Genesis 18-34

I have a few important notes before we begin today's douchebaggery: 1) A Happy Five-Days-Late Brirthday(s) to two of my favorite people, Washington Capitals forward Brooks Laich, and AFI Tour Manager/all-around-nuisance Smith Puget. Happy Belated Birthday, guys! 2) For my own birthday, which was Friday, Shelby and I adopted a two-year-old Chihuahua we named Tweek. I'll post pictures later, I promise.

And so it begins...

In Genesis 18, God confirms that he will allow Sarah to give birth to a son. But she doesn't believe him, because she is old and menopausal. And because of this, she is no longer considered a woman. Seriously.
"...It ceased to be with Sarah after the manner of women (Genesis 18:11)."

The fear of God is confirmed later in the chapter. Also, God is mean, but Abraham convinces him not to kill someone for no apparent reason. Then there is old people sex. Yay.

In Genesis 19, God's angels go to Sodom to see Lot, Abraham's nephew, to determine whether or not the city is wicked. Lot convinces the men of the city to be nice to the angels, and even offers his daughters as a bargaining chip. What a nice guy. Much like Noah's family earlier in Genesis, Lot's family is considered to be the only uncorrupted in the city. And we still don't know why.

Later, God decides to destroy the city anyway, in true God-like fire-and-brimstone manner. Luckily, Lot and his family had the chance to escape, but Lot's wife is stupid and didn't listen to God when He said, 'Don't look back,' because she did, and was turned into a "pillar of salt." WHAT. Lot and his daughters made it safely to a cave in which they could stay, and then the best part happens:

Since their mother died, er, turned into salt, there is no one to bear Lot's children so his daughters do it themselves after they get him drunk enough. Holy fucking hell.

In Genesis 20, Abraham and Sarah are on the move again, and Abraham ends up lying about Sarah being his sister again, and God ends up punishing some innocent man again because Abraham lied again. Repetition, much? Only this time, God made all the women of the guy's house barren. Because gene extinction is the way to go. Doesn't that rightfully justify any type of genocide? Thanks, Judeo-Christianity, you rock!

In Genesis 21, a part of the Bible makes sense! It says, and I quote, "...Children suck..." And I couldn't agree more! More sense: Abraham's bastard son Ishmael gets an inheritance! Then God bribes Abraham again, and it goes back downhill. The number seven appears again, right after I stumbled upon the word wot. And I was like, "Wot?" Apparently, wot is the archaic verb for know. So there you go.

A large helping of douchebaggery occurs in Genesis 22. But first, Abraham saddles his ass, which made me LOL. But then, God (being what he is) tries to trick Abraham into offering his only son as a sacrifice on some alter that he was forced to build. Mind you, Abraham had to pay God to allow Sarah to finally become pregnant. What a waste of humanity and livestock.

Luckily, and angel came down and pretty much told Abraham, 'Oh yeah, God, he's just kidding! LOL, I can't believe you actually almost killed your son. LOL.' Then we're introduced to some kid named Buz. And Abraham has a concubine. Sweet.

In Genesis 23, the word sepulchre is mentioned quite a bit. And I'm ashamed of myself for this, because I should know what it means, but I don't. A sepulchre is a tomb, grave, or burial place. So there you go. The reason for the mentioning of a sepulchre: Sarah dies at 127 years old.

Abraham must find a burial site for his wife, so he buys some land from some Ephron dude, which includes a field and a cave (we are told this about ten times in a twenty verse chapter) for 400 silver shekels, whatever a shekel is. According to research, shekels were the base monetary unit in Israel until 1980. So there you go.

In Genesis 24, Abraham is hellbent on finding his son, Isaac, a wife. So he sends a servant out to Abraham's homeland, which is not Canaan, to find some random lady for Isaac to marry. Before the servant is sent, however, he must swear his mission to Abraham by placing his hand under Abraham's thigh. CREEP.

The servant stops by a well somewhere in Mesopotamia to essentially fish for a wife for Isaac. But really, he just prays for God to send him a lady that is predestined to be Isaac's wife. I was confused. See, in the first part of Genesis, it was stated that man was allowed to choose his own wife, but God picks them anyway. Awesome. So some guy comes to the well with some lady (Rebekah) and a whole bunch of sheep, and Abraham's servant drinks from Rebekah's pitcher, just like God said, and then Rebekah invites the servant into her house and we find out that the lady that is predestined to marry Isaac IS HIS COUSIN. WHAT IS WITH ALL THE INCEST.

