The Gates of Eden

"When the Morning Stars Sang Together" by William Blake

By Bishop Joseph W. Boyd (Ancient Church of the West)

In the antediluvian world, my children, there were trees and flowers that far exceed the stature of mountains today. In that day, the seas covered half of the earth and the land covered the other half, and when it was night at sea it was day on land, which made the breezes blow pleasantly every day, and laden the night sky with mist. 

The waters of the sea were fresh and bubbled beneath the land in a myriad of subterranean tunnels. Trees we called “taproot trees” would burrow down to this hidden water and pipe it to the surface with their hollow roots, and gush cold, sweet water through their hollow lower branches, looking like a mighty green tree growing out of the base of a waterfall. 

Other trees were called “dwelling trees” and differed in size, shape, and architectural style. The mangroves grew into mansions with many small rooms close to the ground, with halls and balconies, gazebos, and playgrounds built above lakes and rivers. The bulb trees grew huge hollow caverns in their bases, with an oval opening for a door, and a honeycomb of rooms built into the trunk wall. The walls were strong, but let the light through so that the family could see. The fig family towered above the other trees, growing in layers from the solid core to the many-windowed outer wall. The fig was so strong and its branches so broad and densely covered with epiphytes that many fig tree dwellers never had to come down from their heights, but flew from place to place on the backs of flying beasts. Fig branches were covered with moss, orchids, bromeliads, and grasses that produced miniature ecosystems at each level. The topmost branches became a solid mass of aerial roots and decomposed leaves, which was home for an infinite variety of plants basking in the altitude and sunlight. This also was where the best views could be had, on rolling hills of grass, flowers, and branches that pierced through the dense canopy, rooting in the soil, and looking like trees on their own. 

There were many beautiful things in the world before the Deluge, which could never be described to you now, since your imaginations can barely take you to a place you’ve never been. Continually hearing the music of the spheres, carried on the wind by the canopy of ice that draped the globe, and being lulled at night by the soft glow of luminescent orchids, hanging from the branches within the great canopy. The blue-green horizon filled with islands floating on tree branches, the sight of huge metallic birds glistening with iridescence, laboring under a white and mild sun. All almost impossible to imagine for those that could not be there. 

The feeling of importance that comes from living in a world that dwarfs you, but which was built by God for you, is truly overwhelming. Being the center of the universe and knowing that the stars revolve around your head, is much different from the lost humanity of today, which now dwells in an obscure corner of a universe without a center. It is better not to know, so that this desert in which we live may seem more tolerable. Is it better not to know that we live in a fallen world, which has fallen again? But listen to this story of one of God’s great Prophet Enoch, and the manner in which he left this earth. Then you will know, and be as I am, grieving over what man has lost because of our sin. 

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Now during those days, men covered the face of the earth, multiplied in twenty generations from Adam and Chavah to over ten billion souls. They filled the land, living in excesses and wealth, having need of nothing. They formed cities in every habitable place, but few lived near the deserted Garden. The flaming sword had taken too many lives from the people of Eden, and the strange occurrence near the Garden kept many fearful mothers and fathers from settling there, afraid that their children would be killed by foolishly trying to reenter the forbidden space. The few that lived near the Garden were followers of Adam, a teacher and mystic who claimed to be the first man, and taught that the world would be destroyed with water and fire, and about the purpose of the world being found in sacrifice. He was old and feeble, leaving his Children and disciples to be laughed to scorn by their brethren and shunned to live in the place most people wanted to forget, the sacred Garden. There was war between the descendants of Cain, the Marked, who believed that their founder was greater than Adam, and the descendants of Seth. But little news of this came to the followers of Adam. These few were faithful to the “Law of the Creator.” The world was slowly plunging into the darkness of the Deluge. 

There came a strange report that a great vine had been seen growing out of the Garden, with its base in the roots of the largest tree in the world, the Tree of Life. It had grown out of the sacred enclosure, sending tendrils down the four rivers that flowed out of Eden, with one going through the Gate of the Flaming Sword itself. These tendrils continued to grow to phenomenal size, and many traveled from the four corners of the world to see the incredible vine. The tendrils grew up from the river valleys, finding upright stones as their anchors. They quickly enveloped the stones, and wrapped themselves around them tightly and rooting themselves so many times that the forest fell down around their bases for miles. They then shot towards the sky taller and straighter than any forest trees had ever done. All the vines grew with even, measured pace, none outranking the others. Within 50 years, the four vines had grown into monstrous towers that could be seen on the horizon half a journey to the coast, and even in the land of the Marked. 

