The Space Between Myths
This is the English translation of a Coptic text that was first found in 1954. I estimate that the codex dates back to the third century of the common era, during the formative years of Christianity. This can be surmised because of the dating of papyrus used in the cover of the text. The dates on this papyrus lead right up until 250 C.E., suggesting that this was the time that the codex was bound. It was buried shortly thereafter, though by whom and why are questions which remain unanswered. The original codex was found in Egypt, buried by itself in a cave. I postulate that the text was buried because it was forbidden by the authorities of the day. Yet someone must have believed that the work should be preserved, and hid it in a sealed jar, to be uncovered at a later date.
Though the text was constructed in the third century, it is apparent that the thoughts contained therein are much older. The ideas contained in the manuscript seem to be those of an early Christian sect which revered Norea, a daughter of Eve. Though the text was not whole, I managed to fill in many of the gaps using context clues. I have given the text the title The Space Between Myths and Realities, a phrase from the text itself because the codex seemed not to contain a title. The codex itself is probably also a translation, first from Aramaic to Greek and then from Greek into the Coptic text which we now have.
Actually, we no longer have the Coptic manuscript itself. It is fortunate that I copied it when I did, since a short while later, the papyrus pages were swept away. On a particularly blustery day, the papyrus was picked up by a burst of wind coming through my office window and carried off; the original manuscript was completely lost. This was not the only setback to the translation of The Space Between Myths and Relaties, since the wind picked me up as well, making me fall out of the window as I was trying to save the manuscript. I spent weeks in the hospital before my work on the text could begin again. I must admit to many hours agonizing over the delay in the completion of my work with this text. This work in particular drew me in and compelled me to translate its words to make them available to a much larger audience.
Though the codex was lost, we do have the original Coptic words, which I copied diligently in the weeks before the gusty catastrophe, and therefore, I can offer you the following English translation, the long-awaited fruit of a lost text.
– April, 2004
My brothers chant tales in my ear as I sleep at night and I wake remembering vague details, a slow, persistent hum in my mind, reminding me to feel ashamed that I am her daughter. sssser-pent-sssser-pent-sssser-pent-sssserpent It is unclear if I am the serpent, or if it is my mother, or another entity all together. More clear is the call to repent, whatever role the serpent, my mother and I have played, all parties remotely connected to the story are summoned by these nightly hymns to atone for their sins, for the sins of the world.
It was a turbulent time.
It was the night of menstruation ritual when the chants began. I first heard them as my mother and I traveled toward the river. It seemed as though the night was swollen with a deep whisper. sssser-pent-sssser-pent-sssser-pent-sssserpent It did not grow louder, but it was somehow more intense. The words became sharper, the pronunciation more pronounced. My mother, having my hand in her own, dragged me swiftly behind her, running wildly and seeming frightened, though she always looked like that, the heads of Leviathan seeming to twist madly at the ends of her locks. Our feet splashed in muddled puddles as we ran, sending the spit of the ground upon our calves, anointing us up our thighs.
My mother stopped at the river which sprang out of the trees. The father of the Euphrates had tiny waves which were illuminated by moonlight, casting deep slithers of green on the face of the river. The waves became scales reflecting moon reflecting sun burning. I ran a bit past her, my ankles dancing in the stream of water, my hand still in hers. The river hissed whispers of watery histories. Shadows, I noticed now, drew trees on the damp ground, fuzzily, forcing interpretations of their interpretations. They were far from trees. The chants continued. I wondered if my mother heard them.
My mother smiled at me. It was the first time I had ever seen her lips curl upwards. Her face seemed pained by the unfamiliar pose, her mouth twisted as her cheeks reached for her forehead. It soothed me.
My mother began walking further; the water swallowed her up to her waist and she beckoned me to follow. I floated on my back, resting in the bedsheets of water as she grasped my wrists, locking our arms together. I watched the moon move, round in its cycle through the sky. I laid in the water for hours, I knew. And nothing happened. The chants had been replaced with the splashing of water; all else was silent.
