Ship of Fools: Someone must sleep in the barn

Thread: Someone must sleep in the barn Board: The Laugh Judgment / Ship of Fools.

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Posted by Simon (# 1) on :

Joke submitted by anon:

A Hindu priest, a rabbi and an evangelical Christian were travelling together when they were overcome with fatigue. They stopped at a farmhouse and asked for lodging, but the farmer said he only had room for two. One of them would have to spend the night in the barn.

"I'll go," said the Hindu priest, and off he went. A few minutes later, there was a knock at the back door. There stood the Hindu priest, exclaiming, "There's a cow in there, and cows are sacred in my religion. It would be impossible for me to sleep in the same room as a cow."

The farmer then asked which of the other two would volunteer to sleep in the barn. "I'll go," said the rabbi, and off he went. A few minutes later there was a knock at the back door. It was the rabbi. "There's a pig in that barn. It wouldn't be kosher for me to sleep there. I cannot do it!"

"Oh, all right," said the evangelical. "I'll go," and off he went.

A few moments later there was a knock on the door. It was the pig and the cow.

[ 07. July 2005, 00:02: Message edited by: Simon ]

Posted by Midnight Scholar (# 9112) on :

Last time I heard this one, the third member of the party was a lawyer.
The pig and the cow can't stand to spend the night with a lawyer - geddit?
IMO this was much funnier. Wouldn't you have to have a problem with evangelicals to find the quoted version funny? (Though having thought about it, perhaps the guy was from my college CU [Projectile]

)

OTOH many, many people find lawyer jokes funny.

mn

Posted by Back-to-Front (# 5638) on :

[Killing me]

Ahhh, this has given me a good start to the day.

Thank you.

Posted by Ariel (# 58) on :

quote:
Originally posted by Midnight Scholar:
Wouldn't you have to have a problem with evangelicals to find the quoted version funny?

Not necessarily, I quite like the mental image of the pig and cow knocking on the door.

Posted by Mark M (# 9500) on :

quote:
Originally posted by Back-to-Front:

Ahhh, this has given me a good start to the day.

Thank you.

Me too! It's amazing how good a good chortle is after a nightshift.

Posted by Glimmer (# 4540) on :

Not funny, just nasty. Very useful for retelling within earshot of a disliked person who happens to be evangelical (or a lawyer or an estate agent or a traffic warden or a politician or .....)

Posted by Gill H (# 68) on :

I've heard it with the disliked person being somebody specific (eg Saddam).

Would it have been funnier if it was Fred Phelps?

Posted by Jengie Jon (# 273) on :

Actually there is a gloss that makes it funnier.

When the Hindu comes back, the Conservative Evangelical, says "Well being a Christian we are far more sensible, and have no creature which is either taboo or sacred. So I guess I really should have gone straightaway and left you two with your superstitious religions to share the house".

It changes the point subtly but provocatively.

Jengie

Posted by Alan Cresswell (# 31) on :

quote:
Originally posted by Gill H:
I've heard it with the disliked person being somebody specific (eg Saddam).

Would it have been funnier if it was Fred Phelps?

I've certainly heard it with Ian Paisley in place of the generic "evangelical". In that making fun of a whole group of people on the basis of the nature of a few (eg: a few evangelicals can be truly obnoxious, constantly quoting Scripture and trying to convert you just because you happen to be walking past them in the street) is mildly offensive to members of that group, I'd find the same joke with Ian Paisley less offensive. But that might be because Ian Paisley is so offensive.

Posted by Tree Bee (# 4033) on :

Yup, tickled my funny bone!

Posted by Barnabas62 (# 9110) on :

Loved it. Am certain to repeat it! Made me think of certain people in the "tribe" I belong to.

Posted by The Coot (# 220) on :

It worked for me, not real ha-ha, but useful for throwing off a bit of built up resentment.

Posted by Newman's Own (# 420) on :

I loved (and repeated) this joke on countless occasions during the first ten years after I heard it first - there are all sorts of versions of who the third person is (often Ian Paisley). Trouble is, since the tenth anniversary of my hearing this was about 35 years ago, I just could not manage a laugh yet again.

Posted by Rat (# 3373) on :

The thing I find quite interesting is that the ones I find most funny so far are the ones that chime in with my experience, even though that experience is not positive. This one (and even more so another I can't recall right now) are rooted in a form of sectarianism. The Paisley connection was in my head also. Sectarianism has impinged on my life in all sorts of ways - personal, familial and environmental - and it is something that gets me really het up. Yet these are the jokes that have made me laugh, even when I can see a matching offensive element (not this one particularly).

