Camp songs.

My wife and I got into a scriptural disagreement the other morning, because we are highly educated Catholics and do that sort of thing, you know. I made a passing reference to the fact that some Bible translations of Genesis say it was gopherwood from which Noah built his famous ark, although other scholars are uncertain what gopherwood is, and some think it was cypress. Mrs. K disagreed; in her studies she was informed that the ark was actually built of "sticks and barky barky."

Her source for this was, of course, sleepaway camp, where she was taught the following 'round the ol' campfire:

So Noah, he built him, he built him an arky arky
Noah, so Noah, he built him an arky arky
Made it out of sticks and barky barky
Children of the Lord

You can see how difficult it is to argue against evidence like that. But it didn't end there. When I mentioned that in the book of Jonah, chapter 2, the reluctant prophet was swallowed not by a whale but by a "great fish," I was rebutted again with a different song:

Jonah Jonah Jonah
In the belly of a whale...

Obviously camp songs have a lot of misinformation about scripture. So I decided that I would write a biblically accurate camp song.

I don't have the melody -- heck, we don't know if anyone's actually going to a summer camp this year -- but I came up with lyrics about King Saul and his anger at David. It goes a little something like this:

Old King Saul was jealous
Because David was so zealous
And he saw him as a rival to the throne (boom boom)
Saul's son Jack said "You should beat it
Or my pop will make you eat it"
David thought he would leave well enough alone (boom boom)

(Chorus) And Saul chased David here
And then Saul chased David there
From Keillah down to Nob 
King Saul he chased that little slob
Mighty Saul chased little David everywhere! (boom boom)

Angry Saul he then killed thousands
As he pushed through towns and mountains
Hoping that he would at last chop David's head (boom boom)
But then David got the jump and
As old Saul, he took a dump, and
David cut a piece of kingly robe instead (boom boom)

(Chorus)

Then once more they went to Ziph
And David had a great epiph-
-Any to scare off Saul by leaving him his spear (boom boom)
When Saul saw it by his head
And realized Dave could leave him dead
He said, "Okay, Dave, I'm buggin' out of here" (boom boom)

(Chorus)

There. I hope at least the kids will get this story right.

Next up, my camp song about how David arranged for Uriah to get killed so he could make whoopee with Bathsheba. Arky arky indeed!