All the world wondered at the sight, and if any asked Adam, who lay on his death bed, all he would do is smile and say, “He told us to be fruitful and multiply, never telling us to stop when the world was full.” The old philosophers, the sons of Seth, knowing the purpose of the world, would nod and whisper, but the rest of the world was mystified, and soon turned to other forms of entertainment. The vines stood too long to be interesting, and eventually no one paid attention to them at all. 

Now there was a young man named Enoch, of the 33rd generation of Lord Adam, at the ripe marrying age of 200. The vines were already tall when he was born, but unlike everyone else, he always looked at the four towering vines with a wistful eye. Unlike many of his generation, Enoch chose to remain loyal to the prophecy of Lord Adam, performed the ritual of sacrifice, and abstained from the wonton fulfillment of lust that was common for young men of the day. He was an architect, skilled in the molding of trees for beautiful dwellings, and had a heart that sought after the Creator’s plan. In those days, Adamians were thought as unfit for other positions by the world around them, and were left to do demeaning jobs like architecture. Enoch new that there was no shame in creating according to the design of things, and the vines captivated his imagination, so he set out to know them. He knew that if the vines might be taught to open to men, becoming usable dwellings that they would prove important if the Marked ever besieged the people of Eden’s Gate, becoming strong towers of refuge. Perhaps they would even save man from the deluge that was to come. Enoch knew that each plant, flower, bird, and reptile was created for man’s use, and each use had to be discovered and preserved for the glory of the Creator. And so, Enoch applied himself to seeking for that key to open the vines, and often flew high around the twisting towers aboard his steed. 

When he could not find the keys in the air, Enoch traced the roots of the vines back to the gates of the sacred garden as far as he could. At the entrance of the gate, Enoch could see the vine’s base, rooted at the base of the mountainous Tree of Life. He faintly saw the outline of two people in the bark the vine’s trunk, and he ventured closer to see if his eyes deceived him. He knew that he should stay clear of the gate, but his curiosity got the better of him, and he ventured too close, just inches past the boundary of ancient barrier line, Abel’s altar. With a mighty roar, the sword of flame blazed in an arc towards Enoch, who had clambered along the top of the sprawling vine to its intersection with the gate. Enoch was not fast enough to outpace the beams of the sword, and the teaching of Lord Adam rang in his ears, reminding him of the most basic truth in creation. So he turned his back to the gate and knelt towards the altar of sacrifice, and cried out “I plead the blood! Spare me, Holy One!” The anticipated blow did not fall, but he could feel the heat of the sword sear the back of his neck, as the invisible angel’s hand stayed its fury. The sword sang like a flock of hummingbird, ringing with a pitch too high for man’s ears. Without looking back, Enoch shuffled to the altar, stood up and walked away, never looking back. He felt the heat of the sword on his neck until he left sight of Eden’s Gate. 

Enoch was able to discern that, unlike other plants and flowers, this vine was formed of living metals, mined from the depths of its roots. As he studied it, he found that it layered its cells with iron and gold, and formed an unbreakable structure of metallic fibers, which made the vine glister in the morning sun. He also discovered that the leaves were not only photosensitive, creating energy for the plant to use from sunlight, but that the leaves maintained a constant temperature and gave off considerable amounts of electricity. Iron ore would naturally pull towards the plant, and cling to its skin until it had been pulled through the outer skin and was absorbed for the plants use. Water that was collected by the leaves from the mist in morning hung on the undersides of the leaves among thousands of long, red hairs, reversing the process observed in cupped leaves of common plants. Water changed its density and surface tension when it was in contact with any part of the vine, and would resist the insertion of objects such as a hand or a stick. All of this Enoch kept in his flawless memory. 

Enoch was unable to find another key to the use of this vine on the ground, where keys to the genetic design were normally found. As an architect, Enoch often found a knot, an unusual branch, or a soft pad of bark the size of a man’s hand that fell off at a human touch to reveal the key. This vine had to have a unique purpose! Like the samosa vine that he had studied, which linked people with instant communication world-wide, because leaves that carried patterns drawn on them with a human finger anywhere else there were other samosa vines, this vine had to have a purpose put there by the Creator. No mater how he tried, however, Enoch could not find a key to this mysterious creation, and could not forget his glimpse of the human form on the vine’s smooth bark from within the gates of the Garden. 

