Now, I’m a Christian (as Officer Duke declares at Sunshine’s funeral, in the 2013 motion picture Wrong Cops), so it behooves me to come clean and tell you directly what the meaning of this story is:
This book, this romantic novel that I’m writing — with much help from you, O reader — centers upon a single message: that we are saved in JESUS CHRIST. That’s the plot, in a nutshell. Everything I’ve written so far, and all that follows the present chapter, adds up to one bold formula:
God created a perfect world and planted humankind within it. Everything was permissible, except the very first deed that humankind did — God explained this immediately after the evil transgression took place. So this marred mankind’s immortality; it made man mortal. Now God desired to help humankind and give them a second chance at Eternal Life, so he drew up a Law and had it published on two stone tablets; and he decreed:
“If you can follow this Law, then, when you die, your soul will float back into Heaven and live forever with me and my Angels; but any soul that breaks this Law, after dying, will get funneled straight to Hell, where you will feel less bliss and be governed by subpar management.”
Yet no human being could keep this Law, so they all kept going to Hell, such that Hell grew overcrowded. Then God decided “Enough is enough,” and he put on a tailored suit of mortal flesh: he became Jesus Christ. The reason he did this is as follows.
Before Christ, in order to translocate those damned souls from Hell to Heaven, so as to free up space, one needed to sacrifice a “clean” animal — this was according to an addendum in the Law’s fine print — for the animal’s blood would cancel out the sin-debt of the imperfect person (it all makes sense, when you truly think about it). So God reasoned within himself that he might be able to put an end to this grisly business of bloodshed-amnesty if he worked hard to become the Cleanest Animal Ever and then fell upon his own sword, rendering himself the Sacrifice of Sacrifices. So that’s what he did, and now that we’re all up-to-speed, I can begin this chapter’s myth:
O! But just two more things, before we start. First, you should know that the only way that God was able to get a “clean” animal costume is to impregnate a female earthling. That lucky person was Mary, the young mother that our shared character wed in the previous chapter. And, secondly…
Actually that’s all I needed to say; there’s no second item. Now we can start, for real:
CH. 5, BODY TEXT
Once upon a time, there was a man named Jesus. And this man was perfect and upright — he never broke the Law; he was not a crook. And he feared his Heavenly Father.
And this Jesus was the seventh of seven brothers. His other brothers were mostly named Bryan. There was Detective Bryan; Bryan Xmas; Astro Bryan; Vampyre Bryan; Bryan the Tyger; and Frank Booth Judas. Then, to make it an even ten siblings, Jesus also had three sisters: Teresa, Lilith, and Woman (codenamed “Eve”).
He also invented a plantation that was run entirely by robotic slave labor, upon which he begat many offspring, which turned out to be hybrid cyborgs. Plus he owned a factory farm that had seven thousand goats; three thousand mechanical bulls; five hundred yoke of oxen; five hundred she asses; and one inflatable camel. So it was a very great household. And he had two brand names, with which he branded all of his private property, even his “computer kids”: the plus sign (+), and the fish.
Thus, from the Ancient Wild West all the way to the Postmodern Wild Wild West, Christ was known as the luckiest son of a gun.
Now, one day, all of Jesus Christ’s brothers and sisters were feasting in a restaurant with him: they were eating steak tartare. And they were drinking Fundador.
And whenever they finished their meal, so that the feast was done, it was Christ’s habit to stand up and give a speech, and to make a toast: he would claim that he was getting married, and that his spouse was “Mrs. Death”: an invisible lover whom he had long courted unsuccessfully. Then he would immolate himself upon a cross (his signature plus-sign set ablaze with his signature emblem, bringing to mind a flame-broiled fish), so as to meet his bride while eliminating the iniquities of his tablemates. Thus did Jesus continually — it was a tradition, every time they all dined together. Meanwhile his tablemates, the Christs and Christas who were his biological siblings, cursed their Father in their hearts, just so the sacrifice didn’t go to waste.
§
Now there came a day when the Hypocrite Angels gathered and presented themselves before their Heavenly Father. They stood posing before the Father as if they expected him to take a group photo.
Then that devil named Lucy from my other vampyre book comes into the courtroom riding Bryan the Tyger bareback.
And Shaddai, the Father, sez to Lucy: “What now?”
And Lucy answers Shaddai and sez: “Oh I was just riding around on my Behemoth here, my Burning Tyger — it’s true, what they say: he really is a succubus’s best friend — and we were looking for trouble.”
