People don’t read the book of “Revelation,” anymore. Weird novels like the “Da Vinci Code” and strange prophecies of Nostradamus are popular. Some even read malarkey like the “Gospel of Judas” as reported recently in local papers. They run and hide, however, from that old apocalyptic book of “Revelation.”

“Revelation” is too violent, they say. Sun scorches planet earth. Everyone drinks blood because there’s no water. Four horsemen of the Apocalypse gallop the globe spreading false religion, disease, starvation and war. Human blood runs like a river at the battle of Armageddon.

It’s true, “Revelation” is violent but that‘s not why people don’t read it. It’s punishment in the book they don’t like. Punishment is not a “politically correct” idea, anymore. When militant Arabs sucker-punched the U.S.A., President Bush rained “Revelation” down on the heads of Afghanistan and Iraq. Governments were changed. Men, women and children, were killed. People don’t like punishment so they hate Bush.

Some people don’t like singer Toby Keith because he sings about punishment, “ …grand pappy told my pappy back in my day son, a man had answer for the wicked that he done. Take all the rope in Texas find a tall oak tree, round up all the bad boys hang em high in a the street, for all the people to see.“ There’s a lot more rope in “Revelation” than in Texas. Enough rope for every bad boy in the world.

Perhaps, some people don’t like punishment for good reason. They know the world has a terrible record of separating the guilty from the innocent. Good guys often find themselves hanging from tall oak trees and bad boys get away. “Revelation” changes all that. The long arm of the law reaches every bad boy in the world. Crime doesn’t pay in the book of reckoning.

Darrell Watkins lives in Kelseyville.

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