in the article hated Bush and loves Obama..because the money tap has been turned back on!

We have a saying here in Joshua's Army...don't BS the blog.It never works.

Likewise, your expounding on Dickey-Wicker, which clearly disallows the use of federal funds for the destruction of embryos. Click on the link in the article, read it carefully and take notes.

As for the possibilities of why the Chosen One reversed himself undercover, I think my three possibilites are perfectly valid based on common sense and the way this administration has conducted itself so far. Hey, it's the Chicago way..on a national level.

Oh, and look up the definition of libel sometime. Unfortunately, your legal knowledge is apparently on a par with your scientific knowledge.

Based on a quick look at your profile, your blog and your comment, we know a couple of things..you hate Christians and the Bible, are an Obamabot, suffer from Bush Derangement Syndrome (admittedly, not my favorite president, but I never got foaming-at-the-mouth about it), are retired and so bored that your self-confessed hobby is trolling blogs you deem to be 'Christian' and 'Right wing.'

Seems pathetic to me, especially if this is the best you can do.

I suggest you find another blog to troll for your enjoyment. Joshuapundit might actually challenge your deeply held beliefs and I have a feeling that might be uncomfortable for you.

And if you wish to be taken seriously , I'd suggest you avoid the name calling and bitchery in the future. It just makes you look like an idiot without any class whatsoever. And who wants that, eh?

Oh, and one last thing BTW..in spite of the fact we disagree and your attempt to troll the board is pretty rank, thanks for your service to our beloved Republic.
( I assume your telling the truth about that)

We're all able to mouth off because guys like you were willing to pick up the rifle, and I respect that, if nothing else.It's why I spent the time and electrons responding to you that I did.

Regards,
Rob

But see, the problem is that Rob is intellectually dishonest. Because if he doesn't have an answer, he suppresses the question. I put in a followup, and he refused to let it see daylight.

Obviously, I should have kept a copy. But I think I can recreate it. (To be honest, the response I gave him was, while terse, relatively polite. If he thinks he can shut me up, the gloves are off. Not that the condition of my hands really matters at this point, but still. It's the principle of the thing.)

Rob,

Gee, where do I start?

Well, first of all, most of the links you gave for "stem cell failures" lead to "lifenews.com," which lists their mission statement as "LifeNews.com is an independent news agency specifically devoted to reporting news that affects the pro-life community... The topics covered by LifeNews.com include abortion, assisted suicide and euthanasia, bioethics issues such as human cloning and stem cell research, campaigns and elections, and legal and legislative issues."

Got enough agenda there, Butch?

You know, it's strange. Among the issues mentioned there, I don't see "death penalty." Isn't death... like, the antithesis of life? You'd think they'd be there on the front lines opposing it, wouldn't you? Odd.

as a matter of fact, when you google 'failure of embryonic stem cell research' you get about 350,000 hits.

Yeah, and you google any three unrelated words, you end up with hundreds of thousands of hits. Try "cheese gun swan" - 524,000 hits. With something as controversial as stem cell research, I'm surprised you only got 350,000 results.

On top of which, since George Bush banned federal funding of anything involving embryonic stem cells in 2001, and the research only got started in 1998, I think we can all see why there have been limited successes with it, if we're honest with it. Can't we?

We have a saying here in Joshua's Army...don't BS the blog.It never works.

Why would that be, Rob? Because like attracts like? Because it would be like calling the ocean "damp"?

Likewise, your expounding on Dickey-Wicker, which clearly disallows the use of federal funds for the destruction of embryos. Click on the link in the article, read it carefully and take notes.

Well, I could suggest that you do the same yourself. Or perhaps, do a little research yourself. Or would that be asking too much?

In January of 1999, Harriet Rabb, the top lawyer at the Department of Health and Human Services, released a legal opinion that would set the course for Clinton Administration policy. Federal funds, obviously, could not be used to derive stem cell lines (because derivation involves embryo destruction). However, she concluded that because human embryonic stem cells "are not a human embryo within the statutory definition," the Dickey-Wicker Amendment does not apply to them.

But reality isn't your strong point, is it, Rob?

Oh, and look up the definition of libel sometime. Unfortunately, your legal knowledge is apparently on a par with your scientific knowledge.

Golly, gee. How about Stanford University? Would their definition be good enough for you?

Libel involves the publishing of a falsehood that harms someone.

Slander is the same doctrine applied to the spoken word. Collectively, they are referred to as defamation. Both fall under the jurisdiction of individual states, which usually require the falsehood to be intentional.

So there we go. You're also ignorant on the law and/or the English language. Any other subjects you want to expound on?

Based on a quick look at your profile, your blog and your comment, we know a couple of things

Oh, this ought to be good...

you hate Christians and the Bible

Uh, no. Obviously, I've read the Bible several times. It's hypocrites that get under my skin. As you, personally, should be able to tell...

(you) are an Obamabot

No, sorry. He's doing a good job, and God knows he's infinitely better than his predecessor, but I don't agree with everything he does. For example, why (in the words of Nancy Pelosi) is "impeachment... off the table"?

(you) suffer from Bush Derangement Syndrome (admittedly, not my favorite president, but I never got foaming-at-the-mouth about it)

OK, one time I tried to talk about him while I was brushing my teeth, but that hardly qualifies, does it?

I wouldn't call it "foaming at the mouth," but when an intellectually untalented man consistently lies to the American people, destroys the economy, takes us to war for no reason, and supports the torture of prisoners (among dozens of other charges), what's to like about the man?

Speaking of “Bush Derangement Syndrome,” though, let’s look at a few of your statements (just in this webpage – no need to mine the rest of your blog. That would be too easy):

“since the current occupant of the White House is an avid fan of abortion…”

“Sooo..what is President Barry Zero up to?”

“…this was a window to allow well-connected `friends of Obama' to dump some stock they held (or short it) in companies specializing in embryonic stem cell research at a profit after it was artificially pumped up by the highly publicized White House announcement and make a tidy profit…”

“…the Chosen One…”

“…Obamabot…”

I wonder. Has the phrase “Obama Derangement Syndrome” been taken yet?

(Actually, yes it has. It even appears in a National Review article, so I’ll presume you’ve seen the term. Apparently, though, you’re blind to the warning signs…)

are retired and so bored that your self-confessed hobby is trolling blogs you deem to be 'Christian' and 'Right wing.'

Ah, no. If you'd actually been reading, you'd have noticed that my current hobby is Fallout 3. (Incidentally, the Experimental MIRV? Not worth the weight to carry it. And why do Mini Nukes not weigh anything? I mean, I understand that ammo is weight-free. But nuclear weapons?)

Joshuapundit might actually challenge your deeply held beliefs and I have a feeling that might be uncomfortable for you.

You certainly haven't managed that so far.

And if you wish to be taken seriously , I'd suggest you avoid the name calling and bitchery in the future. It just makes you look like an idiot without any class whatsoever. And who wants that, eh?

Well, in the words of that great philosopher Popeye T. Sailor, "I yam what I yam."

On the other hand, if you want to be taken seriously, perhaps you could make an effort to get at least one fact right. You know, just for the heck of it.

So, greetings from the fact-based community. As ever, I remain, the

Nameless Cynic

See? It's important to make new friends.

Update: (3/21/09) I seem to be banned from his blog. He got all cranky with me, called me a "libtard," and now he doesn't return my calls, he never writes, and we haven't been palling around in the lunchroom like we used to.

I'm so hurt that he would leave me like this. I don't know how I'll get through the day.

Now, about that "evolution" argument...

OK, so I got lazy and took last week off. It's true. I've been involved in a couple of on-line arguments, and I've become addicted to an evil, destructive drug known as "Fallout 3." (Trust me, it's better than crack, and you don't have that whole pesky "you're under arrest" thing to worry about...)

Well, I was casting about for a new point to annoy people with, and realized that a guy named Brian Byrne made the point much better than I ever could.

(OK, maybe not "better," but at least "more succinctly." I mean, really, I have this unfortunate habit of rambling on for paragraphs at a time, simply because I'm in love with the sound of my own voice. I should be ashamed. I'm not, of course. But I should be.)

So I'm going to be lazy this week, too, and reprint his entire entry, fully attributed, of course.

The Holocaust AND Darwin in the Same Week?!?

The Vatican chipped a wee bit from the religious ignorance boulder yesterday when they acknowledged that Darwin was right about that whole evolution thing. In doing so, they officially gave the kiss-off to Intelligent Design, more or less dismissing it out of hand, as any thinking person has already done.

I'm not Catholic, and I don't want to fall into the trap of gushing on and on about how something I'm not now, nor have ever been a part of, is sooooo much better than what's closer at hand. That said, it strikes me as particularly powerful, the degree to which the Vatican seems to have actual scholars actually thinking about these issues, as opposed to the American fundamentalist Protestant approach of creating a think tank to generate misinformation that flies directly in the face of painfully obvious science.

Granted, the Vatican’s scholarship only goes so far in the face of their continued anti-straight-male rights positions, and I also seem to remember something about a coverup and some kids? Something. Still, let’s give them credit for cracking a book.

