Warning: The following is a direct parody of something else. You may not "get it" unless you have seen the "original".

Oh, hi, folks! This is the Mayor of Townsville. Say, I was watching television from my office yesterday and I thought this tid-bit in the latest installment of the Till/Holding debate over “Yahewh’s Failed Land Promise” was just too delicious not to single out and make a long, long-winded speech about. It so beautifully exposes and details what Holding has called Till’s “inability to so much as blow his nose without instructions” that I wanted to highlight it for my visitors, all 3 of them! Listen up, now!

I've been reading the material that Till has offered in rebuttal to Holding’s many varied attempts to buttress biblical inerrancy and I ran across a particular item that I thought was most interesting! In part 4 of Till’s article, "Where's the Land," Till tries to defend his ignorance in part by appealing to a guy named Monson who read a book by a guy named Cross. Whaw haw, I love that hearsay stuff. Anyway, in particular, Monson focuses on a quote from Cross, and here's a sampling of what Monson wrote,

Well, Farrell was aware of this term, as well as its meaning and application. I have to admit, however, that while I had seen "suzerian-vassal treaty" used before in my reading, I was not familiar with any of the specifics as to what all this entailed; a problem I quickly tackled, however! I came to find out that this was a rather complex issue, and it wasn't until I read Frank Moore Cross's From Epic To Canon: History and Literature in Ancient Israel (Harvard Univ. Press, 1998), and Canaanite Myth and Hebrew Epic (Harvard Univ. Press, 1973), that I really understood. In fact, in From Epic To Canon, in the chapter on "Kinship and Covenant in Ancient Israel," Cross has a subheader titled "Elements of Confusion in the Understanding of Israel's Ancient Covenant." And I think what he has to say applies to the situation here because he mentions directly the Abrahamic and Davidic covenants. I'm just going to quote, for the moment, a very interesting footnote:

Frank Moore Cross (footnote, page 14) {my emphasis added}: There are, to be sure, some interesting parallels between two types of "dynastic promise to David" and two types of dynastic clauses of suzerainty treaties of the second millennium. Certain elements are common to both types: The suzerain secures the vassal on the throne, secures the land in his possession, and lists land boundaries. Sometimes "sonship" is granted.

But two types of promise are found in regard to the future of the dynasty. The usual is to promise that a king's heirs will remain on the throne under the protection of the suzerain so long as they are obedient to the stipulations of the covenant. The treaty makes the perpetuation of the dynasty conditional. In the second type, the promise of the land and promise of the dynastic succession are unconditional. This type is found in pure form in the Treaty of Tudkhaliyas IV and Ulmi-Teshup of Dattassa. It is said that if Ulmi-Teshup is faithful to his covenant with his suzerain, it is the obligation of the suzerain to preserve his heirs on the throne of Dattassa, and to preserve the land in the heirs' possession. If a future son sins (rebels), he may be punished or removed, but kingship and land must pass to another heir of Ulmi-Teshup, in theory thereby creating an eternal dynasty. Put another way, it can be said that permanence of dynasty and possession of land rests on the "reservoir of grace" filled by the obedience of Ulmi-Teshup alone, and therefore is not dependent on the fidelity of each succeeding heir--presumably intensifying Ulmi-Teshup's motivation to obedience. The analogy with the "high" or unconditional royal ideology of the Davidids is obvious. Thanks to the piety of David, the throne is eternally promised to the house of David; thanks to the fidelity of Abraham, the land is promised perpetually to his seed. One suspects that in this unconditional promise to heirs, archaic kinship ideology is at work: the family of the faithful covenant partner is bound forever in kinship bonds with the suzerain, and his family.

