“Spirit of heterodoxy, come out of him in the name of Jesus, I command you!”
I’m not exaggerating. Doesn’t even take special training, just a belief in demons and in a Christian’s power over them. And yes, heterodoxy. The opposite of orthodoxy, you know. Potentially demonic. I wish I was exaggerating.
No it is perfectly valid. Walky should get another go tho. I would argue with Dina that it was Joyce that barred me entry, if I were him. Then explain that my favourite dinosaur was a terrorbird due to its feet.
She’s a Mom in training. She has an acute bullshit detector for certain sorts of bullshit, namely the sort of bullshit kids try. And since Walky is an overgrown child…
You can know when someone you don’t like is acting out of character. Everyone was able to tell Mary was acting out of character when she was being overly nice. And with Walky it is really obvious because he is actually acting against his usual bad habits.
Don’ t let on to Joyce that Leviathan is the Ugaritic sea monster Lôtān, one of the servants of the sea god Yammu defeated by Hadad in the Baal Cycle. Or that the story of Job is taken from the Akkadian Ludlul bēl nēmeqi.
My favorite dinosaur is the ruby-throated hummingbird, Archilochus colubris.
Nonsense. I’ve read the Job, and the beast described is very clearly and unambiguously Godzilla (or perhaps an identical creature born from the nuclear detonation at Sodom).
Oh, Walky, honey. Just say you’re failing math (which as far as both of you know, it’s true), and you need to set tutoring up with the new TA (because as far as Joyce knows, you actually were trying to effectively study with Jason).
Christians like this assume everybody is both familiar with the base assumptions of their religion and, on some level, agrees with it unless it’s been shown otherwise. It’s not at all uncommon for them to assume everybody believes in Religious Jesus even if they don’t worship him or that “The Bible says right here….” is a compelling argument to all people.
Conversely, that if you’re an atheist you only have a passing familiarity with Christianity or any Biblical tropes, even if you grew up in an ostensibly Christian country.
BBCC
Well, yeah, clearly if you’re NOT some denomination of Christianity (even ‘heretical’ ones like Catholic), it’s just because you’re not familiar with Christianity.
vlademir1
This is why I used to love to sit down and have conversations with people who take those assumptions to heart. My own beliefs*, though nominally Christian, are so far removed from the normalized ones that most from Joyce’s background lump me into the same category as “atheists”** and those from The Satanic Temple and The Church of Satan (ie actively malicious to their beliefs and way of life)… which is why I had to give up having those conversations since it’s not compatible with living and working as a functioning adult in the US.
*I self describe as an areligious, animist, apatheistic, pantheistic Catholic-Buddhist with some additional influences from other spiritual paths I’ve walked in the past.
**I scare quote atheists here because it’s a use of the fundie understanding of the term, which is more akin to antitheists, rather than the wider understanding.
Religion aside, the Bible is one of the most influential literary works of all time. Anyone should be able to pick up a Leviathan allusion; it also appears in the works of Thomas Hobbes
I grew up non-denominational Christian and the only references to Leviathan I was aware of until I looked it up recently were from video games and Supernatural…and now I think I better understand what people mean by Christian-lite.
Was raised without any religion and no, that’s not true. I’ve heard the word (mostly on Farscape) and knew it was some biblical thing, but I was under the impression that it was some kind of mythical whale.
It is in fact a bit weird just how much Christians tend to take it for granted that everyone around them will be familiar with all the same the weird fiddly bits of lore from their Jesus fandom that they are
BBCC
I didn’t even know who Jesus was until I was in 7th grade. I’d only heard his name as a expletive – ex. “Jesus Christ, that was loud!”
We were reading and a reference to him being nailed to a cross for suggesting people be nice to each other. My teacher said “We all know who that’s a reference to right? Jesus.”
Uly
1. I find that refreshing to hear! Although surprising in our culture.
I live in Canada, so a bit less of an outwardly religious culture (too much talk about religion can be considered rude her). I find it interesting it was my secular seventh grade that assumed everyone would get the reference and not my Catholic high school which explained every frigging biblical reference everybody ever made.
And yeah, my class was divided by reading level. Lower reading level got to read Holes and higher reading level got stuck with Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy. I say ‘stuck with’ because no matter how much our teacher tried and showed us the movie, it bored the whole group to tears. Finally, the teacher said screw it and just let us all read Holes. Which, in practice, meant he read Holes to us.
Roborat
Wait, you found Hitchhiker’s boring? How is that possible.
