PrologueAway
inhuman, Gothic, Christianity
Two thousand years of blight on our humanity,
As forest giants age, then rot and fall
Allowing light and air to seedlings small
Now God is dead (acute insight of Nietzsche's)
So dignity flows back to human creatures;
Unchecked their natural form unfolds
No longer squeezed into perverted moulds,
Not dominated by a single angry God
With swarms of parasitic priests to wield the rod
Or curse our joys (Will. Blake has written)
As bugs on juicy leaves their eggs have shitten.¹
Those priests who like the puling strangler fig
To noble tree clings, chokes and then grows big
Unable by itself to stand upright
Perforce must find a helpless host to blight
And once established lay waste all around
Poisoning all life above and under ground;
The priests it is who've sucked God's juices dry
Left Him to rot, collapse and die;
They could not help themselves, they had to kill;
Parasitism aside, He might be living still.
Not the least benefit of God's demise
The priests as well as God volatilise,
The parasite without the host can't live,
Let's breathe clean air. Thanks for the purgative.
And yet, who knows, perhaps it was His fault;
By beating down all others, any dolt
To this one God is drawn and to Him mumbles
Unceasing prayers. God (scarcely surprising) crumbles
Beneath the crushing weight of all those cares,
Sick unto death of all those glassy stares,
Stifled by suppliants' halitosis
Succumbs to pulmonary necrosis.
For God to try and be the one and only
Not simply fatal is, but also lonely.
- A truly tragic fate (in classic way)
And for His hubris even God must pay.
But dualistic doctrine's now outmoded
That old Satanic stuff's been quite exploded,
Since Goethe's Faust, and after Freud and Jung,
Our psychological Renaissance has begun;
Classic revival - all the gods restored!
Our inner selves just cannot be ignored;
Deafness to any one of them is at our peril,
Lack of consideration turns them feral.
Running amok they'll rip us all to shreds
By playing fast and loose inside our heads.
1. The Temptation
'The Vision of Christ that thou dost see
Is my vision's greatest enemy.'²
"Get thee behind me, Satan," Jesus hissed,³
(Reveals himself a good ventriloquist)
Projecting on Satan his demand for power,
Sweet Jesus can't admit to being sour.
Poor Satan! What has he done thus to warrant
Of unacknowledged desire a poisonous torrent?
Summoned to Earth by Jesus' desperate need
To fasten on another his own greed.
But wait - perhaps a reverse creation operated:
The Jesus spectre, Satan instigated,
To disengage himself from visions manic,
From dreams of grandeur, wildly messianic.
The internal voice we struggle to resist:
"Get thee behind me, Jesus," Satan hissed,
Alarmed at his uncontrollable desire
To act the prophesied Messiah.
Forswearing spiritual charisma
For earthy, sexual machismo,
Onto poor Jesus he projects his mania:
Son of the Father and Ghostly miscellania.
But Satan lost (or did he win
Achieving victory via the feminine?)
His Jesus shadow set in motion
Vast Christian waves across the ocean.
Foolish young Jesus, could he but see
(Improbable at thirty-three)
The consequence of his compulsion,
He'd turn away in shocked revulsion.
And down in Hell did Satan have regrets,
His honour stung by wounding epithets?
Who won? Who lost - of victory was cheated?
Were both in conflict torn apart, defeated?
2. The Everlasting Gospel
Had he not all conquest spurned
He had not the world suborned,
Preying on mankind's latent guilt
At blood impetuously spilt.
A wiser Jesus would foresee
Perversions by Christianity,
Foresee the foolishness ensuing
From truth to simple Jews bestrewing.
Foresee the gross misunderstanding
Of death to sacrifice expanding;
Cruelty, pain, their self-infliction
Sanctified by crucifixion.
Pain, a holy path become,
mankind to martyrdom succumb;
Man's nobler tendencies assaulted,
Envy and poverty exalted.
For nothing's wrong with temporal power,
It slips away with passing hour,
The will to power's inherent in life's plan,
Declined, not scorned, will dignify the man.
3. Sex
Satan denied, the vigorous sexual force,
Emasculate man pursues a feeble course;
When priests man's sexual pleasure blight,
They rob him of his chief delight.
In gospel record did the early church
For tales of Jesus' sexuality research,
He ate, he drank, presumably he shat,
A young man doubtlessly still capable of - that?
The man who overthrew the money-changers' stalls
In anger, certainly did not lack balls,
And yet no tales of sex are represented,
A neutered Jesus for the world invented.
Now why is that? Did he love men?
Fall prey to the notorious Magdalen?
Chase all women with furious lust,
Or turn from them in rank disgust?
The chase, more probably than not
Was by the women, hot to trot;
And did he cruelly refuse appointments
When women offered more than ointments?
A steady, sober, conventional liaison -
The church would sound a diapason;
On balance, the most likely explanation -
There was a homosexual inclination.
For the man who other men would choose
Was an abomination to the Jews,
Who, for this very reason, hurled
Abuse at the Greco-Roman world.
