the Dalaverse

I am in the mood for sharing quotes, so I shall. One of my favorite collections, from Lamb: The Gospel According to Biff, Christ's Childhood Pal by Christopher Moore, which is one of my favorite books of all time and one I really must reread soon. I don't think any of these can count as spoilers, because, well, we all know how the story ends. I guess I'm spoiling jokes, but there are plenty more where these came from, and some of them are funnier in context.





"We lived here, then we lived in Egypt, now we live here again," Joshua said. "It was a long way."
"You lie, it takes forty years to get to Egypt."
"Not anymore, it's closer now."

The angel has confided in me that he is going to ask the Lord if he can become Spider-Man. He watches the television constantly, and he has become obsessed with the story of the hero who fights demons from the rooftops. The angel says that evil looms larger now than it did in my time, and that calls for greater heroes. The children need heroes, he says. I think he just wants to swing from buildings it tight red jammies.



Don't let anyone tell you that the Prince of Peace never struck anyone. In those early days, before he had become who he would be, Joshua smote me in the nose more than once.



Miracles. She kissed me. Holy Moses on a matzo! She kissed me.

"A nest of vipers," Joshua shouted. The wheat was so tall I couldn't see where he was calling from.
"A pox on your family," I replied.
"No, there's a nest of vipers over here. Really."
"Oh, I thought you were taunting me. Sorry, a pox off of your family."



Joshua taught us that we should not hate -- a lesson that I was never able to master, along with geometry. Blame Jakan for the former, Euclid for the latter.



"I was thinking about becoming the village idiot, if my father will allow it."
"He has a God-given talent," Joshua said.
"I've been talking to Bartholomew the idiot," I said. "He's going to teach me to fling my own dung and run headlong into walls."



"Being a shepherd seems easy. I went with Kaliel last week to tend his flock. The Law says that two must go with the flock to keep an abomination from happening. I can spot an abomination from fifty paces."
Maggie smiled. "And did you prevent any abominations?"
"Oh yes, I kept all of the abominations at bay while Kaliel played with his favorite sheep behind the bushes."
"Biff," said Joshua gravely, "that was the abomination you were supossed to prevent."



I began improvising what I thought was a good funeral song.
"La-la-la. Oh, we are really, really sad that your mom is dead. Too bad you're a Sadducee and don't believe in an afterlife and your mom is just going to be worm food, la-la. Makes you think that you might want to reconsider, huh? Fa-la-la-la-la-la-wacka-wacka." (It sounded great in Aramaic. Really.)



The sin of Onan. Spilling the old seed on the ground. Cuffing the camle. Dusting the donkey. Flogging the Pharisee. Onanism, a sin that requires hundreds of hours of practice to get right, or at least that's what I told myself. God slew Onan for spilling his seed on the ground (Onan's seed, not God's. God's seedturned out to be my best pal. Imagine the trouble you'd be in if you actually spilled God's seed. Try explaining that). According to the Law, if you had any contact with "nocturnal emissions" (which are not what come out of your tailpipe at night -- we didn't have cars then), you had to purify yourself by baptism and you weren't allowed to be around people until the next day. Around the age of thirteen I spent a lot of time in and out of our mikveh, but I fudged on the solitary part of penance. I mean, it's not t like that was going to help the problem.



And so I let loose with one of my famous dirges. "La-la-la. Hey Roman guy, too bad about your getting stabbed. La-la-la. It's probably not a message from God or nothing. La-la-la. Telling you that maybe you should have gone home, la, la, la. Instead of oppressing the chosen people who God hisownself has said that he likes better than you. Fa, la, la, la."
The soldier didn't speak Aramaic, so the lyrics didn't move him as I had hoped. But I think the hypnotic toe-tappiness of the melody was starting to get him. I plunged into my second verse.
"La-la-la, didn't we tell you that shouldn't eat pork, la-la. Although looking at wounds in your chest, a dietary change might not have made that big a difference. Boom shaka-laka-laka-laka, boom shaka-laka-lak. Come on, you know the words!"



And the angel said, "What prophet has this written? For in this book is foretold all the events which shall come to pass in the next week in the land of Days of Our Lives and All My Children."



"Uh..." I wanted to say something about a really sexy mother, but that didn't seem like the sort of thing he wanted to hear. "Uh, you have God."



"Oh, back to the nice strategy. Did Moses--"
"Moses should have said, 'Let me people go, please.'"
"That would have made the difference?"
"It could have worked. You don't know."



