The judge, his hands behind his back, walked up and down his large study. What a cursed critical case! If the Chancellor had not been given up by the doctors on the day of the trial, the sentence would have been different. The petition for mercy! Would it have any result except that of prolonging the poor man's torture? Whether in the end it would not have been better——? Everything would have been over then. An old official came out of the adjoining room and laid a bundle of papers on the table.
"One moment. Has the petition for mercy been sent to His Majesty?"
"It has, sir."
"What's your opinion?" asked the judge.
The counsellor raised his shoulders and let them fall again.
Konrad cowered down and stared at the table.
On it lay everything—paper, ink, pens. What should he write? He might describe his sadness, but how did a man begin to do that? He lifted up his face as if searching for something. His glance fell through the window on to the wall, the upper part of which was lighted by the evening sun. The mountain tops glowed like that. Ah, world, beautiful world! Still three weeks. Or double that time. Then—the very beating of his heart hurt him; his temple throbbed as though struck by a hammer. For he always thought of the one thing—and it suddenly flashed into his mind—there were other executioners! His supper was there—a tin can with rice soup and a piece of bread. He swallowed it mechanically to the last crumb. Then came night, and the star was again visible in the scrap of sky between the roof and the chimney. Konrad gazed at it reverently for the few minutes until it vanished. Then the long, dark, miserable night. And this was called living! And it was for such life that you petitioned the king. But if a king grants mercy, then the sun shines. The kindness shown him by the judge had strengthened him a little, but the last of his surging thoughts was always, "Hopeless!"
The next night Konrad had another visitor—his mother, in her Sunday gown, just as she used to go to communion. And there was some one with her. She went up to her son's bed, and said: "Konrad, I bring you a kind friend."
When he felt for her hand, she was no longer there, but in the middle of the dim cell stood the Lord Jesus. His white garment hung down to the ground, His long hair lay over His shoulders. His shining face was turned towards Konrad.
When the poor sinner woke in the morning his heart was full of wonder. The night had brought healing. He jumped blithely out of bed. "My Saviour, I will never more leave you."
Something of which he had hardly been conscious suddenly became clear to him. He would take refuge in the Saviour. He would sink himself in Jesus, in whom everything was united that had formed and must form his happiness—his mother, his innocent childhood, his joy in God, his repose and hope, his immortal life. Now he knew, he would rely on his Saviour. He would write a book about Jesus. Not a proper literary work; he could not do that, he had no talent for it. But he would represent the Lord as He lived, he would inweave his whole soul with the being of his Saviour so that he might have a friend in the cell. Then perhaps his terrors would vanish. In former days it had pleased him, so to speak, to write away an anxiety from his heart, not in letters to others, but only for himself. Many things which were not clear to him, which he found incomprehensible—with pen in hand he succeeded in making clearer to his inward eye, so that vague pictures almost assumed corporeal shape. He had in that fashion created many comrades and many companions during his wanderings in strange lands when he was afraid. So now in his forlorn and deserted condition he would try to invite the Saviour into the poor sinner's cell. No outward help was to be hoped, he must evoke it all out of himself. He would venture to implore the Lord Jesus until He came, using his childish memories, the remains of his school learning, the fragments of his reading, and, above all, his mother's Bible stories.
And now the condemned man began to write a book in so far as it was possible to him. At first his dreams and thoughts and figures were disconnected through timidity, and the painful excitement which often made his pulses gallop and his heart stop beating. Then he cowered in the corner, and wept and groaned and struggled in vain with the desire for mortal life. When he succeeded in collecting his thoughts again, and he took up his pen afresh, he gradually regained calm, and each time it lasted longer. And it happened that he often wrote for hours at a stretch, that his cheeks began to glow and his eyes to shine—for he wandered with Jesus in Galilee. Suddenly he would awake from his visions and find himself in his prison cell, and sadness overcame him, but it was no longer a falling into the pit of hell; he was strong enough to save himself on his island of the blessed. And so he wrote and wrote. He did not ask if it was the Saviour of the books. It was his Saviour as he lived in him, the only Saviour who could redeem him. And so there was accomplished in this poor sinner on a small scale what was accomplished among the nations on a large scale; if it was not always the historical Jesus as Saviour, it was the Saviour in whom men believed become historical, since he affected the world's history through the hearts of men. He whom the books present may not be for all men; He who lives in men's hearts is for all. That is the secret of the Saviour's undying power: He is for each man just what that man needs. We read in the Gospels that Jesus appeared at different times and to different men in different forms. That should be a warning to us to let every man have his own Jesus. As long as it is the Jesus of love and trust, it is the right Jesus.
It often happened that during the prisoner's composition and writing, a wider, softer light from the window spread through the cell, flickered over the wall, the floor, the table, and then rested for a space on the white paper. And so light even entered the lonely room, but unspeakably more light entered the writer's heart.
The gaoler saw little of the writing. Directly he rattled his keys, it was hidden under the sheet—just as children hide their treasures from intrusive eyes. When five or six weeks had gone by, hundreds of written sheets lay there.
Konrad placed them in a cover and wrote on it
I.N.R.I.
CHAPTER I
When darkness covers the world men look gladly towards the east. There light dawns. All lights come from out of the east. And the races of men are said to have come hither from that quarter. There is an ancient book, in which is written the beginning of things and of men. The book came from the nation of the Jews, and the old Jews were called the people of God, for they recognised only one eternal God. And great men and holy prophets arose in that nation. The greatest of them was named Moses, and it is written that he it was who brought down to men the Ten Commandments. But the Jews fell on evil times, they sank lower and lower and were heavily oppressed by stronger nations. Like us, they suffered poverty and curses and despair, and this lasted for a thousand years and more. Prophets appeared from time to time, and with words of mercy announced that a Saviour would come to lead the Jews into the kingdom of glory. For that Saviour they waited many hundreds of years. Oftentimes one would appear whom they took for Him, but they were deceived. And when at last the real Saviour, the real, mighty Saviour appeared, they did not recognise Him. For He was different from what they had imagined.
