UPDATE: Mystery solved. For an explanation of the symbol (and a stencil for copying), click here.
Miami Ink is a popular tv show about tattoos, and it has not been shy about displaying religious imagery. The video below is of a Texas pastor--Pastor Cleetus--getting a Jesus tattoo. Another popular tattoo has been what is purported to be an Egyptian symbol for "Only God Can Judge Me."
Don't know about the Egyptian symbol part--unlike the "G" in B of G I'm not omniscient (yet!) and I don't have the time to go beyond the research I've already done. However, I do know why "Only God Can Judge Me" has emerged as a particularly popular tattoo trope. The contemporary source of this meme was Tupac Shakur, who had "Only God Can Judge Me" tattooed next to a cross on his chest & performed a signature rap by the same title. This stanza is particularly haunting when you consider how he ultimately died:
I hear the doctor standing over me
screaming I can make it
Got a body full of bullet holes
Laying here naked
Still I can't breathe
something evil's in my I-V
Cuz everytime I breathe
I think they're killing me
I'm having nightmares
Homicidal fantansies
I wake up stranglin'
Danglin'
from my bed sheets
I call the nurse
cuz it hurts
To reminisce
How could it come to this ?
I wish they dind't miss
somebody help me
Tell me where to go from here ?

Leave a comment