Mesopotamia - The Redeemer (42 page)

“You put me on trial, but I am not
the one to blame. I am not the one who stole your love from you. I
am not the source of your pain.” Truth's agonizing gaze did not
silence him. “Nor am I the source of your pain, Truth, the pain
that you were never able to hide and that is now more apparent than
ever. What is the source of your pain, Truth? What is the secret
source of your hidden pain?”

Truth could hardly breathe. He was
beside himself and was not used to losing control. Despite his
desire to strangle Smoke, his hand was petrified. 'Shut your
mouth,' he wanted to scream, but his mouth failed him. He wanted to
disappear. He wanted Flash to intervene and rescue him.

Flash was in his aircraft,
preparing to land on Samos' docking platforms, and he had already
set the Brotherhood's contingency plan into action. He verified
with Thunder, who was outside the simulator, that the module was
indeed in his possession. Abyss and Spark confirmed that the
Brotherhood's badger units were under their command and waiting
ready at the main junctions of the station. Thunder reported that
Shadow and his squadron of badgers had taken control of the
Processor. He assumed that Shadow would not abandon Truth.

The spheres of light continued to
play the beautiful harmonies. The pain pounded in Truth's head as
it continued to dissolve everything that had been so clear and
simple just moments before. Truth grasped onto the sacred verses in
an attempt to appeal to his soldiers' emotions.

So it is written in the Ginza
Rabba:

The traitor will speak evil
words,

With sorcery and charms,

With mendacity of wisdom,

He speaks with the fraudulent
light.

I, however,

Stand in the gates of darkness,

In the black water channels of the
earth.

“The Atheists and the Pythagoreans
have abandoned the Earth and the Gnosis—”

“You!” Gabriel interjected. “Not
the Gnosis, rather they have abandoned you. As one being judged, I
plead for mercy. If this be my last grace, I shall not ask it from
the father of the ship, nor from Truth the Gnostic, but rather from
you, whose birth name I do not know. Tell me, who abandoned
you?”

Truth froze and returned to his
verses:

Suffering and pleasure is like a
taught string,

From the lofty nobles to the men of
knowledge,

From the blue of the sky to the
center of the Earth,

But this was all in the land
between the rivers,

In Mandaean Mesopotamia.

All this existed once but is now
gone.

The warriors are buried in darkness
and I in the gates of fire.

Far from the life giving
waters,

I stood opposite the dark
abyss,

Watching the warriors burning,
shining.

“Don't say anything else about the
Gnostics or the Mandaeans. I want to know about you, the man who is
the closest to me but whose name I do not know,” pleaded
Gabriel

“I am the Mandaean!” he roared with
rage that boomed throughout the audio-visual system. “The shining,
burning warriors are my family. I was left by the abyss and
darkness, under the mound of corpses belonging to my family and my
tribe.” Truth's eyes blazed.

Flash appeared at the entrance to
the simulator.

Truth was surprised and shouted
angrily, “I told you to stay in the ship!”

“Had you been the redeemer, you
would not have let them drag you down into demeaning your position
and causing you personal pain and revenge. You are not the
redeemer. Step aside! Listen to me, my brothers throughout the
audio-visual system. I am a Gnostic, and as such, my loyalty lies
with the Gnostic Brotherhood of Purity. Truth, you are not the
redeemer. You have committed not just one sin: you have supported
the fallen, and now everyone knows it; you gave the Pythagorean and
the traitor a forum to speak and weaken our resolve. But you will
not succeed. We, the loyal members of the Brotherhood of Purity,
will proceed on our sacred mission without you.”

“Seize him!” ordered Truth.

Some of the soldiers grabbed Flash,
who did not resist.

