If twins are born, the hunter kills one so that the second may live

 Returning from the far north, Attila had brought along a primordial delight in superfluousness. The latter, he said, represented the capital whose interest nourishes the world, harvest by harvest. That was how the hunter lived amidst tremendous herds, which kept multiplying without his interference, long before the earth was notched by the plowshare.

“The hunter has companions, but tillage brought slavery, killing became murder. Freedom ended; the game was driven away. In Cain a descendant of the primal hunter was resurrected, his avenger, perhaps. Genesis supplies only a rumor about all this. It hints at Yahweh's bad conscience regarding the slayer.”

I enjoyed hearing these things when I poured the refills long past midnight. Those were spoors that the anarch repeatedly tracks down – and the poet, too; no poet is without a touch of anarchy. Where else could poetry come from?

*

Attila felt that superfluousness requires its control. When the word comes surging, the poet has not yet formed it into a poem. Countless shapes slumber in marble – but who will bring forth even one? Hard by the rich pastures, Attila had run into nomads who arduously dug their food from the earth: worms and roots.

Oolibuk – that was the Inuit's name – was still a good hunter; he knew how to wield his bow. Once Attila asked him to shoot a black-throated diver swimming some eighty feet from their kayak. The bird eluded the first arrow by diving; the second pierced its head through both eyes when it resurfaced.

Otherwise the Inuits were thoroughly corrupted by dealing with the whalers, who, next to the sandalwood skippers, were notoriously the worst villains ever to plow the seas. From them, they had learned how to smoke, drink, and gamble. They gambled away their dogs, boats, weapons, and also their wives; a woman might change hands five times in a single night.

*

Yet Oolibuk also knew about the days before any ship had ever penetrated these climes. Grandmothers who had heard about the past from their grandmothers would tell their grandchildren.

The big day in an lnuit's life comes when, still a boy, he kills his first seal. The men gather around him and his booty; they hail his dexterity and praise the seal – never has anyone seen such a strong animal and such good meat.

Killing a seal is difficult; a man is not a hunter if he fails. He has to content himself with female food, with fish, seaweed, and crustaceans. Strange tales are told about such men; one of them, finding no wife, had to make do with a mussel, and he lost his member because the shell clamped shut.

The hunter, in contrast, is a free man, around whom the world arranges itself. He alone maintains the family, richly providing it with meat and hides, as well as blubber, which provides light and warmth in the simply endless winter night. The hunter is bold and cunning, and, like all early hunters, he is related to the game he tracks. His body is plump and brawny like a sea mammal's, it is rich in blood and fat and has the same smell as the animal. The hunter will brave even the whale and the polar bear.

*

But the winter is long. It can come early and wear on interminably. Nor is the hunter always lucky. Though the pantry and storeroom of his ice dwelling can be chock-full at the start of winter, the crossing of the Arctic night remains a unique venture.

Incidentally, prior to setting up my bunker on the Sus, I studied construction plans that Captain Ross had found among the Eskimos of New North Wales. A basic theme for the anarch is how man, left to his own devices, can defy superior forces – whether state, society, or the elements – by making use of their rules without submitting to them.

“It is strange,” Sir William Parry wrote when describing the igloos on Winter Island, “it is strange to think that all these measures are taken against the cold - and in houses of ice.”

*

If the prey is inadequate, then the family will not survive the winter. It will waste away with hunger and scurvy in its glass palace. Polar bears will break open the igloo and find their meals. They will be followed by foxes and gulls.

Frost is a harsh master. Even while the Greenlander is struggling with death, the others bend his legs under his loins to make the grave shorter. If twins are born, the hunter kills one so that the second may live. The food would not suffice for both. If a mother dies in childbirth, the newborn is buried with her, or a bit later, when the father, at the end of his rope, can no longer stand the baby's bawling. “The father's grief is, of course, unbearable, especially when it is a son” – so goes Parry's account. Sometimes infants are exposed on desert islands when winter comes.

*

Why did Attila stress such details in his reminiscences of the polar night? What was his “guiding thought”? (That is what the Domo always asks when checking instructions.)

Was Attila bent on offering examples of the “power of necessity”? When worse comes to worst, a man is forced to make decisions that are hard, cruel – yes, even deadly.

Naturally, the Arctic tribes, or whatever is left of them, have long since been perishing in comfort. This is a gradual dying, over generations. But the fateful question remains in its harshness, even if time gives it a different mask.

With the discovery of oil in northern Alaska, high rises shot up there as everywhere else in those days. A traveler walled in by fire on the twentieth floor of a hotel has to choose between burning up and leaping into space. He will jump; this is documented by photographs.

*

But this did not seem to be Attila's point. His guiding thought in that discussion (which, as we recall, concerned abortion ) was, more or less: It is reprehensible to delegate a misdeed. The hunter takes his son to the mother's grave and kills him. He does not assign the task to anyone else – not his brother, not the shaman; he carries it out himself.

If a man here in Eumeswil has “made a child,” he usually hands his wife or girlfriend a check and feels he is off the hook, certain that she will take care of it. Attila obviously means that if the man personally killed his son like the Inuit, then he would know what he was doing.

As an anarch, who acknowledges neither law nor custom, I owe it to myself to get at the very heart of things. I then probe them in terms of their contradictions, like image and mirror image. Either is imperfect – by seeking to unite them, which I practice every morning, I manage to catch a corner of reality.

Eumeswil

Ernst Jünger

The Damaging Effects Of Jewish Intellectualism And Activism On Western Culture

In the past couple of years I began to wonder about the fact that Jews are firmly in the middle of leftist movements centered around socialism, communism, and feminism. The Culture Of Critique by Kevin MacDonald answered why they are so heavily invested in leftist causes and how they have damaged traditional Christian ideals by treating America as a cultural laboratory to further their own group interests above those of gentiles (non-Jews).

Up to recently, Jews did not have a homeland, meaning they had—and still have—to live in countries where they’re minorities. Therefore they would historically favor societies that were open, multicultural, pro-immigration, and left-leaning so that they would not be persecuted by the host nation or be barred from attaining higher social and economic status.

Jews benefit from open, individualistic societies in which barriers to upward mobility are removed, in which people are viewed as individuals rather than as members of groups, in which intellectual discourse is not prescribed by institutions like the Catholic Church that are not dominated by Jews, and in which mechanisms of altruistic punishment may be exploited to divide the European majority.

To accomplish such a society, Jewish intellectuals moved mountains to promote human equality and the idea of racial equality (the inventor of the word ‘racist’ was Russian Jewish communist Leon Trotsky, born Lev Bronshtein). While pushing the notion of equality, Jews were hyper-aware of their own unique race and would exclude themselves from many of the prescriptions they offered to their host cultures. They made sure to help their “tribe” before all others.

Below are the main arguments and highlights of The Culture Of Critique:

“Race is a myth”
Famed Jewish anthropologist Franz Boas was instrumental in pushing the idea of nurture and culture over that of nature. We now speak of “cultural” effects upon nations instead of more genetically determined factors like race.

An important technique of the Boasian school was to cast doubt on general theories of human evolution , such as those implying developmental sequences, by emphasizing the vast diversity and chaotic minutiae of human behavior, as well as the relativism of standards of cultural evaluation.

[…]

By 1926 every major department of anthropology was headed by Boas’s students, the majority of whom were Jewish.

[…]

Ashley Montagu was another influential student of Boas. Montagu, whose original name was Israel Ehrenberg, was a highly visible crusader in the battle against the idea of racial differences in mental capacities. He was also highly conscious of being Jewish, stating on one occasion that “if you are brought up a Jew, you know that all non-Jews are anti-Semitic. . . . I think it is a good working hypothesis”. Montagu asserted that race is a socially constructed myth.

Freudian psychoanalysis as a gentile subversive movement
The book proposes that Sigmund Freud, a Jew, pushed psychoanalysis to break down traditional pair bonding in gentiles.

Many early proponents viewed psychoanalysis as a redemptive messianic movement that would end anti-Semitism by freeing the world of neuroses produced by sexually repressive Western civilization.

[…]

Freud’s theory of anti-Semitism in Moses and Monotheism contains several assertions that anti-Semitism is fundamentally a pathological gentile reaction to Jewish ethical superiority.

[…]

Freud managed to diagnose Western culture as essentially neurotic while apparently, on the basis of the argument in Moses and Monotheism, holding the view that Judaism represents the epitome of mental health and moral and intellectual superiority.

[…]

…when [Western] institutions were subjected to the radical critique presented by psychoanalysis, they came to be seen as engendering neurosis, and Western society itself was viewed as pathogenic. Freud’s writings on this issue are replete with assertions on the need for greater sexual freedom to overcome debilitating neurosis. As we shall see, later psychoanalytic critiques of gentile culture pointed to the repression of sexuality as leading to anti-Semitism and a host of other modern ills.

[…]

The psychoanalysts who emigrated from Europe to the United States during the Nazi era expected to make psychoanalysis “into the ultimate weapon against fascism, anti-Semitism, and every other antiliberal bias.”

Frankfurt school
The Frankfurt school was a research institute set up in Germany during the 1920’s. They were instrumental in developing an intellectual base for cultural Marxism under the “critical theory” framework.

At a deep level the work of the Frankfurt School is addressed to altering Western societies in an attempt to make them resistant to anti-Semitism by pathologizing gentile group affiliations.

[…]

…entire thrust of the Frankfurt School’s view of science rejects the idea that science should attempt to understand reality in favor of the ideology that science ought to serve moral (i.e., political) interests.

[…]

The end of anti-Semitism is thus viewed as a precondition for the development of a utopian society and the liberation of humanity— perhaps the closest that the Frankfurt School ever came to defining utopia. The envisioned utopian society is one in which Judaism can continue as a cohesive group but in which cohesive, nationalistic, corporate gentile groups based on conformity to group norms have been abolished as manifestations of psychopathology.

[…]

In the 1970s, the Frankfurt School intellectuals continued to draw the fire of German conservatives who characterized them as the “intellectual foster-parents of terrorists” and as fomenters of “cultural revolution to destroy the Christian West”

[…]

Jewish interests are also served by the Frankfurt School ideology that gentile concerns about losing social status and being eclipsed economically , socially, and demographically by other groups are an indication of psychopathology. As an exceptionally upwardly mobile group, this ideology serves Jewish interests by defusing gentile concerns about their downward mobility.

Jewish intellectual strategies to change culture

Judaism, because of its position as a minority group strategy committed to its own worldview, has tended to adopt ideologies in which the institutions and ideologies of the surrounding society are viewed negatively.

[…]

…an important goal of Jewish intellectual effort may be understood as attempting to undermine cohesive gentile group strategies while continuing to engage in their own highly cohesive group strategy.