"You must repent and atone, atone and repent! Your sins have made you unclean. I cleanse you of the evil that you carry like your wallet."



"You know, Biff wasn't announced by an angel, but locusts ate our garden and Alphaeus had gas for a month around the time he would have been conceived. I think it might have been a sign. That certainly didn't happen with my other boys."
Ah, Mother. Did I mention that she was besought with a demon?



Here Abraham received the word of God that his people would be the Chosen, here were the Hebrews delivered out of Egypt, here Solomon built the first Temple, here walked the prophets and the kings of the Hebrews, and here resided the Ark of the Covenant. Jerusalem. Here did I, the Christ, and John the Baptist come to find out the will of God and, if we were lucky, spot some really delicious girls. (What, you thought it was all religion and philosophy?)



"Don't you try your Son of God mumbo jumbo on me, you're still a wuss."
"If it be so, so be it. So shall it be written."
Well, it is now, Josh. It's written now. (It's strange, the word "wuss" is the same in my ancient Aramaic tongue as it is in this language. Like the word waited for me these two thousand years so I could write it down here. Strange.)



If I do manage to escape the angel, I'm not going to be able to make my living as a professional mourner, not if you people don't have the courtesy to die. Just as well, I suppose, I'd have to learn all new dirges. I've tried to get the angel to watch MTV so I can learn the vocabulary of your music, but even with the gift of tongues, I'm having trouble learning to speak hip-hop. Why is it that one can busta rhyme or busta move anywhere but you must busta cap in someone's ass? Is "ho" always feminine, and "muthafucka" always masculine, while "bitch" can be either? How many peeps in a posse, how much booty before baby got back, do you have to be all that to get all up in that, and do I need to be dope and phat to be da bomb or can I just be "stupid"? I'll not be singing over any dead mothers until I undersand.



Back out at the front of the inn I shopped for my teaching assistant. It was an eight-harlot inn, if that's how you measure an inn. (I understand that now they measure inns in stars. We are in a four-star inn right now. I don't know what the conversion from harlots to stars is.)



So you know:
Balthasar's concubines were eight in number and their names were:

Tiny Feet of the Divine Dance of Joyous Orgasm
Beautiful Gate of Heavenly Moisture Number Six,
Temptress of the Golden Light of the Harvest Moon,
Delicate Personage of Two Fu Dogs Wrestling Under a Blanket,
Feminine Keeper of the Three Tunnels of Excessive Friendliness,
Silken Pillows of the Heavenly Softness of Clouds,
Pea Pods in Duck Sauce with Crispy Noodle,
and Sue.



"I could kick that punk's punk ass," the angel said, jumping on the bed, shaking a fist at the television screen.
"Raziel," I said, "you are an angel of the Lord, he is a professional wrestler, I think it's understood that you could kick his punk ass."



"You're stupid and you're blue and the next time I poison you I will be sure to use something without an antidote."



"I'll bet he was myrrh," said Josh. "Bastard, he brings the cheapest gift and now he wants to sodomize me. My mother told me the myrrh went bad after a week too."
Did I mention that Joshua was not a myrrh fan?



Joshua turned around and put his hand on the demon's head. "This evil creature once beheld the face of God. This monster once served in heaven, obtained beauty, lived in grace, walked in light. Now he is the instrument of suffering. He is hideous of aspect and twisted in nature."
"Hey, watch it," said the demon.
"What I was going to say is that you can't blame him for what he is. He has never had what you or any other human has had. He has never had free will."
"That is so sad," said the demon.



I thought of how Joy had taught me to read and speak Chinese, to mix potions and poisons, to cheat at gambling, to perform slight of hand, and where and how to properly touch a woman. All of it without expecting anything in return. "Are all women stronger and better than me?"
"Yes," he said.
It was another day before we spoke again.



A month later, when we had returned to the same gate and we were standing in line to get through, Joshua asked: "So what do you think of the wall now? I mean, now that we've seen so much more of it?"
"I think it's ostentatious and unpleasant," I said.
"If they don't have a name for it, you should suggest that."
And so it came to pass that through the ages the wall was known as the Ostentatious and Unpleasant Wall of China. At least I hope that's what happened. It's not on my Friendly Flyer Miles map, so I can't be sure.



"We are here to see Gaspar," I said. "Balthasar sent us."
"Gaspar sees no one. Your aspect is dim and your eyes are too round." He slammed the little hatch.

"Go away. Your feet are misshapen and your eyebrows grow together in a threatening way."

