Tag Archives: God

Written By God

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According to researchers, recent analysis of the Bible strongly suggests that it was written by God. I kid you not. The headline above, from Britain’s Daily Mail, proves it.

The researchers in question were ‘a computer scientist at Carnegie Mellon University and a Lutheran pastor in Germany’. Their findings were announced by The Mail in its Science section, conclusive proof that God himself, the mythical creation of an ancient nomadic tribe, personally wrote the Bible! He didn’t inspire it or guide the pens of the men who put it together. Oh no, he actually wrote it.

How can we know this? Because there are way too many coincidences, too much foreshadowing of later events in stories written hundreds of years earlier, and too many fulfilled prophecies for it not to be.

This analysis is of course seriously flawed. Operating within the parameters that the far from objective ‘researchers’ set for it, the project told them exactly what they wanted to hear. Yes, there are some themes and ideas that run throughout the Bible but this is because its various authors were all concerned with the gods, one in particular. This is all they wanted to write about and all that subsequent editors were interested in too.

The Bible is noticeably short on recipes and sports reports because such things were of no interest to the priests and zealots who wrote it. We might have had a more engaging and less divisive book if these men and their later editors had been more interested in sport and cooking, but they weren’t and the Bible reflects this fact. But there’s nothing supernatural about this. The authors were, like many other ancients, concerned with meaning of life stuff and the God myths that seemed to them to explain it. The god the nomadic tribes of the middle east thought explained it best was YHWH. Far from being a consistent presence in the books of what is now the Old Testament, YHWH changes depending on who’s shaping the myths he plays a part in. This is not, incidentally, what theologians are pleased to call progressive revelation.

It’s a reflection of multiple authors writing over long periods of time in various contexts about the same thing. Nonetheless, the way humans relate to YHWH changes from book to book, as do his morals, demands and expectations. If YHWH authored the Bible, the one character he hasn’t got a grip on is himself.

Our computer specialist and German pastor also dredge up the discredited fantasy that Jesus fulfils all the prophecies of the Old Testament. Of course he does; that’s the way he’s written. His story – actually ‘stories’, plural – are rewrites of older myths, particularly those about Moses. Did Moses foreshadow Jesus, foretelling all he’d do hundreds of years before he was even born? Of course not. Did Jesus then knowingly mirror the acts of Moses during his life to prove he was God’s chosen one? Again, of course not; only a fool is taken in by this ruse. There have, alas, been plenty of them, including the present ‘researchers’.

The obvious explanation is the one that makes most sense; the Jesus stories are modelled on earlier myths and snippets from the Jewish scriptures without any of them needing to be remotely historical. The article mentions, for example, the description of the Passover lamb in Exodus 12 and gasps that, yes, centuries later, Jesus is referred to as the ‘Lamb of God’ (John 1:29). It doesn’t seem to enter the researchers’ credulous little heads that the later authors knew Exodus and decided to apply its imagery to Jesus. This is how the trick was done. There was no holy dictation making the connection. They simply applied earlier scriptures to Jesus and write his story around them. We can see this in another example from the report: Matthew used a mistranslation of Isaiah 7:14 as a template for his virgin-conception myth.

Claiming, as the researchers do, that the construction of later stories was God making sure no-one missed the point of the earlier ones is painfully niave.

Jane Austen’s Pride and Prejudice foreshadows Helen Fielding’s Bridget Jones’s Diary. The details of the two works are, after all, remarkably similar. The only plausible explanation for these similarities is that Jane Austen’s hand must have been guided by a spiritual force to record events almost two centuries before they would occur for real in Helen Fielding’s definitive version of the story. This at least is what these present researchers would conclude if they ran an analysis of the two Mr Darcy books in the same way they have the Bible.

It’s A Small World After All

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Life Is Meaningless.

Or is it? I’ve long held the view that life is as meaningful or meaningless as we’re prepared to make it. There is no hidden meaning lurking somewhere out there, certainly not in some holy book, that we can plug into, if we’re so inclined, to make us feel better. This lack doesn’t make our individual lives meaningless. I’ve never understood the assertion that we need a life beyond this one to make it meaningful. Nor does the bizarre notion that this existence is merely a trial run for the real life that comes once this one is over. Why did the incomprehensible god who supposedly created us in this scenario not make us perfect from the get go and ‘fit us to live with him’ in heaven? It’s illogical that he would not.

