A Bee In Their Easter Bonnet
No real back story--it's Lent, Easter is coming, I'm re-reading Hal Lindsey, and the news of the past couple of weeks has been quite in keeping with the season (actually, I guess you could say there's a couple or three millenniums worth of back story here, but this pretty much shows what I know about it).
Comments and faves
xolta_99 (27 months ago | reply)
Wow this is topical.
Sir Basil Birchbottom (27 months ago | reply)
Yeah, I try to avoid anything relevant, but this was just too good to pass up.
xolta_99 (27 months ago | reply)
Hopefully this stops before it becomes a holy war to end us all.
xolta_99 (27 months ago | reply)
You sir make me mad.
Sir Basil Birchbottom (27 months ago | reply)
Sorry, xolta_99, but if this string plays out the way it's supposed to, it will become a holy war that will be a new beginning for us (well, some of us, anyway).
Of course, that's only us pre-millennialists who think that. The post-millennialists figure Christ will return only after mankind establishes 1000 years of peace on earth through our own efforts, the amillenialists figure there isn't going to be any actual Second Coming, that Christ established His Kingdom in the form of The Church the first time He came and things are just going to go on getting better and better, and God only knows what the atheists argue about for fun.
xolta_99 (27 months ago | reply)
Well i am am a agnostic so what you just said is okay but I certainly do not believe in it.
Sir Basil Birchbottom (27 months ago | reply)
Well, just keep an open mind--don't reject it out of hand.
And, Gordo-8, thanks!
notmrjohn (27 months ago | reply)
Ya know, I read some stuff that folks wrote back in 999 AD, Well it didn't happen then either. I done read that Revelations, with some willing suspension of disbelief, it seems to be about how the Roman Empire is gonna fall, and it did. So there ya go. If i read it again and forget all about them Romans, it sez that a bunch of stuff is gonna happen, there ain't nothin I can do about it, god is gonna do i no matter what anybody doest, so why worry about it? Best thing to do is be the best person you can be, be kind to ever one, hope they be kind to you, but if not, it's cause God wants it that way.
Sir Basil Birchbottom (27 months ago | reply)
It must be said that End Times interpretation is NOT a universally held Christian belief. The official position of the Catholic Church, for example, is that Revelations is not prophecy about the fall of either the first Roman Empire or some future one, but simply allegorical tale to teach the lesson about keeping the Faith in hard times, using familiar forms and characters to illustrate the story, the same way some of our American Westerns of the Fifties and Sixties dealt with modern social issues (or, as one Church-sanctioned book I read put it, it was a 1st Century AD version of "Star Wars"). As I said, I'm a premillenialist myself, and still believe the Jews are the Chosen People, but recognize the post- and amilleniallists, and even the Replacement Theology crowd, can come up with some good arguments for their viewpoint, and might even be right. And, ultimately, I don't figure it matters who is. I figure if I believe in God and Jesus as my Saviour, then I'm prepared whether the Battle of Armageddon starts at 0600 tomorrow morning or the world lasts for another hundred billion years.
Sir Basil Birchbottom (27 months ago | reply)
Thank you, GORDO-8. I am both honored and flattered by the invitation. I must say, however, that I am not a public speaker--in fact, I tend to clench up and have trouble getting out the simplest phrases, and those usually in garbled form and delivered in a frustrated growl or obsequious "hope I said that right" tone of attempted self-deprecating humor (George W. Bush was a Churchillian orator compared to me). So, I'd best stick to drawing and the written word, and leave the preaching to those who received The Call in that field.
CLHARBAUGHBAYIMAGES (27 months ago | reply)
This is great! True and funny at the same time !
Sir Basil Birchbottom (27 months ago | reply)
Thanks--glad you liked it!
tom clearwood (26 months ago | reply)
you are clearly as talented a theologian as you are an artist.
--
Seen on your photo stream. ( ?² )
Sir Basil Birchbottom (26 months ago | reply)
Thank you, sir--I do appreciate the kind words, but I have to insist I'm even more of an amateur at the former than I am at the latter.
Sir Basil Birchbottom (21 months ago | reply)
Sad news from The Front (via the NYT):
Maj. Gen. Israel Tal, Israeli Military Strategist, Is Dead at 85
By ETHAN BRONNER
Published: September 8, 2010
JERUSALEM — Israel Tal, who as one of Israel’s most influential military strategists designed and developed its main tank, the Merkava, refashioned battleground doctrine and served as an adviser to prime ministers, died Wednesday. He was 85.
His death came after a prolonged illness, the Israeli Army announced.
General Tal, who reached the rank of major general and, in 1973, was deputy chief of military staff, was assigned to lead a committee in 1970 to design a tank when Israel was finding it difficult to get others to sell it major military hardware.
The layout of the Merkava, Hebrew for chariot, which was first fielded in 1979, was unusual in placing the turret and crew compartment in the rear and the engine in front. This was done largely to improve the chances of crew survival if the tank took a hit from the front. It also allowed escape out the back and room for more soldiers. The Merkava is widely considered one of the world’s most reliable and safest battle tanks.
General Tal also forced a rethinking of several elements of Israeli military doctrine, greatly increasing its reliance on armor as well as the range and aggressiveness of its gunners, and helping reorganize its ground troop management.
Defense Minister Ehud Barak said in a statement on Wednesday that General Tal was “one of the bravest and most influential commanders in the history of the Israel Defense Forces.”
Born in the small Zionist settlement of Beer Tuvia in Palestine in 1924, General Tal, also known as Talik, fought in the British Army’s Jewish Brigade in World War II, was a brigade commander for Israel during the 1956 campaign in the Sinai, was an armored division commander in the 1967 Arab-Israeli war and was commander of the southern front in the final stages of the 1973 Arab-Israeli war.
The Patton Museum of Cavalry and Armor in Fort Knox, Ky., has General Tal’s photograph as one of five on its wall of greatest armor commanders, putting him with two World War II legends — Gen. George S. Patton himself and Field Marshal Erwin Rommel of Germany.
Eitan Haber, a former close aide to Yitzhak Rabin, the assassinated Israeli prime minister, said on Israel Radio that General Tal “was an intellectual and educator, and it was no coincidence that writers, poets and artists gathered in his shadow.”
General Tal advised Mr. Rabin, as he had done with Golda Meir and David Ben-Gurion.
General Tal, who would have turned 86 next week, is survived by his wife, Hagit; a daughter, Pnina; a son, Yair; and several grandchildren.
John in Boston (9 months ago | reply)
My fave bit here from Sir Derriere d' Birch:
"Yeah, I try to avoid anything relevant..."
Gotta love this wacky old wanker! Fun stuff.
Sir Basil Birchbottom (9 months ago | reply)
Thanks, John!