"You are so stupid that the village idiots' guild uses you as a standard for testing," said the monk.
"Actually, I'm a member of the village idiots' guild," I retorted.
"In that case," said the monk, "go away."



"Go away. Your nature is dense and your breath smells like a yak's ass."



"Go away. Your nostrils flare in an unpleasant manner and your soul is somewhat lumpy."



Parables were never my strong suit. If you want to say something, say it. So, of course, Joshua and the Buddhists were the perfect people to hang out with, straight talkers that they were.



He called this discipline kung fu, which translates, "method by which short bald guys may kick the bejeezus out of you."



"He's not hitting you to punish you, he's hitting you to keep you in the moment."
"Well, I'm in the moment now, and at the moment I'd like to beat the crap out of him."
"You don't mean that."
"Oh, what? I'm supposed to want to be the crap I beat out of him?"
"Yes, Biff," Joshua said somberly. "You must be the crap."



"It's a yeti," said Gaspar from behind me, obviously having been roused from his trance. "An abominable snowman."
"This is what happens when you fuck a sheep?!" I exclaimed
"Not an abomination," Josh said, "abominable."



"When will we leave, master?" I asked.
"When it is time," said Gaspar.
"And how will we know it is time to leave?"
"When the time for staying has come to an end."
"And we will know this because you will finally give us a straight and concrete answer instead of being obtuse and spooky?" I asked.
"Does the unhatched tadpole know the universe of the full-grown frog?"
"Evidently not," Joshua said.
"Correct," said the master. "Meditate upon it."
As Joshua and I entered the temple to begin our meditation I said, "When the time comes, and we know that the time has come for us to leave, I am going to lump up his shiny little head with a fighting staff."
"Meditate upon it," said Josh.
"I mean it. He's going to be sorry he taught me how to fight," I said.
"I'm sure of it. I'm sorry already."
"You know, he doesn't have to be the only one bopped in the noggin when noggin-boppin' time rolls around," I said.



"If you come to a river and find a boat at the edge, you will use that boat to cross and it will serve you well, but once across the river, do you put the boat on your shoulders and carry it with you the rest of your journey?"
"How big is the boat?" I asked.
"What color is the boat?" asked Joshua.
"How far is the rest of the journey?" I queried.
"Is Biff there to carry the oars, or do I have to carry everything?" asked Josh.
"No!" screamed Gaspar. "No, you don't take the boat along on your journey. It has been useful but now it's simply a burden. It's a parable, you cretins!"



"We know from karma," I said. "We're Buddhist monks."
"Heretics!" Rumi hissed.
"Bite me, you bug-eyed scrawny brown guy," I said.
"You are a scrawny brown guy!"
"No, you're a scrawny brown guy!"
"No, you are a scrawny brown guy!"
"We are all scrawny brown guys," Joshua said, making peace.
"Yeah, but he's bug-eyed."
"And you are a heretic."
"You're a heretic!"
"No, you are a heretic."
"We're all scrawny brown heretics," said Joshua, calming things down again.
"Well, of course I'm scrawny," I said. "Six years of cold rice and tea, and not a scrap of beef for sale in the whole country."
"You would eat beef? You heretic!" shouted Rumi.
"Enough!" shouted Joshua.
"No one may eat a cow. Cows are the reincarnation of souls on their way to the next life."
"Holy cow," Josh said.
"That is what I am saying."



The statue of Kali over her altar was carved from black stone and stood as tall as ten men. She wore a necklace of human skulls around her neck and a girdle made of severed human hands at her hips. Her open maw was lined with a saw blade of teeth over which a stream of fresh blood had been poured. Even her toenails curved into vicious blades which dug into the pile of twisted, graven corpses on which she stood. She had four arms, one hold a cruel, serpentine sword, another a severed head by the hair; the third hand she held crooked, as if beckoning her victims to the place of dark destruction to which all are destined, and the fourth was posed downward, in a manner presenting the goddess's hand-girded hips, as if asking the eternal question, "Does this outfit make me look fat?"



"Poke him."
"No, he's a my teacher, a holy man. I'm not poking him."
"He's Untouchable."
Joshua couldn't resist the irony, he poked him. Instantly the yogi opened his eyes, pointed out to sea and screamed, "Look, a seagull!"
We looked. When we looked back the yogi was holding a full bowl of rice. "Here, go cook this."



He was gloriously drunk. "Know what?" Josh said. "I love bunnies. They toil not, neither do they bark. Henceforth and from now on, I decree that whenever something bad happens to me, there shall be bunnies around. So shall it be written. Go ahead Biff, write it down." He waved to me under the bunny, then turned and started back through the gate. "Where's the friggin' wine? I got a dry bunny over here."



