VII. Darkness as Matrix — In Praise of Night
It is time to rehabilitate darkness. Not the darkness of fear, not the obscurity of despair—but the primordial night, the original matrix, the cosmic womb from which all light springs and to which all light, after its journey, will eventually return. In dominant Western thought, heir to a sometimes poorly digested Manichean dualism, darkness is associated with evil, absence, and death. This is a misinterpretation of tragic depth.
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“The earth was formless and empty, and darkness was over the face of the deep.” Genesis 1:2 — before light, there was potential |
In Genesis, darkness is not the problem that light solves. It is the condition of light—its context, its matrix, its silent mother. Before light, there was pure potential. Before manifestation, there was infinite possibility. And this infinite possibility had a name: the abyss. Tehom, in Hebrew—a feminine word, profound, uterine. Darkness as the womb of the cosmos. Night as the necessary condition for all that will come into being.
Biology itself sanctifies darkness. The pineal gland—that eye that never closes—functions precisely in the dark. It is at night, and only at night, that melatonin is secreted in abundance: this key molecule not only for sleep, but also, according to recent research, for cellular protection, immunity, and perhaps even—according to the most audacious interpretations of neurochemistry—for altered states of consciousness akin to mystical experiences. Night is the pineal gland’s laboratory. Darkness is its working condition. And those who fear the dark may not yet realize that they fear the greatest workshop for the transformation of their own being.
The autistic child—the soul that sees too much—in this interpretation, is a child of the inner night .
He perceives what is not yet visible, what is not yet formulated, what has not yet entered collective language. He is a being of pure potential, an inhabitant of the primordial abyss, a passenger of the cosmic tehom. And if this sometimes isolates him in a world that prefers gleaming certainties to the power of obscure possibility, it is the inevitable price of prophetic vision—that gaze which sees not what is, but what will be.
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VIII. Closure — The Temple is not in ruins
The inner temple whose anatomy we have explored throughout this chapter—the column-tree of life, the hypothalamus-forge, the pineal gland-eye, the subtle bodies in perpetual shuttle between the planes—is not a ruined temple. It has never been abandoned. It has never been destroyed. It was simply built according to an architect’s plan that few have learned to read, because this plan is written in a language that precedes all human languages: the language of the soul.
What the world calls the “disorders” of the autism spectrum, this inner temple knows as specific architectural features—higher-than-normal vaults, wider windows that let in more light and air, deeper foundations that touch spiritual aquifers that conventional buildings never reach. This is not broken architecture. It is poorly documented sacred architecture.
The invitation at the end of this chapter is not to seek a cure for autism. It is to seek the key to understanding—that pivotal moment when we cease to see a problem to be solved and begin to perceive a language to be learned. Every atypical behavior is a sentence in this language. Every heightened sensitivity is a chapter. Every gaze lost in the void is a stanza addressed to interlocutors we cannot yet see.
And if you’re looking for an image to conclude with — here’s one that no psychiatry treatise will offer you, but that your soul might recognize with that sweet shiver that feels like a memory:
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The autistic child who looks up at the night sky doesn’t simply see stars. He sees addresses. Each planet is a letter of an alphabet his soul has known since before incarnation. |
And if this book is in your hands tonight, if these pages have resonated somewhere within your body or your memory, if you’ve had the strange feeling of having already read these lines somewhere, in another language, under another sky—perhaps it’s simply because your soul, too, is beginning to remember. And memory, in that inner sanctuary we all inhabit, is the most powerful of remedies.
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End of Chapter V — The Inner Temple: Anatomy of a Soul That Sees Too Much
The situation reached a point where I felt as though I had signed up for a permanent subscription to his services.
Jokingly, I said to him one day: “My dear friend, you really ought to pay me a commission on every dance party you host!
After all, he was putting me to work—making me haul around that heavy keyboard!”
Why do I draw this parallel with Artificial Intelligence?
