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“Jesus went unto the mount of Olives….
He that is without sin among you, let him first cast a stone at her.”
-- John 8:1,8
I was jogging through Jerusalem, as I am wont to do (why am I wont to do something? Because I want to do it. Won’t you? … ahem… so who’s on first?).
I ran by a sign with an arrow that read “Har ha-Zeytim.”
That means, literally, “Mountain of Olives.”
Coincidence—last night I was watching the film “Cloudy With a chance of meatballs”… and here was a mountain of olives?!
Point of Fact—that film, in Israel is translated as “Rain of Falafel.”
Know your audience.
(I think "Alice in Wonderland" is called “Shiksa Trips Balls on Hashish”)
Actually, Mount Olives (located in East Jerusalem) is fairly well-known.
First mention in 2nd Samuel 15:30, when King David flees the murderous Absalom (ironic name: “Father of Peace”)
Even Jesus hung out there a lot. According to the infallible word of Wikipedia, “Jesus is said to have spent time on the mount, teaching and prophesying to his disciples.”
So if Jesus is Zack Morris, Mt. Olives is “The Max.”
Completely inoffensive analogy, right?
After all, Zack Morris WAS like Jesus ca. 1991:
Zack Morris could stop—looking at the camera and saying, “Time out!”
He didn’t cure lepers, but he could make Screech cool (I’m sure that must’ve been an episode)
He healed the sick -- helped Jessi kick that nasty caffeine pill addiction; “I’m so excited, I’m so excited, I’m so— (say it with me) SCARED.”
And Zack Morris had his own Mary Magdalane.
He turned the whorish Kelly Kopowski into… less of a whore? Right? They got married in Hawaii or something.
OKAY!
Back to Jesus!
And Mount Olives!
Why did Jesus make that famous proclamation about the person without sin can cast the first stone?
Because the people “brought unto him a woman taken in adultery.” The people point out to Jesus, “Now Moses in the law commanded us, that such should be stoned: but what sayest thou?”
In other words, kid to the baby-sitter: “My dad lets me eat jellybeans for dinner! He does!”
And Jesus says that oh-so-famous phrase.
The people shut up, leave the room, and leave the woman and Jesus alone. He tells her, get outta here and quite fornicatin’ with married dudes (not in so many words)
(John 8:1-11).
Amen.
So—don’t cast a stone! We’ve all made mistakes.
Say it with me:
Pobody’s Nerfect.
Michael Jordan missed shots.
Tom Hanks has made crappy movies.
Some of Hemingway’s stories sucked.
So don’t beat yourself up over everything.
But that also means you gotta cut other people some slack, too.
When you point a finger at someone... you're pointing three at yourself.
... and the thumb... well, the thumb doesn't do a damn thing.
“All of you lied. Should you have asterisks behind your names? All of you have said something wrong. All of you have dirt. When your closet’s clean, then clean somebody else’s. But clean yours first.”
-- Barry Bonds, from the 2008 documentary “Bigger, Stronger, Faster*”
“Moses was a hero, but Moses was a heel, he didn’t get into the promised land, didn’t do what God told him to do.
David was a hero, but David was heel. He chased every woman in a skirt or toga or whatever they wore back then.
Every man is fallible and even the people who were the prime examples of how to run your life in the Bible-- screwed up. They all screwed up.
People need to get off their self-righteous soap boxes and start lovin’ each other."
-- the father of the filmmaker, Chris Bell, from the same film
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