No boxed set is complete without some extras. So here are some alternate endings and deleted scenes!

Alternate Ending 1: Mormons

If you thought the original bible was crazy, you haven't seen anything yet because we've got bible plus! Now with aliens!

Joseph Smith wasn't the first modern prophet to claim an extra special relationship with The Wiz, but he was one of the best. Apparently Smith was contacted by one of The Wiz's minions and told to go dig up some golden tablets. So he does, although no one else sees these tablets, and he tells a buddy to take dictation while Smith deciphers this supposed magic Wiz language with some magic rocks in a hat.

Smith's dictation buddy takes home his notes and tells his wife about the whole thing. She immediately starts calling him a dumbass because the whole thing just reeks of bullshit. So she reads the notes and tells her husband to go back and tell Smith that he lost the notes and get him to retell the story. The dictation buddy does as his wife says and Smith calls him a girl brains and says, "Fuck it. I'll just do this other tablet." Smith sticks his head in the hat again and starts jibber-jabbering about how The Wiz is actually an alien and that Jesus and Lucifer are brothers. These alien god folks all have like 800 wives and they have planets all to themselves to just make babies all day every day.

So if Mormons wear special underwear and convince women that dudes should marry and start families with as many women as they want, they'll get a heaven planet with even more wives after Jesus comes and destroys this shithole.

South Park Tells About the Foundation of Mormonis…

Alternate Ending 2: The Adventist Movement

While the rest of the Christian world had given up the whole prophet thing, these folks and a few others kept the prophecy thing alive and kicking. As the ages pass and the world doesn't come to an end as previously predicted, the Adventist sects continue to just get weirder. Apparently blood transfusions will send you to hell and you have to go to church on Saturday instead of Sunday. They're also very much against the scientific theory of evolution. The Darwinian school seems to peeve them greatly as their Watchtower magazine is sure to tell you should you be handed that waste of paper.

It's just weird and too cultish for my taste. Poof! Now you're creeped out!

Deleted Scenes: Apocryphal Texts and Gnostic Gospels

There were a great many stories that were made for the bible that just didn't make the final cut. In the following section I'll tell you about three of my personal favorites.

The Gospel of Mary Magdalene

This is a rather incomplete text as many apocryphal texts are. There are two very interesting quotes from this text however that are worth mentioning.

The first is this: "I have left no commandment but what I have commanded you, and I have given you no law, as the lawgiver did, lest you be bound by it."

It's easy to understand why the editors didn't want this one included in the final cut. It might undermine their authority in making all kinds of laws in the name of The Wiz.

Secondly, in the last bit of this text Mary is asked by Peter to tell all the apostles whatever secret shit Jesus told her. So she tells the guys and Peter has a freaking fit, calling her a lying piece of trash. But then Levi puts Peter in his place by saying:

"Peter, you are always irate. Now I see that you are contending against the woman like the adversaries. But if the Savior made her worthy, who are you to reject her? Surely the Savior knew her very well. For this reason he loved her more than us. And we should rather be ashamed and put on the Perfect Man, to form us [?] as he commanded us, and proclaim the gospel, without publishing a further commandment or a further law than the one which the Savior spoke."

Apparently Levi wasn't cool with that misogynistic shit the other apostles were putting out there. Unfortunately for Christianity, the apostle Paul, formerly Saul, was not too female friendly and his version of the story makes up the largest portion of the new testament.

The Gospel of Thomas

This is a collection of supposed quotes from Jesus just given for the reader's thoughts. Some of my favorites include:

"Jesus said, "If those who lead you say, 'See, the Kingdom is in the sky,' then the birds of the sky will precede you. If they say to you, 'It is in the sea,' then the fish will precede you. Rather, the Kingdom is inside of you, and it is outside of you. When you come to know yourselves, then you will become known, and you will realize that it is you who are the sons of the living Father. But if you will not know yourselves, you dwell in poverty and it is you who are that poverty."

"Jesus said, "I have cast fire upon the world, and see, I am guarding it until it blazes.""

However, my absolute favorite is this little gem:

"The disciples said to Jesus, "We know that You will depart from us. Who is to be our leader?"

Jesus said to them, "Wherever you are, you are to go to James the righteous, for whose sake heaven and earth came into being."

That one kind of undermines Peter and Paul having a claim to be the leader of the church body.

The Gospel of Judas

They say that there are two sides to every story, however given human nature I'd say that's an overly conservative estimate of how many different versions of any story we'll find. Nevertheless, if all we have is one side of the story it's hard not to form a biased opinion.

In the common bibles of all Christian sects there is a consensus that Judas was a piece of shit traitor who sold Jesus out for some gold in a sack. But many people haven't heard Judas's side of the story. In this text Judas tells about how Jesus told him secret shit and how Judas was actually super special. Jesus tells Judas that he is supposed to sell Jesus out to those haters and that it's all part of The Wiz's grand plan.

My favorite lines from this choppy but interesting text are:

"But you will exceed all of them. For you will sacrifice the man that clothes me. Already your horn has been raised, your wrath has been kindled, your star has shone brightly, and your heart has been hardened"

These dudes really knew how to make Jesus out to be quite the poet at times!

If you'd like more information about gnostic and apocryphal biblical texts, just follow this link: http://sacred-texts.com/chr/apo/index.htm

A Final Thought from Your Resident Heretic

As I've read this book again and again it plays out in my head as I've given it to you here. There's no sugar coating and no toying with your emotions with philosophical metaphors. All that is presented here is bad fiction. And in the end that's all the bible is. It's bad fiction.

But many people out there have never heard the story laid out like this. They've been given the hard nosed indoctrination that was drilled into their parents before them. They were told all their lives that this book of horrible fiction was actually the facts of real life. They think The Wiz is a real dude and that all these crazy tales really happened. But if this blog series was their first introduction to Christianity, they almost certainly would never simply assume it was factually true.

I hope all you heathens enjoyed my offering of The Bible in a Nutshell, and I hope you had a few laughs along the way.

Photo Credit: FunnyJunk