I don't like your paradise

2024 Author: Seth Attwood | [email protected]. Last modified: 2023-12-16 15:55

- I have seen for a long time: you, a kind person, teach. You know, apparently, a lot. Tell me: there, do you think that we have? - and Chamota pointed up.

“There dwells the only Lord God the Almighty, whom I confess, there is his army, there is paradise, in paradise the souls of the righteous,” answered Demetrius.

- Whose land is this? Chamota asked again, making a circle with his hand.

“The land is yours,” was the answer.

“So the firmament above our land is ours,” Chamota said the obvious truth to him. “Your god has nothing to do in our firmament. You, the Romans, have your own firmament above your head. We have ours. We are not part of your unit.

Sacred heat seized Demetrius.

“I, an unworthy presbyter of the true church, tell you,” he began sternly, “God is love, God is good, bringing the world. He is the creator of everything and the father of people, who created them in his own image and likeness. He is the father, spirit and son of the holy, consubstantial trinity, pre-existent, having neither beginning nor end. Our only faith is true, it was given to us by the son of God himself in the gospels of the holy apostles. He who has accepted the true faith is saved in this life, and in another he will be in paradise with God. The one who rejects the true faith will go to hell.

Attracted by Chamota, the Russians approached: some stopped behind a circle, others squeezed closer, pushing the front ones. Demetrius saw that his time had come. But Satan is strong, he obscures the ear of the sinner, and the word of truth is boring to coarse minds. In his mind, Demetrius asked God for help.

- Tell me, what is this paradise? Chamot asked.

- Paradise is a place in the heavenly firmament, where believers are in eternal bliss, without worries and burdens, without regrets, without grief … - Demetrius tried to give a picture of paradise in a simpler and more tempting way. - In paradise, they sing praises to God, being at ease, without temptations, without labor.

- Tell about hell! We don't even have a word like that.

- That wicked place underground, the kingdom of Satan in eternal darkness. There, devils torment the souls of sinners who did not know the true sulfur without rest, bake them in an unquenchable fire, boil them in tar, torment them with hooks … - wishing to amaze the imagination of the simple-minded Slavs, Demetrius listed the terrible and disgusting tortures taken in Rome and Byzantium.

“You said,” Chamotha began, waiting for the end of a long list of torments, “if I accept your faith, your god will take me to heaven?

- Yes. Be baptized and you are saved.

- And those? Chamota pointed to the sky.

- Who? - Demetrius did not understand.

- Navi. Our fathers and grandfathers, - explained the prince-foreman. - They are in our firmament.

“You are wrong,” objected Demetrius, “they are not in heaven with the righteous, they are there,” he pointed to the earth, “they burn in hell. They will burn forever. - Reading the alarm on their faces, Demetrius persuaded with force: - Hurry to turn to the god of truth, all hurry. Nobody knows their time, hurry up! God Himself speaks to you through my medium, otherwise hell, fire, fire!

- Well! Chamota stood up and stretched. - I do not like your paradise. Sit and sit with your hands folded … One day longing will suck your heart like a worm! Yes, even boast to your god to shout, praise him. This is not a man's business. How are we? Here, a young, foolish person, having met the old prince, will bow to him and - will be. No, and that man is bad, and that God is worthless, if he loves to listen to praise and to amuse himself with boast, like an unfulfilled boar stuffs his belly with acorns beyond measure. Ugh! Such a god is suitable for slaves. We're free people. And I shouldn't tear myself away from our Navi. This is not the way we do - to leave a comrade, to leave the squad. Eh, you!.. - Chamota spat a second time and continued: - You're not young. Think about it, teach you what! Not! You said yourself, everyone heard that our navis are sitting in hell. Chamota made no secret of his sneer. - And I - there too. I will be bored without my friends. I'm not afraid of your fire. Not a single Rossich can escape the funeral pyre. And - okay it will be for us.

Having finished the matter, Chamota left. Dispersed, without hesitation, and the rest. Left alone, Demetrius remorsefully struck himself in the chest once, twice. Romey deliberately wounded the body with the sharp edges of the cross. He whispered:

- My guilt, oh my God, my great guilt, I have forgotten the Holy Scripture, that lies are for salvation, that one must be meek as a sheep, wise as a snake.

Blood oozed from deep abrasions under the tunic. There is no place for solitude, otherwise Demetrius would have punished himself with a whip, whose triple tail immediately cuts through the skin. May God forgive him for the unintentional sin of the temptation of the pagans.

Valentin Ivanov, Primordial Russia. Volume 1, fragment

The entire film can be viewed here: Primordial Russia