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TEXT

the english translation by Barbara Földesi

FLOCK and BARN

1. OSTINATO I
Prerecorded (in the style of an interrogation record):

Inspector: What exactly was being played?
Voice A (delayed): Well, we were not sure yet.
Suspension Inspector (Peeps or dictaphone) Voice S: “If someone’s goat is pushing another one’s goat, so that it dies, they shall sell the goat, which is still alive and share the money and the dead animal.”
Inspector: Who even said that?
A: … My wife? …. My ex-wife. (and, in order to relieve the ex-wife instantly) Or Rebekka?... … My daughter.
Inspector: And the following?
(Dictaphone, child’s voice): “Who sexually abuses an animal should be put to death.”
(Or: “Your first son you shall give me. So you shall do with the smaller animals on your farm. Seven days let it be with its mother, on the eighth day you shall give it to me.”)
Inspector (A keeps quiet): Is this Isaac, your grandson?
A (hesitantly approving): Book of Exodus, chapter 21 (2nd Moses 22, 29)
(Dictaphone, child’s voice): “And they said – “No, we want to stay outdoors in the night””
A (now assertive): Yes. Isaac. (break, proud) – Isaac, my grandson.

2. HEARING ABRAHAM

A: The rules! They have to be clear. “You shall!” Or else it can’t be measured.
S: The rules? No animal-humans experiments.
A: Animals and humans. Essentially they work very similar.
S (slightly annoyed): In the realms of brain research –
A (serious, curious): Yes?
S: Under guidance of Maya the Bee –
A (unperturbed, serious): The electro-chemistry – up there (points at his brain, slightly calmer) Whether goat or head of the institute –
S: (useless hand movements, shaking her head) And for such a thing –
A: (not quite believing it): You are risking the job?

S (in terms of “No”, but): This is about hierarchy!
A: Ah, the lobsters.
S: YOUR lobsters!
A: Your hierarchy. (lecturing) Hierarchy is not a consequence of sociocultural construct. Hierarchy is its precondition!
A (while S is doing something on the machine, A is addressing towards the audience like Frank Underwood in House of Cards, without S taking notice of it):
There is this idea, that hierarchical structures are a sociological construct of the western patriarchy. And this is so untrue, it’s nearly incredible. And I use the lobster as an example, because the lobster… In the history of evolution we descend from the lobster, approximately 350 million years ago we had common ancestors. Lobsters live in hierarchy and have a nervous system, which is adapted to hierarchy. And: is driven by serotonin, exactly the same as our nervous system. The nervous system of lobsters and humans is so similar, that even antidepressants work on lobsters. She, (pointing with his head towards S) in just a moment, will try to seam calm, but internally she is agitated and will ask me immediately, if we shall organize our life together like lobsters.

S: Let me be a part. You say (break) we should live like lobsters?
A: How animals and humans organize their structures is basically the same. You have a mechanism in your brain, which runs with serotonin, like the lobster-mechanism, and follows your social status. And the higher the status, the more positive your feelings.
S: So you believe, we are, like the lobsters, hard-wired as men and women, no creative leeway, by nature.
A: No, Because a … In a game of chess there is a lot of things you can do, even though you are not allowed to break the rules. Your biological (looks at the ceiling) nature is somehow similar, it gives the rules. But within these rules you have a lot of creative leeway.
But the idea… to say, that hierarchic organization is a consequence of the capitalistic patriarchy is obviously absurd. It is wrong! It’s not a question of opinion. It is highly groundless.
S: (analyzing, plain text, as if she is listing reasons for the divorce) This provoking, this constant teasing, this twisting of words … Naturally!
A: Naturally.
S: This is absurd. You are just testing, how far you can go, how far you can drive a wedge – (tearful) between you and me
A: (dismissing any guilt) Not at all!
(Alarm at the monitor) Look! Here! The exact same pattern! Just as before! At Schütz´ Benedicte before the meal.

