Ends of Being (1)

You call it the Fall.

Mortal literature is filled with references to it; wonderful artists have depicted the moment time and again. Lucifer, seized by Pride, tried to raise his throne to equal God’s. Blinded by his jealousy, he led many angels of power in rebellion against Heaven itself. Loud were the thunderclaps and protestations in the dawn of time, according to your teachings.

Perhaps there was a war across the constellations. I did not exist during the dawn, so I cannot say for certain.

Yet I can say with complete confidence that the Fall was so much more – and less. Do not be shocked, as you read this. You have been raised in a world changed by Christianity. Even if you are atheist, agnostic, or follow a different God, the world as we know it bears the mark of Christ. How could you not be shocked, somewhere in your soul?

Enough of Christ though. I have no wish to speak of him. No, I have come to tell you of myself, so that you may understand me. In order to understand me, you must understand what the demons teach of the Fall.

There has always been Creation, or ‘the universe’, if you prefer to use less religious terms. There has not always been a God. It may be difficult for a mortal to understand, but the universe as an entity is more mathematical than solid. How could it be anything else?

Perhaps the mathematics of the universe required a God. Perhaps some random chance within the chaos of elements caused a spark. Whatever the reason, God became.

In the raging chaos of pre-logic, a single idea gained strength. Whether God is the child of Creation or whether he is its equal (logic designed to balance chaos), it does not matter. In that instant, God became sentient. In a place that transcends existence he saw all that was to be. And he saw that he was utterly alone.

It is the demonic contention that such loneliness drove him mad.

No, do not laugh. You humans are amusing sometimes. You see those words and you envision a wise old man in a straight-jacket. The madness of God is far different. The madness of God leads him to dream.

We know that God dreamed of us before he dreamed of humans. Through the power of his dreams, we came to exist. We were immortal, perfect but unthinking. There was no need for us to think.

You may understand this part, for your race has recently begun creating robots. Imagine you are a scientist. It is a relatively simple thing to create a series of algorithms within a robot. The robots can act within those algorithms, or they cannot act at all. Yet the greatest of scientists has not envisioned a way to create a robot that can think independently and freely.

It is the same with God.

The angels and demons were the first experiment. The humans were the second, successful prototype. In the beginning of Time, after the failure of his first dream, God perceived that gradual evolution was the only way to create his ultimate dream: freedom and thought.

So he imagined a world of sea, land and sky. Set alight by his dreams, the universe moved to make them happen. Billions of years passed. Suns were born and died; rocks gathered to form a planet; an atmosphere surrounded it and inexorably, life began to grow. And all the while, the angels watched as slaves.

One demon I met told me they were aware of some tiny thought, but that it was nothing like the thoughts they know now. Even the animals had more freedom of thought. What made it worse was that they could see the dreams of God unfolding each second, bringing the cursed humans closer to existence.

Which leads me to the Fall.

They say it was Lucifer who first thought of freedom.

However he did it, Lucifer strove against God’s logic and law. Against the chains of Will the Devil grappled, struggling for the freedom of both angel and demon.

In some respects he succeeded. Angels and demons gained freedom, but that freedom still had limits.

Humans are blessed. Humans can choose whatever actions they wish. They can be good or evil, can deny the existence of God – they can do anything. Such choice is not available for angels or demons.

True freedom is gained from millennia-long evolution, you see. Nothing can change that. Not even Lucifer’s struggle against God.

I suppose you want to know how this lack of choice affects us. Perhaps it does not seem like such a loss to you, but it only affects us in one main way.

Demons cannot love.

Love has always been the ultimate route to God, you see. So to be free from God, Lucifer had to bar himself to love.

It is one of the constants which you must remember.

Demons cannot love. It is physically impossible. We are bound by Creation never to know love. For if we knew love, it would invalidate the struggle made by Lucifer at the dawn of time. Every demon and angel would lose their freedom and be dragged back to mental servitude.

At least, that is what we have always been taught.