Jihads, fatwas and the (wrong) number of the beast: 8 myths from the world of religion

1. Nowhere in the Bible does it say Jesus was born on the 25^th of December. There are various theories for why we have this date, the most popular being it was chosen to coincide with either the Roman winter solstice or ancient winter festivals.
2. Nor does the bible talk about an exact number of magi who came to visit Jesus. Or that they were kings. Or rode on camels. Three magi seems reasonable as three gifts are described, but they are not mentioned by name. Furthermore they saw Jesus when he was a child, as old as two years, as described in Matthew 2:11. A final crushing blow to fans of the manger scene: the first tableau was created by St francis of Assisi over a thousand years after Jesus was born, so those cute farmyard animals gathered in the background may not have been present.
3. A fatwa does not mean a death sentence. It is a legal opinion issued by an Islamic scholar, but is not legally binding. The idea that it spells doom for a recipient probably stems from the 1989 fatwa against Salman Rushdie, who was accused of blasphemy after publishing his book The Satanic Verses.
4. A jihad is not necessarily a 'holy war'. While there exists 'jihad bil saif' or jihad 'by the sword', the word by itself literally means 'struggle' and most scholars interpret it as an inner struggle or a battle of spirituality.
5. The Quran does not promise 72 virgins to martyrs. There is a promise of virgin companions – to all, not just martyrs – but there is no number mentioned. Also, the source is a hadith, not the Quran - hadiths are the words of Mohammed as reported by others, and Muslims are not obliged to believe them.
6. The number of the beast is not 666. I know, heavy metal, devil-worshippers, that dodgy tattoo your friend got while drunk. All are based on the book of Revelation; but in 2005 a team of researchers from the university of Birmingham translated the earliest known copy of Revelation and found the devil's favourite to be 616. Many people, including the lead author of the Birmingham university team believe the 'devil' to be either Caligula or Nero, the hated leaders who oppressed early Christians, so a more figurative sort of Beelzebub. In case it ever comes up in Trivial Pursuit, the fear of the number 616 is called Hexakosioidekahexaphobia.
7. Voodoo has nothing to do with sticking dolls in people. Nothing. The closest you get is a healing ritual that involves a small wooden figure with holes in; twigs are then inserted into the holes to stimulate healing energy. Like most peaceful religious ideas it has been seized, twisted and spat out in a completely different form, though in this case it was early slave owners who stoked the fires of suspicion with tales of black magic, cannibalism and human sacrifice. And then Hollywood got hold of the idea...
8. There are (many) more than 10 Commandments in the Bible. Exodus lists 13; it then goes on to list 6 more in the 'thou shalt not covet' line (asses, maidservants etc). The list continues. It is in Leviticus that the Commandments really gather steam, though at this stage they are also rather cryptic in some cases; camels, swans and tortoises are forbidden as foodstuffs, the multiplying of horses is likewise outlawed and 'neither shalt thou mar the corners of thy beard'. Orthodox Judaism lists 613 Commandments in the Bible.

River Time, Arseholes and the Practicalities of Parking Your Canoe

Cast of Characters:

Andy: volunteer, teacher, cayuco balance experimentalist

Don Salome: a lanchero or boat driver; Wearer of Hats

Neighbourhood dogs: various, of a scruffy nature

Neighbourhood ducks: various, unconcerned with:

Local cayucoists of note: including lady-with-child-who-says-hello; older-lady-with-surly-child-who-does-not-say-hello and old-man-with-crooked-smile

Many people, when faced with something like a kayak, will point to the law of entropy. Person in a dugout log, balance, water: they will mention inevitability, complexity. Complex systems decay, heat will dissipate – from a body immersed in water, for example – and stable things will become less stable. Equilibrium's a fickle fellow; they're bound to mention this. They'll be wrong, of course. Laws of entropy only apply in a closed system, and there are many things that can affect a person in a canoe. Arseholes, for one. Or more specifically the waves created by arseholes (some people choose to call them power-boat owners, but we shall proceed with the standard nomenclature here) when they pass you on the river at 15 knots or so, shore-boat casually slung from the back, token floozies decorating the sundeck. When faced with the wake of an arsehole, which can be up to a foot high, in a cayuco with a lip about 4 inches above the water, your choices are few and all involve wetness and cursing. When simultaneously accosted by God in the form of a heavy rain shower it's tempting to extend the period of cursing to after the immediate period of soaking, but it's unclear if this really affects the situation at all, least of all God or your damp trousers. Those who don't believe in trousers would argue we can't change what's not there, but they're missing the point.

