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Carpenter
SKETCH-O-VISION
A VERY GOOD USE OF YOUR TIME.
The setup
Watch on YouTube
Watch onYouTube
The premise
Here’s the bit.
Speaking straight to the audience, a self-described intellectually curious young man with no real job explains that his private excavations have turned up furniture made by Christ. He unveils a chair with one short leg and no lower back support, a two-legged table that falls over the moment he lets go, and a baffling object that might be a spice rack, except that a jar of cumin slides straight off it. Granting that Jesus may have been a great religious leader, he concludes that his carpentry was so poor he could never have built his own cross, then complains that the same controversial thesis would go over far better coming from Christina Applegate in a halter top.
The funny people
Meet the cast. 1
Say it with us
Highly quotable.
Now, I'm an intellectually curious young man with, let's face it, no real job.
Clearly, if it is a spice rack, it is not a spice rack of the best ilk.
As a carpenter, he was incompetent.
A little extra
Notes from the archive.
The kithfan.org episode guide lists this sketch as "Christ As Carpenter"; the official episode rundown calls it "Carpenter".
Script
Automatically generated script; wording may contain errors. Speaker labels are inferred.
- 00:01
Amateur Archaeologist
Hi.
- 00:04
Amateur Archaeologist
As I'm sure you're all aware, there's a movement amongst archaeologists to attempt to reconcile the biblical account of history with the archaeological record.
- 00:14
Amateur Archaeologist
Now, I'm an intellectually curious young man with, let's face it, no real job.
- 00:19
Amateur Archaeologist
So, I've done some exploring of my own in this vein.
- 00:22
Amateur Archaeologist
The Bible tells us that Christ was trained as a carpenter.
- 00:26
Amateur Archaeologist
But in my most recent digs, I found artifacts that show he was not a very good carpenter.
- 00:33
Amateur Archaeologist
This chair, for example.
- 00:36
Amateur Archaeologist
One of the legs is significantly shorter than the other three.
- 00:40
Amateur Archaeologist
This causes a certain degree of wobbling and a more subtle defect, no lower back support.
- 00:48
Amateur Archaeologist
Over here we have a table.
- 00:50
Amateur Archaeologist
Now, this table has only two legs.
- 00:54
Amateur Archaeologist
Now, I've conferred with many leading contemporary carpenters and they all agree that three is the bare minimum required for stability.
- 01:03
Amateur Archaeologist
Observe, even taking into account the primitive times, this portrays a shocking lack of craftsmanship.
- 01:13
Amateur Archaeologist
Now over here, we have this.
- 01:17
Amateur Archaeologist
And frankly, I have no idea what this is.
- 01:20
Amateur Archaeologist
For a while, I thought it might be a spice rack of some sort, but watch.
- 01:26
Amateur Archaeologist
If I take this jar of crushed cumin seed and place it here,
- 01:33
Amateur Archaeologist
Clearly, if... clearly, if it is a spice rack, it is not a spice rack of the best ilk.
- 01:39
Amateur Archaeologist
Conclusions.
- 01:41
Amateur Archaeologist
Yes, Christ was a great philosophical and religious leader, perhaps even, as some maintain, the savior or messiah.
- 01:48
Amateur Archaeologist
But it seems clear that he had few career options.
- 01:52
Amateur Archaeologist
As a carpenter, he was incompetent.
- 01:55
Amateur Archaeologist
He would have been unable even to construct the simple crucifix upon which ultimately he met his martyrdom.
- 02:01
Amateur Archaeologist
Now, I know that these views are going to be controversial, but I am also aware that if Christina Applegate were to express them I'm wearing a halter top. Get eat it up.
The rabbit hole continues
One more couldn’t hurt.
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