Well, folks, I'm a busy guy what with all the speeches I have to make, but you know, I just happen to have a copy of that Cross guy's book in my office. I think I got it when I traded it from the Mayor of Citysville for a bowling ball. Anyway I eagerly decided to look it up and whoa hoa! I was stunned when I found it. Before I begin to comment on this, though, I want you all to notice Monson and Till’s religious bigotry and racism. See how he referred a guy named "Frank Moore Cross"? Bah ha! I know what he's thinking. That's a secret code. You see, I looked up "Frank" in the dictionary and it's a word that refers to the ability of people to use postal services free. Now Till and Monson are attacking Christians, right? And the "cross" is their symbol. Whoo hoo! So the only reason these guys used a book by this man is to send a secret message to Christians that they should "frank more cross," that is, break the law by sending the crosses they carry on their necks with illegal postage. Ha ha, I knew it! Not only that, but rearrange the letters in the name "Frank Moore Cross." Know what you get? You get "Remarks for Coons." Ah ha! It's a hidden racial slur! Maybe they think the average idiot will miss stuff like that, but it takes a practiced idiot like me to find hidden racist remarks! Excuse me a minute -- hey, Ms. Bellum, can you take this stuff to the laundry for me, I need it drycleaned. What? I need to take it to the drycleaners. Don't get smart with me, Miss Bellum. They're the same thing, even an idiot like me knows that!

Anyways, let me explain what's so funny about this. Ya see, the footnote Monson talks about isn't in the section "Elements of Confusion and All that Stuff." No sirree! It's actually a footnote at the end of the preceding subheaded section. It just runs a couple of pages and goes under that section on Confusion. Oh, I know, Till will say Monson just looked too quick at the pages and made a mistake. And probably Till will also say he assumed Monson was a reliable source and that he knew what he was talking about. Well, I say, Humbug! You can't trust Till after a mistake like this! No, sir! I sure wouldn't! If Miss Bellum filed something under E that belonged under F, I would have her out the door on her hiney in a minute. She's sure lucky I don't always remember that E and F are different letters.

Anyway, I figure Holding will have a field day with this, just like he's had a field day with Till not being able to read that he didn't want him to pay for 90% of his website and all the other dumb reading errors Till has made so far. Also this reveals that Till is not the expert in suzerainty treaties or the Bible that he likes to pretend that he is. In many of Till’s articles he makes a big fuss over revealing what the Bible “clearly” says in one of 45,837,983 English translations he uses. He then copies and pastes from them translations, it seems, to dazzle his errancy-minded readers into a belief that he is some kind of self-taught amateur whiz in these biblical languages and in the Bible. Sure works for some of his fans I know. However, his fumbling in using Monson's documentation, and that he in fact relies on one of his own fans to get him material and interpret it for him, reveals that he really is a self-taught amateur and also one who actually doesn’t have the wherewithal to double-check his sources (since he obviously wouldn’t know what Cross said in that book if it hit him in the face otherwise he would have puzzled over the inapplicability of what Cross wrote to what Holding said from the garbage-in-garbage-out fan of his) and find out if they are actually accurate in their reporting. And recall, folks, that this guy has a Master’s degree in English, graded student papers for 30+ years, and has written on Biblical errancy for 12 years, which should uniquely qualify him for checking source material on this subject!

Errors like this one destroy a person's credibility. It destroys an anti-apologist’s credibility because it reveals deception and sloppy research. Such an error reveals deception because, when Till was parading "his" Bible and suzerainty treaty "knowledge" around, he never once informed his readers that his statements were attributable to books he read. Not mentioning where he got his information, he allowed his readers to assume that this was simply a knowledge of the Bible and treaties that Till himself possessed. It is sloppy because Till, that Master of the Errancy, should have known to double-check his "reference source" for accuracy since he himself had no self-contained knowledge of treaties and so should have been more careful in his research. But, perhaps credibility is not an issue for the pack of Till-thralls who hang on every word Till has to offer in defense of their ignorant unbelief. Perhaps Till's stuffy demeanor, fluff, blather, obnoxious repetition, and superior attitude appeals to those who care about "style" (such as it is) over substance. However, those of us who rely on serious scholarship cannot abide by Till's mistakes. I don't think a single scholar, whose "lifeblood" is the Bible, ever let one of his fans cut and paste a paragraph with an erroneous attribution like this into their discussion of a Bible or a suzerainty treaty.

