I bought God Is Disappointed In You in early December as an apostate X-mas gift to myself. I was initially attracted to the cover, its’ illustration and the satiny red ribbon placeholder.
After catching the shiny silver edge pages with my thumb, I found what would make this book an easy buy: Leviticus. Russell’s account immediately had me cackling loud enough for everyone on the 1st floor of The Strand to hear and give that “oy, another meshuggenah” shrug. Indispensable as bathroom reading, GIDIY provides a faithful rendition of Old & New Testaments with the kind of irreverence which requires a reverent dedication to detail. I highly recommend GIDIY if you’ve never read the Bible, or if you’ve found the KJV dull and or impenetrable.
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If the author thinks the main message of the Bible is “God is dissappointed in you” I have to question how well he understood it. The climax of the Bible is the message “God would do anything for you”.
One version I’ve come across about this was that a needle was a place in a city’s walls that had a gate or ‘eye’ and that the eye was deliberately designed to keep the damn camels out of the inner city. I rather like this one, but the more I look, the more complicated the interpretation of this passage seems to be. This link, in particular, opens up some very interesting takes: from ‘Hebrew New Testament Studies’
Is that “God would do anything for you” or God would do anything to you. Or both?
I have read the Bible in various English translations (I prefer NRSV). Forgetting about whether one is a religious believer, if one only considers them as works of literature “God is Disappointed with you” is a really dumbed-down, inaccurate exigesis (based on my using the “look inside” feature at amazon) .
Now, Crumb’s Genesis is a real version, and a good one.
I signed in just to upvote you.
Amen brother!!
Except cure cancer?
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Ditto. Although luckily for me, all I retained was the story of the Good Samaritan, which is ok by me to teach kids so long as you tell them also to be wary of traps. Better to get a grown-up to help.
Given the dreadful sexual implications inherent in the stories of the bibble, and remembering these are presented so as to both appear well-mannered but also frightening, when my mind imagines what the words transliterated to an imaginary reality are, I shiver at the content.
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If. Just gotta figure out that if.
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Nobody fucks with the Jesus.
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So basically scrap one project for another? No toasters.
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But he won’t do that
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Right. Infinite patience vs infinite creativity and a sense of humour. The latter won.
most versions of the bible these days are actually translated from the original languages, so they’re really just translations, not “translation of a translation of a translation.”
Everything I needed to know about this project I learned from the words “Shannon Wheeler” on the packaging
What a valuable addition to the conversation. Thank you.
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you will be blessed for your obvious restraint, in the next life if not this one.
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Well, I think this has to do with the subject at hand instead of something completely irrelevant.
If it makes you feel better I’ll belittle some cat owners, they too have nothing to do with the book that has been mentioned but it would be more fair.
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Hey, you cat owners. I’m disappointed in you and how you let this weird little wild creature into your homes!
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Sounds like the set-up for a Monty Python skit…
