Teacher (tiy.char), n.: a person whose words are so important that to listen to them spoken is a privilege; a person whose actions are so admirable that to see them carried out is an honor.
—Tang-Webster-Mbaru Third Galactic Dictionary, Second Edition
The Dean felt a certain obligation to Coyote Jones. After all, he was a cripple, cut off from much of normal communication. If her sources of information were reliable—and they would not have dared not to be—the man had done everything humanly possible to protect Drussa Silver; and if he had failed it was not for want of trying. His grief at her death had been terrible, she was told, if somewhat excessive in its manifestations; and it had not been easy to restore his emotional balance.
And then, there was the undeniable fact that she had personally caused him to suffer that unpleasant episode on Galoralon ... All things considered, she felt that he was entitled to an explanation, and when she sat down to write it, she gave it her full attention.
Dear Citizen Jones:
I am pleased to hear that you are once more able to travel and in full control of your faculties, and I understand and share your grief at Drussa Silver's death. It is a misfortune that you fall into that group of humans unable to accept death as no more than a joyful transition; perhaps it has something to do with your mind-deafness. At any rate, I am told that you are your normal self again, except for your very understandable regret at leaving Freeway. I would be the same way, Citizen—no one leaves Eden willingly.
The purpose of this letter is to explain a few things to you, very briefly. I'm reasonably certain that I can't count on your Bureau Chief to do this for me.
There was, first of all, the question posed for your "dissertation topic." That is, why is it that the Shavvies, who are otherwise so like the Maklunites, are able to drastically affect the culture in which they live, while the Maklunites have almost no effect at all? I could have told you the answer to that question the first day you came to see me, Citizen; it is trivially obvious.
Remember the Maklunite Choosing Ceremony, at which the Cluster must decide if you are even worthy to try to join them? You, as I understand it, had great difficulty satisfying the group at your own Choosing. Then, once the Choosing has been completed, there is still one hurdle after another to be leaped. The first review by the Cluster community at three weeks, another at three months, still another at one year, while you wonder if you will be allowed to remain. And the stringent standards that are set by these people ... with all the goodwill in the world, and with all the support your Cluster could give you, Citizen, you yourself did not make it even through the three-month review.
Contrast this with the Shavvies, Citizen, and you will see at once where the difference lies. True, both use a concept of "choosing," though it means quite different things. True, both are communal religions, dedicated to the development of a united awareness built by mindspeech. True, both are totally nonmaterialistic, with all things held in common: both all labor and all its fruits. True, both are committed to an ethic of service and a firm conviction that it is their obligation to devote their lives to others. But the standards set are radically different ... if a Shavvy man becomes so fond of a particular tunic or a particular book or woman that he doesn't want to share with anyone else, the others laugh at him, but they indulge his weakness. The Maklunites, on the other hand, would expel him from the Cluster as unfit.
Do you see, Citizen Jones? The Maklunite religion is a religion of saints. Its standards are set so high that for most human beings their attainment is impossible, beyond all hope. The Shavvy religion is a religion of the people. All people.
Saints are few. They are rare. A religion composed entirely of saints will always have a minimal impact upon society because sainthood takes a lot of time and effort, service takes the rest, and people at large are miserably uncomfortable in the presence of saints. SAINTS ARE NO FUN TO BE WITH: they make you too conscious of your own shortcomings.
The Shavvies, now, are like you and me. It is expected that we will fall short of the standards set us, and often. We are loved none the less, we are not rejected for our failings, our community rallies round to help us do better the next time and to assure us that if we are weak, so is every one of them. Some of us are weaker than others, but the weakest is held as dear as the strongest.
The second question that has not been answered for you is this one—why all the fuss? You undoubtedly know by now that the original intention was that Drussa should die in mid-flight, as you brought her back for trial, and that TGIS was to bear the blame for the hidden nerve-dart that caused her death. This is the sort of thing that The Fish would tell you. I'm sure he has also told you that TGIS was well aware of the plans of the Council of Eight and had no intention of interfering. The question is, why?
The answer is simply stated, Citizen—the economic well-being of the Three Galaxies, as defined by our governments, depends upon disunity. Do you understand? Oh, I know we have a Tri-Galactic Council, and much carrying-on about galactic community and the personhood of all humankind, blah, blah, blah. But the Council is nothing more than the United Nations was on Old Earth: a powerless figurehead going through ritual rhetorical motions. In reality, the governments of all member planets are well aware that if there were real unity, the whole thrust of our economy—based on hard-driving, aggressive colonists charging fiercely out into space to open up planet after planet and make its wealth available to the Federation—that whole thrust would come grinding to a halt. If people are content in themselves, you cannot motivate them to worship the Almighty MORE, they feel no compulsion to chase off into the unknown to face they know not what; they prefer to concentrate their energies upon their own spirits and the community in which they live.
This was the fearsome danger represented by the Shavvies, Citizen Jones. If Drussa Silver could unite a whole planet in so short a time, our governments hypothesized, she might well head a movement that would unite whole galaxies, and this was a risk that could not be endured. The fact that she was holy, that she was divine—and make no mistake, Coyote Jones, they knew quite well that she was, whatever they may have told you—made no difference. The divine must always die; they cause far too much trouble alive.
It will perhaps be some small comfort to you to know that the experts are wrong, however, in their assumption that with Drussa Silver gone, the Shavvies will revert to the status of a small fringe cult on one backward planet. It will be a while before their miscalculation becomes apparent. But in a few years, to their utter astonishment, they will discover that the new judges and officials are Shavvies, that the incoming administrators and scientists and doctors and futurists and artists and writers—all the Students coming out of the Multiversities, in other words—are Shavvies.
A little patience, dear Citizen Jones. and we shall see a new world, you and I.
With all my best wishes,
Dean Shandalynne O'Halloran.
She folded the letter, marked it TOP SECRET—BY DIPLOMATIC POUCH ONLY, and sent it along. Then, her task finished, she went with a clear conscience to the Multiversity Chapel, where the evening service was just beginning, in ample time to add her own mindvoice to the chanting of the Creed.
I am a Child of Light.
Therefore,
I have the power to Search.
Trees of probability make up my life ...