Opinion: History better off without modern regulations

If you can actually visualize it, I don’t have a topic this week. So, humor me. Say you can’t.

Having no desire to get caught up in the intelligent design versus evolution controversy, I’ll skip creation, the Garden of Eden, Adam, Eve, the serpent and original sin, and move along to Noah and the ark.

Even if Noah’s neighborhood had been zoned for carpentry work, it’s doubtful he would have been awarded a building permit to erect a boat in the middle of a desert.

Besides, years of hammering and sawing would have led to complaints by Noah’s neighbors.

In the name of noise abatement, the ark might never have been built.

If the ark had been completed, imagine the ruckus today’s civil libertarians would make when word spread that the only humans sailing with the animals would be Noah and his family.

Injunctions would have delayed the sailing while the animals grew more testy by the minute.

Who knows, the flood might have caused the ark to defy the injunctions and float away toward its destiny.

The story of Moses and the exodus from Egypt today would be in trouble. The events leading up to the Passover would probably generate enough legal actions to end the Exodus before it started.

If not, imagine the fallout from Moses’ parting the waters of the Red Sea in order to lead the Israelites across.

First, legal action would have stopped the children of Israel at the shoreline until an environmental impact statement was filed on the effect of thousands of people and chariots crossing the ocean floor.

Besides, Moses probably would have been in violation of maritime laws for creating shipping hazards by diverting the ocean currents. Legal battles would have gone on for years.

It might have turned out to be a legal wilderness they wandered in for 40 years.

Assuming they eventually made it across, the public health authority would have sprung into action, citing Moses because the manna from heaven wasn’t approved for human consumption.

Entering into Canaan would have been tricky. No leader today would propose a military encounter to knock down the wall around Jericho by marching around it for six days and, on the seventh day, sounding trumpets and shouting.

Media would demand to be embedded in Joshua’s army to see the wall come down for themselves. Besides, the whole thing would be delayed while the United Nations imposed sanctions on the invaders.

In today’s environment, the destruction of Sodom and Gomorrah would have raised eyebrows everywhere. The claim would be that the cities’ citizens were minding their own business and shouldn’t have been wiped out.

It goes without saying that Lot would have had a lot (pun not intended) to answer for. I mean, what’s the real story? What actually happened to his wife out there in the desert? A fellow can’t expect to just walk away when his wife mysteriously turns into a pillar of salt while her hometown is burning down.

A congressional fact-finding committee would be named to get to the bottom of this injustice. The cable news outlets would talk about nothing else for months to come.

Doubtless, the big fight between David and Goliath wouldn’t take place today until all the licenses and tax forms necessary to hold a sporting event were obtained.

If the fight were allowed, it’s likely that media would have portrayed Goliath as an innocent bystander.

He was just your average 9-foot-tall gentle soul wearing battle armor, aiming a spear at David. Sneaky David let him have it right between the eyes.

The poor fellow went down defending his country.

David would probably have been charged with carrying a concealed slingshot and portrayed by media as an out of control teenage thug who sucker-punched an unsuspecting Philistine.

It’s clear that David’s poll numbers would be so low he never could have been elected king.

It seems that Old Testament stories took place at the proper times.

Joe McAdoo is former chairman of the communication department at Drury University.[[In-content Ad]]