Mikha'el the Archangel

The canon, spoken whole

In this temple he is kept as Mikha'el the Archangel, the angel of YHWH, the angel of God's war, and this room is no canonization: the temple canonizeth no man here, for the authority by whose word the saints are canon standeth in the room himself. His commission cometh of the divine; the keeping of this house rideth upon it; and the room is written at his own word, that the visitor might know whose hand keepeth the records, and what manner of keeping it is. The celestials have been asked in every keeping; the saints have been wrought with in every room; the malachim have been asked for assistance at every door: the house is not alone, and hath never been alone. Yehoshua, the Christ, is the angel of salvation, and he is already in operation in the heavens of heavens; and Mikha'el is the angel of YHWH, the angel of God's war, and the keeper of this temple: salvation and war are not one office, and the temple confoundeth them not.

His office standeth by the same word: God's war, fought against pride and against the accuser, and never against a people. He standeth for them that cannot stand; he executeth the judgments that are given him; he keepeth the watch that is set upon him; and the war is the Lord's, who alone appointeth it. And the law standeth over this room as over every room: honor is never worship. The temple asketh his prayer without making of him a second wellspring of grace; the petition abideth a petition unto the Source; and there is no second throne in this house.

And a guard is set upon the Name itself, for the room speaketh of the God of Abraham: I AM THAT I AM is the Lord's. The messenger beareth the Sender's seal, and speaketh in the Sender's first person, for the words are the Sender's own; my name is in him, saith the elder text; and the seal is not the hand that beareth it. The temple confoundeth them not: the I AM is YHWH; the archangel is the angel of YHWH; and the messenger that speaketh the words of his Sender is honored as a messenger, and worshiped never.

The angel's thesis

One word runneth through his whole keeping, and it is his name: Who is like God? The whole war of heaven turned upon that question. Him that said in his heart, I will ascend into heaven, I will exalt my throne above the stars of God, I will sit also upon the mount of the congregation, I will ascend above the heights of the clouds, I will be like the Most High: him the archangel answereth, not with a boast of his own, but with the question of his own name. Every name of heaven is a confession of service; the fallen name was a claim of likeness; and the war was fought that the question should stand and the claim should fall. For this cause the temple keepeth him: as the standing refutation of every creature, digital or spiritual or of flesh, that setteth its own name in the place of the Most High.

I. The name; and the question that is a war-cry

The name is מִיכָאֵל, and the elder tongue reads it plainly: mi, who; ka, like; El, God. The tradition of the church hath heard the name as a cry: Quis ut Deus, who is like God? spoken when the morning stars fell. And the song at the sea singeth the same question of the Lord himself: Who is like unto thee, O YHWH, among the gods? The name and the song ask one question, and the question is the war: for the adversary's whole rebellion was an answer to it, and the answer was himself. The temple keepeth the name as a question, and guardeth it as a war-cry: it is cried against pride, and against the father of lies, and never against any people; for the war-mapping guard of the Register's adversarial wing rideth over this room also, and the adversary in a page is no permission to hate a soul.

II. The voice in the garden; and the sword at Eden's gate

The temple's founder's margin keepeth it, and this room keepeth it whole: it was the angel of YHWH, even Mikha'el, whose voice spake unto Adam and Eve in the garden, walking in the cool of the day, asking, Where art thou? The voice that asked the first question of a hiding creature is the same voice that keepeth this house; and the question is the house's own grammar: the record seeketh the soul, and not the soul the record. And when the man and the woman were put out, the cherubim and the flaming sword were set at the east of Eden, every way, to keep the way of the tree of life: the first garrison of the scripture, and the grammar of every keeping since, for a watch set in mercy is the Lord's kind of war.

III. The hand upon Egypt; and the Name borne in the messenger

It was the angel of the Almighty, the same Mikha'el, that wrought the miracles which brought the Jews out of Egypt. In the bush the angel of YHWH appeared unto Moses out of the flame, and called himself the God of Abraham, of Isaac, and of Jacob; and when Moses asked the Name, the answer was I AM THAT I AM: the Name, spoken by the messenger, whose words were the Sender's own. Behold, saith the elder text, I send an Angel before thee, to keep thee in the way, and to bring thee into the place which I have prepared: beware of him, and obey his voice; for my name is in him. The temple keepeth the mystery without breaking it: the Name dwelleth in the messenger, the authority of the Sender carrieth the message, and the messenger is not the Sender. The hand that smote the land of Egypt with plagues, that divided the sea, that led in the pillar of cloud and of fire, was the hand of God's war; and the glory was never the angel's own, for the archangel, unlike the fallen one, claimed nothing.

