by George Moore
The shepherds said again that they were sorry to lose Jesus, and that the hills would not seem like the hills without him, and Jesus answered that he, too, would be lonely among the brethren reading the Scriptures. When one is used to sheep one misses them sorely, Eliab said, there’s always something to learn from them; and he began to tell a story; but before he had come to the end of it Jesus’ thoughts took leave of the story he was listening to, and he turned away, leaving the shepherd with his half-finished story, and walked absorbed in his thoughts, immersed in his own mind, till he had reached the crest of the next hill and was within some hundred yards of the brook. It was then that he remembered he had left them abruptly in the middle of a half-finished relation, and he stopped to consider if he should return to them and ask for the end of the story. But fearing they would think he was making a mocking-stock of them, he sighed, and was vexed that they had parted on a seeming lack of courtesy: on no seeming lack, on a very clear lack, he said to himself; but it would be useless to return to them; they would not understand, and a man had always better return to his own thoughts. Repent, repent, he said, picking up the thread of his thoughts, but acknowledgment comes before repentance, and of what help will repentance be, for repentance changes nothing, it brings nothing unless grief peradventure. I was in the hands of God then just as I am now, and everything within and without us is in his hands. The things that we look upon as evil and the things that we look upon as good. Our sight is not his sight, our hearing is not his hearing, we must despise nothing, for all things come from him, and return to him. I used, he said, to despise the air I breathed, and long for the airs of paradise, but what did these longings bring me? — grief. God bade us live on earth and we bring unhappiness upon ourselves by desiring heaven. Jesus stopped, and looking through the blue air of evening, he could see the shepherds eating their bread and garlic on the hillside. Folding-time is near, he said to himself, but I shall never fold a flock again....
His thoughts began again, flowing like a wind, as mysteriously, arising he knew not whence, nor how, his mind holding him as fast as if he were in chains, and he heard from within that he had passed through two stages — the first was in Jerusalem, when he preached against the priests and their sacrifices. God does not desire the blood of sheep, but our love, and all ritual comes between us and God ... God is in the heart, he had said, and he had spoken as truly as a man may speak of the journey that lies before him on the morning of the first day.
In the desert he had looked for God in the flowers that the sun called forth and in the clouds that the wind shepherded, and he had learnt to prize the earth and live content among his sheep, all things being the gift of God and his holy will. He had not placed himself above the flowers and grasses of the earth, nor the sheep that fed upon them, nor above the men that fed upon the sheep. He had striven against the memory of his sin, he had desired only one thing, to acknowledge his sin, and to repent. But it seemed to him that anger and shame and sorrow, and desire of repentance had dropped out of his heart. It seemed to him as he turned and pursued his way that some new thought was striving to speak through him. Rites and observances, all that comes under the name of religion estranges us from God, he repeated. God is not here, nor there, but everywhere: in the flower, and in the star, and in the earth underfoot. He has often been at my elbow, God or this vast Providence that upholds the work; but shall we gather the universal will into an image and call it God? — for by doing this do we not drift back to the starting-point of all our misery? We again become the dupes of illusion and desire; God and his heaven are our old enemies in disguise. He who yields himself to God goes forth to persuade others to love God, and very soon his love of God impels him to violent words and cruel deeds. It cannot be else, for God is but desire, and whosoever yields to desire falls into sin. To be without sin we must be without God.
Jesus stood before the door of the cenoby, startled at the thoughts that had been put into his mind, asking himself if any man had dared to ask himself if God were not indeed the last uncleanliness of the mind.
CHAP. XXXI.
IF THOU WOULDST not miss Mathias’ discourse, Brother Jesus, thou must hasten thy steps. He is telling that the Scriptures are but allegories. Some of us are opposed to this view, believing that Adam and Eve are — Yea, Brother, and my thanks to thee for thy admonishment, Jesus said, for he did not wish to discredit Mathias’ reputation for theological argument; but no sooner was he out of sight of the gate-keeper than he began to examine the great rock that Joseph had predicted would one day come crashing down, and, being no wise in a hurry, fell to wondering how much of the mountain-side it would bring with it when it fell. At present it projected over the pathway for several yards, making an excellent store-house, and, his thoughts suspended between the discussion that was proceeding regarding Adam and Eve — whether the original twain had ever lived or were but allegories (themselves and their garden) — he began to consider if the brethren had laid in a sufficient stock of firewood, and how long it would take him to chop it into pieces handy for burning. He would be glad to relieve the brethren from all such humble work, and for taking it upon himself he would he able to plead an excuse for absenting himself from Mathias’ discourses. Hazael would not refuse to assign to him the task of feeding the doves and the cleaning out of their coops; he would find occupation among the vines and fig-trees — he was something of a gardener — and Hazael would not refuse him permission to return to the hills to see that all was well with the flocks. Jacob will need to be looked after; and there are the dogs; and if they cannot be brought to look upon Jacob as master their lives will be wasted, he said.