Another important point that’s brought up in the article:

Professor [Marc Leclerc, who teaches natural philosophy at the Gregorian University] said that too many opponents of Darwin – above all Creationists – had mistakenly claimed that his theories were "totally incompatible with a religious vision of reality," as did proponents of Intelligent Design.

I would say I’m baffled by the fact that nobody in the American Taliban has stood up and acknowledged this idea (really, could all-powerful God have NOT created things He knew would evolve?), but doing so would remove a hugely popular bludgeon from their arsenal in the ongoing, completely fabricated culture war. The idea that Christian ideals and ideas are being persecuted by a callous Liberal Elite Establishment is key to keeping the wedge between fundamentalists and everyone else firmly in place. They keep their people feeling alienated, their alienation unifies them, and they flock to the polls when another W shows up on election day.

Does God really hate abortion?

If you ask the standard pro-lifer "does the Bible oppose abortion?" their first answer will be "Of course it does! All life is sacred!" It's when you try to pin them down regarding where, exactly, the Bible says this that they start to get squirrelly. For all of the people who are willing to tell me that I'm "twisting Scripture" and taking things out of context for saying that homosexuality isn't opposed by the Bible, the only way to say that the Bible opposes abortion is to read things into the verses that aren't actually there.

You find arguments like "Psalm 78:5-6 reveals God's concern over "the children yet to be born." Yeah, that's a steaming pile. What it actually says is:

He decreed statutes for Jacob
and established the law in Israel,
which he commanded our forefathers
to teach their children,
so the next generation would know them,
even the children yet to be born,
and they in turn would tell their children.

Yeah, so the fathers are going to teach the baby while it's still in the womb? Or is that just saying that each generation will teach the next? Poetic license is not equal to proof.

Or the anti-abortion people will feed you unsupported arguments like "Well, the Bible says 'thou shalt not kill.' And so abortion is murder, right?" But that doesn't answer when a fetus is considered a human being. For example, all throughout the Bible, "life" is equated with "breath." In Genesis 2:7, it says "the LORD God formed the man from the dust of the ground and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life, and the man became a living being." So you could take that to read that life begins when the baby takes its first breath.

Alternatively, in Leviticus 27:6, the Lord tells Moses how much people are worth, to establish the tithe, and children aren't worth anything until they're a month old (anything younger apparently has no value). In the same way, the Lord told Moses to count the "Levites" (Jews) in Numbers 3:15, but not to count anybody less than a month old. So perhaps the baby isn't even human until then.

Another common argument is to use more poetic license from the Bible to show that God sees us as individuals even before we are born. For example, Jeremiah 1:5 (Before I formed you in the womb I knew you, before you were born I set you apart), or Psalm 139:13-16:

or you created my inmost being;
you knit me together in my mother's womb.
I praise you because I am fearfully and wonderfully made;
your works are wonderful,
I know that full well.
My frame was not hidden from you
when I was made in the secret place.
When I was woven together in the depths of the earth,
your eyes saw my unformed body.
All the days ordained for me
were written in your book
before one of them came to be.

So, we'll ignore the fact that in Jeremiah, we have a guy claiming to be a prophet pumping up his own importance. Let's just consider the statement in there: "Before I formed you in the womb I knew you." Doesn't that imply that God sees every person as important before conception? Which not only leads us back to the Catholic opposition to birth control, but, taken to its logical conclusion, any woman who miscarries should be charged at least with manslaughter, if not murder.

Same argument, folks. Let's not fool ourselves. So let's consider what the Bible actually says, as opposed to what people want to read into it.

Let's go to Numbers 5:19.

And the priest shall charge her by an oath, and say unto the woman, If no man have lain with thee, and if thou hast not gone aside to uncleanness with another instead of thy husband, be thou free from this bitter water that causeth the curse.

First, that's another use of shakab-as-rape: "...If no man have shakab with thee," which is then contrasted with her willingly having sex with a man other than her husband. If it is suspected that a woman has been raped or had an adulterous affair, she will be forced to drink the "bitter water" (made from holy water and some dust swept from the church floor), which would cause her to have an abortion "to make thy belly to swell, and thy thigh to rot."

Or in Ecclesiastes 6:3-5, where Solomon is making the point that it is better to end a pregnancy early than to allow him to be born and live a miserable life:

If a man beget an hundred children, and live many years, so that the days of his years be many, and his soul be not filled with good, and also that he have no burial; I say, that an untimely birth is better than he. For he cometh in with vanity, and departeth in darkness, and his name shall be covered with darkness. Moreover he hath not seen the sun, nor known any thing: this hath more rest than the other.

So apparently, the "holiness of the womb" isn't quite as important as some conservative Christians would like you to believe. In fact, it wasn't even a serious crime to cause an abortion.

If men strive, and hurt a woman with child, so that her fruit depart from her, and yet no mischief follow: he shall be surely punished, according as the woman's husband will lay upon him; and he shall pay as the judges determine. And if any mischief follow, then thou shalt give life for life, eye for eye, tooth for tooth, hand for hand, foot for foot, burning for burning, wound for wound, stripe for stripe.(Exodus 21:22-25)

It states right there that abortion is a civil matter - you only pay a fine. It's the other damage, to the mother (not, you'll notice, the fetus), that can get the abuser punished.

In Genesis 38:24, there's a pregnant woman convicted of prostitution. Though the leaders of Israel knew the woman was carrying a fetus, they still decided to burn her. Why does the fetus have to die for the mother's crimes?

And all through the Bible, it repeats that it's better to be aborted, to die before you're born, than to live a crappy life. That sounds kind of... well, pro-choice to me. Or at least a "quality of life" argument.

Cursed be the day wherein I was born: let not the day wherein my mother bare me be blessed. Cursed be the man who brought tidings to my father, saying, "A man child is born unto thee," making him very glad. And let that man be as the cities which the LORD overthrew, and repented not: and let him hear the cry in the morning, and the shouting at noontide; because he slew me not from the womb; or that my mother might have been my grave, and her womb to be always great with me. Wherefore came I forth out of the womb to see labour and sorrow, that my days should be consumed with shame? (Jeremiah 20:14-18)

Or as an hidden untimely birth I had not been; as infants which never saw light. There the wicked cease from troubling; and there the weary be at rest. There the prisoners rest together; they hear not the voice of the oppressor. The small and great are there; and the servant is free from his master. (Job 3:16-19)

If a man begets a hundred children, and lives many years, so that the days of his years are many, but he does not enjoy life's good things, and also has no burial, I say that an untimely birth is better off than he. For it comes into vanity and goes into darkness, and in darkness its name is covered; moreover it has not seen the sun or known anything; yet it finds rest rather than he. (Ecclesiastes 6:3-5)

OK, they were sad, so they're allowed to wish to have been aborted? Not just "never have been born," the wording is pretty clear there. "because he slew me not from the womb; or that my mother might have been my grave"

And apparently, abortion is quite all right if it's performed on somebody you don't like, during wartime, or on someone who disagrees with your religion.

At that time Menahem, starting out from Tirzah, attacked Tiphsah and everyone in the city and its vicinity, because they refused to open their gates. He sacked Tiphsah and ripped open all the pregnant women. 2 Kings 15:16

Give them, O LORD—
what will you give them?
Give them wombs that miscarry
and breasts that are dry.
(Hosea 9:14)

The people of Samaria must bear their guilt,
because they have rebelled against their God.
They will fall by the sword;
their little ones will be dashed to the ground,
their pregnant women ripped open.
(Hosea 13:16)

So basically, if you actually read the Bible, you'll find that it really isn't opposed to abortion after all. In fact, it's easier to make the case that the Bible supports pornography than it is to say that it opposes abortion.

No, really. It is. As evidence, I submit the following:

How beautiful your sandaled feet,
O prince's daughter!
Your graceful legs are like jewels,
the work of a craftsman's hands.
Your navel is a rounded goblet
that never lacks blended wine.
Your waist is a mound of wheat
encircled by lilies.
Your breasts are like two fawns,
twins of a gazelle.
(Song of Solomon 7:1-3)

Your stature is like that of the palm,
and your breasts like clusters of fruit.
I said, "I will climb the palm tree;
I will take hold of its fruit."
May your breasts be like the clusters of the vine,
the fragrance of your breath like apples,
and your mouth like the best wine.
(Song of Solomon 7:1-3)

And even more than that, my favorite Bible verse:

There she lusted after her lovers, whose genitals were like those of donkeys and whose emission was like that of horses. (Ezekial 23:20)

Perhaps, rather than twisting passages from the Bible, the rabid anti-abortion activist should remember one or two. Like, perhaps, Matthew 7:1-2: Judge not, lest ye be not judged. For with what judgment ye judge, ye shall be judged: and with what measure ye mete, it shall be measured to you again. And, once again, another verse from the Gospel of Matthew. "But in vain they do worship me, teaching for doctrines the commandments of men." (Matthew 15:9).

Huh. Imagine that.

You know, I never figured that I'd be writing a religious blog. But I seem to have struck a nerve somewhere with my recent activities.

