Balaam, the Gray Prophet Read online

  Why did the Lord bother with him? Why was he chosen to be part of a grand cosmic plan he didn’t understand? YHWH was God to the Sons of Israel, and Balaam wasn’t of that tribe. People in these parts worshipped whatever god their tribe asked them to. Baal was a popular god around here, and he came in various guises, all of them hated by YHWH. YHWH had declared all Baals false gods, and that struck fear in the heart of every Baal worshipper.

  The God of the Israelites was most frightening of all the gods. There was no end to His power. When He blessed His followers, He made them invincible. YHWH demanded only one thing in exchange for His blessing: absolute obedience. Obey the laws of YHWH, and you received His blessing. Balaam knew from his dreams that Moab was on the Lord’s list of abominations, but Balaam could do nothing to help, not unless the Lord willed it. The residents of Moab and their neighbors, were afraid. They watched The Sons of Israel draw ever nearer. Angels of death manifesting as bikers. Riding heavy fire breathing motorcycles - steel machines custom designed from ancient data and built by nanobots, running on hydrogen fuel - the very fuel of the sun.

  The pork and beans were warm enough. Balaam lifted the can from the hotplate using an oven mitt and spooned beans into his mouth. He was hungry. Tonight, he needed energy. Outwardly, he would appear to be in a very deep sleep. When YHWH willed to invade his dreams, it drained him as thoroughly as if he’d run an uphill marathon. The divine synchronization possessed him completely: his mortal will dissolved into YHWH’s divine will, lost in its unfathomable, infinite density. Occasionally in this visionary state, he was cursed with lucid dreaming. If he could remain calm, he could blast away from it, riding on a blinding stream of light. This took most all his life energy, leaving him clinging desperately to his mortal frame.

  He finished the beans and threw the empty can into the recycling bin. Now came the second phase of his visionary ritual, the one he looked forward to most. Though he’d had a few drinks at the bar, this night called for more fortification. The second phase of preparation was drinking precisely four shots of whiskey. This was the magic formula to help him past any lucid dreaming state he might get stuck in. To confront the power of YHWH, and not be in total submission, was a grave error. There were no halfway measures with the Lord. YHWH wanted everything from His followers or nothing. He demanded one-hundred percent of their heart, mind, soul, and strength. Nothing short of that would do.

  Balaam undressed and put on his warm, fluffy bathrobe. It was important to be comfortable when contacting YHWH. The less distractions, the better.

  He kept bottles of whiskey and drinking glasses in the bottom cabinet drawer. He grabbed an already opened bottle, along with his favorite glass, a shooter, and set them on the cabinet next to the hotplate.

  Why God used him as His prophet made no sense. He wasn’t a Son of Israel. There was no lineage, no blood ties that bound him to their tribes. He owned no kosherized motorcycle. The Israelites claimed their Lord to be the one true God, creator of heaven and the heaven of heavens. YHWH was no pretender to the throne like the Baals or Ashtoreth, and Balaam knew this was true, as surely as he ate, drank, and breathed. YHWH was, is, and always will be, the one true God. He lived inside Balaam’s conflicted and warring heart.

  There was no savoring the whiskey. With glass filled, he threw his head back and downed the whiskey in one quick move. By the fourth glass, the alcohol had already saturated his brain and softened his world, sweeping away stinging shards of anxiety in preparation for the Lord. He didn’t bother to pull down the comforter and snuggle under it; he flopped on his back against the bed and waited for sleep. It would arrive soon. And with it, the Lord.

  Consciousness drained away quickly and quietly. Balaam’s mind, soft and accepting, opened the door for the Lord to enter. YHWH burst through intellect’s doorway, radiating energy, removing the constraints of his neural matrix. Balaam’s mind shot skyward, expanded, and left the world behind, touching heaven’s edge. No longer dreaming - he was the dream. Every consecutive millisecond Balaam was born anew. Once a human being, he was now a particle of thought, unresponsive to material gravity.

  The Lord asked, “Who were those men with you at the bar?”

  Balaam was sucked down one whirlpool of thought into the next. He said, “Why ask? I know that you know who they are, but I’ll say the words. They were men sent by Balak, Chief of Moab. He fears the Sons of Israel will destroy him and his people. He wants me to curse the Israelites in order to save Moab.”

