The Children of Babel: About Halfway..

 Aleph.  And war did rage for seven years, the very machines created by the builders of Babylon in hopes to conquer death did become the world's executioners: boulders of dashing pulverization hurled into masses of men; basins of tar lifted atop the walls of cities, burned to boiling and cast upon millions of innocent as rain. Rulers wished to preserve their men as chattel, yet their chattel lay upon hills as carrion; their blood transfigureth grains of sand into forest, their flesh turneth all that lives into plague. And a fifth of the earth's men did die, and a fifth of the earth's men did become crippled, and a fifth of the earth's men did dwell in the house of lunacy.

And behold, the unfathered children of the Festival at Babel had turned twelve. And by such time as their fifth years when war beginneth throughout the world, they all were cast out from their mothers as reminders of  former sin. Great was their disgrace, and the streets of the world were tumultuous with cries through their mothers' windows: "Mothers, why hast thou forsaken us?" And the mothers did weep in concord with their children but offered them not food neither shelter nor warmth. And the children of Babel did sleep and eat within the streets of every city of the world - robbing for food, maurauding for shelter, and trespassing upon sheep to sheer for blankets. And the Children of Babel were much despised. 

And as every city sent citizens into battle to die man by man, the unfathered boys and girls did become as men for every city. By six did they learn to ply trades no city man could practice. By eight did they tenant the markets of their cities. By ten did they take among themselves to man and wife. And by twelve they were manifold among ministers for the kings of the earth. 

And verily, as men fought the world elsewhere, there was none to shield mothers from their unwanted children. Few were the new children of men, and the younger children who did live were great with hunger. And the mothers did come to their unwanted children and ask for sustenance they had not means to give, and the Children of Babel did grant their mothers and brothers food and nourishment. 

And by the sixth year of war, the mothers of the earth were exceeding with woe, for their youngest sons were soon to be trained as soldiers, and the mothers did fall in supplication upon the Children of Babel: 

"Go unto the kings of the earth and prevail upon them to end the war. For we have no children but our striplings, and err the war continueth shall we have no son but the sons of Babel and no honorable men to marry our daughters?" 

and the Children of Babel did exclaim unto their mothers, "Were we not children enough for thee? Hath we not proven our honor? In shame didst thou banish us like slaver, yet for the world we did become as men. When the harvest was great we were like chaffe to thee, yet now we are the source of thy wheat, and thou askest us to vouchsafe the reverence of mothers who never did love us as children," 

to which the mothers responded, "We did always love you as the issue of our hearts, but great is the shame of our actions in Babel. Thou art not the children of thy fathers, for we did lie with enemies. Though we did wish to raise you as children, thou hadst been born with marks of shame.' 

and the Children of Babel did reply: "We are not shameful. We are descendants of the world entire. Through no aid of forebears, we have turned shame to fortune. And behold, thou wishest to profit from thy shame." 

and the mothers were prostrate with weeping and exclaimed "Lo, we have betrayed, we have been disloyal, we have sinned, we have turned away and ignored the children of our wanton acts of wickedness." 

and the Children of Babel did say to their mothers: "Well,... fuck it. No, you're not wicked or evil, you're just kind of a selfish bitch. I'll talk to the kings of the earth and see what I can do."

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Bet. And the Children of Babel did speak with the kings of the earth and they did say "Verily, we have spoken with the mothers of the earth and they hath pleaded you to end this war ere their last children depart for the valley of the shadow of death."

And the kings of the earth did respond "Behold, what have these children to live for? We cannot provide them plenty nor succor without visiting the valley ourselves, for they shall rise up and revolt; and therefore their lives are saved merely by their commitment to our darker purposes. Only their deaths shall endow them with meaning." 

And the Children of Babel did reply "Thou dost surely realize they would disagree." 

And the kings of the earth did respond "What else may we do for them? Their lives are but torture and squalor, but glory may they find as swordly extension of sovereign's arm." 

To which the Children of Babel did respond "They do surely have their consolations, and surely they do value their lives however small. Life mattereth to them if even thou seest them as wheat for the harvest."

And the kings of the earth did reply "Only pharaohs see themselves as gods of stone. We sovereigns are half mortal and do feel the guilt of their calamities. We cannot provide them with more ere they go the way of the earth, and when they do, the flock thins, and as shepherds we may tend them more." 

And the Children of Babel did say unto them "Thou wouldst not have to fret over rebellion if thou hadst not become as tyrants over them."

And the kings of the earth did say "We did not become tyrants, our tyranny was compelled by the tyranny of many kings before us, and should we relinquish our despotic privilege, others would assume merely what we had, with all the greater force for their insecure positions." 

