by Shannon W. Hennessy (Mage: The Ascension | The Mythos Project | Columns)
Very few occult references are as cryptically veiled in speculation or assumption in regards to authenticity or credibility as the Book of Dead Names, or, as it is referred to more commonly, the Necronomicon. Most occult scholars (mortal or otherwise) maintaining any degree of respect and consideration from their peers in the field contest the very existence of such a volume of collected blasphemies as hearsay and superstition. The truth of the matter is that the Necronomicon does indeed exist, as does it’s author; the "Mad Arab," Abdul Alhazred, and to understand and properly respect the written word if the book’s message and motivation, you must first have some insight into the author himself.
"There is but one God, and Muhammad is his prophet…"
The Mad Arab was born Abdul Ashif Bethel Muhammad Alhazred in the year 712 AD to a wealthy, silversmith father and a common prostitute mother. However, it is stated by some of the students of the Mad Arab that Alhazred’s mother found the truth in the teachings of Allah and made proper penance for her sins against God and man, married while with child, and became a devout follower of the tenets of Islam before the birth of her son.
As a child, Alhazred was unsurpassed in his command of reading, writing and arithmetic; he became an exceptional mathematician and scholar before the age of fifteen, and at the age of sixteen, he was already regarded as one of the most talented and enlightened scholars of his people. Although names are either deliberately omitted or, were forgotten in time, Alhazred was (according to those who took up the task of writing his biography) placed under the tutelage of some of the most enlightened intellectuals in the history Asia Minor and was sent abroad by his father to study science, philosophy and theology in Jerusalem, Baghdad and Mecca, the latter being where his Avatar awakened.
At the age of twenty, Abdul Alhazred married Rachel Sadiz, the daughter of the governor of Tabez, and sired two sons with her; Abdul and Meta. In the early winter of his twenty-fourth year, however, Alhazred slipped into an unexplained, catatonic state of Quiet that left him completely and totally devoid of speech and movement. Specialists from Arabian doctors to Rabbis from Jerusalem were called upon by Alhazred’s father-in-law to tend to the apparent illness, but to no avail. Alhazred’s condition was apparently deemed irreversible and blamed upon some manner of demonic possession. This news so shocked Alhazred’s wife, Rachel, that she miscarried their third child with whom she had been pregnant for three months.
After a few weeks of torpid existence, Alhazred’s eyes began to glow with a dim and ghastly light. He began to speak again, but the process was slow and labored. When Alhazred finally regained the ability to fully express himself verbally, his voice had taken on a completely different tone than it had known before, and his actions and intentions changed with it.
"Send us into the swine, that we may enter into them…"
Alhazred’s recovery was swift, as was his squandering of the riches he had inherited from Rachel’s dowry. Using the wealth supplied by Rachel’s father upon his union with the sultan’s daughter, Alhazred financed dozens of expeditions and caravans into the darker recesses of Africa and Asia in an effort to acquire scrolls, tablets, books and diaries of myth and legend. Secret meetings were arranged between Alhazred and leading occultists from Greece, spiritualists from Carpathian Europe, mediums from Rome, Norse diviners and soothsayers and men who had journeyed to India and returned with knowledge both forbidden and arcane in Islamic society. Alhazred publicly denounced the teachings of the prophet Muhammad and the religion of Islam as false doctrine and petty superstition. Scholars, teachers and fellow magi who had once been the staunchest allies and closest friends of Alhazred, denounced their association with him in kind, fearing the changes that had come over him
Alhazred grew increasingly distant and disassociated from Rachel and his sons, having sent them away from Tabez to stay with relatives while he studied and debated eldritch mathematics beyond the scope of most modern and accepted science and teaching languages that he had not only never studied, but that had been extinct since before the towers of Babylon had their foundations laid to those who were willing to meet his price.
Having determined unanimously that Alhazred was in fact possessed by Satan, the elder council of magi, nobles and intellectuals made the decision to banish him to the wilderness outside of the city, never to return in sentence for his mad blasphemies and his pursuit of damnation. Accompanied by soldiers of both the governing sultan the Caliph of Yemen, the council burst in on Alhazred’s sanctum in the middle of the night and discovered the madman surrounded by scrolls written in the name of Moloch, tablets describing the glorious redemption in darkness offered by Baal, and parchments of dried, human flesh which spoke of a gate and a great seal which protected the earth from the wrath of deities which outdated the teachings of both Muhammad and Moses by millennia.
