Chapter 15

At the end of one of these, out of the sun's rays, the old man lay propped up among cushions, dreaming, or perhaps only conscious, of the refreshing breeze that came and went away again. But he awoke at the sound of their steps on the sanded paths, and raised his stick as a sign to them to come to him, and, seeing that he wished to speak, Joseph leaned over his chair, putting his ear close to his father's face, for Dan's speech was still thick and often inarticulate. Thou wast nearly going down in the storm, he said, and Joseph could hardly believe that he heard rightly, for what could his father know of the storm on the lake, he being in a deep swoon at the time beyond the reach of words. He asked his father who had told him of the storm, but Dan could say no more than that a voice had told him that there was a great storm upon the lake and that Joseph was in it. Miracle upon miracle! Joseph cried, and he related his escape from shipwreck; how when coming in Peter's boat from the opposite shores the wind had risen, carrying the lake in showers over the boat till all were wetted to their skins. But, unmindful of these showers, Jesus had continued his teaching, even after a great wave wrenched away a plank or part of one. Master, if the boat be not staunched we perish, Peter said, for which Jesus rebuked Peter and called them all to come forward and kneel closer about him. Kneel, he said, your faces towards me, and forget the plank and remember your sins. We could not do else but as we were bidden, and we all knelt about him, our thoughts fixed as well as we were able to fix them on our sins, but the water was coming into the boat all the while, and in the midst of our prayers we said: in another moment we perish if he stay not the wind and waves. We thought that he would stand up in the bow and command, but he remained seated, and continued to teach us, but the wind lulled all the same, and when we looked round the boat was staunch again, and we made the wharf at Capernaum easily.

Ecanus, who was a man of little faith, asked Joseph if he had seen anybody put his hand to the plank and restore it to its place, and Joseph answered that all were grouped round the Master praying, and that none had fallen away from the group. But there were some in the boat that saw a little angel speeding over the waves. Philip saw both wings and the angel's feet, but I had only a glimpse. If you would only let me bring him to you---- But, reading his father's face, Joseph continued: if you haven't faith, Father, he couldn't do anything for thee. Father, let me bring him. This shows no distrust in your power, he interjected suddenly, turning to Ecanus. Each man has powers given to him; some are physical and some spiritual; some are powerful in one element and some in another. But no magician that I have met has power over fire and water. Only those into whom God has descended can command both fire and water alike. And he related that when they passed through Chorazin and a woman ran out of her house crying that her little boy had fallen into the fire, Jesus had asked her if she had applied any remedy, and on her saying she had not, he had said: then I will cure him. With his breath he restored him, and five minutes after the child was playing with his little comrades in the street. If, however, she had poured oil on the wounds he couldn't have cured them, Joseph explained, for his affinity with fire would have been interrupted. In the village of Opeira a child while carrying a kettle of boiling water from the fire tipped it over, burning a good deal of the flesh of one foot, which, however, healed under Jesus' breath almost as soon as he had breathed upon it. And yet another child was healed of the croup, but this time it was John who imposed his hands: Jesus had transmitted some of his power over the ills of the flesh to the disciples. On Dan asking if Joseph had seen Jesus cast out devils, Joseph replied that he had, but it would take some time to tell the exordium. Whereupon Ecanus remembered that other patients waited for his attendance and took his leave, warning Joseph before leaving against the danger of tiring his father, a thing that Joseph promised not to do; but as soon as the door closed after the physician Dan began to beg so earnestly for stories that Joseph could not do else than tell him of the miracle he had witnessed. Better to submit, he thought, than to agitate his father by refusal; and he began this narrative; the morning of the storm, which they would not have succeeded in weathering had it not been for the intervention of the angel. Jesus and some of the disciples, including Joseph, had set their sail for the Gadarene coasts; and finding a landing-place by a shore seeming desolate, they proceeded into the country; and while seeking a sufficient number to exhort and to teach, their search led them past some broken ruins, shards of an old castle, apparently tenantless. They were about to pass it without examination when a wailing voice from one of the turrets brought them to a standstill. They were not at first certain whether the wailing sound was the voice of the wind or a human voice, but they had hearkened and with difficulty had separated the doleful sound into: woe! woe! woe! unto thee Jerusalem, woe! woe! It sounds to me, Peter said, like one that is making a mock of thee, Master. Having heard that thou foretellest woe to Chorazin---- But Judas, seeing a cloud gathering on Peter's face, nudged Peter, and the twain went up together and some minutes after returned with a half-naked creature, an outcast whom they had found crouching like a jackal in a hole among the stones, one clearly possessed by many devils. Now as all were in wonder what his history might be, a swineherd passing by at the time told them how the poor, naked creature would take a beating or a gift of food for his singing with the same gentle grace. The words had hardly passed the swineherd's lips than the possessed began to sing:

Woe! woe! woe! the winds are wailing. The four great sisters, the winds of the world, Call one to the other, and it is thy doom They are calling, Jerusalem. Woe! woe! woe! The North brings ruin, the South brings sorrow, The East wind grief, and the West wind tears For Jerusalem. Woe! woe! woe!

