The bird of paradise alights only on the hand that does not grasp. - John Berry

I was shocked recently to discover that the Ten Commandments made popular by Charlton Heston and Alabama Supreme Court Justice Roy Moore - those iconic stone tablets upon which God, Himself lay down the Law - are NOT the Biblical Ten Commandments!!!

Remember the movie? Remember the part in the movie when Charlton Heston comes down from the mountain with those stone tablets, only to find that the Israelites have erected a Golden Calf to worship? "Thou shalt not kill." "Thou shalt not steal." Those Commandments are from Exodus 20, and they're the ones we all remember. They're the Ten Commandments you can buy on plastic replica slabs at your local Christian souvenir shop.

Unfortunately, they were also the Commandments that Moses shattered in his rage. In Exodus 34:1, after calming down, Moses tells the Israelites that he's going back up the mountain to get God to carve out another set of Commandments with "the words that were on the first." This is where things get bizarre.

When Moses comes down from the mountain with the second, FINAL set of commandments, they're nothing like the first! This new set compells the reader to perform arcane harvest rituals ("the feast of unleavened bread shalt thou keep in the month when the ear is on the corn") and keep food preparation areas neat and tidy ("the fat of my feast shall not remain all night until the morning"). Oh, and coincidentally, there happens to be a new commandment forbidding "molten gods." Not TOO obvious, there, are we Moses?!

So what's the point of all this? The point is that the Ten Commandments as everybody knows them AREN'T EVEN THE REAL TEN COMMANDMENTS!!! What this says about how plastic reality is, and just how easy it is to manipulate this plastic reality, at least as it manifests in modernity's vast collective hive-mind... (shudder)

Anyhoo, this incredible, myth-shattering revelation got me thinking... with all those different tablets flying around, there must have been a whole whack of rejected suggestions left on the Commandment slushpile! As an added challenge, I've included two commandments from God's actual, final draft of that document. See if you can spot them!

TOP 13 REJECTED COMMANDMENTS!

13. Thou shalt not get yo freak on in church.
12. Honour thy mother and father. Brothers and sisters are fair game.
11. Once yearly, upon the vernal equinox, thou shalt shave thy genitals with a sharpened clamshell.
10. Never shalt thou tip thy waitress with pennies nor coupons.
9. All the first-born are the sole, exclusive property of the Lord thy God.
8. Thou shalt not suck the faeces out of a dead monkey's asshole.
7. You're so vain, you probably think this commandment is about you.
6. Thou shalt neither drink of the bongwater, nor shalt thou piss in the bong.
5. Thou shalt not disembowel thy hostage without adequate justification, for that is an abomination.
4. Thou shalt not cook a goat in its mother's milk.
3. Thou shalt not be a 'playa hayta.'
2. Upon thy death, thou shalt not become a zombie nor a vampire.
1. Thou shalt not be such a goddamn asshole all the time.

(answer: 9 and 4!)

The Truth Section

"I hate to see the American flag hanging out of every bloody station wagon, out of every SUV, every little Midwestern house in some residential area. It's easy to confuse patriotism with nationalism. Flag waving ain't gonna do it."
- Jethro Tull frontman Ian Anderson probably lost what few redneck fans his band had left when he spoke the above words during an interview with the Asbury Park Press.

"As organizers allowed the parade to roll on - including veterans from various wars, several high school marching bands and even a group of young women from the local Hooters restaurant - the anti-war veterans were ordered onto sidewalks." - Tallahassee's Veteran's Day shame.

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