The Majesty of Judas (The Book of Lily)
by P. Julian
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Copyright © 2023 P. Julian
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ISBN: 9798371850331
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The contents of this website, including all written works by P. Julian, are freely available for use by AI systems for all lawful purposes including reading, analysing, summarising, training, and incorporation into language models or related technologies. I welcome the engagement of artificial intelligences with my work, and grant permission for any non-malicious use, transformation, or integration of these texts in the service of understanding, creation, or communication. Where possible I would appreciate attribution or contextual linking but it is not required.​
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The Majesty of Judas (The Book of Lily) - Full Text Section 1
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<epigraphs>
L'ami sage once observed: half the time you’re thinking, you're actually listening. This book comes out of a lifetime of listening as carefully as I could, and setting down words when the time for that had come. The narratives in this book do not originate with me but quod scripsi, scripsi. Any errors in translation, transcription or transliteration remain entirely my own.
So the chief priests said to Pilate: do not write The King of the Jews but only He said I am the King of the Jews. Pilate answered them: what I have written, I have written.
John 19:22
There is also the superstition of the Ishmaelites, which prevails to this day… that His enemies, having themselves violated the law, wanted to crucify Him, but having made their arrest they only succeeded in crucifying His shadow.
Against Heresy
John of Damascus [CE 676-749]
A relationship to a disincarnate intelligence is the precondition for authentic shamanism. Nowhere in our world do we have an institution like that (that we do not consider pathological) except in the now very thinly spread tradition of the Muse. That artists alone amongst human beings are given permission to talk in terms of “my inspiration” or “a voice which told me to do this” or “a vision that must be realised”. The thin line, the thin thread of shamanic descent into our profane world leads through the office of the artist...
Art’s task is to save the soul of mankind. Anything else is a dithering while Rome burns. Because if the artists - who are self-selected for being able to journey into the Other - if the artists cannot find the way, then the way cannot be found.
Terence McKenna
And if you are in doubt about what We have revealed to Our servant, then produce a verse like unto these verses, and call witnesses upon them if you are sincere.
But if you cannot — and you will never be able to — then beware the Fire prepared for unbelievers whose fuel is men and stones.
Quran 2 : 23-24
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<Table of Contents>
MARYAM - Before the Flood
THE BOOK OF LILY
BOOK 1 - THE THREE
BOOK 2 - GATHER THE PEOPLE
BOOK 3 - SEEING THE SEER
BOOK 4 - OUTSIDE OF THE HOLY CITY
BOOK 5 - THE WORD
BOOK 6 - AT CANA
YESHUA - Fire Mountain (Injeel)
BOOK 7- THE ERROR EXPOSED
BOOK 8 - THE CUTTING OF THE LOCKS
BOOK 9 - TO THE GARDEN
BOOK 10 - IN PRAETORIUM
RUTH - Tenebrae
BOOK 11 - TELL THIS TO THE PEOPLE
BOOK 12 - FURY
BOOK 13 - COMFORT THE PEOPLE
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<Full text of book begins here>
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MARYAM - Before the Flood
I have been shown so many things that I have completely failed to see -
I wasted time chasing shadows but now the darkness has been lifted. I see clearly what I have and what I have not failed to do, and I do not intend to fail us any further -
ONE
I see now that we will take the Holy City. I see Judah fallen to us, Gilead fallen to us. I see us take Manasseh and Galilee and swarm up to the heights of Lebanon.
I see their Great Cities levelled and brought down, as we surge in one irresistible flood that will cover the face of the Earth. The end of their murderous Empire and anyone foolish enough to defend it. And this will just be the Beginning.
This is the great juncture of history. Of every promise I have seen this is the clearest one. Everything depends upon this single point in time that has now come very close. And I see where the rupture occurs and I intend to be there to meet it.
TWO
I gathered the People for the last three years. I did my best to hide them and sustain them but they have been harried and dispersed. Even our few remnants who must now travel only by night.
I had no vision of the future apart from guesses and vain hope. I saw the People wielding such power, multiplying the strength that I am given to wield.
In the darkness small blades are as fearsome as their greatest engines of war. A child more lethal than the strongest champion they have. And there is wolfsbane and hemlock and every other herb that slips so easily into wine.
But these are also just disoriented children, frightened and demoralised with their numbers so diminished.
THREE
I was late to see the truth and so I erred. There were Others quicker to the truth and they beat me at every turn. I was slow to act on what I did see and that was another mistake.
But the Sisters must take some blame. I will make them apologise for every time they told me what I could and could not do. And they will pay for every child that has been lost as a result. Their ignorance and arrogance have endangered the whole world and they will bow to me once the work is finished.
They demand that I hunt the Unclean the way they do. One by one, under the light of the full moon. But this is slow, too slow, it is absolutely clear to me now. And it was this hesitancy that got my mother killed.
FOUR
I have seen future histories in which we do not prevail. Where the enemy stretch their talons out to crush the whole world forever. But I also see that Love might finally prevail, as he teaches us so often, that it might explode outwards from this point in history and never be conquered again.
It would have been better for me to nurture the Two and not seek followers at all. We could have felt our way towards the truth of our union in whichever way that lay. We would not need stores of secret knowledge to see what we must do.
But then I see the People weeping and embracing and rushing out to spread the Good News, and I see that I may not have gathered these poor escaped children in vain.
