The New Revelation book

The New Revelation book is a sacred text whose significance in the novel lies not only in its doctrines but in the relationships attached to a particular copy. Blessed Foster gave it to Patty on the night he placed his kiss on her; Patty later offers that same volume to Mike and Jill as an act of shared spiritual kinship. To Mike, the book can be both evidence of a genuine religious impulse and, in much of its teaching, profoundly wrong.## The Copy Patty Shares Patty presents the book after reassuring Mike and Jill that she is no longer anxious about their salvation: Mike has taught her about waiting, and she has learned not to be impatient. Then she crosses to her purse, retrieves the copy, and identifies it as the one Blessed Foster gave her on the night he placed his kiss on her. The object carries a history that a newly purchased copy could not: it joins Patty’s personal experience of Foster to the faith she has made her own.

Jill’s tears and hesitation register the weight of the gift. She addresses Patty as both aunt and water brother, and protests that they cannot take this particular copy; they could buy another. Patty refuses that distinction. She explains that she is sharing water with them, an act of growing closer, so accepting the book means entering a relationship rather than acquiring a possession. Jill agrees, but expands the gift’s meaning: the book will belong to all of them. She kisses Patty, and Mike then asks for his turn. The transfer becomes a shared ritual, with the physical book at its center and affection passing among the three.

A Text Among Many

The book later appears in a very different setting: amid the crowded collection of sacred writings Mike has assembled while trying to understand human religion. At their San Francisco flat, Jill finds him sitting among texts that range from the Talmud, the Kama Sutra, and several Bibles to the Book of the Dead, the Book of Mormon, the Koran, and other religious and esoteric works. Patty’s precious copy of The New Revelation stands among them—not as an isolated authority, but as one item in Mike’s comparative inquiry.

Mike’s study follows an earlier, unsuccessful attempt to absorb the Hoover Library in immense gulps. He discovers that the machinery cannot scan fast enough, nor can he turn bound pages quickly enough, and that raw information comes to him faster than he can understand it. The scene among the religious books marks a shift from taking in material to confronting the difficulty of making sense of it. Patty’s volume is now both a personal gift and one text in a much larger human archive.

Mike’s Judgment of Fosterism

Mike tells Jill that he does not understand, then assesses the Fosterites with a mixture of respect and sharp criticism. He recognizes that they have grasped something important, but says their understanding is twisted and clumsy. Comparing their groping to his own earlier work as a carny, he argues that they will not correct their errors. He makes Patty’s book rise as he identifies it as mostly nonsense, a judgment that distinguishes his view of the physical object from his evaluation of its teaching: the volume remains cherished, even when its doctrines do not withstand his scrutiny.

Jill’s response protects Patty without denying Mike’s criticism. Patty, she says, does not see the parts that he rejects; she is wrapped in her own innocence and behaves as God without knowing who she is. Mike agrees, adding that Patty believes this only when he tells her with proper emphasis. The exchange sets the book’s limits beside its personal force: Patty’s devotion is sincere, but Mike does not treat sincerity as proof that the text is wholly true.

Place in Mike’s Search

Mike’s criticism forms part of a broader effort to find a way of understanding that is not exhausted by collecting facts or applying inherited systems. He distinguishes scientific knowledge, which he respects but finds directed toward questions other than the one he is pursuing, from philosophy, which he considers liable to circle back to its starting assumptions. The many sacred books around him, including Patty’s copy, give material form to that unresolved search: they are sources to examine, not answers he can simply accept.

The New Revelation book therefore carries two meanings without either cancelling the other. It is a concrete inheritance from Patty’s religious life and the means by which she offers Mike and Jill a place within her bond of faith. It is also a text Mike can criticize while still recognizing that Fosterism contains something worth attending to. Its movement—from treasured personal gift to one volume among many, and from shared devotional object to an example under examination—reflects the novel’s distinction between the sincerity of a religious attachment and the truth of every doctrine attached to it.