Yet if the joke was explicitly, locally sectarian - the sort of thing I've heard told by orangemen against catholics for instance - I'd have reacted badly. There is obviously some line to be drawn between evoking a familiarity and being truly familiar.

I am not sure where I am going with this. I need to think about it some more.

Posted by Og: Thread Killer (# 3200) on :

Hmmm.....I wonder what the reaction would be on here if it was Pope Benedict for the 3rd one?

Posted by Newman's Own (# 420) on :

quote:
Originally posted by Og: Thread Killer:
Hmmm.....I wonder what the reaction would be on here if it was Pope Benedict for the 3rd one?

I am sure that version shall be in circulation as well - though most variations on this joke are generic rather than mentioning anyone specifically, all well-known religious figures are subject for inclusion.

Yet, tired though this old joke is, it would not work if the third person were Benedict or ++Rowan (for example.) They are too polite in manner. For all that Benedict was known as 'grand inquisitor,' his public statements, however exasperating to some, were very academic in tone. Ian Paisley, John Selby Spong, Falwell (just to name a few - and I'm not equating the three!) had the manner of the 'troublemaker' at times and enjoyed being controversial.

Posted by Eliab (# 9153) on :

'Evangelical' is just too broad a category for the joke to work for me. You need to have some definite characteristic that the cow and pig object to, and there isn't one in this version I first heard it as 'lawyer' and that does work.

This is a joke where the whole point is to laugh at someone. Not necessarily in a spiteful way, but it must at least provide a meaningful target. We all know that lawyers are (in joke-land) grasping and unscrupulous lowlifes, so it's funny that animals run away from them. There isn't a similar convention that evangelicals are ... whatever it is that offends cows and pigs ... so in this version it falls flat.

[ 08. July 2005, 18:01: Message edited by: Eliab ]

Posted by Belisarius (# 32) on :

I orginally heard this as a Polish joke; as mentioned elsewhere on this Board, there indeed are probably only a finite number of joke formats.

Posted by Lurker McLurker™ (# 1384) on :

It does sound like a reworked version of a non-christian joke. This is a subgenre of christain humour actually, there are quite a few of these kind of jokes around.

Posted by themanwiththegingerhair (# 9691) on :

As Eliab mentioned I don't believe that "evangelicals" are enough of a defined character for the joke to work.

I might have a different understanding of the word to some of the other posters because I apply the term to virtually all "believing" protestant Christians.

The joke though is clearly set up to offend the 3rd group. As it isn't funny (there is nothing obvious about evangelical Christians that would offend a pig) then it is an insult and not a joke.

Posted by kempis3 (# 9792) on :

Made my day.

Many thanks.

Posted by 103 (One-O-Three) (# 5846) on :

Apperently - I don't have permission to vote here :'(

-103

Posted by Zeke (# 3271) on :

quote:
Originally posted by themanwiththegingerhair:
As Eliab mentioned I don't believe that "evangelicals" are enough of a defined character for the joke to work.

I might have a different understanding of the word to some of the other posters because I apply the term to virtually all "believing" protestant Christians.

The joke though is clearly set up to offend the 3rd group. As it isn't funny (there is nothing obvious about evangelical Christians that would offend a pig) then it is an insult and not a joke.

Why do you consider most protestant Christians to be evangelical? And why do you qualify it with "believing?" Believing what? What would be on the other side from that, protestant Christians who have no idea what they've signed up for? It seems to me that if a person is designated as a Christian, there is a strong implication that he or she believes something, at least. I may have misunderstood your meaning, since I am a little confused and trying not to take offense when I am sure it is not meant.

Posted by Mousethief (# 953) on :

quote:
Originally posted by themanwiththegingerhair:
I might have a different understanding of the word to some of the other posters because I apply the term to virtually all "believing" protestant Christians.

I'm neither an evangelical nor a protestant, but I find this sentence extremely offensive.

Posted by Pyx_e (# 57) on :

Hosting

A couple of posts by MT and themanwiththegingerhair on this subject are in order that it may be clarified will be OK. Other interested parties should start a thread in either Purgatory or Hell. In a short term project like this we need to avoid tangents and stick to the theme, there are plenty of other opportunities and places on board to discuss such points.

Pyx_e

Hosting

[ 31. July 2005, 11:07: Message edited by: Pyx_e ]

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