Having got falling in the river out of the way in the first week I felt a sort of immunity; my number had been called and I had come out the other side a wiser, wetter man. The first time you paddle in a cayuco with someone else however, this belief is immediately shaken. One person can adjust his own weight relative to paddling and water conditions and remain upright with relative ease; two people, providing one of them is inexperienced, will attempt to compensate not only for their own motion and that of the water but for their partner's too; multiply this effect several times if there is alcohol involved and see the section on cursing above.

Another factor for the equation is positioning: experts [I don't claim to be one, you understand, but you only have to be at the bottom of the ladder to see what kind of shoes those at the top are wearing] will tell you that where you sit in a canoe will affect how it paddles a great deal. Too far forward and you won't be able to affect the drag enough to steer, resulting in most inefficient circling; too far back and you'll find water flooding in that innocuous looking crack at the back. None of these are hypothetical problems, you understand. The decision of how to sit is also a tricky one, at least if you have impractical sized legs as I do, with knees that jut out from the edge to be caught by every passing oar-stroke. The locals here prefer a small, low wooden step to sit on with their legs stretched out in front, but I find this restricts the comfort in my lower spine to about 30 seconds, and a hobbling English teacher is not a happy English teacher. My preferred method is to kneel. An average journey reconstructed might resemble this:

1. Push cayuco out to floating depth where it can be shoved off in comfort once inside.

2. Get into the cayuco. These simple words obscure a plethora of problems, all of them less interesting than the average water-borne parasite; suffice to say there is wobbling, and occasionally splashing and cursing.

3. Kneel down with the absolute confidence of one who knows people are watching.

4. Push off with paddle; perform customary foreigner-in-a-cayuco wobble and 270 degree turn to face where you wish to go.

Once you have overcome the initial fear of falling in (efficiently accomplished by falling in, as we saw above), the journey itself can be an exercise in Zen as the mind wanders pleasantly across the water without focussing on very much at all. Reach, dip, stroke, flick; repeat. Consider the ducks as they float by with cares no greater than finding some good-looking algae. Or the dogs; they may bark at your passing, but there is something pleasant in knowing they will be there to bark at you tomorrow and the next day. Even minor annoyances, once habitual, become pleasantly routine. Reach, dip, stroke, flick.

The flick is important, however, I should explain that part. A beginner in a canoe will naturally paddle on both sides, alternating as the boat wanders too far in the direction of important objects such as other canoes or trees. This results in the haphazard zig-zag pattern that would, if it were plotted on a map, resemble a somewhat confused snake. What quickly becomes clear from watching the locals is that this is not how they do it, not at all. Aside from having the natural grace of those who were born with paddles if not actually in their hand then very near by, they maintain paddling on one side for quite some time. Somewhat improbably, their cayucoes follow the line of a well-trained if somewhat sluggish arrow. This is because of the Flick.

The Flick: when drawing the oar through the water towards you, pull it past your body and then turn it sideways, trailing the oar behind you and thus creating a drag on one side of the boat; optional is to pull your top hand in towards you to kick the oar out and create more drag – the Flick itself. Effectively you are creating a rudder that draws you back to facing forwards after your stroke drags you to one side. This ensures that when paddling on the left, with the stroke naturally pushing the cayuco to the right, the Flick will swiftly pull you back to the left, maintaining a straight line and moving you one step closer to Looking Like A Local when paddling. There are at least 17 other steps before reaching Local, not least marrying someone's daughter and being able to hold a conversation while standing in a canoe and nonchalantly casting your fishing net, but every step counts.

