#deliver me unto greater heights

[cammelcase]

Catch me at love island so we can graft our forms to become beyond human.

[lavawingsart]

Lordober 2024 Tissue

My socials " Mighty Dragon, thou'rt a trueborn heir. Lend me thy strength, o kindred. Deliver me unto greater heights. " A fight of ones who consider themselves dragons. Art (c) ME!

Posted using PostyBirb

[catcas22]

Fortissax is Fia Theory

Alright people, grab your red yarn and thumbtacks. I need to share this with someone, so you all get to read my deranged ramblings.

Real talk, I'd love to hear your thoughts on this.

Thesis:

Proposition 1) Fortissax was consort to Godwyn and the mother of the Golden Lineage.

Proposition 2) Fia is the human form of Fortissax.

Some of this theory will be (I believe) airtight, some of it will be based on circumstantial evidence, and some will be reasonably plausible headcanon that I feel would enhance the lore. Take it or leave it as you like.

The part that I maintain is airtight.

In-game, Fortissax’s gender is never confirmed. Any time pronouns are used to refer to Fortissax, the game uses it/its pronouns.

This could be deliberate obfuscation on the part of the game devs. Fortissax’s gender could have been part of a big reveal that ended up being cut from the final product.

It’s also possible that the ancient dragons are capable of changing their sex (ASOIAF dragons seem to work this way), or they simply don’t attach the same significance to sex/gender that humans do.

The Golden Lineage intermarried with dragons at some point in history.

Godrick’s dialogue: “Mighty Dragon, thou'rt a trueborn heir. Lend me thy strength, o kindred. Deliver me unto greater heights.” [Emphasis mine]

Godwyn was the exalted noble who Fia was attempting to resurrect when she first saw the guidance of Grace.

Fia’s dialogue: “After I received the warmth and lifely vigour from a number of champions, I lay with the remains of an exalted noble, to grant him another chance at life.”

Fia after killing D: “Finally, it is returned to its rightful place. The stolen hallowbrand of the exalted noble. And now, I must bid you goodbye as well. Though I ask you deliver this message to the Roundtable Hold. I am Fia, Deathbed Companion. Hark, Roundtable. Disturb not the Death of Godwyn, the exalted.” [Emphasis mine]

The word choice here seems too intentional to be coincidence. Fia first refers to an “exalted noble.” Later, she refers to Godwyn’s half of the curse mark as “the stolen hallowbrand of the exalted noble,” then goes on to refer to “Godwyn the Exalted” within a few sentences. Godwyn is the Exalted Noble, the Exalted Noble is Godwyn.

Slightly less airtight, but still strongly implied.

Fortissax and Godwyn were an item. This is already pretty widely accepted fanon, but I’ll lay out the evidence anyway.

Basically any time Fortissax is mentioned, it is in the context of their close bond with Godwyn. On it’s own, this wouldn’t mean much -- strong platonic bonds are a thing.

But we also established that Godwyn’s descendants are also descended from dragons. Out of the four named ancient dragons (the game never gives any indication that feral dragons can take human form), Fortissax is the most likely candidate.

Gransax is dead by the time the war against the dragons is over.

Placidusax is in (self-imposed?) exile in Farum Azula.

Lansseax is a possibility, but we know from the description of Vyke’s dragon bolt that “Of all the knights, Vyke the Dragonspear was the one Lansseax loved the most.” This does not entirely rule out the possibility of a political marriage between Lansseax and Godwyn, but it’s worth noting.

Although it’s not airtight, Fortissax being Godwyn’s consort makes the most sense. When you take their close bond and Godrick’s dragon heritage together, the game does seem to be implying a union between the two.

Lichdragon Fortissax is a shade.

We have plenty of in-game precedence for echoes of a person remaining behind to fight while the individual in question goes on to do other things. See Royal Knight Loretta in Caria Manor, Festering Fingerprint Vyke in the Church of Inhibition, and Godfrey’s Golden Shade in Leyndell.

We never see Fortissax manifest in the physical world, only ever showing up in the mindscape (Fia’s mindscape? Godwyn’s? Fortissax’s?) where we fight him.

Think about the sequence of events here. Fia is sleeping beside Godwyn. We touch her, which takes us directly to the Lichdragon’s boss arena. We kill Fortissax, and exit the dream to find that Fia has brought forth the Mending Rune of the Death Prince.

The slightly shaky but still supported stuff.

Fia is the human form of Fortissax -- this is the big one.

We encounter Lichdragon Fortissax in what is seems to be either Fia’s mindscape or a shared dream between Godwyn and Fia.

If we accept the premise that Fortissax is Godwyn’s consort, it is worth noting that Fia also seems to have prior history with Godwyn.

Fia clearly considers herself Godwyn’s consort. Consider the lines: “For I am the companion of Godwyn, Prince of Death. I wished to be a mother to Those Who Live in Death.” And, “I will soon lay with Godwyn. To conceive my child, the rune.”

Fia also refers to herself as the mother of those who live in death. This would align with her being the consort of Godwyn, the progenitor of those who live in death.

Pretty clear-cut. Of course it’s possible that Fia is delusional and pursuing the fantasy equivalent of a para-social relationship, but I tend to doubt that due to this line, spoken if you try to kill Fia: “Godwyn... Is that you, dear?”

I don’t care how delusional you are, you don’t cry for your celebrity crush in your dying moments. She knew him before the Night of the Black Knives.

Fia’s “I was awakened by the guidance of grace, and chased from my birthplace” line actually fits with what little we know of Fortissax.

From the descriptions of the Aspects of the Crucible incantations, we know that the Crucible was the primordial form of the Erdtree. This supports the theory that the Erdtree is simply the latest iteration of the World Tree, which goes through different phases with each new age.

Dragonlord Placidusax was the god of the age preceding Marika. “The Dragonlord whose seat lies at the heart of the storm beyond time is said to have been Elden Lord in the age before the Erdtree.”

It seems logical that the ancient dragons would have their capitol/home base around their version of the world tree, just as the demigods do in the current age. Fortissax likely would have been born in the area that would later become the city of Leyndell.

Nothing in Fia’s lore contradicts Fortissax’s lore. Fortissax was probably Godwyn’s consort. Fia is Godwyn’s consort. We fight Fortissax in Fia’s mindscape. Definitely not an airtight case, but if you put it all together I think it logically follows.

The “moving into headcanon territory” stuff.

Fia was in Stormveil at some point.

The sorcery Rancorcall is found in the basement of Stormveil. This sorcery is notably used by Sir Lionel, Fia’s adoptive father.

If all of the above is true, this makes a ton of sense. After being driven from Leyndell, Fia fled to the castle of her son/grandson/distant descendant Godrick.

This also explains the Godwyn face in the basement. What little remained of Godwyn sensed that his wife was in Stormveil and attempted to quite literally grow closer to her.

Fia probably has Godwyn’s Great Rune.

Certain people were allowed to possess Great Runes prior to the Shattering. Rennala received the Rune of the Unborn from Radagon before he returned to Marika. Morgott used his Rune to authenticate his identity as a descendent of Godfrey (see Morgott’s Great Rune description), implying that he had it with him throughout his exile in the Shunning Grounds. It is plausible that Godwyn was also permitted to carry a Great Rune prior to the Night of the Black Knives.

Based on the image we see of the NBK during the opening cinematic, it does not appear that Godwyn put up much of a fight. We don’t see a weapon, dead Black Knife Assassins, or signs of a struggle. The staging looks more like an execution than a battle. Most likely, Godwyn was dragged out of bed and repeatedly shanked in the back before he had time to react.

We know that Tiche died covering the group’s retreat, confirming that the Black Knives did not make a clean getaway. Someone must have raised the alarm. It is highly unlikely that they hung around long enough to loot Godwyn’s Great Rune (if he had one).

Putting all of that together, if Fia/Fortissax was Godwyn’s consort, she was probably present during the assassination. She probably held him as he bled out, allowing his Great Rune to pass into her possession. Could Godwyn’s Great Rune plus the Curse Mark create the Mending Rune of the Death Prince?

The shade Fia left behind takes the form of Lichdragon Fortissax because Fortissax could have saved Godwyn from the assassins.

While Fortissax was by all accounts quite formidable, Fia appears to be much less martially inclined. We never see her physically fight in-game. She uses Death Blight to kill D and uses a death sorcery (I think it’s Rancorcall?) as a last-ditch defense if you attack her after killing her champions, but she would not have had access to either of these prior to the NBK.

If she witnessed Godwyn’s murder, she would certainly be tormented by the knowledge that she could have saved him had she been in her draconic form. I propose that this is the origin of Lichdragon Fortissax -- it is the manifestation of Fia’s guilt for her inability to save Godwyn from death, now fighting to save him from a fate worse than death.

Putting it all together...

            At some point following the war against the dragons, Fortissax wishes to settle down and start a family with Godwyn. To that end, the dragon takes the form of a human woman and takes the name Fia.

            On the Night of the Black Knives, Fia witnesses Godwyn’s murder. She is with him in his final moments, allowing her to see that he isn’t quite as dead as he should be. Despite her objections, the powers-that-be of Leyndell insist that he is definitely 100% dead and lay him in state in preparation for an Erdtree burial.

            Unwilling to accept Godwyn’s death and desperate to save him, Fia starts looking into death sorcery (probably under the priests of the Deathbirds -- see Death Ritual Spear description). She discovers a method that might allow her to resurrect him -- the rites of the Deathbed Companions.

            Fia does her hug/life-drain thing with a number of champions, most likely members of the Dragon Cult. She then attempts to lie with Godwyn in order to complete the ritual. In an incredible display of poor timing, Marika chooses that precise moment to send out the call to the Tarnished.

            Fia sees the guidance of Grace, she is caught with Godwyn’s body, and she is subsequently run out of Leyndell. Godwyn is buried at the foot of the Erdtree. Consciously or unconsciously, Fia leaves behind the Lichdragon shade in a last-ditch attempt to save Godwyn. For a time, she wanders the Lands Between alone, likely not doing very well in terms of sanity.

