"The_Principia_Discordia" - читать интересную книгу автора (Wilson Robert Anton)
Having at last glimpsed the value of Discordianism, you are hereby ready to be awed by the importance of the little book you hold in your hands this very moment.
Five years of Discordian Society activity transpired before the First Edition of Principia Discordia rolled off District Attorney Jim Garrison's mimeograph machine (without his knowledge) in New Orleans in 1964. That was the work of Gregory Hill and Lane Caplinger, a Discordian typist in the DA's office.
During the next five years Greg preoduced bigger and funnier editions, with a little help from me (but not as much as the enemies of our faith suspect).
By no means is the Principia our only scripture. All along Greg has been writing what he says is a summary of the Universe, but evidently it will be quite some time before he completes it. Additionally, there are piles and piles of Discordian leaflets and broadsides cranked out by zealous converts from everywhere - with new ones arriving in the mail each month - but Goddess only knows where they all are now or remembers what they said. There is also Chaos: Broadsheets of Ontological Anarchism by Hakim Bey (Grim Reaper Books) of the Unarmed Expropriation Committee of the John Henry McKay Society and Bishop of Persia (in Exile) of the Moorish Orthodox Church of Amrerica. But out most exalted testament of all is The Honest Book of Truth - of which there is, alas, only one copy locked away in the Closed Stacks of the Akashic Records. Only qualified Discordian Episkoposes with activated pineal glands may copy passages from it - and these may only be published when they can be shown beyond a reasonable doubt to have redeeming social value, such as by educating you or arousing purient interest.
But this Fourth and Fifth Combined Edition of Principia Discordia is unquestionably the most influential of all the great, immortal works of significant literature our classic Greek Goddess has inspired.
Who would even venture to guess how many wretched and thankless lives these few astonishing pages have deprived forever of meaningless purpose? Who can say how many seminarians read the Principia and decided to change vocations and become clowns, or many landlords it has caused to sell their estates and buy yachts or airplanes for smuggling marijuana, or how many politicians it has inspired to vanish alone into the high mountains and become sagacious hermits, or how many investment bankers it has turned into anarchists?
Slim Brooks was just an ordinary merchant seaman dwelling in the New Orleans French Quarter until he read Principia Discordia. The he became the mysterious Keeper of the Submarine Keys who would never tell anyone what submarine or why it was locked.
Roger Lovin was just a dashing, talented and handsome con artist who was too shallow to settle into any one thing. But for years and years after he read the Principia, under his Discordian Name of Fang the Unwashed, he consistently and with unswerving devotion to the task excommunicated every new person any of the rest of us initiated into the Discordian Society.
Robert Anton Wilson was just a Playboy advisor who wrote safe and insipid answers to inquiries from readers about the size and present whereabouts of John Dillinger's penis until he read this remarkable tract. Then he became Mord the Malignant and wrote a whole library full of widely read books about the Illuminati and how to make Syncronicity work for you in finding quarters on the sidewalk.
Mike Gunderloy was just a compulsive reader of fanzines until the fateful day he read Principia Discordia (under the mistaken impression it was another fanzine). Now he is Ukelele the Short of the Discordian Society and big-time publisher of Factsheet Five.
Elayne Wechsler was just some broad with a funny bone until she read the Principia and asked the question that led to my great definition of theology. "Why," she wanted to know, "is the Discordian Society, which worships a female divinity, so male dominated?" Recalling that more women than men are devout about Christianity with its male God and His male Son, I decided that people like religions that blame reality on the opposite sex. So let that be a lesson to us males. Behind every great idea there is a broad with a funny bone.
So there is no telling how much happier and better adjusted reading this book will make you. Principia Discordia is both a psychological laxative and a spiritual corn plaster. Unsolicited testimonials can be mailed to me in care of Out of Order - the sectual organ of the Orthodox Discordian Society - at Box 5498, Atlanta GA 30307.
Most neophyte Discordians are either too cautious or too serious. They constantly ask permission to do this or that like there are rules hidden away somewhere in the folds of our robes of office. Or they labor at length over ponderous metaphysical schemata with no gags in them, as if the sole ironclad rule of our Society isn't that you have to be funny, as much as possible and as often as possible - or else!
But we are indulgent toward monks who catch on in due time. Seldom do I beat anyone with my trusty staff - and certainly never without their help.
