21
" Here sighs and cries and shrieks of lamentation echoed throughout the starless air of Hell;at first these sounds resounding made me weep:tongues confused, a language strained in anguishwith cadences of anger, shrill outcriesand raucous groans that joined with sounds of hands,raising a whirling storm that turns itselfforever through that air of endless black,like grains of sand swirling when a whirlwind blows.And I, in the midst of all this circling horror,began, " Teacher, what are these sounds I hear?What souls are these so overwhelmed by grief?" And he to me: " This wretched state of beingis the fate of those sad souls who lived a lifebut lived it with no blame and with no praise.They are mixed with that repulsive choir of angelsneither faithful nor unfaithful to their God,who undecided stood but for themselves.Heaven, to keep its beauty, cast them out,but even Hell itself would not receive them,for fear the damned might glory over them." And I. " Master, what torments do they sufferthat force them to lament so bitterly?" He answered: " I will tell you in few words:these wretches have no hope of truly dying,and this blind life they lead is so abjectit makes them envy every other fate.The world will not record their having been there;Heaven's mercy and its justice turn from them.Let's not discuss them; look and pass them by... "
32
" To be sure, Judas Iscariot was not exactly the sort of character that Christian Mjomba - or anyone else at St. Augustine’s Seminary for that matter - would have wanted to be nicknamed after. But the fact was that Mjomba had never made a secret of his views on the world. Everyone in the seminary brotherhood knew his stand on apartheid and things like that; and they were considered very liberal. In the conservative environment that prevailed at St. Augustine’s Seminary, they were also tantamount to betrayal! It was about the most unsavory that anyone could have wished to be associated with. But that was the label he had got stuck with.Everybody knew, besides, that it wasn’t some uninformed gentile or misguided unbeliever who had betrayed the Deliverer and handed Him to His killers. And Judas Iscariot wasn’t just anybody either. Judas was one of the twelve who had been handpicked by the Deliverer to form the core of the convocation that would become the Sancta Ecclesia. In addition to being the Deliverer’s purse bearer, Judas Iscariot also drank wine from the same cup as his Master! The man who would betray the Deliverer with a kiss was a member of the inner circle of the burgeoning Christ Fellowship; and, before long, his name had become so repulsive even among Romans, it had replaced that of Brutus, the friend of Cæsar who had conspired with others and stabbed the emperor in the back, as a symbol of betrayal. A traitor par excellence!Whenever Mjomba thought about Judas’ betrayal of the Messiah of the world with a kiss, it was not the act of betrayal itself that came to mind. It was not even the chilling words “Would’st thou betray thy Master with a kiss, Judas?” that were addressed to the betrayer by the Deliverer in the moment when Judas, no doubt representing all humanity, embraced the Nazarene and kissed him on the cheek so the temple’s constabulary wouldn’t grab and take into custody the wrong person! It was the Deliverer’s address to Peter a little earlier on in the Upper House as the fisherman, who himself would swear that he did not know the Nazarene, not once but three times, in front of a shivering crowd not long afterward, balked at the notion of the miracle worker and Son of Man could stoop to wash his (the fisherman’s) dirty feet, namely “Not all are clean, Peter!” And that was, in all probability, after Judas’s feet had already been washed by the Nazarene.That, in any event, was the character after whom Christian Mjomba had been nicknamed by his buddies in what he initially regarded as something that was itself an act of betrayal. The traitors! He could not understand how people could be so insensitive about the feelings of others! And even though he had never said it, he had never liked it a bit - until he started work on his theological thesis." _Joseph M. Luguya, Humans: The Untold Story of Adam and Eve and their Descendants "
33
" To be sure, Judas Iscariot was not exactly the sort of character that Christian Mjomba - or anyone else at St. Augustine’s Seminary for that matter - would have wanted to be nicknamed after. But the fact was that Mjomba had never made a secret of his views on the world. Everyone in the seminary brotherhood knew his stand on apartheid and things like that; and they were considered very liberal. In the conservative environment that prevailed at St. Augustine’s Seminary, they were also tantamount to betrayal! It was about the most unsavory that anyone could have wished to be associated with. But that was the label he had got stuck with. Everybody knew, besides, that it wasn’t some uninformed gentile or misguided unbeliever who had betrayed the Deliverer and handed Him to His killers. And Judas Iscariot wasn’t just anybody either. Judas was one of the twelve who had been handpicked by the Deliverer to form the core of the convocation that would become the Sancta Ecclesia. In addition to being the Deliverer’s purse bearer, Judas Iscariot also drank wine from the same cup as his Master! The man who would betray the Deliverer with a kiss was a member of the inner circle of the burgeoning Christ Fellowship; and, before long, his name had become so repulsive even among Romans, it had replaced that of Brutus, the friend of Cæsar who had conspired with others and stabbed the emperor in the back, as a symbol of betrayal. A traitor par excellence!Whenever Mjomba thought about Judas’ betrayal of the Messiah of the world with a kiss, it was not the act of betrayal itself that came to mind. It was not even the chilling words “Would’st thou betray thy Master with a kiss, Judas?” that were addressed to the betrayer by the Deliverer in the moment when Judas, no doubt representing all humanity, embraced the Nazarene and kissed him on the cheek so the temple’s constabulary wouldn’t grab and take into custody the wrong person! It was the Deliverer’s address to Peter a little earlier on in the Upper House as the fisherman, who himself would swear that he did not know the Nazarene, not once but three times, in front of a shivering crowd not long afterward, balked at the notion of the miracle worker and Son of Man could stoop to wash his (the fisherman’s) dirty feet, namely “Not all are clean, Peter!” And that was, in all probability, after Judas’s feet had already been washed by the Nazarene.That, in any event, was the character after whom Christian Mjomba had been nicknamed by his buddies in what he initially regarded as something that was itself an act of betrayal. The traitors! He could not understand how people could be so insensitive about the feelings of others! And even though he had never said it, he had never liked it a bit - until he started work on his theological thesis." - Joseph M. Luguya, Humans: The Untold Story of Adam and Eve and their Descendants "