Housed in seemingly endless tunnels branching out from the main vault are the reports of the Bene Gesserit field agents. Much of this material has yet to yield to the Ixian analog-scanners, but selective retrievals have revealed fascinating insights and anomalies. Gaius Helen Mohiam's folios appear incomplete and fragmentary, surprising for a Cogita Vera (soothsayer) and a Mater Executrix. One scholar has called them censored and edited, but the elaborate security systems that the library once had would have made such overt alterations difficult once the material was filed. On the other hand, the accounts of Lady [Mingus] Margot Fenring are wonderfully full, revealing that her role in the Atreides rise was greater than suspected. The reports of the Lady Jessica Atreides, who the Sisterhood still curse as the archtraitor, naturally stopped about the time of her aql in the Fremen Ceremony of the Seed on Arrakis. The reports of Jehanne Butler, an important person in Bene Gesserit history whose child's abortion was her personal motive for the Butlerian Jihad, are complete and calculating, demonstrating the effective support of the Sisterhood in that transformation of human philosophy. Of a particularly poignant nature are the often confused and always starkly honest accounts by the Reverend Sister Chenoeh and the Reverend Mother Tertius Eileen Anteac, which relate their stays in the court of the God Emperor Leto II and their interactions with him and their conflicts with the orthodox dogmaticism of the Soothsayer Marcus Claire Luyseyal.
The discoveries at Dar-es-Balat have had dramatic technological and economic benefits for the Bene Gesserit Library and have also significantly increased scholarly interest in its holdings. There is hope that continued modernization and research, combined with only moderately cautious cooperation of the Sisterhood, will reveal further insights into the Atreides phenomenon and correct the neglect of the library that has continued since the reign of Leto II and the Scattering.
J.A.C.
NOTES
1Available from the Rakis copies are: Princess Irulan Atreides-Corrino, ed., The Dunebuk, Rakis Ref. Cat. 7-Z331; Anon., The Tleilaxu Godbuk, Rakis Ref. Cat. 3-TL42; G. Albans and G.O. Playt, The Mentat Handbook, tr. Dale, Reeve Mara (Finally: Mosaic); Spacing Guild, The Steersman's Guide, tr. P.K. Lorilaraz (Topaz: Lndlow); Anon., The Dune Gospels, Rakis Ref. Cat. 1-T2.
2Available from the Rakis copies are: al-Ada, The Dune Catastrophe, tr. Miigal Reed (Mukan: Lothar), and The Story of Liet-Kynes, Lib. Conf. Temp. Series 109; Duncan Idaho-10208, The Hayt Chronicle, tr. Kershel, Reeve Shautin (Finally: Mosaic).
3K. R. Barauz, ed.. The Azhar Book, Vol. 1-4, Arrakis Studies 49 (Grumman: United Worlds).
BENE GESSERIT RANKS
The internal structure of the Bene Gesserit ranks of Sisterhood is found in the Ordines Matrium. The Ordines Matrium and the Private Files hold the records of membership and rank within the Sisterhood, some apparently dating from before the Butlerian Jihad, Only one title used in these records remains in the modern Bene Gesserit — Reverend Mother. But from current information it seems that the title itself held far more significance in the past than it does now. The mendicant teaching order now known as the Bene Gesserit appears to lack the facilities and resources to maintain the highly complicated structure of initiation, preparation, and rank structuring described in the historical documents.
The Ordines Matrium indicates that a woman was more apt to be chosen for than to choose the Sisterhood as her life's work. The breeding indices determined an individual's eligibility for membership. Only those females shown to be of a proven active-trait line, and whose recent ancestry showed at least one Reverend Mother, were accepted as initiates. And even these credentials apparently did not mean automatic acceptance. Bene Gesserits, while doing their regular work, observed these particular female infants periodically for signs of active-trait characteristics. As soon as such a child experienced her first menses, she was tested for sensitivity, using the gom jabbar test for humanness. Those females showing sensitivity and a certain degree of intelligence and interest were trained, either at a chapter house or by a Bene Gesserit tutor within their own homes, as "initiae." The initiae trained within chapter houses could be identified both by their youth and by their clothing — dun-colored, long-sleeved shirts and leggings covered by short brown tunics.
