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[Mahdi]

Well, you got my last question right. Thats 1 for 3. I guess I'll have to make this one a little harder.

What popular television show did Frank Herbert help save by joining "The Commitee"?

[kpack]

ummm..... I think I'd like to use a life-line. I would like to poll the audience please.

[Mahdi]

Ok audience what do you say?

a: 25%

b: 25%

c: 25%

d: 25%

Stupid audience.

[kpack]

Let's see, I'll take a wild guess, is it "The Outer Limits"?

[niels]

outerlimits=cool

by the way, my opinion about frank herbert is dropping. Reading more in his books i see he has only used religious sentiments to make the books cooler. The Atreides are christians, The Tleilaxu are muslim. And muadhib is a prophet.

anyway, i dont like it.

[Mahdi]

nope, not the outer limits.

Doesn't it say in the authors note that Dune was to "explore the myth of the messiah", I think the religious parts of it are nessecary. And while there are many simularity's between the Muslim religion and the Fremen religion, most of what Frank Herbert created is different, he built on current religions to make them something new.The Telixeu worship the sun, not Allah, and the Fremen are the only other people in the original books that are religous at all. It is not until the last book (or is it second last?) that we see a religion totaly like one existing today, and that is when the heroes of the novel meet a small group of jews. The Atreides Christian? When was the last time you heard a "true christian" declaring genocide on a people instead of turning the other cheak? (In the original novel Dune Duke Leto declares Kanly on House Harkonnen, which means that the Atreides will kill any Harkonnen they see) Also, how many christian people do you see using religion as a tool? Paul was told that if something happened he should accept the religious mantle placed on him by the Fremen in order to escape to them. Throughout the entire novle, Paul used the Fremen religion as a way to control them, as did Jessica. And the Fremen are definatly not christian.

[mechadragon]

When was the last time I turned on my TV and saw televanglists manipulating money out of old ladies purses? Or saw major religious leaders telling Disney that if they continued to allow homosexuals into the park, that plauges would consume Florida? How many Crusades? How many died in the fires of the Inqusition? Don't try to paint the Christians as pacifists. They are not, have never been, and will never be. And since it's inception, Christianity has been used to control the peoples ideaology with it's promises of Heaven and it's threats of Hell.

Keep this in mind...

[*] No one is innocent

[*] No one is honest

[*] History always depends on the perspective of the one telling it

[*] And if it seems to good to be true, it is.

Were the Crusades, where the Pope declared that all of the Muslims be forced out of the "Holy Land" not a genocide?

Was the Inqusition, where the Catholic church declared war on the native pagan inhabitence of the Holy Roman Empire not a genocide?

Is the Nephite Preisthood's (A high order within the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints) current push to "purify New Zion" not a form of genocide?

And what of the intolerance and antipathy instilled toward the homosexual community? Is that kindness, tolerance, and love?

With the recent water crisis in your area Mahdi, how did the people treat you? What were thier religions primarily?

I guess they were all just "false Christians," as they live buy the eye for an eye philosophy. That's not biblical, now is it?

(It's not my intention to offend anyone directly, it is my intention to show that such things are never as black and white as we often like to think these matters are.)

[Mahdi]

wow, this has gotton way off topic.

[mechadragon]

Sorry... had to get it off my chest, please continue.

BTW, I agree that Herbert use a certain Jesus analogy with the character of Muad'dib. I think that to say it applies to House Atredies to be inacurate. But, if you look at the history of the Jews and the exodus, you will find that the Fremen are essentially a modified form of the Jews, right down to thier depiction and prophecy of a Messiah.

I think that Herbert meant these as metaphors for the way our own society uses religion and manipulation of faith to achieve certain ends, right down to the radical and unpredictable fanatical aspect of the congregation.

As for the answer to the question... I have no frikin' clue.

[Mahdi]

hmm, I always thought the fremen were more muslim than jew, and so do the few muslims I know, but then again, they were the zensunni wanderers (How long did the jews wander the desert?)

Now the answer is Star Trek.