The servant offers a dowry for Rebekah and her parents (some lady and Abraham's brother) accept, and give their blessing, which consists of this:
"...Be thou the mother of thousands of millions... (Genesis 24:60)."
Yay.

When Rebekah and the servant get back to Canaan, Isaac falls in love at first sight, and Rebekah veils herself before she meets her husband to be. OPPRESSION OF WOMEN, taken from the religion of Islam, which is the main religion of modern Mesopotamia, even though Christianity was supposedly created before Islam. Then Isaac grieves the death of his mother Sarah by getting laid.

In Genesis 25, Abraham finally dies at the age of 175, but not before he gives Isaac a big-ass inheritance and leaves his other children (born by concubines) out to dry. What a guy. Then Ishmael dies at the age of 137, and Isaac and his cousin make babies. Ew. Rebekah gets knocked up with twins, and God makes one twin the other's slave in the womb. WHAT.

When the twins, Esau and Jacob, are born, Esau is described as such:
"...Red all over like a hairy garment... (Genesis 25:25)."
WHAT.

Later, Jacob bribes Esau's birthright out of him with starvation. What a guy.

In Genesis 26, there is a famine. Big shock. Isaac is forced to move from Canaan with his wife Rebekah, and essentially becomes his father Abraham when he lies to the king of the land and says that Rebekah is his sister, not his wife. But God didn't punish this guy. Woah.

Isaac lives on the land of the random king until he builds up enough wealth to get him kicked out of the city because he's too powerful. Then he digged and builded a new city (direct grammar, by the way), and then Esau gets married to some Judith lady and Isaac and Rebekah get pissed.

Genesis 27 starts the story of Jacob. Rebekah and Isaac both favor different children, so parent provoked sibling rivalry ensues: hairy vs. smooth. Not kidding. Isaac is old, blind, and dying, so he tells Esau (his favorite) to go to the field and get some venison and he will earn a blessing. But Rebekah finds out and tells Jacob (her favorite) to slaughter a goat while Esau is out hunting and wear the skin on his hands and arms to trick Isaac into thinking he is Jacob. Isaac falls for it and gives Jacob Esau's blessing, which promises him the "fatness of Earth," among other things. Esau, on the other hand, gets screwed and becomes his brother's slave. Cool. This, of course, glorifies vengeance killing, but Rebekah saves Jacob from his evil brother.

Then, Rebekah worries about Jacob taking an unworthy wife.
"...If Jacob takes a wife of the daughters...of the land, what good shall my life do me (Genesis 27:46)?"
What a drama queen. Really.

In Genesis 28, Isaac tells Jacob that he has to marry his cousin. WHY. Then Esau finds out and marries his cousin too. WHY.

On his way to pick up his cousin-wife, Jacob falls asleep (or is knocked out by God) and has a dream about a ladder to Heaven which God and angels can use to get to Earth. Then Jacob wakes up from the dream, makes a pillar out of his stone pillows and pours oil on it. WHY. OH, I GET IT. IT'S GOD'S HOUSE. WHAT.

Jacob gets some action from his cousin(s) in Genesis 29. He first meets Rachel and falls in love at first sight with her, you know, because it's predestined and all. LAME. In order to get to marry Rachel, Jacob must work for her father for seven years, but when those seven years are up, the one offered is is Rachel's older sister, Leah, because in their culture, it's disrespectful not to offer the firstborn first. So then, Jacob decides that he'll have both sisters as his wives (ew), so he serves another seven years for Rachel (for real this time). When they finally get married, God sees that Jacob loves Rachel more than Leah, so he makes Rachel barren. HA.

Rachel freaks out on Jacob in Genesis 30. When she finds out the Leah can have kids and she can't, she tells Jacob,
"...Give me children, or else I die (Genesis 30:1)."
That is so like a woman. IF I CANNOT BEAR CHILDREN, I AM WORTHLESS AND MY LIFE HAS NO MEANING. Sexist bullshit.

After more "Handmaid's Tale" references and Random Dan, part two, there is more sibling rivalry between Rachel and Leah, who basically have a birthing contest.

Jacob finally gets sick of working for Rachel and Leah's dad, Laban, so he takes his pay (half of Laban's flocks) and breeds them so his are the better livestock. Then he builds a fence for the livestock AND MAKES WHITE PAINT APPEAR ON THE WOOD. HOW. Then, the animals magically conceive when the drink. HOW. I guess there really is something in the water?