While building a boundary wall of mangroves near the boarders of Marked country, Enoch was able to see the vines with greater perspective, and he noticed that each one of the vines had a huge domed bud at the top, which he could not see before when he was close. Upon his return, he ventured to explore the mysterious buds on the back of his flying crest-trumpet beast, to find the answer to his nagging question as to the use of the vines. When he finally coaxed his beast to where the air was thin and cold, and where the ice above glistened and amplified the voices of stars, he alighted upon a giant flower bud, hidden by the fan shaped leaves that blocked out the sun. Under the bud, he had seen thousands of tiny tentacles twisted and rejoined the trunk, making it look as if the bud had a head of long curly locks flowing towards the earth. Now as he stood on the dome of this huge bud, he could see that the protective bracts were almost ready to open, busting at the seams, allowing the bright orange of the immature petals to bleed through the cracks. 

Over the next year strange things began to happen to the vines, and yet again, people from around the world to see the sight. The vines first dropped their leaves, revealing a trunk that had grown triangular ribbed braces to reinforce the entire surface of the towering vines. Then the vines began to grow again, at a remarkable rate, shooting their flower buds past the limit of flying beasts, and out of the reach of man. All four vines seemed to merge in the distance, and it became impossible to see a gap between the domed buds. Then, when the flowers began to open, its bright red petals were barely visible to the naked eye, and it became a popular pastime to fly as high as you could to catch a glimpse of the beautiful color of these monstrous flowers. 

Meanwhile, Enoch married and began his life as a husband, all but forgetting his past fascination with the towering curiosity that dominated the horizon in the exhilaration of his new bride. His curiosity would awaken from its slumber whenever anything unusual would happen, like when the air was scented at night by a heady perfume that seemed to come from the giant flowers in the sky. Or, like the day when strange shaped opaque shadows were seen resting on the crystal covering above the earth and gradually filtered through the ice to reveal the glowing forms of creatures much like round jelly fish, full of lights and pulsation, which could be seen hovering around the flowers for days, filaments of their many legs still grasping the firmament while their light bodies descended to pollinate the flowers. They were seen for several days before they disappeared again one night. The teachers said that they must be fish from the outer waters, just like the fish that could be found in the bromeliad ponds of our tree dwellings. A fish or a butterfly from the outer waters, the name did not matter, but it would not be the last time the people of Eden ever saw the massive forms of the Star Kissers. 

Enoch’s mind turned more and more towards the teaching of Lord Adam, and the sacrifice that was to be made to cover the sins of mankind and unite the Creator's life to the life of His creation. Mysteries started to occur as, night after night, he talked with the Holy One in his dreams. He had heard of Lord Adam’s walks in the Garden with the physical presence of the Creator. He knew that this is why He made man, and so with joy Enoch began to live for his friendship with the Uncreated Holy One, to walk with God in his heart and in the beauty of his imagination. Worship became sweet, and the desire for the keys to knowledge that he sought before began to fade into a desire to know God. Nothing could express in human words what was going on in the mist of the evening, in paths near the Garden. 

The flowers dropped their garments, and the people celebrated as the huge petals, still red and orange were brought into the cities far from Eden and arranged in concentric circles around the temples. The young people danced and played on them all night long in the town squares, and even some of the nobles from the Marked came to see the petals before they faded. Emboldened by Lord Adam’s recent death and a new philosophy of chaos, brought by mysterious gurus, who claimed to descend from the stars, the sons of Seth joined with the sons of Cain for a time of peace, and worshipped the fallen flowers of the towering vines, as if they were some kind of god. These fallen wings of the firmament were veined with purple and blue, on a canvas of truest oranges and reds, filled with windows like those of a dragonfly or precious stones, was the most excellent crown of the forbidden glory of Eden. 

Enoch preached to those who followed Lord Adam that among all the wonders that the Creator had formed, these blossoms were the most glorious in color and form ever seen, but no part of the flower should be seen in their town centers, or mimicked in the color of their clothes. These towers should only be seen as the tributes to the Creator’s glory and not as pagan objects of worship. 