Years ago when I was younger and a newly minted atheist, my then wife and I took our young children to Disneyland Paris. Apart from an argument with Snow White about Dumbo (some other time) I had a moment’s revelation as we waited in line for It’s A Small World After All. I realised how much like life this was: queue interminably before getting on the ride, spend a relatively short time on it before being ejected into the void. This, I realised was life, or a close approximation of it. ‘Wait’ for eons to be born, make the most of the brief ride that follows, and accept that after it stops you will in all probability cease to exist. It’s not a bad deal. Better than not experiencing It’s A Small World (if that’s your thing) or indeed life at all.

My life has meaning, as does yours. If it’s not apparent, it’s certainly workoutable. In fact, part of life’s purpose is to work out what that purpose is for yourself. For me it’s in my relationships, with my partner, my children, my grandchildren (so much love there), my friends; in the things I spend my time doing: travelling, learning, writing, volunteering; in my work, when that was a thing for me. If you can’t find meaning in these kind of things, it doesn’t mean there is a meaning elsewhere; find it where you are. If you need to feel it lies beyond, in a supernatural realm, you are only going to be disappointed; imaginary realms cannot give you purpose. They can mask the fact you have failed to make meaning in your life, but they cannot plug the black hole of meaninglessness if that’s what you’ve created for yourself. Neither can that black hole be plugged by Jesus or any other imagined being. A nothing filled up with nothing is still just nothing.

No, this life is not a rehearsal for a better one that is to follow. Even if it was, there is no meaning in the promise that you will be allowed to spend eternity worshipping a capricious God. There’s no purpose in that. Far better to take what is real to you in the brief time chance has allowed you in the light, and recognise it as your meaning and purpose.

We Will Judge Angels

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The guy in this video has had his mind bent by Paul’s crazy assertion in 1 Corinthians 6:3 that Believers will judge the angels at the Final Judgement.

This is pretty mind bending, I think you’ll agree, not to mention totally insane. The video incidentally turned up in my Facebook feed; I didn’t go looking for it. I’m not that masochistic. My Facebook is back to being inundated with posts and videos from evangelicals. That algorithm certainly needs attention. Just because I write about Jesus doesn’t mean I want to receive wacky posts about him from Christians.

Anyway, Mr Mind-Bent (I can’t track down his name) got me thinking what this judging will be like. For a start, and despite the video’s claim, Paul doesn’t specify that the judgement will be part of the Final Judgement. This is what he actually says:

…do you not know that the Lord’s people will judge the world? And if you are to judge the world, are you not competent to judge trivial cases? Do you not know that we will judge angels? How much more the things of this life! (1 Corinthians 6:2-3)

My God, the Lord’s people will not only judge angels: they’ll judge the world too. We’re really in trouble if God is going to hand the job over to some of the most unstable people in existence. They are also, as the video claims, going to be unleashed on the angels. You might wonder, as I did, what the angels might need to be judged about. The Masked Singer maybe, or which of them farted in the elevator? It could be the Lord’s people will be required to sit in judgement on the Bad Angels: Satan and his minions who rebelled against God back at the beginning of time. Paul doesn’t specify, though elsewhere in the infallible, never-contradictory scriptures, the devil has already been judged (John 16:11) and his fate sealed (Revelation 20:10).

Why in any case would beings who can never sin merit judgement? Sin doesn’t exist in heaven. The presence of God makes it impossible, which doesn’t account for how Satan and his mob managed it. I’m sure there’s a Bible verse somewhere that gets round it some way or other.

Of course none of this judging of the world and angels is ever going to happen. Angels, God, Heaven: none of them exist. Our man in the video has had his mind bent for nothing. While he admits he doesn’t fully understand Paul’s claim, nevertheless he believes it. He has faith in it, he preaches it (‘preach it brother, preach it!’) and wants other people to believe it. He’d be better thinking it through then he’d realise – maybe just maybe – that the Bible is full of crap.

An Exclusive Interview

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So what I say is if people had listened to me from the start a lot of these problems wouldn’t ever have happened. I think people know that now cos I’m indisputerbably the best there’s ever been. And haven’t I always been telling you that? Cos I am the best. [Note to Editor: you can cut out a lot of this]. What I’ve accomplished is the best, not like anything any of those other guys ever managed. The best.

And I’ve got plans, you know, cos the best is yet to come. All people have to do is show me the respect I deserve for doing all the good things, the really great things, I’ve done. But you know, they don’t all do that. Some of them, a lot of them, don’t appreciate all the great things I’ve done and all the great things I’m still gonna get done. And all I ask in return is a little respect. Maybe some appreciation, you know. Cos, and I know people know this, I’m the best there is. I’ve seen off my enemies, I’ve had my agents see off our enemies, like they deserve. I’ve had them all killed and more. Horrible, horrible people. I’ve had to punish some of my own people too. Horrible, horrible people, all of them.

