A 1189 Day Journey Through the Bible

I am writing from my hotel in Graz, Austria. Nehemiah 1: This chapter is Nehemiah's prayer.  He is lamenting over the fall of Jerusalem, and saying he wants to bring people together in God's name (recalling God's promise to Moses):  ‘If you are unfaithful, I will scatter  you among the nations,   but if you return to me and obey my commands, then even if your exiled people are at the farthest horizon, I will gather  them from there and bring them to the place I have chosen as a dwelling for my Name.’

I am writing from my hotel in Graz, Austria. Ezra 10: The racism continues. The people of the town are now apologizing for intermarrying, then there's a big list of all the people who did.  And it says that they all pledged to "put away their wives," yet we are not told what that means.

I am writing from my hotel in Graz, Austria. Ezra 9: This chapter is about Ezra's prayer to God and how sorry he is for his people not being racist enough.  There was interbreeding going on between races and this was a big no no. I assume this is one source of where mixed race hatred stemmed from.

I am writing from my hotel in Graz, Austria. Ezra 8: First we start with a long list of people who are coming with Ezra. He assigned some roles and did some burnt offerings.

I am writing from my hotel in Graz, Austria. Ezra 7: Ezra, a teacher of the law, comes to Jerusalem. And then basically there's a letter from King Artaxerxes that endorses Ezra.

I am writing from my desk in Seattle, WA. Ezra 6: There was another letter about the temple.  Then it was finished, and there was some sacrifices.  And then passover was celebrated.  We've seen this before.

I am writing from my desk in Seattle, WA. Ezra 5: This is another chapter that has a letter which discusses the status of the temple being rebuilt.

I am writing from my desk in Seattle, WA. Ezra 4: This is kind of interesting.  So the enemies of Judah and Benjamin hear about the temple, and they want to help rebuild it.  But they say no way, we don't want your help.  So they tried to discourage them from building it; perhaps sour because they didn't want their help. Then there was a back and forth of letters between a couple kings named Xerxes (I thought this dude was just on the 300) and Artaxerxes about how Jerusalem was being rebuilt and they weren't down with that.

I am writing from my desk in Seattle, WA. Ezra 3: The altar is rebuilt, complete with sacrifices. Then they started to rebuild the temple, and shouted praise.

I am writing from my desk in Seattle, WA. Ezra 2: This chapter is just a relatively detailed list of those who returned from exile.

I am writing from my desk in Seattle, WA. Ezra 1: In this chapter, Cyrus helps the exiles to come back.  Though I wonder if he's just getting them to come back to help build the temple?  There's also an inventory of silver and gold items.

I am writing from my desk in Seattle, WA. 2 Chronicles 36: This chapter has four king changes, the last of which was not so great.  Then Jerusalem fell.  The temple was destroyed and exile occurred. We are told that Cyrus king of Persia proclaims how God is on his team.

I am writing from my desk in Seattle, WA. 2 Chronicles 35: In this chapter, Josiah has a pretty standard passover celebration, then later dies by arrow.

I am writing from my hotel in San Francisco, CA. 2 Chronicles 34: Josiah torn down some statues that were making God butthurt so that was a good thing. So the people find the Book of the Law, and they realized they hadn't been following it well.  And God tells a prophet who then tells people that God is about to roast the place because these idiots have burning incense to other gods.  THE NERVE. They don't wanna get roasted so they decided to follow God out of fear! Which doesn't actually change people.  See:  American Fundamentalism.

I am writing from my hotel in San Francisco, CA. 2 Chronicles 33: Manasseh did evil, meaning that he roasted his sons and did some witchcraft.  You know, the foreign god stuff that the teenager God gets really bent out of shape about.  So God made sure that he got kidnapped.  Once he was taken, he changed his mind and wanted to be good again, so God helped him out.  So his story is one of redemption.  He died and his son Amon took over.  Evidently that dude was a big turd so his officials assassinated him.  His son Josiah took over.

I am writing from my hotel in San Francisco, CA. 2 Chronicles 32: Here we go again. Sennacherib (king of Assyria) decides to attack Judah.  He tells all the people that God won't help them.  Hezekiah asks for God's help, so God sends an angel (still not explanation of what an angel is) and the angel slaughters a bunch of people so Hezekiah can win.  Maybe like a Superman of some sorts? Recurring theme:  Have God on your side and you're gonna be gravy. Later on, Hezekiah died and his son Manasseh took over as king of Judah.