I expect that Till will never once claim responsibility for the blunder. Oh, he might say it was a "mistake" but he'll put "mistake" in his statement within quotation marks. To my mind, this denotes that the “mistake” really wasn’t one in actuality; it only “appears” as an mistake. I could be wrong, but I know how to read people's minds so I'm probably not. He'll probably state, “…but it's one not attributable to my own error, but to that of my reference source, Monson.” Well, Till, just who is using this “reference source” if not you? Who is responsible to make sure that his “references” are accurate and convey what you want it to convey? Aren’t you the one with the Master’s degree in English who graded student papers and claims to be more knowledgeable about the Bible than fundamentalist scholars, and in a position to pass judgment on even liberal ones that disagree with you? Shouldn’t you be the expert in finding the very best “reference sources” available on this subject and then use them appropriately? And what about Monson? Oh, he'll probably say, "I looked too fast and thought it was in that section. It was under that section." You know, I find it amusing when people blame their books for errors of their own. It is never the reader who is at fault when a book “misprints.” I have a couple of friends in the library business who laughed uproariously when I told 'em I figured Monson would say that. They rolled their eyes and said in effect, “Yes, that’s the same type of lame excuse we hear from readers everyday! Then we ask them to return their books and send them back to the library since they are obviously too dense to know how to read.” You will see in a moment that Holding read this same book, but because he has the experience and knowledge to check his sources noticed that there was something odd in what Till-Monson was reporting (influenced by his “reference source”) and double-checked what he had claimed.

Now that we’ve seen that it's likely Till or Monson will claim the error was due (respectively) to their trust of their fan and the printing, and not to themselves, draw your attention to his original discourse in which Till not only simply cut and pasted the information obtained from Monson, but then used that erroneous information to stress a point! He used this erroneous cite to bolster his argument. What's that? What do you mean, How did he use that cite to bolster his argument??? It's in close proximity, isn't it? It's in the same article! That's what counts. That was Till’s interpretation of what the Monson was reporting (and, remember folks, Till has claimed to be an expert at debunking Biblical inerrancy). And Monson was obviously trying to say that Holding was "confused" by this "element of confusion" as the subheading supposedly said. Therefore, the “error” was indeed his! When I realized what Till had done, I got the mental picture of Fuzzy Lumpkin running headfirst into the wall and then bouncing off one of Blossom's punches. I can hear the canned spinach now! I wonder what lengths biblical errantists will go to distance themselves from problems which destroy not only their errancy stance, but also their credibility. The trouble here is Till has agreed to debate Holding in a public forum and he can’t easily sweep these errors of judgment and research under the rug with a quick editing job of his article without mention of his mistake. Everyone is already aware of the mistake since his material was entered into the public record. I can see now the brilliance of Holding for cornering Till into engaging in an open, public debate where EVERYTHING that both sides submit will be open for public scrutiny! Boy, I just wonder how Till is going to sweep that bit about paying for 90% of Holding's website under the rug. That one is in PRINT and Holding has a copy!

Do the people who follow Till realize what buffoonery this guy’s arguments are? They spend at least 7000 hours a year listening to this guy and reading his stuff, under the impression, I would assume, that their attention is going to first-rate errancy material that will aid them in combating Biblicists like J. P Holding. They trust the intellect of Till to buttress their doubts and assure them that they made the right decision rejecting Christianity. Now they find out that their hero is stumbling in defense of their unbelief by pretending to know subtleties of ancient Near Eastern suzerainty treaties but all the while he was using a second-rate, error-prone fan of his! This is simply unbelievable and if I had given time to Till I’d demand it back. Once you make one such mistake, presto! That means you've made a million by association and not a word you said is worth spit. Uh ah, Game Over!

To my personal and insane delight, Holding also caught Till’s error and then nailed his hide to the wall with it. Thank heavens, I need something to get happy over! Anyways, I hope that this will be a lesson to Till's admirers, who should understand now that they shouldn't swoon in admiration when he undertakes to tell them what the Bible meant or that a treaty form doesn't apply to what Holding says.  They should always take with a grain of salt what an amateur says when he presumes to explain the meanings of Bible texts from a social world and culture he he doesn't know. I wonder if the fans of Till are changing their minds now? I doubt it, but this is good stuff for them, folks. Really good. It's all they've got to hang on to.

The Mayor