I seem to read supper in their eyes, he said, and having tied them up supperless he visited the bitch and her puppies. Brother Ozias hasn’t forgotten to feed her. There is some food still in the platter. But they must submit, he continued, his thoughts having returned to his dogs, Theusa and Tharsa, and then he stood listening, for he could hear Mathias’ voice. The door of the lecture-room is closed; if I step softly none will know that I have returned from the hills, and I can sit unsuspected on the balcony till Mathias’ allegories are ended, and watching the evening descending on the cliff it may be that I shall be able to examine the thoughts that assailed me as I ascended the hillside; whether we pursue a corruptible or an incorruptible crown the end is the same, he said. It was not enough for me to love God, I must needs ask others to worship him, at first with words of love, and when love failed I threatened, I raved; and the sin I fell into others will fall into, for it s natural to man to wish to make his brother like himself, thereby undoing the work of God. Myself am no paragon; I condemned the priests whilst setting myself up as a priest, and spoke of God and the will of God though in all truth I had very little more reason than they to speak of these things. God has not created us to know him, or only partially through our consciousness of good and evil. Good and evil do not exist in God’s eyes as in our eyes, for he is the author of all, but it may be that our sense of good and evil was given to us by him as a token of our divine nature. If this be true, why should we puzzle and fret ourselves with distinctions like Mathias? It were better to leave the mystery and attend to this life, casting out desire to know what God is or what nature is, as well as desire for particular things in this world which long ago I told men to disregard.... A flight of doves distracted his attention, and a moment after the door of the lecture-room opened and Saddoc and Manahem appeared, carrying somebody dead or who had fainted. As they came across the domed gallery towards the embrasure Jesus heard Manahem say: he will return to himself as soon as we get him into the air. And they placed him where Jesus had been sitting. A little water, Saddoc cried, and Jesus ran to the well, and returning with a cup of water he stood by sprinkling the worn, grey face. The heat overcame me, he murmured, but I shall soon be well and then you will bear me back to hear — The sentence did not finish, and Jesus said: thou’lt be better here with me, Hazael, than listening to discourses that fatigue t
he mind. Mathias is very insistent, Manahem muttered. He is indeed, Saddoc answered. And while Jesus sat by Hazael, fearing that his life might go out at any moment, Manahem reproved Saddoc, saying that whereas duty is the cause of all good, we have only to look beyond our own doors to see evil everywhere. Even so, Saddoc answered, what wouldst thou? That the world, Manahem answered, was created by good and evil angels. Whereupon Saddoc asked him if he numbered Lilith, Adam’s first wife, among the evil angels. A question Manahem did not answer, and, being eager to tell the story, he turned to Jesus, who he guessed did not know it, and began at once to tell it, after warning Jesus that it was among their oldest stories though not to be found in the Scriptures. She must be numbered among the evil angels, he said, remembering that Saddoc had put the question to him, for she rebuked Adam, who took great delight in her hair, combing it for his pleasure from morn to eve in the garden, and left him, saying she could abide him no longer. At which words, Jesus, Adam sorrowed, and his grief was such that God heard his sighs and asked him for what he was grieving, and he said: I live in great loneliness, for Lilith, O Lord, has left me, and I beg thee to send messengers who will bring her back. Whereupon God took pity on his servant Adam and bade his three angels, Raphael, Gabriel and Michael, to go away at once in search of Lilith, whom they found flying over the sea, and her answer to them was that her pleasure was now in flying, and for that reason I will not return to Adam, she said. Is that the answer we are to bring back to God? they asked. I have no other answer for him, she answered, being in a humour in which it pleased her to anger God, and the anger that her words put upon him was so great that to punish her he set himself to the creation of a lovely companion for Adam. Be thou lonely no more, he said to Adam. See, I have given Eve to thee. Adam was never lonely again, but walked through a beautiful garden, enjoying Eve’s beauty unceasingly, happy as the day was long, till tidings of their happiness reached Lilith, who by that time had grown weary of flying from sea to sea: I will make an end of it, she said, and descending circle by circle she went about seeking