Shadows from the Past – 2003
The Seers Home, Philotas, New England, USA
“Hey, guys listen to this.” Inanna folded the magazine she was reading around its spine. “Religion And Daily Life Under King Sammael. An article from The Journal of Literary Archeology.”
Apart from Inannas reading light, the room was dim, the great log fire providing a soft and gentle light, one that the people gathered together found much more comfortable than the full light of day. Inanna’s eyes were glowing dim red in the reflected fire as she cleared her throat and moved her lamp to get a better reading light. “Here we go. A note on sources. This article was originally inspired by the discovery of a parchment document that was reported to date from around 1200 BC. This was a report on the day-to-day religious life and beliefs of a small kingdom in Gilead, a Canaanite area north of Canaan proper. It caused a considerable stir and was the basis of a 60 Minutes Special hosted by Stan Blather on CBS television. Unfortunately, it has been discovered that the parchment was modern-day typing paper stained with coffee, the text had been written using the Google implementation of Word XP and had been printed out using a Hewlett-Packard Laserjet 1220C laser printer. Stan Blather, however, continues to maintain the documents are authentic.
“Curiously, although the original documents are clearly forgeries, the search started by their discovery lead to a much more important find. A series of tightly-sealed stone jars were found that contained records of the Kingdom mentioned in the forged parchment. These documents have withstood every test that could be directed at them and it is the consensus of opinion that they are indeed genuine. They include administrative details of the running of the kingdom in question, some accounts of the investigation and trial of law-breakers and a detailed account of the religious practices of the people. These last are of particular interest since they deal with the local religion as it was actually practiced.”
“Gods, those things have turned up. I thought they were gone forever. Nammy, you remember burying them when we escaped from Shyt’tin? Me digging in that cave, you screaming at me to give it up and get moving.” Lillith chuckled at a long-forgotten memory suddenly coming vividly to life. She was sitting at Paul Lazaruski’s feet, her head resting affectionately against his knees.
“It was all right for you, they were just going to cut your head off. Me, they had much more interesting things planned although they hadn’t quite decided what. I believe one of my beloved grandchildren thought tossing me into a pit of scorpions was a good idea while another wanted to give me the Edward Two treatment.”
“You know, Humpty thinks Eddie Two may have been one of us. Apparently he lived for three days after he got the red-hot poker?” Igrat’s voice came from the shadows, over the last few years London had become a more common stop on her courier runs and her contacts with the Piccadilly Circus had increased accordingly.
“If it happened at all.” Nell sounded dubious. “There’s a lot of questions over the accepted account and some people think Eddie Two was simply sent into exile in Italy. Which means that, if he was one of us, he might still be alive somewhere.”
“This is interesting. Listen to this.” Inanna picked up where she had left off. “Earlier discoveries of documents related to religious practices appear to have been highly abstract and theoretical in nature. Perhaps the best comparison would be religion as practiced in a parish church as distinct from being taught in a Seminary. At least one of the stone jars had been opened prior to their discovery by the archaeological team. The current theory of the forged parchment is that the jars had been discovered by a cultured member of The Caliphates Ruling Council who realized they would be destroyed in accordance with the Councils policy of eradicating all pre-Islamic records and artifacts. Recognizing the importance of the find, he made and planted the fake parchment in order to ensure the real documents were found by the international community and preserved for posterity.”
“Now that is interesting.” The Seer spoke thoughtfully, his arm around Sacawagea’s shoulders. “We’ve been hearing whispers for some time that there’s a group trying to get historical treasures out of the Caliphate. Succeeding too. Nobody knows quite what to make of them, whether they’re just criminals trying to make profit out of smuggled antiquities or genuine idealists who are trying to save what they can of the area’s historical heritage. Bard’s mentioned a group called "The Pact of the Rose" that may be involved in that effort, if that’s right, then they’re like us.”
