Why can't I own a Canadian?

[Basher]

Saw this on another board.

Dr. Laura Schlessinger is a radio personality who dispenses advice to people who call in to her radio show. Recently, she said that, as an observant Orthodox Jew, homosexuality is an abomination according to Leviticus 18:22 and cannot be condoned under any circumstance. The following is an open letter to Dr. Laura penned by an east coast resident, which was posted on the Internet. It's funny, as well as informative:

Dear Dr. Laura:

Thank you for doing so much to educate people regarding God's Law. I have learned a great deal from your show, and try to share that knowledge with as many people as I can. When someone tries to defend the homosexual lifestyle, for example, I simply remind them that Leviticus 18:22 clearly states it to be an abomination. End of debate. I do need some advice from you, however, regarding some of the other specific laws and how to follow them:

When I burn a bull on the altar as a sacrifice, I know it creates a pleasing odor for the Lord - Lev.1:9. The problem is my neighbors. They claim the odor is not pleasing to them. Should I smite them?

I would like to sell my daughter into slavery, as sanctioned in Exodus 21:7. In this day and age, what do you think would be a fair price for her?

I know that I am allowed no contact with a woman while she is in her period of menstrual uncleanliness - Lev.15:19- 24. The problem is, how do I tell? I have tried asking, but most women take offense.

Lev. 25:44 states that I may indeed possess slaves, both male and female, provided they are purchased from neighboring nations. A friend of mine claims that this applies to Mexicans, but not Canadians. Can you clarify?

I have a neighbor who insists on working on the Sabbath. Exodus 35:2 clearly states he should be put to death. Am I morally obligated to kill him myself?

A friend of mine feels that even though eating shellfish is an abomination - Lev. 11:10, it is a lesser abomination than homosexuality. I don't agree. Can you settle this?

Lev. 21:20 states that I may not approach the altar of God if I have a defect in my sight. I have to admit that I wear reading glasses. Does my vision have to be 20/20, or is there some wiggle room here?

Most of my male friends get their hair trimmed, including the hair around their temples, even though this is expressly forbidden by Lev. 19:27. How should they die?

I know from Lev. 11:6-8 that touching the skin of a dead pig makes me unclean, but may I still play football if I wear gloves?

My uncle has a farm. He violates Lev. 19:19 by planting two different crops in the same field, as does his wife by wearing garments made of two different kinds of thread (cotton/polyester blend). He also tends to curse and blaspheme a lot. Is it really necessary that we go to all the trouble of getting the whole town together to stone them? - Lev.24:10-16. Couldn't we just burn them to death at a private family affair like we do with people who sleep with their in-laws? (Lev. 20:14)

I know you have studied these things extensively, so I am confident you can help. Thank you again for reminding us that God's word is eternal and unchanging.

Your devoted fan,

Jim

[Kanada Kev]

I love that email (i got a copy of it a while back). The condratictions in all the bible texts, and the ability to interpret the words to suit your purpose, allow for endless out-of-context blather.

For some really interesting reading on this sort of thing check out:

http://www.evilbible.com/

Later . . .

Kanada Kev =8)

[afro poppa]

Funny stuff. But it is interesting because it brings up the whole argument about religion and some of its "outdated" laws vs. today's society and it's values. Where does one draw the line?

Obviously though, in this case, it would not be up to Jim to take the religious laws into is own hands by killing because that would break one of the Ten Commandments which isn't legit. It would be up to God to judge these people.

The again I think I am just making this whole crazy joke just a wee bit too serious.

[timouse]

A friend of mine feels that even though eating shellfish is an abomination - Lev. 11:10, it is a lesser abomination than homosexuality. I don't agree. Can you settle this?

you think that's bad? imagine being a jewish shellfish!

[edger]

Brilliant!

[hamilton]

Obviously though, in this case, it would not be up to Jim to take the religious laws into is own hands by killing because that would break one of the Ten Commandments which isn't legit. It would be up to God to judge these people.

The Torah specifically states that death is the punishment for breaking many laws. It seems like ol' Yahweh is contradicting *himself*. Of course, he also commanded the Israelites to slaughter the Canaanites and take over their land, too. Didn't you know that it's okay to kill people, as long as God *told* you to kill them?

I think Bob Dylan wrote a song about that.

[bouche]

Yeah. I really don't understand how people in power can pick and choose the biblical law. Then again, that sorta happens with regular ol' law.

How would that so-called doctor respond to those questions? That's what I wanna know.

[AD]

that whole letter is a ripoff of part of a west wing episode. season 2, episode 3. bartlet is talking to dr. jenna jacobs, who was inspired by schlessinger. shortly after the episode aired, the letter above started circulating the internet.

I wanted to ask you a couple of questions while I had you here. I'm interested in selling my youngest daughter into slavery as sanctioned in Exodus 21:7. She's a Georgetown sophomore, speaks fluent Italian, and always clears the table when it was her turn. What would a good price for her be?