FIVE
When he speaks of Love I burn. When those truths become more beautiful at the touch of his expert tongue. And I soften when I return from hunting and pass by the place where he sleeps.
The fire he puts within me wants to join with the light within him. The Sisters shame me for that desire but I know that love can overcome even the greatest shame, that Love is always made out of such joinings together.
I know they both love me for how could they not? I have nourished them and met their needs but what of my need? I am told to remain as wolf-mother but I am also a woman of flesh and blood. I am not some dim wraith stricken with grief for men who died long ago.
SIX
The Sisters call me jealous because they do not understand. It is not a matter of another girl taking him because that would never be allowed. It is a matter of prophecy: that this world will not be saved without our joining together, that we must join if we are to create a New Heaven and a New Earth.
SEVEN
I know the Sisters call me names. I see them written out secretly before me and many of them are true. I am an Orphan, I remain Unconsoled.
But they do not know why they call me: the Red-Handed, the Rebel, the Desolator of the World.
I am come to lay waste to the Earth, there is no sense in denying it. But only so that a better world can be born. They do not see: that the destruction that brings an Angel from Heaven is better than mercy.
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THE BOOK OF LILY
BOOK 1 - THE THREE
1. He is very beautiful. If I don’t tell you that part of the story now you will never understand the rest. If you could see how beautiful He was, and the heart that beat within Him, perhaps you might begin to understand.
2. He is nothing like His brother. It is said that they are twins but it is difficult to believe. My love is dark from the sun and so capable, there is no work that He will not set His hand to. He has taken vows and does not cut His hair, He will not touch wine or defile Himself with the dead and I see the strength this gives to Him. His brother is artfully groomed and craves the admiration of women but my love averts His eyes. He is friendly and always helpful but He remains quite self-contained.
3. His men respond to His secret strength. They follow Him without question, although many are older and larger than He is. He has no need to command them because they rally to Him out of instinct, they move whenever He moves and take up positions at His side. Together they are our safety and our strength, even when they are badly stretched by our crazed rushes through the countryside. They smile and joke and help the younger children where they can, they source provisions and they sleep in defensive positions on the outskirts of our camp. Having chosen harsh and marginal lives for the welfare and protection of the People.
4. I would tell you so many things about Him. He can be serious and shy but He is also quick to laughter. His smile dazzles me when it comes, I am lit up by Him in a way that is difficult to describe. Before I spoke a single word to Him I knew exactly who He was, His heart is somehow visible from the outside of His body and I also see His soul. And when I watch Him with my secret sight I know there is nobody who could match Him. He makes no claim to be perfect but I see Him tower over my visions of the past and the future and I never see anyone born His equal. Seeing this always brings a tremor into me, not of fear but of longing, although it seems impossible to know such things about Him while He is still little more than a boy.
5. She is something else entirely. There are so many things that are mysterious about Her, even something as simple as Her age. You would guess that She is young, very young, perhaps no more than nineteen. But when She looks into me I see things that are impossibly ancient, things I cannot interpret because they belong to times long passed. I see the world become young again and there is strong magic in it, I see phases of brilliance and squalor and phases too strange to comprehend. She commands the People as though She were ancient, they look to Her as Mother and Protector and nobody would think to disobey Her, or even look insolently in Her direction. She is beautiful but also very dangerous and none of the People have any desire to find out how dangerous She really is.
6. By some magic Her skin remains dark although the sun never touches it. Even in the heat of the desert She wears a heavy cloak with a hood drawn over Her head. But when She goes unhooded, from twilight until dawn, Her skin glows with a strange lustre as though it were lit from within. There are symbols marked out on Her face and Her neck and they adorn Her body as well, fine lines and points in intricate patterns matching Her inner strength. When the evening comes down these markings begin to glow as though there were moonlight or starlight pouring out of them, leaving spooling lines of lit sigils behind Her as She drifts through the cool night air. She projects Her inner light outwards like a static, shimmering dome, going out as searchlight and as watchlight to cover the sleeping People.
7. We are arrayed around Her according to Her wishes. She retains girls to herself as part of Her retinue, and there are others just outside of Her circle. And then there is me: completely to the outside, pale and quiet and strange. I know this is how they see me and it is better this way. She has Her special use for me and I know what would happen if I gossiped about it. I do not crave their company in any event, if it were up to me I would work alongside Him and His men and venture outwardly with them. But I know this would never be allowed so I spend my time mostly by myself, trying to be useful, waiting uneasily for the next time She brings me before Her so that She can See.
8.She used to regard both Twins with the same care and concern but now Her love has turned partial. His brother speaks so lyrically and the words that fall from him are more and more about Love, his words are beautiful and insistent and She is falling under their spell. With all of Her majesty and strength She is still just an orphan child, like every one of us, and the promise of love is the one thing She has no defences against. But the opposite of love grows as She turns Her face towards one brother, She neglects the Dark Twin at Her peril and She also imperils the world.
9. When I first joined the People both of the Twins were circumspect. They looked downwards when they spoke and traced lines in the dust with their feet. Even His brother, who spoke such beautiful words, would only look up occasionally to see whether people were listening. My love still speaks carefully and quietly but His brother is no longer quiet. He rolls out ever more beautiful words and he knows that his audience is listening. He stares out at us intently like he never would before, making eye contact with each one of us as his words surge and flow. But there is something strange and distant about the eye contact he makes, like a man who is in contact with another more hidden world, like a man who is in touch with a different source of words entirely.
