Specifically, prana (nerve) and bindu (muscle) training prepared one for the state of concentration needed to understand the reality of a situation. (This state of concentration is also essential to the Bene Gesserit observational skills and martial art techniques.) To gain the proper attitude for complete concentration, one must first remove oneself, mentally if not physically, from all distractions. To do this one uses relaxation techniques which eliminate the distraction from extraneous stimuli. At this point in her studies, the student also learns how to distinguish primary information from secondary or unessential information — "to see the facts and discard the ghafla." Once one has relaxed and has begun to observe the proper information, one must learn to observe closely and clearly. In this state of observation one assimilates pertinent data from the present situation and recalls all pertinent data from memory.
If possible, the observer next assumes a positive physical posture of relaxation and concentration. When the analytical work is being done under private, leisurely conditions, the person relaxes in one of thirty-three postures, each appropriate to a specific type of analytical work. In public situations, the observer assumes an immediate but unobtrusive ritualistic posture which calls the muscles and tissues into alertness. If under great stress or immobilized, one can alter this posture to accommodate the restraints. Next, one begins controlled breathing for concentration, relaxation, and an oxygen supply sufficient to support accelerated mental activity. Finally, as the last step before entering the concentration mode one withdraws sensory and emotional awareness from all internal areas of distraction. In most cases the Sister performs a simple calmness ritual, but in great danger, she recites the litany against fear to subdue any instinctual, primal terror, particularly one stimulated by a racememory fear.
Fear is the mind killer. Fear is the little death that brings total obliteration. I will face my fear. I will permit it to pass over me and through me. And when it has gone past me, I will turn to see fear's path. Where the fear has gone there will be nothing. Only I will remain.
At this point, the observer can begin the concentration mode.
The concentration mode involves three stages of observational analysis. First, one must now severely limit the attention to only the past and present data concerning the topic. Second, one must enter a state of total contemplation in which the attention flows in a steady stream over the topic — the observer completely enclosing the topic. Third, one must be conscious not of the techniques of observation, not of the presence of self, but of the topic — one must become the topic. At the moment of unity, the observer understands the topic as she understands herself. Thus, all knowledge depends on the observation of detail and on one's body being trained to support close observation, on objective classification and cataloguing, and on maximum retention of data. Only complete control of nerves and tissues, muscles, blood and chemistry, can detach one enough from the demands of the self to allow objective detachment during the observation, analysis, and synthesis process. The control of the body leads to the purification of the mind necessary to separate the real from the unreal.
Although the process of preparation, control, and analysis seems complicated and time consuming, after a woman has trained for ten years, first in the separate steps and then in the entire process, she can, if necessary, perform the entire function in less than a second. One of the controls learned is the ability to release oneself from the artificial confines of the human notion of "time." There is no "time" in the concentration mode — all activities can be managed simultaneously.
Once the basic processes have been mastered, second-level functional states can be invoked such as Dao, Prajna, and Adab, Dao is the dormancy trance, a type of bindu suspension in which an adept can slow her physiological activities to a level just on the edge of life-maintenance, a trance useful for survival under threatening conditions and also necessary to rejuvenate cells. The Prajna meditation trance is used for deep understanding and for the special state of "seeing" some Sisters are capable of performing (a state usually augmented with enhancement by chemicals such as melange). Adab, on the other hand, is a retrieval process accessible to all skilled Bene Gesserits; this state of recall is also called the "demanding memory," a recollection of necessary data stimulated externally or by the gestalt of a situation rather than being triggered consciously by the woman herself. Adab is different from the "consciousness impression/complete recall" method used regularly to store and process data. The normal mnemonic process allows complete reproduction of any conversation, even simulating the tone and pitch control of the original speaker (a practice always used by Sisters or novices who acted as messengers). But Adab not only stores material in the subconscious, it also uses the subconscious to integrate new with stored data, thus producing completely accurate and logically assimilated memory, a memory so strong that when stimulated it will overwhelm the woman's consciousness.
Prana-bindu training is also used by the adept in all the daily functions of her life. For example, the famous Bene Gesserit martial arts, the "weirding ways of battle," are based upon complete prana-bindu control. The hand-to-hand combat techniques retained from ancient Terran cultures depend upon supreme muscle control for their astonishing ferocity. Not only the unarmed combat maneuvers depend on this training but the extraordinary knife and whip skills also require this command of muscles and nerves. Prana-bindu control can heal wounds and retard aging. The Bene Gesserit knew their cellular structure so intimately that they could analyze and neutralize most poisons within thenbodies. The great test of this ability occurred during a woman's initiation as a Reverend Mother in neutralizing the "Water of Life" within her system. Occasional women were found to have cellular allergies to and incompatibilities with the chemical and were unable to neutralize it, but fortunately this occurred rarely.