Truth's mind raced with images of
corpses piled on top of each other. They merged with images of
other bodies, of the carnage and the destruction that he witnessed
throughout his years as a warrior and Gnostic leader. The Gnostic
hymns were meaningless compared to the images etched into his
memory. The faith that had allowed him to stave off the pain had
begun to collapse. Even his prodigies, Smoke and Flash, had turned
their backs on him. Once again, he was alone, like he had been
during the final days of Mandaean Mesopotamia. With tremendous
effort, he remained upright and erect in order to project a sense
of leadership to his soldiers. But even they could discern the
metamorphosis taking place within him. He wondered how he had lost
control, how the emotions, thoughts and images had manifested
themselves precisely at that moment. The pain burst into his
consciousness and he could not keep it at bay. “I lost all my
family, the entire Mandaean nation. I am the last scion of the
Mandaeans,” he murmured with a broken voice.

“Holy men, brave Gnostic warriors:
I would like to speak to you.” A woman's voice was heard as
Diotima's image appeared on all of the screens of the audio-visual
system. “I am Diotima, Atheist defense minister. I am located in
the command ship of the Atheist fleet, which will surround you
shortly. My question to you, Truth the redeemer, is from 'One
Thousand and twelve Questions' of the first Mandaean scholar,

Zazai d'Gawazta son of Hawa of 272
AD.

All of the Gnostic soldiers, not
just Truth, were dumbstruck. Those who were riveted to their
screens on their aircraft as well as those who were stationed in
their positions throughout Samos did not understand what was
happening. They were prepared to fight and to die, but they were
not prepared for the upheavals that were occurring around them.
Sophia's passing of the Blood Challenge, Smoke's betrayal, Flash's
subterfuge, their leader's weakness, and now, the intrusion of an
Atheist woman who was an expert in their sacred texts. These rapid
developments were unfathomable—how could they digest them? Some of
them fortified themselves by sticking to the official Gnostic
position of devotion to the goal no matter what happened. But there
were also those who were influenced by what they had heard.

Smoke's words had confused them.
The truths that served as anchors for them had been undermined.
They felt as if they were floating through space in unfamiliar
territory. Some of them clambered for something to grab onto deep
within themselves.

“The Gnostic forces will destroy
you, the Atheists, in the blink of an eye if you do not back off.
This is not your war,” intervened Flash.

Diotima ignored Flash. “Tell me,
Truth, what is the place of peace where there is no rebellion?”

Truth's eyes lit up upon hearing
the traditional quotes from his childhood, the Mandaean writings.
“The place of peace is orphanhood, for in it there is no one there
to rebel against,” he replied.

“And what is the big strong heart,
who supports the small as the large?”

“The strong heart is the devoted
one, for there is no large or small,” he replied.

“And what is the paved path from
which those in the residence of light look out?”

“Sadness. Sadness paves the road
for happiness to reach the salvation of the purification of the
light.”

“If so, then remember also the
Mandaean dictate: Life belongs to God alone, and no man has the
right to take it!” replied Diotima. “Truth the Mandaean, you are a
Gnostic, a knowledgeable man and the only one here who was born
into the Gnosis. The Mandaeans were not hungry for destruction like
the other Gnostics. In the Mandaean song, there are pure waters and
an abundance of life. For the pain, and despite the pain, there is
life. And that life is sacred.” The audience in the audio-visual
system listened in silence. Truth had no power to resist.

Listen, Truth the redeemer! Listen
to the words of the Ginza Rabba, the cradle of your culture:

A seed was released and fell

Into the unknown of the womb

Which sanctified it.

Soul, body and life

Rejoice in mystery.

The soul revels

And sings the song:

'In the name of mighty life'.

“Do you recognize this?” Diotima
held a reddish-brown clay tablet and presented it to the
audio-visual screen. It was the size of the palm of a hand and was
engraved with cuneiform symbols. At its top was a hole threaded
with a thick strip of linen. The tablet was rough with the wear of
five thousand years.

“This is the Charm of Uruk, the
Redeemer's Tablet,” said Truth with wonder.

The audio-visual system fell
silent. All they could hear was the sound of the aircraft engines
from a distance. After some hesitant murmurs, the voices increased
and then cheers and cries could be heard. But when Diotima began to
speak again, the voices subsided.

