<< (Ian 4/4) Ralph I finally found my Prometheus Book catalog
and I don't see "Mistakes of Moses" listed. All I can do at this
point is to wait and see what happens. I'll keep you informed. >>
DAR
They have several of his works but they don't seem to have
Mistakes of Moses listed on this page. Check out page twenty
eight of the
winter '97 catalog (note: anyone can order a free copy of the
Prometheus catalog by calling 1-800-421-0351). They offer the
book "On the Gods, And Other Essays", which I have, and is
great (On the Gods is a great essay) but it does not have
Mistakes of Moses. The back of this book does contain an ad for
the book "Mistakes of Moses" from Prometheus but perhaps
they are not selling it anymore. They also offer on this page "The
Best of Robert Ingersoll" which may or may not contain this
work.
No big deal, I have the work in digital form and can e-mail it
to you. Or you can download it yourself, free. The address used
to be:
http://freethought.tamu.edu/library/historical/robert_ingersoll/in
dex.html
But I think it has moved to somewhere on:
I really suggest you check out The Mistakes of Moses.
Ingersoll destroyed the Pentateuch (and the idea that Moses
wrote it) over a hundred years ago, so if you want to write a
humorous book on this subject, you really should read this.
Thomas Paine also deals with this in The Age of Reason, which
you have probably read (for those who have not read The Age of
Reason, it is an attack on the Bible from start to finish. Written
204 years ago, a must read).
cheers,
Darrel
----------------------------
"You will find by reading that second chapter that God tried to
palm off on Adam a beast as his helpmeet... God caused all the
animals to walk before Adam in order that he might name them.
And the animals came like a managerie into town, and as Adam
looked at all the crawlers, jumpers and creepers, this God stood
by to see what he would call them. After this procession passed,
it was pathetically remarked, "Yet was there not found any
helpmeet for Adam." Adam didn't see anything that he could
fancy. And I am glad he didn't. If he had, there would not have
been a free-thinker in this world; we should have all died
orthodox. And finding Adam was so particular, God had to make
him a helpmeet, and having used up the nothing he was
compelled to take part of the man to make the woman with, and
he took from the man a rib...And then imagine a God with a bone
in his hand, and about to start a woman, trying to make up his
mind whether to make a blonde or a brunette."
--Mistakes of Moses, (1879 ed.) J.B. McClure. pg. 103
More Mistakes of Moses:
"Now and then some one asks me why I am endeavoring to
interfere with the religious faith of others, and why I try to take
from the world the consolation naturally arising from a belief in
eternal fire. And I answer: I want to do what little I can to make
my country truly free. I want to broaden the intellectual horizon
of our people. I want it so that we can differ upon all those
questions, and yet grasp each other's hands in genuine
friendship. . . . I want it so that every minister will be not a
parrot, not an owl sitting upon a dead limb of the tree of
knowledge and hooting the hoots that have been hooted for
eighteen hundred years. But I want it so that each one can be an
investigator, a thinker; and I want to make his congregation
grand enough so that they will not only allow him to think, but
will demand that he shall think, and give to them the honest truth
of his thought.
...remember that our views depend largely upon the country in
which we happen to live. Suppose we were born in Turkey, most
of us would have been Mohammedans; and when we read in the
book that when Mohammed visited heaven he became
acquainted with an angel named Gabriel, who was so broad
between his eyes that it would take a smart camel three hundred
days to make the journey, we probably would have believed it. If
we did not, people would say: "That young man is dangerous; he
is trying to tear down the fabric of our religion. What do you
propose to give us instead of that angel? We cannot afford to
trade off an angel of that size for nothing." Or if we had been
born in India would have believed in a god with three heads.
Now we believe in three gods with one head."
--Ingersoll, Mistakes of Moses