The Preacher and The Pig
You never know what unknown history you might uncover by looking at the various sites telling why a day is special. Remember the one I found with the story of milking a cow on an airplane? And today, I could’ve used the story about the guy who delivered a 250-pound cheese ball to the White House, but then I saw something else that grabbed my curiosity. It was about a trial in the year 1521, and the trial was at “A Diet of Worms.”
Are you saying “huh?” right now? Me, too! I’ll start with the simple thing, the definition of the word diet in 1500s Europe…
From the Shun Keto website: The word diet has had different meanings throughout history. In the political context, a diet refers to a formal deliberative assembly, such as the German Imperial Diet, which was the general assembly of the Imperial Estates of the Holy Roman Empire.
One of those assemblies in the “Holy Roman Empire” was called A Diet of Worms and it was the assembly that tried Martin Luther in 1521. And it was on April 17th, thus it showed up in my daily history search.
Now, in case you’re wondering about the image and title for this blog, it is a reference to one of history’s most awful acts of anti-semitism. And I only learned about it when studying a book called “Holy to Yahveh” by Terrye Goldblum Seedman about 20 years ago. I was only able to find one copy at Thrift Books, but maybe by leaving a link here, it can help people find it elsewhere by seeing the cover image.
In her book, the author talks about how hard Martin Luther tried to convert Jews to Christianity as he understood it. When he failed to convert the masses, he got extremely angry and created an 8 point outline for killing them and removing all knowledge of their religious practices from the world. He called it “The Jews and Their Lies” and his suggestions for their destruction were followed by Hitler during the Holocaust. She doesn’t include all of it, but just a small part of it says…
First, to set fire to their synagogues or schools and to bury and cover with dirt whatever will not burn, so that no man will ever again see a stone or cinder of them. This is to be done in honor of our Lord and of Christendom, so that God might see that we are Christians, and do not condone or knowingly tolerate such public lying, cursing, and blaspheming of his Son and of his Christians. For whatever we tolerated in the past unknowingly and I myself was unaware of it will be pardoned by God.
Another part of his behavior she covered in the book was about how he carved an image of a pig over a door to keep the Jews out of his church. I looked for information on that to see if that’s why he was on trial, and I was shocked to see it was far worse than just a carving of a pig. It’s a detailed portrayal of Jewish men doing perverted acts with a pig. I didn’t make it large enough to see the details, but I’m shocked that anyone who calls themself a minister of God and His Holy Word would commission something so disgusting. It’s called The Judensau, and Wikipedia has a full article on the one at Wittenberg. Yes, apparently there are more than one of these. Yuck!
So, I know this is a little less positive than most of what I share on this blog, but since the date popped up in “This Day in History” searches, I’m sharing what I’ve learned. My hope is that when you see how far off one man can go, and then you look at how much influence those off-kilter thoughts can have, you’ll understand the desperate need to study God’s Word and get a solid understanding of it in your own life. Even Solomon, the wisest man to ever live, ended up building an altar to at least one false god for one of his wives.
It’s sad that humans can fail so miserably, and I’m also reading about plenty of failures on the parts of the Jews in the Bible as I read Isaiah right now. It’s not an excuse for anti-semitism, and they all paid heavy prices (like years in bondage) for their failures, but we have a God who does not desire to see any of us perish for our failures. That’s why He provides the blood of Christ to save us from our sins. Whether preachers end up riding pigs or riding circuits to get a solid gospel from God’s Word to the masses, they are still human, so I encourage you to follow the biblical instruction that, if you think you are standing, take heed lest you fall. Keep a healthy appetite for The Bible, and study to show yourself approved unto God. It’s your safest place to avoid the traps in this world.
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My Love for Weird History
It was an “udderly” successful flight that changed history. A cow named Nellie Jay (who was later renamed Elm Farm Ollie), made remarkable strides in flight on February 18th, 1930. No, she did not have red hearts instead of regular cow spots, but she was the first cow to be flown in an airplane and milked while in flight. The day is now known as “Cow Milked While Flying in an Airplane Day” and is celebrated every February 18th.
You can read all about the cow and its history at https://www.holidaycalendar.io/holiday/cow-milked-while-flying-in-an-airplane-day and https://nationaltoday.com/cow-milked-while-flying-in-an-airplane-day/ which each have unique focus on telling what happened. I like that the Holiday Calendar site (first link) gives ideas for celebrating the day, and the National Today site tells what day of the week these special days and celebrations fall on.