After five years of training, the initiae were tested extensively for sensitivity and active-trait potential and separated into two groups: the "virgae" — potential Reverend Mothers, and the "profictuae" — future members of the general Sisterhood, if successful, they were presented to a gathering of Bene Gesserit in the "Ceremony of the Initial Oath." A Proctor Superior administered the oath to each individual, touching her forehead and repeating the following words:
I stand in the sacred human presence. As I do now, so should you stand some day. I pray to your presence that this be so. The future remains uncertain and so it should, for it is the canvas upon which we paint our desires. Thus always the human condition faces a beautifully empty canvas. We possess only this moment in which to dedicate ourselves continuously to the sacred presence which we share and create.
The candidate then faced the Sisterhood and repeated her first oath: "I am a Bene Gesserit. I exist only to serve." After this ceremony the young women moved from first form to second form, both in their training and in their living accommodations. Their new status was shown by the sleeveless, hoodless abas they now wore, though sometimes they retained their dun shirts and leggings in cold climates.
Profictus and virga forms lasted three years. The profictuae received specialized education to prepare them for their work as Sisters. Though all were trained for the general duties of "pellices" (breeders), some received special training to become concubines or wives of the aristocracy. Others were trained for careers: "praecetrix" to teach and tutor; "emissariae espion" to join the spiderweb of Bene Gesserit information gatherers; historians and archivists to keep the order's records; accountants and scribes to run the order's businesses; and domestic managers for the chapter houses and the schools. The virgae, however, prepared for their eventual roles as Reverend Mothers. After three years of preparation, the two groups of novices came together in the Gathering Hall of the Mother House to take their vows as Bene Gesserits. The Matres Felicissimae officiated before a gathering of Bene Gesserit of all ranks, who listened to their newest Sisters repeat the Credo:
Religion is the emulation of the adult by the child. Religion is the encystment of past beliefs: mythology, which is guesswork, the hidden assumptions of trust in the universe, those pronouncements which people have made in search of personal power, all of it mingled with shreds of enlightenment. And always the ultimate unspoken commandment is "Thou shalt not question!" But we question. We break that commandment as a matter of course. The work to which we have set ourselves is the liberating of the imagination, the harnessing of imagination to humankind's deepest creativity.
The Sisters trained for the general order were then given posts in the field or placed in openings in the chapter houses and the schools. The prospective Reverend Mothers, in the meantime, entered the second level of their training, become "filiae alvi."
As filiae alvi the postulants became workers as well as students. The postulants functioned in chapter houses or in the Mother House primarily as messengers. Any Reverend Mother traveling on business would take with her several filiae alvi trained in the memory-trance. After working and being constantly evaluated for two years, the postulants were tested and judged by a review board of Proctors Superior. At this stage, the postulants received one of three fates: reassignment for further training; disqualification for Reverend Motherhood — thus becoming regular Sisters; or advancement to the level of acolyte. Those promoted to acolyte were assigned to specific Reverend Mothers for whom they became personal servants for one to six years, depending on the individual's abilities.
The third step preparatory to becoming a Reverend Mother was the rank of "Mater Acrior," During the ceremony accepting a woman as Mater Acrior, she acknowledged the "Interdict Banning Immortality": "Ag
e slowly, but slowly age. The world of time is inhabited by creatures who are worn by time — and we must appear to be as they are. Extend your time but do not exceed the limits of your culture. It is better to die one's own death than to be killed as a sorceress." She also accepted the second part of the Credo: "To suspect your own mortality is to know the beginning of terror; to learn irrefutably that you are mortal is to know the end of terror." At the conclusion of this ceremony the woman donned a sleeved but hoodless black aba. Now the Mater Acrior began responsible work in her chosen field. Often she would be apprenticed to a Reverend Mother for a training period, but eventually she assumed her own role of worker within the Sisterhood. The length of time she remained at this level varied with the individual. Some women lived their lives as Matres Acrior while others were ready for the final rites within five or ten years.