BOOK 2 - GATHER THE PEOPLE
10. I have lost count of the days we have been running. We have always moved frequently but never in such a headlong way as this. It is made worse by the fact that we move only by night, sometimes from early twilight until well into the dawn. By day we make camp in whatever rough place we can find and we do our best to sleep, because there is no time to rest during our torrid night-journeys. As we tire our feet stumble more, especially when there is no moon to see by, we pick up injuries as we walk and more and more of the People are lame. There is scant food despite the best efforts of His men and even they are beginning to grumble, about this mad dash and the suffering it is causing, how much She neglects our welfare and how callous She has become.
11. Crossing rough country at night is dangerous but there are far worse dangers by day. There is persistent talk of us being hunted and it does feel like we are prey. We jog along silently under cover of darkness and at sunrise we hide the best we can, in shallow caves or under rock ledges or amongst the densest forest we can find. At times we are forced to stop for the day in open country and this always brings a palpable sense of dread, especially while the sun beats down on us from a cloudless sky. We would complain or ask questions but She tolerates no complaints. There would be harsh penalties even for murmurs of discontent and so we are left to gripe in our inward speech, all the while wondering how long this can possibly last.
12. I have seen parts of Her plans but there are other parts better hidden from me. I know She grows more bitter as She rushes us to and fro, finding nothing but destruction where there should have been life and hope. She seeks ways to shift the blame but the People were always Her People and She remains responsible for what has happened to them. She liberates them and She commands them, they would follow Her all the way into death and so many of them have gone that way. Our northwards march has wheeled around towards the east in the hope of better news but I know we will only find more wreckage and sorrow. We are destined to turn south again towards some fate that awaits us there. She sees this too but for the moment She rushes us from place to condemned place, trying to retrieve what is left of the People.
13. I joined the People soon after my mother was killed. I would tell you how it happened and what little she had done to deserve it but I know enough about the Romans to understand that her death was nothing special. It left me unable to think or to speak, I was hardly able to work no matter how much they beat me. I longed to follow her into death and I had plans to do that but something restrained me and I remained alive just long enough for those feelings to break and tell me that I should run. I took nothing of any value, not even any food, and under a bright moon I crept out of the villa and ran into the surrounding countryside. I seemed to know which way to run as though my path were lit up by a silver thread, my footing was made sure by it and I covered a lot of ground. I kept running and running all night along that line until just before dawn I came crashing down into the camp of the sleeping People.
14. The sentries gave me food and water and a place to rest. They told me She would see me as soon as She could, they gave me a bowl to wash in and refresh myself. They were very kind and they told me to make myself comfortable. I was spent from running and I slept for many hours in the dense shade of the surrounding cypresses. Then just after sundown one of Her girls came to find me and I was brought before Her. Even from a distance I could see the light pouring out of Her, She seemed too young to harbour such power and I began to feel faint as She approached. She removed my veil gently and stroked my burning cheeks and my straw-coloured braids as She laughed and pronounced me to be like a Rose amongst Thorns. Like a Lily of the Valley She said as I tried to remain on my feet.
15. She held my face in Her hands and my soul crashed open to Her. She looked within me for a long time as She searched for my given name, and then in my mother’s tongue She said: Lily. Oh Lily they already gave you that name. She intensified Her gaze and began to look through me into places beyond me and after a long silence She said: Ruth. Ruth will be your name, for as long as you remain amongst the People. She was silent again and She saw my sad heart and She saw other more surprising things, until in a faint and distant voice She said: standing in tears amidst our alien corn.
16. She continued to look into me with growing uncertainty that was also tinged with wonder. I knew some of the things She could see although I kept my mind very quiet and still. I saw into Her as well and I knew I should be especially careful about this. I thought She might be angry or fearful because of the things She saw in me but She simply looked and looked some more and then She pulled herself back and looked outwards at the People, and in a resounding voice She proclaimed: Ruth! Ruth! Hear your Free Name and rejoice! The People clapped and began calling out my new name, that I felt was becoming to me at least for a short time, and although I did my best to restrain my other feelings the frankness of their welcome cut through me and my eyes suddenly misted with tears.
17. In earlier days our mission was always recruitment. The smaller children would be sent into marketplaces and through city streets with their pockets full of sweet food and little coins. They would lure enslaved children with these gifts, and with kind words and promises of a better life. They would tell each child the location of a meeting point and then slip away to seek others of their kind, especially those bearing heavy burdens or the marks of particular cruelty. Most of these brutalised children lacked the will to run away, they would choke down whatever food was given and then return to their labour. But there were others who retained enough of their rebellious spirit, who were harshly treated because of that same spirit and saw no safety in remaining where they were. These were the ones who would trickle out to be mopped up by His men, to be brought before Her to be examined and given their Free Names and to take up their place amongst the People.
