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Roll Over Jehovah! presents a history of Western civilisation, from the biblical Garden of Eden to the present day. Having created the universe, Jehovah is challenged by Lucifer who suggests creation is rather dull, and he proposes Jehovah gives humans free will as a test of their innate goodness. With some reservations, Jehovah accepts a wager: if the humans obey him, things will be allowed to continue; otherwise Lucifer will be allowed to make the next creation.

The show then plays out well-known biblical stories, characters and historical events, often in a darkly humorous vein but sometimes with great emotional force, to demonstrate the human struggle with the forces of good and evil. Jehovah repeatedly bends the rules in order to avoid losing the wager, a source of increasing frustration to Lucifer, who gradually becomes more sinister.

Jehovah's right-hand archangel, Gabriel, is the surprising mainspring of the story. At first he is seen as the one who carries out Jehovah's plans on earth, something of a teacher's pet. However, as the story unfolds it dawns on him that Jehovah's methods are not always as squeaky clean as he would like and the world is not as black and white as Jehovah had led him to believe.

Lilith, first wife to Adam, appears early in the musical, and female challenges to the status quo and the patriarchy are woven into the narrative.

Eventually, as humankind progresses to the modern secular state where Lucifer has apparently won the bet, Gabriel finds a third way. He realises the battle of good against evil is a sham, where neither antagonist can claim the right to hold sway. Consequently, he brings the show to a close by rejecting both Lucifer and Jehovah, suggesting we need to trust the younger generation of humankind, who need not think in such black and white terms.