Panis de Deo

          To, whom, then, will you compare God?
              What image will you compare him to?
         As for an idol, a craftsman crafts it,
              and a goldsmith overlays it with gold
              and fashions silver chains for it.
          A man too poor to present such an offering
              selects wood that will not rot.
          He looks for a skilled craftsman
              to set up an idol that will not topple.

-- Isaiah 40:18,20

I love passages in the Bible that portray how useless idols are.  Isaiah has quite a few of them, but I think this one from chapter forty-four is my favorite:

Half of the wood he burns in the fire;
over it he prepares his meal,
he roasts his meat and eats his fill.
He also warms himself and says,
“Ah! I am warm; I see the fire.”
From the rest he makes a god, his idol;
he bows down to it and worships.
He prays to it and says,
“Save me! You are my god!”
They know nothing, they understand nothing;
their eyes are plastered over so they cannot see,
and their minds closed so they cannot understand.
No one stops to think,
no one has the knowledge or understanding to say,
“Half of it I used for fuel;
I even baked bread over its coals,
I roasted meat and I ate.
Shall I make a detestable thing from what is left?
Shall I bow down to a block of wood?”
Such a person feeds on ashes; a deluded heart misleads him;
he cannot save himself, or say,
“Is not this thing in my right hand a lie?”

Isaiah is earnestly pleading his case against idols, but you can almost sense a bit of sarcasm, too: as if he's saying, "Hello!?  Don't you see this?"


Later this week: I will be posting another short story. :)