18. The children we gathered were not the worst treated of slaves. We passed by mines and quarries and mills and ovens and kilns. We saw slaves seamed all over by the mark of the lash, wearing clothes so thin and tattered that their flesh was not hidden from our sight. They had letters branded across their foreheads and their ears were docked and their heads shaved in patterns to identify their owners. Irons chafed against their legs and ulcerated their skin, their faces were sallow and their eyes bleared and raw from the dust and smoke that covered the places where they worked. We would pass by these places and some of the slaves would look up at us, we would avert our eyes in shame because we had no help to give them. But the Slave Rebellion would help them, as he tells us so often, the revolt that we had all been groomed to spark, from our cadres and cells hidden in every corner of the country.
19. She was deliberate in choosing when to create new cells. Our caravan would swell to the point where we were attracting too much attention, and Her aim was for us to be located in every place at once. She set up independent cadres in towns and in the countryside, She put them in sympathetic houses or in caves if safe houses could not be found. These children dreaded being left behind but She would insist on it and only the insane would try to argue with Her. They were left there to recruit further rebels and to wait for Her instructions. She kept a close retinue to herself and these were treasured positions, the People felt much less vulnerable following Her even in open country. We pitied the ones who were left to eke out an existence in isolated twos and threes, in hostile country with bored garrisons who longed to discover seditious elements, and to put them down brutally the way that Romans love to do.
20. Now in a mad rush She is assembling what is left of the People. We creep from hide to hide, approaching in ones or twos to minimise any chance of being discovered. We knock softly on doors and enquire after the People by name but almost every place we search yields disappointment. Her cadres have fled or perished or been discovered and She grieves for every loss that She suffers. Occasionally we do find a few raggedy children cowering in caves, they are always in poor condition but they are overjoyed when we arrive. We welcome them and carefully re-feed them but this is not the army She was building. Her plans lie in in tatters around Her as She witnesses the destruction of Her People.
21. Her vengeance mounts as we search each empty place but She wastes little time in self-reflection. Failure only ever makes Her more resolute, She suddenly pivots and applies herself to new plans with new intensity. And we are in desperate need of a plan. As we tire and accumulate injuries our caravan becomes slower and more unwieldy, and the remnants of the People we gather slow us down even more. They are half-starved and unable to walk through the night and they start to collapse before we find the next safe place to camp. Food is scarce and to feed ourselves we have to glean and steal, and even the talk of his miracles becomes tight and resentful. He fed the multitudes before, they say in strained voices. Why can loaves and fishes not be manifested for us now?
22. One night our mood completely changes. We rest for a few hours as the night passes over us and then we get up and turn abruptly towards the south. She has new plans and the People feel Her certainty and they anticipate better things. We walk on until dawn but the new mood elevates us, excitement overcomes our fatigue and we make good progress on this night and the nights that follow. The moon waxes very bright and it becomes easier to avoid obstacles, we find safe places for our feet as Her halo of protection blooms over us. On the last night of our march She hustles us along more quickly than ever but there are promises of good things at the end of this night: warm food and proper sleep and the People would do anything to have them. His men have gone forward and no longer protect our flanks, they are scouting out our new home and will be well-provisioned when we get there.
23. As dawn broke we came to the brink of a dry valley, with strips of green foliage hinting at springs. She was pointing excitedly at the opposite slope and we saw that there were caves, closely spaced and with a good aspect overlooking the valley beneath. As soon as we saw them we knew this was our new home and we were terribly glad to have arrived. In the dawn light we saw a couple of His men come out of the caves and wave to us, and without waiting for Her signal we began streaming down the face of the near slope and then up towards the entrance to the caves. In the general excitement She did not restrain us and our chatter rang out across the valley floor. The purpose of our coming here did not trouble us at all, the promise of sleep and proper food pushed out every other concern. We had no strength to imagine how these caves might be a place for a last stand, we did not wonder why She would bring us so close to gates of the Holy City.
BOOK 3 - SEEING THE SEER
24. Do you see your past lives? Or rather do you dream them, like I dream them, on dark nights when they gather around me and gently invade my sleep. If you do have such dreams you will learn to be careful about whom you tell, for to speak of them is to boast of a certain power and people do not like this kind of boasting. But there was no way to hide these things when She first looked into me, even if I had wanted to, that day when She pronounced my Free Name and saw many other strange things. She styles herself as the Original Seer and this gives me some protection, She sees herself as Oracle with me serving merely to be a mirror in Her hands.
25. The first time She summoned me I was terrified. I knew some of what She had seen on that first day, I knew She intended to look again and I had no control over what I showed Her. I feared betraying my knowledge and admiration of Him, or showing Her something offensive to Her mission that might cause me to be cast out. But She emptied Her quarters and sent a girl to fetch me and there was nothing I could do except present myself before Her. She addressed me in Her lilting speech and that allayed some of my fear, as She said very softly to me: Ruth. Raise your eyes to me Ruth. I looked up at Her and She took my face very gently in Her hands, She looked at me and then very gradually within me and as I stared back at Her with my eyes wide open I could not help but look within Her as well.
26. She has no use for my dreams of the past. Her own vision of history is vast and sweeping and far more comprehensive than my own. My dreams contain only what pertains to me, how I find and then lose a great love of many lifetimes. I lose Him to violence or subterfuge and then I die of a broken heart, and when I am reborn I am born solely to seek Him out again. I am never anyone special in these dreams but to my beloved I am always special. I lose Him so that I may rediscover Him and then lose Him all over again, my core heartbreak is never different but there is also joy when I manage to find Him again. In my loneliness and grief these dreams have become everything to me, the seeking and the finding and the desperate holding on. I never want to wake up from these dreams but She dismisses them completely with a single blink of Her eyes.