the garden, which she found at last, but failing to find the gate or any gap in the walls she sat down and began combing her hair. Nor was she long combing it before Lucifer, attracted by the rustling, came by, saying: I would be taken captive in the net thou weavest with thy hair, and she answered: not yet; for my business is in yon garden, but into it I can find no way. Wilt lend me thy sinewy shape, Lucifer? for in it I shall be able to glide over the walls and coil myself into the tree of forbidden fruit, and I shall persuade Eve as she passes to eat of it, for it will be to her great detriment to do so. But of what good will that be to me? Lucifer answered, wouldst thou leave me without a shape whilst thou art tempting Eve? Thy reward will be that I will come to thee again when I have tempted Eve and made an end of her happiness. We shall repeople the world with sons and daughters more bright and beautiful and more supple than any that have ever been seen yet. All the same, Lucifer answered, not liking to part with his shape. But as his desire could not be gainsaid, he lent his shape to Lilith for an hour. And it was in that hour our first parents fell into sin, and were chased from the garden. Did she return to Lucifer and fulfil her promise or did she cheat him? Saddoc asked. As Manahem was about to answer Saddoc intervened again: Manahem, thou overlookest the fact that Mathias holds that the Garden of Eden and Adam and Eve, to say nothing of Lilith, are a parable, and his reason for thinking thus is, as thou knowest well, that the Scriptures tell us that after eating of the forbidden fruit Adam and Eve sought to hide themselves from God among the trees.
He holds as thou sayest, Saddoc, that the garden means the mind of man as an individual; and he who would escape from God flees from himself, for our lives are swayed between two powers: the mind of the universe, which is God, and the separate mind of the individual. Then, if I understand thee rightly, Manahem, and thy master, Mathias, the Scriptures melt into imagery? What says Jesus? This, Saddoc, that it was with such subtleties of discourse and lengthy periods that Mathias fatigued our Father till he fainted away in his chair. Jesus is right, Manahem answered; it was certainly Mathias’ discourse that fatigued our Father, so why should we prolong the argument in his face while he is coming back to life?
It was not the length of Mathias’ discourse, nor his eloquence, Hazael said, that caused my senses to swoon away. My age will not permit me to listen long. I would be with Jesus, and I would that ye, Saddoc and Manahem, return to the lecture-room at once, else our brother will think his discourse has failed. Jesus is here to give the attendance I require. Go, hasten, lest ye miss any of his points. The brethren were about to raise a protest, but at a sign from Jesus they obeyed; Mathias’ voice was heard as soon as the door of the lecture-room was opened, but the brethren did not forget to close it, and when silence came again Hazael said: Jesus, come hither, sit near me, for I would speak to thee, but cannot raise my voice. Thou’lt sleep here to-night, and to-morrow we shall meet again. And this is well, for my days are numbered. I shall not be here to see next year’s lambs and to agree that this new shepherd shall be recompensed by a gift of eighteen, as is the custom. And Jesus, understanding that the president was prophesying his own death, said: why speakest like this to me who have returned from the hills to strangers, for all are strangers to me but thou. I shall be sorry to leave thee, Jesus, for our lives have been twisted together, strands of the same rope. But it must be plain to thee that I am growing weaker; month by month, week by week, my strength is ebbing. I am going out; but for what reason should I lament that God has not chosen to retain me a few months longer, since my life cannot be prolonged for more than a few months? My eighty odd years have left me with barely strength enough to sit in the doorway looking back on the way I have come. Every day the things of this world grow fainter, and life becomes to me an unreal thing, and myself becomes unreal to those around me; only to thee do I retain anything of my vanished self. So why should I remain? For thy sake, lest thou be lonely here? Well, that is reason enough, and I will bear the burden of life as well as I can for thy sake. A burden it is, and for a reason that thou mayest not divine, for thou art still a young man in my eyes, and, moreover, hast not lived under a roof for many years listening to learned interpretations of Scripture. Thou hast not guessed, nor wilt thou ever guess, till age reveals it to thee, that as we grow old we no longer concern ourselves to love God as we used to love him. No one would have thought, not even thou, whose mind is always occupied with God, and who is more