Ace of Spades HQ

« Belated Memorial Day Thought | Main | We Link, You Decide »

June 01, 2004

Dude, You're Getting a Testament

Via Ilyka, another charming example of how dunderheaded, retarded liberalism just keeps making our world a worse and worse place:

They are, after the Lord's Prayer and the Ten Commandments, possibly the most famous words in the Bible.

But now the 23rd Psalm, undoubtedly the best-known and best-loved in the English language, has had a makeover.

In a new version published by the Church of England, the words: "Yea, though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil" are replaced by: "Even if a full-scale violent confrontation breaks out I will not be afraid, Lord." The new version shares with the traditional one the opening line "The Lord is my shepherd", but the psalmist goes on: "He lets me see a country of justice and peace and directs me towards this land" and that His "shepherd's power and love protect me" - instead of "thy rod and thy staff they comfort me".

Wow. I can really feel the Holy Spirit moving within me.

All of this brings up an interesting point: One must never merge church and state, or else the church becomes filled with the sort of moronic bureaucratic time-servers who serve the rest of the government, and for the same reasons (good pay, little real responsibility, no chance of being fired).

I forget who told me this, but someone (who seemed to know what he was talking about) said that in England, the Church isn't a calling at all anymore; it's simply yet another bureaucratic-type job that people sign up for because it pays okay, isn't terribly demanding, and has some degree of social respectability associated with it.

But -- get this -- the Church has less and less to do with actual worship of God, and indeed the "clergy" is one of the groups most hostile to the notion of traditional religion in the country. The Church's priests are the ones most likely to look down on people of actual faith as being religious "rightwing" nutters.

Since I got that second-hand, I can't be sure if it's true. However, passages like "Even if a full-scale violent confrontation breaks out I will not be afraid, Lord" seem purposefully calculated to drive people away from the Bible entirely.

posted by Ace at 11:43 PM

Comments

There was a great British political comedy back in the '80s called Yes, Prime Minister, which I have heard was not too far from reality. In one episode, the PM had to appoint a new CoE bishop. After some amusing machinations, he learns that the CoE is "primarily a social organization, not a religious one." It's a club for the wealthy to hobnob and look respectable.

Posted by: Smack on June 2, 2004 12:31 AM

Well they had to get rid of that "thy rod and thy staff they comfort me". Part of their agreement over the child molesting problem.

Posted by: Jim on June 2, 2004 05:49 AM

As much as it pains me to say, you're confusing the CoE with the Catholics there Jim.

Posted by: The Black Republican on June 2, 2004 09:54 AM

Another outcome of church/state fusion: A year or so ago I read an article explaining that the national church in Denmark could not fire a clergyman who said he was an atheist.

Posted by: Clark on June 2, 2004 10:50 AM

I can't believe that's not a joke. How can anyone take it seriously?

Posted by: Mark on June 2, 2004 01:24 PM

Your comments on the separation of church and state reminded me of what's going on in L.A. now. I don't know how many of you are following this, but the ACLU recently filed a lawsuit to get Los Angeles county to change its seal, which was adopted in the early 1950s. On one side of the seal is a very small cross.

Now you might think this is a nit-picky kind of complaint, especially considering that most people never look at a county seal (seriously, do you know what yours looks like?), let alone scrutinize it, let alone declare it an unconstitutional encroachment on the separation of church and state. But I'm writing to say I'm with the ACLU on this one. Frankly, I fear an America where the government can ram religion down our throats in the name of "heritage" or "culture." Indeed, if I have any issue with the ACLU, it is that they aren't going far enough. Here are some items I'd like to see added to that lawsuit.

1. There should be no mention, in any government document, of the words Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday, Saturday or Sunday. Tuesday and Friday are named after pagan Teutonic German religious figure, Wednesday from "Woden's day (i.e. Odin)" and Thursday is named for the Norse god Thor. The other three are named for celestial bodies and the Greco-Roman deities associated with them: the Sun, the Moon, and Saturn. I don't want the government using my tax dollars to propogate religious notions about which deities/celestial bodies we worship. For basically the same reason, government should not be allowed to acknowledge the months of July or August, which were inserted by Julius Caesar and Augustus Caesar in connection with their deification in Roman mythology. And we should probably not mention the planets at all.

2. Government should ban the use of certain religiously loaded terms in schools. These terms include "erotic" (after Eros), "panpipes" (after the demi-god Pan), "Venice" or "venereal disease" (from Venus, Roman goddess of love), "Athens" (from Athena, patron of the city of that name), any word ending in "-ology" (from the Greek word "logos," which is theologically loaded in Christianity), "praise" (the name Muhammad means "praised one," or "he who is praised"), or any reference to oil or grease (the name Christ means "annointed," as with oil). We don't need government telling our kids what to think about these clearly religious topics.

3. All government employees who go bald on top of their head should be required to wear a government-issued toupee. The bald spot is far too reminiscent of the Catholic tonsure, and the bald area may be suspiciously close to the area covered by a yarmulka. We don't need government slyly endorsing Catholicism or Judaism that way.

