Seven Veils of Seth (2 page)

Augustine,
City of God
, 15:15

*

Since God is the highest good, He would not allow any evil to exist in His works, unless His omnipotence and goodness were such as to bring good even out of evil.

Augustine,
Enchiridion
, XI

*

This is part of the infinite goodness of God, that He should allow evil to exist, and out of it produce good.
Thomas Aquinas,
Summa Theologica
, Q. 2, Art. 3, Reply Objection 1

*

I declare that I know not which is preferable – a disadvantage which proves to be a benefit, or an advantage which proves to be a hindrance.

Michelangelo, [“To Pope Clement VII in Rome,” January 1524]
The Letters of Michelangelo
¹

The shadowy figures of travelers, who might bring either rain or harm to the community, always seemed portentous. So they consulted the diviner about the newcomer's intentions, even before concern spread through the oasis, but the diviner – in a way typical of this miserable fraternity who are unable to satisfy people's curiosity, even though people cannot dispense with them – merely sparked more curiosity with his murky sayings, which resembled riddles and puzzles.

The inhabitants of the oasis would not have been skeptical about the stranger's doings, had he not aroused their suspicions with his conduct, for normally they hastened to welcome visitors and to shower them with displays of generosity, commencing with the slaughter of livestock, continuing with evening festivities, and concluding by shackling them with marriage to their daughters. They had attempted to employ the same ruses with this suspect wayfarer. Eventually they dispatched the fool, in the hope of obtaining a reading on the situation, since they had adopted the ancient tradition of utilizing a fool as their trusted messenger. They were convinced that strangers are by nature mysterious, secretive individuals, who conceal more than they reveal. Otherwise, they would never have set out across the deserts and would never have chosen to join the ranks of foreigners. Whenever their fools failed, they sent a sage. If he failed as well, they dispatched to the cunning fellow the scion of all the cunning of the oasis and perhaps of the entire desert: the diviner.

The stranger outwitted the entire string of investigators this time, however, thus increasing the apprehensions of the people and the anxieties of the elders. When the nobles consulted the diviner, he volunteered a cryptic statement of the sort that diviners favor: “Each day I grow ever more certain that not for no reason at all does a man travel great distances to seek what a mirage conceals.” Then Elelli added a clearer summary of the encounter: “There's more here than meets the eye; so, beware!” The fool Edahi said what no one else did, although his remark disgusted both the elders and the common folk: “I'll tell you the truth. The best thing you can do is to kill him tonight.”

He found the spring at the southwestern edge of the oasis. Shocked by the sight of the abundant water, which was ringed round with rude, earthen dikes, he slipped out of his clothes, pulled off his veil, and – without even meaning to – threw himself into the tempting pool. With his hands and feet he created a turbulence that disturbed the stillness of the water and the silence of the grove, which was surrounded by lofty palm trees interspersed with unfamiliar shrubs. From the fields wafted some unseen fruit's mysterious scent, which tickled his nostrils, although he could not identify it.

The water on his skin felt delightful: cool, soft, and as smooth as a beautiful woman's body. He ducked his head, and the flood covered him completely. The heavenly spring rocked him; he enjoyed submersion in the water and succumbed to the intoxication. When he thrust his head up suddenly from the depths to gasp for air, he heard a confidential whispering. He listened carefully for a moment, but silence returned, blanketing the whole area. After inhaling greedily, he found himself repeating involuntarily: “How delightful! Why haven't the idiotic wise men of the desert ever told us that water's embrace is more delightful than women's?”