The Caliph of Yemen was so enraged by the betrayal and blasphemy of the beloved Scholar of Tabez that he had Alhazred beaten repeatedly, his hair shorn from his head, and his clothes torn from his body. Naked and without sandals, water or provisions, the Mad Arab was exiled from Tabez into the surrounding wilderness of desert and waste.
Rachel, still in remembrance of what Alhazred HAD been, closeted herself away for forty-two days in private mourning for the loss of her husband; a Muslim tradition observed by widows.
Into the Wilderness…
Alhazred wandered in the deserts of Arabia for weeks. Finally, dying of thirst and exposure, he was discovered by a group of nomads who took the Mad Arab for a lost holy man, fed him and clothed him. With the assistance of these nomads, and after he had recovered his strength, Alhazred discovered the ruins of the damned city of Irem.
What knowledge (if any) that Alhazred gained from the hieroglyphs of Irem’s ruins is unknown; he returned after a few days alone, his companions who had traveled with him for the sake of his safety missing, carrying a large, green-gold chest the likes of which none had ever seen.
The pilgrimage of the Mad Arab did not end with Irem, however. Alhazred traveled next to Egypt, in search of a nameless city said to have been inhabited by creatures that were half-men and half-crocodile. Many scholars who have studied both Alhazred’s life as well as his works believe that this "nameless city" was the ruins of Crocodiliopolis, the legendary, ancestral home of the shapeshifters known as Mokole. Alhazred makes references to these "demons" throughout various correspondences with students and peers stating that they hunted him for acts of desecration and blasphemy on these ruins.
During a conflagration between Alhazred and these "demons" while crossing the Red Sea, a storm was summoned that destroyed the ship, all hands and all the cargo that the Mad Arab had salvaged from the ruins of Crocodiliopolis. The only survivor of the ensuing chaos wreaked by the storm was Alhazred himself, who washed onto the shores of northern Arabia, where he dwelled alone in his madness for two years surviving on starfish and crabs.
Eventually, Alhazred was discovered and rescued by a band of Islamic nomads en route to Mecca and nursed back to health.
"He restoreth my soul…"
After a time in Mecca, Alhazred returned to Yemen via trade caravan, and indeed even to the very city from which he had been exiled years before. The council, which had banished the Mad Arab, summoned him to explain himself and his return. Alhazred pleaded with them to return him to the scholastic pedestal on which he had once stood, saying "I have fought long in the desert with my adversary and with the demon that has possessed me. By the power of Allah, I have cast him into outer darkness!" In truth, however, Alhazred had suffered a form of amnesia from his powerful Quiet and remembered nothing from the time of his first catatonia up until his arrival in Mecca with the nomads. The magi of Tabez sensed nothing malignant in Alhazred, and believed his Quiet to be remiss attributing his recovery to his renewed faith in Allah due to his stay in Mecca. Abdul Alhazred was restored to his station of esteemed teacher and respected scholar and magus in the service of the Caliph of Yemen and the people of Tabez.
During this period of spiritual and mental restoration, Alhazred was summoned via a dream to site somewhere outside of Tabez. There, he was driven by his subconscious to exhume a set of relics hidden among the dunes; he found a set of tablets written in ancient Assyrian depicting what he interpreted as demons – half-man, half-crocodile – worshipping a god of horrific countenance. The deity in the relief had the head of an octopus, the arms and claws of a lobster, and wings like that of a bat. While fluent in a dozen different languages, both active and deceased, Alhazred was unable to read the tablets or interpret their meaning. He did, however, realize that these relics had been among the treasures he had sacked from the ruins of Crocodiliopolis in Egypt while he had been possessed in a stark, terrifying moment of clarity amidst his amnesia.
On a separate occasion some months later, Alhazred found himself wandering the wilderness outside of Tabez and into the camp of the nomadic people who had fed and clothed him after his subsequent exile and dehumanization at the hands of the Caliph of Yemen years before. The nomads bowed down before Alhazred, kissing his feet and referring to him as "master" and "magus." The nomads turned the green-gold chest Alhazred had left with them back to its rightful owner gladly, claiming that those who had maintained custody over the relic had died mysteriously from fever and, in some cases, had vanished completely or committed suicide. While still somewhat under the spell of sleep, Alhazred had the clarity of mind to understand that something was propelling him to place the tablets he had found in the dunes inside the chest.
