Ishmael (Ishmael, #1)

by Daniel Quinn

The Takers are those who know good and evil, and the Leavers are…?” “The Leavers are those who live in the hands of the gods.”

senectuous

“You remember the question we started out to answer when you arrived this afternoon: How did man become man? We’re still after the answer to that question.”

“And now you can answer the question I posed this morning: How did man become man?” “Man became man by living in the hands of the gods.”

“So now you know what happens to people who live in the hands of the gods.” “Yes. They evolve.” “Why do they evolve?” “Because they’re in a position to evolve. Because that’s where evolution takes place. Pre-man evolved into early man because he was out there competing with all the rest. Pre-man evolved into early man because he didn’t take himself out of the competition, because he was still in the place where natural selection is going on.” “You mean he was still a part of the general community of life.” “That’s right.”

“And then what happened?” “And then the Takers said, ‘We’ve had enough of living in the hands of the gods. No more natural selection for us, thanks very much.’ ” “And that was that.” “And that was that.”

“You remember I said that to enact a story is to live so as to make it come true.” “Yes.” “According to the Taker story, creation came to an end with man.” “Yes. So?” “How would you live so as to make that come true? How would you live so as to make creation come to an end with man?”

The whole thing is going to come to an end with us. In order to make their story come true, the Takers have to put an end to creation itself—and they’re doing a damned good job of it.”

The premise of the Taker story is the world belongs to man.” I thought for a couple of minutes, then I laughed. “It’s almost too neat. The premise of the Leaver story is man belongs to the world.”

The Takers’ story is, ‘The gods made the world for man, but they botched the job, so we had to take matters into our own, more competent hands.’ The Leavers’ story is, ‘The gods made man for the world, the same way they made salmon and sparrows and rabbits for the world; this seems to have worked pretty well so far, so we can take it easy and leave the running of the world to the gods.’

We were never meant to be the only players on this stage. Apparently the gods intend this planet to be a garden filled with creatures that are self-aware and intelligent.”

Amazingly enough, it is plain—because man is the first of all these. He’s the trailblazer, the pathfinder. His destiny is to be the first to learn that creatures like man have a choice: They can try to thwart the gods and perish in the attempt—or they can stand aside and make some room for all the rest. But it’s more than that. His destiny is to be the father of them all—I don’t mean by direct descent. By giving all the rest their chance—the whales and the dolphins and the chimps and the raccoons—he becomes in some sense their progenitor….Oddly enough, it’s even grander than the destiny the Takers dreamed up for us.”

“Just think. In a billion years, whatever is around then, whoever is around then, says, ‘Man? Oh yes, man! What a wonderful creature he was! It was within his grasp to destroy the entire world and to trample all our futures into the dust—but he saw the light before it was too late and pulled back. He pulled back and gave the rest of us our chance. He showed us all how it had to be done if the world was to go on being a garden forever. Man was the role model for us all!’

Some creature had to be the first to go through this, had to see that there were two trees in the garden, one that was good for gods and one that was good for creatures. Some creature had to find the way, and if that happened, then…there was just no limit to what could happen here.

In other words, man does have a place in the world, but it’s not his place to rule. The gods have that in hand. Man’s place is to be the first. Man’s place is to be the first without being the last. Man’s place is to figure out how it’s possible to do that—and then to make some room for all the rest who are capable of becoming what he’s become. And maybe, when the time comes, it’s man’s place to be the teacher of all the rest who are capable of becoming what he’s become. Not the only teacher, not the ultimate teacher. Maybe only the first teacher, the kindergarten teacher—but even that wouldn’t be too shabby.

“We’ll never know what the Leavers of Europe and Asia were up to when the people of your culture came along to plow them under forever. But we do know what they were up to here in North America. They were looking for ways to achieve settlement that were in accord with the way they’d always lived, ways that left room for the rest of life to go on around them. I don’t mean that they did this out of any sense of high-mindedness. I simply mean that it didn’t occur to them to take the life of the world into their own hands and to declare war on the rest of the community of life. Proceeding in this way for another five thousand years or ten thousand years, a dozen civilizations might have appeared on this continent as sophisticated as yours is now, each with its own values and objectives. It’s not unthinkable.”

According to Taker mythology, every civilization anywhere in the universe must be a Taker civilization, a civilization in which people have taken the life of the world into their own hands. That’s so obvious it doesn’t need to be pointed out. Hell, every alien civilization in the history of science fiction has been a Taker civilization. Every civilization ever encountered by the U.S.S. Enterprise has been a Taker civilization. This is because it goes without saying that any intelligent creature anywhere will insist on taking his life out of the hands of the gods, will know that the world belongs to him and not the other way around.”

What exactly would it mean to belong to the world at this point?

How can civilized people belong to the world?”

The Chalice and the Blade.”

“Then here is a program: The story of Genesis must be reversed. First, Cain must stop murdering Abel. This is essential if you’re to survive. The Leavers are the endangered species most critical to the world—not because they’re humans but because they alone can show the destroyers of the world that there is no one right way to live. And then, of course, you must spit out the fruit of that forbidden tree. You must absolutely and forever relinquish the idea that you know who should live and who should die on this planet.” “Yes, I see all that, but that’s a program for mankind, that’s not a program for me. What do I do?” “What you do is to teach a hundred what I’ve taught you, and inspire each of them to teach a hundred. That’s how it’s always done.” “Yes, but…is it enough?”

“The Leaver lifestyle isn’t about hunting and gathering, it’s about letting the rest of the community live—and agriculturalists can do that as well as hunter-gatherers.” He paused and shook his head. “What I’ve been at pains to give you is a new paradigm of human history. The Leaver life is not an antiquated thing that is ‘back there’ somewhere. Your task is not to reach back but to reach forward.”

During the last century every remaining Leaver people in North America was given a choice: to be exterminated or to accept imprisonment. Many chose imprisonment, but not many were actually capable of adjusting to prison life.”

Donald Trump can do a lot of things I can’t, but he can no more get out of the prison than I can.

it should be noted that what is crucial to your survival as a race is not the redistribution of power and wealth within the prison but rather the destruction of the prison itself.”