Jesus ‘n’ Mo ‘n’ conversion

December 5, 2018 • 9:45 am

The new Jesus and Mo strip, called “part”, comes with the motto “They are risen”, as well as the email note: “There are lots more examples of believers turning setbacks into triumphs, but Sabbatai Zevi is a firm favourite.” You can read about Zevi at the link. At any rate, this week’s strip is a good one:

Will this be banned in Pakistan? Stay tuned. It won’t be banned anywhere else, even though it’s an insult to Christianity and not Islam.

16 thoughts on “Jesus ‘n’ Mo ‘n’ conversion”

  2. This may have been discussed on this website before, but the social psychologists Leon Festinger, Henry Riecken, and Stanley Schachter wrote a classic book called “When Prophecy Fails” which examined the phenomenon exemplified by Sabbatai Zevi’s and Christ’s followers, in a modern day UFO cult. This from Wikipedia:

    Festinger stated that five conditions must be present if someone is to become a more fervent believer after a failure or disconfirmation:

    A belief must be held with deep conviction and it must have some relevance to action, that is, to what the believer does or how he or she behaves.

    The person holding the belief must have committed himself to it; that is, for the sake of his belief, he must have taken some important action that is difficult to undo. In general, the more important such actions are, and the more difficult they are to undo, the greater is the individual’s commitment to the belief.

    The belief must be sufficiently specific and sufficiently concerned with the real world so that events may unequivocally refute the belief.

    Such undeniable disconfirmatory evidence must occur and must be recognized by the individual holding the belief.

    The individual believer must have social support. It is unlikely that one isolated believer could withstand the kind of disconfirming evidence that has been specified. If, however, the believer is a member of a group of convinced persons who can support one another, the belief may be maintained and the believers may attempt to proselytize or persuade nonmembers that the belief is correct.

    (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/When_Prophecy_Fails)

    Quite interesting, to quote Stephen Fry.

    2. The person holding the belief must have committed himself to it; that is, for the sake of his belief, he must have taken some important action that is difficult to undo.

      I don’t know if Heaven’s Gate is the example they study, but their castration (were there women in the group too? I don’t remember) would be a classical example of this character.
      (No, it wasn’t Heaven’s Gate. Some other mob of nutters.)

  3. How is that not an insult to Islam? It’s a cartoon depiction of the prophet.

    Maybe I’m wrong on the basics.

    2. Technically Islam is a religion. Religion’s cannot get insulted, only people who might follow a religion. And then maybe not all Muslims are insulted, though maybe they are required to be offended.

      Being insulted is complicated. Better to live a life with low inhibitions in order to minimize ability to be offended.

      1. Technically, Christianity is also a religion. Somehow, the entire post gets a pass, but my comment is what triggers.

        And since we’re being pedantic, apostrophes don’t pluralize. 🙂

      2. “Technically Islam is a religion. Religion’s cannot get insulted[.]”

        Technically, I think “Islam” is commonly used as synecdoche for “Muslim people.”

        Similar to how one might refer to “Christendom.”

    3. The Artist (for that is his moniker) is quite explicit that the cartoon stars Jesus Christ himself and Mohammed’s stunt double. The status of the Moses-like character is not TTBOMK made clear.
      The Divine Incarnation that is the Barmaid is NEVER represented. (OK, maybe the occasional hand, dispensing Ambrosia of Endarkenment.)

      Has the Noodly Appendage (SBUHMB) ever appeared? I can’t remember.

  4. Christian response : the old testament predicts “one messiah, two comings”, the first time as a “suffering servant” and the second as a “conquering king”. This is why many of the Jews did not recognise their messiah, since they were looking for the second, not the first. Further, the passover Seder illudes to Christ the passover lamb as having no bones broken (compare to the crucifixion narrative and compare to IIRC Psalm 22). There are off course many other “pointers”, e.g. Genesis 3:15……. I wrote to the Pakistan High Commission a few days ago about their disgusting Islamic laws, but so far no response.

  5. “When theories are falsified by … observations, scientists can respond by revising the theory, or by rejecting the theory in favor of a rival or by maintaining the theory as is and changing an auxiliary hypothesis.”
    Karl Popper: Philosophy of Science, IEP.

    1. I think I see what you are trying to say here but you’ve got it wrong. In science the replacement theory is subject to validity testing. That’s the “falsified by observations” part.

  6. At least Jesus has come to terms with the fact that his followers are “modern cultists”. He’s probably reading about the republican party…there must be a chapter in there about them.

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