Shall I try to tell how it happened, just as my mother used to tell me, her little boy, the story on winter evenings? Shall I recite it to myself like one who desires to wake himself at midnight before the Lord comes? Shall I, who am without learning, search in my poor confused head for the fragments that have remained in it? So much has been lost in the wear and tear of the world, and yet since it has grown so dark with me something flashes out, and shines forth on high, like some starry crown in the night! Shall I invoke the holy figures that they may stand by me through the anguish of my last days, that they may surround me with their glad eternal light, and let no spirit of despair come near me?—The path between the walls of this cruel fortress is narrow, and through it only a feeble light penetrates to me.
As God wills. I am grateful for and content with the pale reflection of the sky that comes to me from the holy east through the cracks in the wall. Oh, God, my Father, let glad tidings come to me from distant lands and far-off times, so that my simple heart can hold and understand them. I am thirsty for God's truth, and whatever shall strengthen, comfort, and save me, will be for me God's truth. Oh, thou pale light! Art thou my mother's heritage and blessing? Oh, my mother! From out the eternal dwelling speak to thy unhappy son—oh, speak!
Did I not always see you in the woman who, during the cold winter season, was compelled to go across the mountains far from home? And so I will begin.
At that time the land of the Jews was under the dominion of the Romans. The Roman Emperor wished to know how many Jews there were, and commanded that an enrolment of the people should be made in Judaea. All the Jews were to go to the place of their birth, and there report themselves to the Imperial officer. In the little town of Nazareth, in Galilee—a mountainous district of Judaea—there lived a carpenter. He was an elderly man, and had married a young wife of whom a folk-song still sings—
"As beautifully white as milk,
As marvellously soft as silk;
A woman very fair to see,
Yet full of deep humility."
They were poor people, but pious and industrious and obedient. No man in the wide world troubled about them, and yet had it not been for them the Roman Empire might not have fallen. Years afterwards, indeed, it fell because of that carpenter. People from all quarters of the globe dwelt in Galilee, even barbarians who had wandered there from the west and the north. And it was often difficult to distinguish their descent. Our carpenter was born in the south of Judaea, in the town of Bethlehem, which, in olden times, had been the native place of King David. Joseph, the carpenter, was not unwilling to speak of that, and even to let it be known that he was of the house of David, the great king. But yet he might well have thought it a finer thing to rise up from below than to come down from above. And is it not so? Does not man rise up from below, and God come down from high? In his boyhood David was a shepherd; it is said that he slew the leader of the enemy with stones from his sling, and that was why he rose so high. Now for that reason, and because Joseph, the carpenter, was glad to visit his native town once again, and to take his wife with him and show her the land of his youth, the enrolment of the people was right pleasing unto him. So the two made their plans, and set out for Bethlehem. It was three days' journey and more, and they might well have complained. If a workman to-day has not all that is of the best, he should think of Master Joseph, who always cared more for good work than good money. They probably took a packet of food with them from home, and the bride was often obliged to rest by the way. The path over the rocky mountains was difficult and tiring, and they had to pass through the suspected land of Samaria. But Joseph never grumbled. And at last they reached Judaea. And when they came upon ancient monuments, he liked to stop, first in order to see how they were built, and then to ponder over the great men and great deeds of olden times. They spent a night at a place called Bethel, and there Joseph dreamed that he saw a ladder before him, and that it reached from earth to heaven. And Joseph thought, if the rungs would bear him, he might perhaps ascend it; meanwhile, he saw how an angel, robed in white, slowly descended it until he came down to where Joseph was. But when Joseph stretched out his hand to him, the angel was no longer to be seen. Joseph awoke, and the sweet dream filled his soul. It was the place where once the Patriarch Jacob saw the heavenly ladder, and there it had remained ever since, so that angels might continually descend and ascend between heaven and earth. And then they cheerfully continued their way. Joseph was afraid when he heard the jackals shriek in the desert and saw the Bedouin camps. But he thought the angel who had come down was hovering near him, and often imagined that he felt his wings fanning his cheek.
The land through which they journeyed was barren; the plants were dried up by the frost and were all faded. Snow lay on the summits of Lebanon, which the travellers now saw from afar, away in their native land, and pale gleams fell on to the lowlands of Judaea through the cloudy atmosphere, so that stones and grass were white. When they rested beside a brook the woman gazed thoughtfully into the pool and said, "Look, Joseph; what are the wonderful plants and flowers on the surface of the water?"
And Joseph said, "Haven't you ever seen them before, Mary? You are young and have only known a few cold winters. And you don't know what these flowers mean? Let me tell you. A maiden stands in the dawn. Her feet are on the moon and the stars circle round her head. And under her foot she crushes the head of the serpent who betrayed our first parents in Paradise. And see, Spring courts the maiden and brings her his roses. And Winter, too, courts the maiden, and because he has no other flowers he makes these to grow on the surface of the water and on the window-panes. But they are stiff and cold, and the maiden, the mysterious rose, of whom a prophet sang, 'All nations shall call thee blessed!' she chose the Spring."
That was the story Joseph told, Joseph whose beard was white as the ice-flowers. Mary listened to the tale and was silent.
On the third day the royal city lay before our wanderers. Magnificent it stood on the hill-top with the domes and pinnacles of its temples. At that time Herod, king of the Jews, sat on the throne and imagined that he ruled. But he only ruled in so far as the strangers allowed him to rule. The town which had once been the pride of the chosen people, now swarmed with Roman warriors, who filled the streets with noise and unruly conduct. Joseph led his young wife down towards the sloping rocks where were the graves of the prophets. There he was so overcome that suddenly he stretched forth his hands to heaven: "Almighty Jehovah, when will the Messiah come?" His cry was re-echoed in the hollows of the rocks, and Mary said: "You should not shout so, Joseph. The dead will not awaken, and Jehovah hears a prayer that is quietly spoken."