One of my "anonymous" responses was signed by (and therefore, I'm willing to accept that it was from) this hypocrite, who not only refused to allow a comment that he disagreed with, he decided to inform me:

It is obvious that you are not a Christian in any way shape and form. As for your military service doesn't mean squat when compared to your immature knwolwdge of the Bible and the Word of God. Truth is unchangeable and Jesus Christ is Truth. Homosexuals are by their very act condmened less they repent of their Evil Life style.
I'm glad you responed on my blog. I Knew their were people of no moral convictions out there and you obviosly are one of them. I'll pray for you and your family that you come back to the Truth.

David Drysdale Sr.

So, aside from being homophobic and illiterate (and his illiteracy matches what's on his blog - hence my acceptance that it's him), he's making some major assumptions about me simply because I disagree with him.

And, incidentally, his problems are more extensive than that. Based on the lack of balance in his thinking, I suspect that "Master Drysdale" is not as effective a teacher of the martial arts as he claims. If nothing else, the fact that he insists on referring to himself as "Master Drysdale" shows a fascinatingly large ego. He may think that he's found his center, but he's tilting pretty heavily in the wrong direction.

Oh, and by the way, Davy. There are a number of very useful spellcheck programs out there. Of course, they wouldn't solve all of your problems, like on your blog, where you air your ignorance for all the world to see.

Yeah, scroll down that left column there. Past five or six anti-gay screeds (many followed by "Master Drysdale" - not that you have an ego problem... are you short, by some chance? Because I see a little short-guy complex going on here...), couple of anti-abortion things, couple of politicians (Sarah Palin? "Governor of Alaska and trouble for Liberals"? Really? No, Davy, we want her to run in 2012. Please. She makes you look intelligent...), couple of conservative commentators (Christ, do you have enough crap on here?), way down at the bottom, where you prove how much you love your wife by having pictures of pretty girls on there... well, Spellcheck probably wouldn't tell you about this one, but you know Kiera Knightley? Yeah, I'm pretty sure she's never written a book...


However, let me expand on that shakab argument, in case anybody's interested.

If you accept that the Old Testament considered homosexual rape a particularly heinous sin, it also explains one of the worst stories in the Old Testament: Genesis 19. In a nutshell, two angels visit Lot in Sodom and he treats them to dinner and convinces them to stay the night. Outside, a group of men gather, asking to "know" the men staying with Lot — to "know them in the Biblical sense." Lot discourages the crowd by offering them his daughters, telling the men they can do whatever they want to the girls. But the daughters are refused.

Now, while this chapter is commonly used to denigrate loving, same-sex relationships by comparing them to homosexual rape, which is really a nonsensical comparison - it's exactly the same as saying that the existence of an abusive husband proves that any marriage will always be a crime, or the fact that a heterosexual rapist exists is evidence that all men are evil animals.

(OK, there's actually some truth in that...)

However, consider the fact that Lot was supposed to be a righteous man, and yet he offers his daughters to a violent mob to be gang-raped. And this story is mirrored in Judges 19 (only in Judges, the woman is accepted, and, having survived being gang-raped all night, is then killed by her lover when she limps back home).

First of all, those stories prove how little value women had in that society. But if you think about it hard enough (and lock away that little voice in your brain that tells you how evil this whole scenario is), the stories are somewhat mitigated if the society also had a strong, religious prohibition against homosexual rape.

(The way I see it, it might explain it, but it doesn't make it right. I have a hard time not seeing any society that could think that way as evil - however, I'm also viewing that society from the outside.)

In the end, if these people thought that homosexual rape was so bad that heterosexual rape was considered positive in comparison, that explains a great deal about both chapters of the Old Testament.

Fun with Christians III

Let me just start out by saying this: I apparently need a hobby. Very, very badly.

I have started trolling innocent blogs.

OK, to be honest, they aren't that innocent. They're conservative Christian websites, loaded with the stink of smug superiority exclusive to the self-satisfied hypocrite with a ready-made group of victims to look down on. And I wasn't really trolling, as such, since I was on-topic, and merely waited for them to post something saying that "homosexuality is a sin." And, really, I can't say that I've started doing that, since I tend to chime in with annoying chunks of reality whenever I run across somebody being stupid.

So, really, in the larger sense, the only true parts of that sentence involved the fact that I did it (whatever it was), and that whatever it was that I did, I did it on other blogs.

OK, maybe I started this whole thing out badly. Let me back up, and I'll see if I can start making sense. Wouldn't that be a nice change?

Some time ago, I was skimming through some of the various blogs I like to read, and I happened upon a post on Adult Christianity which I found fascinating.

Let me just put in an unrequested plug: I first found Adult Christianity because I happened upon MissPoppy.com, the best place for religious, irreligious, and anti-religious swag in the world (and yes, it has all three - just thumb around in there for a while; you'll see what I mean). In the fullness of time, I learned of her blog, and have been reading it ever since.

Anyway, the article which I found so fascinating (and which doesn't seem to be on her Blogspot mirror - maybe I just missed it) is entitled "One More Article Explaining That The Bible Does Not Condemn Homosexuality." It took a number of ideas that I was already familiar with, one piece of brilliant scholarship, and a number of lesser ideas which were cleverly put together, and melded them into a beautiful, logical whole.

I was entranced. Specifically with her main thesis (which I used as my central thesis in my initial foray into Christian Logic), that two famously homophobic verses from the Bible are simple translation errors. Specifically:

Thou shalt not lie with mankind, as with womankind: it is abomination. (Leviticus 18:22)

If a man also lie with mankind, as he lieth with a woman, both of them have committed an abomination: they shall surely be put to death; their blood shall be upon them. (Leviticus 20:13)

See, in the Ancient Hebrew, the verb for "to lie with" used on the "mankind" side of that equation is shakab, and the verb used on the "womankind" side is mishkab. And in the primitive, 30,000-word vocabulary of Ancient Hebrew, it makes no sense to decide that they would have two words with exactly the same meaning.

So what Miss Poppy Dixon did, in a burst of (as I said earlier) brilliant scholarship, was to go through the Ancient Hebrew books of the Bible and count the number of uses of each word (in the original tongue, not the translation), and then consider the usage of each. This simple exercise pointed out the fact that shakab, in the sexual sense, refers to non-consensual coitus (or, to put it bluntly, rape).

Incidentally, I wrote Miss Poppy to thank her for her brilliance, and to be sure that she didn't mind me using her work, and... well, for just being her. Her response was as follows:

Oh, I'm always so afraid to open a post with the subject line "homosexuality," and rehearse in my mind my standard reply, "Thanks for sharing your thoughts with me," but this time I need not have feared.

I appreciate your writing, and even more so your quoting me. I am no scholar. I just spent a couple of hours with a blue letter Bible and put the thing together.

Thanks for linking to me, and for fighting the good fight. It's an important message.

Miss Poppy

So, two things.

1. Despite her erudition, Miss Poppy is not actually aware of the meaning of the word "scholar." Hint: There doesn't have to be a school involved.

2. She's a wonderful, brilliant woman, who I would have to marry if... well, if I wasn't already married. And if she wasn't (I assume).

But anyway, I took her work, and boiled it down to the following few paragraphs.

Let's look at "homosexuality as sin." The primary sources for this belief are the two mistranslated verses from Leviticus, 18:22 and 20:13.

If you go back to the source material, in Ancient Hebrew, you'll find that the verb used for "mankind" is shakab, and the one used for "womankind" is mishkab. And shakab, in its sexual sense, is used when you are talking about forcible sex (such as, say, rape), or any sex against the will of the victim.

For example, shakab is also the word used in Genesis 34:2, when Shechem defiles Hamor the Hivite; and in 2 Samuel 13:14 - "...but, being stronger than she, forced her, and lay with her." And in Isaiah 13:16 - "Their children also shall be dashed to pieces before their eyes; their houses shall be spoiled, and their wives ravished." It's even used in Exodus 22:19, "Whosoever lieth with a beast shall surely be put to death."

There are references to consensual sex in the Bible, but none of them, if you look at the source material (before the translation errors crept in) use the word shakab. So the correct translation of the passages from Leviticus is an exhortation against homosexual rape: "Thou shalt not force sexual congress on a man, as (or instead of) with a woman."

Personally, I prefer the Word of God over the Mistranslation of God. Simply because you happen to disapprove of homosexuality, you shouldn't push your own prejudices as the teachings of the Lord.

"But in vain do they worship me, Teaching as their doctrines the precepts of men." (Matthew 15:9).

Armed with this brief statement, I googled "homosexuality sin" with the filter "blogs", and then sorted by date (to be sure that I was beating on the freshest horse).

I had the following results:

Some blogs moderate their posts, and simply wouldn't allow my words to appear at all. (In fact, I contacted this one to ask if they'd received it, and got a terse "Please see our 'Comments' tab" in response, where they open with "We do not promote false doctrine." So, yeah. Real open-minded guys, there...)

Some blogs, interestingly, moderate after the fact: my response would appear, and then would disappear shortly thereafter. (You know, that seems even more hypocritical than not letting it appear in the first place. At least, it seems that way to me.)

On some blogs, they allowed me to post it, but nobody had an answer.

