[MD] Theocracy, Secularism, and Democracy

[Krimel]

[John]
Well Krimel, I do have a bumper sticker that says, "jesus was a commie" so
yeah, you know I basically agree with your whole overall point here.

Certainly nothin' "tough to swallow", as you call it.  Good eatin'!  In
fact.

I won't go into a lot of dispute or discussion here, but I just wanna say
you touched on one key issue for me right now, that I've been arguing with a
good friend of mine, over the book of Job and whether Job was really a
righteous man, upright and perfect in all his ways, as God brags about him
to Satan, or if Job was secretly guilty of self-righteousness, as my friend
claims.

See, he was rich, but was he self-righteous?  At the end, he repents of
something, admits he abhors himself and repents in dust and ashes.  But what
exactly did he do wrong?

[Krimel]
Job is a complex both in its content and the history of its composition.
Like many of the books of the Bible it is written in layers over time.
Probably multiple authors and editors and all that. But just as is stands
without the history... Job didn't do shit. His friends of "comforters" in
sequence speculate on Jobs failing and he tells them they are full of crap.
Finally God steps in and agrees that Job's buddy's are full of crap and Job
is blameless. So Job say, well then why did you fuck with me. God's answer
is pretty much because I am God and I can do whatever I please. What's it
too you? For whatever reason That's cool with Job and he praises the Lord
and he gets a new family and new riches as a consolation prize. 

[John]
I say if God says he was perfect, then that's as close to perfect as
counts.  But Christians claim no person can be perfect apart from life in
Christ.  So don't they contradict this part of the bible?

[Krimel]
I don't think God does say stuff like that. I think people believe that and
it informs their reading for scripture. The Bible is riddled with
contradiction that can only be resolved through the most obvious of
subterfuge. 

[John]
And don't forget, they're sabbath school whitewashings with me.  Not sunday
school.

[Krimel]
Ok, I am not familiar with that sect. Are you guys alter callers? As I
recall you started as a doomsday cult. A wiki qwiki say yes and throws in an
old lady with psychic powers. Yeah, ok, any day of the week you guys want to
meet is fine with me and thanks for the warning.

[John]
My favorite tweaking of the learned and righteous,  is my personal take on
the episode following the "render unto ceaser's what is ceaser's" dodge,
where a guy later asks Peter if his master pays tribute, and Peter says
"yeah", probably thinking about the whole ceaser thing, and Jesus rebukes
him!  Says, the kings of the earth don't extract tribute from their sons, so
therefore "the sons" are free.  And then, to "keep from giving offense",
gives Peter a fishing tip whereby he pulls the magic trick of the coin outta
the fishes mouth .

[Krimel]
I don't have much more than puzzlement on that tale either but here is a few
tidbits that you might find interesting. The issue at hand is the coin and
taxes. The Jews believed that the nation of Israel belonged to God and to
God alone. They were not fans of foreign rulers or of making any compromises
whatever the foreign dominion. They were almost unique in this as the Romans
were pretty decent folk by imperialist standards. When Jews when to the
temple to make their tithes and offering they were forbidden by Jewish
practice to use the coins of the conquerors. That's why there were money
changers in the temple. They exchanged Roman coinage for temple coins. So in
one sense when Jesus says Caesar's face is on the coin so render it unto
him, it is a put down on the illegitimate coinage of the empire.

The story with Peter is a different story but it sounds like the same kind
of deal. The sons are clearly the Jews and the strangers the Romans. This
heat between the Romans and Jews ultimate went really badly and came to a
head in 70 AD when the the Jews were pretty much wiped off or spread across
the face of the earth leaving us with two of the world's great religions,
modern rabbinic Judaism and the Hellenized version known as Christianity.

[John]
I use this one to argue that Christians are exempt from taxation.

[Krimel]
Well use it if you can make it work but none of the above has anything
whatever to do with Christians. Jesus and his Jewish followers were in
conflict with the Romans. There wouldn't be any Christians around at all for
another 50 years or so.