“The Charm of Uruk has protected
you, the Mandaeans. It connected you to your Mesopotamian roots,
but it is also part of the collective heritage of humanity.
Therefore, much effort was made to salvage it when you were in
danger of being decimated. I received it for safekeeping, but it
does not belong to me.” She looked into Truth's eyes. “It is
yours,” she stated. “It is for you to extricate its message for
humanity.”

Her voice and her appearance
managed to win over the Gnostics. Though they were not aware of it,
she had successfully penetrated the crack that had grown in Truth's
authority. “This amulet holds our collective roots. The original
Gnostics, the Mandaeans, possessed the secret knowledge that was
passed down from ancient Sumer. The truth that the ancient
Sumerians possessed was intended only for the first Gnostics, who
were involved in deep internal meditation. They knew that actuality
has no form and that it guises itself, tucked between flesh and
symbols. The later Gnosis were off-base when they thought that
flesh was extraneous and that spiritualism exists in the absence of
materialism. He who bears the amulet holds the key to lead the
Gnosis to the guidance of humanity; it is the key to bridging the
differences between the cultures; it is the key to a brotherhood of
all men. Neither Pythagorean nor Atheist may redeem humanity. Only
a Gnostic who possesses the amulet will merit to become the
redeemer on condition that he redeems all of mankind,

Something that she said struck a
chord within Truth.

“The nothingness that escaped you,
Gnostics, may be found here in the tablet,” she continued. “It is
the hollow crevices that are made of lines and triangles using a
reed stylus. The materialism, which the Pythagoreans revere, is
nothing more than the earth from which the Uruk Tablet is made.
This tablet, along with the stylus that engraved it, came from the
marshes of ancient Uruk. This is the first record of writing, which
binds all of mankind to a common root. The redeemer will bind all
of humanity together.”

Diotima separated a bunch of linen
fibers, tied them to the tablet, and declared, “This first knot is
for the Sumerians.”

Diotima's audience was fascinated.
She separated another few strands, tied them to the first and
declared, “The Pythagoreans are also connected to the same root.
They are tied to the same God, An, the source of all numbers and
sounds, who lends his name to the creational constant. They are
also connected to Ishtar-Sophia, the source of love, wisdom and
kinship. Pythagoras' father was Phoenician, a descendent of the
culture that spread the secret knowledge of the phonetic alphabet.
The Phoenicians were the seers of voices, the readers of sounds,
the interpreters of the soul.”

She took a third bunch of strands
and declared: “Gnostics, this third knot is for you. You too
continue in the path of your forefathers, the ancient
Mesopotamians.”

A feeling of warmth spread through
Truth's chest, the feeling of years of toughness melting away. The
sensation was strange and daunting.

As she braided the three strands
together, Diotima continued. “You have the choice, Truth, to
correct the mistakes that we have all committed for generations.
This is how you will redeem humanity.”

Everyone looked toward the
audio-visual screens and the amulet hanging from the linen rope.
Gabriel looked into Truth's eyes. He saw something in them that he
had never seen before.

“You are the redeemer, Truth,”
continued Diotima. “The vehicle of your redemption will be the
letters that were pressed onto a clay tablet using a sharpened reed
stylus. The letters keep coming back to you, Truth, after thousands
of years, from ancient Sumer. You have the power to weave the
letters together to make words, words together to make a sentence
and sentences together to create meaning. You have the power to
bring this meaning to man, man to culture and cultures to each
other.”

Diotima's words tipped the scales.
Truth appeared calmer, more human. He heaved an involuntary sigh of
relief. “This is the amulet of my people, the Tablet of Uruk,” said
Truth. The confidence was returning to his voice. For the first
time, he accepted his identity.

“It is yours. It has been waiting
five thousand years for you,” said Diotima.

Truth stood erect but not tensely.
He spoke slowly, clearly and confidently.

“I am Truth the Mandaean, the last
scion of the original Gnosis, the leader of the Gnosis.” The
commander's authoritative voice had returned. “I thank you, Diotima
the Atheist, for returning the tablet of my forefathers to me.
However, I cannot accept the appointment as redeemer. It is not I
who will be the redeemer.”