The Sacred Book of the Werewolf

by Victor Pelevin

  ‘So it turns out that a super-werewolf is one who enters the Rainbow Stream, and the Rainbow Stream is what the superwerewolf enters?’

  ‘Precisely.’

  ‘But that means that the former is defined in terms of the latter, and the latter is defined in terms of the former. What meaning is there in all this?’

  ‘A most profound one. Both the Rainbow Stream and the path of the super-werewolf lie out of this world and are beyond the reach of the everyday mind - even a fox’s. But they are directly related to each other. Therefore, it is only possible to speak of the former in relation to the latter. And of the latter in relation to the former.’

  ‘And is it possible to add anything more to this?’

  ‘It is.’

  ‘What?’

  ‘That the Rainbow Stream is not a stream at all, and the superwerewolf is not a werewolf at all. One should not become attached to words. They are only required as fleeting footholds. If you attempt to carry them with you, they will drag you down into the abyss. Therefore, they should be cast off immediately.’

  I took a little time to think about what I had heard.

  ‘It is intriguing. It turns out that the supreme teaching for foxes consists of only two words that are related only to each other and are not amenable to any explanation. And in addition, even these words have to be cast off once they have been spoken ... It would seem that the fox who fed the Buddha did not have very good karma. And did she herself succeed in entering the Rainbow Stream?’

  The Yellow Master nodded.

  ‘However, that only happened quite recently. And she did not leave behind any instructions for other were-creatures. That is why I am obliged to transmit the teaching to you.’

  ‘It is hard to believe in the truth of such a teaching.’

  ‘The higher teachings are called higher because they differ from those to which you are accustomed. And if something appears true to you, you may already regard it as false.’

  ‘Why?’

  ‘Because otherwise you would have no need of any teachings. You would already know the truth.’

  That was logical. But his explanations reminded me of those philosophical syllogisms that are primarily intended to confound the mind.

  ‘But even so,’ I persisted, ‘how can a teaching consist of only two words?’

  ‘The higher the teaching, the fewer the words on which it leans for support. Words are like anchors - they appear to provide a reliable grasp on a teaching, but in reality they only hold the mind in captivity. That is why the most perfect teachings dispense words and symbols.’

  ‘Of course, that is so,’ I said. ‘But even in order to explain the superiority of a wordless teaching, you have had to speak many words. How can only two words be enough for someone to guide himself through life?’

  ‘The higher teachings are intended for beings with higher abilities. And for those who lack them, there are volumes upon volumes of nonsense, in which they can rummage for the whole of their lives.’

  ‘And do I have higher abilities?’ I asked in a quiet voice.

  ‘You would not be sitting here otherwise.’

  That altered the situation somewhat.

  ‘And are there many super-werewolves in the world?’

  ‘Only one. Now that is you. If you wish, you can enter the Rainbow Stream. But you will need to make an effort.’

  Who would not feel flattered on hearing that she has higher abilities? And the prospect of becoming a unique being was something that completely took my breath away. I thought about it.

  ‘And the fox who succeeded in entering the Rainbow Stream, what is known about her?’

  ‘Very little,’ the Yellow Master said. ‘Your predecessor lived in a little mountain village, practised extreme asceticism and completely forswore all contact with human beings.’

  ‘How did she feed herself?’

  ‘She used her tail to convince a pumpkin patch that spring had come. And then she absorbed the life-force of the pumpkins ...’

  ‘How terrible,’ I whispered. ‘And what happened to her?’

  ‘One day she simply disappeared, and that’s all.’

  ‘And she did not leave any writings?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘That was rather egotistical of her.’

  ‘Perhaps you will leave some.’

  ‘But do I really have to switch from men to vegetables?’

  ‘The Buddha did not leave any instructions on that score. Listen to what your heart tells you. And do not swerve from the path.’

  I bowed twice.

  ‘I promise to strive obstinately for the goal, if you will grant me the transmission of which you have spoken.’

  ‘You have already received the transmission.’

  ‘When?’ I asked.