  Luminous columns of spirit rose from whirlpools of intellect that continued to pull Balaam from one vortex to the next, each new vortex more powerful than the last. Stars danced across the night sky. Towering columns of light tunneled past galaxies that swirled amongst glowing fields of plasma. Inward, ever inward, into the realms of the humanly unthinkable. There were limitations embedded within the minds of humankind, and Balaam had reached them.

  The dark curtain of space rent in half, revealing billions of star islands spinning kaleidoscopically outwards, each held firmly in the gravitational hand of the Almighty. God, hidden by the very nature of His absoluteness within the stationary center of infinity, revealed of Himself to Balaam all he could assimilate. Before every beginning, past every ending, YHWH reached out in love to Balaam, offering all the truth the prophet could take in.

  YHWH then spoke to Balaam: “You shall not go with them to see Balak. You will not curse the Israelites, for they are blessed.”

  Abruptly as the flick of a light switch, the vision ended. Balaam sat bolt upright in bed as if tazed in the ass. He looked about the room confused, empty, and temporarily demented. When God severed the divine connection, it was quick and harsh. The glories of heaven were sucked away in an instant, deflating Balaam’s mind like a pin popped balloon. He was a grain of sand, lost amongst trillions of its kind. He’d traveled from the highest golden glories to the drab gray mundane, all within seconds. Balaam now faced the raw morning. He swung his legs off the bed, managing to stand without falling.

  Unlike most people, coffee wasn’t his eye opener. That only came after a drink of whiskey. He poured some whiskey into a glass. He retained enough class not to drink it straight from the bottle. His mind still addled, the visionary dreams shattered his sense of reality for hours after awakening. Balaam held his right hand before his face and examined it, then clenched it into a fist to feel the pressure of skin against skin. It seemed he was still living inside God’s dream, the Lord spontaneously creating everything he was and everything he did. Or was he merely dreaming of the Lord dreaming of him? The heaven of heavens were choreographed within the mind of God: all things were but dreams within dreams, played out inside the circle of time, bound by eternity.

  “I’m made in the Lord’s image,” Balaam said aloud to himself. “I dream in my way as the Lord dreams in His; I’m but an infinitesimal nanosecond within His endless and holy dream. If I awaken within His dream, what do I become then?” He heated a tin mug of water on the hotplate and stirred in a teaspoon of instant coffee crystals. Lifting the mug with an oven mitt, he took a long sip. “YHWH never sleeps. He is perpetually awake. That’s why I can’t beat him to the punch.” More alert now, but still hungover from the Lord’s nighttime visit, it was nearly time to meet with Mickey and his associates, as he’d promised.

  Dressed in his customary manner, face shadowed beneath the hood of his sweatshirt, he left his house for the field next door. “Eeayore, it’s time to go.” The donkey lifted her head from grazing and approached him, affectionately nudging her master’s shoulder with her nose. Eeayore loved Balaam the best that she could. Blessed with a higher degree of intelligence than most of her kind, she could even sense Balaam’s moods, often adjusting her gate to comfort him. Today, her master’s mood was sour.

  Balaam wanted the Balak gig badly. Wanted it more than anything else in the world. Balak was a rich man with a reputation for generosity. If he employed you, and you did the job well, he was a man who was more than fair. Bal
aam itched to go and use his mojo for Balak. He wanted so much to curse the Sons of Israel and take the prize. He wanted the money, and wanted it badly, but knew the gig wasn’t happening. The Lord’s clear message didn’t allow him any wiggle room.

  “There’s not much going on in Pethor for a man of my talents,” Balaam told Eeayore. “Around here, the best thing going’s the whiskey.” He gently mounted Eeayore and scooched around until he found the saddle’s comfort zone. Balaam gave an affectionate slap to Eeayore’s hindquarters, urging her to trot slowly towards the road. This wasn’t going to be a good day. The last thing he wanted to do was tell Mickey what the Lord had told him.

