The Game Of Empire,
CHAPTER FOUR.
Olaf Magnusson was not:
"...rapt in the contemplation of the All that his Neosufic religion enjoined. He had striven to be, but his thoughts kept drifting elsewhere, until at last he accepted their object as the aspect of the Divine which was set before him tonight." (p. 250)
How can you contemplate the All? Can you strive to? Surely thought always drift elsewhere? In zazen, we contemplate the here and now which includes drifting thoughts. They are not to be suppressed but to be noticed and let go of. (To practice is to persevere, not always to succeed.)
The aspect of the Divine that is set before Magnusson is:
"Strength. Strength unafraid, unhesitant, serving a will which was neither cruel nor kind but which cleanly trod the road to its destiny.... He could not hold the vision before him for very long at a time. It was too superb for mankind." (ibid.)
Indeed. The alert reader remembers Djana's visions on Talwin:
"Before her flashed the image of a Merseian Christ, armed and shining, neither compassionate nor cruel but the Messiah of a new day.... She hadn't heard of any such belief among them. Maybe they had no need of redemption; maybe they were God's chosen...."
-Poul Anderson, A Circus Of Hells IN Anderson, Young Flandry (Riverdale, NY, January 2010), pp. 193-365 AT CHAPTER FOURTEEN, p. 298.
Merseian conditioning had worked on Djana's Catholic upbringing. It went further:
"He on the throne: 'For that they have sinned beyond redemption, the sin that may not be forgiven, which is to blaspheme against the Holy Spirit, no more are they My people.
"'Behold, I cast them from Me; and I will raise against them a new people under a new sun; and their name shall be Strength.
"'Open now the book of the seven thunders."
-A Circus Of Hells, p. 304.
A Third Testament? Does Magnusson's religion come from Sufism or from the Roidhunate?
Finally, after Magnusson's vision of Strength:
"Into his awareness there kept jabbing mere facts, practicalities, things he must do, questions of how to do them - yes, crusades have logistic requirements too -" (ibid.)
Mere facts are what we have to attend to, Magnusson. A pity he mentioned his crusade...
5 comments:
Kaor, Paul!
Now I'm wondering what the heck is Neosufism? I recall other Muslims, Sunnis or Shias, talking about the Sufis and denouncing them as heretics. Apparently they had been too influenced by Christianity.
Ad astra! Sean
Sean,
A modified Western form of Sufism.
Sufism is mystical, therefore potentially heretical.
Paul.
Kaor, Paul!
Given the context of where "Neosufism" was mentioned, it might be better called a modified TECHNIC variant of Sufism.
Ad astra! Sean
Actually, crusades -do- require logistics. Look at what happened to Peter the Hermit's "People's Crusade" in 1096.
The one led by Bohemond and Tancred and Robert of Normandy actually knew what it was doing, and carved a bloody path all the way to Jerusalem.
They were confident that God was with them, but they also paid attention to swords, armor, and food.
Kaor, Mr. Stirling!
By then West European armies were wising up to the fact some attention had to be paid to logistics if they wanted to be EFFECTIVE.
Ad astra! Sean
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