[…]

…one of the themes of post-Enlightenment Judaism has been the rapid upward mobility of Jews and attempts by gentile power structures to limit Jewish access to power and social status. Given this rather conspicuous reality, practical reasons of economic and political self-interest would result in Jews being attracted to movements that criticized the gentile power structure or even advocated overthrowing it entirely.

[…]

Another practical goal of Jewish political and intellectual movements has been to combat anti-Semitism. For example, Jewish attraction to socialism in many countries in the 1930s was motivated partly by communist opposition to fascism and anti-Semitism. The general association between anti-Semitism and conservative political views has often been advanced as an explanation for Jewish involvement with the left, including the leftist tendencies of many wealthy Jews.

[…]

In the absence of a clearly perceived conflict with Jewish interests, it remains possible that different political choices among ethnic Jews are only differences in tactics for how best to achieve Jewish interests.

[…]

Silberman notes “American Jews are committed to cultural tolerance because of their belief— one firmly rooted in history— that Jews are safe only in a society acceptant of a wide range of attitudes and behaviors, as well as a diversity of religious and ethnic groups. It is this belief, for example, not approval of homosexuality, that leads an overwhelming majority of American Jews to endorse ‘gay rights’ and to take a liberal stance on most other so-called ‘social’ issues.”

[…]

Institutions that promote group ties among gentiles (such as nationalism and traditional gentile religious associations) are actively opposed and subverted, while the structural integrity of Jewish separatism is maintained. A consistent thread of radical theorizing since Marx has been a fear that nationalism could serve as a social cement that would result in a compromise between the social classes and result in a highly unified social order based on hierarchical but harmonious relationships between existing social classes.

[…]

When an experiment in ideology and political structure fails, another experiment is launched. Since the Enlightenment, Judaism has not been a unified, monolithic movement.

[…]

In the promised utopian societies of the future, the category of Jew-gentile would be of no theoretical importance , but Jews could continue to identify as Jews and there could be continuation of Jewish group identity while at the same time a principle source of gentile identity— religion and its concomitant supports for high-investment parenting— would be conceptualized as an infantile aberration.

Promotion of cosmopolitanism, individualism, and decadent lifestyles
A race to degeneracy hurts Jews less than gentiles because they still retain guiding ingroup values. Gentiles are left in the cultural winds that Jews help create.

Research summarized by Triandis on cross-cultural differences in individualism and collectivism indicates that anti-Semitism would be lowest in individualist societies rather than societies that are collectivist and homogeneous apart from Jews.

[…]

In the long run, radical individualism among gentiles and the fragmentation of gentile culture offer a superior environment for Judaism as a group evolutionary strategy,

[…]

Indeed, “the universities, ‘free’ professions, salons, coffeehouses, concert halls, and art galleries in Berlin, Vienna, and Budapest became so heavily Jewish that liberalism and Jewishness became almost indistinguishable”.

[…]

People in individualist cultures, in contrast, show little emotional attachment to ingroups. Personal goals are paramount, and socialization emphasizes the importance of self-reliance, independence, individual responsibility, and “finding yourself”. Individualists have more positive attitudes toward strangers and outgroup members and are more likely to behave in a prosocial, altruistic manner to strangers. Because they are less aware of ingroup-outgroup boundaries, people in individualist cultures are less likely to have negative attitudes toward outgroup members.

[…]

Jews, as a highly cohesive group, have an interest in advocating a completely atomistic, individualistic society in which ingroup-outgroup distinctions are not salient to gentiles.

[…]

…a fundamental aspect of Jewish intellectual history has been the realization that there is really no demonstrable difference between truth and consensus.

[…]

…the cultural idealization of an essentially Jewish personal ethic of hedonism, anxiety, and intellectuality came at the expense of the older rural ethic of asceticism and sexual restraint.

Crypto-Judaism

Jews went through great efforts to conceal the predominately Jewish nature of their intellectual movements by having token gentiles be controlled spokespersons for their groups.

…because [their] movements were intended to appeal to gentiles, they were forced to minimize any overt indication that Jewish group identity or Jewish group interests were important to the participants.

[…]

…to exert their influence, they were forced to deny the importance of specifically Jewish identity and interests at the heart of the movement.

[…]

…after the collapse of the communist regime in Poland, “numerous Jews, some of them children and grandchildren of former communists, came ‘out of the closet’ ”, openly adopting a Jewish identity and reinforcing the idea that many Jewish communists were in fact crypto-Jews.

[…]

Lyons (1982, 73) finds that “most Jewish Communists wear their Jewishness very casually but experience it deeply. It is not a religious or even an institutional Jewishness for most; nevertheless, it is rooted in a subculture of identity, style, language, and social network.

[…]

Freud took great pains to ensure that a gentile, Jung, would be the head of his psychoanalytic movement— a move that infuriated his Jewish colleagues in Vienna, but one that was clearly intended to deemphasize the very large overrepresentation of Jews in the movement during this period.

The Jewishness of an assimilated Jew tends to come out when Jewry is threatened:

Jewish identity of even a highly assimilated Jew, and even one who has subjectively rejected a Jewish identity, may surface at times of crisis to the group or when Jewish identification conflicts with any other identity that a Jew might have, including identification as a political radical.

Their disproportionate participation in communism, Marxism, and socialism
Marxism is an exemplar of a universalist ideology in which ethnic and nationalist barriers within the society and indeed between societies are eventually removed in the interests of social harmony and a sense of communal interest.

[…]

Jews perceived communism as good for Jews: It was a movement that did not threaten Jewish group continuity, and it held the promise of power and influence for Jews and the end of state-sponsored anti-Semitism.

[…]

…many Eastern European Jews were impoverished at least in part because of czarist anti-Jewish policies that prevented Jewish upward mobility. As a result , a great many Jews were attracted to radical political solutions that would transform the economic and political basis of society and would also be consistent with the continuity of Judaism.

[…]

The main weapons Jews used against national cultures were two quintessentially modern ideologies, Marxism and Freudianism, “both [of which] countered nationalism’s quaint tribalism with a modern (scientific) path to wholeness”

[…]

Communism was good for Jews: It was a movement that never threatened Jewish group continuity, and it held the promise of Jewish power and influence and the end of state-sponsored anti-Semitism. And when this group achieved power in Poland after World War II, they liquidated the Polish nationalist movement, outlawed anti-Semitism , and established Jewish cultural and economic institutions.

[…]

12 of the 20 NKVD directorates were headed by ethnic Jews, including those in charge of state security, police, labor camps, and resettlement (i.e., deportation). The Gulag was headed by ethnic Jews from its beginning in 1930 until the end of 1938, a period that encompasses the worst excesses of the Great Terror. They were, in Slezkine’s words, “Stalin’s willing executioners”

[…]

Jewish dissidents whose parents had run the Gulags, the deportations, and the state-sponsored famines, now led the “urgent call for social justice” [after Stalin’s crackdown on Jews].

Jews were originators of the “social justice” movement that we now have to deal with, but they lost control of it after Jews were no longer seen as minorities in need of social justice but as privileged whites who are part of the power structure. Many Jews are confused about how to handle a movement they helped create that is highly sympathetic to Palestinian causes.

Jews in neo-conservatism

Neoconservatism evolved from those on the farthest right of Stalin’s communist left, who eventually became anti-communist because of Soviet persecution of Jews after World War 2. They still retain liberal ideals like the denial of race and gender differences. Their most preached position of “Middle East democracy” is a euphemism for “let’s hurt Israel’s enemies.”

Jewish liberals promote domestic issues which help their interests in the USA while neocons promote foreign policies that support Israel under the false guise of conservatism. They don’t work together directly but seem to cover all the bases to help Jews both in and out of Israel.

…origins of neoconservatism as a Jewish movement are thus linked to the fact that the left, including the Soviet Union and leftist radicals in the United States, had become anti-Zionist.

[…]

The New Left also tended to have negative attitudes toward Israel, with the result that many Jewish radicals eventually abandoned the left. In the late 1960s, the black Student Non-Violent Coordinating Committee described Zionism as “racist colonialism” which massacred and oppressed Arabs.

[…]

Part of the attraction neoconservatism held for Jewish intellectuals was its compatibility with support for Israel at a time when Third World countries supported by most American leftists were strongly anti-Zionist.

[…]

In alliance with virtually the entire organized American Jewish community, neoconservatism is a vanguard Jewish movement with close ties to the most extreme nationalistic, aggressive, racialist, and religiously fanatical elements within Israel.

[…]

…by far the best predictor of neoconservative attitudes, on foreign policy at least, is what the political right in Israel deems in Israel’s best interests.

[…]

…neoconservatives have been staunch supporters of arguably the most destructive force associated with the left in the twentieth century—massive non-European immigration.

Jewish influence in America
Jewish groups, particularly the AJCongress, played a leading role in drafting civil rights legislation and pursuing legal challenges related to civil rights issues mainly benefiting blacks. “Jewish support, legal and monetary, afforded the civil rights movement a string of legal victories. . . . There is little exaggeration in an American Jewish Congress lawyer’s claim that ‘many of these laws were actually written in the offices of Jewish agencies by Jewish staff people, introduced by Jewish legislators and pressured into being by Jewish voters’ ”

[…]

By 1968, Jews constituted 20 percent of the faculty of elite American colleges and universities and constituted 30 percent of the “most liberal” faculty. At this time, Jews, representing less than 3 percent of the population, constituted 25 percent of the social science faculty at elite universities and 40 percent of liberal faculty who published most.

[…]

[Jewish intellectualism] has resulted in a society increasingly split between a disproportionately Jewish “cognitive elite” and a growing mass of individuals who are intellectually incompetent, irresponsible as parents, prone to requiring public assistance, and prone to criminal behavior, psychiatric disorders, and substance abuse.

[…]

…neither communism nor fascism was good for Jews in the long run. But democracy cannot be trusted given that Weimar ended with Hitler. A solution is to advocate democracy and the trappings of traditional religious culture, but managed by an elite able to manipulate the masses via control of the media and academic discourse.

[…]

Of considerable importance to the history of U.S. immigration policy has been the collaboration between Jewish activists and elite gentile industrialists interested in cheap labor, at least in the period prior to 1924.

Jewish progress in the 20th century
In the late 19th century the great bulk of the Jewish population lived in Eastern Europe, with many Jews mired in poverty and all surrounded by hostile populations and unsympathetic governments. A century later, Israel is firmly established in the Middle East, and Jews have become the wealthiest and most powerful group in the United States and have achieved elite status in other Western countries. The critical Jewish role in radical leftism has been sanitized, while Jewish victimization by the Nazis has achieved the status of a moral touchstone and is a prime weapon in the push for large-scale non-European immigration, multi-culturalism and advancing other Jewish causes.