While thinking about that, can I ask another? My Chief of Staff, Leo McGarry, insists on working on the Sabbath, Exodus 35:2, clearly says he should be put to death. Am I morally obligated to kill him myself or is it okay to call the police?

Here's one that's really important, 'cause we've got a lot of sports fans in this town. Touching the skin of a dead pig makes us unclean, Leviticus 11:7. If they promise to wear gloves, can the Washington Redskins still play football? Can Notre Dame? Can West Point?

Does the whole town really have to be together to stone my brother, John, for planting different crops side by side? Can I burn my mother in a small family gathering for wearing garments made from two different threads?

I know this doesn't really contribute to the discussion, but there you have it.

Basher - I thought you would have picked up on this?

AD

[Basher]

that whole letter is a ripoff of part of a west wing episode. season 2, episode 3. bartlet is talking to dr. jenna jacobs, who was inspired by schlessinger. shortly after the episode aired, the letter above started circulating the internet.

I know this doesn't really contribute to the discussion, but there you have it.

Basher - I thought you would have picked up on this?

AD

AS I learned today AD, it is actually the other way around!

http://westwing.bewarne.com/second/25letter.html

Kent Ashcraft wrote us on December 9, 2003

"This is to confirm that I am in fact the author of the Dr. Laura letter, and that what you have on your web page is the exact text that I wrote (which is amazing to me, since there have been so many changes and add-ons).

"A couple of years ago Lorimar Productions compensated me for the use of portions of the letter on The West Wing."

We had previously heard from Marc Bejarano on September 29, 2003

Marc Bejarano sent us a link to

an open letter to Dr. Laura

J. Kent Ashcraft

May 2000

The above site claims they have tracked down the original author of the letter and the date it originally went out is said to be before any of the ones listed as possible origins below.

The site also has a slightly different version of the letter than the one below.

[AD]

I am always right

Refreshingly candid exec producer Aaron Sorkin admits he lifted the diatribe from a much forwarded anonymous email. . . . Sorkin, who hoped to give credit, says they "cast a fairly wide net, but we didn't find the author."

Damn. Good stuff.

AD

[YearsAlongTheSea]

I think that's absolutely hilarious; well written. There are still so many laws, even in Canada that are rediculously outdated. I mean, wasn't there a short period when herb was essentially legal, or more fittingly, not illegal? Here's a link to a good article I just read on contradictary laws and such from the National Post .

[Basher]

Basher is ALWAYS right!

I only learned this yesterday myself jerkface!

[AD]

Well, you were right weren't you?

All in good fun

[Basher]

lol - I know AD. Us West Wing fanatics gotta stick together.

[AD]

The previews for Sorkin's new show look good, I'm glad he's writing again.

Basher did you ever watch Sports Night? Not as in-depth as West Wing but still top-notch I though.

[Dr_Evil_Mouse]

how people in power can pick and choose the biblical law

It's easy - just gloss over all the contradictions in your favour!

A list of a bunch of contradictions in the Bible can be found here ; though some of them are good head-scratchers (which imo only the Documentary Hypothesis of multiple authorship over vast stretches of time can explain), some of them are just the product of theological tensions between Judaism and Christianity - which is no doubt where a lot of the picking-and-choosing comes from.

I also ran across a site that has some interesting material and links on theocracy and dominionism in the US, worth checking out.

[d_rawk]

Ok, I said I wasn't going to do it. And I'm not, really. But just gotta say ...

Leviticus is working on keeping people healthy. Now, I disagree with a lot of what he has to say (and agree with some of what he has to say that seems remarkably sensible but altogether ignored culturaly at the moment). But he really doesn't put any more emphasis on sodomy than he does on, y'know, wearing mixed fabrics. This is why the "kill a queer for Christ" people get me so worked up. I mean, dude, that's not 100% cotton you're wearing. So ... and I *bet* you ate a shrimp sometime recently ...

I mean, this guy is trying to work something out in the way of criminal law. And he is trying real hard to keep the Jews healthy. Given the fact that the tieing on of sheepskin to the penis was probably not a very common thing, he was probably right to be annoyed with various types of sexual behaviour (sodomomy of course entailing any number of sexual acts, involving male or female or whatever combination of the two). And yes, he said man shouldn't lie down with man as he does with a woman. Probably not a hard thing for him to say at the time and place in which he was saying it. But he places no more weight on it than on all of the other laws to which nobody gives any credence. So what the hell?

And isn't a good portion of the new testament Jesus rejecting the old laws? "You have heard it said a tooth for a tooth and an eye for an eye, but I say ...". This is dangerously close to what you are talking about above, I acknwoldge. The picking and choosing. But it is complicated. He is here to "uphold and fulfill" and yet with every action and with (most) of his words, he is actually disputing. But really, not eating pork was really fucking wise up until recently. It really was. That shit was dangerous. It isn't so dangerous now. Was Leviticus out of his mind? No. He was right. Was he out of his mind when he thought that people (note: people, not just "men") shouldn't be putting their sensitive bits into dens of bacteria and disease? Well, no. But we've come a long way since then, and we have the technology, so ... fuck it. Literally. If it pleases you to do so.

