The only honest art form is laughter, comedy. You can't fake it... try to fake three laughs in an hour - ha ha ha ha ha - they'll take you away, man. You can't.
Lenny BruceRead
If Jesus had been killed twenty years ago, Catholic school children would be wearing little electric chairs around their necks instead of crosses.
Interpretation
What this quote means
The quote highlights the absurdity of how symbols of faith or suffering can change based on cultural context.
Lenny Bruce uses this provocative statement to illustrate how society's perceptions of symbols evolve over time. He suggests that if a different method of execution had been more culturally significant, the spiritual icons we hold dear would similarly reflect that context, challenging us to think critically about the icons we venerate and the values they represent.
Themes
SymbolsFaithCultureContextIrony
In practice
Example use cases
In a discussion about the evolution of religious iconography, this quote can emphasize how society shapes symbolism.
More from Lenny Bruce
All quotes βI'm not a comedian. I'm Lenny Bruce.
Lenny BruceRead
I'll die young, but it's like kissing God.
Lenny BruceRead
All my humor is based on destruction and despair. If the whole world were tranquil, without disease and violence, I'd be standing in the bread line - right in back of J. Edgar Hoover.
Lenny BruceRead
In the Halls of Justice the only justice is in the halls.
Lenny BruceRead
Marijuana is rejected all over the world. Damned. In England heroin is alright for out-patents, but marijuana? They'll put your ass in jail. I wonder why that is? The only reason could be: To Serve the Devil - Pleasure! Pleasure, which is a dirty word in Christian culture.
Lenny BruceRead
Similar quotes
We're not our skin of grime, we're not our dread bleak dusty imageless locomotive, we're all beautiful golden sunflowers inside, we're blessed by our own seed & hairy naked accomplishment-bodies growing into mad black formal sunflowers in the sunset, spied on by our eyes under the shadow of the mad locomotive riverbank sunset Frisco hilly tincan evening sitdown vision.
Allen GinsbergRead
Each of us lives within the universe - the prison - of his own brain. Projecting from it are millions of fragile sensory nerve fibers, in groups uniquely adapted to sample the energetic states of the world around us: heat, light, force, and chemical composition. That is all we ever know of it directly; all else is logical inference.
Vernon Benjamin MountcastleRead
Are you searching for your soul? _x000D_ Then come out of your own prison.
RumiRead
Here's an easy way to figure out if you're in a cult: If you're wondering whether you're in a cult, the answer is yes.
Stephen ColbertRead
Whatever you do in life, if you want to be creative and intelligent, and develop your brain, you must do everything with the awareness that everything, in some way, connects to everything else.
Leonardo Da VinciRead
The challenge remains. On the other side are formidable forces: money, political power, the major media. On our side are the people of the world and a power greater than money or weapons: the truth.
Howard ZinnRead