But thankfully, there were some signs of life in the theological world. After all that, I managed to engage two groups, one evangelical site and one (I came to find out) Mormon site, where they ended with "OK, you stated your case well. I reject it."

(I even had a brief discussion with one kid, who seemed surprised that anybody read his stuff.)

So overall, I think that all I've managed to do is to prove something that I already knew: logic doesn't do a damned thing in arguing with Christians about their beliefs.

And so it goes.

Time to get back to a system of laws

It's becoming apparent that many of the Guantanamo inmates will be getting away with no more punishment than time already served. Not only are many of the confessions tainted by torture (and therefore inadmissible), a new problem has come to light: thanks to incompetent record-keeping, we just don't have any evidence. And in the end, if you can't make a case, you can't prosecute.

At this point, it's difficult to ascertain why this situation came about. The command staff at Guantanamo may have been overwhelmed by the array of duties that they were being called upon to perform, they may have had no experience at the job and simply bungled it, or they may have assumed that the military courts would simply hand down "guilty" verdicts without actually considering the evidence.

In the words of one former prosecutor (.pdf) who resigned in disgust:

Similarly, neither OMC-P nor CITF maintained any central repository for case files, any method for cataloguing and storing physical evidence, or any other system for assembling a potential case into a readily intelligible format that is the sine qua non of a successful prosecution. While no experienced prosecutor, much less one who had performed his or her duties in the fog of war, would expect that potential war crimes would be presented, at least initially, in "tidy little packages," at the time I inherited the Jawad case, Mr. Jawad had been in U.S. custody for approximately five years. It seemed reasonable to expect at the very least that after such a lengthy period of time, all available evidence would have been collected, catalogued, systemized, and evaluated thoroughly -- particularly since the suspect had been imprisoned throughout the entire time the case should have been undergoing preparation.

Instead, to the shock of my professional sensibilities, I discovered that the evidence, such as it was, remained scattered throughout an incomprehensible labyrinth of databases primarily under the control of CITF, or strewn throughout the prosecution offices in desk drawers, bookcases packed with vaguely-labeled plastic containers, or even simply piled on the tops of desks vacated by prosecutors who had departed the Commissions for other assignments. I further discovered that most physical evidence that had been collected had either disappeared or had been stored in locations that no one with any tenure at, or institutional knowledge of, the Commissions could identify with any degree of specificity or certainty. The state of disarray was so extensive that I later learned, as described below, that crucial physical evidence and other documents relevant to both the prosecution and the defense had been tossed into a locker located at Guantanamo and promptly forgotten. Although it took me a number of months -- so extensive was the lack of any discernible organization, and so difficult was it for me to accept that the US military could have failed so miserably in six years of effort -- I began to entertain my first, developing doubts about the propriety of attempting to prosecute Mr. Jawad without any assurance that through the exercise of due diligence I could collect and organize the evidence in a manner that would meet our common professional obligations.

Although certain pundits are pushing the "61 who returned to terror" meme as a reason to keep them imprisoned, it's been easily debunked. (Of course, even if it were correct, their stated 11% recidivism rate is significantly lower than the Bureau of Justice statistic telling us that 67.5% of criminals released from US prisons are "rearrested for a felony or serious misdemeanor within 3 years.")

The Republicans, of course, are going insane about the upcoming closure of Gitmo, screaming about "what are we going to do with the TERRORISTS!?!?"

I'm not clear why this is a problem. There are federal facilities all over the place. It's time to just ignore the whining of the congresscritters, and stick them in there. (That's what "exclusive jurisdiction" means, after all — the state authorities don't have any pull in there unless they've been granted some.) If Brownback wants to complain, tell him to figure out where these boys would be welcome, which is already set up as a detention facility, and we can send them there.

In the meantime, tough. Stop knuckling under to the GOP, Obama — they're already proving to be classic Republican contrarians. Just roll over them, and let them get all stampy-feet angry for a while. It's not like they were planning to agree with you any time in the near future anyway.

Once the Guantanamates are safely stowed away, you can give them the trial that they've been denied so far (not that that's going to be an easy matter, of course, since the policies of the Bush administration has made many of them unindictable).

Trial outcome? Easy stuff. If it's determined that they're guilty and sentenced, they take the punishment. If not, we drop a moderately fat check on them, and send them back to their country of record, or to a third country, if necessary. If we don't even give them a chance to settle in the USA, it defuses the arguments of the unhinged right.

All Obama needs to do is fix each problem as it comes up, and move on. Call it the Whack-A-Mole Theory of Governance.

Fun with Christians II-B

Well, that game seems to be over. Sad, but there it is. He responded, and his post ended:

I wouldn’t bother continuing to post comments, there is plenty for others to read and I’ll post some links to refutations of your assertions so those who wish can do the research themselves, after all…that’s why I let your comments stand in the first place.

I won’t link to Cynic’s blog, there is too much horrible language used there. If you want it you can search it.

That was a clue for me that he'd actually gone to my blog. It wasn't like I hid it. It was included in every post; the post headers link to it every time.

Obviously, in retrospect, that was much too easy a clue. But I always post linked to this blog; I wasn't hiding who I was, just what my personal beliefs are. Ah, well. Life goes on...

Anyway, I sent the following final shot, which (outside of here) will never see the light of day:

Although I suspect that this response will never be seen, let just point out a few inconsistencies (or misunderstandings) in your post.

I’m going to assume from your comments that you have no issue with the bible calling Homosexuality a sin, it’s just that Leviticus 18:22 has been mistranslated, and taken out of context.

Not quite. I do not believe that homosexuality is a sin. I believe that much of the Old Testament has been mistranslated or taken out of context, and this is what leads to the prohibition against homosexuality.

I believe that ALL scripture is “breathed out by God” and is as described in 2nd Timothy 3:16.

But you ignore Colossians 2:14, where he "canceled out the written code." Further, although you once again bring up the now-canceled dietary laws, you continue to ignore other strictures laid out in the OT, which, having been "breathed out by God," should be just as valid today. I mentioned a few of them - this is by no means exhaustive, though. Particularly Leviticus and, to a lesser extent Exodus, are full of these ignored Lesser Commandments:

Have you killed a teenager for yelling at their parents lately? Leviticus 20:9:
"For every one that curseth his father or his mother shall be surely put to death: he hath cursed his father or his mother; his blood shall be upon him."

Leviticus 19 is pretty straight-forward, Ten-Commandments-like stuff, but there are a few exceptions: not planting your field with two different seeds won’t come up a lot for the average city-dweller, but have you worn a cotton-poly shirt? Forbidden. (Lev 19:19) Haircuts and shaving are right out (Lev 19:27), as are tattoos (Lev 19:28), astrology (Lev 19:26) or fortune tellers (Lev 19:31).

...the daily animal sacrifices were stopped by the selective reading of Hebrews 10:2-11 (of course, it doesn’t say that you should stop, just that it can never “take away sins” – oddly, the purpose is not simply to take away sins, but because the Lord Thy God commanded it, so is that really a good argument?)

Leviticus 12:1-8 declares that a woman is unclean for 33 days after giving birth to a boy and for 66 days after giving birth to a girl. It goes on to demand that certain animals must be offered as a burnt offering. Read Leviticus 23 to see the detailed regulations concerning “complete rest” on the Sabbath day, and the demands of animal sacrifice. Leviticus 18:19 forbids a husband from having sex with his wife during her menstrual period. Leviticus 19:19 forbids mixed breeding of various kinds of cattle, sowing various kinds of seeds in your field or wearing “a garment made from two kinds of material mixed together.”

For that matter, Leviticus 25:44 says that you may own slaves, as long as they’re from neighboring nations (which would be, for Americans, Mexico and Canada). On the other hand, Leviticus 21:20 says that you can’t approach the altar of God if you have a defect in your sight. I’m pretty sure that would include glasses.

Exodus tells us some interesting facts. For example, 21:7 tells you how to sell your daughter into slavery, while 35:2 tells you to kill someone who works on the Sabbath.

And those are the ones I've mentioned before, that you choose to ignore. Entirely non-dietary, but ignored. I could go on, but why? Based on your responses so far, you'll continue to ignore these requirements that were "breathed out by God."

I was right, though. He moderates which responses he allows, and if I hadn't engaged with him in the first place, the original debate wouldn't have taken place. But go to the original post, and way down at the bottom, you'll find the final response, under my name, which now reads:

Cynic,
You are right. I’m tired of posting your rants disguised as “proof” of your assertions. Your “proofs” haven’t changed since your first comment post…assertions and no support.

Category error ring a bell?

Context of passage ring a bell?

All you’ve done is show you can cut and paste from your favorite Homosexual revisionist tracts…nothing more.

I was naive to believe you were actually looking for my exegesis…you are looking for an excuse to spew your hate and your unfounded views of scripture.

Spew them on your own blog…not here.

I challenge anyone to find anything I wrote which qualified as a "rant." All passages were taken in context. All translation issues are accurate.

Hypocrisy is a lovely thing, isn't it?

But, yeah. I think he's ticked at me.