“It talks about Sammael himself next. It says that King Sammael is believed to have ruled his Kingdom for almost sixty years, from approximately 1230 BC through to 1170 BC. His Kingdom appears to have been one of a number (perhaps twenty or thirty) of small kingdoms in Gilead that nominally owed allegiance to both the Egyptians and the Hittites but in reality were completely independent. The implication is that he died in his late 70s or early 80s, a remarkable age for the time and place. This long life has lead some scholars to suggest that King Sammael was really Pharaoh Ramses II who also accessed the throne by assassinating his father and ruled for many years. This seems unlikely though; the records available place Sammael at a slightly later date than Ramses II and the men’s characters seem to have been strikingly different.”
“You can say that again.” Nefertiti was amused by the idea. One of the groups little pleasures was reading historical articles and watching television programs on history. There’d been a good one on what some claimed had been the discovery of Queen Nefertiti’s body. It had lead to some comedic speculation on what the producers would have done if they’d found out their audience had included the Queen herself. “I only met Sammael once, and I was in Rammie’s harem at the time, but he was a remarkable man, one far in advance of his age. We were there to receive his oath of fealty you know. He kept it too, which was unusual for those days.”
“Sammael always kept his word, he was proud of that.” Lillith glanced over at Naamah, sitting curled up in Henrys arm. Her eyes were vacant, doubtless lost in the memories of a Kingdom that had vanished centuries before. Memories of a Kingdom and a King. Like most Demons, Naamah had had many relationships over the centuries but King Sammael had been the great love of her life, the one she’d never managed to equal or replace. “What else does it say?”
“Next bit is about what happened to the Kingdom. It says that the final fate of Sammael’s Kingdom is unknown. Sammael himself was succeeded by one of the two children he parented with his second wife, Queen Naamah. Sometime before 1100BC, the Kingdom had vanished, probably swept up and destroyed in the invasions by the Sea Peoples. Hints of the Kingdom survive in Jewish mythology, although the state itself, its rulers and inhabitants have all been thoroughly demonized. Many scholars now believe that early Jewish mythological references to hell and its inhabitants are actually an allegorical propaganda tract directed at Sammael and his Kingdom of Shyt’tin.”
“Grandchildren, not children and there were more than two. Or perhaps not, I mixed up my stock of potions before we left and put the lot into the palace wine supply. Perhaps only two survived. The last bit is true enough though, we remember hearing about it when we were in Ras Shamra. By then, the Shyt’tin we knew was long gone, all of Sammael’s enlightenment died with him and his successors were just the normal, petty, debauched rulers of the era. Those were rough days, we only got out of there by the skin of our teeth. Where’s the bit on religion Inanna? As the High Priestess of Astarte, I’d like to see what they’ve made of us.”
“Here we are. Everybody paying rapt attention? If not, Naamah will make you some ‘tea’. According to this, Sammael’s personal character appears to have affected religious practice in several significant ways. It is recorded that Sammael’s first wife died in childbirth early in their marriage and he appears to have held himself responsible for her death. As a result, he seems to have modified religious beliefs and practices in order to provide women with a measure of protection from abuse by society in general and their spouses in particular. This indicates a very important fact about the religion; it was very much a state religion used for and in support of state objectives. King Sammael was also the High Priest of Baal; Queen Naamah was also the High Priestess of Astarte. Contrary to many previous beliefs, religion served the state. In Sammael’s Kingdom at least, the secular was dominant over the spiritual.”
“Well, they got that bit right. We would spend hours rigging the prophecies to support whatever it was we had decided to do. And Sammael was very protective towards women, he took down Edom because of what King Adam had done to Lillith and her children.”
Inanna carried on reading. “There were two primary gods in the pantheon, Baal and Astarte. Often portrayed as being in conflict or opposition, the Shyttim scrolls portray them as being complementary and their relationship as being mutually dependent. Again, this reflects the secular dominance of religion in Shyttim and religions role as an arm of the secular authority. With the King and Queen as the High Priest and High Priestess, it is hardly surprising that the relationship between Baal and Astarte should be portrayed as one of harmony.”