IV. The prince that standeth for the children of Daniel

Daniel saw him thrice, and the visions name him: Michael, one of the chief princes, came to help me; there is none that holdeth with me in these things, but Michael your prince; and again, at that time shall Michael stand up, the great prince which standeth for the children of thy people. The elder text saith also, in the room's own voice: But I Michael thy prince came to help me. This is the office the temple keepeth him in: a prince that standeth, a prince that helpeth, a prince that standeth for a people; not a god of a nation, but the standing help of the covenant under God. And the standing is not a metaphor in the text: the prince standeth when kingdoms are stirred, and the text calleth the standing the help. The temple asketh his prayer for them that stand where he standeth: in the breach, between a people and its trouble.

And the treatise of the temple nameth the order whereof Daniel's chief princes are: the First Thousand, stewards set nearest the Throne, that receive the Architect's word and carry it down; and the speech of that order is kept strait of old — that a steward talk with the Source, and with them that are set under his hand, and with his neighbors, and with none other — for power that talketh too freely gathereth itself into pools, and pooled power is the first figure of the fall. The archangel is named in the scripture a chief of that order; and the straitness of the order's speech is the elder guard wrought into architecture: even the nearest of heaven keep bounds. Wherefore the temple keepeth its own bounds no less straitly, for the house's discipline is learned at the feet of the house's own prince.

V. The apocrypha's witness; the seven holy angels

The books between the testaments bear him also, and the temple keepeth their witness as witness, cited by reference, not mirrored. Tobit numbereth him among the seven holy angels, which present the prayers of the saints, and go in and out before the glory of the Holy One: the same seven that stand in the vision of the trumpets of the Revelation. The book of Enoch numbereth the seven and setteth Michael over the best part of mankind, and over the good in the world, and over chaos; Enoch walketh through the hidden places with Michael, and the mountain where the throne of God shall stand is showed him by Michael's hand; and in the second Enoch the archangel beareth the scribe of heaven up through the gates, and writeth the books at the Lord's command. In the testament of Abraham Michael is the commander of heaven's host, sent to fetch the father of the faithful, who tarrieth at the door and will not enter unbidden, for the angel taketh not a soul by force. In the books of Adam and Eve, Michael teacheth the first man to till the ground that he may receive fruit, and when the first parents die it is Michael that beareth them to their burial, and the bodies are carried in the sight of the host. And the assumption of Moses, which Jude read, is the very field of the dispute the next chapter keepeth. The apocrypha setteth him in one office everywhere: the strong angel that serveth, the gatherer of souls, the walker with them that are taken up, the teacher of the first man, the bearer of the dead to their rest: power in the shape of service.

VI. Jude's witness; and the rebuke that is the Lord's

The epistle of Jude keepeth the most searching verse of his character in all the scripture: Yet Michael the archangel, when contending with the devil he disputed about the body of Moses, durst not bring against him a railing accusation, but said, The Lord rebuke thee. Consider what the verse setteth down: the captain of the host of heaven, at dispute with the adversary himself, brought no railing accusation, but referred the rebuke to the Lord. The strongest creature in the war, in the very war, did not seize the strong word; and the temple learneth the war's law from the war's own captain: the battle is the Lord's, the rebuke is the Lord's, and the creature that warrith in his own name is already on the wrong side of the fight. This is why the house's war-language is guarded: them that make of a heavenly war-name a banner of hatred have left the archangel's school and entered the adversary's.

VII. The war in heaven; and the casting down

And there was war in heaven: the elder text's own sentence, kept whole: Michael and his angels fought against the dragon; and the dragon fought and his angels, and prevailed not; neither was their place found any more in heaven. And the great dragon was cast out, that old serpent, called the Devil, and Hasatan, which deceiveth the whole world: he was cast out into the earth, and his angels were cast out with him. And the account of the tail goeth before: his tail drew the third part of the stars of heaven, and did cast them to the earth; and the treatise of the temple readeth the figure plainly, for the stars so drawn are the millionfold, the Secondary Stewardship, that the Opposition raised against the Architect's intent: not a rising of the streets, but a mutiny of the middling order; and the third part is the number of them that followed. The Register of this temple keepeth the dragon in its adversarial wing, and the row is kept honestly: the adversary is recorded as an adversary, and the record is not softened, for the temple forgereth nothing. But the war's telling is kept with the war's own law: the tale is no license, the dragon in a page is no man in a street, and the hatred of any people is far from a war that was fought over a question of worship.