[…]

The victory over National Socialism set the stage for the tremendous increase in Jewish power in the post-World War II Western world, in the end more than compensating for the decline of Jews in the Soviet Union. As Slezkine shows, the children of Jewish immigrants assumed an elite position in the United States, just as they had in the Soviet Union and throughout Eastern Europe and Germany prior to World War II. This new-found power facilitated the establishment of Israel, the transformation of the United States and other Western nations in the direction of multiracial, multicultural societies via large-scale non-white immigration, and the consequent decline in European demographic and cultural preeminence.

[…]

While constituting approximately 2.4 percent of the population of the United States, Jews represented half of the top one hundred Wall Street executives and about 40 percent of admissions to Ivy League colleges. Lipset and Raab (1995) note that Jews contribute between one-quarter and one-third of all political contributions in the United States, including one-half of Democratic Party contributions and one-fourth of Republican contributions.

Predictions for the future

One may expect that as ethnic conflict continues to escalate in the United States, increasingly desperate attempts will be made to prop up the ideology of multiculturalism with sophisticated theories of the psychopathology of majority group ethnocentrism, as well as with the erection of police state controls on nonconforming thought and behavior.

[…]

History also suggests that anti-Jewish reactions develop as Jews increase their control over other peoples. As always, it will be fascinating to observe the dénouement.

[…]

Presently white gentiles are the most underrepresented group at Harvard, accounting for approximately 25 percent of the students, while Asians and Jews constitute at least half of the student body while constituting no more than five percent of the population. The United States is well on the road to being dominated by an Asian technocratic elite and a Jewish business, professional, and media elite.

Jews feel an intimate bond with each other as you may have already noticed by their professional networking circles like I have in Washington DC. Their actions, lives, and ideology are dominated by their race. While I don’t have a problem with that, I do find their subversive movements against gentiles hypocritical in that they would in no way advise or enact those ideas for Israel. Their morality, fairness, and justice is limited to whether they are dealing with fellow Jews or gentiles, and they will not push any idea or notion that may paint Jewish actions in a critical light.

The book makes clear that Jews conducted cultural undertakings that they believed would end anti-Semitism once and for all, but like most utopia builders, they forgot to account for the consequences, particularly how multiculturalism, a Jewish keystone policy, is beginning to cater to additional groups that are hostile to Jewish interests. Also, incubating social justice and then losing control of it has left out Jews as a victimized group and promoted Palestinian interests instead.

Their overshot explains why the American Enterprise Institute (AEI), a neocon organization, has in the past two years begun attacking feminism, an ideology that developed with disproportionate Jewish support. They’re doing so because minorities are clamoring for a bigger piece of the victim pie and introducing anti-Semitic and pro-Palestine thought. Some Jews have calculated that at this point it’s better to introduce some truth and realtalk in gender issues (but not race) so that non-Jewish groups don’t gain too much power. Don’t be surprised if Jews throw multiculturalism under the bus at some point and claim that they are the true “white” Americans in need of protection from the anti-Semitic minority hordes.

In turns out there is no “Jewish conspiracy” at all. The Jewish people simply are hyper-nationalistic and ethnocentric and so live and work in a way that their group is benefited first. Their participation in every sociological movement is structured so that Jews are benefited outright, or at least not hurt. This would be no different than if your efforts to increase your income and well-being went to benefit your direct family.

What amazes me is how methodical, patient, and determined Jews are in promoting their group interests. Such efforts should be commended and modeled. Why isn’t there such a group of Americans that do the same for Christian interests? The answer lies in the fact that gentiles are less organized, less ethnocentric, more altruistic to outgroups, and more prone to selling out their people if presented with money and power, while Jews would only sell out after their ingroup needs are met.

A lot of red pill truth is concerned with dismantling myths that have been institutionalized by intellectual Jews over the past century. Not being able to highlight race or gender differences matches with the Jewish imperative because doing so will inevitably lead to “anti-Semitism” when differences between Jews and gentiles are pointed out concerning each group’s propensity for ambition, intelligence, ethnocentrism, identity, and socioeconomic class status. The Culture Of Critique explains where significant parts of our current cultural problems came from, connecting a lot of dots I had missing about why our culture got to where it is. The bulk of what I criticize about Western culture was in fact ushered in by intellectual Jewish movements.

Before opening this book, I wondered if it would turn me into a neo-Nazi, but instead it served as a historical truth bomb that has made me skeptical of the ideas, behavioral actions, and teachings of prominent Jews and where their true intentions and loyalties lie (i.e. if an American Jew would die for America before Israel). I’m also having trouble getting my head around the fact that such a small group would embark on a massive reconstruction of reality and ideological manipulations on the world’s people just to protect their group—and succeed. I feel both outrage and admiration at the same time.

Ironically, my parents were allowed to emigrate to the United States in part because of intense Jewish lobbying to loosen immigration laws. I probably wouldn’t be here today if it wasn’t for their efforts in creating a multicultural America. The neomasculine ideals that I believe are correct, and the traditions that I would want to bring back, would have likely prevented me from coming into existence and becoming an American citizen.

That said, when I witness the cultural destruction today and how it negatively affects my male peers, I feel not anger for what has transpired in the past but a deep focus on actions I can take in the present to preserve secular masculinity for men who don’t want to turn into a effete male who prays at the alter of a matriarchal power structure.

The Culture Of Critique is thoroughly cited, but the author often went on long tangents that veered away from his main arguments. It reads likes a textbook and does repeat itself often, but the author is patient in making sure you understand the gravity of the information he’s presenting. If you’re interested in how our culture got to this point in time, I highly recommend the book.

Roosh Valizadeh
https://theredarchive.com/blog/Return-of-Kings/the-damaging-effects-of-jewish-intellectualism-and.20635

Patrick McGoohan’s The Prisoner

 

1. Introduction

A&E’s DVD (and Blu-ray) release of The Prisoner bills this cult series as “television’s first masterpiece.” In truth, it is probably television’s only masterpiece. The Prisoner is a triumph of acting, photography, design, writing, and thought. More generally, of course, it is a triumph of audacity and imagination. Like a great work of art, it is timeless. Very little about The Prisoner is dated—even though it went into production forty-five years ago. For the most part, the series looks as fresh as it did when first aired. And its message seems more relevant than ever.

Of course, the central problem with The Prisoner is what that message is exactly. Fans love to emphasize the “open-endedness” of the series: everyone has their own Prisoner. But when we interpret a text (even a cinematic text) our goal should not be to come up with a purely subjective, idiosyncratic interpretation. Interpretations of The Prisoner are often wildly speculative and subjective—and often completely ignore the public statements that Patrick McGoohan (the series’ creator) made about it. Surely what we want is an interpretation which causes the text to open itself and reveal the meaning its creator put into it, if any. Serious-minded people don’t treat texts as Rorschach blots. One begins the task of interpretation by carefully studying every detail of a text. One also studies the background of its author, and what its author has said about it.

Some interpretations work better than others. Some can explain the text as a whole, others only in part. The former is obviously preferable to the latter. For example, in the final episode of the series we at last discover the identity of the mysterious “Number One”: he is the Prisoner himself. Can one interpret this in an atheistic, or “secular humanist” vein? Does the final episode teach us that Number One is God, but that God is really us? One could indeed interpret things that way—but only if one ignored the fact that McGoohan was a devout Catholic. 

What I have attempted to do in this essay is to present an overall interpretation of The Prisoner, situating it within the tradition of twentieth-century “anti-modernism.” As an artist, McGoohan must be understood as belonging to the school of Pound, Yeats, Eliot, Joyce, Huxley, Lawrence, Kafka, and (to some extent) Orwell. It does not matter if McGoohan never read these authors; they would have recognized him as one of their own. It is my belief that such an interpretation is the most fruitful way to understand The Prisoner. But first, a little background information for the uninitiated . . . 

At the time The Prisoner went into production, Patrick McGoohan was the highest-paid actor in British television. He was the star of Danger Man (shown in the United States as Secret Agent), in which he played a spy by the name of John Drake. But Drake was no James Bond knock-off. Danger Man premiered on September 11, 1960, almost two years before the release of the first Bond film, Dr. No. Incidentally, McGoohan was the first actor offered the part of Bond, but he turned it down. He felt that Bond’s womanizing and killing were immoral. McGoohan made sure that Drake was never depicted in any amorous encounters with women, and that he never killed his enemies.[120] But Danger Man was plenty violent. Fisticuffs were a major feature of the series (and also of The Prisoner). McGoohan was physically imposing in the role of Drake. He was tall, tough, determined, and deadly serious. McGoohan’s odd, sing-songy voice (a product of being born in New York, and later raised in Ireland and Sheffield) was also crisp and powerful. He radiated enormous intensity and intelligence. 

In 1966, McGoohan’s contract for Danger Man ran out, and he decided to quit (even though the first two episodes of the new season—the only ones in color—were already in the can; they were later edited together as a seldom-seen feature called Koroshi). Lew Grade, the head of ITC, the firm that produced Danger Man, wanted very much to keep McGoohan on. When the star put to him the idea for The Prisoner, Grade immediately agreed to it. He had no idea what he was getting into.

The germ of The Prisoner was provided by George Markstein, the script editor for Danger Man. Markstein had worked in British intelligence, and knew of the existence of a secret “rest home” called Inverlair Lodge, where old spies could live out their days without accidentally revealing their secrets when Alzheimer’s set in. Somehow, Markstein, thought, this could be developed into an exciting series. This was basically the extent of Markstein’s contribution to the series’ format. The Prisoner was Patrick McGoohan’s creation.

Here is the premise: A secret agent—whose name is never revealed in the entire series—angrily resigns his job and prepares to leave the U.K. on holiday. Unbeknownst to him, however, he is followed home by a man in a hearse, who knocks him unconscious using some kind of gas. When the secret agent awakens, he is in his own bedroom, but when he looks out the window, he finds that he is in a strange, cosmopolitan little town. He discovers that he is being held prisoner in this place, which is known only as “the Village.” No one is referred to by name, only by number. The inhabitants wear colorful costumes, and spend a good deal of time parading and having fun, yet they are all curiously soulless. Underneath the Village is a complex of underground control rooms, from which a vast bureaucracy watches the Villagers’ every move using sophisticated electronic surveillance equipment. 