3. ABRAHAM & ISAAC

S (into the Dictaphone): Abraham–Isaac, two.
A: Yeees, two! (nearly euphoric) And at “two” we reenact. And then we will see.
S (urging to stay reasonable, while taking the text sheet): But Isaac – he is a child!
A: But nothing will happen to him. He will not even notice.
S (looking at the text sheet): And anyhow – it’s not gonna work. Listen! (reads out loud to proof that it’s not going to work): Abraham awoke –
A (interrupts, starts in his mind to basically introduce and set up): Abraham awakes. This is where we start. The great “voice”! (towards S) What does she say to Abraham? She says (dignified): “Abraham” – (towards the audience) In reality it was god, who was talking to Abraham (towards S, saying it in a “masculine” voice) “Abraham” (break, A doesn’t know how to continue) “Abraham –“
S (text sheet, tries a “performed” pathos, rather nasty, but in a way that the children won’t be scared): Abraham, listen. I only want that you do me a favor.
A: (astonished): A favor? Which favor? (to the audience, prosaic) Which favor?
(commenting, explains to the audience) And Abraham tries –exactly as Sara just now – he tries to seem calm.
S (in the fairytale, demanding): I want a sacrifice.
A (surprised) A sacrifice? (thinking, walking through the attendees like through a sparse forest to the animals) I can entrust you one of these fawns.
S: I was thinking more of a – real sacrifice.
A (a shiver is running down his spine, towards imself): Isaac? (break) Are you crazy?
S: I want to find out – whether you can follow me. (break) I have to establish a state. –
A (still horrified): And for this you want me to … my son…. –
S (wants to get out, towards the Professor) So, this about the sacrifice, this is too silly for me.
A (understanding, catering to Sara): Believe me. Abraham. He was equally horrified.
S: This voice. It only wants this – “let’s see how far I can go”.
A: Exactly. Because it is the weight of the sacrifice that gives a meaningless thing a meaning, do you understand? Not just any lamb! I want Isaac, your son (again in the Abraham-godlike-character) – take Isaac – (so excited, that he looks helpless and immediately to his prompter)
S (slightly annoyed, dismissive): And sacrifice him –
A (entirely in his character): And sacrifice him –
S (declaiming reproachful, because the student doesn’t know his poem): And bring him – to the burnt offering – onto a mountain. (Shaking her head): I won’t do that. Experiment finished. I cannot follow you in this. (Passes the text sheet onto the nanny)

K(Nanny): I can’t speak Hebrew …
S: Doesn’t matter. It’s anyways Latin.
K: What’s going on?

4. SAMAEL

T (devil): The public – Us! We have a right to know what happened. How was Abraham feeling in this?
A: (rhapsodizing) Abraham! (prosaic) He was of course shocked. But the heavenly “voice”, it calmed him down: “What would you be without me?” (asks T) What would he be without him, hm? (reads from the text sheet): “ The son you owe entirely to ME. I only demand back, what belongs to ME.”
T: A mother – would have never approved it!
A: But Sara didn’t know anything about it. And once prayed and sacrificed –
T: (studying his presentation cards) But then he is meeting this man: “You want to kill your son? Because some “voice” is telling you to do so?”
A (wriggling in front of court, in terms of “everything wrong”): No, no.
T: Mental incapacity?
A: Insane? (examines) Yes, maybe. (looking at Isaac) But anyhow (looking at T) Abraham. (looking at Isaac, seeking for comprehension) He has to go through it.
Isaac (took off his headphones out of uncertainty): What? What do I have to do?
A (affectionate): Nothing, my son, you have to do nothing. Be good to your parents. And in school – (puts the headphones back on him), well-behaved.
T (outraged, to the jurors): This is insanity. What kind of god is this? Me, all of us, the community, we beg you – take one of the animals.
A (considering, tone of voice whether goat or head of institute): Whether maternal instinct of a goat or a woman’s motherly feelings – the biochemical pattern –
S (comprehending, nearly again as head of the institute): This is your “science”?
A: Are humans something else than animals? My experiment! You will see.
Isaac (as if he spontaneously sings along with a song he hears through his headphones, maybe towards a goat):
(Poem “O Sulamit”)

1S. OSTINATO II

Prerecorded (in the style of an interrogation record):

Inspector: Which text passage has yet been added?
S off voice (a total expert in sandwich knowledge, in the hearing towards the public): The Old Testament is the story of man’s settlement. Just, as it was, 6000 years ago. So that the land will not become fragmented. The young men had to stay within the territory. In order to protect it, to farm it. The young women? They were sold. Hence FLOCK and BARN had to be passed on to the sons. As the girls after all were not there anymore.
K off voice Inspector: “A woman shall not wear men’s clothes, and a man not women’s dresses; because, whoever does that, is an atrocity.”
S: Well, this one of the many rules, they are countless. It was just about their form.
Inspector: For instance:
Isaac off voice: The length of a carpet shall be 6 meters., the width 1 meter. You shall make 50 golden hooks, with which one may stitch together, one after the other, so that it may become an accommodation. You shall also make planks for the home to set it up.
Voice S: Yes, for instance.

