Dennis Biba

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Is religion the root of all evil or the seed of a humanity that is growing beyond itself? In the sequel to The Parable of the Sower, Octavia Estelle Butler takes the time to realise what previously existed only in the thoughts of protagonist Lauren Olamina: Earthseed. The first volume was characterised by the tension between Lauren’s hyperempathy syndrome and the pyro drug, or, to put it boldly, between the constructive and destructive forces of society. While the motif of the pyro drug is lost in the second part and the pyromaniacs are replaced by crusaders, Lauren’s hyperempathy continues to play an important role. Although it gives Lauren a high level of social intelligence, it also makes her a highly manipulative person. This becomes most apparent in the missionary attempts of her fellow human beings when Lauren begins to establish her own religion. Earthseed is intended to take on the community-building character of the major religions, but without repeating their mistakes. As a syncretic religion, however, Earthseed remains little more than a bundle of cobbled-together beliefs – ‘universal truths’ in Lauren’s view – for much of the novel’s plot. Based on the Heraclitean observation that everything changes, Earthseed initially seems more philosophical than religious, partly because Lauren consciously rejects the mystification of her own life. Every verse of her teaching is put to the test in critical discussions, almost subjected to scientific methods, even if the decision to finally fix the findings in the form of a holy book provokes an inner contradiction against the dogma of eternal change.

However, Lauren is not interested in spiritual fulfilment or knowledge per se. Her religion primarily fulfils a social function, based on the idea that religions are necessary to keep communities together. A shared ideological superstructure is unavoidable, especially when numerous (e.g. ethnically motivated) conflicts are to be expected due to the diversity of a community. This is a thesis that is also held, for example, by sociologist Hartmut Rosa, who sees secularisation, i.e. the loss of importance of the major religions, primarily as a loss of meaning in Western societies, as Friedrich Nietzsche already diagnosed in the 19th century. The community is supposed to have a goal, which in the case of Earthseed is surprisingly profane despite all the religious semantics: the colonisation of the universe. At the beginning of the story, the government’s expensive Mars missions are condemned as a waste of money, but Lauren cannot resist the fascination that outer space triggers. The contradiction is not resolved any further and Lauren’s criticism is later repeated by her daughter, this time against her own mother. Despite criticising colonialism, Lauren not only incorporates colonial growth and missionary logic into her religion, but also amasses considerable wealth as a cult leader. The Parable of the Talents follows an interesting narrative strategy by putting the criticism of Lauren in the mouth of her daughter, who grew up with Christian foster parents and was indoctrinated with their ideology. Like Lauren herself, the daughter character is ambivalent and her criticism is not unjustified, which is why it is difficult for the reader to make a clear judgement. Is Lauren’s atheist husband Bankole right in the end, when he sceptically confronts both Christianity and the Earthseed sect and counters the utopianism of the believers with the pragmatism of a doctor? In any case, Lauren’s decisions have far-reaching consequences for Bankole.

The question of the utopian potential of the Earthseed community is not easy to answer. On the one hand, something like a small-scale social utopia is actually emerging in the small village of Acorn, which in the 1990s had to appear significantly more progressive against the backdrop of slavery, which had barely been overcome. The community is peaceful, cooperative, ecologically and democratically organised. On the other hand, Acorn remains little more than a village from the pre-industrial era until it is overtaken by the brutal conditions of the present. The community’s idea of ecological sufficiency stands in stark contrast to the technological utopianism of its religion.

All in all, Butler’s two parables remain ambiguous, just as the explicit depiction of selected atrocities over hundreds of pages makes the reading less enjoyable. The Parable of the Talents follows a very similar (not to say identical) narrative pattern to the first volume, but after a very slow pacing it surprises with an unexpectedly dense epilogue in which the never-realised third volume is alluded to. And so Earthseed is ultimately another unrealised utopia, that is left to the reader’s imagination.

Octavia Estelle Butler (1998): The Parable of the Talents. [Novel]. USA.