"Walter Jon Williams - Prayers on the Wind" - читать интересную книгу автора (Williams Walter John)

"All truth is not vouchsafed to the unenlightened," said O'Neill. "To those unprepared by correct study
and thought, truth can be a danger." She gestured with an arm, encompassing the world outside the
Palace. "Who should know better than we, who live on Vajra? Haven't half the charlatans in all existence
set up outside our walls to preach half-truth to the credulous, endangering their own Enlightenment and
those of everyone who hears them?"
Jigme listened to O'Neill in silence. O'Neill and Daddy Carbajal were the leaders of the reactionary
party, defenders of orthodoxy and the security of the realm. They had argued this point before.
"Knowledge will make the Sang cautious," said Jigme. "They will now know of our armament. They
will now understand the scope of the human expansion, far greater than their own. We may hope this will
deter them from attack."
"The Sang may be encouraged to build more weapons of their own," said Daddy Carbajal. "They are
already highly militarized, as a way of keeping down their subject species. They may militarize further."
"Be assured they are doing so," said O'Neill. "Our own embassy is kept in close confinement on a
small planetoid. They have no way of learning the scope of the Sang threat or sending this information to
the Library. We, on the other hand, have escorted the Sang ambassador throughout human space and
have shown her anything in which she expressed an interest."
"Deterrence," said Jigme. "We wished them to know how extensive our sphere is, that the conquest
would be costly and call for more resources than they possess."
"We must do more than deter. The Sang threat should be eliminated, as were the threats of heterodox
humanity during the Third and Fifth Incarnations."
"You speak jihad," said Miss Taisuke.
There was brief silence. No one, not even O'Neill, was comfortable with Taisuke's plainness.
"All human worlds are under the peace of the Library," said O'Neill. "This was accomplished partly
by force, partly by conversion. The Sang will not conversion."
The Gyalpo Rinpoche cleared his throat. The others fell silent at once. The Incarnation had been
listening in silence, his face showing concentration but no emotion. He always preferred to hear the
opinions of others before expressing his own. "The Third and Fifth Incarnations," he said, "did nothing to
encourage the jihads proclaimed in their name. The Incarnations did not wish to accept temporal power."
"They did not speak against the holy warriors," said Daddy Carbajal.
The Incarnation's elderly face was uncommonly stern. His hands formed the teaching mudra. "Does
not Shakyamuni speak in the Anguttara Nikaya of the three ways of keeping the body pure?" he asked.
"One must not commit adultery, one must not steal, one must not kill any living creature. How could
warriors kill for orthodoxy and yet remain orthodox?"
There was a long moment of uncomfortable silence. Only Daddy Carbajal, whose tautric Short Path
teaching included numerous ways of dispatching his enemies, did not seem nonplused.
"The Sang are here to study us," said the Gyalpo Rinpoche. "We also study them."
"I view their pollution as a danger." Dr. O'Neill's face was stubborn. Miss Taisuke gave a brilliant
smile. "Does not the Mahaparinirvana-sutra tell us that if we are forced to live in a difficult situation and
among people of impure minds, if we cherish faith in Buddha we can ever lead them toward better
actions?"
Relief fluttered through Jigme. Taisuke's apt quote, atop the Incarnation's sternness, had routed the
war party.
"The Embassy will remain," said the Treasured King. "They will be given the freedom of Vajra, saving
only the Holy Precincts. We must remember the oath of the Amida Buddha: 'Though I attain
Buddhahood, I shall never be complete until people everywhere, hearing my name, learn right ideas
about life and death, and gain that perfect wisdom that will keep their minds pure and tranquil in the midst
of the world's greed and suffering.'"
"What of Gyangtse, Rinpoche?" O'Neill's voice seemed harsh after the graceful words of Scripture.
The Gyalpo Rinpoche cocked his head and thought for a moment. Suddenly the Incarnation seemed
very human and very frail, and Jigme's heart surged with love for the old man.