Mary had hoped in her heart that they would enter Jerusalem and spend the night there. Joseph said it could not be, for he had no relatives in the town who could give them lodging, and he had not money enough to pay strangers for a lodging. Also he did not like the strange ways of the place; he yearned for his beloved Bethlehem. It wasn't very far off now; could she manage it?
Mary signed "Yes" with her head, and gathered together all her remaining strength. But just beyond the city walls she sank down exhausted, and Joseph said: "We will stay here so that you may rest, and to-morrow I can show you the Temple."
There was a man on a stony hillock nailing two beams of wood together. Joseph understood something of that sort of work, but he was not quite clear over this particular thing. So he asked what it might be.
"He for whose use it is, doesn't want it," replied the workman. It then flashed into Joseph's mind that it was a gallows.
Mary grasped his arm: "Joseph, let us go on to Bethlehem." For she began to be frightened.
They staggered along the road. A draught of the spring of the Valley of Jehoshaphat refreshed them. Farther on in the fertile plain of Judaea lambs and kids were feeding, and Joseph began to speak of his childhood. His whole being was fresh and joyful. Home! And by evening time Bethlehem, lighted by the setting sun, lay before them on the hill-top.
They stood still for a space and looked at it. Then Joseph went into the town to inquire about the place and the time of the enrolment, and to seek lodging for the night. The young woman sat down before the gate under the fan-shaped leaves of a palm-tree and looked about her. The western land seemed very strange to her and yet sweet, for it was her Joseph's childish home. How noisy it was in Jerusalem, and how peaceful it was here—almost as still and solemn as a Sabbath evening at Nazareth! Beloved Nazareth! How far away, how far away! Sometimes the sound of a shepherd's pipe was heard from the green hills. A youth leaned up against an olive tree and made a wreath of twigs and sang: "Behold, thou art fair, my love. Thine eyes are as doves in thy fragrant locks, thy lips are rosebuds, and thy two breasts are like roes which feed among the lilies. Thou hast ravished my heart, my sister, my spouse." Then he was silent, and the leaves rustled softly in the evening breeze.
Mary looked out for Joseph, but he came not. And the singer continued: "Who art thou that shinest like the day-dawn, fair as the moon, and clear as the sun, divine daughter of Eve?" And Mary still waited under the palm-tree and listened, and she began to feel strange pangs. She drew her cloak more closely round her, and saw that the stars already stood in the sky. But still Joseph came not. And from the hill the singer: "And from the root of Jesse a twig shall spring." And a second voice: "And all nations shall rise up and sing her praises." So did the shepherds sing the songs of their old kings and prophets.
At last Joseph came slowly from the town. The enrolment was to take place to-morrow at nine o'clock; that was all right. But there was difficulty over the lodging for the night. He had spoken with rich relations; they would have been very glad, but unfortunately a wedding feast was going forward, and wanderers in homely garments might easily feel uncomfortable. He quite understood that. Then he went to his poorer relations, who would have been even more glad, but it was deplorable that their house was so small and their hearth so cramped. All the inns were overcrowded with strangers. They did not seem to think much here of people from Galilee because all kinds of heathenish folk lived there—as if any one who was born in Bethlehem could be a heathen! And so he did not know what to do.
Mary leaned her head on her hand and said nothing.
"Your hands and feet are trembling, Mary," said Joseph.
She shook her head; it was nothing.
"Come, my wife, we will go in together," said Joseph. "We are not vagabonds to whom they can refuse assistance."
And then they both went into the town. Mine host of the inn was stern.
"I told you already, old man, that there's no place for the like of you in my house. Take your little daughter somewhere else."
"She's not my daughter, sir, but my true wife, trusted to me by God that I may protect her," returned Joseph, and he lifted up his carpenter's hand.
The door was slammed in their faces.
A fruit-seller, who had witnessed the scene, stretched forth his brown neck and asked for their passport.
"If you show me your papers and three pieces of silver, I'll take you in for the love of God. For we are all wanderers on the earth."
"We've no passport. We've come from Nazareth in Galilee for the enrolment, because I am of the house of David," replied Joseph.
"Of the house of David! Why, you don't seem to know whether you're on your head or your heels," and with a laugh the fruit-seller went his way.
"It is true," thought Joseph, "noble ancestors are useless to a man of no importance." For the future he would let David alone.
Mary now advised him to go outside the town again. Perhaps the very poor or entire strangers would have pity on them. And as they staggered along the stony road to the valley the woman sank down on the grass.
Joseph looked at her searchingly. "Mary, Mary, what is it?"
A shepherd came along, looked at them, and listened to their request for shelter.
"My wife is ill, and no one will take us in," complained Joseph.
"Then you must go to the beasts," said the shepherd cheerfully. "Come with me. I'll gladly share my house with you. The earth is my bed, the sky my roof, and a rocky cave my bedchamber."
And he led them to a hollow in the mossy rocks, and it had a roof woven out of rushes. Inside an ox was chewing the hay it had eaten out of the manger. A brown ass stood near by and licked the ox's big head. There was still some hay left in the manger and in the corner was a bed of dry leaves.
"Since you have nothing better, lie down here and rest as well as you can. I will seek a bed at my neighbour's."
So saying the shepherd went away. It had now grown dark.
The young woman lay down on the bed of leaves and heaved a sigh from her terrified heart. Joseph looked at her—and looked at her. Lightly the angel's wings touched his face.
"Joseph, be not afraid. Lift up your heart and pray. It is the secret of all eternities, and you are chosen to be the foster-father of Him who comes from heaven."
He looked round him, not knowing whence came these thoughts, these voices, this wondrous singing.
"You are tired, Joseph, you must sleep," said Mary. And when he slumbered peacefully she prayed in her heart: "I am a poor handmaiden of the Lord. The will of the Lord be done."