Enoch had two children by the time the fruit had ripened on the vines. His curiosity had turned to indifference as pagan worship was focused on the vines, and his quest for their meaning had grown cold, as the Garden became a new pilgrimage place for worshippers of chaos. Denying the fact that Adam was their father, and that man had fallen from perfection by willful pride and disobedience, a new philosophy swept the world. It was believed that the Garden was the sacred spot where the vines had given birth to man, and that the evidence for this was in the imprint of two people that could be seen on the vine’s trunk, just through the inaccessible gate. They said that this giant vine held the cosmos together, with its heads holding up the sky and its roots throughout the whole universe. Temples carved the ensign of a four-limbed golden tree as their seal, and fashion revolved around the colors of the blossoms. News of the latest supernatural vine happenings became common in the ears of the lounging population of the world, and many followers of Adam wished it could be chopped down. 

It became evident that even with the amazing strength of the stalks, the ripening fruit was causing the vines to lean under their weight. The vines began to twist and contort under the constant pressure of the fruit, doubling back on themselves and reducing their height by half. The fruit came into view for all to see, as the overloaded heads bowed towards the earth. The riper the fruit became, the more obvious it was that this fruit was unlike an ordinary fruit. Worshippers of the vine began to fear that this beautiful edifice would topple under its own weight, and so they tried to help the vine by attempting to pull the fruit off with ropes and fleets of thousands of giant flying and walking beasts. But the fruit was made of living ore and totally unbreakable. Over the next few months, as the vine began to crumple under the extreme stress, the fruit became phosphorescent, and its dull glow illuminated the night sky, like four moons vying with the fifth for brightness. 

Then, a group of vine worshipers on a pilgrimage to Eden’s Gate held a service to worship their place of origin in the vine’s trunk, offering up libations to the earth and chaos on the ancient altar of Able. One of them let his cloak tail flap past the altar stones, and he and thousands of gathered worshippers were instantly reduced to a field of stinking ashes. The world, being what it then was, obsessed with pleasure and ease, cried out against the guardian of the Garden, and proclaimed him their enemy. Vine worshippers from the four corners gathered in the city of Nob to form an army, more than a million strong. It was declared that this was the doing of a vengeful god who could be defeated by united mankind, and that this would depose his tyranny forever. Under the charge of the chief beautiful ones, the gurus of the stars, they vowed to charge the gates and gain access to the images of the original man and woman. They would thus control life and death, creation and destruction. When they came to the walls of the Garden, they attempted scale the walls of running water, but were repelled by their great force. Amassing in the great plain before the gate, they attacked simultaneously upon beasts of war, both on land and in the air. They charged the seemingly empty gate under the cover of artillery and battering rams, only to be rendered to ashes on every side by the invisible wielder of a flaming sword, brighter than the sun and singing like the sea and a swarm of locust. That night the stench of the battlefield canceled the fragrance of the night jasmine, for every man and woman in that battle turned to ash. 

The captains returned, for they seemed to be invincible, like the rest of the beautiful ones. They proclaimed that this was the doings of the petty god of Adam, who wished humankind harm, and kept them from eating of the tree of immortality that was every man’s ultimate potential. They explained that the vine was endeavoring to bring a new fruit of Life out of the garden, and into the reach of humankind. They taught that although Eden's images were not accessible until someone conquered Adam’s god, the true image of man was always available through pleasure, another picture of the power of chaos to create. It was then that many of the women among them began to bear giants, terrible children that resembled another species altogether, the "Fallen Stars of the Heavens." 

Enoch renewed interest in the stories he heard about the vine and saw on the samosa leaves. Something that seemed so natural was at the center of such a supernatural debate. The angel that had spared his life had slaughtered men who had not even crossed the thresh-hold of the altar. As the world descended more and more into debauchery, and as peace between the Marked and the sons of Seth continued, violence between people increased. The very sanctity of marriage was defiled, and men and women lived in lust that knew no boundaries. No longer disdainful, the dormant curiosity once again arose within Enoch as he cried out to the Creator to show him the purpose of the vines, and asked if the vines could be the salvation of man from impending doom, forming an impenetrable dwelling place for the righteous during the coming judgment, held high aloft floods or fires. 

Enoch became more and more concentrated on the dreams that came to him in the night, writing down what he had seen and heard when he awoke, feeling as if the thought and words that he wrote were detached from him, flowing through him without the effort or control his hands and head. He would often awake from a trance, with page after page in front of him, written in the tongue of Adam upon scrolls of bamboo slats, in the sacred naming script that Lord Adam wrote upon the trees of the Garden. The identities of the mysterious beautiful ones were revealed one night, and Enoch trembled in cold sweat as he was shown their end, and the tortures that these fallen sons of God would bring upon earth at the end. He was shown the coming judgments of flood, and the following annihilation of the world in flame. He wrote of the Promised One, of whom Chavah had longed for among her descendants, the man-child that would come as the sinless one, become the Second Adam, and restore man back to God. He wrote as one possessed with the Spirit of Creation, and when he was finished writing he knew what he must do. 