  Chapter 3: Bad News

  A few customers were gathered outside the Pethor Bar waiting for the door to open. Mickey and his associates arrived with the rest of the early morning crowd. The building had noticeably changed since the nanobot emergency sweep. Many of the nanobots were disabled in the EMF sterilization, but some remained. Their numbers began to multiply a few hours before the bar opened: they had reconfigured their molecular matrix to utilize solar energy. Re-energized, they went on a redecorating rampage.

  “What the hell,” Mickey said when the front door opened. From the outside, the building had underwent subtle changes of color and texture. Inside, the drab barroom had totally transformed. The walls were delicately engraved slabs of gold, inlaid with vertical strips of ebony. Round mirrors were strategically embedded in the walls to reflect objects infinitely by pointing at round mirrors on the opposite wall. The floor was covered in extremely plush burgundy carpet. Fluffy white clouds floated randomly near the chrome ceiling. The table legs were tubes of corner swirl silver supporting a giant multifaceted diamond tabletop. The formerly drab Pethor Bar now resembled an elegantly cheesy brothel straining to attain heavenly notes of beauty.

  “Is it safe to be in here?” Mickey asked the bartender.

  The bartender said nothing. He was obviously no longer compelled to call emergency. He’d grown a beautiful pair of pastel blue wings. They fluttered as he wiped off the countertop. Along with his wings came a new attitude.

  The morning customers were confused but undeterred from drinking. The threat from self coded nanobots - hearty survivors of an EMF purge - didn’t scare them from getting drunk. Mickey ordered two bottles of house whiskey for their table. He had a bad feeling while they waited for Balaam. He was almost certain what the prophet was going say, and it wasn’t what his boss wanted to hear. “Let me pour,” Mickey said as he sat down at the table. He filled everyone’s shot glass to the rim.

  ****

  Eeayore trotted up to the fire hydrant in front of the bar, her passenger lost in thought. Balaam was contemplating friendships, and how friends often disagree. Everyone had their own a take on the world: viewpoints were individualized by experience, genetics, and beliefs. But with him, things were different. His best friend wasn’t human. His best friend was YHWH, creator of heaven and earth. God’s opinions were manifest as the very universe itself. God’s children had opinions about that universe. But the problem went deeper for Balaam. Balaam was hooked directly to God, and God and he had differing opinions. For Balaam, there was no choice but to give in to God’s opinion.

  Balaam dismounted Eeayore and tied her to the fire hydrant. She wouldn’t actually wander off; this was just their little custom. “Like you, Eeayore, I stay tied down,” Balaam said, and patted his donkey’s side. “My life’s orbit is as confined as yours. I’ll forever remain tagged as the prophet who dispenses curses and blessings.” He walked over to the bar door, grabbed the handle and quickly let go. The handle felt warm, alive, and pulsing. He shook off the creepiness and opened the door, surprised by the extreme revamping of the interior. He’d seen the work of malfunctioning nanobots a few times before, but this was unique, an insanely inspired creation.

  A low floating cloud was on a collision course with Balaam’s head. His first impulse was to duck, but as it drew near, the smell of cotton candy filled the air. He passed through the cloud unharmed on his way to Mickey’s table. A chair was pulled out and waiting for him. He sat down, hoping the hoodie hid the disappointment on his face.

  “I’m assuming you received your instructions last night,” Mickey said. He quickly downed a shot of whiskey, then poured himself another. He filled a glass for Balaam and pushed it across the diamond tabletop towards him.

  Balaam made no move to take the drink. He pondered what to say, but failed to come up with the right words to soften the blow. He decided to go with the easy answer, which happened to be the truth. He grabbed his shot glass and tossed the whiskey down his throat. He looked at Mickey, then quickly lowered his head. Without making eye contact with the Moabite delegation, he said, “Go back to your homeland. The Lord has refused to give me permission to go with you.”

  Mickey believed there was little chance for a positive response, so the prophet’s announcement came as no surprise to him. His boss, Balak, won’t be happy about the news, but he won’t be discouraged either. He’ll think it a clever ploy to up the ante. And as far as Mickey knew, it might be. But that’s not the vibe Mickey got from Balaam. The prophet wasn’t a game player. Mickey swallowed another shot of whiskey and said, “You’re gonna make Balak work for this one, aren’t you? Sending us back empty handed while you hold all the cards. Okay then, there’s not much more to say.”