Lillith laughed. “The public relationship perhaps. You two had some pretty explosive rows. Just how often did he toss you into the dungeons Nammie?”
“Never. He never hit me, not once. Even when I deserved it. He had a foul temper but he knew it and recognized the problems it could cause. I think his temper was the one thing Sammael was really scared of. So he would walk away rather than let our fights get to that point. He never hurt any of his other wives either, the worst punishment he threatened was to expel them from his harem. That was enough, all the girls knew how well-off they were and didn’t do anything to challenge their position. Keep going Inanna.”
“While other gods are mentioned in the scroll, these are repeatedly described as being manifestations or avatars of either Baal or Astarte. These relationships are also portrayed as being harmonious and complementary with each manifestation of Baal being paired with a complementary manifestation of Astarte. For example, Shapash, the sun-god manifestation of Baal takes away the souls of the dead while the complementary Yarikh, Moon Goddess manifestation of Astarte brings the souls of the new-born. This complementary relationship is all-pervasive; for example Astarte is depicted as the Goddess of Justice while Baal is the God of Punishment. In the Shyt’tin scrolls, it is obvious that the investigation of crimes was carried out by the Temple of Astarte and the results of the investigation handed over to the King who decided the appropriate rewards and penalties in his capacity as the High Priest of Baal.”
“Is that ever the truth.” Lillith and Naamah were both laughing. “Remember some of the trials we had?”
“I should do, I wrote up the records, remember?” Lillith snuffled slightly and wiped her nose. “Some of them should be in those jars. I put the more interesting ones in there. Perhaps they haven’t got to them yet.”
“So are the more important personages, not least of whom is Sammael himself who emerges as a definitely historical character. Amusingly, even the vices attributed to him in Jewish mythology, pride and arrogance - and a bad temper that he keeps under control, most of the time, are confirmed in the Shyt’tin scrolls. Queen Naamah is another recognizable character, the description in the Shyt’tin scrolls, rich red hair, dead green eyes and a preference for dark red clothing all appear in both Hebrew mythology and the Shyt’tin scrolls. This is not, of course, an absolute identification since the description isn’t precise enough to be definitive. It could even be applied to our current President’s Executive Assistant for example. Another character that steps out of the mists of mythology is Lillith who may well have been the author of many of the scrolls. She is described in them and there is a specific touch that makes the correlation very strong. In Hebrew mythology, Lillith is described as having legs made of fire; there are repeated references in the Shyt’tin scrolls to the Lillith mentioned as suffering from severe burn injuries to her feet.
“Now this, people, could be a problem.” The Seer had sat up and was paying sharp attention. “Anything else in there that could worry us Lillith?” The Seer’s voice wasn’t particularly concerned but it was a point worth checking since it played into a series of other problems that were worrying him.
Lillith though for a second. “They’ve made the only connections they could, Naamah’s appearance and my feet, then ignored them both. Anyway, they wouldn’t believe it if anybody came out with the truth anyway. That’s always been our greatest protection. As for these, they’re just very old records. They’ll just be read by university professors and religious colleges and be swept up in academic obscurity. After all, what’s the circulation of The Journal of Literary Archeology? A couple of hundred?”
Inanna looked at the contents page. “Seven hundred and twenty. I’d guess half of those are us.”
“There you are then boss.”
“I’m not so sure.” The Seers voice was thoughtful and a little apprehensive. “One day, soon, we’re going to come out of the shadows. We can do it at the time of our choosing or we can do it when were blown, but we’ll have to do it sometime. You know it’s getting harder and harder to hide ourselves as the state records get tightened up. Fingerprints everywhere, DNA testing is getting more common all the time. We’ve got a hold on NSC and Homeland Security and that puts us a jump ahead but one day, we’re going to be tripped up. I’d rather it was when we choose rather than getting it sprung on us.”
“Before we do, any chance of getting me a Presidential Pardon?” Henrys amused voice was muffled by Naamah’s head in his shoulder. It was a good question though, as William Bonney, there was still a death sentence out on him.
