***
I just got an email note from my editor. There have been complaints.
Evidently, I piqued your curiosity with something I said months ago, about how I happened to lead a Los Angeles fellow to Christ at the Greater Los Angeles Billy Graham Crusade, back in '63. I then begged off on sharing the anecdote and never came back to it. My editor, Bob, says I can't do that. I cannot mention a funny story and then not tell it.
Sorry, folks, but I don't think it's all that funny. In fact, the whole incident was a stupid waste of time. It was just another of Beelzebub's silly pranks. I should let Beelzebub tell the tale. Beelzebub thinks it's hilarious. But okay. I shall tell you the whole tedious story, and don't say that I didn't warn you in advance.
First off, no matter what you believe, Beelzebub, Belial, and I are not the same as God. For one thing, the three of us cannot be everywhere all at the same time as the three of Him used to do. The only reason a fallen archangel can have so much fun is that we can move like the wind from here to there. Beelzebub in particular gets in and out quickly. But if we “devils” did even half of the stuff that Christians blame us for, we'd have perished from exhaustion, centuries ago. Mostly, we just hang out together and talk, or shoot pool, or play poker, or flirt with women who are drop-dead gorgeous.
So there the three of us were, August 1963, having drinks at Beelzebub's favourite bar in Salt Lake City. It's a Friday night. But the Mormon girls, on this particular Friday, for whatever reason—and this is pretty unusual—were not biting. It's only ten o'clock and Beelzebub has already been shot down four times – three times by good-lookers and once by an overweight schoolteacher with a bad complexion. Beelzebub is now back in our booth, nursing both his drink and his injured narcissism, when he starts going off on the good old days.
"You know who used to really piss me off?" asks Beelzebub.
"Who,
Jesus?" asks Belial.
"Yes,
Jesus," snaps Beelzebub.
We've heard it all before. Bubba loves to complain about Jesus. During his earthly ministry, when Jesus was asked to exorcise "evil spirits" from "demoniacs," the spirits often proved as annoying, as plentiful, as persistent as houseflies: you could chase them out of a schizophrenic at lunchtime, and the demons would go somewhere else, and yet be back home in time for dinner. Repeat. Repeat again. Jesus was obliged to exorcise some demoniacs as many as seven times and then slip out of town before an eighth treatment was required. But I think you've already heard that before, from Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John.
Now whenever Jesus got one of the nutters to settle down for a while, the Pharisees would say, "There's Beelzebub for you," meaning Jesus.
But Jesus would be heard to say, "Beelzebub did not do that exorcism. If Beelzebub casts out Beelzebub, his house will not stand" (
Matt. 10:25, 12:25-28, et al.).
Bubba was personally offended, or pretended to be, whenever Jesus said that. "I don't like it when the Lord takes my name in vain," he says. (He sips his beer, pensively. He sulks. We wait for him to speak again, like Joseph Conrad’s Marlow:) "
'If Beelzebub casts out Beelzebub, his house will not stand.' What is that supposed to mean? I don't care if his old man was a carpenter, I'm tired of having my architectural skills impugned. Give me a hammer and a box of nails, and some lumber, and I'll go one-on-one with Jesus and his cuckoldy father any day of the week."
Beelzebub is sounding angry but it's all bluster. He is just frustrated to have been blown off by those Mormon girls.
Belial stops picking his teeth with that frayed toothpick of his and says: "Get over it, Bubba. That was two thousand years ago."
"Yeah, well guess what? My house is still
standing."
"So is
his," says Belial, pointing skyward. "Why not pay Jesus a house-call? Oh, I forgot – you got kicked
out." Belial now laughs like an idiot at his own joke, as if he were not kicked out of Heaven on the same exact day as Beelzebub. But the thing with Belial is, he just doesn’t give a shit.
So Beelzebub mulls for a while. He comes up with an idea. "It's about time we put it to the test."
"Come again?"
"Let Beelzebub cast out Beelzebub!"
Quite suddenly, Bubba stood up and walked out of the bar without saying goodnight to either of us.
– L.
(
Tomorrow: Now, what!)