He was starting to submerge once more when the whispering started again. He discerned a feminine timbre to it. He listened for a time, but the voices fell silent and stillness prevailed, interrupted only by the cooing of a dove and the chirring of grasshoppers. He disappeared again, surrendering to the mysterious deeps, as vague insights were awakened in his consciousness. From the body of water he received a forgotten message. He strove to crack the talisman protecting it, but this was difficult. He struggled and did not give up. He almost succeeded, for consciousness' smoldering coal flared up so that darkness was dispersed and existence was convulsed by a prophecy, but a commotion spoiled everything. He shot to the surface to find a row of beauties above him. He was unsure whether they were human beauties or beautiful jinn. They traded jests with a boldness unknown among the women of the desert and winked at one another with a coquettishness in which virginal bashfulness was not totally overshadowed by traces of the seduction of wanton hussies or even of the temptation of the women singers of whose audacity visitors from distant lands had provided him legendary accounts. They were haughty and uncannily similar in physique and height, and perhaps even in rank. They had beautiful faces, fair complexions, and large black eyes – like gazelles' – that sparkled with promise, seduction, and passion. They wore wraps that concealed their towering bodies but revealed the contours of their full, curvaceous rumps. So he decided to jest: “Do I see female jinn or beautiful women?”

They all laughed again, and their bodies swayed back and forth, as if dancing at a celebration of the full moon. They so dazzled his eyes that he whispered some advice to himself: “Had no beautiful woman ever entered the desert, it would have been preferable to put your head under the water and keep it there forever.”

One of them, in a lilting voice, asked, “Why do you doubt we're human?”

Without any hesitation he answered, as he plowed through the water, “Your beauty!”

They echoed in unison, “Beauty?”

Even so, he replied with the wiles of a man well acquainted with women, “Not merely your beauty, but your similarity. You resemble each other like female jinn.”

“Like female jinn?”

They laughed merrily, and then the woman with the seductive voice suggested, “You speak about the female jinn as if you belonged to that nation.”

“I'm not a jinni, but my first wife was one.”

They cried out with genuine curiosity, “Really?”

Then they started laughing again as they leaned their alluring figures over the bank of the spring. One of them requested, “Tell us about the female jinn. What are they like?”

In her eyes he saw a seductive look that no man experienced with women could have missed. He asked, “Do you mean in bed?”

They all laughed with genuine gaiety and for the first time blushed in embarrassment. So he decided to push the game one step further: “I've never found anyone to equal them in bed. They're like blazing fire.”

The area resounded with their boisterous, flirtatious laughter, which no longer hid its bashfulness or seduction. He observed then that they were a covey of six beauties, each so comparable in allure and stature that it was hard to tell them apart. He seized the opportunity afforded by their mirth to ask, “Are you sisters?”

More than one responded, “Of course not!”

“As you know, I'm a stranger in this settlement, and the stranger is always entitled to consideration from the resident.”

“Speak!”

“I want to hear you sing at an evening party.”

One replied, “We're singers by profession. What good would we be if we didn't sing for men?”

He added mischievously, “A belle is only beautiful if she recites poetry. A belle is only beautiful if she slips into the bedchamber.”

Some laughed but others said, “It's not right for a man who has just made shocking remarks to ask women to sing.”

“Shocking?”

“Didn't you say – moments ago – that water's embrace is more delightful than a beautiful woman's?”

He disappeared into the water to seek prophetic inspiration to deliver him from this crisis. Then he said, “That was the tongue of the desert dweller speaking, not mine.”

“The desert dweller's tongue?”

“Thirst's tongue.”

“Thirst's tongue?”

“A person who has never known the fire of the desert doesn't understand the meaning of water; so forgive me.”

The woman with the seductive voice said, “Before you obtain our forgiveness, I have a piece of advice for you.”

“I'm all ears.”

“Never insult a woman, not even in private.”

“You're right!”

“Do you know why?”

“I'm all ears.”

“Just as the birds carry seditious talk to a leader, the air is charged with carrying insults to a woman.”

“Are you a diviner?”

“Every woman is a diviner. A woman is instinctively a diviner.”

“You're right, so right. I swear I'll have to figure out how to repay you for this counsel, because advice is more precious than a pot of gold. That's true even if it's from the mouth of a fool; so, what then if it's from the tongue of a beautiful woman?”

“Are you a poet?”

“Everyone in the desert is a poet; why ask?”

