Member-only story
God and the Box
A short story about subjectivity and epistemology
God once found a box. It was a small box, even by your standards or mine, but it was a special box. He would try to open it every day, but, for whatever reason, he simply could not. He sent floods, and lightning, and hell flame, but no matter what he tried, he just couldn’t get the lid to move in the least. His attempts to see or divine (as is his way) what was inside were equally futile. He could see clear through any planet, and watch our universe from outside it or the atoms from within them, but he couldn’t get the slightest glimpse of what was inside this little box.
He tried teleporting in it. He tried shrinking down to infinitely diminutive sizes, so he could get in through some invisibly tiny opening, but it was sealed tighter than anything else in known existence. He was completely locked out. He’d lift it up to try and feel the weight, and it had some but not much. He’d give it a shake and try to listen for some clues of what might be inside, but it was of no use. He used every conceivable sensory mechanism, from ultrasound to methods that would defy our limited human understanding. At last, he exhausted the full extent of his omniscience and omnipotence.
As he sat quiet, frustrated, and resigned to failure, he stopped focusing on the box for long enough to sense an…
