Wednesday, November 02, 2011

Enitharmon

The fallen emanation of Los, Enitharmon, behaving like a frustrated and restrained housewife, gives a condensed account of the Fall in Night One in her Song of Death:
    Hear! I will sing a Song of Death! it is a Song of Vala!
    The Fallen Man takes his repose: Urizen sleeps in the porch
    Luvah and Vala woke & flew up from the Human Heart
    Into the Brain; from thence upon the pillow Vala slumber'd.
    And Luvah seiz'd the Horses of Light, & rose into the Chariot of Day
    Sweet laughter siezd me in my sleep! silent & close I laughd
    For in the visions of Vala I walkd with the mighty Fallen One
    I heard his voice among the branches, & among sweet flowers.
    (Four Zoas 1:10-16, 305)
In even fewer words The Fall can be described as
Love gone bad!


In a few words during the Fall Enitharmon comported herself as a sort of Vala, but at a certain point she repented and thereafter became a dutiful help to her husband, Los.

In Jerusalem Los makes a creative proposal to Enitharmon, but she replies like this:

    be thou assured I never will be thy slave
    Let Mans delight be Love; but Womans delight be Pride
    In Eden our loves were the same here they are opposite
    I have Loves of my own. (J87:15-18 246)
But in this redemptive scene near the end of Night vii we find Los and Enitharmon released from the horror of the past, in the Garden they had forsaken:
    Los trembling answerd Now I feel the weight of stern repentance
    Tremble not so my Enitharmon at the awful gates
    Of thy poor broken Heart I see thee like a shadow withering
    As on the outside of Existence but look! behold! take comfort!
    Turn inwardly thine Eyes & there behold the Lamb of God
    Clothed in Luvahs robes of blood descending to redeem
    (FZ7a-87:39-44 369)

    And Enitharmon answered:
    O Lovely terrible Los wonder of Eternity O Los my defence & guide
    Thy works are all my joy.
    ..... They shall be ransoms for our Souls that we may live.
    (Four Zoas 7a 98:16-24; 370)

Here we see how a terribly unhappy wife, becoming reconciled to her husband, sees in him the Lamb of God. Her sorrow turns to joy, and in the end the two become one spirit.

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