2S. HEARING SARA

A: The rules have to be clear. “You shall!” Or else it can’t be measured.
S: The rules? No animal-human experiments.
A: Animals and humans – (reconstructing, visualizing to himself) they are – essentially – the same. (unperturbed, pugnacious): The chemistry – up there (pointing at his forehead, reflecting, starting slightly softer, different) Whether goat or head of institute –
S (hand gestures, head shaking): And for that –
A (not quite believing): You risk the job?
A (new entry point, engaged): Did you know, that the nervous system of lobsters and humans is similar in such an extent, that with lobsters – (empathy) when they are sad or disappointed – antidepressants – they work?
S: [towards the audience, pointing with her head at A): He doesn’t show. But internally he is sad and disappointed.] With one word- you say, that we – instead of planning, of creating – at the end of one’s life, are not different to a lobster?
A: (sighing, because he is not being understood) What I want to say, is – the flowers on balconies are to be watered in a way, that no water is dripping down – do you listen to me – human and animal, how they are constructed! Like algorithms. They are basically the same.
S (more on the side, just to get rid of it): Like women and men.
A (insisting): The same.
S (for now is finished with the hand gestures, now S is lecturing)Look, when women became the property of men, and this is not long ago at all, their power had to be cut down. Which at last is not down to her sexual attractiveness …
A: The society needs commandments, which do not exist in the wilderness. Be like that! Do, what is written in there! Orders from above.
But how did that work? You have to dress! This cannot be discovered through observation of birds. For this purpose it needs “meaning”, the things one can see, hear, smell, touch, and measure have to receive a command: Don’t do that!
(S doesn’t react)
You were able to steal my boxers, but not the other way round. Now I ask you: why is it like that?
S: You embarrass yourself.
A: Exactly! That’s what I’m saying! “Embarrassing”. Why actually! To that there isn’t yet a scientific answer. But I know now, where the rules come from, all of them. We find them in Isaac’s head. In his brain. Let’s finish the experiment!
S: We step dangerously close towards animal protection, I’m telling you.
A (playing down, ridiculing it): common, common, no kid will be – the wolf –
(Alarm on the monitor, now totally focused on the scientific aspect)
Look! Here! The exact same pattern! Just as before! Before the meal. At Schütz´ Benedicte.

3S. ABRAHAM and ISAAC

S (into the Dictaphone): Abraham-Isaac two.
A: Yeees, two! (nearly euphoric) And in “two”, we restage it. And then we will see.
S (S urging to stay reasonable, while taking the text sheet): But Isaac – he is a child!
A: But nothing will happen to him. He will not even notice.
S (looking at the text sheet): And anyhow – it’s not gonna work. Listen! (reads out loud to proof that it’s not going to work): Abraham awoke –
A (interrupts, starts in his mind to basically introduce and set up): Abraham awakes. This is where we start. The great “voice”! (towards S) What does she say to Abraham? She says (dignified): “Abraham” – (towards the R and K) In reality it was god, who was talking to Abraham (towards S, saying it in a “masculine” voice) “Abraham” (break, A doesn’t know how to continue, repeats) “Abraham –“
S (text sheet, tries a “performed” pathos, but still disbelieving): Abraham, listen. I want you to do me a favor.
A (astonished): A favor? Which favor? (towards R and K, prosaic) Which favor? (comments, explains R and K and also to the head of the institute in Koehlmeier-manners) And Abraham tries – exactly as Sara just now – he tries to seem very calm.
S (fairytale, like Ruebezahl, demanding): I want a sacrifice.
A (surprised, but serious): A sacrifice? (considering, walks through the attendees like through a sparse forest towards the animals) I can entrust you one of these fawns.
S: A fawn? I was thinking more of – a real sacrifice.
A (a shiver is running down his spine, towards imself): Isaac? (break) Are you crazy?
S: I want to find out – whether you can follow me. (break) I have to establish a state. –
A (still horrified): And for this you want me to … my son…. –
S (wants to get out, towards the Professor) So, this about the sacrifice, this is too silly for me.
A (understanding, catering to Sara): Believe me. Abraham. He was equally horrified. – It is – the importance matters. The size of a sacrifice! Do you understand? Not any Schnitzel! You cannot establish a state with it. I want Isaac, your son.
(as an alternative: Not any lamb! I want Isaac, your son!)
(again in the role of Abraham) – take Isaac – (so agitated, that he looks helpless and immediately to his prompter)
S (slightly annoyed, dismissive, wants to get to an end): And sacrifice him –
A (moved): And sacrifice him –
S (declaiming reproachful, because the student doesn’t know his poem): And bring him – to the burnt offering – onto a mountain. (Shaking her head, commenting): I won’t do that. I don’t even wanna join. (passes on her text sheet to K)
A: But this is how it is supposed to have happened. And don’t you think, that I am not horrified about that? The text didn’t leave any doubts. He mentioned “Isaac”. And such laws are the base. This is why the homo sapiens are so well organized. And sacrifices are the “givers” – for the validity of laws. Without sacrifice no norm.

