I'm in a Central Asian court, six or seven centuries ago, during the Mongols' rule. Many foreigners, though--diplomats from allies and tributary nations and various churches--a Jesuit from Portugal, Buddhists from Tibet.

One day, to the shock of all, a superhuman figure walks in--well over 2 meters tall, with angular features in brick-red, mustard-yellow, deep blue--not a painted mask, but a living face. Announces he's a representative of Folk Taoism. I think. Or did he say he was an Arhat or Lohan, a guardian spirit from Tibetan Buddhism?

What I DO remember clearly: the Jesuit priest-diplomat in a corner, muttering in Portuguese "Oh, hell..." He's the only who seems to recognize that the new guy has doomed the hopes of all the evangelicals in this court, whether Christian, Muslim, Hindu, Zen, Hinayana Buddhist, or Confucian. Central Asia's lost to them all!

For mere books and priests can't compete with an oversize, living deity. Demi or not.

NOTES IN THE MORNING

• Mongol court, religious representatives: there really were priests of many faiths at the court of Jenghiz Khan; he welcomed all but didn't favor any--more enlightened than modern China's current repression of Christians and Muslims and hysteria over the Falun Gong sect.
• A newcomer alarms a suspicious court:
  1. I just started Le Guin's Tales from Earthsea; refugees on the central Isle of Roke fear an activist newcomer urging a few risks for freedom's sake; he helps found a wizard's university there.
  2. Three nights ago I dreamed two siblings, both child prodigies, walked into a dangerous medieval court, risking assassins to represent their people--the gifted! This hints that...
• The Taoist entity is giftedness--or coming out of the closet about one's real thoughts! In recent years the growing amount of email I've gotten from prodigies has made me focus more on the issues of those so bright (or just so weird) they can't conform. This dream reminds us: "Weirdos, remember--we have power. We scare conformists. When we don't hide."

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