Moses says God says: (Deuteronomy 20:16-18)
God’s ruthless. Just read Deuteronomy,
believers get zero autonomy:
“You must kill all non-Jews
in this land that I choose.”
Just back then? Or still now? (Love His bonhomie!)
Luke says Jesus says: (Luke 19:27)
Christ was often less peaceful than stormy,
with disciples both pushy and swarmy;
to the rest he made plain
if they’d not have him reign:
“Bring them hither and slay them before me.”
Muhammad says God says: (Qur’an 9:5)
“Polytheists, wherever you find them,
you should ambush and capture and bind them,
and only relax
if they pray and pay tax;
elsewise kill them, and in the dust grind them.”
*****
Given that Jews, Christians and Muslims all claim to be worshipping the same god, the only God, the God of Abraham, it’s somewhat surprising how much time they spend fighting each other. But then, factions within the same religion have been known to slaughter each other. It seems to be something inherent in religions, especially monotheistic ones – if you believe there is only one god, your god, then everyone else’s belief is blasphemy.
Somehow these tribal religions of preliterate herders have continued to the present. They are so illogical and – despite beautiful architecture etc – so frequently violent that the best response I can think of is the mockery of limericks and other forms of light verse. That, and mourning the dead children, and supporting efforts to impose peace.
These limericks were first published in The HyperTexts, Michael R. Burch’s enormous anthology which includes extensive poetry about both the Holocaust and the Nakba, the Palestinian Catastrophe.
“Moses causes the Levites to kill the idolators” is marked with Public Domain Mark 1.0.
Form in Formless Times 
I too have written limericks about religion, mostly heretical limericks:
Pell-Mell for Hell Mel
by Michael R. Burch
There once was a Baptist named Mel
who condemned all non-Christians to hell.
When he stood before God
he felt like a clod
to discover His Love couldn’t fail!
Why I Left the Religious Right
by Michael R. Burch
He’s got Jesus’s name on a wallet insert
and “Hell is for Queers” on the back of his shirt
and he upholds the Law,
for grace has a flaw:
the Church must have someone to drag through the dirt.
Hell to Pay
by Michael R. Burch
A messiah named Jesus, returning
from heaven, found planet earth burning
& with children unfed,
so he ventured: “Instead
of war, why not consider cheek-turning?”
Indignant right-wingers retorted:
“Sir, your pacifist views are distorted!
Just pull the plug quickly
on someone who’s sickly!
Our pursuit of war can’t be aborted!”
But, alas!, poets seem unlikely to save the world from the darkness of human religions:
The Heimlich Limerick
by Michael R. Burch
for T. M.
The sanest of poets once wrote:
“Friend, why be a sheep or a goat?
Why follow the leader
or be a blind breeder?”
But almost no one took note.
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Nice, Mike! I particularly like ‘Hell to Pay’. But I’m confused by ‘The Heimlich Limerick’ – T.M.? “The sanest of poets”? I’m lost.
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Tom Merrill is an antinatalist poet who thinks human beings have no right to procreate. It’s a bit of an inside joke.
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