Hay-Soos

an Israeli researcher claimed Moses was on psychedelic drugs when he heard God deliver the Ten Commandments.... "As far Moses on Mount Sinai is concerned, it was either a supernatural cosmic event, which I don't believe, or a legend, which I don't believe either, or finally, and this is very probable, an event that joined Moses and the people of Israel under the effect of narcotics," Shanon told Israeli public radio on Tuesday. Moses was probably also on drugs when he saw the "burning bush," suggested Shanon, who said he himself has dabbled with such substances. and The Dilbert Blog blogged This week’s series in Dilbert caused quite a stir. It featured a new guy in the office whose name is pronounced hay-soos and spelled Jesus. I drew those strips a few months ago, and in my typical careless way I didn’t realize they would be running around Easter time. Oops.

I am sure it was not intentional. NOT!!!

You can see the series here, here, here, here, and here, while they are still in the archive.

Will Jews and Christians be rioting in the streets? How many embassies and other buildings will be burned? How many people will be killed, and how many death threats will the cartoonist receive? Probably none, because Jews believe what they read in the Torah, and Christians know that Jesus is still the Son of God, and neither were harmed by the cartoons.

As you might imagine, I got a lot of e-mail about this strip. Comments were about evenly divided between people who are deeply offended and people who think it was my best work yet. Interestingly, the people most amused often described themselves as religious, and those offended often noted that they were not especially religious.

My favorite rhetorical question, which I received an alarming number of times, was “Why don’t you mock Mohammed next? Huh? Why not?”

Well, aside from the blindingly obvious reason that I prefer life over death,

What about life AFTER death.

I didn’t realize I was making fun of Christianity this week.

And if you believe that, I have a bridge in Brooklyn I would like to sell you.

It’s a standard cartoon practice to take well-known historical or fictional stories and put other characters in those roles. I did the same thing with The Wizard of Oz, and no one thought I was insulting Dorothy.

I am not aware of a major faith in which Dorothy is a key figure.

Dr. Rusty Shackleford blogged We like to serve these rare moments of honesty with a side of fava beans and a nice chiante.