“I assume that Messiah is some incarnation/relation of Mephisto” Actually, Adolf Hitler died several months before Trump would have been conceived. My guess is his soul spent some time in hell, then found the perfect family to join on his return to this earth.
“If you’re given a choice between ax and guillotine — go guillotine”
Actually, between the choices for most of the modern execution methods – which often seem to get botched one way or another – I’d still choose guillotine. No doubt it will be over with quickly.
One thing to remember is that at the time Peanuts was popular, there was a lot more familiarity with the Bible. In my circle of people, almost everyone went to church regularly and was thus fairly familiar with the Bible. A character like Linus quoting it would not seem as some sort of pressure tactic to convert anyone, but more as part of his theological side (and if you know anything about theologians, they definitely NOT Bible thumpers, a lot of them are more skeptical of the thing than your average true believer).
In any case, as people have drifted away from regular church going, perhaps Linus seems more out of place these days. But I’ve never seen his character as a Bible thumper, but rather someone who is rather philosophical about life and willing to point out what has been written and leave it up to the reader to interpret.
Travelled with a couple friends to a poorer country, where meals were dirt cheap. About $1 for an meal at any given restaurant. They suggested we’d rotate who picked up the tab, which seemed fair at first. But I would only order 1 meal – they’d order about 2-3 each, “because its so cheap.” But essentially where I’d be eating only 3 meals a day, I’d be paying for 8-9 when it was my turn to pick up the check. And even though the country was cheap, I had not budgeted extra cash for meals I was not gonna eat (and there was no using credit in this place in those days).
If you’ve never heard the radio series for “Star Wars” which came out in the early 80’s, give it a listen. I was surprised at how good it was, despite not having any of the visuals.
I found that some classics that I just did not get while in high school and college, when I came back to them later I absolutely loved them. Moby Dick among them. Also Crime and Punishment.
I live in Japan where most people still read a paper newspaper. I myself get an English one delivered daily. And guess what, there seems to be a lot less trouble here with disinformation, where everyone gets their info from whatever site they happen to like or whatever news they want to hear.
“I assume that Messiah is some incarnation/relation of Mephisto” Actually, Adolf Hitler died several months before Trump would have been conceived. My guess is his soul spent some time in hell, then found the perfect family to join on his return to this earth.