I’m like the most wonderful king there’s ever been. I know, I know that some people don’t like the idea of a king but when you’ve done all the wonderful, really wonderful things I’ve done, like killing all our enemies dead and taking over all their shithole countries, which, trust me, they never really did much with anyway – it’s hard not to see yourself as a king, when you’ve done all that I’ve done, and that’s what I am, a really wonderful, really caring King. The best ever. [Edit this too]

So listen, Piggy, be sure to quote me word for word. Cos you know, I get really pissed – some people say far too easily, but of course they don’t really know me, how caring I am – when horrible people put my words in my mouth and make me say things I never said. And you wouldn’t like me to get pissed cos I can be really difficult to deal with then. So don’t do it, you hear?

Now if you don’t mind I gotta get to some meeting. I need a nap. Word for word, you hear. [Edit]

This interview with YHWH, Lord of Hosts and Best God Ever is brought to you completely unedited by Juan Isaiah Thanthe-Other.

A Special Christmas Bible Study

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An angel of the Lord appeared to (the shepherds), and the glory of the Lord shone around them, and they were terrified.

But the angel said to them, “Do not be afraid. I bring you good news that will cause great joy for all the people. Today in the town of David a Saviour has been born to you; he is the Messiah, the Lord. This will be a sign to you: You will find a baby wrapped in cloths and lying in a manger.”

Suddenly a great company of the heavenly host appeared with the angel, praising God and saying, “Glory to God in the highest heaven, and on earth peace to those on whom his favour rests.” (Luke 2:9-16)

Another chunk of scripture that will be proclaimed from pulpits and in nativity plays again this year. Let’s take a closer look at the scenario Luke creates. Does it bear any relation to something that might occur in reality?

First, an angel. Doesn’t this tell us from the outset that we’re in the realms of fantasy fiction? You can’t fault Luke for trying though, he does his best to impress by adding a whole host of them. You can hear him thinking that ‘a great company of angels’ should convince all but the most hardened of hearts. He’s inventing freely, throwing in the tropes of the genre with abandon. Doesn’t he know angels are fierce, two-faced, six-winged creatures (Ezekiel 14:18; Isaiah 6), not handsome youths in glowing white robes? There’s a reason they prefaced their every appearance, including this one, with ‘Do not be afraid’.

Good news that will cause great joy for all the people: All? Even as Luke wrote this paean to wishful thinking he knew that the Jesus myth had not brought joy to ‘all people’. Most had rejected the claims of the new cult and joy was hardly the prevalent emotion in some of the churches Paul wrote to.

This will be a sign to you: You will find a baby wrapped in cloths and lying in a manger. A baby wrapped in cloths, as was the custom, and lying in an animal feeding trough is a ‘sign’? A sign that the Messiah had arrived? Really? Granted a manger is not a conventional place for a new-born but it’s hardly miraculous. And what if by the time the shepherds had abandoned their flocks to the night and its marauding wolves, Mary had, say, picked up the child or found a better place for it? Imagine the confusion! Sorry, Luke but this is a very poorly constructed story. You just didn’t think it through.

As for the angels’ last proclamation, what does it really mean?

Glory to God: this of course is fawning to a God whose ego is more inflated and fragile than Donald Trump’s. He demands continual praise not only from his heavenly messengers but from those here below, or else he’ll go off on one. You really want to spend eternity with such a tyrant, Christians?

…in the highest heavens: a reference to the fact that early Christians believed in different layers of heaven; Paul writes about them too. God resides, as acknowledged here, in the highest, the top floor executive suite. No-one ever gets to go up there. Emails are sent down from on high.

And on earth peace to those on whom his favour rests: what sort of peace? Certainly not the absence of conflict or war. We’ve now had two more millennia of these, some in the past initiated by Christians themselves. Do people who are at peace with themselves start wars? Peace within then. Do Christians know greater peace than anyone else? Hard to say when it’s not something that can be measured but I’m sure Christians will claim it’s so.

On whom his favour rests: who exactly is this? Who enjoys the favour of a capricious deity? How do they know when he visits all manner of trials and tribulations, testing and tempering on those who count themselves as his. I’m sure the early Christians who helped write the angels’ speech thought it was they who enjoyed the Lord’s favour. Today’s Christians probably think the same. YHWH has always played favourites. Everyone else can go to hell.