  ‘Just now.’

  ‘Is that all?’

  I must have looked very perplexed.

  ‘It is quite enough. All the rest would only introduce confusion into your ginger head.’

  ‘Then what am I to do?’

  The Yellow Master sighed.

  ‘If you were a human being, I would simply smack you across the forehead with my stick,’ he said, nodding towards his knotty staff, ‘and send you to work in the garden. There is nothing higher than this teaching and some day you will understand that. But the path of the super-werewolf is a special one. And since you are so persistent in asking me what you must do, I will tell you. You must find the key.’

  ‘The key? To what?’

  ‘To the Rainbow Stream.’

  ‘And what kind of key is it?’

  ‘I have no idea. I am not a super-werewolf. I am a simple monk. And now be on your way - your palanquin is waiting for you.’

  ‘And ever since then I have continued on my way,’ I said, and stopped speaking.

  My story seemed to have made a strong impression on Alexander.

  ‘Well?’ he asked me. ‘Have you found the key?’

  ‘Of course.’

  ‘And what is it?’

  ‘A correct understanding of your own nature. Everything that I tried to explain to you.’

  ‘So you’ve already entered the Rainbow Stream?’

  ‘You could say that,’ I replied.

  ‘What did it look like?’

  ‘First you have to understand what the super-werewolf is.’

  ‘So what is it?’

  ‘It’s you.’

  ‘That’s what I keep telling you,’ he said plaintively. ‘But you confuse me. You say it’s really you. You everywhere.’

  ‘Again you don’t understand. You think you’re the superwerewolf because you can break light bulbs and knock flies down by just looking at them . . .’

  ‘Not only flies,’ he said. ‘And not only by looking at them. You can’t even imagine what I can do.’

  ‘What can you do?’

  ‘I don’t even have to look, get it? I only have to think it. For instance, yesterday evening I happened to the General Customs Inspector.’

  ‘What, did he die?’

  ‘What for? He just muttered in his sleep and turned over on to his other side. I wiped him clean out.’

  ‘And what does that mean?’

  He shrugged his shoulders.

  ‘It means he’ll get some obscure job in some foundation and will sit there until he fades into the wallpaper. And all his kickbacks will go to the right people now. I mean, to the honest people with clean hands.’

  ‘What a tough guy you are,’ I said. ‘And how do you do it?’

  He thought about it.

  ‘It’s like sex, only the other way round. It’s hard to explain. You know yourself, it’s all in the tail. But I haven’t figured out the details yet ... So you admit I am the super-werewolf after all?’

  ‘You don’t understand anything properly,’ I said. ‘Just because you can swat flies and customs officials, that doesn’t make you a super-werewolf. You don’t even have any right to think you’re a super-werewolf
yet.’

  ‘And you do have the right to think so, do you?’

  ‘Yes, I do,’ I said modestly, but firmly.

  ‘Seems to me you’re coming on a bit too strong altogether, Ginger. There’s no place left in the world for me any more.’

  ‘This whole world is yours. Just understand who you really are.’

  ‘I’m the super-werewolf.’

  ‘Right. But what is a super-werewolf?’

  ‘It’s me.’

  ‘There you go again. I thought you were a keen-eyed lion, but you’re a blind dog.’

  He shuddered as if he’d been lashed with a whip.

  ‘What?’

  ‘It’s just a teaching about the gaze of the lion,’ I explained hastily, sensing that I’d said too much. ‘They say that if you throw a stick to a dog, it will watch the stick. But if you throw a stick to a lion, it will keep its eyes fixed on the thrower. It’s a formal turn of phrase that was used in debates in ancient China when an opponent started clutching at words and stopped seeing what was really important.’

  ‘Okay,’ he said, ‘let’s drop it. So maybe you’ll tell me what the super-werewolf is?’

  ‘The super-werewolf is the one you see when you look deep inside yourself for a long time.’

  ‘But you said there’s nothing in there.’

  ‘That’s right. There isn’t anything there. That is the superwerewolf. ’

  ‘Why?’