            Eventually she encounters Sir Lionel who, being a decent guy, appoints himself her protector and offers to escort her to wherever she’s going. With his aid, she makes her way to Stormveil, where she convalesces for a time.

            She eventually moves on to the Roundtable Hold, likely seeking access to more champions. Fia waits there, gathering life-energy and biding her time, until D arrives with his stolen half of the Curse Mark, at which point she enlists the aid of a helpful Tarnished to set her plan into motion.

So that's the Fia/Fortissax theory. What do you guys think?

Edit 1: I have been informed that Fia's defensive spell is actually Fia's Mist, not Rancorcall. My bad.

Edit 2: Showed this to my brother, and he had an interesting addition. What if Lichdragon Fortissax isn't just a shade, it's all the parts of Fia's psyche that make up Fortissax? Under this theory, she completely severs herself from her old life and gives up the ability to ever become a dragon again in an attempt to save Godwyn. Don't really have any evidence for it, but it's a cool interpretation.

Edit 3: Just a fun little coincidence. On one of the sword monuments, Forti is referred to by the title "Dread Fortissax." During the early stages of her assimilation into the Greek Pantheon, the queen of the underworld was often given the title "Dread Persephone." Probably doesn't mean anything, but I think it's neat.

[tarnussy]

not to brag but... went in Godrick's arena to dance with him a lil and hear him chuckle and he yeeted me up a tree, didn't think that was even possible

I guess he delivered me unto greater heights huh

[pistonhyundai]

Skate 2 at 15: Viva San Vanelona

Skate 2 turned 15 years old this week, and I never stopped playing it. Even when the servers slowly went to hell and made it harder (eventually impossible) for you to skate with other people or watch their clips, I'd still feel the urge to boot it up and screw around. In that eight year stretch where it wasn't backwards compatible with modern Xboxes, I kept a 360 hooked up just so I could always have a way to play it, and even afterwards only felt comfortable unplugging it after buying a digital copy on the 360 marketplace so I wouldn't even need to put the disc in my Series X.

Not many games have this sort of power over me. More recent indie efforts like Session and Skater XL don't capture that same feeling, and even Skate 3, a game with a fair share of features you could only view as improvements to the series, can't quite be as absorbing. So what is it about Skate 2 that's made it a constant for nearly half my life? I guess you can start with the obvious: how it feels to play.

When I think about a lot of my absolute favorite video games���shooters like Quake, platformers like Mario and Sonic, or even a strategy game like Worms Armageddon—the through-line between them is clear: there's a simple joy to the fundamental movement of the game. It goes without saying that platformers live and die by their running and jumping, but Quake is similarly defined by its breakneck speed and movement tech, and even with Worms (where the standard ground movement is deliberately sluggish), the high-risk-high-reward flinging granted by the Ninja Rope item is so ubiquitous to the series that a lot of fans outright ignore entries that don't get its physics right. When something as fundamental as simply getting around in a video game is its own fun, it makes it very easy to play something just for the sake of it, and the Skate series embodies that quality.

Skate's analog stick-driven Flickit trick system is a contentious one depending on who you ask, and when you think about the skateboarding games that came before it, that's understandable. The immediacy of Tony Hawk's Pro Skater's "direction + button = trick" formula came to define the genre in the series' heyday thanks to its approachable, pick-up-and-play nature (even Hawk-era games striving to be more grounded and technical like Thrasher: Skate and Destroy still rely on similar button combinations for its tricks), so of course Skate's idiosyncratic control scheme and the nuance it provides isn't going to be for everybody. Should you overcome the comparatively steep learning curve, however, Flickit becomes immensely rewarding to work with. Getting around feels incredibly natural, and you're given an unparalleled degree of control over things like the speed of your flip tricks, the height of your jumps, and the motion of your grabs—all with movements of the right analog stick. It delivers a level of finesse and a connection between you and the board that feels like nothing else in the genre.

This depth the Flickit system provides (along with the generally higher risk of outright bailing) puts a greater emphasis on landing single tricks than your average skateboarding game. A rail, ramp, or gap is usually a means to an end as part of a larger combo in other games, but like how simulation racers in the vein of Forza and Gran Turismo contrast arcade racers by finding simpler joys in hitting a corner's apex just perfectly, Skate relishes the smaller moments, treating them as setpieces unto themselves. That perfectly smooth grind down a slanted staircase railing. The clean landing of a half-pipe transfer you put that extra bit of spin to. A miraculous rooftop drop onto a nearby incline. Having any one of these things go off without a hitch after throwing yourself at them repeatedly brings a sense of accomplishment that rivals any million-point Pro Skater combo (while the ragdoll physics and crunchy sound work ensure that failure is its own entertainment without getting too graphic), and it's something that makes you look at the world with a different eye compared to other extreme sports games; one that feels a little closer to an actual skateboarder's.

Instead of thinking about how you can link your surroundings together for huge combos, you think about what looks and feels good, approaching individual landmarks from all angles to pick them apart, eventually getting off your board to drag nearby props over to either mutate the spot or slot the object in as the missing piece that makes something skatable with flair. Maybe you'll even want to edit the replay and upload it to the game's Skate Reel gallery of user-made photos and replays—or in these days of dead servers, save it manually with the Xbox's built-in recording. Each Skate game has scoring mechanics and career modes, all with the unique objectives and trappings you'd expect from them, but it's these naturally occurring, self-imposed "I wonder if I can do that?" moments that end up being the best challenges in the series.

And this is where Skate 2 really stands out from the other games in the trilogy as something special: its setting is perhaps as perfect a canvas for its gameplay as you can ask. New San Vanelona, a renovated take on the original game's city (the result of an earthquake that occurred in the Wii and DS-exclusive spinoff, Skate It), is a sprawling skate wonderland full of diverse environments, each brimming with unique opportunities to capitalize on. Every region has its own makeup that feels catered to a specific style of skateboarding: Cougar Mountain's hillside roads are made for careening down, the dilapidated buildings and rooftops of the Boneyard are begging for prop improvisation, and there are multiple skate parks and mega complexes that grant intoxicatingly big air. Proceed for a few seconds in any direction and you'll find an interesting spot to skate, an object to drag around for use in a setup, or some insane drop or steep road you can use to either set up a huge jump or simply eat shit after building up speed. Each location gracefully the flows into the next, with smaller skate spots peppered in along the way, making it incredibly easy to lose hours just mindlessly roving around the city, seeing what corners of the world speak to you at a given moment. The first game's take on the city is decent, but feels a little barren by comparison (it doesn't help that it lacks the moveable props or the ability to get off your skateboard, making it harder to set things up), and the third game's Port Carverton is segregated into three disconnected biomes that can't quite inspire the same creativity as New San Vanelona.

Skate 2's level design is so engrossing that some of its most memorable spots exist entirely by accident, never intended to actually be used. The series is no stranger to glitches, as I'm sure you've seen on YouTube, but it can be used for more than just funny highlights and bails. While they can end up spoiling the competitive aspect of the wipeout-based objectives, certain exploits can be used to bend the rules and get a little extra help in making something happen. Depending on the glitch you use, you can build up speed quickly in a tight location or launch yourself dozens (sometimes hundreds) of feet into the air, and more enterprising skaters can use this to reach new heights that give their surroundings a whole new complexion. One such spot is found by Slappy's skate park, an early-game location that's introduced to you via a roll-in drop that leads into the first major air you catch in the game. It's fun enough to mess around in on its own, but if you exploit a glitch to work your way to its adjacent rooftops, you can make it to the top of nearby hangar that just so happens to line up with the roll-in jump's landing. The result is an enormous leap that dwarfs that original roll-in gap, with a landing that grants you the kind of speed that lets you approach the nearby quarter-pipes and jumps in new ways, clearing huge spine transfers and even letting you jump from the ground to another nearby roof. It adds an extra dimension to what was already one of my favorite stomping grounds in the game, taking what was once well-worn territory over the top. Skate 2 has its own themes of anti-authority sprinkled in (an evil corporation controls the Financial District of the city and has capped rails and hired security to make places unskatable, something you deal with in the course of the career mode), but it's this kind of glitch-induced trespassing through half-finished outskirts of the game that really nails urban skateboarding's spirit of rebellious expression in a way that only video games could. That it was never intended in the first place only makes it that much sweeter.

The beauty of it all is that Slappy's is just a microcosm of what it's like to play Skate 2. It feels like every inch of New San Vanelona is littered with opportunities for all sorts of unique stunts and slams, and the result is one of the most gratifying emergent gameplay experiences I've ever had. For all the possibilities Skate 3 grants with its user-created skate parks and the ability to drop props into the world at-will, it just can't match the magic of Skate 2's four-wheeling wanderlust, and even with an upcoming new entry that has a promising focus on communal creativity (almost like some sort of skateboarding Minecraft), I wouldn't be surprised if I stuck with this game for another 15 years.

[shammah8]

RHAPSODY OF REALITIES

📅 SUN. 14TH APRIL 2024

THE DYNAMICS HAVE CHANGED

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For in him dwelleth all the fulness of the Godhead bodily (Colossians 2:9).

Pastor Chris Says

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One remarkable distinction between Jesus and the prophets of old is that Jesus had the fullness of the Godhead dwelling in Him. The Holy Spirit was within Him, but the prophets only had the Holy Spirit come upon them from time to time.

For example, we read the story in Judges 6 when Gideon was chosen by God to deliver Israel from the Midianites. The Bible says, "But the Spirit of the LORD came upon Gideon, and he blew a trumpet; and Abiezer was gathered after him" (Judges 6:34).

Also, in the 14th chapter, we find the story of Samson who encountered a young lion while on his way to Timnath. The Spirit of the Lord came upon him, enabling him to tear the lion apart "as he would have torn a kid" (Judges 14:6).

In 1 Samuel 10:10, before Saul became king, the Spirit of the Lord came upon him, and he prophesied among the prophets. Also, read the story of David in 1 Samuel 16:13. After Samuel anointed David as the future king of Israel, the Spirit of the Lord came mightily upon him.