Fun with Christians II-A

You know, I've had a lot of arguments with christians over the years. I've used logic, insults, scholarly analysis; I've reduced them to tears and impotent rage. It's never worked. Little fuckers are too pigheaded. Plus, I have this suspicion that, once they start arguing with a heathen, they automatically discount any argument, regardless of how obvious or reasonable it seems, as coming from a poisoned well. So I decided to do a very bad thing.

I was going to lie, and pretend to be another christian, but one with a different slant on the scriptures.

There were challenges involved (for example, I was going to have to remember to capitalize "Christian" and "Scripture"). But I figured I was up to the challenge.

(Oh, by the way, if you didn't read the original post, now might be a good time. And feel free to borrow any of the following arguments that you like. Few of them are original to me, anyway.)

I'm not going to go over the entire argument. You can read it on your own if you want. What I explained seemed quite reasonable to me, and between years of arguing with Christians, and with the benefit of having the internet for research, I figured that I could throw down with the best of the theocrats.

But here's how it went. With our boy Bobby interjecting variations on "I don't understand what you're getting at," I wrote pretty much the following thesis. Feel free to use it, but give me credit. I'm relatively proud of it.

I mentioned the tired old "shellfish" argument, but only as one piece of a set of three. I’m fully aware of Matthew 15:11, where He cast off the kosher rules ("Not what goes into the mouth defiles a man; but what comes out of the mouth, this defiles a man."), but on that same subject, you should remember Matthew 5:17-19, where Jesus upheld the Jewish dietary laws:

"Do not think that I came to destroy the Law or the Prophets. I did not come to destroy but to fulfill. For assuredly, I say to you, till heaven and earth pass away, one jot or one tittle will by no means pass from the law till all is fulfilled. Whoever therefore breaks one of the least of these commandments, and teaches men so, shall be called least in the kingdom of heaven; but whoever does and teaches them, he shall be called great in the kingdom of heaven."

However, let’s put aside that argument. There’s more to Leviticus than just chapters 18 and 20. Why are you demeaning gay people, but not the other abominators? Because seafood and gay sex aren’t the only abominations in the Bible.

Have you killed a teenager for yelling at their parents lately? Leviticus 20:9:

For every one that curseth his father or his mother shall be surely put to death: he hath cursed his father or his mother; his blood shall be upon him.

(KJV, of course. I’m normally an NIV kind of guy, but you can’t beat King James for the beauty of the language.)

For that matter, all of Leviticus 20 is a killer. Literally in some cases; in others, the violator is left either childless or shunned: adultery or marrying your mother-in-law or daughter-in-law, are apparently capital offenses; weirdly, having sex with your sister just gets you shunned.

But, of course you know that, since that’s one of the chapters you quoted.

A lot of Leviticus 19 is pretty straight-forward, Ten-Commandments-like stuff, but there are a few exceptions: not planting your field with two different seeds won’t come up a lot for the average city-dweller, but have you worn a cotton-poly shirt? It's forbidden (Lev 19:19). Haircuts and shaving are right out (Lev 19:27), as are tattoos (Lev 19:28), astrology (Lev 19:26) and fortune tellers (Lev 19:31).

While you’re at Leviticus 19, please note that you are allowed to have sex with another man’s slave, but you have to sacrifice a ram to do it. (Lev 19:20-22).

And that’s just Leviticus. Why do you choose to selectively follow some parts of the Old Testament, but not others? The dietary laws were pulled (or not, depending on your reading of Matthew 5), and the daily animal sacrifices were stopped by the selective reading of Hebrews 10:2-11 (of course, it doesn’t say that you should stop, just that it can never “take away sins” – oddly, the purpose is not simply to take away sins, but because the Lord Thy God commanded it, so is that really a good argument?). But I’ll bet you still get haircuts, and I’ll bet that, even if you have a wool suit, the thread holding it together is cotton.

You can't just selectively decide which parts of the Old Testament to follow. Particularly not when (as I said before) you aren't even necessarily following an accurate translation.

Being straight myself, I don’t have any particular stake in the question, other than Christ’s exhortation to “love thy neighbor as thyself.” (Like I said, I may use NIV [New International Version of the Bible] simply for clarity, but I love the KJV [King James] language.)

But I’ve found that most arguments regarding homosexuality being a sin are simply mistranslations and phrases taken out of context.

One of the words mistranslated that way is arsenokoites. It’s a Greek word formed from the words for “male” and “bed.” It isn’t not found anywhere else in the Bible, and has not been found anywhere in the contemporary Greek of Paul’s time. We don’t know what it means. Although you can see where some translators might have decided on that meaning, it could also refer to male prostitutes with female customers (a common practice in the Roman world - look at Pompeii).

Furthermore, the word often translated as “effeminate” (1 Corinthians 6:9, for example; the Greek word malakoi) means “soft” or “vulnerable.” The same word is translated as “soft” in reference to clothing (Matthew 11:8, Luke 7:25) and as “illness” (Matthew 4:23 and 9:35). It is not used anywhere else in the New Testament. In 1 Corinthians 6:9, it probably refers those who are “soft,” “pliable,” “unreliable,” or “without courage or stability.” The translation of malakoi as “effeminate” is incorrect and impossible to justify based on ancient usage.

One of my very good friends was kicked out of the Air Force because of her beliefs and her lifestyle. The mealy-mouthed phrase “love the sinner, hate the sin” makes very little sense when you consider that the “sin” in question is an important part (possibly the most important part) of someone’s personality and emotional life.

I can’t change anyone’s beliefs. But I can point out some logical inconsistencies in your arguments.

First of all, marriage in biblical times was not based on romantic love but on a legal contract usually entered by parents on behalf of their children. The Biblical view held that the role of women was property belonging to their father or husband. Women were members of the people of God only because of their relationship to their father, brother or husband; women could not carry circumcision (the “sign of the covenant”) in their bodies, and were therefore less important, except as breeding stock. (Women were listed in there among the “do not covets,” right next to the house, the servants and the animals - Exodus 20:17.)

People had children specifically to continue the family; the only way a man could live on after his death was through his children, and should never remain unmarried (one of the many words that ancient Hebrew did not contain was any term for “bachelor”). And if you want to see a blatant demonstration of male dominance over women, check out Genesis 38.

The Greek word for romantic love (eros) is never used in the New Testament, though it was the most common word for love in the Greek-speaking world. In fact, the Biblical languages of Hebrew and Greek do not have a word for “homosexual.” Old Testament Hebrew is a primitive language, the first step above picture writing (some historians think that it might be the first alphabetic language). Like Egyptian, it originally had only consonants (no vowels). It had about a 30,000-word vocabulary (modern English has over 300,000 words). One Hebrew word could be used in dozens of different ways, with the meaning determined by the context. Each word was made up of 3 letters of the alphabet and usually expressed some form of activity or action. It is impossible to translate most Hebrew words exactly into modern English. Linguists and translators end up having to guess a lot.

The Greek of the New Testament was more complex than Hebrew, with a 250,000-word vocabulary and several words for “soft” concepts (feelings, philosophical concepts, and so on) which were somewhat beyond the Hebrew language. For example, Greek had four different words for “love.” The Greek used in the New Testament is different from classical or modern Greek. For many years, some scholars thought that New Testament Greek was a special language created by the Holy Spirit. Then, in the late nineteenth century, documents from the time of the New Testament (letters, bills of sale, and news reports) were discovered written in exactly the same kind of Greek (called koine) that the Bible used. The King James Version of the Bible, on the other hand, was translated in 1611, long before these manuscripts were discovered.

The reason that there are so many different Bible translations (about 30 major ones) today is because the exact meaning of many words is still in question, and even what should be included as original material is hotly debated by Biblical scholars. To read bits and pieces of biblical material into present-day culture is to misrepresent the Bible and to distort its message of God’s love in Christ for all people in today’s world.

For example, “sodomy” is a modern word, and its origin is taken out of context. A “Sodomite” in the Bible is simply a person who lives in Sodom (which includes, by the way, Lot and his family). The term “Sodomite” in the King James version of Deuteronomy 23:17 and I Kings 14:24 is an incorrect translation of the Hebrew word for “temple prostitute.” (See “The Invention of Sodomy in Christian Theology” by Mark D. Jordan, University of Chicago Press, 1997.)

No Jewish scholars before the first Christian century taught that the sin of Sodom was sexual. None of the biblical references to Sodom mention sexual sins, but view Sodom as an example of injustice, lack of hospitality to strangers, idolatry and as a symbol for desolation and destruction (see Deuteronomy 29:22-28 and 32:32; Ezekiel 16:49-50; Jeremiah 49:18; 50:41; Isaiah 13:19-22 and Matthew 10:14-15).

And not only are you misunderstanding both the language or culture of the time, many aspects of the Bible are completely ignored.

Leviticus 12:1-8 declares that a woman is unclean for 33 days after giving birth to a boy and for 66 days after giving birth to a girl. It goes on to demand that certain animals must be offered as a burnt offering. Read Leviticus 23 to see the detailed regulations concerning “complete rest” on the Sabbath day, and the demands of animal sacrifice. Leviticus 18:19 forbids a husband from having sex with his wife during her menstrual period. Leviticus 19:19 forbids mixed breeding of various kinds of cattle, sowing various kinds of seeds in your field or wearing “a garment made from two kinds of material mixed together.”