CHAPTER II
It is midnight and, wakeful shepherds see a bright star. A strange star, too; they had never seen its like before. It sparkled so brightly that the shepherds' shadows on the plain were long. And it is said that they saw other stars approach it, and at length surround it. And then the new star threw off white sparks, which flew down earthwards and stopped in mid-air; and there were children with white wings and golden hair. And they sang beautiful words to the honour of God and the good-will of men.
In that selfsame hour a boy brought tidings that a tall, white-robed youth stood in front of the shepherd Ishmael's cave, and that within lay a young woman on the bed of leaves, an infant at her breast. And high up in the air they heard singing.
The story quickly spread through the mountains round Bethlehem. The shepherds who were awake roused those who slept. Everywhere a delicious tremor was felt, a sense of mighty wonder. A poor, strange woman and a naked child! What was the use of singing? Swaddling clothes and wraps and milk were what was needed. One brought the fleece of a slaughtered sheep. Another brought dried figs and grapes and a skin of red wine. Other shepherds brought milk and bread and a fat kid; every one brought something, just as they took tithes to the officer. An old shepherd came with a patched bagpipe, and when the bystanders laughed, Ishmael said: "Do you expect our poor, good Isaac, to bring David's golden harp? He gives what he has, and that's often worth more than golden harps."
When they came down they no longer saw the star or the angels, but they found the cave, and the father and the mother and the child. He lay in the manger on the hay, and the beasts stood round and gazed at him with their big, melancholy, black eyes. The shepherd's pity for the poor people was so great that no one thought he was doing a good work for which people would praise him and God would bless him. No one looked slyly at his neighbour to see who gave more and who less. Their one feeling was pity.
People came from the town; and a wiry shepherd, placing himself before the entrance to the grotto, and using his staff as a spear, said: "Men of Bethlehem, ye cannot enter; the babe sleeps."
Near by stood an old man, who said dreamily: "The town cast him out. I always said there was no salvation yonder. That's to be found with the poor under the open sky. Miracles are happening here, men are pitiful. What does it mean?"
Down below in a cleft of the rock cowered a poor sinner, and burrowed in the earth with his lean fingers as if he would dig himself a grave in its depths. He gazed at the cave where the child was with glassy, staring eyes. A prayer for mercy surged up in his heart like a stream of blood. Those who saw him turned from him shuddering. They took him for Cain, his brother's murderer.
CHAPTER III
A stranger was riding a lazy camel across the lonely Arabian desert. All men are Moors in the dark, but this man was a Moor in the starlight. A newly discovered star brought the man from the banks of the Indus. He consulted all the calendars of the East, but none could tell him about the star. Balthasar, however, was not the man to let the strange, incomprehensible star escape him. Nothing can be concealed in God's bosom from an Eastern scholar, for not even God Himself has a passport for the land of the all-wise. The world is through them alone and for them alone; man must grow of himself towards the light as the lotus grows out of the mud. So thought Balthasar, and felt that life was a failure.
In such wisdom the faith of Orientals lives and moves and has its being. If man honestly aspires to higher things and tortures his flesh, it may go better with him in another life. For he must be born again many times, and must torture his body until it shrivels up, is freed from sin, and is without desires. Then the soul is released and is not born again, for Nirvana, the last goal, is reached. Only bad men continue to live. The nations of India had been demoralised by that doctrine for centuries. But it did not satisfy wise men. Balthasar thought: If a man starves through a few dozen lives, then something good must come out of it. Or is evil good enough to continue, and good evil enough to cease? Balthasar sought better counsel. He sought throughout the universe for a peg on which to hang a new, more beneficial philosophy of life. When, then, he saw the new star in the sky, he never ceased looking at it. And, lo! it too took the road from east to west which all men traversed. What was there yonder in the sunset that all went towards it, on earth as in heaven? Could not one particular star swim against the stream? True, this new heavenly pilgrim took an unusual path; he leaned somewhat to the north of the barbarous folk. So the wise man of the east left the fragrant gardens of India and followed the star. On the road he was joined by two Oriental princes and their suites, who were also seeking they knew not what.
And one night the three wise men saw in the heavens an extraordinary constellation, a group of stars hitherto unknown to any of them.
[Illustration: Diagram of constellation of stars,
using asterisks for the stars, spelling out "INRI".]
They looked at the constellation for a long while, and Balthasar thought it was like writing. They brought all their wisdom to bear on it, but could not explain it, for all it shone so brightly. Did the gods mean to write some message? Who could understand it? An uncanny appearance, which no knowledge or faith could explain! The next night they did not see it, but the guiding star still went before them and yielded to no sun.
One morning, just as day began to dawn, they rode through the streets of Jericho. A man was lying on his face in the road, and the Moor asked him why he lay in the dust.
"I lie in the dust," answered the man of Judah, "because I must practise myself in humility in order not to become too proud. We have become great beyond measure these last days. The King of the Jews is born, the Messiah promised of God."
Then the wise man from India remembered how the Jews had been expecting their Messiah for ages, the royal deliverer from bondage.
"I thought you had King Herod," he said.
"He's not the right king," answered the man in the dust. "Herod is a heathen, and cringes to the Romans."
And now clouds from Lebanon hid the star, and the travellers knew not which way to go. Balthasar, perplexed, went towards the neighbouring city of Jerusalem; there surely he would be able to learn more. He asked at the royal palace about the new-born king. Such a question was news to King Herod. A son born to him? He knew nothing about it. He would see the strangers who asked such a question.
"Sire," said the Moor, "something is in the air. Your people are whispering of the Messiah."
"I'll have them beheaded!" shouted Herod angrily; then, more gently: "I'll have them beheaded if they don't kneel before the Messiah. I myself will bow before him. If only I knew where to find him!"
"I'll go and look round a little," said the complacent Balthasar, "and if I find him I'll come and tell you."
"Do, do, noble stranger," said Herod, "And then, pray take your ease at my palace as long as you like. Are you fond of golden wine?"
