T’was Yahweh made the universe and all
And made it, He, in days that numbered seven.
Then watched as it so quickly fell from grace,
And closed, the gate became, ‘tween Earth and heaven.
Created he, the flowers, stars and moon,
The human eye, the brain, and good things all.
The liver fluke, the tapeworm and the plague….?
Such things as those were good before the fall.
Those sharpened fangs, and venom, claws and germs
Originally entirely benign
Until the magic apple once was bit
And all things underwent a [kind of] re-design
Coz harmful things could never be divine, … (could they?)
T’was all our fault, and that’s the bottom line.
Our fate was sealed when Yahweh chose to place
Within the garden magic fruit, that would,
When eaten by the creature he’d designed,
Impart knowledge of evil, and of good.
So Adam said to Eve: “Hey listen, love,
He warns of death if we eat from that tree,
But I don’t know what “death” is, love, do you?:
“I’m every bit as ignorant as thee,” said she, “so don’t ask me.”
A serpent tempted Eve one fateful day.
And she believed the serpent’s wicked lies
It turns out: women made from people’s ribs
Are not inherently especially wise.
And ate she of the tree, and cursed the world.
She gave the fruit to Adam, he ate too.
Soon came upon them understanding thus:
“You’re naked!” “Goodness me, and so are you!!!”
Its interesting knowledge, this is true, but…
Is that all that the fruit was meant to do?
You’d think they’d come to a sudden realisation
Of the right and wrong of every situation
An instant, fruit-based moral education
To pass on to the human population
A fascinating ethical revelation
Invulnerable to bad interpretation.
Sounds like all they got was titillation,
just inexplicable humiliation
and the start of religion’s nudity fixation:
The inauguration of a prudish denunciation of the instrumentation of procreation.
as well as being the first step on the journey to damnation.
Along comes Yahweh, asking ‘bout the fruit
Knowing full well that eaten it had been,
Surprised he acted, like he didn’t know!
But being omniscient, surely he’d foreseen.
And: Death alone, declared the Lord of life,
Was punishment befitting such a crime
As using one’s free will to choose to not
Just worship and obey him all the time.
Having thus decided upon ‘death’
For doing anything against HIS will
How fortunate it was that he’d designed
Some handy livestock for us, then, to kill!
For centuries thenceforth, ordered he that man,
Should slaughter bird, and goat, and sheep and cow.
(But later had his own son put to death,
So we don’t have to slaughter livestock now).
But getting back to Adam, Eve and snake,
Let’s contemplate the price he made them pay.
To woman, he gave childbirth’s risks and pains
To man, the need to work hard every day.
Before all this, there was no work to do,
and childbirth was just a piece of cake.
All day they’d rest, and babies just slid out…
If only Eve had not believed the snake!
But being as he is, the Lord of all,
The sole designer of the world we see
He surely could have come up with a price
Other than “death” or so it seems to me.
“Seeing as I am” lord Yahweh might have said,
“The lord of every detail here created
I get to choose the consequence of sin
The punishment, and all results related”.
And certainly he could have simply said
That “you alone can make up for your sin.
By only righteous works can you be saved,
If I’m to open heav’n and let you in.
“Although you’re sinful now, if you decide
That you’ll be good, instead of being mean.
If you will help the needy, feed the poor,
By acts of righteousness you’ll be made clean!”
This makes Christians angry, and they say
He can’t, he can’t, he YES OF COURSE HE COULD!!!
He makes the moral laws, so why not make
Salvation do-able through acts of good?
If people were convinced of all their guilt
And genuinely wanted to repent,
They’d quickly make this world a better place,
Improving people’s lives wherever they went.
Instead we’re told the only way to God
Is to hear a silly story and believe.
Believe a silly story, based ‘round death,
That only bronze-age sadists could conceive.
He sacrificed himself unto himself
To pay himself the price that he’d demanded
For any violation by a human
Of strict adherence to his perfect standard.
“Believe”: it’s such a useless thing to do!
But that’s the thing that’s closest to God’s heart.
As long as some believe then God’s content
To watch His whole creation fall apart.
Believe this ancient story of a man
Who walked on water, raised folk from the dead.
Who magically made wine from H2O
And had a crowd miraculously fed.