The training program had a second objective: the ability to control others whether as individuals, masses, or cultures. The Bene Gesserit is taught to "read" and "register" a person in order to manipulate him by Voice. In "reading" one observes and identifies the clue tones which will control the other person. In "registering" one uses a brief mnemonic trance to retain the clue tones, making that person controllable in future situations. Finally, through the use of rihani decipherment, a Bene Gesserit can recognize a registered individual no matter what overt change in behavior or appearance he assumes. Rihani decipherment also allowed sisters to unerringly identify Face Dancers and gholas, even when they assumed the appearance of individuals unknown to the Sister herself. The decipherment pattern allowed her to discern the nonhuman characteristics.
Through Voice, a subtle manipulation of vocal tones, a Bene Gesserit could manipulate individuals or large groups by triggering clue tones. Certain voice patterns trigger primal human responses, and the registered person could be controlled in any situation. Women specially gifted with The Great Control could manage any number of people in any situation, and could even control other Bene Gesserits. Particular subtleties of Voice usage are the Lie Adroit — manipulation through concealed falsehood; the Zensunni Codex — a play of words that confuses or obscures the truth; and the implantation of autosuggestive cue words (for example, the most common word thus implanted is "Uroshnor," a word itself empty of meaning, but which, when spoken, triggers a state of immobilization). These techniques, however, are taught only for specific professional work.
In order to learn how to control large groups of people and even cultures, during her final three years of education a candidate enters a series of courses teaching the characteristics of mob behavior (e.g., history, politics, anthropology, and mythology). Unless a woman is to be a political determiner when she graduates or is being groomed for political roles within the order, these courses are theoretical. For those who enter the Missionaria Protectiva, however, a special training program teaches the manipulation of cultural attitude through mythosimplantation. Truthsayers, economists, and women preparing to be MBAs are all trained in practical group manipu
lation as well as in theory.
Of course, as a secondary part of the entire training program, candidates are also taught survival techniques. For example, a rudimentary course is "Hand and Finger Signals," while a more advanced course in the same discipline is "Tactile Encoding Methods." Though the techniques of setting and breaking palm locks is designated as an advanced course, there is evidence that each middle-school girl prided herself in mastering the technique. Such primary regimens as the waiting stance, the sense-cleansing regimen, and the tranquility mode were taught to children in the kinder houses.
In general, the students were taught practical skills for the primary Bene Gesserit occupations of breeding and espionage. The prana-bindu skills, the observational and analytical skills, and the self-preservation skills were all bases on which to develop the theoretical abilities needed in an organization whose goal was the accumulation and manipulation of economic and political power.
J.A.C.
Further references: B.G. HISTORY; R.M. Darius Kate Clenhanan, Amor Fati: The Key to the Way, tr. Zhana Feliin, B.G. Inundation Studies 15 (Diana: Tevis); Ruuvars Shaigal, ed., Fundamentals of the Way: A Bene Gesserit Mental Exercise Book (Grumman; Lodni).
BUTLER, JEHANNE
(And the history of the Butlerian Jihad.)
Parents unknown. Born Komos (Eridani A 4) 230 B.G., died 182 B.G.; married T. Butler 205 B.G., no children. Leader of revolt of Komos vs. Richese, leader Butlerian Jihad 200 B.G. — 182 B.G. Jehanne Butter gave her name to the Butlerian Jihad, one of the most enduring developments in the history of the race. As leader of the revolt of Komos against Richese, and then of the Jihad for the first twenty years of its course, she left an imprint on the minds of her followers which bespeaks an extraordinary personality: powerful, resolute, intuitive, and merciful; to those who knew her she was little short of a saint, and after her death she became one in the minds of millions. As a result of the material produced by the excavations on Rakis we are able to transform her from a legend into an historical personality.
Jehanne was trained as a priestess on Komos and also as a Bene Gesserit. Rather than following the career of a priestess, either from her own decision or that of her order, she married Thet'r Butler, the Logistos of Xania, one of the ten administrative districts on Komos. In the same year as their marriage, (205 B.G.), Jehanne went to the capitol of Pylos to enter the hospital for the birth of a child. Since both parents had married late in life for their culture, they were especially eager for this birth. When on the delivery table, Jehanne was anesthetized; when she awoke, she and her husband were informed that their daughter, Sarah, had been aborted. The hospital explained that the fetus had been too deformed to survive. The abortion was described as therapeutic.
Jehanne's control of her own body, which as a result of her Bene Gesserit training extended beyond those muscle systems usually thought of as automatic, had permitted a deep knowledge of the growth of her child within the womb. She was convinced that it was impossible for her child to have been so grievously malformed as the hospital had described. In time, Jehanne came to believe that her child's death had at best been unnecessary. Using the access to official records provided by Thet'r's position as Logistos, she discovered within the archives of the hospital evidence that the hospital director — the first selfprogramming machine on Komos — had instituted a program of unjustified abortions. Armed with this information, she approached the priestesses of Kubebe for their aid in creating a movement against the domination by Richese.
