We have another divine sighting. This time, God appears to have chosen to reveal himself on the underside of Mary Jo Coady’s iron in Methuen, Massachusetts. She is delighted by the selection, saying that it is a message directly from God that “life is going to be good” — and perhaps to use less spray starch on the shirts. It is a truly modern parable of moving from the Shroud of Turin to Mary Jo Coady’s iron.
This is still better than bird droppings or griddle grease, here.
Coady, 44, says that the image is proof that “he’s listening.”
What is most interesting is how difficult it was for Jesus to make appearances before the invention of grills and irons. Consider this labor intensive effort:
Luke 24:36-46
[36] While they were still talking about this, Jesus himself stood among them and said to them, “Peace be with you.”
[37] They were startled and frightened, thinking they saw a ghost. [38] He said to them, “Why are you troubled, and why do doubts rise in your minds? [39] Look at my hands and my feet. It is I myself! Touch me and see; a ghost does not have flesh and bones, as you see I have.”
[40] When he had said this, he showed them his hands and feet. [41] And while they still did not believe it because of joy and amazement, he asked them, “Do you have anything here to eat?” [42] They gave him a piece of broiled fish, [43] and he took it and ate it in their presence.
[44] He said to them, “This is what I told you while I was still with you: Everything must be fulfilled that is written about me in the Law of Moses, the Prophets and the Psalms.”
[45] Then he opened their minds so they could understand the Scriptures. [46] He told them, “This is what is written: The Christ will suffer and rise from the dead on the third day.”
That was before Mary Jo Coady bought her iron.
For the pictures and full story, click here.
Mom saw Jesus riding on a taco.
Dad saw Jesus on some spit.
Kids saw Jesus in some bird dung!
Jesus, while you’re ironing, can you fix my shirt?
With your magic powers can you heal my fax?
Can you point out all the witches to Father Mudmee?
Can you tell our soldiers whom to kill?
When you whisper in the ear of the president,
why do you always tell him: “Go to war”?
From the look of the iron I am amazed that you could iron with it. I would think that it would stain anything it touched. Wait a minute! Just think of what an instrument this lady has here. This IS a goldmine! How much would you pay for a cheap scrap of cloth burned with the image of Jesus from this ladies dirty iron? $20? $30? Have a headache? Just apply your “Shroud of Mass” ice pack! Only $19.95! It’s limitless what she could scorch with her iron for a buck! And limitless the amount of people who would buy them.
Frank,
And the cross that one had to carry was in reality just the “Cross Bar.”
So yes, I stand by my original statement that wood was scarce especially in the area of Galilee
“Most of Yeshu’s neighbors would have been farmers who lived in the village and worked the fields nearby, or workers in the relatively small number of trades necessary to support agricultural life. Yosep is identified in Matthew’s gospel as a carpenter. The Greek word is tekton which can be translated in the broad sense as “builder.” In Palestine that would mean a construction craftsman skilled in both carpentry and masonry. Because stones were plentiful and wood was scarce, a tekton would have worked primarily with stone.”
http://followingjesus.org/leader/context_life.htm
In the Maldives, the boats are entirely constructed of coconut wood, … but sewn boats were recorded in use…….
Hmmmm, new book must read: http://books.google.com/books?id=ZDh2KKSlQg4C&pg=PA152&dq=what+were+boats+constructed+of+during+jesus+time&ei=K5wSS8SuNpX0ygT0haG2DA#v=onepage&q=&f=false
Elaine M.m
For clarification I was banking on you English teaching as opposed to Biblical Anointment.
The Thread on the Super Duper Topic Today was this;
Anonymously Yours 1, November 29, 2009 at 11:10 am
Buddha,
“wood was scarce and what would would have been available would have not been much better than thatching”
That’s good to know. The imitation wood cross must have been much lighter than one made of real wood.
And these fishing boats? Where they made of “thatching”?
AY,
Yes.
As would scholar and builder. I know little about Aramaic proper. Perhaps there is even a homophone issue here. (Insert gay telephone joke here.)
AY–
I left talk of things religious–immaculate conceptions, Lazarus rising from the dead, Sodom and Gomorrah, coats of many colors, the parting of seas, etc.–to others many years ago. I figure I got enough religion in twelve years of parochial school to last me a lifetime. I’ll leave the discussion of Jesus and carpentry and the Bible and old Aramaic terms to you and Buddha.
Note: I may partake, every now and again, in conversations about the appearance of images of Jesus, Mary, and other saints–on tree trunks, slices of toast, the bottoms of irons, etc., just for amusement’s sake.
Buddha,
I want to make sure I have the meaning down: double entendre, is like this. You know why the little Greek brother wouldn’t leave home? He could not stand to leave his brothers behind.
Or after Nixon saw Deep Throat more than once, he stated that he had it down Pat.
Would the above be considered double entendre’s?
