Leavers leave things to chance?

As every other day, Ishmael and his pupil begin his class as though it was any other day until the pupil asks about the leavers. this question astonished me because if he was so interested about the leavers wouldn´t he have already asked that question. Ishmael wasn´t as surprised as me. I think he thought the narrator would ask that question. "Why are you interested in knowing the story?". (pg 212) I believe the answer to this question was pretty easy to get. Still the narrator could only say that his reasons were almost unexplainable. "Again, why not learn it?" (pg 212) Ishmael got mad at his pupil, and so he was pushed to explain him why. First told him why the takers story was important to know. "So they can stop enacting it." (pg 213) Then Ishmael would go back to the point of why it was important to know the leavers story. The narrator told him that the story was necessary to know so that if they gave up the takers story, they´d have a story to switch to. This argument convinced Ishmael.

As the discussion of the story of the leavers started, an important question was formed. "How did man become man?".(pg 215) The question wasn´t answered but it was held to be answered later. the teacher continued with his class asking all kinds of questions. "According to Mother Culture, what kind of event was your agricultural revolution?"(pg 215) This began a discussion which would lead to the beginnings when Cain and Abel were alive. The pupil says that as Cain did, takers determine to kill leavers if needed to expand to territory covered by them. Then Ishmael as a good teacher gives a task to his pupil, he will act as a leaver and the narrator as a taker. The taker must convince the leaver that his life is better. " The man lives on the knife-edge of survival and has to struggle perpetually to keep from falling."(pg 220) The pupil says this trying to convince Ishmael that in the takers ways they control their lives, they play god. Their discussion circles around food supply, leavers pick it up and if ther´s no food they stay hungry, instead takers control their food supply. "What the gods provide is enough for your life as animals- I grant you that. But for your life as humans, you must provide that."(pg 226) This line expresses how takers play god, providing what they need for themselves to live. Not depending on the gods. Finally, after a long discussion they com to a conclusion. "The takers are the ones who know good and evil, and the leavers are...? The leavers are those who live in the hands of the gods."(pg 229)