For that matter, Leviticus 25:44 says that you may own slaves, as long as they’re from neighboring nations (which would be, for Americans, Mexico and Canada). On the other hand, Leviticus 21:20 says that you can’t approach the altar of God if you have a defect in your sight. I’m pretty sure that would include glasses.

Exodus tells us some interesting facts. For example, 21:7 tells you how to sell your daughter into slavery, while 35:2 tells you to kill someone who works on the Sabbath.

That’s why I prefer to take my faith from the New Testament. (For example, Matthew 7:1: “Judge not, lest ye be judged.”) After all, it says right in Colossians 2:14, “He forgave us all our sins, having canceled the written code, with its regulations, that was against us and that stood opposed to us; he took it away, nailing it to the cross.” (This of course, ignores the “jot and tittle” argument, but I have no problem reconciling that.)

Jesus and Paul both spoke against the misuse of Leviticus, both in Mark 7 and Colossians 2. In fact, I kind of like part of that last bit from Mark. “And he said, That which cometh out of the man, that defileth the man. For from within, out of the heart of men, proceed evil thoughts, adulteries, fornications, murders, thefts, covetousness, wickedness, deceit, lasciviousness, an evil eye, blasphemy, pride, foolishness: All these evil things come from within, and defile the man.”

Of course, on the subject of Paul, let’s remember that he only came around after Jesus was crucified, and like many people who end up “born again,” he went a little overboard. He wrote more than any other author of the Bible. Paul’s writings have been taken out of context and twisted to punish and oppress every identifiable minority in the world: Jews, children, women, blacks, slaves, politicians, divorced people, convicts, pro choice people, lesbians, gays, bisexuals, transsexuals, religious reformers, the mentally ill… the list goes on and on.

Paul is often difficult and confusing to understand. Since most of his letters were written in response to news from other people, reading Paul can be like listening to one side of a telephone conversation. We know, or think we know, what Paul is saying, but we have to guess what the other side has said. As 2 Peter 3:16-18 pointed out, we have to be on guard against using Paul’s writings in unhealthy and destructive ways.

A few final verses, and I guess I’ll be done (and it’s about time, isn’t it?). Romans 1:16: “For I am not ashamed of the gospel of Christ: for it is the power of God unto salvation to every one that believeth.” It doesn’t specify where they find love, but merely that they love God and His Son. That is the path to deliverance.

Romans 2:1: “Therefore thou art inexcusable, O man, whosoever thou art that judgest: for wherein thou judgest another, thou condemnest thyself; for thou that judgest doest the same things.” That must be an important message - it’s repeated several times.

Actually, I’ve quoted enough. For further reading, you can look up the following (in no particular order). John 12:47; 13:34-35; all of Acts 10 (but specifically verses 28 and 34); I Corinthians 13 (yes, the whole thing); all of Galatians (especially 3:1-5 and 23-28; 5:14-15 and 22-23); all of Ephesians (especially chapter 2); Philippians 2:1-13; I John 3:13-21; 4:7-19; and, most of all, Romans 15:1-7.
___________________


(Final update, if anyone cares.)

Fun With Christians II

OK, so awesome inauguration today. Great speech. Tears. The world is suddenly a better place. I'm... what is this feeling? Is it "happy"? I've heard that word. I know that there are people who think it means something...

Ah, to hell with them. I've got bigger fish to fry.

As anyone who knows me (which includes the three people who regularly follow this blog) can tell you, I love a good argument. The ebb and flow of intellectual discourse, or simply devastating a particularly unthinking opponent with simple logic - I can't help myself.

So when I find a blog calling itself Go Share Your Faith!, obviously, I had to check it out, and... well, you know, share my faith.

Specifically, let's look at this entry, amusingly entitled Uh…Being Gay is NOT a gift; it’s a sin…period. Which, right off, shows you that they're open to divergent viewpoints, right? But it starts like this.

Yes, you read that right. Being Gay Homosexual is an abomination…not a “Gift from God.”

I’m not sure which bible this “Pastor” is reading but he evidently doesn’t read very closely. How does one discount, or totally miss the following scriptures?

Leviticus 18:22 You shall not lie with a male as with a woman; it is an abomination.

Leviticus 20:13 If a man lies with a male as with a woman, both of them have committed an abomination; they shall surely be put to death; their blood is upon them.

He also quoted two other Bible verses (1 Corinthians 6:9, and 1 Timothy 1:8 - feel free to look those up on your own if you want to. They aren't really germane to this discussion.)

Now, lest you think that I’m picking unfairly on you…Mr. Homosexual, notice that others are condemned by God also; murderers, sexually immoral, liars, perjurers, etc.

None of these actions are acceptable to God.

So what to do?

Repent of your wicked ways.

Believe the Gospel you currently mock.

And then, only at the end of this entry, do we get the Youtube video that this guy objects to. Which is pretty much the definition of "putting the cart before the horse."
Basically (if you have video issues), it's a little less than 2 minutes long, and it's a bit from the Oprah show where a minister is telling a gay man that it's OK, and "being gay is a gift from God."

I'm not sure that would have been my message, but I'm no minister. But you know me (OK, statistically, you probably don't - let's just move on), I had to post a comment.

You know, if you're going to quote the Old Testament, you should live up to all of its requirements, like not eating shellfish, shaving or wearing clothing made from two different threads (you know, like a cotton-poly blend). And, incidentally, you should probably study it a little closer.

Both quotes from Leviticus, for example, in the ancient Hebrew, are mistranslations - they refer to homosexual rape, not homosexuality itself.

The author applied the Hebrew term shakab to the "thou shalt not lie with" sequence and mishkab to the "as with" woman sequence. Mishkab occurs 46 times in 44 verses, all in the books of Moses. Mishkab generally means "bed," as in Leviticus 15:4 when the scripture states if a man lies in a bed [mishkab] and a woman has bled on the sheets, he is unclean, or as in Numbers 31:17 where God commands that every woman who has been to "bed" [mishkab] with a man (and therefore might be carrying an "unborn baby") should be slain. Yada, yada, yada: all pretty self-explanatory.

Shakab occurs 213 times in 194 verses, so we have plenty of context from which to draw a closer definition of the term. I looked through each of these verses and found that in 101 instances shakab meant to go to bed, or to sleep, in the most innocuous sense. In 51 instances shakab means to "sleep with the fathers," not in any perverse Christian sex fantasy sense, but meaning that they died, as in the "Luca Brasi sleeps with the fishes" sense.

...In 52 instances (virtually all of the sexual instances) the term shakab is used to describe a sexual encounter typified by deceit or force, in other words, some type of rape. Consider the following examples:

"Come, let us make our father drink wine, and we will lie [shakab] with him, that we may preserve the seed of our father." (Genesis 19:32) Lot's daughters rape their father, at least that's his story, and he's sticking to it.

"And Abimelech said, What is this thou hast done unto us? one of the people might lightly have lien [shakab] with thy wife, and thou shouldest have brought guiltiness upon us." (Genesis 26:10) Here Isaac tries to pass his wife, Rebekah, off as his sister. Rightly assuming that Rebekah would not have willingly had sex with any Philistine who offered, we can assume that among the Philistines it was considered a boys-will-be-boys type of issue to rape unmarried Jewish women. Even so the king, Abimelech, delivers an edict forbidding anyone to "molest" Isaac (again with the male rape thing), or his wife.

Previously, in Genesis 20, Abraham had practiced the same deceit with his wife, Sarah. Abimilech, thinking Sarah was Abraham's sister, kidnapped her, with the intention of raping her. He was forced by God to return her to Abraham, to whom he paid a fine.

..."And when Shechem the son of Hamor the Hivite, prince of the country, saw her, he took her, and lay [shakab] with her, and defiled her." (Genesis 34:2)

"That she called unto the men of her house, and spake unto them, saying, See, he hath brought in an Hebrew unto us to mock us; he came in unto me to lie [shakab] with me, and I cried with a loud voice:" (Genesis 39:14) In this story Joseph, living as a trusted slave in the house of Potifer, is sexually harassed by Potifer's wife. She's after him to have sex with her and he'll have none of it. One day he ends up alone with her and when he realizes this he rushes to get out of the house only escaping by shedding his coat which she has hold of. When Potifer comes home she cries rape, claiming as evidence the coat he "left behind." Joseph is sent to prison.

"Whosoever lieth [shakab] with a beast shall surely be put to death." (Exodus 22:19) Assuming that no ewe is "asking for it" we can assume that "lie with" in this instance refers to nonconsensual sex, or rape, albeit of an animal.

And everything else you quote is the same. But it takes more room to prove that than it does for you to (mis)quote it.

Perhaps you should worship the Word of God, not the Mistranslation of God.

I thought it was a good point. It covered a basic flaw in the argument. I was happy with it.

And it almost didn't get posted at first. I got an email from the blogger, Robert Pavich, who said

do some research before you bring this old tired one out will you?

I kid you not. That was the sum total of his response. No capitalization, limited punctuation.

