If you have friends like mine on Facebook, then this bit of drivel has probably been tossed your way:

“Because you know, when the Bible was written, and then rewritten, and then edited, and then re-edi -ted, then translated from dead languages and then re-retranslated and re-edited again, then re-re-re-edited, and then re-translated, and then given to kings for them to take their favorite parts out, and then re-edited and re-translated and given to the pope for him to approve, and then re-edited and re-written— all based on stories that were told orally 30 to 90 years after they had happened to people who didn’t know how to write… I guess what I’m trying to say is, the bible is literally the world’s oldest game of telephone.” (David Cross, comedian)

We could respond soberly, but I have an idea that is more fun. What if, in the middle of his comedic diatribe, Mr. Cross got smacked with the facts. The result might be something like this:

“Because you know, it seems that something might have happened in Jerusalem, but of course all we have is oral tradition and hearsay–oops, scratch that–well, apparently we have written eyewitness accounts, but we are stuck with only 1–oh? Goodness me–make that four eyewitness accounts, written 90 years–Oops, I’m sorry–30 years from the event (and–who knew? Turns out there are some mentions within the letters of Paul penned only 15 years afterward); Of course all of this was written in dead languages (like Greek–who can speak that?) by people who were clearly illiterate–like that Pharisee scholar Paul and Luke the physician–ok maybe not so illiterate but hey, let’s not let facts ruin a good narrative, eh?–And of course that information only survived in a few manuscripts–oops, turns out it’s actually tens upon tens of thousands of manuscripts, hmm–but these are obviously from centuries –oops, correction–as early as decades after their writing; still, probably they have wildly different information, which of course is because of later editing and endless re-translations and due to the activities of kings and medieval popes, and–oh wait–I guess it turns out that these copies are all virtually identical and differ only rarely in insignificant ways such as missing punctuation marks. Well, shucks, I guess it looks the Bible is more like honest reporting than like a game of telephone. But hey, I’m a comedian, not a scholar, and I still don’t like the Bible, so feel free to ignore it and ridicule any of your friends who feel differently. (Christians are fun to ridicule, because they are nice and won’t behead you like certain other scary religions we won’t mention).”