IMO the Old Testament reads OK as a narrative, though the recurring “and then God told Moses ‘Tell the Children of Israel to do X, Y, and Z’” bits are admittedly distracting. The New Testament reads as a fictional narrative even better. (Or, rather, several parallel ones.) The Book of Mormon works OK, but is, yes, incredibly dull. While we’re on the subject, though, IMO the Koran really doesn’t work as a fictional narrative.
Not to mention the ”… begat … begat …”. :3 I know several Mormons who simply skip over Nephi’s ten or so chapters of quoting Isaiah, it being interminable and dense, which is a shame, because those are chapters that Nephi included because he thought they were so important.
Agreed that Toldot (Generations? I forget what it’s called in English) is tedious, but it’s just one chapter. And it contains the highly entertaining line “And so-and-so begat Nimrod, who was a mighty hunter before the Lord; thus it is said ‘Like Nimrod, a mighty hunter before the Lord’” embedded in the middle of all the begats, which I could never read without giggling when I was a kid.
I believe (and
someone else does too)
that “nimrod” used as an insult stems from a Bugs Bunny
cartoon where Bugs says of Elmer Fudd, “What a Nimrod”, in
sarcastic praise of Fudd’s hunting skill.
IMO the Old Testament reads OK as a narrative, though the recurring “and then God told Moses ‘Tell the Children of Israel to do X, Y, and Z’” bits are admittedly distracting. The New Testament reads as a fictional narrative even better. (Or, rather, several parallel ones.) The Book of Mormon works OK, but is, yes, incredibly dull. While we’re on the subject, though, IMO the Koran really doesn’t work as a fictional narrative.
Not to mention the ”… begat … begat …”. :3 I know several Mormons who simply skip over Nephi’s ten or so chapters of quoting Isaiah, it being interminable and dense, which is a shame, because those are chapters that Nephi included because he thought they were so important.
Agreed that Toldot (Generations? I forget what it’s called in English) is tedious, but it’s just one chapter. And it contains the highly entertaining line “And so-and-so begat Nimrod, who was a mighty hunter before the Lord; thus it is said ‘Like Nimrod, a mighty hunter before the Lord’” embedded in the middle of all the begats, which I could never read without giggling when I was a kid.
I believe (and someone else does too) that “nimrod” used as an insult stems from a Bugs Bunny cartoon where Bugs says of Elmer Fudd, “What a Nimrod”, in sarcastic praise of Fudd’s hunting skill.
I was so excited to be able to say that thing that you just said, until I saw that you’d already said it. x3