Bibliofreakblog

This Week’s Stranger

The Stranger seems to be getting it’s religiosity on this week, and at least half of that is thanks to me.  ME!!!!

But first, the reason why I went with the the big size of this week’s cover is because if you were to print it out, you could connect the dots to make Muhammad.  

Terrorists!  Consider yourselves subverted!

But the other reason is because of my interview with Dr. Elaine Pagels in the books section.  The longer version is online, and the shorter version is in print.  

Here’s just a snippet of the interview, wherein I asked Dr. Pagels about what the Gnostic Gospels add to the story of Jesus, and she said:

You know it’s very hard to know what actually goes back to Jesus. The Gospel of Mary, the Gospel of Thomas, [and] the Gospel of Philip, make it really clear that Peter and Mary Magdalene were seen as rivals for leadership in the church. That’s something you’d never get out of the Gospels [in the New Testament], because they basically depict Mary Magdalene, as Luke would say, as “one of the women.” She’s not in any way seen as a disciple, but in these other texts she is. And interestingly, all of the Gospels that really like Peter (like the Gospels of Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John) treat Mary as a very peripheral figure, demon-possessed woman, one of the women, just kind of a throwaway figure, not important. These other texts like the Gospel of Mary Magdalene picture her as a major disciple. And in the texts that picture her as important, Peter usually comes off quite badly. So you realize that there are these rivalries and challenges in the early movement.

O.K., so that was a bit more than a snippet.  

But guess what else?  I also wrote the Party Crasher article!  I went to a party where a bunch of folks from the mayor’s office were hanging out.  Here’s a bit from the article:

Let this be a lesson for you, kids: You might grow up, keep your ideals, work for a liberal mayor, and finally be able to afford booze again, but when it comes to your picture being in Party Crasher, you will morph from a cool young liberal into a stuffy curmudgeon.

A little background for those outside of Seattle:  The Jobless Skool Kids were a bunch of college grads who worked 40+ hours/week last year for free for now Mayor Mike McGinn during his campaign.  Shortly after he was elected last November, they were hired to his staff.  Also, our D.A. has said that he won’t waste time prosecuting people on marijuana charges.  Also, I don’t even like dogs.  At all.