Fifth Gospel(67)

He felt a sting, a sudden gnawing in his bowels!

The blue archangel Satan gave a mocking laugh.

‘Now you’ve done it! Feel the tearing of hunger in Jesus? That is why men must live by the rule of the daily bread, and walk side by side with me…the archangel of death!’ The whisper came closer, ‘Listen to me, I am like you, I am stubborn and full of longing, I am eternal, and so I can wait. When the time comes, I will return for what is mine!

And he was gone.

Christ Jesus let out a gasp and fell to the earthen floor of the cave. Above him he sensed warmth; the love-radiant thoughts of the stars were making a way into his heart to comfort him.

And so it was, the orphan from heaven closed his eyes then, and slept his first earthly sleep.

‡

‘So that’s how it was!’ I sat back so astounded that I could hardly take a breath, my fingers black with ink and my back aching. ‘Yeshua and Jesus had been two persons in one, but when Yeshua lifted up to make way for Christ, the Son of God then entered into the Son of Man and the two natures, human and divine were united!’

Illuminated and reconciled were all the arguments of same and similar, image and likeness, persons and natures! So many disagreements, misunderstandings and half-truths! So much blood had been shed when it had all been so simple!

But my elation was followed by a sudden fear, a fear that there might not be any mysteries left to tell. For what mystery could be greater than a God permeating a man? When I told Lea, she smiled quietly.

‘Oh…pairé! Now it really begins; now we see how a man becomes a God!

I hit the side of my head, for I realised that she was right!





32


THE FIRST CALL




As I continue this path to that field below Montségur, with the sound of priestly chants in my ears and the bee guiding my descent, I sing to remember how life in the fortress had, by that time, grown more and more unbearable.

Storms and sleet and bitter cold came to keep the women and children indoors. In the keep it was crowded, and the stench of animals and bodies was high. To this was added the boredom of days spent waiting, and the hunger, which drove even the most affable to arguments, and sometimes to blows. So terrible were the aimless days that whenever there was fighting with the French it seemed almost a respite.

The seigneurs of the fortress had hoped to wear out the patience of the army, expecting that when bad weather came, the French would pack up and go home to sit before their fires. But as winter approached the army grew in number and in boldness, while we began to dwindle and to grow weak.

One night, the noise of shouts and screams reached the room at the end of the spiral stairs and when I came to the court below, I found the fortress in chaos.

Basque mercenaries had taken a narrow ledge on the eastern face of the pog, some way below the fortress. We all knew what this meant: it gave our enemies a foothold from which to assault us. I told the people that we were not yet desperate, for that ledge was perilous and difficult to reach from below, and that even if a siege engine could be built in such a place the French would have to guard it day and night and they would suffer bitterly from the cold winds and the snow. On the other hand, I told them, we still controlled the barbican and our secret path had not yet been discovered. This was a blessing, for it meant we could continue to communicate with the world below and have soldiery and fresh supplies brought to us. Secretly, however, I knew it was only a matter of time before the French found our secret path, a path that would lead them to the Barbican and to the sealing of our fate.

When I saw Lea again my heart was filled with a mixture of joy for being with her and apprehension for what would come. She said nothing about our troubles and I tried to put the gloom and foreboding from my mind. I asked her what she would tell next.

‘Well, pairé,’ Lea said, ‘after the baptism those who saw it with their own eyes could not agree, for each had his own understanding. They were like men standing around a tree; each man only sees one side and believes he can know the entire tree from it.’

I pondered this. ‘But Lea, if those who saw it with their own eyes couldn’t agree, what hope is there that we, centuries later and with only meagre documents and word of mouth to guide us, will find agreement?’

‘But pairé, it was important that there be very little evidence of Jesus Christ.’

‘Why do you say that?’

‘It was important that his life not be a historical fact, but a mystical one, for how else could faith be born?’

‘But look at the suffering it has caused, Lea!’ I said, aghast.

‘The angels are not concerned for the suffering of men, pairé, they are only concerned with learning.’