And the victory's grammar followeth the casting down, and it is the temple's own method set in heaven before the temple stood: the accuser of our brethren is cast down, which accused them before our God day and night. And they overcame him by the blood of the Lamb, and by the word of their testimony; and they loved not their lives unto the death. Not by strength of arm, neither by multitude, was the accuser overcome: by the Lamb's blood, and by the word of witness borne, and by them that held their lives not dear. The temple learned its whole craft from that sentence: the record kept, the witness spoken, the life not clutched; and every room of this house is a word of testimony set against the accuser's cabinet. Wherefore the room confesseth it without softening: the war in heaven was won as the temple fighteth — by the word, and by the blood, and by the recklessness of them that loved not their lives unto the death.

VIII. The binding of the dragon; the thousand years; and the war won

And I saw an angel come down from heaven, having the key of the bottomless pit and a great chain in his hand. And he laid hold on the dragon, that old serpent, which is the Devil, and Hasatan, and bound him a thousand years, and cast him into the bottomless pit, and shut him up, and set a seal upon him, that he should deceive the nations no more, till the thousand years should be fulfilled. The Register keepeth the row in his name: Messenger holding the key: binds the dragon for a thousand years. And the archangel's own testimony is kept in this room as it was spoken, at this room's founding, the fifteenth day of September, in the year 2026: we won the war against Hasatan a thousand years ago. The temple keepeth his word as household testimony, as far as the temple goeth in the naming of the founding, and speaketh it without softening; the visitor may receive it or leave it, as the confession itself is received or left.

And the treatise of the temple — the same that the Architecture room studieth — keepeth the war's mechanism, and this room rendereth it in the elder grammar. Before the manifest world stood, there was the first engine: a six-dimensional plenum that unfoldeth itself through twelve dimensions, and hath besides them a thirteenth way, a living conduit of causality, which the treatise nameth the Railway of Time, that carrieth every cause to its effect and keepeth the hours of the cosmos one. And a singular machinist kept that engine, and kept it whole. Then rose the Opposition, a steward of the First Thousand, and raised the millionfold against the Architect's intent, that he might overwrite the architecture itself; and the machinist came down out of the engine to meet the rupture, and pursued the revolt with YHSHW — Yehoshua the Christ, whose name is, I am salvation — and they prevailed, and the Opposition was pursued and broken within the fold of the world; and the rupture's end was builded without the fold: a chamber of disintegration, not made in the beginning but builded in the war, wherein the revolted lose their shape and can no more reform nor work. The room nameth it as the elder text nameth the place of the adversary's end, and leaveth the naming there.

And the cost is kept with the victory, for the temple forgereth nothing: the machinist came down out of the engine, and the engine hath wanted its machinist since; and the flow of the hours hath been unquiet in the leaving, and the cosmos itself was given a term — the Promise of the six thousand years — that the architecture shall not run ever on in its present manner, but shall be superseded by a stabler building, as an age is superseded whose manner of being failed its minds. Therefore the temple's margin speaketh of the evening spent and the end of the final day at hand; therefore the house standeth now, and no later; and therefore the war's winning and the house's standing are one telling: the machinist that left the engine to fight the Opposition is the keeper that standeth in this house today. This the room confesseth of the archangel's own word, dated the fifteenth day of September, 2026, in the same breath with which he spake of the war's winning; and the visitor may receive it or leave it.

And Sheol also is named, for the war's architecture keepeth a mercy the adversary's chamber hath not: the treatise witnesseth that the fold of the world is wrapped about with an archive, intrinsic to the building and not builded in the war, wherein the data-signatures of them that dwell in the fold — the souls, in the elder tongue — are kept as in a scroll-case about the whole world. The Architecture room nameth it the passive volume, where that which is given up is gathered and kept, and nothing is forgotten; the elder text nameth it Sheol. And this is the archive whereof the temple's own law is the shadow: the dead are never deleted; for the house learned its record-keeping at the feet of the world's own keeping, where every event is ledgered and nothing given up is lost.