So, the heralds of Jesus’ birth didn’t exactly bring good news, did they. Not even in Luke’s imaginary, completely invented, never-happened-in-reality and isn’t-even-a-decent-metaphor scenario.

There May Be Trouble Ahead…

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Prophets, from left to right: Elijah, Julie Stephens,
Cindy Jacobs and er... Ed Miliband

Prophets don’t exist. A bunch of people intoxicated by religious fervour who think God has given them a special message that they must deliver to whoever will listen, are not prophets; they are a collection of extremists intoxicated with religious fervour.

We know this because no God exists. He can’t, as a result, drop messages, special or otherwise, into the heads of fanatics.

That’s it, really. No more to be said.

But so-called prophets exert quite an influence on our modern world. According to Abraham (I know, he’s a mythical figure but bear with me), God selected an ancient Jewish tribe to be his favourite buddies, so long as they did whatever he demanded of them, including hacking off their foreskins and that of their sons. What sort of prophet – what sort of God – comes up with this kind of lunatic fetishism?

Later the creators of a new prophet, whom they called Moses, came up with a story in which their hero encountered God in a bush (the symbolism is lost on us today.) This time he wanted his special buddies to invade their neighbour’s territory, slaughter them and take their land for themselves. This his favourite, de-foreskinned tribe did (modern genetic analysis of the peoples in the region suggests this isn’t what happened.)

After these fictional madmen came some potentially real fanatics who thought God had assigned them to lambast their fellow Jews for their shortcomings. These prophets promised the rubes rewards if they behaved as the prophets thought they should. These guys also came up with the idea that God would send a warrior Messiah to help his special little tribe take over the world. This is what happens when fanatics are allowed to get a hold of things.

A couple of centuries later, another self-proclaimed prophet turned up (or is invented) who seemed to think he’s the most special-est of all the prophets so far. This guy, called Yeshua (meaning ‘salvation’, so obviously not in any way symbolic) prophesied that the Messiah would be arriving real soon to sort the world out. He’d then hand it over to the Jewish people to manage. This guy’s script writers weren’t sure if Yeshua was talking about himself or some other supernatural character called the Son of Man. It doesn’t matter really. Nothing he prophesied happened when he confidently predicted it would: there was no Messiah who flies down from heaven, no final judgment, no great reset for the Earth. He was an absolute failure as a prophet; evidence, if more is needed, that those who claim to speak for God don’t know what they’re talking about. Don’t worry, though, this guy was recast as a resurrected Godman, just like the ones in pagan myths.

A few other prophets appeared around about the same time. In fact, the extremist who changed his name to Paul seemed to think that just about anyone could become one so long as they ‘edified’ the brethren. It was a few years though before the next really big so-called prophet came along.

In the 8th century, a guy called Muhammad said he was told by an angel who represented a different version of God that, amongst other things, Islam would spread worldwide and there would be an increase in senseless murders. These rather nebulous and self-fulfilling predictions are even now coming to pass. Muhammad’s future followers are indeed spreading Islam across the globe while senseless murders continue being committed, a good many of them by Muslims themselves.

While Muslims have made it clear that Muhammad is the final prophet, history has blessed us since with a few more. Joseph Smith in the 1880s was commanded by a different God (or maybe by the same one who’s changed his mind again) to start a new church and to obliterate anyone who stood in his way. He was successful in this enterprise, despite managing to get himself killed in the process.

You’d think, wouldn’t you, that given their abysmal success rate and the number of people who have suffered or perished as a result of their endeavours that we’d have had enough of prophets. While churches cannot agree on whether ‘genuine’ prophecy still exists, the prophets keep coming. Fanatics the world over, every bit as barmy as their predecessors, appoint themselves some deity’s spokesperson, and the ‘prophetic’ pronouncements begin: meaningless theobabble spattered across the Internet.

Who Has Seen The Wind, Or Cause and Effect

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The first time I encountered this poem was when Yoko Ono intoned it, as only she could, on the B-side of John Lennon’s Instant Karma!, back in 1970.

I noticed at the time (because I always read such things, while playing the B-sides of singles) that the poem’s composer was someone called ‘Rossetti’. Back then I knew nothing about him or her. Years later, I came across Dante Gabriel Rossetti, the Pre-Raphaelite artist but it turned he didn’t write the poem either. His sister Christina did.

