I was traveling by bus yesterday when I noticed a lot of big billboards of respectable jewelers and sari houses had pictures of cleavage flaunting ladies. I was under the impression that in the uber conservative Kerala they still censored all “unacceptable” display of feminine flesh. I am quiet sure that the last time I looked that was so. Well, the last time I looked was about nine years ago, I was in college, and my drunken friends were trying to rub the black paint off some unsuspecting film stars censured assets. Times have changed my younger friends tell me, they tell me that they cant remember a such a censored cleft save occasionally on the posters of the kind of movies “none of them watch” (Yah right).

Should I feel old and ignorant, for having woke up like kumbhakaran to a completely changed world, or just pity my poor young friends for they will never have the LMAO joy of watching drunken friends vent frustrations on black paint.

Ciao
Schizo

original image by mattlogelin

Note: Pardon my lack of resourcefulness of not being able to procure an offending billboard. I assure you efforts are underway to furnish all necessary evidence.

Tomorrow I leave Vellore, my home of seven long years. I leave behind best friends, memories and the naivety of youth.

Tomorrow I leave the well where I became a man.

Tomorrow I shall be happy.

Ciao

Schizo

photo by Lady Vervaine

Luke 17: ESV
Then one of them, when he saw that he was healed, turned back, praising God with a loud voice; and he fell on his face at Jesus’ feet, giving him thanks. Now he was a Samaritan.Then Jesus answered, “Were not ten cleansed? Where are the nine? Was no one found to return and give praise to God except this foreigner?” And he said to him, “Rise and go your way; your faith has made you well.”

We had a bible study in church the other day and yours truly was spaced out as usual and dreaming about speaking at TED. Through my haze of pleasant clouds somehow some parts of this passage caught my attention.

The story is; Jesus was walking along minding Gods business one day when ten lepers find him and beg him to heal him, and heal he does, and asks them to go show themselves to the priest. One of these chaps instead of running to the priest comes back to thank Jesus, and that’s the main lesson of this story.

Jesus, to put it mildly, was rather weird. He was God and he was man, the creator and the created in one hominid package. He was weird because he was the only human being on the planet at that time who really understood all the “whys” of God. This is one of the reasons I guess a lot of people never really understood what he meant even if they obeyed what he said. This passage has such an all too familiar group, ten guys who have been miraculously healed, ebullient and obedient running to declare themselves restored into society, just as Jesus asked them to. Only one of them, the only one unschooled in the ways of Jehovah really understands what this man-god wanted.

The purpose of his healing was not just his restoration to normalcy or glory, but to realize that the most important thing is to glorify God. This leper disobeyed Christ and in doing so was healed wholly. He came back to worship because he understood that the god who heals is much more important than the priest who declares you healed.

Ciao

Schizo

The marvelous painting is by Brian Kershisnik

The ever triumphant, extraordinary Dr. Schizo has finally tinkered long enough and is satisfied with the glorious mod of a great theme. The newly modded chic-orientalis Misty look is on live display on the truly remarkable Blog of Dysfunction. The mod supports:

1. Increased width of the text area for better readability

2. A radically redesigned header area

3. A chic palette change

among other changes. Well. Pictures speak louder than words. Voila

Before:

After:

Thank You Sadish for Misty look.

Ciao

Schizo

Read this stimulating message by one of my favorite theologians.

Lose your faith! Lose your faith in God. For as the French mystic Simone Weil insisted, there is a kind of atheism that is purifying, cleansing us of idols. Lose your faith in the god who is but the product of your projections, fantasies, wishes, and needs, a security blanket or good-luck charm god. Lose your faith in the god who is there to hold your hand, solve your problems, rescue you from your trials and tribulations, the deus ex machina, literally the “machine god”, wheeled out onto the stage in ancient Greek drama, introduced to the plot artificially to resolve its complications and secure a happy ending.

