Peter Heinegg - Abrahams Ashes. The Absurdity of Monotheism

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Abraham's Ashes

The Absurdity of Monotheism

Peter Heinegg

University Press of America, Inc.

Lanham Boulder New York Toronto Plymouth, UK

Copyright 2013 by University Press of America, Inc.

4501 Forbes Boulevard, Suite 200, Lanham, Maryland 20706

UPA Aquisitions Department (301) 459-3366

10 Thornbury Road, Plymouth PL6 7PP, United Kingdom

All rights reserved

Printed in the United States of America

British Library Cataloguing in Publication Information Available

Library of Congress Control Number: 2012941673

ISBN: 978-0-7618-5965-9 (paperback : alk. paper)ISBN: 978-0-7618-5966-6 (electronic)

Approximately 795 words from THE KORAN translated by N. J. Dawood (Penguin Classics 1956, Fifth revised edition 1990). Copyright N. J. Dawood, 1956, 1959, 1966, 1968, 1974, 1990, 1993, 1997, 1999, 2003, 2006.

The paper used in this publication meets the minimum requirements of American National Standard for Information Sciences Permanence of Paper for Printed Library Materials, ANSI/NISO Z39.48-1992.

In memory of my grandfather,
Franz Fabry (Feilchenfeld)
1888-1967

Contents

Prelude vii

Acknowledgments xi

Introduction: Crazy Abe

1	A Bad Beginning

2	The Son Who Was Sacrificed

3	Abraham, the First Muslim

Conclusion: Farewell to the Lunacy

Prelude

Blessed Are the Abrahamic Bootlickers (Not)

Fly round the world, from pole to pole,

and watch this awe-full scene unfold:

face down, hands out, butts in the air,

the pious masses bend in prayer

or humbly fawn with lowered tail

like wolves before the alpha male,

or bow their heads or bend their knees,

or beat their breasts, to urge their pleas

to Yahweh, Allah, Jesus, Lord,

the Grand, the Good, the All-Adored.

One long religious roundelay:

O parce nobis, Domine * ( * Lat. Spare us, o Lord)

or Kyrie, eleison, ( Grk. Lord, have mercy)

khoneyni adds some Jewish tone. ( Heb. Have mercy on me)

Of course, its wholly infantile,

but, non-believers, dont just smile.

We have to find some logic here,

some cui bono , love or fear,

to crack this huge latreutic case

why worshipers stare into space

prostrate themselves, crouch, kowtow, grovel.

Why heap up slavish praise, then shovel

it into Gods voracious maw?

The pious say, Why? Its the Law!

But that wont dotry these four schemes

(Well call them Adorations Memes):

First, Gods an Egomaniac,

a Junkieworship is his crack.

So bring it on! And, man, they do:

salaams, hosannahs, hallelu-

jahs, hymns, the holy-rolling stuff;

all His enablers pour out puff-

ery non-stop to feed his habit.

He just cant get enoughdagnabit!

Or, Second, maybe Gods sadistic

(that sounds a bit more realistic):

He loves to watch his creatures squirm

(not man the titan, man the worm).

Folks twist and writhe amid the dust:

its vaguely similar to lust:

a desperate, pathetic passion,

a belly-flop without the splashin).

And, best of all, he doesnt listen!

All those requests somehow go missin.

Hope springs eternal, Pope would say;

and if Godot cant come today,

perhaps well see his face demain .

You never know: peut-tre, hein ?

Sure, sure, you keep on hoping, friend:

hes just beyond the rainbows end,

the big rock-candy mount (and, oh,

that fountain now spouts Veuve Clicquot).

But wait, this line is far too sick.

Screw Schadenfreude why not pick

the Third Proposal: dont assault

His Majesty, its humans fault.

While pray-ers prate their yadda-yadda,

the truth is, way up there lies nada.

Gods not to blame, that isnt fair;

mirages, phantoms, mere hot air

bear no responsibility

for what deluded viewers see.

So this is self-delusion? Yup,

a bunch of loonies thought it up;

and other loonies form the chorus

(we try to reasonthey ignore us).

Well, leave them in their stagnant pool

of tears and fears and godly fool-

ishness: they seem to like it. Oy,

it sounds like masochistic joy.

Wait, that would be our Number Four:

believers need to pay much more

than lifes already hefty price.

Their sufferings add extra spice.

Lets see: their guilt, their wasted time,

their feeling that theyre sinful slime,

their silent God, their vain petitions

for help and love, their strong suspicions

that Hes not there, their holy terrors

(eternal hell for moral errors),

and on and on. Egad, why bother

with all this ditzy Lord! Lord! pother.

Must be, believers dig their pains

the deadly God-drugs fried their brains

All true, and yet believers claim,

We do feel something , all the same.

Theres something going on inside

our hearts and souls; its like a tide

(a wind?) of in-spir-ation!

No, actually its masturbation.

Its self-provoked neuronal jollies,

a praying-hands-job, theo-follies.

(Berninis St. Teresas wound,

so sweetly painful that she swooned).

Oh well, no need to start a fight

whatever gets you through the night,

I guess. But really, why not keep

your witsand tell that Lord to bleep

himself and all the fraud that taints

the playpen antics of the saints?

There has to be a better way;

you bet, and its called sapere

(wise up in Latin), use your head,

dont die upstairs before youre dead,

dont talk to spooks, dont wail and whine

to anything purportedly divine.

Your mind was meant for better things

than non-existent sky-throned kings.

Dont lose your self-respectjust look:

bootlickers mouths are filled with gook.

Peter Heinegg

Acknowledgments

Thanks to Penguin Books for permission to quote from The Koran , tr. N. J. Dawood. All Bible quotations, unless otherwise indicated, are from the King James Version. All other translations, unless otherwise indicated, are by the author.

Introduction

Crazy Abe

When a mans fancy gets astride on his reason, when imagination is at cuffs with the senses, and common understanding, as well as common sense, is kicked out of doors, the first proselyte he makes is himself; and when that is once compassed, the difficulty is not so great in bringing over others; a strong delusion always operating from without as vigorously as from within. For cant and vision are to the ear and the eye, the same that tickling is to the touch. Those entertainments and pleasures we most value in life, are such as dupe and play the wag with the senses. For, if we take an examination of what is generally understood by happiness, as it has respect either to the understanding or the senses, we shall find all its properties and adjuncts will herd under this short definition, that it is a perpetual possession of being well deceived.

Jonathan Swift, A Tale of a Tub , A Digression on Madness (1704)

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