And he sung this little song several times, till the hearts of the disciples hardened against the outcast and they were minded to beat him if he did not cease; but the swineherd warned them that a surer way to silence him was by giving him some food; and while he stood by eating, the swineherd confided the story of the fool, or as much of it as he knew, to Jesus. The fool, he said, came from Jerusalem some two years ago. He had been driven out of the Temple, which he frequented daily, crying about the courts the song with which he wearied you just now, till the most patient were unable to bear it any longer; and every time he met a priest he looked into his face and sang: woe! woe! woe! unto Jerusalem, and whenever he met a scribe he would cry: woe! woe! woe! unto Jerusalem, hindering them in their work about the Temple. Some stones were thrown, but enough life was left in him to crawl away, and as soon as he recovered from his wounds he was about again, singing his melancholy ditty (he knows but one). He was told if he did not cease he would be beaten with rods, but he could not cease it, and started his ditty again as soon as he could bear a shirt on his back; and then he must have travelled up here afoot, picking up a bit here and a bit there, getting a lift in an ox-cart. He is without memory of anything, who he is, where he came from, or who taught him his song. He does not know why he chose that broken tower for a dwelling, nor do we, but fortunately it stands in a waste. We hear him singing as we go by to our work and pitch him scraps of food from time to time. We hear him as we return in the evening to our homes making his melancholy dwelling sadder with his song. But he is a harmless, poor fool, save for the annoyance of his song, which he cannot stanch any more than the wind in the broken turrets. A harmless fool who will follow whosoever asked him to follow, unafraid, and taking a blow or a hunch of bread in the same humour, and distinguishing no man from the next one.

As the swineherd said these words the fool said: Jesus, thou hast come to my help, but woe to thee, Son of God, thou wilt suffer thy death in Jerusalem; and looking up into Jesus' face more intensely: oh, Son of Man, what aileth thee or me? And knowest thou anything of the cloud of woe that hangs over Jerusalem? To which Jesus made no answer, but called upon the devils to say how many there were, and they answered: three. Then depart ye three, Jesus replied, and was about to impose his hands when the three devils asked whither they should go, to which Jesus answered: ye must seek another refuge, for here ye cannot remain. Seek among the wolves and foxes. But these will flee from us, the devils answered; allow us to enter the hogs rooting the ground before thee. But at this the swineherd cried out: forbid the devils to enter into my hogs, else they will run over the cliffs and drown themselves in the sea. Though you are Jews, and do not look favourably on hogs, they are as God made them. To which Jesus answered, turning to his disciples: the man speaks well, for if unclean they be, it was the will of God that made them so. And taking pity on the hogs that were rooting quietly, unaware of the devils eager to enter into them, he said: there are statues of gods and goddesses in Tiberias, enter into them. And immediately the devils took flight, giving thanks to Jesus as they departed thither.

Joseph waited a moment and tried to read his father's face. But Dan's face remained fixed, and as if purposely, which vexed Joseph, who cried: now, Father, you may believe or disbelieve, or be it thou'rt naturally averse from Jesus, but thou knowest as well as I do that two days after the great storm a statue of the goddess Venus fell from her pedestal in the streets of Tiberias and was broken. But, Joseph, when the statue fell I was sick and had no knowledge of the fall. But if a statue of the goddess Venus did fall from her pedestal, I'd ask why the devils should choose to destroy false gods? Were it not more reasonable for them to uphold the false gods safe and secure on their pedestals? The gods were overthrown for a sign that the devils had left the fool's body, Joseph answered. But why, Dan replied, didn't three statues fall?--a statue for each devil--and whither did the devils go? That one statue should fall was enough for a sign, Joseph said, but no more would he say, for his father's incredulity irritated him, and seeing that he had angered his son, Dan stretched his hand to him and said: perhaps we are more eager to believe when we are young than when we are old. And he asked Joseph to tell him of some other miracle that he might have seen Jesus perform.