“That’s an interesting area of law Henry. Don’t worry, we’ve already seen to it. If somebody looks hard enough, they’ll find a pardon was issued a day or two before you ‘died’. It’s a good forgery, nobody will question it. But, people, keep the basic point in mind and think on it. Who we are and what we are will come out eventually. The more we think though the implications of that now, the less likely it is to become a disaster for us when it happens. We’ve lived in the shadows so long, we take them for granted but they’re shrinking all the time. Times coming when they won’t be there at all.”
“Let’s get back to the Gods. This is fun.” Inanna found her place again and resumed reading. “The Shyt’tin scrolls translated so far are sketchy on the subject of Baal. Baal is described as the god of the elements Air and Fire, of strength, power and energy. His manifestations included Moloch, the God of Fire, Enil, God of Lightening and Enki, God of Thunder. Baal was very much a male god and was associated with a male priesthood. Baal was symbolized by the Bull and the association of Baal and the King was driven home by the King keeping a herd of Royal Bulls. These were, apparently, all selected for their black coats and their ferocious temperament. A particularly disgraceful form of execution was to be trampled to death by the Royal Bulls. In addition to being a very unpleasant way to die, it also symbolized the victim being rejected by the Gods and his spirit condemned to everlasting wandering.
“The Priests of Baal appear to have spent their time concentrating on physical fitness and learning the skills of fighting, both with weapons and without. Their religious duties appear to have concentrated around giving public displays of skill and proficiency in gymnastics and fighting. They are described as accompanying Sammael’s army when it went to war but, unlike other military priests, they took the front line. Their religious duty was to encourage the soldiers by both word and deed and the priests of Baal were supposed to set an example of bravery and skill. In peacetime, it appears that people sacrificed to Baal and received lessons in combat and gymnastics from the priests of Baal in return.”
Naamah snorted. “All of which is a very complex way of saying that we used religion as an excuse to train young men to fight. We had to, we were a small kingdom and when we went to war, we did it with every man we could muster. That’s why we punched far above our weight in the local power politics arena. We were a bit like Sparta I suppose, every man was a soldier of one sort or another. That’s another thing that fell apart when Sammael died, the prosperous and powerful found themselves able to avoid going into the Army. So, only the poor and powerless found themselves fighting and they didn’t have any real interest in the outcome. So the Shyt’tin Army started to lose, sacrificed its reputation for invincibility and when the Sea Peoples came it collapsed. Inanna, what’s it got to say about Astarte?”
Inanna coughed and cleared her throat, taking a gulp from the glass of wine beside her before restarting her read.
“While the Shyttin Scrolls mention Baal only in passing, this is in sharp contrast to the description of the Temple of Astarte where the descriptions are exhaustive and detailed. This again points to the author of the Shyttin scrolls being a woman, probably Lillith who is also described as the Keeper of Records. Astarte is described as the Goddess of the elements earth and water, of diplomacy, mystery and perseverance. Astarte is very much a female goddess and is associated with female priestesses. Manifestations of Astarte include Yarikh, Goddess of the Moon, Ishtar, Goddess of Love, Sinna Goddess of Healing and Innit, Goddess of Water. Astarte is symbolized by the hawk. It is very interesting that Baal, God of air and fire is symbolized by the bull, a land creature while Astarte, Goddess of earth and water is symbolized by the hawk, a creature of the air. This tends to suggest an interplay of characteristics, rather like the oriental concept of Yin and Yang in which each element contains the seed of the other.
“Worship of Astarte was a combination of prayer, sacrifice and incantation. The procedure appears to have been that those wishing to pray to Astarte or one of her manifestations brought with them a sacrifice. Typically, this would appear to be part of a herd animal, usually a sheep or a goat. There are some suggestions that a typical sacrifice of this kind might be a fatty tail. This would be placed on one of the grills built into the altar. Fires were usually kept burning beneath those grills and the supplicants would make their requests to Astarte as their offering burned on the altar. It is obvious that cooked would be a better term than burned here because the sacrifices were subsequently eaten by Astarte’s priestesses. Prayers apparently consisted of the supplicant speaking to Astarte or her manifestations and either making requests for favors desired or giving thanks for favors granted. It appears that declarations of adoration or of submission were neither sought nor desired by the religious authorities.”