Christina Rossetti was profoundly religious. She set about helping fallen women: ‘fallen’ according to the sexual mores of the day. A number of these young girls may well have been ‘led into sin’ in the first place by her hell-raiser brother, Dante. Her poem Who Has Seen The Wind, written in 1847, is an allegory of the work of the Holy Ghost: as the wind itself can never be seen, only detected by its effects, so too the Holy Ghost can be sensed only by its invisible workings in the real world. It’s an old argument, hinted at in Psalm 19:1, which says the heavens declare the handiwork of the Lord. Modern versions of the argument exist, based on the philosophical assertion that every effect must have a cause, including one that equates God with a murderer, 

It’s a terrible idea in all its forms. First, we know the wind, and murderers too, exist. The wind can be measured and the processes involved in creating winds of various strengths are well understood. Likewise murderers (as tempting as it is to equate God with a callous killer.) The inference that the cause of any given effect must be supernatural – a Ghost, a god, an angel – is mere primitive instinct. Even more unjustifiable is the leap that says this supernatural cause is The First Cause, which itself has no cause. A further leap into the absurd is the assumption that this uncaused First Cause is a God who was first imagined by middle-eastern tribesmen and later reshaped by early Christians and the church.

Which brings us to God: The Science, the Evidence, a new book by a Christian scientist, Olivier Bonnassies and industrialist Michel-Yves Bolloré, proposing that because we don’t fully understand how the universe came into being, it must have been God. Bonnasaries explains how they arrived at this conclusion:

It’s the fact that this (piece of paper) exists. And that because it exists, it needs a cause, and that (cause) needs another cause, and at the end, you need what we call a primary cause in order that everything exists. Because nothing can exist by itself.

Except, apparently, that cause designated, without evidence, the First Cause: God.

It is this, Bonnasaries and Bolloré claim as a scientific hypothesis. Bonnasaries must surely know as scientist that it is far from scientific. ‘God did it’ is a conclusion, arrived at without evidence; there is nothing observable, testable or measurable about it. It is philosophical conjecture at best, theology at worst. Christina Rossetti put it so much better, all those years ago (but still she got it wrong).

 

You don’t have to imagine: there is no Heaven

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From an Anonymous commenter:

How do you know there is no Heaven or an afterlife? I have no proof Heaven or an afterlife exists either, but where is your proof that they don’t? I don’t think I will ever understand how atheists can be so certain of something that they can’t prove any more than I can understand fundamentalist Christians who say if you don’t accept Jesus Christ as savior you’re doomed to hell. You’ve got something in common. 

And my response:

Thanks for the comment, Anonymous. I’ve copied it here from the old post you added it to.

First, it isn’t up to those of us who question the existence of things like Heaven to ‘prove’ they don’t exist. It’s up to those who claim they do exist to demonstrate that this is the case. A negative proposition such as ‘there is no Heaven’ or ‘there’s no such thing as unicorns’, can’t be ‘proven’ as such, simply because its impossible to present evidence for a no-thing. A positive assertion, however, such as ‘there is a Heaven’, is theoretically demonstrable. But this particular claim never has been. No one has demonstrated where Heaven is (it has to exist somewhere, right?) No-one has ever returned from Heaven with empirical evidence of its existence. No-one has ever survived death to experience Heaven. No evangelical seems to understand that Heaven is exclusively God’s abode and no human will be resurrected into eternal life until the Final Judgement. That’s the Final Judgement Paul and Jesus said was just round the corner but which has never arrived.   

The problem is worse than this, however. There is so little evidence that a god exists, and even less the Christian God (see my previous post, as well as here and here). If there’s no God – and it is highly likely there isn’t – then all contingent beliefs are wiped out: there’s no Heaven, Saviour, Resurrection, Final Judgement, Hell or Eternal Life.

So this is how I know there is no Heaven: it all comes down to probability. The probability there is a Heaven is so infinitesimally small – its highly improbable in fact – that it’s safe to assume there isn’t one.

Despite first impressions suggesting this view has a lot in common with evangelical belief, I think you’ll find it is actually the opposite. While evangelicals accept on faith that Heaven must exist – because the Bible says so – the fact that its existence is both highly improbable and indemonstrable allows for the 99% certainty that it does not.

Finally, Anonymous, no-one other than mathematicians and lawyers deal in proof. Scientists most certainly don’t: they are concerned with evidence and demonstrating something is or is not the case. You’d do best to drop ‘proof’ from your arguments. Unless you can prove something mathematically, you’re not going to provide or find proof, certainly not when contending with religions. Second, how about giving yourself an online name? Commenting as ‘Anonymous’ suggests you don’t have the courage of your convictions and also adds you to the numerous other Anonymous commenters who pop up on blogs. There’s no way of distinguishing between you.  

