DemiGods

Saturday, 12 February 2011

Owen asks a lot of questions about religions. He seems completely baffled that people buy into that stuff which, I guess, is to be expected if you grow up in our home. Whenever he asks why certain members of our family acted in a crazy way, or why he has this Monday or that Friday off of school, or why this story is in the news, the answer is always religion.

In an effort to explain to him how these religions – from decent to bat-shit crazy (a.k.a. “The Buddhist to Scientology Continuum”) – came about, I checked some books out of the library. Four of them, actually. All written by a women who goes by the name “Demi.” Her biography notes that she started writing on walls by the age of two, so you know she’s well qualified to write children’s books.

The books I rented are: Muhammad, Jesus, some Lao Tzu book with a long title, and Buddha Stories, a book with dark gold lettering on black pages that render it nearly impossible to read if not in direct sunlight.

Okay, here’s the good part: the books look beautiful. They are lavishly illustrated, almost as if every page is a work of art. This even goes for that Buddha book (at least, for the 10 minutes during which the sun shines through our sliding glass door). The pictures are obviously the work of someone with great talent, someone who probably wrote on walls as a two-year old.

Here’s the bad part: the wording is more suited to a 10 year old. I think Owen was frequently lost during our reading of Muhammad. By the time he’s 10, though, he’ll probably look at books like these as too simple.

Another bad part: Okay, I would think someone who wrote about religious leaders from all the different major religions would do so in a strictly biographical way. I mean, Demi is Buddhist (it’s hard to see how someone of any other faith could so even-handedly write about the founders of many other faiths), so I didn’t think she would get tripped up in the the supernatural mysticism surrounding these enterprising hucksters.

The Lao Tzu book, for example, says he lived to 160 years old. I guess I can overlook that as a possible exaggeration, but the Jesus book says he raised the dead, got himself resurrected, and then went to heaven. Bullshit. I’m not buying it, and neither should my son. The Muhammad book is even worse, trumpeting his faithfulness and downplaying his bloodlust. Funny thing: the book kowtows to Muslim’s no-picture-of-Muhammad tradition, saying on the first page: “In keeping with Islamic tradition, the Prophet Muhammad and his family have not been depicted in this book.”  However, Muhammad is depicted on every single page. He’s just show as someone made entirely out of gold (like Shirley Eaton in Goldfinger). Also, there’s this little curlicue that follows every use of the word Muhammad in the book. It was very distracting. After reading the book, I discovered that this doodle is some sort of blessing, kind of like if you had to say “The one and only” every time you said my name.

Yeah…anyway, Owen is welcome to read the Koran and the Bible and the book of Morons one day when he’s old enough. In fact, I hope he does. Until then, I won’t be sharing any “my first cult indoctrination” books with him.