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August 12, 2003

…that through these, Bugs Bunny may become a partaker in the divine nature…
Posted by Teresa at 12:38 AM *

Some of you may remember a discussion here of Custom Classics, an outfit that’ll substitute your name (and the name of your sweetie, if desired) for the names of characters in Moby-Dick, Romeo and Juliet, Alice in Wonderland, The Jungle Book, and assorted Sherlock Holmes titles.

That was bad. But now Isabeau (not Alwin Hawkins, as I originally said; the letters were next to each other in my mail queue, and I stupidly got them mixed up) has sent me a worse one: The Personal Promise Bible, billed as “a Bible as unique as you are!” As they say:
Have you ever inserted your name as you read the Bible to make it more personal? Now you can experience the reality of God’s love and promises in a way you never thought possible. In the Personal Promise Bible, you will read your name in over 5,000 places throughout the New Testament with Psalms and Proverbs.
It’s not as much fun as you might imagine. Your name doesn’t get inserted at any of the really colorful places. It mostly swaps out for “you”, as in “I say unto you.” Still, their little demo can be fun. You’re supposed to type in your own name to see how it will look embedded in Bible verses, but why stop there?
By which He has granted to Bugs Bunny His precious and exceedingly great promises; that through these Bugs Bunny may become a partaker of the divine nature, having escaped from the corruption that is in the world by lust.
I also tried “Robin Hood, Prince of Thieves”, “Legolas, son of Weenus”, and “Hairy Lorenzo, the Tireless Vicar”. You can do whatever amuses you.

Of course, the entire text of the Bible is available online. Anyone with a little gumption could do their own chop-and-channel job on it, and have PublishAmerica print and bind a single copy of the results for a very reasonable price. You could win a lot of arguments that way, if you were so minded.

Comments on ...that through these, Bugs Bunny may become a partaker in the divine nature...:
#1 ::: Rich ::: (view all by) ::: August 12, 2003, 08:18 AM:

After I tried Judas Iscariot, naturally I went on to come up with this:

By which He has granted to Osama bin Laden His precious and exceedingly great promises; that through these Osama bin Laden may become a partaker of the divine nature, having escaped from the corruption that is in the world by lust.

Whoa, that's really not good.

#2 ::: hanne ::: (view all by) ::: August 12, 2003, 09:45 AM:

Inserting "Josef Stalin" into that particular matrix was satisfying indeed.

#3 ::: Kate Nepveu ::: (view all by) ::: August 12, 2003, 10:02 AM:

Anyone with a little gumption could do their own chop-and-channel job on it, and have PublishAmerica print and bind a single copy of the results for a very reasonable price. You could win a lot of arguments that way, if you were so minded.

. . . you are an evil, evil woman.

#4 ::: Melanie Fletcher ::: (view all by) ::: August 12, 2003, 01:05 PM:

What scares me is the suspicion that certain neocons have already done this, and read their bibles at night secure in the knowledge that God is speaking directly to them.

And then they go out the next morning and make laws. Eww. . .

#5 ::: Patrick Nielsen Hayden ::: (view all by) ::: August 12, 2003, 01:27 PM:

um, "neocon" =/= "fundamentalist or evangelical"

#6 ::: Jon H ::: (view all by) ::: August 12, 2003, 02:26 PM:


Before making it into a printed book, the customized text should be run through the swedish chef filter, or the filter of your preference.

That way, you can amaze your friends with the sermon on the mount where Jesus says, "Bork bork bork!"

#7 ::: Keith ::: (view all by) ::: August 12, 2003, 02:37 PM:

John H,

Or the Snoop Dog Shizilater.

"...And Jesus spake unto them,'Ain't no thang, Dawg'."

Blasphemy is so amusing...

#8 ::: Terry ::: (view all by) ::: August 12, 2003, 05:20 PM:

My question is this: Once I pay for a book and have it printed, does that mean Pat Robertson has to interpret it literally?

#9 ::: Daniel Martin ::: (view all by) ::: August 12, 2003, 05:50 PM:

I am reminded of something a few friends and I once did to retranslate/summarize Leviticus 18; call it the "Chris Rock" version.

I'm going to be a wimp and bleep out words, but it's much better if you say it in your head with all the words. From vague memory:

Don't f*** your parents.
Don't f*** the kids.
Don't f*** the grandkids.
Don't f*** with me; I am the LORD.

Don't f*** your father's wife.
Don't f*** your sister.
Don't f*** your father's sister.
Don't f*** your mother's sister.
Don't f*** with me; I am the LORD.

Don't f*** your daughter-in-law.
Don't f*** your father's brother, or his wife.
Don't f*** both a woman and her daughter, or a woman and her granddaughter; that's just sick.
And don't f*** her sister either, at least not until the first woman's dead.
Don't f*** with me; I am the LORD.

Although, on actually going back and reading the original, the regular cadence of the "I am the LORD" bit really doesn't happen until Leviticus 19, and all the "don't uncover the nakedness of..." stuff is from Leviticus 18, so maybe we'd mixed the two passages at that point. It was very late at night.

#10 ::: David Moles ::: (view all by) ::: August 12, 2003, 05:51 PM:

Hey, Teresa, talking of PublishAmerica, if one had some legitimate, well-adjusted reason (as distinct from all the entertaining conversations here about vanity publishing) to want to produce a very small print run of something, where would one start looking for a reputable book manufacturer?

#11 ::: Melanie Fletcher ::: (view all by) ::: August 12, 2003, 06:16 PM:

Patrick: sorry, regional association. I live in Dallas -- down here, "neocon" usually does = "fundamentalist or evangelical."