At the initiation rites of the "Water of Life," a woman became a "Mater Sapientissima" or, to the general public, a Reverend Mother. To mark her status, at this time she chose a three-part name which showed both the antiquity of the order and the efficiency of its breeding charts. A woman kept her family name to designate her position in the breeding indices, but to it she added a name (always male) from the original order of the Bene Gesserat on ancient Terra and a name honoring a famous woman from the history of the Sisterhood. For example, if a woman's name had been Cora of the Corrino line, she might choose the name Marcus Jehanne Corrinus as her Reverend Mother designation. The vestment of her new status was a sleeved black aba with a hood.
The Reverend Mother title was generic, used by all Reverend Mothers in public no matter what rank or position of authority they held within the Sisterhood. One should not confuse this general title with that of "Hidden Rank," however, since they are two different designations. Hidden Rank was used by a Bene Gesserit who lived or worked in a position in which her official rank would prohibit her usefulness or endanger her life. For example, if a woman of Reverend Mother status married into a Major or a Minor House, she kept her rank a secret by using the Hidden Rank designation (few men were eager to accept a Reverend Mother into their beds). Occasionally, a Sister working as a pellex was forced to keep her affiliation secret, acknowledging only that she had been trained in a Bene Gesserit school. For such a woman, even her Bene Gesserit files recorded her as being of Hidden Rank. Within the general designation of Reverend Mother, however, there were four specific ranks: Regular R.M., Proctor, Proctor General, and Proctor Superior. There were several other designations limited to Reverend Mothers of any rank, also. Two academic degrees could be earned only by Reverend Mothers: "Erudica" and "Doctissima." And two professions could be filled only by Reverend Mothers, those of "Ambactae" (ambassadors) and of "Cogita Vera" (truthsayers).
Because they educated women of the Major and Minor Houses, the Bene Gesserit also had actual and honorary ranks for laity. Lay Sisters were allowed to work in schools and chapter houses, doing the mundane work necessary to the function of any institution. Honorary titles bestowed on Bene Gesserit-educated women of the aristocracy were awarded at academic exercises held annually in each Bene Gesserit school. The rifles of "Mater Adfarata" and "Mater Custodia Viarum" appear, from the Bene Gesserit files, to have been awarded frequently. When one compares the annual awards to the historical records showing the power fluctuations among Houses, one could conclude that these honorary degrees were primarily a means of currying favor and maintaining patronage for the order.
The Ordines Matrium presents a Sisterhood which appears to be far more complicated than the present Bene Gesserit. There is no way of ascertaining the validity of this distinction, however, because the current information pertaining to present Bene Gesserit ranks has not been made available for this study.
J.A.C.
Further references: B.G. GOVERNANCE; B.G. HISTORY.
BENE GESSERIT TRAINING
The essence of the Bene Gesserit training philosophy seems to be that, if one can control oneself, or "know thyself," ultimately one can control the universe. Its first axiom is "My mind controls my reality." The training itself is based on a series of progressive exercises, lasting approximately ten years, which give the student power to control herself mentally, physically, and psychologically, and to control others. This control is used not to withdraw to an internal fantasy world but rather to observe and understand reality with detached objectivity. Thus, the prana-bindu training, begun if possible during the child's first year of life, assures the candidate that mastery of herself is mastery of illusion, both of her own and of other people's. Most of the information available concerning traditional Bene Gesserit training is taken from an analysis of the texts and manuals found in the Irulan materials at Dar-es-Balat. The modern Sisterhood will not release its contemporary material for research use, and has withdrawn the texts formerly available in the open collection of the Wallach IX library.