Joseph had seen Jesus perform many other miracles, but he was loath to relate them, for none, he felt sure, would impose upon his father the belief that Jesus was the Messiah that was promised to the Jews. All the same the miracle of the woods rose in his mind, and so plainly that he could not keep the story back, and almost before he was aware of it he began the relation, telling how Jesus, James, John, Andrew, and himself were at table, mingling jest with earnest (Peter was not with them, being kept at home, for his wife was in child-birth at the time), when the women of the village were heard running up the street crying together to the men to take part in the chase of the wild man of the woods, who had come down amongst them once more questing the flesh of women. But this time we'll put a stop to his leaping, they cried. A goatherd coming from the hills has seen him enter a cave and as soon as he has folded his goats he will lead us to it. But the villagers were in no mood for waiting; the goats could be folded by another; and the goatherd was bidden and obliged to leave his goats and lead the way, Jesus and his disciples following with the others through the forest till we came to a ravine. And the goatherd said: look between yon great rocks, for it was between them he passed out of my sight. And let one of you creep in after him, but I must return to my goats, having no confidence that they have been properly folded for the night. The goatherd would have run away if he hadn't been held fast, and there were questions as to who would enter. The first said "no," the second the same, giving as reason that they were not young or strong enough, whereas the goatherd was both, and none better endowed for the struggle; and the people became of one mind that they must beat the goatherd with the crows if he did not go down into the cave, but Jesus, arriving in time, said: it is not lawful to break into any man's dwelling with crows, nor to kill him because his sins affront you; let us rather give him means to cut himself free from sins. At which words the people were near to jeering, for it seemed to them that Jesus knew little of the man they were pursuing, and they knew not what to understand when he asked if any among them had a long, sharp knife, and there was a movement as if they were about to leave him; but one man said: thou shalt have mine, Master, and, taking it out of his girdle, he gave it to Jesus, who tested it with his thumb, and, satisfied with it, laid it on the rock beside the cave. But the people began to mutter: he will use the knife against us, Master. Not against you, Jesus answered, but against himself, thereby defending himself against himself. There were mutterings among the people, and some said that his words were too hard to understand, but all were silent as soon as Jesus raised his hands and stepped towards the cave, and began to breathe his spirit against the lust that possessed the man's flesh. We must return here, he said, with oil and linen cloths. At which all wondered, not knowing what meaning to put upon his words, but they believed Jesus, and came at daybreak to meet him at the edge of the forest and followed the path as before till they came to the hillside. The man was no longer hidden in his cave, but sat outside by the rock on which Jesus had laid the knife, and Jesus said: happy is he born into the world without sting, and happy is he out of whom men have taken the sting before he knew it, but happier than these is the man that cuts out the part that offends him, setting the spirit free as this man has done.

Joseph ceased speaking suddenly and stood waiting for his father to admire the miracle he had related, but Dan's tongue struggled with words; and Joseph, being taken as it were with another flux of words, and like one apprehensive of the argument that none shall undo God's handiwork, set out on the telling that the cause of man's lust of women was that God and the devil had a bet together--the devil saying that if God let him sting a man in a certain part of his hide he would get him in the end despite all that God might do to save him from hell. To which God, being in the humour, consented, and the sting was put into nearly all men. A few the devil overlooked, and these have much spared to them, and those out of whom the sting is taken in childhood are fortunate, but those who, like the wild man of the wood, cut the sting out of their own free will are worthy of all praise; and he cited the authority of Jesus that man should mutilate his body till it conform perforce to his piety. But the story of man's fall is told differently in the Book of Genesis, my son. The admonition that he was laying violent hands on a sacred book startled Joseph out of his meditations, and in some confusion of words and mind he began to prevaricate, saying that he thought he had made himself clear: the release of pious souls from the bondage of the flesh was more important than the continuance of the impious. Moreover in the days of Moses, Israel was not steeped in as many iniquities as she is now, and the Day of Judgment was not so close at hand. More men meant more sins, and sin has become so common that God can endure the torture no longer.... Again Joseph ceased speaking suddenly and, almost agape, stood gazing into his father's face, reading therein a great perplexity, for Dan was asking himself for what good reason had God given him so strange a son. He would have been content to let the story pass into another, but Joseph was waiting for him to speak, and speaking incontinently he said he had heard that in the Temple of Astoreth the Phoenician youths often castrated themselves with shards of shells or pottery and threw their testicles in the lap of the goddess crying out: art thou satisfied now, Astoreth? But he did not know of any text in their Scriptures that counselled such a practice; and the introduction of it seemed to savour of borrowing from the heathen. Whereupon Joseph averred that whereas the wont of the Phoenician youths is without reason, the same could not be said of Jesus' device to save a soul. To which Dan rejoined that the leaving of the knife for the man to mutilate himself with, seemed to him to be contrary to all the rumours of Jesus that had come to his ears. I have heard that he would set the law aside and the traditions of our race, declaring the uncircumcised to be acceptable to God as the Jew; that he sits down to food with the uncircumcised and lays no store on burnt offerings. Nor did Isaiah, Joseph interrupted, and circumcision is itself a mutilation. I do not contest its value, mark you; but if thou deny'st that Jesus was right to leave a knife whereby the sinner might free himself from sin thou must also deny circumcision. Circumcision is the sign of our race, Dan answered. A physical sign, an outward sign, Joseph cried, and he asked his father to say if the Jews would ever forget priests and ritual; and he reminded his father that the once sinner, now a holy anchorite, did not bring an appetency into the world that could be overcome by prayer, and so had to resort to the knife that he might live in the spirit. It seems to me, Joseph, that we should live as God made us, for better or worse. But, Father, once you admit circumcision---- A man should not be over-nice, Joseph, and though it be far from my thought to wish to see thee a fornicator or adulterer it would rejoice me exceedingly to see grandchildren about me. There is a maiden---- Another reason, Father, of which I have not yet spoken makes the marriage of the flesh seem a vanity to me, and that is---- I know it well, Joseph, that the great day is coming when the world will be remoulded afresh. But, Father, do ye believe in nothing but observances? Tell me, Joseph, did thy prophet ever raise anybody from the dead? Yes, and hoping to convince his father by another miracle he fell to telling eagerly how a young girl who was being carried to the grave was called back to life.

