when your players are wild but know how to make memorable stories
My favourite is the one with Moses coming down with the Big Book of Rules, direct from God. Then getting his pals to kill thousands of his followers for not following the Rules, which presumably they’ve never seen.
Levites: But doesn’t it say in the Rules…
Moses: KILL THEM ALL.
Exodus 32, verse 27
DM: You killed so many people with that donkey bone I think we can stop treating it as an improvised weapon. Here’s a proper statblock.
I’ll point out that the “Jesus and the fig tree” story is a parable. It’s made fun of a lot, but it’s a vicious lesson by someone who was very theatrical in their teaching style. The fig tree is Israel, who were expected by their god to always be in season and ready for their messiah. But when Jesus arrived, they were not in season, and so were cursed to never bear fruit again. It wasn’t an agricultural misunderstanding, it was a lesson and everything that surrounds it gives it context.
Jesus: curses random tree
Followers: Jesus, is there a problem? You can tell us directly.
Jesus: No, everything is fine *sulks*
Sure, but even as a parable it shows jesus expects something that is not possible, and punishes living things for being as he created them to be.
Not saying you’re wrong in a practical sense, but carrying practical sense into an allegorical story from a culture and time not your own is, if not folly, at least ill-advised.
One of the many things that christians seem to misunderstand is that almost none of the Bible is about them. It’s about the descendants of Israel who are the descendants of Noah who are the descendants of Adam and Eve, who were uniquely created by their god in its image and given a piece of its divine breath… none of which is about all humanity, but especially gentiles who are literally the same as wild animals as far as scripture is concerned.
Remember the story of the woman who begged Jesus and his disciples for help for days because her daughter was “possessed?” Not only did Jesus go out of his way to ignore and avoid her for days, he then compared her to a dog for not being Israelite. Only when she leaned into the insult did Jesus relent.
Israel was that specific fig tree and Israel was supposed to be special and had unique expectations placed on them since they were literally their god’s children, and other people were not.
I’m not disagreeing really. I’m building on your point.
Their god was a local god, which like all the people’s gods everywhere had a creation myth for their people. Of course the other people weren’t included. If they wanted a creation or a god, they could just come up with their own. Lazy cunts.
Dude, you completely left out Abraham. Which is wild given that Judaism, Christianity, and Islam are all referred to as Abrahamic faiths. While Abraham was descended from Adam and Eve, it is far more accurate to say Israelites trace their heritage back to Abraham. This is because it is Abraham that makes the first covenant pact with God.
Abraham gives birth to two sons. At first, Abraham’s wife is barren, so to have a kid they all agree Abraham knock up his servant. This gives birth to Ishmael. Fourteen years later, Abraham’s wiife finally manages to miraculously conceive, and Isaac is born. And there’s this whole deal where god puts Abraham to the test and tells Abraham he has to sacrifice Isaac to him. And both of them go along with it only for God to go, “Nevermind, guys, it was a test. But since you’ve pleased me by being so faithful, I’ll grant you a powerful line through Isaac (Israel),” and God then sends them a ram to sacrifice instead.
Isaac gives birth to two sons, Esau and Jacob, twins, but Esau was born first. Technically, God’s blessing is his by birthright. Isaac favors Esau, Isaac’s wife favors Jacob. Jacob gains the birthright twice over. Once because Esau returns to camp, hungry as hell one day and just casually trades his birthright to Jacob in return for some lentil stew. Second, when Isaac is pretty much on his death bed, and blind, Isaac’s wife and Jacob trick Isaac into blessing Jacob instead of Esau. Initially, Esau is pissed and Jacob flees. But he eventually comes back and reconciles with his brother and wrestles God (I’m not kidding.) Then his name gets changed from Jacob to Israel. Dude marries two wives, one of which is his sister, and gives birth to twelve sons, which become the twelve tribes of Israel. There’s also a daughter, but this is a patriarchal religion so women don’t matter. This is basically where the Jew as Jews start.
Now, rewinding back a bit, remember that Ishmael guy, born of the servant Abraham knocked up? Yeah, so he and the servant got sent away. But God also promises this servant and Ishmael that Ishmael too, will give birth to a great nation, and that he will have 12 sons himself that will become princes. And it is Islam, specifically, the prophet Muhammed, who traces their roots back to Ishmael. That’s how fucking old the whole Jew/Muslim conflict is.
And then there’s Christianity, which is when some Jew named Jesus was born the son of Virgin Mary and went on to preach love and kindness and got himself sacrificed in a story which really illustrates, once you remove the falsehoods of heaven, hell, and God, that humanity is so crooked they’ll basically kill a man for being too good while praising and pardoning a criminal (Barabbas. He and Christ both get the chance to be pardoned by the people, but they can only choose one. Barabbas is chosen, and Christ gets crucified.) But also yes, as you said, Jesus totally favored the Jews, and did the whole thing with comparing the woman to a dog versus the childeren he was meant to lead (Israelites.)
Makes sense, especially when you consider that John the Baptist was an Apocalyptic Jew who played a foundational role in The Christ’s contemporary education.
Asked one of those “Bible is all literal truth” guys one day, “How did Jesus teach?”
“?”
“He taught in parables, right? Stories that aren’t true, meant to illustrate a point.”
“Ok.”
“Is it possible other Bible stories are parables?”
“?”
The parts about feeding poor people are parables. Those stories are metaphors for spiritual poverty. What Jesus fed the hungry was the bread of life, ie, the Gospel. Jesus doesn’t want you to actually feed people, he wants you to preach to them.