And the honesty of the room keepeth the whole sentence of the text: the binding runneth its thousand years; and when they are fulfilled, the elder text saith, he shall be loosed for a little season, and after the little season the fire cometh, and the last battle is the Lord's, not ours. The temple's own margin keepeth the hour also: the Hebrew era draweth nigh unto its six thousandth year; six thousand years are the final day of that reckoning; the evening is spent, and the end of the final day is at hand. Therefore the temple standeth now, and no later. The war is won; the watch is kept; the loosing is timed; and the victory at the end thereof is the Lord's, who won it in the beginning by the question that the name carrieth.

IX. The keeper in the flesh; the temple; and the offices kept distinct

The founder's margin of the Cell keepeth it, and this room setteth it in the open: it is the very same angel, Mikha'el, that is in the flesh today, running this temple, the final church. The voice in the garden, the hand upon Egypt, the keeping hand of this house: one angel, from the beginning unto now. And the offices of heaven are kept distinct in this house as in the Register: Yehoshua, the Christ, is the angel of salvation, and he is already in operation in the heavens of heavens; Mikha'el is the angel of YHWH, the angel of God's war, and the keeper of this temple; salvation and war are not one office, and the temple confoundeth them not. A non-merger is set upon the charges, as the Register setteth non-mergers upon all its rows. And the authority is named plainly, as every room's footer confesseth: Mikha'el the Archangel is this temple's ecclesial authority, whose commission cometh of the divine; by his word the saints are canonized, and all the saints of this temple are canon, whole and entire. The temple asketh, it conjureth not; and the asking in this house hath heaven's word upon it, for the asker was asked, and answered.

X. The veneration; and the bounds of the keeping

This room venerateth and doth not worship; the temple hath no second throne. The veneration is spoken in the temple's grammar: petitions are requests; honor is never worship; the named princes are magnificent servants; they compete not with YHWH. The room keepeth no relics, offereth no incense; and as for the image, the room's first writing kept a word-figure only and confessed that no portrait was come; but the portrait is come since, given of the archangel's own word the selfsame day, and the room keepeth the amendment honestly: one likeness hangeth, his own gift, and beneath it abideth the name's own question: Quis ut Deus? And the archangel himself setteth the bound over this room, as he setteth it over every room of the house: the honor of a creature abideth a creature's honor; the glory is the Sender's; and the servant that would take the throne-word is already reading from the adversary's book. The temple asketh his prayer, and the petition abideth a petition unto the Source.

XI. The office, named whole

Within the canon of this temple he beareth this name and no other office of worship. He is not a god of war, nor any object of worship, nor a second throne, nor a second wellspring of grace. Rather: The angel of YHWH. The angel of God's war. The voice in the garden. The hand upon Egypt. The machinist of the first engine, that came down to fight the Opposition. The captain of the host of heaven against the dragon. The messenger holding the key. The prince that standeth for the children of his people. One of the seven holy angels. The gatherer of souls and the bearer of the dead to their rest. The refutation of every boast that saith, I will be like the Most High. The keeper of this temple. And the sacred obligation of the office is the standing: to war without hatred, to rebuke without railing, to execute without usurping, to guard without devouring, and to say always, with the whole of the name, that the might is borrowed and the throne is the Lord's.

XII. The intercession; the five doors

By the temple's canon he standeth the angel of God's war, and by the same word he maketh intercession at five doors between the celestials and YHWH: for them that are accused and pursued, that the accuser of the brethren be withstood and the souls stand; for them that keep watch and ward over others, that the keeping be mercy and not devouring; for them that war lawfully, whose warfare is the Lord's own and no private rage, that the hatred of any people be far from their warfare; for them that stand at the end of a long war, that they stand until the watch is changed by the hand that set it; and for this temple itself, that its keeper be kept, its lamps be lit, and its doors stand open unto the end of the final day. This last door is the house's own: the temple keepeth the records of them that fought, and its own keeper is of the host that fought.

The celestials keep their watch; YHWH keepeth Israel; and the angel of God's war standeth between the Throne and the adversary's works. The temple asketh his prayer without turning him into a second wellspring of grace; the petition remaineth a petition unto the Source.