“Oh yeah.” Naamah’s voice was droll. “You can say that again. Sammael had zero tolerance for that sort of nonsense. That’s something ambassadors learned very quickly, we went by deeds not words. If an ambassador went into long, verbose eulogies, Sammael would turn off, just stop listening. If the ambassador was lucky that was, if he wasn’t he might get thrown out and told to come back when he had something important to say. He’d openly laugh at people who had pretensions to long strings of titles. Caused a few problems that did.”
“This gives us an interesting insight into one of the functions of the Temple of Astarte. It appears that women approaching childbirth could elect to deliver their babies in the Temple, attended by the Priestesses. In such cases the birth became a religious rite. In theory at least, it appeared that women believed that childbirth under those circumstances was much safer than the normal birthing at home. There may be good reason for that belief. Part of the religious rite involved driving out evil spirits by washing down the surfaces of the natal area with boiling water, thus invoking the power of both Baal (fire) and Astarte (water) to protect the mother. Those attending the birth would also wash in hot water to prevent evil spirits from using them to gain access to the mother. With today’s eyes we can, of course, see that the effect of these ritual washings was simply to increase hygiene and reduce the chance of natal infection. That being the case, the birthing rites at the temple of Astarte are a classic case of doing the right thing for the wrong reasons. The price a woman paid for giving birth the Temple of Astarte was that her baby would be sacrificed.
“Uh-oh. Let’s see how they screw this up.” Lillith was combining apprehension and annoyance in her voice. “I laid this all down quite clearly when I wrote these scrolls, surely they can’t make a complete pig’s breakfast of it.”
“Want to bet on that?” Naamah replied sweetly. “Mind you they got the birthing thing right, it really is amazing how often we got things right for totally the wrong reasons. I suppose in a couple of thousand years time, we’ll all be looking back on today’s decisions and saying the same thing.”
“If we survive that long.” The Seer was still thoughtful. “The odds aren’t good that any of the human race will survive much longer.”
“Hey, come on, I want to hear about human sacrifices.” Igrat was trying to break the Seer’s gloom and succeeded.
“This brings us to the delicate subject of human sacrifice. Canaanites in general, and worshippers of Baal in particular, are frequently accused of carrying out human sacrifices. These accusations are often quite virulent and have gone unopposed simply because so little has survived of the Canaanites own version of affairs. Here, a strict caution is in order. The Shyt’tin Scrolls cover one relatively small and insignificant part of the Canaanite/Gilead community and its standards and beliefs may not apply to the wider community. However, based on the Shyt’tin scrolls, it appears that, while human sacrifice did take place, it did not involve the death of the person in question. Indeed, in one of the scrolls, there is a description of such a sacrifice and it is quite obvious that elaborate precautions were taken to prevent the baby from coming to any harm. In this community at least, it is clear that sacrifice in the human context simply meant a commitment to serve as a priest or priestess for a fixed period of time. Parents sacrificing a newborn would simply be agreeing that the child would serve as a priest or priestess for a period when he or she was old enough (for reasons that will become obvious, this would be after puberty). An adult might sacrifice a few months or years of their lives by becoming a priest or priestess for that period.”
“Yippee, they got it right!” Naamah and Lillith cheered and gave each other high-fives. “At last, after all these years, somebody understands what we meant!”
“You mean you didn’t have half-naked slave-girls shacked to an altar with knives poised over their hearts when the hero swung in on a chandelier to rescue her.” Henry McCarty sounded disappointed.
Naamah punched him on the arm. “NO half-naked slave girls, no evil priests, no altars, no heroes. Come to think of it, no chandeliers either. Sorry Henry. Just a promise to spend some time serving Astarte in the temple. By the way, the post-puberty bit is wrong, we got them as young as possible, as soon as they could be separated from their families so they’d be easier to teach.”