The highest ranking authority in the Village is called “Number Two,” and the office is constantly changing hands. Number One remains in the background. The location of the Village is never revealed—nor is it ever revealed “which side” runs the place. The Villagers are cared for from cradle to grave. Some seem to work, whereas others do nothing. The masters of the Village have at their disposal the most advanced technology imaginable. They can invade one’s dreams, brainwash one into believing anything, switch minds from one body to another, and bring a dead man back to life. Escape is impossible. The perimeter of the Village is guarded by a mysterious creature that looks like a balloon and is called only “Rover.” It lives at the bottom of the sea and can suffocate escapees, or merely stun them. Is it alive? Is it a machine? “That would be telling,” says Number Two in the first episode (see the Appendix to this essay).

The men behind the Village want to know why our hero—who they call “Number Six”—resigned his job. He refuses to tell them, or to conform. They try to break his will in various ways. They drug him. They hypnotize him. They trick him into thinking he has escaped, only to reveal that he has never left. They raise him to the exalted position of Number Two, then literally beat him and deposit him back in his bed. They turn his old friends against him. They make him doubt his own identity. They perform a mock lobotomy on him. They trick him into believing he is a gunfighter in the Old West. They regress him back to his childhood, then “bring him up” all over again. They even allow him to actually escape, and then lure him back. Finally, with no more tricks left up their sleeves, the Villagers admit defeat and beg the Prisoner to lead them. 

Oh, and aside from McGoohan the only other regular is a dwarf.

This was—and is—quite simply, the most unusual thing ever made for television. Only David Lynch’s Twin Peaks rivals it for sheer strangeness and originality.[121] McGoohan arranged with Lew Grade to produce The Prisoner under the auspices of his company, Everyman Films, which he had set up in 1960. This gave him total control over every aspect of the production. ITC budgeted the series at £75,000 an episode, a huge amount in those days. Extensive location shooting was done at Portmeirion in Wales: an artificial village constructed over several decades by architect Clough Williams-Ellis. McGoohan planned out in detail the world of the Village. He contributed to the design of sets, props, and costumes. The Village even had its own font (based on Albertus), which was also used for the opening and closing titles of the series. 

The production included many Danger Man alumni. Particularly striking were the sets designed by art director Jack Shampan. They included a large, circular chamber which could be redressed to serve as several settings: No. 2’s office, the sinister “Monitor Station,” and others. These sets are ultra-modern and ultra-simple. They look as impressive today as they did in 1966. The music was one aspect of the production that McGoohan was less happy with. The original theme, contributed by Wilfrid Josephs, was deemed too avant-garde (though it still appears in the background in several episodes). Ron Grainer, the composer of Dr. Who, contributed the theme that was finally used. Albert Elms contributed background music which works brilliantly in the series, but sounds thin and repetitive when heard apart from the visuals (a series of CDs was released a number of years ago). 

The Prisoner is visually opulent and looks even more expensive than it was. The photography is crisp and provocative. Scenes call to mind Bergman, Fellini, and Hitchcock. The color is vivid. The editing is like that of a Bond film: fast-paced, each shot lingering only briefly, presenting only essentials. Indeed, every aspect of this series is polished and top-drawer. The Prisoner exhibits that same consummate professionalism that one finds in other British series of the time, like The Avengers and The Saint. Some of the best direction in the series came from McGoohan himself (he helmed five episodes, wrote three, and probably re-wrote all the rest).

The story goes that as production of the series went on, McGoohan began asserting more and more control over every aspect. He was a perfectionist, who delegated little. George Markstein quit and subsequently attacked McGoohan in interviews for his “megalomania.” But one can hardly argue with the results, for The Prisoner is a brilliant creation. Nevertheless, after a year in production, only thirteen episodes were completed, and the stories were getting stranger and stranger. ITC decided to pull out and told McGoohan to wrap things up with a final four episodes. When the last episode was broadcast, viewer reaction in Britain was so hostile that it is said McGoohan and his family felt they had to leave the country.

Originally McGoohan had only wanted to do seven episodes. Indeed, roughly ten of the episodes are fairly routine adventures, lacking much intellectual substance. The seven “primary episodes” are:

“Arrival”

“Dance of the Dead”

“Free for All”

“The Chimes of Big Ben”

“Checkmate”

“Once Upon a Time”

“Fall Out”

Like many television series, the episodes were not broadcast in the order in which they were filmed. 

2. Interpreting The Prisoner

So, to quote No. 6 in “Arrival,” what’s it all about? The Prisoner, like many texts, has different levels. The exoteric Prisoner is an adventure series with lots of action, gee-whiz technology, and a dashing, intransigent hero. Even at this level, the series makes the viewer ask certain questions. Chief among these are:

(1) What is the hero’s name?

(2) Who runs the Village?

(3) Where is the Village?

(4) Why did our hero resign?

(5) Who is No. 1?

The first three questions are insignificant and will lead one astray. Anyone who thinks that these are important questions probably also thinks that the central question of The Trial is what the K in Joseph K stands for. 

The Prisoner is not John Drake. He is Patrick McGoohan, if Patrick McGoohan had been a secret agent. The Prisoner’s birthday is March 19—the same as McGoohan’s (this is mentioned twice in the series). In the final episode, he credits each of his stars—Leo McKern, Alexis Kanner, and Angelo Muscat—at the bottom of the screen, but bills himself as “Prisoner.” Furthermore, the Prisoner shares other biographical details in common with McGoohan: he boxed in school and had a talent for mathematics (“Once Upon a Time”). 

But there is much else to the character that is not McGoohan. In fact, at times it seems No. 6 is everything. He can build a boat and navigate it, he can fly a helicopter, he can fence and shoot, he can speak several languages, he can water-ski, he is a gymnast, he can ride a horse, he knows the sciences, he knows literature, etc. In truth, he is Everyman. He is all of us. (In Biblical terms, six is the number of man, for man was made on the sixth day.) What is he trying to say about all of us? I will address that in section four, below. As to the location of the Village and who runs it, I will deal with those issues in passing.

Of the above questions, only those concerning the Prisoner’s resignation and the identity of No. 1 have any real significance.

It is made clear that the Prisoner resigned his job for matters of principle. (“The Chimes of Big Ben” has the Prisoner revealing that his resignation was “a matter of conscience”; in “Once Upon a Time” he says that he resigned for “peace of mind.”) Part of McGoohan’s message must surely be to convey that principle.

In “Living in Harmony” the story of The Prisoner is played out in an Old West setting. The Prisoner resigns his job as sheriff, then is kidnapped and taken to another town where he is forced to become the new sheriff. He refuses to wear guns, however. Naturally, this calls to mind John Drake. So, did our hero resign his job because he could no longer stomach killing? This cannot be the case, for in the same episode he does put on his guns briefly in order to kill the homicidal “Kid.” This shows that he is willing to kill, if he thinks it justified (he also kills with abandon in “Fall Out”). No, our hero did not resign because he thought it never right to kill; he resigned because he could no longer, in good conscience, kill for, and in the name of, his society. His act of resignation is a rejection of his society, and its regime (in “Once Upon a Time,” when Leo McKern says “You resigned,” McGoohan replies “I rejected”). 

One of the mysteries of The Prisoner is why the Villagers cannot see that this is all there is to it. But this is what one should expect: modern people find nonconformists to be thoroughly inexplicable creatures. How could anyone reject this wonderful world in which, to quote Ned Beatty in Network, “all necessities [are] provided; all anxieties, tranquilized; all boredom, amused.” There must, they think, be another reason why he resigned!

Nevertheless, the Prisoner clearly has some vestigial loyalty to Her Majesty. In “Arrival” he insists that his loyalties don’t change. In “A, B and C” he condemns B for working on the “wrong side.” Almost every episode opens with No. 6 demanding of his captors “Whose side are you on?!” This is one of the two ways in which No. 6 is portrayed as being misguided. He is portrayed as a hero, and as an extremely virtuous individual, but he has failings nonetheless. In “The Chimes of Big Ben,” No. 2 tries to set him straight on the issue of “whose side” they are on:

No. 2: It doesn’t matter which side runs the Village. Both sides are becoming identical. What in fact has been created [here] is an international community. When the sides facing each other suddenly realize that they are looking into a mirror, they will see that this is the pattern for the future.

No. 6: The whole earth, as the Village is?

No. 2: That is my hope.

“A, B and C” informs us that the Prisoner believes in “absolute truth.” But he needs to realize that neither side (democratic-capitalist or communist) embodies his ideals, and that neither side is salvageable. He tries to escape the Village to get back to “my world” (as he puts it in “Dance of the Dead”), thinking that it’s “different” (“The Chimes of Big Ben”). But, in essence, they are the same. The Village is the essence of modernity laid bare. But No. 6 does not see it. 

What he needs to see is that, as Heidegger claimed, the two sides are metaphysically identical. Both capitalism and communism are based on the supremacy of materialism, and on the rejection of man’s higher nature. In “Arrival,” No. 2 says “We have everything here.” But there is one thing conspicuously absent from the Village: a church. The Villagers are devoid of any spiritual dimension. They are happy, healthy, well-fed humanoids, with an army of psychologists at the ready to drug away their every doubt and blue mood. 

The Village is a microcosm of modern society. (In fact, No. 6 calls it that in “Many Happy Returns.”) First of all, it has no cultural or ethnic identity. (“Are you English?” the Prisoner asks No. 2 in “Dance of the Dead”; she does not answer.) Physically, the place is a mix of international architectural styles. (“It’s very international,” says a girl in the first episode.) 

The authorities know everything about you—but no one cares, because it makes everyone feel “safe.” Don’t worry about car accidents, you aren’t allowed to drive yourself anywhere (too dangerous). And don’t forget to be in by curfew at 10:00 pm. 

The Villagers pride themselves on their democracy, even though the whole process is rigged (“Free for All”). “Of the people, by the people, for the people,” a sign proclaims. They think themselves free, even though their “freedoms” are things like the freedom to walk on the grass (“Arrival”). “You do what you want. . . . As long as it’s what the majority wants,” No. 2 tells us in “Dance of the Dead.” Run for office by all means, but don’t try and change anything if you win. (“You want to spoil things!” No. 6 is told in “Dance of the Dead.”) Don’t make the mistake, however, of thinking that the Villagers have no ideals. “Progress! Progress! Progress!” they scream in “Free for All.” (McGoohan has said that the “penny-farthing bicycle,” seen in the series as the Village’s emblem, represents the ideal of progress.)

A cheery radio announcer makes sure that a light, informal tone is maintained at all times. To “simplify” things, everyone goes by number, rather than by name. Those who claim not to be numbers are laughed at (“Free for All”)—and resented. The Villagers wear silly costumes—colorful capes, straw hats, striped sailor shirts. Dignity is, of course, a terribly old-fashioned idea, and, again, likely to stir resentment. 