And the Children of Babel fell prostrate "Thy chattel has bled the earth. As the dying wheat beareth much fruit the dying soldiery must beareth provision for the living." 

And the kings of the earth were resolute "The people of the earth are chattel and chattel they must remain." 

Gimmel: And the Children of Babel did return to the Kings of the Earth and they did say. We have spoken among ourselves and have solutions. Thou seest the verdancy of earth post-deluge, and the farming of the earth may be so fecund that there should be no drought for centuries hence. We entreat thee, make peace and put thy subjects as tillers to work the land in fields and forests. 

And the kings of the earth did sue for peace, and the surviving men did go into the fields and work the earth, and there was abundance. 

TCP: There Is More

 And Herod just sits there, signing his papers on his throne, in his garden, in his bed, in bath and at toilet. Signing his name to pronounce their deaths, one after another after thousands, as though death by Herod were as natural as the breath of Yahweh. 

Death IS as natural as the breath of Yahweh and it presents itself when it chooses to present itself. Herod just made it happen sooner for a lot of us. I'm amazed he didn't make it happen sooner for me. There was no one in Israel he wanted to kill more. 

He has strangled me, and yet he's made me live, for I am Mariamne, the chosen one, the rightful protector, Last of the Lillies, daughter to a murdered king, sister to a murdered high priest, now mother to murdered princes. The Corpse Bride, deified and defiled nightly in his chamber so he might know connubial bliss in death he never got from me in life. 

Do I consent to it? Did I ever consent to anything of Herod? Anything to my person? Anything to untold thousands I knew and saw? What matter my trials next to their's? Until Herod killed them, their lives were but dust while Herod neglected them, they were but dust after Herod paid attention. But when Herod neglected me, I was their Queen, beloved by all crowds, bedecked with garlands, every appearance in the street a triumph. I lived on not for myself, and certainly not for Herod, I lived for them. I live on for them and stay in this world so I might aid the passing of Herod and the coming of the Messiah. 

For I have just one message to whisper in Herod's ear. He hears it every day now, and every day the voice in his head afflicts him as no lamentation for the dead ever can. "Hillel is loved." 

Hillel, you see, was supposed to be executed. The Sanhedrin President was supposed to be executed years ago, but Hillel cannot die. Herod the Great always knew that the moment he touches Hillel is the moment the people of Israel demand his head on the pike next to the Great Sage. But he thought he had Hillel cornered. His men were boils among the Sanhedrin, hydra heads with yarmulkes, even if he could not pronounce death upon Hillel, Hillel's own organization could, and Hillel had committed a sin against the state so egregious that the Sanhedrin had to pronounce his death. 

Hillel, great sinner that he is, blocked an idol of his King from adorning the Temple with his own person, seemingly determined to make his person into a carcass. Herod demanded nothing but his resignation, yet the message was clear. Everyone knew what it meant. Hillel must die, and the vipers of the Sanhedrin must pronounce sentence. 

And Hillel? What does the saint do? He orders them to execute him posthaste and make Shammai, his opposing rival in every manner, the new President! This slight man, a sagely scholar who barely reaches the letters of Herod's German guards, is our greatest politician since Queen Esther! He knows that if the Sanhedrin kills him, his blood be on them and on their families. The Sanhedrin make Shammai President, but they not only don't kill him, they vote him Shammai's old position of Holy Father! 

Were all ten plagues to afflict just this man, he would survive them and thrive. He, not I, is the true anointed sovereign! He may well be the Messiah we await! 

And yet were he offered the crown of God, he is too wise not to refuse it. He has something more actionable than the divine blessing: he has the loyalty of his people, he has the trust of his people, he built an empire out of love neither I nor Herod had any idea how to build. 

He is not the deliverer, but were there one in our time, this combination of prophet and heretic is the truest incarnation we ever shall know. Everything which Herod built from fear and death, Hillel built through love of life. 

Herod knows all this, and this, not Augustus's wound, is what drove him mad. Herod's mind calculates all possibilities like an abacus, and yet he cannot account for how Hillel built a parallel soveriegnty to his own of spirit and love. For all time, Herod has believed there is no truth, there is no word, there is no good or evil, there is merely sense and pleasure, and the senseless pleasure of watching others not feel the pleasure you feel. Only in Hillel did Herod finally realize: there is more.   

I know Herod's end, his end is with me, and it is momentary. When he is finished with me tonight, his guards will deposit me back into the vat of honey, and Herod will jump in with me. 

End of Volume 1