Parodies
Did you know that UBC has an archive full of historical documents about Vancouver? It is located in the basement of the Koerner library and on a cold misty day, we CAP students were lucky enough to spend a lesson in the toasty warmth of the Rare Books and Special Collections wing of the archives.
Amongst the bits and bobs of ephemera stored away in neatly labelled folders, I came across Colin Upton’s comic book collection and fished out a short smaller-than-A5 sized comic titled “Bible Stories for Atheists #1: The Flood” (You can find this comic in Colin Upton comic books Folder 1-6, Box 1). Colin Upton is a Canadian cartoonist who grew up in Vancouver, hence his collection in UBC’s archives. This particular comic that I was attracted to was self-published and intended to be sold for 75 cents a piece to anyone who was interested. The story is as follows…
Noah is ushering animals into his ark and his wife is having a hard time believing that the great flood as predicted by God is actually happening. She thinks that the flood is not fair for those who haven’t sinned. When she confronts Noah with her thoughts, he replies with “ […] God commands it! How dare you question God’s will!”. In a rage, Noah’s wife runs into the ark and burns it down with a torch. She then screams up to the sky, telling God that without humans on earth, “No one [will be] left to suffer for your sick amusement”. The rain stops but Noah is not happy. He kills his wife by beating her with his walking stick and drowning her in a puddle of water. Noah then apologizes to God, blaming his failure on his wife and the comic ends with him walking away and saying that he needs a drink.
My initial reaction to this comic was one of humour. Being an atheist myself (and when I say atheist, I use the term very lightly), I felt like I could appreciate this parody in all it’s comedic glory, however, the more I thought about it, the more I wondered where the line should be drawn. Is it alright to write about a well known bible story in this way just because it’s funny? I suppose the medium in which this joke has been conveyed was suitable, but what do you theists out there think about this? The purpose of this short blog was to bring up the idea of parodies of religious stories to light and hopefully collect some opinions on this matter.
The cover image of Bible Stories for Atheists by Colin Upton.
Sources:
http://hicandhoc.tumblr.com/post/24156497295/bible-stories-for-atheists-by-colin-upton
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