Today’s Jesus and Mo strip, called “divide”, came with a caption: “Are you sure it’s not in their cardiovascular system?” When you read the strip, you’ll understand:
What I don’t get about this strip is that even if Jesus were real, and was conversing with his believers, it would have to be in their heads. What’s the alternative: Jesus appearing before people and having a chat with them? Well, you tell me, but this is one I don’t get, though it’s clearly meant to satirize the “personal conversations” people have with Jesus.
I bet there’s a chatbot for that, though. . .
There’s something sublime about this – I mean I think even the theologically faithful would be in harmony with this … the mind, the consciousness of an undifferentiated whole … this is also the fork in the road leading to cult theosophy.. e.g. “Christ Consciousness” is cult heresy…
well, ok then –
it IS sublime.
There, I said it.
Yes. It is strange. But anything can be interpreted 🙂
I think it suggests that Jesus is not all powerful. Mo, as his close friend and bedfellow, knows it. Mo, being the founder of Islam, is prone to forget that Jesus is supposed to be God in the eyes of the little people. Jesus reminds him of these crucial points of Christianity as seen by the little people.
I think it suggests Jesus knows that religion is in the minds of the people. When he says that it is TRUE that every Christian has an intimate relationship with him, he is repeating the dogma. That’s what people are supposed to believe and he knows it.
Maybe the general idea of the strip is that both Jesus and Mo exist, even if it is only Mo’s body double that we get to see. But there is no magic. Only belief.
But then I would think so, wouldn’t I? I don’t believe this nonsense!
It reminds me of Peter O’Toole’s line in the movie The Ruling Class. He’s asked how he knows he’s god (plotline of the move). He responds that it came to him while in prayer and realized he was talking to himself.
Just so! Thanks for the reminder. Best line in that movie, maybe.
Thanks for the movie reference. IMDB gives it 7.2/10 and categorises it as a Dark Comedy / Parody / Psychological Drama / Musical (!), and it came out during the Boomer era. Seems right up my alley.
It’s an excellent though off-the-wall (or off-the-cross?) movie. Apart from Peter O’Toole’s manic Jesus/Jack, there’s Alistair Sim as a nervous bishop, Graham Crowden as a loony psychiatrist, Arthur Lowe as a sarcastic butler and a very young Carolyn Seymour.
Jesus is a multiplexing AI bot!
Of course it’s “in their heads.” It’s each individual believer creating his own personal narrative—an “in the head” fantasy that doesn’t require a multiplexing automaton at all. No miracles to be seen here.
Here is my interpretation: he is punning. He is playing with the phrase “it’s all in their head” meaning it does not really exist, the person is only imaging it. This contrasts with Jesus/ god stating that actually, in reality, he is having conversations with believers in their head.
I agree, it’s a pun.
Years ago in atheist/christian chat rooms I used to ask the Christians to describe what it feels and sounds like when God “talks to them” — and how they know. It was interesting to do this in an online forum with a lot of believers willing to have such conversations, since in real life people tend to deflect as quickly as possible.
To say they struggled with it is an understatement. Either they came up with strange platitudes like “an impulse of the heart,” or they tried to describe it as a Knowingness similar to knowing when you yourself is speaking, only in this case you’re sure it’s not you. A few did talk vaguely about a voice (auditory hallucination?) but many ended up defeated, which seemed to surprise them a bit. It’s ineffable. That was when my inability to understand or accept was taken as either inexperience, mental incapacity, or, of course, my hardening myself to the obvious in order to avoid God.
God gives hints, a Mormon told me. A tree leaf blowing in the wind (Or maybe falling from a tree?) told him to buy the car that he was vacillating about buying. The leaf was of the same colour as the car, hence the interpretation.
It’s all very simple. Let the Lord into your heart and you will hear His voice. Believe and he will guide you. Sometimes you might not understand Him and His ways. Do not despair. He is infinite. You are not.
Sometimes my intuitions present themselves in words. When this happens out-of-the-blue to someone, they might interpret it as an independent inner voice. I have little doubt that similar experiences underly the classical Muses, seemingly divine revelations, etc. And IMO it’s not a big step from having an inner voice to experiencing it as an audible external one. YMMV.
The “bicameral mind”?
😀
Jaynes’ book is one of my very favourites. IIRC he includes the Muses in his very wide range of pre-consciousness examples. I just asked GPT-5 about the current consensus views of The Origin .., and got:
If I recall correctly, there was a bumper sticker on a vehicle I would see on my work-commute route years ago proclaiming: “I’m just doing what the voices in my head tell me to do.”
Jesus’s response to Mo reminded me of the Jim Carrey movie “Bruce Almighty” where he answered everyone’s prayers via email…
My aunt, as a child, once said “Jesus, please hand me the broom” after she had heard in Sunday school that Jesus was always with her.