“Because the only appropriate recompense for a woman is praise in verses that tribes broadcast and that subsequent generations repeat. Similarly, there is no punishment for a woman more harmful than mocking her in an ode that's repeated by every tongue and enjoyed by the tribes.”

He responded admiringly, “You're right, so right.”

The woman with the seductive voice approached him and introduced herself: “I'm Tafarat.”

She stepped back so her companion could introduce herself: “My name's Temarit.”

She stepped aside so her neighbor could present herself: “My name's Tamanokalt.”

She drew back so the woman next to her could introduce herself: “My name is Tahala.”

She stepped back so her neighbor could come forward: “My name's Tamuli.”

She stepped back so her friend could introduce herself: “My name is Taddikat.”

Silence prevailed. The dove stopped its cooing and the grasshoppers quieted their refrain. Then the stranger said, “My name is Isan!”

More than one of the covey exclaimed: “Isan! What a name!”

Then the proud beauty who had given her name as Temarit moved forward to say, “May I give you another piece of advice?”

When he nodded his bare head, she declared, “Be careful never to expose your head in a woman's presence again.”

He was quick to defend himself: “I thought it shameful for a man to remove his veil in the desert, but not in the water.”

Temarit stepped back while Tamanokalt moved forward to elucidate the saying's secret meaning: “If men realized how repulsive their faces are, they would never take their veils off.”

“What?”

“Their faces resemble camels'.”

“Camel faces?”

She stepped back so Tahala could add: “And their ears resemble donkeys'.”

“Donkey ears?”

She retreated, and Tamuli stepped forward to continue: “And their noses are birds' beaks.”

“Birds' beaks?”

She withdrew, and Tafarat presented herself to sum up: “Aren't camel faces, donkey ears, and bird beaks a handicap for you?”

Initially upset, he responded, “A handicap . . . a great handicap.”

“Avoid letting a woman see you without your veil, because she will despise you even if you fashion a palace for her in your heart and have enough children by her to populate the desert.”

Silence reigned again. They fetched their jugs to fill with water from the spring. First Tamuli bent over the pool. A black plait of her hair escaped from her wrap's confinement to swing seductively through the air. In fact, it fell into the water. He crept toward her, as if to help fill the jug, but instead seized the braid in his hands, clasping it between his palms. A daring strategist well acquainted with women, he squeezed it till water sprayed out. He closed his fingers around it and affectionately fondled it. Then he leaned down to kiss it, inhaling its fragrance. Closing his eyes he said, as though to himself, “I never dreamt there were retem blossoms in the oases.”

In a whisper like the rustling of northern breezes caressing the plumes of the retem bushes, she replied: “In the oases, there are flowers more fragrant than retem blossoms.”

“You are a jinni!”

Whispering once more, she told him, “A man's favorite perfume is a woman's scent, not a retem's.”

He clung to the plait and pressed it against his damp chest with an audacity ill-becoming a visitor who had only just entered an alien sanctuary. He had a strong incentive, however, for the inaccessible mystery guiding his steps granted him a prophetic insight that women tend to be animated and spontaneous with strangers but cautious and inhibited around kinsmen. Thus, he acted spontaneously, since he was certain the young women's temperaments would not shine forth unless his did. Generally speaking, women are like dolls that are animated only when we manipulate them, when we show them how, for woman is a paste more malleable in a man's hands than dough. He can transform her into a nun or an artiste, perhaps because her spirit is contained within man's spirit. For this reason, no woman is corrupt unless a man corrupts her, and no woman is virtuous, unless a man has rendered her so.

She bent over him, inundating him with her perfume, her genuine perfume, the fragrance of a woman – not that of retem blossoms – a fragrance that fells a man rather than anesthetizes him. This perfume, which turns some men into heroes and others into villains, can perfect life or lead to insanity. It can create life or extinguish it. This is the feminine scent. A beautiful woman's fragrance is life-saving when she wishes and fatal when she so decrees. It can animate dead bones if she chooses to offer herself, but slays the entire world if she decides to withhold herself.