During his conversation with his stepmother what had lived embedded in him like a seal on wax had begun its leave-taking. This had made him feel bewildered and abandoned, and unable to think coherent thoughts. His movements too followed only a predetermined design, towards the man who would take his destiny further.
At daybreak, a windstorm announced itself in the anger of a red sky. Soon the air had picked up the sand around him to sting his eyes. He stumbled and fell. Two men dressed in white garments with hoods over their heads and scarves over their faces came from the road ahead. They were leading an overburdened mule.
The taller man helped him up, and said loudly over the din, ‘What’s this? Jesus of Nazareth, is that you? Where are you going alone, my son?’
Jesus looked up at him, trying to understand words that no longer made sense. When his voice came from his mouth it sounded hollow, as if it came not from him but from the wind, ‘I am going to where people like you do not wish to direct your vision, where human pain can find the consolation that comes from what you have forgotten!’
‘Jesus of Nazareth!’ the other man shouted. ‘Do you not remember us from Engaddi?’ The man took the scarf from his face momentarily. ‘Do you see who I am?’
The shorter man did likewise, and said, ‘I once sat with you in the grotto…do you remember?’
Jesus did not see them clearly. He saw however, what they represented.
‘Come away from this scorching wind!’ the taller one said, ‘The Lord is a storm come to sweep away the world.’
‘You are lost lambs!’ Jesus coughed, walking away.
‘We are all lost, Jesus!’ the shorter one cried, ‘It does not matter how many psalms we sing, or how many temples we build, God continues to deny us our Messiah!’
Jesus stood in the tempest of elements and looked at them. ‘And when I become your shepherd,’ he said, ‘when you realise who I am, you will run away again and become lost, just as you ran away from me long ago.’
The men put scarves to their mouths to ward off the dust and debris.
The shorter man said, ‘You must come with us…you are not well. Not far from here there is a house of the order where you can rest.’
‘Leave me be!’ he said to them. ‘I won’t go to your secluded house! You wear white and you pretend to be pure, but you are not pious men in your hearts, because in you burns a fire that has not been kindled by God but by your own ambitions. You bear the mark of the tempter! It is the tempter that has made you arrogant, so that your wool glitters with his fire!’ He put his fingers to his face. ‘But the hair of this wool you try to pull over me pricks my eyes.’
The taller man shouted, ‘Rest assured, Jesus, it is the dust that pricks your eyes! You know we have shown the tempter the door, he has no part in what we do…you should’ve stayed with us, now look at what the world has made of you! Let us help you!’
‘Oh what arrogance and pride! But you are only greater than others because you stand on their backs!’
They did not know how to respond to this and he left them standing in the desert. Behind him the mule made its loud complaints, shaking its head, as the breath of Jehova carried the world away to blot out the sun.
The storm abated, and days passed without beginning and without end.
It was night.
Fatigued and cold Jesus wandered towards a light in the distance. When he drew near to it, he saw a man sitting by a fire preparing to eat a meal. When the man looked up, he stood in a hurry, afraid, and called out to Jesus with a mustered boldness,
‘Who are you? I am alone but I have a knife, and I shall not be afraid to use it!’
Jesus showed him his empty hands. ‘I thirst,’ he said, knowing he must pause, for his legs would soon give out from under him.
The man came to Jesus and helped him to a place beside the fire.
‘Forgive me…I am constantly afraid of being robbed by thieves or killed by bandits! I see you are no thief and no bandit…come, be my guest, eat at my table. I have made soup,’ he said, showing Jesus the watery stew which he was pouring into a bowl. ‘There’s crow in it and wild mushrooms,’ he pointed out those meagre morsels with an approving eye, ‘and some other wild things I have no name for. Once, you know, I would have spat at the thought of such a meal, but now I shake with anticipation. Look at my hands how they shake. Because of the crow, I have made it boil a good long while, to kill the poison. That is what it has come to, still, thanks be to God, I have something!’ He sighed, ‘Israel mourns, Israel hungers, its people cry out in pain for deliverance, but first I must cry out for something to put into my belly! After that, a man can turn his mind to the hunger of the soul. In the meantime we are all animals…’ He looked at Jesus. ‘You need something in your belly too, I’ll wager. You look like you have eaten nothing in days. Come, it’s good you’ll see, I have let it boil long to kill the poison…’