Everything is automated. The houses have radios and TVs which can’t be shut off because, after all, why would anyone want to shut them off? Leaving for the Village store to buy processed food? Don’t forget your credit card and identity card. 

Got troubles? Go to the Citizen’s Advice Bureau (“A Change of Mind”). Need work? Queue up at the Labour Exchange, where you will be given an aptitude test (“Arrival”). Suffering existential Angst, or anti-social tendencies? “There are treatments for people like you!” (“Dance of the Dead”). Do you wonder “Who am I? Why am I here?” (“Schizoid Man”). Sign up for Group Therapy at the hospital. It “counteracts obsessional guilt complexes producing neurosis” (“Arrival”). And remember: “Questions are a burden to others; answers a prison for oneself” (“Arrival” and “Dance of the Dead”). In fact, “if you get [an] attack of egotism, don’t wait. Go . . . to the hospital immediately” (No. 2 to the Rook in “Checkmate”). The Village treats men as soulless pieces of meat to be manipulated by science (“We mustn’t damage the tissue,” No. 2 cautions in “Free for All”). Pavlovian methods of conditioning are employed (methods first perfected—as No. 6 points out twice in “Checkmate”—on dogs).

When your mind is completely gone and you can no longer shop for yourself, you are retired to the Old People’s Home, where you are encouraged to enjoy a second childhood. 

3. The Prisoner as Anti-Modern Manifesto

In short, The Prisoner attacks modernity on the following grounds:

1.  Modernity rests upon a materialistic metaphysics (all is matter), and champions materialism as a way of life (the focus on material comfort and satisfaction).

2.  Modernity is spiritually empty (again, no church in the Village); it must deny or destroy what is higher in man.

3.  Modernity destroys culture, tradition, and ethnic and national identity in the name of “progress” (called “multiculturalism” and “globalization” today). It is significant that we do not know where the Village is, for modern people are really “nowhere.” As Nietzsche’s “Madman” said, “Where are we headed? Are we not endlessly plunging—backwards, sideways, forwards, in all directions? Is there an up and a down anymore? Do we not wander as if through an endless nothingness? Do we not feel the breath of empty space? Hasn’t it grown colder?” (The Gay Science).

4.  Modernity promises only trivial freedoms (e.g., the freedom to shop) while suppressing freedom of thought, freedom of religion, freedom of association.

5.  Modernity involves the belief that nature (including human nature) is infinitely malleable, open to the endless manipulation and “improvement” of science. In a 1977 interview with Canadian journalist Warner Troyer, McGoohan said, “I think we’re progressing too fast. I think that we should pull back and consolidate the things that we’ve discovered.” 

6.  Modernity systematically suppresses ideals that rise above material concerns: ideals like honor, and dignity, and loyalty (the Village is filled with traitors).

7.  Modernity preaches a contradictory ethos of collectivism, and “looking out for No. 1.”

8.  Modernity banishes the sacred, and profanes all through oppressive levity, irony, and irreverence (masking cynicism).

9.  Modernity places physical security and comfort above the freedom to be self-determining, to be let alone, and to take risks.

10. Modernity fills the emptiness in people’s lives with noise (the TV and radio you can’t turn off). Silence might start people thinking, which could make them unhappy.

In addition to the hostility to religion, the Village also seems to be hostile to marriage, sex, and procreation. It is not clear whether there are any married couples in the Village. Sex is probably forbidden. No children are seen until “The Girl Who Was Death,” and those children are depicted as living in a kind of barracks. There is a touch of Plato’s Republic in The Prisoner. 

The Villagers are Nietzsche’s “Last Men.” In Thus Spoke Zarathustra, Nietzsche has his prophet proclaim:

“Alas the time of the most despicable man is coming, he that is no longer able to despise himself. Behold, I show you the last man.

“‘What is love? What is creation? What is longing? What is a star?’ thus asks the last man, and he blinks. . . . 

“‘We have invented happiness,’ say the last men, and they blink. They have left the regions where it was hard to live, for one needs warmth. One still loves one’s neighbor and rubs against him, for one needs warmth. . . . 

“One still works, for work is a form of entertainment. But one is careful lest the entertainment be too harrowing. One no longer becomes poor or rich: both require too much exertion. Who still wants to rule? Who obey? Both require too much exertion.

“No shepherd and one herd! Everybody wants the same, everybody is the same: whoever feels different goes voluntarily into a madhouse.

“‘Formerly, all the world was mad,’ say the most refined, and they blink.

“One is clever and knows everything that has ever happened: so there is no end of derision. One still quarrels, but one is soon reconciled—else it might spoil the digestion.

“One has one’s little pleasure for the day and one’s little pleasure for the night: but one has a regard for health.”

Zarathustra’s audience is not horrified by this vision of man at the end of history. When he finishes speaking, he is interrupted “by the clamor and delight of the crowd. ‘Give us this last man, O Zarathustra,’ they shouted. ‘Turn us into these last men!’”[122]To borrow from Eliot, the Villagers are “hollow men.” Or to borrow from C. S. Lewis, they are “men without chests.” They have no soul and no spirit. They are concerned only with comfort, safety, and satisfaction. They have no ideals, and consider nothing to be worth fighting for. In “Free for All,” No. 6 tells the Villagers, “I am not a number, I am a person.” They laugh at him. Then, when he continues to address them, briefly expounding views which No. 2 characterizes as “individualistic,” their faces are blank, uncomprehending. Later in the same episode, No. 6 addresses the Town Council: “Look at them. Brainwashed imbeciles. Can you laugh? Can you cry? Can you think? . . . In your heads must still be a brain. In your hearts must still be the desire to be a human being again.” McGoohan’s portrayal of modern man might have seemed an exaggeration in 1967, but not today. Contemporary man—forty-five years on—does not even rise to the level of a Babbitt or a Willy Loman. He is Dilbert. He is Homer Simpson.

All right, we have seen what McGoohan is against, but what is he for? I will offer the following guesses—with apologies to the late Mr. McGoohan if I happen to misread him.

First and foremost, based on what we know of McGoohan himself, as well as clues internal to the series, I think we can say that he was a theist who believed that man is a creature of God, with an immortal soul, subject to divine law. (Obviously, McGoohan was against materialism in metaphysics and in culture—in “Fall Out” the President states that No. 6 has triumphed “despite materialistic efforts.”) He believed that when men no longer turn their souls toward God, they stop being men. He believed that societies have souls too, and that the soul of a society is its spirituality. Again, the most significant fact about the Village is the total lack of any religious or spiritual institutions. 

McGoohan also seemed to place importance on cultural and ethnic identity. We cannot simply be “citizens of the world.” We are English, or Irish, or French, or Estonian, or Japanese. He was against the modern homogenization of the globe (physically embodied in the “internationalism” of the Village) which is rapidly making every place look pretty much like every other. 

McGoohan seems also to have advocated minimal government and self-reliance. He opposed government intrusion into our lives, as well as “cradle to grave” socialism. This is the “libertarian” aspect to The Prisoner (the least interesting aspect and, of course, the one that gets the most attention). McGoohan also would seem to have favored somehow limiting what science and technology can meddle with. One supposes that he was a conservationist, who in particular regarded human life as sacred and inviolable.

If McGoohan wanted us to identify him with his character, then, based on what we learn about No. 6 in the course of seventeen episodes, we can conclude that McGoohan believed in honor, in dignity, in fighting for what one holds dear, in discipline, in self-denial, and in absolute truth. He believed in self-sacrifice and service to others (note how he buys the candy for the old lady in “It’s Your Funeral”), not out of duty to “the majority” or to the state, but out of benevolence (note the use of the Beatles’ tune “All You Need Is Love” in “Fall Out”). Quite simply, he was a Christian. Not a mushy “Jesus Freak” sort of Christian, but a tough, muscular C. S. Lewis sort of Christian. 

Finally, McGoohan believed in a life that makes room for silence, for thought, for contemplation. He believed in taking life seriously. Was McGoohan a liberal or a conservative? His emphasis on freedom of thought and freedom of expression, and his belief in minimal government seem to make him a classical liberal. But his spirituality, his emphasis on place and culture, his skepticism about “rule by the majority,” and his old-fashioned ideals make him look like a conservative (in “A Change of Mind” one Villager accuses him of being “reactionary”). In truth, it is really unimportant where we locate McGoohan on the political spectrum. If we had asked him, we can be fairly sure he would have eschewed all our ready-made labels. 

So what did McGoohan propose doing about our plight? Here the answer is simple: he advocated a revolution. In “Dance of the Dead,” “Bo Peep” states: “It is the duty of all of us to care for each other, and to see that the rules are obeyed. Without their discipline we should exist in a state of anarchy.” No. 6 replies “Hear! Hear!” In the same episode, he finds a transistor radio on a dead body. When he switches it on, we hear the following: “I have a message for you. . . . The appointment cannot be fulfilled. Other things must be done tonight. If our torment is to end, if liberty is to be restored, we must grasp the nettle even though it makes our hands bleed. Only through pain can tomorrow be assured.” 

Furthermore, in interviews McGoohan has actually said that he had hoped the protest movement of the 1960s would lead to a revolution. He referred to the action of the final episode of The Prisoner as “revolution time.” But who are to be the revolutionaries, other than McGoohan? He probably wondered the same thing. In the world of the Last Man, what can one do except cultivate one’s own garden? McGoohan made his impassioned, seventeen-hour speech on behalf of revolution. He spent his last years writing poetry that may never be published, and acting only occasionally.

4. Patrick McGoohan’s Anti-Individualism

Earlier, I said that although No. 6 is clearly portrayed as a hero, he is not perfect. He is misguided in two significant ways. The first I have already discussed: he does not seem to realize that in essential terms his own society and the Village are identical. There is no physical escape from them. The second way he is misguided is that he is an individualist. This statement will surely shock many fans of the series. 

Several episodes (such as “Free for All”) explicitly refer to his individualism. No. 6 continually asserts his individuality. In “Arrival” he tells us that he will not be “pushed, filed, stamped, indexed, briefed, debriefed or numbered! My life is my own.” Fourteen episodes open with his proclaiming “I am not a number! I am a free man!” In “Dance of the Dead,” No. 6’s costume for Carnival is his own tuxedo, specially delivered for the occasion. “What does that mean?” asks his maid. “That I’m still . . . myself,” he answers, dramatically. In the same episode, No. 2 tells him, “If you insist on living a dream you may be taken for mad.” “I like my dream,” he says. “Then you are mad,” she replies. 

