Michael Jackson's Religion: The "You First" Adultery Policy

Michael Jackson's This Is It, the documentary in theaters now, is truly amazing, a towering work of art about a musical genius, brilliant dancer, and true athlete. From the reports of MJ's last days and death, we were sort of expecting to see an aging pop star making a difficult comeback, but instead, were awestruck by the energy, talent and musical genius of a man still at the top of his game. If you haven't seen This Is It, you should make a date to do so!

I knew Jackson was a deeply religious man, but I didn't know the details. My curiosity was piqued, so I investigated, and learned that he was a Jehovah's Witness, which surprised me. And oddly enough, even with the hundreds of books I read while writing The Religion Virus, and the thousands of web sites I'd perused, I never once learned much about this particular branch of Christianity. It seemed like a good time to rectify that...

I find their theology to be an interesting variant on Christianity, particularly the idea that when you die, you're dead and gone, with no soul that survives. However, they interpret the resurrection as meaning those who believe in the JW version of Christianity will be resurrected, recreated as it were.

There's a lot more interesting theology, but one bit really caught my attention. It seems that the Jehovah's Witnesses can only get divorced for adultery. But there's an out: if you're divorced for some other reason (like if you'e a woman, and your husband beats the crap out of you), then it's considered adultery for you to get married again, unless your ex-spouse has sex with someone else first.

So I can just picture it ... you split up with your spouse for some reason, and you're both ready to remarry. "Hey, babe, you first, go ahead and have sex, I don't mind..." "No, you first!" "No, you go first!" Whichever of you goes first is the sinner, the other one is off the hook!

Boy, that really puts the pressure on. And it would really make it worth your while to spy on your ex, to find out if he/she had hooked up with someone yet.