The Black Back Bible

Gibson is a cop.

He read my note to you about transportation and how the worst safety record is held by motorcycles.

He brought out something I didn't think of. “If there weren't idiots on motorcycles, we'd have a problem finding organ donors.”

“Out here, (meaning Mississippi), we call motorcycle riders 'organ donors.'' I think he is from southwestern Georgia between Bunea Vista and Ellaville.

I wondered what drove him west, but I think he married a girl from Mississippi and that's really all it took.

Gibson's great-grand uncle was a semiretired Baptist preacher known as “Daddy Black.” My father knew Daddy Black and told stories about him.

Black carried a big black “coffee table” family Bible everywhere he went. It was impossible to miss, and he sometimes joined town preachers at the cafe beside the post office on Monday mornings for coffee.

On one of those mornings the Baptist preacher pointed to the huge black Bible and said something like: “I see you are carrying a black backed Bible,” to which Daddy Black said it was the only kind he would have.

The Methodist preacher chimed in that the world was full of “modernisms” which distracted people. He then asked Daddy Black if he was a member of the “Back to the black backed Bible movement,” an organization to rid the world of “modernisms.”

Then another preacher offered that he was a member and wanted to use the kind of Bible used in the day of Paul and Silas, Timothy and all the rest.

That seemed to crank up Daddy Black and he started ranting about red backed Bibles, white backed Bibles and some with no leather back at all.

Time and Monday mornings passed, and the preachers gave little if any thought to the “black back Bible movement” prank.

Daddy Black preached a weekend revival at a small church, and word came back that he got on a rant about any kind of Bible other than black backed Bibles and let the congregation hold a double helping of it.

The local radio station carried fifteen minute, live religious broadcasts on Sunday mornings that we used to call “preacher shows.”

Preachers showed up, paid their twenty dollars for the fifteen minutes and went to work.

On one particular Sunday morning, Daddy Black substituted for a preacher who had to be out of town but didn't want to lose his radio slot.

Daddy Black bore down on “modernisms” calling the names of local preachers who were members in good standing of the “back to the black back Bible movement.” He squeezed every second of his radio time trying to rid the world of modernisms.

The preachers had to scrub really hard to get that off their faces.

joenphillips@yahoo.com

By Joe Phillips Dear Me