Columbo

As a kid I used to watch Columbo. Like many detective dramas, the show had a gimmick. After you got used to the gimmick, the show lost some of its charm. You knew exactly what to expect.

The gimmick involved a studied contrast between appearance and reality. Columbo, with his jalopy, slovenly, disheveled appearance, rambling delivery, and absentmindedness, seemed to be a blithering idiot. As a result, murder suspects underestimated him.

This is a classic case of dramatic irony, where the audience knows something a benighted character does not.

One of the better episodes (“By Dawn’s Early Light”) I remember had Patrick McGoohan (of The Prisoner fame) play Col. Rumford, commandant of a military academy, as Columbo’s wily antagonist.

Rumford’s first impression of Columbo was the antithesis of everything that Rumford represented. Rumford was a model of efficiency, whereas Columbo was a stumblebum. Or so it seemed.

However, upon subsequent encounters, Rumford caught on to the fact that this was just an act. In reality, Columbo was a formidable opponent. At that point it became a test of wits.

When I read open theists interpret the Bible, they remind me of the clueless murder suspects in Columbo who didn’t realize–until it’s too late–that Columbo’s demeanor was a ruse which lulled them into letting their guard down.

Few things are funnier than watching somebody who thinks he’s smarter than he is talking down to somebody else who really is smarter, but plays dumb and makes the other guy look like a fool by drawing him ever deeper into the coils of an argument he can’t win. Exposing his arrogance, ignorance, and stupidity.

Indeed, some people who overestimate themselves never figure out that they’ve been taken for a ride. The performance is for the benefit of onlookers.