Operation: Codebreaker
by Jon Worley

There's this book that sets forth the strictures on how any person can "decode" the Bible, and folks have been flocking to buy it. If there's one message in the Bible, it's that we've all got to work it out for ourselves. And the craziness surrounding this book makes me think of that moment in Life of Brian where Brian utters that very thought, and the crowd responds ecstatically, in unison, "Yes, we've all got to work it out for ourselves."

Ahem.

So, in the interest of helping some of our more gullible citizens gain a better understanding of the best-selling book in history, I'd like to present a few of my favorite moments in the Bible, decoded by my own very special Secret Bible Decoder Wheel (ordering info at the end of the column).

Song of Solomon (or Song of Songs) 5:1
"I come to my garden, my sister, my bride; I gather my myrrh with my spice, I eat my honeycomb with my honey, I drink my wine with my milk. Eat friends, drink, and be drunk with love."

I said these words at my wedding, and they mean simply "Get down, make love", preferably sung in the voice of Freddie Mercury. My Secret Bible Decoder Wheel goes a bit further in its interpretation. It says "Baste chicken slowly, and then tear into it with ravenous breath." Note that these two interpretations are not mutually exclusive.

In a more general way, let's approach the entire book of Job. In this tale, God decides it would be fun to torture a guy named Job. So everything Job loves, like his wives, his kids, his house and all his possessions are wiped out. And God tries to get Job to rebuke Him, or at least turn away from God. Job is tempted, but in the end he sticks with God, and like any Hollywood movie he gets back double what he lost. His wives are all buff and stacked, his kids are all doctors and his land is fertile.

This is a bit of an oversimplification, but the message inside is pretty simple, at least as my Sunday School teacher put it: If you can't see God, smell him or even suspect him of being a terrible bastard, as long as you stick with him long enough he'll come around, and everything will be keen. This message explains why almost everyone in Bangladesh is Muslim, by the way.

My Secret Bible Decoder Wheel sets forth an even more basic interpretation: "God gets a bit heavy into the hooch every now and again, but he's always sorry in the morning." Again, you will note that these interpretations are not mutually exclusive.

Let's finish up with a bit from everyone's favorite book, Revelation, shall we?

Revelation 20:1-3
Then I saw an angel coming down from heaven, holding in his hand the key to the bottomless pit and a great chain. He seized the dragon, that ancient serpent, who is the Devil and Satan, and bound him for a thousand years, and threw him into the pit, and locked and sealed it over him, so that he would deceive the nations no more, until the thousand years were ended. After that he must be let out for a little while.

This is toward the end of the whole weird Revelation saga and recognizable figures like O.J. and Chuck Norris have already left the scene. Now we're into the future, and the bad-ass angel has cast Satan (who I like to think looks a little like Ralph Reed) into a big pit. But, see, God is a big fan of furlough, even for the sworn enemy of man: the Devil gets parole eventually.

My Secret Bible Decoder Wheel is a bit more cryptic, which is fitting considering the source material. It reads: "I talked to Bill Casey before he died, and it turns out the CIA has done some really nasty things".

As Meatloaf says, two out of three ain't bad. I think with a little more practice I could really get the hang of this codes thing.

Jon Worley's Secret Bible Decoder Wheel is available from the LCN Syndicate. Send $5 (money order or well-concealed cash) to: LCN Syndicate (Amish Country Office), 404 W. Philadelphia, York, PA 17404. No checks, no credit card orders. And no C.O.D.s.

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