Tuesday, March 8, 2011

Stupid is as Stupid Does

There's a famous photo from the original fundamentalist Christian revival in the 1920's of a preacher on stage with a huge banner behind him proclaiming "Read Your Bible!" I was unfortunately not able to find it searching online, but if only certain modern conservative Christians would follow that advice. It could save them from a lot of embarrassment.

For example, check out the strength of this guy's devotion. He's so committed to hating gay people that he's had Leviticus 18:22, the Old Testament verse prohibiting male homosexuality, tattooed onto his right arm. That's a whole lot of ink, so he must be really sincere about his beliefs, right?

There's just one little problem with that sort of display from the standpoint of Biblical literalism - Leviticus 19:28:

You shall not make any cuttings in your flesh for the dead, nor print any marks on you: I am the LORD.

That's right. If this particular zealot had been willing to read even a few more pages of Leviticus he would have found that Old Testament Jewish law not only forbids homosexuality, it forbids tattoos as well.

Really, with the recursion there it's amazing he didn't implode on the spot.

H/T Religion Gone Crazy

Technorati Digg This Stumble Stumble

3 comments:

Robert said...

Thank you for that most amusing tidbit.

To be fair, I think everyone pretty much does the same thing or most people do. I'm sure my magick has produced realizations I ignored because they didn't fit into my tight little boxes and others I accepted as they did.

Rufus Opus said...

And he wrote it on the back of his arm in case he winds back up in prison again.

Unknown said...

@R.O.: Hah!

I'm a fan of pointing out that wearing mixed fabrics is just as much of an "abomination" in Leviticus as homosexuality; most people in modern clothes are easy targets ;)