The Man from Earth Page #6

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I've always wondered about the reasons.

Well, we still have an

afternoon to kill, right?

Charades?

No. John?

I have a charade, and

it is just for you.

Sandy, come here.

Come on, come on, come on.

Okay, this one's for you.

Ready?

( Grunts like ape )

( Wolf whistles )

( Grunting )

Ooh!

Uhn.

My first wedding?

There you go.

There you go!

Very good, and I bet at least one of us

Is your direct descendent.

And I didn't even send a christmas card.

Christmas card? What

about a birthday card?

And don't even get me

started on the candles...

with the blowing and the ( huffs )

For years with the blowing.

Yeah, all right. I tried.

Well, uh, call me underdeveloped,

But I'd like to hear more.

Me too.

More.

You double-damn swear

this isn't some cockamamie

Science fiction story or...

you're pulling on us?

Next question.

You--You--You

realize

This is an invitation

To men in white suits with happy pills.

Think about it--

A mechanism allowing survival

For thousands of years?

Run out of room even faster.

Then we'd have to go to mars as a colony

As we expanded, as we'd have to.

I'd like that.

On a planet of another star.

I envy you.

Did you have a pet dinosaur?

They were a little bit before my time.

At least something is.

No doubt you could give us

a thousand details, John,

Corroborating your story,

From the magdalene to the Buddha to now.

Ten thousand,

And you could stay out of the books.

Oh, it's getting chilly.

Here, come over here. Join me.

That, uh, raises an

interesting question, John.

Could there be others like you

Who escaped the aging

process as you have?

Representing something terrific

We don't even know about biology.

We're learning all the time.

Yeah, but how would he know?

He doesn't wear an I.D. Badge

saying "yabba dabba doo."

There was a man in the 1600s.

Where were you in 1292 a.D.?

Where were you a year ago on this date?

Anyway, it was the

And I had a hunch that he was...

like me, so I told him.

Ah. See, you said this was a first.

I forgot.

A crack in your story, John?

A touch of senility.

Anyway, he said yes,

But from another time, another place.

We talked for two days.

It was all pretty convincing,

But we couldn't be sure.

We each confirmed what the other said,

But how do we know if the confirmation

Was genuine or an echo?

I knew I was kosher,

But I thought, "maybe

he's playing a game on me."

You know, a scholar

of all we spoke about.

He said he was inclined

with the same reservation.

Now, that's interesting.

Just as we can never be sure,

Even if we

wanted to--

I mean, if we were sure,

You couldn't be sure of that.

We parted, agreeing

to keep in touch--

Of course,

we didn't--

And 200 years later I thought I saw him

In a train station in brussels.

Lost him in the crowd.

Oh, what a shame.

I--I mean, if

it were true.

Okay, here's one for you.

What do you do in your spare time?

( Laughs )

Every 50 years or so,

When I wanna get away from the rush,

I go down to a primitive

tribe in new guinea

Where I'm worshipped as an immortal god,

And they have a huge statue of me.

It's a big party.

Yeah, I've got a lot of pictures of it,

But I've already packed

them up. I'm sorry.

I won't make the obvious nasty

crack about more unwashed cavemen.

Actually, bathing was the style

Until the middle ages

when the church told us

It was sinful to wash away god's dirt,

So people were sewn

Into their underwear in october

And they popped out in april.

You said you just happened.

I don't believe that.

If your story's true,

Why did god allow you to happen?

That makes an interesting point.

Are you religious, John?

I don't follow a known religion. No.

Ever.

Long time ago I did,

Like most people.

Some just never get over it.

Do you believe in god?

As laplace said,

"I have no need of that hypothesis."

He may be around, though.

He's everywhere. We just can't see him.

Pfft. If this was the best I could do,

I'd be hiding, too.

And creation...

it's here--I'm not so

sure it was created.

What then?

Maybe it's just accumulated,

fields affecting fields.

What about the source

of the field energies?

Wouldn't that imply a prime mover?

I'd wonder about the

source of the prime mover,

Infinite regress, but that

doesn't imply anything to me.

Back to the mystery.

It's a very old question,

But there's no answer

except in religious terms.

If you have faith, it's answered.

Did you ever meet any person

from our religious history?

A biblical figure?

In a way.

Who?

We should skip this one.

No, no, no skipping. Come on.

Next question.

No, come on!

( Clamoring )

Come on, spit it out!

Good lord! You were one of them!

This is going in a direction

that I--I didn't expect.

I hoped it wouldn't--

We...call it a night.

Come on! You were someone

in religious history?

Yes.

In the bible?

Yes.

Someone we know?

How could we not know

someone in the bible?

I mean somebody important.

You may think you know him,

But it's mostly myth.

The entire bible is

mostly myth and allegory

With maybe some basis

in historical events.

You were part of that history?

Yes.

Moses.

Moses was based on misis, a syrian myth,

And there are

earlier versions--

All found floating on water,

The staff that changed to a snake,

Waters that were parted so followers

Could be led to freedom

And even receive laws

On stone or wooden tablets.

One of the apostles.

They weren't really apostles.

They didn't do any real teaching.

Peter the fisherman learned

a little more about fishing.

How do you know that?

The mythical overlay is so enormous...

and not good.

The truth is so, so simple.

The new testament in 100

words or less. You ready?

I don't think I wanna hear this.

Harry, will you take me home?

No, not right now. I

do want to hear this.

Sit down, Edith. You

act like you believe him.

It's sacrilege.

How can it be sacrilege?

He hasn't said anything yet.

The new new testament is sacrilege.

There are a dozen new new testaments,

From hebrew to greek

to latin to tyndale,

All the way to king james,

All revisionist,

And all called revealed truth.

I mean a new new testament in 100 words.

I can give you the ten

commandments in ten words.

Don't. Don't, don't, don't,

Don't, don't, don't,

don't, don't, don't.

( Laughs ) Don't.

The commandments are just modern

updates of more ancient laws.

Hammurabi's code.

That's right, they

weren't the first, right?

Edith, I was raised on the torah...

my wife, on the koran.

My oldest son is an atheist.

My youngest is a scientologist.

My daughter is studying hinduism.

I imagine that there is room there

for a holy war in my living room,

But we practice live and let live.

Why don't you sit down.

What is your preferred

version of the bible?

The King James, of course.

It's the most modern, the

work of great scholars.

Modern is good.

All right, John, hit

us with the short form.

Guy met the Buddha, liked what he heard,

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