I’ve been thinking about it, and really, the Bible is a great source of family values. I would love to see my country and the world embrace this concept:
If a man rapes an unbetrothed virgin, he must pay her father 50 shekels of silver and then marry her. (Deuteronomy 22:23)
Yeah. You rape it, you buy it. Why hasn’t George Bush enacted this yet?
So the rapist refuses. What’s good punishment? (For the woman too, because she’s defiled and all...)
Behold, I will corrupt your seed, and spread dung upon your faces. (Malachi 2:3)
No shit (oh, sure, bad pun). I think it is only right that the most violent (and pornographic) literature written in the history of mankind should dictate our norms and morality. I believe that the unborn children of our enemies should be “cut asunder.”
I believe that when making an oath with someone you should place your hand “betwixt his thighs.” I mean, why not?
I believe in monogamy, unless you are an impressive statesman with a lot of slaves. Then, and only then, should you have the right to have hundreds of wives and concubines.
I believe that if one man cheats with another’s wife, the two men should cut off the wife’s hand. Duh.
And I think you should have drunken incestuous passionate sex whenever God demands it. But at no other time. Then you should have dung spread upon your face.
Today, one of our best and brightest passed away. Sir Edmund Hillary, the first man to climb to the top of the world to the summit of Mount Everest, died at the ripe age of 88.
Mr. Hillary was a native New Zealander who grew up gangly and uncoordinated but with a strong interest in mountain climbing. He quickly found that his physical strength outmatched those of his peers and reached the summit of his first mountain, Mount Oliver, at the age of 20. To fund his climbing antics, Hillary joined his brother, Rex, as a beekeeper.
Sir Hillary became the first man to set foot atop Mount Everest on May 28, 1953. Upon climbing back down, Hillary said to lifelong friend George Lowe, “Well George, we finally knocked the bastard off.” The last big rock ascent on Everest is called the Hillary Step in his honor.
After climbing Everest, Hillary devoted his life to helping the Sherpa people of Nepal. He also spoke out eloquently against the attitudes of modern mountaineers who now climb Everest with just a goal of getting to the top. “They don’t give a damn for anybody else who may be in distress and it doesn’t impress me at all that they leave someone lying under a rock to die.”
I have admired and studied Sir Hillary since becoming fascinated with Mount Everest and mountain climbing when I first placed my ears on The Climber by musician Neil Finn. The song tells the aching truth of a climb to Everest’s summit gone wrong -- it’s the kind of song that you luck upon every once in a while that captivates you so much that for months you lose sight of nearly everything you were previously interested in. And those moments are heaven, if you’ve never experienced them.
Edmund Hillary is one of the last great men; one of the last great explorers and outdoorsman. Tonight, I toast a beer to Sir Hillary and those of his ilk -- explorers canvassing our great lands not for gain or exploit, but for beauty and truth, and to quell man’s inner pang for the unknown and unchartered.
Cheers, Edmund Hillary.
