CREATION

Dearly beloved:

It is indeed a pleasure to share in your cheerful festivities. Some of you may know of my recent appointment as Associate Professor of the Theology of Management at Harvard University. I therefore thought that it would fit well with both my current concerns and yours if we spent a few moments looking at the idea of God as a manager - not, of course, the manager as God.

Some of our first, and perhaps best, insights into God as a manager are naturally to be drawn from the creation of the Universe - a story with which I assume we are all very familiar. Even from a distance of many thousands of years, the creation of the Universe appears an impressive achievement, does it not?

Beloved, one of the most interesting and little discussed aspects of the Creation, on which I decided to write my own doctoral thesis, is the following: what exactly happened on the 7th Day? The traditional answer is, of course, that after 6 days of uninterrupted creative decision-making, God rested. I find this unsatisfactory on both metaphysical and linguistic grounds.

Dearly beloved, ancient Hebrew is a splendid language for describing weeping, wailing, gnashing of teeth, smiting hip and thigh, lusting and other vigorous activities or emotional conditions. It is, however, somewhat deficient as a vehicle for conveying the subtleties of planning, administration and other quintessentially managerial activities. Approaching the problem from the standpoint of what any self-respecting manager would do after such a creative effort, I had a sudden insight: was it not apparent that after 6 days of unprecedented executive action, God did not "rest" at all in the normal sense of the word, but took a step back from his work and on the 7th Day called for an immediate, in-depth review of the implementation of the creational guidelines and parameters of Days 1 through 6? In short, beloved, an intelligent reinterpretation of all the available evidence leads ineluctably to the conclusion that on Day 7 God created Consultants.

Some later theologians have felt that this may have been an Almighty blunder. However that may be, it appears that the profession got quickly into its stride. The first proposal, perhaps a trifle ambitious, was for a review of Creation that would occupy 6994 years, at a total cost somewhere in excess of the entire resources allocated to the creation of the Universe. This had to be rejected. A more modest proposal was soon accepted, and in their work the Consultants found little to criticize in the creational activities of Days 1 through 5.

However, when the consultants turned their attention to the Garden of Eden, they were not at all happy with what they found. It was immediately apparent from even the most cursory study of Adam and Eve's time recording charts, that the first man and woman had virtually nothing to do and almost all day in which to do it. The Consultants, therefore, felt that from a production point of view, the unused capacity resulting from this inactivity represented a poor rate of return on the investments involved in the creation process. Furthermore, the Consultants pointed out that the total benefit package accruing to Adam and Eve as a result of having Paradise all to themselves was quite excessive, especially in comparison with some of the hardships being experienced in the Animal Kingdom; Adam and Eve were undoubtedly overcompensated. Alternatively, it could be argued that the Garden of Eden, though having a total population of only 2, was overstaffed.

God was obliged to point out that His 5000-year population multiplication program would be seriously impacted if either Adam or Even was declared redundant, and insisted that He was not going to go on creating one sex out of the other's rib for all eternity.

Here, dearly beloved, we approach the climax of our talk to you today. It was a result of this impasse, and because the Almighty had done His work all too well in making all the soil and climactic conditions so favorable, that the Consultants - alas- came up with that fatal scheme to occupy Adam and Eve's spare time, which was to have such dire consequences for all of us. I speak, of course, of that ill-considered, small-scale apple production project. It is indeed a sobering thought, is it not, dearly beloved, that in addition to all their more recent contributions to the human condition, it is at the feet of the first Consultants that we have to lay the responsibility for original sin.

Perhaps not surprisingly after this episode, the remainder of the Old Testament shows us God to be a rather testy and irritable manager, putting little trust and confidence in subordinates, often raining plagues, fire and brimstone upon the just and the unjust alike, and in general paying little regard to any system of merit.

And so, dearly beloved, having brought you up to date with my current research and its sobering results, I can only leave you with this consolation from the book of Jeremiah: "Put not your trust in Consultants, lest you be sorely deceived; for many are called to write position descriptions, but few are chosen to be upgraded. Rather, put your trust in the great conductor of the heavenly orchestra, for surely, if He knoweth not the score, who shall know it?" Peace be with you.

by John Vincent-Smith

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