[Being is chained to a rock amidst a floor of flame]
God: How do you find your new home?
Being: I find it painful beyond imagination, just as you intend me to.
G: Indeed. So, like all those in this situation, you wish you had lived less sinfully.
B: No, I have no such wish.
G: Yet surely you now see the consequences of your actions?
B: I see that I am punished for failing to act in accordance with your edicts.
G: Yet you do not wish you lived better?
B: How could I have lived better?
G: I assure you, as your creator, that you were capable of living a less sinful life.
B: You do not understand. I mean that I do not find the life I have lived to be wanting.
G: You are to spend eternity in tortures beyond imagination, and yet you find nothing wanting?
B: The two are not separable. Let us suppose that I make a purchase. I receive something, and must pay something. When I consider the paying in isolation, I may find it less than desirable, but this does not mean I regret the purchase.
G: Ah, so you think you derived so much pleasure from your sins as to outweigh an eternity of torture! I shall return in a few thousand years.
B: [shakes head as God departs]
[time passes]
G: I believe that when we last spoke, you said that your life was so good that it was worth eternal damnation. I assume by now you have seen the folly of such conceit?
B: No, I have no regrets.
G: Surely the thousand years of torture you have already experienced is more than enough to outweigh any pleasures of your living years, even without the eternity to follow?
B: Of course. The ten minutes I had experienced when you asked me a thousand years ago was enough.
G: Then why did you say you did not regret your "purchase"?
B: Why should I regret it?
G: Because by your own admission, your punishment has outweighed the spoils from your crime!
B: To what crime do you refer?
G: The sinful life you lived.
B: When I look back upon my life, I see no crime. I lived always as I considered correct, honorable, and beautiful.
G: Aha! You're one of the ones who feels unjustly punished, because you sinned by mistake!
B: No, there was no mistake. I understood quite clearly that my actions were not ones of which you would approve.
G: You make no sense! You have said that you have experienced far more pain than pleasure as a result of your choices, that you knew this would be the case, and that you nonetheless have no regrets! How can this be?
B: You make the mistake of assuming I value pleasure above all else.
G: What, then, do you value?
B: Honor, courage, and authenticity.
G: Sinning is not honorable!
B: Not by your codes of honor, you mean.
G: What other ones are there?
B: Mine.
G: By what authority do you create your own honor?
B: By my own - there is no other.
G: You can't do that.
B: I have done it.
G: Yes, and you have received your just rewards for it. [gestures around to fire and rocks]
B: What is your point? That you are correct because you are more powerful than I, and capable of punishing me? Suppose I had taken a being weaker than myself, and told it that it was correct to puncture its arms with nails every morning to worship me. Would you approve?
G: Of course not. You would punished for such actions.
B: Yes, I see. The strong punishes the weak, and is punished in turn by the even stronger, as it ever is.
G: I am not correct because I am powerful.
B: Then why are you correct?
G: Why will you not admit that I am right, and perhaps be spared this torture?
B: What do you want me to say?
G: I want you to admit that I, your God who is the source of all things including yourself, who moves heaven and earth with a word, am correct; I want you to worship me and love me.
B: You are, as you say, very powerful. Why, then, is it that you are the one who wants something from me?
G: I need nothing from you. I can change you so that you will love me.
B: You cannot. You can change the matter which comprises me, and create a being which loves you, but you cannot cause me to love you, for by making the change, you would cause me to cease to be.
G: I can do anything!
B: You can build up, you can tear down, you can reap and sow, create and destroy. Yet you cannot cause me to worship you while retaining my own nature, for my very nature is in opposition to yours. You wish for me to love you, yet you cannot compel me to love you without taking away my identity. Even you, you whose very words move the galaxies, cannot contradict yourself.
G: I don't see what you're trying to accomplish here.
B: There is nothing I am trying to accomplish, for there is nothing which remains to be accomplished. I have lived consistently and honorably, and fought for that which was beautiful. I am complete. You can torture me until the end of this world and into the next, or cause me to cease to exist right now - it does not matter.
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