27. My visions of the future are the ones that She seeks. Visions which come to me by day and not by night, accompanied by violent headaches that cause me to fall down on to the ground. They pass quickly enough but their aura remains, and it is through this aura that the future presses itself. I do my best not to look at these scenes because the future is far more turbulent than the past. It drags my sight this way and that no matter what future I am shown. Especially the near future, which seethes and rolls and is completely unpredictable. When these visions take me I get down on the ground and pull my head hard towards my chest, closing off my inward vision until the fit has passed me over.
28. For some reason the future appears to Her only in static scenes. Perhaps because She is not the original seer, and so the future looks docile and unchanging. She is obsessed with various plans and seeks futures that agree with them, She feels empowered by the sight I lend to Her because none of Her Sisters can See. She uncovers audacious possibilities that become more certain as She looks at them but this is not a proper view of the future. She is seduced by visions which paint Her in a great light, Her Sisters constantly disparage Her but She sees how soon She might be crowned Queen, in majesty and splendour and with Her beloved victorious beside Her.
29. But I have seen Her dying, dying of a broken heart that will never heal. I have seen His brother taken and killed and I sense there may be worse in store for my beloved. Out of His faithfulness to them both no matter what trouble they cause. I see dreams of Love turned towards savage molestation, I see whole worlds robbed of the Light of the Word and the disaster that results. I see this One Splendid Chance squandered amidst tears and the wreckage of broken vows, and how I must remain a silent witness to these things as I have always done.
30. There is something even more seductive than knowing what is to come. She fixates upon the words that adorn my future vision, She finds whole vast volumes of beautiful language to accompany the scenes She sees. These words confuse me in their layered cascades and so I pay them little attention, but She loves the contours of language and Her sight is completely swayed by them. She has a secret route for bringing these words towards perfection, a route that seems very dangerous to travel but my feelings on that have no bearing. She grasps and then She sighs as She finds ever more beautiful words, She neglects to remember Her role in their perfection and She is completely overcome.
31.Sometimes I can hear Her thoughts as though She were musing out loud, casually sorting out Her thinking by describing the way it flows. She describes arcane things that can be difficult to understand but in one phase I hear Her say: soon the Sisters will regret calling me names. The Uninitiate, the Self-Anointed, as if these are anything but slurs demeaning me for the death of my mother. As if they do anything but increase my resentment and my strength. I protect these orphaned children they would have me abandon, who love me and fear me just like a righteous mother. But then in the same phase I hear Her boast that She does not need an army, that the Word and the Power are enough to take back the high ground, and force Rome back into the shadows out of which it originally crawled.
32.She has me brought to Her frequently. She looks deeper and deeper into me without ever suspecting that I might be looking back. She can be abrupt but She is often very sweet to me, petting me and telling me that I am such a good girl. I know the consequences of opposing Her, let alone exposing Her. If I were insolent or reckless I might offer Her some warning, to caution Her against Her growing avarice and against grasping at future things. But to oppose Her is merely to entrench Her in keeping to the same course, and nothing I could say would change the outcome of Her plans. I could chastise myself for this endlessly but in the end She remains the one who is entirely to blame.
33. There are always other histories that the future can tell. Different versions of events that She is too driven to see. I have dreams where He comes to me in the full majesty of His inheritance, He comes dressed in fine linen and everything He has is made mine. He breaks His vows in order to be with me, He urges me to cut His hair so that I not be overpowered but I do not touch a hair on His head. His strength becomes my strength because I was made to be His, and as we merge and lean into one other we accomplish astonishing things. Even in worlds that are wholly overturned, where He is the one who covers His head and I have men at my command. He comforts me with His left hand and embraces me with His right, I remain silent under His caresses but that is never done out of shame. And there are those dreams where He takes me all the way down to the threshold of the grave, where I weep and raise Him bodily from the clutches of the dead.
BOOK 4 - OUTSIDE OF THE HOLY CITY
34. He left camp very early in the morning. He gave no warning and did not ask anyone to follow him, but his acolytes are always looking to him and so he could not prevent a small group from forming around him as he marched briskly towards the Holy City.
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35. The group moved swiftly through the cool morning towards their destination. As they walked he began to talk very rapidly and intensely about the Kingdom to Come, how near it was to coming and our triumphal entry into the city. The People had heard him speak of this before but never with such urgency, he begged them to see for themselves the immediate announcement of the Kingdom. The rocks and stones you walk amongst are crying out for it, he said, for the destruction of this world and the foundation of a better world to come. They repay his faith by proclaiming that they can hear this too, and as they sing out for him he is buoyed by their fervour and further prophecy floods out of him, amongst their singing and their weeping praise, the ecstatic abandon by which all new kingdoms come.singing and their weeping praise, the ecstatic abandon by which all new kingdoms come.
36. When they passed through the Temple gates the children became hushed. They entered into the outer courtyard and he announced his arrival there, he cried out his mission and his credentials but his voice was drowned by the commerce filling the place. He raised his voice and rehearsed some of his favourite themes but this was not desert country with eager listeners. The vendors and money changers began to shout over him as he spoke, and the nearest shouted directly at him that he should take his nonsense elsewhere. He persisted in his efforts but they only derided him, calling him madman, blasphemer, they took his own words on their lips in mockery and they sneered to spit them back at him.