Alhazred’s dreams continued to grow progressively more vivid after the reclamation of the chest from his nomadic saviors. In his dreams, Alhazred claimed to have visited not only the ancient past of earth, but also other worlds, their ancient pasts, celestial bodies such as Betelgeuse, Aldebaran, Sirius and the space that lie betwixt them. These dreams began to torment and haunt Alhazred, and as he confided in his peers, they began to suspect that perhaps while casting out the adversary which had once possessed him that he had been visited again by their forces tenfold and was again possessed by unclean spirits.
"Go ye forth and be ye fishers of men…"
The worst fears of the elder council and magi of Tabez were realized when once again Alhazred abandoned his duties as both a man of God and a father to his sons and took to the streets preaching the blasphemies revealed to him in his tortured dreams. Alhazred told any who would listen of gods who could manifest themselves as mortal men and women, and in some cases, animals. He preached of how these gods were as capable of both good and evil in their endeavor to cross the gate of time and space itself to reclaim the birthright that had been denied them by the swirling chaos at the center of the universe – their creator. He called these deities the Great Race and spoke of their war against those who had come before them; beings that Alhazred referred to as the Elder Gods. The Elder Gods, he claimed, were the founders of the universe, created by the mighty Pharaoh of Darkness, Azathoth. Alhazred disavowed the three major monotheistic religions of his day, citing that Christ, Moses and Muhammad had not been touched by the true hand of the Great Race, and were therefore charlatans and tricksters. Never before had the Celestial Chorus or the Ahl-i-Batin of Yemen endured or tolerated such heretical blasphemies against their collective visions of reality. The more Alhazred taught of his Great Race, the more furious the magi of Yemen became.
Eventually, the magi of Yemen, with the continued support of the Caliph, banished Alhazred and all of his students and disciples from Tabez forever. To return would mean immediate execution of any that would dare. Abdul and Meta, Alhazred’s sons, however, were spared and Rachel was allowed to divorce Alhazred so that Allah might have mercy on her children’s souls.
While in exile, Alhazred continued to educate his disciples in the ways of the Great Race. He presented to them the graven image if mighty Cthulhu, he whom Alhazred claimed was the most potent of the earth’s Elder Gods. He instructed them in the terrifying rites of Nyarlathotep, who had visited Alhazred in his dreams. Many of the Mad Arab’s students could not bear the gravity of the forbidden knowledge they were partaking from and fled into the wilderness or committed violent suicides. For those who remained faithful and strong, Alhazred taught the secrets of Yig; the god of the underworld the Egyptians referred to as Set. He taught them the names of Dark Han, Sub-Niggurath and Chaugnar Faugn, and the handful of apostles became a cult and built infernal altars to these new, yet vastly ancient deities.
In time, Alhazred journeyed to the city of Damascus where he retired from teaching the gospel of the Great Race in exchange for the research opportunities that a monk was afforded. During this period of reclusiveness, the Mad Arab finished what he had started in Tabez before he had been cast out; a book of pacts, rituals, equations, rotes, rites and procedures collected into the unholy and foul book of the wonders and miracles of the Great Race, the horrible Necronomicon. With this tool, Alhazred could ensure that the work of the Great Race and their struggle for freedom could continue and thrive like the fungus on an olive branch… even if the branch itself were cleft from the tree. The Mad Arab completed two complete copies of the tome; one for his personal use and one for the use of his handpicked successor and apprentice.
"There are many, terrible and ancient gods, and Alhazred is their prophet…"
The Final Days of the Mad Arab
Shortly after the completion of the Necronomicon, word of Alhazred’s ability to command the forces of nature began to spread across Arabia, Syria and what is now Iraq. Stories of how the Mad Arab could call down fire from the heavens to smite his enemies, speak words that killed men where they stood, bring stillness to the ocean tempest, summon demons and inflict madness on any he wished made Alhazred a legend in his own time. His living legend status, however, also earned him the ire and hatred of the collected magi of the Celestial Chorus, Ahl-i-Batin, Order of Hermes and Verbena of Persia and Asia Minor. In time and through reputation, Alhazred became one of the most powerful and influential earthbound, mortal occultists and awakened magus of his day and age.