At the same time that these overtures were being made to the priestesses, Jehanne and Thet'r had begun the formation of a secular organization. Using Thet'r's administrative abilities, and Jehanne's gifts of rhetoric, amplified by her Bene Gesserit schooling, a Front for the End of Koman Exploitation was formed.
Their movement was a speedy success, as was their request of the priestesses for aid. Contrary to some cynical opinions, the priestesses were far too well entrenched within a society of believers for their position to have been threatened. Rather, the priestesses likely entered the struggle for the same reason that the rest of the Komans did — they were appalled by the evidence Jehanne was able to put forward concerning the actions of the hospital director, and they agreed that the time had come to, move against Richese.
The coup on Komos was the first example of the organizational genius of Thet'r Butler and the tactical brilliance of Jehanne: the choice of the tribute collection week as the occasion for the coup, the seizure of the tribute fleet for transport to Richese, the timing and execution of a lengthy and intricate plan which achieved total surprise and an almost bloodless victory.
The Komans went to Richese with nothing more than a successful revolution in mind. They discovered there the extent to which their hospital director was simply a reflection of a state of society beyond their imagination. The degree to which machines controlled the population of Richese, and had altered the emotional and intellectual characteristics of its inhabitants over centuries, was literally incredible to the Komans. Many of them never entirely believed what they saw there.
The revelations on Richese produced a Jihad, but it was not Jehanne who made that decision. The priestesses of Kubebe were the principal forces behind the change which occurred in the ranks of the rebels. They were motivated by their interrogations of the chief programmers and scientists of Richese, many of whom had been willing participants in the actions of the machines in altering the population of Richese. Perhaps the critical moment in these interrogations occurred during the questioning of a Doctor G. Demlen by the chief priestess of Komos, Urania.
Demlen was an especially arrogant and unrepentant man, whose disdain for his fellow man's intelligence was equalled only by his respect for his own — and that of his machines. As his quite prideful and voluntary description of his work on Richese droned on, Urania's feelings overcame her training and her face began to betray her revulsion. Ultimately even Demlen noticed, and interrupted his stream of selfcongratulatory candor to ask what was upsetting her. Urania told him his work violated fundamental principles of respect for human life, not to mention the offense to the worship of the Goddess.
At the mention of the Goddess, Demlen exploded in a fit of honest and acid outrage, and in his fury, after suggesting that there was more worth reverence in one of his machines than in the worship of "a supposed 'goddess' invented by a clutch of bucolic bumpkins on a pigsty of a planet," Demlen turned toward the icon of Kubebe as if to spit on it. Before he could commit the act, Urania had killed him with her ceremonial knife.
That night the priestesses met in council, and the next morning Jihad began to be preached to the faithful of Komos, against "the thinking machines and all who find their gods within them."
Far from being eager for this, Jehanne argued against it. Her statements, insofar as we can construct them, seem to have anticipated much of what was to happen in the coming years — the growing ruthlessness of the crusaders, the atrocities, the deaths of so many innocents. But the priestesses were not deterred. It was not that they did not believe that these things might happen. Rather, they resolved on the Jihad in spite of this belief. Their horror before the discoveries of Richese, and the certainty that they would be duplicated on other planets, their deep-rooted outrage at the insult to their Goddess and their religion — these made their minds firm. Too many analyses of the origins of the Jihad have ignored this motivation — the people of Komos believed their religion. So too did Jehanne; but her beliefs were tempered with mercy and foresight to a degree not true of the priestesses.
Jehanne could not have been dislodged as the leader of the movement, even had anyone wished it. But from this moment there was a certain tension within the leadership of the Jihad. On the one hand there was Jehanne, urging mercy and restraint; on the other was Urania whose goal was the extirpation of any hint of machine domination of humans, and who was willing to sacrifice much, and many, to achieve it. The tension was resolved in favor of Urania on Carthagos.
The transformation of the Jihad after Jehanne's death has been discussed at length in the various histories of the movement. These discussions have focused upon the growing ruthlessness of the crusade, and in so doing have failed to remark upon certain changes in tactics which bear directly upon the question of the nature of Jehanne's participation as leader.
Certain characteristics of the plans of the fleet did not change after Jehanne's death. The various actions of the horde, whether investing an entire planet or striking at an outpost, continued to show the effects of meticulous planning and brilliant staff work. Logistical support for all operations remained virtually flawless, and the timing and arrangements of often complicated maneuvers involving hundreds of vessels showed a degree of foresight and sound training seldom equaled in military history. These observations, coupled with the survival of Thet'r Butler have prompted many to conclude that the true leader of the rebellion was Thet'r, and not Jehanne. A full analysis of the tactical history of the Jihad will not support this argument, however.
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