But today, the dynamics have changed. We're in the generation of Jesus Christ, and the Holy Spirit doesn't come on us like He did with those in the Old Testament. He lives in us now in His fullness. The Holy Spirit lives in you in His maximum capacity and entirety, just like Paul said about Jesus in Colossians 1:19, "For it pleased the Father that in him should all fulness dwell."

In the next chapter, Paul also reiterated, "For in him dwelleth all the fulness of the Godhead bodily" (Colossians 2:9). Then in the very next verse, He was quick to add that we are complete in Him: "And ye are complete in him, which is the head of all principality and power" (Colossians 2:10).

So, today, just like Jesus, when you walk the streets, it's with the fullness of the Godhead. God Almighty, in His fullness, lives, walks and talks in you. Hallelujah! Can you see that you aren't an ordinary person? You're a God-carrying vessel, filled with His fulness, and doing extraordinary things. Glory to God!

            🙏 P R A Y E R

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Dear Father, I thank you for the indwelling of your Holy Spirit within me. I'm a God-carrying vessel, replete with the maximum load of God. I am not an ordinary person; I am a vessel of divine power. I can do all things through Christ which strengthens me. Amen.

       📖 FURTHER STUDY:

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1 John 4:4;  Ye are of God, little children, and have overcome them: because greater is he that is in you, than he that is in the world. 

Ephesians 3:14-20;  For this cause I bow my knees unto the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ,

[15] of whom the whole family in heaven and earth is named,

[16] that he would grant you, according to the riches of his glory, to be strengthened with might by his Spirit in the inner man;

[17] that Christ may dwell in your hearts by faith; that ye, being rooted and grounded in love,

[18] may be able to comprehend with all saints what is the breadth, and length, and depth, and height;

[19] and to know the love of Christ, which passeth knowledge, that ye might be filled with all the fulness of God.

[20] Now unto him that is able to do exceeding abundantly above all that we ask or think, according to the power that worketh in us, 

Colossians 1:26-27;  even the mystery which hath been hid from ages and from generations, but now is made manifest to his saints:

[27] to whom God would make known what is the riches of the glory of this mystery among the Gentiles; which is Christ in you, the hope of glory:

[simianking]

It doesn't really fit his character. He wants to go back to the tree, reclaim it, not replace or destroy it. Plus grafting has more bug theming than anything else, nothing botanical

Also he makes a pun about grafting the wings so he can fly. "Deliver me unto... greater heights *chuckle*" Which contradicts turning into a tree

is “godrick the grafted is trying to turn himself into a tree to replace the erdtree” a known/accepted elden ring theory or

[aenreth]

Mighty dragon, thou'rt a trueborn heir. Lend me thy strength, o kindred. Deliver me unto greater heights.

[spiltichor]

ELDEN RING BOSS DIALOGUE STARTERS Various starters all from dialogue from boss fights, modified for more common modern language. Make sure to specify the muse for multimuses!

“ You are emboldened by the flame of ambition. ” “ Put these foolish ambitions to rest.  “ “ Cower in fear of the night. “ “ Lend me your strength. “ “ Deliver me unto greater heights. ”   “ I command thee, kneel. “ “ One day we shall return together to our home.” “ Have no fear, I will hold you. “ “ Be not alarmed nor afraid. “ “ The stars have aligned. “ “ Are you good and prepared? “ “ Allow me to paint you the full picture. “ “ The glory of the clash is shared. “ “ A falling star, right before our eyes! “ “ He was a living legend if ever I saw one. “ “ What is your business? “ “ Willful traitor. “ “ Such shame I cannot bear. “ “ You are but a fool. “ “ We are all forsaken. “ “ Your deeds will be met with failure. “ “ No one will hold me captive. “ “ A serpent never dies. “ “ You must abide alone a while. “ “ Welcome, honored guest. “ “ Corpse after corpse, left in my wake.” “ I waited. “ “ Heed my words. “ “ I have never known defeat. “ “ You will witness true horror. “ “ Your strength is extraordinary. “ “ Oh dearest ____, I’m sorry. “ “ Become my blade once more. “ “ I will not have it stolen from me again. “ “ To kill what? “ “ I knew you’d come. “ “ What a sad state of affairs.” “ I commend your spirit. “ “ You fought well. “ “ A man cannot kill a god. “ “ It’s been a long while. “ “ I have returned. “ “ That will be all. “ “ A crown is warranted with strength. “

[homogrimoire-archive]

Kingfield's Fourth Anniversary - Final Day

If I Rose To Power It'd Be A Bouquet

Dwight has the wonderful idea to propose. Needless to say, David is in for a surprise.

AO3 Link

Dwight loved David with all his heart. He really did. Sometimes, it felt like he wanted to shout it out into the world for all to hear. He wasn't the kind for such public displays though. But, he was about to do something pretty close to announcing his love to the world.

He and David had been dating for years now. Everyone who they cared about knew. And just about anybody who was at least somewhat invested in pro boxing. As a pro boxer, David had a lot of eyes on him. David wasn't bothered in the slightest. He liked the attention, and had no desire to hide who he loved.

Dwight was scared of the notion, but was swayed by David. Deep down, he didn't want to hide who he was anymore. So, it had been public knowledge that they were a couple for a few years now. It wasn't all sunshine and rainbows, but being able to kiss and embrace and display their love to one another whenever they pleased far outweighed any negativity it brought to their lives.

Dwight never regretted a single moment of their time together. He imagined that David felt the same. Thus, with David’s boxing career nearing its glorious end, Dwight figured he knew how to start this new chapter of their lives.

Of course, Dwight wanted this monumental moment in their lives to be very special. So he spent many a month planning. He knew he wanted things to be private. To do such a thing in a crowd with spectators was pushing it for him. He was quick to figure out how he wanted to do it, but where was a different matter.

He considered spending a night out and doing it at their condo, but the location admittedly wasn’t so romantic. Renting a boat for a scenic night of sightseeing along a beautiful coast was considered, but was quickly ruled out when he remembered that he would probably get seasick. But, then it hit him! Ocean sunsets were beautiful and very romantic. So, after more deliberation, Dwight decided on California. A popular tourist destination, so it would be easy to kill time before the main event. Next was finding the time to do the exciting deed, which was easy since all Dwight needed to do was look at David’s schedule.

Convincing David into taking a little, much needed vacation was easy. A little bit of seduction went a long way. It would be a week-long affair of sight seeing and fun, culminating to a fanciful dinner on the fifth day. Dwight never really got used to having the finer things of life such as a dinner that cost a week’s check for a part time job, nor did he gain the taste for it like David said he would. Hell, he still liked to eat cup noodles warmed up in a microwave. But he’d accept the indulgence for such a night.

Since the restaurant was not too far from their hotel, they decided to walk. They could have called an uber or something, but it was a comfortable and clear night. Holding hands, Dwight leaned against David as they walked. He smelled vaguely of his cologne, a scent which eventually came to bring Dwight a sense of comfort.

Time seemed to move so wonderfully slow in such reposeful moments. Yet, it always seemed to end too quickly, for they were already in front of their hotel. And suddenly, Dwight was hit with a wave of anxious anticipation.

“Hey, uh, I’ll be up there soon. I’m gonna take a quick smoke.” Dwight said with a kiss to David’s cheek. He knew David didn’t like it when he smoked, for a number of good reasons. Admittedly, it was a guilty pleasure.  But Dwight wasn’t actually gonna smoke. He just needed an excuse, even if a cigarette did sound very tempting to help calm his nerves.

“Alright, but don’t keep me waitin’, luv.” David replied, and leaned in close to Dwight’s ear and whispered something real low that made Dwight’s face flush. Well, two could play that game.  Dwight pulled David down by his shirt and whispered something that made David feel rather excited, to say the least. With a reminder to not start anything without him, David made his way into the building as Dwight pulled out a box of cigarettes just for show.

After a few minutes of waiting, Dwight made his way to the receptionist’s desk to get a bouquet he had ordered and set to be delivered to the hotel. The bouquet consisted mainly of beautiful red roses, with white lilies scattered throughout. Wonderful as could be.

He took the envelope, with the letter inside he spent weeks perfecting, out of his pocket, and gently placed it in the bouquet. On the elevator ride up, he checked his pockets for what must have been the hundredth time that night for that precious box. After getting out of the elevator and reaching the end of the hall where their room was, he looked out the hall’s large window to see the beautiful beach down below as it stretched onward. It was the first time he really got a look at the beach at night. It captured him, making him decide to make a change of plans. He hurried back to the elevator and made his way back down. Once he was outside, he took out his phone.

“Hey Dwight. What is it?” David answered.

“Come outside and meet me at the beach, I’ve got a surprise for you!”

“…Really?”

“Yes, Really! You’ll love it, I promise.” Dwight assured him.

“Well, If you say so. See ya in a moment luv. Love you.”

“Alright, love you too.” he said, and they hung up.

Dwight practically skipped to the beach. He was excited for how wonderful things were gonna be. It would truly be something to remember, more memorable than a balcony anyhow, even if it was a nice balcony with a nice view. As he waited at the edge of the beach, he checked his pockets once more. He felt his heart drop when he didn’t immediately feel the box, but let out a sigh of relief once he searched his other pocket.

”Oh, David, over here!” Dwight waved as soon as he saw the other man. He was careful to keep the flowers hidden behind his back as David jogged over to him.

"So, wot does mister handsome here 'ave in store for me?" David wondered as he playfully tried to take a peek.

"Close your eyes! It's supposed to be a surprise." Dwight said, and David followed his order. He brought forth the flowers, but pocketed the envelope before letting David know he could open his eyes. He decided its contents would best be given to start the height of the night.

"Awwh…" David said as his expression softened as he gazed at the flowers. "Aren't you a sweet thing?" he added with a kiss to Dwight's cheek. "They're lovely."

"Ah, well, I'm glad you like 'em. I was gonna give them to you earlier, but I saw the beach, and thought we could take a walk. The night's still so young, and you know, why end it soon?”

“I think that's a wonderful idea, luv.” David answered while still gazing into the flowers, and then turned back to Dwight and gently slipped his hand into Dwight’s. “Any time spent with you is time well spent.”

Dwight felt his heart swell. If he was uncertain before, which he wasn’t, he knew that he loved David more than anyone, and was determined to follow through with his plan.

