God and Golem, Inc. by Norbert Wiener

Author:Norbert Wiener
Language: eng
Format: epub
Published: 0101-01-01T00:00:00+00:00

V

I have said that the reprobation attaching in former ages to the sin of sorcery attaches now in many minds to the speculations of modern cybernetics. For make no mistake, if but two hundred years ago a scholar had pretended to make machines that should learn to play games or that should propagate themselves, he would surely have been made to assume the sanbenito, the gown worn by the victims of the Inquisition, and have been handed over to the secular arm, with the injunction that there be no shedding of blood; surely, that is, unless he could convince some great patron that he could transmute the base metals into gold, as Rabbi Low of Prague, who claimed that his incantations blew breath of life into the Golem of clay, had persuaded the Emperor Rudolf. For even now, if an inventor could prove to a computing-machine company that his magic could be of service to them, he could cast black spells from now till doomsday, without the least personal risk.

What is sorcery, and why is it condemned as a sin? Why is the foolish mummery of the Black Mass so frowned upon?

The Black Mass must be understood from the point of view of the orthodox believer. For others it is a meaningless if obscene ceremony. Those who participate in it are far nearer to orthodoxy than most of us realize. The principal element in the Black Mass is the normal Christian dogma that the priest performs a real miracle, and that the Element of the Host becomes the very Blood and Body of Christ

The orthodox Christian and the sorcerer agree that after the miracle of the consecration of the Host is performed, the Divine Elements are capable of performing further miracles. They agree moreover that the miracle of transubstantiation can be performed only by a duly ordained priest. Furthermore, they agree that such a priest can never lose the power to perform the miracle, though if he is unfrocked he performs it at the sure peril of damnation.

Under these postulates, what is more natural than that some soul, damned but ingenious, should have hit upon the idea of laying his hold on the magic Host and using its powers for his personal advantage. It is here, and not in any ungodly orgies, that the central sin of the Black Mass consists. The magic of the Host is intrinsically good: its perversion to other ends than the Greater Glory of God is a deadly sin.

This was the sin which the Bible attributes to Simon Magus, for bargaining with Saint Peter for the miraculous powers of the Christians. I can well imagine the puzzled aggrievement of the poor man when he discovered that these powers were not for sale, and that Peter refused to accept what was, in Simon's mind, an honorable, acceptable, and natural bargain. It is an attitude that most of us have encountered when we have declined to sell an invention at the really flattering terms offered us by a modern captain of industry.

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