Difference between revisions of "459: Holy Ghost"

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{{comic
 
{{comic
 
| number    = 459
 
| number    = 459
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| date      =  
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| date      = August 6, 2008
 
| title    = Holy Ghost
 
| title    = Holy Ghost
 
| image    = holy_ghost.png
 
| image    = holy_ghost.png
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==Explanation==
 
==Explanation==
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Mainstream Christian denomination hold the belief that God exists, and exists as a threefold presence within which there are three distinct 'persons' who interact with one another and the world, yet sharing one common nature. (If this sounds counter-intuitive or downright weird, please ask a quantum physicist to explain how three quarks can be bound together in such a way that they have distinct 'colour' identities yet cannot be separated from one another.) The three 'persons' sharing the property of being God are conventionally called the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit - but in more archaic English usage, the third person was referred to as the Holy Ghost.
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Many {{w|Christian}} denominations hold the belief (of which {{w|Catholicism}} is one) that {{w|God}} exists, and exists as a threefold presence within which there are three distinct 'persons' who interact with one another and the world, yet sharing one common nature. The three 'persons' sharing the property of being God are conventionally called {{w|God_the_Father|the Father}}, {{w|God the Son|the Son}}, and {{w|the Holy Spirit}} — but in more archaic English usage, the third person was referred to as {{w|the Holy Ghost}}.
  
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The 1984 movie 'Ghostbusters' was based on the premise that ghosts (non-corporeal creatures) exist and that four unemployed men had access to technology that could trap such ghosts. These men formed a business as 'Ghostbusters' and an important tool in their arsenal was a so-called 'proton beam' powered by a wearable backpack. These beams would prod or stun ghosts, allowing them to be manouevered into traps. Throughout the movie the Ghostbusters reminded each other 'not to cross the beams' as this was supposed to cause a disasterous reaction, until the climax of the movie where crossing the beams was required to subdue the main antagonist.
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The 1984 movie ''{{w|Ghostbusters}}'' was based on the premise that ghosts exist and that four unemployed men had access to technology that could trap such ghosts. These men formed a business as Ghostbusters and an important tool in their arsenal was a so-called "proton stream" powered by a wearable backpack. These streams would prod or stun ghosts, allowing them to be maneuvered into traps. Throughout the movie, the Ghostbusters reminded each other 'not to cross the streams' as this was supposed to cause a disastrous reaction, until the climax of the movie where crossing the streams was required to banish the main antagonist.
  
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The premise of xkcd cartoon 459 is that the Ghostbusters have just encountered and eliminated the divine entity of Christian theology sometimes called the Holy Ghost, and are being taken to task by a Christian bishop. The bishop points out that Christian theology requires a Trinity and is unwilling to accept the Gostbusters' apology; their identity becomes clear in the final panel where we see a group of four persons wearing backpacks identified as proton packs.
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Here we see that the Ghostbusters have just encountered and eliminated the Holy Ghost, and are being taken to task by the {{w|Pope}}. The Pope points out that Christian theology requires a {{w|Trinity}} and is unwilling to accept the Ghostbusters' apology.
  
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The tooltip text is a play on the fact that Christians may make the sign of the cross (by touching the forehead, chest and shoulders), colloquially called 'crossing oneself', and on the Ghostbusters concept of (not) 'crossing the beams'.
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The title text is a play on the fact that Catholics may make the sign of the cross to ward off danger (by touching the forehead, chest and shoulders), colloquially called 'crossing oneself', and on the danger of the Ghostbusters' 'crossing the streams' (touching two proton stream together, which in ''Ghostbusters'' canon causes an explosive chain reaction in all nearby atoms).
  
 
==Transcript==
 
==Transcript==
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<!-- The transcript can be found in a hidden <div> element on the xkcd comic's html source, with id "transcript".
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:Pope: This is a disaster.
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  -- Tip: Use colons (:) in the beginning of lines to preserve the original line breaks.
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:Voice: Is it really that bad?
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  -- Any actions or descriptive lines in [[double brackets]] should be reduced to [single brackets] to avoid wikilinking
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:Pope: Do you know how much scripture we'll have to revise?
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  -- Do not include the title text again here -->
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:Voice: Look, we've apologized-
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:Pope: I mean, we can't have a trinity with just a father and a son!
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:Voice: Again, we're sorry.
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:Pope: Sorry's not enough. Guards, take their proton packs.
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:Ghostbusters: Hey, we were just doing our jobs!
  