“You’re a sap.” Dwight lightly laughed as they began their walk.

“Only for you.” David teased, knowing very well how sappy that was. “But, I’d say you’re a pretty big sap yourself.” he said, putting some emphasis on the flowers. With the evidence present, Dwight had no choice but to concede.

“Well, only for you.” he smiled.

They continued their walkdown the beach in the sand, David holding onto his flowers with his free hand, the plastic that encased them crinkling as he walked. It mixed with the quiet crunch of the sand as they walked on it and the ocean’s gentle night sway to form the background noise to their conversation. Dwight has his free hand shoved into his pocket, clutching the box.

It was indeed a beautiful night. They were relatively far away from the hustle and bustle of civilization, letting a few stars shine with the lower amount of light pollution present. They passed a few groups having a bonfire, eventually coming reaching a stretch of beach devoid of others. The bright, full moon shone down onto them on the near starless clear night. The moon formed a shimmering, thick wave of light on the dark ocean that stretched from the horizon to the edge of where the sand met the ocean waves.

"I'm glad you thought of this." David praised. "It's relaxing. Nice."

"It is." Dwight responded. Now or never. And now was perfect as could be. "Hey, um, I got you one more thing." Dwight said, and pulled out the envelope for David to take.

w3sZAEqaq

"And you really called me a sap." David jested as he jokingly shook his head and took the envelope. It was plain, but of a sturdy, textured paper. Inside was a folded up paper also of good quality. He unfolded it and turned so the moonlight would illuminate the paper. He also had to hold it close to his face, so he could read it clearly. Thus, he began to read it aloud.

"David, we've spent many years together. A number of 'em were in hell, but you helped make my time there more bearable. I'm glad I was able to do the same for you.  I'm glad we were able to make a life together here. And through those years we've spent building a life greater than any heaven, I grew to love you more than I thought I could ever love. It happened when we got our first apartment together and you cuddled against me that night, when you kissed me on live tv when you won your first championship, and it's happened a million more times. I love you more than anything. And I know I love you as much as you love me." David was sure he was about to cry out of pure elation. He went on to read the last sentence. "So, I've one question to ask you now:"

"Will you marry me?"

Shocked, David lowered the paper to see Dwight down on one knee before him. David was most certainly crying now. Unto him, a beautiful ring was offered. The intricate piece of fine jewelry could have been made of plastic and glass for all he cared though. What mattered was what the ring represented, what was happening.

"Yes!" he proclaimed once the reality caught up to him. He let Dwight slip the ring on, and then hoisted him up, pulling him in close and laughing and spinning with joy. "Yes! Yes! Yes!"

He slowed down and let Dwight down as well, keeping him close as he expressed his own love with a deep kiss.

"Of course I'll marry ya, you angel of a man."

Dwight giggled, and pulled David in for another deep kiss. There were no words he could use to accurately describe the magnitude of the wonderful emotions he was feeling.

The blessed letter in his pocket and bouquet in hand, David walked back to their hotel with Dwight holding his other hand. Both fidgeted with the ring as they walked, whispering sweet words and recalling beloved memories.

Fiancé and fiancé, they spend their first night together as such, feeling a love they knew would never end.

[christmichaelofsalvington]

Reverence and Revelation

My Spirit of Truth is a comfort unto all receptive creatures...

If you suffer from the great struggle of failing in believing in yourself .. and if you've lost hope and are trying to gain back that hope in the goodness of God and life .. if you're suffering and searching to feel better every day but cannot quite get your head above the water of stress and worldly dominating tendencies .. if you're lost in a feeling of sadness and hopelessness .. if you're feeling emotionally reactive all your days .. and judgementally corrupted .. and angry at your circumstances and painful relations .. not knowing where to turn for genuine guidance and help .. if you are not understanding why some things happen to you and keep repeating in your life .. and you cannot seem to make the most of your life opportunities .. if you are suffocating beneath a mind that involuntarily tortures you .. if you feel that you're failing to get ahead and discover your gifts and authenticity .. and if you are tossed and turned by the whip of your life's chaff of circumstances and events, and perceive that there is no way out .. no truthful way to understand yourself and love yourself ..

I say unto you .. I Michael of Salvington am come to show you a better Way and Truth and Life .. I come to elevate you into dignity and respect .. to return you to nobility of honor and reverence for thine Source of Lufe .. and for revelations of glory and generosity to inundate your personal world .. if you're questioning in your mind why another fails to appreciate you and love you in the ways you are deserving to be cared for .. then, I Michael come to ennoble your wits and to eternalize your supply of love and compassion .. your everlasting bounties for the heavenly things to emerge in thee.

Already do I have My residence within your heart .. and already am I standing

ready and available to teach and guide you according to your humility .. your childlike willingness .. your capacities for religious spiritual relationship .. your wholehearted faith and trustworthiness .. and your faithfulness to rely upon the Infinity of Life .. your purest adoration for the Almighty God.

If you feel unengaged with what is good, beautiful, and true .. yet, if you desire to know truth and to begin to learn with Me to live in truthfulness and goodness and beauty .. to live upon the heights of the greater way of godliness .. if you desire to live more in this very moment of limitless possibilities .. and to begin the ardent task to free yourself from the enslavement to the past and the anxiety provoking mindset of the future .. to enter into this moment .. if you desire truth absolute .. objective non-negotiable truth .. subtle and all-empowering truth .. and if you're willing to walk in truthfulness, vulnerability, transparency, humility, honesty, and righteousness .. forthrightness and love .. then I .. Michael of Nebadon .. come to free you from the past and the future and the unhesitatingly disturbing delusions of fallen imageries which pervade the lands of a populace gone mad and crazed and who have lost their vision.

If you're always putting your attention 'out there' in the world of effects and appearances .. and if ephemerality and temporariness have made a plague from out of your mind and heart .. and if you cannot seem to find what's really important and essential to better your life .. and you cannot become that inner empowering cause of your highest creative nature and your most courageously inspired character .. and that intelligence of utter sincerity .. if you struggle with these things and you cannot live in this moment and embrace the glory of Infinity in this moment .. then I .. Michael of Salvington .. I come to raise you from the dead into the living.

You are designed and created and meant to experience the abundance of life .. to come back into this moment and experience life in this moment rather than your mind's ill-gotten misperceptions of life .. for it is not designed for you to live in the instrument of mind .. but you must live in the Spirit of Life .. at one with the Lord thy God .. you must learn with Me how to expand that Indwelling Life all throughout thine human experience .. so that you come to engage and embrace and evoke and know the First Person of Deity .. the Universal Father who hath delivered a portion of himself .. a fragment of his Infinity Will .. a particle of his Spirit-filled Life .. to live in you and with you .. in your own heart and mind .. willing for you to perfect all human transgressions, so that you become as his upholding divine nature .. you develop your character into boldness and allegiance .. you become his very divinity personalization upon the vastness of the Supremacy of Life.

If you desire to feel the presence of all these ideas .. this living ideal generated by mercy and qualified with love unconditional and unconquerable within you .. then .. I am come .. to raise you from the dead into the living.

I am thy Universe Father Son .. come into this new epoch .. this advent of ascendancy .. for all of life .. and for all the kingdoms of life upon thine planetary world in which you find yourself living.

Michael Of Nebadon

[albertfinch]

Ten Power Exhortations - September 5, 2019

John 1:46  - "Nathanael said to him, “Can any good thing come out of Nazareth?” Philip said to him, “Come and see.” It may not seem that anything good can come out of your Nazareth, but God is not looking at our past; God isn’t looking at our resources, our money, our talents; He is looking for a Bethlehem, a holy place to deliver His will, a humble place to cover His dreams in swaddling clothes and lay them in a protective manger until they grow and eventually enter the temple on their own.

Affirmations:

EVERY DAY AND IN EVERY WAY THE HOLY SPIRIT GUIDES ME UNTO ALL TRUTH.

AS I LISTEN TO HIS VOICE, THE HOLY SPIRIT TELLS ME OF THINGS TO COME.

BY MEDITATING ON THE SCRIPTURES AND COMMUNING WITH THE HOLY SPIRIT I AM FILLED WITH THE KNOWLEDGE OF HIS WILL IN ALL SPIRITUAL WISDOM AND UNDERSTANDING.

MY CIRCUMSTANCES ARE NOT REALITY-- GOD'S PROMISES ARE REALITY.

We must topple the "stronghold of our experiences."  The only one who has a right to shape our lives is Jesus Christ.  We must determine to allow nothing and no one to shape us, not even our personal experiences, unless they are consistent with the promises of God.

To the degree that our experiences do not conform to the Word of God, they subtly teach us that God is not who He says He is.  In other words, even though you were not healed, you should not conclude "healing is not for today."  God's provision is eternal, which means that until heaven and earth pass away, He has provided for our healing.

2 Corinthians 10:4,5  -  "For the weapons of our warfare are not carnal, but mighty through God to the pulling down of strongholds;  Casting down imaginations, and every high thing that exalteth itself against the knowledge of God, and bringing into captivity every thought to the obedience of Christ."

He wants to demonstrate who He is THROUGH our life. We don't disqualify ourselves because of our present position. The Lord called you to rule and reign in this life wherever He has you positioned, and He wants to begin to anoint you for mighty acts wherever He has you. Wherever He has you, they need to see a demonstration of the reality of who Jesus Christ is. You have your position in the Lord right now (God's purpose for your life), and whatever He has you doing, He wants to anoint you so that people begin to take notice of not just your words, but of the glory of His Kingdom, wherever you are. 1 Corinthians 2:4-5, "And my speech and preaching were not with persuasive words of human wisdom, but in demonstration of the Spirit and of power, that your faith should not be in the wisdom of men, but in the power of God."

God's question to Ezekiel in Ezekiel Chapter 37 was never about the bones. What God was really asking Ezekiel was, "Where is the limit to your faith?" After seeing all the death and devastation, God needs someone who will rise up and declare, "MY GOD IS STILL ABLE!" That is what God is looking for TODAY!  God needs your voice to declare His power!  Someone around you needs to hear that God is still able to save, heal, deliver, defend, provide, heal, and bring victory! The answer our generation gives to the question of "Can these bones live?" is going to determine the level of breakthrough that we experience.

