The Turkish government responded to the pope’s comments by recalling its ambassador to the Vatican, and summoned the Vatican’s ambassador in Ankara to express its “great disappointment and sadness.”

It’s okay, Turkey, I get disappointed when people bring up my horrendous crimes against humanity too.

So, what actually happened and when?

In 1915 there were about 2 million Armenians living in the Ottoman Empire (Turkey) where their ancestors had lived for 3000 years. They were both an ethnic and religious minority in the Muslim-ruled country. (Armenia, when it was independent, was the first country to make Christianity its official religion.) The Turkish government wanted a solution to the “Armenian problem” so they decided to force them from their homes and send them into the Syrian Desert without food or water.

It began on April 24 of that year. On that day the government arrested and executed several hundred Armenian intellectuals – many Armenians were well-educated business owners, lawyers, doctors, and craftsmen, in contrast to the majority Turkish peasant farmers – and the rest were given a choice of walking until they dropped dead of exhaustion and exposure or stopping walking and being shot dead on the spot.

The military weren’t the only ones to get to join in the mass murdering fun. Killing squads made up of murders and ex-convicts went about crucifying (literally), drowning, and burning Armenians. They raped the women and kidnapped children, converting them to Islam and giving them to Turkish families. The children were given new Turkish or Arabic names and were beaten if they spoke Armenian.

In May, the Ottoman government began confiscating “abandoned” Armenian property. This resulted in a lot of property seizures since people were not allowed to take anything with them nor were they allowed to sell it before they left.

Ancient cities were leveled and all traces of Armenian culture was destroyed.

The genocide didn’t end until 1922. During those years the Armenian population in Turkey went from a couple million to fewer than 400,000.

The architects of the Armenian Genocide fled to Germany which promised not to prosecute them for their crimes. They were later located and assassinated by Armenian activists.

If you see similarities between the Armenian Genocide and the Holocaust, you’re not imagining it. Hitler saw how little was done by other countries to come to Armenia’s aid and used it as a guideline for his own genocidal plans.

Thus for the time being I have sent to the East only my ‘Death’s Head Units’ with the orders to kill without pity or mercy all men, women, and children of Polish race or language. Only in such a way will we win the vital space that we need. Who still talks nowadays about the Armenians? – Adolf Hitler

Jean Astruc noticed that some passages used the name Yahweh for God and others used Elohim. He believed that Moses used two different documents for his sources. Later, a man named Julius Wellhausen extended this theory by identifying four different sources that date from different periods and emphasize different concerns. Along with the two sources mentioned above are the Priestly source and the Deuteronomic source.

In the parts that use “Yahweh” for the name of God, His name is known to Adam but in the parts that use “Elohim” and the priestly source, His name isn’t known to man until He reveals it to Moses (in Exodus). He says, “I appeared to Abraham, Isaac and Jacob as El Shaddai, but I did not make myself known to them by name, Yahweh.”

The Deuteronomic source is basically Deuteronomy. Instead of telling a story, it is a book of speeches. Although these speeches were supposed to be ones that Moses delivered to his people after they had been wandering as nomads for years, its laws are ones for an agricultural society. For example, Deuteronomy 19:14:

The Priestly source is mostly in Leviticus and parts of Numbers. The concerns expressed in this source are about worship: sacrifices, the Sabbath, holidays, circumcision, rituals, and what is pure and impure (food, behavior).

The Yahweh texts are thought to have been originally written about 1000 BC and the Elohim, about 900 BC. They were combined around 800 BC. The Deuteronomic texts were also written about that time and then combined with the first two after another hundred years. The Priestly texts were added in during the 6th Century BC.

The stories in the Bible are older than the dates they were written because they were part of an oral tradition and many of them have similarities to older Babylonian stories. Despite similarities, the Bible introduced some revolutionary religious ideas.

The most revolutionary was the idea of a single God who is all-powerful, all-knowing, and exists everywhere. In polytheism gods lived in a special place where only they existed (although they would come to Earth to visit people…mostly to get up to no good.) The gods represented things in nature – the sky, fertility, crops, or the sea. In polytheism, religious stories (myths) told about the lives of the gods, in monotheism the Bible tells the stories of people and their relationship to God.

On the third day there was a wedding in Cana of Galilee, and the mother of Jesus was there. Jesus and his disciples had also been invited to the wedding. When the wine gave out, the mother of Jesus said to him, “They have no wine.” And Jesus said to her, “Woman, what concern is that to you and to me? My hour has not yet come.” His mother said to the servants, “Do whatever he tells you.” Now standing there were six stone water jars for the Jewish rites of purification, each holding twenty or thirty gallons. Jesus said to them, “Fill the jars with water.” And they filled them up to the brim. He said to them, “Now draw some out, and take it to the chief steward.” So they took it. When the steward tasted the water that had become wine, and did not know where it came from (though the servants who had drawn the water knew), the steward called the bridegroom and said to him, “Everyone serves the good wine first, and then the inferior wine after the guests have become drunk. But you have kept the good wine until now.” Jesus did this, the first of his signs, in Cana of Galilee, and revealed his glory; and his disciples believed in him.

Weddings were followed by feasts which could last for several days. It was a point of pride in Middle Eastern cultures then, as it is now, for the host to be able to provide plentiful food and wine for their guests. Running out of wine while the party is still going strong would have brought dishonor on the family even if it wasn’t due to their poor planning or lack of funds. Maybe they had enough before, but then Jesus decided to invite his disciple bros. Not a problem, a few more are always welcome.

Mary decides to state what is obviously obvious.* “They have no wine.” He might tease her a bit, but he’ll still provide the wine to make his mom happy. She’s confident that he can do something about the lack of wine. Does this mean she knows he can perform miracles? The Koran (3:49) says:

And (make him) a messenger to the Children of Israel (saying): I have come to you with a sign from your Lord, that I determine for you out of dust the form of a bird, then I breathe into it and it becomes a bird with Allah’s permission, and I heal the blind and the leprous, and bring the dead to life with Allah’s permission; and I inform you of what you should eat and what you should store in your houses. Surely there is a sign in this for you, if you are believers.

But this story is originally from the Gospel of Thomas, written about 140 AD. It is not a part of the official Christian canon and earlier miracles would conflict with the statement that the miracle of the wine was “the first of his signs”.

*Dads tell dad jokes, moms state the obvious. Parents act like parents no matter the place or time. What would be a dad joke in Jesus’s case? The platypus?