My mother looked up at the sky. The moon silhouetted her face and she opened her mouth, her head leaning back, and swallowed the moon whole. It continued on its path straight into her mouth, as if this was its destination all along. She closed her mouth and the night become dark. Her eyes seemed illuminated and she looked tempestuous.
I began to bleed.
Though I dared not look, I pictured the pulpy matter flowing downstream, giving life to the river, thousands of tiny red snakes swimming from between my legs and swirling around rocks before they disappeared under the small waves of the river.
The sounds of my blood leaving my body were too much for me, and I made noises to cover them. Familiar. sssser-pent-sssser-pent-sssser-pent-sssser-pent. Faster. ssser-pent-ssser-pent-sser-pent-sser-pent. Further. ser-pent-ser-pent-ser-pent-ser-pent. Failure. er-pent-er-pent-re-pent-re-pent.
My mother let go of my hands.
My fertility turned the water to wine, deeply crimson, yet flowing more freely than blood alone. I wondered about the moon, if it was letting go of eggs that night, for it had been swollen and seemed ready to burst.
The chants have filled my nights ever since.
But I have not been separated from my brothers. Apart from their dark incantations, I have not been singled out. We run and play together; although I am growing breasts, the ritual has not served to keep me isolated from the men.
It was not Cain whom I first became close to. As far as anyone could tell he was my least favorite. I never spoke to him.
But you already know this story. You do not need to read these words. They are only signs which will direct you to the place in your mind where this story already sits. There are infinite paths to get there, and these signs may be misleading, crumbling under the weight of time before becoming paths themselves. They may lean crooked, pointing in ambiguous directions, so you may want to stop reading and find another, more direct, reliable way. Or you could continue.
It is true they call me a virgin,[1] but you may be misled. They may also call me a whore, though they would be further off. Both concern my first conversation with Cain.
“You’re too close to the trees.” Calling across a field one day when no one else was around.
“I happen to like them.” I did not look in his direction, but continued on my path.
He detached himself from the tree he leaned on. I did not lean on a tree.
“You are missing out.” The words were thrust angrily in my direction.
“Perhaps you are as well.” Mine pumped back, my head barely in his direction.
“You are like me.” Sharp. I did not wince. My legs quivered with tension.
“Mistaken again.” He did wince; I had pounded him.
“You are bold.” He prodded. I could feel the grass begin to sweat dew.
“I know more.” Firmly; yet I bared more than I wished to. His skin was hard to peel. Mine would be as well.
“You are not alone.” It was a caress.
We were locked.
Indeed, nothing was taken. Through childbirth and old age. So, it is true that I am a virgin.
In later years words such as mine would turn an arc to ash. That was the power of my voice. It is hard to comprehend that the apple gave the ability to recognize, and not always understanding. They called me Na’amah then. You see that they did not understand; though they were able to see the truth and rejected that ability, opting to know lies. That was the true fall. They shrieked my name into air that swelled with the sound. It soon burst, sending the residue of those screams into new places. But I am now Norea, and I use the air for my own purposes, making it hum with my voice. You have the ability to understand.
Yes, I have heard the stories about my mother. But you can only trust stories so far. There is no way to judge how true they are, even when they begin to happen to you.
It was the first time I had seen Samael. But I knew immediately that the figure standing before me was it. I had heard descriptions of it from my brothers. It had a full mane of white, which grew almost as low as its sagging, wrinkled breasts. In some ways, it had the look of a tortoise, which at any age seems old because of its redundant folds of skin. It was so pale as to be translucent and glowing. I did not know if I should be afraid.
It stepped. I stopped. It was not with its eyes that it saw. Energy radiated from them; they took nothing in. This was a form it took on for me, only so that I could see it. There was a certain awe evoked in this form, for though it looked disgusting, it shone even in the daylight.
Turn your head.
It stepped. I wept at the pleasurable cruelty of its image. Again and it was closer. I was rock, and shivering.
It began to speak… “Your mother came to us.” Pricking my ears.
“You must render service to us, like your mother Eve; for I have been given dominion over you.” My lower jaw forced itself upon my top teeth.
Its spell on my eyes broke. “You are accursed. I am not your descendant. You do not know my mother.”
It jumped for me, springing; its breasts hung onto my own.
A scream broke out of my chest. Samael was gone.
I am the virgin whom the forces did not defile.
“Who are you to be demanding the help of God?” Its skin was simultaneously the whitest and the most natural looking skin I had ever seen. It hovered above me, great golden wings of fabric and wood flapping at its back.
“Who are you?” The response surprised even me, for far from supposing I would reply to it, I was mesmerized. It looked strangely similar to the blind Samael, and yet it was beautiful, seemingly on fire.
“I am understanding. I am knowledge. I am apples. I am olives. I am a blazing shrub. You already know me. You did not need to call for my help.”
“Eleleth.”
“That is my name.”
My head lowered.
“Tell me about the genesis of that creature.”
It began.[2]
In the beginning, the shadow of wisdom created the world. Wisdom alone can make no whole world. It was an aborted fetus. It could not breathe on its own, and wisdom only goes so far in inspiring life. The world was abandoned.
A mold began to grow in the shadow of wisdom, surrounded by only darkness and water. In the beginning, there was chaos.
The mold cried into the night, trying to prove that it alone existed.
But a voice answered, sweetly inspiring terror. “Samael, you are blind. Wisdom is incorruptible, and you only last as long as words.”
The mold still grew. Grew a mane. Grew a mind. Grew a voice. Grew.
It was this voice that gave it power. The mold molded the world with its words. Its speech parted waters, holding them back. Its tongue cut rivers and licked land upward into mountain ranges. It uttered birds into being. With only its voice, the mold brought Jealousy, Wrath, Pain, Bitterness, Suffering, Lust, and Lamentation into being; it now had offspring. The mold called it creation.
It was a universe made of shadows. There was nothing that the mold did not touch.
A light fell from the sky. A purple puddle nearby reflected images of God into the sky. Samael saw. It was more striking than anything the mold could have called into being. Indeed, the image in the water was more powerful than the mold.
Naturally, the mold was entranced by the power. As it watched, the image faded, leaving light on the ground and speckles light in the sky. The world was no longer shadow. The mold yearned to bask in the light of God again.
A plan grew from the mold.
“You understand what is happening?” Eleleth, in flames.
“Samael is born. It constructed this world with its words.”
“It is not alone in this [power][3].”
It continued.
The mold formed a mound of clay with its voice, a heap which was in the image of light in a puddle, a human. This clay was male, bait for incorruptibility. The man would fool God. The mold intended to have God for itself, to lay hold of incorruptibility; to always soak in the greatness.
The mold breathed its breath into the nostrils of the clay, giving the man a soul, allowing movement. The soil of the human became different than the soil of the earth, transformed, but only in its function
It would have been an unfortunate sight to us. Knowing that humans were destined to be animated, the form of a human lying on the ground would have been disturbing. But mold does not have foreknowledge, and this mold was proud of its workmanship.
Fortunately for us, the Wisdom of Life, Sophia Zoe, did know the fate of humankind, and took pity on the small man writhing on the earth. Without this spirit, he could not stand. Soul is not enough. Sophia Zoe had anticipated the creation of man. It was the will of God, and so she knew.
Sophia Zoe had created her own human, in the likeness of Incorruptibility. The Spirit let a droplet of light fall from the sky, creating the body of the new human being, a body saturated with Spirit. It had waves in its form, which gently rose and fell as if they were the first melodies. Droplets are androgynous, and the human still needed to attract the human of Samael. Sophia Zoe sculpted femininity. It took twelve months.
The first virgin had arrived.
Rain began to fall, tiny stars reflecting the chaos which Samael had tried to tame. The rain burned red with the breath of seven-headed dragons contained in each drop. A small trickle for all of eternity would soon loosen the binds holding the moisture from the land. Creation had only begun.
The humans landed plop in a garden, a mess of uncharacteristically sultry vinestreesgrassleaves. Crooked vines and banyan roots hung down on all sides of them, lightning striking the ground. The light was just right then, at dusk, to stab the canopy with a flaming sword of sunshine, orange and opening, pricking a gurgle of water.
The first thing the breasted-human saw was herself. In a puddle which mirrored the image of God, she gazed at the moving figure in the ripples. The figure had a sharp jaw-line, and shoulders which blocked other sights from being echoed in the water. She felt her own shoulders, which were round and pliable and pinched her full cheeks. The reflection mimicked her movements, but reflections can only show so much.
A form like her reflection made the sound of earth against earth and caught the female’s attention. She strolled closer.
“Arise, Adam,” she encouraged the dirt. Her words became life. The first creation was complete.
They were able to look each other in the eye.
“You shall be called Eve. For it is you who have given me life. It is you who is my mother. It is you who have given birth.”
The forms had uttered their first words. Both speeches which became truths.
But the next words Eve spoke were not her own. She became filled with sounding, roars bellowing from her pores, eyes flooding with the water of her insides, palms radiating fiery rays, mouth opened as if her head were on hinges. No mouth could open wide enough for these words:
“It is I who am the part of my mother;
And it is I who am the mother;
It is I who am the wife;
It is I who am the virgin;
It is I who am pregnant;
It is I who is the midwife;
It is I who am the one that comforts pain of travail;
It is my husband who bore me;
And it is I who am his mother,
And it is he who is my father and my lord.
Yet I have born a man as lord.”
Well, words of truth are few and far between and the space between myths and realities can easily be filled with speech.
Samael felt the love of his new creation float in a different direction. Its aroma no longer found those feline nostrils, and with that perfume out of the mind of the mold, it recalled its original intention.
Samael had never captured Incorruptibility. Instead, it had on its hands an unruly creature, who moved by his own accord and mingled with this spirit-endowed woman, who carried a resemblance of the face Samael was originally trying to have.
Samael craved her.
This female would do, Samael thought.
Embers trickled from the sky, singing the land to sleep. As the earth slept, so did Adam, conceiving erased dreams and empty visions.
The mold crept toward the woman. The Spirit leapt from the woman. She laughed. A hysterical laugh, set free from her throat, expectorated.
The female body continued to run and the Spirit sunk her toes into the ground, grasping the soil with them. With her arms and hair she grabbed hold on the sky and fixed her torso firmly. Samael reached them just in time to see leaves and fruit explode from the Spirit’s skin.
Eve continued to run. The mold surrounded her and came upon her body and into her mouth. Samael defiled her speech, and she became the prophet to whom no one would listen. Her breasts and the point beneath her belly became untrustworthy. They began to grow in preparation. The offspring of mold squirmed inside her.
Samael awoke Adam with his words.
“It is not good that you should be alone, Adam. I have made for you a helper.”
Eve was brought in front of Adam, and after his cloudy fantasies, she was new and unfamiliar.
“I have formed her from your rib, so that you know she belongs to you.”
Adam was delighted. His eyebrows migrated quickly up his forehead and his eyes widened.
“But you may have her only if you follow my command.” Samael paused. “From every tree in this garden shall you eat; yet — from the tree of recognizing good and evil do not eat, nor touch it; for the day you eat from it, with death you are going to die.” The mold pointed toward the biggest tree, which stood in the middle of the garden. It seemed to grasp heaven and it moved as other trees did not.
It was a fair trade.
A snake flowed up the trunk of the tree, which pulsated. The tree and the snake melded so that they were both filled with the Spirit. The serpent swayed towards her mission.
The subtlest creature did not have to wander far to find Eve. The woman came toward the tree and was not alone. The snake slid toward Eve, leaving ridges in sand. She twisted up the woman’s leg, winding around the ankle, calf, and thigh before resting her head on Eve’s belly.
“What did Samael say to you?” The fork of the creature’s tongue flicked.