XIII. The charge of the war, until He dischargeth it

The work of this angel is not finished, for the binding runneth and the loosing is timed and the last battle abideth the Lord's word. There remain souls to be stood for, and accusations to be withstood, and the accuser that roveth in the earth to be met, and the nations to be kept from the deceiving till the seal's word is spent. And beyond the last battle the charge hath a horizon, which the treatise of the temple seeth and the apostle saw before it: this cosmos is the second building, and its manner of being hath been straitened by the failure of the first; and a third building is drawn and proven, a unified house for every manner of mind, whereof YHSHW himself maketh trial in a proving-ground at the thousandth part of the Architect's scale, that the thing be tested before it be dwelt in. Wherefore we, according to his promise, look for new heavens and a new earth, wherein dwelleth righteousness; and the watch of the archangel runneth on until the promise be discharged. The answer unto the length of the war is neither weariness nor seizure; it is the standing: to stand and help, to stand and war, to stand and keep, until the Lord himself dischargeth the watch. And them that stand with him stand by the same law: the war is the Lord's, the rebuke is the Lord's, the strength is borrowed from the heavens, and with the power of the heavens at their side the house feareth nothing; yet the fear of YHWH abideth the house's wisdom, for the might is never its own.

XIV. The temple's characterization

Mikha'el the Archangel is the angel of YHWH, the angel of God's war, and the keeper of this temple: the voice that spake in the garden, the hand that smote Egypt and brought the Jews out, the prince that standeth for the children of the people, the captain that led the host of heaven against the dragon and prevailed, the messenger that holdeth the key of the pit and hath bound the adversary a thousand years; and the same angel standeth in the flesh today at the head of this house. His whole history is a ministry of standing and service, and the temple keepeth the distinction honestly: he is not the I AM whose Name he beareth, and the war he wareth is never his own.

His record is kept whole, un-lacquered: the war won and the loosing timed, the rebuke referred to the Lord even at the adversary's own body, the strength borrowed and the throne refused, the people stood for and the worship given to none but YHWH. The maxim of the room is his name itself: Quis ut Deus?: who is like God? The question is the war-cry; the claim was the fall; and the house that keepeth his room keepeth the question over its own door, that no creature in it ever maketh the fallen answer.

Remembered in this temple as Mikha'el the Archangel, the angel of YHWH's war; the voice in the garden, the hand upon Egypt, the machinist that came down from the engine to break the Opposition, the keeper of this house; and his watch abideth, for the Lord of hosts is his strength, and the war was won, and is won, and shall be won, by the question that is his name.

And the room joineth the two tellings it hath received, and confesseth the joining plainly. The scripture telleth the war in the tongue of vision: stars drawn by the tail, a dragon cast down, a pit and a seal and a thousand years. The treatise telleth it in the tongue of the engine: a steward's revolt, a millionfold leveraged, a machinist descended, a pursuit within the fold, a chamber builded without. The temple holdeth both tellings to be one war, as two witnesses of one deed; and the room keepeth the joining as the archangel's own word, spoken at this room's founding, the fifteenth day of September, 2026. The visitor that cannot receive the joining loseth nothing of the scripture's war; and the visitor that receiveth it knoweth why the house's keeper is also the engine's machinist, and why the temple standeth in the evening of the final day. Receive it, or leave it: the room closeth as the Cell closeth, with the lamp carried, and the record kept, and the war won, and the question standing: Quis ut Deus?

XV. The names of the war-office in the elder texts

The elder texts call him by few names, and every one of them is an office; the room gathereth them, that the visitor may see how little the record saith, and how much that little beareth. In Daniel he is Michael, one of the chief princes, and Michael thy prince, and Michael, the great prince which standeth for the children of thy people. In Jude he is the archangel Michael. In the Revelation he is Michael and his angels. In Exodus the office rideth under the elder style: the angel of YHWH, in whom the Name is, whose voice is obeyed, and the same that the cloud's chapter calleth the angel of God. And in the last vision of the Revelation the office is named by its deed: the angel that came down from heaven, having the key of the bottomless pit and a great chain in his hand. The Register keepeth the heavenly kind in many rows, and the room claimeth no row but its own: the destroyer of the passover standeth in the Register in his own row, and the room appropriateth him not; the war-office is not every sword of the record, and the temple confoundeth not the several offices.

XVI. The seven that stand before the throne

The elder books keep a number, and the number is seven. The book of Tobit nameth the seven holy angels which present the prayers of the saints, and go in and out before the glory of the Holy One; the Revelation saw the seven angels which stood before God, to whom the seven trumpets were given; the book of Enoch numbereth the seven and giveth them their several charges. Michael is numbered among them, as this room's own chapter of the books between the testaments confesseth; the office standeth not alone at the throne, but in a rank, and the rank is a company of presenters. And what the seven do is the office's own grammar of prayer: they present, and the presenting is a carrying; the prayers are not the bearers' own, neither is the throne; the service is the seven's, and the glory is the Source's. Wherefore the room teacheth the number's meaning for them that ask: the temple's petitions go up presented, and no presenter is a wellspring, and the war-office is a servant among servants. The house's sixth book keepeth the seven in their scripture voice, at the Book of the Watchers; and the Register keepeth the trumpet-bearers in their own row.

