Tim Minchin: The Good Book

Life is like an ocean voyage
And our bodies are the ships
And without a moral compass
We would all be cast adrift

So to keep us on our bearings
The Lord gave us a gift
And like most gifts you get
It was a book

I only read one book
But it's a good book, don't you know
I act the way I act because
The Good Book tells me so
If I want to know how to be good
It's to the Good Book that I go
Cause the Good Book is a book
And it is good and it's a book

I know the Good Book's good because
The Good Book says it's good
I know the Good Book knows it's good
Because a really good book would

You wouldn't cook without a cookbook
And I think it's understood
You can't be good without a Good Book
Cause it's good and it's a book
And it is good for cookin'

I tried to read some other books
But I soon gave up on that
The paragraphs ain't numbered
And they complicate the facts
I can't read Harry Potter
Cause they're worshiping false gods and that
And Dumbledore's a poofter
And that's bad cause it's not good!

Morality is written there
In simple white and black
I feel sorry for you heathens
Got to think about all that
Good is good and evil's bad
And goats are good
And pigs are crap
You'll find which one is which
In the Good Book
Cause it's good and it's a book
And it's a book (yeah!)

I had a cat, she gave birth to a litter
The kittens were adorable
And they made my family laugh
But as they grew they started misbehaving
So I drowned the little fuckers in the bath!
When the creatures in your care start being menaces
The answers can be found right there in Genesis
Chapter six, verse five through seven! Yee-haw!

Swing your partner by the hand
Have a baby if you can
But if the voices in your head
Say to sacrifice your kid
To satiate your loving God's
Fetish for dead baby blood
It's simple faith the book demands
So raise that knife up in your hands

Before the Good Book made us good
There was no good way to know
If a thing was good or not-not good
Or kind of touch-and-go—so
God decided he'd give writing
Allegoric prose a go
And so he wrote a book
And it was generally well-received

The Telegraph said 'This god is reminiscent of the Norse'
The Times said 'Kind of turgid, but I liked the bit with horses'
The Mail said 'Lots of massacres; a violent tour-de-force
If you only read one book this year
Then this one is a book
And it is good
And it's a book' Yee-haw!

Swing your daughter by the hand
But if she gets raped by a man
And refuses then to marry him
Stone her to death!

If you just close your eyes and block your ears
To the accumulated knowledge of the last two thousand years
Then morally – guess what? – you're off the hook
And thank Christ you only have to read one book

Just because the book's contents
Were written generations hence
By hairy desert-dwelling gents
Squatting in their dusty tents

Just because what Heaven said
Was said before they'd leavened bread
Just cause Jesus couldn't read
Doesn't mean that we should need

When manipulating human genes
To alleviate pain or fight disease
When deciding whether it's wrong or right
To help the dying let go of life
Or stop a pregnancy when it's
Just a tiny blastocyst
There's no reason why we should take a look
At any other book
But the Good Book
Cause it's good and it's a book
And it's a book and it's quite good!

Good is good and evil's bad
And kids get killed when God gets mad
You better take a good look
At the Good Book