Saturday, April 07, 2012

Preface To Church: What Comes Between Good Friday & Easter Sunday?

Apparently it's called Holy Saturday. That's a little disappointing, although it shouldn't be - after all, "Good Friday" is a little underwhelming as a name for a religious holiday. Often people will say things like, "Have a good Friday!" & they're certainly not suggesting that you celebrate the crucifixion of a religious figure.

However, one of the more interesting stories about Holy Saturday is that Jesus - who was of course at that point quite dead - literally goes to hell.

Don't take that the wrong way! He went there of his own accord & just to free the heroes of the Old Testament, from Adam & Eve on up. The implication - & if you weren't ever taught this, you're probably not Catholic - was that, before Jesus' death, everyone went to hell. Noah was in hell. Moses was in hell.

But Jesus only brings people from the Old Testament to heaven. Great humans of pagan faiths have to stay there. & probably no one explain to Socrates, say, why his old chess buddy Solomon just disappeared one day. Unless maybe Satan told them later, just to fuck with them.

It makes you wonder - did Jesus have that planned all along? Or did he think, right after his death, "Oh I know what I can do!" & though there's any real consensus on the subject - most Protestants utterly reject the notion, since there's nothing really in scripture about it - it's impressive how much Jesus got done on a day that for the most part he could have just taken it easy.

Did you get as much done today?

No comments: