by R. Twine
‘My beloved creatures,’ He said to the people, ‘you will be taken care of by my angels; you may live a life of ease while I’ll watch over you with great joy. There’s only one thing I want to ask of you: don’t betray me, and don’t try to understand the mystery of Good and Evil; I created them and hid them from you for your own benefit.’
‘All right, Heavenly Father,’ Adam and Eve said. ‘We promise you to do as you told us to.’
Meanwhile, cunning Satanail, craving for revenge, felt his anger grow with every passing day… He knew how to avenge the Father for his expulsion, because he knew all the mysteries. He was intending to seduce Eve by letting her into the secret of good and evil! Besides, Satanail wanted to prove that the creatures, created in the image and likeness of the Great Father, were imperfect… The deposed angel was already anticipating his victory…
Satanail learned a lot during the years he spent on Earth. He knew he could not appear in Heaven in his angelic guise because it had been strictly guarded since his expulsion, so he sneaked into Eden in the guise of a beautiful snake which was much more cunning than the wild animals. Having hidden among the dense green branches of a big tree, he watched his future victim; Satanail couldn’t take his eyes off this woman…
“Indeed, the Father is great for having managed to create such a beautiful woman!” he thought, marveling at her from his hiding place. She was so gorgeous that he fell in love with her; her beauty was unparalleled in the kingdom he created on Earth!
Satanail was shrewd and had a keen intuition. In this first-ever woman he quickly saw the opportunity of implementing his plan. Satanail rejoiced: now he knew how to strike back. Seizing the right moment when Eve approached the tree with the branches hiding them from view, he started talking to her in a soft voice filled with tenderness.
‘Oh, Eve, you’re so lovely! I’m stricken with your beauty! I’ve never seen a more beautiful creature before! I just cannot take my eyes off you… Oh, you, heavenly beauty, take a bite from this wonderful fruit…,’ crooned Satanail, offering her a beautiful red transparent apple. ‘Here you are! Take a bite from it together with your Adam and you’ll become like gods who know about good and evil. And through this fruit you’ll come to know true pleasure, and become truly free and independent – like I am…’
‘The Father forbids us to eat the fruits from this tree, and I wouldn’t dare disobey him. I fear His wrath. I fear dying…,’ Eve said quietly.
The Father is kind to everyone; he loves all his creatures, therefore there’s nothing for you to be afraid of,’ insisted the snake.
‘No, this is not so. All the angels who disobeyed Him were expelled,’ said Eve, disagreeing with him.
‘The angels He rejected are greatly enjoying living on Earth,’ pressed on the sly snake. ‘They live in joy in their new life.’
Satanail found the woman created by The Creator curious, a little bit naïve and yielding. She was more gentle-hearted than the much-hated Adam. She emanated love and tenderness. Besides, all her essence was imbued with beauty. “She’s indeed the creation of God”, Satanail thought while being absolutely confident that someday he would succeed in making her taste the forbidden fruit.
‘I know nothing about it,’ said Eve, astonished.
‘That is the very truth,’ the snake assured her, and again extended a hand with the apple in it.
The snake’s talk appealed to Eve; she sensed the wisdom hidden in his words. The snake was much unlike Adam, with whom she could converse only about the Father and hunting. Yielding to temptation, Eve took the forbidden fruit and took a bite out of it, thinking: “Why am I attracted to everything that’s forbidden? Which knowledge is this all about?” The curious Eve told Adam what had happened, and tempted him with her talk. Adam, following her suit, succumbed to the temptation and tasted the forbidden fruit.
So Adam and Eve came to know good and evil; they became aware of their nudity, and hid themselves from God (5). The Father was beside Himself with rage. He cursed the serpent. He cast the first-ever people down onto Earth which was also “cursed because of him” (6). Man, God’s creation, ceased to be immortal.
‘This was the first of Satanail’s victories,’ Michael the Archangel pointed out while continuing to show me the events of the ancient past.
‘After the expulsion of Adam and Eve, some angels followed them secretly to Earth. They would settle within them to live human lives; they passed their knowledge through the flesh and the soul while people made use of this knowledge on Earth. Those who had the angel spirit in them would give birth to geniuses. Satanail didn’t waste his time either, implanting his destructive gene into the souls and bodies of weaker people who easily succumbed to his temptations. Having seen all this, the Father ordered the angels not to use human bodies any more.
“People must live by their own wits! You, the angels, must guard them, while revealing the secrets only to the chosen ones!” He admonished.
‘Since then, angels have become intermediaries between human beings and the Kingdom of Heaven; they are invisibly protecting them from almighty Satanail. But some angels turned out to be exceptions…
‘And here’s the story of one of your past incarnations,’ said the Archangel quietly, pointing at the image quivering in the haze. ‘It was your second coming to Earth. At the time some parts of people were mixed with demons. This was the time people began to demonstrate ever more vividly the part of their nature they inherited from the Prince of Darkness. Satanail had expected that an ever increasing number of people possessing his nature would be born. And with this innumerable host of his warriors Satan intended to shake the Universe! But it was not meant to be: the Father destroyed everyone by throwing incessant torrential rains down on the Earth. He spared only Noah and his family; God held this man in high regard, and Noah became the second forefather of humankind. Bloodthirsty souls were cast into the abyss. Satanail had to start everything from scratch again. History repeated itself – once more...’
A beautiful dark-haired girl appeared in front of me; she had a long dress on, and sat alone in a park, dreamily looking up at the sky. Apparently, she was waiting for someone. Bright green eyes and scarlet lips stood out picturesquely on her unusually white face and these features were accentuated by long curly hair. After some time a young man, wounded and bleeding from battle, appeared. He kissed the girl and put down on the grass his helmet, lavishly decorated with jewels. The man was extraordinarily handsome – the girl couldn’t take her eyes off him. He knelt in front of her and said, ‘Madlen, I came to say goodbye to you forever. In memory of me I’d like to give you this jewel which Satanail hacked out of my helmet when we fought each other ferociously. And when your days on Earth are over, I myself will open the gates to heavenly Eden to you, and lead you into my domain. Here you are, Madlen…’
And he gave her a big emerald of exceptional purity that radiated green light. Madlen took the jewel from him and cried, bitterly.
‘I won’t see you anymore and it means that I won’t live much longer. Don’t torment my soul – make my days on Earth shorter. Satanail knows you won’t be back, therefore he’ll be following me, and my life will become an eternal torture,’ said Madlen, closing her eyes which were filled with pain.
‘Madlen, I simply must challenge Satanail who enslaved your soul and the soul of many others. He fought for the right to have you because he thinks it is to him alone that everything on Earth belongs,’ said the Archangel’s voice, coming from the wounded warrior, for in reality the Archangel had merely assumed the young man's form. ‘This jewel has been chipped off a big emerald goblet that stood near the Throne of God. It was this same goblet that the Father struck after finding out that Satanail raised the mutiny in the Universe and headed the army of the most powerful Angels. A lot of stone shards had fallen off it; I took one of them and attached it to my helmet. From this day on this jewel will belong only to you as a token of my endless gratitude; no matter how many incarnations you will go
through and whatever appearance you will have, you’ll always be born as a woman whose soul I will always favor!’
‘What a pity a human soul is doomed to eternal suffering!’ Madlen exclaimed, looking at the Archangel.
‘Unfortunately, the sin was committed, therefore sufferings will continue, Madlen; there’s no other way around it for humankind. The soul is immortal, just as God Himself is! After leaving the earthly world I’ll always be thinking about you. And I’m going to suffer as much as you do!’
‘I’ll miss you. I don’t want Satanail to take my soul captive. He’s a real seducer! The human soul is weak and has no protection against him! He leads people astray with extraordinary ease in order to manipulate them later on. Even the strongest individuals find it hard to confront him!’ said Madlen through sobs, seeing that the Archangel’s spirit was about to leave the body of the warrior. ‘You are bleeding badly…’
‘I promise to stand by you – invisibly,’ he said sadly, and shed a final hot tear upon Madlen’s hand. ‘I will never be able to reject you,’ the young man with an angelic face whispered softly, and died at her feet. Droplets of his blood kept trickling down onto the grass. The Archangel left the lifeless body, took his helmet and sword, and ascended to Heaven, waving farewell to Madlen. The beautiful emerald was all she had left…
Sometime later Madlen gave birth to a daughter with beautiful green eyes, and died shortly afterwards.
I couldn’t hold back my tears; they came pouring down my face. I recollected that life of mine, I recollected that incarnation, and that pain I had had in my heart. I re-experienced the death of the man I loved, the man who had in him the spirit of the Archangel who descended from the skies to protect me from the Prince of Darkness.
The image disappeared, and I spoke in a barely audible, shaky voice,
‘The life of the man I once loved was cut short, following which your spirit left me. Loneliness was something I couldn’t endure so I died, hoping to reunite with my beloved in Heaven. But this was not meant to happen. After my death you led me to the place where my sinful soul was reposing. I was completely and utterly alone! You did appear in my next incarnations but only to avert the danger that was looming over me. And every time you assumed the appearance of different men – I loved them, but they always died, leaving me alone. Why are the Heavens so cruel?’
I meant the one and only man whom I had ever loved… He'd appeared in my life only to disappear again, causing me so much pain. Where was he? What happened to him? His appearance may change, but his spirit somehow remains the same. How was it going to be this time round? I was desperate, because it was my last incarnation…
‘It has been ages since we met in that beautiful garden! Why doesn’t that spirit of yours want to leave me alone?! Why have you woken up in me such painful memories?! What do these images mean, after all?’
‘Miriam, you shouldn’t fear loving!’ said Michael, trying to reassure me.
‘But, at the same time, I shouldn’t forget that Satanail is capable of taking possession of any man’s body. Your spirit resides in those I loved; it always saved me from the burning inferno!’ I said, frustrated.
‘This time it’s going to be different. I will not be able to enter mortal bodies to stand up to the Prince of Darkness, but from time to time I’ll be able to influence those under Satanail’s authority, thus diverting danger from you. Satanail is cunning, and you’ll have to surpass him in cunningness by making use of his own methods against him. Angels let people live their mundane lives without ever hurting them; we became your devoted guardians. Satanail is the only one capable of hurting you! This is why I’m here – in order to protect you from his cobweb! He’s all-powerful on Earth, and it’s getting increasingly difficult to fight him. He’s a Heavenly Angel created by the Great Father, and true angels are very powerful. He’s protecting his territory…from people!’
I stopped and looked the Archangel straight in the eye.
‘Am I given to understand that people on Earth are Satanail’s guests?’
‘He settled on Earth long before man arrived there. This is why he has such a great influence on human beings.’
I stopped and looked the Archangel straight in the eye.
‘Am I given to understand that people on Earth are Satanail’s guests?’
‘He settled on Earth long before man arrived there, this is why he has such a great influence on human beings.’
I froze in my tracks, bewildered by such a revelation.
‘My duty is to lift you up to my abode forever, when your hour of death will come. But now I’m here only to help you make the right choice, Miriam…’
The Archangel disappeared, leaving me alone.
The filming session in New York was over. I packed my things and then called Samuel.
‘What plans do you have for today?’ I asked him.
‘Tonight I’m going to see my friends. You can come with me, if you don’t mind,’ he invited.
‘No, I don’t mind at all. Come and pick me up in an hour,’ I said.
‘Okay,’ said Sam in a happy tone of voice.
My punctual admirer was waiting for me by the hotel at the time we had set.
‘Glad to see you, Miriam! You look great.’
‘I should think so: I’ve been sleeping for fifteen hours.’
‘While you are sleeping, your knight in shining armor may go riding by without noticing you,’ he laughed. ‘But your rest clearly did you good.’
‘Sam, do you believe in angels and Satan?’ I asked him unexpectedly.
His jaw dropped in bewilderment.
‘That’s a very strange question to ask, Miriam. Have you been dreaming about them?’
‘I just want to know your opinion. Do you believe there are entities other than humans?’
‘I don’t even know how to answer that question,’ Sam said after a small hesitative pause. ‘Stuff like that originated in the church and religion, that is, they – in some way or another – deal with the problem of faith. Maybe there are people who have contact with guardian angels and things like that…But as for me… I can’t say I believe they exist, though I can’t say they don’t exist, either. Personally, I have never seen angels, spirits or demons of any kind. It’s probably all made up by an unhealthy imagination of an equally unhealthy mind.’
‘Can the life of a man depend upon the hereafter if he sees and perceives the world of the hereafter as a real one? Is the incarnation of these entities capable of feeling love for people? Are there any mutual feelings between people and these creatures?’ The questions came jumping out of me in bursts.
‘I never thought you would be interested in this kind of thing, Miriam. Nobody has ever asked me such questions,’ said Sam, still more bewildered. ‘Nowadays hardly anybody believes in these things. You know, if they did exist, a lot people would see them. By the way, to my mind, the same holds true about extraterrestrials and life on other planets,’ he warned me with an ironical smile. ‘All this was created by man’s wild imagination… If the invisible world does exist, we, humans, will never know about it. What’s the use of looking for it, after all? What purpose does it serve? Everything must be left as it is. It is mankind we should think about, and not about things that don’t exist in the real earthly world.’
‘But there are people who have gotten into contact with their deceased relatives,’ I insisted. ‘And they saw them and talked to them in earnest. And this is not fiction!’
The Mercedes turned into a car park and went down to a lower storey. Sam killed the engine, turned to me and asked me a question,
‘Have you ever seen anything like that?’ His face was serious and somewhat annoyed; it seemed to me as though he didn’t like talking about such subjects. ‘Or are you just asking me about all this out of sheer curiosity? My folks are atheistically-minded individuals who brought me up accordingly. If you take a good look around you, then you will see there are millions like my parents who don’t believe
either in the souls of the dead or in the existence of the hereafter. Visions and talks with angels seem sheer fantasies to me, but then again – I cannot say they don’t exist at all. What if they do exist, after all, and, while we are talking about them they stand behind our backs listening quietly to what we’re saying?’ said Sam laughingly.
‘They really do. I think, there are not only angels who are listening to us, there are demons, too, as well as those who somehow or other take interest in our lives. It wasn’t out of sheer curiosity that I asked you about it,’ I said quietly, ‘I simply want to know what you really think about it. Would you be capable of loving a woman while knowing she doesn’t belong to you though she loves you? Knowing that every time you make love to her, your body can be taken away by those who are stronger than you? Stronger than any man…’
‘It’s impossible, Miriam. Just think for yourself: how can anybody possibly take possession of your body? You must have been overfed with strange, New-Age books – women are susceptible to this kind of stuff. But I think after a while it can start to take a toll on your mind. I’ve had quite a few women, and nobody ever took possession of either me or them! Just get it out of your head! In the past I used to think about it, too, but then I decided that there are neither angels nor demons. And what people often put down to “providence” or “the devil’s tricks” is just a clumsy attempt to blame everything on some “higher power” a man is incapable of standing up to. But if you think logically, then almost everything can be explained from a purely scientific point of view. A lot of people start hearing voices or suffer hallucinations because of a mental disorder.’
‘I hope you don’t consider me ill or crack-brained.’ I interrupted him, unable to keep silent any longer.
‘No, of course I don’t, Miriam. What I’ve just said has nothing to do with you. I mean, you just got interested in the occult or the teachings of some guru, which is pretty normal; everyone gets interested in them once in their life, right?’