Cam

Observations from my gf upon learning that these “Bible books” she keeps hearing me yammer about are not like… some sequel to the Bible, but are actually what the Bible is made of:

Her: So I thought Matthew was this whole important book but * holding up my Bible * it’s like 50 pages! It’s a fucking pamphlet!
Her: So did you know that the Old Testament is like, really long?? * physically shows me the page where the New Testament starts and how slim the NT side is * This is nothing!! “Oh, we’re the New Testament!” It’s the new nothing! Come back when you have more to say!
Her: I think this is the first time I’ve ever picked up your Bible. Is it supposed to burn?
Her: IT’S AN ANTHOLOGY
Her: how long until this goes on Cohost?
Me: Oh, immediately.

I find this extremely funny (especially because I’ve been yammering to her about the Bible for years 🥲) and also find her fresh observations extremely good and funny but also like… I’m just kinda pissed off on her behalf because when she was a kid, She Was Baptized… like I think it was a non-evangelical denomination and I know they’re not as into the Bible (which is fine!!) but like… “oh hey kid do you know anything about this religion? No? That’s fine, we’ll put you through this initiation ritual”

There was a class but apparently they didn’t teach her anything!

Observations from my gf upon learning that these “Bible books” she keeps hearing me yammer about are not like… some sequel to the Bible, but are actually what the Bible is made of:

Her: So I thought Matthew was this whole important book but * holding up my Bible * it’s like 50 pages! It’s a fucking pamphlet!
Her: So did you know that the Old Testament is like, really long?? * physically shows me the page where the New Testament starts and how slim the NT side is * This is nothing!! “Oh, we’re the New Testament!” It’s the new nothing! Come back when you have more to say!
Her: I think this is the first time I’ve ever picked up your Bible. Is it supposed to burn?
Her: IT’S AN ANTHOLOGY
Her: how long until this goes on Cohost?
Me: Oh, immediately.

Okay… hear me out…
The little guy running naked while Jesus is being arrested from the Gospel of Mark + the Beloved Disciple from the Gospel of John = Same guy.

Disclaimer: I don’t know anything about anything, I’m just a guy who sees some gay shit* in the Bible and unlike a lot of Christians, I am Intrigued instead of Appalled.

*Yes, there will be gay shit in this post eventually.

So both of these figures, interestingly, are generally seen as the respective authors humbly not identifying himself. But literally the only reason people think that is because both of these characters are unnamed. It's a huge speculation. The "titles" of the gospels (which I will be using here) were later additions based on early Christians' guesses of who the author was/who the unnamed guy was, but neither guess can be backed up in the texts themselves.

Mark’s Streaker appears in two whole verses following Jesus’ arrest in the garden: “A certain young man was following him, wearing nothing but a linen cloth. They caught hold of him, but he left the linen cloth and ran off naked.” Mark 14:51-52

Warning signs, sticky notes, fences over extremely specific stretches of grass, and similar things have become standard pieces of our narrative design toolkit.

It's an easy way to quickly, efficiently, and subtly make a player wonder what happened to necessitate that rule or restriction: Why is there a sign on the break room fridge saying that you should NEVER turn on the microwave while someone is in the elevator? Why is there a fence over just this one specific stretch of highway overpass? Is this "DO NOT CREATE THE TORMENT NEXUS" sign here because someone created the torment nexus?

To talk about the same specific topic but totally switch the, uh, genre of the subject matter: I listen to a fair amount of podcasts about academic study of the Bible, and I heard someone (I wish I could remember who) say that you can learn a lot about an ancient society based on their law codes because it tells you what they were doing. I.e., there was once a woman whose husband was involved in a fight and to save her husband she grabbed the genitals of the other man, and the society was like, “What do we do about this??” (The solution, of course, in Deuteronomy 25, was cutting off her hand.)

But I heard more recently (…I wish I could remember who!!) saying that that’s not true, and actually these lawmakers perceived their law code as more prestigious if it could cover literally every situation imaginable. Just fully a bunch of writers sitting around making up a guy.