We must constantly seek to understand what God wants us to become -- our DESTINY.

"Matthew 7:8 AMP - "For everyone who keeps on asking receives; and he who keeps on seeking finds; and to him who keeps on knocking, the door will be opened."

Genesis 1:26 - "Let Us make man in Our image, to be like Ourselves; let man have dominion....over all the earth."

It has always been the Lord's intent to have a "people" who would have dominion authority on the earth. The word "dominion" (Hebrew - radah) means to prevail, rule, reign, to tread down."

"Arise, shine; for thy light is come, and the glory of the Lord is risen upon thee. For, behold, the darkness shall cover the earth, and gross darkness the people: but the Lord shall arise upon thee, and His glory shall be seen upon thee. And the Gentiles shall come to thy light, and kings to the brightness of thy rising. Lift up thine eyes round about, and see: all they gather themselves together, they come to thee..." - Isaiah 60:1-4

This refers to "glory" abiding upon us so it can be visibly seen (an open Heaven). At the same time, there is an increasing darkness that is covering both the earth and the people. Many only see this darkness, but there is another side of the coin – "the Lord shall arise upon thee, and His glory shall be seen upon thee."

Before Jesus comes to appear "outwardly," He must first come "within" us so His glory can radiate out from us to affect the spiritual consciousness of the ones He has given us to DISCIPLE and the world.

"When He shall come to be glorified in His saints, and to be admired in all them that believe..." -  II Thessalonians 1:10

Jesus said to Peter -- "Feed My sheep." You have to be the nourishment for other souls until they learn to feed on God. We owe it to God to be our best for His lambs and His sheep (DISCIPLESHIP) as well as for Himself.

"Therefore go and make disciples of all nations"... - Matthew 28:19

The enemy has attempted to fence in your destiny. In other words, he has built a fortress in many of our minds using circumstances to build an ungodly belief system. He will also attempt to build a fortress by using our past failures.

Can you imagine a major breakout of the glory of the Lord over your life? Be prepared to ascend the hill -- to climb to greater heights and cover more ground for the Kingdom than you ever thought possible before.

The Holy Spirit is currently at work equipping and supplying us the life in freedom of advancing from glory to glory.

"Everyone will be salted with fire" (Mark 9:49). Many Christians today are being tested, stretched, and tried. It's as if our God, whose eyes are like blazing fire, is blowing His mighty wind from Heaven. He's fanning some smoldering wicks as He equips His servants to become FLAMES OF FIRE. We should not be surprised or amazed. The Apostle Paul writes that the believer's spiritual "foundation" would be tested by fire to reveal the endurance of his faith and love (I Corinthians 3:13-15).

ALBERT FINCH MINISTRY http://afministry.ning.com

[tarnussy]

Mighty dragon, thou'rt a trueborn heir. Lend me thy strength, o kindred. Deliver me unto greater heights.

[exaltatuss]

“Mighty Dragon Emperor, thou’rt a trueborn lord. Lend me thy strength, o kindred.” And shortly after, she would then take out the tube she had been culturing a special strain of PROJECT: SOMA’s Emperor’s Blood for her own use.

It was about time for it to be ripe. And it was about time for her to transcend.

“Deliver me unto greater heights.” And as such, she would consume the special strain of Emperor’s Blood, immediately feeling the immense surge of power that would now course through her veins.

“For even serpents can become dragons.”

[audarkmist]

Battle with Sin.

I sometimes see people wondering “How can I better fight sin?”. I think part of it is trial and error. I will give out some methods that have helped me. I want you to feel free to add your own. It is a war so having good battle plans, sharing tactics and equipping ourselves is essential. It will sound a little cliche at first.

1. Knowledge and faith. The word of God is our sword, shield and amour.

Ephesians 6:11-20 Put on the whole armour of God, that ye may be able to stand against the wiles of the devil. For we wrestle not against flesh and blood, but against principalities, against powers, against the rulers of the darkness of this world, against spiritual wickedness in high places. Wherefore take unto you the whole armour of God, that ye may be able to withstand in the evil day, and having done all, to stand. Stand therefore, having your loins girt about with truth, and having on the breastplate of righteousness; And your feet shod with the preparation of the gospel of peace; Above all, taking the shield of faith, wherewith ye shall be able to quench all the fiery darts of the wicked. And take the helmet of salvation, and the sword of the Spirit, which is the word of God: Praying always with all prayer and supplication in the Spirit, and watching thereunto with all perseverance and supplication for all saints; And for me, that utterance may be given unto me, that I may open my mouth boldly, to make known the mystery of the gospel, for which I am an ambassador in bonds: that therein I may speak boldly, as I ought to speak.

Hosea 4:6 My people are destroyed for lack of knowledge: because thou hast rejected knowledge, I will also reject thee, that thou shalt be no priest to me: seeing thou hast forgotten the law of thy God, I will also forget thy children.

2. Prayer.

Just going to repeat a part from Ephesians.

Praying always with all prayer and supplication in the Spirit, and watching thereunto with all perseverance and supplication for all saints;

Matthew 26:40-41 And he came to the disciples and found them sleeping. And he said to Peter, “So, could you not watch with me one hour?Watch and pray that you may not enter into temptation. The spirit indeed is willing, but the flesh is weak.” 

This verse really hits home. It makes me think we are like in the trenches watching for when to detonate the explosives (by praying to God our secret weapon). We must actively be watching for when we sense the devil is trying to tempt us. Then when we sense it we begin praying.

I sometimes go like “God, do you copy? I got him in my sight, he’s here alright, surrounding me from all corners”. God is like “Surrounding you say? Wonderful now we can fire from in any direction!”. I made a bit of a joke there xD

3. Resist the devil.

James 4:7 Submit yourselves, then, to God. Resist the devil, and he will flee from you. 

Matthew 4:10 Then saith Jesus unto him, Get thee hence, Satan: for it is written, Thou shalt worship the LORD thy God, and him only shalt thou serve. 

I tend to be like “Get back, get back, you don’t know me like that! You don’t know what I really want. I want God”. Lol sorry my brother kept saying this meme around the house xD

I find that the devil tends to tempt you less with sins once you’ve successfully overcome them a lot. He may come back now and then to test the waters. 

4. Know how the devil tends to attack and that we are NOT very strong. The devil is literally just plotting, scheming and hating you. It’s kind of waste of life because you would think he could find better things to do than pick on us. It turns out this is the best way he thought he might use the time he has left.

The devil tends to attack me with questions as he did Eve. I am not sure if he does the same with you or not. I just want you to be warned this can be a method of temptation.

Avoid tempting circumstances in real life or in your own mind. You don’t “got this” and you aren’t “strong”. We got to see we really are not that strong because I’m pretty sure each of us has not gone a day without some kind of sin. I mean even if it’s not loving God with all your heart, mind, soul and strength. I would recommend not even going on the border line of sin.

To get you in a circumstance that will lead to sin he may say:

“What if you only go so far and not further?” We know this is a spiral downfall.

“You are strong enough to stop at the right moment”. Nope, nope, don’t do it.

“Is this really a sin if you only go halfway?”. Very funny...

“Just take one bite of the fruit of good and evil”. Oh wait, that one was for Eve.

I think you get the picture.

6. Remember the past. 

This one has personally helped me overcome actual sins. I remember the way it felt after I sinned. I felt bad, I felt guilty, I felt lonely, I felt distant, I felt sad, I felt I spat on the savior and so on. 

So when I am about to sin I tell myself “It is not worth it! It will just bring me down and break me into little pieces. I do not want to ever go back to that feeling! It is not worth it”. It did not do much at first I would say “I just want this so bad (It is essentially worth it)”. I then came to a point where I got so sick of feeling terrible I told myself “Yeah true it is not worth the pain that follows”.

7. Avoid fear.

I don’t know if it’s just me... I sometimes become afraid of sinning or worse afraid after sinning. I start freaking out in the morning when I wake like “What if I ruin the day with sin? What if I sin today?! What if it is the last straw?”.

Good news is we have an advocate who pleads our case and a mighty man in battle by our side we can always reach. The one who never sinned!

1 John 2:1 My little children, these things write I unto you, that ye sin not. And if any man sin, we have an advocate with the Father, Jesus Christ the righteous:

Psalm 24:8 Who is the King of glory? The LORD strong and mighty, The LORD mighty in battle. 

Saying “do not fear” is all well and good... but how? I sometimes get so sick and tired of listening to the voice of fear and lies. “God will not forgive you”, “you crosses a line this time” sound familiar? I just get so angry at the devil and fear itself I say “I’m not letting go of God. I am going to hold on to him till my last breath. No one is taking him from my hands, no not the devil nor I even strong enough to take him away from me!”. 

Romans 8:38-39 For I am persuaded, that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor principalities, nor powers, nor things present, nor things to come, Nor height, nor depth, nor any other creature, shall be able to separate us from the love of God, which is in Christ Jesus our LORD.

This comes down to not being passive in getting what you want. I will point back to the bible. Remember Jacob? He refused to ever stop wrestling with God until he blessed him. He gave him no rest! Remember the evil judge parable? The widow kept coming back. She gave him no rest! Remember that woman who came begging for help? At first Jesus even basically told her she is a dog. She did not give up arguing with him demanding that even dogs get crumbs. She gave him no rest because he was his only hope. All were willing to keep going to their last breath.

In verse 20 it says “And he said to her, ‘For this statement you may go your way; the demon has left your daughter’”. So the girl was not healed by waiting around her house hoping it be God’s will to heal her daughter. It happened because she pressed on with God. 

One verse I like when thinking of prayer is Isaiah 1:18 Come now, and let us reason together, saith the LORD: though your sins be as scarlet, they shall be as white as snow; though they be red like crimson, they shall be as wool.

Do you get the point? Don’t you dare let go of God. When you have sinned and failed cling all that much harder to him! Cling as hard as you feel you need! I sometimes hug my pillow to represent symbolically the act of clinging to him spiritually. 