As always I value Elaine’s input, but really, wasn’t Jesus both scholar and builder? Are not most people more than one thing? Are not scholar and builder reflections of value adding activities? My point is no deeper than that. We are both correct but in different ways. I have no issue with your observation. It’s an interesting bit of linguistics but I don’t think it’s linguistic obscura to coin a term – it may distort but not totally obscure original meaning as a double entendre but it doesn’t alter the fundamental relationship of action to actor. If tekton had meant something fundamentally different, like miner – a value extraction activity, then I’d be more up in linguistic arms about it.
Buddha,
That is only a correct presumption so long as the original works were correctly interpreted. Some people say that foreign languages are difficult to comprehend. This is not true for every Latin word we have 15 to 150 variations of the same root word in the English Language. Latin I will give you is difficult. However, Spanish, French and German not that difficult once you get a few root words down. The Problem with most is that they are mentally lazy and happy doing menial works. I too fit in that category.
I would like to have the schoolmarm to clarify if what I stated was accurate. Elaine M., you got your ears on?
AY,
I see no linguistic problem here. Historically, it’s actually a double entendre. Assuming the Bible is accurate, Joseph was a carpenter and the career paths of the time were largely lineal. Jesus being an actual carpenter, at least until the whole Son of God thing took off for Him, is merely an application of Occam’s Razor and close but not always literal translations. That the word for builder/carpenter has dual meaning with scholar in Aramaic but is more in line with the traditional English meaning of carpenter with the ancient Greek appellation tekton is simply idiomatic and semantic. What is a scholar if not a builder of knowledge? Both terms apply to creating value from components. Linguistically, you have spotted an oddity. A neat one I’ll stipulate.
Buddha,
This is one area where I will not get into a real debate as we could both be correct and supported by incorrect facts. Words have a way of lost meaning in translations. I will state that you appear to be quite gay today. And please be very careful where you lay your fagots.
The above translation today would indicate that you are some kind of queer. In the 1920’s dictionary that I sometime use to get the usage and meaning words, one such is queer which has another interesting as various meanings as you could intend.
I hope you get the point rather than take offense. roflol.
Hence,
“…the Greek word for ‘carpenter’ in the gospels actually stands for an underlying Aramaic term that is used metaphorically in the Talmud to denote a scholar.” (Porter, 2004, p. 81)
“In the Gospels, Jesus is called a tekton, a Greek word that meant not merely a carpenter skilled in making cabinets or furniture but a designer, construction engineer, or architect. A tekton could build a house, construct a bridge, or design a temple.” (Starbird, 2003, p. 53)
http://www.jesuspolice.com/common_error.php?id=6
I once thought I saw Jesus in a BLT but on closer inspection it turned out to be Orlando Cepeda
Elaine M.,
Is that you? lol……
AY,
I hate to rain on yours. While Jesus would have been familiar with mud brick construction as was common in that area, wood joining would have been in his skill set. Timber was a such a staple of the Lebanese economy for such a long time (including the time of Jesus), that the cypress tree is on their flag. While not the most common building material in the region it was not unknown or unused. After all, a mud brick door would be a pain to open on a rainy night. Now would he have had the joining skills of say a contemporaneous Chinese or Japanese builder? No. They have and had at the time very sophisticated joining techniques – many of which require no glue or nails and are still used today on traditional buildings like temples. The Chinese and Japanese literally have thousands of joint variations. They could have built you a car out of wood at the time if you gave them direction. Jesus on the other hand, would have had basic framing skills as required by the mud brick architecture of the area in making forms, transitions and shoring. Maybe even enough basics to build crude furniture. But he’d have known how to work wood.
All these visions of Jesus and The Virgin Mary are fakes created by little grey hoaxers with big eyes who go about in disk shaped vehicles that resemble flying crockery.
There that is a rational explanation.
AY–
See–all the crazy people don’t live in Texas! Some of them live up here in Massachusetts too.
Do you have to wonder why this woman and her husband are separated?
I’m surprised that no one has come up with the idea for establishing a museum that would house collections of this kind of “holy” memorabilia.
Buddha,
Another myth. He was more likely a masonry miracle worker. There was very little wood working to be done. If you were a carpenter it meant at the time you had special abilities as wood was scarce and what would would have been available would have not been much better than thatching.
Something about ships being hulled out of stone or made from what we call cement that intrigues me. Not to sink your ship.
I want to know if the Lord suffers from that blight among all steam irons: starch residue build up. If He’s got that one nailed, Proctor-Silex has a job for Him. And before any zealots jump on my word choice “nailed”, I’d like to point out Jesus was a carpenter before he was a fixture. He has a long history of home improvement when properly employed. The key word being “properly”.
Professor,
Jesus can come in many form. Life imitating Life is a fun thing to watch some days. But never ever take my plastic Jesus off of my dash board.
[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_F-5kpyD4cE&hl=en_US&fs=1&]