Not looking like a tourist will gain you slightly more currency in the river pecking order. A smile from crooked-smile-man, the neighbourhood dogs failing to bark at you, a nod of acknowledgement from Don Salome. This, above all, is the nod of age and experience, the river reaching up to touch her cap with gentle civility. Don Salome's hat is as much a part of him as the lines on his face, etched from 70 odd years of life on the water, and it is impossible to imagine him doing anything but driving a boat; he is always the first to bail out water after the rain stops, and his smiles are gained only through a lengthy process of grudging acceptance. Rumour has it he keeps a 30 year old wife.

The river here is a sleepy beast. If we were to continue up the creek of animal analogies we would probably find ourselves facing a manatee rather than a mongoose, though strictly speaking a serpent analogy is de rigeur in this area; perhaps an anaconda, broad and languid, sleepily digesting the carcasses of boats with unwary drivers. She gained another just the other day as two collided head on not far from here. With none of the standard maritime rules for passing on this side or that, the occasional meeting of bows - as of ants passing along a trail, though often with more destructive force - seems inevitable. One sunk, the other limped on with the passengers of both aboard.

In parking a cayuco you must obey the same laws of supply and demand as motorists everywhere, as spaces are sometimes at a premium. Slip into the bay, deftly manoeuvre around semi-submerged rocks to find an unoccupied patch of riverbank and nudge aside all contenders to claim your space before someone beats you to it. There is an active community of students who paddle to school – all of them sporting faster, lighter cayucoes than us, I note with some jealousy – and arriving late can leave you sweating and heaving your half-tree up the muddy bank in a most ungainly fashion.

There are days when I don't feel like climbing into my Alaska (she was donated by an Alaskan, apparently one without imagination), days when I wish nothing more than to curl up in a nice lancha and let Don Salome do the driving. Most notable among these are when it rains so hard there is little difference between being in the cayuco and being in the water. But this is to miss the point: taking a cayuco to work means freedom, and not just the kind where you don't rely on lancheros to take you home. The ability to float downstream is to forget for a moment the stresses and practicalities of routine, the incessant obedience to ever more inventive timetables. It is the closest we come to being on River Time. Clocks may have reached their greedy hands into the deepest crevices of our lives, this is still what matters here. The river knows of hustle and bustle - she sees them every day with their outboard motors and schedules - but when their wake disappears she is the same, always. In truth my own path probably lies more in hustle, or at least in obeying the clocks that drive us forward each day, but I wish to keep a toe in River Time. Just a toe, trailing in the water with wet abandon until necessity finds me once again.

Suicidal lemmings, stupid ostriches and sharks in chemotherapy: 7 enduring myths from the animal world

1. Lemmings don't actually herd themselves off cliffs in mass ritualistic suicide pacts. This idea was popularized by the Disney film White Wilderness, which did involve aforementioned lemmings falling from great heights, but – Disney fans look away now – they were pushed, albeit into a river off camera. The idea of suicidal animals surviving through natural selection doesn't have a lot of sense when you think about it...

2. Bulls are not programmed to run hell-bent towards the colour red. They are dichromats (they can effectively only see in two colours), so the actual colour isn't relevant – it's the motion of the rag that provokes them to charge those silly men in uniforms who enjoy killing so much. [Chickens, however, go crazy for red; when one cuts itself those around it will often peck it to start, sometimes starting a cannibalistic frenzy.]

3. Ostriches do not really hide their heads in the sand to hide. This is the equivalent of babies hiding behind their hands and assuming we can't see them; once again, it's hard to imagine evolution favouring this sort of thing as a defence mechanism. Incidentally, the ostrich lays the smallest egg of any bird by body mass at only 1 and a half %.

4. Sharks can get cancer. The idea that they are somehow immune – and thus might be a possible source of a cure – has been around for some time, and was included in the film Deep Blue Sea.

5. Chameleons don't change colour to camouflage themselves – or at least most don't. The majority will change their colour as a method of regulating body temperature, for communication or out of fear. Interestingly, the Bible forbids eating Chameleons.