On the subject of personal encounters with other Discordians - and sometimes even the most careful among us cannot avoid them - keep in mind the lodge grips of our Disorder. Somewhere in the following pages you will learn the Turkey Curse. Among Zen Buddhists it is said, "When you meet another bodhisattva on the road, greet him with neither words nor silence." That leaves you with a vast selection of barnyard noises from which to choose.
But as you crow like a rooster or quack like a duck or moo like a cow, scrutinize your brother or sister Discordian with alert interest - never cracking a smile - to see how he or she will respond. An oinking reply that is too loud indicates a swaggering bravado which falls short of mature eristic enlightenment, but that is far better than a feeble and spiritless neigh.
Perhaps best of all is simply uttering a mondo. That is like picking up the telephone when it rings and saying, "Wrong number, please!" However much you think about a mondo it makes no sense - even clamps and pliers cannot get hold of it. Yet at the same time, if it is a good mondo, the longer you think about it the more it seems light it ought to make sense - although you can never figure out why. Beyond that much, a truly great mondo sticks to your mind like hot pine pitch - gumming up your thought process for weeks on end.
When the Zen Master Joshu was still a monk, his master - Nansen - struck him in answer to some dumb remark or other. Joshu grabbed Nansen's arm, glared at the master and said, "From now on do not hit people by mistake!" Nansen replied as follows: "The whole world can tell a snake from a dragon, but you cannot fool a Zen monk." That's a genuinely great mondo.
From this much you can see why meeting other Discordians in person can be harrowing. Besides the pen is only mighter than the sword at a range greater than five feet. When the SubGenius Church held its first Devival, Reverand Ivan Stang of the Dallas Clench expressed suprise at how nice and polite all the fans of his Dobbswork were, adding, "It's almost disappointing." Still, the wise take no unnecessary chances.
As you can tell, we are much indebted to other religions. Not only SubGeniusism and Zen and Taoism have inspired us, but also Zoroastrianism - which practiced fire worship. We too, pay homage to fire in certain circumstances - such as when it is burning the writings of false prophets or is producing inhalable quantities of cannabis smoke. Our tradition is rooted in a medievil rite called the Mass of the Travesty in which marijuana was the sacrament. According to The Emperor Wears No Clothes by Jack Herer, the Mass of the Travesty "can be liked to a Mel Brooks, Second City- TV, Monty Python, or Saturday Night Live - e.g., Father Guido Sarducci- type group - doing irreverent, farcical or satirical take-offs on the dogmas, doctrine, indulgences, and rituals of the R.C. Ch. mass and/or its absolute beliefs." Unfortunately, the humorless Roman Catholic Church authorities of the 15th century thought the Mass of the Travesty was heretical - and that was the true story of how marijuana got its bad name, which it has never since been able to shake off.
Actually, the Mass of the Travesty may have been a disguised remnant of the original Greek Discordianism. For history indicates there must have been, among those ancient ones, Erisian Mysteries. (But if so, they were never solved.) Eris tells us they existed and were the work of Malaclypse the Elder, a mystery writer by trade who also tutored the philosopher Diogenes in lamp maintenance, barrel keeping, rock rolling, public masturbation and Cynicism - until Diogenes was with it enough to fend for himself.
No outpouring of gratitude would be complete without acknowledging the desert religions of the Middle East which keep that part of the world alive with action to this day - and from which we inherited our fanatical dtermination to be at all times, right or wrong, as unreasonable as possible. Translated into latin this commitment is the motto on our coins, seals, rings, plaques and tomb stones: Semper Non Sequitur!
Much of our grandeur is also derived from Hinduism. From the Aryan mystery cult we aquired our soma-drinking habit. Soma, in turn, fortified us with the confidence that we are better than people who look different than us. From Verdanta we learned how to Sanskrit our temple walls. Tantra taught us our many strange sex secrets. That staying up all night to smoke ganga and dance and sing can be passed off as religious activity was something we learned from the Bauls of Bengal. But surely the cult of Kali, Cosmic Mother, Giver and Taker of Life, resembles Discordianism most. We asked Eris about this and She said Kali is short for the Greek Kallisti, which was engraved on the party-crashing Golden Apple of Discord dealt with later on in this informative volume. She added that Her own full name is actually Eris Kallisti Discordia, but took the Fifth Amendment when we asked if this means She and Kali are one in the same.
Our borrowings from Christianity are so obvious that mention of them is almost insulting to whatever modicum of intellegence you possess. But from that tradition we gained our crafty distrust of the reality principle as well as the rather singular notion of an Only Begotten Son.
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