  ‘Because that nothing can become anything at all.’

  ‘How’s that?’

  ‘Look. You’re a werewolf, because you can turn into, erm, a wolf. I’m a were-creature, because I’m a fox who pretends to be a human being. But the super-werewolf becomes you, me, this bag of apples, this cup, this crate - everything that you look at in turn. That’s the first reason why it’s called the super-werewolf. Besides, any were-creature can be caught by the tail, figuratively speaking.’

  ‘Okay, probably,’ he said.

  ‘But the super-werewolf can’t be caught by the tail. Because it doesn’t have a body. And that’s the second reason why it’s called that. Do you understand?’

  ‘Not entirely.’

  ‘Remember, when we were flying back from the north, you told me that when you were a child, you used to dream about a diving suit in which you could land on the sun, dive to the bottom of the ocean, jump into a black hole and come back out?’

  ‘I remember.’

  ‘Well then, that’s exactly the kind of diving suit the superwerewolf wears. It’s simply a void that can be filled with anything. Nothing can stick to this void. Nothing can touch it or stain it, because you only have to take away what it’s been filled with, and it will be the same as it was before. There’s nowhere for the local cop to put a registration stamp on it, and nothing for your Mikhalich to attach his bugs to.’

  ‘I get it. Now I get it,’ he said, turning pale. ‘That’s really impressive. No security service could ever catch someone like that!’

  ‘I’m glad you appreciate that.’

  ‘And how do I become it?’

  ‘There’s no way.’ I said.

  ‘Why?’

  ‘Think about it.’

  ‘Because there can only be one super-werewolf, and it’s already you? Do I understand things right now, Ginger?’

  ‘No, Grey One, no. You can’t become it, because you have always been it. The super-werewolf is your own mind, the same one you use from morning till night to think all sorts of nonsense. ’

  ‘So I’m the super-werewolf after all, am I?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘But it’s my mind, isn’t it? Then what’s the problem?’

  ‘The problem is that your mind isn’t actually yours.’

  ‘Then whose is it?’

  ‘It’s not possible to say that it is anybody’s at all. Or what it’s like and where it is. All these concepts arise within it, that is, it precedes everything else without exception. Do you understand? Whatever you imagine, consider, believe or know for sure, the mind’s what will do it.’

  ‘Are you talking about the brain?’

  ‘No. The brain is one of the concepts that exist in the mind.’

  ‘But the mind arises because there is a brain,’ he said uncertainly.

  ‘Those villains have really brainwashed you out of your wits,’ I sighed. ‘People have no idea what mind is. Instead they study the brain, or the psyche, or Freud’s love letters to Einstein. And scientists seriously believe that mind is the product of certain chemical and electrical processes in the brain. That’s the same as thinking that a TV set is the cause of the film showing on it. Or that a salary is the cause of human existence.’

  ‘That’s what economists do think.’

  ‘Right. Well, let them think it. Let them generate their electrical impulses, steal tranches of credit, make official protests, measure the amplitude and the velocity, give the blowjob and take the derivative coefficient, and then determine their rating. Fortunately for this world, we foxes are here in it, as well as all those clowns. We know the secret. And now you know it too. Or you almost know it.’

  ‘Yeah, right,’ he said. ‘And who else knows it, apart from foxes?’

  ‘Only the chosen are supposed to know it.’

  ‘And you’re not afraid to reveal it to me?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘Why? Because I’m one of the chosen too?’

  ‘Because only the mind can know this secret. And the mind has no one to hide it from anyway. It is one.’

  ‘One?’

  ‘Yes,’ I said, ‘one in all, and all from one.’

  ‘Then who are these chosen ones?’

  ‘The chosen ones are those who understand that any worm or butterfly, or even a blade of grass at the edge of the road, are chosen ones just like them, only they don’t know about it for the time being, and you have to take great care in order not to offend any one of them accidentally.’

  ‘I still don’t understand what mind is,’ he said.

