Monday, June 12, 2006
Perfect Joke Revisited
Apparently others have given a lot of thought to the perfect joke, including whether the ability to tell the perfect joke is an attribute of God. One would think the answer would be yes, since S/He is, after all, omnipotent: the creator of heaven and earth ought to be able to tell a better joke than the rest of us. “Where were you when I laid the foundation of the earth?… Have you commanded the morning since your days began,and caused the dawn to know its place … ” etc. etc. (Job 38)
However, God may not be able to deliver the ultimate Stand-Up. Just for starters, the Almighty may not actually have a sense of humor, despite near-daily evidence to the contrary offered by the Republican leadership.
However, God may not be able to deliver the ultimate Stand-Up. Just for starters, the Almighty may not actually have a sense of humor, despite near-daily evidence to the contrary offered by the Republican leadership.
Comedy is the art of the inappropriate. We laugh at the unexpected, not the
routine. But nothing can be unexpected for a God who knows everything--past,
present, and future. There can be no punch lines or novel twists for a God who
is incapable of being surprised. Everything happens on schedule according to a
divine plan; and God, the author of that plan, is never taken aback. Thus, if
God is to laugh at all, he must provide his own humor and laugh at his own
jokes, because there is nothing to surprise or amuse him in the course of human
events. (George H. Smith)
