Tobacco had nowhere been forbidden in the Bible, but then it had not yet been discovered, and had probably only escaped proscription for this reason. We can conceive of St. Paul or even our Lord Himself as drinking a cup of tea, but we cannot imagine either of them as smoking a cigarette or a churchwarden [pipe]. Ernest could not deny this, and admitted that Paul would almost certainly have condemned tobacco in good round terms if he had known of its existence. Was it not then taking rather a mean advantage of the Apostle to stand on his not having actually forbidden it? On the other hand, it was possible that God knew Paul would have forbidden smoking, and had purposely arranged the discovery of tobacco for a period at which Paul should be no longer living. This might seem rather hard on Paul, considering all he had done for Christianity, but it would be made up to him in other ways.

Samuel Butler: The Way of All Flesh

This is not only a masterpiece of sustained low-key sarcasm (as is the whole book, come to that); it is also an object lesson in the dangers attendant upon attempts to squeeze out of a text more meaning than it actually contains. Much of the theological exegesis one reads is no more sensible than 1970's Beatles fans thinking that Paul was dead because he is dressed in black in the picture on the cover of Abbey Road. One is reminded of the flight of Brian of Nazareth from his new and unwelcome horde of disciples, during which he loses one of his sandals. They come across the sandal during their pursuit of him and one of them [played by Spike Milligan?] says ``He has left us his shoe!'' wondering what He might have meant by it.

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