The Myth of Er

Er felt the flames lick his feet. He opened his eyes. Which was weird because very few men, if any, ever opened their eyes on a funeral pyre.

Er’s fellow soldiers pulled him off the pyre quickly. They were stunned, afraid. He had died in battle ten days ago. It was strange, yes, that his body had shown no signs of decomposition, but there was a war on and no time to consider such things. They made quick arrangements for his funeral and the funerals of all their fallen comrades.

Er’s face was pale, ashen, he still looked dead as he began to speak, “I was dead. I went to where the dead go. I saw what happens after we die.”

He had his fellow soldiers’ complete attention.

He told of dying in battle. He told of his soul leaving his body. He told of accompanying the souls of all the other men slain in the battle on a journey.

Their journey took them to a mysterious place where there were four doors, two floating, unsuspended in the air, and two leading into the ground. There were judges seated in front of each of the doors and the judges instructed the spirits on which doors to ender. When Er stepped forward, the judges told him he was only to watch.

Then Er saw souls beginning to exit the doors. Some souls exited the heavenly doors and floated down to the ground as if carried by great winds. They wore brilliant raiments, almost glowing.

He also saw souls exiting one of the earthbound doors. These souls looked dirty and haggard. The souls that knew each other began to talk, discussing the experiences they had just come from. The souls that descended from the sky door told of one thousand years spent in joy and peace. The souls that exited the earth door told of one thousand years spent in agony and misery. The souls remained there together for seven days. On the eighth day, they departed for some other place. Er followed them.

After four days of travel, they arrived at a place where a great pillar of brilliant rainbow-colored light descended from the heavens, into the earth. Standing around the pillar were three sisters. Er knew, somehow, these were the daughters of Necessity; the sisters of Fate.

The souls went to the first of the sisters. Her name was Lachesis and she bade them choose a new life to return to Earth in. There were lives of every kind to choose from — lives of riches and fame, lives of fame, great strength, and beauty. Lives of poverty and mundane existence. Even the lives of animals were available to them. Each soul was made to choose. When they had chosen, Lachesis assigned each one of them a genius or a daemon — a spirit to accompany throughout their life and keep them invisibly to the path they had chosen. This genius was there to make sure they fulfilled the destiny that had set before themselves.

The guiding spirits led them to the next sister, Clotho, who worked at a spindle. Clotho took the thread from the spindle and attached a portion to each man’s hand. Once fastened thus, each man was lead to the final sister, Atropos, who spun the threads and made them irreversible.

Each soul was then made to drink from the River of Unmindlefulness so that upon returning to Earth, their time in the afterlife, the reward or punishment, and their selection of a new life would not be remembered by them. After they drank, there was a great earthquake and a thunderstorm and each man was rocketed into the air like a shooting star, and carried to the moment of their new birth, back on Earth.

Er’s fellow soldiers stood in total silence as he finished his tale. He had no idea how or when he returned to his body. The next thing he remembered was waking up on the pyre at the sensation of the flames.