I'm working on a petition for like-minded citizens to sign. I hope you'll help me out with my campaign. And if you have more ideas about government oppression, let me know.

Posted by: Aaron on June 2, 2004 01:47 PM

Hey Aaron! Los Angeles translates to City of Angles. Angels?! WTF?! This right wing religeous stuff is everywhere! Please add changing the city and county's name too. Maybe just change it to Elay 'cause that's what everyone calls it anyway. Or, Los Athiest maybe if you're really stuck on having the L.A. thing.

Posted by: Enas Yorl on June 2, 2004 03:11 PM

One point I forgot to mention: there is absolutely no justification for letting government employees have Sundays off. Seriously, this is tantamount to state-sponsored religion. Saturdays, as well, because that's the Jewish day of worship (as well as Seventh Day Adventists and, I think, Jehovah's Witnesses). And of course we can't make Friday a day off, because of Islam. I therefore propose that all government institutions, including public schools, be closed from Monday to Thursday, and make the government employees work Friday through Sunday. Everyone knows they deserve is, given the sheer volume of ultra-efficient work they accomplish as it is.

Posted by: Aaron on June 2, 2004 04:35 PM

Damn, Aaron, you really know how to run with a topic. If you haven't got your own blog, get one. Now.

Ace, thanks for the link and glad your archives are fixed. It's like a cornucopia of dementia in there that I'm glad to have access to again.

Posted by: ilyka on June 2, 2004 06:47 PM

Ilyka,

How does one go about getting a blog?

Posted by: Aaron on June 3, 2004 01:11 AM

Join the Linux community. Linuxwaves.net

Posted by: Susanna on July 5, 2004 05:30 PM

You can also check some information in the field of... Thanks!!!

Posted by: on April 1, 2005 02:15 AM

Amazon.com Widgets

Now Available!
The Deplorable Gourmet
A Horde-sourced Cookbook
[All profits go to charity]

Top Headlines

TJM definitively ranks the films of John Boorman.

Kid punks CNN chump by speaking truth to retard

Podcast: CBD and Sefton talk birthright citizenship, the 14th Amendment and SCOTUS, no boots in Iran, Artemis II and refocusing NASA, the NBA's hatred of everything non-woke, and more!

In more marketing for Project Hail Mary, scientists say they've found the biosigns indicating life growing on an alien planet. It's not proof, just signatures of chemicals that are produced by biological metabolism, and it could be nothing, but scientists think it's a strong sign that this planet is inhabited by something.

In a paper published in the Astrophysical Journal Letters, a team of scientists announced the detection of dimethyl sulfide (along with a similar detection of dimethyl disulfide) in the atmosphere of an exoplanet called K2-18b. This is actually the second detection of dimethyl sulfide made on this planet, following a tentative detection in 2023.
Tons of chemicals are detected in the atmospheres of celestial objects every day. But dimethyl sulfide is different, because on Earth, it's only produced by living organisms.
"It is a shock to the system," Nikku Madhusudhan, first author on the paper, told the New York Times. "We spent an enormous amount of time just trying to get rid of the signal."

He means they tried to prove the signal was caused by things other than dimethyl sulfide but they could not.

Artemis moon shot a go, scheduled for 6:24 Eastern time tonight
Great marketing arranged by Amazon to promote Project Hail Mary. Okay not really but it does work out that way.

TJM talks John Boorman, director of Excalibur

Good rickroll

What? Skeleton of the most famous Musketeer, D'Artagnan, possibly discovered in Dutch church closet.
Dumas picked four names of real musketeers out of a history book, D'Artagnan, Athos, Aramis, and Porthos. So there was an actual D'Artagnan, though he made most of the story up. (Or, you know, all of it.)*

Charles de Batz de Castelmore, known as d'Artagnan, the famous musketeer of Kings Louis XIII and Louis XIV, spent his life in the service of the French crown.
The Gascon nobleman inspired Alexandre Dumas's hero in "The Three Musketeers" in the 19th century, a character now known worldwide thanks to the novel and numerous film adaptations.
D'Artagnan was killed during the siege of Maastricht in 1673, and there is a statue honoring the musketeer in the city. His final resting place has remained a mystery ever since.

A lot of Dumas's stories are based on bits of real history. The plot of the >Three Musketeers, about trying to recover lost diamonds from the queen's necklace, was cribbed from the then-almost-contemporaneous Affair of the Queen's Necklace. And the Man in the Iron Mask is based on real accounts of a prisoner forced to wear a mask (though I think it was a velvet mask).
* Oh, I should mention, Dumas says all this, about finding the names in an old book, in the prologue to his novel. But authors lie a lot. They frequently present fictions as based on historic fact. The twist is, he was actually telling the truth here. At least about these four musketeers having actually existed and served under Louis XIV.
Fun fact: You know the beginning of A Fistful of Dollars where the local gunslingers make fun of Clint Eastwood's donkey and Eastwood demands they apologize to the donkey? That's lifted from The Three Musketeers. Rochefort mocks D'Artagnan's old, brokedown farm horse and D'Artagnan is incensed.