4S. SAMAEL

T: But she felt it! Look at her!
A: Ah, really? But look at the goats. What do they anticipate?
S (studying her presentation cards): On his way he encounters a young man “Do you really want your son as sacrifice? Only, because a (emphasized) “strange voice’ told you so?”
A: No, no. I do this out of my own motivation.
S: You are crazy.
A: Crazy, maybe. But I follow the law.
I (being confused, took off his head phones): Don’t fight. Please don’t fight!
A: You will only understand this later! – When you are grown-up. (waits rigid until I puts the headphones back on).
T: Me! All of us! We beg of you – take an animal instead.
(T: In the devils, I beg of you, take one of the animals.)
A: Motherly feelings of a goat or a woman’s motherly feelings – biochemically –

6S. TEMPTATION

S (towards R and K): Dad became crazy. Take care of him. And seriously, don’t let him out of your sight. He wants to sacrifice Isaac.
R: I hate you.
S: I never left you. Abraham, he left. And only after I understood that, I applied for the job here. I always had a place for you. But you wanted to go to your father. (already wants to walk away) How was it for you, to take my place?

7S. THE UNFATHOMABLE

Isaac: Now I know what we are doing.
(A remains silent)
I (excited): We make a burnt offering.
(A remains silent)
I: But – the sacrificial animal?
(A remains silent)
I (sparkling, the surprise has worked): I am the sacrifice, right?
A: Yes. (approving) You saw through me.

Prerecorded:

Isaac off voice: The egoism of despots surely doesn’t stop when it comes to their children. Herodes killed seven of his sons. And one of those governors, who don’t have a name, crucified 2000 men. And bequested the “ fatal teachings: the Jewish population can only be dealt with through terror. And mass crucifixion is a good method” …
K: I don’t understand anything.
Isaac off voice: Cut marks in the area of the ribs show that the breasts of children and lamas were cut open. The heart was taken out of 140 Peruvian children to appease the gods. And this was not even 600 years ago.
K: I don’t understand anything.
Isaac off voice: I am sure. Without evil, no belief.

(live on stage:)

S (towards the public): Isaac asks, who will be the sacrifice. “You will simulate it”, A says. And Isaac lies down on the stake without hesitation. A holds a sharp knife to his throat. Isaac interrupts. He says: Wait. Normally, a sacrificial animal is afraid. Can I do it again?
S (towards the public): At this point two angels approach and curb Abraham. They don’t believe it’s a game, to them it looks very, very serious.

(Prerecorded text)

Voice 1:
Two Seraphime sing together:
Holy is the lord, Zebaoth,
the globe is filled with his glory

8S. SACRIFICE

(A: (is embarrassed about the failure, in case this isn’t obvious anyways): I am sorry.)
S (is irritated by R): I remember precisely the taste of a whitewashed wall, of hay and fur.
A: We say “yuck”! What we mean by that: You shouldn’t eat it!
S: This already is a rule? “Yuck”?
A: Yes, I think so.
S (now very private. End of the day. No repetition anymore): Are you travelling to Italy this summer?
A: I will see Lot, Rebekka and Isaac will join.
I would like to believe in us again.
S: We are not the measure of all things anymore. The wind has turned. We are dancing in the prom of the unthankful ones. (paragraph from Monteverdi, Damicella)
A: For what shall I be thankful? Whom?
S: How do you actually know what is good and evil?
A: Evil is an idea, when I purposely harm. Of this only us human monkeys are capable of, of such an idea, what hurts others, and this is where I step into.
S: Nearly everything that surrounds us is idea, unreal, fiction. Only the meat, the bones, the wood, the feces, the hay, the light, the sound, the electricity, the chemical reaction of molecules, the switch are real. The meaning of all this: unreal.
I always first sense the meaning. Only afterwards I understand the things behind them: meat, bones, urine, CO2, light.

Isaac (like in a dream, or waking up in this moment):
You shall grasp all fat from the intestines
and the lobe of the liver
and both kidneys with the fat on them
and you shall let it smoke up on the altar.

A (waits until Isaac is back to sleep): Good is: the lessening of suffering, the beauty, the feeling of hunger, being together, planning, reproduction, food, death, birth.
S: We aren’t animals. We anticipate the future and plan it.
A: Because the moral is already hardwired. Why do you feel stories as good if they are about good and evil? Because they give you an instruction for how to act, a future.
S: But nowadays, on the field where Cain once slew Abel, are robots.
A: Exactly. Doctor and lawyer, property management, my office –
S: The camera, that is serving my “safety”!
A: Aren’t they our Cain?

9S. PROM OF THE UNTHANKFUL ONES

S: Unobserved.
Who wants to sleep out-doors tonight?
EVERYONE: Yeah!