But the attitude of the series toward individualism is, contrary to appearances, ambivalent. Up to the final episode, one could perhaps be excused for thinking that The Prisoner is an unqualifiedly positive portrayal of an individualist hero. But in “Fall Out,” when No. 6 addresses the assembly, he begins his first sentence with “I” and the assemblymen drown him out chanting “I! I! I! I! I! I!” The President states that No. 6 has “gloriously vindicated the right of the individual to be individual”—but his unctuous manner suggests that these are merely empty platitudes. When the Prisoner enters No. 1’s chamber, he sees himself on a TV screen saying “I will not be pushed, filed, stamped,” et cetera, as quoted earlier. Then we hear his voice speeded up, hysterically chanting “I! I! I! I! I! I!” And we see the image that closes almost every episode: iron bars slamming shut over McGoohan’s face, this time over and over again. Are we being told here that the ego is a prison? 

No. 1 wears a mask like that of the assemblymen: half-black, half-white. When No. 6 rips it off, underneath is a monkey mask. The monkey face gibbers “I! I! I!”along with the soundtrack. When No. 6 rips that mask off we see that No. 1 is McGoohan. He laughs maniacally and disappears through a hatch in the ceiling. The Prisoner had wanted to discover the identity of No. 1, and now he finds out that he has been No. 1 all along. Understanding the meaning of this is the key to understanding the entire series. In the 1977 Troyer interview, the following exchange occurs:

McGoohan: [The audience] thought they’d been cheated. Because it wasn’t, you know, a “James Bond” No. 1 guy.

Troyer: It was themselves.

McGoohan: Yes, well, we’ll get into that later, I think. (Knowing laughter from Troyer) Come back to that one, that’s a very important one.

That the Prisoner is No. 1 is hinted at throughout the entire series. McGoohan has said that he did not know in advance that things would work out the way they did. However, given his description of how “Fall Out” essentially “wrote itself,” we have some grounds for supposing that McGoohan knew the identity of No. 1 all along, subconsciously. The number on the Prisoner’s house in London is “1” (the actual address is 1 Buckingham Place). The dwarf butler always bows to him. The large red phone No. 2 uses to speak with No. 1 in “A, B and C” (and seen again in other episodes) is shaped suspiciously like the number 6. Finally, at times it seems that the Village exists just in order to break No. 6; as if he is at the center of the whole thing.

No. 1 represents man’s ego in the bad sense. In an interview that predates The Prisoner, McGoohan was quoted as saying, “But what is the greatest evil? If you’re going to epitomize evil, what is it? Is it the [atomic] bomb? The greatest evil that one has to fight constantly, every minute of the day until one dies, is the worst part of oneself.” In the Troyer interview, we read the following:

Audience member: No. 1 is the evil side of man’s nature?

McGoohan: The greatest enemy that we have. No. 1 was depicted as an evil, governing force in this Village. So, who is this No. 1? We just see the No. 2’s, the sidekicks. Now this overriding, evil force is at its most powerful within ourselves and we have constantly to fight it, I think, and that is why I made No. 1 an image of No. 6. His other half, his alter ego.

No. 1 is the embodiment of what I call “Will” (see chapter 1, “Knowing the Gods,” for a fuller discussion of this concept). Will is that dark impulse inside all of us which desires to close itself to what is other (including the transcendent, divine other) and to raise oneself above all else. No. 1’s monkey mask represents this primal, brutish aspect in all of us. (Significantly, the first task No. 2 sets for himself in “Once Upon a Time” is to find the Prisoner’s “missing link.”) When Warner Troyer asked McGoohan about the monkey mask, McGoohan said:

Yeah, well, we’re supposed to come from these things, you know. It’s the same with the penny-farthing bicycle symbol thing. Progress. I don’t think we’ve [truly] progressed much. But the monkey thing was, according to various theories extant today, that we all come from the original ape, so I just used that as a symbol, you know. The bestial thing and then the other bestial face behind it which was laughing, jeering and jabbering like a monkey.

Will manifests itself in more or less sophisticated forms. In “Knowing the Gods” I write:

In its higher forms, Will manifests itself . . . in (1) the transformation of the given world according to human designs, and (2) the yearning to penetrate and master the world through the instrument of the human mind—through exploration, analysis, dissection, categorization, observation, and theory. In its most refined form, Will becomes what might be called a “Titanic Humanism”: a seeking to make man the measure, to exalt man as the be-all and end-all of existence, to bend all things to human desires. 

Modernity is the Age of Will, the age of this Titanic Humanism. It is this which The Prisoner so brilliantly lays bare and parodies as “the Village.”

Why is Will, as “No. 1,” the head of the Village? Or: why is Will the true master of modernity? I write, further, in the same essay:

It is no accident that all the grand schemes and contrivances of modernity (the technological mastery of nature, the global marketplace, socialism, universal health care, etc.) have as their end exactly what [Will in its infantile form] seeks: the satisfaction of desires, and the maintenance of comfort and security. 

East and West, Communism and Capitalism are metaphysically identical because both are run by Will; both are run by an exclusive concern with the values of the Last Man: comfort, security, and satisfaction of (physical) desire. McGoohan has said, “I think progress is the biggest enemy on earth, apart from oneself, and that goes with oneself, a two-handed pair with oneself and progress.” 

But why does McGoohan confront us with this hard truth by having our hero discover that No. 1 is himself? Isn’t he the exception? Isn’t he the man who has rejected Will and the world it has created? No. 6 has indeed rejected modernity, but he himself exhibits Will in one of its more subtle forms. He does not turn from modernity to anything higher than it, or higher than himself. He turns inwards and wills himself as, in effect, an atomic individual. As I have said, the most significant thing about the Village is that it has no church. But perhaps the most significant thing about No. 6 is that he doesn’t ask about this. Again, we see him fly a helicopter, build two escape rafts, mix it up with thugs (countless times), box, fence, shoot, play chess, demonstrate his psychic powers, display his knowledge of Shakespeare, do gymnastics, and much else, but we never see him pray. No. 6 is, in effect, a secular humanist who believes that he can stand alone, needing no one, not even God. (In this respect, of course, he is not McGoohan, but “Everyman”—or, perhaps, McGoohan in those moments of doubt that all of us have.) 

The series presents us with numerous examples of No. 6’s hubris. In “Free for All” he shouts “I’m afraid of nothing!” In the same episode, after he is elected the new No. 2, he gets on the Village loudspeaker and cries “I am in command! Obey me and be free!” A psychologist in “Checkmate” expresses the desire to learn No. 6’s “breaking point.” “You might make that your life’s ambition,” he says to her. In “Once Upon a Time,” the silent butler obeys No. 6. “He thinks you’re the boss!” Leo McKern exclaims. “I am,” McGoohan replies. When he sits down on the throne in “Fall Out” he seems quite pleased with himself. No. 6 is a strong man, but he is not introspective. He is a man of action. He lacks self-criticism. 

“Many Happy Returns” is an episode that many take to be a straightforward thriller: No. 6 wakes up to find the Village deserted, sails away on a raft, but, predictably, winds up back in the Village by the end of the hour. There is more here than meets the eye, however. Consider what No. 6’s behavior in this episode reveals. Finally left alone—a lone wolf, a true individual, an atom in the void at last—he does not look inside himself and take stock. Instead, he promptly goes in search of the world that, in the beginning of the series, he rejected and sought to escape from. Then, once back there, he goes in search of the Village! No. 6 is the proverbial rebel without a pause. He is constantly reacting against the world. He needs others, he needs the world, in order to reject them, for he can do nothing else. He is sheer negativity—sheer rejection and cancellation of otherness. His constant activity—pacing around his apartment, walking around the Village, working out—as well as his acts of violence, are expressions of this. 

Now, this life of rebellion and negativity is not a truly human life. It is a kind of Purgatory. It is no accident that there are continual references in the series to No. 6’s being dead. An undertaker in a top hat, driving an old hearse, is the man who kidnaps him and takes him to the Village. (This lends itself to the irresistible, but wrong-headed speculation that in the beginning McGoohan really dies, and that the Village is Hell, or Purgatory!) In “Dance of the Dead” No. 6 asks No. 2 why he doesn’t have a costume for Carnival. “Perhaps because you don’t exist,” she says. In the same episode, after the Villagers try and kill the Prisoner, No. 2 tells him, “They don’t know you’re already dead.” She tells him that the body he found on the beach will be “amended” to look like him, so that to the outside world No. 6 will be dead. “A small confirmation of a known fact,” she says. There are suggestions that the Village is populated by the living dead. Once again, in “Dance of the Dead” (note the title itself!) No. 6 finds the key to the morgue hanging on a hook outside the door. What can this mean, except that the door is locked not to keep people from getting in, but to keep them from getting out? In “Once Upon a Time,” No. 2 cries “I’ll kill you!” “I’ll die,” whispers our hero. “You’re dead,” No. 2 replies. Then there is No. 6’s dalliance with “The Girl Who Was Death.” And finally, there is the fact that No. 6 almost always appears in black.

The best literary parallel I can think of for No. 6 is the character of Hazel Motes in Flannery O’Connor’s Wise Blood. Motes is also an atomic individualist who despises society and modern people. Raised in a religious home, he rejects the God that society believes in and founds an atheist “religion”: “the Church Without Christ.” He buys a disastrous used car (an old Essex), but no matter how many times it breaks down and reveals its frailty, he insists that it’s a fine car and will get him wherever he needs to go. “Nobody with a good car needs to be justified,” he says. The car represents man’s mortal coil, and the Catholic O’Connor is telling us that man cannot stand totally alone; he must turn his soul to something higher. 

McGoohan is telling us something similar. He is saying, “Fine. Reject society. Reject materialism and the modern world. But if you reject them in the name of your own ego you are buying into that primal, Biblical sin that is at the root of modernity itself: the placing of ego and its interests, narrowly conceived, above all else.” Without preaching to us, without ever mentioning religion, McGoohan invites us to rise above our No. 1, and turn our souls toward the Real Boss. One need not be a Christian, let alone a Catholic, to understand and sympathize with this message. Indeed, the idea that it is our ego that holds us back from enlightenment or true liberation is a perennial idea. (One of the ironies of the series is that resignation is a trait No. 6 is singularly lacking!)

Christian themes are to be found throughout The Prisoner. In several episodes we hear a march-version of the hymn “How Great Thou Art.” This occurs first in “The General,” in which No. 6 destroys a supercomputer with the question “Why?” (One is reminded of the old story—probably apocryphal—of President Eisenhower asking Univac if there is a God; “Now there is,” the computer is said to have shot back.) In “Once Upon a Time” we hear this theme played on a church organ. In “Fall Out” we are repeatedly bombarded with the old spiritual “Dry Bones.” “Them bones, them bones, them dry bones! Now hear the Word of the Lord!” 

