The Bible. It is God’s Word writ large. And, depending on your volume of choice, writ heavy, too. Sixty-six books written by 40 men (all bearded) under the direction of the Holy Spirit over the course of roughly 1,600 years. Nearly 800,000 words and zero pictures if you don’t count your doodles of St. Paul as Sir Paul in the margins of Ephesians. And, if some are to believed (they’re hiding behind the ficus), 200,000 of those words are “shalt” followed by 200,000 printings of “not.” (The other 400,000 words are forms of “begat.”)
Of course, the ficus aficionados are wrong. In more ways that one. The Bible, to be sure, contains its fair share of proscriptions against certain specific behaviors. Like stealing my cheese (the sinfulness of moving said cheese is still a topic of much debate amongst the more learned theologians of western Sheboygan). But it is also rife with colorful language of the non-bluish variety. Metaphors, similes, word pictures, and other forms of literary imagery I’m too lazy to AltaVista, Dogpile or Lycos.
What you may not know (and how could you, really, since I’m the only one who does) is that, when the authors of the Bible went, as they say, “off Spirit,” they put their Mont Blanc chisels and quills to stone and scroll in a, luckily, vain effort to one-up the imagination of the Lord. Once lost to the Wet Willy’s Waterslide of time, a smattering of these passages have been revealed to me as the result of ingesting a divine combination of Coke Zero, Flonase and 18-straight views of the Veggie Tales classic “The Lord of the Beans.”
The Shillelagh of Unctuousness – Dr. Luke originally envisioned this phrase to describe Judas Iscariot’s principle means of ingratiating himself with the other disciples. As in, “Judas, wielding yet once more his formidable shillelagh of unctuousness, managed to secure for himself an extra portion of lamb stew from John.” But then the good doctor remembered he wasn’t Scottish, despite his tartan toga and hankering for haggis.
The Ferret of Forgiveness – In Numbers 21, Moses lifted up a bronze snake upon a stick to heal the now repentant Israelites from the snakes on the plains God had sent in judgment. Originally, Moses had pleaded with Yahweh to make this typology a ferret because he felt “Bronze Weasel” would someday make a great name for a CCM band. Moses was wise, not infallible.
The Parable of the Talentless – In more than one Gospel, Jesus parablized a parable of a wise ruler who, in his absence, gave three of his underlings 10, 5 and 1 talent, respectively. You know how it ends (hint: good, good, meh). One early manuscript of Matthew, recently discovered folded up in the liner notes of my wife’s old (she claims) Juice Newton cassette, includes a follow-up to this parable that scholars in our house have dubbed “The Parable of Talentless.” It recounts a surly ruler excoriating three minstrels named Guarini, Sanjaya and “The Pen Salesman.”
The Fountain of Living Soda Water – Okay, this one isn’t really a rejected Bible metaphor. It’s an actual soda fountain at Dollywood. I know it’s true because I saw an animated GIF of grumpy kittens drinking from it on the internet.
The Tower of Boggle – Genesis 11:1-9 recounts the drama of the Tower of Babel, at which God dispersed the people of the earth and created different languages that modern folks can learn easily in 10 days using the Pimsleur Approach. In 1972, a trio of archeologist brothers – Peter, Paul and Marion Parker – claimed to uncover evidence of a second tower they dubbed the Tower of Boggle. Their attempts to have Bible publishers insert this narrative into the canon proved fruitless. An result they should have known had their Ouija board “game” actually worked.
In the finalish analysis, I think we can all be thankful that the Holy Spirit moved and/or threatened these authors and other hangers-on to hew to His self-breathed, inerrant word. Better to learn of the Vine and the Door and the Good Shepherd than scratch our noggins at the thought of the lion lying down with llama.
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Jason Fox mixes metaphors as easily as falling off a pie.
The Shillelagh of Unctuousness
