(Cont.)
Then Moses spoke up and addressed the denominations of the Church, and said: “Hear this, you believers in the Roman Paul’s blood sacrifice. You think it is a small favor that the champion of the workforce allows you to set up your places of worship among the tabernacles in the camp, and to stunt the people’s imaginations and siphon away their energies; so that now your ambition will no longer be satisfied with this fair treatment, but you aspire to usurp the very place of the volcano of potential? And for this cause, you have set aside your usual infighting, and ceased the bickering between your many subgroups, so as to stand united as adversaries against the Volcano? Also, despite our treating you with respect, as equals and family, you badmouth Bryan and myself, and slander our characters?”
Then Bryan scheduled a symposium, where they might discuss the above concerns while drinking and dining, followed by a dance-off (a competition in which disputants dance with each other until they reach an agreement), to take place before the day of the Volcano’s censer experiment. And he sent out invitations to the Church’s big three branches: the Catholics, Protestants, and Baptists. But they all three returned a joint-message saying: “We will not attend.” And, when pressed, they explained their reason for being unwilling even to talk things over with their fellow-travelers: “You think it is a small offense,” the Big Three replied, “that you dragged us away from our gainful employment in the Empire, a realm where our Churches enjoyed a tax-exempt status, and then abandoned us to wander about here in the wild land under a chief who is clearly insane? You have not brought us to Eldorado of India, or given us money or land or power. And now, on top of all that, you wish to depose our mediators who stand between the people and heaven, to seize the position of middle-man for yourself? No, thank you; there is nothing for us to discuss. We shall sit this dance out.”
When Moses read this response, he was saddened. And he said to Yahweh the volcano god: “Respect not their offering, when they put out their censer at your scientific test. And do not believe them if they claim that I accepted any bribes – I have not taken a single ass from them. Neither have I threatened any of them, nor assaulted nor interrogated them: my days in the intelligentsia are over, unlike their mastermind Paul the Roman.”
Then Yahweh the volcano god addressed all the clerics: “Tomorrow is the day. We shall conduct our experiment to prove who is the only true Creator. Be present at the Tabernacle of Potential: you, and all the branches of the Church that wish to compete. Bryan also will be there with me. Don’t forget to bring your censers.”
§
Then, when the day of the experiment arrived, every man took his censer, and put fire and incense in them, and they brought them into the engine room of the Tabernacle of Potential, and set them on the mantelshelf. And there were two hundred and fifty censers, total.
So all the clergymen and Yahweh the volcano god stepped back and waited, while beholding the censers lined up on the shelf. And everyone wondered what might happen next. The scroll on which the plan of the experiment was preserved stated that the censer corresponding to the Maker and Sustainer of Spacetime should receive a visitation from the spirit of his murdered father. Those were the rules.
And the whole congregation stood watching with bated breath, inside the door-flap of the chamber that held the Furnace of Potential. Yet the Church corralled away its members from the multitude, and they were brought to the other side of the tent, where they formed a separate congregation; thus the workforce was divided. And they continued to wait for the test results.
Soon, out of the furnace came floating what looked like fireflies: many faint phantoms of Christ, about the size of fairies. These took their places beside the censers of their respective denominations. Seeing this, the clergymen thought themselves successful.
But, at the same time, a thick bluish sparkling smoke billowed up and formed an entity of terrible aspect, of dreadful make, which was an hundredfold bigger than the other ghosts. When the Churchmen beheld this, their hearts were almost eradicated – their reason fled from them; and they were stupefied. The being had two huge wings, and four arms; one pair like those of the sons of Adam, and one pair like the forelegs of lions, with bloodstained claws. He was black and stout, and the hair on his head was like the tails of rattlesnakes. He had two eyes like burning coals; and a third eye, in his forehead, like the eye of the lynx, from which there flew sparks of fire. With a thunderclap, this towering giant announced his name as Baal-Peor; then he cast the surrounding Christs into the furnace, as he took his place beside the censer of Yahweh.
Once the Christs hit the flames, each one burst ablaze and ricocheted back at whoever had summoned him: in this way, all two hundred and fifty clergymen were struck and burnt to ashes by heavenly firebolts.
Moses, having witnessed this, turned aside and said to Bryan: “What just occurred?” And Bryan replied:
“The Volcano is proven victorious. For the censers of the Christian sects could only summon echoes of Saint Paul’s Christ, who was unable to budge the scientific truth, since he is a son who was killed by his father; whereas the guidelines of the experiment stated that the visitation must be from a father who was murdered by his son. And, long ago, this Baal-Peor was slain by Yahweh.”
No comments:
Post a Comment