  The prophet lifted his head to meet Mickey’s eyes. “I can only do and say what the Lord tells me to do and say.” Once again he dropped his chin to his chest, face hidden, the top of his gray hoodie facing Mickey and the rest of the delegates.

  ****

  The fire hydrant Eeayore was leashed to had physically changed. No longer was it only yellow; now there was a gradient shift to red that started just below its dome shaped top. An aroma of dew covered hay rose from the fire hydrant, drawing Eeayore close. She licked the top, finally biting a chunk out of it. Unlike metal, the piece easily tore away. She chewed and swallowed it just like straw.

  The fire hydrant reformed, repairing the indentation left from Eeayore’s bite. The remaining yellow paint liquefied, flowed upwards, and quickly restored the fire hydrant to its original condition. Eeayore brayed softly, snorted, then shook her head from side to side. The hay wasn’t sitting well inside her gut. It dissolved, passed through her stomach lining, entered her bloodstream, and finally reached her brain. Once there, it interfaced with her existing molecular structures to organically meld with and alter her brain’s functionality.

  ****

  Balaam walked out of the bar alone; Mickey and his associates remained inside, drinking and discussing how to gently deliver the news of their failure to Balak. Eeayore watched Balaam approach as he exited the bar. She nodded her head and snorted, happy to see her master. “Lets go visit the river,” Balaam said, untying Eeayore from the fire hydrant.

  His weight on her back comforted her. Their interspecies bonding was mutually satisfying. He wanted to believe in their friendship, but he was a realist. He knew Eeayore didn’t have much self awareness; her supposed feelings were his own anthropomorphic projections. But somehow, that didn’t lessen the bond he felt. Whatever the reality, what they had together soothed them both, man and beast.

  ****

  The river running through Pethor became a small stream where it flowed through Balaam’s small parcel of land. Balaam meditated beneath the shade of a few fig trees, watching the sparkling water on its journey through his land. Eeayore stood at the stream’s edge drinking water, cooling down the heat generated by biological changes fomenting inside her skull. The electrochemical renovating from self coded nanobots, toughened by surviving an EMF sterilization, silently rewired her neural pathways.

  ****

  It was getting late. Already dusk approached, but Balaam wasn’t yet motivated to go inside his house. It felt good to laze around on the grass and listen to the music of flowing water, praising the Lord for His boundless love. He yawned, and his consciousness s
hifted. YHWH made Himself known inside the prophet’s mind. Balaam’s desire to relax evaporated in the Lord’s presence, but this time, he only partially submitted.

  He pondered over his values. He’d lost a great gig - the gig of a lifetime. If he’d just gotten his own way, just this once, he could’ve made enough money to last multiple lifetimes, living in unimaginable luxury, without ever worrying over material things again.

  He thought about his twisted, inexplicable relationship with the Lord. He’d read the sacred scriptures of the Sons of Israel. They only left him more confused about the truth. Balaam’s connection with YHWH was direct - raw and visceral. He studied the Lord’s relationship with the early prophets. They seemed more psychopathic at times than anything else. They claimed God commanded the Sons of Israel to kill those that worshipped false gods - every man, woman, and child. This command triggered no cognitive dissonance within the Israelites, even when God wrote in stone to kill no one. Balaam understood the ancient scriptures’ supreme lesson was obedience to God. A grateful child was expected to obey their loving Father.

  Night had fallen as Balaam struggled to see the Divine Plan being played out on the cosmic stage, a plan far beyond his puny mortal ability to comprehend. All Balaam knew was that he must not curse the Sons of Israel, the most hardcore of biker gangs. Its members had once been slaves which turned them into very strong and angry men. These bikers were blessed with supernatural powers when they went on their rampages. Through the divine pipeline of prophets, they received God’s instructions, which directed their paths with absolute precision. The idol worshippers faced a merciless death at the hands of the Sons of Israel, who rode into town wearing their sacred colors: the menorah rocker and the star of David patches. There was no escape from the Divine Plan which relentlessly drove everyone towards a new golden age.