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If those words come up — we’ll do it. I can only take the words that pop up each time I go to the site.

Hopefully they'll come up soon. Really, this controversy is an interesting one, so I'll give a short synopsis!

The controversy between the Pentedactylites and the Tessarodactylites revolves around the number of fingers found on the human hand.

The Pentedactylite position is based upon a literal reading of Scipture in II Samuel 21:20 and I Chronicles 20:6, in both places a giant warrior of Gath is reported, of whom the Bible says that he had six fingers on each hand. From this, Pentedactylites infer that, on the normal human hand, all five digits - including the thumb - should be considered "fingers," just as all six on the Gittite's hand were.

Opposing this viewpoint, however, are the Tessarodactylites who utilise a rationalistic approach to the question, noting that modern science says that "the thumb isn't really a finger." On this basis, they argue that the normal human hand only has four fingers.

The Pentedactylite position is the traditional position of the Church. In his seminal work on the subject entitled On Fingers (Ad Digiti) - which unfortunately has been lost and is now found only in quotations from later Fathers - St. Augustine of Hippo remarked, "in His infinite wisdom, as hath been handed down to us by means of Holy Scripture and the most reverend traditions of our most holy faith, God hath designated all the appendages which do project from the hand of man, whom He hath made in His image, as fingers." It is most generally understood that Augustine was opposing an early manifestation of the Tessarodactylite heresy as it was expressed by various schismatic groups in Britain and northern Gaul, the origin of the heresy apparently being a bishop of Camulodunum named Ahenobarbus.

In modern times, the Tessarodactylite heresy reappeared in Germany and the Netherlands via the influence of rationalistic anatomists in universities such as those of Tübingen, Hamburg, and Leiden. This heresy has made inroads into the Roman Catholic Church, despite official condemnation by Pope Sisinnius II (2 Dec. 1830 - 1 Feb 1831), who dedicated his only official papal bull (Haereticum praeconor ut manus quattor digitos) to combatting this error. However, the heresy today is most closely associated with liberal Protestant groups, and is also the official position of the Unitarian Universalist denomination.