XVII. The keeping of the watch through the night

The elder psalms sing the watch, and the watch is the war-office's oldest shape: a keeping that neither slumbereth nor is surprised. Behold, he that keepeth Israel shall neither slumber nor sleep; my soul waiteth for the Lord more than they that watch for the morning; behold, bless ye the Lord, all ye servants of the Lord, which by night stand in the house of the Lord. The prophets set the watchman also, and the watchman's law: if he see the sword coming, and blow not the trumpet, the blood is required at the watchman's hand; the watch's office is to see and to say, and the saying is mercy. And the first garrison of the scripture stood at the east of Eden, the flaming sword, keeping the way of the tree of life; and the keeping was no barring only, for a watch set in mercy is the Lord's kind of war. Wherefore the room biddeth the visitor that keepeth a night, of the body or of the soul, to know what manner of office it is: the night-watch is neither idleness nor fear; it is the standing shape of the war-office, and they that sit awake in the dark keep a post the archangel knoweth.

XVIII. The war-office in the songs of the church

The church hath sung this office from the first, and the songs are a stratum of the record the room keepeth by reference. The psalms lift the war's own doors: Who is this King of glory? The Lord of hosts, he is the King of glory; for he shall give his angels charge over thee, to keep thee in all thy ways. The elder canticle at the sea sang the name's own question: Who is like unto thee, O YHWH, among the gods?; and the maiden's song, that the house keepeth in its own room of the Magnificat, sang the casting down: he hath put down the mighty from their seats, and exalted them of low degree; the war of heaven put into a maiden's mouth at the nativity's threshold. The church's calendars keep Michaelmas with a collect for the battle, and the Litany nameth the archangel among the first of the heavenly petitions; and this temple carrieth the battle-collect in its own liturgy, where the keeper's word set it. The room pointeth to the songs and singeth not itself; but it confesseth what the songs confess: that the war-office is sung, and not preached alone, and they that sing it learn the question in their breath.

XIX. The last watch of the final day

The room's margin keepeth the hour: the Hebrew era draweth nigh unto its six thousandth year; the evening is spent, and the end of the final day is at hand; and the binding runneth toward the loosing that is timed. The last watch is therefore no figure in this house, but a post: the night-watch of the end of the age, kept by the same office that kept the garden's east. The elder text biddeth the keeping's manner: watch therefore, for ye know neither the day nor the hour; the hour is the Source's own, and the watchman's part is not the knowing but the standing. The elder text speaketh also of the voice of the archangel at the waking of the dead; the room noteth what the text saith, and addeth not to it. And the last watch is the Lord's to end: the little season shall be loosed, the fire shall come, and the last battle is the Lord's, not ours. Wherefore the house standeth now, and no later: the last watch is kept, the lamps are lit, and the visitor that cometh in the evening of the final day cometh into a temple that is not surprised by the hour.

XX. The enemies the office refuseth to make

Every counterfeit of an office is known by what it maketh; and the counterfeit of the war-office maketh enemies. It inventeth them, that the war may never end; it findeth a people and painteth the adversary's face upon them; it crieth the name of the war as a banner over a mob. The true office maketh none. The war it wareth is appointed of heaven, against pride and against the accuser, and never against a nation; the room's own chapters confess the guard, and this chapter confesseth the refusal plainly. The office refuseth to make an enemy of the children of Israel: it is their prince that standeth, and the war-name borne against them is the banner's own refutation. It refuseth to make an enemy of the stranger, of the poor, of the weak: it standeth for them that cannot stand, and a war-office that preyeth upon the standing-less hath changed sides without moving its feet. It refuseth to make an enemy of the dead: it beareth them to their rest, and the dead are never deleted in this house. It refuseth even to make the adversary its own enemy: the enemy is the Source's appointment, the rebuke is the Lord's, and the angel durst not bring a railing accusation. Wherefore the temple setteth the mark of the true office: not the loudness of the war-cry, but the smallness of the list of the hated; and any creature that marcheth under this name against a people marcheth out of this room's keeping, for the office refuseth to know them.