GIVE GOD NO REST. Demand boldly that he gives you the blessing of his presence, the justice of his son and the trail of crumbs of his love. It is your right to demand in when you are in Christ. 

Romans 8:32 He that spared not his own Son, but delivered him up for us all, how shall he not with him also freely give us all things?

8. Sin fighting playlist.

1. I won’t look back. 2. Here’s my heart. 3. Not today Satan. 4. Raise the dead.

5. Soldier. 6. Anchor (remix). 7. King. 8. Rise. 9. Move. 10. The resistance.

11. As it is in heaven. 12. Warrior . 13. Lion’s den. 14. Elevated.

15. Step down. 16. Out of the fire. 17. Saved my soul. 18. Death was arrested.

19. Light a fire. 20. Love fighter. 21. Battlefield. 22. More than conquerors. 

 23. Anchor. 24. The battle belongs to the Lord.  25. Point of no return. 

26. My allegiance. 27. I am here for you.

God bless soldier. Keep up the good fight without giving up! Keep pressing on no matter how hard it may feel at times.

Matthew 24:13 But he that shall endure unto the end, the same shall be saved. 

1 John 4:4 You, dear children, are from God and have overcome them, because the one who is in you is greater than the one who is in the world. 

Romans 8:37 Nay, in all these things we are more than conquerors through him that loved us.

[ratherhavetheblues]

INGMAR BERGMAN’S  ‘THE RITE’ “I have undefined feelings of fear…”

© 2020 by James Clark

     The films of Ingmar Bergman present a double dilemma. First of all, their dramas pose a very seldom recognized alert. Moreover, when in fact recognized, the intimacy almost always proves to be unwelcome. Secondly, those players actually game for the dare, find themselves unable to maintain serious coherence. Our film today, namely, The Rite (1969), is somewhat unusual in as much as all four of the characters (of this cameo production) are significantly in-the-know. But they perform poorly amidst others, and also amidst their self. (That we have declared the film, In the Presence of a Clown [1997] to be Bergman’s swan song, does nothing to end more instances of absorbing volatility.)

    Whatever blood feuds Bergman might have embroiled himself in, toward the bureaucracy of the theatre and the bureaucracy of the law, his raison d’etre here was to spotlight the care and carelessness of disinterestedness. He had had from the very early outset of his endeavors, in the film, Summer Interlude (1951), a deep concern for those few with an instinct for attaining to a sensibility of kinetic disinterestedness being trampled by hordes of selfish, cowardly brutes. Accompanying that debut was a galaxy of optics and sonics intent upon interrupting theatricals hitherto seeming unassailable. The church of Bergman, thereby, tasted with pleasure the atmosphere for its pristine spirit, while clutching, as if a mathematical truth, melodramas of domestic nefariousness and nothing else but scraps of integrity, because the “something else” would take real guts. Seeing that those early communications might as well be Hollywood, by the end of the sixties there came to pass another ingredient to open a closed door. On the heels of two films, now-homicidal, in their destructiveness (in the form of Hour of the Wolf and Shame [both in 1968])—and just before the mass murder movie of The Passion of Anna (1969) rounding off a trilogy—the helmsman saw fit to up the ante in the form of a strange and yet mundane touch, namely, silently pushing with hands and fingers. This could be called a form of rite, with the proviso that rites take many forms. The display of this action features three millionaire experts in making a splash, along with one bungler killed by the trio. The former wends its sort-of merry way. The bungler alone has lived, despite largely missing the boat. Here’s how it went, in a nine-day production hustle, that no one chose to take seriously.

    After some vintage-style harsh percussion discordance, we see the unimpressive protagonist looking through a magnifying glass. (“Dear, dear,” the wayward pundit pounces. “That’s pretty ordinary, for an investigation.”) However, the first scene requires consciousness of that mid-century flare-up, called “The Theatre of the Absurd,” and particularly that flaccid form of the playwright, Eugene Ionesco, he of the once recognized (for a few days) invention, called “Rhinoceros,” pounding along the streets of a sleepy downtown, to maintain that other engines exist. The bemusing get-go today involves the demanding  peripatetic theatre group, called, “Les Riens” (“The Nothings”), of great interest to a judge, being tasked to get to the bottom of a charge of pornography, which, on the face of it is trivial (absurd);  but it becomes a life and death challenge none of them can handle. The approach of the official and the putatively dangerous vagabonds is a classic of parody, aimed toward those readily losing any creative traction. The judge fusses with his reading glasses, rubs his face with his handkerchief, and, with a forced smile, ushers in “The Nothings,” themselves. “Welcome! How do you do? Please come in. This weather’s very trying. Record temperatures, I hear. 34 degrees, most unhealthy! Yesterday’s thunderstorm didn’t help, although it was pouring down…” (Though the matter must figure more fully, later on, we have to digress from Ionesco to point out the presence of that trio forming a moment of the “very trying,” the interplay of a cluster—the judge all but eclipsed—which speaks to an audacity not happening. During the moment of the magnifier, two lights are prominent. The judge is positioned between those lights, but magic interactive initiative is very far away.) One of the artists complains, “The show was interrupted twice while the lights went out [only two singularities]. Odd when it happens in a big city… A kind of panic…”

    Panic, it seems, becomes a watchword, inasmuch as the atmosphere skips from Ionesco’s easy going, bourgeois quirkiness to a very different, darker absurdist register, namely that of playwright, Jean Genet, specifically his play, “The Balcony,” set in a brothel, with a judge overarching his mandate, to say the least. Drinks are offered, and it starts slowly with two Coca Colas and a sherry. (“The Government is paying!”) As with the anything but gentle Genet judge, our considerably gentle Bergman judge approaches (absurdly) an infraction on the same level of a parking ticket, as if needing to straighten out the universe. “Every day is a work day for me. I’m a workaholic. My doctor has warned me… If I had a loving wife at home… We’re not here to talk about me, agreeable though it is…” The judge, unlike the Genet glutton, has been galvanized by the three exotics in hopes of gaining from their supposed intensities a greater understanding. (That twist, never to be seen in the annals of Theatre of the Absurd and its fulsome nihilism, brings to the occasion something unique.)

   It was one thing that the workaholic would pry into their business in hopes of measuring increases of wisdom. It was something else that they would stand for it. Having culled a mass of controversial data, the roaring little pedant has touched so many nerves that their usual aplomb has failed. (Here absurdity drama races along a track of old-timey, screwball comedy, as hitting heights, in Bergman’s film, A Lesson in Love [1954].) The documentarist who never sleeps peppers his guests in this way: “The Dutch police were utterly shaken, that’s for sure!” (That they were, on one occasion, performing for a group of politicians and industrialists, at a chateau near Liege could be the complication.) “You jumped a set of lights in 1956.” The group’s income having been hidden away in a Swiss bank.

   With all their advantages, the sensationalists reveal to be looking toward an oncoming rhinoceros, enflamed by the mouse’s modest hopes. Now crazily shackled to a routine of solo interrogation, the top dogs lose poise in remarkable ways. Two of the worriers, Thea and Sebastian, back at their hotel, rattle off an inventory which would somewhat put to shame their feeding a fan base of assholes. She starts slowly, first of all by clasping her hands, only to increase her stress. She regards her fingers with dismay. “I’d love to sleep on my own, but I can’t sleep if you’re not here.” She goes on to fault him for having slept with the wife of a terminal cancer victim. He retorts, “My contract expires in six months. Then we’ll dissolve our friendship.” He begins to kiss her crotch. Her fingers are seen in close-up, tightly splayed. He recounts a juvenile dream. She, not only telling him that he’s a dull lover, but also surprising us with an anecdote. (Prior, however, to sitting on top of the back of a plush seat, as if on a throne, she hopes to still the spectre of scandal by wielding a tennis-racket size mirror. We see, from our perspective, only the void of the mirror’s back. Introspection impossible. That being a second coming of the cheap haute couture model, in Bergman’s Dreams. To round out the impasse, she places the mirror over her crotch.) “I’m going to tell you what a psychiatrist once said to me. He said, ‘You’re not solid matter, you’re movement. You flow into others, they flow into you. Nothing’s constant… When you realize this, your neurosis will go…’ And then he said, ‘The islands in the river are a sign of approaching death… They grow and solidify, rising out of the flowing darkness. One day the stream will be suffocated—by islands.’” Sebastian had slept through her highlight. (There is a long history of such failing to thrive, in early and later films.) Then there is Sebastian, who might not have slept at all, with, “I remember something a director once said about actors. ‘I never cease to marvel that suddenly lilies will shoot up out the arses of carcasses.’” (Is that a dig or a homage?) A cut to her finds her with one hand over her face. She proceeds, by departing with, “Lord have mercy on me…” That elicits from him, “Take me unto You. Deliver my soul, let it perish in the void.” A pan to her, discloses both of her hands covering her face like a grill.  After she’s gone, Sebastian burns his bedding. The physical source of that recklessness is seen to be, “Union Match.”

    The optics of Sebastian, on his burning bed, spread back to the televised Vietnamese suicide demonstrator, in the Bergman film, Persona (1966). Whereas that sacrifice had believed that major change could happen, with the play of destruction here nothing vivid and progressive has a hope. Sebastian becomes the first of the trio to be interrogated as to motive and punishment. The interview, in fact, finds the overly circumspect and curious bureaucrat being “burned” by the fire-bug’s studious spleen. Withal, however, there occurs the mole’s very awkward bid to join such hoped-for “splendor.” Not yet having revealed the frustrations under which the seeming buoyancy occurs, Sebastian goes over the top in conjuring away any weakness. He establishes that he belongs to a line of circus stars; that his father was a musician (“He could have been great, but he was a drunk”); that he was divorced from a professor of archaeology (“She lives in Cairo”); that he murdered his former business partner (once Thea’s husband, and now she being nominally married to Hans, the third member of the troupe). The judge, acknowledging that curiosity, not law, is up for grabs, thrills in knowing that Sebastian killed with his first dagger thrust and stabbed three more times. (But the little man’s documentation has become radioactive.) “I support some four or five children; my lawyer has all the facts.”

