Comedy >
from "The Real Story" by Michael Peppe, in THREE-FISTED TALES OF BOB, edited by the Rev. Ivan Stang, 1990
God talks to J.R. "Bob" Dobbs and gets around to the reason He called him to an interview:
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"But enough chitchat about trivialities," said "God," getting up. "I've got a lot more important things to do than shoot the shit with you about My wild and crazy youth. Like take My eternal break, for example, which is too short as it is." He clasped His hands behind Him and began to slowly pace. "You asked Me why I called you here today." Here He wheeled and skewered "Bob" with a very grave, if slightly bloodshot, look. "Your Prophet's License is up for renewal."
- "Bob's" jaw dropped. "Already?"
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"Time flies, eternity waits."
- "Does this mean I have to reapply all over again?"
- "No. You just have to take the oral. And we better jam on it: I've gotta run off a whole buncha these today." He gestured towards the window to the outer office. Through it "Bob" could see Christ, Mohammed, Gautama Buddha, Zoroaster, Ramakrishna, Gurdjieff, Werner Erhard, Edgar Cayce, Mary Baker Eddy, L. Ron Hubbard, Dr. Gene Scott and several others in a kind of waiting room, flipping through old READER'S DIGEST.
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"There's a possible twenty-one points in all," began "God." "Twenty questions, and the last one counts double. They start out easy and get harder. Question number one: What is freedom?"
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"Very good. Two: What is science?"
- "Everyone's personal religion."
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"And religion?"
- "Somebody else's science: speculation."
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"I see you've done your homework. Four: What is insanity?"
- "The state of being insufficiently neurotic."
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"And neurosis?"
- "Personality."
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"And why is that?"
- "Because consciousness always needs to have a style."
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"Seven. This one's a little tougher. A fish is to water as the mind is to...?"
- "Um...information?"
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"No. Falsehood. One wrong. What do all the evils in the world have in common?"
- "They're all necessary ones."
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"Correct. And who commits them?"
- "Everyone?"
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"No. Everyone else. Two wrong. What are the two great keys to lifelong happiness and what great modern thinker discovered them?"
- "Oh that's easy. Good health and a bad memory. Ingrid Bergman."
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"To whom is all religious, moral, political, scientific and artistic preaching directed?"
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"And what is the most important information in any message?"
- "The name of the messenger."
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"What, did you cram for this? Thirteen: Why do some people believe in Me?"
- "Because You exist?"
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"Of course not, silly. Personally I think I definitely might, but that's irrelevant. Because they're afraid not to. And why do other people not believe in Me?"
- "Hmm. Because they're afraid to?"
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"No. Trick question. Everyone believes in God. They just don't believe in someone ELSE'S God."
- "But...what about atheists?"
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"Hell, they need more faith than ANYONE: They gotta believe in EVERYTHING! Anyway, I should know: Who d'ya think invented faith in the first place, for God's sakes, Oral Roberts? And I did it long before I shrink-wrapped Homo sapiens to fit AROUND it, believe Me."
- "But what about scientists, who--"
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"SCIENTISTS? All those guys DO is make up new names for Me. For example, their latest one is "the Big Bang," by using which they actually think they're believing in something else--just by changing the name! But you notice they're always very careful to capitalize it...Speaking of which, let's move on to the next section: cosmology. Which is greater: the number of stars or the number of universes?"
- "Um...neither. They're exactly the same."
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"Actually, not exactly, but close enough. At any given time, the number of universes exceed the number of stars by an average of 1,341 [ 2 ] I don't understand this : close enough to be negligible. Here's another easy one: What's a black hole?"
- "The house arrest of the four dimensions?"
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"No. My empty grave. Seventeen: Is the universe composed of waves or particles?" [ 3 ] See also Wave–particle duality
- "Both."
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"Wrong. Neither. The universe consists of infinitesimal looped strings vibrating in ten dimensions." [ 4 ] See Extra dimensions, M-theory, Uniform 10-polytope
- "What happened to the other six?"
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"Fell down and got lost in the cracks between the first four in the first moment of creation. In fact, you should have gotten that one: It was just discovered recently by a human physicist at Princeton named Edward Witten. Can you name the OTHER two of the only three humans in history whose theories on the nature of reality were correct?"
- "Both wrong. One was the Cabalist sage Isaac ben Solomon Luria, who in the sixteenth century correctly surmised, in his theory of zimzum, or contraction, that My first act of creation was to retract Myself from existence, in order to make room for the world. In fact," He murmured confidentially, "what the physicists AND the Cabalists don't realize is, I AM the other six dimensions!"
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"And who was the third correct human?"
- "The painter Salvador Dali, who astutely noted that the universe is not vast [ 5 ] See also Observational cosmology and expanding at all, but is in fact smaller than a butterfly and contracting to a single point somewhere in a railway station in Perpignan, France. But enough science. Final question. It's a tough one, especially for a clergyman, and it counts double, so you get three tries. What is the greatest enemy of truth?"
- "Bob" concentrated. "Ah...the self?"
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"Close."
- "Fear?"
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"Closer."
- "Belief?"
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"Still closer, but no Pipe." "God" spoke into the intercom. "Horus, could You please page the next Anointed?"
- "But wait a minute--" blurted "Bob." "What's the answer?"
- "God" smiled at him sympathetically. "Consensus." [ 6 ] See also Truthiness
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In the outer office "Bob" could see all the prophets gathering around a single desk, clutching paper tickets. A voice was calling out numbers. "Number nineteen? Is number nineteen here?...Number twenty?" "Bob" stood up.
- "So what's my grade?" he asked. "Did I pass the test?"
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"Oh yeah, easily. With flying colors."
- "On only eleven points out of twenty-one?"
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"Oh, the test itself is just a formality: a buncha red tape I hafta hassle with so's My ass is covered, for Personnel. There's really only one requirement for a prophet, and you've got it."
- "What's that?"
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"A mouth."
Footnotes
^ 1 | See free will |
^ 2 | I don't understand this |
^ 3 | See also Wave–particle duality |
^ 4 | See Extra dimensions, M-theory, Uniform 10-polytope |
^ 5 | See also Observational cosmology |
^ 6 | See also Truthiness |
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