knowledge, or clinical experience, or personal growth. That doesn’t lead to omnipotence, but saying there is only one true way to do things does. Why, I haven’t had such success since Torquemada, Judge Jefferies, or Cotton Mather. In religion, this would be called inquisitional, in politics it would be called totalitarian, in business monopolistic. And they’re doing it in the name of heaven, or at least democracy. The AAMFT committee on supervision is going to bring back the auto-da-fe.
But no burning at the stake.
Today that’s all done by disenfranchisement from the health insurance plans.
This may be the most disturbing thing you have said yet.
Wait till you hear what’s coming.
You know; what you are saying tends to undercut the importance of gender differences. I suppose you are opposed to the women’s movement.
How well I have disguised myself. On the contrary, I am delighted with all the recent freedom movements, particularly the liberation of women. Having women seek equality everywhere is just what I have been waiting for. As I said earlier, I always thought Eve had more on the ball than Adam. Equality for woman has made them more of a challenge. In the old days, women were just too easy to tempt. All I had to do was be charming. But now it’s much more exciting.
Next thing I know you will tell me that feminism was your idea.
Not quite, though over the centuries I have succeeded in converting most isms into some form of idolatry, eventually.
What about Judaism?
Especially JudaISM.
I fully supported the women’s movement in the beginning, but then I realized that it could get out of hand. It was all right for Adam to have all of that power because he generally squandered it. But Eve and power, I saw that could really be dangerous, so I did my usual thing to throw them off course.
And you do this by . . . ?
By doing the same thing I did to the Marxists, by getting them to equate power with maturity, to confuse equality with spirituality, and to politicize intimacy.
And the temptation is?
Getting their leaders all focused on the issue of abuse.
Now wait a minute. That is absolutely ludicrous. Abuse is a very serious problem.
Obviously, men abusing women is an important issue, but it is not the most dangerous aspect of their relationship. There is something men do that is far more harmful and enslaving than physical abuse, or even the abuse of economic or political power.
That’s sure news to me.
Once again, I have so well tempted flesh and blood to focus in one direction that they cannot see what is most obvious. Haven’t you ever noticed that if you go into any medical building in the country, or mental health care clinic, that the women patients far outnumber the men? What do you think that’s about? Only a very small percentage of those visits is driven by violence. You see, far more women have been done in by passive husbands than by violent ones. Again, it has been going on since the Garden. Women are constantly being snookered into taking the emotional responsibility for their families, for their husbands, for their children, for togetherness, for the future. Violence really has severe limits as a form of social control because ultimately it becomes intolerable, but not passivity. Especially when it is disguised by innocence and charm. That kind of stress, precisely because it is not as painful, tends to remain chronic. And chronic conditions are always far more destructive because sooner or later they become withering. . . . I see that you are speechless, so I will go on. While gaining economic power and political equality can be liberating to some extent, equality does not free people from relational binds. Ultimately the power to be free has to do with the internal factors, the inner resources I enumerated earlier.
Yes, but if your body isn’t free what good is freedom of the soul?
First of all, that’s reversible. Secondly, you seem to be forgetting religious history. How does it go? “Not by might, nor by power, but by my spirit.”
Wow, the devil can quote scripture.
Look, my point is simply this. You asked how I tempt humanity to deny its essential nature: the fact that it is not omnipotent. And I was explaining how I seduce them into thinking in terms of power rather than soul. My success with the abuse issue is even greater than anything I did to pervert the Marxists. It has so distracted the functioning and thinking of the helping professions that I could not ask for anything more. It has produced more one-issue people than almost anything I have ever tried. The books, the conferences, the sermons, the court suits, and especially the polarization. It’s wonderful! But the joke’s on them. I shouldn’t tell you this, but in the not too distant future men are going to become irrelevant to procreation. A major breakthrough will be made in the genetic code, and women will be able to fertilize themselves.
How could that be possible?
Even in your time there are species that reproduce parthenogenetically.
Then men won’t be needed any longer: Wait till I tell some persons I know about this.
Hold on. I said they won’t be needed for fertilization. Their presence will always be essential to differentiation.
You, sir, have just betrayed the fact that you are male, after all.
I didn’t know ideas had gender. And you have just given the term ad hominem new meaning. Women, you see, have far more relational power in families then men. If only they knew how to use it. Maternal investment may be the most powerful force on earth. It can promote genius or schizophrenia, talent or retardation. The male of the species is almost invariably far more emotionally dependent. The transference from mother to wife is far more intense than that from father to husband. What women really have to do is to stop seeking confirmation from their partners and work on their differentiation from their own mothers instead. Then the power would naturally gravitate towards them.
Once again, a brief example would help.
Very well. If women want to prevent their daughters from being abused in one generation, all they have to do is stop being charmed by their sons in the previous generation.
Well, maybe we should go on to that third issue you mentioned, immortality. This one is a little hard for me to swallow. The way you have reframed the gender issue... well... I would have to change a lot about the way I look at life. Besides, you are coming close to treading on very sacred ground.
I suppose you mean sexual abuse in religion and therapy? Look, let me give it to you straight. Salvation has always been cunnilingual.
You are playing on the word, of course. You mean great preachers are always cunning linguists.
I know what I said. Religion, politics, therapy, they always go with sex. This is nothing new. Read Chaucer. Read The Decameron.
The Decameron was pre-Reformation.
And I suppose everyone stopped enjoying it after Luther. Look, go back to the Israelites. It is right there in the temple cult, temple prostitutes, male and female. He, or if you prefer, she, created them.
But they cleaned that out.
For the time. They only purified the institution. I am not talking about morality. I am just showing you how easy it is to tempt flesh and blood when they are involved in matters of the soul. Salvation has always been salacious. That’s nothing new. That’s why I love religion and therapy.
You know, as some traditions have it, you got pretty close to your counselee yourself.
I never touched Eve. That’s one counseling tradition I will never accept responsibility for.
Then how