Slowly, slowly the purpose of the vines dawned on his weak mind through the revelation of the Creator, and the thought made him exultant and distressed at the same time. Could the Creator have made such a wonderful universe? Was the scheme for His world so far beyond man’s limited mind? But, could man be so utterly doomed because of his fall? He sought God for the salvation of the people of Eden, but salvation seemed far off, pictured in his dreams by a star moving across the galaxies to hover over the spot where a child was to be born. The vines were shown to be a part of the Creator’s plan for the role of mankind before the Fall. 

A year passed, and the book was completed. Enoch had it copied among the followers of Adam, and took a copy to the great library at End, where Adam had begun his search into the sciences of the world, and still held the repository of the books he had written on prophecy and law. It was placed under the keeping of Melach, keeper of the books of Adam, who was expecting a child of his wife, Torah. He bagged Enoch to stay a while, and name and bless the child in the sight of the Creator at the child’s birth. He did not have to wait long, for two days later a son was born. Enoch prayed over the boy and named him “Atemna Khonasei No-a”. The meaning of the name was “One who will be baptized in water to begin mankind again.” 

The impish children of the enthroned beautiful ones grew stronger and faster than any creature that man had seen before. Transforming into the contorted forms of beauty so admired by the pagan worshippers, they could not be killed or defeated. They were muscled in distorted and exaggerated proportions, with features that were haughty and unnatural. They wore their hair long and did not cloth their shame. These children of the Fallen Stars looked like their fathers, animals, imbued with human form. They filled the streets with blasphemy and unnatural affection, and destroyed marriage, religion, and the altars that had been built by the ancients… all but Abel’s altar at the Gate of the Garden. They eventually dominated man, overwhelming them with their intelligence and voracity, shocking even the most hardened pagan with their brutality and delight in gore. They overwhelmed the defenses of mankind, and ruled the sons of Seth and the kingdoms of the Marked, and brought them into subjection to the will of their immortal fathers. The beautiful ones that had once come among humankind to persuade and counsel with appealing philosophies and truths about the goodness of human nature could now show their true form, and ceased to masquerade as men. They glorified themselves into form of creatures never seen before, as demigods surrounded by halos of fire and thousands of eyes, filled with arms and wings, all while maintaining their corporeal frames. 

When the Bine established their kingdom over Eden, their first objective was to devise a plot for the attack of the Garden. It seemed that the Serpent who had deceived Chavah wanted to return to his former perch within the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil. The giants that roamed the land had been created for this purpose alone, and when there were enough of them, numbering in the millions, they marched on the Garden, wiping out all the followers of Adam as they swept through the land. They burned the trees that contained the inventions of Adam and his sons, and marched towards the library of Adam, and the great temple that had been built of stone for the sacrifices to the Creator. 

When Enoch heard of the coming destruction of the people, and ordered them all to congregate at the plain before the Garden’s Gate. Here they would offer up a living sacrifice and pray for Creator’s deliverance. There was nowhere on earth the followers of Adam could flee from the wrath of the Bine. Some of the followers loaded their flying beasts with their children and valuable, and set off for one of the islands on the other side of the world. Hoping that they would be spared the wrath of the evil that was taking over the world. Enoch met with the people in the Temple of Sacrifice, and read to them of the coming judgment by flood and flame, and exhorted the people not to lose heart, but that God would save His people form evil. 

The news of the armies approach came the next day, as they were borne in the sky by all manner of flying beasts. They blackened the sky and caused the earth to tremble as they forced every beast in their path to serve them. The animals at that time could not kill, but their unspeakable deaths caused tremulous horror in the world as beasts unwilling to fight man were ripped to pieces by their demonic riders. World was slowly imploding towards its center, the center of the universe, the center of God’s plan, the Garden of Eden, the Axis Mundi. 

