OXFORD — Theologians have begun intensely debating whether God is capable of designing an IKEA bookcase that He cannot assemble.
The hotly contested argument arose among well-respected theological minds after one divinity student raised the omniscience paradox regarding whether God was powerful enough to create a piece of IKEA furniture so confusing and misshapen that He would then be unable to put it together Himself.
"It's a new twist on an age-old question," said Professor Blake Rumsey, an associate at the Oxford University School of Theology and Religion. "While our forebearers were preoccupied with debating whether or not God could create a rock so heavy He could not lift it, the true question of our time is predicated on the complexity, unpredictability, and truly abominable craftsmanship of the IKEA bookcase and the power that would be necessary to assemble it correctly. Even the Church Fathers would be stumped by this one."
Rumsey's peers agreed. "God can do all things, yes?" asked Dr. Clifford Martin of the Cambridge Seminary of Learning Biblical Things. "So, with that said, God can create an IKEA bookcase of any level of impossibility to assemble, yes? But would it then be too complex even for Him, in His omnipotence, to put together? It creates a puzzling theological dilemma."
At publishing time, the debate had shifted to whether God could put together even a routine IKEA bookcase made by the demons at IKEA.
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