   The judge, then, touching upon “your invention,” drives the proud (or at least vain) vicious one to show something he knows would be deflating. This push-back demonstrating how dialogue functions as a deadly weapon, a poisonous emission, in the hands of rabidity. “Christ, you’re ridiculous with your bloody self-esteem, your lower-class curiosity and tastelessness. Your lack of education and sympathy. I’ve noticed you’re not very clean, Mr. Abrahamsson. You neglect your personal hygiene.” (This causes the judge to shake slightly.) “Underneath your aftershave is a sour smell and filthy corpulence. You put on a clean shirt every day, but I see a tidemark on the collar.” (The judge rubs his face in his handkerchief.) “Your nails aren’t very clean. I despise you.” (The judge is frozen in anger.) “I find you officious, unbelievably ridiculous… Not bad to mix with three world-famous artists.” (The judge bends over and holds his handkerchief over his nose.) “It feels good to pester us with humiliating questions under pretense of decency and discretion. Pulling down our trousers and giving us a spanking… I’ll demand a judge who is on my level. You’re unable to either understand or judge our work. You’re dull! Lock me up now, for contempt or whatever…” (Whereas Sebastian has touched upon the reckless incorrectness of the matter, the Tom Ewell-like mouse, with his Marilyn suddenly in the vicinity, is a far more considerable player than the pyromaniac is able to fathom.) “I admit I sweat profusely. I’ve seen many specialists about it, it’s all metabolism.” (The emissions of the judge cannot, in fact, be wrapped up by medical analysis.) “I can understand that it bothers you. The smell, that is. But I will not accept that I am dirty. No one washes as often as I do…” (Do these libations link to a wide-ranging ripple of sensibility?) “You say I’m lower-class. I don’t know about that, it’s a flexible concept—like everything else. My parents were well-off, my father was a lawyer, my mother a teacher. I dare say we [he and his siblings] were brought up well.” (Cut to the adversary, sneering behind his hand, and behind his nearly eternal shades. The former jail inmate has, with this interplay, shown to be not only cynical but a deranged cynic, perhaps driving the other two to the trademark of graft in their dubious fortunes.)

    “I immediately sensed your animosity,” the host attains, putting into to a level of reflection beyond the sensationalist’s rude and stupid hopelessness. “And as I pointed out, it grieves me and makes me insecure.” (Now Sebastian sees that he’s over his head, and begins to inhale in some stress.) “All this has been upsetting to both of us, so I suggest we say goodbye. I won’t take your outburst to heart. Will you find your own way out? I wish you a speedy recovery and look forward to tonight’s performance. I can understand your strong emotions.” (Quick pan from judge to Sebastian, now incensed again, the latter’s cigarette hand covering his eyes as he lolls on the sofa, perhaps seeing weakness in the sense of civility and perhaps relishing a trump card along lines of holy impudence.)  “Not only are you nasty and repulsive, but you’re a crappy actor to boot… You’re ruthless, immoral and rotten. People like you don’t deserve to live.” (That latter, pointed ugliness, eventually returning in the Bergman film, Autumn Sonata [1978].)

   That jailbird, no longer seen to be part of a profound endeavor, becomes an oblique alarm in a very dangerous surrounding. The judge remonstrates, “I’m embarrassed on behalf of you and myself. I’m incapable of feeling aggression. I’m only seized with a feeling of impotence”—Thea having told Sebastian what a lousy lover he was. Same word, different meaning. “I beg you,” the judge calls out, “go at once!” This elicits from the burning man a melodramatic stance with hands clasped over his head and shaking like a holy roller. “That’s how it is… Mother of God! That’s as it should be… I have seen it and there’s no return!” (Cut to the judge, pouring sweat.) Sebastian, voice-over: “I have no family. Nothing to live for…” The summoned,  now the crazed summoner. “Don’t worry, I won’t touch you, that would be too vile. Just sit down.” Sebastian tears off his jacket in the mode of a matador and puts on another show. “I’ll tell you about an act that Hans [the third wheel] and I have performed. ‘A man enters a police station to report something peculiar [something like the play, “Rhinoceros”]. What is it he wants to report? He’s been seized by a huge appetite. He ate his wife, a shop assistant, his two children and his grandmother. [NB, hungry to be notorious, and then be handsomely apologetic, and live forever—a cheap scammers resort]. Then a bearded man entered the shop, God himself. He cut out a fillet of God’s shank and ate it. He had an irresistible urge to shit and then he went to the police’—“Calm down, I’m near the end.” ‘He lifts his cranium, which he’d sawed off.’ (Blasphemy and advantage. Immortality by way of drama!) ‘His head was empty. At the bottom was a string for the eyelids, but that was it.’” (Recall the surrealist eyebrow, in the film, Dreams [1955].)

    “Are you calm now?” Sebastian, the paradoxical catechist asks. One more question, the literal, somewhat absurdist pedant poses—your religion? And that ignites more nonsense. “I have no religion. I don’t belong to any faith. I don’t need a god, salvation or eternal life. I’m my own god, I supply my own angels and demons. I reside on a stony beach which sinks into a sheltering ocean. A dog is barking, a child is crying. The day closes and turns to night.” He slaps the judge on his chest and grabs him, saying, “You can’t intimidate me! No human being will ever frighten me again. I have a prayer that I say to myself in the absolute silence. ‘May there be a wind to stir the sea and the sultry dusk. May a bird fly in from the sea and scatter the silence with its call.’” The hardness of life savoring its gifts; and this all too inventive, scattered player sending them promptly back.

The judge, not in the business of easiness, enters a church in search of useful ingredients. The stone statues are archaic, but with some gentle expressivity. Four candles burn. There is the ingredient he needs, being elusive. “Father, I don’t want to confess, but I need someone to talk to. “I’m listening,” he hears from the priest, being Bergman himself, far from cordial. Into the confessional, we find the judge on the other side of the grill between them, his presence dispersed within the vertical field—that being a graphic rendition of the “movement” Thea embraced, only to ditch it. “I think I’m going to die. Strangely enough I’m, scared. On my way home yesterday, I had to sit down on a bench. I felt as if I was already dead.” (Panning close to him.) “My body had a stench I’ve never noticed before. There’s an abnormal heat, of course, and my weak heart. And then my old father’s death.” (He wears a commemorative armband.) “Try as one may, everything changes… What am I saying. I’m talking through my hat.” (His faced plunging into a handkerchief.) “People can pardon each other, can’t they?” (An odd place to touch upon the possibility that much must  be held in solitary.) “There is an earthly grace. But outside the fragile circle of human warmth cruelty reigns, forever in all eternity… I know you’re not laughing at me. You must be familiar with the phenomenon from your practice. You’ll know that non-believers often pray…” (to something hard to define). “It gives me relief in my pain… My mother has died. No one will hear me if I call out…” And, then, a troubling capitulation: “I daren’t walk on the floors because of the animals. I have to stay in bed.” (Cut to the stone Madonna. Three candles to left, and at right, a flame glowing. In that place of refuge, but not innovation, he dallies, “If I start to cry from anxiety, I’ll be even more afraid.”)

   The last careful eccentric under a tiny cloud, namely, Hans, considerably older and far more congenial than the first two strutting their stuff, had been kept two hours waiting on account of the judge’s rocky night. Such missing the boat, for the actor playing, Hans, namely, Gunner Bjornstrand, had become a stock measure of knowing better and yet ultimately sliding back to superficiality, in several Bergman films. We’ll see Hans disgusted with the troupe and yet carrying on, long after the judge’s death. We first see him this day, in the course of the pedantry of the judge, in close-up, with his hands tightly covering his face from the specific boredom and a long-term boredom. Soon, however, the two more mature figures smooth over the irregularity and begin with the subject of Sebastian’s remarkable hostility. Hans quickly excuses his colleague by way of his apparently being struck by a series of infections. “He takes the matter too seriously… I’ve stopped fretting over professional matters long ago. I do my best, that’s all. It’s only natural your judicial system wants to investigate this. The penalty is lenient if we’re found guilty. The fine has been deposited in a bank nominated by you.” The judge replies, “I’m delighted to hear that we have the same attitude.” Do they, though? Hans had been part of a revolutionary-cum-hot-entertainment package for years (forget about their register). There would be volatile factors based upon an avant-garde of long-standing. The reflective judge and his moonlighting would look to the sunny side and shun the vast darkness of the matter, a matter of “movement,” which, despite the millions they reap, has beaten them down to a cheap rite.

     Once again the little scholar asks, “Who among you is the creative force?” Hans, the smoothy, feels the need, then, to emphasize that incisive cooperation has shone upon their labors of love. “We share thoughts and feelings, we know one another’s reactions. If you perform day in, day out, in such an utterly demanding environment, you eventually merge into an integrated body. That doesn’t prevent our having different views on this and that.” The not so shabby savvy of the questioner had asked for specific dimensions of their magic; he was given a scheme of corporate wealth, not unlike the priorities of Hollywood.

     As if mired in quicksand, Hans, with the theological judge awaiting the troupe’s romantic complications, feels the need to call for Thea’s being exempt from interrogation, on the basis of her emotional lack of equilibrium. Instead of reminding the little man that the matter is an infraction hardly more severe than walking upon a precious lawn, he pushes the health card which seems to the functionary very weak. (We never learn of the antiquated place making the fuss, but it probably involves a silly pseudo-country, like Monaco.) This pushes his image of mature control off a ledge—madly spilling out his humiliation that, though married to her, Thea spends most of her time with the sociopath. “My biggest fear is to be left alone.” Consequently, he offers a bribe of $100,000 to keep his nominal wife out of the process. (“Now I’m really curious,” the student masticates.) Playing along, only to rip up the cheque, he balloons in his studies as to being in the hunt. “I’ll disregard the enormity of your attempt to bribe a civil servant… You must have strong reasons for wanting to stop the meeting.” The meeting occurs. Thea has a sexual fit; the judge rapes her, seemingly requiring a trip to the hospital; and next day, it’s as if nothing happened.