Everything else is literal, especially the parts where God created the Earth in its current form in six 24-hour days and decreed there were only two immutable biological genders.
(The prosperity gospel is a hell of a drug. It’s no wonder Trump follows it.)
Almost everything in there is a parable. It’s a cultural thing, because stories were only worth preserving as a lesson. The concept of preserving objective reality for its own sake is a very modern and recent ideology. It would have been seen as madness by ancient peoples.
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Also, in the Apocrypha, childhood Jesus turned a kid he didn’t like into a tree. Quite possibly… a fig tree.
Jesus was a little asshole. It’s pretty funny those works survived.
DM: Not that one, Job: I have a special d20 just for you!
Looks like a d10 to me o lord.
d1
There is a convenience store I stop at which has a self help / religious book rack. On it, there is a copy of “The Action Bible”, and, given it’s cover, I assume this is the DMG for OPs campaign.
There’s also a Manga Bible, which is a pretty rad artistic interpretation as well. :D
I mean, I feel like making Jesus a samurai is as authentic to history as making him a blond white dude.
Also, wandering the countryside, helping out the peasants and tweaking the nose of the establishment, gathering a crew of like-minded friends/followers, and culminating in an act of self-sacrifice which results in the protagonist’s willing death? I can easily see how someone could imagine, “what if Jesus, but ronin?”.
Shit. Im gonna end up buying one or both of these at some point…
I love how there’s a random cute girl in the top left, no idea who the hell she’s supposed to be, but 👍🏻.
Probably Mary Magnalin. That is pretty funny though
Hmm it might be his mom Mary. She’s j got a virginal look.
One nitpick- Solomon using demonic assistance to build his Temple is extrabiblical lore. I believe that Solomon’s command over demons might be mentioned in the Talmud, but not in the Bible itself.
The story of Elisha and the boys deserves to be “nitpicked” as well. I haven’t checked for myself, but from what I understand most secular and non-secular scholars agree that the Hebrew term includes babies all the way to “boys” who are in their twenties. This makes better sense of how the term is used in other passages and of why Elisha would encounter 42 of them (which only counts those who were mauled) just hanging out in the countryside.
Here’s a biblical scholar talking about it. The bible specifies small boys, so definitely not in their 20s. Not that having bears eat adults for making fun of your bald head is any better.
He was being chased by a gang of young men, not just being made fun of by some random children.
Translation is a scholarly art, and English translations - and the masses understanding of them - are like the restoration of the Ecce Homo fresco.
While we’re at it, myrrh was a fragrant resin used in all sorts of applications, not just for embalming.
I guess I’ll keep it going. Moses means “to pull out from the water,” so he wouldn’t have been “Moses” while placing him in the basket.
Also, why would the daughter of the dude supposedly killing all of the slave babies be like, “I’m gonna name this baby using the slaves’ language.”
That’s an apologist’s take not a scholar’s take. Modern translations use “small boys”.
That was the one I didn’t get. What’s it about?
There is a tradition from numerous ancient and medieval sources that Solomon had command over demons because he was the wisest man who ever lived and knew their name and all the ways to control them. This developed into the idea that Solomon had such control over demons that he could force them to build a temple for God against their will, and this is how the First Temple was built. This belief was common in the middle ages but not ever officially sanctioned by the Church.
For more reading-
https://www.wikipedia.org/wiki/Seal_of_Solomon
It’s a pretty metal legend. Solomon was a boss.
There is also a legend that Solomon was once outwitted by Asmodeus, who flung Solomon deep into the desert and shapeshifted to pretend to be him and rule in his place. Solomon then had to find his way back and take back his kingdom from Asmodeus.
The ending of that Daniel story is definitely something.
At the king’s command, the men who had falsely accused Daniel were brought in and thrown into the lions’ den, along with their wives and children. And before they reached the floor of the den, the lions overpowered them and crushed all their bones.
That ending written by the Three Stooges writers
Lol funny, but also, they were money changers, not money lenders. Exchanging foreign currencies.
as a roman catholic, i had a good chuckle. hope to see more.
What is that summon demon one?
The Seal of Solomon. Solomon’s signet ring, given to him by God, is supposed to have granted him a bunch of supernatural abilities, one of which was the ability to command things like devils and jinns. I think the story is only part of specific mysticist beliefs within the Abrahamic religions and not in any of the main texts, hence the GM having to check their books for it
I think the story is only part of specific mysticist beliefs within the Abrahamic religions and not in any of the main texts
GM: Ask, and it shall be given unto you.
Solomon: I just wanna flip through that collection of splatbooks you’ve got back there.
Why, thank you! TIL
How is each an every one of them a hit. Great consistency, 10/10 post
The Daniel in the Lions’ Den one could have had Daniel rolling a nat 20 animal handling check right as the DM warns him it’s not a good idea, that would have been even better.
Okay now do Lot
LOT: Look I know we didn’t get the hint very quickly but I think sending angels to literally handhold us out of the city might be too much railroading for me.
GM: Alright, I’m sorry, I just… I spent all afternoon planning stuff in Zoara.
EDITH: Hey, I know they said not to look back, but I want to look back. They’ll never notice.
GM: You sure about that?
EDITH: Let me enjoy seeing Steve get divinely smote at least
GM: Alright, roll a Con save
EDITH: Con save? To look without the angels noticing?
GM: It’s not about the angels
I thank thee. Hopefully the GM’s not too salty about Edith wandering off the main storyline again
Nat 1
Can’t stop giggling. Thank you.
“um roll athletics” if that isn’t me for every single session I DM