BBCC
I guess being 12 or 13 and not quite getting the humour? We barely made it past the earth being destroyed because we hated it.
Roborat
Have you tried it again now that you are older? Please say you gave it another chance.
I find it weirder that Leviathan of all things is being called a ‘weird fiddly bit of lore’. The actual description of it, yes. The exact origin of it, yes.
But Leviathan shows up in so many non-religious contexts – ultimately referencing the religious context, yes, but not in a religious context, and occasionally a couple steps removed, due to directly referencing one of the other non-religious contexts.
Most of which would make Joyce’s attempt to use it, here, actually more baffling than simply not having heard of Leviathan before would have. ‘She’s talking about some Bible thing…why does she think that would change my mind?’ vs ‘Why is she talking about sea serpents to justify firebreathing dinosaurs?’ or ‘What does the god of the Cenobites have to do with this?’
So, yes, in this context, Joyce is totally assuming Dina accepts a biblical story as true, but no, Leviathan isn’t a word you could only expect the biblically literate to encounter.
Emily
But we’re talking about Leviathan in a religious context not as a general word. Like, my understanding of a leviathan is a big sea monster which does not track with her comparison to a fire-breathing terrestrial dinosaur at all so something is clearly being lost in translation. Like I have no fucking clue what she’s talking about especially since parasaurolophus is nowhere near big enough to qualify as a leviathan to my understanding of one.
No, we’re not talking about the religious context. This subthread was started by someone pointing out that ‘leviathan’ is used in non-religious contexts, and then somebody denying that. (Context is important here, too!)
That the religious context is the one that Joyce brought up does not make the claim that Leviathan is ‘a fiddly bit of lore’ that you could only be expected to know at least the basics of (some combination of massive, aquatic, serpentine and evil) if you were religious true.
You enter a conversation, make a post that has literally nothing to do with the conversation at hand, and then accuse somebody responding to the actual topic of the conversation of nitpicking?
Well some parts of the Bible are well known enough that most or all of the general public are at least aware about it even if they ain’t religious. Anyways I wouldn’t be surprised if there’s at least some species of dinosaur named after the Leviathan and that that’s how Dina would be aware about it.
Lots of Christians relate mostly to the New Testament and don’t now much about the old.
(It would probably shock Joyce to learn that Leviathan was based on existing God myths of pre Jewish times. Oh, right, do creationists believe in pre Jewish times?)
197 thoughts on “Explained”
Doctor_Who
“I’m here to learn”?!
And with that, Joyce decides to temporarily convert to Catholicism so she can request an exorcism.
insomniac
Oh, there are Protestant exorcists, no worries there.
Chris Phoenix
“Spirit of heterodoxy, come out of him in the name of Jesus, I command you!”
I’m not exaggerating. Doesn’t even take special training, just a belief in demons and in a Christian’s power over them. And yes, heterodoxy. The opposite of orthodoxy, you know. Potentially demonic. I wish I was exaggerating.
Ana Chronistic
RED FLAG O METER
learning?? wtf
Clif
Who is this person and what has he done with Walky?
Catman
First encounter with Shattered Glass Walky?
Shaith86
Piccolo: Red flag!
*a few minutes later*
Goku: Is that a red flag?
Piccolo: Crimson.
AnvilPro
Walky is the safest boy I know
Dana
Not if he gets Joyce into Dorothy defense mode.
Alice Macher
“I say Good Day!”
Yumi
I love Dina; I have her magnet on my car.
I do think she could reflect on her screening process some.
Batman
No it is perfectly valid. Walky should get another go tho. I would argue with Dina that it was Joyce that barred me entry, if I were him. Then explain that my favourite dinosaur was a terrorbird due to its feet.
Batman
Or even the modern day chicken then when she looks at me funny tell her to google the lifecycle of the chicken embyro.
Sunny
I had to add “dinosaurs” to that search, but that’s pretty cool.
newllend(henryvolt)
Give the guy a break he’s nust really trying to buckle down on his math class… and maybe also give his new secret girlfriend a good morning smooch.
DailyBrad
You know, for someone who professes to really not like Walky, she sure can pick up on him being out of character. *cough*
Rabid Rabbit
She’s a Mom in training. She has an acute bullshit detector for certain sorts of bullshit, namely the sort of bullshit kids try. And since Walky is an overgrown child…
BBCC
Well, sometimes. Joyce is quite capable of plenty of childish bullshit herself.
Felian
Part of the Christian Mom Training ™ is to be impervious to own bullshit. Do as i say, not as i do!
