If we switched stories from the bible with Grimm's Fairy Tales, would it be any different?

[Taverner]

Yes I know this was a Bill Maher joke, and it was an astute one at that.

But think about it - Jonah swallowed by a whale is about probable as the story of Rumpelstiltskin. Jesus being born of a Virgin, turning water into wine, and a few fishes and loaves into many is about as probable as the story of Snow White.

But one we don't believe, the other has people that do.

And, if you say anything about how probable they are, you get shouted down as a bigot, yet no one thinks Rapunzel actually happened.

[Exultant Democracy]

1. Folktales and Religion are just different areas of mythology

although their is a considerable amount of overlap and a grey area between the two.

[Tunkamerica]

2. that would be a dark religion

but an interesting idea

[RaleighNCDUer]

7. And the Abrahamic religions are not?

The OT is rife with massacres, murders, betrayals, infidelities, vengeance. And Revelations is more horrific than anything in the OT.

[Taverner]

8. ...or It's one helluva Acid trip

:evilgrin:

[Tunkamerica]

9. horrific, but the tone of grimm's fairytales are decidedly dark

maybe it's a different shade of dark.

[Taverner]

13. I dunno - doesn't get much darker than Psalm 137:9

[Deep13]

24. Aren't they all? nt

[JustFiveMoreMinutes]

3. Death To Step-Mothers!

.. in that parallel universe.... ALL step-mothers are EVIL and should be hanged!

<tic>

[Taverner]

5. If we switched them, instead of fighting for gay marriage we'd be fighting for step-mother rights

[dimbear]

15. Check a first edition of the Marchen. You'll see that originally

most of those stepmothers were actually birthmothers. The Grimms caught hell for it and changed to stepmothers in later editions. Along with loads of other lighten-ups.

[lob1]

4. Rapunzel didn't actually happen??!!?!?

Don't be silly. They made movies about him and everything.

[dimbear]

14. Rapunzel is a retelling of an Italian story. In the original,

Rapunzel, who is a young girl BTW, is kept as a sex slave. You see the motifs, alone in the tower, old wicked magician. Then comes the young romantic rival. Then she gets preggers. Like daytime TV.

[damntexdem]

6. Wait, are you saying that Rmpelstiltskin wasn't real?

You damn atheist! ;-)

[LuvNewcastle]

10. I could see Hansel and Gretel being interchangeable

with the creation myth. The forest/the garden, the parents' warning/God's warning, the candy house/the tree of knowledge, the witch/Satan. Most cultures seem to have identical or at least similar stories. The fascination with these stories is somehow tied up with the human psyche and/or human prehistory. I hope that one day we discover the stories behind the stories.

[Taverner]

12. The story of Prometheus stealing fire from the gods

Or even better yet - the story of Pandora and her box

[rug]

11. If you don't, you have a problem.

[struggle4progress]

16. I dunno. Can you give an edifying reading of Grimm -- say something at least as interesting

as portions of the Talmud, Midrash Rabbah, or Zohar?

[RaleighNCDUer]

22. Probably. They are really very basic stories of good vs evil,

of the redemptive power of love, of sorrow and transformation (often, literally). Check out Bruno Bettelheim's "The Uses Of Enchantment: The Meaning And Importance Of Fairy Tales".

Fairy tales - even the dark stories of the Grimm Brothers - provide guidance to children. Sometimes, that guidance is the knowledge that bad shit happens, that things don't always end well, and loss is a natural part of life. Actually, they are more reality based than the various holy books that insist that there is always a happy ending - at least in the afterlife - IF you obey the rules and eat your peas.

(edited for 2nd paragraph which mysteriously disappeared when I posted it)

[spin]

17. My son in law compares the Bible to Aesop's Fables...

and the story of Christ to an adult version of Santa Claus.

He may well have a point.

[dimbear]

18. The similarities are more important than the differences.

Compare the Biblical book of Esther, the apocryphal Judith, Snow White, Cinderella, and 'Beauty and the Beast.' They all illustrate that moral that a woman's power comes through her physical attractiveness and that all else is secondary.

I admit I have not been able to find replicated the moral of 'The Princess and the Pea' anywhere in the Bible. That's humbling. (Nobility comes from complaining.)

[okasha]

21. It's sexist in itself to discount the courage and intelligence

displayed by Judith and Esther. Both use their attractiveness, to be sure; but Judith's power ultimately comes from the sword she uses to behead Holofernes--check out Artemesia Gentileschi's paintings for a graphic commentary on the subject. Esther, true enough, is the winner of a beauty contest; but its her courage and persuasiveness that impress the king in the end. Then there's the story of Jael, who drives a tent peg through Sisera's head with no implication of seduction beforehand.

[dimbear]

23. Examine all the stories I mention and sift out the sine qua non. n/t

[cambie]

19. It is unsuitable as a holy-book.

as it is readable and makes sense. Maybe if it was run through a translator several times until it was nearly incomprehensible then we could make a religion out of it.

[tortoise1956]

20. Huh?

you - you mean - that Snow White wasn't real? But I saw her in a movie!

Besides, I'm pretty sure I was married to her stepmother...