A story rife with borrowed ancient myths,
A group of 12, a few nights in a tomb,
Magic healings, and stars that did portend
His exit from his virgin mother’s womb.
Yes, all of this, and more, you must accept.
That’s the system Yahweh did conceive.
No matter all the good that you might do,
It’s all for nothing if you don’t believe.
If you’re an awful evil paedophile
Who rapes and murders children every night,
Or maybe you’re a racist piece of trash
Who likes to murder those who are not white.
Perhaps you rob old ladies, blow up cars,
Or wipe out entire countries, that’s all right!
If you’ll suspend your disbelief in God
And beg to Christ, you’re perfect in his sight.
While all those ordinary decent folk
Who just cannot believe, who never could.
Will roast in hell, by rational thought betrayed:
The evidence against these baseless claims was just too good.
Don’t think too much. Don’t let a doubt creep in
Don’t ever think the whole thing’s less than true.
The devil’s at the door, and wicked lies
That sound like truth, he saith unto you.
“But snakes don’t talk! And neither donkeys, too!
A man inside a fish would surely die!
A wall that fell on 27,000 men
Would surely be prohibitively high.’
Says Lucifer: “Don’t you care that Jesus’ life
Was written of by men he’d never met?
When written several decades past his death,
Exaggeration’s surely what you get!
“You don’t believe,” says satan, “do you, friend?
The graves were opened, and poured out their dead?
And walked they ‘round the streets greeting old friends
But no-one wrote down anything they said?
“Believe you, that the risen Christ ascended
When finished was the task that he’d been sent?
Ascended physically? And travelled sky-ward?
You’ve never stopped to think of just… where he went!
“Coz given what we know in modern times,
‘bout gas and pressure in our atmosphere,
And what’s beyond our planet…. Can’t you see
Just why unto the rest of us it’s clear:
His body became worm food, here!”
But heed not Satan. Believe thou not his lies
Over him the victory has been won
By Yahweh, through his favourite payment, death,
By crucifying and killing his own son.
He could have made up rules that harmed no-one…
But yet another ritualistic sacrificial bloody painful violent death seemed much more fun.
And made it, He, in days that numbered seven.
Then watched as it so quickly fell from grace,
And closed, the gate became, ‘tween Earth and heaven.
Created he, the flowers, stars and moon,
The human eye, the brain, and good things all.
The liver fluke, the tapeworm and the plague….?
Such things as those were good before the fall.
Those sharpened fangs, and venom, claws and germs
Originally entirely benign
Until the magic apple once was bit
And all things underwent a [kind of] re-design
Coz harmful things could never be divine, … (could they?)
T’was all our fault, and that’s the bottom line.
Our fate was sealed when Yahweh chose to place
Within the garden magic fruit, that would,
When eaten by the creature he’d designed,
Impart knowledge of evil, and of good.
So Adam said to Eve: “Hey listen, love,
He warns of death if we eat from that tree,
But I don’t know what “death” is, love, do you?:
“I’m every bit as ignorant as thee,” said she, “so don’t ask me.”
A serpent tempted Eve one fateful day.
And she believed the serpent’s wicked lies
It turns out: women made from people’s ribs
Are not inherently especially wise.
And ate she of the tree, and cursed the world.
She gave the fruit to Adam, he ate too.
Soon came upon them understanding thus:
“You’re naked!” “Goodness me, and so are you!!!”
Its interesting knowledge, this is true, but…
Is that all that the fruit was meant to do?
You’d think they’d come to a sudden realisation
Of the right and wrong of every situation
An instant, fruit-based moral education
To pass on to the human population
A fascinating ethical revelation
Invulnerable to bad interpretation.
Sounds like all they got was titillation,
just inexplicable humiliation
and the start of religion’s nudity fixation:
The inauguration of a prudish denunciation of the instrumentation of procreation.
as well as being the first step on the journey to damnation.
Along comes Yahweh, asking ‘bout the fruit
Knowing full well that eaten it had been,
Surprised he acted, like he didn’t know!
But being omniscient, surely he’d foreseen.
And: Death alone, declared the Lord of life,
Was punishment befitting such a crime
As using one’s free will to choose to not
Just worship and obey him all the time.