BBCC
Sounds like a few of the crappy moms in this cast.
DailyBrad
Joyce would be a way better mom than the majority of them, thankfully.
Jaco
That just means she knows WHY she doesn’t like him.
Also, I guess I should ship Joyce <3< Walky.
Sam
You can know when someone you don’t like is acting out of character. Everyone was able to tell Mary was acting out of character when she was being overly nice. And with Walky it is really obvious because he is actually acting against his usual bad habits.
AntJ
Now he’s with Amber, WALKY has to be the responsible one
BBCC
That is TERRIFYING.
ShinyNeen
And having to be responsible for the sake of the one he loves worked out so well for him before, too.
newllend(henryvolt)
Well he….I hadn’t thought about it like that.
Emily
Oh sweet baby Jesus.
Clif
Merry Christmas.
Achallenger
Joyce knows there’s a plot afoot
Roborat
Maybe she is a Patreon member.
ShinyNeen
Aww, Joyce seems kinda disappointed that Dina doesn’t like her Creationist Fact!
Also, these are definitely two characters well-suited to debating the merits of learning. Mhmm.
Mokurai
Don’ t let on to Joyce that Leviathan is the Ugaritic sea monster Lôtān, one of the servants of the sea god Yammu defeated by Hadad in the Baal Cycle. Or that the story of Job is taken from the Akkadian Ludlul bēl nēmeqi.
My favorite dinosaur is the ruby-throated hummingbird, Archilochus colubris.
BrokenEye, the True False Prophet
Nonsense. I’ve read the Job, and the beast described is very clearly and unambiguously Godzilla (or perhaps an identical creature born from the nuclear detonation at Sodom).
BBCC
Oh, Walky, honey. Just say you’re failing math (which as far as both of you know, it’s true), and you need to set tutoring up with the new TA (because as far as Joyce knows, you actually were trying to effectively study with Jason).
Roger
Yeah you go Dina
Derek
Does…does Joyce assume Dina is Christian? Because how else would Dina know about Leviathan or why it’s assumed to be relevant?
Uly
Christians like this assume everybody is both familiar with the base assumptions of their religion and, on some level, agrees with it unless it’s been shown otherwise. It’s not at all uncommon for them to assume everybody believes in Religious Jesus even if they don’t worship him or that “The Bible says right here….” is a compelling argument to all people.
NelC
Conversely, that if you’re an atheist you only have a passing familiarity with Christianity or any Biblical tropes, even if you grew up in an ostensibly Christian country.
BBCC
Well, yeah, clearly if you’re NOT some denomination of Christianity (even ‘heretical’ ones like Catholic), it’s just because you’re not familiar with Christianity.
vlademir1
This is why I used to love to sit down and have conversations with people who take those assumptions to heart. My own beliefs*, though nominally Christian, are so far removed from the normalized ones that most from Joyce’s background lump me into the same category as “atheists”** and those from The Satanic Temple and The Church of Satan (ie actively malicious to their beliefs and way of life)… which is why I had to give up having those conversations since it’s not compatible with living and working as a functioning adult in the US.
*I self describe as an areligious, animist, apatheistic, pantheistic Catholic-Buddhist with some additional influences from other spiritual paths I’ve walked in the past.
**I scare quote atheists here because it’s a use of the fundie understanding of the term, which is more akin to antitheists, rather than the wider understanding.
AntJ
Religion aside, the Bible is one of the most influential literary works of all time. Anyone should be able to pick up a Leviathan allusion; it also appears in the works of Thomas Hobbes
Wizard
And now I’m imagining Hobbes arguing that society needs the firm rule of fire-breathing dinosaurs.
Rabid Rabbit
Nah, that’s more Calvin’s viewpoint.
woobie
I think Calvin has been a fire breathing dinosaurish city destroyer.
BBCC
For those of basically totally areligious at home, it was also featured on Yu-gi-Oh.
MatsuoTanuki
My first exposure to Leviathan was in Disney”s Atlantis.
BSLangley
I grew up non-denominational Christian and the only references to Leviathan I was aware of until I looked it up recently were from video games and Supernatural…and now I think I better understand what people mean by Christian-lite.
Felian
which also requires some degree of elitism to read ^^ i guess the Yu-gi-Oh reference is more accessible ^^
Fart Captor
Was raised without any religion and no, that’s not true. I’ve heard the word (mostly on Farscape) and knew it was some biblical thing, but I was under the impression that it was some kind of mythical whale.