Paul, too. I mean, how long has it been since homosexuality was removed from the list of pathological psychiatric afflictions? Not bloody long. So if Paul (who I don't actually trust, but I'm taking his side on this) lumps homosexuality in with all those other things he goes on about in 2nd Cor. (drunkeness, etc..). He is just trying to make a general point. He sees homosexuality as a vice, and of course he does. There was no g-damn notion of orientation at that time! There was no g-damn notion of orientation a shy 100 years ago! He is saying: those who give into vice at the expense of truth/goodness/whatever can't possibly - as "unrepentant sinners" - be properly in the service of God. Fair enough. He is both right and wrong -- he is right in his sentiment, and his interpretation of what homosexuals are doing (that is, in his mind, engaging wantonly in unnecessary vice) fits perfectly with what he is trying to get across. He is mistaken about all of that, I think. But it is no fault of his own. (And Paul has some glaring faults, I'll be the first to say. I just don't think one line in one letter is enough to condemn him entirely. He is right. But he is wrong.)

What I find really interesting is that we have no documentation of Jesus ever bothering to so much as utter a word about "queers". If it is so damn awful, and if contemporary Xians really need to be soooooo preoccupied with it ... well, you'd think the namesake of the religion would have at least bothered to take a moment to say something. But nada. I mean, c'mon, this is a man coverting with prostitutes.

HE DIDN'T CARE.

The bible is a good book, and also a ridiculous book, there is no doubt. But these don't seem like contradictions to me:

JOH 10:30 I and my Father are one.

JOH 14:28 Ye have heard how I said unto you, I go away, and come again unto you. If ye loved me, ye would rejoice, because I said, I go unto the Father: for my Father is greater than I.

How shallow are we wading in those words in order to see them as contradicatory? Their fucking complementary is what they are.

PRO 4:7 Wisdom is the principal thing; therefore get wisdom: and with all thy getting get understanding.

ECC 1:18 For in much wisdom is much grief: and he that increaseth knowledge increaseth sorrow.

1 Cor.1:19: "For it is written, I will destroy the wisdom of the wise, and will bring to nothing the understanding of the prudent."

Again. There are obvious and brutal discrepencies in the bible, no doubt. But the above is not one of them. There is much grief in wisdom -- but still -- get wisdom. Nobody was promising lollipops. Ever.

[Dr_Evil_Mouse]

! If I wasn't not drinking right now, I'd drive into town right now and carry this on over lots and lots of pints (but then I'd probably drive home drunk and get killed, so maybe it's all for the better ).

Jesus comes along at a weird time in Jewish history too, because there was so much confusion about how to work with the law; if anything, he's running parallel with the Pharisaic tradition of finding ways of grappling with the contradictions and seeking out humane solutions to them. The "eye for an eye" thing I've always read as a broader cultural thing; it goes back at least to Hammurabi (the Code was from ca. 1750 BCE, iirc), so I see the "but I say" as more of an indictment of that whole climate of violence (not to mention the Romans').

But yeah, I don't find the Christian Right has much of anything to do with that whore- and civil-service-employee-cavortin' Jesus; he's not much more than their horse to bet on to win that big eternal afterlife. Conservative Christian theology in the last hundred years (at least, or certainly since Barth) draws much more from Paul - the more reactionary the Paul, the better.

And at any rate, none of this particularly Christian theologising would be of much interest to Schlessinger (if she could even hear objections to her to begin with).

[hamilton]

Leviticus is working on keeping people healthy. Now, I disagree with a lot of what he has to say (and agree with some of what he has to say that seems remarkably sensible but altogether ignored culturaly at the moment). But he really doesn't put any more emphasis on sodomy than he does on, y'know, wearing mixed fabrics. This is why the "kill a queer for Christ" people get me so worked up. I mean, dude, that's not 100% cotton you're wearing. So ... and I *bet* you ate a shrimp sometime recently ...

I mean, this guy is trying to work something out in the way of criminal law. And he is trying real hard to keep the Jews healthy.

The problem is more that this particular society was run by the priests - so when they made a rule it became, ipso facto, the Word of God. I'm sure Yahweh (if you want to argue that he even exixts) wasn't really so concerned about people eating pork, or eating from the lower end of the cow - but, due to the fact that certain technological and hygenic advances hadn't been made yet, it was better to make a law prohibiting their consumption rather than letting people get sick. So, these rules end up in "holy books" and now, thousands of years later, people are still following these rules even thought the reason for their creation in the first place is long out of date.

And while I can agree that may of the contradictions listed in the link provided by the good Dr. Mouse are either irrelevant, or in some ways not entirely contradictions, the punishment by death for so many of the crimes listed in Leviticus and other Torah texts does seem to be a glaring contradiction to the Ten Commandments.