A commenter asked which should be read first, The Hobbit of LOTR?
Easy, no question -- read The Hobbit first. It's actually the start of the story and comes first chronologically. It sets up some major characters and major pieces in play in LOTR.
Also, the Hobbit is Beginner-Friendly, which LOTR isn't. The Hobbit really is a delightful book, and a fast read. It's chatty, it's casual, it's exciting, and it's funny. In that dry cheeky British humor way. I love that the narrator is constantly making little asides and commentary, like he's just sitting next to you telling you this story as it occurs to him.
LOTR is a very long story. Fifteen hundred pages or so. The Hobbit is relatively short and very punchy and easy to read. If you don't like The Hobbit, you can skip out on LOTR. If you do like it, you'll be primed to read LOTR.
Oh, I should say: The Hobbit is written as if it's for children, but one of those smart children's stories that are also for adults. Don't worry, there's also real fighting and violence and horror in it, too.
LOTR is written for adults. (It's said that Tolkien wrote both for his children, but LOTR was written 17 years later, when his children were adults.) Some might not like The Hobbit due to its sometimes frivolous tone. Me, I love it. I find it constantly amusing. Both are really good but there is a starkly different tone to both. LOTR is epic, grand, and serious, about a world war, The Hobbit is light and breezy, and about a heist. Though a heist that culminates in a war for the spoils.

The Hobbit Challenge: Read two more chapters. I didn't have much time. Bilbo got the ring.
I noticed a continuity problem. Maybe. Now, as of the time of The Hobbit, it was unknown that this magic ring was in fact a Ring of Power, and it was doubly unknown that it was the Ring of Power, the Master Ring that controlled the others.
But the narrator -- who we will learn in LOTR was none of than Bilbo himself, who wrote the book as "There and Back Again" -- says this about Gollum's ring:
"But who knows how Gollum had come by that present [the Ring], ages ago in the old days when such rings were still at large in the world? Perhaps even the Master who ruled them could not have said."
In another passage, the ring is identified as a "ring of power."
I don't know, I always thought there was a distinction between mere magic rings and the Rings of Power created by Sauron. But this suggests that Bilbo knew this was a ring of power created by Sauron.
Now I don't remember when Bilbo wrote the Hobbit. In the movie, he shows Frodo the book in Rivendell, and I guess he wrote it after he left the Shire. I guess he might have added in the part about the ring being a ring of power created by "the Master" after Gandalf appraised him of his research into the ring.
I never noticed this before. I know Tolkien re-wrote this chapter while he was writing LOTR to make the ring important from the start. And also to make Gollum more sinister and evil, and also to remove the part where Gollum actually offers Bilbo the ring as a "present" -- Bilbo had already found it on his own, but Gollum was wiling to give it away, which obviously is not something the rewritten Gollum would ever do.
But I had no memory of the ring being suggested to be The Ring so early in the tale.

Finish the job, Mr. President!
Melanie Phillips lays out the case for the total destruction of the Iranian government and armed forces. [CBD]

TJM acts like he knows anything about John Wick and screenwriting. It's embarrassing, really.

Podcast: Sefton and CBD talk about how would a peace treaty with Iran work, Democrats defending murderers and rapists, The GOP vs. Dem bench for 2028, composting bodies? And more!

Oh, I forgot to mention this quote from Pete Hegseth, reported by Roger Kimball: "We are sharing the ocean with the Iranian Navy. We're giving them the bottom half."

Batman fires The Batman
Batman is disgusted by the Joachim Phoenix version of Joker
Batman tries to fire Superman
Batman is still workshopping his Bat-Voice

Forgotten 80s Mystery Click: Red Leather Suit and Sweatband Edition
And I was here to please
I'm even on knees
Makin' love to whoever I please
I gotta do it my way
Or no way at all

Tomorrow is March 25th, "Tolkien Reading Day," because March 25th is the day when the Ring is destroyed in the book. I think I'm going to start the Hobbit tomorrow and read all four books this time.
The only bad part of the trilogy are the Frodo/Sam chapters in The Two Towers. They're repetitive, slow, and mostly about the weather and terrain. But most everything else is good. Weirdly, the Frodo-Sam chapters in Return of the King are exciting and action-packed and among the best in the trilogy. (Though the chapters with everyone else in Return of the King get pretty slow again. Mostly people talking about marching towards war, and then marching towards war.)

Sec. Army recognizes ODU Army ROTC cadets for their bravery and sacrifice in private ceremony
[Hat Tip: Diogenes] [CBD]

TJM gives you a brief tour of his movie collection.

Forgotten 80s Mystery Click
One day I'm gonna write a poem in a letter
One day I'm gonna get that faculty together
Remember that everybody has to wait in line
Oh, [Song Title], look out world, oh, you know I've got mine