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Chapter 23
Themes
Key
LitCharts assigns a color and icon to each theme in Dune Messiah, which you can use to track the themes throughout the work.
Power
Religion
Guilt and Longing
Fate and Choice
Summary
Analysis
Duncan Idaho stands in the desert by a water dike, looking at the four moons reflected in its surface. He listens to the sounds of animals. Recently, an attendant walked Paul into the desert and then returned alone, saying that Paul walked off into the distance, saying “now I am free.” Looking out into the desert, Idaho rebukes himself for leaving Paul alone. The Fremen attendants refused to send a search party after Paul, citing the tradition that the blind meet their death in the desert.
Paul feels free only when he decides to die. Up until this point, Paul felt imprisoned both by his position of power and by his prescience; he had to follow a certain path, was isolated from normal life, and knew he had no freedom to alter his fate. Therefore, walking into the desert and abandoning it all is the only way Paul is able to reclaim his freedom.
Themes
Idaho sits down on a rock and repeats Paul’s last words out loud. His mind fills with memories of Paul as a little boy. Idaho reflects on what Paul said about the problems in the universe with no solution, and he wonders whether Paul will be killed by a worm or by the heat. Idaho laments that there is nothing he can do to save Paul and wonders if there is a “fastidious courtesy” in dying with no burial.
A worm or the heat—natural phenomena—will kill Paul. In this way, Paul returns seamlessly to the ungovernable universe when he dies. He doesn’t subject himself to the impermanent laws of humans by letting a human kill him. Instead, he joins the eternal by dying at nature’s hands.
Themes
Idaho goes over the Fremen rules in his head. He is angry that a great man is dying while the “self-important” language of government plods on. At this thought, Idaho rebukes himself for retreating into his mind instead of facing his failure to save Paul. Out in the desert, a storm brews—a storm strong enough to cut flesh from bones. Idaho reflects that Paul will become one with the desert. Idaho imagines that Paul will be spoken of in the future in terms of the sea: water subsumed him, but he swam on.
Idaho laments nobody holds a ceremony or pays much attention to Paul’s passing. This kind of seamless death is exactly what Paul knew would happen to him—the kind of death that happens to every person, no matter how powerful they are. All people are mortal and powerless when compared to the eternal forces that govern the universe, such as nature and time.
Themes
A man clears his throat, and Idaho turns to see Stilgar. Idaho protests to Stilgar that Paul was a Fremen “interloper”: he brought the alien element of water to Sietch. Stilgar says that the Fremen nonetheless welcomed Paul as one of them. Idaho says that Paul will die with honor and won’t give in to the desert. Stilgar says that Paul will nonetheless give his water to the desert in Fremen fashion. Stilgar says that Alia is asking for Idaho. Although Paul had ordered the Reverend Mother not to be killed, Stilgar and Alia had disobeyed him and executed her.
Idaho is angry that Paul is dying in the Fremen fashion when Paul wasn’t really a Fremen and only pretended to be for political reasons. To Stilgar, however, this death revealed Paul’s genuine loyalty to the Fremen and disproved people who questioned his loyalty. Instead of being the appearance of a godhead to keep all the Fremen under his command, Paul truly honored Fremen customs until the end.
Themes
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Stilgar says that Alia is in a fit of anger and grief over Paul’s disappearance and needs Idaho’s comfort. Idaho says that he will go to Alia in a moment, and Stilgar leaves. Turning back to the desert, Idaho feels that Paul set a “whirling vortex” in motion that no one could control. The Guild failed, the Qizarate were exposed for Treason, and Paul’s final act solidified the Fremen’s loyalty to him forever.
Even though the Qizarate was exposed as disingenuous, Paul’s final act was of a religious nature: his death solidified his eternal influence over the Fremen. In this way, while a powerful person’s actions in life may elevate them to the status of a false godhead, only death can truly turn them into an everlasting figure.
Themes
Alia comes up behind Idaho, wailing that Paul is gone. Idaho rebukes Alia for calling Paul a fool, saying she displays a strange love. Alia says that she loved her brother, and that he should have just “stepped off the track,” taking Chani with him. Alia laments that Paul didn’t escape out of his “love of heaven.” Idaho agrees that Paul’s actions were part of the oracle. Alia repeats that Paul was a fool, and then admits that she is grieving. Alia explains that Irulan is wailing, claiming to have loved Paul and wanting to raise his children. Idaho realizes that Princess Irulan’s behavior is the Guild’s last frail effort.
As a proponent of leading a normal life herself, Alia hates that Paul never gave up his position of power even though he wanted to. Even Paul’s death, although it was a self-sacrifice, was a sacrifice that ensured his legacy’s influence over the universe for the future to come. However, Irulan’s behavior is still a threat to the safety of Paul’s legacy. Parentless, Paul’s children are vulnerable to the Guild’s attempt to raise them and influence them to carry out the Guild’s schemes.
Themes
Alia sobs and leans against Idaho. Idaho kisses Alia’s hair. Alia says that she needs Idaho. Idaho admits that he loves Alia, and Alia says that “love knows love.” Idaho shudders, feeling that he has stepped into an unexpected future. Alia asks Idaho to follow her. They go back toward “the Place of Safety.”
Throughout Dune Messiah, Alia bemoaned that her eminent position excluded her from love. Now that Paul has ensured eternal Fremen loyalty and Alia no longer has to posture as the Qizarate’s goddess, she is free to fall in love with Idaho—a person who represents a past which both Paul and Alia were nostalgic for. In this way, although Dune Messiah dealt with political matters, it ends on a human note, suggesting that no other experience—not even that of personal power—exceeds love.
Themes