“Dry Bones” is an old Negro spiritual inspired by the Book of Ezekiel, which is one of the prophetic books of the Old Testament. In Chapter 37, the prophet relates his “vision of the dry bones”:

The hand of the Lord came upon me, and he led me out in the spirit of the Lord and set me in the center of the plain, which was now filled with bones. . . . How dry they were! He asked me: Son of man, can these bones come to life? “Lord God,” I answered, “you alone know that.” Then he said to me: Prophesy over these bones, and say to them: Dry bones, hear the word of the Lord! Thus says the Lord God to these bones: See! I will bring spirit into you, that you may come to life.

In the Bible, the bones represent the Israelites who have lost hope and faith. In “Fall Out,” the dry bones are modern men, who have lost their souls. When the young rebel No. 48 sings “Dry Bones,” the members of the assembly (who bear such titles as “Welfare,” “Identification,” “Therapy,” and “Education”) go mad: “Them bones, them bones gonna walk around!” They are the dry bones of our world. “The bones is yours, dad!” says No. 48. “They came from you, my daddy.”

No. 48 and No. 2 are fastened to metal poles, in a manner that suggests crucifixion. When No. 6 speaks some soothing words to No. 48, the young man says “I’m born all over,” suggesting the Christian theme of the second birth. No. 6 also undergoes a Christlike temptation at the hands of the President, who offers him “ultimate power.” Then there is the small matter of Leo McKern’s “resurrection.”

Does No. 6 get the message in the end? Not at all. In the Troyer interview, McGoohan states that his character is “essentially the same” at the end of the series. The final shot of the series is the same as the very first: there is a thunderclap, and the Prisoner comes speeding towards us in his hand-built Lotus. He is caught in the circle: an eternal cycle of rebellion, leading nowhere, and certainly not upwards. He is still a prisoner—not of the Village or of society, but of his own ego.

Appendix: What About Rover?

The one thing everyone seems to remember about The Prisoner is Rover. Mention the series to people over 40, and they are likely to say “Is that the one where he’s chased around by the big white balloon?” Indeed, Rover is one of the most curious, frightening, and unforgettable aspects of the series. Despite his claim (in “Free for All”) that he is afraid of nothing, No. 6 is clearly frightened by Rover. Here are some of the odd facts about this strange beast/machine:

1.  It is first seen in “Arrival” as a tiny white ball, bobbing on a jet of water at the top of a fountain. It then expands into the size of a weather balloon (which is apparently what the prop man used).

2.  It roars.

3.  It can stun (several episodes) or kill (“Schizoid Man”). How it does this is not clear, but it involves covering the victim’s face.

4.  It can understand language (“Schizoid Man”).

5.  It can divide into small balls in order to move unconscious victims (“Chimes of Big Ben” and “Free for All”).

6.  It has some connection with the “lava” inside the lava lamps seen throughout the Village.

7.  It seems to “live” on the ocean floor, where it is apparently part of a larger body of “goop.” When “activated” (by a flick of a switch on No. 2’s desk) it separates itself from this goop and rises to the surface.

8.  It can move at high speeds.

Now, some of the above suggests that Rover is a living thing—but other things suggest that it is a machine (in “Schizoid Man” No. 2 commands, “Deactivate Rover immediately!”). That it has a mind of its own was implied in the original “Arrival” script, in which Rover is a sort of windowless hovercraft with a police light on top. “Who drives it?” No. 6 was to have said. “Drives it?” No. 2 was to have replied, incredulous.

What does Rover mean, if anything? Here there is a danger, for making Rover a balloon was a last-minute inspiration. The original Rover machine—just described—sank in the ocean during filming. But over time, the new form of Rover must have acquired some significance in the minds of McGoohan and the other writers, and so we can ask about its “meaning” nonetheless.

My suggestion is that Rover is supposed to be a hybrid animal-machine. It represents the mysterious, amorphous, chthonic, primal, uncanny element in nature, which modern man tries to factor out, to deny, or to control. It is what Sartre calls “the viscous.” But man cannot fully tame the chthonic. Rover’s imprisonment in the lava lamp represents man’s attempt to do this. Rover’s killing “Curtis” in “Schizoid Man” represents man’s failure to do so. Even the masters of the Village are afraid of their “machine.” No. 6’s fear-reaction when confronted by Rover has a special quality: he is reacting to the terrible, the uncanny. When not doing man’s bidding, Rover sinks to the bottom of the ocean, where it reunites with a much vaster “viscous,” the parameters of which we do not see—suggesting our inability to comprehend the chthonic. It is our confrontation with the uncanny that is often our first confrontation with something that transcends human knowledge and power. Thoughtful people reflect on this, and eventually turn their gaze upwards.[123]

First published in TYR: Myth—Culture—Tradition, vol. 1, ed. Joshua Buckley, Collin Cleary, and Michael Moynihan (Atlanta: Ultra, 2002), 167–90.

SUMMONING 

THE GODS

Essays on Paganism in a God-Forsaken World

Collin Cleary

The decay of language is not so much a disease as a symptom

 As a grammarian, Thofern sets great store by the verb “to nurture,” and it is here that I, as a historian, concur with him. The historian's task is a tragic one; ultimately it has to do with death and eternity. Hence his burrowing in rubble, his circling around graves, his insatiable thirst for sources, his anxious listening to the heartbeat of time.

What could lie hidden behind such disquiet? – I have often wondered. How understandable the terror of the savage who, upon seeing the sun disappear, fears it will never return. The man who stored the mummy in the rock hoped for the mummy's return, and we rob it of its bindings in order to confirm his – no, our – hope. When granting life to the past, we succeed in conquering time, and a subduing of death becomes apparent. Should the latter work out, then it is conceivable that a god will breathe new life into us.

13

“The decay of language is not so much a disease as a symptom. The water of life is dwindling. Words have meaning still, but not sense. They are being replaced largely by numbers. Words are becoming incapable of producing poetry and ineffective in prayer. The crude enjoyments are supplanting the spiritual ones.”

That was what Thofern said. In the seminar, he went into detail: “People have always delighted, more or less clandestinely, in the argots, the books sold under a coat or read with one hand. Then they are praised as models. The Third Tone dominates.”

By the “Third Tone” he meant the lowest level for naming things and activities. They are addressed in a lofty, a current, or a common manner; each manner is good in its place.

“If the common becomes normal in colloquial speech or even in poetry, then it involves an assault on the lofty. Anyone who likes to gobble and boast about it forestalls any suspicion of viewing bread as a miracle that is celebrated in the Supper.

“Profanation sets off lower forms of merriment. A head can ascend to a crown, a face to a countenance, or it can twist into a mug. Profanation can provoke merriment when it appears in Pandaemonium; the gods, too, laugh at Priapus. The merry-andrew has his place in the intermezzo. But if he rules the boards as a buffo assoluto, then the stage becomes a distorting mirror.

“At the opera comica, I always saw a few spectators departing once the laughter began to roar. This is more than a question of taste. There is such a thing as a collective gusto, also a jubilation, announcing imminent danger. The good spirits leave the house. In the Roman circus, the effigies of the gods were draped before blood flowed.”

*

Now and then, I, as a student of history, was permitted to help Thofern prepare his lectures. Thus, when dealing with the decay of language, he asked me to gather material about the contributions of the Eumenists.

Those things go back quite a way, and it may be said that no one cares two hoots about them anymore. At the luminar, however, the number of titles that I tallied up was enormous, even for the limited area of our city. As in any work on a scholarly apparatus, the main issue was to survey the cardinal points. Whatever has moved the Zeitgeist cascades in a chaotic flood; one has to catch the historical meaning concealed behind opinions and events.

The linguistic decay that the professor was talking about occurred during the final period of the wars between nations, a time that heralded great coalitions. First, the regional gods had to be disempowered worldwide; the fact that the father was also affected indicated a planetary agitation.

The disempowering of the father endangers the heavens and the great forests; when Aphrodite bids farewell, the ocean goes dim; once Ares is no longer in charge of wars, the shacks of flayers multiply, the sword becomes a slaughterer's knife.

In a period of decline, when it was considered glorious to have helped destroy one's own nation, the roots of language were, not surprisingly, likewise pruned, above all in Eumeswil. Loss of history and decay of language are mutual determinants; the Eumenists championed both. They felt called upon to defoliate language on the one hand and to gain prestige for slang on the other hand. Thus, down below they robbed the populace of language and, with it, poetry, on the pretext that they were facilitating speech; while on the heights they presented their “mugs.”

The assault on evolved language and on grammar, on script and signs, is part of the simplification that has gone down in history as a cultural revolution. The first world-state cast its shadow.

*

Well, that lies behind us now. In this area, we have been released from wanting and wishing and can render unbiased judgment to the extent of our abilities. In Eumeswil, this applies, I feel, to Vigo, Bruno, and Thofern. Different as they are, these three are able to have a conversation without promptly serving up the trendy claptrap. One often has the impression in Eumeswil that it is not the person but the swarm that answers. Of course, there are raised platforms, as with my dear father, and also flounders of the deep, which unite in schools.

Eumeswil

Ernest Jünger 

The brass city

 How had he hit on Damascus and then the leap to Spain, through which Abd-ur Rahman had escaped being murdered? For almost three centuries, a branch of the Omayyads, who had been exterminated in Syria, flourished in Cordoba. Along with mosques, the faïences testified to this branch of Arabic civilization, a branch long since withered. And then there were the castles of the Beni Taher in Yemen. A seed fell into the desert sand, managing to yield four harvests.

The fifth Omayyad, an ancestor of Abd-ur Rahman, had dispatched Emir Musa to the brass city. The caravan traveled from Damascus through Cairo and the great desert, into the western lands, and all the way to the coast of Mauritania. The goal was the copper flasks in which King Solomon had jailed rebellious demons. Now and again, the fishermen who cast their nets in the EI-Karkar Sea would haul up one of these flasks in their catches. They were closed with the seal of Solomon; when they were opened, the demon spurted forth as smoke that darkened the sky.

Emirs named Musa also recur subsequently in Granada and other residences of Moorish Spain. This emir, the conqueror of Northwest Africa, may be regarded as their prototype. His Western features are unmistakable; of course, we must bear in mind that the distinctions between races and regions vanish on the peaks. Just as people resemble one another ethically, indeed become almost identical, when approaching perfection, so too spiritually. The distance from the world and from the object increases; curiosity grows and with it the desire to get closer to the ultimate secrets, even amid great danger. This is an Aristotelian trait. One that makes use of arithmetic.