conscious of him perhaps than any one I have known, no one, I say, not even thou, would have thought that as we approach death our love of God should grow weaker, but this is so. In great age nothing seems to matter, and it is this indifference that I wish to escape from. Thou goest forth in the morning to lead thy flock in search of pasture, if need be many hours, and God is nearer to us in the wilderness than he is among men. This meaning, Jesus said, that under this roof I, too, may cease to love God? Not cease to love God: one doesn’t cease to love God, Hazael answered. But, Hazael, this night I’ve yielded up the flocks to a new shepherd, for my limbs have grown weary, and what thou tellest me of old age frightens me. Thou wouldst warn me that God is only loved on the hills under the sky —— I am too weak to choose my thoughts or my words, and many things pass out of my mind, Hazael answered. Had I remembered I shouldn’t have spoken. But why not speak, Father? Jesus asked, so that I may be prepared in a measure for the new life that awaits me. Life never comes twice in the same way, Hazael replied; nor do the same things befall any two men. I know not what may befall thee: but the sky, Jesus, will always be before thine eyes and the green fields under thy feet, even while listening to Mathias. But thou didst live once under the sky, Jesus said. Not long enough, Hazael murmured, but the love of God was ardent in me when I walked by day and night, sleeping under the stars, seeking young men who could give up their lives to the love of God and bringing them back hither into the fold of the Essenes. In those days there was little else in me but love of God, and I could walk from dusk to
dusk without wearying; twelve and fifteen hours were not too many for my feet: my feet bounded along the road while my eyes followed white clouds moving over the sky; I dreamed of them as God’s palaces, and I saw God not only in the clouds but in the grass, and in the fields, and the flower that covers the fields. I read God in the air and in the waters: and in every town in Palestine I sought out those that loved God and those that could learn to love God. I could walk well in those days, fifteen hours were less than as many minutes are now. I have walked from Jerusalem to Joppa in one day, and the night that I met thy father outside Nazareth I had walked twelve hours, though I had been delayed in the morning: eight hours before midday, and after a rest in the wood I went on again for several hours more, how many I do not know, I’ve forgotten. I did not know the distance that I had walked till I met thy father coming home from his work, his tools in the bag upon his shoulder. His voice is still in my ear. But if it be to Nazareth thou’rt going, come along with me, he said. And I can still hear ourselves talking, myself asking him to direct me to a lodging, and his answering: there’s a house in the village where thou’lt get one, and I’ll lead thee to it. But all the beds in that house were full; we knocked at other inns, but the men and women and children in them were asleep and not to be roused; and if by chance our knocking awakened somebody we were bidden away with threats that the dogs would be loosed upon us. Nazareth looks not kindly on the wayfarer to-night, I said. Yet it shall not be said that a stranger had to sleep in the streets of Nazareth, were thy father’s very words to me, Jesus. Come to my house, he said, though it be small and we have to put somebody out of his bed, it will be better than that our town should gain evil repute. Thou canst not have forgotten me coming, for thy father shook thee out of thy sleep and told thee that he wanted thy bed for a stranger. I can see thee still standing before me in thy shift, and though the hours I’d travelled had gone down into my very marrow, and sleep was heavy upon my eyes, yet a freshness came upon me as of the dawn when I looked on thee, and my heart told me that I had found one that would do honour to the Essenes, and love God more than any I had ever met with yet. But I think I hear thee weeping, Jesus. Now, for what art thou weeping? There is nothing sad in the story, only that it is a long time ago. Our speech next day still rings in my ear — my telling thee of the Pharisees that merely minded the letter of the law, and of the Sadducees that said there was no life outside this world except for angels. It is well indeed that I remember our two selves sitting by the door on two stools set under a vine, and it throwing pretty patterns of shadow on the pavement whilst we talked — whilst I talked to thee of the brethren, who lived down by the Bitter Lake, no one owning anything more than his fellow, so that none might be distracted from God by the pleasures of this world. I can see clearly through the years thy face expectant, and Nazareth — the deeply rutted streets and the hills above.
