Here is another email I received from
our correspondent in Hell. Guess whom he meets this time!
{beginning of email}
“HUT,
two, three, four, HUT, two, three, four…” The man, wearing what appeared to be
a World War Two American Army uniform, marched along. As he drew closer, I saw
that his simple uniform bore a lot of insignia. He turned and saluted us—me and
John and Joe and some others—and kept marching.
Curious,
I called out to the man. He stopped, at attention, then turned in military
style toward me. “At ease,” he commanded himself. Then he slouched a little and
sauntered over to us. He sat down.
“You
wouldn’t mind telling me who you are, would you?” I asked.
“MacArthur,
Douglas, General, serial number 3-point-14159.”
“A
nice round number,” John whispered to me.
“If
captured, we can only tell the enemy our name, rank, and serial number, which
they can read off of our dog tags,” said General McArthur.
“I
would say I was surprised to see you here, General, but I just finished
speaking with the pope. You were one of the most famous men in American
history, but coming right after His Holiness…”
“Right.”
“Well,
sir, might you tell me why you are down here in Hell?”
“I
served at the command of a socialist president, for one thing,” the general
said.
“Ah,
yes. Franklin Delano Roosevelt, author of Social Security, the New Deal, and
lots of social services. I assume I will meet him sooner or later. Socialist as
he was, he was so popular that he had to die to get out of office, and
Americans had to add an amendment to the constitution to keep it from happening
again. Four terms! You said, for one thing. What other reason?”
“I
was the Supreme Allied Commander in Asia,” he said. “Eisenhower’s counterpart.”
“Yes.
Go on.”
“In
August of 1945, the Empire of Japan surrendered unconditionally.”
“Yes,
they did. Soon afterwards, the Japanese people heard the voice of an Emperor,
for the first time in history, telling them they had to accept this defeat. Go
on.”
“Unconditionally,”
said the General.
“Your
point?”
“That
means that our troops could have run all over the place raping and pillaging to
their hearts’ content.”
“But,”
I said, “they didn’t. Two reasons. First, they were for the most part
humanitarians, and they did not want to act like madmen. Second, you commanded
them not to. At first, some of the American soldiers consorted with Japanese
women, but not, as I understand, by force. But then even that stopped. But what
I don’t get is how that landed you in Hell.”
“Well,
I disobeyed the Bible,” said the general. “In Deuteronomy 7:2, God commanded
the Israelites to show no mercy to the inhabitants of the conquered land, to
utterly slaughter them, and to make no treaties with them. I disobeyed all of
those commands. We showed mercy to the Japanese, and even helped them start
their economy back up. We made treaties with them and even wrote their
constitution for them. This constitution included a provision that they would
not have an army capable of fighting outside of Japan itself, a provision that
persisted until the year 2016.”
“But,
sir!” exclaimed I. “That was a brilliant move! Japan grew rapidly and became
one of America’s best allies, which was important for our security and for
world peace! Why, sir! They loved you! When you said you wanted to run for
president, some of them put up campaign banners for you! The banners said…”
“Yes,
I know,” said the General. “They said, we
play for your erection.” John started laughing but the General said, “No,
seriously, they did. But great idea or no, it was a direct violation of God’s
command.”
“In
the Old Testament, not the New,” I said.
“The
fundamentalists who get to choose who goes to Heaven and who doesn’t use Old
Testament rules,” the general reminded me.
{end of email}
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