(There is no reason to suppose
Among the Jews were any less of those,
Or us, depending on your point of view,
It just was not permitted - pas du tout.)
How Peter's knockback would have been completer
Had it included also Peter's peter;
Betrayal would even be more tragic
With added binding spell of sexual magic.
No no, the church was quite insistent
That Jesus' sexual life was non-existent;
Unnatural, joyless, unfulfilling state,
Now, sexless Christ go out and imitiate!
And read how sexual joy, St. Paul did spurn:
"Better to marry than [with desire] to burn."4
What fulsome praise! How does old Paul enthuse
About this gift God granted man to use!
No accident that the Holy Catholic Church
In seeking natural union to besmirch
Ordains that sex for procreation's only meant,
Comes between piss and excrement.
One may as well exhort the tree to grow
While poisoning the roots that are below;
Poor man! He cannot rise in love,
What's stopped below is also stopped above.
He always fails to reach the impossible goal
And blames himself for lack of self-control,
Thus such a weakling failure does he feel
That to the jackal priests he makes a meal.
"Repent you sinner. To nobler things aspire,"
They urge him on, shout "Higher! Higher!"
Whilst cunningly ensure precautions taken:
The legs on which he'd climb are deftly broken.
For once let man his sexual powers enjoy,
No priest or king his freedom can destroy;
If he experiences natural, guiltless union
He can't be yoked by church-dispensed communion.
Just drink some juice and have a little nibble
To wash away your sins without a quibble,
That way to heaven you will reach - at least
So long as you're obedient to the priest.
The church finds its most fertile soils
Where man in degradation toils,
As crows pick out the eyes of weaker sheep,
So priests feed best where human life is cheap.
4. Power
The tale of forty days of fasting fervour's
Uniquely unsupported by observers,
A single unequivocal example
In gospels otherwise thought ample
From Jesus's spiritual repertory
Why tell his followers just one story?
Many, or none, is far more plausible -
The tale's veracity's unendorsable.
This pious ecclesiastic fabrication
Was judged a needed illustration;
What was it deemed so very evil
That had to be fastened on the devil?
Why, worldy power is thought pernicious,
In Jesus' words, is called seditious,
The Christian man must secular rule forswear -
A burden for poor priests to bear.
Ah yes, the priests to power are drawn
So power must Satan ever hold in pawn;
A cunning trick where man they do ensorcell,
And while he's blinded, snatch the juicy morsel.
The power priests want, man must forgo,
They stage a facile Punch and Judy show,
Their devious lie in Jesus' mouth they set
To stop the flock from having what they get.
"Of course for man's own good (of course)
We rule him. Laws we must enforce,
Methodically improving on life's plan;
That's how 'We vindicate the ways of God to man.'"5
The priests are no more robed as in antiquity
But casually dressed in their ubiquity,
Neat tie and collar, shirt and suit
Alert behind their desks, and resolute.
Experts firmly, sensibly advising,
Doctor and lawyer, patronising;
Guardians of civil surety
Uphold the web of State Security.
"We know what's best; you haven't had the training,
Eccentric acts you're better off restraining."
If some misguided type attempts an insurrection,
Then "For your good" - a forcible injection.
"For his protection, a burden mild,
Just as the watchful mother saves her child
By picking up, and putting knives upon a shelf,
We save poor erring man from - ultimately - himself."
5. Judas
Authentic Jesus in the gospels can be seen
Hiding between the lines, by eyesight keen.
Authentic sight and self-investigation
Discern false notes and textual mutation.
The story may be told in many ways,
For instance, Judas, Christ betrays
For thirty silver pieces - trifling sum,
Does that ring true? And by a bosom chum?
The silver's false; that's not the reason,
How come there's no investigation of this treason?
Down through the ages no-one's ever queried
Just why, of Jesus' friendship, Judas wearied.
Perhaps another story could be told
More likely than a spurious love of gold:
Consider if Judas, with Jesus did conspire,
In trying to prove the latter was Messiah.
For Judas was an educated man
The only one of twelve to form a plan,
Prophetic scriptures had to be fulfilled:
The chosen one runs risk of being killed.
Triumphal entry to the holy city,
Betrayal to foes who'll manifest no pity,
Trial, sentence, suffering and then the crypt -
So Jesus dreamed, and Judas wrote the script.
For Jesus wouldn't be acknowledged fully
Unless a villain acts, whom all could bully,
Someone to draw the bile and angry fury
Not quite ascribable to simple Jewry;
From Jesus, would all negativity deflect,
And whom all will despise, and all reject,
Someone to bear the wrath of humankind
And down the centuries to be maligned.
Then Christ in all his glory shines,
While Judas everyone consigns
To Hell, damnation and the fiery pit -
By God's right hand will Jesus sit.
Now which of them the prophet did foretell:
The one in Heaven or the one in Hell?
The one whom every human being curses?
And are these Christian or Satanic verses?