In Genesis 31, Jacob finally leaves Laban's city, and he carries his cattle with him. No, that's not a typo. Jacob carries his cattle on a seven day journey. Then Laban finds him and accuses him of taking his daughters hostage, even though THEY ARE HIS WIVES AND THEY WENT ON THEIR OWN ACCORD. Because girls BELONG to their fathers.

Laban came looking for them because the idols of his god were stolen, which justifies iconoclasm. Laban forgave them and they built a mound of stones and ate off them. WHAT. Those rocks then ended up being a witness to some crazy pact between Laban and Jacob, in which Jacob promises not to take any more wives.

In Genesis 32, Jacob sets out to find his twin brother Esau, even though the tables have turned and Jacob is afraid of Esau. The number two appears in this chapter quite frequently, so I researched the number two, which in numerology means partnership. So there you go.

Then there are she-asses, and Jacob teaches us how to bribe our brothers with livestock. Suddenly, Jacob is wrestling with someone on the side of the road and the someone is touching his thighs. CREEP. Then whoever is wrestling with Jacob tells him that his name is now Israel, and I got very confused. Then I made this revelation (ha, no pun intended): IT IS GOD. WHAT. GOD IS WRESTLING WITH JACOB ON THE SIDE OF THE ROAD. WHY. Then it is said that Jews don't eat the hollows of thighs because God touched Jacob's, er, Israel's thigh during the fight. WHAT IS IT WITH THIGHS.

In Genesis 33, Jacob finds Esau and he bows to him seven times, and Esau "fell on his neck" trying to get to hug Jacob. Then Jacob offers him part of his herd, and Esau refuses, but Jacob is persistent ("TAKE IT! TAKE IT! TAKE IT!"). Then Jacob and Esau leave together to a new land and erect an alter to God.

In Genesis 34, it's raping time. Leah's daughter, Dinah, gets raped by some Shechem guy, but he really loves her. Really. Honestly. He wants to marry Dinah but her brothers, Simeon and Levi, make an excuse for them not to get married: Shechem is uncircumcised. So Shechem goes all crazy and makes the whole damn town chop off their dick skin so he can marry the girl he raped. WHAT.

Three days after the mass circumcision, Simeon and Levi kill every man in the city so Shechem can't marry their sister, and they took their asses. How rude. Then Jacob gets all pissed and comes out with this gem:
"...Ye have troubled me to make me stink among the inhabitants of the land... (Genesis 34:30)."
Then Simeon and Levi justify their killing by calling their sister a harlot. BECAUSE IT WAS TOTES HER FAULT THAT SHE WAS RAPED. I love the logic here.

The End, thank God. I don't think I could deal with more this review.

Genesis 1-17

Shall we begin then? Today's review, as the title suggests, will be The Book of Genesis, chapters 1-17.

In Genesis 1, God randomly appears out of nothing and creates everything in six days. On day one, God creates light and dark, which then becomes day and night. On the second day, God uses water to create everything else. He "divide[s] the waters from the waters," (any logical person should realize that if you divide water from water, you have nothing left) to create Heaven, which I had no idea was made of water. On day three, the rest of the water that is not Heaven becomes Earth. It is said that all lands gathered in one mass, which supports the scientific idea of the continental divide. On day four, God creates the sun, moon, and stars. On day five, God creates all sea creatures "after his own kind," which, if you think about it, could support reverse evolution. Finally, on day six, God creates land creatures and man (Adam). With the seventh day of the week, God instates a day of rest, because he is lazy; therefore, the week should begin with Monday, and end with Sunday (the day of rest), instead of beginning with the day of rest, because apparently, we are lazy.

Being an English major, I am already having a hard time with the grammar of the Bible, because "created he him," is not proper pronoun use. Also, being an animal rights activist, I am certainly disgusted by the fact that animal abuse is justified in Scripture:
"...Let them [man] have dominion over the fish...and over the fowl...and over the cattle...and over every creeping thing that creepeth upon the earth (Genesis 1:26)."

I'm also having trouble with the creeping, too.

In Genesis 2, things grow on Earth, even though God does not make it rain. Remember how the earth is made of water? Yeah, well, in order to grow the Garden of Eden, it rains up from underground. WHAT. This is where things start getting screwy.

Even though chapter one says that God created Adam on the sixth day, chapter two states that Adam is "...Formed...of the dust of the ground..." after the day of rest. But most importantly, this is very similar to the classical Greek creation myth, in which Zeus molds Prometheus from clay. Hmm. After Adam is created, he is sent to "dress" the Garden of Eden, and is also giving the task of naming every living creature on the planet, because again, God is lazy. When this is finished, God drugs Adam and steals his rib to make him a wife, Eve. Then, there's some innuendo, and the act of sex becomes sacred (finally). Oh, and we learn that there a two trees in the Garden of Eden: The tree of life, and the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. These come into play very soon.