To demonstrate that an animal possesses capabilities that AI lacks: namely, sensitivity.
I once had a dog at home—a cross between a Doberman and another breed—but he was a magnificent animal: sleek and black, with a rather lithe, slender build. I fed this dog exactly as I fed myself; more precisely, I forbade anyone from giving him any meat-based food. My spiritual guide had taught me this: “You have no right to compel your parents, your friends, or anyone else to abstain from eating meat, for they possess the faculties of discernment and judgment.
Your dog, however, falls under your direct responsibility; therefore, you have no right to feed him meat or any other product of animal origin.” And, indeed, the dog became a vegetarian, adopting the exact same diet as my own.
And every member of the household respected my wishes.
That said, if a rat 🐀 or a chicken 🐓 happened to cross his path, things would end badly for them; all that would remain to be seen were the rat’s tail or the chicken’s feathers. This simply demonstrates that an animal is endowed with animal instincts—instincts that will undoubtedly remain unchanged until a future life, when they might be transformed through the power of our positive example. Much like our parents, who often speak well of us only after we have departed. I couldn’t say whether it was a direct consequence of that treatment, but this dog developed such sensitivity that it led me to believe he was the reincarnation of a musician.
To borrow an expression from my friend Émile Volel: I loved playing the harmonica, and every time I did, the dog would let out howls as if he were singing a song. My wife would then say to me: “Oh, don’t play that instrument! You’re making the dog suffer!”—unaware that this was, in reality, a manifestation of joy; that he was, in fact, a “musician-dog” whose very soul vibrated to the sound of the harmonica.
To understand Émile’s “problem,”
I attempted an experiment one day: I played those very same pieces—this time using the “harmonica” setting on my electronic keyboard—while sitting right next to the dog. He showed absolutely no reaction—nothing comparable to the response he gave when faced with the real harmonica. But the instant I picked up the “simple” harmonica again, he immediately began to “sing.”
One day, while I was at work, I recounted this anecdote to the staff, but they simply refused to believe me.
So, I asked my daughter to go and play the harmonica for the dog; he immediately began to “sing”—letting out a soft, gentle howl—and the staff members were delighted to discover that I had been telling them the truth.
All of this demonstrates that, even if one attempts to repress one’s true nature, it always ends up coming back in full force.
To console ourselves, let us tell ourselves that artificial intelligence can never truly replace humans; it is devoid of feelings—it is nothing more than a robot 🤖. In any case, let’s give a huge round of applause for us humans! 👏 👏 👏.
Frantz,
What I am discovering in my new life is that the majority of people cling to what they know, without realizing just how much it can limit them. There is often a resistance to exploring new things—new ways of thinking and new discoveries.
And yet, today there are so many tools, insights, and possibilities available to human beings to help them better understand life, to see things differently, and sometimes even to alleviate their suffering. But many remain trapped in a hellish routine—repetitive, almost mechanical.
Your book is, quite simply, a groundbreaking work that is slowly finding its way. I have also learned that good things—profound works and anything of true quality—take time to be fully recognized. But that does not matter, for we are in no rush: it is eternity that awaits us. Jean-Yves Hakime 🐛 🦋
Yes, when my grandson asks me, “How many books have you sold so far?”
I reply: “Not enough—yet. But I hope this work will gradually find its place. It could become your legacy; when the time comes—when I’m called away—and everyone suddenly rushes to get a copy, you’ll certainly have your hands full keeping up with the demand.”
There is an extraordinary episode of *God Friended Me* where, thanks to the author ✍️ of a famous book 📕, nearly 70 tenants and their families were spared from eviction from their apartment building. Private investors had wanted to purchase the building to convert it into a luxury hotel; however, because the book in question had been written within those very walls, the building had been designated a historical landmark—meaning no one could take possession of it under any pretext whatsoever.
That is Episode 13, mentioned above.
Thank you 🙏 for your kind words of appreciation.