But even reading the Irulan material allows one to understand why the Sisterhood acquired a reputation as keen analysts, expert "seers," and fearsome fighters. The "weirding ways" seen by outsiders are actually the results of a long process of selfdiscipline which developed the ability to analyze and synthesize information not only in an environment of peace but also under stress. Two precepts found in Reverend Mother Darius Kate Clenhanan's Amor Fati: The Key to the Way show this philosophy. The first shows the necessity for discipline: "To use raw power is to make yourself infinitely vulnerable to greater powers," and the second deals with practical application of the training: "The mind can go in either direction under stress — toward positive or toward negative: think of it as a spectrum whose extremes are unconsciousness at the negative end and hyperconsciousness at the positive end." Thus the goal of the training is to insure that the Sister will have her power under control whatever the situation. Clenhanan also points out the fatal weakness inherent in this training: great control can lead to great confidence, to overconfidence, and finally, to an ultimate loss of objectivity — to vanity and pride. Therefore candidates were continually evaluated and given tasks which forced them to work with people more skilled than themselves. Fundamentals of the Way: A Bene Gesserit Mental Exercise Book also includes exercises specifically designed to prevent vanity about the student's growing strength. For example, the third-year training section opens with this caution: "All proof inevitably leads to propositions which have no proof. All things are known because we want to believe in them."
One interesting omission in all of the training was ethical or moral philosophy or theology. The Bene Gesserit was always known publicly as a religious order, a mystic Sisterhood which espoused a belief in the supernatural control of the Great Mother. None of the available instructional material (and Irulan seems to have kept all of her texts and manuals for each section's training) even refers to a transcendent force or being. In fact, in the Missionaria Protectiva material, religion is described as "the purposeful instruction of the masses." The texts describe thousands of religio-mythic variations on the theme of supreme, non-human power, but no evidence indicates that the Sisterhood believed in any power greater than that of its own goal, the Kwisatz Haderach. The Great Horned Mother is used more as a mascot than as a deity. Historical evidence suggests that this atheistic, tendency developed sometime after the Butlerian Jihad, but textual evidence, equally convincing, indicates that the Sisterhood has never been a religious organization.
A two-part training program was pursued simultaneously by a candidate: the training of the mind and the training of the body. Thus a small child would spend hours learning the many languages in use in her culture, and later spend more hours sitting rockstill, lowering her body temperature or slowing her heartbeat, moving one muscle at a time as she catalogued the stimulus/response pattern of her body. The physical training program, the prana-bindu school, is perhaps the best way to illustrate the unification of these two primary branches of training.
The clearest analysis to date of the system is in Reverend Mother Maxius Oaire Beeghler's Prana and
Bindu: Control for Power, She identifies the bask premise of the training as that found in an ancient Terran religion in which the path to the truth was called Sabda and closely resembled what is known to the Bene Gesserit as the "Way." Sabda allowed an internal realization of truth which identified the knower with an immutable reality. The Bene Gesserit Way also identifies the knower with reality, but denies immutability. Thus the Bene Gesserit axiom: "The purpose of argument is to change the nature of truth." The same conditioning processes, however, are used to attain both Sabda and the Way. The key to both is achieving harmony and tranquility through establishing balance within the individual. This balance is achieved through tapas (austere regimens which control and organize the psychic and physical forces of the body, and concentrate one's powers) and upsana (the meditation which allows one to go deep within oneself to find the link between the internal forces, the point of balance between knowing the body and knowing the mind).
The mental self is trained through nayana — a discipline which controls reasoning. Nayana pairs linguistics and logic in order that the individual can distinguish between language and meaning. The student is constantly taught that a sentence means more than the meaning of the individual words, that it includes the physical activity which accompanies the act of speaking. The observer, therefore, must be able to "read" and "register" the gestalt of the speaker, must be able to understand the linguistic patterns of thought conveyed through the immediate language, and must be able to synthesize all these channels instantly in order to understand completely what actually is being "said." Thus, in the process of learning, the student must always completely control the internal sources — her own physical, mental, and emotional condition at the time of synthesis — and totally perceive the external sources — the environment of the speaker, the physical and psychic gestalt of the speaker, the cultural undertones of the language, and the actual overtones of the word sets being used. In general, this technique of data collection, synthesis, and understanding was perfected after the Butlerian Jihad. The aim was to replace thought machines with people who were not only capable of instantaneous logic computations, as were the machines, but who were also able to assimilate sensory and emotional information. Through a rational/intuitive process, such people would come to conclusions that were human rather than mechanistic but objectively detached rather than egotistically biased.
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