The Head of John
The drums sounded and shouts sprang from the multitude. But the tetrarch dominated all of the racket with his voice. “Hear me Salome! I will give thee whatsoever thy soul desireth, Capernaum shall be thine! And the fertile plain of Tiberias! even to the half of my kingdom!”
Then she threw herself to the floor and suddenly, with her heels rocking in the air, she moved a few feet forward on her hands like a great beetle.
Next, she jumped to her feet, so that she was staring at Herod. Her lips were painted carmine, her eyebrows black and her eyes sparkled with a dangerous brilliance; from her forehead sprang titillating droplets.
Herod and Salome looked intently at each other until Herodias snapped her fingers from the gallery.
Salome then smiled, displaying her strong white teeth and whispered like a modest, shy maiden.
“I would that they presently bring me in a silver charger....” She had forgotten the name; but smiling once again said clearly, “the head of John!”
Perhaps she was very angry with her beloved and so had him decapitated, but when she contemplated the beloved head upon the tray, she wept, went mad, and perished in an erotic frenzy.
A horrifying inner struggle in the psyche of Salome: a spiteful ego dragging other egos down in his abominable decadence, a loathsome triumph for the murderous devil... terrible... horrible...
Herod feared the multitude because they considered John to be a prophet. Chapter 11 of the Gospel of Matthew speaks of John the Baptist as a true Jinn, a Celestial Man, a Demigod, superior to the Prophets. Jesus himself even stated the following about him:
Yea, I say unto you, and one who is more than a prophet. For this is he, of whom it is written: ‘Behold, I send my messenger before thy face, who shall prepare thy way before thee.’
Verily I say unto you, among them that are born of women there hath not risen a greater one than John the Baptist: notwithstanding he that is least in the kingdom of heaven is greater than he.... And if ye will receive it, this is Elijah, who was to come. He that has ears, let him hear. - Matthew 11:9-15
These words of the great Kabir Jesus link the two great Hebrew personages in one.
John the Baptist, decapitated by the lustful Salome, was in truth the living reincarnation of Elijah, the prophet of the Almighty.
At that time, the Nazarenes were known as the Baptists, Sabeans, and Christians of Saint John; their mistake consisted in the absurd belief that the Kabir Jesus was not the Son of God, but simply a prophet who wanted to follow John.
Origen (vol. II, page 150) observes,
“There are some people who say that John the Baptist was the Anointed One, (Christ). When the concepts of the Gnostics, who saw in Jesus the Logos and the Anointed, began gaining ground, the early Christians left the Nazarenes, who unjustly accused the Hierophant Jesus of perverting the teachings of John and of changing for another the baptism in the Jordan.” - Codex Nazarenus II page 109
Salome, naked, intoxicated with wine and passion, dancing in front of King Herod with the innocent head of John the Baptist in her erotic arms, shook the lands of Tiberias, Jerusalem, Galilee, and Capernaum...
However, we must not be so outraged: Salome lives within the intimate psychological depths of many women... You know this... and no male must presume that he is perfect, because within each male a Herod is concealed.
To kill is obviously the most destructive and most corrupt act known on the planet Earth.
It is written in the book of all mysteries that you can kill not only with daggers, firearms, the gallows, or poison. There are many that kill with a contemptuous look, with an ironic smile or laugh, with ingratitude or libel or slander.
Truly I tell you that the world is full of uxoricides, matricides, patricides, fratricides, etc.
A lot of love and wise copulation with the one we love is necessary if we truly want to reduce the murderous devil to cosmic dust by means of the omnipotent spear of Eros.