Pestilence: Leprosy vs. Black Goo - Metzorah - Mythic Torah

Welcome back to Mythic Torah, my regular article investigating monsters, heroes and gods in the weekly Torah reading. This week's reading is Metzorah, the 5th reading of the book of Leviticus, that deals with purity/impurity laws surrounding leprosy in people and houses, as well as menstruation.

The Venom Symbiote, Spider-man 3

There's a common science-fiction trope in which a black, viscous substance infects people and takes over their bodies. X-files, Helix, Prometheus and Spider-man all feature a threatening Black Goo that corrupts and spreads with a reason and purpose we can't really comprehend.

The black oil functions as disease given corporeal form, a physical manifestation of our greatest fears about illness, as human beings get infected and lose control of our bodies. This ichor can't be reasoned with or spoken to, it is a faceless, relentless force that can never be entirely gotten rid of.

Magic: the Gathering has its own example of this trope that is particularly relevant for our Torah portion of Metzorah - the Phyrexian oil. Magic's Phyrexians are an infectious, invasive force that consumes and compleats people, animals, plants and whole worlds and environments. It is a living, intelligent disease that corrupts not only living beings but rocks and planets, and as long as a single drop survives Phyrexia can be reborn.

Metzorah stands in interesting contrast with this trope. Our Torah reading is concerned about illness, and in particular Tzara'at (translated as leprosy but certainly not our modern disease that has the same name) that can infect both people and houses, rendering both impure and requiring various diagnoses and rituals to remove the problem.

And yet we never get a sense that the Tzara'at is a being, or is caused by a being, acting with intention. Where the Black Goo acts as if it has intelligence, one that may be beyond our comprehension, Tzara'at is presented without personality or a sense of purpose - it just happens.

This might strike you as obvious - and indeed it may fit well with our modern sense of disease - but it is not the only way that sickness is presented in the Bible.

Let me introduce you to Resheph, the god/demon of disease.

Kabbalunch: "If Holiness, Holiness: If Defilement, Defilement"...

A friend and colleague of mine, Adam Zagoria-Moffet, recently posted an excellent piece on the nature of exorcism in Judaism, that connects nicely with my own take on it in my fantasy novel Radiance. Check it out!

Rewriting Radiance - The floods raise up a roar

Few major changes this week than in the past, but in the 'villain' scene at the end of Tiferet/Splendour (you can read the original here) I wanted to add some clarity to Ashmedai's objectives, and make him a little more understandable, so that his actions in the final scene make a little more sense.

Originally, he merely says the following:

    “Where is my payment?” demanded Ashmedai as Samael stepped away from the captives and walked back down the tunnel towards him. Ashmedai took on the angel’s face as he spoke, twisting the features of fire and stone into the shadows that surrounded him.

But this didn't seem expressive enough of the King of Demons' desire for the sensations of the flesh. The updated version is after the jump:

Rewriting Radiance - The Lower Temple

Welcome to another behind the scenes look at Rewriting Radiance, in which I show you some of the thought processes going into revising my kabbalistic fantasy novel.

I love the scene from the fifth section of Radiance, Tiferet/Adornment, in which Asher and Virgo descend to the Lower Temple, the synagogue of the demons, but I felt that it wasn't quite living up to its potential. While I loved showing how frum (religiously scrupulous) Jewish demons are portrayed, the setting just wasn't rich enough.

Cont. after the jump

Radiance - Behind the Scenes (Chessed edition)

Another section down (that's 7 out of 10 for those keeping count), so time for another Behind the Scenes look at the process that went into Radiance.

For those who may be a little behind in the chapters, you are warned that extremely major SPOILERS abound from here on out. You should definitely read Chessed before looking at this behind the scenes edition, so I'll put the content after the break.