I got this from another e-list, and thought it might fit Rangernet. Anybody ever had any personal experience with this?
Our music minister used something similar for an effective sermon illustration, once. He spoke of going to a "Rattlesnake Roundup" in Texas. The participants in this festive occasion would round up and capture rattlesnakes from the local ranches. Many rattlesnakes were caught, milked (for their poison, which has some use in making antidote for that poison), decapitated, skinned, cooked, and their meat served. Yum. He remembered being amazed at watching this, because as the snakes were being butchered, he could see into the basket of dead rattlesnake heads, and the heads were biting each other. Not only that, but the decapitated, skinned snakes were hung up on nails, and they persisted in wiggling for some time. For all practical purposes, the snakes were DEAD, but they still moved -- and yes, their heads could still be dangerous. He related this to faith. We believe what we know to be true from the Bible, in spite of what our senses tell us -- just as we believe that this wiggling skinned snake body and its decapitated head that is biting blindly in the basket are dead, in spite of appearances.
LIFE AFTER DEATH � The New England Journal of Medicine reported
5 cases of rattlesnake poisonings by dead rattlesnakes. Snakes apparently retain some primitive reflex actions for a short while after being killed.
Patient 1 bludgeoned a rattlesnake on the head with wood and was bitten when he picked up the dead snake. Patient 2 shot the snake in the head, didn't see any movement for three minutes then picked it up and was bitten in the finger. Patient 3 shot then decapitated the rattler, when he picked up the head it bit him in the finger, which had to be amputated. Patient 4 was also bitten by a decapitated rattlesnake that had been motionless for five minutes. Patient 5 did the rattler in with a shotgun but was also bitten.
Apparently snake heads can be dangerous for up to 60 minutes after death.
Kerry Weiser
Vancouver, WA
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Michael Paul
Johnson
[EMAIL PROTECTED]
http://ebible.org/mpj
