From: Jim Jordan <jbjordan@gnt.net>
Subject: Re: (whorl) Pas, Silk and Horn
Date: Sat, 08 Apr 2000 12:44:18 

At 01:10 PM 4/8/00 -0400, you wrote:
>Adam asked:
>
>.> Is there textual evidence from TBOTLS that Silk may be in a two-headed
>> Pas body? (It's been a while since I reread it.)
>
>Near the end of the last book Kypris appears in a Window and says
seductively, "Silk, wouldn't you like to be like Pas? We'd be together
then....They can scan you in at Mainframe. As I was scanned, Silk, with
him. He held my hand....You'll go on with your life, Silk. Just as it is.
You'd be Pas too. And he would be you. Look."
>
>And she shows him the image of a "bronze-limbed man with rippling muscles
and two heads." One is Silk's.
>
>But there isn't the least textual evidence that he took her up on it.

	There's no evidence that he didn't either, of course, which is also most
lupine. I suppose we'll eventually find out. 
	Given the "theology" of the narrative, which is never far from the
surface, I've wondered about this. Silk's ascension to "heaven" (past the
"border mountains," to quote an old hymn), following his death and
resurrection and preceding his return in the final conflagration of (his
part of) the Whorl, closely follows the New Testament narrative. In the
cited passage, Wolfe at least alludes to Silk's ascension to "the right
hand of the Father," with Kypris as a surrogate for the Holy Spirit. The
question raised in my mind is this: Is the Pas of the Whorl the "evil
Typhon" of earth? Clearly he originated there, but he actually seems to be
the "good god" of the Whorl. If this be the case, then for Silk to allow a
transcript of himself to be entered into Mainframe would not be out of
accord with his character. On the other hand, this might be something like
"The Last Temptation of Silk," which he should reject. I've never sorted
this question out. I suspect that time will tell, and we'll find out
eventually.
	"Bronze limbed" is right out of the Bible, I suspect. The ascended Christ
appears as a man of bronze in Revelation chapter 1:15, and compare Daniel
10:6.

Nutria


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