Jerusalem Commands

You have the press, the politicians and manners of a people who have lost their self-respect - you have everything you deserve. And unless you remember how to follow your best instincts you will never again find that self-respect.

I once asked the Bishop if he thought it was possible for a white man genuinely to love a black man like a brother and he said he thought it might prove an illusion in the end, because of the social pressures. Other church people have not been able to answer this question. Race is not everything, I think. After all, I owe my life to a Jew in Arcadia. It was not he who put a piece of metal in my womb, nor sowed that dreadful seed in me, nor libelled me, nor humiliated me, nor betrayed me. I am not antiSemite, I tell them, I am merely antisceptic. But they never understand these plays on words. The arts of irony and innuendo are lost to those who abuse the freedoms of democracy. Mrs Cornelius thinks I am too broad-minded for my own good but that is the way I was born, I said. What can I do? Wie lange wird es dauern? ‘I’ll get my reward in Heaven,’ I tell her. Da ma yekhessanash . . .

‘And I’ll be right beside yer, Ivan,’ she says. I used to think her mysterious laughter, which had little to do with what she said, a sign of her senility but now I think it has something to do with anxiety. I tell her she should see a doctor. NO! This is not God! NO! She lies to me. She lies to me. They must not hurt me not hurt me so. God made me promise. I did not do those things. Those things make me sick. It is not fair. I am justice and of the Just but I denied my birthright and God cursed me with blindness. I denied my people and God cursed me with the gift of lies. I would not listen to my father and God ordained that I should believe only untruths. For it is written that God shall make such just punishment upon any of the Just that shall err from his purpose. I am the lamb and the blood is my blood. He loved me in Odessa. He put a piece of metal in my womb. I have done what is unclean and I have repented. Anubis is my friend. Dieser letzte weiche Kuss, Esmé. Es war ein Schlag in den Unterleib. Ich kann noch immer die Stelle spiiren. Ein Reitgerte hebt sich und saust herab. Sie ist von jener grausamen Flut aus Asche mitgerissen worden. Sie ist ein Gespenst. Ein kinemaqueen.

How could we resist them?