Out of curiosity, I went back to the post, where I found that my name was used, followed by

Cynic,
Next time do your homework…the shellfish argument is a dead end.

Now, that annoyed me even more, because, aside from the fact that shrimp were a throwaway argument within the first two lines (specifically, one argument in a set of three), do you mean to tell me that that's the only point that he picked to dismiss? The Shrimp!?!!?

And further, without my response in there, a casual reader might think that I was telling a previous poster (who also mentioned the shellfish argument) that he was wrong. And since it's a very valid point (Leviticus does ban a lot of things that are being ignored here), you might be able to see where I was a little bit annoyed.

So, I hit "reply" on the email, and told our boy Bobby:

I find it fascinating that you would dismiss my comment out of hand, without arguing. Do you have a point?

I used a scholarly analysis of the translation of Leviticus in as an argument. And your response is "Do your research"? Do you even listen to what you say? I gather that you're too hypocritical to allow an argument that you can't refute.

It's sad that you are allowing your personal prejudices to blind you to the word of God. "But in vain do they worship me, Teaching as their doctrines the precepts of men." (Matthew 15:9)

I really love throwing scripture quotes at them to refute their ignorant points. (Not, admittedly, that this guy had anything like a point...)

Apparently, throwing around words like “hypocrisy” makes Bobby cranky. Because, after a brief email exchange, I went back to his site, to find my post, preceded by:

Blog owner’s note: I didn’t approve this comment at first because it’s a rehash of an old argument but after some reflection, I thought that it would be useful to let it be posted. I say this for one reason. I’m going to assume that the commenter is trying to find the truth of what scripture actually says on the subject and is not just trying to “make his point.”

I think that it would be beneficial to play this out no matter how it goes.

So with that said, here is his comment:

And he then even responded.

Bill,

I’m going to ask what I already asked in the email that I sent to you just to get us started on an even keel so everyone reading can follow along….ok? bear with me.

I’m going to try and understand your arguments so I’m going to restate them and you tell me if I have it ok?

1.) Shellfish. Because homosexuality is called an abomination in Leviticus then anything else that’s prohibited (like the eating of shellfish) should be outlawed also and I’m hypocritical to just pick on those that practice homosexuality.

2.) The word “lie” shakab in Leviticus is mistranslated and really should be “homosexual rape” due to it’s inclusion in passages where forced sex occurs.
OR
It just means “to lie down” as in “go to sleep.”

Have I understood your arguments correctly?

And since I figured we were off to the races, I got right into it.

Well, because I’m just a backwards sort of guy, I’ll take your arguments in reverse order. Tonight, we’ll talk about your second point.

2.)The word… shakab in Leviticus is mistranslated and really should be “homosexual rape”

Well, technically, we don’t speak ancient Hebrew, and so the translation gets tricky. For example, when two different words are used, is it possible that they mean different things?

Or, let’s put it another way. Let’s take the phrase “compare apples and oranges.” Only, just to make things interesting, let’s take two different words from another language, and replace them. What that means is, Leviticus 18:22 now reads, “Thou shalt not eat apples, as thou do oranges: it is abomination.”

See, the ancient Hebrew word shakab doesn’t translate directly. And neither does mishkab, if you want to be totally honest about it. They are (let’s be real) two totally different words.

Now, there are three distinct versions of Hebrew in the Bible, usually called “Archaic Biblical Hebrew” (10th to 6th century - Exodus 15 through Judges 5), Biblical Hebrew (most of the Old Testament), and “Late Biblical Hebrew” (Ezra, Nehemiah - mostly the same as Biblical Hebrew, with a few adapted words from other cultures). There’s other forms - Dead Sea Scroll Hebrew (from about 300 BC through about 100 AD) and Mishnaic Hebrew (from about 100 AD through 300 or 400 AD) come to mind, but we’ll ignore them.

Each of these versions of ancient Hebrew only had a few thousand words. In comparison, the second edition of the Oxford English Dictionary (pub. 1989) contains full entries for 171,476 words in current use, and 47,156 obsolete words. This doesn’t count 10,000 sub-entries (derivative words), or medical and scientific terms, Latin words used in law and religion, French words used in cooking, German words used in academic writing, Japanese words used by martial artists and anime fans, or any slang or computer terms (like, say, iPod or email).

With that difference in the depth of the language, why would the Biblical writers use two different words for one thing? Why would you not eat apples, as you do oranges? Unless we were talking about two different acts.

If the Hebrew word shakab is used in the Old Testament to refer to the act of sex 53 times, and in 52 of those times, we’re talking a forcible act, what does that say? (And, to be honest, since the woman in ancient times was a piece of property, the one, single other instance could be a forcible sex act as well. Do you really want to get into the specifics of Old World sex in this forum?)

I listed a few specifics to show that shakab was the word for “forcible sex” in the Bible. Feel free to point out where I might have erred.

Tomorrow, we’ll talk about Old Testament abominations.

We'll see where this gets us.
_____________

Update: And, surprise! He didn't back down - he actually responded. Part 2

The Real Bush Legacy

On January 12, 2009, outgoing President George W. Bush gave the last press conference of his presidency. In it, he reminisced about his view of the last four years, joked with the press corps, and blatantly ignored the longest-serving member of the White House press corps, despite the fact that she was front row center with her hand raised the whole time.

He made some intersting statements. He never admitted responsibility for anything that happened: he claimed that the economy was tanking, for example, because he "inherited a recession."

When asked to revisit whether there were any mistakes he had made, he managed to come up with three this time around:

1. "putting a Mission Accomplished on a aircraft carrier"

2. "could I have done something differently (during Katrina), like land Air Force One either in New Orleans or Baton Rouge."

3. "I believe that running the Social Security idea right after the '04 elections was a mistake."

So, one purely cosmetic thing he did, one purely cosmetic thing he didn't do, and one substansive issue, but one that he completely failed to do when he tried. But at least he's learned to prep for questions that he wasn't able to answer the first time around. (Unlike, say, Sarah Palin.)

Weirdly, in talking about his third mistake, he said "As an aside, one thing I proved is that you can actually campaign on the issue and get elected. In other words, I don't believe talking about Social Security is the third rail of American politics."

Yeah, George. Sure. Two things, though.

One - you didn't "campaign" on it, you started actually working on privatizing after the 2004 election. (You even mentioned that ten seconds earlier. Please don't spin around that fast any more - you'll make yourself dizzy.)

Two - George, they shut you down on this issue, even after your stage-managed "town hall" meetings. Do you know what "third rail" really means?

He followed that up with two "disappointments."

Abu Ghraib obviously was a huge disappointment during the presidency. Not having weapons of mass destruction was a significant disappointment. I don't know if you want to call those mistakes or not, but they were -- things didn't go according to plan, let's put it that way.

He wasn't responsible for Abu Ghraib, his policies or those of his cabinet didn't lead to the abuse of detainees: it was just "didn't go according to plan." And the non-existance of WMDs, despite having been briefed repeatedly that those weapons weren't there, wasn't really a "mistake" - just a "disappointment."

In response, Marketwatch published a column entitled Seven Most Horrible Things About Bush Presidency, subtitled "Commentary: An alternative to commander-in-chief's view of his time in office." It starts:

Contrary to the president's own assessment of his tenure earlier this week, it was an astonishing eight years - and not in a good way. The country suffered two recessions, and two shooting wars. The government botched its response to a brazen attack by terrorists on two cities, and then four years later utterly failed to react when another city was consumed by a natural disaster.

The president took on tyranny by embracing torture. He fought a war for freedom by trampling human rights. He enriched the already rich, excused their excesses, and then bailed them out of trouble and handed us the bill.

He politicized everything, promoted incompetents, and -- whenever things got tight -- appealed to our basest instincts of fear, greed, ignorance and hate.
Bush had all the luck of Jimmy Carter, the attention to detail of Ronald Reagan, the adaptability of Lyndon Johnson, the abiding respect for the Constitution of Richard Nixon, the humility of Teddy Roosevelt, the rhetorical skills of Calvin Coolidge, the fiscal restraint of Franklin Roosevelt, the cronyism of Warren Harding, and the overreaching idealism of Woodrow Wilson.

And his election had all the legitimacy of Rutherford Hayes'.

It's a blistering commentary - I recommend you read all of it. And since 2005, MarketWatch has been a wholly-owned subsidiary of Dow Jones, along with the Wall Street Journal and several other internet properties. So it would take a truly cynical mind and a blatant rewriting of history to say that MarketWatch is a "liberal bastion."

Despite the Bush Legacy Project struggling to spin the positive aspects of the 43rd president's time in office, I think it's pretty clear what Bush's actual legacy is going to be.

Vocabulary Worksheet

I've been thinking about language a little bit lately. Specifically profanity.

Let's start with the term (one, in fact, of the Seven Words George Carlin Couldn't Say On Television), "motherfucker." Think about that one for just a second. Consider that it could easily be a synonym for "father." Why is that so bad?