In the aftermath of my previous post, which i invited many friends and batch mates to read and comment upon, here’s what the best friend has to say:

Many people including me are so offended by the violence of God expressed in the Bible. This sometimes, to be truthful shakes my faith in the Bible. After reading your mail I thought about this for sometime and here is my reply:

One of the most horrifying ideas in the Bible is the notion of the “Ban”, an idea that can be traced to many forms of tribal religions in the ancient near East and in other parts of the world as well. Victory in war is given by God and therefore all the spoils of war belong to God, not to the tribe. In many cases this was shown by the ritual killing of the conquered. Traces of this culture remain in the Bible. Example : 1 Samuel 15, the prophet condemns Saul after his victory over the Amalekites because he failed to kill the defeated king Agag and because he spares the “best of sheep and of cattle and the fatlings and the lambs,and all that is valuable”. All of that belonged to YHWH, but Saul spared it out of greed.

violence whether natural or evil is a part of our universe and it is as pervasive as life itself

Other equally horrifying ideas are those that portray rape,and marriage by force as you mention in your mail but violence whether natural or evil is a part of our universe and it is as pervasive as life itself and human freedom. We know God as both the creator and the Saviour of our violent universe. It is inconceivable that God should not be present in violence and associated with or opposed to violence in different ways.

The reader who is concerned with violence must examine the text carefully in order to percieve precisely how God and violence are related. In the old testament, punishment was often decreed by invoking the ‘lex talionis’ : an eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth.

My knowledege of the Bible is indeed weak but from what I remember of the events leading indirectly to the massacre that you refer to, were :”wicked men of the city surrounded the house of a man who was entertaining a guest and his concubine.The men raped the concubine …abused her throughout the night…she finally died and was left at the door.

Again later on we see : inspite of an oath that anyone who failed to assemble before the Lord at Mizpah would be certainly put to death, the people of Jabesh Gilead in direct confrontation to this oath fail to assemble at the appointed site. They break an oath to stand before God himself. There is a reason therefore that all this plunder and loot is occuring. I don’t think that people living in such a cultural setting would have understood in any other way.

God allowed violence of human nature to extinguish the evil of disobedience.

God allowed violence of human nature to extinguish the evil of disobedience. Perhaps my logic is warped. Perhaps a hundered loop holes can be found in my statements and you may debate every line but, this is the only working way I discovered to try to live with the OT.

You CANNOT lift a scene or an event out from every thing else before and after it with out looking at the events leading to it…without looking for the divine solution that follows the carnage.

Comments, opinions and criticisms, are as always welcome.

Image by rauchdickson

“Go and strike the inhabitants of Jabesh-gilead with the edge of the sword; also the women and the little ones. This is what you shall do: every male and every woman that has lain with a male you shall devote to destruction.” And they found among the inhabitants of Jabesh-gilead 400 young virgins who had not known a man by lying with him, and they brought them to the camp at Shiloh, which is in the land of Canaan.And Benjamin returned at that time. And they gave them the women whom they had saved alive of the women of Jabesh-gilead, but they were not enough for them.

And the people had compassion on Benjamin because the Lord had made a breach in the tribes of Israel.And they commanded the people of Benjamin, saying, “Go and lie in ambush in the vineyardsand watch. If the daughters of Shiloh come out to dance in the dances, then come out of the vineyards and snatch each man his wife from the daughters of Shiloh, and go to the land of Benjamin.And the people of Benjamin did so and took their wives, according to their number, from the dancers whom they carried off.
Do I belive in a God who approved of rape, murder, and marriage by force?

Did the same god utter these words

28 But I say to you that everyone who looks at a woman with lustful intent has already committed adultery with her in his heart.

Is the God of the bible the ultimate standard of morality or the human will? How can he be when he approved rape, pillage, and murder.

Can the God who gave the ten commandments be justified in ordering his people to break them?

If Jehova has changed his standards with time, can I?

I wonder as I wander.

Ciao

Schizo

Verses from ESV Judges 21 and Matthew 5