Random musings on The Joshua Tree (sprinkled with just a bit of Fundamentalism)

No, the Joshua Tree didn't get its name from them U2 dudes. The tree got its name from the Mormons who said it resembled the Biblical figure, Joshua reaching his arms upward toward the sky in prayer.[1]

Remember Joshua? He was Moses' number 2 dude and led the Israelites in conquering the Cannanites.

The Cannanites? Funny you should ask. The Good Book tells us how Cannanites are descendants of Canaan, that “Son of Ham” who, along with Shem and Japeth made up Noah’s “My Three Sons.” Yup, Noah, he’s the same dude who built a fairly big boat (Ken Ham – no apparent relation to Noah’s seemingly perverted son - sezs it was at least 450 feet long x 75 feet wide x 45 feet high[2]) when a spry, barely middle-aged, 500 year-old,[3] daddy, using gopher wood (why gopher wood? ‘Cause gerbil wood was just plain silly) to carry either two – or kinda, meybe even seven (yeah, that one’s sorta confusing[4]) of everything, yup, every dinosaur including the Spinosaurus, Argentinosaurus, and  Sauroposeid,[5] every kind of dino-bird, every type of mammal, animal, bird, snake, worm, bug, gnat, spider, mosquito, and well, everything – in the entire freakin’ world – yup, all estimated 8.7 million species – not even including the now extinct ones, all of ‘em, ‘cause see, it was gonna rain fer 40 days ‘n nights, ‘n then stay flooded fer a year which is a seriously long time to backstroke, and when it finally drained, created – ta da – the Grand Canyon! Yeah, he’s that dude…

So Cannanites are therefore, the "Sons of Ham" dudes who found themselves "forever enslaved" 'cause it seemed Ham – they’s pappy, or grand-pappy or great-grand pappy, or great-great-grand pappy, or great-great-great-grand pappy, or well…you get the idea, apparently done some dirty, nasty stuff to Noah while the old man was shat-faced drunk 'n passed out, ‘parently neked, 'an woke up, said something to the effect, “Hey dude, me bum's a-burnin', 'an it shore don’t seem like it ain’t no 'roids;” and as opposed to whoopin’ the tar outta hiz boy or cursing Ham, Noah done – in true Mafioso form – cursed Ham's kinfolk, them “Sons of Ham” – ferever, yup. Fer-ever...

or at least until “…those consummate theologians, the Reverend Doctors Ulysses S. Grant and William Tecumseh Sherman” done figured out what in fact the Bible actually meant.[6]

Point being, Joshua was that same dude who led the Israelites in conquering them “forever enslaved” Cannanites.

Anyhoos...back to the tree. See, our Mormon brothers apparently said the tree resembled Joshua reaching his arms skyward in prayer. Of course that’s when I starts a-thinkin’ of Joshua reaching to the sky demanding that the Sun and Moon stop doing whatever it was they’d been doing keeping gravity, gravitizing, the tides from tiding, the poles in place and whatnot:

"O sun, stand still at Gibeon, And O moon in the valley of Aijalon." And the Good Book tells us that they did…

Which gets me a-thinkin' of my recent visit to the Dayton, Tennessee courthouse where the Scopes Trial was held and the famous Clarence Darrow examination of William Jennings Bryan (can’t help but hear Spencer Tracy and Frederic March’s fast-paced dialogue):

DARROW: Do you believe Joshua made the sun stand still?

BRYAN: I believe what the Bible says. I suppose you mean that the earth stood still?

DARROW: I don't know. I'm talking about the Bible now.

BRYAN: I accept the Bible absolutely.

DARROW: The Bible says Joshua commanded the sun to stand still for the purpose of lengthening the day, doesn't it, and you believe it?

BRYAN: I do.

DARROW: Do you believe at that time the entire sun went around the earth?

BRYAN: No, I believe that the earth goes around the sun.

DARROW: Do you believe that the men who wrote it thought that the day could be lengthened or that the sun could be stopped?

BRYAN: I don't know what they thought.

DARROW: You don't know?

BRYAN: I think they wrote the fact without expressing their own thoughts.

DARROW: Have you an opinion as to whether or not the men who wrote that thought …

…

DARROW: Have you an opinion as to whether whoever wrote the book, I believe it was Joshua -- the Book of Joshua -- thought the sun went around the earth or not?

BRYAN: I believe that he was inspired.

…

DARROW: It is your opinion that the passage was subject to construction?