Having thus decided upon ‘death’
For doing anything against HIS will
How fortunate it was that he’d designed
Some handy livestock for us, then, to kill!
For centuries thenceforth, ordered he that man,
Should slaughter bird, and goat, and sheep and cow.
(But later had his own son put to death,
So we don’t have to slaughter livestock now).
But getting back to Adam, Eve and snake,
Let’s contemplate the price he made them pay.
To woman, he gave childbirth’s risks and pains
To man, the need to work hard every day.
Before all this, there was no work to do,
and childbirth was just a piece of cake.
All day they’d rest, and babies just slid out…
If only Eve had not believed the snake!
But being as he is, the Lord of all,
The sole designer of the world we see
He surely could have come up with a price
Other than “death” or so it seems to me.
“Seeing as I am” lord Yahweh might have said,
“The lord of every detail here created
I get to choose the consequence of sin
The punishment, and all results related”.
And certainly he could have simply said
That “you alone can make up for your sin.
By only righteous works can you be saved,
If I’m to open heav’n and let you in.
“Although you’re sinful now, if you decide
That you’ll be good, instead of being mean.
If you will help the needy, feed the poor,
By acts of righteousness you’ll be made clean!”
This makes Christians angry, and they say
He can’t, he can’t, he YES OF COURSE HE COULD!!!
He makes the moral laws, so why not make
Salvation do-able through acts of good?
If people were convinced of all their guilt
And genuinely wanted to repent,
They’d quickly make this world a better place,
Improving people’s lives wherever they went.
Instead we’re told the only way to God
Is to hear a silly story and believe.
Believe a silly story, based ‘round death,
That only bronze-age sadists could conceive.
He sacrificed himself unto himself
To pay himself the price that he’d demanded
For any violation by a human
Of strict adherence to his perfect standard.
“Believe”: it’s such a useless thing to do!
But that’s the thing that’s closest to God’s heart.
As long as some believe then God’s content
To watch His whole creation fall apart.
Believe this ancient story of a man
Who walked on water, raised folk from the dead.
Who magically made wine from H2O
And had a crowd miraculously fed.
A story rife with borrowed ancient myths,
A group of 12, a few nights in a tomb,
Magic healings, and stars that did portend
His exit from his virgin mother’s womb.
Yes, all of this, and more, you must accept.
That’s the system Yahweh did conceive.
No matter all the good that you might do,
It’s all for nothing if you don’t believe.
If you’re an awful evil paedophile
Who rapes and murders children every night,
Or maybe you’re a racist piece of trash
Who likes to murder those who are not white.
Perhaps you rob old ladies, blow up cars,
Or wipe out entire countries, that’s all right!
If you’ll suspend your disbelief in God
And beg to Christ, you’re perfect in his sight.
While all those ordinary decent folk
Who just cannot believe, who never could.
Will roast in hell, by rational thought betrayed:
The evidence against these baseless claims was just too good.
Don’t think too much. Don’t let a doubt creep in
Don’t ever think the whole thing’s less than true.
The devil’s at the door, and wicked lies
That sound like truth, he saith unto you.
“But snakes don’t talk! And neither donkeys, too!
A man inside a fish would surely die!
A wall that fell on 27,000 men
Would surely be prohibitively high.’
Says Lucifer: “Don’t you care that Jesus’ life
Was written of by men he’d never met?
When written several decades past his death,
Exaggeration’s surely what you get!
“You don’t believe,” says satan, “do you, friend?
The graves were opened, and poured out their dead?
And walked they ‘round the streets greeting old friends
But no-one wrote down anything they said?
“Believe you, that the risen Christ ascended
When finished was the task that he’d been sent?
Ascended physically? And travelled sky-ward?
You’ve never stopped to think of just… where he went!
“Coz given what we know in modern times,
‘bout gas and pressure in our atmosphere,
And what’s beyond our planet…. Can’t you see
Just why unto the rest of us it’s clear:
His body became worm food, here!”
But heed not Satan. Believe thou not his lies
Over him the victory has been won
By Yahweh, through his favourite payment, death,
By crucifying and killing his own son.
He could have made up rules that harmed no-one…
But yet another ritualistic sacrificial bloody painful violent death seemed much more fun.