"I drink red wine," answered the Moor.
"Or of the fair women of the west?" asked the king.
"I love dark-skinned women," said Balthasar.
"Good! Then come, my friend, and bring me news of the new-born king."
Balthasar rode on farther with his companions, and directly he left the town the star again shone in front of him. It hung high up in the heavens, and after they had followed it for some hours it slowly turned its course eastwards, and stopped above a cave in the rocks. And there the strangers who had ridden out of the east to seek for truth, there they found truth and life, there they found a child, a child who was as tender and beautiful as a rosebud in the moonlight, a little child born to poor people, and other poor folk stood round and offered the very last of their possessions, and were full of joy.
Dusky Balthasar peered inside. Had he ever seen eyes shine as in this shepherd's cave? It seemed to him that he saw a new light and a new life there; but he could not understand it. And in the air he heard a strange song, more a suggestion than words: "You will be blessed! You will live for ever!"
The strangers hearkened. What was that? You will be blessed, and you will live for ever! For us happiness is to be found only in non-existence. At sight of this new-born infant the idea of immortal life came to them for the first time.
They offered the poor mother precious jewels, and their hearts were glad and happy and strange within them. Formerly these princes and wise men had only found pleasure in receiving, now they found it in giving. Formerly Balthasar had been all sufficient unto himself, he had woven his thoughts in entire loneliness, had despised the rest of the world, and had only cared for himself. And suddenly there came to him this joy in the joy of poor men, and this suffering at their suffering! He shivered in his silken cloak, and when he took it off and wrapped it about the child he was warm.
They all offered gifts, precious gold and rich perfumes and healing ointments. But they were ashamed of their gifts beside the royal offerings of the shepherds, who, though it was not much, brought all that they possessed.
Balthasar in his joy wished to hasten to Jerusalem in order to tell Herod: I have not yet found the King of the Jews, but I have found a poor child and whoever looks upon him is happy, he knows not why. Now kings are not so anxious to be happy; they prefer to be powerful. A youth came forward from the back of the cave and said to Balthasar: "Do you know the man to whom you would go? Why, he would strangle the Emperor Tiberius if he could. Be silent, then, about a helpless child who is loved by the people as a prince."
"Oh, child!" said Balthasar, "you have the misfortune to be the people's favourite. Therefore the great hate thee."
"Stranger, go not to Jerusalem. Say nothing of the child."
The strangers did not feel at ease in a land which had an emperor and a king, neither of whom was the right ruler! And so they mounted their camels. They took one more look at the child in the manger and they rode away straight over the stony desert. They directed their course towards the east, towards all the starry constellations, and dreamed of a new revelation which might enable them henceforth to live rich in love and ever glad.
Meanwhile King Herod, sleeping or waking, was not at peace. It was not on account of his wife or his brothers whom he had had murdered from a suspicion that they might kill him to secure the throne. It was something else that caused his anxiety. The new-born king! No one mentioned the news at court, but he heard it from the walls of his palace, from the flowers of his garden, from the pillows of his couch. Who had first spoken the word? Whence did it come? A new-born king! Where? He must forthwith hasten to do him homage, to present him with a gift tied with a silken string. And one day the decree came to Bethlehem that every mother who had an infant son should bring it to the king's palace at Jerusalem for the king desired to see the progeny of his subjects in order to discover what hope there was for the delivery of the land of the Jews from bondage: he wished to present gifts to the boys; yes, he was preparing a great surprise for his people. No little excitement prevailed among the women, who declared that the childless king intended to adopt the handsomest boy as his own son. Since each mother considered her son the handsomest and most attractive, she took the boy that she had and carried him to Jerusalem to the palace of King Herod. And those who refused to go were sought out by the guards.
Unhappy day, O Herod! which bears thy name for all time! The angry king, desiring to kill the anti-king, commanded the wholesale murder of the future protectors of his realm! He destroyed the race which had formerly saved the beautiful city from ruin!
"All hail to our king, long may he live!" shouted the mothers in the courtyard of the palace. Then knaves rushed out from the doors, tore the children from their mothers' arms, and slew them. None can describe, indeed none would attempt to describe, how the unhappy mothers strove frantically with the tyrants until they fell fainting or lifeless upon the bodies of their dear ones.
Tremble, O men, before the terrible decree of Herod, murderer of the innocents, yet despair not. He for whom they spilled their blood by God's decree will requite it in full measure.
CHAPTER IV
He at whom Herod had struck was not among the slaughtered innocents. For Mary had no desire to show her babe to the king.
They kept in hiding with their great treasure. They remained in hiding a long time. The rite of circumcision made the boy a member of the nation which God had named His chosen people. The child's ancestors reached back to Abraham, to whom the promise was made. And if according to Holy Writ I trace his descent from the race of Abraham, branch by branch, it comes at last to Joseph, Mary's husband. And it is here that the glad tidings turn us aside with firm hand from all earthly existence—to the Spirit through which Mary had borne Him, Him whom with holy awe we call Jesus.
Now it came to pass one night that Joseph awoke from his sleep: "Arise, Joseph, wake them, and flee!" The voice called to him clearly and distinctly: twice, thrice.
"Flee? before whom? The shepherds protect us," Joseph ventured to say.
"The king will have the child. Make your preparations quickly and flee."
Joseph looked at his wife and child. Their faces were white in the moonlight. To think that such as they had an enemy on the earth! Flee! But whither? Where could the king not reach them? His arm extended throughout the whole of Judaea. We must not dream of going to Nazareth; he would be sure to seek us there. Shall we go towards the land where the sun rises? There dwell wild men of the desert. Or towards the setting sun? There are the boundless waters, and we have no boat in which to sail thither, where the heathens live who have kinder hearts than the grim princes of Israel.
"Wake them!" called the voice clearly and urgingly. "Take them to the land of the Pharaohs."
"To Egypt, where our forefathers were slaves, and were only delivered with difficulty?" asked Joseph.
