Radiman’s cryptic statement:
TAG speculates:"I have been away from Tir and from the Council on a pilgrimage, to rediscover myself…”
Who are The Pilgrims?One clue may lie in Radiman's use of the word "pilgrimage". It's an eccentric turn of phrase, and it immediately brings up associations with a Council of Truth-affiliated clan that has remained an enigma to everyone on the outside: The Pilgrims
From Prophet Without Honour –Chapter Nine:The Pilgrims believe strongly in many of the myths and legends surrounding Rubi-Ka and notum, and they have a self-professed spiritual relationship with the planet and her resources. They also believe that David Marlin - the man who united the Solitus slaves and freed them from the shackles of their Omega masters almost twenty millennia ago - will one day return to lead the free peoples of Rubi-Ka in a crusade against their oppressors
Why does this quote preface the chapter on David Marlin? Anne Bradstreet was a Pilgrim. She was a Puritan who came to the New World in 1630 on the Arabella, one of the first ships to bring Puritans to New England. Interestingly, she was an offspring of the famous Dudleys (maiden name) who had played such a great role in the history of the English Reformation and Elizabethan Settlement. She was perhaps the first female poet in the New World.”"If we had no winter, the spring would not be so pleasant: if we did not sometimes taste of adversity, prosperity would not be so welcome." Anne Bradstreet- ('Meditations Divine and Moral,' 1655—added for clarity)
From John Bunyan’s “Pilgrims Progress”“A pilgrim I on earth, perplexed with sins, with cares and sorrows vexed.”
Radiman claims to have been on a metaphysical “pilgrimage” of rediscovery. Bunyan’s Pilgrim searches for the “celestial city.” Is the old man in rags the biblical Job? What is the significance (if any) between Job, and the City of Jobe? Back to Bradstreet’s quote, we see that without “adversity", prosperity would not seem so sweet. The theme of a metaphysical pilgrimage, struggle and redemption are replete in the mystery before us.As I walked through the wilderness of this world, I lighted on a certain place where was a Den, and I laid me down in that place to sleep: and, as I slept, I dreamed a dream. I dreamed, and behold, I saw a man clothed with rags, standing in a certain place, with his face from his own house, a book in his hand, and a great burden upon his back. I looked, and saw him open the book, and read therein; and, as he read, he wept, and trembled; and, not being able longer to contain, [His Outcry] he brake out with a lamentable cry, saying, "What shall I do?"
From the book of Job:
Hmmm…what does it all mean?" "Only a few years will pass before I go on the journey of no return. My spirit is broken, my days are cut short, the grave awaits me