Imagine then, the pain poor Judas felt
In acting out the rôle himself he'd dealt,
Against his better judgement helps his mate,
Condemns himself to centuries of hate.
Sadly and sweetly his dear friend he kissed
Willing most fervently for Jesus to desist,
But nothing swayed his friend's determination,
So Jesus' fate was Judas' desolation.
As Juliet dies when Romeo's corpse did see,
So Judas hangs himself on nearby tree,
In faithful service paid a fearful price,
Who was it made the truer sacrifice?
Surely this Judas will not do
Either for Christian or for Jew;6
No-one to curse and to calumniate:
Resurrect the old one, for we love to hate.
6. Fundamentalist belief and other drugs
Or is there one more act to play,
God and his devil have their final say,
Fight one more duel to end the drama
Disentangling stubborn knots of karma?
Life's void is endless night to some,
Eternity till kingdom come;
As castoffs in a tiny boat
Perish in fear, endeavouring to float.
The depths beneath strike terror in the heart,
What hideous message would that void impart?
We clutch the Bible, Church, or bottle,
And this tight grip the world will throttle.
"It's right or wrong because God said it,
In God's own Book I duly read it."
But you believe that scripture is God's word,
In all belief the self alone is heard.
For all submission to a foreign force
Through our free will we must endorse;
I grant the right for you to govern me
And can't escape responsibility.
Who thus submits to Biblical authority
Cannot deny his own must take priority,
Cannot deny we float upon the deep,
Cannot avoid the existential leap.
Church, Bible, bottle - just a drug,
Futile attempts the gaping hole to plug,
Into the void we'd gaze, but courage lack
- We gaze into it, and it gazes back.
What is belief that we so tightly grab it,
A Nessus' shirt, addictive mental habit?
Do we Platonic shadows in a cave perceive,
Our motto not 'we see,' but 'we believe'?
Thus: you believe that Mary was a virgin,
But in my mind do contrary thoughts burgeon;
For one, the birth is parthenogenetic -
Others find that disgusting and emetic.
Belief in transubstantiation
Works some fools up into a passion,
But all belief's a poor stand-in for knowledge,
Better to keep our breath to cool our porridge.
For native anger is the geniune force,
For strong meat dish, belief's the mental sauce,
Comes after, not before, the prime desire,
An a posteriori thought; a dignifier;
Convenient peg on which to hang emotion,
It's usually an ill-considered notion;
"Up Christians, Hindus, Muslims, or the Jews!"
It's immaterial which belief you choose.
Ask any man who's spoiling for a fight,
Can't wait to get the enemy in sight,
Their false beliefs are vigorously slandered,
The true crusaders march beneath our standard.
Tell me! What earthly difference does it make?
That you prefer the pastry, I, the cake,
Is much more of significance for me
Than any mental tweedledum or dee.
As Eve and Adam in the garden nude
Sewed for themselves some clothes of fig leaves crude,
So we in shame at our own ignorance
Put on belief - our disinheritance.
Belief and doubt, the Siamese twins,
Two heads, one heart, no individual skins,
To separate the two, an action fatal,
No remedy for this condition natal.
Cut one head off, the other cries,
And instantly curls up and dies;
The twins must beat their joint Cartesian drum:
'Credo et dubito ergo sum.'
With every ray a shadow lies behind,
Desire lights up the constructs of the mind,
Belief's the daytime face, the sunlit world,
And doubt, the hemisphere in dreaming darkness furled.
But wait a bit: the dark will come to light,
The world rotates, and swaps the day and night,
Yesterday's certainties now appear absurd,
Beliefs once heresies spring back, by all averred.
Blake wrote that 'If the sun and moon should doubt
They'd immediately go out';7
I'd add: 'A fortiori, if they should believe
They'd immediately unweave.'
7. Epilogue
Did Satan win the epic battle
Enslaving Jesus as his chattel?
For Jesus' dark desire for power
In Christianity attained full flower.
To win the war, must it be lost
At peril of a frightful cost?
Suppressing sin an empty victory,
A self-defeating interdictory?
For two millennia extended
Is Jesus' history now ended?
From Christian dream shall we awake,
The seventh seal about to break?
And is the drama all but over,
And we, our all-embracing selves recover:
Satan/Jesus - just a name,
Dualistic worn-out game?
Editor's Notes:
1. 'As the caterpillar chooses the fairest leaves to lay her eggs on, so the priest lays
his curse on the fairest joys.'
Blake, Proverbs of Hell from The Marriage of Heaven and Hell.
2. Blake, The Everlasting Gospel, from The
Rossetti Manuscript.
3. Luke 4, 8. (King James Version)
4. I Corinthians 7,9. (King James Version)
5. Pope, An essay on Man, Epistle 1. (See also: Milton,
Paradise Lost, Book 1.)
6. Blake, The Everlasting Gospel, (Epilogue)
from The Rossetti Manuscript.
7. Blake, Auguries of Innocence (lines
109-110), from The Pickering MS. |