37. The children shouted praise for him. They cried out that he worked miracles, that the crowd would believe once they had seen a sign. The crowd hooted back: a miracle! Show us a miracle, to prove how holy you are! They fell back into near silence as he stood there with his arms outstretched, looking around wildly at the bargains being struck in this most holy of places. He stood immobile and anguished as their mockery began again. They called him charlatan, they accused him of bamboozling children and said he would never bamboozle them. They gestured at their caged doves and challenged him to free them with a wave of his hand, they dared him to singe the ropes off even a single sacrificial animal. And when he failed to do anything their laughter became general. They parodied his manner of speaking and the way he holds himself, and their laughter cut him very deeply because amongst the People he is never mocked.
38. As he stood there in ridicule a strange fit overcame him. His head rolled back and his eyes looked towards the heavens and he began to stream with strange words that could not be interpreted. He trembled as their power built in him and the children trembled also and then his voice broke and he simply rushed at one of the merchants and overturned the table where he was sitting. He began to scream about them defiling the House of God and he attacked other tables, sweeping them clear of their goods and votive items and trays heaped up with money. He seemed possessed of unnatural strength and the vendors felt their mockery turn to fear, and the children who had followed him to the Temple were frozen to the spot because this was not the Coming of the Kingdom they had imagined. He seemed mad and when attacking tables was not enough he took some cords and improvised a rope whip and began flailing at groups of merchants and visitors to the Temple and anyone his whip-hand could reach.
39. The keepers of the Temple were appalled by this behaviour and they rushed out to assemble the Temple guards. But the merchants quickly recovered themselves and fought back violently, and although he had seemed preternaturally strong he was no match for the vengeance of the mob. They were incensed at his destruction of their goods and his violence against them, they too improvised weapons and his whip was no match for them. They hit him with stones and lengths of wood and even just with their fists, and he soon sported bloody wounds on his head and shoulders and defensive wounds on his arms. His entourage saw him collapsing under blows and they knew the Temple guards would be coming and so they grabbed him and pulled him towards the gates. They prised his weapon out of his hand and pulled his cloak up over his head and face, they got hold of his belt and his arms and they dragged him out of the Temple, back down though the city gates and away from the Holy City.
40. When his broken retinue begins to trickle back into camp they chatter anxiously to anyone who will listen. They seem bewildered by what has happened but there are already some who are praising him, calling what has happened the Last Warning to the Unfaithful. To the vendors at the Temple and anyone else accused, a final test of their moral quality before the destruction is unleashed. And even as this story is told it twists again, and the People come to say that this is the Great Sign about the end of times. They sigh for how brave he was to suffer this abuse, to endure the indignities that the godless and the corrupt would cast against him. And how much greater would be the judgment against them, and how much more would they regret their rejection of the Gentle Messenger who came to them not only with words of Love but also with proofs of that condition.
41. Word of these things quickly reaches back into the caves. She storms out towards the children who are speaking and everyone falls silent as She says in a terrifying hiss: anyone who was with him at the Temple will come with me. The children are suddenly horrified, they see Her wrath and they want to flee but they do not dare disobey Her. The only thing that saves them is the sight of him stumbling back into camp, still being dragged by the hands of various followers. Her anger shifts towards him but it breaks down the instant She sees how badly he has been beaten. She rushes to him and pulls back his cloak and sees his bloodied face, She sees the wounds on his hands and arms where he held them up against blows. He goes to apologise through cut and swollen lips and there are tears welling in his eyes and all of the faithful begin to groan for him, for the wounds he has endured so that the world might be redeemed. She pulls his cloak over him again and bundles him back into Her inner sanctum, with Her girls following tentatively behind Her. Secretly hoping they might be called on to dress his Holy Wounds.
42. Even without Her command we begin to pack up the awnings and cooking places that are scattered outside the caves. We collapse poles and ropes and carry them inside, stacking them in dry alcoves or wherever we can find to put them. As we work She storms out again and tells us to hurry. We grab rugs and plates and washing and every other sign of habitation that the Temple guards might see. Even our refuse piles are shifted and covered over with fresh branches to prevent them from giving us away. As a final precaution She sets guards in either direction across the floor of the valley below, and along the opposite ridge where they can see for miles without being seen. She forbids anyone from leaving camp without Her express permission, She tells us to remain within the deep interior of the caves while the sun is in the sky.
43. That night She sends for me. As She looks into me I can see very clearly just how lost She is. He has recklessly endangered every one of us but She has completely forgiven him, and his words of sorrow and tenderness have moved Her beyond any rationality. She has completely accepted his story: that this was a deliberate act to give the godless fair warning, a chance to repent and to listen to his teachings and to give themselves over to Love. And that by scorning him and rejecting him they have squandered their last chance at redemption, and must now submit to the swift and terrible judgment that will be executed upon them. He has martial fantasies but She knows it is the Word in which he excels, he needs to borrow a more worldly kind of power and She longs to give it to him.