And Shaddi the Father of all the Angels prayed unto Lucy, saying: “Please, we don’t want any more trouble. Why don’t you go try to judge Jesus, the new Christ, my latest son and the luckiest yet — for I believe that he is 100% sin-free and even sheds his blood daily for the iniquities of his siblings. He burns himself alive on his cross, in strip-‘T’ fashion. I’d be surprised if you could find anything disingenuous about him.”
Then Lucy answered the High God Shaddai from the back of her Tyger: “Jesus is boring. You always assign him the wretchedest fate, and he’s always suffering and dying; therefore he’s always elated, believing that he’s the reason that there’s salvation in the world. For some reason, the worse you treat humans, O Shaddai, the more they think that you deserve praise. So he’s as happy as a ham cuz he’s addicted to self-sacrifice. But if you elevate his position in the economy, so that he becomes an official member of the mega-rich, and joins that topmost percentage of billionaires, then he’ll realize that being a jerk is just as dull as being a saint. So he’ll be moved to return a second time and teach his followers that they should neither vilify the rich nor pity the poor — but rather set up a system that automatically meets everybody’s basic needs, and eliminates both these extremes by placing a limit on amassments as well as losses: ceiling and floor, high and low. Only then will things become interesting.”
“How so?” sez Shaddai.
“Cuz then everyone will be able to make love with impunity.”
“What? But why?” sez Shaddai.
“Cuz then nobody will need to worry about how to afford to care for any child who is accidentally conceived; since all people will have agreed that every human being’s needs shall be satisfied without question.”
“But what about sexually transmitted diseases?” sez Shaddai, Father of the Angels.
“There will still exist all your favorite forms of cooties,” she explains, “but since the care for personal health will have been included upon the list of guaranteed rights, these nuisances will be treated easily, if not outright avoided… Actually, on second thought, some plagues might simply die out.”
“Hmm… I see,” sez old Shaddai, not sure what this development betokens for his power-hold. “OK, look: I give you permission to make my son Jesus Christ stinking rich. But I just don’t want you teasing him about turning his back on all of his former stringent teachings, if he doesn’t immediately give all his riches away.”
“I won’t tease him,” sez Lucy. “That’s a promise. But, just so you know, the man is already sitting pretty.”
Shaddai blinks: “Jesus Christ? Are you serious?”
“Yes,” sez Lucy, “he owns a roboticized plantation and a well-stocked factory farm. Both are very lucrative. Plus he has a whole army of cyborg half-breeds.”
“Well then why are you and I even having this conversation?”
“I don’t know,” Lucy smiles. “L’art pour l’art?”
§
Now there comes a day when all the nine siblings of Jesus are eating and drinking with their brother in his mansion. And a female Angel from Heaven flies down and lands on Jesus and straddles him and sez: “Your oxen are plowing, and your she-asses are feeding beside them. Everything is going fine.” Then she kisses him for the climax and flies away.
But while the above visitor is still kissing Jesus, another female angel comes and crash-lands next to the first; and immediately after the first angel flutters off, the second mounts up and sez: “God sends thunderbolts from heaven. They zap the sheep, which fry up; but the goats can take it: they love electricity — it’s an aphrodisiac, to them. And your own divinity must come from a strain as pure as theirs, because of your sizzling-cross act. Yes, you, young man, have the stamina of a goat.” And this second divine messenger conceives twin servants; then escapes alone to bear them in a corner of paradise.
And between the last scene above and the next that follows, a flashy troop of covering cherubs shuffles by.
Now, while this most recent Angel is still busy gyrating on Jesus, there falls also another female Angel down from Heaven; and after her sister flies off, she clinches Christ and sez: “I shall carry thy… Ooh!” And, without explanation, she then flies away.
And right when that last Angel is uttering her first big ‘O’, yet another Angel falls like a raindrop next to the couple; then mounts up just as her precursor lifts off; and this latest Angel offers Jesus a sip, for she is holding a cocktail glass: they share its contents while she subtly thrusts her hips. Then Jesus cries out, saying: “Take this cup away from me, no matter what my Father wills — I am happily tired now.” So the damozel does a reverse-drip back skyward.
Then Jesus rises and dons his mantle. He looks in a mirror and styles his hair so that it’s no more disheveled. Then he exclaims in a loud voice, saying:
“I have fulfilled my calling, as my mother did before me. For the male Angel Gabriel visited the Virgin Maria and made her a Magdalene with God’s half-permission (as his instructions were unclear). And Maria was willing. So that’s why I look more like Gabriel than God.”
In all this Jesus sinned not, nor charged Shaddai foolishly.
No comments:
Post a Comment