The myth of Adam and Eve is probably the most widely known Christian story. The myth is expanded in Genesis 3. There's a random serpent in the garden, which represents temptation. The serpent convinces Eve to eat from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, and she, in turn, convinces Adam to eat as well. Then the shit hits the fan.

First of all, God tells Adam and Eve not to eat from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, just from the tree of life, which tells me that God wants everyone to be ignorant little peons that just shut up, do his bidding, and make babies. Awesome. But because Adam and Eve listened to the serpent, they are now smart enough to realize that they are naked (how do you seriously not know that you're naked?!), so they make clothing because they are ashamed of their nakedness. I also have a problem with this. There is absolutely no need to be ashamed of the human body in it's natural state. I don't understand how being ignorant and being naked go hand in hand.

Next, God comes down to the garden all pissed, and the men blame everything on Eve, because women are subservient. Then, God gets all sexist up on Eve to punish her:
"...I will greatly multiply thy sorrow and thy conception; in sorrow thou shalt bring forth children...he [thy husband] shall rule over thee (Genesis 3:16)."
So now woman's duty is to be miserable because she's a woman, and to bear children. Hear that, ladies?

The whole of chapter three relates to yet another Greek myth: Adam and Eve's knowledge of good and evil is akin to Prometheus's fire.

In Genesis 4, Adam and Eve make babies, Cain and Abel. God plays favorites because sheep are better than grain, so Cain kills Abel. God pretty much banishes Cain from his sight, but since God sees all, Cain has nowhere to go. He ends up somewhere east of Eden that no one cares about. Before Cain leaves, God tells him, essentially, if you fail at something, it is a sin. After more bad grammar, bigamy is glorified. Eventually, Eve bears another child, Seth, to replace their dead one. Great.

In Genesis 5, a whole bunch of people live to unfathomable ages. That's pretty much the entire chapter. "'So-and-so had these kids. He lived a number of years, 'and he died.'" Well, duh.

Genesis 6 begins the story of Noah and the Ark. In the beginning of the chapter, God's children are considered giants (Titans, anyone?). I honestly can't believe all the parallelism in this book.

God allows men to choose their wives (which is fantastic, thanks God!), but then turns around and says that man is inherently evil and that he regretted making them in the first place. Thanks, guy. He complains about the violence on earth, so what does he do? He uses violence to take everyone out. What a hypocrite.

So God tells Noah to build an ark and take two of each animal on board, plus his wife, three sons, and their wives, to prepare for God's flood. Because everyone is corrupt besides Noah and his family. WHY. God tells Noah what to do about twenty times. For real.

By Genesis 7, I started noticing mass repetition of the number seven. Seven days in a week. In seven days, God's gonna flood the earth. The animals come to the ark by sevens. The flood comes on February 17. According to research, in numerology, seven is the number of perfection. So there you go.

After some more creeping, the flood finally comes.

In Genesis 8, the flood dries up. To make sure, Noah sends out a dove from the ark, which returns with an olive leaf, to signify that the water is gone and there is peace. This occurs on the first day of the first month, or New Year's. Noah builds God an alter and partakes in ritual animal sacrifice, even though he possesses the only living animals on the planet now. WHY. And then God apologizes for being a dick and killing everything. Oops. It's not their fault that they were born evil (but it should be God's).

Right off the bat in Genesis 9, God is condoning animal abuse again.
"...The fear of you and the dread of you shall be upon every beast of the earth, and upon every fowl...upon all that moveth upon the earth, and upon all the fishes...(Genesis 9:2)"
Noah saved all the animals from their demise, therefore he controls them. Uh, no.

Then, God justifies the whole, "an eye for an eye" philosophy. This is in a book that people live by.

Later, Noah gets drunk and naked, and one of his sons finds him. And because his son sees him naked, Noah forces him into slavery. WHAT. Then Noah dies at the age of 950. WHAT.

The division of countries takes place in Genesis 10. Oh, and there's some guy named Nimrod the Mighty Hunter.

In Genesis 11,someone builds a city out of brick and slime, but then God decides that he wants to break up his people and force them to learn different languages, seemingly so they can't communicate with each other and form a coup and overthrow him (or, that's my opinion anyway).