Alhazred was summed to the court of the Caliph of Baghdad to serve as the Court Astrologer and Soothsayer, and for a while all was well. After a year, however, Alhazrad’s health began to fail, and as if knowing that his time were coming to an end (despite his magical ability to stall such mortality), he returned to Damascus to erect a temple in the glory and honor of the mighty Cthulhu.
In the year 732 AD, while sharing the prophecies and miracles of the Great Race to a small crowd of students, hecklers, curious bystanders and fearful agnostics, The Mad Arab, Abdul Alhazred, disappeared from sight and into thin air in the mid sentence and broad daylight. His clothes, a few coins and a small amount of blood were all that remained of the author of the Necronomicon and the prophet of Cthulhu.
Many believe that Alhazred was completely consumed by the demonic forces which inhabited his body; his soul no longer enough for them to nourish themselves. Others, magi mostly, claim that it was the wrath of paradox spirits, who punished Alhazred for his blasphemies and his works towards rending the reality in which he existed for the sake of another. The more devout students of the Mad Arab, however, claimed that Alhazred had been summoned to Cthulhu’s side in reward for his faithful service, and that he waits with the mighty Cthulhu in his sunken city, Ry’leh, for the day when he will lead the sleeping god’s children and servants in an assault on the gate which isolates the Great Race from our realm.
Construction of the temple whose foundation was consecrated in the name of Cthulhu was never completed. Urged on by the collective members of the Celestial Chorus and Order of Hermes, the governor of Damascus brought soldiers down onto the disciples of the Mad Arab, killed all but two, and razed the temple to dust.
To date, there are FOUR KNOWN and complete copies of the Book of Dead Names, also known as the Al-Azif and Necronomicon. Of these volumes, it is said two were written by Alhazred himself while two others were manufactured by his apprentice shortly his disappearance in order to preserve the words of the Mad Arab beyond the grave and persecution of the cult he had founded.
There is a very good possibility, however, that a dozen or so books claiming the namesake of Alhazred’s Necronomicon exist or have been manufactured over the centuries. These forgeries, while valuable in their own rights to some degree or another, should be treated as incomplete or ineffectual due to erroneous translation or damage. Many claim that Alhazred walks the earth to this day, having survived his disappearance and in possession of his personal copy of the Necronomicon while obsessively hunting the other three across the world.
Practical Demon Keeping
The Mad Arab, Abdul Alhazred can actually be used in a variety of ways within a World of Darkness chronicle, although personally I feel that his works and his characterization are most useful in Vampire: The Dark Ages, Mage: The Sorcerers Crusade or Mage: The Ascension. For ease of understanding and use, and seeing as how there is very little information at all regarding the Ahl-i-Batin in White Wolf canon, my personal vision of the Mad Arab is that of either a Celestial Chorister gone Marauder or Barabbi. The following stats are MERELY a SUGGESTION regarding the powers and abilities of Abdul Alhazred. Please feel free to use any and all stats you deem appropriate in your respective game when using the Mad Arab:
Abdul Alhazred, the "Mad Arab"
(A.K.A. The Poet of Tabez, Master of the Dead Names)
Nature: Fanatic
Demeanor: Architect
Essence: Primal
Tradition: Iblitic or Celestial Chorister Barabbi/ Marauder Oracle
Attributes: Strength 2, Dexterity 3, Stamina 4, Charisma 4, Manipulation 5, Appearance 2, Perception 5, Intelligence 5, Wits 5
Abilities: Alertness 3, Awareness 3, Dodge 4, Intimidation 2, Subterfuge 5, Drive/Ride 2, Firearms/Archery 3, Leadership 4, High Ritual 5, Meditation 5, Research 5, Technology 3, Cosmology 5 (or Special*), Culture 4, Enigmas 5, Linguistics 5, Lores (All Supernaturals at 3 and Mythos Lore at 5), Occult 4, Science 5 (Mathematics)
Backgrounds: Allies 3, Avatar 5, Resources 4, Talisman 5**
Spheres: Correspondence 4, Qlippothic Entropy 3, Forces 5, Life 3, Matter 3, Mind 4, Prime 5, Spirit 3
Willpower: 9
Arete: 6
Quintessence: 10
Paradox: 5
Resonance: (Entropic) Alien/Corruptive/Chaotic/Diabolic
If Marauder, I would suggest a Quiet of 2-5
* - Alhazred’s knowledge of Mythos Cosmology is essentially second to none. The Necronomicon is the definitive work on the subject.
