{"id":413,"date":"2018-01-07T22:29:32","date_gmt":"2018-01-08T03:29:32","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/theswordoffire.com\/?page_id=413"},"modified":"2018-01-07T23:04:39","modified_gmt":"2018-01-08T04:04:39","slug":"of-men-and-magic","status":"publish","type":"page","link":"https:\/\/theswordoffire.com\/?page_id=413","title":{"rendered":"OF MEN AND MAGIC"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"Outside<\/a><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\u201cOf Men and Magic\u201d An excerpt from chapter 12 of Asulon.
\n(WARNING\u2026SPOILERS!!!)<\/p>\n

.
\n\u201cDo you want to explain to me how you did that?\u201d demanded Moor without preamble.
\n\u201cNot really, I have things to do,\u201d replied Simon. He looked at the paladin standing there silent and immobile. \u201cI suppose that you mean the storm. Would it satisfy you if I said it was just a trick I had picked up over the years?\u201d
\n\u201cNo. Snake charming is a trick, walking barefoot across hot coals is a trick,\u201d said Moor, rising anger in his voice. \u201cMaybe I can accept that what you did in the tavern as some kind of mind trick, perhaps even summoning every rat in Eboracium just when you needed them was also a trick, but calling forth a storm out of a cloudless sky in time to save the giants\u2013no, that was not a trick, that was magic.\u201d
\nHe gave Simon a suspicious look. \u201cJust what kind of priest are you that you can do these things? I have heard of people able to do magic down through the years, but none were actually able to do much when challenged.\u201d
\nSimon shook his head and sighed. \u201cNo, it is not magic. What men call magic is merely a poor imitation of this.\u201d
\n\u201cOh? If it not magic, what then?\u201d
\n\u201cAuthority,\u201d Simon said. \u201cSomething that mankind had over creation as our birthright, but lost when the first man fell and the earth was cursed.\u201d
\n\u201cSo why did you not use this \u2018authority\u2019 of yours earlier?\u201d demanded Moor. \u201cYou could have saved us a good deal of trouble at several points.
\n\u201cI do not have the mantle of authority all the time,\u201d replied the priest, \u201cI do not know ahead of time when I will be able to command the beasts or the elements. The times I may do these things are limited\u2013so that I will not become proud, I suppose.
\n\u201cOnly when the Lord leads my spirit can I command creation, and then only specific things within it. For instance, I have never held command over any man, woman or child, for we are all co-heirs to this authority, though few realize it and fewer still use it.\u201d
\nMoor raised an eyebrow, even more skeptical now that he had Simon\u2019s explanation.
\n\u201cSo that is what happened in the tavern and with the rats and the storm? You used this authority of yours?\u201d
\n\u201cThe rats, yes, and also the storm, but the vision we saw in the tavern surprised me nearly as much as you,\u201d Simon said.
\n\u201cAre you saying that you had no hand in it?\u201d asked Moor.
\nSimon thought for a moment before he spoke. \u201cWhen the guard marshal was questioning you at the tunnel and the Anakim were under attack at Logres, I saw the danger and knew what must be done. In Asulon, I called for any creatures nearby to aid us and, it being Eboracium, rats came. As for the Anakim, fire threatened, so rain came. But the vision in the tavern\u2013that was different. The Lord spoke in my spirit, saying, \u2018Bring the girl to the hearth and support her in prayer.\u2019 I was as surprised as you by what followed. For her part, Rachel told me that the Lord spoke to her and said, \u2018Go to the hearth and sing\u2019. I did not know what would happen, only that the Lord\u2019s hand was at work in it. We are in strange days and stranger days are yet to come.\u201d
\n\u201cAll this still sounds like magic to me,\u201d Moor said.
\n\u201cArgeus told me that you were married once,\u201d said the priest.
\n\u201cYes . . . once. A lifetime ago,\u201d replied Moor.
\n\u201cThen you should understand this analogy. The difference between magic and the authority I use is much like the difference between the wrong and the right times people have sexual relations.\u201d
\n\u201cOh?\u201d Moor said, wondering where the old man was going with this.
\n\u201cAn old man may buy the services of a prostitute, a young man may sleep with a girl he is fond of, though not wed to, or a young couple may come together on their wedding night. All have sexual relations, but it makes a great difference whether the act is under God\u2019s law and therefore protected. The sex act is powerful and, like all powerful things, dangerous. Prostitution is unlawful because it puts you in danger of physical and spiritual infection. God\u2019s law forbids fornication because an act that holds so much power is dangerous outside the safety of the fortress of marriage. The sex act carries the power of binding and, once an unwed couple go their separate ways, their spirits are torn apart and wounded.
\n\u201cMen seek magic much like most of them seek sex, chasing something unlawful or, at least, premature in this age. Those who follow what is commonly called \u2018black magic\u2019 want only raw power and I have no use for them. They use magic to satisfy their lust for power, as a man uses a prostitute to satisfy his physical lust. But I do feel sorrow for those lured into what is mislabeled as \u2018white magic.\u2019 They seek something they know once must have been, but they do so before the time for its return.\u201d
\n\u201cAnd what do they seek?\u201d asked Moor.
\n\u201cA return to Eden,\u201d replied Simon, a note of longing in his voice. \u201cWhat attracts most people to magic is an innate desire in the human heart to regain the world as God first made it, before mankind fell. We instinctively know what we lost and long for its return.
\n\u201cWe all long for a time when we had power over creation and were its caretakers, when we could command the wind and the earth and the waters in a place where death walked not and sickness was unknown, where we could understand the speech of the animals and none would do us harm. That is why children are so fond of magic in their fairy tales, for they know that the world should work that way, even if it does not now. But all of us long for Eden, whether we know that name or not. We seek to satisfy our homesickness for a land we have never seen, but know, as surely as we know our hearts beat and our lungs draw breath, once existed and will exist again.
\n\u201cBut, as I said, that birthright was stolen from us. Those who practice magic, whether they realize it or not, attempt to buy back a portion of that birthright from the very one who stole it. Of course, he will never give up such power willingly, so they receive hollow shams and counterfeits, phantoms of the power man once had. What you see me doing is possible because God has lifted the curse for a moment and given back to me mankind\u2019s birthright for a time. Magic seeks to carve a creature out of stone before the true birth of the living child that will be the new earth reborn and Eden returned. That is the difference between magic and what I do.\u201d
\nMoor stood staring at Simon, silent for a long time.
\n\u201cYou are a strange kind of priest,\u201d said the paladin finally. He opened the cabin door and walked away.
\nAsulon, Book One of The Sword of Fire, is available in ebook, audiobook and paperback formats on Amazon.
\nhttp:\/\/www.amazon.com\/ASULON-SWORD-FIRE-Book-ebook\/dp\/B003YOSEWK<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

  \u201cOf Men and Magic\u201d An excerpt from chapter 12 of Asulon. (WARNING\u2026SPOILERS!!!) . \u201cDo you want to explain to me how you did that?\u201d demanded Moor without preamble. \u201cNot really, I have things to do,\u201d replied Simon. He looked … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"parent":132,"menu_order":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","template":"","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"footnotes":""},"class_list":["post-413","page","type-page","status-publish","hentry"],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/P2mO2S-6F","jetpack-related-posts":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/theswordoffire.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/pages\/413","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/theswordoffire.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/pages"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/theswordoffire.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/page"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/theswordoffire.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/theswordoffire.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=413"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/theswordoffire.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/pages\/413\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":420,"href":"https:\/\/theswordoffire.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/pages\/413\/revisions\/420"}],"up":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/theswordoffire.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/pages\/132"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/theswordoffire.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=413"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}