Timothy’s Apology
Timothy I of Baghdad, Apology for Christianity before the Caliph al-Mahdi
Timothy I, Patriarch of the Church of the East
“Amen, O King. But may God grant us that we too may share it with you.” The last line of two days, and he gave the King the sentence before it.
- Catch rate
- 6 / 255
- Base research
- 200
- Stat total
- 312
Base stats
Every stat is a checkable fact about the actual book, not a designer's mood. Bars are drawn against the highest value any book reaches.
Why these numbers
The game's own explanation, as a reader sees it in the backpack.
Two days of debate, written down. A record rather than a treatise, and it survives entire.
Timothy argues from what the other man already grants and follows it where it goes — the sharpest of them reasons from the ascension backwards to the crucifixion.
He is the guest, not the host, and every answer is given in front of the man holding the power in the room. Arguments made under that constraint are carefully made.
A real conversation rather than a system, and it reads fast because it is one.
Cited for this book
Baghdad, 781: the Patriarch of the Church of the East answered the Caliph al-Mahdi’s questions for two days and somebody wrote it down. He closes not by claiming the win but with a pearl dropped in a dark house, everyone reaching, one of them holding it — and then refuses to let that become “everyone is equally right,” because a pearl still catches what light there is.
Moves learned
By levelling up. A book that develops keeps what it knew and learns the rest on its new schedule.
| Lv | Move | Type | Cat. | Pwr | Acc | PP |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Sun, Light and Heat | Theology Proper | Argument | 70 | 100% | 15 |
| 1 | Random Verse | Bible | Argument | 10 | 100% | 30 |
| 34 | Chapter… | Bible | Scripture | — | — | 12 |
| 37 | Signs and Miracles | Rationality | Argument | 66 | 100% | 15 |
| 40 | No Testimony Found | History | Argument | 68 | 100% | 10 |
| 43 | He Went Up, So He Went Down | Rationality | Argument | 74 | 100% | 10 |
| 47 | The Pearl in the Dark House | Faith | Argument | 80 | 100% | 5 |
| 50 | Our Mutual Hostility | Rationality | Argument | 88 | 100% | 10 |
Read it: The Pearl in the Dark House
The passages the Scriptorium holds on screen, word for word from a public-domain translation.
“And as the sun with its light and its heat is not called three suns but one sun, so also God with His Word and His Spirit is not three Gods but is and is called one God.”
Timothy I, Apology for Christianity (trans. Alphonse Mingana, Woodbrooke Studies 2, 1928, public domain).
“It is imperative that signs and miracles should be annulled by other signs and miracles… Since signs and miracles are proofs of the will of God, the conclusion drawn from their absence in your Book is well known to your Majesty.”
Timothy I, Apology (trans. Mingana, 1928, public domain), elided.
“O our victorious King, in this world we are all of us as in a dark house in the middle of the night. If at night and in a dark house a precious pearl happens to fall in the midst of people… every one would strive to pick up the pearl, which will not fall to the lot of all but to the lot of one only.”
Timothy I, Apology, close of the Second Day (trans. Mingana, 1928, public domain), elided.
“As the lustre of a pearl is somewhat visible even in the darkness of the night, so also the rays of the true faith shine to some extent even in the darkness and the fog of the present world.”
Timothy I, Apology (trans. Mingana, 1928, public domain) — the half that stops the parable becoming “everyone is equally right.”
Baghdad, 781: the Patriarch of the Church of the East answered the Caliph al-Mahdi’s questions for two days, and somebody wrote it down.
He closes with a pearl dropped in a dark house — everyone reaching, one of them holding it — and then refuses to let that become “everyone is equally right,” because a pearl still catches what light there is.