"Joseph, delay not. Go to the people whose faith is folly, but whose will is just, yonder where the waters of the Nile make the land fertile and bless it; There you will find peace and livelihood, safety for your wife, and teaching for the child. When the time comes, God will lead you back as once He led Moses and Joshua across the sea."
Joseph knew not whose voice it was; he did not seek to know, and doubted not his soul rested trustfully in the arms of the Lord. He put his hand on the shoulders of his dearest one, and said softly: "Mary, awake, and be not afraid. Gather together our few possessions, put them in a sack, and I will fasten it to the beast Ishmael gave us. Then take the child. We must away."
Mary pushed her long, soft, silky hair from her face. Her husband's sudden decision, the departure in the middle of the night, made her wonder, but she said not a word. She gathered together their scanty possessions, took the sleeping child in her arms, and mounted the ass, who pricked up his ears and thought what a day's work must be before him since it began so terribly early. His former owner had not pampered him; his short legs were firm and willing. They gave one last grateful look at the cave, the stones of which were softer than the hearts of the men of Bethlehem. Joseph took his stick and a leathern strap and walked beside the ass, leading it, the ass which carried his whole world and his heaven, and—the heaven of the whole world.
After going some way, they thought to rest under some palm-trees, not far from Hebron. But the ass would not stop, and they let him have his will. Then soldiers of Herod rode that way; they saw a brown-skinned woman with a child sitting on the sand.
"Is it a boy?" they called to her.
"A girl," answered the woman. "But strangers have just passed by, and I think they had a boy with them, if you can come up with them."
And the horsemen galloped on. Meanwhile the fugitives from Nazareth had reached bad roads, and were tired and wretched. Was not Jacob's favourite son also taken into Egypt just like this child? What will become of this one? They became aware of their pursuers galloping behind over the bare plain. Not a tree, not a shrub which could afford them protection. They took refuge in the cleft of a rock, but Joseph said: "What is the use of hiding? They must have seen us." But as soon as they were well inside the dark hole, down came a spider from the mossy wall, summoned all her brood and her most distant relations in great haste, and they speedily spun a web over the opening, a web that was stronger than the iron railings in Solomon's temple, at the entrance to the Holy of Holies. Hardly was the weaving finished when the knaves came riding up. One said: "They crept into the hole in the rock."
"What!" shouted another, "no one could have crept in there since the time of David the shepherd. Look at the thick cobwebs."
"That's true," they laughed, and straightway rode off.
An old man who seemed to have risen from the grave now stood before the dusky woman who had denied her own son and betrayed the stranger wanderers. Whence he came he did not know himself. He loved the lonely desert, the home of great thoughts. He did not fear the robbers of the desert, for he was stronger than they because he had nothing. Now and again the desire came to him to behold a human face, so that he might read therein whether the souls of men looked upwards or sank downwards. The old man went up to the woman who had denied her own son and betrayed the fugitives. And he said: "Daughter of Uriah! twice have you given your son life: once through pleasure, once through a lie. So his life will be a lie. He will breathe without living, and yet he will not be able to die!"
"Mercy!" she cried.
"He will see Jerusalem fall!"
"Woe is me!"
"He will see Rome burn!"
"Mercy!" she groaned.
"He will see the old world perish. He will see the barbarians of the north prevail. He will wander restless, he will be ill-treated and despised everywhere, he will suffer the boundless despair of universal misery, and he will not be able to die. He will envy men their death anguish and their right to die. He will learn how they suck sweet poison from the loveliest blossoms, and how twelve-year-old boys kill themselves from sheer weariness. He is the son of lies and is banished into the kingdom of lies. He will lament over the torments of old age, and he will not be able to die. He will call those children whom Herod slew blessed, and gnash his teeth at the memory of the woman who saved him through a lie."
"Oh, stop!" shrieked the woman. "When will he be redeemed?"
"Perhaps when the eternal Truth is come."
CHAPTER V
The desert lay under a leaden sky. The yellow undulating sandy plain was like a frozen sea that had no end, and so far as eye could see was only bounded by the dark orb of heaven. Here and there, grey, cleft, cone-shaped rocks and blunt-cornered stone boulders or blocks and flat-topped stones not unlike a table rose out of the sand-ocean. Two such stones were situated close together; one was partly covered by the yellow quicksand, the other stood higher out of the ground. On each of them lay a man stretched at full length. One, strong and sinewy, lay on his face, supporting his black-bearded cheeks with his hands so that his half-raised face could gaze over the barren plain. The other, a smaller-made man, lay on his back, making a pillow of his arms, and gazed at the gloomy sky. Both wore the Bedouin dress and were provided with arms which were fastened into, or suspended from, their clothes. Their woolly heads were protected by kerchiefs. Their complexion was as brown as the bark of the pine-tree, their eyes big and sparkling, their lips full and red. The one had a snub nose; the nose of the other was long and thin. So do these men of the desert appear to my mind's eye.
"Dismas," said the snub-nosed man, "What do you see in the sky?"
"Barabbas," replied the other, "what do you see in the desert?"
"Are you waiting for manna to fall from the sky?" said Barabbas. "Do you know that I'm almost starved to death? I must go down to the caravan route."
"Well, go. I'll to the oasis of Sheba," said Dismas.
"Dismas, I hate you," growled the other.
Dismas said nothing, and steadfastly looked at the sky, which had not for a long while been so softly sunless as to-day.
"Since the day when you refused to help me hold up the caravan of Orientals with my men, I have hated you. They had much frankincense and precious spices and gold. With one blow we should have provided ourselves with enough for many a long year. And you——"
"Wanderers who were seeking the Messiah! I do not attack such as they," said Dismas.
"You, too, are seeking him, you pious highwayman."
"Of course, I seek him."