Enoch and the people stood before the living gates of the Garden, praying. The ashes of the defeated armies had given way to fields of flowers, and the little children slept on them among all the treasured servants of man, their pet animals. Enoch took one of them, a spotless lamb, from the grasp of a weeping child, and slew it upon the altar of Abel. Abel, too, had been a spotless sacrifice, killed in innocence as a sign of the one that was to come to liberate the world from the Fall. As the blood of the lamb dripped down through the rocks and crevices of the altar, Enoch took a fiery brand and lit the wood that was stacked in neat rows beneath the sacrifice, in the form of so many crosses. The sacrifice smoldered and popped, and the smell of burning meat filled Enoch’s nostrils and singed his beard. His eyes began to tear, not from the acrid smoke, but from the realization of all man had lost because of the Fall. Man had immortality, a purpose, a relationship with his Creator, but now, his experience was incomplete. The world around man had plunged into chaos because of man’s pride, and refusal to obey God’s commands. In God’s mercy, there was a way of salvation, a way of blood, a way of restoration to God's life; but its realization was still eons away. This moment would bring to an end this age, and maybe even bring about an end to the whole creation. God would start again with a new world, and a man that would choose to love Him above the desires of his own tongue. 

As the people knelt before the altar, millions upon millions of those who had descended from Lord Adam, the last strands of history and heritage tying man back to his creation, a song began to stir through the lips of the old men. These men were the Sons of Adam, scorned patriarchs of the human race, and they bore themselves with straight backs as they bore up under the weight of the world’s mysteries bearing down upon their shoulders. The song was the song of Adam. He sang the song to his Lord while they walked in the Garden, and He sang this song as he plowed in his fields in worship, and as he rocked his babies to sleep with thoughts that they might have been the Promised One, the Restorer, the Messiah. The old men knew it best, but it filtered down through the generations, standing as the earth trembled and the sky darkened with their backs to the coming attackers, and their faces full of hope towards the Altar of the Lamb. 

Ahnah glah somkya dum so 

To mana seen kyo toi manna 

Ha kai an sola manna saileishol ya 

Wei galeal Lathath kei so somkya dum 

The world praises you

My being lets me see your face

From your face I see your love for me

For you, Creator, I then become your praise

The fire on the altar billowed upwards, and the smoke became black clouds, obscuring Eden's Gate from view. The thunderous sound of hooves and wings collided with the crashing of trees as they toppled before enslaved behemoths. No sounds stirred the waiting congregation as the sacrifice popped and crackled upon the altar. Enoch stood with his hands outstretched to heaven, his knees buckling and falling to the ground. The smoke still billowed into the gateway, and the war cries of the Bine hailed blasphemies upon the gate's living stones. 

Enoch felt it in his heart, he knew that he must cross the threshold, and cross into the holy of holies. He knew to do so was death, but he knew he heard the voice of the Creator through the smoke. He had heard that voice in his dreams many times, he had heard that voice speak through him when he preached of the ending of the world, and he had hear that voice in quite tones as he walked near the Garden in the cool of the day. His wife and children clung to his robes, yet he stood, and took one step towards the altar. The Sons of Adam, who were still singing behind him followed his steps, and his children were dragged along as he moved…. 

The enemy was almost upon them, and almost came crashing into the mass of worshipping people. Just before the behemoth began to tread upon living flesh, Enoch entered the smoke of the offering. 

With unimaginable force - 

Bshaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaah! Zwaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaat! 

Children cried out in the deafening blaze as they were thrown back, and old people fell to their backs and gasped, unable to breathe. Numbed silence descended as the mortals in the field lost the ability to hear, like the sustained ringing of a bell. The bright light that shattered the evening haze did not quickly pass, but gained with intensity. The Garden had exploded with such a tremendous blast that the trees, higher than the kneeling worshippers had been flattened for as far as the eye could see, with the exception of the four towering vines. The waters that flowed over the walls was flowing into the sky, so powerful was the draft of the light. 

A voice came out of the light, which formed a pillar to the heavens like comet imbedded in the Garden with its tail streaming into space. The voice could be heard by the deafened multitudes in their heads, not just by their ears. 

“You cherished sons of the morning, who sang with me in my creation! 

"You beloved watchers who were set over man, to protect his purity and innocence! 

"You guardians of Eden, of the sky, of the earth; you helpful spirits of time and space, set forth to keep the world! How are you fallen through lust! Unnatural affection! Abandoning station! Forsaking Design! Doing that which you were not mandated or purposed to do! You who were blessed suns and stars are now fallen from the heavens! Be you reserved in everlasting chains under darkness unto the Judgment of the Great Day!” 