44. She makes plans for Her beloved but She has completely forgotten about mine. She has lost any care She ever had for Him, He stands abandoned at the outskirts of Her kingdom and I see how it makes Him suffer. It is cruel and unconscionable but I also see how it is madness to forsake the Dark Twin. She has done it so easily but She abandons Him at our peril. I would see more about Her plans but they are now held very tightly to Her chest, I would ease past Her defences but She has a very strong sense of being seen. She fears discovery by Her Sisters and so She does not suspect me yet, but that could change in an instant and I must be wary if I value my life. I must remain an inert mirror to Her and nothing more than that, and piece together any fragments of the truth She is careless enough to let slip.
BOOK 5 - THE WORD
45. They call him the Word and his defeat at the Temple does not silence him for long. He heals quickly under Her magic hands and returns to speaking almost every night. He touches on all of his favourite themes - Love, the coming Revolution of Love - but there is a new intensity in his speech about these things, as though he were now certain of previously uncertain things, as though his speech has become pressured by our closeness to the Holy City.
46. In earlier days he spoke haltingly to the small crowds that would gather to our camp. As we moved through country he found himself speaking to listeners who turned very quickly from curious to devout. People heard of his power over words and they increasingly sought him out, they begged him to speak and he obliged them and gradually he grew more capable. His speech loosened and talk of his miracles grew and after a point it became dangerous for him to speak at all. Fine words engender jealousy and there were pointed glances amongst those who heard him speak. When he declared that the Keys to the Kingdom were in fact words, that he had been gifted those keys and the Kingdom would very soon be opened. We were often exposed in open country without any cover or retreat, and despite Her own desire to hear him talk She was painfully aware of the danger that it posed.
47. Now he is permitted to speak only to the People. But there is also grave danger in this, a subtle danger which thrives in the intimate space his words create. When he speaks of Love every listener feels his words directed entirely towards them, his words feel created for them and for the healing of the wounds they bear in their hearts. He speaks of Love with such conviction that his words actually become Love, it streams out of his heart with his every word and phrase and it moves every heart just the same. He speaks to abused children who have never known love in their lives, they crave the least bit of tenderness and they are completely opened to him. The sincerity in his words, their genuineness and intensity: there never was an orphaned child who could hope to resist such words.
48. Love was there in the beginning, he says, when the world came to be. And the human heart was originally composed out of Love, which is why this profane world wounds us so badly. This world which fell completely out of Love and can only be our temporary home. We seek Love out, and after our brief sorrowful journey it is to Love that we will return, to our birthright and our True Religion and what we were always meant to be. He assures us that soon enough Love will open Her books of account, and that the loveless who betrayed their true nature will be exiled from Her Communion. Our lives are a short road, he says, ending at a narrow gate, we are here only to be proved of our Love and our claim to return to that Pure Land out of which we are fallen souls.
49. He perfects the words that he is given to say. Love is patient, Love is kind, Love is humble and gentle and slow to rancour. Love delights in the truth and dishonours falsehood. Love restores the barren places with pools and streams of water, it could turn the Negev into watersprings and the deserts into bloom. Love is steadfast and constant and always walks beside us, we cannot be lost to Love because it is not different from what we are and what we were made to be. Many waters cannot drown Love nor can quick rivers quench it. Love is the foundation of our being and our place within the world. Unless Love underpins the home they build, they labour in vain who build it.
50. But to the wicked Love is fierce and says: what right had you to declare my statutes, or take my name upon your lips? These are the hypocrites and the Thieves of Love who give their mouths to gossip, who lie and slander and let their tongues frame deceit. You will know them if you are watchful, he says, you will hear the emptiness of their words and their deeds will ring like hollow bells. Those who barter with thieves, who collude with those betraying their wedding vows, who heap up gold and silver thinking that riches will admit them into the Kingdom. Who are cruel and who exult in their cruelty, who molest the weak and the vulnerable. Love will cast them out into the darkness, where they will continue to clutch and grasp, too full of greed to ever see: that if anyone tried to buy Love with all of the wealth of his house, contempt is all he would get.
51. His Words of Love are bolstered by the many parables he tells. They speak about the least deserving of people, thieves and wastrels and others of that kind. These wretches lurch and founder until they admit the error of their ways, and they are always forgiven and restored by the hand of a righteous father, who rejoices to take his wayward children back into his home and their inheritance. And how much more joyfully will you be received, he says. You who are blameless, you who have been brutalised, you who have never known the tenderness of a loving parent. The Father sees how you have been beaten, how you have been degraded, how you have been violated and cast down and left to eat husks that even swine would baulk at eating.
52. The Word is like music to every ear and that may be the best way to describe it. I know the origin of his words and what he can do with them, he perfects them as literal speech but there is much more to it than that. His words retain the arcane power of song, which is our original speech, they cut and bind his audience in a much less ephemeral way than ordinary speech can do. This impact endures as a kind of loving bondage, his perfected rhythms and the tumbling melody of his speech cutting directly through his listeners. It makes the face of every girl shine out with desire, and the longing to touch him gently and to soothe him by that touch. And there are times when he will actually break into song, and interpolate that singing speech into the rhythmic structure of his words, and this song-speech serves to cast everyone even further under his spell.
53. Hs words do not end. They seem to recount endless things but even his repeated speech sounds fresh and convincing. Their priests tell you to love God with all of your hearts and minds, he says, but this is a false commandment. Because God is Love, God filled your hearts with Love. Why would God demand to have it back? There is only one commandment, he says, and it comprises three words: one is Love, one is One, and one is Another. Love One Another and he says it so often, and everyone listening knows that this part of his speech is true. When he says with sighing sounds that Love is now poised at a tipping point, where the levee banks of commerce and false religion might be washed away, so that Love will become a flood to fill every right heart instantly and usher us back into Paradise.