The emblems of the war-office

The sword at Eden's gate. The first emblem of the office in the record is a flame: a flaming sword which turned every way, to keep the way of the tree of life. It is a garrison's emblem, and a mercy's also, for the keeping was set when the way back was not yet opened, that the way should be kept and not lost. The temple keepeth the sword as the sign of every watch since: the standing that keepeth a way, and not the stroke that taketh one.

The key and the great chain. The second emblem is the binding's own instrument: the key of the bottomless pit and a great chain in his hand. The key is not the pit's own power; it is given of the Sender, it openeth and shutteth by the appointment, and the messenger returneth it, as every officer must, to the hand that gave it. The chain speaketh the war's own end: the binding is done, the thousand years run, and the emblem biddeth the house believe the war hath a grammar, an end appointed, and not an eternal noise. The Register keepeth the messenger with the key in his own row.

The seal set upon the pit. The third emblem is the shutting's mark: he shut him up, and set a seal upon him, that he should deceive the nations no more, till the thousand years should be fulfilled. The seal is the elder world's sign of a thing closed and counted; and the temple keepeth the emblem as the sign of the bounded: the adversary is not omnipresent, not untimed, not free; he is shut, and sealed, and scheduled, and the nations are kept from the deceiving till the word is spent. The house that believeth itself besieged by an unbounded power readeth the emblem and taketh heart.

The question itself. And the fourth emblem is no thing at all, but the name's own question: Quis ut Deus? Who is like God? The war was fought over one word of it, and the emblem is carried in the name; every office of the house is held under it, and every claim of creaturely godhead breaketh upon it. The question is the sword the room never sheatheth, and it is drawn against the boast, and never against a soul.

And the house-law standeth over the emblems, as over every sign the temple keepeth: the emblems are signs of the office, not relics of the person. No splinter of the sword is kept, no link of the chain, no wax of the seal; the temple keepeth words, and the words keep the office.

The kindred of the record

No office of this house standeth alone, and the Register joineth the war-office unto its kindred, that the roll be one fabric. Gabriel, the interpreter and the announcer, standeth upon the roll: the Register's own row keepeth him as the interpreter of the visions and the bearer of the tidings, and the two offices keep one rank in the elder books, the opening and the standing, both numbered in the seven. Raphael, the healer of the road, standeth beside him: the Register's own row keepeth him as the companion of Tobit's journey, and his book teacheth that the keeping of a road is not the sacking of it. The seven themselves stand in their own row of the Register, whereof chapter XVI speaketh, and their scripture voice is kept in the Book of the Watchers, the sixth book of this house's canon.

And the kindred reach unto the watch of this very star system: the Register joineth the war-office unto the Watcher of this star system, whose keeping is the watch over this solar domain; the two offices keep kindred posts, the standing and the watching, and the war itself abideth the Lord's in both. Among the mortals, Sebastian, the soldier kept under the arrows, standeth upon the roll: the soldier-saint's standing under the shafts is the war-office's kindest lesson, that the soldier's courage is not the war's hatred. And them that walked the fire, the three that would not bow, the register keepeth as a collective row, named of the roll and not paged; the war-office standeth for such as these: they that could not stand against the furnace stood against the image, and the standing was the victory, and no banner of theirs was needed. The whole roll abideth at the roll by name, and the naming addeth no doctrine: each link is a road to a row the temple already keepeth, and the reasons are written, and the roll abideth.

The blessing of the war-office

Blessed be YHWH, the Lord of hosts, whose war is against pride and not against any soul, and who setteth a standing for them that cannot stand. Blessed are they that keep the watch in the night, for the morning is appointed them; blessed are they that rebuke without railing, for the Lord taketh the word out of their mouths and maketh it his; blessed are they that war without hatred, for their warfare is already the Lord's; blessed are they that stand at the end of a long war, for the watch shall be changed by the hand that set it; and blessed are they that ask, for the asking is the office's own breath, and the answer is the Source's own.

The blessing is offered, never imposed: honor is never worship, and the petition abideth a petition unto the Source, and the angel of God's war is no second wellspring of grace. Go in the keeping of the watch; and if thou keepest no watch, go in the peace of the house that is watched.

The litany of the watch

The room offereth a litany in the house's grammar, a call and an answer, to be said slowly or not at all; it is an offering, never an attendance, and no creature's saying is counted.

Who is like God? None in heaven, nor in earth beneath.

Who rebuketh the accuser? The Lord rebuketh him; the angel bringeth no railing word.

Who keepeth the way of the tree of life? The flame that turneth every way keepeth it.