The myriad of wicked soldiers that were advancing towards the Garden suddenly turned as if to run, but with the last utterance an indescribable figure emerged from the light, confining the light to the span of his form, and moving with speed that the human eye can only detect as a blur. Like the reflection of light off of ripples of water, the form struck down the armies of the Bine before they could draw their weapons. The fathers of this hideous breed ascended to do battle with this warrior from behind the ranks, radiating with a feverish red glow all their own. With thousands of arms, the angel cut the beings from the realm of mortals, and threw them into the confines of the dark abyss. The souls of the wicked sons of the Bine were also cut from their bodies and thrown into their fathers’ prison. 

Enoch saw a hand extended to him, and then the smiling face of the Holy One, in human form. Enoch could not bear to look up into His face, but the Holy One touched him, telling him instantly of a special plan. As he looked into the eyes of his Savior, days, or even months could have passed. Time no longer bound him, and the universe became a symbol for love as he looked into the eyes of the Creator. Enoch knew that he would be a living witnesses that would preach to the world in the Last Day, before the Final Coming of Christ. He knew now what God had told him before, that he and the Sons of Adam would be the only men to finally use the creation that had been meant for mankind’s fulfillment of their role in the universe. 

God created the infinite universe to be ruled by mankind, telling them to fill the earth and to prosper. Because man was not meant to die, there were many ways that God created for the Sons of Adam to continue to increase within the universe and never cease from his purpose. God created a universe filled with fertile places where the Tree of Life could sprout anew, and give man a suitable habitation for his ever increasing family. The Tree was created so that every two thousand years, it would grow branches towards the sky, flower, bear fruit, and send its fruit out as food, and its seeds as the seed of a new world, into the vast spaces between worlds. It was the resting place for the Star Kisser’s eggs which hatch and form a symbiotic relationship with the fruit, designed to last the long journey between stars. The vessel would be plant, animal, and mineral, forged from the metals that man could never mine from the earth, and living so that it could repair itself and navigate like a mariner, seeking out the scent of water. It was the perfect realization of the continuing creation of God’s unfallen plan throughout the whole universe. 

After what seemed to be an eon of communion with God, the Holy One took Enoch’s hand and led him to the glowing pool under the outlines of a man and a woman, which were the keys that God had placed in the design of the vine. Enoch touched the heavy water that bubbled up over the portal, and with difficulty he forced his hand in. When he did this, all resistance broke, and he was instantly pulled into a vein that was slippery and full of pure air. Pressure from the giant stem quickly pulled him to the topmost part. Enoch remembered that the pure air must be the reason why the vine would flame when sparks flew from its leaves, because of the tremendous amount of oxygen that it produced. He found himself in a chamber that allowed the light to shine through the walls, which looked like the inside of a chambered nautilus, with pink walls and golden light. A pulsing blue skin covered the front half of the chamber, and reacted to his touch when he placed a hand on the wall for support. 

Enoch’s wife and children followed him, along with the elders that followed him into the smoke, the descendants of Adam, who were to be witnesses at the Last Day. Several of the other children, who had come to them for protection, were also pulled up into the vine. They had been knocked out or numbed by the blast. When they awoke, everything had to be explained to them, since they either thought they were dead or perhaps in the belly of a behemoth. 

The great vine’s metallic walls, strung tight by being contracted into folds, were energized when the source of the rivers beneath the tree was suddenly diverted into its veins. The switch was instantaneous, and the coiled vine shot forward with incredible velocity, crackling with an incredible charge of lightening as it straightened. The fruits were pushed through the stratosphere and jerked free from the stems when they reached the end of their tethers. Their outer covers pealed away and the Star Kissers’ gossamer orbs unfolded and flapped out like thousands of rippling wings. The fruits’ momentum carried them through the frozen mist of the firmament and left a gaping hole that could be seen for week afterwards as the crystals broke outwards into space. The large folds continued to unveil themselves and thousands of feet of tentacles stretched forward to carry on the momentum, the joy of flight being the first instinct experienced by the newly hatched Star Kissers, and they instinctively pushed themselves forward toward the bright light of the sun. Once clear of the earth’s protective covering, the clear folds of the fruits’ living sail caught the solar wind, and propelled it far into space, carrying the seeds of life. In one of the living ships, the precious cargo of the seed of Adam was safely transported, to a place prepared for them in the mind of God. 