** - Alhazred’s personal copy of the Al-Azif/Necronomicon/Book of Dead Names
The Book of Dead Names
The Necronomicon is, for all intents and purposes, the bible of the Elder Race as written and collected by Alhazred. Within the book’s pages are prayers, sigils, forgotten names of gods long dead, and summoning techniques used for communion with these beings. Use of this book and its contents, however, should never be taken lightly by anyone who comes into possession of it. There are at least four complete and handwritten copies of the Book of Dead Names in existence; the Celestial Chorus, deep within the catacombs of the Vatican City, holds one of them under Templar guard. It is believed that this particular copy of the book was the first and original copy drafted by Alhazred in Tabez, however this may or may not be the case.
For game purposes (should you actually allow one of your players to come into possession of a copy of this tome) you can either use the resources for Grimoires in Infernalism: The Path of Screams, or you can use the following resources to generate probable contents of the book from rituals, procedures, rotes, investments, gifts, disciplines, etc.:
The Book of Madness by Sam Inabinet, Kathleen Ryan, Steve Brown, Bill Bridges, and Phil Brucato
ISBN 1-56504-137-2
$15.99 (U.S.)
A book that I sincerely hope will receive the "revised" treatment sometime in the very near feature, this resource is instrumental, in my opinion, for the formation of complete antagonist NPCs in a Mage: The Ascension setting. Rules for everything from demons to Nephandi can be found here and it is certainly worth the read.
Infernalism: The Path of Screams by Phil Brucato
ISBN 1-56504-495-9
$18.00 (U.S.)
Path of Screams is to Sorceror’s Crusade what Book of Madness is to Mage… except BETTER. In my Mage games, I’ve adopted The Path of Screams in lieu of Madness until a revised working of the book comes out, and I’ve found that when coupled WITH the book of Madness, it’s a PERFECT resource for modern day Mage settings as well. Pay close attention to the Grimoire section on Page 90, as this may be the EASIEST and most efficient manner for you to incorporate the Necronomicon into one of your games.
Clanbook: Baali by Lucien Soulban and Sven Skoog
ISBN 1-56504-213-1
$12.00 (U.S.)
A great resource not only for antagonists in a Vampire setting, but for Dark Age era infernalist and cult practices. A little over the top at times, Baali delivers a nice, horrific feel to the Dark Ages and a reason for your PCs to be wary of those who traffick with "outer gods."
Breedbook: Mokole by Jim Comer, Rick Russell, Chad Imrogno and Conrad Hubbard
ISBN 1-56504-306-5
$18.00 (U.S.)
For more information on Crocodiliopolis or for official canon on how the World of Darkness may have felt/looked in pre-history, this is the place to go.
Book of the Wyrm, 2nd Edition by Brian Campbell, Sam Inabinet, Deena McKinney, Jim Moore, Justin Achilli and Ethan Skemp
ISBN 1-56504-356-1
$18.00 (U.S.)
Pay special attention to the write-up regarding the Vhujunka in this book, as they are the closest things to a pre-generated servitor race of the Cthulhu Mythos that you’re going to dredge up in a Werewolf resource. Also, many of the totem spirits of the Black Spiral Dancer Tribe can be converted for use in a Werewolf chronicle that includes the mythos as a plot element.
Freak Legions: A Players Guide to Fomori by Steve Brown, Phil Brucato, John Dcott Burrows, Jackie Cassada, Jim Comer, Lucien Dark, Beth Fischi, Christopher Howard, Jenn Lindberg, Jim Moore, Nicky Rea and Richard Watts
ISBN 1-56504-350-2
$12.00 (U.S)
Fomori Powers and Taints are EXCELLENT for use as demonic or infernal investments, and this books chocked full of them. Use your best judgment as a ST to determine how many points each power should cost in pacts, and you can populate the pages of the Al-Azif/Necronomicon yourself.