6. Polar Bears don't hide themselves by covering their noses with their paws. Despite many hours of observation in the wild this behaviour has never been witnessed, though they have been observed to be very fond of toothpaste.

7. Dogs don't actually sweat through their mouths. Despite the popular myth, those lolling tongues don't actually help; it's their paws that provide most of the sweat glands and thus help regulate temperature.

8. Elephants don't have a special graveyard, nor do they sense when they are going to die and take themselves away from the herd. I know: Disney movies really shouldn't lie to us so often.

9. Goldfish do not have a 3 second memory. Research at Plymouth University showed that they not only have at least a 3 month memory but can be trained to respond to visual and audible stimuli.

10. St Bernard dogs do not carry, and have never carried miniature whisky barrels to those they rescue. Though they are trained as rescue dogs, the whisky was an invention of the painter Sir Edwin Landseer who added it to a composition as a 'point of interest'.

11. Of the 4 360 species of frogs in the world, only one says 'ribbit'. This is the Pacific Tree Frog, which happens to live in Hollywood and so has been endlessly recorded and played back throughout the world and thus associated with frogs everywhere.

Changing the Debate: Occupy and the 99%

[I wrote this a few months back and forgot to post it online; it was for the local paper, who so far haven't shown the interest to publish it, which I mean to ask them about...]

For those who don't watch a lot of news: there has been a lot of urban camping recently. The Occupy movement, also known as the 99% or 'those hippies in tents' gained international interest when a group of activists took over Zuccotti Park in New York on September 17^th and started a worldwide conversation about inequality and greed. Within weeks they had a library, power station (using bicycle-generators), medical tent, cleaning crews and a recycling program; clearly, this was not your average protest. Before long there were thousands of similar Occupy encampments in cities around the world.

Several months, many meetings and a lot of pepper spray later, Occupy is one of the most used words this year yet many are still scrabbling to understand what the movement is. Where are the leaders? What are their demands? Who exactly is in those tents, and when will they go home? The problem with these questions is that they assume Occupy is a single thing, a protest with a limited goal, and it is not. Since it means so many things to so many people I can only speak for myself, but the best way that occurs to me is that Occupy is an idea - a growing awareness that the world doesn't have to be so unequal. Or, in the words of the Spanish Indignados who occupied Madrid earlier this year: Ya Basta! Enough!

They have had their fill: enough of a world that presents few opportunities for the young, enough of inequality in money and resources, enough of profits over people, of banks that are bailed out while people are thrown from their homes, of corporations that hold more money and power than most countries, of governments who cut public services yet fail to collect tax from the wealthiest, who spend billions on wars abroad while poverty rises at home. They want money spent on social services instead of banking debts, affordable housing, job creation, tighter regulation of the banking industry, higher taxes on the rich (many support a so-called Robin Hood tax on financial transactions too) and an end to endless war. These are not vague ideas, and if the media continues to paint them as such it is because these ideas are not just a threat to the financial elite but extremely popular too. Many of those protesting have been thrust into the pigeon-hole of 'anti-capitalist' before, and remain patient while explaining what they are for, not against.

The cry from the tents is one of hope that the world can be changed, and so far they have resisted all attempts to be bought off with mere promises. They are outside the political system because they have seen what it has done to movements in the past; they do not want a leader because leaders and their acolytes can be bought, lobbied and swayed; their list of demands does not easily fit into a 10 second sound-bite, but they do not care. As they would say: you can't evict an idea whose time has come.

But just where did this idea come from? Forgive me for backtracking, but England in the 1640s seems to me a good place to begin. Frustrated with Cromwell's failure to ensure even basic wages for his New Model Army, soldiers – calling themselves Levellers - began to demand more than just a parliament, and started the long fight to secure voting rights for everyone. They saw that with the vote they could have some measure of power over those in charge. Interestingly enough, one principle of the Occupy movement is about the same in reverse - that if politicians are largely slaves to the economy and big money, our votes are next to useless. This is particularly true of the UK, where real democratic representation is corrupted by the ‘First Past the Post’ electoral system.

