In the Church of Dubious Miracles, a man once sold empty jars.
Every Saturday he carried a wooden crate into the town square, climbed onto it, and arranged twelve jars at his feet.
He never explained what was inside them.
Instead, he told stories.
He told how he had crossed the Salt Desert with one canteen. How he had talked a banker into reopening the mill. How he had predicted the Great Hailstorm three days before the first stone fell.
Some stories were true.
Some had improved considerably with age.
Nobody seemed concerned about which was which.
People came to hear him. Then they came to quote him. Eventually, they came carrying money.
One afternoon a newcomer held up a jar.
“What does this do?”
The man shrugged.
“It’s one of mine.”
The newcomer bought two.
By sunset, all twelve were gone.
The following Saturday another merchant occupied the same square.
His jars were thicker. The lids sealed better. He had diagrams explaining their construction and a small demonstration proving they could survive a six-foot fall.
People inspected them politely.
Nobody bought one.
The merchant finally stopped an old woman carrying two of the first man’s jars.
“His jars are empty,” he said.
“Of course,” she replied.
“Then why did you buy them?”
The old woman looked confused by the question.
“They’re his.”
Years later, merchants in the town still argued about what the first man had put inside those jars.
They never found anything.
They were looking in the wrong place.
The jars had not contained his authority.
They had inherited it.
That became known as the Law of the Empty Jar:
Trust begins somewhere.
When it begins with a person, it can travel.
Into a product.
Into a recommendation.
Into a company.
Into an ordinary glass jar sitting on a wooden crate.
The jar does not have to manufacture trust from nothing.
Sometimes it only has to belong to someone who already has it.
RW
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