Be Dangerous! For The Dreamers of the Day are Dangerous Men

In Frank Herbert’s 1965 science fiction novel Dune, we follow the story of the fall and rise of the aristocratic Atreides family circa 22,000 CE. The principal character, the marquee of the family, Paul Atreides, goes on a unique hero’s journey of guerilla warfare and political maneuvering, with both cosmological and philosophical repercussions. Without giving too much away, a central plot in the novel is Paul discovering his own telos, “the full potential or inherent purpose” of himself, within his mind and his broader destiny. This mystery surrounding Paul’s purpose creates an underground current through most of the novel. And when the current bursts to the surface, the reader is only left to pondering a hypothetical divine mystery. Is the reader witnessing a transfiguration (see Mark 9:1–10) or a revelation (See Revelation 21:1), as this archetypical desert warlord develops into an enlightened desert mystic? Is Paul a mix tape of Moses meets T. E. Lawrence? Or is he experiencing the slow mental descent of an asylum-bound messiah?