“Another delicate subject is the duties of the Priestesses of Astarte. It is very hard to describe the primary duty of the priestesses as being anything other than religious prostitution.”
“Now that is really uncalled-for. “ Naamah was seriously irritated by the comment. “Religious prostitution had nothing to do with it. The girls themselves were never paid and anybody who came in looking for a cheap lay somehow never got to draw the right chit. It was a religious rite and a pretty tightly controlled one. What the couple did and how they did it was determined by the scrolls they drew as they went into their chamber.”
“It mentions that here. Supplicants at the Temple of Astarte would make a sacrifice to the Goddess in expiation of their sins and draw a token from a bowl on the altar. If the token was blank, it was a sign that the Goddess did not regard the sacrifice as adequate reparation for the sins of the supplicant. If it bore the name of one of the Priestesses, the sacrifice was obviously considered adequate and the supplicant and priestess would have intimate relations in one of the side rooms set aside for that purpose. It is important to note that neither the Priestess not the supplicant had any choice as to their partners in this relationship, it having been decided by the will of Astarte. It appears that even the details of their relations were guided by an elaborate ritual. One might speculate that the will of Astarte was quite frequently manipulated by the High Priestess to serve state ends.”
“Of course it was, that game was rigged more thoroughly than a backstreet poker school. Good, honest, upstanding citizens got the beautiful priestesses almost every time they came in. Letches and wretches never seemed to get anything.” Naamah laughed softly. “One day we had a really young kid come in, must have been five or six, with a lamb’s tail. I guess he’d probably stolen it but that was none of our business. Turned out he was an only child and had nobody to play with. He’d heard adults talking about going to the temple to play games with the priestesses and put the interpretation on that any lonely five year-old would. So he won his pick and the scroll said play dice and jacks. And that’s what they did, he and the priestess, Ishi I think it was, played dice, jacks and cups with him for the afternoon.”
“Was your chit in that bowl Nammie?” Igrat sounded unduly interested
“Of course not. As the incarnation of Astarte, I was reserved for the representative of Baal, who just happened to be my husband. Even if it had been, it wouldn’t have come up, as I told you, we had that game rigged. Anyway, go on Inanna.”
“Naturally some of these relations produced children and it appears that such children were regarded as gifts from the Gods and were recruited as lifetime members of the priesthood, boys as priests of Baal, girls as Priestesses of Astarte. Thus, there appear to have been three classes of the priesthood. At the top were those born to serving priestesses and who were brought up in anticipation of their religious roles. It is reasonably apparent that this education was substantially better than that available to the bulk of the population; it is, for example, clear that all priests and priestesses could read and write. There is some suggestion that it is this class of members of the priesthood who supplied King Sammael with his administrative staff. It can thus be concluded that Sammael’s bureaucrats had some cause for assuming their actions were guided by divine inspiration rather than the bland assumption of god-like superiority adopted by their modern equivalents.”
“Hey, the author’s met Humpty!” Igrat’s voice was a crow of triumph.
“She’s right you know, come to think of it, a lot of the administrators we’ve met over the years have seemed a lot like Humpty. Do you think they’re all related?” Lillith looked around the dim room.
“Could be. Wouldn’t that be a thing, all the civil servants, everywhere, every time, are all part of one huge family.” The Seer seemed entranced by the prospect. “You know, that would make so much common sense.”
“Doesn’t seem very likely, ducks.” Nell sounded unconvinced although she had to admit the idea was attractive.
“As unlikely as us? But we’re here. And it would explain so much. Nammie, was it true that all the priestesses could read and write? That was pretty unusual for that place and time.”
“Sammael again. He believe that if women could read and write, they’d pass those skills on to their children. So getting literate was a big part of a priestess’s duties. Especially those women who would only be with us for a short time.”
“Nammie, did women get the same deal when they went to the Temple of Baal? Make a sacrifice, draw a chit and get a nice young priest?”