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{{comic discussion}}  
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{{comic discussion}}
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[[Category:Religion]]

Revision as of 13:40, 16 July 2014

Holy Ghost
Okay, everyone, cross yourselves, then cross the streams.
Title text: Okay, everyone, cross yourselves, then cross the streams.

Explanation

Many Christian denominations hold the belief (of which Catholicism is one) that God exists, and exists as a threefold presence within which there are three distinct 'persons' who interact with one another and the world, yet sharing one common nature. The three 'persons' sharing the property of being God are conventionally called the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit — but in more archaic English usage, the third person was referred to as the Holy Ghost.

The 1984 movie Ghostbusters was based on the premise that ghosts exist and that four unemployed men had access to technology that could trap such ghosts. These men formed a business as Ghostbusters and an important tool in their arsenal was a so-called "proton stream" powered by a wearable backpack. These streams would prod or stun ghosts, allowing them to be maneuvered into traps. Throughout the movie, the Ghostbusters reminded each other 'not to cross the streams' as this was supposed to cause a disastrous reaction, until the climax of the movie where crossing the streams was required to banish the main antagonist.

Here we see that the Ghostbusters have just encountered and eliminated the Holy Ghost, and are being taken to task by the Pope. The Pope points out that Christian theology requires a Trinity and is unwilling to accept the Ghostbusters' apology.

The title text is a play on the fact that Catholics may make the sign of the cross to ward off danger (by touching the forehead, chest and shoulders), colloquially called 'crossing oneself', and on the danger of the Ghostbusters' 'crossing the streams' (touching two proton stream together, which in Ghostbusters canon causes an explosive chain reaction in all nearby atoms).

Transcript

Pope: This is a disaster.
Voice: Is it really that bad?
Pope: Do you know how much scripture we'll have to revise?
Voice: Look, we've apologized-
Pope: I mean, we can't have a trinity with just a father and a son!
Voice: Again, we're sorry.
Pope: Sorry's not enough. Guards, take their proton packs.
Ghostbusters: Hey, we were just doing our jobs!


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Discussion

Pope: Do you know how much scripture we'll have to revise? It isn't a problem. Trinitarian dogma isn't even peripheral to scripture. So the answer is: "None". I am sure that had there been cause for concern at least one comedian would have come up with it by now.

I used Google News BEFORE it was clickbait (talk) 09:46, 31 January 2015 (UTC)

It's not the Trinity that's the issue. It's that the Bible talks a whole lot about the Holy Spirit. He is very important to the theology. If He can be trapped, it means the Bible got a lot of things wrong. Trlkly (talk) 23:50, 28 March 2016 (UTC)
Uh, the Bible got everything wrong, it's fiction... -- The Cat Lady (talk) 09:00, 15 August 2021 (UTC)
No it didn't; Even if you don't believe it's the infallible word of God (it is), you still need to except it as a book with potentially unreliable historical accounts of things that actually happened 172.69.34.129 (talk) 19:13, 31 January 2024 (please sign your comments with ~~~~)
One can "except it", but it's hard to "accept it". Too many gods (or versions of gods) with their own infallible words. At the most, just one could be correct, and the chances are that every one has been miscopied/mistranslated/re-edited without necessarily having a proper meeting with the ultimate author to discuss the result. (Various of the Holy Books do have statements that command like "do not change the words of this book", for a kind of memetic stasis. But it's hard to know if this was obeyed (or even present) right from the start. It could easily have been frozen after being corrupted.)
Learning history from the Bible doesn't help, though. Anything that's not actually wrong is at least biased (and no room for updating with any newly attested understanding of, say, the socio-economic situation in Pharoah's Egypt) or unprovable (what did the leper actually say? ...and does it matter?). But given that (e.g.) Herod The Great died BC (4BC-1-BC, by best estimates) you have to decide that it was his son, or revise all the other book-inspired dating/event systems.
I have no problem with the Bible (and most other equivalents) suggesting that we all follow the line of "be good to each other". One should not mind which God/gods/elemental-philosophies people subscribe to if they do that. (c.f. that done to Aslan, in C.S. Lewis's "The Last Battle", and that is almost directly a theologically-inspired Jesus avatar anyway.) Not that everyone does that, with or without the Bible as their go-to. 172.69.195.170 21:54, 31 January 2024 (UTC)

Nk22 (talk) 11:18, 20 April 2015 (UTC)Woah

Why is the 2nd frame inverted?

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