God only gave me two hands. The rest he gave to the Indians.

[David Marc Fischer]

Maybe I've missed a mention of this...but could the expression have
something to do with multi-armed gods from India India?

I understand that each arm symbolizes a different ability of the god.

David

> "God only gave me two hands" (with various placements of "only" or "just")
> gets about 160 Google hits--not many, to be sure.  There are significantly
> more for "I only have two hands" (12,500), "I've only got two hands"
> (2,770), "I only got two hands" (450), etc.  Of course, not all of those
> instances are germain. Still, we can identify a set expression, which is
> often uttered as a retort to being urged to hurry at some manual task. The
> "Indians" part is probably an innovative addendum, without much occurrence
> in oral tradition.
>
> --Charlie
> _____________________________________________________________
>
> ---- Original message ----
>>Date: Mon, 4 Aug 2008 13:16:32 -0400
>>From: Grant Barrett <gbarrett at WORLDNEWYORK.ORG>
>>Subject: Re: God only gave me two hands. The rest he gave
>>
>>On Aug 4, 2008, at 12:58, Charles Doyle wrote:
>>
>>> Yes, like Mark, I'd say it's a proverb or catch phrase + a variable)
>>> coda.
>>
>>Perhaps, but I've tried numerous searches in which I wildcarded the nouns
>> or verbs, or tried different, common ones, and others in which I changed
>> or wildcarded the pronouns, to no avail. I've also tried stripping it
>> down to the basics, taking it down the minimum form in which any meaning
>> is still retained.
>>
>>For example, "two hands" is likely to be unchanged whatever form this
>> saying might have taken elsewhere, though perhaps "ten fingers" or >"two
>> arms" or "one body" might be possible.
>>
>>For example, I've searched for the lord|almighty|jesus|holy father|He in
>> the place of "God," and Injuns|heathens|pagans|natives|Native Americans
>> in place of "Indians."
>>
>>Grant
>
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