  ‘Nobody understands that. Although, on the other hand, everybody knows it. Because it is precisely mind that is listening to what I say right now.’

  ‘Aha,’ he said. ‘I get it now . . . Maybe not everything, from beginning to end, but the way I understand it, there isn’t any end to all this anyway . . .’

  ‘That’s it!’ I said. If only that was always the way.

  ‘Okay, let’s say we’ve figured out the super-werewolf. But what’s the Rainbow Stream?’

  ‘Simply the world around us,’ I said. ‘You see the colours - blue, red, green? They appear and disappear in your mind. That is the Rainbow Stream. Every one of us is a super-werewolf in the Rainbow Stream.’

  ‘You mean, we’ve already entered the Rainbow Stream?’

  ‘Yes and no. On the one hand, the super-werewolf is in the Rainbow Stream from the very beginning. But on the other, it is not possible to enter it at all, because the Rainbow Stream is simply an illusion. But this is only an apparent contradiction, because you and this world are one and the same.’

  ‘Aha,’ he said. ‘Interesting. Okay, carry on.’

  ‘The real super-werewolf is a heavenly being. A heavenly being never loses her connection with the heavens.’

  ‘What does that mean?’

  ‘In this world there is nothing but dust. But when a heavenly being sees the dust, she remembers the light that makes the dust visible. While a tailless monkey only sees the dust on which the light falls. That’s why, when a heavenly being dies, she becomes light. But when a tailless monkey dies, he becomes dust.’

  ‘Light, dust,’ he said, ‘so there is something there after all! There is some kind of individual personality. You’ve definitely got one, Ginger. I’ve felt that pretty strongly just recently. Or will you tell me I’m wrong?’

  ‘This personality, with all its quirks and stupidities simply dances like a doll in the clear light of my mind. And the more stupid this doll’s quirks, the clearer the light that I recogn
ize over and over again.’

  ‘Now you’re saying “my mind”. But you only just said it’s not yours.’

  ‘That’s the way language works. It’s the root from which infinite human stupidity grows. And we were-creatures suffer from it too, because we’re always talking. It’s not possible to open your mouth without being wrong. So you shouldn’t haggle over words.’

  ‘All right. But the personality that dances like a doll - that’s you, isn’t it?’

  ‘No. I don’t think of this personality as me, because I’m very far from being a doll. I am the light that makes it visible. But the light and the doll are only metaphors, and you shouldn’t clutch at them.’

  ‘Yes, Ginger,’ he said. ‘You’ve certainly been studying these questions for a long time . . . So tell me, how old are you really?’

  ‘Old enough,’ I said and blushed. ‘And about the dog and the lion - don’t be offended, please. It’s a classical allegory, and a very ancient one, honestly. The dog watches the stick, but the lion watches the person who threw it. By the way, when you understand that, it makes it much easier to read our press . . .’

  ‘I understand about the dogs and the lions, you needn’t have told me again,’ he replied sarcastically. ‘And I know about the press without you. Better tell me which way foxes look.’

  I smiled guiltily.

  ‘We foxes keep one eye on the stick and the other on the person who throws it. Because we’re not very strong creatures, and we don’t just want to improve our souls, we want to live for a while too. That’s the reason we’re slightly cross-eyed ...’

  ‘I’ll have to toss a couple of sticks your way and see which way you look.’

  ‘You’re in good form today, comrade lieutenant general.’

  Alexander scratched his chin.

  ‘Right, where’s the main conclusion?’ he asked.

  ‘What conclusion?’

  ‘You know, how to control all this? So that we can benefit from it.’

  ‘It’s rather hard to control,’ I said.

  ‘Why?’

  ‘You’ll run yourself ragged trying to find the controller.’

  ‘Yes, it looks that way all right,’ he said. ‘I’m not sure I like it.’

  ‘What’s wrong with it?’

  ‘The Rainbow Stream, the super-werewolf - that’s all fine. Let’s say we’ve dealt with control too. But I still don’t understand the most important thing. Who creates the world? God?’