It has not come down to us whether the emir felt any qualms about opening the flasks. From other accounts, we know that his step was risky. For instance, one of the imprisoned demons had sworn to himself that he would make the man who freed him the most powerful of mortals; he had spent hundreds of years thinking about how to make him happy. But then the demon's mood had soured; gall and venom had concentrated in his dungeon. When a fisherman finally opened the flask centuries later, he would have suffered the fate of being ripped to shreds by the demon had he not resorted to a trick. Evil becomes all the more dreadful the longer it is deprived of air.

In any case, Musa, needless to say, could not have recoiled from the unsealing. This is already evidenced by the uncommon boldness of his expedition through the wastelands. The aged Abd-es Samad, who possessed The Book of Hidden Treasures and could read the stars, guided the caravan to the brass city within fourteen months. They rested in deserted castles and amid the graves in decaying cemeteries. At times, they found water in wells that Iskander had dug while trekking westward.

The brass city was likewise dead and was enclosed by a ring wall; it took another two moons for blacksmiths and carpenters to build a ladder all the way to the battlements. Anyone who climbed up was blinded by a spell, so that he clapped his hands, and crying “Thou art beautiful!” plunged down. Twelve of Musa's companions perished, one after another, until at last Abd-es Samad succeeded in resisting the witchcraft by incessantly calling out Allah's name while clambering up and, after he reached the top, reciting the verses of salvation. Under the mirage as under a watery surface, he saw the shattered bodies of his predecessors. Said Musa: “If that's how a rational man acts, what will a madman do?”

The sheik then descended through one of the turrets and, from the inside, opened the gates of the necropolis. However, it was not these adventures - although they have their secret meaning - that prompts the mention of Emir Musa; rather it was his encounter with the historical world, which becomes a phantasm vis-a-vis the reality of the fairy tale.

The emir had the poet Thalib read aloud the inscriptions on the monuments and on the walls of the deserted palaces:

Ah, where are they whose strength has built all these

With unbelievably lofty balconies?

Where are the Persian shahs in castles tall?

They left their land - it did forget them all!

Where are the men who ruled the vast countries,

Sind and Hind, the proud hosts of dynasties?

To whom Sendge and Habesh did bend their will

And Nubia when it was rebellious still?

Await no tiding now from any tomb,

No knowledge is forthcoming from its womb.

The times changed, weaving death from every loom; 

The citadels they built brought naught but doom.

These verses filled Musa with such profound sorrow that life became a burden for him. As they wandered through the rooms, they came to a table carved out of yellow marble or, according to other reports, cast in Chinese steel. There, the following words were notched in Arabic letters:

At this table, a thousand kings have dined whose right eyes were blind and a thousand others whose left eyes were blind: they have all passed on and now they populate the graves and catacombs.

When Thalib read these words aloud to him, everything went dark before Musa's eyes; he shrieked and rent his garment. Then he had the verses and inscriptions copied down.

Eumeswil

By Ernest Jünger

The state of mind during dying & rebirth

The Brahmin Uṇṇābha

At Sāvatthī. Then the brahmin Uṇṇābha approached the Blessed One and exchanged greetings with him. When they had concluded their greetings and cordial talk, he sat down to one side and said to the Blessed One:

“Master Gotama, these five faculties have different domains, different resorts; they do not experience each others’ resort and domain. What five? The eye faculty, the ear faculty, the nose faculty, the tongue faculty, the body faculty. Now, Master Gotama, as these five faculties have different domains, different resorts, and do not experience each others’ resort and domain, what is it that they take recourse in? And what is it that experiences their resort and domain?”

“Brahmin, these five faculties have different domains, different resorts; they do not experience each others’ resort and domain. What five? The eye faculty, the ear faculty, the nose faculty, the tongue faculty, the body faculty. Now, brahmin, these five faculties having different domains, different resorts, not experiencing each others’ resort and domain—they take recourse in the mind, and the mind experiences their resort and domain.”

“But, Master Gotama, what is it that the mind takes recourse in?”

“The mind, brahmin, takes recourse in mindfulness.”

“But, Master Gotama, what is it that mindfulness takes recourse in?”

“Mindfulness, brahmin, takes recourse in liberation.”

“But, Master Gotama, what is it that liberation takes recourse in?”

“Liberation, brahmin, takes recourse in extinction.”

“But, Master Gotama, what is it that extinction takes recourse in?”

“You have gone beyond the range of questioning, brahmin. You weren’t able to grasp the limit to questioning. For, brahmin, the holy life is lived with extinction as its ground, extinction as its destination, extinction as its final goal.” Then the brahmin Uṇṇābha, having delighted and rejoiced in the Blessed One’s statement, rose from his seat and paid homage to the Blessed One, after which he departed keeping him on his right.

Then, not long after the brahmin Uṇṇābha had departed, the Blessed One addressed the bhikkhus thus:

“Bhikkhus, suppose in a house or hall with a peaked roof, opposite a window facing east, the sun was rising. When its rays enter through the window, where would they settle?”

“On the western wall, venerable sir.”

“So too, bhikkhus, the brahmin Uṇṇābha has gained faith in the Tathāgata that is settled, deeply rooted, established, firm. It cannot be removed by any ascetic or brahmin or deva or Māra or Brahmā or by anyone in the world. If, bhikkhus, the brahmin Uṇṇābha were to die at this time, there is no fetter bound by which he might again come to this world.”*
SN 48 : 42

* Commentary rightly recognises here the case of jhāna nonreturner† (lower sekha below the non-returner who nevertheless has the same future destination as non-returner if his death occurs during the jhāna. While he abandoned the five hindrances only temporarily, in the state of jhāna there is no actually any difference between him and non-returner. It is a valuable information, it looks like our state during the death has a strong influence on the rebirth. ↓

†The very commentary claims that senses don't work at jhāna, what tell us much more about an intellectual level of commentaries than about jhānas. Apart that such claim is contradictory with verbal definitions of jhānas given by Suttas, it is in existential contradiction with the very Sutta, how Uṇṇābha could walk?

The Exposition on Burning

“Bhikkhus, I will teach you a Dhamma exposition on the theme of burning. Listen to that….

“And what, bhikkhus, is the Dhamma exposition on the theme of burning? It would be better, bhikkhus, for the eye faculty to be lacerated by a red-hot iron pin burning, blazing, and glowing, than for one to grasp the sign through the features in a form cognizable by the eye. For if consciousness should stand tied to gratification in the sign or in the features, and if one should die on that occasion, it is possible that one will go to one of two destinations: hell or the animal realm. Having seen this danger, I speak thus.

“It would be better, bhikkhus, for the ear faculty to be lacerated by a sharp iron stake burning, blazing, and glowing, than for one to grasp the sign through the features in a sound cognizable by the ear. For if consciousness should stand tied to gratification in the sign or in the features, and if one should die on that occasion, it is possible that one will go to one of two destinations: hell or the animal realm. Having seen this danger, I speak thus.

“It would be better, bhikkhus, for the nose faculty to be lacerated by a sharp nail cutter burning, blazing, and glowing, than for one to grasp the sign through the features in an odour cognizable by the nose. For if consciousness should stand tied to gratification in the sign or in the features, and if one should die on that occasion, it is possible that one will go to one of two destinations: hell or the animal realm. Having seen this danger, I speak thus.

“It would be better, bhikkhus, for the tongue faculty to be lacerated by a sharp razor burning, blazing, and glowing, than for one to grasp the sign through the features in a taste cognizable by the tongue. For if consciousness should stand tied to gratification in the sign or in the features, and if one should die on that occasion, it is possible that one will go to one of two destinations: hell or the animal realm. Having seen this danger, I speak thus.

“It would be better, bhikkhus, for the body faculty to be lacerated by a sharp spear burning, blazing, and glowing, than for one to grasp the sign through the features in a tactile object cognizable by the body. For if consciousness should stand tied to gratification in the sign or in the features, and if one should die on that occasion, it is possible that one will go to one of two destinations: hell or the animal realm. Having seen this danger, I speak thus.

“It would be better, bhikkhus, to sleep—for sleep, I say, is barren for the living, fruitless for the living, insensibility for the living—than to think such thoughts as would induce one who has come under their control to bring about a schism in the Saṅgha. Having seen this danger, I speak thus.

“In regard to this, bhikkhus, the instructed noble disciple reflects thus: ‘Leave off lacerating the eye faculty with a red-hot iron pin burning, blazing, and glowing. Let me attend only to
this: So the eye is impermanent, forms are impermanent, eye-consciousness is impermanent, eye-contact is impermanent, whatever feeling arises with eye-contact as condition—whether pleasant or painful or neither-painful-nor-pleasant—that too is impermanent.

“‘Leave off lacerating the ear faculty with a sharp iron stake burning, blazing, and glowing. Let me attend only to this: So the ear is impermanent, sounds are impermanent, ear-consciousness is impermanent, ear-contact is impermanent, whatever feeling arises with ear-contact as condition … that too is impermanent.

“‘Leave off lacerating the nose faculty with a sharp nail cutter burning, blazing, and glowing. Let me attend only to this: So the nose is impermanent, odours are impermanent, nose-consciousness is impermanent, nose-contact is impermanent, whatever feeling arises with nose-contact as condition … that too is impermanent.

“‘Leave off lacerating the tongue faculty with a sharp razor burning, blazing, and glowing. Let me attend only to this: So the tongue is impermanent, tastes are impermanent, tongue-consciousness is impermanent, tongue-contact is impermanent, whatever feeling arises with tongue-contact as condition … that too is impermanent.

“‘Leave off lacerating the body faculty with a sharp spear burning, blazing, and glowing. Let me attend only to this: So the body is impermanent, tactile objects are impermanent, body-consciousness is impermanent, body-contact is impermanent, whatever feeling arises with body-contact as condition … that too is impermanent.

“‘Leave off sleeping. Let me attend only to this: So the mind is impermanent, mental phenomena are impermanent, mind-consciousness is impermanent, mind-contact is impermanent, whatever feeling arises with mind-contact as condition … that too is impermanent.’

“Seeing thus, bhikkhus, the instructed noble disciple experiences estrangement towards the eye, forms, eye-consciousness, eye-contact, and whatever feeling arises with eye-contact as condition—whether pleasant or painful or neither-painful-nor-pleasant … towards the mind, mental phenomena, mind-consciousness, mind-contact, and whatever feeling arises with mind-contact as condition…. Experiencing estrangement, he becomes dispassionate.

Through dispassion [his mind] is liberated. When it is liberated there comes the knowledge: ‘It’s liberated.’ He understands: ‘Destroyed is birth, the holy life has been lived, what had to be done has been done, there is no more for this state of being.’

“This, bhikkhus, is the Dhamma exposition on the theme of burning.”
SN 35 : 235