The First Treachery — Soulwrights

“Let Us make Man in Our own image!” He pronounced.
The angels gasped, the whole host of them, and for the first time in the entirety of their existence… they faltered and hesitated to do His bidding. It would become the only day of its kind in the course of our shared history.

“Blessed be Your Name, Lord God Almighty, King of the Universe. May Nothing impede Your will, You Who knows all things and is Himself the Spring of all beauty and the only Font of goodness. Would that Your Grace be longsuffering with us as we presume to ask:
Will not Man, endowed with the sentience of our spirits and the autonomy of his own flesh, become a god unto himself?”

“For that,” Adonai responded, “I have placed eternity in their hearts. Ever will mankind yearn for Our holy habitation. From bones to soul the gravity of infinity will beckon unto them. They cannot help but to be creatures of both planes.”

“How will we know, O Sovereign of the Cosmos, that Man has chosen to walk in Your ways and not his own counsel?” the angels inquired.

“So that their hearts are plainly manifest,” said Adonai, “I have placed before them the Two Trees… and the One Choice.”

“Gardener of Galaxies!” the angels exclaimed. “Far be it from Man to have the agency to refuse You!”

“In that eventuality,” Adonai inclined, “I have made them to become mortal apart from Us. Their fear of the shadow of death will remind them of the Source of all life, that they may always return, however far they may wander.”

“O Singer of Stars, having become mortal, will not Man then be turned toward murder in that shame?” At this, the angels began murmuring within their ranks.

“Against that impulse,” deigned Adonai, “I have fashioned in them the desire to flourish. They will be fruitful and they will multiply greatly. Their desire for life will always outstrip their designs for death.”

“Your Name be praised, Great Whisperer of Worlds. Capable of reproduction, will not Man be prone to violate his others in those passions, going where he should not go, laying where he should not lay, taking what he should not take?” the angels worried.

“My Soul detests the very thought,” Adonai groaned. “Nevertheless, they must be free to rend if they would be truly free to restore. However, I have given them children as little ones born in hope, even if conceived in violence, so that every babe brings with it the fragrance of our own Heaven, in order that the world retains its primeval memories, to the ends of their days.”

“Father of all Creation, will not Man, having children of their own, forget about Your works and think that they were born only from themselves?” the angels wondered.

“To aid them in their frailties, for they are but dust,” Adonai reminded, “I have given them my manifold revelation – the breath of My Ordinances, the breath of My Spirit, and the breath of My Word.”

“God of Wonders, may we beseech Your wisdom once more. What if Man, with all these gifts, granted by You, Who only gives good things, should come to despise not only Your Namesake but even their own souls, so that they would have nothing before them but the dark and doom of annihilation?”

“And unto that end I have already given them Myself, even now, with naught saved in My own keeping. They shall have Me in full, and even I will become subject to My just decrees. Any evil that has ever been worked upon them will be exacted from Me, in the flesh. It has already come to pass, so that the ache of My remorse howls in every wind where there are wings, as My anguish flashes in every sky where there are eyes.

“Behold! I am the Firstborn of All Conceptions and the Ultimate End of All Machinations. I am the Lamb that has been slain, before the foundations of the world. Against any evil wrought in the establishment of these heavens, I offer Myself as recompense first and restoration last. Their skin shall become Mine; My blood will become theirs. As man and woman are rejoined back to themselves, so all Creation will be reunited back unto Me. Now, let everything that has breath – praise the Lord!”

In an instant, with joy and ecstasy abounding, all angelkind erupted in praise, as has always been their wont, in a single, triumphant hymn that would last for aeons. They sing that same song still to this day. Nevertheless, at times, although they no longer press the Maker to explain Himself, they may be found, regardless, peering in upon our estate in a reverent state of wonder, thunderstruck and undone at the unfathomable depths of His glory.

Well, that much has been true for the angels that remained in His employ, at least. In truth, for all the joy and light that exploded across the cosmic skies that night, there was also darkness that day. Some of the angels never ceased their murmuring, not until it had become full on treason and dissent. For it was then that the dark ones corrupted themselves and sullied their gifts, once ethereal, thereafter sinister. The War of Eternities has been contentious ever since and every soul its own battleground, each individual a microcosm of all realities and phenomena at work in the heavens.

It is a curious thing that an Almighty God would fashion finite creatures such as ourselves to reside right upon the fulcrum of the balance of the fates of the universe. What’s more, that we have been allowed to tip the scales to either end. That He has, to certain extents, permitted us to alter His fate, as well. What sort of Mad Deity would conceive of such a thing… and then actually carry it out?

Let everything that has breath praise the Lord.