"Ha! ha! ha!" laughed he of the snub-nose, pressing his pointed chin into his hand. "The Messiah! the fairy-tale of dreaming old men. All weak men dream and believe. Don't you see that when you have to strive and struggle for your little bit of life there isn't time to wait for the Messiah!"
"That's just what I've believed for many a year and day," answered Dismas sadly. "I left my home to follow you; I've plundered men of silks and precious stones here in the desert, and time has flown nevertheless. All the treasure in the world cannot bid it stand still for an hour; comfort only makes the days fly quicker. We should not struggle for life, but hold it fast, for existence is a wondrous thing. Oh, in vain—the days vanish. So I've determined to have nought to say to the hours which pass, but to a time that endures for aye. And only he whom God sends can bring such a time."
Barabbas pressed his face against the stone, and said with comfortable conviction; "We've only the life we have; there's no other."
"If it was as you say," returned Dismas, "we must make this one life great——"
"If there's no life to come," said Barabbas, "we must live this one out. That is nature, and to deny it folly. No, I will enjoy my life. Enjoyment is a duty."
"That is what bad men think," said Dismas.
"There are no bad men," exclaimed Barabbas, "and no good men either. Friend, look at the lamb, he harms no one; he would rather be torn to pieces by the lion than tear the lion to pieces himself. Is he good, therefore? No, only weak. And the lion who kills and eats the lamb? Is he bad, therefore? No, only strong. And so it is his right to destroy the weak. Strength is the only virtue, and the only good deed is to exterminate the weak."
When he made an end of speaking, the other turned his face towards him and said: "What extraordinary words are those? I never heard such talk before. In whose heart were such ideas born?"
"They were not born in the heart," said Barabbas. "The heart is dumb. Dismas, if I must dwell in desert caves and do nothing, I must search out and inquire. I break stones in pieces and search. I pull the corpses of animals and men to pieces and inquire. And I find that things are not as the old writings tell us. There's only one Messiah: the truth. Man is an animal like any of the lower creatures—that is the truth. Ha, ha, ha!"
A shudder went through Dismas's body. How he disliked this man! And yet, on account of his companion's strong will, and through the habit of years, he could not free himself. He had often fled away from him, but had always come back. Now he stood up, lifted his arms to heaven, and exclaimed: "Oh, Lord, in the holy heights, save me!"
"Invoke the stars," said Barabbas, with a scornful laugh. "You'll be right then. They know nothing of you and your God. They're made of common dust. They themselves, and all the beings on them, live in the same base struggle as does our earth and everything on it. An enormous dust-heap, swarming with vermin, that's all."
Dismas sat on his stone with folded hands, pale as a corpse.
"Barabbas, my comrade," he said at last, "it is your bad angel that speaks."
"Why don't you praise him, Dismas? Why don't you shout for joy? My message has redeemed you. You think because you've attacked, slain, and plundered unsuspecting travellers that everlasting hell must be your portion. My strong message does away with hell. Do you see that?"
The other replied: "I heard a prophet in the wilderness cry that a man whom God had damned could be saved by repentance. Your damnation, Barabbas, never! No Almighty God! Everything a dry, swarming dust-heap, and no escape! Frightful, frightful!"
"Do you know, Dismas, your lamentations don't amuse me?" said the other, supporting himself on his hands and knees like a four-footed beast. "I have a more important matter on hand. I'm hungry."
Dismas jumped on his stone, and made ready for flight. "If he's hungry, he's capable of killing and eating me."
Barabbas had assumed a listening attitude, and his eagle eyes stared out into the desert. A red banner was visible between the rocks and stones; it moved and came nearer. It was a woman's red garment. She rode on an ass, and seen closer, carried a child in her arms. A man, tired out, limped beside her, leading the ass.
"Dismas, there's someone," whispered Barabbas, grasping the handle of his weapon. "Come, let's hide behind the stone until they come up."
"You'll fall on those defenceless folk from an ambush?"
"And you're going to help me," said Barabbas coolly.
"We'll take what we need for to-day, no more. I'll only help you so far, mark that."
The little group came nearer. The man and the ass waded deep in the sand, which in some places lay scantily over the rough stones, and in others had drifted into high heaps. The guide was leading the animal quickly, for during this sunless day he had lost his bearings, but said nothing about it, in order not to make his wife anxious. His eyes sought the right road. They ought to reach the oasis of Descheme that day. Now he saw two men standing on blocks of stone which reached up into the sky.
"Praised be God!" said Joseph of Nazareth, "these men will put me right."
Before he had time to frame his question, they quickly descended. One seized the ass's bridle, the other grasped Joseph's arm, and said: "Give us what you have with you."
The pale woman on the ass sent an imploring glance to Heaven. The little child in her lap looked straight out of his clear eyes, and was not afraid.
"If you've bread with you, give it us," said Dismas, who was holding the ass.
"Fool!" shouted Barabbas of the snub-nose, "everything they have belongs to us. Whether we will give anything, that's the question. I will give you the most precious thing—life. Such a beautiful woman without life would be a horror."
Dismas reached at the sack.
"Why are you doing that, brother?" said Barabbas. "We'll lead them to our castle. The simoon may be blowing up. There they'll have shelter for the night."
He tore the bridle from Dismas's hand, and led the ass bearing the mother and child down between the stones to the cave, Joseph saw the men's weapons, and followed gloomily.
When the shades of evening fell, and the desert was shut out and the sky dark, when the blocks of stone and the cone-shaped rocks resembled black monsters, the wanderers were settled in the depths of the cave. The ass lay in front of it sleeping, his big head resting on the sand. Near by lurked the robbers, and ate their plunder.
"Now we'll share our guests in brotherly fashion," said Barabbas. "You shall have the old man and the child."
"They are father, mother, and child," replied Dismas; "they belong together, we will protect them."
"Brother," said Barabbas, who was in high good humour at the ease of the capture, "your dice. We'll throw for them. First, for the ass."
"Right, Barabbas."
He threw the eight-cornered stone with the black marks, and it fell on his outspread cloak. The ass was his.
