It is blasphemy to deny that “the Lord” appeared to Abraham in the plains of Mamre, and that he, with two others, eat dressed calf, butter and milk (Gen. xviii., 1—8). It is blasphemy to say that god has parts (Art. I.), but it is difficult to understand how he eat without teeth, and swallowed without a throat; besides, what became of the eaten meat if there was no stomach to receive it? Truly, the gate is narrow which leadeth unto life, and narrow must be the brains that go in there through.
It is blasphemy to deny that god, who knows everything, did not know what was going on in Sodom and Gomorrah.
He said: “Because the cry of Sodom and Gomorrah is great, and because their sin is very grievous, I will go down now, and see whether they have done altogether according to the cry of it, which is come unto me; and if not, I will know” (Gen. xviii., 20, 21). Much faith is necessary to believe that god knew and that he did not know all at once, but “he that believeth not shall be damned.”
It is blasphemy to deny that the same god who did not punish Lot and his daughters for incest, punished Lot’s poor wife because she committed the terrible crime of looking back towards her burning home. She was turned into a “pillar of salt” (Gen. xix., 26), and Jesus bids us remember her (Luke xvii, 32), but does not say why we should do so. If god had forgotten her and had turned the two daughters into salt, the family history would have been less scandalous than it is.
It is blasphemy to deny that god “rained upon Sodom and Gomorrah brimstone and fire from the Lord out of heaven” (Gen. xix., 24). Heaven must be a pleasant place if it contains stores of brimstone and fire which can be rained down in this fashion. Action of this kind is supposed to be wicked when done by man, but a divine O’Donovan Rossa is apparently held up for our admiration. I have sometimes wondered whether this brimstone may not possibly have come from the lake of brimstone and fire connected with the bottomless pit (Rev. xx., 10); if so, it is very probable that as the earth turned round and Sodom and Gomorrah came opposite the bottomless pit, so that it was above those “towns,” god lifted the lid and let out some of the contents. This view should commend itself to the religious, as it cannot be pleasant for them to look forward to spending eternity in the close neighborhood of a celestial manufactory of dynamite.