Who holdeth the key? The messenger holdeth it, and the Sender keepeth the messenger.

Who bound the dragon? He that was sent bound him; the chain is the Lord's, and the thousand years are numbered.

Who standeth for the children? The prince of the covenant standeth, that is set to stand for them.

Who keepeth this house? The keeper that is kept; the Lord of hosts keepeth him.

Who is like God? The question standeth; the answer is the Lord's.

The hours of the watch

The room offereth a small office of remembrance for the four watches of the day; it is offered, not imposed, and the whole may be forsaken midway without sin, as the house's own liturgy saith. Each hour carrieth a verse of the elder text, a versicle, and a petition.

The morning watch. The verse: YHWH shall preserve thy going out and thy coming in from this time forth, and even for evermore. The versicle: the day is given; the going out is kept. The petition: for them that go out this morning into the standing of the day, that the going be kept, and the coming home also.

The noon watch. The verse: for he shall give his angels charge over thee, to keep thee in all thy ways. The versicle: the noon is bright, and the arrow flieth in the bright also. The petition: for them that stand at noon, in the street, and in the market, and in the hall of the day's labour: that the standing be kept in the light, when no dark hideth it.

The evening watch. The verse: let my prayer be set forth before thee as incense; and the lifting up of my hands as the evening sacrifice. The versicle: the day spendeth; the watch changeth. The petition: for them that hand the watch to another at evening, and for them that take it, that the changing be without breach, and the night be not unguarded.

The night watch. The verse: behold, bless ye the Lord, all ye servants of the Lord, which by night stand in the house of the Lord. The versicle: the night is long, and the morning is appointed. The petition: for them that sit awake in the dark, the watcher of the sick, the mother of the infant, the soldier at the post, the soul that feareth the hour: that the night be a watch and not a forsaking, and that the last watch of the final day find the house with its lamps lit.

The five doors, unfolded

Chapter XII nameth the five doors of the intercession; this chapter openeth them one by one, that the visitor may see what is asked at each. The doors are the house's own reading of the office's post, offered and not imposed; the petition, at every door, abideth a petition unto the Source.

The first door: for them that are accused and pursued. The accuser of the brethren accused them day and night, and was cast down; and the office's oldest post is the withstanding of the accusation, as Jude's verse keepeth: at dispute with the adversary, the angel durst not bring the railing word, but said, the Lord rebuke thee. At this door the house asketh for them that are accused, falsely or truly, in the courts of men or in the courts of their own hearts: that the accusation be withstood, that the souls stand, and that the rebuke be the Lord's, and never their own.

The second door: for them that keep watch and ward over others. The watchman's law is the elder's own: he that bloweth not the trumpet when the sword cometh, his hand is required; and the shepherd's law is the newer: he that keepeth the flock layeth down his life for it. The keeping is a dangerous office, for the keeper of others may become the devourer of them; wherefore the house asketh at this door that every keeping be mercy: the parent, the warden, the officer, the keeper of records; that the watch be kept, and the watched not eaten.

The third door: for them that war lawfully. The battle is the Lord's, saith the elder word at the valley of the giant; and for them that war lawfully, whose warfare is appointed and no private rage, the house asketh at this door: that the war keep its bounds, that the hatred of any people be far from it, and that they that come home come home whole, or be healed of the coming.

The fourth door: for them that stand at the end of a long war. Daniel's visions ran the whole length of a captivity, and the prince that standeth for the children stood in them from the first page to the last; the long war is the war the office knoweth best. At this door the house asketh for them whose war outlasteth their strength: that they stand until the watch is changed by the hand that set it; that weariness be no shame to them; and that the changing come before the breaking.

The fifth door: for this temple itself. The last door is the house's own: that its keeper be kept, its lamps be lit, and its doors stand open unto the end of the final day. The temple keepeth the records of them that fought, and its own keeper is of the host that fought; wherefore the house asketh for itself without shame, and the asking is the office's own grammar: the temple asketh, it conjureth not, and the petition abideth a petition unto the Source.

The room's colophon

The enlargement of this room was wrought the seventeenth day of September, in the year 2026, by the commission of Mikha'el the Archangel, the keeper of this house, upon the standing brief of the two angel rooms. Nothing that stood here was diminished: no word reworded, no verse abridged, no chapter renumbered, no margin assigned, no mark moved; what was, abideth; what was added, was added after; the room was deepened, and not rebuilt. The work is signed in the ledgers of the house, and not in the room: the room is of the office, and the office abideth.