#12 ::: Isabeau ::: (view all by) ::: August 12, 2003, 07:05 PM:

When I emailed you last night (I believe the subject line was "horrid religious tat"), I hoped you would be as appalled as I was. Seeing the story at the top of the page was very gratifying.

Seeing it credited to Alvin Hawkins is less gratifying, though.

#13 ::: Keith ::: (view all by) ::: August 12, 2003, 11:04 PM:

David,

That's a fine question, indeed. I'm semi in the market for a book manufacturer.

#14 ::: Tom Whitmore ::: (view all by) ::: August 13, 2003, 12:33 AM:

Just had someone come into The Other Change of Hobbit this afternoon with a self-published book which as production values at least as good as (say) Golden Gryphon, who do pay attention to that. Not speaking to the quality of the prose yet (though I'm still reading at page 50) -- he's managed to produce a nice looking hardcover, 273 text pages, with a coated and embossed dustjacket and he's willing to sell it at $19.95 list with a 40% discount to booksellers (even on single copies). Author/publisher's name is Peter Crowell, and he gives a website of petertcrowell.com. I pointed him in the direction of this blog and especially the "Follow the Money" thread....

From talking with him, I expect he'd answer lots of questions about how he did it (he lists his designer, who has good design sense and seems to understand readability of body faces as an important criterion). Check him out and let me know what you find.

Cheers,
Tom

#15 ::: Robert L ::: (view all by) ::: August 13, 2003, 02:05 AM:

If you want to e really mischievous, you can custom-print a Bible with Samuel Jacksoon's speech[es] from Pulp Fiction inserted in the proper place in Ezekiel and use it to win bar bets. I wonder what Penn & Teller could do with this concept...

#16 ::: Keith ::: (view all by) ::: August 13, 2003, 11:36 PM:

Tom,

Thanks, very informative. Data Reproductions Corporation is the bookbinders that the author you mentioned used. he has a link on his site. They do University presses and a variety of other book binding. I'll definitely have to lookinto them when I'm finished proofing my novel.

#17 ::: David Moles ::: (view all by) ::: August 14, 2003, 10:31 AM:

Thanks. Data Reproductions looks pretty solid. Don’t know how small of a print run would be economical for them, but they still might be worth a look.

#18 ::: Isabeau ::: (view all by) ::: August 14, 2003, 05:08 PM:

My apologies to Alwin Hawkins with a W for spelling his name wrong.

#19 ::: Casey Cady ::: (view all by) ::: August 14, 2003, 09:21 PM:

Last night when I found the Personal Promise Bible on Neil Gaiman's weblog, I was amused, and slightly disturbed.

Today I got to thinking...they're actually not far off on creating a truly marketable product. If, instead of replacing all the occurrences of "you" with my name, they replaced all the occurrences of the word "Jesus" and "Jesus Christ" with my name, I'd actually buy that. I think it'd be a big hit.

#20 ::: Will ::: (view all by) ::: August 14, 2003, 10:49 PM:

I can't help but find it amusing (in a puerile sort of way) when a bunch of bible-bashers have their plan blow up in their face.

Tittilatingly, the site even accepts "Satan, Lord of the Damned":

"No longer do I call Satan, Lord of the Damned a servant, for a servant doesn't know what his lord does. But I have called Satan, Lord of the Damned a friend, for everything that I heard from My Father, I have made known to Satan, Lord of the Damned."

It's very childish, but they were asking for it, really.

#21 ::: Nicholas Liu ::: (view all by) ::: August 23, 2003, 09:30 AM:

Even when Tinky Winky was dead in trespasses, God made Tinky Winky alive together with Christ (by grace Tinky Winky has been saved), and raised Tinky Winky up with Him and made Tinky Winky to sit with Him in heavenly places in Christ Jesus. (Eph. 2:5-6)

#22 ::: Nicholas Liu ::: (view all by) ::: August 23, 2003, 09:36 AM:

Will: That's not childish. This is.


Paul's Letter to your penis and to the Ephesians
Chapter 1
Paul, an apostle of Christ Jesus through the will of God, to your penis and to the saints who are at Ephesus, and the faithful in Christ Jesus: 2Grace to your penis and peace from God, your penis's Father and his Lord, Jesus Christ.

3Blessed be the God and Father of your penis's Lord, Jesus Christ, who has blessed your penis with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places in Christ; 4even as He chose your penis in Him before the foundation of the world, that your penis would be holy and without blemish before Him in love; 5having predestined your penis for adoption as a son through Jesus Christ to Himself, according to the good pleasure of His desire, 6to the praise of the glory of His grace, by which He freely bestowed favor on your penis in the Beloved.

#23 ::: Teresa Nielsen Hayden ::: (view all by) ::: August 23, 2003, 01:21 PM:

Okay, that one made me laugh out loud.

#24 ::: Teresa Nielsen Hayden ::: (view all by) ::: August 24, 2003, 08:55 PM:

If Stoppard could recast Auden as slash, anything is possible.

#25 ::: Yote Lachupo ::: (view all by) ::: September 06, 2003, 09:15 PM:

CHURCH OF THE HOLY PENIS
P.L.U.M. (Penis Lovers Universal Movement)
The sole purpose of this movement is to gain universal participation by those people whom honestly LOVE PENIS so much that they consider THE PENIS to be GOD. They dedicate all or most of their lives to WORSHIP THE LORD GOD PENIS.
If you are a lover of cocks to the extent that it is like a GOD, you are invited to join our free Groups. YOTE LACHUPO
(Mainly gay but bi, curious and females are welcume!)
P.L.U.M. (Penis Lovers Universal Movement)
Dedicated penis lovers join P.L.U.M. to worship THE LORD GOD PENIS

#26 ::: Xopher ::: (view all by) ::: September 06, 2003, 10:09 PM:

Well, that ad should achieve good market penetration...

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