THE HEJERA PLOT:
The whole HEJERA PLOT is a "redemptive scenario" for the
Middle East. In it, a secret organization called "The HEJERA" -
the Heavenly Jerusalem Association - which aspires for an OldNew
type of a spiritual and universal Zionism is being formed, and
brings about its "P.L.O.T", namely, bringing about the PLO
(Palestine Liberation Organization) Transformation into a sister
Zionist agency. In other words, this is a story about ideological
and psychological reconstruction on an unusual scale.
In that story, these games are described in the process of
development (with magical instant performance) as training
facilities for Messianic Initiates. Their applications are meshed
with another phantasy sequence which reproduces the journey of
Abraham and Isaac, together with Ishmael, Eliezer the donkey and
another mysterious stranger, towards Mount Moriah. Thus at each
leg of that journey, the members of that party may come to other
contentions or agreements, and these set the parameters for the
design of the next game. The more general principle illustrated by
this particular arrangement is that a system of games can act as
an integral modelling facility of a complete reconstructive, or
even redemptive, curriculum, and the contexts, biases and payoffs
of the game may be tuned each time to the specific needs of the
particular individual, or even group, that play the game. The new
understandings reached at each game enable the graduation to the
next one. In a sense, the principle of such a Games System is like
the principle of Karma and transmigrations that what one failed in
one round must be reformed in the next round, or the one after....
Perhaps different from these oriental scenarios, in these
redemptive scenarios also the environment gets reconstructed in an
evolutionary manner into the pattern of the ideal city, the New
Jerusalem, whatever this means (see section on "Redemptive
Scenarios" below). The contending visions about the ideal are also
reconstructed in the course of the games sequence.
The idea behind bringing such complex and even sublime
matters into the realm of children's games is that computer games
are likely to become anyway the educational workshop of the new
generation - for good or bad. This is an attempt to formulate how
this attractive, even addictive, new medium could be used for the
otherwise apparently faltering attempts to provide moral education
and character development to the young. There are specific "moral
skills" that are covertly reinforced through the game procedures,
such as skills needed for building understandings out of which
this Heavenly Jerusalem is getting built. Such skills are listed
in the section on "Hejera Game Procedures" below.
Another idea behind the formulation of "The HEJERA PLOT" and
of the Games System is similar to the Rosicrucian manifests where
the fantasy about a secret society led to the establishment of
such an organization (as discussed in Frances Yates' "The
Rosicrucian Enlightenment"). There are already many fun-clubs for
"The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy" and societies of D & D (the
Dragons and Dungeons Fantasy Games System), and a game system with
marvelous-yet-serious contents and backed by computer networking
can be frameworks for building new types of communities and
"Reform Clubs". Specifically, such a society for building the
Heavenly Jerusalem could mean a rejuvenation of the Freemason
Oreders which were once of great impact (i.e.- the establishment
of the USA!) but have become empty shells.
The main intention behind this whole extecise remains the
reform of Zionism into a more universal and spiritual movement. The
story and the Games were thus conceived as to have appeal not just
in the Middle East but in the US MidWest and "Bible Belt" as well,
from where new varieties of Christian Zionism are emerging. Our
benign "plot" would encompass the adherents of Bible resergence
and of "New Age" lore, with Biblical-Kabbalistic insights, images
and processes being the meeting grounds.
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Note:
The Academy of Jerusalem is now engaged in the
design of a game called "The King/Queen Of Jerusalem Game", which is
a sort of a HEJERA Game. This game being designed, however, is quite
different in its context and in most of its scenes and parameters. It
is not displayed, for obvious proprietory reasons. If you find
the concept of the HEJERA Games of real interest, see the following articles for further designs:
Computer Games for Social and Spiritual Development