Smells like holy spirit

Due to their first product's runaway success, the maker of the world's first Jesus-scented candle is expanding the company's line of biblical burnables.

"In time for Christmas 2005, we'll be releasing Holy Father Frankincense and Mother Mary Myrrh," said Bob Tosterud, co-owner of His Essence, LLC. Tosterud then showed LWN a commemorative tin specially designed to hold the trinity of candles.

"We're also testing a Moses-scented candle, for Jewish folks. An early version smelled like you'd expect for a man who'd been wandering for forty years in the desert, but that didn't test very well so we went back to the drawing board. Our latest vision for Moses is a fresher scent, like that a baby plucked from the Nile with an undertone of bulrush." According to Tosterud, the wick of the Moses-scented candle will be shaped like a burning bush.

The company plans to release new religious-smelling candles each season. "We'd like to release a Mohammad-scented candle in time for Eid in 2006, then a Buddha-scented candle later that year. 2007 will see the launch of our Mary Baker Eddy-scented and Joseph Smith-scented candles, to represent the Christian Science movement and Church of Latter Day Saints respectively. We'll round out the decade with a variety of scents based on Shinto kami and Hindu gods."

Tosterud admitted that some scents were more difficult to capture than others. "You'd think a Satan-scented candle would be easy, but it took 666 batches to get just the right ratio of fire to brimstone." The company projects the Satan-scented candle to be a big seller because the Satanists, although small in number, burn through a whole lot of candles.

Where possible the company uses religious consultants, but that process sometimes reveals philosophical schisms. "Members of the Native American Pequot tribe told us the Great Spirit should smell like soft rain falling on maple leaves," said Tosterud. "But members of the Navajo tribe told us the Great Spirit should smell more like flowers on a desert wind. As a compromise we developed our Great Spirit-scented candle to smell like the betrayal of the land-grabbing, oath-breaking, pale-faced devil. That seemed to make everyone happy."

"Our most accurate candle so far is probably the one designed to smell like Church of Scientology founder Robert Heinlein," Tosterud added. "We were lucky enough to obtain an actual shirt of his with the scent still pretty much intact. It's a mix of flannel, body odor, and Aqua Velva."

The company's product line will end with an unscented candle for atheists.