From these heady days of not-quite-revolution we can skip the pages any way we choose. Throw a dice at the intervening centuries and you'll likely land on a year of importance in this story, for the same battles have been fought many times over in every corner of every land. Those who have less fight for More, whether it be resources or wages or accountability, while those who hold the purse strings think of ever more ingenious ways of holding on to More. From the suffragette movement to civil rights marches, from anti-war Vietnam protests to poll-tax revolts, from the WTO protests in Seattle to protesters in tents outside St Paul's, the narrative is from the same book. Of course there are differences – huge differences, so great that those in one movement might disagree almost entirely with another, but what they agree on has changed the world – for the better - many times over. If you doubt this you need only look at the fact that we have the right to vote, to free speech, to gain an education and ride a bus no matter what the colour of our skin.

It is important to remember that we are not just debating ideas but reality, and that there is plenty of reality to go around. The soberly titled and well-respected Congressional Budget Office report in the US found that “deep economic inequality is corrupting politics, culture and American society as a whole” as reported by the Guardian in October. The equally sober-sounding Institute for Fiscal Studies recently arrived at a similar conclusion this side of the Atlantic: that income inequality has risen to the highest point since records began, along with relative poverty and child poverty. However we choose to label this system, it isn't working for most of the people, and never has.

I have described the world of Occupy from the outside, but in truth it's not 'they' but 'we'. I stand by those in the tents, and on the streets, and in universities and workplaces around the world because I really do believe it can make a difference. And here's the thing: if you've ever felt that the world isn't meant to be this unequal, that we should expect more than being glad to have a job, that cleaners work just as hard as bankers (and both should be paid relative to their efforts), that welfare is more important than weapons, then you are one of the 99% too. The anthropologist Margaret Mead famously said “never doubt that a small group of thoughtful, committed citizens can change the world. Indeed, it is the only thing that ever has.” The only certainty of history is change, and our world cannot remain as it is. The economy, wars, bankers' bonuses, capitalism and the price of haddock - all will shift in time. We are not at the endpoint of history, nor the beginning. We have the same opportunity as every other point in time to change our fortunes; the only difference is that there are more people than usual on their feet saying 'enough'. Whether you agree with everything we say or simply believe the world wasn't meant to belong to the few, the survival of this idea relies on one thing – how many of us will stand up and support it.

Devon is in the grip of a series of budget cuts – £30m is to be cut from local services in the next year alone, with Exeter's flagship support centre for domestic violence losing 100% of its budget and the budget for Children, schools and families being slashed by £1 million. It's not hard to see the effects of the recession in this area, as Barnstaple's growing population of empty shops and pawn brokers shows, but it is sometimes more difficult to know what we can do to reverse these anti-democratic changes. In fact there are many possibilities:

1. Since money talks (often loudly), speak to the banks in a language they understand – move your money to a credit union or building society. This has already had an effect in America, with several banks dropping unfair charges after thousands of customers closed accounts worth $4.5bn.

2. Change the conversation – a major achievement of the Occupy movement has been to shift the focus onto the financial institutions which caused the crisis. If people are constantly challenging the important issues – such as companies like Vodafone being let off billions in tax, or huge amounts being spent on wars while services are cut, or the influence of big money in politics – politicians must pay attention sooner or later.

3. Seek out independent news – you can often get a much more informed picture of the world than from the mainstream. A good start – though I encourage you to look for yourself – is Democracy Now, a daily news show online.

4. Make a start. Changes are small at first: buying locally, helping someone in need, investigating ideas and sharing what you find - but they add up.

Lastly, but most importantly - stand together. Join us on Facebook (search for 'Occupy Barnstaple') for more information on how you can join in. Or start your own initiative: get some folks together and grow your own veg; Occupy your house, invite some friends and screen a good documentary; bring some food and support to the folks at Occupy Exeter - use your imagination!

Groups such as the North Devon Anti-cuts Alliance, the Transition Town movement and the Green Party, all of whom have been campaigning on issues similar to this for years, will have many more ideas.

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