Southpaw Jones

Thursday. Don’t get me started.

June 21, 2007 By: Southpaw Jones Category: Interesting?

Is This Interesting?
Thoughts/feelings that just might not matter:

Folks tend to think that religion is all about melodrama, earnestness, righteousness, kneeling, doing, studying, and caring a whole lot about a lot of things. Well, there’s some truth to that, but a great deal of the Judeo-Christian tradition is NOT CARING and chilling the #$*@ out. Jesus was all like, “Relax, dudes, I got your back. Can I rub your feet?” and Moses was all, “Enough of this working for the Egyptians. I know this place where we can eat milk and honey and lay around in hammocks all day.”

You want proof? Take The Ten Commandments. Please take them! Ooo, the great monolith of legislation for Israel and the Deep South alike! Bow before it! Carve it in stone as it was once carved in stone, broken by Angry Moses, then carved in stone again. The truth is, they’re not that scary. To the unbiased eye, the first published Laws of God read more like an ancient self-help book on simplifying your life, reducing stress, avoiding action, and indeed, CARING LESS.

Don’t believe me? Take a look:

ONE: ‘You shall have no other gods before Me.’

One God. One-stop shopping. All your needs met here. No need to diversify your spiritual investments. Memorize one name. I’m your sole diety. Pray only once when you’re in trouble. Booyah.

TWO: ‘You shall not make for yourself a carved image–any likeness of anything that is in heaven above, or that is in the earth beneath, or that is in the water under the earth.’

Don’t you have enough on your plate with the plowing of fields and the raising of children? If you want to sweat and carve and whittle and sandblast some idol, you’re going to have to do it without my permission. Just watch a sunset, fool, so sayeth the Lord.

THREE: ‘You shall not take the name of the LORD your God in vain.’

[This one is less about “Oh my God” and more about “I swear to the Lord God in the face of my only child, I’m gonna pay you back those three shillings!”] Don’t go around making crazy, melodramatic statements and dragging My name into them. Keep me out of your stupid promises.

FOUR: ‘Remember the Sabbath day, to keep it holy.’

This is a big one. You need a day off, bro! Once a week. What’s that? No, you can’t work. Not even a little. It is forbidden! Don’t you see, you’ve become a “human doing” instead of a human being. I’m not going to debate this with you. Take a day and do nothing, or be found in violation of God’s law! Go watch some Netflix.

FIVE: ‘Honor your father and your mother.’

Ok, this one is about caring, I’ll admit, but it does get you off the hook where aunts, uncles, siblings, grandparents, and neighbors are concerned. In the face of that gaggle, honoring two measly people doesn’t seem so hard, does it?

SIX: ‘You shall not murder.’

Is anything worth dropping a rock on another person’s skull? Really? You know, it takes a lot of effort to kill someone. Most folks don’t want to die, and they’ll resist. Necessary wars are VERY RARE. So why don’t you just relax, think it over, and then forget about it.

SEVEN: ‘You shall not commit adultery.’

If you can satisfy more than one person sexually, emotionally, and spiritually, well then, you are a god yourself, and you certainly don’t need these silly rules. All the rest of you, stay at home and deal with it. One husband. One wife. One partner. Why double the torture by cheating?

EIGHT: ‘You shall not steal.’

What’s worth stealing anyway? You look stupid all dressed in black and crouching around. Stick with what you’ve got or earn more the hard way, Takey McTakerson.

NINE: ‘You shall not bear false witness against your neighbor.’

Don’t lie in court. Just tell the nice officer what he needs to know, and get out of there. Your meter’s expired.

TEN: ‘You shall not covet your neighbor’s house; you shall not covet your neighbor’s wife, nor his male servant, nor his female servant, nor his ox, nor his donkey, nor anything that is your neighbor’s.’

Trying to keep up with the Joneses, eh? Well, stop it. It’s annoying. Learn to be happy with what you have. It’s up there with the greatest skills you’ll ever acquire. Besides, if you genuinely don’t care about your neighbor’s brand new Lexus, it’ll drive them CRAZY! Bonus!

So that’s it. Splat! The Ten Commandments pretty much decree that you should mind your own business, take time off, have one God, one spouse, and enjoy the things that rightfully belong to you. That’s a gouda meatball-a! You can put those up in the Southpaw Jones Memorial Courthouse, but I’d like you to rename them “10 Ways to Cool Down on a Hot Summer Day.” They’ll get more casual readers that way.

Quotopia
Freshly-picked quotes from the ol’ reference collection:

I don’t like my hockey sticks touching other sticks, and I don’t like them crossing one another, and I kind of have them hidden in the corner. I put baby powder on the ends. I think it’s essentially a matter of taking care of what takes care of you.
Wayne Gretzky

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