Now I thought the exact same thing you are probably thinking now, clearly it's an antenna that beams the pope's prayers up to God in hi-def and receives His answers in similar fashion. Sort of like DirectTV. But I'm a pretty science-minded guy. I don't like to make a lot of assumptions so I decided to look into it. And a good thing too, because much to my surprise, I was wrong!
The pope's hat is indeed NOT a holy receptacle of wisdom, but a projection of papal power. When the pope really wants to dish out his "papal infallibility", he pulls out the holy mother of headgear... the Papal Tiara. This is not your run-of-the-mill tiara. This one would even leave Elton John with a pants tent. The Papal Tiara is an aircraft carrier in the Persian gulf. It's a .44 Magnum pointed at the congregation asking "Do you feel lucky, punk? Well do you?" It is a giant, three-tiered, gold plated, jewel-encrusted phallus perched atop the holy father of morality screaming "Fuck with me and you'll be picking diamonds out of your..." Well, you get the picture.
I was quite surprised, then, to learn that not all religious headgear serve the same purpose. Jewish men for example wear kippot (otherwise known as a yarmulke to those of you not as well versed in religious headgear as I) not just to advertise their religion, but also because the Talmud states "Cover your head in order that the fear of heaven may be upon you." Now a famous Rabbi stated that he never walked 4 cubits with his head uncovered because "the Divine Presence is always over my head" and as we all know, there's nothing the Divine Presence hates worse than hovering over the sight of a head of motley hair. But sadly, this respected rabbi, Rabbi Hunah ben Joshua, was imprecise in his language. Did he mean to imply that walking without the kippot less that 4 cubits was okay? Can I walk for 4 cubits, put my kippot back on, take it off again, walk 4 more cubits, and so on? Is that enough to appease the Divine Presence or will that just piss Him off? A schism thus ensued over the wearing of the kippot into various kippot wearing camps. And well, you can guess the rest. Chaos followed and now we have this:
More recently, kippot have been observed made in the colors of sports teams, especially football. In the United States, children's kippot with cartoon characters or themes such as Star Wars are popular. (In response to this trend, some Jewish schools have banned kippot with characters that do not conform to traditional Jewish values.) Kippot have been inscribed on the inside as a souvenir for a celebration (bar/bat mitzvah or wedding). Kippot for women are being made and worn. A special baby kippah has two strings on each side to fasten it and is often used in a brit milah ceremony.
Lest we neglect Islam, it is of significant note that Muhammad, peace be upon him (lest violence be upon me), was the only prophet, peace be upon him, to get the headgear thing right, namely with the hijab. This practical accessory shields us fragile men and our uncontrollable libidos from would-be temptresses. Like this woman:
Now you know you'd hit that if only you could get a good look at her hair. Muhammad, you go boy! (Peace be upon you.)
No comments:
Post a Comment