The angel and I watched Star Wars for the second time on television last night, and I just had to ask. "You've been in God's presence, right, Raziel?"
"Of course."
"Do you think he sounds like James Earl Jones?"
"Who's that?"
"Darth Vader."
Raziel listened for a moment while Darth Vader threatened someone. "Sure, a little. He doesn't breathe that heavy though."



"Josh, faking demonic possession is like a mustard seed."
"How is it like a mustard seed?"
"You don't know, do you? Doesn't seem at all like a mustard seed, does it? Now you see how we all feel when you liken things unto a mustard seed? Huh?"



"John's followers will be like babes in the wilderness."
"Thirsty?" guessed Nathaniel.
"Hungry?" guessed Peter.
"Horny?" guessed Thomas.
"No, you dumbfucks, lost. They'll be lost!" I said. "Jeez."



"'Verily I say unto you' -- I know you like to say 'verily' when you're talking about adultery -- anyway, 'Verily I say unto you, that should a man put oil upon a woman's naked body, and make her go upon all fours and bark like a dog, while knowing her, if you know what I mean, then he has committed adultery, and surely if a woman do the same thing right back, well she has jumped on the adultery donkey cart herownself. And if a woman should pretend to be a powerful queen, and a man a lowly slave boy, and if she should call him humiliating names and make him lick upon her body, then surely they have sinned like big dogs -- and woe unto the man if he pretends to be a powerful queen, and --"
"That's enough, Biff."
"But you want to be specific, don't you. You don't want people to walk around wondering, 'Hey, is this adultery, or what? Maybe you should roll over.'"



"We've got: Blessed are those who hunger and thirst after righteousness; blessed are the poor in spirit, the pure in heart, the whiners, the meek, the --"
"Wait, what are we giving the meek?"
"Let's see, uh, here: Blessed are the meek, for to them we shall say, 'attaboy.'"
"A little weak."
"Yeah."
"Let's let the meek inherit the earth."
"Can't -- you gave the earth to the whiners?"
"Well then, cut the whiners and give the earth to the meek."
"Okay. Earth to the meek. Here we go. Blessed are the peacemakers, the mourners, and that's it."
"How many is that?"
"Seven."
"Not enough. We need one more. How about the dumbfucks?"
"No, Josh, not the dumbfucks. You've done enough for the dumbfucks. Nathaniel, Thomas --"
"Blessed are the dumbfucks for they, uh -- I don't know -- they shall never be disappointed."
"No, I'm drawing the line at dumbfucks. Come on, Josh, why can't we have any powerful guys on our team? Why do we have to have the meek, and the poor, the oppressed, and the pissed on? Why can't we, for once, have blessed are the big powerful rich guys with swords?"
"Because they don't need us."
"Okay, but no 'Blessed are the dumbfucks.'"
"Who then?"
"Sluts?"
"No."
"How about wankers? I can think of five or six disclipes that would be really blessed."
"No wankers. I've got it: Blessed are those who are persecuted for righteousness' sake."
"Okay, better. What are you going to give them?"
"A fruit basket."
"You can't give the meek the whole earth and these guys a fruit basket."
"Give them the kingdom of heaven."
"The poor in spirit got that."
"Everybody gets some."
"Okay then, 'share the Kingdom of Heaven.'" I wrote it down.
"We could give the fruit basket to the dumbfucks."
"NO DUMBFUCKS!"
"Sorry, I just feel for them."
"You feel for everyone, Josh. It's your job."
"Oh yeah. I forgot."



"It sucks."
"People are mean."
"Lepers are creepy."



Meanwhile the chief priest droned on: "A man dies and leaves no sons, but his wife marries his brother, who has three sons by his first wife...[and on] The three of them leave Jericho and head south, going three point three furlongs per hour, but they are leading two donkeys, which can carry two...[and on] So the Sabbath ends, and they are able to resume, adding on the thousand steps allowed under the law...and the wind is blowing southwest at two furlongs per hour...[and on] How much water will be required for the journey? Give your answer in firkins."
"Five," Joshua said, as soon as they stopped speaking. And all were amazed.
The crowd roared. A woman shouted, "Surely he is the Messiah."
"The son of God has come," said another.
"You guys aren't helping," I shouted back at them.
"You didn't show your work, you didn't show your work," chanted the youngest of the priests.



(all credit to Christopher Moore)