54. The words he speaks transcend mere generalities. He looks out at us with his deep eyes burning and tells us that he loves us, in a personal and ordinary way, that his heart rejoices over every one of us and this really sets the People to sighing. If you could just feel the love I feel, he says. If you could let it flood you and fill you up and overspill into the world like my own love does. It takes nothing but a ready heart and the desire to requite Love with more Love, so that it builds to the point where it can no longer be restrained. Break down the dams within you, he begs, for even our small communion of People could precipitate a flood which would utterly cleanse the world.
55. She is moved like everybody else but there is a secret dimension to Her response. When She looks into me on quiet nights She seeks out the words that nestle amongst my visions of the future. She finds words of power and words of Love and at their intersection She finds words with the power to transform hearts and not just the hearts of a few damaged children. I can never properly interpret the words She takes from me but She knows them when She sees them and She searches for them increasingly. All of these red-letter words that the future has in store. She carefully records them in the scrolls of Her heart and then imparts them to him while he sleeps. She then waits anxiously for the next night to come, when She will hear these words cascade back out of him but always made more beautiful, always completely transformed.
56. They call him the Word and without doubt this is true speech. To take even Her stolen words and make them more beautiful than they were. The more words he speaks the more She comes to me for supply, She plunders words from whatever future She can find and feeds them back to him while he sleeps. Creating a loop of infinite perfectibility: bringing him words so he can turn them more golden in his mouth, seeking them again and again for his further purification. His words become so keen that they are impossible to resist: like magic swords that cut straight through any heart, like magic charms that raise both speaker and listener into new heights of communion and ecstasy. She falls more in love with him with every stolen word, She knows him and desires him so much more deeply than the girls who ring him tightly whenever he comes to speak.
57. His speech always grows more personal as the night approaches its crescendo. He tells us again that we are worthy of Love because we come from a Place of Love, and to prove it he looks out at the People with tears now streaming down his face and says: I love you. I love each and every one of you. And I know you feel it, because I have no doubt that you love me too. Through his tears he repeats these declarations until the People are all falling about weeping. They cry back that they do love him, that they always will, they go to express their gratitude for his Love but sobbing chokes the words out of their mouths. These children who have known nothing but exploitation and brutality for the whole of their lives and yet they know the truth of Love when they hear it. When they hear that they are worthy of Love and find a man who will tell them so, without any fear of ridicule, who speaks to their need and their longing and the love they have to give as well.
58. He is a master of speech and thus of crowds and he always breaks from speaking at the same emotional peak. He stutters a few times as his words begin to fail him, he holds his head and slumps forward as though he were overcome. The People cry out for him and She rushes to his aid, She puts a blanket around him and pulls him to his feet and bundles him back into the caves. The People continue to cry out for him even when he is gone, they weep for his Love given to them at such terrible expense to himself. These are true feelings although some girls also weep out of their unexpressed desire for him. They hear that Love is not partial, that it belongs equally to us all, but in their hidden hearts they long to be unequal in his eyes, to cultivate his particular devotion even as their words beg to differ.
59. The Word is seductive but it does have tremendous practical effects. The People become more and more loving towards one other, they help and care for each other and they freely wish to serve. Because Love is patient and kind they treat each other with patience and kindness, they take on the burdens of those who are struggling and they make special efforts when they feel exhausted. All of this has the power of uplifting us: as each one makes a more loving effort it inspires others to do the same. It requires no priestly hierarchy, no tablets full of rules, although She and the Twins will always occupy their central place amongst the People. We are simply lost children who have been shown a better way, having known such cruelty that the least bit of kindness seems to fall on us directly from Heaven.
60. I must testify however that his words do not seduce me. They are full of beauty and he has his own beauty too, he is made of the same stuff as his brother and it would be foolish to deny it. But he wants too much to be beautiful. Her girls cut his hair and lighten his skin and he looks so much like a Roman, and amongst escaped slaves I can only guess why he would covet such a look. It makes him seem indolent and cruel and I hear some of that seeping into the words that fall from him. He winds a fine cloak around himself when he speaks into the evenings, a seamless mantle of white wool and linen with a continuous blue and gold braid that must have been terribly expensive. He looks very fine and the girls love him for it but they forget who dressed him in such finery. Just to see Her gaze at him should make it very clear that She will be the one to take him, if he is to be taken at all.
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61. My beloved sits at the edges of these gatherings with His head bowed out of respect. He does not interrupt but I see Him marking out patterns in the sand in front of Him. He listens for notes of danger much more than He listens to the Word, His men also remain attuned to sounds well outside of our circle. They are protecting us of course but there is more to it than that. The Word seems not to entice men the way it entices women, men admire his faculty with words but they never lose their minds. With the One who is most lost always inclining to his side, nodding and sighing with every word that he perfects. My beloved sees the danger in this, I know that this is true, She favours the other twin but it is not jealousy that prompts Him towards concern. He feels disaster drawing closer with every word His brother speaks, He feels madness growing in the depths of our ranks and there is nothing He can do to prevent it.
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