"Now for the father and son!"
"Right, Barabbas."
The dice fell. Barabbas rejoiced. Dismas was winner.
"A third time for the woman!"
"Right, Barabbas."
He threw the dice; they fell on his cloak.
"What is that? The dice have no marks! Dismas, stop this joke! You've changed the dice."
When he took them up in his hand the black marks were there again all right. They drew a second and a third time. As before the dice had no marks when they fell.
"What does it mean, Dismas? The dice are blind."
"I think it's you who are blind, Barabbas," laughed Dismas. "Here, drink these drops, and then lie down and sleep."
The strong man soon rolled on to the sand beside the ass, and snored loudly.
Then Dismas crawled into the cave and woke the strangers, in order to get them away from the libertine. For he dared not venture a trial of strength with Barabbas. He had some trouble with Joseph, but at last they were beneath the starry sky, Mary and the child on the ass, Joseph leading it. Dismas walked in front in order to show them the way. They went slowly through the darkness; no one spoke a word. Dismas was sunk in thought. Past days, when he had rested like this child in his mother's arms and his father had led them over the Arabian desert, rose before him. Many a holy saying of the prophets had echoed through his robber life and would not be silenced.
After they had waded through the sand and clambered over the rocks for hours, a golden band of light shone in the east. The bushes and trees of the oasis of Descheme stood out against it.
Here Dismas left the wanderers to their safe road, in order to return to the cave. When he turned back with good wishes for the rest of their journey, he was met by a look from the child's shining eyes. The beaming glance terrified him with the terror of wonderment. Never before had child or man looked at him with look so grateful, so glowing, so loving as this boy, his pretty curly head turned towards him, his hands stretched out in form of a cross, as if he wished to embrace him. Dismas's limbs trembled as if a flash of lightning had fallen at his side, and yet it was only a child's eyes. Holding his head with both hands, he fled, without knowing why he fled, for he would rather have fallen on his knees before the wondrous child. But something like a judgment seemed to thrust him forth, back into the horror of the desert.
For three days our fugitives rested in the oasis. Mary liked to sit on the grass under an olive-tree near the spring, and let the boy stretch his little soft arms to pluck a flower. He reached it, but did not break it from its stem; he only stroked it with his soft fingers.
And when the child fell asleep in the flowers, his mother kneeled before him and looked at him. And she gazed and gazed at him, and could not turn her face from him. Then she bent down and took one little plump, soft hand and shut it into hers so that only the finger-tips could be seen, and she lifted them to her mouth and kissed them, and could not cease kissing the white, childish hands, the tears running down her cheeks the while. And with her large dark eyes she looked out into the empty air—afraid of pursuers.
Joseph walked up and down near at hand between the trees and shrubs, but always kept mother and child in view. He was gathering dates for their further travels.
And now new faces rise before me as they wander farther into the barren desert, swept by the simoon, parched by the rays of the sun. Mary is full of peace, and wraps the child in her cloak so that he rests like a pearl in its shell. He nestles against her warm breast and sucks his fill. Whenever Joseph begins to be afraid, he feels the angel's wing fanning his face. And then he is full of courage and leads his loved ones past hissing snakes and roaring lions.
After many days they reached a fertile valley lying between rocky hills; a clear stream flowed through it. They rested under a hedge of thorns, and looked at a terribly wild mountain that rose high above the rest. It was bare and rocky from top to bottom, and deep clefts divided it in its whole length, so that the mountain seemed to be formed of upright blocks of stone, which looked like the fingers of two giant hands placed one on the other. A hermit was feeding his goat in the meadow, and Joseph went up to him and asked the name of the remarkable mountain.
"You are travelling through the district, and you don't know the mountain?" said the hermit. "If you are a Jew, incline your face to the earth and kiss it. It is the spot where eternity floated down from Sinai."
"That—the Mountain of the Law?"
"See how it stretches forth its fingers swearing. As true as God lives!"
Joseph bowed down and kissed the ground. Mary looked at the stony mountain with a thrill of awe. Little Jesus slept in the shade of the thorn-bush. The threatening rock and the lovely child. There dark menaces, and here——?
Joseph tried to picture to himself the scene when Moses, on the summit of the mountain, received the tables of stone from Jehovah. Then a cloud slowly covered the mountain top as if to veil the secret. Joseph was ashamed of his presumption and kept silence. Before he departed he cut a bough from the thorn-bush and pulled off the leaves and twigs, so that it formed a pilgrim's staff for the rest of the journey. They were always meeting new dangers. And one day a hunter of the desert came running after them. They were not frightened of his tiger skin, but of what he had to tell them. If they had come from Judaea with their boy, they had better hasten into the land of Egypt, for Herod's men were on their track. So they had no rest until at last they came to the land of the Pharaohs. But one day they found themselves not on its frontier, but on the seashore. They were dumb with astonishment. There lay the sea, its waves dashing against the black, jagged cliffs, and beyond them was a smooth, level plain as far as the eye could see.
Once in the past fugitives had stood on the other side of the sea, their enemies behind them. And Joseph lifted up his arms and called upon the God of his forefathers to divide the waters of the sea once again and make a passage for them. Belief in the God of ancestors is strong. He appealed also to his ancestors themselves and entreated them to come to his assistance, for are we not one with them and strong in the same faith? But the sea lay in calm repose and divided not. Six horsemen came riding over the sand, shouting for joy at the thought of their reward, when they saw those they had so long pursued standing by the water, unable to proceed farther. Quickly they approached the shore, and were about to let fly the stones from their slings against the couple who had the little King of the Jews with them, when they saw the fugitives descend the wave-dashed cliffs and go out upon the surface of the sea. The man led the ass on which sat the woman with the child, and just as they passed over the sand of the desert, with even steps, they passed over the waters of the sea.
Their pursuers rode after them in blind rage, urged their horses into the sea, and were the first to reach—not Egypt, but the other world.