Further, why is that a negative, but "fatherfucker" isn't? This sounds sexist to me. And actually, it is, but the reason dates back centuries. "Motherfucker" is bad, because if somebody besides Dad is having sex with Mom, then the matter of who is going to inherit the property and titles comes into question. (And in the days when that mattered, men often had mistresses, so there's no negative definition attached to the "fatherfucker." You just didn't talk about it.)

For that matter, why is it, when somebody is trying to explain that your situation has gone downhill fast, do they tell you "You're screwed"? Why do they say that like it's a bad thing? Is there such a thing as a bad screw? I mean, outside of prison rape, I can't think of one, really.

I've had a reasonable amount of sex in my life, and, while not all of it was particularly memorable, I can't say that any of it was bad. So why is the word synonymous with everything going downhill?

For that matter, you'll notice that "pussy" is mostly used as a term for cowardice. There's definite sexism there, and I've got to say, it's also misleading. Some of the people with the biggest balls I've ever seen are women (another phrase that's not only sexist, but in this case, an anatomical impossibility - we definitely need to figure out a term for bravery that doesn't involve the sex organs).

For that matter, why is it that "having balls" is usually a good thing, but "being a dick" isn't? Aren't the two somewhat intimately connected? (Of course, if you think about it, it can take real balls to really be a dick, so there are times when it all comes together. So to speak.)

Pretty much anything involving "shit" is negative. Which is as it should be, in my opinion. On the other hand, while some people have very attractive asses, it's usually bad to be an ass. Not as bad as being a dick - slightly more playful. Less serious, let's say.

A real ass will frequently talk shit. Which is a metaphor that holds together beautifully - if, in fact, "beautifully" can be used in this particular context. However, you can also talk shit while you're being a dick, which doesn't work as well. And if you're being a pussy and you talk shit, wouldn't that lead to an infection that you really don't want?

Religion is frequently invoked as profanity - in fact, the original meaning of "profane" comes from the Latin term profanare (to desecrate), which stems in turn from pro fano (not allowed into the temple - pro, "out in front of" + fano, the ablative case of fanum, or "temple").

(Again, don't ever say I can't be educational.)

For the most part, though, religious terms are invoked as interjections ("Oh, God, here she comes again"), often more as emphasis ("Jesus Christ!") than as a descriptive - there is no profane form of "Christ-like." Two of the few religious terms that have adjectival or adverbial forms are "hell" (as in "hellish") or "God-damned" - and weirdly, some more spiritually-minded people take more offense to "Goddamned" in the adjectival than they do to "screwed" as a descriptive. (Which, I would guess, emphasizes more their belief in the Invisible Sky Person than their interest in sex - a sad state of affairs, in my opinion, but there it is. You get your pleasure where you can: mine doesn't tend to be found in a church, but I believe that a good bed should be venerated, at least a little bit...)

Now, here's a question for you: if you have your head up your own ass, you're being stupid. But if you have your head up somebody else's ass, it can be good for your career. It seems to me that the results of the two situations should be pretty much the same: you can't see, you can't hear, and let's not even talk about what you smell and taste. And why would somebody reward you for making them uncomfortable? At least, I'm pretty sure that I'd be uncomfortable, especially with some of the bowling ball skulls I've seen on some people.

Plus, if you can get your head up your own ass, shouldn't you get applause for being flexible, at least? I mean, there's better things to do with your time, but at least you've been working out, right?

I like some of the more imaginative terms in the field of profanity: "ass-hat" brings you back to that "head up somewhere it doesn't belong" concept, in a reasonably original way. "Fucknozzle" for that matter, is both a great anatomical metaphor, and has the added advantage that nobody else uses it. So at least you get points for surprise.

I guess my point is that people need to consider what they're saying. There's too much freedom in the English language for you to restrict yourself to the same seven tired terms.

Fun with Christians

So, thanks to another blog with the fascinating name of Happy Jihad's House of Pancakes, I stumbled across a post by a guy named Ray Comfort. Now, Ray, in some kind of weird Christian version of cynicism (which is, after all, my job, not his), calls his blog "Athieist Central" (can he be sued for false advertising?).

Anyway, his was a Chistmas Day post wherein he tried to establish that you can't prove that Darwin existed, any more than you can prove that Jesus existed.

No, I'm serious. He did. I was stunned, too. And his "arguments" were just sad.

1. There’s no corpse, because it decayed away - just a skeleton.

2. Comparing the DNA of the corpse to the DNA of his descendants, and to the DNA of a hair sample from his desk wouldn't work, because Comfort wouldn't accept that it was Darwin's. "Also, how do you know that those who claim to be his descendents are actually his offspring, without having faith in genealogical records?"

3. Same problem with photographs, books, papers and other evidence. He'd just say you can't prove it was actually Darwin. Just somebody claiming to be Darwin.

And the sad part is, there are undoubtedly people who think that argument is effective. So, of course, I posted a reply. I can't help myself.

So your "evidence" consists of just saying "No, you're wrong" to every piece of evidence pulled up? What are you? Three years old? They have evidence to prove Darwin existed. You have only belief that Jesus did. So which is it, Ray? Are you an idiot, or a three-year-old?

Oh, and two things, Ray. Your first line and (almost) your last.

Watch how atheists avoid answering this--there's good reason for their silence.
As I write this, there's 103 responses. Oops.

But 2,000 years after His death and resurrection, I can introduce you to Him. There’s my empirical proof.
Really, Ray?

empirical adj derived from experiment and observation rather than theory.

When you have no idea what the word means, you probably shouldn't use it.

And then, just because I hadn't annoyed enough people yet, I hit some guy calling himself "Da Bomb," who wrote ".... it sounds like you've made up your mind already, you want evidence that prooves something or else you WON'T call it evidence. The Bible's account is evidence and the article I gave you before. To reject it entirely would be willfully ignorant."

So I thought I'd tick him off, too.By getting all fact-based on his ass.

Da Bomb:
You said: "The Bible's account is evidence and the article I gave you before. To reject it entirely would be willfully ignorant."

Well, there's your problem right there. In fact, it's the difference between science and religion. Science, taken as an overarching field (rather than the specific specialties), calls upon s specific, proven set of fact libraries. It has proven, evidence-based fact that it can call upon.

In contrast to that, Religion (again, taken as a large field, and not any of the specific denominations) draws upon a variety of texts, some of which conflict openly with others. For purposes of this discussion, let's restrict ourselves to Christianity, just because it narrows the playing field a bit.

Now, your first argument comes in with which version of the "Old Testament" you're using. Do you accept the Septuagint translation, or do you go with the more common Masoretic text? Let's assume that you're going with the Masoretic text. You then ignore the Apocryphal or deuterocanonical books?

Remember, the Roman Catholic Church recognizes Tobit, Judith, 1 and 2 Maccabees, the Wisdom of Solomon, Ecclesiasticus, Baruch, and Greek additions to Esther and Daniel. The Greek and Russian Orthodox Churches recognize 3 Maccabees, 1 Esdras, the Prayer of Manasseh and Psalm 151.

Some other Eastern Orthodox Churches include a few others, like 2 Esdras and Odes. The Syriac Orthodox Church have The Apocalypse of Baruch and the Letter of Baruch. The Ethiopian Orthodox Church has a few of their own, too, such as Jubilees and Enoch.

The Anglican Church, having been established by Henry VIII to allow him to divorce his wives, uses some of the Apocryphal books liturgically, but not as doctrine. So the Anglican Bible includes the Deuterocanonical books accepted by the Catholic church, plus 1 Esdras, 2 Esdras and the Prayer of Manasseh, which were in the Vulgate appendix.

There's also 4 Maccabees, which is only accepted as canonical in the Georgian Church, but was included by St. Jerome in an appendix to the Vulgate (and in an appendix to the Greek Orthodox Bible), so it's sometimes included in collections of the Apocrypha.

But then we have the New Testament. Most Christian sects accept pretty much the same 27 books, but there's little issues. Revelations, for example, is both accepted and disputed, depending on who you ask. (Which makes sense - it reads like it was written by some hippie dropping acid in the desert.)

Which leads us to the New Testament apocrypha. Only the Ethiopian Orthodox Church recognizes the Shepherd of Hermas, 1 Clement and the Acts of Paul. The Syriac Peshitta, used by all the various Syrian Churches, originally did not include 2 Peter, 2 John, 3 John, Jude and Revelations; Western Syrians have added the remaining 5 books to their canon more recently, but the official lectionaries for the Malankara Syrian Orthodox Church and the Chaldean Syrian Church still present lessons from only the original (22 book) Peshitta. The Armenian Apostolic church has occasionally included the Third Epistle to the Corinthians, but does not always list it with the other 27 books; they also didn't accept Revelations into its Bible until about 800 years ago. The New Testament of the Coptic Bible (which is used by the Egyptian Church) includes the two Epistles of Clement.

And that doesn't even deal with translation problems. Nor does it touch on the various infancy gospels, the Jewish Christian gospels (the Gospels of the Hebrews, of the Nazarenes, or the Ebionites, for example), the Gospel of Thomas, the Passion Gospels, or any of the Gnostic texts.

So, when you try to say that the Bible proves anything, first you have to establish which Bible you're chosing to use.

I don't know why I don't get invited to more parties...