BRYAN: Well, I think anybody can put his own construction upon it, but I do not mean that necessarily it is a correct construction. I have answered the question.

DARROW: Don't you believe that in order to lengthen the day, it would have been construed that the earth stood still?

BRYAN: I would not attempt to say what would have been necessary, but I know this: that I can take a glass of water that would fall to the ground without the strength of my hand, and to the extent of the glass of water I can overcome the law of gravitation and lift it up, whereas without my hand, it would fall to the ground. If my puny hand can overcome the law of gravitation, the most universally understood, to that extent, I would not set a limit to the power of the hand of the Almighty God, that made the universe.

DARROW: I read that years ago, in your "Prince of Peace." Can you answer my question directly? If the day was lengthened by stopping either the earth or the sun, it must have been the earth?

BRYAN: Well, I should say so. Yes, but it was language that was understood at that time, and we now know that the sun stood still, as it was, with the earth.

DARROW: We know also the sun does not stand still.

BRYAN: Well, it is relatively so, as Mr. Einstein would say.

DARROW: I ask you if it does stand still?

BRYAN: You know as well as I know.

DARROW: Better. You have no doubt about it?

BRYAN: No, no.

DARROW: And the earth moves around it?

BRYAN: Yes, but I think there is nothing improper if you will protect the Lord against against your criticism.

DARROW: I suppose He needs it?

BRYAN: He was using language at that time that the people understood.

DARROW: And that you call "interpretation?"

BRYAN: No, sir, I would not call it interpretation.

DARROW: I say you would call it interpretation at this time, to say it meant something then?

BRYAN: You may use your own language to describe what I have to say, and I will use mine in answering.

DARROW: Now, Mr. Bryan, have you ever pondered what would have happened to the earth if it had stood still?

BRYAN: No.

DARROW: You have not?

BRYAN: No, sir; the God I believe in could have taken care of that, Mr. Darrow.

DARROW: I see. Have you ever pondered what would naturally happen to the earth if it stood still suddenly?

BRYAN: No.

DARROW: Don't you know it would have been converted into a molten mass of matter?[7]

'An then I gets to thinkin' how Bryan's insisted how the fundamentalist avoided Biblical “interpretation” like the Biblical Plague – jes like Antonin Scalia, our Supreme Court judicial fundamentalist, always harkens back to our founding fathers original intent…

---

[1] NPS

[2] Ken Ham

[3] "The Good Book tells us that theflood happened when Noah was in his 600th year (Genesis 7:11) and Ken Hamkeenly points out how Noah “…undoubtedly spent several years constructing theArk prior to this, so he would have been in his 500s."

[4] Genesis 6, He tells Noah, “Dude, bring 2 of everything…listen, every-thing”: “You are tobring into the ark two of all living creatures, male and female, to keep themalive with you. Two of every kind of bird, of every kind of animal and of everykind of creature that moves along the ground will come to you to be keptalive.” But then in the next chapter, Genesis7, He sorta changes his mind andsezs well, bring two of every uncleananimal, what the heck, bring seven 7 (Lucky 7), male and female clean animal: “Take with you seven of every kind of clean animal, amale and its mate, and two of every kind of unclean animal, a male and itsmate, and also seven of every kind of bird, male and female, to keep theirvarious kinds alive throughout the earth.”

[5] “God tells us he created all land animals the same day hecreated man about 6,000 years ago and what's more there were even dinosaurs onNoah's Ark because God told Noah to take pairs of every kind of land animal.You see, dinosaurs are no mystery at all if you accept the Bible's account ofcreation."

[6] The Civil War as a Theological Crisis, Mark A, Noll, p. 50,

[7] Darrow / Bryan exchange

Looks like our right-wing friends is gonna e-volve themselves right outta existence…

Chas. Darwin
(the early years)

In his 1859 publication of On The Origin of Species, Charlie Darwin concluded that his notion of natural selection provided a much more serene and magisterial approach to the origin of life within our natural world:

There is grandeur in this view of life, with its several powers, having been originally breathed into a few forms or into one; and that, whilst this planet has gone cycling on according to the fixed law of gravity, from so simple a beginning endless forms most beautiful and most wonderful have been, and are being, evolved.

The seriously cool part about Darwin’s (some say Satan-inspired) little idea is not merely his “grandeur view of life,” but rather that his (not entirely original – yup, it also evolved) “theory” is proven time and time, and time – and yes, time again to…to be…to be, oh, what’s that word? Oh, yeah, that’s right – it's true! Don’t believe me? Check-it-out, here’s a contemporary and real world, objective and even tangible example illustrating Darwin’s notion of natural selection in all its subtle glory.

Between March and April 2013, The Pew’s Religion & Public Life Project randomly polled over 1900 adults throughout the U.S., and asked a number of questions about religious beliefs, political affiliations, gender, race, and even if the respondents “believed” in evolution or rather, were they adherents of the notion of a divinely inspired creation.

God
(or Santa?)

(looks like God)

That is, did those polled believe that some invisible, all-knowing, all-powerful, deity who, by definition, existed before even time, energy, matter, gravity and all that other groovy stuff – and even though middle eastern Jews first wrote about him, somehow managed to look a lot like a seriously buffed Santa, or Ian McKellen (à la Gandalf, minus the gay of course); one day apparently felt that whole self-worship thing wasn’t cutting it, ‘n decided that what he really needed to make his godliness more better were a couple of minions to worship and admire him in all his splendor and greatness, an up ‘n decided to create life, the Universe and darn near everything (thanks Doug Adams) – especially including man and again, even though he had every opportunity to do it anywhere he wanted – Yellowstone or the Grand Canyon or anywhere nice would have been…nice, heck, the North Shore of Hawaii still makes for a splendid paradise (if'n he could just get rid of those annoying tourists), but apparently chose that freakin’ god forsaken land between the Tigris and Euphrates (been there, it seriously blows – big time) and, again, even though it’s in the middle of the middle east, decided to up ‘n create a European lookin’ dude ‘n dudette (I guess ‘cause Europe is much classier than…not Europe?). And then decided, well...you get the idea.

(definitely a white dude...)

So, did those polled believe than life was created, in its present form by God (no, not Gods)? Or in the alternative, did they essentially believe the Universe started some 13.5 billion years ago, the Galaxy 13 billion years ago, the Solar System 4.8 billion, the Earth some 4.5 billion years ago; did simple cells develop some 3.6 billion years ago, complex cells 2 billion years ago, multi-celled organisms 1 billion years ago, simple "animals" 600 million years, mammals 200 million, primates 60 million, hominids some 20 million years ago, and well, heck…‘Voila! Present day dudes ‘n dudettes!

Back to the whole point of this thing. Last spring the nice folks at Pew polled them folks, just like they did four years earlier. They then did what any good, reality-based thinkers do – they compared the results. Here's the deal:

In 2009, 64% of Democrats said humans evolved over time, while 4 years later, that number increased to over two-thirds or fully 67% of Democrats saying folks done e-volved over time. With just about every bit of polling data showing that Democrats continue to outnumber their Republican opponents, and especially when considering the increase in the U.S. population, it’s easy to see how the left is surviving – nay, even flourishing.

It's not just natural, natural selection!

Prof. Megginson

But who said, “It is not the strongest of the species that survives, nor the most intelligent that survives. It is the one that is most adaptable to change”? No, while most folks like to give him credit, it certainly wasn’t Chuck Darwin (it’s actually a paraphrase from a Professor Leon C. Megginson, a marketing professor at LSU who wrote something pretty close to it back in ‘63)?

Point being is that them infernal lefties is clearly adaptable to change. Heck, pretty sure that’s the bedrock foundation of their “Liberal” ideology – that whole inclusive, “changey” thing (a demonic euphemism for evolution, to be sure).

Wha-What’s that? What about them other guys? See, in that same study, 54% of Republicans said they believed folks evolved over time and now, nearly 4 years later with our Tea Baggin’ friends seizing control of Lincoln’s GOP, the number of Republicans stating that humans have evolved, dropped to 43%. Corresponding with this fairly substantial decline is the Gallup party affiliation tracking poll  which shows that as recently as September 2004, fully 39% of registered voters identified themselves as Republicans. By October 2008, the number of folks claiming GOP loyalty had dropped to 33%, by May 2010, to 30%, and by the end of 2012, the number had plummeted to 24%.

Ergo (one ‘o them fancy-schmancy words meaning, therefore), the political party most adaptable to change is the one that will clearly survive. With the number of registered Republicans dropping faster than a hooker’s panties at a political convention (or hooker’s at the C-Street House or dropping faster’n David Vitter’s diapers, take yer pick), looks like our right-wing friends is gonna e-volve themselves right outta existence…

Links:
Darwin's On The Origin of Species (.pdf format)
Publics views on human evolution

Gallup poll party affiliation

The Darwin Project, Six things Darwin never said

The first life on Earth

Human evolution research (Smithsonian Institution)