It is in fact a bit weird just how much Christians tend to take it for granted that everyone around them will be familiar with all the same the weird fiddly bits of lore from their Jesus fandom that they are
BBCC
I didn’t even know who Jesus was until I was in 7th grade. I’d only heard his name as a expletive – ex. “Jesus Christ, that was loud!”
We were reading and a reference to him being nailed to a cross for suggesting people be nice to each other. My teacher said “We all know who that’s a reference to right? Jesus.”
Uly
1. I find that refreshing to hear! Although surprising in our culture.
2. Were you reading Pratchett!?
Dimb
My money is on Douglas Adams’ Hitch-hiker’s Guide to the Galaxy.
Deanatay
That’s where I’d heard that expression.
BBCC
I live in Canada, so a bit less of an outwardly religious culture (too much talk about religion can be considered rude her). I find it interesting it was my secular seventh grade that assumed everyone would get the reference and not my Catholic high school which explained every frigging biblical reference everybody ever made.
And yeah, my class was divided by reading level. Lower reading level got to read Holes and higher reading level got stuck with Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy. I say ‘stuck with’ because no matter how much our teacher tried and showed us the movie, it bored the whole group to tears. Finally, the teacher said screw it and just let us all read Holes. Which, in practice, meant he read Holes to us.
Roborat
Wait, you found Hitchhiker’s boring? How is that possible.
BBCC
I guess being 12 or 13 and not quite getting the humour? We barely made it past the earth being destroyed because we hated it.
Roborat
Have you tried it again now that you are older? Please say you gave it another chance.
Kamino Neko
I find it weirder that Leviathan of all things is being called a ‘weird fiddly bit of lore’. The actual description of it, yes. The exact origin of it, yes.
But Leviathan shows up in so many non-religious contexts – ultimately referencing the religious context, yes, but not in a religious context, and occasionally a couple steps removed, due to directly referencing one of the other non-religious contexts.
Most of which would make Joyce’s attempt to use it, here, actually more baffling than simply not having heard of Leviathan before would have. ‘She’s talking about some Bible thing…why does she think that would change my mind?’ vs ‘Why is she talking about sea serpents to justify firebreathing dinosaurs?’ or ‘What does the god of the Cenobites have to do with this?’
So, yes, in this context, Joyce is totally assuming Dina accepts a biblical story as true, but no, Leviathan isn’t a word you could only expect the biblically literate to encounter.
Emily
But we’re talking about Leviathan in a religious context not as a general word. Like, my understanding of a leviathan is a big sea monster which does not track with her comparison to a fire-breathing terrestrial dinosaur at all so something is clearly being lost in translation. Like I have no fucking clue what she’s talking about especially since parasaurolophus is nowhere near big enough to qualify as a leviathan to my understanding of one.
Kamino Neko
No, we’re not talking about the religious context. This subthread was started by someone pointing out that ‘leviathan’ is used in non-religious contexts, and then somebody denying that. (Context is important here, too!)
That the religious context is the one that Joyce brought up does not make the claim that Leviathan is ‘a fiddly bit of lore’ that you could only be expected to know at least the basics of (some combination of massive, aquatic, serpentine and evil) if you were religious true.
Emily
Ah, so you’re just nitpicking semantics gotcha.
Kamino Neko
You enter a conversation, make a post that has literally nothing to do with the conversation at hand, and then accuse somebody responding to the actual topic of the conversation of nitpicking?
Fart Captor
And my reply to the thread was indicating how the word being used in non-religious contexts did not actually mean I understood how Joyce was using it
This makes you pointing out that it isn’t ONLY used in a religious context seem like nitpicking
Remmington Steele
All because it’s all the hotel rooms, doesn’t mean it’s “influential”.
Tacos
Well some parts of the Bible are well known enough that most or all of the general public are at least aware about it even if they ain’t religious. Anyways I wouldn’t be surprised if there’s at least some species of dinosaur named after the Leviathan and that that’s how Dina would be aware about it.
Keulen
I think some Christians in this country don’t realize that to non-Christians the Bible is just another book of fictional stories.
Emily
And a badly written one at that. I’ve tried to read the Bible and it is an interminable slog.
BBCC
I think I got up to Exodus before I quit.
Clif
The Song of Solomon has some good bits.
CJ
Lots of Christians relate mostly to the New Testament and don’t now much about the old.
(It would probably shock Joyce to learn that Leviathan was based on existing God myths of pre Jewish times. Oh, right, do creationists believe in pre Jewish times?)
Clif