“He said, ‘You shall not eat of the fruit of the tree that is in the middle of the garden, nor shall you touch it or you shall die.’ ”
Her diamond head crawled further up the swollen belly to Eve’s breasts.
The snake whispered. “You will not die. Samael knows that you will become like gods, understanding the difference between good and evil. Indeed, the mold did not want you to surpass it in power. You must eat.”
Already once having understanding, Eve ate.
She turned to Adam and handed him the fruit as well. He ate.
The Spirit left the snake, which fell from Eve’s body, and returned to the tree. God’s will be done.
Samael forced the humans away from the tree, condemning them to a life occupied with survival, leaving no room for understanding, though the ability had been won.
Eve, who soon became your mother, started to grow. She was aware of the swelling of her body. She put a stick between her legs and struck herself. But Abel was still born. Cain came next, so shortly after. But you, Norea, and Seth, were not born of defilement. This is why you have escaped Samael.
“So now you know.”
I left the flaming angel.
I found her near a tree. It seemed she could not get enough of it.
“I know that you know.” She looked up at me.
It was the first time I ever heard my mother spoke.
“Would you make the same choice?” I asked her.
“Yes.”
“But the stories they tell. . .”
“I knew the consequences.” My mother’s eyes grew wide. “Of course, I already knew. I knew that eating the fruit would make the two of us unable to meld together, rib between rib and become one. But becoming closer to God, Norea. It would have been a fall to choose to be the only people who lived. There is no understanding of God without sharing suffering. The Archons did not realize it, but their punishment has made us able to know again.”
“I would have made the same decision.” It was a soft flutter of my lips, a group of bubbles floating into the air and finally disappearing.
“It is just as well,” she told me. “Better for you to be unlike your brothers. I have had dreams of others like you and Seth. Though they come from humankind, they are born without the mark of semen, without the sin of primality, conceived in pure life. They will come from virgins and point their fingers to the moon of God. As with you. They are our children.”
“What good is this fruit? I do not understand the difference between good and evil.” I played the devil’s advocate.
“You understand that there is none.”
[1] Translator’s note: The meaning of the word used here has no English equivalent. It seems to signify purity, though, unlike the English word here, it also signifies activity.
[2] Translator’s Note: The Coptic manuscript here recounts the story of Adam and Eve. Though the reader undoubtedly is already familiar with this well-known story, I will repeat it here for the sake of remaining true to the text.
[3] Translator’s Note: The meaning of the word used here in the Coptic text is unknown.
She floated on her back in the water, looking up at the stars. Her arms and legs flowed in waves that kept her afloat. All around her, the phosphorescence of a summer’s night twinkled in the sea. They left stars on her knees, her breasts, her hips and her toes. A tiny star rested on the crown of her head. With the sky as her full range of vision and weightless in the water, there was no up or down, no north or south and she spun.
Nymphs, goddesses, apsaras, maenads! It’s May. There’s a fresh exhilaration in the air. Mother’s Day is coming up. I have been incredibly inspired by all those bloggers who did the A-Z blogging challenge in April. These things all fit together nicely in a little challenge that I am setting for myself. This month, I am endeavoring to write about 26 strong, creative women from mythology. So, the goal is to write 26 short stories, one based on a female mythological figure for each letter of the alphabet. Feel free to join me, or to set your own goal for this month. New growth and new beginnings are in the air!
As the final rays of the day tuck themselves in behind clouds and hills, I reach the well. The very sight of the clearing tugs at something inside me. I finger the stones, making them melt and turn to sand, as if they were an old lover who’d been waiting for my touch.
It’s a wet kind of cold, the kind that still allows things to grow. The cloudy sky and diffused light makes the green of the plants more striking and they glisten with the drops of rain. Actually, the rain doesn’t quite drop. The air is so thick with water that it falls in a mist, mot even heavy enough to be a drizzle. It makes me feel like I am walking through a long, white cloud, as if I am so far above the earth that I am inside the sky. Only the moss reminds me that I am at sea level.