On earth, the vine burst into flames and melted, raining tiny pieces of cooled metal that someone would later name “gold”, and which would eternally fascinate men and cause him to dream and to wonder, and when he had accumulated enough of it, to become the "Second Bine." But as for the Garden, it remained a forbidden place, and the Tree of Life died back, a leaf falling with every human life snuffed out. The Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil would grow, and eventually became the tree that dominated the horizon. It tempted man with a display of its evil fruit, and its roots were fertilized with the ashes of its victims. The Sword Angel kept to himself, staying invisible to all but the ones that tried to pass the altar. Mankind enjoyed a brief peace, shocked for a time with the realization that all the old stories were true, and that it was so easy to forget that your grandfather’s grandfather really was the first man. This lesson was promptly forgotten, and man once again entered into debauchery that was worse for the reason that they invented wickedness without supernatural counsel. They went on like this until God fulfilled His promise to Adam, and eventually wiped out the world with a flood. 

One of the families that fled on the back of a flying beast was the librarian of Adam’s life work and collection, Mallach, and he did not cease until they found an island on the far side of the world that was almost uninhabited where he could raise his family in peace. There they endeavored to save the last few books that remained of a world that had fallen from its lofty beginnings. Noah was a young man when his father gave him the books of Enoch and Adam, to guard as the only remnants of the old world that had been destroyed by the Bine. He heard distant rumors of a great battle at Eden, and of the disappearance of the great prophet Enoch. They said that “He walked with God, and was not," and Noah wrote this in the end of the Book of Enoch. 

Later, after reading the Book of Enoch, Noah would begin his relationship with the Lord, and to walk with Him in the cool of the evening. The island that Noah inhabited was large and filed with gopher trees, and Noah liked to build things with his hands. So, God would call him to build a boat, taking him almost two hundred years to complete, built completely out of the forest trees around him. To build a construction of hewn wood was revolutionary, and all Noah’s neighbors would scorn and laugh, like they had done to other followers of Adam in the days of Enoch. But Noah found grace in the eyes of the Lord, and through him God saved the world from the great flood. He took two of every animal on board, and the two books he had with filled with the history of the world and prophecy of its final days. These would be passed down to his son, and his son would gave them to a man named Abram, who will give it to his generations, until another prophet came who would learns to walk with God in the cool of the evening, and who also will be transported to another world by a burning bush. This man would write the history that chronicles the true origins and history of the world. 

There is a place near the Gates of Heaven, where angel’s rest, and the loyal Morning Stars study the earth from towers in the night sky. This is the home of the Tree of Life, which was drowned in a deluge on earth a thousand years ago, but has grown again from seed in a place meant for man. There is a place that men wonder at instinctively when they look up at the planets and feel that others stare back at them. There is a place that still looks for the Savior, and will follow His star across the cosmos from the east, in a Star Kisser, back to earth to seek Him… and they will call these travelers “wisemen.” If they only knew that they were the first generation of Adam! There is a place where children still laugh because they will live forever, because they not only consumed the fruit of the Tree, but because it consumed them. There is that place where God’s love is so great that it echoes the cry of mercy even in the doom of a world, for He always saves some for Himself. 

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My children hear me, for I am the son of Noah, once known as Shem, and now known by the name Melchizedek. I was born in the world beyond the flood, and I have handled the books of Enoch and Adam, and learned to read the writing of God at my father’s knee. I saw the crystalline firmament and heard the old ones talk of the Tree of Life in hushed tones. 

The story that I tell you is not to keep you quite, but to make you shout of the power of God, giving you an icon of His grace and truth. My generation fell into greatest sin, like my father’s generation before, following the cunning voice of Nimrod, and built a tower to take us to the stars as well. But today the valley of Nanar is filled with ashes, and the Sword Angel that divided the hearts of intruders in Eden came down and divided the tongues of the proud sons of Noah. The world is full of true confusion and chaos, but as a judgment rather than an act of creation. 

Look up to the place from whence man has fallen. Look down into the valley, and see Sodom and Gomorrah, who confidently play out the roles of the fallen stars of heaven, young men who utter blasphemy and refuse to cover their shame. 

Look to the state of the corrupted heart, which promises ascent to the stars and the knowledge of gods, but delivers our minds as a dinner of asps and vipers, paralyzed from resistance by the poison of pride. 

How far have we fallen! And still the witnesses wait for you!

(Written in one night, the result of a unsettling dream, an odd Syriac poem about the Star or Bethlehem, and musings on the recent revelations about UFO’s from the US Military)