I am writing from my hotel in San Francisco, CA. 2 Chronicles 31: The Israelites smashed all the bad altars and Hezekiah had some more offerings.  Everybody gave because everyone was blessed because God had their back because Hezekiah did all the right stuff.  Same as usual.

I am writing from my desk in Seattle, WA. 2 Chronicles 30: This chapter is just a celebration of the passover.  It is exactly what you think it is.

I am writing from my desk in Seattle, WA. 2 Chronicles 29: Purifying the sanctuary.  Praise.  Sacrifices.  Burnt offerings.  Consecration.  Temple.  BLAH BLAH. Chronicles is so boring.

I am writing from my desk in Seattle, WA. 2 Chronicles 28: Well Ahaz is a shit head because he worshipped idols and burnt the wrong stuff. God gets super pissed about this because God is a jealous teenager with a self esteem problem. (I don't actually think God is like this, but this is a basic understanding of God by primitive, uneducated people who lived thousands of years ago and didn't know what rain was) To alleviate this divine fury some prisoners were released and I guess everything was okay. But Ahaz still sucked because he worshipped some statues or something and then he died. His son Hezekiah took over.

I am writing from my desk in Seattle, WA. 2 Chronicles 27: Conquered the Ammonites.  Was a good guy.  Died.  His son Ahaz takes over.

I am writing from my desk in Seattle, WA. 2 Chronicles 26: Uzziah became king of Judah.  He did all the right stuff so God liked him.  Some wars, God helped him, blah blah.  Every story is the same.  Then pride got the best of him after he became famous so God gave him leprosy.  He died later on down the road.  Then Jotham takes every.  Literally every one of these stories are the same.

I am writing from my desk in Seattle, WA. 2 Chronicles 25: Amaziah takes over as king of Judah.  He did mostly good in the eyes of God, we are told.  He had the officials who killed his father executed, but he didn't kill their kids!  What a saint! Then he rallied a bunch of troops and slaughtered ten thousand people.  He took ten thousand other people alive and brought them to the top of a cliff and then threw them off so they were "dashed to pieces."  LOL I guess you can get away with a lot and still do "mostly good" in the eyes of the Lord. Then he slaughtered some more people and brought back some of their gods, to which he did some burning sacrifices.  God was PISSED.  See, you can burn animals on someone else's statue or some shit and really piss God off, but slaughtering thousands of humans is totally fine. This is obviously an ancient understanding of humanity, which basically has nothing to do with God. Anyway, Amaziah turned away ...

I am writing from my desk in Seattle, WA. 2 Chronicles 24: Joash was seven when he became king.  Weird. He raised some money and repaired a temple. Joash was no good.  He got totally ransacked and then killed.

I am writing from my desk in Seattle, WA. 2 Chronicles 23: So a bunch of guys get around and they all got spears and they are praising the new king.  Ahaziah died at the end of the last chapter and his mom was pissed.  Just ritualistic stuff.  Pretty standard for this era. Then Athaliah shouted "treason" and they detained her.  She is Ahaziah's mom and of course got put to death.  You could get executed for anything. Everyone was calm now that she is dead.

I am writing from my desk in Seattle, WA. 2 Chronicles 22: Well the only family member left was Ahaziah, who was his youngest son, so he is king now. So he gets wounded and then goes into hiding.  He wasn't nice.  Then some other people died too. This back of forth of this king, that king, this king, that king; is reallllllllly boring.

I am writing from my desk in Seattle, WA. 2 Chronicles 21: Jehoshaphat dies and his son Jehoram takes over as king of Judah. He started by killing all of his brothers and some officials.  He did evil but it didn't matter since God already made a promise to some descendent that had nothing to do with Jehoram. Apparently God had a change of heart because Jehoram got a letter from a prophet that said God would murder his family and give him some kind of bowel disease.  Well wouldn't you know, his family got erased and his bowels fell out and he died.

I am writing from my desk in Seattle, WA. 2 Chronicles 20: This chapter is business as usual.  Someone (Jehoshaphat) is about to be attacked (by the Moabites and Ammonites), but because Jehoshaphat and God are buddies, him and his people are able to lay waste to the enemies.  This is a recurring theme. If you take this literally, then God helps you kill people.  But there's so much more to this.  It is about overcoming insurmountable odds. Later on, Jehoshaphat makes an alliance with some asshole and then his ships got destroyed.

I am writing from my desk in Seattle, WA. 2 Chronicles 19: In this chapter Jehoshaphat appoints some judges to basically tell people what to do.  The legislation of morality.  This has never worked and it never will.