“I should have guessed you’d come up with that Iggie. No, over there, you made a sacrifice, drew your chit and that got you athletics and weapons training. An Iggie who went in with a nice young priest on her mind would probably find herself running around the athletics ground for the afternoon, accompanied by said nice young priest who’d encourage her run with a switch across the backside now and then.” There was a general eruption of laughter at that picture and Igrat actually blushed. “But seriously, the Temple of Baal did have women who went there, wanting to learn how to use weapons. Some of them were pretty good too. Sammael never used them in the Army but they were counted on to help defend the cities.”
“Bit like Nanchao then,” the Seer was nostalgic, he’d enjoyed his time out in the Far East. “Achillea, remember how we met Suriyothai, after she did a Thermopylae in the pass above Chiang Saen?”
“Except she walked away from it of course. Yeah, I remember that. And everything that followed on from it. How you kept track of who was doing what, where and to whom is beyond me.”
“That’s his job, remember. Anyway, there’s some more on the priestesses here. The second class of the priesthood was comprised of the children born to women who had taken advantage of the Temples reputation for safer births. It appears that the average residence of such children in the priesthood was two years, during which time they combined the duties of the priesthood with a briefer and more generalized education. One might speculate that such temporary priests and priestesses were watched for talent and any particularly able members were encouraged to stay on and become permanent priests and members of Sammaels administrative corps. Finally, the lowest class of the priesthood were adults who had sacrificed some of their lives to the Temples. These were regarded with an element of suspicion and performed the more menial tasks inherent in running a temple.”
“Not bad, not bad at all.” Naamah was reluctantly impressed. “They’re pretty much right there. We got the kids young, educated the hell out of them for two years and then either sent them back to their parents or persuaded them to stay on. Adults who wanted to become priests and priestesses, we never quite trusted. Either they were running away from something or they thought they had a scam they could set up. A couple of weeks cleaning the privy and boiling the Priestess’s rags would get rid of the scamsters. The ones who were running away from something, well, we’d find out in a couple of weeks what it was. Sometimes they were running for good reason and we’d take those in. Others were running from their own deeds and we’d ease them out.”
“Here’s the last bit everybody. In conclusion, the great surprise from study of the Shyt’tin scrolls is the degree to which religious belief was integrated with, and served the interests of, the state. In Sammael’s Kingdom at least, it is obvious that the religious practices of the state were created and executed as an arm of secular policy. In Shyt’tin, the will of the Gods was decided by King Sammael and served his interests - which, in his eyes at least, meant the gods served his people, not the other way around. It seems likely that this was one of the root causes of his ongoing hostilities with the Israelites who held the opposite view; that the peoples duties was to serve their God. Only a few of the many Shyt’tin scrolls have been translated and it is to be hoped that additional work will throw greater light onto this obscure part of history.”
“Did Sammael actually believe in God, Nammie?” Tom Lynch straightened his back and then resettled himself in his seat next to Inanna.
“In a god? No. In gods, yes although he suspected all the different belief-sets were the same gods under different names. That’s why he wouldn’t allow people to be persecuted for their beliefs. And that, of course, is what really set him against the Hibaru who demanded the right to suppress any religion other than theirs. They even tried it in some of our cities on occasion and they were always demanding the right to do this or that because ‘their religion demanded it’. Eventually Sammael ran the whole lot of them out, with quite a bit of bloodshed by the way. Still, everything was much more peaceful once they’d gone.”
“Discovering those records is going to upset the Bible literalists though.” Lillith thought for a minute. “Or will it? If people have the wit to read and remember they’re just getting one side of the story, there’s no problem.”
“That’s a big leap of faith Lillith. Since when has common sense been common?” The Seer was still gloomy about the future and it showed.
There was a long silence, broken eventually by Inanna. “Hey guys, there’s an article here on what happened to the people who signed the Declaration of Independence. This should be good for a laugh. Tom, get ready to be declared dead again.”