Zombie Mohammed won’t go away – Here comes Zombie Jesus (No, he’s a Lich!)

ZombieLaw blog was started because I am working on a content analysis of the historic uses of Zombie in Federal Court cases and was getting distracted by current event news that I wanted to keep track of. This blog has become both stories from decided legal cases and from current events. The first current event that prompted this blog was the recent Pennsylvania case of Zombie Mohammed, in which a self-described marching Atheist dressed in a religious themed costume during a Halloween parade and was accosted by an immigrant Muslim who wanted the Atheist arrested.

My first ZombieLaw post, Feb 28, “Parading Athiest Zombie wasn’t Harassed” recounted what I had learned about the Zombie Mohammed case and I still recommend listening to the whole 35minute trial posted in my first post. I followed up this story on March 2 with “Judge Mark Martin about the Zombie Muhammed case” – already the mainstream media (FOX) was on to a supposed Sharia law connection.

Since then there have been some further events and so this post is another update. The original story came to me from Turley’s Feb 24 post. The LA Times picked up his story on March 9th publishing Turley’s op-ed “Free speech under fire” which claims to be about “laws banning hate speech, blasphemy and discriminatory language” but jumps first to Judge Martin’s dicta in the Zombie Mohammed ruling. Turley also posted this on his blog to cross-promote his LA Times Op-Ed.

More recently the original story is still bubbling in smaller (mostly conservative) news outlets and blogs. These are in some ways disturbing re-tellings. Turley only inverts the narrative to consider overbearing hate speech crimes but in so doing he affirms the tenuous connection of this case to Sharia law. Others (like Fox News early reports) have made this case about Sharia law. This case is not about Sharia law. It is about the very American notion of “beyond a reasonable doubt” and the Judge did not find evidence of necessary intent. See The Volokh Conspiracy: “The Irrelevance of Anti-Sharia Laws to the “Zombie Mohammed” Case” from Feb 24. This is not about Sharia law, this is American innocence until proven guilty. We should applaud this Judge’s courage even if his eloquence was questionable. Instead these recent stories address fear-mongering that is worrisome:

March 9 – Jonathan Gurwitz writes for the San Antonio Express-News in Texas News-Journal: “Intolerance of Islamic extremists”

Americans have come to accept the violent spasms of religious intolerance that frequently convulse parts of the Islamic world. But is it too much to ask that judges in the United States uphold rights enumerated in the U.S. Constitution?

March 13 -Jenny Erikson in Cafe Mom – “Judge Says Honoring Mohammed Is More Important Than Free Speech in America” writes:

Newsflash for Judge Martin: This is not a Muslim country, it is America, where idiots have the right to be as stupid, insulting, and ignorant as they please.

March 20 – Joanne Hill in Jewish Tribune “Judges sets ‘horrible precedent,’ Freedom Center president says” Their website also refers to the “the brain dead Israeli left” and Romney “bringing life back to the party“. reprinted March 23 as “Fighting Back Against PA’s Blasphemy Verdict” in FrontPageMag :

This movement to advance Sharia law is being conducted by “an armada of organizations such as the Council on American-Islamic Relations, the Muslim American Society and the Muslim Student Association, which are part of the Muslim Brotherhood, which is advancing this agenda,” Horowitz said.

March 23 – Chuck Shepherd in Star Tribune – “News of the Weird – No justice for zombie?” – implying the decision was based on Sharia law and that “ruling was a lack of evidence” is only a “technical basis”.

Finally this article by Retired US Marine Corps. Lt. Colonel James G. Zumwalt
“Failing to heed the ‘Zombie Prophet Mohammed’ warning”
April 3, in UPI.com
April 5 – in Family Security Matters

Did you hear the one about the “Zombie Prophet Mohammed” and “Zombie pope” parading together?

It sounds like the beginning of a bad joke but that scenario happened in Mechanicsburg, Pa., triggering an incident and court decision that is no laughing matter, impacting on U.S. constitutional law.

This retired military officer writes of a “secret game plan”:

judges unknowingly are following a secret game plan, discovered eight years ago in a hidden sub-basement of an Islamist’s home in northern Virginia, written by the leadership of the Muslim Brotherhood — the same organization now taking control (by democratic means) of Egypt. The plan outlines how Shariah will eventually replace existing law in the United States.

He writes that, like Paul Newman’s “Cool Hand Luke” 1967 movie, Egypt and the US have a “failure to communicate”:

The failure is on our part to fully understand what the Muslim Brotherhood and the Zombie Prophet Mohammed case are telling us.

Yes this is a failure to communicate. Read again the Volokh article posted above. This case is not about Sharia law.

March 20 – NJ Herald “Editorials from around Pennsylvania” attacks the reporting in “THE TRUTH ABOUT MARK MARTIN” writing:

Truth is the ultimate victim in this case and that means everyone loses. The first version of events to be reported is usually the most remembered, and lest anyone forget, what gets posted online lives forever.

While some blame attaches to the person who put the match to the powder keg, the full shame belongs to the bloggers and national media who seized on one side of a juicy story and then fanned the flames.

Meanwhile, as of March 15, the “powder keg” is hoping to light again. The complainant-victim, the costumed atheist, zombie Muhammed, “doofus”, Mr. Perce, is continuing his anti-religion activism by posting a billboard that likens Christianity to American Black slavery.

Additionally, other religion writers are toying with Easter liturgy and referring to Jesus as Zombie Jesus and Easter as Zombie Jesus Day.

March 31 – Cecil Adkins Charleston Freethought Examiner in examiner.com – “Zombie Jesus day is April 8th”

But even if one refrains from referring to the originator of the Christian faith as a zombie, it’s hard to think about a little-known event that happened around the time of his death as anything other than a zombie uprising.

Matthew 27:51-53 has the lowdown:

” Then, behold, the veil of the temple was torn in two from top to bottom; and the earth quaked, and the rocks were split, and the graves were opened; and many bodies of the saints who had fallen asleep were raised; and coming out of the graves after His resurrection, they went into the holy city and appeared to many.”

And so, if Jesus is to bring back all the saints (marching in? parading?), surely he would (at least maybe) bring back the prophet Mohammed, (with a Pope?).

And so Perce’s Parading Atheists may have a literal scriptural connection. But literally, would Jesus be a Zombie? No, Jesus was a Lich:

So maybe religious figures are monsters. And Maybe Judge Martin is like Sgt. Brody from Showtime series “Homeland“.