She was, he said, coming from her wedding feast. And he told how there were in the village two young girls, one as fair as the other, rivals in love as well as in beauty, both having the same young man in their hearts, and for a long time it seemed uncertain which would get him; for he seemed to favour them alternately, till at length Ruth, unable to bear her jealousy any longer, went to the young man, saying that she was close on a resolve to see him no more. Your lover? he answered, his cheek blanching, for he dearly loved her. I haven't gotten a lover, she said; only a share in a lover. Your words, Ruth, relieve me of much trouble, he replied, and took her in his arms and said: it was a good thought that brought you hither, for if you hadn't come I might never have been able to decide between you, but your coming has given me strength, and now I know which I desire. And then it was the girl's cheek that grew pale, for he hadn't answered at once which he would have. Which? she asked, and he replied: you, not Rachel. If that be so, she answered, I am divided between joy and sorrow; gladness for myself, sorrow for my friend; and it behoves me to go to her and tell her of her loss. I am the chosen one, she said to Rachel, who turned away, saying: had I gone to him and asked him to choose between us he would have chosen me. He couldn't do else.

She began to brood and to speak of a spell laid upon the young man, and her visits to a sorceress came to be spoken about so openly that it was against the bridegroom's wish that Rachel was asked to the wedding feast; but Ruth pleaded, saying that it would be no feast for her if Rachel did not present herself at the table. The twain sat opposite each other at table, Rachel seemingly the happier, eating, drinking, laughing, foretelling that Mondis would fill Ruth's life with happiness from end to end. Thou wilt never see the face of an evil hour, she said, and Ruth in her great joy answered: Rachel, I know not why he didn't choose thee; thou'rt so beautiful; and the young Mondis wooed her at the table, to Ruth's pleasure, for she knew of his thankfulness to Rachel for allowing the wedding to pass in concord, without a jarring note.

She seemed to listen to him as a sister might to a beloved brother, and as the wedding feast drew to a close she said: Ruth shall drink wine with me, and the cups were passed across the table, and laughter and jest flowed on for a while. But soon after drinking from Rachel's cup Ruth turned pale and, leaning back into the arms of her bridegroom, she said: I know not what ails me.... And then a little later on she was heard to say: I am going, and with a little sigh she went out of her life, lying on her bridegroom's arm white and still like a cut flower. The word "poison" swelled up louder and louder, and all eyes were directed against Rachel, who to prove her innocence drank the wine that was left in Ruth's glass; but it was said afterwards that she had not drunk out of the cup that she had handed to Ruth. Be this as it may, a house of joy was turned into a house of tears. Bridegroom, parents and friends fell into procession, and we who were coming down the street met the bier, and after hearing the story of the girl's death Jesus said: let me speak to her, and, leaning over her, he whispered in her ear, and soon after we thought it was the wind that stirred the folds of her garments, but her limbs were astir in them; the colour came back to her cheeks; she raised herself on her bier, and with his bride in his arms the bridegroom worshipped Jesus as a god; but Jesus reproved him, saying: it was by the power of God working through me that she was raised from the dead: give thanks to him who alone merits our thanks. But Rachel, who had been following the bier in great grief, hanging on the bridegroom's arm could not contain herself at the sight of Ruth raised from the dead, and it wrenching her reason out of her control compelled her to call upon the people to cast out the Nazarene, who worked cures with the help of the demons with whom he was in league, which proved to everybody that her friendly words to Ruth at the feast were make-believe, and that she had been plotting all the while how she might ruin her.