The city of Ur of the Chaldees is mentioned later on in the chapter. If you know your ancient history like I do, you will raise an eyebrow at that statement and vehemently deny that Ur ever had anything to do with the Chaldees. It was the Babylonians. FAIL.

The story of Abraham begins in Genesis 12. God orders Abraham, then called Abram, to leave his homeland to move to Canaan with his wife Sarai (Sarah). While crossing through Egypt, Abram is afraid that the Egyptians are going to try to mack on his wife and kill him in the process so he lies to them and says he is Sarai's brother instead. The plan backfires because the Pharaoh starts macking on Sarai anyway, until he finds out that Abram is really her husband. Even though the Pharaoh apologizes, he calls out Abram for lying (good), God sends plagues on Egypt anyway. WHAT A GUY.

In Genesis 13, Abram's nephew, Lot, goes to Jordan. That's it.

In Genesis 14, we learn that Siddim is "full of slimepits," whatever that means. Abram gets slaves, and we are introduced to Random Dan, who I assume is Abram's brother, who has been taken captive by a whole bunch of unrelated guys. Some king has a dale, which led me to the question, "What is a dale?" Well, friends, a dale is a broad valley. So there you go.

Genesis 15 explains the creation of the Hebrews. God appears to Abram in a vision and Abram complains because his wife Sarai cannot bear children. God says, in a nutshell, if you can count the stars, I'll give you a kid. And then God decides that he's only kidding, and makes a better bargain: a three-year-old cow, a three-year-old goat, a three-year-old ram, a turtledove, and a young pigeon for a kid. WHY. Abram must really want a kid, so he gives God the random animals, and then God turns around and says, again in a nutshell, oh, by the way, you kid's going to be a slave. Then God makes a pact with Abram and gives him all the land between the Nile and the Euphrates (AKA Palestine). If you're wondering about the number three: in numerology, three is the number of completion. So there you go.

Genesis 16 abounds with the stuff Margaret Atwood's "The Handmaid's Tale" is made of. Sarai is depressed that she can't have kids, so she gives her handmaid Hagar to Abram to procreate with. Abram agrees, for some unknown reason. What's more: Abram actually marries Hagar before they get it on. After Hagar gets knocked up, she starts hating Sarai, so Sarai kicks her out. Hagar runs away and is visited by an angel who pretty much tells her to suck it up and go be Sarai's slave. When Hagar's kid, Ishmael is finally born, Abram is 86 years old. Sick.

The shit hits the fan in Genesis 17. God talks about perfection, Abram falls "on his face" twice, God changes Abram's name to Abraham and Sarai's to Sarah (to deculturalize them, of course). Then God launches into a grand speech about circumcision. Ouch. He mandates that all followers of Abraham, whether the are his family or his slaves, must have their foreskin cut off at the age of eight days to maintain a promise to God, and if any man is uncircumcised, he is a broken soul. Is this sexual oppression or what?

By a miracle, God allows Sarah to give birth (at the age of ninety) to keep God's covenant going. Then Abraham goes home and has everyone circumcised, and at the end, has his ninety-nine year old foreskin chopped off with pride. Disgusting.

So, that's it for this review. Thank God. Expect the next chunk of Genesis in a few days.

And God Said, "WTF?!"

Life is an adventure, and blogging is an adventure, so let's go on an adventure. Here is where I drop the bomb.

I've been wanting to do this for a while, out of sheer boredom and a quest for knowledge: I am going to read the Bible.

Those of you that know me are probably choking on your own saliva at the moment. And if you randomly stumbled upon my blog, I'll explain something to you: I think all religion is bogus (yes, I just said bogus, and it's no longer the nineties). I don't believe in it, just like I don't believe in England. But I also don't believe in any scientific explanation of the creation of the universe. Why can't people just admit that they don't know what happened, instead of making up some bullshit?

I'll be reviewing the whole damn thing. Every book in both testaments will be broken up into parts, and I'll discuss the relevance of each passage to modern life, my own personal beliefs, and it's place in history. Plus lots of confusion and bitching.

Anywho, here it is, my new blog series: "And God Said, 'WTF?!' A Skeptic's Guide to the Bible." Enjoy.

Just Playin'

Hah, fooled you! After a few days of deliberation, I've decided to keep the delusion going, and I'm back with a joke, courtesy of Davey Havok.

What do you call a fish with no eyes?

*Ben Stein voice* Anyone? Anyone?

FSH! *laughs uncontrollably*

Bye Bye Bloggy

Cookie-Cut Delusions is shutting down for good. I'd say it's been fun, but I'd be lying again.