   

  

The Daft Things Christians Say (the Sequel)

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The return of an old favourite (of mine if no-one else’s)!

Dennis and I were in the States a couple of weeks ago and had the dubious pleasure of watching American news channels. I noticed on more than one, the presenters signed off with ‘God Bless’. As well as undermining what little objectivity they have left, the phrase rang hollow and made those using it, for whatever reason, as vapid and insincere.

It’s a phrase that many ordinary Christians and the nominally religious use (a waitress serving us lobster also came out with it, as if the lobster would magically be granted extra flavour.) It seems to me it’s a remnant from the days of incantation and magic. ‘May God bless you’ as opposed to ‘Let the devil smite thee’ or some such. ‘Goodbye’ has survived from these times too, originally ‘God be with you’, and is equally meaningless. Meaningless because if a God existed he would presumably be with you if he felt like it, or not as the mood took him. Attempting to summon his presence with an incantation of well-wishing is hardly going to influence him. Similarly with ‘God Bless’. Doesn’t the Bible say that God blesses whom he will (Romans 9:18)? No imperative will change that. Might it make the declarer of God’s presence of blessing feel more smugly self- righteous while the intended recipient might feel better, he or she convincing themselves they are actually ‘blessed’? Maybe, but God would have nothing to do with either state of mind.

Likewise that magic phrase Christians like to add to the end of prayers: ‘we ask this in Jesus’ name’. Will God not listen to their supplications if they don’t add it? Will he grant their requests if they do? I think we all know the answer. Why should it make any difference to Almighty God whether they add magic words to their pleas? If it does, what sort of God is it who must have exact words used, like a Hogwarts spell? The addition of a ‘just’ before the word ‘ask’, meaning ‘this is really a modest little request, your worshipfulness, we don’t want to bother you,’ doesn’t make it any more meaningful. From within the faith, as without, the phrase couldn’t possibly make any difference, apart from possibly allowing the supplicant feel better, more self-satisfied, like the child who adds a pretty picture to the end of their writing. ‘We (just) ask this in Jesus’ name’ another empty and vacuous magic spell.

Omens and Portents

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Hey guys, can you help me out a little? The last few weeks I’ve experienced an omen. Or maybe it’s an auspice. A sign. Could even be a miracle.

That’s the trouble, you see. I don’t know which. And even if, with your help, I manage to work it out, I still don’t know what it all means.

You see, there I was in my favourite coffee shop waiting for my cappuccino to cool a little. I happened to look over at it and saw two dead flies floating on the surface. So naturally, I called over the server and said – you know what’s coming – ‘waiter, there’s a fly or two in my drink’. Now whether the flies had been getting it on with each other and decided the froth on my coffee was a good place to do it, I don’t know, but it led to their demise: death by conjugal drowning.

I got a fresh coffee.

Skip forward a few days and I’m about to have a nice glass of Merlot in my favourite Italian restaurant. There on the top, just after it’s been poured, is a solitary swimmer, another of God’s blessed little creatures backstroking its way around my glass in ever erratic circles. After I paraphrase the old joke again, the waiter removes the glass, fishes out the drunken fly and returns my wine. Or maybe he poured a fresh glass. Who knows.

And then – yes, you know what’s coming – a few days after that I’m having another cappuccino in a third establishment when another of the little blighters tops itself in my drink. That’s three times in only a few days. I mean twice would be a coincidence but three times! As Ian Fleming almost said, ‘once is an accident, twice is a coincidence, three times is a pattern’. There was a pattern to my flysome encounters, and we know what a pattern means: it means a pattern maker! An intelligence behind this series of unfortunate events. But which? And what did they all mean? A pattern has to have meaning! What was the message I was being sent from the supernatural plane?

Was it an omen? A portent? A sign from above? Was God telling me something? If so what? Maybe you guys can help.

I just realised though that there’s a Lord of the Flies, Beelzebub, who might be trying to communicate with me. (Is there a Lord of the Slugs and a Lord of the Flatfish too? Logic dictates there should be… but I digress). In the Word of God (Mark 3:24 etc), Beelzebub is none other than the devil in disguise, an alter-ego of old pal Satan.

What’s Satan/Beelzebub trying to say to me by directing flies to land in my beverages? I really need to know. If only these all-powerful supernatural types could be a little clearer.