Quote John 3:16 to get oil change discount

[CorporalClegg]

Spelling fail is fail.

 

[Judy Waxhorn]

Let the Faithful have their well-lubed moment in the Son.

This sounds sooooo wrong!

You saw what I did there?

Spelling fail is fail.

Not when it's intentional for great justice. :P

 

[Pingfah]

I see nothing wrong with this, as long as he doesn't refuse anyone the deal who does quote the requested passage.

 

[TremblingBluStar]

I get a huge discount off my car's oil changes by doing them myself, as any man with a pair of testicles, or any female with a pair of ovaries, should be doing anyway.

My brother used to do that back when we were teens. However, in this area you can get an oil change for $20 (if you skip the lube and interior cleaning places throw in to inflate the price), but to dispose of an engine full of dirty oil it costs about the same.

Why not get it done at a place where you don't have to worry about disposal? Remember, you can't dump old engine oil down the sink!

 

[Nerys Ghemor]

What do you get if you can quote the King James Bible version or even the original Greek?

For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life.

Οὕτως γὰρ ἠγάπησεν ὁ Θεὸς τὸν κόσμον, ὥστε τὸν Υἱὸν τὸν μονογενῆ ἔδωκεν, ἵνα πᾶς ὁ πιστεύων εἰς Αὐτὸν μὴ ἀπόληται ἀλλ᾽ ἔχῃ ζωὴν αἰώνιον.

...and yes, I did cheat and look these up on the Internet.

Probably depends on how you pronounce the squiggly parts.

If I recall correctly, they serve both as accent marks and "tone" marks. Classical Greek, while not a tonal language in the same sense as Chinese, definitely had something like tones in it. By the time of Koine Greek, I don't believe people paid tremendous attention to that anymore, but it still existed in the written language.

I don't really see the problem with this. It's certainly obnoxious and if a store tried lecturing me about the bible I would think "what a dick" and not come back, but it's his business.

My point exactly--if someone acts like this guy, the free market is going to take care of the problem. There is no need--and I would in fact be very freaked-out if it happened--for the government to have anything to do with this whatsoever.

The guy certainly has a right to run his business anyway he wants, but he doesn't have to act like such an asshole about it.

That's what put me off. He had me until he started the "I'm tired of people telling me what to do" bit. That's what told me this wasn't about sharing his faith, but about getting back at someone he felt had done him wrong.

While I certainly don't decline nouns like the King James Bible does, I'm used to the verse including the word "begotten," so I probably would come close to using that version as well. I think you should get bonus points for Latin, Greek, or Aramaic, but the guy probably wouldn't know what gibberish you're speaking.

Me: Ekna gir ahb Alea lolma, aikna dlbre ihidia ntl, dkl mn dmeimn be, la nabd, ala neuun le hia dlolm.

Him: What are you speaking, Arabic?

Interesting. You can definitely hear the relationship between that language and Arabic. Now, is it me or are there some words in there that linguists haven't decided what the proper vowels ought to be, or is it like some Slavic languages where voiced consonants sometimes seem to go in clusters and play the role of vowels?

 

[scotpens]

Interesting. You can definitely hear the relationship between that language and Arabic.

Also Hebrew. All three languages have the same Semitic roots.

 

[Nerys Ghemor]

Indeed. Not sure why, but it "sounds" closer to Arabic than Hebrew to me (I think it's seeing "la" rather than the Hebraic "lo" as the negative). I don't know whether that's just my perception or it really is closer to one rather than the other.

I love languages, though.

 

[Alidar Jarok]

I see nothing wrong with this, as long as he doesn't refuse anyone the deal who does quote the requested passage.

For what it's worth (and this always my favorite option) if he refuses, you can sue him. Offering that price in exchange for saying John 3:16 is a binding contract.

While I certainly don't decline nouns like the King James Bible does, I'm used to the verse including the word "begotten," so I probably would come close to using that version as well. I think you should get bonus points for Latin, Greek, or Aramaic, but the guy probably wouldn't know what gibberish you're speaking.

Me: Ekna gir ahb Alea lolma, aikna dlbre ihidia ntl, dkl mn dmeimn be, la nabd, ala neuun le hia dlolm.

Him: What are you speaking, Arabic?

Interesting. You can definitely hear the relationship between that language and Arabic.

They're both Semitic languages. Hebrew as well. My favorite phrase to compare Peace Be With You:

Hebrew: Shalom Aleichem
Aramaic: Shlama Llakh
Arabic: As-Salamu Alaykum (and it sounds closer to asalam alaykum).

Now, is it me or are there some words in there that linguists haven't decided what the proper vowels ought to be, or is it like some Slavic languages where voiced consonants sometimes seem to go in clusters and play the role of vowels?

They're not using the Roman alphabet. Anything we write in our alphabet is only an approximation of what it actually is. Semitic languages are more difficult because they have fairly weak, unstressed vowels that can be interpreted in a number of ways. Even trickier is ancient Semitic languages, which didn't have vowels indicated at all. For example (and pardon any orthodox Jews for the example, since it's the only one I know), the name of God was often written as YHWH. Modern interpretation is Yahweh. However, the other common interpretation is Jehovah (J and Y, V and W are interchangeable).

 

[NCC1701]

I get a huge discount off my car's oil changes by doing them myself, as any man with a pair of testicles, or any female with a pair of ovaries, should be doing anyway.

My brother used to do that back when we were teens. However, in this area you can get an oil change for $20 (if you skip the lube and interior cleaning places throw in to inflate the price), but to dispose of an engine full of dirty oil it costs about the same.

Why not get it done at a place where you don't have to worry about disposal? Remember, you can't dump old engine oil down the sink!

Seeing as the local car parts superstore - which is 1km down the road - has an used oil bin where you can dispose of it for free, I don't have a problem getting rid of my used oil around here

 

[TheBrew]

What a lot of crap... no offence.

I would go there, quote it, so the discount would be mine, and then say it's all a bunch of Bronze Age crap, and if he doesn't give me the discount, I would call that attorney general back.
That's just me.

There is no part of this post that is correct.

A better person would grow a pair and not get into a hissy about such a nothing issue.

 

[Asbo Zaprudder]

Use Greek or Aramaic, and you'd probably get the response "If English was good enough for Jesus Christ, it's good enough for me."

 

[auntiehill]

Heck, if I owned a store, I'd give a discount to anyone who could sing a Tim Minchin song or quote Richard Dawkins from memory.

It's the guy's store; he can do any dumb-ass thing he wants with it. It doesn't mean I have to spend my money in his shop, either. Kind of a non-issue.

 

[Trekker4747]

If I was this guy's competitor I'd honor the coupon without people having to recite the verse, I'd likely pick up new, loyal, customers in the process to negate any "loss" in the operation.