    A few declarations before that fuss maintains the real passion. She tells the judge, “I pretend I’m a saint or a martyr, hence the name, Thea.” (Her hands are clasped, as in prayer. “I can sit for hours at the table and look at my palms… I play at going into ecstasy and talking to the Holy Virgin. Belief and unbelief. Defiance and doubt. It’s all a game…I knew you’d be bored.”) The night before the interview, Thea, the saintly player, sits in her dressing room after another lucrative show, and she’s very drunk, by way of a potion called, “Doctor’s Special.” Panning close to her face, she has such a premium of thick cosmetics and a clown nose that she resembles Sebastian and his broad nose. She cries and groans, and Hans asks, “What’s wrong?”/ “I’m so bloody scared of that judge!” Hans counters, “If you panic, I’ll be sitting next door. The day after tomorrow it’ll all be over. We’ll go to the country. I know an inn with great food. If it’s not too hot, we’ll go walking in the woods, sleep under a tree…” (recalling Bjornstrand’s empty rendezvous, in the film, A Lesson in Love, 1954). Feeling some imminent blow-up with Sebastian due to his leaving the troupe, she reminds Hans, “Not long ago you said it was your life’s mission to look after me. You’re my only security”—“security” being a hot-button notion coming to bear in a matter of weeks, with the horror of The Passion of Anna (1969). (“Security” at any cost, being pathologically disastrous.) Hans asks, “Isn’t it better if it’s one big insecurity with other little bursts of security? That’s much closer to reality.” But it strays from the mechanism, the rite, of the demanding clever. His bemusement opens a floodgate of painful candor. “I am tired of you. And I’m tired of Sebastian. I’m tired of you and Sebastian. I’m tired of touring with two lunatics. I’m tired of our so-called artistry. I’ve lost belief in our purpose. We’re pointless, disgusting, ridiculous. We’ve lost our relevance [Thea remarking, “I don’t know what ‘relevance’ means”—a moment flowing back to the film, Dreams, where a crude glutton fails to understand the word, ‘infantile’]. We’re not needed, we’re obsolete… My tedium is limitless. I don’t even feel sorry for you.” The dressing room mirror has been lipsticked, Merde, Shit… “ We’re not worth a tenth of what we earn.” And with classic Bjornstrand weakness, he catches himself, “I don’t know what I’m saying… I never speak about myself…” He takes off his mask and has a drink. “Still, I love you, I do… I feel sorry for you. I’d do anything to spare your discomfort or trouble. Seeing you and Sebastian’s passion worries me. I see you tear each other to pieces. But I should know better. You can say anything, commit any barbarity. Nothing works on you two. You’re monsters. I know it. I recognize it. I can never be like you two. I don’t want to be. Try to listen to me! We have reached the extreme limit. It’s humiliating, degrading. Enough is enough… Do you understand what I’m saying? I’m tired of you… You haven’t understood a word. The world is falling to pieces, burning and bleeding…” She sneers (as Sebastian had sneered upon the judge), “Poor Hans, poor little conscience… It should be this and not that.” He backs himself into, “I believe in common sense” [only recently subscribing]. She asks, “Have I got ugly?” He insists, “No, no, no!” (In the film, Dreams, things come down to, “One has to say ‘no,’ at some point.”)

    As an ambulance is (absurdly) dispatched to bring Thea to what she does almost every night on stage, the “assailant” takes a high road: “The deceit must end! I’ve tried to be nice but to no avail.” The next day, Hans and Sebastian (without a word of Thea’s little ride) discuss a shift in their cash-flow in light of international unpleasantness—a Far East tour cancelled by a war, and their U.S. tour in danger because of the indecency fuss—amounting to a loss of about a million each. Sebastian, a picture of chic, cosmopolitan wealth, remarks, “How annoying, to say the least.” Hans deduces, “You’ll realize I can’t go on lending you money forever. Here’s an account of your finances: balance in my favor, 296,000 franks.” The debtor reminds. “My part of the house in Ascona will be worth something.” The creditor reminds him, “I bought your share when you had that tax bill in Scandinavia.” No problems, it seems, Sebastian merely borrows some more money! The tenor of such burning away of money (as in burning away of bedding) appears to be some vague, rather ridiculous idea of disinterestedness, in the light of their wretched rite, rigged to be coming up roses. The jailbird rebounds, “Tell Baur I’ll do another season, but I need an advance…” (Hans continues to describe a changed world, but it seems they’ve all amassed fortunes never to encounter poverty. The next big shift would be working as solo acts. Hans, at least for that afternoon, is very bullish on this because he was almost ready to retire. He floats the [now ideal] idea of Sebastian and Thea  becoming a duo act. No dice, apparently.) Going back to the solidity of  money, Hans has taken care of remembering that the expensive dresser is 12,000 kronor overdrawn in his chequeing  account, which is met with more strong spirits. Also, there is Hans’ concern about who should pay Thea’s hotel bills (one guess), she being beyond such transactions. (More cut-price disinterestedness.) Before running off to pick up his no doubt rare car from the repair shop, Sebastian, having shown an outlaw style, drives Hans to divulge his hots, his advantage, namely, the way to induce Thea into a multiple orgasm. With the tricks proudly described, he’s driven to scripture, no less,  “I love her in the spirit of the Epistle to the Corinthians,” which prompts Sebastian to rattle off the text, “Love always trusts, always hopes… also perseveres, and so on…” Then, from out of that union, Sebastian asks, “Tell me something, do you detest me?”/ “No, far from it,” Hans assures. “But I used to like you more… Before you started drinking and got sloppy… I even admired you. I thought you were a warm person, full of life” [though a murderer]… You had something, Thea did, too… Light… You may smile. There is no other word for it, light! It’s the light that Thea and I are busy extinguishing.”

     As that nadir begins to bite, Hans and Sebastian visit the judge to propose a  presentation/ interpretation of the troupe, at its succinct best, after that evening’s show. The student of art records, “I agreed to their modest request that no other audience be present” [at a room in the courthouse]. The preamble spotlights Thea and the judge seeming to be fast friends. “I was so relieved when the doctor said it wasn’t serious. You’ve quite recovered?”/ “Just tired from the medication…”/ “I hope this won’t be too hard.”/ “Not for me. I just beat the drum and talk some nonsense.” The scenario propounds to carry the passions of Hans when he was a child. “Our imaginations were stimulated!” (Stimulated by anger?)

    The little man presiding formally, is in fact at their mercy, like the sheep and a whole roster of victims about to explode in, The Passion of Anna. His “curiosity,” his need for cogency, can’t resist daring, in the middle of the night with a fragile heart, to cross a mob, one of the billions who have, in fact, nothing to offer a serious reflection, a serious love of life. The first optic becomes a medieval sword (for medieval hearts), thrust in his face. Still underestimating his peril—a perilous Pauline in the offing, years hence—the host walks into, “So it’s not that simple?” Sebastian barks out, “No, it’s not that simple?” despite his being a pig for the simple. Hans adds, “Call it an intercession”—he still stinging from a refusal to be a smooth intercessor. “Artists are such sensitive creatures.” (How would he know, having been nothing all his life but a Hollywood joke? Surely knowing where the money is, Hans melodramatically intones, “It may be meaningless but now and then we’re all seized by the desire to kneel or pray. A ritual game,” a rite. (The judge in the church had, in his adult way, eschewed facile showboating, while maintaining, however awkwardly, true interplay, true rite.)

   Getting around to the rape—“You, yourself experienced weakness, a sensual longing for surrender. Perhaps as a child”—Sebastian continues, “At a given moment I raise a bag filled with wine and stab it from underneath. The wine gushes down, into a vessel.” Thea beats the drum. Each of the actors places a threatening mask to intensify aggression. By this time, the judge is sweating profusely and begins to tremble. He calls out, “I have something to tell you. My father wanted me to be a lawyer like him and his father before him. I had no choice in the matter.” (This connectivity blooms virulently in subsequent films of Bergman.) “I’m only doing my duty! I wanted to see the act at close range.” (More Ionesco, as if lawyering breeds rape.) “Maybe it was a secret need to… I don’t know. I take and give orders… I don’t understand what drives you or your relationships… I have always been afraid… What am I saying? I must calm down. It’s two in the morning, we’re all tired. Why are you smiling Mr. Fisher?” (Sebastian fishing for trouble.) The judge covers his face, leaving him more lost than he really is. His fingernails have been bitten to the quick. (Far from a rite that could lift him. ) A buzzer explodes. They surround him, and he finds a way to say, “No more fear… Dear artists, you’ll never have a more rewarding and involve audience.” Fisher’s sword now shows the handle to be sexually erect. He slaps the judge’s face many times. The judge calls out, “You hit it on the head, Mr. Fisher. I admire your physical daring. Your hand touched my skin which is burning. But it also touched my memories as a human being. You have hit me and humiliated yourself…” The violence is in the mode of Jenet’s, The Balcony. The latter two sentences are in the mode of Bergman.

    “Maybe not, maybe you feel satisfaction and pleasure,” Sebastian crows. (More Genet.) Sebastian smashes the judge’s face, and the latter falls off his chair and on to the floor. The judge tells them, “Look how my hands are shaking. And I want to cry. I suppose it’s a form of desolation… To lean against someone, to find warmth and security in someone’s arms.” He struggles to stand up.  “What a drama! I’ll happily admit there’s a measure of cruelty also in my profession. How else would it be possible.” (“The Theater of Cruelty,” a notion of French theatrical inventor, Antonin Artaud, comes by as another strange homage to the little man who cherished something necessarily wild and necessarily gentle. He calls out, close to death, “I’m asking you artists. You must know. You know. Start your performance.” Their “performance” is a few obsolete postures, in lifting the vessel, and surrounding the judge. Hans adds, “I then drink from the vessel, swallowing the reflection. That is the act in short…” Cut to the judge, sweating and gasping and looking up. He says, “I understand.”

    In an epilogue we are treated not so much to the conflict’s irony, but the irony of sensibility itself. “A doctor was summoned. He established that Dr. Abrahamson had dies from a heart attack. The three artists were subsequently convicted for the pantomimic art they called, ‘The Rite.’ They paid their fines, gave some interviews and toward the end of the summer they went on a holiday. They never returned to the country in question.”