Lincoln in the Bardo: Chapter 61 Summary & Analysis

“For I am different, yes,” the Reverend admits, though he doesn’t say this to Willie. Unlike Bevins, Vollman, and everybody else in this place, he knows “very well” what he is. “Am not ‘sick,’” he says, “not ‘lying on a kitchen floor,’ not ‘being healed via sick-box,’ not ‘waiting to be revived.’ No.” He then describes his own “end,” which took place in the guest room of his house after a long life in the ministry. As he stared out the window, he felt content, experiencing a “stable and grateful state of mind,” something he “had tried to cultivate” all his life. He was, in short, in a “state of acceptance and obedience” as he died. “I was dead,” he says. “I felt the urge to go. I went. Yes: simultaneously becoming cause and (awed) observer (from within) of the bone-chilling firesound associated with the matterlightblooming phenomenon […], I went.”

Telling the story of his journey into death, the Reverend describes walking “along a high-mountain trail” behind two men he somehow knows have died mere seconds before him. The man at the front is wearing a yellow bathing suit, having died while swimming in Maine. The man directly in front of the Reverend, on the other hand, is wearing a cheap funeral suit and is humming as if he is in a state of happy and “willful ignorance.” As the Reverend walks along this path, he sporadically finds himself back at his grave, hovering above it and watching his wife and a congregation bid their farewells to him at his funeral. Every time this happens, he longs to be back on the trail with his two new friends, where a valley stretches out below them—a valley he knows, somehow, is their final destination.

The Reverend and his companions come upon a set of stone steps that lead into the valley. Since he was buried in his religious garb, the two men look at him, as if to ask whether or not they should proceed, and he nods that they should indeed. Walking along, they hear a “chanting of some sort, excited voices, the clanging of a bell,” sounds that make the Reverend happy. He and his friends step off the stairs into “a sun-drenched meadow,” where they find a “large structure” made of “interlocking planks and wedges of purest diamond, giving off an array of colors.” When they approach, a crowd forms around them and urges them forward until they reach a door attended by an “honor guard” smiling at their arrival.

The honor guard opens the door, and the Reverend and his fellow travelers walk across a diamond floor “to a single diamond table.” At this table sits a man the Reverend understands is a “prince; not Christ, but Christ’s direct emissary.” As for the room itself, it resembles a warehouse with which the Reverend was familiar as a child. Somehow knowing they’re expected to proceed for judgment in the order in which they arrived, the man in the yellow bathing suit steps forward and presents himself to the Christ-emissary.

From each side, two beautiful “beings” with feet of “sun-yellow light” appear. “How did you live,” asks one, and both them place their heads to the man in the bathing suit’s temples, “beam[ing] with pleasure at what they [find] within.” “May we confirm?” they ask, and he assures them they can. The one on his right then sings a “single joyful note” as “several smaller versions of himself” dance out holding a large mirror framed by “precious gems.” “Quick check,” says the Christ-emissary, as one of the yellow-footed beings holds the mirror to the bathing-suited man’s face while the other puts his hand in the man’s chest, removes his heart, and places it on a scale. The other yellow-footed being looks in the mirror, and the Christ-emissary says, “Very good” as a “sound of rejoicing” comes across a “vast kingdom extending in all directions around the palace.”

As the large doors of diamond open to admit the bathing-suited man, the Reverend glimpses “a tent of purest white silk” and a “great feast about to unfold.” Looking closer, he sees a “magnificent king” sitting on a “raised dais” next to an empty chair intended for the bathing-suited man. This king, the Reverend somehow knows, is Christ Himself. As he watches this unfold, he feels a happiness he’s never before experienced—a feeling that sharply diminishes as the diamond doors slam shut and he finds himself plunged into a destitute sadness that causes him to suddenly weep as the man in the funeral suit—also weeping—steps forward for judgment.

The man in the funeral suit undergoes the same process as the first man, but this time the yellow-footed beings withdraw in disgust when they put their heads to his temples, retreating to two stone pots in order to vomit “twin streams of brightly colored fluid.” As the miniature versions of themselves scurry forth to mop their mouths, they ask, “May we confirm?” Aghast, the man in the suit says, “Wait, what did you see. Is there some—” Despite his protests, the yellow-footed beings continue, singing two jagged and terrible notes as the smaller versions of themselves tumble out with a “feces-encrusted mirror” and a scale. “Quick check,” says the Christ-emissary. “I’m not sure I completely understood the instructions,” the funeral-suited man says. “If I might be allowed to—” Before he can finish his sentence, the beings rip out his heart and shove the mirror in his face.

“Oh dear,” says the Christ-emissary, and “a sound of horrific opprobrium and mourning echoe[s] all across that kingdom.” When the diamond doors open, the Reverend can’t believe the change that has taken place within. The tent, which had been made of silk, is now fashioned from stretched and blood-speckled flesh, and the banquet is no longer a feast but a collection of long tables bearing “numerous human forms” in “various stages of flaying.” As the funeral-suited man is forced to advance, he pleads with the Christ-emissary, saying there must have been some kind of mistake, listing off a number of “charitable things he [has] done back in Pennsylvania, and the numerous good people who [will] vouch for him.” In spite of this, the diamond doors slam behind him, and the Reverend realizes it’s his turn to step forth.

“How did you live?” ask the yellow-footed beings, and they put their heads to the Reverend’s temples. Up close, the beings look like familiar authority figures from the Reverend’s childhood. As they examine his life, he tries to “let them fully in,” wanting “to provide as true an accounting of [his] life” as possible. In turn, the beings withdraw “even more fiercely than before” and rush to the stone pots, where they violently vomit. Looking at the Christ-emissary, the Reverend sees that His eyes are downcast. “May we confirm?” says one of the yellow-footed beings as the mirror and scale emerge from either side. “Quick check,” says the Christ-emissary, and the Reverend turns and runs.

Although the yellow-footed beings don’t follow him, “whips of fire” fly by the Reverend’s ears, whispering, “Tell no one about this. Or it will be worse upon your return.” They then withdraw, and the Reverend runs in terror for “days, weeks, months,” forging on until, exhausted, he collapses and falls asleep. Upon waking up, he finds himself here, in the cemetery once again, “grateful” that he has avoided his fate. “I have been here since and have, as instructed, refrained from speaking of any of this, to anyone,” he says. And in any case, he recognizes the futility of telling anybody about what he’s seen, since it’s already too late for the souls here to change the way they’ve lived. “All is done,” he says. “We are shades, immaterial.”

Ever since he learned of his impending damnation, the Reverend has racked his brain for reasons why he might deserve such harsh punishment. “I did not kill, steal, abuse, deceive,” he notes, “was not an adulterer, always tried to be charitable and just; believed in God and endeavored, at all times, to the best of my ability, to live according to His will. And yet was damned.” He wonders if he deserves this punishment because of his “occasional” moments of “doubt,” or perhaps because he sometimes “lusted,” or maybe because he has committed some glaring sin that “even now [he remains] unaware of it, ready to commit it again.”

As the Reverend concludes his tale, he sees that Willie’s situation has worsened, the tendrils having engulfed the boy. As he notices this, Hans Vollman and Roger Bevins III come sweeping up to the white stone home, declaring triumphantly that they’ve succeeded in persuading Willie’s father to return. Indeed, Lincoln follows not far behind, making his way toward them as the moon shines on his distinctive face.