If you’re not interested in flying cows, you can look up the history of how the (dwarf) planet Pluto was discovered on the same day. The day has a few other designations, but since I like the quirky ones, I’m pretty glad for “Thumb Appreciation Day.” 1,2,3,4, I declare thumb war. 👍👍🤜🤛
I’m not sure why I’m attracted to news of the weird, funny, unusual, or odd stuff in this world, but it’s a bit of comic stress relief even if it doesn’t create rolling laughter like animal videos. 😁 But, if we have a sense of humor, it’s pretty likely that God does too, and we get ours from Him. I mean, think about Elisha helping someone retrieve a lost axe head by making it swim to him. Or how about Jonah? The reluctant prophet not only got swallowed up by a whale, he got thrown up by it as well. And then God grew a giant bush over his head and later sent a worm to devour it, just so Jonah could face the silliness of his temper tantrums. And of course, there is also the story of the talking donkey. I wrote about that one back in 2014 on a post called “Donkey Talk Blues” that includes 2 fun videos; one by ApologetiX and one by Don Francisco. If you want to see them, visit https://crystal-writes.com/2014/06/23/donkey-talk-blues/.
Sure, all those stories have the element of being teachable moments from The Lord, but that doesn’t mean God didn’t find a little humor in things as He made them happen for whatever purposes He planned. He had Sarah and Abraham name their son Isaac to remember that she laughed at the possibility of having a son in her in old age–which is its own funny story when you picture a pregnant 99-year-old woman. He added joy as a fruit of The Spirit. And YahShua (Jesus) even told the disciples that He taught them commandments to make sure their joy would be made full. So, whether it be joy, laughter, or just a really big smile, join me in looking for all the gifts of “happy” shown to us by our Lord and Abba Father.
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Ice Cream for Breakfast?
I used to faithfully visit those sites with lists of everything a day had to offer from international days to world days to local celebrations. I still like to quench my curiosity with these things now and again, and I chose today to do some research. The first thing that came up was “National Ice Cream for Breakfast Day.” Apparently, it’s always the first Saturday in February, and it started in the 1960s to cheer up kids with winter blahs. I’ve never tried “snow cream” but I imagine kids might like that even better since it would include some play time. Maybe the parents who started it also knew it was “Fettuccini Alfredo” day, so the kids would have a warm, not-so-sweet dinner later. 🍨🍜
In other February 7th events, 1990 brought a dissolution of the Soviet Union when the “Central Committee of the Soviet Communist Party” agreed to give up its monopoly on power. And I had to share that one because of the word Monopoly. This day in 1935 was the early release date of the Parker Brothers Monopoly game. Though I always believed the story about the out-of-work engineer creating the game for his family during the great depression, I’ve learned tonight that it was actually invented a lot earlier by a woman. It was called The Landlord’s Game and it was based in “Georgism” which was apparently the opposite of what the current game came to represent.
If you read from the older events to the newer ones, you can see how much mankind has learned as time has moved forward. When the New Madrid earthquake hit in 1812 and made the Mississippi River run backward, many probably thought it was the end of the world. Fast forward beyond the Beatles beginning the “British Invasion” in 1964, and the first untethered space walk in 1984 to scientists in 2014 announcing that the Happisburgh Footprints in Norfolk, England are 800,000 years old and we’re in an era where that backward river flow now has a name. It’s called a “fluvial tsunami.” There, now you’ve learned something new for your day.
But, now I have to ask, can we really declare something to be 800,000 years old? Or millions or billions of years old? Isn’t all of that just supposition based on limited knowledge and dating techniques used by people who were never there? Even recorded history may be “his story” or “her story” and not totally factual, so how much more suspect is that which has never been written down from eyewitness testimony? The Bible tells us in 2 Timothy 3:7 that men are “always learning and never able to come to the knowledge of the truth.”
God tells Daniel in chapter 12 and verse 4 that the truths he is hiding away are meant for a time when people will run all over (to and fro) looking for knowledge. The big question here is whether they are seeking knowledge to find ways to connect with God or to try and disprove Him. But, if they are trying to connect with Him, he’s made it far simpler (though not always easier) to just seek Him directly. He promises wisdom (much more important than simple knowledge) to anyone who asks Him for it without doubting.
James 1:5-8 WEBUS
[5] But if any of you lacks wisdom, let him ask of God, who gives to all liberally and without reproach, and it will be given to him. [6] But let him ask in faith, without any doubting, for he who doubts is like a wave of the sea, driven by the wind and tossed. [7] For that man shouldn’t think that he will receive anything from the Lord. [8] He is a double-minded man, unstable in all his ways.
https://bible.com/bible/206/jas.1.5-8.WEBUS
So whether you have fettuccini Alfredo for dinner or ice cream for breakfast, never forget that the most important day in history is the one where the precious blood of YahShua HaMashiach (Jesus Christ) was shed so you could spend eternity in the Presence of The Holy Father, Yahveh Almighty. That is the best of all knowledge and wisdom combined.
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