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Wednesday, August 10, 2022

TMNT S04E33 rips its plot from Nightmares (1983): The Bishop of Battle.

 Leonardo gets addicted to an arcade game called "Tempestra," and breaks into the arcade at night, just as Emilio Estevez does in "The Bishop of Battle" in 1983's anthology Nightmares. Both game's antagonists, Tempestra and the Bishop, share visual and vocal similarities. In both shows, the protagonist reaches the final level, and the game character comes to life, chasing him around the arcade, and chaos ensues. 

It's a bit surprising that no one has noticed this before. Writers for the Ninja Turtles must have been fans of cheesy 80's horror anthologies. 

Sunday, May 2, 2021

Parallelomania and Schizophrenic thinking

Does our academic discipline drive us to see patterns that aren't really there?

Sunday, April 18, 2021

Does anybody really believe any of this?

 We're just making stuff up as we go along, right, just to keep the sluggish academy to pretend to get fit for the cameras like Bill Clinton jogging into McDonald's for a BigMac. 

Isn't this "institutional wink" stuff really petty?
Maybe we are trying to make ourselves feel better about ourselves because we know that we don't have anything important to offer to society that the most insurmountable obstacles we face are in in fact in our heads. 


Saturday, July 4, 2020

Wednesday, September 4, 2019

El means Power.

In the apocryphal Gospel of Peter, Jesus's words from the cross are strangely, "my power, my power, why have you abandoned me?" This phrasing, instead of "my God, my God," has puzzled commentators and lead some to speculate on the mystic or Gnostic nature of the exclamation.
Justin Martyr refers to El meaning Power.
Epiphanius accepts that El means "power" in discussing a heretical Judaic sect called the Ossaeans (Panarion 2.19.2.1)
The Ossaeans also had a doctrine of Christ as a giant (Panarion 2.19.4.1).

Also the Gospel of Peter presents the crucified Jesus as feeling no pain, which led it to be condemned. The Odes of Solomon also attest to a tradition that Jesus felt no pain on the cross. They also attest to the tradition that Mary felt no pain in labor. Epiphanius also agrees with this in responding to the Ebionite sect that considered Jesus a mere man (Panarion 2.30.19.4).

August 11 2021: Note in Acts, Simon Magus is hailed as "the great power of God," or perhaps, "the Great Power, being God." Possibly "the Great Power" here was the word El--perhaps reflecting colloquial usage? I really don't know. Justin Martyr came from Samaria. Maybe that connection means something; maybe it means nothing. 

Early Influence of Acts on Heretical Baptism Narrative?

But the beginning of their Gospel is, “It came to pass in the days
of Herod, king of Judaea, < in the high-priesthood of Caiaphas >, that
< a certain > man, John < by name >, came baptizing with the baptism
of repentance in the river Jordan, and he was said to be of the lineage of
Aaron the priest, the son of Zacharias and Elizabeth, and all went out unto

him.”26And after saying a good deal it adds, “When the people had
been baptized Jesus came also and was baptized of John. And as he came
up out of the water the heavens were opened, and he saw the Holy Spirit
in the form of a dove which descended and entered into him. And (there
came) a voice from heaven saying, Thou art my beloved Son, in thee I am
well pleased,27 and again, This day have I begotten thee.28 And straightway
a great light shone round about the place.29 Seeing this,” it says, “John said
unto him, Who art thou, Lord?30 And again (there came) a voice to him
from heaven, This is my beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased.31 (8)
And then,” it says, “John fell down before him and said, I pray thee, Lord,
do thou baptize me. But he forbade him saying, Let it alone, for thus it is
meet that all be fulfi lled.”32


Epiphanius, Panarion 19.13.6-7, Frank Williams 142.


depending on when this was written, it could be early attestation for Acts!
Also, why is John experiencing what Paul does in Acts? Is John a good guy or a bad guy?

New thought, Aug. 11th 2021: The Clementine Homilies, in a few sections, portray Paul negatively through the guise of Simon Magus. The Homilies also claims that Simon was originally a student of John the Baptist, albeit a hubristic student. If both this heterodox gospel and these sections of the Clementine Homilies originally came from an Ebionite source, then it could help explain this strange insertion of words from Acts 9 into Christ's baptism narrative. Perhaps John the Baptist is also a negative cipher for Paul? Or perhaps this source wants to connect John, Paul, and Simon as anti-Christ figures? 

Perhaps this baptism narrative is a "put-down" of John? Perhaps it reflects the Homilies' syzygus theory where error precedes truth--here John would represent error and Christ truth, of course. 
If there is a connection between the Gospel of the Hebrews and the Clementine Homilies, then we have here a bit of reconstruction of the historical thinking of a particular lost Christian community.

Wednesday, June 6, 2018

Goodbye to Booze.

Goodbye booze!
You ruined my life by making me fat, slow, and stupid.
Except you're not you; you're me. You're the shadow on the wall when the moon shines through the window in the witching hour saying I'm not allowed to dream without you. You took two years from me and destroyed relationships and hopes. Then you had me all alone. Well today I worked and saw new friends and now I have band practice. You might be fate, but I don't believe in fate. Chocolate milk is better.